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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to
+1901, by Lucy Maud Montgomery
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901
+
+Author: Lucy Maud Montgomery
+
+Release Date: March 19, 2008 [EBook #24873]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MONTGOMERY SHORT STORIES ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Alicia Williams, Jeannie Howse and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901
+
+
+Lucy Maud Montgomery was born at Clifton (now New London), Prince
+Edward Island, Canada, on November 30, 1874. She achieved
+international fame in her lifetime, putting Prince Edward Island and
+Canada on the world literary map. Best known for her "Anne of Green
+Gables" books, she was also a prolific writer of short stories and
+poetry. She published some 500 short stories and poems and twenty
+novels before her death in 1942. The Project Gutenberg collection of
+her short stories was gathered from numerous sources and is presented
+in chronological publishing order:
+
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1902 to 1903
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1904
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1905 to 1906
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1907 to 1908
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1909 to 1922
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+Short Stories 1896 to 1901
+
+    A Case of Trespass                                       1897
+    A Christmas Inspiration                                  1901
+    A Christmas Mistake                                      1899
+    A Strayed Allegiance                                     1897
+    An Invitation Given on Impulse                           1900
+    Detected by the Camera                                   1897
+    In Spite of Myself                                       1896
+    Kismet                                                   1899
+    Lillian's Business Venture                               1900
+    Miriam's Lover                                           1901
+    Miss Calista's Peppermint Bottle                         1900
+    The Jest that Failed                                     1901
+    The Pennington's Girl                                    1900
+    The Red Room                                             1898
+    The Setness of Theodosia                                 1901
+    The Story of An Invitation                               1901
+    The Touch of Fate                                        1899
+    The Waking of Helen                                      1901
+    The Way of Winning Anne                                  1899
+    Young Si                                                 1901
+
+
+
+
+A Case of Trespass
+
+
+It was the forenoon of a hazy, breathless day, and Dan Phillips was
+trouting up one of the back creeks of the Carleton pond. It was
+somewhat cooler up the creek than out on the main body of water, for
+the tall birches and willows, crowding down to the brim, threw cool,
+green shadows across it and shut out the scorching glare, while a
+stray breeze now and then rippled down the wooded slopes, rustling the
+beech leaves with an airy, pleasant sound.
+
+Out in the pond the glassy water creamed and shimmered in the hot sun,
+unrippled by the faintest breath of air. Across the soft, pearly tints
+of the horizon blurred the smoke of the big factory chimneys that were
+owned by Mr. Walters, to whom the pond and adjacent property also
+belonged.
+
+Mr. Walters was a comparative stranger in Carleton, having but
+recently purchased the factories from the heirs of the previous owner;
+but he had been in charge long enough to establish a reputation for
+sternness and inflexibility in all his business dealings.
+
+One or two of his employees, who had been discharged by him on what
+they deemed insufficient grounds, helped to deepen the impression that
+he was an unjust and arbitrary man, merciless to all offenders, and
+intolerant of the slightest infringement of his cast-iron rules.
+
+Dan Phillips had been on the pond ever since sunrise. The trout had
+risen well in the early morning, but as the day wore on, growing
+hotter and hotter, they refused to bite, and for half an hour Dan had
+not caught one.
+
+He had a goodly string of them already, however, and he surveyed them
+with satisfaction as he rowed his leaky little skiff to the shore of
+the creek.
+
+"Pretty good catch," he soliloquized. "Best I've had this summer, so
+far. That big spotted one must weigh near a pound. He's a beauty.
+They're a good price over at the hotels now, too. I'll go home and
+get my dinner and go straight over with them. That'll leave me time
+for another try at them about sunset. Whew, how hot it is! I must take
+Ella May home a bunch of them blue flags. They're real handsome!"
+
+He tied his skiff under the crowding alders, gathered a big bunch of
+the purple flag lilies with their silky petals, and started homeward,
+whistling cheerily as he stepped briskly along the fern-carpeted wood
+path that wound up the hill under the beeches and firs.
+
+He was a freckled, sunburned lad of thirteen years. His neighbours all
+said that Danny was "as smart as a steel trap," and immediately added
+that they wondered where he got his smartness from--certainly not from
+his father!
+
+The elder Phillips had been denominated "shiftless and slack-twisted"
+by all who ever had any dealings with him in his unlucky, aimless
+life--one of those improvident, easygoing souls who sit contentedly
+down to breakfast with a very faint idea where their dinner is to come
+from.
+
+When he had died, no one had missed him, unless it were his patient,
+sad-eyed wife, who bravely faced her hard lot, and toiled
+unremittingly to keep a home for her two children--Dan and a girl two
+years younger, who was a helpless cripple, suffering from some form of
+spinal disease.
+
+Dan, who was old and steady for his years, had gone manfully to work
+to assist his mother. Though he had been disappointed in all his
+efforts to obtain steady employment, he was active and obliging, and
+earned many a small amount by odd jobs around the village, and by
+helping the Carleton farmers in planting and harvest.
+
+For the last two years, however, his most profitable source of summer
+income had been the trout pond. The former owner had allowed anyone
+who wished to fish in his pond, and Dan made a regular business of it,
+selling his trout at the big hotels over at Mosquito Lake. This, in
+spite of its unattractive name, was a popular summer resort, and Dan
+always found a ready market for his catch.
+
+When Mr. Walters purchased the property it somehow never occurred to
+Dan that the new owner might not be so complaisant as his predecessor
+in the matter of the best trouting pond in the country.
+
+To be sure, Dan often wondered why it was the pond was so deserted
+this summer. He could not recall having seen a single person on it
+save himself. Still, it did not cross his mind that there could be any
+particular reason for this.
+
+He always fished up in the cool, dim creeks, which long experience had
+taught him were best for trout, and came and went by a convenient wood
+path; but he had no thought of concealment in so doing. He would not
+have cared had all Carleton seen him.
+
+He had done very well with his fish so far, and prices for trout at
+the Lake went up every day. Dan was an enterprising boy, and a general
+favourite with the hotel owners. They knew that he could always be
+depended on.
+
+Mrs. Phillips met him at the door when he reached home.
+
+"See, Mother," said Dan exultantly, as he held up his fish. "Just look
+at that fellow, will you? A pound if he's an ounce! I ought to get a
+good price for these, I can tell you. Let me have my dinner now, and
+I'll go right over to the Lake with them."
+
+"It's a long walk for you, Danny," replied his mother pityingly, "and
+it's too hot to go so far. I'm afraid you'll get sun-struck or
+something. You'd better wait till the cool of the evening. You're
+looking real pale and thin this while back."
+
+"Oh, I'm all right, Mother," assured Dan cheerfully. "I don't mind the
+heat a bit. A fellow must put up with some inconveniences. Wait till I
+bring home the money for these fish. And I mean to have another catch
+tonight. It's you that's looking tired. I wish you didn't have to work
+so hard, Mother. If I could only get a good place you could take it
+easier. Sam French says that Mr. Walters wants a boy up there at the
+factory, but I know I wouldn't do. I ain't big enough. Perhaps
+something will turn up soon though. When our ship comes in, Mother,
+we'll have our good times."
+
+He picked up his flags and went into the little room where his sister
+lay.
+
+"See what I've brought you, Ella May!" he said, as he thrust the cool,
+moist clusters into her thin, eager hands. "Did you ever see such
+beauties?"
+
+"Oh, Dan, how lovely they are! Thank you ever so much! If you are
+going over to the Lake this afternoon, will you please call at Mrs.
+Henny's and get those nutmeg geranium slips she promised me? Just look
+how nice my others are growing. The pink one is going to bloom."
+
+"I'll bring you all the geranium slips at the Lake, if you like. When
+I get rich, Ella May, I'll build you a big conservatory, and I'll get
+every flower in the world in it for you. You shall just live and sleep
+among posies. Is dinner ready, Mother? Trouting's hungry work, I tell
+you. What paper is this?"
+
+He picked up a folded newspaper from the table.
+
+"Oh, that's only an old Lake _Advertiser_," answered Mrs. Phillips, as
+she placed the potatoes on the table and wiped her moist, hot face
+with the corner of her gingham apron. "Letty Mills brought it in
+around a parcel this morning. It's four weeks old, but I kept it to
+read if I ever get time. It's so seldom we see a paper of any kind
+nowadays. But I haven't looked at it yet. Why, Danny, what on earth is
+the matter?"
+
+For Dan, who had opened the paper and glanced over the first page,
+suddenly gave a choked exclamation and turned pale, staring stupidly
+at the sheet before him.
+
+"See, Mother," he gasped, as she came up in alarm and looked over his
+shoulder. This is what they read:
+
+    Notice
+
+    Anyone found fishing on my pond at Carleton after date will be
+    prosecuted according to law, without respect of persons.
+
+    June First.                                H.C. Walters.
+
+"Oh, Danny, what does it mean?"
+
+Dan went and carefully closed the door of Ella May's room before he
+replied. His face was pale and his voice shaky.
+
+"Mean? Well, Mother, it just means that I've been stealing Mr.
+Walters's trout all summer--_stealing_ them. That's what it means."
+
+"Oh, Danny! But you didn't know."
+
+"No, but I ought to have remembered that he was the new owner, and
+have asked him. I never thought. Mother, what does 'prosecuted
+according to law' mean?"
+
+"I don't know, I'm sure, Danny. But if this is so, there's only one
+thing to be done. You must go straight to Mr. Walters and tell him all
+about it."
+
+"Mother, I don't dare to. He is a dreadfully hard man. Sam French's
+father says--"
+
+"I wouldn't believe a word Sam French's father says about Mr.
+Walters!" said Mrs. Phillips firmly. "He's got a spite against him
+because he was dismissed. Besides, Danny, it's the only right thing to
+do. You know that. We're poor, but we have never done anything
+underhand yet."
+
+"Yes, Mother, I know," said Dan, gulping his fear bravely down. "I'll
+go, of course, right after dinner. I was only scared at first. I'll
+tell you what I'll do. I'll clean these trout nicely and take them to
+Mr. Walters, and tell him that, if he'll only give me time, I'll pay
+him back every cent of money I got for all I sold this summer. Then
+maybe he'll let me off, seeing as I didn't know about the notice."
+
+"I'll go with you, Danny."
+
+"No, I'll go alone, Mother. You needn't go with me," said Dan
+heroically. To himself he said that his mother had troubles enough. He
+would never subject her to the added ordeal of an interview with the
+stern factory owner. He would beard the lion in his den himself, if it
+had to be done.
+
+"Don't tell Ella May anything about it. It would worry her. And don't
+cry, Mother, I guess it'll be all right. Let me have my dinner now and
+I'll go straight off."
+
+Dan ate his dinner rapidly; then he carefully cleaned his trout, put
+them in a long basket, with rhubarb leaves over them, and started with
+an assumed cheerfulness very far from his real feelings.
+
+He had barely passed the gate when another boy came shuffling along--a
+tall, raw-boned lad, with an insinuating smile and shifty, cunning
+eyes. The newcomer nodded familiarly to Dan.
+
+"Hello, sonny. Going over to the Lake with your catch, are you? You'll
+fry up before you get there. There'll be nothing left of you but a
+crisp."
+
+"No, I'm not going to the Lake. I'm going up to the factory to see Mr.
+Walters."
+
+Sam French gave a long whistle of surprise.
+
+"Why, Dan, what's taking you there? You surely ain't thinking of
+trying for that place, are you? Walters wouldn't look at you. Why, he
+wouldn't take _me_! You haven't the ghost of a chance."
+
+"No, I'm not going for that. Sam, did you know that Mr. Walters had a
+notice in the Lake _Advertiser_ that nobody could fish in his pond
+this summer?"
+
+"Course I did--the old skinflint! He's too mean to live, that's what.
+He never goes near the pond himself. Regular dog in the manger, he is.
+Dad says--"
+
+"Sam, why didn't you tell me about that notice?"
+
+"Gracious, didn't you know? I s'posed everybody did, and here I've
+been taking you for the cutest chap this side of sunset--fishing away
+up in that creek where no one could see you, and cutting home through
+the woods on the sly. You don't mean to tell me you never saw that
+notice?"
+
+"No, I didn't. Do you think I'd have gone near the pond if I had? I
+never saw it till today, and I'm going straight to Mr. Walters now to
+tell him about it."
+
+Sam French stopped short in the dusty road and stared at Dan in
+undisguised amazement.
+
+"Dan Phillips," he ejaculated, "have you plum gone out of your mind?
+Boy alive, you needn't be afraid that I'd peach on you. I'm too blamed
+glad to see anyone get the better of that old Walters, smart as he
+thinks himself. Gee! To dream of going to him and telling him you've
+been fishing in his pond! Why, he'll put you in jail. You don't know
+what sort of a man he is. Dad says--"
+
+"Never mind what your dad says, Sam. My mind's made up."
+
+"Dan, you chump, listen to me. That notice says 'prosecuted according
+to law.' Why, Danny, he'll put you in prison, or fine you, or
+something dreadful."
+
+"I can't help it if he does," said Danny stoutly. "You get out of
+here, Sam French, and don't be trying to scare me. I mean to be
+honest, and how can I be if I don't own up to Mr. Walters that I've
+been stealing his trout all summer?"
+
+"Stealing, fiddlesticks! Dan, I used to think you were a chap with
+some sense, but I see I was mistaken. You ain't done no harm. Walters
+will never miss them trout. If you're so dreadful squeamish that you
+won't fish no more, why, you needn't. But just let the matter drop and
+hold your tongue about it. That's _my_ advice."
+
+"Well, it isn't my mother's, then. I mean to go by _hers_. You needn't
+argue no more, Sam. I'm going."
+
+"Go, then!" said Sam, stopping short in disgust. "You're a big fool,
+Dan, and serve you right if Walters lands you off to jail; but I don't
+wish you no ill. If I can do anything for your family after you're
+gone, I will, and I'll try and give your remains Christian burial--if
+there are any remains. So long, Danny! Give my love to old Walters!"
+
+Dan was not greatly encouraged by this interview. He shrank more than
+ever from the thought of facing the stern factory owner. His courage
+had almost evaporated when he entered the office at the factory and
+asked shakily for Mr. Walters.
+
+"He's in his office there," replied the clerk, "but he's very busy.
+Better leave your message with me."
+
+"I must see Mr. Walters himself, please," said Dan firmly, but with
+inward trepidation.
+
+The clerk swung himself impatiently from his stool and ushered Dan
+into Mr. Walters's private office.
+
+"Boy to see you, sir," he said briefly, as he closed the ground-glass
+door behind him.
+
+Dan, dizzy and trembling, stood in the dreaded presence. Mr. Walters
+was writing at a table covered with a businesslike litter of papers.
+He laid down his pen and looked up with a frown as the clerk vanished.
+He was a stern-looking man with deep-set grey eyes and a square,
+clean-shaven chin. There was not an ounce of superfluous flesh on his
+frame, and his voice and manner were those of the decided, resolute,
+masterful man of business.
+
+He pointed to a capacious leather chair and said concisely, "What is
+your business with me, boy?"
+
+Dan had carefully thought out a statement of facts beforehand, but
+every word had vanished from his memory. He had only a confused,
+desperate consciousness that he had a theft to confess and that it
+must be done as soon as possible. He did not sit down.
+
+"Please, Mr. Walters," he began desperately, "I came to tell you--your
+notice--I never saw it before--and I've been fishing on your pond all
+summer--but I didn't know--honest--I've brought you all I caught
+today--and I'll pay back for them all--some time."
+
+An amused, puzzled expression crossed Mr. Walters's noncommittal face.
+He pushed the leather chair forward.
+
+"Sit down, my boy," he said kindly. "I don't quite understand this
+somewhat mixed-up statement of yours. You've been fishing on my pond,
+you say. Didn't you see my notice in the _Advertiser_?"
+
+Dan sat down more composedly. The revelation was over and he was still
+alive.
+
+"No, sir. We hardly ever see an _Advertiser_, and nobody told me. I'd
+always been used to fishing there, and I never thought but what it was
+all right to keep on. I know I ought to have remembered and asked you,
+but truly, sir, I didn't mean to steal your fish. I used to sell them
+over at the hotels. We saw the notice today, Mother and me, and I came
+right up. I've brought you the trout I caught this morning, and--if
+only you won't prosecute me, sir, I'll pay back every cent I got for
+the others--every cent, sir--if you'll give me time."
+
+Mr. Walters passed his hand across his mouth to conceal something like
+a smile.
+
+"Your name is Dan Phillips, isn't it?" he said irrelevantly, "and you
+live with your mother, the Widow Phillips, down there at Carleton
+Corners, I understand."
+
+"Yes, sir," said Dan, wondering how Mr. Walters knew so much about
+him, and if these were the preliminaries of prosecution.
+
+Mr. Walters took up his pen and drew a blank sheet towards him.
+
+"Well, Dan, I put that notice in because I found that many people who
+used to fish on my pond, irrespective of leave or licence, were
+accustomed to lunch or camp on my property, and did not a little
+damage. I don't care for trouting myself; I've no time for it.
+However, I hardly think you'll do much damage. You can keep on
+fishing there. I'll give you a written permission, so that if any of
+my men see you they won't interfere with you. As for these trout here,
+I'll buy them from you at Mosquito Lake prices, and will say no more
+about the matter. How will that do?"
+
+"Thank you, sir," stammered Dan. He could hardly believe his ears. He
+took the slip of paper Mr. Walters handed to him and rose to his feet.
+
+"Wait a minute, Dan. How was it you came to tell me this? You might
+have stopped your depredations, and I should not have been any the
+wiser."
+
+"That wouldn't have been honest, sir," said Dan, looking squarely at
+him.
+
+There was a brief silence. Mr. Walters thrummed meditatively on the
+table. Dan waited wonderingly.
+
+Finally the factory owner said abruptly, "There's a vacant place for a
+boy down here. I want it filled as soon as possible. Will you take
+it?"
+
+"Mr. Walters! _Me!_" Dan thought the world must be turning upside
+down.
+
+"Yes, you. You are rather young, but the duties are not hard or
+difficult to learn. I think you'll do. I was resolved not to fill that
+place until I could find a perfectly honest and trustworthy boy for
+it. I believe I have found him. I discharged the last boy because he
+lied to me about some trifling offence for which I would have forgiven
+him if he had told the truth. I can bear with incompetency, but
+falsehood and deceit I cannot and will not tolerate," he said, so
+sternly that Dan's face paled. "I am convinced that you are incapable
+of either. Will you take the place, Dan?"
+
+"I will if you think I can fill it, sir. I will do my best."
+
+"Yes, I believe you will. Perhaps I know more about you than you
+think. Businessmen must keep their eyes open. We'll regard this matter
+as settled then. Come up tomorrow at eight o'clock. And one word more,
+Dan. You have perhaps heard that I am an unjust and hard master. I am
+not the former, and you will never have occasion to find me the latter
+if you are always as truthful and straightforward as you have been
+today. You might easily have deceived me in this matter. That you did
+not do so is the best and only recommendation I require. Take those
+trout up to my house and leave them. That will do. Good afternoon."
+
+Dan somehow got his dazed self through the glass door and out of the
+building. The whole interview had been such a surprise to him that he
+was hardly sure whether or not he had dreamed it all.
+
+"I feel as if I were some person else," he said to himself, as he
+started down the hot white road. "But Mother was right. I'll stick to
+her motto. I wonder what Sam will say to this."
+
+
+
+
+A Christmas Inspiration
+
+
+"Well, I really think Santa Claus has been very good to us all," said
+Jean Lawrence, pulling the pins out of her heavy coil of fair hair and
+letting it ripple over her shoulders.
+
+"So do I," said Nellie Preston as well as she could with a mouthful of
+chocolates. "Those blessed home folks of mine seem to have divined by
+instinct the very things I most wanted."
+
+It was the dusk of Christmas Eve and they were all in Jean Lawrence's
+room at No. 16 Chestnut Terrace. No. 16 was a boarding-house, and
+boarding-houses are not proverbially cheerful places in which to spend
+Christmas, but Jean's room, at least, was a pleasant spot, and all the
+girls had brought their Christmas presents in to show each other.
+Christmas came on Sunday that year and the Saturday evening mail at
+Chestnut Terrace had been an exciting one.
+
+Jean had lighted the pink-globed lamp on her table and the mellow
+light fell over merry faces as the girls chatted about their gifts. On
+the table was a big white box heaped with roses that betokened a bit
+of Christmas extravagance on somebody's part. Jean's brother had sent
+them to her from Montreal, and all the girls were enjoying them in
+common.
+
+No. 16 Chestnut Terrace was overrun with girls generally. But just now
+only five were left; all the others had gone home for Christmas, but
+these five could not go and were bent on making the best of it.
+
+Belle and Olive Reynolds, who were sitting on the bed--Jean could
+never keep them off it--were High School girls; they were said to be
+always laughing, and even the fact that they could not go home for
+Christmas because a young brother had measles did not dampen their
+spirits.
+
+Beth Hamilton, who was hovering over the roses, and Nellie Preston,
+who was eating candy, were art students, and their homes were too far
+away to visit. As for Jean Lawrence, she was an orphan, and had no
+home of her own. She worked on the staff of one of the big city
+newspapers and the other girls were a little in awe of her
+cleverness, but her nature was a "chummy" one and her room was a
+favourite rendezvous. Everybody liked frank, open-handed and hearted
+Jean.
+
+"It was so funny to see the postman when he came this evening," said
+Olive. "He just bulged with parcels. They were sticking out in every
+direction."
+
+"We all got our share of them," said Jean with a sigh of content.
+
+"Even the cook got six--I counted."
+
+"Miss Allen didn't get a thing--not even a letter," said Beth quickly.
+Beth had a trick of seeing things that other girls didn't.
+
+"I forgot Miss Allen. No, I don't believe she did," answered Jean
+thoughtfully as she twisted up her pretty hair. "How dismal it must be
+to be so forlorn as that on Christmas Eve of all times. Ugh! I'm glad
+I have friends."
+
+"I saw Miss Allen watching us as we opened our parcels and letters,"
+Beth went on. "I happened to look up once, and such an expression as
+was on her face, girls! It was pathetic and sad and envious all at
+once. It really made me feel bad--for five minutes," she concluded
+honestly.
+
+"Hasn't Miss Allen any friends at all?" asked Beth.
+
+"No, I don't think she has," answered Jean. "She has lived here for
+fourteen years, so Mrs. Pickrell says. Think of that, girls! Fourteen
+years at Chestnut Terrace! Is it any wonder that she is thin and
+dried-up and snappy?"
+
+"Nobody ever comes to see her and she never goes anywhere," said Beth.
+"Dear me! She must feel lonely now when everybody else is being
+remembered by their friends. I can't forget her face tonight; it
+actually haunts me. Girls, how would you feel if you hadn't anyone
+belonging to you, and if nobody thought about you at Christmas?"
+
+"Ow!" said Olive, as if the mere idea made her shiver.
+
+A little silence followed. To tell the truth, none of them liked Miss
+Allen. They knew that she did not like them either, but considered
+them frivolous and pert, and complained when they made a racket.
+
+"The skeleton at the feast," Jean called her, and certainly the
+presence of the pale, silent, discontented-looking woman at the No. 16
+table did not tend to heighten its festivity.
+
+Presently Jean said with a dramatic flourish, "Girls, I have an
+inspiration--a Christmas inspiration!"
+
+"What is it?" cried four voices.
+
+"Just this. Let us give Miss Allen a Christmas surprise. She has not
+received a single present and I'm sure she feels lonely. Just think
+how we would feel if we were in her place."
+
+"That is true," said Olive thoughtfully. "Do you know, girls, this
+evening I went to her room with a message from Mrs. Pickrell, and I do
+believe she had been crying. Her room looked dreadfully bare and
+cheerless, too. I think she is very poor. What are we to do, Jean?"
+
+"Let us each give her something nice. We can put the things just
+outside of her door so that she will see them whenever she opens it.
+I'll give her some of Fred's roses too, and I'll write a Christmassy
+letter in my very best style to go with them," said Jean, warming up
+to her ideas as she talked.
+
+The other girls caught her spirit and entered into the plan with
+enthusiasm.
+
+"Splendid!" cried Beth. "Jean, it is an inspiration, sure enough.
+Haven't we been horribly selfish--thinking of nothing but our own
+gifts and fun and pleasure? I really feel ashamed."
+
+"Let us do the thing up the very best way we can," said Nellie,
+forgetting even her beloved chocolates in her eagerness. "The shops
+are open yet. Let us go up town and invest."
+
+Five minutes later five capped and jacketed figures were scurrying up
+the street in the frosty, starlit December dusk. Miss Allen in her
+cold little room heard their gay voices and sighed. She was crying by
+herself in the dark. It was Christmas for everybody but her, she
+thought drearily.
+
+In an hour the girls came back with their purchases.
+
+"Now, let's hold a council of war," said Jean jubilantly. "I hadn't
+the faintest idea what Miss Allen would like so I just guessed wildly.
+I got her a lace handkerchief and a big bottle of perfume and a
+painted photograph frame--and I'll stick my own photo in it for fun.
+That was really all I could afford. Christmas purchases have left my
+purse dreadfully lean."
+
+"I got her a glove-box and a pin tray," said Belle, "and Olive got her
+a calendar and Whittier's poems. And besides we are going to give her
+half of that big plummy fruit cake Mother sent us from home. I'm sure
+she hasn't tasted anything so delicious for years, for fruit cakes
+don't grow on Chestnut Terrace and she never goes anywhere else for a
+meal."
+
+Beth had bought a pretty cup and saucer and said she meant to give one
+of her pretty water-colours too. Nellie, true to her reputation, had
+invested in a big box of chocolate creams, a gorgeously striped candy
+cane, a bag of oranges, and a brilliant lampshade of rose-coloured
+crepe paper to top off with.
+
+"It makes such a lot of show for the money," she explained. "I am
+bankrupt, like Jean."
+
+"Well, we've got a lot of pretty things," said Jean in a tone of
+satisfaction. "Now we must do them up nicely. Will you wrap them in
+tissue paper, girls, and tie them with baby ribbon--here's a box of
+it--while I write that letter?"
+
+While the others chatted over their parcels Jean wrote her letter, and
+Jean could write delightful letters. She had a decided talent in that
+respect, and her correspondents all declared her letters to be things
+of beauty and joy forever. She put her best into Miss Allen's
+Christmas letter. Since then she has written many bright and clever
+things, but I do not believe she ever in her life wrote anything more
+genuinely original and delightful than that letter. Besides, it
+breathed the very spirit of Christmas, and all the girls declared that
+it was splendid.
+
+"You must all sign it now," said Jean, "and I'll put it in one of
+those big envelopes; and, Nellie, won't you write her name on it in
+fancy letters?"
+
+Which Nellie proceeded to do, and furthermore embellished the envelope
+by a border of chubby cherubs, dancing hand in hand around it and a
+sketch of No. 16 Chestnut Terrace in the corner in lieu of a stamp.
+Not content with this she hunted out a huge sheet of drawing paper and
+drew upon it an original pen-and-ink design after her own heart. A
+dudish cat--Miss Allen was fond of the No. 16 cat if she could be said
+to be fond of anything--was portrayed seated on a rocker arrayed in
+smoking jacket and cap with a cigar waved airily aloft in one paw
+while the other held out a placard bearing the legend "Merry
+Christmas." A second cat in full street costume bowed politely, hat in
+paw, and waved a banner inscribed with "Happy New Year," while faintly
+suggested kittens gambolled around the border. The girls laughed until
+they cried over it and voted it to be the best thing Nellie had yet
+done in original work.
+
+All this had taken time and it was past eleven o'clock. Miss Allen had
+cried herself to sleep long ago and everybody else in Chestnut Terrace
+was abed when five figures cautiously crept down the hall, headed by
+Jean with a dim lamp. Outside of Miss Allen's door the procession
+halted and the girls silently arranged their gifts on the floor.
+
+"That's done," whispered Jean in a tone of satisfaction as they
+tiptoed back. "And now let us go to bed or Mrs. Pickrell, bless her
+heart, will be down on us for burning so much midnight oil. Oil has
+gone up, you know, girls."
+
+It was in the early morning that Miss Allen opened her door. But early
+as it was, another door down the hall was half open too and five rosy
+faces were peering cautiously out. The girls had been up for an hour
+for fear they would miss the sight and were all in Nellie's room,
+which commanded a view of Miss Allen's door.
+
+That lady's face was a study. Amazement, incredulity, wonder, chased
+each other over it, succeeded by a glow of pleasure. On the floor
+before her was a snug little pyramid of parcels topped by Jean's
+letter. On a chair behind it was a bowl of delicious hot-house roses
+and Nellie's placard.
+
+Miss Allen looked down the hall but saw nothing, for Jean had slammed
+the door just in time. Half an hour later when they were going down to
+breakfast Miss Allen came along the hall with outstretched hands to
+meet them. She had been crying again, but I think her tears were happy
+ones; and she was smiling now. A cluster of Jean's roses were pinned
+on her breast.
+
+"Oh, girls, girls," she said, with a little tremble in her voice, "I
+can never thank you enough. It was so kind and sweet of you. You don't
+know how much good you have done me."
+
+Breakfast was an unusually cheerful affair at No. 16 that morning.
+There was no skeleton at the feast and everybody was beaming. Miss
+Allen laughed and talked like a girl herself.
+
+"Oh, how surprised I was!" she said. "The roses were like a bit of
+summer, and those cats of Nellie's were so funny and delightful. And
+your letter too, Jean! I cried and laughed over it. I shall read it
+every day for a year."
+
+After breakfast everyone went to Christmas service. The girls went
+uptown to the church they attended. The city was very beautiful in the
+morning sunshine. There had been a white frost in the night and the
+tree-lined avenues and public squares seemed like glimpses of
+fairyland.
+
+"How lovely the world is," said Jean.
+
+"This is really the very happiest Christmas morning I have ever
+known," declared Nellie. "I never felt so really Christmassy in my
+inmost soul before."
+
+"I suppose," said Beth thoughtfully, "that it is because we have
+discovered for ourselves the old truth that it is more blessed to give
+than to receive. I've always known it, in a way, but I never realized
+it before."
+
+"Blessing on Jean's Christmas inspiration," said Nellie. "But, girls,
+let us try to make it an all-the-year-round inspiration, I say. We can
+bring a little of our own sunshine into Miss Allen's life as long as
+we live with her."
+
+"Amen to that!" said Jean heartily. "Oh, listen, girls--the Christmas
+chimes!"
+
+And over all the beautiful city was wafted the grand old message of
+peace on earth and good will to all the world.
+
+
+
+
+A Christmas Mistake
+
+
+"Tomorrow is Christmas," announced Teddy Grant exultantly, as he sat
+on the floor struggling manfully with a refractory bootlace that was
+knotted and tagless and stubbornly refused to go into the eyelets of
+Teddy's patched boots. "Ain't I glad, though. Hurrah!"
+
+His mother was washing the breakfast dishes in a dreary, listless sort
+of way. She looked tired and broken-spirited. Ted's enthusiasm seemed
+to grate on her, for she answered sharply:
+
+"Christmas, indeed. I can't see that it is anything for us to rejoice
+over. Other people may be glad enough, but what with winter coming on
+I'd sooner it was spring than Christmas. Mary Alice, do lift that
+child out of the ashes and put its shoes and stockings on. Everything
+seems to be at sixes and sevens here this morning."
+
+Keith, the oldest boy, was coiled up on the sofa calmly working out
+some algebra problems, quite oblivious to the noise around him. But he
+looked up from his slate, with his pencil suspended above an obstinate
+equation, to declaim with a flourish:
+
+    "Christmas comes but once a year,
+    And then Mother wishes it wasn't here."
+
+"I don't, then," said Gordon, son number two, who was preparing his
+own noon lunch of bread and molasses at the table, and making an
+atrocious mess of crumbs and sugary syrup over everything. "I know one
+thing to be thankful for, and that is that there'll be no school.
+We'll have a whole week of holidays."
+
+Gordon was noted for his aversion to school and his affection for
+holidays.
+
+"And we're going to have turkey for dinner," declared Teddy, getting
+up off the floor and rushing to secure his share of bread and
+molasses, "and cranb'ry sauce and--and--pound cake! Ain't we, Ma?"
+
+"No, you are not," said Mrs. Grant desperately, dropping the dishcloth
+and snatching the baby on her knee to wipe the crust of cinders and
+molasses from the chubby pink-and-white face. "You may as well know it
+now, children, I've kept it from you so far in hopes that something
+would turn up, but nothing has. We can't have any Christmas dinner
+tomorrow--we can't afford it. I've pinched and saved every way I could
+for the last month, hoping that I'd be able to get a turkey for you
+anyhow, but you'll have to do without it. There's that doctor's bill
+to pay and a dozen other bills coming in--and people say they can't
+wait. I suppose they can't, but it's kind of hard, I must say."
+
+The little Grants stood with open mouths and horrified eyes. No turkey
+for Christmas! Was the world coming to an end? Wouldn't the government
+interfere if anyone ventured to dispense with a Christmas celebration?
+
+The gluttonous Teddy stuffed his fists into his eyes and lifted up his
+voice. Keith, who understood better than the others the look on his
+mother's face, took his blubbering young brother by the collar and
+marched him into the porch. The twins, seeing the summary proceeding,
+swallowed the outcries they had intended to make, although they
+couldn't keep a few big tears from running down their fat cheeks.
+
+Mrs. Grant looked pityingly at the disappointed faces about her.
+
+"Don't cry, children, you make me feel worse. We are not the only ones
+who will have to do without a Christmas turkey. We ought to be very
+thankful that we have anything to eat at all. I hate to disappoint
+you, but it can't be helped."
+
+"Never mind, Mother," said Keith, comfortingly, relaxing his hold
+upon the porch door, whereupon it suddenly flew open and precipitated
+Teddy, who had been tugging at the handle, heels over head backwards.
+"We know you've done your best. It's been a hard year for you. Just
+wait, though. I'll soon be grown up, and then you and these greedy
+youngsters shall feast on turkey every day of the year. Hello, Teddy,
+have you got on your feet again? Mind, sir, no more blubbering!"
+
+"When I'm a man," announced Teddy with dignity, "I'd just like to see
+you put me in the porch. And I mean to have turkey all the time and I
+won't give you any, either."
+
+"All right, you greedy small boy. Only take yourself off to school
+now, and let us hear no more squeaks out of you. Tramp, all of you,
+and give Mother a chance to get her work done."
+
+Mrs. Grant got up and fell to work at her dishes with a brighter face.
+
+"Well, we mustn't give in; perhaps things will be better after a
+while. I'll make a famous bread pudding, and you can boil some
+molasses taffy and ask those little Smithsons next door to help you
+pull it. They won't whine for turkey, I'll be bound. I don't suppose
+they ever tasted such a thing in all their lives. If I could afford
+it, I'd have had them all in to dinner with us. That sermon Mr. Evans
+preached last Sunday kind of stirred me up. He said we ought always
+to try and share our Christmas joy with some poor souls who had never
+learned the meaning of the word. I can't do as much as I'd like to. It
+was different when your father was alive."
+
+The noisy group grew silent as they always did when their father was
+spoken of. He had died the year before, and since his death the little
+family had had a hard time. Keith, to hide his feelings, began to
+hector the rest.
+
+"Mary Alice, do hurry up. Here, you twin nuisances, get off to school.
+If you don't you'll be late and then the master will give you a
+whipping."
+
+"He won't," answered the irrepressible Teddy. "He never whips us, he
+doesn't. He stands us on the floor sometimes, though," he added,
+remembering the many times his own chubby legs had been seen to better
+advantage on the school platform.
+
+"That man," said Mrs. Grant, alluding to the teacher, "makes me
+nervous. He is the most abstracted creature I ever saw in my life. It
+is a wonder to me he doesn't walk straight into the river some day.
+You'll meet him meandering along the street, gazing into vacancy, and
+he'll never see you nor hear a word you say half the time."
+
+"Yesterday," said Gordon, chuckling over the remembrance, "he came in
+with a big piece of paper he'd picked up on the entry floor in one
+hand and his hat in the other--and he stuffed his hat into the
+coal-scuttle and hung up the paper on a nail as grave as you please.
+Never knew the difference till Ned Slocum went and told him. He's
+always doing things like that."
+
+Keith had collected his books and now marched his brothers and sisters
+off to school. Left alone with the baby, Mrs. Grant betook herself to
+her work with a heavy heart. But a second interruption broke the
+progress of her dish-washing.
+
+"I declare," she said, with a surprised glance through the window, "if
+there isn't that absent-minded schoolteacher coming through the yard!
+What can he want? Dear me, I do hope Teddy hasn't been cutting capers
+in school again."
+
+For the teacher's last call had been in October and had been
+occasioned by the fact that the irrepressible Teddy would persist in
+going to school with his pockets filled with live crickets and in
+driving them harnessed to strings up and down the aisle when the
+teacher's back was turned. All mild methods of punishment having
+failed, the teacher had called to talk it over with Mrs. Grant, with
+the happy result that Teddy's behaviour had improved--in the matter of
+crickets at least.
+
+But it was about time for another outbreak. Teddy had been unnaturally
+good for too long a time. Poor Mrs. Grant feared that it was the calm
+before a storm, and it was with nervous haste that she went to the
+door and greeted the young teacher.
+
+He was a slight, pale, boyish-looking fellow, with an abstracted,
+musing look in his large dark eyes. Mrs. Grant noticed with amusement
+that he wore a white straw hat in spite of the season. His eyes were
+directed to her face with his usual unseeing gaze.
+
+"Just as though he was looking through me at something a thousand
+miles away," said Mrs. Grant afterwards. "I believe he was, too. His
+body was right there on the step before me, but where his soul was is
+more than you or I or anybody can tell."
+
+"Good morning," he said absently. "I have just called on my way to
+school with a message from Miss Millar. She wants you all to come up
+and have Christmas dinner with her tomorrow."
+
+"For the land's sake!" said Mrs. Grant blankly. "I don't understand."
+To herself she thought, "I wish I dared take him and shake him to find
+if he's walking in his sleep or not."
+
+"You and all the children--every one," went on the teacher dreamily,
+as if he were reciting a lesson learned beforehand. "She told me to
+tell you to be sure and come. Shall I say that you will?"
+
+"Oh, yes, that is--I suppose--I don't know," said Mrs. Grant
+incoherently. "I never expected--yes, you may tell her we'll come,"
+she concluded abruptly.
+
+"Thank you," said the abstracted messenger, gravely lifting his hat
+and looking squarely through Mrs. Grant into unknown regions. When he
+had gone Mrs. Grant went in and sat down, laughing in a sort of
+hysterical way.
+
+"I wonder if it is all right. Could Cornelia really have told him? She
+must, I suppose, but it is enough to take one's breath."
+
+Mrs. Grant and Cornelia Millar were cousins, and had once been the
+closest of friends, but that was years ago, before some spiteful
+reports and ill-natured gossip had come between them, making only a
+little rift at first that soon widened into a chasm of coldness and
+alienation. Therefore this invitation surprised Mrs. Grant greatly.
+
+Miss Cornelia was a maiden lady of certain years, with a comfortable
+bank account and a handsome, old-fashioned house on the hill behind
+the village. She always boarded the schoolteachers and looked after
+them maternally; she was an active church worker and a tower of
+strength to struggling ministers and their families.
+
+"If Cornelia has seen fit at last to hold out the hand of
+reconciliation I'm glad enough to take it. Dear knows, I've wanted to
+make up often enough, but I didn't think she ever would. We've both
+of us got too much pride and stubbornness. It's the Turner blood in us
+that does it. The Turners were all so set. But I mean to do my part
+now she has done hers."
+
+And Mrs. Grant made a final attack on the dishes with a beaming face.
+
+When the little Grants came home and heard the news, Teddy stood on
+his head to express his delight, the twins kissed each other, and Mary
+Alice and Gordon danced around the kitchen.
+
+Keith thought himself too big to betray any joy over a Christmas
+dinner, but he whistled while doing the chores until the bare welkin
+in the yard rang, and Teddy, in spite of unheard of misdemeanours, was
+not collared off into the porch once.
+
+When the young teacher got home from school that evening he found the
+yellow house full of all sorts of delectable odours. Miss Cornelia
+herself was concocting mince pies after the famous family recipe,
+while her ancient and faithful handmaiden, Hannah, was straining into
+moulds the cranberry jelly. The open pantry door revealed a tempting
+array of Christmas delicacies.
+
+"Did you call and invite the Smithsons up to dinner as I told you?"
+asked Miss Cornelia anxiously.
+
+"Yes," was the dreamy response as he glided through the kitchen and
+vanished into the hall.
+
+Miss Cornelia crimped the edges of her pies delicately with a relieved
+air. "I made certain he'd forget it," she said. "You just have to
+watch him as if he were a mere child. Didn't I catch him yesterday
+starting off to school in his carpet slippers? And in spite of me he
+got away today in that ridiculous summer hat. You'd better set that
+jelly in the out-pantry to cool, Hannah; it looks good. We'll give
+those poor little Smithsons a feast for once in their lives if they
+never get another."
+
+At this juncture the hall door flew open and Mr. Palmer appeared on
+the threshold. He seemed considerably agitated and for once his eyes
+had lost their look of space-searching.
+
+"Miss Millar, I am afraid I did make a mistake this morning--it has
+just dawned on me. I am almost sure that I called at Mrs. Grant's and
+invited her and her family instead of the Smithsons. And she said they
+would come."
+
+Miss Cornelia's face was a study.
+
+"Mr. Palmer," she said, flourishing her crimping fork tragically, "do
+you mean to say you went and invited Linda Grant here tomorrow? Linda
+Grant, of all women in this world!"
+
+"I did," said the teacher with penitent wretchedness. "It was very
+careless of me--I am very sorry. What can I do? I'll go down and tell
+them I made a mistake if you like."
+
+"You can't do that," groaned Miss Cornelia, sitting down and wrinkling
+up her forehead in dire perplexity. "It would never do in the world.
+For pity's sake, let me think for a minute."
+
+Miss Cornelia did think--to good purpose evidently, for her forehead
+smoothed out as her meditations proceeded and her face brightened.
+Then she got up briskly. "Well, you've done it and no mistake. I don't
+know that I'm sorry, either. Anyhow, we'll leave it as it is. But you
+must go straight down now and invite the Smithsons too. And for pity's
+sake, don't make any more mistakes."
+
+When he had gone Miss Cornelia opened her heart to Hannah. "I never
+could have done it myself--never; the Turner is too strong in me. But
+I'm glad it is done. I've been wanting for years to make up with
+Linda. And now the chance has come, thanks to that blessed blundering
+boy, I mean to make the most of it. Mind, Hannah, you never whisper a
+word about its being a mistake. Linda must never know. Poor Linda!
+She's had a hard time. Hannah, we must make some more pies, and I must
+go straight down to the store and get some more Santa Claus stuff;
+I've only got enough to go around the Smithsons."
+
+When Mrs. Grant and her family arrived at the yellow house next
+morning Miss Cornelia herself ran out bareheaded to meet them. The two
+women shook hands a little stiffly and then a rill of long-repressed
+affection trickled out from some secret spring in Miss Cornelia's
+heart and she kissed her new-found old friend tenderly. Linda returned
+the kiss warmly, and both felt that the old-time friendship was theirs
+again.
+
+The little Smithsons all came and they and the little Grants sat down
+on the long bright dining room to a dinner that made history in their
+small lives, and was eaten over again in happy dreams for months.
+
+How those children did eat! And how beaming Miss Cornelia and
+grim-faced, soft-hearted Hannah and even the absent-minded teacher
+himself enjoyed watching them!
+
+After dinner Miss Cornelia distributed among the delighted little
+souls the presents she had bought for them, and then turned them loose
+in the big shining kitchen to have a taffy pull--and they had it to
+their hearts' content! And as for the shocking, taffyfied state into
+which they got their own rosy faces and that once immaculate
+domain--well, as Miss Cornelia and Hannah never said one word about
+it, neither will I.
+
+The four women enjoyed the afternoon in their own way, and the
+schoolteacher buried himself in algebra to his own great satisfaction.
+
+When her guests went home in the starlit December dusk, Miss Cornelia
+walked part of the way with them and had a long confidential talk with
+Mrs. Grant. When she returned it was to find Hannah groaning in and
+over the kitchen and the schoolteacher dreamily trying to clean some
+molasses off his boots with the kitchen hairbrush. Long-suffering Miss
+Cornelia rescued her property and despatched Mr. Palmer into the
+woodshed to find the shoe-brush. Then she sat down and laughed.
+
+"Hannah, what will become of that boy yet? There's no counting on what
+he'll do next. I don't know how he'll ever get through the world, I'm
+sure, but I'll look after him while he's here at least. I owe him a
+huge debt of gratitude for this Christmas blunder. What an awful mess
+this place is in! But, Hannah, did you ever in the world see anything
+so delightful as that little Tommy Smithson stuffing himself with plum
+cake, not to mention Teddy Grant? It did me good just to see them."
+
+
+
+
+A Strayed Allegiance
+
+
+"Will you go to the Cove with me this afternoon?"
+
+It was Marian Lesley who asked the question.
+
+Esterbrook Elliott unpinned with a masterful touch the delicate
+cluster of Noisette rosebuds she wore at her throat and transferred
+them to his buttonhole as he answered courteously: "Certainly. My
+time, as you know, is entirely at your disposal."
+
+They were standing in the garden under the creamy bloom of drooping
+acacia trees. One long plume of blossoms touched lightly the soft,
+golden-brown coils of the girl's hair and cast a wavering shadow over
+the beautiful, flower-like face beneath it.
+
+Esterbrook Elliott, standing before her, thought proudly that he had
+never seen a woman who might compare with her. In every detail she
+satisfied his critical, fastidious taste. There was not a discordant
+touch about her.
+
+Esterbrook Elliott had always loved Marian Lesley--or thought he had.
+They had grown up together from childhood. He was an only son and she
+an only daughter. It had always been an understood thing between the
+two families that the boy and girl should marry. But Marian's father
+had decreed that no positive pledge should pass between them until
+Marian was twenty-one.
+
+Esterbrook accepted his mapped-out destiny and selected bride with the
+conviction that he was an exceptionally lucky fellow. Out of all the
+women in the world Marian was the very one whom he would have chosen
+as mistress of his fine, old home. She had been his boyhood's ideal.
+He believed that he loved her sincerely, but he was not too much in
+love to be blind to the worldly advantages of his marriage with his
+cousin.
+
+His father had died two years previously, leaving him wealthy and
+independent. Marian had lost her mother in childhood; her father died
+when she was eighteen. Since then she had lived alone with her aunt.
+Her life was quiet and lonely. Esterbrook's companionship was all that
+brightened it, but it was enough. Marian lavished on him all the rich,
+womanly love of her heart. On her twenty-first birthday they were
+formally betrothed. They were to be married in the following autumn.
+
+No shadow had drifted across the heaven of her happiness. She believed
+herself secure in her lover's unfaltering devotion. True, at times she
+thought his manner lacked a lover's passionate ardour. He was always
+attentive and courteous. She had only to utter a wish to find that it
+had been anticipated; he spent every spare minute at her side.
+
+Yet sometimes she half wished he would betray more lover-like
+impatience and intensity. Were all lovers as calm and undemonstrative?
+
+She reproached herself for this incipient disloyalty as often as it
+vexingly intruded its unwelcome presence across her inner
+consciousness. Surely Esterbrook was fond and devoted enough to
+satisfy the most exacting demands of affection. Marian herself was
+somewhat undemonstrative and reserved. Passing acquaintances called
+her cold and proud. Only the privileged few knew the rich depths of
+womanly tenderness in her nature.
+
+Esterbrook thought that he fully appreciated her. As he had walked
+homeward the night of their betrothal, he had reviewed with
+unconscious criticism his mental catalogue of Marian's graces and good
+qualities, admitting, with supreme satisfaction, that there was not
+one thing about her that he could wish changed.
+
+This afternoon, under the acacias, they had been planning about their
+wedding. There was no one to consult but themselves.
+
+They were to be married early in September and then go abroad.
+Esterbrook mapped out the details of their bridal tour with careful
+thoughtfulness. They would visit all the old-world places that Marian
+wished to see. Afterwards they would come back home. He discussed
+certain changes he wished to make in the old Elliott mansion to fit it
+for a young and beautiful mistress.
+
+He did most of the planning. Marian was content to listen in happy
+silence. Afterwards she had proposed this walk to the Cove.
+
+"What particular object of charity have you found at the Cove now?"
+asked Esterbrook, with lazy interest, as they walked along.
+
+"Mrs. Barrett's little Bessie is very ill with fever," answered
+Marian. Then, catching his anxious look, she hastened to add, "It is
+nothing infectious--some kind of a slow, sapping variety. There is no
+danger, Esterbrook."
+
+"I was not afraid for myself," he replied quietly. "My alarm was for
+you. You are too precious to me, Marian, for me to permit you to risk
+health and life, if it were dangerous. What a Lady Bountiful you are
+to those people at the Cove. When we are married you must take me in
+hand and teach me your creed of charity. I'm afraid I've lived a
+rather selfish life. You will change all that, dear. You will make a
+good man of me."
+
+"You are that now, Esterbrook," she said softly. "If you were not, I
+could not love you."
+
+"It is a negative sort of goodness, I fear. I have never been tried or
+tempted severely. Perhaps I should fail under the test."
+
+"I am sure you would not," answered Marian proudly.
+
+Esterbrook laughed; her faith in him was pleasant. He had no thought
+but that he would prove worthy of it.
+
+The Cove, so-called, was a little fishing hamlet situated on the low,
+sandy shore of a small bay. The houses, clustered in one spot, seemed
+like nothing so much as larger shells washed up by the sea, so grey
+and bleached were they from long exposure to sea winds and spray.
+
+Dozens of ragged children were playing about them, mingled with
+several disreputable yellow curs that yapped noisily at the strangers.
+
+Down on the sandy strip of beach below the houses groups of men were
+lounging about. The mackerel, season had not yet set in; the spring
+herring netting was past. It was holiday time among the sea folks.
+They were enjoying it to the full, a happy, ragged colony, careless of
+what the morrows might bring forth.
+
+Out beyond, the boats were at anchor, floating as gracefully on the
+twinkling water as sea birds, their tall masts bowing landward on the
+swell. A lazy, dreamful calm had fallen over the distant seas; the
+horizon blues were pale and dim; faint purple hazes blurred the
+outlines of far-off headlands and cliffs; the yellow sands sparkled in
+the sunshine as if powdered with jewels.
+
+A murmurous babble of life buzzed about the hamlet, pierced through by
+the shrill undertones of the wrangling children, most of whom had
+paused in their play to scan the visitors with covert curiosity.
+
+Marian led the way to a house apart from the others at the very edge
+of the shelving rock. The dooryard was scrupulously clean and
+unlittered; the little footpath through it was neatly bordered by
+white clam shells; several thrifty geraniums in bloom looked out from
+the muslin-curtained windows.
+
+A weary-faced woman came forward to meet them.
+
+"Bessie's much the same, Miss Lesley," she said, in answer to Marian's
+inquiry. "The doctor you sent was here today and did all he could for
+her. He seemed quite hopeful. She don't complain or nothing--just lies
+there and moans. Sometimes she gets restless. It's very kind of you to
+come so often, Miss Lesley. Here, Magdalen, will you put this basket
+the lady's brought up there on the shelf?"
+
+A girl, who had been sitting unnoticed with her back to the visitors,
+at the head of the child's cot in one corner of the room, stood up and
+slowly turned around. Marian and Esterbrook Elliott both started with
+involuntary surprise. Esterbrook caught his breath like a man suddenly
+awakened from sleep. In the name of all that was wonderful, who or
+what could this girl be, so little in harmony with her surroundings?
+
+Standing in the crepuscular light of the corner, her marvellous beauty
+shone out with the vivid richness of some rare painting. She was tall,
+and the magnificent proportions of her figure were enhanced rather
+than marred by the severely plain dress of dark print that she wore.
+The heavy masses of her hair, a shining auburn dashed with golden
+foam, were coiled in a rich, glossy knot at the back of the
+classically modelled head and rippled back from a low brow whose waxen
+fairness even the breezes of the ocean had spared.
+
+The girl's face was a full, perfect oval, with features of faultless
+regularity, and the large, full eyes were of tawny hazel, darkened
+into inscrutable gloom in the dimness of the corner.
+
+Not even Marian Lesley's face was more delicately tinted, but not a
+trace of colour appeared in the smooth, marble-like cheeks; yet the
+waxen pallor bore no trace of disease or weakness, and the large,
+curving mouth was of an intense crimson.
+
+She stood quite motionless. There was no trace of embarrassment or
+self-consciousness in her pose. When Mrs. Barrett said, "This is my
+niece, Magdalen Crawford," she merely inclined her head in grave,
+silent acknowledgement. As she moved forward to take Marian's basket,
+she seemed oddly out of place in the low, crowded room. Her presence
+seemed to throw a strange restraint over the group.
+
+Marian rose and went over to the cot, laying her slender hand on the
+hot forehead of the little sufferer. The child opened its brown eyes
+questioningly.
+
+"How are you today, Bessie?"
+
+"Mad'len--I want Mad'len," moaned the little plaintive voice.
+
+Magdalen came over and stood beside Marian Lesley.
+
+"She wants me," she said in a low, thrilling voice; free from all
+harsh accent or intonation. "I am the only one she seems to know
+always. Yes, darling, Mad'len is here--right beside you. She will not
+leave you."
+
+She knelt by the little cot and passed her arm under the child's neck,
+drawing the curly head close to her throat with a tender, soothing
+motion.
+
+Esterbrook Elliott watched the two women intently--the one standing by
+the cot, arrayed in simple yet costly apparel, with her beautiful,
+high-bred face, and the other, kneeling on the bare, sanded floor in
+her print dress, with her splendid head bent low over the child and
+the long fringe of burnished lashes sweeping the cold pallor of the
+oval cheek.
+
+From the moment that Magdalen Crawford's haunting eyes had looked
+straight into his for one fleeting second, an unnamable thrill of pain
+and pleasure stirred his heart, a thrill so strong and sudden and
+passionate that his face paled with emotion; the room seemed to swim
+before his eyes in a mist out of which gleamed that wonderful face
+with its mesmeric, darkly radiant eyes, burning their way into deeps
+and abysses of his soul hitherto unknown to him.
+
+When the mist cleared away and his head grew steadier, he wondered at
+himself. Yet he trembled in every limb and the only clear idea that
+struggled out of his confused thoughts was an overmastering desire to
+take that cold face between his hands and kiss it until its
+passionless marble glowed into warm and throbbing life.
+
+"Who is that girl?" he said abruptly, when they had left the cottage.
+"She is the most beautiful woman I have ever seen--present company
+always excepted," he concluded, with a depreciatory laugh.
+
+The delicate bloom on Marian's face deepened slightly.
+
+"You had much better to have omitted that last sentence," she said
+quietly, "it was so palpably an afterthought. Yes, she is wonderfully
+lovely--a strange beauty, I fancied. There seemed something odd and
+uncanny about it to me. She must be Mrs. Barrett's niece. I remember
+that when I was down here about a month ago Mrs. Barrett told me she
+expected a niece of hers to live with her--for a time at least. Her
+parents were both dead, the father having died recently. Mrs. Barrett
+seemed troubled about her. She said that the girl had been well
+brought up and used to better things than the Cove could give her, and
+she feared that she would be very discontented and unhappy. I had
+forgotten all about it until I saw the girl today. She certainly seems
+to be a very superior person; she will find the Cove very lonely, I am
+sure. It is not probable she will stay there long. I must see what I
+can do for her, but her manner seemed rather repellent, don't you
+think?"
+
+"Hardly," responded Esterbrook curtly. "She seemed surprisingly
+dignified and self-possessed, I fancied, for a girl in her position. A
+princess could not have looked and bowed more royally. There was not a
+shadow of embarrassment in her manner, in spite of the incongruity of
+her surroundings. You had much better leave her alone, Marian. In all
+probability she would resent any condescension on your part. What
+wonderful, deep, lovely eyes she has."
+
+Again the sensitive colour flushed Marian's cheek as his voice lapsed
+unconsciously into a dreamy, retrospective tone, and a slight
+restraint came over her manner, which did not depart. Esterbrook went
+away at sunset. Marian asked him to remain for the evening, but he
+pleaded some excuse.
+
+"I shall come tomorrow afternoon," he said, as he stooped to drop a
+careless good-bye kiss on her face.
+
+Marian watched him wistfully as he rode away, with an unaccountable
+pain in her heart. She felt more acutely than ever that there were
+depths in her lover's nature that she was powerless to stir into
+responsive life.
+
+Had any other that power? She thought of the girl at the Cove, with
+her deep eyes and wonderful face. A chill of premonitory fear seized
+upon her.
+
+"I feel exactly as if Esterbrook had gone away from me forever," she
+said slowly to herself, stooping to brush her cheek against a
+dew-cold, milk-white acacia bloom, "and would never come back to me
+again. If that could happen, I wonder what there would be left to live
+for?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Esterbrook Elliott meant, or honestly thought he meant, to go home
+when he left Marian. Nevertheless, when he reached the road branching
+off to the Cove he turned his horse down it with a flush on his dark
+cheek. He realized that the motive of the action was disloyal to
+Marian and he felt ashamed of his weakness.
+
+But the desire to see Magdalen Crawford once more and to look into the
+depths of her eyes was stronger than all else, and overpowered every
+throb of duty and resistance.
+
+He saw nothing of her when he reached the Cove. He could think of no
+excuse for calling at the Barrett cottage, so he rode slowly past the
+hamlet and along the shore.
+
+The sun, red as a smouldering ember, was half buried in the silken
+violet rim of the sea; the west was a vast lake of saffron and rose
+and ethereal green, through which floated the curved shallop of a thin
+new moon, slowly deepening from lustreless white, through gleaming
+silver, into burnished gold, and attended by one solitary, pearl-white
+star. The vast concave of sky above was of violet, infinite and
+flawless. Far out dusky amethystine islets clustered like gems on the
+shining breast of the bay. The little pools of water along the low
+shores glowed like mirrors of polished jacinth. The small,
+pine-fringed headlands ran out into the water, cutting its lustrous
+blue expanse like purple wedges.
+
+As Esterbrook turned one of them he saw Magdalen standing out on the
+point of the next, a short distance away. Her back was towards him,
+and her splendid figure was outlined darkly against the vivid sky.
+
+Esterbrook sprang from his horse and left the animal standing by
+itself while he walked swiftly out to her. His heart throbbed
+suffocatingly. He was conscious of no direct purpose save merely to
+see her.
+
+She turned when he reached her with a slight start of surprise. His
+footsteps had made no sound on the tide-rippled sand.
+
+For a few moments they faced each other so, eyes burning into eyes
+with mute soul-probing and questioning. The sun had disappeared,
+leaving a stain of fiery red to mark his grave; the weird, radiant
+light was startlingly vivid and clear. Little crisp puffs and flakes
+of foam scurried over the point like elfin things. The fresh wind,
+blowing up the bay, tossed the lustrous rings of hair about Magdalen's
+pale face; all the routed shadows of the hour had found refuge in her
+eyes.
+
+Not a trace of colour appeared in her face under Esterbrook Elliott's
+burning gaze. But when he said "Magdalen!" a single, hot scorch of
+crimson flamed up into her cheeks protestingly. She lifted her hand
+with a splendid gesture, but no word passed her lips.
+
+"Magdalen, have you nothing to say to me?" he asked, coming closer to
+her with an imploring passion in his face never seen by Marian
+Lesley's eyes. He reached out his hand, but she stepped back from his
+touch.
+
+"What should I have to say to you?"
+
+"Say that you are glad to see me."
+
+"I am not glad to see you. You have no right to come here. But I knew
+you would come."
+
+"You knew it? How?"
+
+"Your eyes told me so today. I am not blind--I can see further than
+those dull fisher folks. Yes, I knew you would come. That is why I
+came here tonight--so that you would find me alone and I could tell
+you that you were not to come again."
+
+"Why must you tell me that, Magdalen?"
+
+"Because, as I have told you, you have no right to come."
+
+"But if I will not obey you? If I will come in defiance of your
+prohibition?"
+
+She turned her steady luminous eyes on his pale, set face.
+
+"You would stamp yourself as a madman, then," she said coldly. "I know
+that you are Miss Lesley's promised husband. Therefore, you are either
+false to her or insulting to me. In either case the companionship of
+Magdalen Crawford is not what you must seek. Go!"
+
+She turned away from him with an imperious gesture of dismissal.
+Esterbrook Elliott stepped forward and caught one firm, white wrist.
+
+"I shall not obey you," he said in a low, intense tone; his fine eyes
+burned into hers. "You may send me away, but I will come back, again
+and yet again until you have learned to welcome me. Why should you
+meet me like an enemy? Why can we not be friends?"
+
+The girl faced him once more.
+
+"Because," she said proudly, "I am not your equal. There can be no
+friendship between us. There ought not to be. Magdalen Crawford, the
+fisherman's niece, is no companion for you. You will be foolish, as
+well as disloyal, if you ever try to see me again. Go back to the
+beautiful, high-bred woman you love and forget me. Perhaps you think I
+am talking strangely. Perhaps you think me bold and unwomanly to speak
+so plainly to you, a stranger. But there are some circumstances in
+life when plain-speaking is best. I do not want to see you again. Now,
+go back to your own world."
+
+Esterbrook Elliott slowly turned from her and walked in silence back
+to the shore. In the shadows of the point he stopped to look back at
+her, standing out like some inspired prophetess against the fiery
+background of the sunset sky and silver-blue water. The sky overhead
+was thick-sown with stars; the night breeze was blowing up from its
+lair in distant, echoing sea caves. On his right the lights of the
+Cove twinkled out through the dusk.
+
+"I feel like a coward and a traitor," he said slowly. "Good God, what
+is this madness that has come over me? Is this my boasted strength of
+manhood?"
+
+A moment later the hoof beats of his horse died away up the shore.
+
+Magdalen Crawford lingered on the point until the last dull red faded
+out into the violet gloom of the June sea dusk, than which nothing can
+be rarer or diviner, and listened to the moan and murmur of the sea
+far out over the bay with sorrowful eyes and sternly set lips.
+
+The next day, when the afternoon sun hung hot and heavy over the
+water, Esterbrook Elliott came again to the Cove. He found it
+deserted. A rumour of mackerel had come, and every boat had sailed
+out in the rose-red dawn to the fishing grounds. But down on a strip
+of sparkling yellow sand he saw Magdalen Crawford standing, her hand
+on the rope that fastened a small white dory to the fragment of a
+half-embedded wreck.
+
+She was watching a huddle of gulls clustered on the tip of a narrow,
+sandy spit running out to the left. She turned at the sound of his
+hurried foot-fall behind her. Her face paled slightly, and into the
+depths of her eyes leapt a passionate, mesmeric glow that faded as
+quickly as it came.
+
+"You see I have come back in spite of your command, Magdalen."
+
+"I do see it," she answered in a gravely troubled voice. "You are a
+madman who refuses to be warned."
+
+"Where are you going, Magdalen?" She had loosened the rope from the
+wreck.
+
+"I am going to row over to Chapel Point for salt. They think the boats
+will come in tonight loaded with mackerel--look at them away out there
+by the score--and salt will be needed."
+
+"Can you row so far alone?"
+
+"Easily. I learned to row long ago--for a pastime then. Since coming
+here I find it of great service to me."
+
+She stepped lightly into the tiny shallop and picked up an oar. The
+brilliant sunshine streamed about her, burnishing the rich tints of
+her hair into ruddy gold. She balanced herself to the swaying of the
+dory with the grace of a sea bird. The man looking at her felt his
+brain reel.
+
+"Good-bye, Mr. Elliott."
+
+For answer he sprang into the dory and, snatching an oar, pushed
+against the old wreck with such energy that the dory shot out from the
+shore like a foam bell. His sudden spring had set it rocking
+violently. Magdalen almost lost her footing and caught blindly at his
+arm. As her fingers closed on his wrist a thrill as of fire shot
+through his every vein.
+
+"Why have you done this, Mr. Elliott? You must go back."
+
+"But I will not," he said masterfully, looking straight into her eyes
+with an imperiousness that sat well upon him. "I am going to row you
+over to Chapel Point. I have the oars--I will be master this once, at
+least."
+
+For an instant her eyes flashed defiant protest, then drooped before
+his. A sudden, hot blush crimsoned her pale face. His will had
+mastered hers; the girl trembled from head to foot, and the proud,
+sensitive, mouth quivered.
+
+Into the face of the man watching her breathlessly flashed a
+triumphant, passionate joy. He put out his hand and gently pushed her
+down into the seat. Sitting opposite, he took up the oars and pulled
+out over the sheet of sparkling blue water, through which at first the
+bottom of white sand glimmered wavily but afterwards deepened to
+translucent, dim depths of greenness.
+
+His heart throbbed tumultuously. Once the thought of Marian drifted
+across his mind like a chill breath of wind, but it was forgotten when
+his eyes met Magdalen's.
+
+"Tell me about yourself, Magdalen," he said at last, breaking the
+tremulous, charmed, sparkling silence.
+
+"There is nothing to tell," she answered with characteristic
+straightforwardness. "My life has been a very uneventful one. I have
+never been rich, or very well educated, but--it used to be different
+from now. I had some chance before--before Father died."
+
+"You must have found it very lonely and strange when you came here
+first."
+
+"Yes. At first I thought I should die--but I do not mind it now. I
+have made friends with the sea; it has taught me a great deal. There
+is a kind of inspiration in the sea. When one listens to its
+never-ceasing murmur afar out there, always sounding at midnight and
+midday, one's soul goes out to meet Eternity. Sometimes it gives me so
+much pleasure that it is almost pain."
+
+She stopped abruptly.
+
+"I don't know why I am talking to you like this."
+
+"You are a strange girl, Magdalen. Have you no other companion than
+the sea?"
+
+"No. Why should I wish to have? I shall not be here long."
+
+Elliott's face contracted with a spasm of pain.
+
+"You are not going away, Magdalen?"
+
+"Yes--in the fall. I have my own living to earn, you know. I am very
+poor. Uncle and Aunt are very kind, but I cannot consent to burden
+them any longer than I can help."
+
+A sigh that was almost a moan broke from Esterbrook Elliott's lips.
+
+"You must not go away, Magdalen. You must stay here--with me!"
+
+"You forget yourself," she said proudly. "How dare you speak to me so?
+Have you forgotten Miss Lesley? Or are you a traitor to us both?"
+
+Esterbrook made no answer. He bowed his pale, miserable face before
+her, self-condemned.
+
+The breast of the bay sparkled with its countless gems like the breast
+of a fair woman. The shores were purple and amethystine in the
+distance. Far out, bluish, phantom-like sails clustered against the
+pallid horizon. The dory danced like a feather over the ripples. They
+were close under the shadow of Chapel Point.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Marian Lesley waited in vain for her lover that afternoon. When he
+came at last in the odorous dusk of the June night she met him on the
+acacia-shadowed verandah with cold sweetness. Perhaps some subtle
+woman-instinct whispered to her where and how he had spent the
+afternoon, for she offered him no kiss, nor did she ask him why he had
+failed to come sooner.
+
+His eyes lingered on her in the dim light, taking in every detail of
+her sweet womanly refinement and loveliness, and with difficulty he
+choked back a groan. Again he asked himself what madness had come over
+him, and again for an answer rose up the vision of Magdalen Crawford's
+face as he had seen it that day, crimsoning beneath his gaze.
+
+It was late when he left. Marian watched him out of sight, standing
+under the acacias. She shivered as with a sudden chill. "I feel as I
+think Vashti must have felt," she murmured aloud, "when, discrowned
+and unqueened, she crept out of the gates of Shushan to hide her
+broken heart. I wonder if Esther has already usurped my sceptre. Has
+that girl at the Cove, with her pale, priestess-like face and
+mysterious eyes, stolen his heart from me? Perhaps not, for it may
+never have been mine. I know that Esterbrook Elliott will be true to
+the letter of his vows to me, no matter what it may cost him. But I
+want no pallid shadow of the love that belongs to another. The hour of
+abdication is at hand, I fear. And what will be left for throneless
+Vashti then?"
+
+Esterbrook Elliott, walking home through the mocking calm of the
+night, fought a hard battle with himself.
+
+He was face to face with the truth at last--the bitter knowledge that
+he had never loved Marian Lesley, save with a fond, brotherly
+affection, and that he did love Magdalen Crawford with a passion that
+threatened to sweep before it every vestige of his honour and
+loyalty.
+
+He had seen her but three times--and his throbbing heart lay in the
+hollow of her cold white hand.
+
+He shut his eyes and groaned. What madness. What unutterable folly! He
+was not free--he was bound to another by every cord of honour and
+self-respect. And, even were he free, Magdalen Crawford would be no
+fit wife for him--in the eyes of the world, at least. A girl from the
+Cove--a girl with little education and no social standing--aye! but he
+loved her.
+
+He groaned again and again in his misery. Afar down the slope the bay
+waters lay like an inky strip and the distant, murmurous plaint of the
+sea came out of the stillness of the night; the lights at the Cove
+glimmered faintly.
+
+In the week that followed he went to the Cove every day. Sometimes he
+did not see Magdalen; at other times he did. But at the end of the
+week he had conquered in the bitter, heart-crushing struggle with
+himself. If he had weakly given way to the first mad sweep of a new
+passion, the strength of his manhood reasserted itself at last.
+Faltering and wavering were over, though there was passionate pain in
+his voice when he said at last, "I am not coming back again,
+Magdalen."
+
+They were standing in the shadow of the pine-fringed point that ran
+out to the left of the Cove. They had been walking together along the
+shore, watching the splendour of the sea sunset that flamed and glowed
+in the west, where there was a sea of mackerel clouds, crimson and
+amber tinted, with long, ribbon-like strips of apple-green sky
+between. They had walked in silence, hand in hand, as children might
+have done, yet with the stir and throb of a mighty passion seething in
+their hearts.
+
+Magdalen turned as Esterbrook spoke, and looked at him in a long
+silence. The bay stretched out before them, tranced and shimmering; a
+few stars shone down through the gloom of dusk. Right across the
+translucent greens and roses and blues of the west hung a dark,
+unsightly cloud, like the blurred outline of a monstrous bat. In the
+dim, reflected light the girl's mournful face took on a weird,
+unearthly beauty. She turned her eyes from Esterbrook Elliott's set
+white face to the radiant gloom of the sea.
+
+"That is best," she answered at last, slowly.
+
+"Best--yes! Better that we had never met! I love you--you know
+it--words are idle between us. I never loved before--I thought I did.
+I made a mistake and I must pay the penalty of that mistake. You
+understand me?"
+
+"I understand," she answered simply.
+
+"I do not excuse myself--I have been weak and cowardly and disloyal.
+But I have conquered myself--I will be true to the woman to whom I am
+pledged. You and I must not meet again. I will crush this madness to
+death. I think I have been delirious ever since that day I saw you
+first, Magdalen. My brain is clearer now. I see my duty and I mean to
+do it at any cost. I dare not trust myself to say more. Magdalen, I
+have much for which to ask your forgiveness."
+
+"There is nothing to forgive," she said steadily. "I have been as much
+to blame as you. If I had been as resolute as I ought to have been--if
+I had sent you away the second time as I did the first--this would not
+have come to pass. I have been weak too, and I deserve to atone for my
+weakness by suffering. There is only one path open to us. Esterbrook,
+good-bye." Her voice quivered with an uncontrollable spasm of pain,
+but the misty, mournful eyes did not swerve from his. The man stepped
+forward and caught her in his arms.
+
+"Magdalen, good-bye, my darling. Kiss me once--only once--before I
+go."
+
+She loosened his arms and stepped back proudly.
+
+"No! No man kisses my lips unless he is to be my husband. Good-bye,
+dear."
+
+He bowed his head silently and went away, looking back not once, else
+he might have seen her kneeling on the damp sand weeping noiselessly
+and passionately.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Marian Lesley looked at his pale, determined face the next evening and
+read it like an open book.
+
+She had grown paler herself; there were purple shadows under the sweet
+violet eyes that might have hinted of her own sleepless nights.
+
+She greeted him calmly, holding out a steady, white hand of welcome.
+She saw the traces of the struggle through which he had passed and
+knew that he had come off victor.
+
+The knowledge made her task a little harder. It would have been easier
+to let slip the straining cable than to cast it from her when it lay
+unresistingly in her hand.
+
+For an instant her heart thrilled with an unutterably sweet hope.
+Might he not forget in time? Need she snap in twain the weakened bond
+between them after all? Perhaps she might win back her lost sceptre,
+yet if--
+
+Womanly pride throttled the struggling hope. No divided allegiance, no
+hollow semblance of queenship for her!
+
+Her opportunity came when Esterbrook asked with grave earnestness if
+their marriage might not be hastened a little--could he not have his
+bride in August? For a fleeting second Marian closed her eyes and the
+slender hands, lying among the laces in her lap, clasped each other
+convulsively.
+
+Then she said quietly, "Sometimes I have thought, Esterbrook, that it
+might be better--if we were never married at all."
+
+Esterbrook turned a startled face upon her.
+
+"Not married at all! Marian, what do you mean?"
+
+"Just what I say. I do not think we are as well suited to each other
+after all as we have fancied. We have loved each other as brother and
+sister might--that is all. I think it will be best to be brother and
+sister forever--nothing more."
+
+Esterbrook sprang to his feet.
+
+"Marian, do you know what you are saying? You surely cannot have
+heard--no one could have told you--"
+
+"I have heard nothing," she interrupted hurriedly. "No one has told me
+anything. I have only said what I have been thinking of late. I am
+sure we have made a mistake. It is not too late to remedy it. You will
+not refuse my request, Esterbrook? You will set me free?"
+
+"Good heavens, Marian!" he said hoarsely. "I cannot realize that you
+are in earnest. Have you ceased to care for me?" The rigidly locked
+hands were clasped a little tighter.
+
+"No--I shall always care for you as my friend if you will let me. But
+I know we could not make each other happy--the time for that has gone
+by. I would never be satisfied, nor would you. Esterbrook, will you
+release me from a promise which has become an irksome fetter?"
+
+He looked down on her upturned face mistily. A great joy was surging
+up in his heart--yet it was mingled with great regret.
+
+He knew--none better--what was passing out of his life, what he was
+losing when he lost that pure, womanly nature.
+
+"If you really mean this, Marian," he said slowly, "if you really have
+come to feel that your truest love is not and never can be mine--that
+I cannot make you happy--then there is nothing for me to do but to
+grant your request. You are free."
+
+"Thank you, dear," she said gently, as she stood up.
+
+She slipped his ring from her finger and held it out to him. He took
+it mechanically. He still felt dazed and unreal.
+
+Marian held out her hand.
+
+"Good-night, Esterbrook," she said, a little wearily. "I feel tired. I
+am glad you see it all in the same light as I do."
+
+"Marian," he said earnestly, clasping the outstretched hand, "are you
+sure that you will be happy--are you sure that you are doing a wise
+thing?"
+
+"Quite sure," she answered, with a faint smile. "I am not acting
+rashly. I have thought it all over carefully. Things are much better
+so, dear. We will always be friends. Your joys and sorrows will be to
+me as my own. When another love comes to bless your life, Esterbrook,
+I will be glad. And now, good-night. I want to be alone now."
+
+At the doorway he turned to look back at her, standing in all her
+sweet stateliness in the twilight duskness, and the keen realization
+of all he had lost made him bow his head with a quick pang of regret.
+
+Then he went out into the darkness of the summer night.
+
+An hour later he stood alone on the little point where he had parted
+with Magdalen the night before. A restless night wind was moaning
+through the pines that fringed the bank behind him; the moon shone
+down radiantly, turning the calm expanse of the bay into a milk-white
+sheen.
+
+He took Marian's ring from his pocket and kissed it reverently. Then
+he threw it from him far out over the water. For a second the diamond
+flashed in the moonlight; then, with a tiny splash, it fell among the
+ripples.
+
+Esterbrook turned his face to the Cove, lying dark and silent in the
+curve between the crescent headlands. A solitary light glimmered from
+the low eaves of the Barrett cottage.
+
+Tomorrow, was his unspoken thought, I will be free; to go back to
+Magdalen.
+
+
+
+
+An Invitation Given on Impulse
+
+
+It was a gloomy Saturday morning. The trees in the Oaklawn grounds
+were tossing wildly in the gusts of wind, and sodden brown leaves were
+blown up against the windows of the library, where a score of girls
+were waiting for the principal to bring the mail in.
+
+The big room echoed with the pleasant sound of girlish voices and low
+laughter, for in a fortnight school would close for the holidays, and
+they were all talking about their plans and anticipations.
+
+Only Ruth Mannering was, as usual, sitting by herself near one of the
+windows, looking out on the misty lawn. She was a pale, slender girl,
+with a sad face, and was dressed in rather shabby black. She had no
+special friend at Oaklawn, and the other girls did not know much about
+her. If they had thought about it at all, they would probably have
+decided that they did not like her; but for the most part they simply
+overlooked her.
+
+This was not altogether their fault. Ruth was poor and apparently
+friendless, but it was not her poverty that was against her. Lou
+Scott, who was "as poor as a church mouse," to quote her own frank
+admission, was the most popular girl in the seminary, the boon
+companion of the richest girls, and in demand with everybody. But Lou
+was jolly and frank and offhanded, while Ruth was painfully shy and
+reserved, and that was the secret of the whole matter.
+
+There was "no fun in her," the girls said, and so it came about that
+she was left out of their social life, and was almost as solitary at
+Oaklawn as if she had been the only girl there. She was there for the
+special purpose of studying music, and expected to earn her own living
+by teaching it when she left. She believed that the girls looked down
+on her on this account; this was unjust, of course, but Ruth had no
+idea how much her own coldness and reserve had worked against her.
+
+Across the room Carol Golden was, as usual, the centre of an animated
+group; Golden Carol as her particular friends sometimes called her,
+partly because of her beautiful voice, and partly because of her
+wonderful fleece of golden hair. Carol was one of the seminary pets,
+and seemed to Ruth Mannering to have everything that she had not.
+
+Presently the mail was brought in, and there was a rush to the table,
+followed by exclamations of satisfaction or disappointment. In a few
+minutes the room was almost deserted. Only two girls remained: Carol
+Golden, who had dropped into a big chair to read her many letters; and
+Ruth Mannering, who had not received any and had gone silently back to
+her part of the window.
+
+Presently Carol gave a little cry of delight. Her mother had written
+that she might invite any friend she wished home with her to spend the
+holidays. Carol had asked for this permission, and now that it had
+come was ready to dance for joy. As to whom she would ask, there could
+be only one answer to that. Of course it must be her particular
+friend, Maud Russell, who was the cleverest and prettiest girl at
+Oaklawn, at least so her admirers said. She was undoubtedly the
+richest, and was the acknowledged "leader." The girls affectionately
+called her "Princess," and Carol adored her with that romantic
+affection that is found only among school girls. She knew, too, that
+Maud would surely accept her invitation because she did not intend to
+go home. Her parents were travelling in Europe, and she expected to
+spend her holidays with some cousins, who were almost strangers to
+her.
+
+Carol was so much pleased that she felt as if she must talk to
+somebody, so she turned to Ruth.
+
+"Isn't it delightful to think that we'll all be going home in a
+fortnight?"
+
+"Yes, very--for those that have homes to go to," said Ruth drearily.
+
+Carol felt a quick pang of pity and self-reproach. "Haven't you?" she
+asked.
+
+Ruth shook her head. In spite of herself, the kindness of Carol's tone
+brought the tears to her eyes.
+
+"My mother died a year ago," she said in a trembling voice, "and since
+then I have had no real home. We were quite alone in the world, Mother
+and I, and now I have nobody."
+
+"Oh, I'm so sorry for you," cried Carol impulsively. She leaned
+forward and took Ruth's hand in a gentle way. "And do you mean to say
+that you'll have to stay here all through the holidays? Why, it will
+be horrid."
+
+"Oh, I shall not mind it much," said Ruth quickly, "with study and
+practice most of the time. Only now, when everyone is talking about
+it, it makes me wish that I had some place to go."
+
+Carol dropped Ruth's hand suddenly in the shock of a sudden idea that
+darted into her mind.
+
+A stray girl passing through the hall called out, "Ruth, Miss Siviter
+wishes to see you about something in Room C."
+
+Ruth got up quickly. She was glad to get away, for it seemed to her
+that in another minute she would break down altogether.
+
+Carol Golden hardly noticed her departure. She gathered up her letters
+and went abstractedly to her room, unheeding a gay call for "Golden
+Carol" from a group of girls in the corridor. Maud Russell was not in
+and Carol was glad. She wanted to be alone and fight down that sudden
+idea.
+
+"It is ridiculous to think of it," she said aloud, with a petulance
+very unusual in Golden Carol, whose disposition was as sunny as her
+looks. "Why, I simply cannot. I have always been longing to ask Maud
+to visit me, and now that the chance has come I am not going to throw
+it away. I am very sorry for Ruth, of course. It must be dreadful to
+be all alone like that. But it isn't my fault. And she is so fearfully
+quiet and dowdy--what would they all think of her at home? Frank and
+Jack would make such fun of her. I shall ask Maud just as soon as she
+comes in."
+
+Maud did come in presently, but Carol did not give her the invitation.
+Instead, she was almost snappish to her idol, and the Princess soon
+went out again in something of a huff.
+
+"Oh, dear," cried Carol, "now I've offended her. What has got into me?
+What a disagreeable thing a conscience is, although I'm sure I don't
+know why mine should be prodding me so! I don't want to invite Ruth
+Mannering home with me for the holidays, but I feel exactly as if I
+should not have a minute's peace of mind all the time if I didn't.
+Mother would think it all right, of course. She would not mind if Ruth
+dressed in calico and never said anything but yes and no. But how the
+boys would laugh! I simply won't do it, conscience or no conscience."
+
+In view of this decision it was rather strange that the next morning,
+Carol Golden went down to Ruth Mannering's lonely little room on
+Corridor Two and said, "Ruth, will you go home with me for the
+holidays? Mother wrote me to invite anyone I wished to. Don't say you
+can't come, dear, because you must."
+
+Carol never, as long as she lived, forgot Ruth's face at that moment.
+
+"It was absolutely transfigured," she said afterwards. "I never saw
+anyone look so happy in my life."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A fortnight later unwonted silence reigned at Oaklawn. The girls were
+scattered far and wide, and Ruth Mannering and Carol Golden were at
+the latter's home.
+
+Carol was a very much surprised girl. Under the influence of kindness
+and pleasure Ruth seemed transformed into a different person. Her
+shyness and reserve melted away in the sunny atmosphere of the Golden
+home. Mrs. Golden took her into her motherly heart at once; and as for
+Frank and Jack, whose verdict Carol had so dreaded, they voted Ruth
+"splendid." She certainly got along very well with them; and if she
+did not make the social sensation that pretty Maud Russell might have
+made, the Goldens all liked her and Carol was content.
+
+"Just four days more," sighed Carol one afternoon, "and then we must
+go back to Oaklawn. Can you realize it, Ruth?"
+
+Ruth looked up from her book with a smile. Even in appearance she had
+changed. There was a faint pink in her cheeks and a merry light in her
+eyes.
+
+"I shall not be sorry to go back to work," she said. "I feel just like
+it because I have had so pleasant a time here that it has heartened me
+up for next term. I think it will be very different from last. I begin
+to see that I kept to myself too much and brooded over fancied
+slights."
+
+"And then you are to room with me since Maud is not coming back," said
+Carol. "What fun we shall have. Did you ever toast marshmallows over
+the gas? Why, I declare, there is Mr. Swift coming up the walk. Look,
+Ruth! He is the richest man in Westleigh."
+
+Ruth peeped out of the window over Carol's shoulder.
+
+"He reminds me of somebody," she said absently, "but I can't think who
+it is. Of course, I have never seen him before. What a good face he
+has!"
+
+"He is as good as he looks," said Carol, enthusiastically. "Next to
+Father, Mr. Swift is the nicest man in the world. I have always been
+quite a pet of his. His wife is dead, and so is his only daughter. She
+was a lovely girl and died only two years ago. It nearly broke Mr.
+Swift's heart. And he has lived alone ever since in that great big
+house up at the head of Warner Street, the one you admired so, Ruth,
+the last time we were uptown. There's the bell for the second time,
+Mary can't have heard it. I'll go myself."
+
+As Carol showed the caller into the room, Ruth rose to leave and thus
+came face to face with him. Mr. Swift started perceptibly.
+
+"Mr. Swift, this is my school friend, Miss Mannering," said Carol.
+
+Mr. Swift seemed strangely agitated as he took Ruth's timidly offered
+hand.
+
+"My dear young lady," he said hurriedly, "I am going to ask you what
+may seem a very strange question. What was your mother's name?"
+
+"Agnes Hastings," answered Ruth in surprise. And then Carol really
+thought that Mr. Swift had gone crazy, for he drew Ruth into his arms
+and kissed her.
+
+"I knew it," he said. "I was sure you were Agnes' daughter, for you
+are the living image of what she was when I last saw her. Child, you
+don't know me, but I am your Uncle Robert. Your mother was my
+half-sister."
+
+"Oh, Mr. Swift!" cried Carol, and then she ran for her mother.
+
+Ruth turned pale and dropped into a chair, and Mr. Swift sat down
+beside her.
+
+"To think that I have found you at last, child. How puzzled you look.
+Did your mother never speak of me? How is she? Where is she?"
+
+"Mother died last year," said Ruth.
+
+"Poor Agnes! And I never knew! Don't cry, little girl. I want you to
+tell me all about it. She was much younger than I was, and when our
+mother died my stepfather went away and took her with him. I remained
+with my father's people and eventually lost all trace of my sister. I
+was a poor boy then, but things have looked up with me and I have
+often tried to find her."
+
+By this time Carol had returned with her father and mother, and there
+was a scene--laughing, crying, explaining--and I don't really know
+which of the two girls was the more excited, Carol or Ruth. As for Mr.
+Swift, he was overjoyed to find his niece and wanted to carry her off
+with him then and there, but Mrs. Golden insisted on her finishing her
+visit. When the question of returning to Oaklawn came up, Mr. Swift
+would not hear of it at first, but finally yielded to Carol's
+entreaties and Ruth's own desire.
+
+"I shall graduate next year, Uncle, and then I can come back to you
+for good."
+
+That evening when Ruth was alone in her room, trying to collect her
+thoughts and realize that the home and love that she had so craved
+were really to be hers at last, Golden Carol was with her mother in
+the room below, talking it all over.
+
+"Just think, Mother, if I had not asked Ruth to come here, this would
+not have happened. And I didn't want to, I wanted to ask Maud so much,
+and I was dreadfully disappointed when I couldn't--for I really
+couldn't. I could not help remembering the look in Ruth's eyes when
+she said that she had no home to go to, and so I asked her instead of
+Maud. How dreadful it would have been if I hadn't."
+
+
+
+
+Detected by the Camera
+
+
+One summer I was attacked by the craze for amateur photography. It
+became chronic afterwards, and I and my camera have never since been
+parted. We have had some odd adventures together, and one of the most
+novel of our experiences was that in which we played the part of chief
+witness against Ned Brooke.
+
+I may say that my name is Amy Clarke, and that I believe I am
+considered the best amateur photographer in our part of the country.
+That is all I need tell you about myself.
+
+Mr. Carroll had asked me to photograph his place for him when the
+apple orchards were in bloom. He has a picturesque old-fashioned
+country house behind a lawn of the most delightful old trees and
+flanked on each side by the orchards. So I went one June afternoon,
+with all my accoutrements, prepared to "take" the Carroll
+establishment in my best style.
+
+Mr. Carroll was away but was expected home soon, so we waited for him,
+as all the family wished to be photographed under the big maple at the
+front door. I prowled around among the shrubbery at the lower end of
+the lawn and, after a great deal of squinting from various angles, I
+at last fixed upon the spot from which I thought the best view of the
+house might be obtained. Then Gertie and Lilian Carroll and I got into
+the hammocks and swung at our leisure, enjoying the cool breeze
+sweeping through the maples.
+
+Ned Brooke was hanging around as usual, watching us furtively. Ned was
+one of the hopeful members of a family that lived in a tumble-down
+shanty just across the road from the Carrolls. They were wretchedly
+poor, and old Brooke, as he was called, and Ned were employed a good
+deal by Mr. Carroll--more out of charity than anything else, I fancy.
+
+The Brookes had a rather shady reputation. They were notoriously lazy,
+and it was suspected that their line of distinction between their own
+and their neighbours' goods was not very clearly drawn. Many people
+censured Mr. Carroll for encouraging them at all, but he was too
+kind-hearted to let them suffer actual want and, as a consequence, one
+or the other of them was always dodging about his place.
+
+Ned was a lank, tow-headed youth of about fourteen, with shifty,
+twinkling eyes that could never look you straight in the face. His
+appearance was anything but prepossessing, and I always felt, when I
+looked at him, that if anyone wanted to do a piece of shady work by
+proxy, Ned Brooke would be the very lad for the business.
+
+Mr. Carroll came at last, and we all went down to meet him at the
+gate. Ned Brooke also came shuffling along to take the horse, and Mr.
+Carroll tossed the reins to him and at the same time handed a
+pocketbook to his wife.
+
+"Just as well to be careful where you put that," he said laughingly.
+"There's a sum in it not to be picked up on every gooseberry bush.
+Gilman Harris paid me this morning for that bit of woodland I sold him
+last fall--five hundred dollars. I promised that you and the girls
+should have it to get a new piano, so there it is for you."
+
+"Thank you," said Mrs. Carroll delightedly. "However, you'd better put
+it back in your pocket till we go in. Amy is in a hurry."
+
+Mr. Carroll took back the pocketbook and dropped it carelessly into
+the inside pocket of the light overcoat that he wore.
+
+I happened to glance at Ned Brooke just then, and I could not help
+noticing the sudden crafty, eager expression that flashed over his
+face. He eyed the pocketbook in Mr. Carroll's hands furtively, after
+which he went off with the horse in a great hurry.
+
+The girls were exclaiming and thanking their father, and nobody
+noticed Ned Brooke's behaviour but myself, and it soon passed out of
+my mind.
+
+"Come to take the place, are you, Amy?" said Mr. Carroll. "Well,
+everything is ready, I think. I suppose we'd better proceed. Where
+shall we stand? You had better group us as you think best."
+
+Whereupon I proceeded to arrange them in due order under the maple.
+Mrs. Carroll sat in a chair, while her husband stood behind her.
+Gertie stood on the steps with a basket of flowers in her hand, and
+Lilian was at one side. The two little boys, Teddy and Jack, climbed
+up into the maple, and little Dora, the dimpled six-year-old, stood
+gravely in the foreground with an enormous grey cat hugged in her
+chubby arms.
+
+It was a pretty group in a pretty setting, and I thrilled with
+professional pride as I stepped back for a final, knowing squint at it
+all. Then I went to my camera, slipped in the plate, gave them due
+warning and took off the cap.
+
+I took two plates to make sure and then the thing was over, but as I
+had another plate left I thought I might as well take a view of the
+house by itself, so I carried my camera to a new place and had just
+got everything ready to lift the cap when Mr. Carroll came down and
+said:
+
+"If you girls want to see something pretty, come to the back field
+with me. That will wait till you come back, won't it, Amy?"
+
+So we all betook ourselves to the back field, a short distance away,
+where Mr. Carroll proudly displayed two of the prettiest little Jersey
+cows I had ever seen.
+
+We returned to the house by way of the back lane and, as we came in
+sight of the main road, my brother Cecil drove up and said that if I
+were ready, I had better go home with him and save myself a hot, dusty
+walk.
+
+The Carrolls all went down to the fence to speak to Cecil, but I
+dashed hurriedly down through the orchard, leaped over the fence into
+the lawn and ran to the somewhat remote corner where I had left my
+camera. I was in a desperate hurry, for I knew Cecil's horse did not
+like to be kept waiting, so I never even glanced at the house, but
+snatched off the cap, counted two and replaced it.
+
+Then I took out my plate, put it in the holder and gathered up my
+traps. I suppose I was about five minutes at it all and I had my back
+to the house the whole time, and when I laid all my things ready and
+emerged from my retreat, there was nobody to be seen about the place.
+
+As I hurried up through the lawn, I noticed Ned Brooke walking at a
+smart pace down the lane, but the fact did not make any particular
+impression on me at the time, and was not recalled until afterwards.
+
+Cecil was waiting for me, so I got in the buggy and we drove off. On
+arriving home I shut myself up in my dark room and proceeded to
+develop the first two negatives of the Carroll housestead. They were
+both excellent, the first one being a trifle the better, so that I
+decided to finish from it. I intended also to develop the third, but
+just as I finished the others, a half-dozen city cousins swooped down
+upon us and I had to put away my paraphernalia, emerge from my dark
+retreat and fly around to entertain them.
+
+The next day Cecil came in and said:
+
+"Did you hear, Amy, that Mr. Carroll has lost a pocketbook with five
+hundred dollars in it?"
+
+"No!" I exclaimed. "How? When? Where?"
+
+"Don't overwhelm a fellow. I can answer only one question--last night.
+As to the 'how,' they don't know, and as to the 'where'--well, if they
+knew that, there might be some hope of finding it. The girls are in a
+bad way. The money was to get them their longed-for piano, it seems,
+and now it's gone."
+
+"But how did it happen, Cecil?"
+
+"Well, Mr. Carroll says that Mrs. Carroll handed the pocketbook back
+to him at the gate yesterday, and he dropped it in the inside pocket
+of his over-coat--"
+
+"I saw him do it," I cried.
+
+"Yes, and then, before he went to be photographed, he hung his coat up
+in the hall. It hung there until the evening, and nobody seems to have
+thought about the money, each supposing that someone else had put it
+carefully away. After tea Mr. Carroll put on the coat and went to see
+somebody over at Netherby. He says the thought of the pocketbook never
+crossed his mind; he had forgotten all about putting it in that coat
+pocket. He came home across the fields about eleven o'clock and found
+that the cows had broken into the clover hay, and he had a great chase
+before he got them out. When he went in, just as he entered the door,
+the remembrance of the money flashed over him. He felt in his pocket,
+but there was no pocketbook there; he asked his wife if she had taken
+it out. She had not, and nobody else had. There was a hole in the
+pocket, but Mr. Carroll says it was too small for the pocketbook to
+have worked through. However, it must have done so--unless someone
+took it out of his pocket at Netherby, and that is not possible,
+because he never had his coat off, and it was in an inside pocket.
+It's not likely that they will ever see it again. Someone may pick it
+up, of course, but the chances are slim. Mr. Carroll doesn't know his
+exact path across the fields, and if he lost it while he was after the
+cows, it's a bluer show still. They've been searching all day, of
+course. The girls are awfully disappointed."
+
+A sudden recollection came to me of Ned Brooke's face as I had seen it
+the day before at the gate, coupled with the remembrance of seeing him
+walking down the lane at a quick pace, so unlike his usual shambling
+gait, while I ran through the lawn.
+
+"How do they know it was lost?" I said. "Perhaps it was stolen before
+Mr. Carroll went to Netherby."
+
+"They think not," said Cecil. "Who would have stolen it?"
+
+"Ned Brooke. I saw him hanging around. And you never saw such a look
+as came over his face when he heard Mr. Carroll say there was five
+hundred dollars in that pocketbook."
+
+"Well, I did suggest to them that Ned might know something about it,
+for I remembered having seen him go down the lane while I was waiting
+for you, but they won't hear of such a thing. The Brookes are kind of
+protégés of theirs, you know, and they won't believe anything bad of
+them. If Ned did take it, however, there's not a shadow of evidence
+against him."
+
+"No, I suppose not," I answered thoughtfully, "but the more I think it
+over, the more I'm convinced that he took it. You know, we all went to
+the back field to look at the Jerseys, and all that time the coat was
+hanging there in the hall, and not a soul in the house. And it was
+just after we came back that I saw Ned scuttling down the lane so
+fast."
+
+I mentioned my suspicions to the Carrolls a few days afterwards, when
+I went down with the photographs, and found that they had discovered
+no trace of the lost pocketbook. But they seemed positively angry when
+I hinted that Ned Brooke might know more about its whereabouts than
+anyone else. They declared that they would as soon think of suspecting
+one of themselves as Ned, and altogether they seemed so offended at my
+suggestion that I held my peace and didn't irritate them by any more
+suppositions.
+
+Afterwards, in the excitement of our cousins' visit, the matter passed
+out of my mind completely. They stayed two weeks, and I was so busy
+the whole time that I never got a chance to develop that third plate
+and, in fact, I had forgotten all about it.
+
+One morning soon after they went away, I remembered the plate and
+decided to go and develop it. Cecil went with me, and we shut
+ourselves up in our den, lit our ruby lantern and began operations. I
+did not expect much of the plate, because it had been exposed and
+handled carelessly, and I thought that it might prove to be
+underexposed or light-struck. So I left Cecil to develop it while I
+prepared the fixing bath. Cecil was whistling away when suddenly he
+gave a tremendous "whew" of astonishment and sprang to his feet.
+
+"Amy, Amy, look here!" he cried.
+
+I rushed to his side and looked at the plate as he held it up in the
+rosy light. It was a splendid one, and the Carroll house came out
+clear, with the front door and the steps in full view.
+
+And there, just in the act of stepping from the threshold, was the
+figure of a boy with an old straw hat on his head and--in his
+hand--the pocketbook!
+
+He was standing with his head turned towards the corner of the house
+as if listening, with one hand holding his ragged coat open and the
+other poised in mid-air with the pocketbook, as if he were just going
+to put it in his inside pocket. The whole scene was as clear as
+noonday, and nobody with eyes in his head could have failed to
+recognize Ned Brooke.
+
+"Goodness!" I gasped. "In with it--quick!"
+
+And we doused the thing into the fixing bath and then sat down
+breathlessly and looked at each other.
+
+"I say, Amy," said Cecil, "what a sell this will be on the Carrolls!
+Ned Brooke couldn't do such a thing--oh, no! The poor injured boy at
+whom everyone has such an unlawful pick! I wonder if this will
+convince them."
+
+"Do you think they can get it all back?" I asked. "It's not likely he
+would have dared to use any of it yet."
+
+"I don't know. We'll have a try, anyhow. How long before this plate
+will be dry enough to carry down to the Carrolls as circumstantial
+evidence?"
+
+"Three hours or thereabouts," I answered, "but perhaps sooner. I'll
+take two prints off when it is ready. I wonder what the Carrolls will
+say."
+
+"It's a piece of pure luck that the plate should have turned out so
+well after the slap-dash way in which it was taken and used. I say,
+Amy, isn't this quite an adventure?"
+
+At last the plate was dry, and I printed two proofs. We wrapped them
+up carefully and marched down to Mr. Carroll's.
+
+You never saw people so overcome with astonishment as the Carrolls
+were when Cecil, with the air of a statesman unfolding the evidence of
+some dreadful conspiracy against the peace and welfare of the nation,
+produced the plate and the proofs, and held them out before them.
+
+Mr. Carroll and Cecil took the proofs and went over to the Brooke
+shanty. They found only Ned and his mother at home. At first Ned, when
+taxed with his guilt, denied it, but when Mr. Carroll confronted him
+with the proofs, he broke down in a spasm of terror and confessed all.
+His mother produced the pocketbook and the money--they had not dared
+to spend a single cent of it--and Mr. Carroll went home in triumph.
+
+Perhaps Ned Brooke ought not to have been let off so easily as he was,
+but his mother cried and pleaded, and Mr. Carroll was too kind-hearted
+to resist. So he did not punish them at all, save by utterly
+discarding the whole family and their concerns. The place got too hot
+for them after the story came out, and in less than a month all moved
+away--much to the benefit of Mapleton.
+
+
+
+
+In Spite of Myself
+
+
+My trunk was packed and I had arranged with my senior partner--I was
+the junior member of a law firm--for a month's vacation. Aunt Lucy had
+written that her husband had gone on a sea trip and she wished me to
+superintend the business of his farm and mills in his absence, if I
+could arrange to do so. She added that "Gussie" thought it was a pity
+to trouble me, and wanted to do the overseeing herself, but that
+she--Aunt Lucy--preferred to have a man at the head of affairs.
+
+I had never seen my step-cousin, Augusta Ashley, but I knew, from Aunt
+Lucy's remarks concerning her, pretty much what sort of person she
+was--just the precise kind I disliked immeasurably. I had no idea what
+her age was, but doubtless she was over thirty, tall, determined,
+aggressive, with a "faculty" for managing, a sharp, probing nose, and
+a y-formation between her eyebrows. I knew the type, and I was assured
+that the period of sojourn with my respected aunt would be one of
+strife between Miss Ashley and myself.
+
+I wrote to Aunt Lucy to expect me, made all necessary arrangements,
+and went to bid Nellie goodbye. I had made up my mind to marry Nellie.
+I had never openly avowed myself her suitor, but we were cousins, and
+had grown up together, so that I knew her well enough to be sure of my
+ground. I liked her so well that it was easy to persuade myself that I
+was in love with her. She more nearly fulfilled the requirements of my
+ideal wife than anyone I knew. She was pleasant to look upon, without
+being distractingly pretty; small and fair and womanly. She dressed
+nicely, sang and played agreeably, danced well, and had a cheerful,
+affectionate disposition. She was not alarmingly clever, had no
+"hobbies," and looked up to me as heir to all the wisdom of the
+ages--what man does not like to be thought clever and brilliant? I had
+no formidable rival, and our families were anxious for the match. I
+considered myself a lucky fellow. I felt that I would be very lonely
+without Nellie when I was away, and she admitted frankly that she
+would miss me awfully. She looked so sweet that I was on the point of
+asking her then and there to marry me. Well, fate interfered in the
+guise of a small brother, so I said goodbye and left, mentally
+comparing her to my idea of Miss Augusta Ashley, much to the latter's
+disadvantage.
+
+When I stepped from the train at a sleepy country station next day I
+was promptly waylaid by a black-eyed urchin who informed me that Mrs.
+Ashley had sent him with an express wagon for my luggage, and that
+"Miss Gussie" was waiting with the carriage at the store, pointing
+down to a small building before whose door a girl was trying to soothe
+her frightened horse.
+
+As I went down the slope towards her I noticed she was tall--quite too
+tall for my taste. I dislike women who can look into my eyes on a
+level--but I had to admit that her form was remarkably symmetrical and
+graceful. She put out her hand--it was ungloved and large, but white
+and firm, with a cool, pleasant touch--and said, with a composure akin
+to indifference, "Mr. Carslake, I presume. Mother could not come to
+meet you, so she sent me. Will you be kind enough to hold my horse for
+a few minutes? I want to get something in the store." Whereupon she
+calmly transferred the reins to me and disappeared.
+
+At the time she certainly did not impress me as pretty, yet neither
+could I call her plain. Taken separately, her features were good. Her
+nose was large and straight, the mouth also a trifle large but firm
+and red, the brow wide and white, shadowed by a straying dash of brown
+curl or two. She had a certain cool, statuesque paleness, accentuated
+by straight, fine, black brows, and her eyes were a bluish grey; but
+the pupils, as I afterward found out, had a trick of dilating into
+wells of blackness which, added to a long fringe of very dark lashes,
+made her eyes quite the most striking feature of her face. Her
+expression was open and frank, and her voice clear and musical without
+being sweet. She looked about twenty-two.
+
+At the time I did not fancy her appearance and made a mental note to
+the effect that I would never like Miss Ashley. I had no use for cool,
+businesslike women--women should have no concern with business. Nellie
+would never have troubled her dear, curly head over it.
+
+Miss Ashley came out with her arms full of packages, stowed them away
+in the carriage, got in, told me which road to take, and did not again
+speak till we were out of the village and driving along a pretty
+country lane, arched over with crimson maples and golden-brown
+beeches. The purplish haze of a sunny autumn day mellowed over the
+fields, and the bunch of golden rod at my companion's belt was akin to
+the plumed ranks along the fences. I hazarded the remark that it was a
+fine day; Miss Ashley gravely admitted that it was. Then a deep smile
+seemed to rise somewhere in her eyes and creep over her face,
+discovering a dimple here and there as it proceeded.
+
+"Don't let's talk about the weather--the subject is rather stale," she
+said. "I suppose you are wondering why on earth Mother had to drag you
+away out here. I tried to show her how foolish it was, but I didn't
+succeed. Mother thinks there must be a man at the head of affairs or
+they'll never go right. I could have taken full charge easily enough;
+I haven't been Father's 'boy' all my life for nothing. There was no
+need to take you away from your business."
+
+I protested. I said I was going to take a vacation anyway, and
+business was not pressing just then. I also hinted that, while I had
+no doubt of her capacity, she might have found the duties of
+superintendent rather arduous.
+
+"Not at all," she said, with a serenity that made me groan inwardly.
+"I like it. Father always said I was a born business manager. You'll
+find Ashley's Mills very quiet, I'm afraid. It's a sort of charmed
+Sleepy Hollow. See, there's home," as we turned a maple-blazoned
+corner and looked from the crest of one hill across to that of
+another. "Home" was a big, white, green-shuttered house buried amid a
+riot of autumn colour, with a big grove of dark green spruces at the
+back. Below them was a glimpse of a dark blue mill pond and beyond it
+long sweeps of golden-brown meadow land, sloping up till they dimmed
+in horizon mists of pearl and purple.
+
+"How pretty," I exclaimed admiringly.
+
+"Isn't it?" said Gussie proudly. "I love it." Her pupils dilated into
+dark pools, and I rather unwillingly admitted that Miss Ashley was a
+fine-looking girl.
+
+As we drove up Aunt Lucy was standing on the steps of the verandah,
+over whose white roof trailed a luxuriant creeper, its leaves tinged
+by October frosts into lovely wine reds and tawny yellows. Gussie
+sprang out, barely touching my offered hand with her fingertips.
+
+"There's Mother waiting to pounce on you and hear all the family
+news," she said, "so go and greet her like a dutiful nephew."
+
+"I must take out your horse for you first," I said politely.
+
+"Not at all," said Miss Ashley, taking the reins from my hands in a
+way not to be disputed. "I always unharness Charley myself. No one
+understands him half so well. Besides, I'm used to it. Didn't I tell
+you I'd always been Father's boy?"
+
+"I well believe it," I thought in disgust, as she led the horse over
+to the well and I went up to Aunt Lucy. Through the sitting-room
+windows I kept a watchful eye on Miss Ashley as she watered and deftly
+unharnessed Charley and led him into his stable with sundry pats on
+his nose. Then I saw no more of her till she came in to tell us tea
+was ready, and led the way out to the dining room.
+
+It was evident Miss Gussie held the reins of household government, and
+no doubt worthily. Those firm, capable white hands of hers looked as
+though they might be equal to a good many emergencies. She talked
+little, leaving the conversation to Aunt Lucy and myself, though she
+occasionally dropped in an apt word. Toward the end of the meal,
+however, she caught hold of an unfortunate opinion I had incautiously
+advanced and tore it into tatters. The result was a spirited argument,
+in which Miss Gussie held her own with such ability that I was utterly
+routed and found another grievance against her. It was very
+humiliating to be worsted by a girl--a country girl at that, who had
+passed most of her life on a farm! No doubt she was strong-minded and
+wanted to vote. I was quite prepared to believe anything of her.
+
+After tea Miss Ashley proposed a walk around the premises, in order to
+initiate me into my duties. Apart from his farm, Mr. Ashley owned
+large grist-and saw-mills and did a flourishing business, with the
+details of which Miss Gussie seemed so conversant that I lost all
+doubt of her ability to run the whole thing as she had claimed. I felt
+quite ignorant in the light of her superior knowledge, and our walk
+was enlivened by some rather too lively discussions between us. We
+walked about together, however, till the shadows of the firs by the
+mills stretched nearly across the pond and the white moon began to put
+on a silvery burnish. Then we wound up by a bitter dispute, during
+which Gussie's eyes were very black and each cheek had a round, red
+stain on it. She had a little air of triumph at having defeated me.
+
+"I have to go now and see about putting away the milk, and I dare say
+you're not sorry to be rid of me," she said, with a demureness I had
+not credited her with, "but if you come to the verandah in half an
+hour I'll bring you out a glass of new milk and some pound cake I made
+today by a recipe that's been in the family for one hundred years, and
+I hope it will choke you for all the snubs you've been giving me." She
+walked away after this amiable wish, and I stood by the pond till the
+salmon tints faded from its waters and stars began to mirror
+themselves brokenly in its ripples. The mellow air was full of sweet,
+mingled eventide sounds as I walked back to the house. Aunt Lucy was
+knitting on the verandah. Gussie brought out cake and milk and chatted
+to us while we ate, in an inconsequent girlish way, or fed bits of
+cake to a green-eyed goblin in the likeness of a black cat.
+
+She appeared in such an amiable light that I was half inclined to
+reconsider my opinion of her. When I went to my room the vase full of
+crimson leaves on my table suggested Gussie, and I repented of my
+unfriendliness for a moment--and only for a moment. Gussie and her
+mother passed through the hall below, and Aunt Lucy's soft voice
+floated up through my half-open door.
+
+"Well, how do you like your cousin, my dear?"
+
+Whereat that decided young lady promptly answered, "I think he is the
+most conceited youth I've met for some time."
+
+Pleasant, wasn't it? I thought of Nellie's meek admiration of all my
+words and ways, and got her photo out to soothe my vanity. For the
+first time it struck me that her features were somewhat insipid. The
+thought seemed like disloyalty, so I banished it and went to bed.
+
+I expected to dream of that disagreeable Gussie, but I did not, and I
+slept so soundly that it was ten o'clock the next morning before I
+woke. I sprang out of bed in dismay, dressed hastily, and ran down,
+not a little provoked at myself. Through the window I saw Gussie in
+the garden digging up some geraniums. She was enveloped in a
+clay-stained brown apron, a big flapping straw hat half hid her face,
+and she wore a pair of muddy old kid gloves. Her whole appearance was
+disreputable, and the face she turned to me as I said "Good morning"
+had a diagonal streak of clay across it. I added slovenliness to my
+already long list of her demerits.
+
+"Good afternoon, rather. Don't you know what time it is? The men were
+here three hours ago for their orders. I thought it a pity to disturb
+your peaceful dreams, so I gave them myself and sent them off."
+
+I was angrier than ever. A nice beginning I had made. And was that
+girl laughing at me?
+
+"I expected to be called in time, certainly," I said stiffly. "I am
+not accustomed to oversleep myself. I promise it will not occur
+again."
+
+My dignity was quite lost on Gussie. She peeled off her gloves
+cheerfully and said, "I suppose you'd like some breakfast. Just wait
+till I wash my hands and I'll get you some. Then if you're pining to
+be useful you can help me take up these geraniums."
+
+There was no help for it. After I had breakfasted I went, with many
+misgivings. We got on fairly well, however. Gussie was particularly
+lively and kept me too busy for argument. I quite enjoyed the time and
+we did not quarrel until nearly the last, when we fell out bitterly
+over some horticultural problem and went in to dinner in sulky
+silence. Gussie disappeared after dinner and I saw no more of her. I
+was glad of this, but after a time I began to find it a little dull.
+Even a dispute would have been livelier. I visited the mills, looked
+over the farm, and then carelessly asked Aunt Lucy where Miss Ashley
+was. Aunt Lucy replied that she had gone to visit a friend and would
+not be back till the next day.
+
+This was satisfactory, of course, highly so. What a relief it was to
+be rid of that girl with her self-assertiveness and independence. I
+said to myself that I hoped her friend would keep her for a week. I
+forgot to be disappointed that she had not when, next afternoon, I saw
+Gussie coming in at the gate with a tolerably large satchel and an
+armful of golden rod. I sauntered down to relieve her, and we had a
+sharp argument under way before we were halfway up the lane. As usual
+Gussie refused to give in that she was wrong.
+
+Her walk had brought a faint, clear tint to her cheeks and her
+rippling dusky hair had half slipped down on her neck. She said she
+had to make some cookies for tea and if I had nothing better to do I
+might go and talk to her while she mixed them. It was not a gracious
+invitation but I went, rather than be left to my own company.
+
+By the end of the week I was as much at home at Ashley Mills as if I
+had lived there all my life. Gussie and I were thrown together a good
+deal, for lack of other companions, and I saw no reason to change my
+opinion of her. She could be lively and entertaining when she chose,
+and at times she might be called beautiful. Still, I did not approve
+of her--at least I thought so, most of the time. Once in a while came
+a state of feeling which I did not quite understand.
+
+One evening I went to prayer meeting with Aunt Lucy and Gussie. I had
+not seen the minister of Ashley Mills before, though Gussie and her
+mother seemed to know him intimately. I had an idea that he was old
+and silvery-haired and benevolent-looking. So I was rather surprised
+to find him as young as myself--a tall, pale, intellectual-looking
+man, with a high, white brow and dark, earnest eyes--decidedly
+attractive.
+
+I was still more surprised when, after the service, he joined Gussie
+at the door and went down the steps with her. I felt distinctly
+ill-treated as I fell back with Aunt Lucy. There was no reason why I
+should--none; it ought to have been a relief. Rev. Carroll Martin had
+every right to see Miss Ashley home if he chose. Doubtless a girl who
+knew all there was to be known about business, farming, and milling,
+to say nothing of housekeeping and gardening, could discuss theology
+also. It was none of my business.
+
+I don't know what kept me awake so late that night. As a consequence I
+overslept myself. I had managed to redeem my reputation on this point,
+but here it was lost again. I felt cross and foolish and cantankerous
+when I went out.
+
+There was some unusual commotion at the well. It was an old-fashioned
+open one, with a chain and windlass. Aunt Lucy was peering anxiously
+down its mouth, from which a ladder was sticking. Just as I got there
+Gussie emerged from its depths with a triumphant face. Her skirt was
+muddy and draggled, her hair had tumbled down, and she held a dripping
+black cat.
+
+"Coco must have fallen into the well last night," she explained, as I
+helped her to the ground. "I missed him at milking-time, and when I
+came to the well this morning I heard the most ear-splitting yowls
+coming up from it. I couldn't think where he could possibly be, for
+the water was quite calm, until I saw he had crept into a little
+crevice in the stones on the side. So I got a ladder and went down
+after him."
+
+"You should have called me," I said sourly. "You might have killed
+yourself, going down there."
+
+"And Coco might have tumbled in and drowned while you were getting
+up," retorted Gussie. "Besides, what was the need? I could go down as
+well as you."
+
+"No doubt," I said, more sharply than I had any business to. "I don't
+dream of disputing your ability to do anything you may take it into
+your head to do. Most young ladies are not in the habit of going down
+wells, however."
+
+"Perhaps not," she rejoined, with freezing calmness. "But, as you may
+have discovered, I am not 'most young ladies.' I am myself, Augusta
+Ashley, and accountable to nobody but myself if I choose to go down
+the well every day for pure love of it."
+
+She walked off in her wet dress with her muddy cat. Gussie Ashley was
+the only girl I ever saw who could be dignified under such
+circumstances.
+
+I was in a very bad humour with myself as I went off to see about
+having the well cleaned out. I had offended Gussie and I knew she
+would not be easily appeased. Nor was she. For a week she kept me
+politely, studiously, at a distance, in spite of my most humble
+advances. Rev. Carroll was a frequent caller, ostensibly to make
+arrangements about a Sunday school they were organizing in a poor part
+of the community. Gussie and he held long conversations on this
+enthralling subject. Then Gussie went on another visit to her friend,
+and when she came back so did Rev. Carroll.
+
+One calm, hazy afternoon I was coming slowly up from the mills.
+Happening to glance at the kitchen roof, I gasped. It was on fire in
+one place. Evidently the dry shingles had caught fire from a spark.
+There was not a soul about save Gussie, Aunt Lucy, and myself. I
+dashed wildly into the kitchen, where Gussie was peeling apples.
+
+"The house is on fire," I exclaimed. Gussie dropped her knife and
+turned pale.
+
+"Don't wake Mother," was all she said, as she snatched a bucket of
+water from the table. The ladder was still lying by the well. In a
+second I had raised it to the roof and, while Gussie went up it like a
+squirrel and dashed the water on the flames, I had two more buckets
+ready for her.
+
+Fortunately the fire had made little headway, though a few minutes
+more would have given it a dangerous start. The flames hissed and died
+out as Gussie threw on the water, and in a few seconds only a small
+black hole in the shingles remained. Gussie slid down the ladder. She
+trembled in every limb, but she put out her wet hand to me with a
+faint, triumphant smile. We shook hands across the ladder with a
+cordiality never before expressed.
+
+For the next week, in spite of Rev. Carroll, I was happy when I
+thought of Gussie and miserable when I thought of Nellie. I held
+myself in some way bound to her and--was she not my ideal?
+Undoubtedly!
+
+One day I got a letter from my sister. It was long and newsy, and the
+eighth page was most interesting.
+
+"If you don't come home and look after Nellie," wrote Kate, "you'll
+soon not have her to look after. You remember that old lover of hers,
+Rod Allen? Well, he's home from the west now, immensely rich, they
+say, and his attentions to Nellie are the town talk. I think she likes
+him too. If you bury yourself any longer at Ashley Mills I won't be
+responsible for the consequences."
+
+This lifted an immense weight from my mind, but the ninth page hurled
+it back again.
+
+"You never say anything of Miss Ashley in your letters. What is she
+like--young or old, ugly or pretty, clever or dull? I met a lady
+recently who knows her and thinks she is charming. She also said Miss
+Ashley was to be married soon to Rev. Something-or-Other. Is it true?"
+
+Aye, was it? Quite likely. Kate's letter made a very miserable man of
+me. Gussie found me a dull companion that day. After several vain
+attempts to rouse me to interest she gave it up.
+
+"There's no use talking to you," she said impatiently. "I believe you
+are homesick. That letter you got this morning looked suspicious.
+Anyhow, I hope you'll get over it before I get back."
+
+"Are you going away again?" I asked.
+
+"Yes. I am going to stay a few days with Flossie." Flossie was that
+inseparable chum of hers.
+
+"You seem to spend a good deal of your time with her," I remarked
+discontentedly.
+
+Gussie opened her eyes at my tone.
+
+"Why, of course," she said. "Flossie and I have always been chums. And
+she needs me more than ever just now, for she is awfully busy. She is
+to be married next month."
+
+"Oh, I see--and you--"
+
+"I'm to be bridesmaid, of course, and we've heaps to do. Flossie
+wanted to wait until Christmas, but Mr. Martin is in a--"
+
+"Mr. Martin," I interrupted. "Is Mr. Martin going to marry your
+friend?"
+
+"Why, yes. Didn't you know? They just suit each other. There he comes
+now. He's going to drive me over, and I'm not ready. Talk to him, for
+pity's sake, while I go and dress."
+
+I never enjoyed a conversation more. Rev. Carroll Martin was a
+remarkably interesting man.
+
+Nellie married Rod Allen at Christmas and I was best man. Nellie made
+a charming little bride, and Rod fairly worshipped her. My own wedding
+did not come off until spring, as Gussie said she could not get ready
+before that.
+
+
+
+
+Kismet
+
+
+The fifth heat in the free-for-all was just over. "Lu-Lu" had won, and
+the crowd on the grand stand and the hangers-on around the track were
+cheering themselves hoarse. Clear through the noisy clamour shrilled a
+woman's cry.
+
+"Ah--I have dropped my scorecard."
+
+A man in front of her turned.
+
+"I have an extra one, madame. Will you accept it?"
+
+Her small, modishly-gloved hand closed eagerly on it before she lifted
+her eyes to his face. Both started convulsively. The man turned very
+pale, but the woman's ripe-tinted face coloured darkly.
+
+"You?" she faltered.
+
+His lips parted in the coldly-grave smile she remembered and hated.
+
+"You are not glad to see me," he said calmly, "but that, I suppose,
+was not to be expected. I did not come here to annoy you. This meeting
+is as unexpected to me as to you. I had no suspicion that for the last
+half-hour I had been standing next to my--"
+
+She interrupted him by an imperious gesture. Still clutching the
+scorecard she half-turned from him. Again he smiled, this time with a
+tinge of scorn, and shifted his eyes to the track.
+
+None of the people around them had noticed the little by-play. All
+eyes were on the track, which was being cleared for the first heat of
+another race. The free-for-all horses were being led away blanketed.
+The crowd cheered "Lu-Lu" as she went past, a shapeless oddity. The
+backers of "Mascot", the rival favourite, looked gloomy.
+
+The woman noticed nothing of all this. She was small, very pretty,
+still young, and gowned in a quite unmistakable way. She studied the
+man's profile furtively. He looked older than when she had seen him
+last--there were some silver threads gleaming in his close-clipped
+dark hair and short, pointed beard. Otherwise there was little change
+in the quiet features and somewhat stern grey eyes. She wondered if he
+had cared at all.
+
+They had not met for five years. She shut her eyes and looked in on
+her past. It all came back very vividly. She had been eighteen when
+they were married--a gay, high-spirited girl and the season's beauty.
+He was much older and a quiet, serious student. Her friends had
+wondered why she married him--sometimes she wondered herself, but she
+had loved him, or thought so.
+
+The marriage had been an unhappy one. She was fond of society and
+gaiety, he wanted quiet and seclusion. She Was impulsive and
+impatient, he deliberate and grave. The strong wills clashed. After
+two years of an unbearable sort of life they had separated--quietly,
+and without scandal of any sort. She had wanted a divorce, but he
+would not agree to that, so she had taken her own independent fortune
+and gone back to her own way of life. In the following five years she
+had succeeded in burying all remembrance well out of sight. No one
+knew if she were satisfied or not; her world was charitable to her and
+she lived a gay and quite irreproachable life. She wished that she had
+not come to the races. It was such an irritating encounter. She opened
+her eyes wearily; the dusty track, the flying horses, the gay dresses
+of the women on the grandstand, the cloudless blue sky, the brilliant
+September sunshine, the purple distances all commingled in a glare
+that made her head ache. Before it all she saw the tall figure by her
+side, his face turned from her, watching the track intently.
+
+She wondered with a vague curiosity what induced him to come to the
+races. Such things were not greatly in his line. Evidently their
+chance meeting had not disturbed him. It was a sign that he did not
+care. She sighed a little wearily and closed her eyes. When the heat
+was over he turned to her.
+
+"May I ask how you have been since--since we met last? You are looking
+extremely well. Has Vanity Fair palled in any degree?"
+
+She was angry at herself and him. Where had her careless society
+manner and well-bred composure gone? She felt weak and hysterical.
+What if she should burst into tears before the whole crowd--before
+those coldly critical grey eyes? She almost hated him.
+
+"No--why should it? I have found it very pleasant--and I have been
+well--very well. And you?"
+
+He jotted down the score carefully before he replied.
+
+"I? Oh, a book-worm and recluse always leads a placid life. I never
+cared for excitement, you know. I came down here to attend a sale of
+some rare editions, and a well-meaning friend dragged me out to see
+the races. I find it rather interesting, I must confess, much more so
+than I should have fancied. Sorry I can't stay until the end. I must
+go as soon as the free-for-all is over, if not before. I have backed
+'Mascot'; you?"
+
+"'Lu-Lu'" she answered quickly--it almost seemed defiantly. How
+horribly unreal it was--this carrying on of small talk, as if they
+were the merest of chance-met acquaintances! "She belongs to a friend
+of mine, so I am naturally interested."
+
+"She and 'Mascot' are ties now--both have won two heats. One more for
+either will decide it. This is a good day for the races. Excuse me."
+
+He leaned over and brushed a scrap of paper from her grey cloak. She
+shivered slightly.
+
+"You are cold! This stand is draughty."
+
+"I am not at all cold, thank you. What race is this?--oh! the
+three-minute one."
+
+She bent forward with assumed interest to watch the scoring. She was
+breathing heavily. There were tears in her eyes--she bit her lips
+savagely and glared at the track until they were gone.
+
+Presently he spoke again, in the low, even tone demanded by
+circumstances.
+
+"This is a curious meeting, is it not?--quite a flavor of romance!
+By-the-way, do you read as many novels as ever?"
+
+She fancied there was mockery in his tone. She remembered how very
+frivolous he used to consider her novel-reading. Besides, she resented
+the personal tinge. What right had he?
+
+"Almost as many," she answered carelessly.
+
+"I was very intolerant, wasn't I?" he said after a pause. "You thought
+so--you were right. You have been happier since you--left me?"
+
+"Yes," she said defiantly, looking straight into his eyes.
+
+"And you do not regret it?"
+
+He bent down a little. His sleeve brushed against her shoulder.
+Something in his face arrested the answer she meant to make.
+
+"I--I--did not say that," she murmured faintly.
+
+There was a burst of cheering. The free-for-all horses were being
+brought out for the sixth heat. She turned away to watch them. The
+scoring began, and seemed likely to have no end. She was tired of it
+all. It didn't matter a pin to her whether "Lu-Lu" or "Mascot" won.
+What _did_ matter! Had Vanity Fair after all been a satisfying
+exchange for love? He _had_ loved her once, and they had been happy at
+first. She had never before said, even in her own heart: "I am sorry,"
+but--suddenly, she felt his hand on her shoulder, and looked up. Their
+eyes met. He stooped and said almost in a whisper:
+
+"Will you come back to me?"
+
+"I don't know," she whispered breathlessly, as one half-fascinated.
+
+"We were both to blame--but I the most. I was too hard on you--I ought
+to have made more allowance. We are wiser now both of us. Come back
+to me--my wife."
+
+His tone was cold and his face expressionless. It was on her lips to
+cry out "No," passionately.
+
+But the slender, scholarly hand on her shoulder was trembling with the
+intensity of his repressed emotion. He _did_ care, then. A wild
+caprice flashed into her brain. She sprang up.
+
+"See," she cried, "they're off now. This heat will probably decide the
+race. If 'Lu-Lu' wins I will not go back to you, if 'Mascot' does I
+will. That is my decision."
+
+He turned paler, but bowed in assent. He knew by bitter experience how
+unchangeable her whims were, how obstinately she clung to even the
+most absurd.
+
+She leaned forward breathlessly. The crowd hung silently on the track.
+"Lu-Lu" and "Mascot" were neck and neck, getting in splendid work.
+Half-way round the course "Lu-Lu" forged half a neck ahead, and her
+backers went mad. But one woman dropped her head in her hands and
+dared look no more. One man with white face and set lips watched the
+track unswervingly.
+
+Again "Mascot" crawled up, inch by inch. They were on the home
+stretch, they were equal, the cheering broke out, then silence, then
+another terrific burst, shouts, yells and clappings--"Mascot" had won
+the free-for-all. In the front row a woman stood up, swayed and shaken
+as a leaf in the wind. She straightened her scarlet hat and readjusted
+her veil unsteadily. There was a smile on her lips and tears in her
+eyes. No one noticed her. A man beside her drew her hand through his
+arm in a quiet proprietary fashion. They left the grand stand
+together.
+
+
+
+
+Lilian's Business Venture
+
+
+Lilian Mitchell turned into the dry-goods store on Randall Street,
+just as Esther Miller and Ella Taylor came out. They responded coldly
+to her greeting and exchanged significant glances as they walked away.
+
+Lilian's pale face crimsoned. She was a tall, slender girl of about
+seventeen, and dressed in mourning. These girls had been her close
+friends once. But that was before the Mitchells had lost their money.
+Since then Lilian had been cut by many of her old chums and she felt
+it keenly.
+
+The clerks in the store were busy and Lilian sat down to wait her
+turn. Near to her two ladies were also waiting and chatting.
+
+"Helen wants me to let her have a birthday party," Mrs. Saunders was
+saying wearily. "She has been promised it so long and I hate to
+disappoint the child, but our girl left last week, and I cannot
+possibly make all the cakes and things myself. I haven't the time or
+strength, so Helen must do without her party."
+
+"Talking of girls," said Mrs. Reeves impatiently, "I am almost
+discouraged. It is so hard to get a good all-round one. The last one I
+had was so saucy I had to discharge her, and the one I have now cannot
+make decent bread. I never had good luck with bread myself either."
+
+"That is Mrs. Porter's great grievance too. It is no light task to
+bake bread for all those boarders. Have you made your jelly yet?"
+
+"No. Maria cannot make it, she says, and I detest messing with jelly.
+But I really must see to it soon."
+
+At this point a saleswoman came up to Lilian, who made her small
+purchases and went out.
+
+"There goes Lilian Mitchell," said Mrs. Reeves in an undertone. "She
+looks very pale. They say they are dreadfully poor since Henry
+Mitchell died. His affairs were in a bad condition, I am told."
+
+"I am sorry for Mrs. Mitchell," responded Mrs. Saunders. "She is such
+a sweet woman. Lilian will have to do something, I suppose, and there
+is so little chance for a girl here."
+
+Lilian, walking down the street, was wearily turning over in her mind
+the problems of her young existence. Her father had died the preceding
+spring. He had been a supposedly prosperous merchant; the Mitchells
+had always lived well, and Lilian was a petted and only child. Then
+came the shock of Henry Mitchell's sudden death and of financial ruin.
+His affairs were found to be hopelessly involved; when all the debts
+were paid there was left only the merest pittance--barely enough for
+house-rent--for Lilian and her mother to live upon. They had moved
+into a tiny cottage in an unfashionable locality, and during the
+summer Lilian had tried hard to think of something to do. Mrs.
+Mitchell was a delicate woman, and the burden of their situation fell
+on Lilian's young shoulders.
+
+There seemed to be no place for her. She could not teach and had no
+particular talent in any line. There was no opening for her in
+Willington, which was a rather sleepy little place, and Lilian was
+almost in despair.
+
+"There really doesn't seem to be any real place in the world for me,
+Mother," she said rather dolefully at the supper table. "I've no
+talent at all; it is dreadful to have been born without one. And yet I
+_must_ do something, and do it soon."
+
+And Lilian, after she had washed up the tea dishes, went upstairs and
+had a good cry.
+
+But the darkest hour, so the proverb goes, is just before the dawn,
+and after Lilian had had her cry out and was sitting at her window in
+the dusk, watching a thin new moon shining over the trees down the
+street, her inspiration came to her. A minute later she whirled into
+the tiny sitting-room where her mother was sewing.
+
+"Mother, our fortune is made! I have an idea!"
+
+"Don't lose it, then," said Mrs. Mitchell with a smile. "What is it,
+my dear?"
+
+Lilian sobered herself, sat down by her mother's side, and proceeded
+to recount the conversation she had heard in the store that afternoon.
+
+"Now, Mother, this is where my brilliant idea comes in. You have often
+told me I am a born cook and I always have good luck. Now, tomorrow
+morning I shall go to Mrs. Saunders and offer to furnish all the good
+things for Helen's birthday party, and then I'll ask Mrs. Reeves and
+Mrs. Porter if I may make their bread for them. That will do for a
+beginning, I like cooking, you know, and I believe that in time I can
+work up a good business."
+
+"It seems to be a good idea," said Mrs. Mitchell thoughtfully, "and I
+am willing that you should try. But have you thought it all out
+carefully? There will be many difficulties."
+
+"I know. I don't expect smooth sailing right along, and perhaps I'll
+fail altogether; but somehow I don't believe I will."
+
+"A great many of your old friends will think--"
+
+"Oh, yes; I know _that_ too, but I am not going to mind it, Mother. I
+don't think there is any disgrace in working for my living. I'm going
+to do my best and not care what people say."
+
+Early next morning Lilian started out. She had carefully thought over
+the details of her small venture, considered ways and means, and
+decided on the most advisable course. She would not attempt too much,
+and she felt sure of success.
+
+To secure competent servants was one of the problems of Willington
+people. At Drayton, a large neighbouring town, were several factories,
+and into these all the working girls from Willington had crowded,
+leaving very few who were willing to go out to service. Many of those
+who did were poor cooks, and Lilian shrewdly suspected that many a
+harassed housekeeper in the village would be glad to avail herself of
+the new enterprise.
+
+Lilian was, as she had said of herself, "a born cook." This was her
+capital, and she meant to make the most of it. Mrs. Saunders listened
+to her businesslike details with surprise and delight.
+
+"It is the very thing," she said. "Helen is so eager for that party,
+but I could not undertake it myself. Her birthday is Friday. Can you
+have everything ready by then?"
+
+"Yes, I think so," said Lilian briskly, producing her notebook.
+"Please give me the list of what you want and I will do my best."
+
+From Mrs. Saunders she went to Mrs. Reeves and found a customer as
+soon as she had told the reason of her call. "I'll furnish all the
+bread and rolls you need," she said, "and they will be good, too. Now,
+about your jelly. I can make good jelly, and I'll be very glad to make
+yours."
+
+When she left, Lilian had an order for two dozen glasses of apple
+jelly, as well as a standing one for bread and rolls. Mrs. Porter was
+next visited and grasped eagerly at the opportunity.
+
+"I know your bread will be good," she said, "and you may count on me
+as a regular customer."
+
+Lilian thought she had enough on hand for a first attempt and went
+home satisfied. On her way she called at the grocery store with an
+order that surprised Mr. Hooper. When she told him of her plan he
+opened his eyes.
+
+"I must tell my wife about that. She isn't strong and she doesn't like
+cooking."
+
+After dinner Lilian went to work, enveloped in a big apron, and
+whipped eggs, stoned raisins, stirred, concocted, and baked until
+dark. When bedtime came she was so tired that she could hardly crawl
+upstairs; but she felt happy too, for the day had been a successful
+one.
+
+And so also were the days and weeks and months that followed. It was
+hard and constant work, but it brought its reward. Lilian had not
+promised more than she could perform, and her customers were
+satisfied. In a short time she found herself with a regular and
+growing business on her hands, for new customers were gradually added
+and always came to stay.
+
+People who gave parties found it very convenient to follow Mrs.
+Saunders's example and order their supplies from Lilian. She had a
+very busy winter and, of course, it was not all plain sailing. She had
+many difficulties to contend with. Sometimes days came on which
+everything seemed to go wrong--when the stove smoked or the oven
+wouldn't heat properly, when cakes fell flat and bread was sour and
+pies behaved as only totally depraved pies can, when she burned her
+fingers and felt like giving up in despair.
+
+Then, again, she found herself cut by several of her old
+acquaintances. But she was too sensible to worry much over this. The
+friends really worth having were still hers, her mother's face had
+lost its look of care, and her business was prospering. She was
+hopeful and wide awake, kept her wits about her and looked out for
+hints, and learned to laugh over her failures.
+
+During the winter she and her mother had managed to do most of the
+work themselves, hiring little Mary Robinson next door on especially
+busy days, and now and then calling in the assistance of Jimmy Bowen
+and his hand sled to carry orders to customers. But when spring came
+Lilian prepared to open up her summer campaign on a much larger scale.
+Mary Robinson was hired for the season, and John Perkins was engaged
+to act as carrier with his express wagon. A summer kitchen was boarded
+in in the backyard, and a new range bought; Lilian began operations
+with a striking advertisement in the Willington _News_ and an
+attractive circular sent around to all her patrons. Picnics and summer
+weddings were frequent. In bread and rolls her trade was brisk and
+constant. She also took orders for pickles, preserves, and jellies,
+and this became such a flourishing branch that a second assistant had
+to be hired.
+
+It was a cardinal rule with Lilian never to send out any article that
+was not up to her standard. She bore the loss of her failures, and
+sometimes stayed up half of the night to fill an order on time.
+"Prompt and perfect" was her motto.
+
+The long hot summer days were very trying, and sometimes she got very
+tired of it all. But when on the anniversary of her first venture she
+made up her accounts she was well pleased. To be sure, she had not
+made a fortune; but she had paid all their expenses, had a hundred
+dollars clear, and had laid the solid foundations of a profitable
+business.
+
+"Mother," she said jubilantly, as she wiped a dab of flour from her
+nose and proceeded to concoct the icing for Blanche Remington's
+wedding cake, "don't you think my business venture has been a decided
+success?"
+
+Mrs. Mitchell surveyed her busy daughter with a motherly smile. "Yes,
+I think it has," she said.
+
+
+
+
+Miriam's Lover
+
+
+I had been reading a ghost story to Mrs. Sefton, and I laid it down at
+the end with a little shrug of contempt.
+
+"What utter nonsense!" I said.
+
+Mrs. Sefton nodded abstractedly above her fancywork.
+
+"That is. It is a very commonplace story indeed. I don't believe the
+spirits of the departed trouble themselves to revisit the glimpses of
+the moon for the purpose of frightening honest mortals--or even for
+the sake of hanging around the favourite haunts of their existence in
+the flesh. If they ever appear, it must be for a better reason than
+that."
+
+"You don't surely think that they ever do appear?" I said
+incredulously.
+
+"We have no proof that they do not, my dear."
+
+"Surely, Mary," I exclaimed, "you don't mean to say that you believe
+people ever do or can see spirits--ghosts, as the word goes?"
+
+"I didn't say I believed it. I never saw anything of the sort. I
+neither believe nor disbelieve. But you know queer things do happen at
+times--things you can't account for. At least, people who you know
+wouldn't lie say so. Of course, they may be mistaken. And I don't
+think that everybody can see spirits either, provided they are to be
+seen. It requires people of a certain organization--with a spiritual
+eye, as it were. We haven't all got that--in fact, I think very few of
+us have. I dare say you think I'm talking nonsense."
+
+"Well, yes, I think you are. You really surprise me, Mary. I always
+thought you the least likely person in the world to take up with such
+ideas. Something must have come under your observation to develop such
+theories in your practical head. Tell me what it was."
+
+"To what purpose? You would remain as sceptical as ever."
+
+"Possibly not. Try me; I may be convinced."
+
+"No," returned Mrs. Sefton calmly. "Nobody ever is convinced by
+hearsay. When a person has once seen a spirit--or thinks he has--he
+thenceforth believes it. And when somebody else is intimately
+associated with that person and knows all the circumstances--well, he
+admits the possibility, at least. That is my position. But by the time
+it gets to the third person--the outsider--it loses power. Besides, in
+this particular instance the story isn't very exciting. But then--it's
+true."
+
+"You have excited my curiosity. You must tell me the story."
+
+"Well, first tell me what you think of this. Suppose two people, both
+sensitively organized individuals, loved each other with a love
+stronger than life. If they were apart, do you think it might be
+possible for their souls to communicate with each other in some
+inexplicable way? And if anything happened to one, don't you think
+that that one could and would let the spirit of the other know?"
+
+"You're getting into too deep waters for me, Mary," I said, shaking my
+head. "I'm not an authority on telepathy, or whatever you call it. But
+I've no belief in such theories. In fact, I think they are all
+nonsense. I'm sure you must think so too in your rational moments."
+
+"I dare say it is all nonsense," said Mrs. Sefton slowly, "but if you
+had lived a whole year in the same house with Miriam Gordon, you would
+have been tainted too. Not that she had 'theories'--at least, she
+never aired them if she had. But there was simply something about the
+girl herself that gave a person strange impressions. When I first met
+her I had the most uncanny feeling that she was all spirit--soul--what
+you will! no flesh, anyhow. That feeling wore off after a while, but
+she never seemed like other people to me.
+
+"She was Mr. Sefton's niece. Her father had died when she was a child.
+When Miriam was twenty her mother had married a second time and went
+to Europe with her husband. Miriam came to live with us while they
+were away. Upon their return she was herself to be married.
+
+"I had never seen Miriam before. Her arrival was unexpected, and I was
+absent from home when she came. I returned in the evening, and when I
+saw her first she was standing under the chandelier in the drawing
+room. Talk about spirits! For five seconds I thought I had seen one.
+
+"Miriam was a beauty. I had known that before, though I think I
+hardly expected to see such wonderful loveliness. She was tall and
+extremely graceful, dark--at least her hair was dark, but her skin was
+wonderfully fair and clear. Her hair was gathered away from her face,
+and she had a high, pure, white forehead, and the straightest, finest,
+blackest brows. Her face was oval, with very large and dark eyes.
+
+"I soon realized that Miriam was in some mysterious fashion different
+from other people. I think everyone who met her felt the same way. Yet
+it was a feeling hard to define. For my own part I simply felt as if
+she belonged to another world, and that part of the time she--her
+soul, you know--was back there again.
+
+"You must not suppose that Miriam was a disagreeable person to have in
+the house. On the contrary, it was the very reverse. Everybody liked
+her. She was one of the sweetest, most winsome girls I ever knew, and
+I soon grew to love her dearly. As for what Dick called her 'little
+queernesses'--well, we got used to them in time.
+
+"Miriam was engaged, as I have told you, to a young Harvard man named
+Sidney Claxton. I knew she loved him very deeply. When she showed me
+his photograph, I liked his appearance and said so. Then I made some
+teasing remark about her love-letters--just for a joke, you know.
+Miriam looked at me with an odd little smile and said quickly:
+
+"'Sidney and I never write to each other.'
+
+"'Why, Miriam!' I exclaimed in astonishment. 'Do you mean to tell me
+you never hear from him at all?'
+
+"'No, I did not say that. I hear from him every day--every hour. We
+do not need to write letters. There are better means of communication
+between two souls that are in perfect accord with each other.'
+
+"'Miriam, you uncanny creature, what do you mean?' I asked.
+
+"But Miriam only gave another queer smile and made no answer at all.
+Whatever her beliefs or theories were, she would never discuss them.
+
+"She had a habit of dropping into abstracted reveries at any time or
+place. No matter where she was, this, whatever it was, would come over
+her. She would sit there, perhaps in the centre of a gay crowd, and
+gaze right out into space, not hearing or seeing a single thing that
+went on around her.
+
+"I remember one day in particular; we were sewing in my room. I looked
+up and saw that Miriam's work had dropped on her knee and she was
+leaning forward, her lips apart, her eyes gazing upward with an
+unearthly expression.
+
+"'Don't look like that, Miriam!' I said, with a little shiver. 'You
+seem to be looking at something a thousand miles away!'
+
+"Miriam came out of her trance or reverie and said, with a little
+laugh:
+
+"'How do you know but that I was?'
+
+"She bent her head for a minute or two. Then she lifted it again and
+looked at me with a sudden contraction of her level brows that
+betokened vexation.
+
+"'I wish you hadn't spoken to me just then,' she said. 'You
+interrupted the message I was receiving. I shall not get it at all
+now.'
+
+"'Miriam,' I implored. 'I so wish my dear girl, that you wouldn't talk
+so. It makes people think there is something queer about you. Who in
+the world was sending you a message, as you call it?'
+
+"'Sidney,' said Miriam simply.
+
+"'Nonsense!'
+
+"'You think it is nonsense because you don't understand it,' was her
+calm response.
+
+"I recall another event was when some caller dropped in and we had
+drifted into a discussion about ghosts and the like--and I've no doubt
+we all talked some delicious nonsense. Miriam said nothing at the
+time, but when we were alone I asked her what she thought of it.
+
+"'I thought you were all merely talking against time,' she retorted
+evasively.
+
+"'But, Miriam, do you really think it is possible for ghosts--'
+
+"'I detest that word!'
+
+"'Well, spirits then--to return after death, or to appear to anyone
+apart from the flesh?'
+
+"'I will tell you what I know. If anything were to happen to
+Sidney--if he were to die or be killed--he would come to me himself
+and tell me.'
+
+"One day Miriam came down to lunch looking pale and worried. After
+Dick went out, I asked her if anything were wrong.
+
+"'Something has happened to Sidney,' she replied, 'some painful
+accident--I don't know what.'
+
+"'How do you know?' I cried. Then, as she looked at me strangely, I
+added hastily, 'You haven't been receiving any more unearthly
+messages, have you? Surely, Miriam, you are not so foolish as to
+really believe in that!'
+
+"'I know,' she answered quickly. 'Belief or disbelief has nothing to
+do with it. Yes, I have had a message. I know that some accident has
+happened to Sidney--painful and inconvenient but not particularly
+dangerous. I do not know what it is. Sidney will write me that. He
+writes when it is absolutely necessary.'
+
+"'Aerial communication isn't perfected yet then?' I said
+mischievously. But, observing how really worried she seemed, I added,
+'Don't fret, Miriam. You may be mistaken.'
+
+"Well, two days afterwards she got a note from her lover--the first I
+had ever known her to receive--in which he said he had been thrown
+from his horse and had broken his left arm. It had happened the very
+morning Miriam received her message.
+
+"Miriam had been with us about eight months when one day she came into
+my room hurriedly. She was very pale.
+
+"'Sidney is ill--dangerously ill. What shall I do?'
+
+"I knew she must have had another of those abominable messages--or
+thought she had--and really, remembering the incident of the broken
+arm, I couldn't feel as sceptical as I pretended to. I tried to cheer
+her, but did not succeed. Two hours later she had a telegram from her
+lover's college chum, saying that Mr. Claxton was dangerously ill with
+typhoid fever.
+
+"I was quite alarmed about Miriam in the days that followed. She
+grieved and fretted continually. One of her troubles was that she
+received no more messages; she said it was because Sidney was too ill
+to send them. Anyhow, she had to content herself with the means of
+communication used by ordinary mortals.
+
+"Sidney's mother, who had gone to nurse him, wrote every day, and at
+last good news came. The crisis was over and the doctor in attendance
+thought Sidney would recover. Miriam seemed like a new creature then,
+and rapidly recovered her spirits.
+
+"For a week reports continued favourable. One night we went to the
+opera to hear a celebrated prima donna. When we returned home Miriam
+and I were sitting in her room, chatting over the events of the
+evening.
+
+"Suddenly she sat straight up with a sort of convulsive shudder, and
+at the same time--you may laugh if you like--the most horrible feeling
+came over me. I didn't see anything, but I just felt that there was
+something or someone in the room besides ourselves.
+
+"Miriam was gazing straight before her. She rose to her feet and held
+out her hands.
+
+"'Sidney!' she said.
+
+"Then she fell to the floor in a dead faint.
+
+"I screamed for Dick, rang the bell and rushed to her.
+
+"In a few minutes the whole household was aroused, and Dick was off
+posthaste for the doctor, for we could not revive Miriam from her
+death-like swoon. She seemed as one dead. We worked over her for
+hours. She would come out of her faint for a moment, give us an
+unknowing stare and go shudderingly off again.
+
+"The doctor talked of some fearful shock, but I kept my own counsel.
+At dawn Miriam came back to life at last. When she and I were left
+alone, she turned to me.
+
+"'Sidney is dead,' she said quietly. 'I saw him--just before I
+fainted. I looked up, and he was standing between me and you. He had
+come to say farewell.'
+
+"What could I say? Almost while we were talking a telegram came. He
+was dead--he had died at the very hour at which Miriam had seen him."
+
+Mrs. Sefton paused, and the lunch bell rang.
+
+"What do you think of it?" she queried as we rose.
+
+"Honestly, I don't know what I think of it," I answered frankly.
+
+
+
+
+Miss Calista's Peppermint Bottle
+
+
+Miss Calista was perplexed. Her nephew, Caleb Cramp, who had been her
+right-hand man for years and whom she had got well broken into her
+ways, had gone to the Klondike, leaving her to fill his place with the
+next best man; but the next best man was slow to appear, and meanwhile
+Miss Calista was looking about her warily. She could afford to wait a
+while, for the crop was all in and the fall ploughing done, so that
+the need of a successor to Caleb was not as pressing as it might
+otherwise have been. There was no lack of applicants, such as they
+were. Miss Calista was known to be a kind and generous mistress,
+although she had her "ways," and insisted calmly and immovably upon
+wholehearted compliance with them. She had a small, well-cultivated
+farm and a comfortable house, and her hired men lived in clover. Caleb
+Cramp had been perfection after his kind, and Miss Calista did not
+expect to find his equal. Nevertheless, she set up a certain standard
+of requirements; and although three weeks, during which Miss Calista
+had been obliged to put up with the immature services of a neighbour's
+boy, had elapsed since Caleb's departure, no one had as yet stepped
+into his vacant and coveted shoes.
+
+Certainly Miss Calista was somewhat hard to please, but she was not
+thinking of herself as she sat by her front window in the chilly
+November twilight. Instead, she was musing on the degeneration of
+hired men, and reflecting that it was high time the wheat was
+thrashed, the house banked, and sundry other duties attended to.
+
+Ches Maybin had been up that afternoon to negotiate for the vacant
+place, and had offered to give satisfaction for smaller wages than
+Miss Calista had ever paid. But he had met with a brusque refusal,
+scarcely as civil as Miss Calista had bestowed on drunken Jake Stinson
+from the Morrisvale Road.
+
+Not that Miss Calista had any particular prejudice against Ches
+Maybin, or knew anything positively to his discredit. She was simply
+unconsciously following the example of a world that exerts itself to
+keep a man down when he is down and prevent all chance of his rising.
+Nothing succeeds like success, and the converse of this is likewise
+true--that nothing fails like failure. There was not a person in
+Cooperstown who would not have heartily endorsed Miss Calista's
+refusal.
+
+Ches Maybin was only eighteen, although he looked several years older,
+and although no flagrant misdoing had ever been proved against him,
+suspicion of such was not wanting. He came of a bad stock, people said
+sagely, adding that what was bred in the bone was bound to come out
+in the flesh. His father, old Sam Maybin, had been a shiftless and
+tricky rascal, as everybody knew, and had ended his days in the
+poorhouse. Ches's mother had died when he was a baby, and he had come
+up somehow, in a hand-to-mouth fashion, with all the cloud of heredity
+hanging over him. He was always looked at askance, and when any
+mischief came to light in the village, it was generally fastened on
+him as a convenient and handy scapegoat. He was considered sulky and
+lazy, and the local prophets united in predicting a bad end for him
+sooner or later; and, moreover, diligently endeavoured by their
+general treatment of him to put him in a fair way to fulfil their
+predictions. Miss Calista, when she had shut Chester Maybin out into
+the chill gloom of the November dusk, dismissed him from her thoughts.
+There were other things of more moment to her just then than old Sam
+Maybin's hopeful son.
+
+There was nobody in the house but herself, and although this was
+neither alarming nor unusual, it was unusual--and Miss Calista
+considered it alarming--that the sum of five hundred dollars should at
+that very moment be in the upper right-hand drawer of the sideboard,
+which sum had been up to the previous day safe in the coffers of the
+Millageville bank. But certain unfavourable rumours were in course of
+circulation about that same institution, and Miss Calista, who was
+nothing if not prudent, had gone to the bank that very morning and
+withdrawn her deposit. She intended to go over to Kerrytown the very
+next day and deposit it in the Savings Bank there. Not another day
+would she keep it in the house, and, indeed, it worried her to think
+she must keep it even for the night, as she had told Mrs. Galloway
+that afternoon during a neighbourly back-yard chat.
+
+"Not but what it's safe enough," she said, "for not a soul but you
+knows I've got it. But I'm not used to have so much by me, and there
+are always tramps going round. It worries me somehow. I wouldn't give
+it a thought if Caleb was here. I s'pose being all alone makes me
+nervous."
+
+Miss Calista was still rather nervous when she went to bed that night,
+but she was a woman of sound sense and was determined not to give way
+to foolish fears. She locked doors and windows carefully, as was her
+habit, and saw that the fastenings were good and secure. The one on
+the dining-room window, looking out on the back yard, wasn't; in fact,
+it was broken altogether; but, as Miss Calista told herself, it had
+been broken just so for the last six years, and nobody had ever tried
+to get in at it yet, and it wasn't likely anyone would begin tonight.
+
+Miss Calista went to bed and, despite her worry, slept soon and
+soundly. It was well on past midnight when she suddenly wakened and
+sat bolt upright in bed. She was not accustomed to waken in the night,
+and she had the impression of having been awakened by some noise. She
+listened breathlessly. Her room was directly over the dining-room, and
+an empty stovepipe hole opened up through the ceiling of the latter at
+the head of her bed.
+
+There was no mistake about it. Something or some person was moving
+about stealthily in the room below. It wasn't the cat--Miss Calista
+had shut him in the woodshed before she went to bed, and he couldn't
+possibly get out. It must certainly be a beggar or tramp of some
+description.
+
+Miss Calista might be given over to nervousness in regard to imaginary
+thieves, but in the presence of real danger she was cool and
+self-reliant. As noiselessly and swiftly as any burglar himself, Miss
+Calista slipped out of bed and into her clothes. Then she tip-toed out
+into the hall. The late moonlight, streaming in through the hall
+windows, was quite enough illumination for her purpose, and she got
+downstairs and was fairly in the open doorway of the dining-room
+before a sound betrayed her presence.
+
+Standing at the sideboard, hastily ransacking the neat contents of an
+open drawer, stood a man's figure, dimly visible in the moonlight
+gloom. As Miss Calista's grim form appeared in the doorway, the
+midnight marauder turned with a start and then, with an inarticulate
+cry, sprang, not at the courageous lady, but at the open window behind
+him.
+
+Miss Calista, realizing with a flash of comprehension that he was
+escaping her, had a woman-like impulse to get a blow in anyhow; she
+grasped and hurled at her unceremonious caller the first thing that
+came to hand--a bottle of peppermint essence that was standing on the
+sideboard.
+
+The missile hit the escaping thief squarely on the shoulder as he
+sprang out of the window, and the fragments of glass came clattering
+down on the sill. The next moment Miss Calista found herself alone,
+standing by the sideboard in a half-dazed fashion, for the whole thing
+had passed with such lightning-like rapidity that it almost seemed as
+if it were the dissolving end of a bad dream. But the open drawer and
+the window, where the bits of glass were glistening in the moonlight,
+were no dream. Miss Calista recovered herself speedily, closed the
+window, lit the lamp, gathered up the broken glass, and set up the
+chairs which the would-be thief had upset in his exit. An examination
+of the sideboard showed the precious five hundred safe and sound in an
+undisturbed drawer.
+
+Miss Calista kept grim watch and ward there until morning, and thought
+the matter over exhaustively. In the end she resolved to keep her own
+counsel. She had no clue whatever to the thief's whereabouts or
+identity, and no good would come of making a fuss, which might only
+end in throwing suspicion on someone who might be quite innocent.
+
+When the morning came Miss Calista lost no time in setting out for
+Kerrytown, where the money was soon safely deposited in the bank. She
+heaved a sigh of relief when she left the building.
+
+I feel as if I could enjoy life once more, she said to herself.
+Goodness me, if I'd had to keep that money by me for a week itself,
+I'd have been a raving lunatic by the end of it.
+
+Miss Calista had shopping to do and friends to visit in town, so that
+the dull autumn day was well nigh spent when she finally got back to
+Cooperstown and paused at the corner store to get a bundle of matches.
+
+The store was full of men, smoking and chatting around the fire, and
+Miss Calista, whose pet abomination was tobacco smoke, was not at all
+minded to wait any longer than she could help. But Abiram Fell was
+attending to a previous customer, and Miss Calista sat grimly down by
+the counter to wait her turn.
+
+The door opened, letting in a swirl of raw November evening wind and
+Ches Maybin. He nodded sullenly to Mr. Fell and passed down the store
+to mutter a message to a man at the further end.
+
+Miss Calista lifted her head as he passed and sniffed the air as a
+charger who scents battle. The smell of tobacco was strong, and so was
+that of the open boxes of dried herring on the counter, but plainly,
+above all the commingled odours of a country grocery, Miss Calista
+caught a whiff of peppermint, so strong as to leave no doubt of its
+origin. There had been no hint of it before Ches Maybin's entrance.
+
+The latter did not wait long. He was out and striding along the
+shadowy road when Miss Calista left the store and drove smartly after
+him. It never took Miss Calista long to make up her mind about
+anything, and she had weighed and passed judgement on Ches Maybin's
+case while Mr. Fell was doing up her matches.
+
+The lad glanced up furtively as she checked her fat grey pony beside
+him.
+
+"Good evening, Chester," she said with brisk kindness. "I can give you
+a lift, if you are going my way. Jump in, quick--Dapple is a little
+restless."
+
+A wave of crimson, duskily perceptible under his sunburned skin,
+surged over Ches Maybin's face. It almost seemed as if he were going
+to blurt out a blunt refusal. But Miss Calista's face was so guileless
+and her tone so friendly, that he thought better of it and sprang in
+beside her, and Dapple broke into an impatient trot down the long
+hill lined with its bare, wind-writhen maples.
+
+After a few minutes' silence Miss Calista turned to her moody
+companion.
+
+"Chester," she said, as tranquilly as if about to ask him the most
+ordinary question in the world, "why did you climb into my house last
+night and try to steal my money?"
+
+Ches Maybin started convulsively, as if he meant to spring from the
+buggy at once, but Miss Calista's hand was on his arm in a grasp none
+the less firm because of its gentleness, and there was a warning gleam
+in her grey eyes.
+
+"It won't mend matters trying to get clear of me, Chester. I know it
+was you and I want an answer--a truthful one, mind you--to my
+question. I am your friend, and I am not going to harm you if you tell
+me the truth."
+
+Her clear and incisive gaze met and held irresistibly the boy's
+wavering one. The sullen obstinacy of his face relaxed.
+
+"Well," he muttered finally, "I was just desperate, that's why. I've
+never done anything real bad in my life before, but people have always
+been down on me. I'm blamed for everything, and nobody wants anything
+to do with me. I'm willing to work, but I can't get a thing to do. I'm
+in rags and I haven't a cent, and winter's coming on. I heard you
+telling Mrs. Galloway yesterday about the money. I was behind the fir
+hedge and you didn't see me. I went away and planned it all out. I'd
+get in some way--and I meant to use the money to get away out west as
+far from here as I could, and begin life there, where nobody knew me,
+and where I'd have some sort of a chance. I've never had any here.
+You can put me in jail now, if you like--they'll feed and clothe me
+there, anyhow, and I'll be on a level with the rest."
+
+The boy had blurted it all out sullenly and half-chokingly. A world of
+rebellion and protest against the fate that had always dragged him
+down was couched in his voice.
+
+Miss Calista drew Dapple to a standstill before her gate.
+
+"I'm not going to send you to jail, Chester. I believe you've told me
+the truth. Yesterday you wanted me to give you Caleb's place and I
+refused. Well, I offer it to you now. If you'll come, I'll hire you,
+and give you as good wages as I gave him."
+
+Ches Maybin looked incredulous.
+
+"Miss Calista, you can't mean it."
+
+"I do mean it, every word. You say you have never had a chance. Well,
+I am going to give you one--a chance to get on the right road and make
+a man of yourself. Nobody shall ever know about last night's doings
+from me, and I'll make it my business to forget them if you deserve
+it. What do you say?"
+
+Ches lifted his head and looked her squarely in the face.
+
+"I'll come," he said huskily. "It ain't no use to try and thank you,
+Miss Calista. But I'll live my thanks."
+
+And he did. The good people of Cooperstown held up their hands in
+horror when they heard that Miss Calista had hired Ches Maybin, and
+prophesied that the deluded woman would live to repent her rash step.
+But not all prophecies come true. Miss Calista smiled serenely and
+kept on her own misguided way. And Ches Maybin proved so efficient
+and steady that the arrangement was continued, and in due time people
+outlived their old suspicions and came to regard him as a thoroughly
+smart and trustworthy young man.
+
+"Miss Calista has made a man of Ches Maybin," said the oracles. "He
+ought to be very grateful to her."
+
+And he was. But only he and Miss Calista and the peppermint bottle
+ever knew the precise extent of his gratitude, and they never told.
+
+
+
+
+The Jest That Failed
+
+
+"I think it is simply a disgrace to have a person like that in our
+class," said Edna Hayden in an injured tone.
+
+"And she doesn't seem a bit ashamed of it, either," said Agnes
+Walters.
+
+"Rather proud of it, I should say," returned her roommate, spitefully.
+"It seems to me that if I were so poor that I had to 'room' myself and
+dress as dowdily as she does that I really couldn't look anybody in
+the face. What must the boys think of her? And if it wasn't for her
+being in it, our class would be the smartest and dressiest in the
+college--even those top-lofty senior girls admit that."
+
+"It's a shame," said Agnes, conclusively. "But she needn't expect to
+associate with our set. I, for one, won't have anything to do with
+her."
+
+"Nor I. I think it is time she should be taught her place. If we could
+only manage to inflict some decided snub on her, she might take the
+hint and give up trying to poke herself in where she doesn't belong.
+The idea of her consenting to be elected on the freshmen executive!
+But she seems impervious to snubs."
+
+"Edna, let's play a joke on her. It will serve her right. Let us send
+an invitation in somebody's name to the senior 'prom.'"
+
+"The very thing! And sign Sidney Hill's name to it. He's the
+handsomest and richest fellows at Payzant, and belongs to one of the
+best families in town, and he's awfully fastidious besides. No doubt
+she will feel immensely flattered and, of course, she'll accept. Just
+think how silly she'll feel when she finds out he never sent it. Let's
+write it now, and send it at once. There is no time to lose, for the
+'prom' is on Thursday night."
+
+The freshmen co-eds at Payzant College did not like Grace Seeley--that
+is to say, the majority of them. They were a decidedly snobbish class
+that year. No one could deny that Grace was clever, but she was poor,
+dressed very plainly--"dowdily," the girls said--and "roomed" herself,
+that phrase meaning that she rented a little unfurnished room and
+cooked her own meals over an oil stove.
+
+The "senior prom," as it was called, was the annual reception which
+the senior class gave in the middle of every autumn term. It was the
+smartest and gayest of all the college functions, and a Payzant co-ed
+who received an invitation to it counted herself fortunate. The senior
+girls were included as a matter of course, but a junior, soph, or
+freshie could not go unless one of the senior boys invited her.
+
+Grace Seeley was studying Greek in her tiny room that afternoon when
+the invitation was brought to her. It was scrupulously orthodox in
+appearance and form, and Grace never doubted that it was genuine,
+although she felt much surprised that Sidney Hill, the leader of his
+class and the foremost figure in all college sports and societies,
+should have asked her to go with him to the senior prom.
+
+But she was girlishly pleased at the prospect. She was as fond of a
+good time as any other girl, and she had secretly wished very much
+that she could go to the brilliant and much talked about senior prom.
+
+Grace was quite unaware of her own unpopularity among her class
+co-eds, although she thought it was very hard to get acquainted with
+them. Without any false pride herself, and of a frank, independent
+nature, it never occurred to her that the other Payzant freshies could
+look down on her because she was poor, or resent her presence among
+them because she dressed plainly.
+
+She straightway wrote a note of acceptance to Sidney Hill, and that
+young man naturally felt much mystified when he opened and read it in
+the college library next morning.
+
+"Grace Seeley," he pondered. "That's the jolly girl with the brown
+eyes that I met at the philomathic the other night. She thanks me for
+my invitation to the senior prom, and accepts with pleasure. Why, I
+certainly never invited her or anyone else to go with me to the senior
+prom. There must be some mistake."
+
+Grace passed him at this moment on her way to the Latin classroom. She
+bowed and smiled in a friendly fashion and Sidney Hill felt decidedly
+uncomfortable. What was he to do? He did not like to think of putting
+Miss Seeley in a false position because somebody had sent her an
+invitation in his name.
+
+"I suppose it is some cad who has a spite at me that has done it," he
+reflected, "but if so I'll spoil his game. I'll take Miss Seeley to
+the prom as if I had never intended doing anything else. She shan't be
+humiliated just because there is someone at Payzant who would stoop to
+that sort of thing."
+
+So he walked up the hall with Grace and expressed his pleasure at her
+acceptance, and on the evening of the prom he sent her a bouquet of
+white carnations, whose spicy fragrance reminded her of her own little
+garden at home. Grace thought it extremely nice of him, and dressed in
+a flutter of pleasant anticipation.
+
+Her gown was a very simple one of sheer white organdie, and was the
+only evening dress she had. She knew there would be many smarter
+dresses at the reception, but the knowledge did not disturb her
+sensible head in the least.
+
+She fingered the dainty white frills lovingly as she remembered the
+sunny summer days at home in the little sewing-room, where cherry
+boughs poked their blossoms in at the window, when her mother and
+sisters had helped her to make it, with laughing prophesies and
+speculations as to its first appearance. Into seam and puff and frill
+many girlish hopes and dreams had been sewn, and they all came back to
+Grace as she put it on, and helped to surround her with an atmosphere
+of happiness.
+
+When she was ready she picked up her bouquet and looked herself over
+in the mirror, from the top of her curly head to the tips of her
+white shoes, with a little nod of satisfaction. Grace was not exactly
+pretty, but she had such a bright, happy face and such merry brown
+eyes and such a friendly smile that she was very pleasant to look
+upon, and a great many people thought so that night.
+
+Grace had never in all her life before had so good a time as she had
+at that senior prom. The seniors were quick to discover her unaffected
+originality and charm, and everywhere she went she was the centre of a
+merry group. In short, Grace, as much to her own surprise as anyone's,
+found herself a social success.
+
+Presently Sidney brought his brother up to be introduced, and the
+latter said:
+
+"Miss Seeley, will you excuse my asking if you have a brother or any
+relative named Max Seeley?"
+
+Grace nodded. "Oh, yes, my brother Max. He is a doctor out west."
+
+"I was sure of it," said Murray Hill triumphantly. "You resemble him
+so strongly. Please don't consider me as a stranger a minute longer,
+for Max and I are like brothers. Indeed, I owe my life to him. Last
+summer I was out there on a surveying expedition, and I took typhoid
+in a little out-of-the-way place where good nursing was not to be had
+for love or money. Your brother attended me and he managed to pull me
+through. He never left me day or night until I was out of danger, and
+he worked like a Trojan for me."
+
+"Dear old Max," said Grace, her brown eyes shining with pride and
+pleasure. "That is so like him. He is such a dear brother and I
+haven't seen him for four years. To see somebody who knows him so well
+is next best thing to seeing himself."
+
+"He is an awfully fine fellow," said Mr. Hill heartily, "and I'm
+delighted to have met the 'little sister' he used to talk so much
+about. I want you to come ever and meet my mother and sister. They
+have heard me talk so much about Max that they think almost as much
+of him as I do, and they will be glad to meet his sister."
+
+Mrs. Hill, a handsome, dignified lady who was one of the chaperones of
+the prom, received Grace warmly, while Beatrice Hill, an extremely
+pretty, smartly gowned girl, made her feel at home immediately.
+
+"You came with Sid, didn't you?" she whispered. "Sid is so sly--he
+never tells us whom he is going to take anywhere. But when I saw you
+come in with him I knew I was going to like you, you looked so jolly.
+And you're really the sister of that splendid Dr. Seeley who saved
+Murray's life last summer? And to think you've been at Payzant nearly
+a whole term and we never knew it!"
+
+"Well, how have you enjoyed our prom, Miss Seeley?" asked Sid, as they
+walked home together under the arching elms of the college campus.
+
+"Oh! it was splendid," said Grace enthusiastically. "Everybody was so
+nice. And then to meet someone who could tell me so much about Max! I
+must write them home all about it before I sleep, just to calm my head
+a bit. Mother and the girls will be so interested, and I must send Lou
+and Mab a carnation apiece for their scrapbooks."
+
+"Give me one back, please," said Sid. And Grace with a little blush,
+did so.
+
+That night, while Grace was slipping the stems of her carnations and
+putting them into water, three little bits of conversation were being
+carried on which it is necessary to report in order to round up this
+story neatly and properly, as all stories should be rounded up.
+
+In the first place, Beatrice Hill was saying to Sidney, "Oh, Sid, that
+Miss Seeley you had at the prom is a lovely girl. I don't know when
+I've met anyone I liked so much. She was so jolly and friendly and she
+didn't put on learned airs at all, as so many of those Payzant girls
+do. I asked her all about herself and she told me, and all about her
+mother and sisters and home and the lovely times they had together,
+and how hard they worked to send her to college too, and how she
+taught school in vacations and 'roomed' herself to help along. Isn't
+it so brave and plucky of her! I know we are going to be great
+friends."
+
+"I hope so," said Sidney briefly, "because I have an idea that she and
+I are going to be very good friends too."
+
+And Sidney went upstairs and put away a single white carnation very
+carefully.
+
+In the second place, Mrs. Hill was saying to her eldest son, "I liked
+that Miss Seeley very much. She seemed a very sweet girl."
+
+And, finally, Agnes Walters and Edna Hayden were discussing the matter
+in great mystification in their room.
+
+"I can't understand it at all," said Agnes slowly. "Sid Hill took her
+to the prom and he must have sent her those carnations too. She could
+never have afforded them herself. And did you see the fuss his people
+made over her? I heard Beatrice telling her that she was coming to
+call on her tomorrow, and Mrs. Hill said she must look upon
+'Beechlawn' as her second home while she was at Payzant. If the Hills
+are going to take her up we'll have to be nice to her."
+
+"I suppose," said Edna conclusively, "the truth of the matter is that
+Sid Hill meant to ask her anyway. I dare say he asked her long ago,
+and she would know our invitation was a fraud. So the joke is on
+ourselves, after all."
+
+But, as you and I know, that, with the exception of the last sentence,
+was not the truth of the matter at all.
+
+
+
+
+The Penningtons' Girl
+
+
+Winslow had been fishing--or pretending to--all the morning, and he
+was desperately thirsty. He boarded with the Beckwiths on the
+Riverside East Shore, but he was nearer Riverside West, and he knew
+the Penningtons well. He had often been there for bait and milk and
+had listened times out of mind to Mrs. Pennington's dismal tales of
+her tribulations with hired girls. She never could get along with
+them, and they left, on an average, after a fortnight's trial. She was
+on the lookout for one now, he knew, and would likely be cross, but he
+thought she would give him a drink.
+
+He rowed his skiff into the shore and tied it to a fir that hung out
+from the bank. A winding little footpath led up to the Pennington
+farmhouse, which crested the hill about three hundred yards from the
+shore. Winslow made for the kitchen door and came face to face with a
+girl carrying a pail of water--Mrs. Pennington's latest thing in hired
+girls, of course.
+
+Winslow's first bewildered thought was "What a goddess!" and he
+wondered, as he politely asked for a drink, where on earth Mrs.
+Pennington had picked her up. She handed him a shining dipper half
+full and stood, pail in hand, while he drank it.
+
+She was rather tall, and wore a somewhat limp, faded print gown, and a
+big sunhat, beneath which a glossy knot of chestnut showed itself. Her
+skin was very fair, somewhat freckled, and her mouth was delicious. As
+for her eyes, they were grey, but beyond that simply defied
+description.
+
+"Will you have some more?" she asked in a soft, drawling voice.
+
+"No, thank you. That was delicious. Is Mrs. Pennington home?"
+
+"No. She has gone away for the day."
+
+"Well, I suppose I can sit down here and rest a while. You've no
+serious objections, have you?"
+
+"Oh, no."
+
+She carried her pail into the kitchen and came out again presently
+with a knife and a pan of apples. Sitting down on a bench under the
+poplars she proceeded to peel them with a disregard of his presence
+that piqued Winslow, who was not used to being ignored in this
+fashion. Besides, as a general rule, he had been quite good friends
+with Mrs. Pennington's hired girls. She had had three strapping
+damsels during his sojourn in Riverside, and he used to sit on this
+very doorstep and chaff them. They had all been saucy and talkative.
+This girl was evidently a new species.
+
+"Do you think you'll get along with Mrs. Pennington?" he asked
+finally. "As a rule she fights with her help, although she is a most
+estimable woman."
+
+The girl smiled quite broadly.
+
+"I guess p'r'aps she's rather hard to suit," was the answer, "but I
+like her pretty well so far. I think we'll get along with each other.
+If we don't I can leave--like the others did."
+
+"What is your name?"
+
+"Nelly Ray."
+
+"Well, Nelly, I hope you'll be able to keep your place. Let me give
+you a bit of friendly advice. Don't let the cats get into the pantry.
+That is what Mrs. Pennington has quarrelled with nearly every one of
+her girls about."
+
+"It is quite a bother to keep them out, ain't it?" said Nelly calmly.
+"There's dozens of cats about the place. What on earth makes them keep
+so many?"
+
+"Mr. Pennington has a mania for cats. He and Mrs. Pennington have a
+standing disagreement about it. The last girl left here because she
+couldn't stand the cats; they affected her nerves, she said. I hope
+you don't mind them."
+
+"Oh, no; I kind of like cats. I've been tryin' to count them. Has
+anyone ever done that?"
+
+"Not that I know of. I tried but I had to give up in despair--never
+could tell when I was counting the same cat over again. Look at that
+black goblin sunning himself on the woodpile. I say, Nelly, you're not
+going, are you?"
+
+"I must. It's time to get dinner. Mr. Pennington will be in from the
+fields soon."
+
+The next minute he heard her stepping briskly about the kitchen,
+shooing out intruding cats, and humming a darky air to herself. He
+went reluctantly back to the shore and rowed across the river in a
+brown study.
+
+I don't know whether Winslow was afflicted with chronic thirst or not,
+or whether the East side water wasn't so good as that of the West
+side; but I do know that he fairly haunted the Pennington farmhouse
+after that. Mrs. Pennington was home the next time he went, and he
+asked her about her new girl. To his surprise the good lady was
+unusually reticent. She couldn't really say very much about Nelly. No,
+she didn't belong anywhere near Riverside. In fact, she--Mrs.
+Pennington--didn't think she had any settled home at present. Her
+father was travelling over the country somewhere. Nelly was a good
+little girl, and very obliging. Beyond this Winslow could get no more
+information, so he went around and talked to Nelly, who was sitting on
+the bench under the poplars and seemed absorbed in watching the
+sunset.
+
+She dropped her g's badly and made some grammatical errors that caused
+Winslow's flesh to creep on his bones. But any man could have forgiven
+mistakes from such dimpled lips in such a sweet voice.
+
+He asked her to go for a row up the river in the twilight and she
+assented; she handled an oar very well, he found out, and the exercise
+became her. Winslow tried to get her to talk about herself, but failed
+signally and had to content himself with Mrs. Pennington's meagre
+information. He told her about himself frankly enough--how he had had
+fever in the spring and had been ordered to spend the summer in the
+country and do nothing useful until his health was fully restored, and
+how lonesome it was in Riverside in general and at the Beckwith farm
+in particular. He made out quite a dismal case for himself and if
+Nelly wasn't sorry for him, she should have been.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+At the end of a fortnight Riverside folks began to talk about Winslow
+and the Penningtons' hired girl. He was reported to be "dead gone" on
+her; he took her out rowing every evening, drove her to preaching up
+the Bend on Sunday nights, and haunted the Pennington farmhouse. Wise
+folks shook their heads over it and wondered that Mrs. Pennington
+allowed it. Winslow was a gentleman, and that Nelly Ray, whom nobody
+knew anything about, not even where she came from, was only a common
+hired girl, and he had no business to be hanging about her. She was
+pretty, to be sure; but she was absurdly stuck-up and wouldn't
+associate with other Riverside "help" at all. Well, pride must have a
+fall; there must be something queer about her when she was so awful
+sly as to her past life.
+
+Winslow and Nelly did not trouble themselves in the least over all
+this gossip; in fact, they never even heard it. Winslow was hopelessly
+in love, when he found this out he was aghast. He thought of his
+father, the ambitious railroad magnate; of his mother, the brilliant
+society leader; of his sisters, the beautiful and proud; he was
+honestly frightened. It would never do; he must not go to see Nelly
+again. He kept this prudent resolution for twenty-four hours and then
+rowed over to the West shore. He found Nelly sitting on the bank in
+her old faded print dress and he straightway forgot everything he
+ought to have remembered.
+
+Nelly herself never seemed to be conscious of the social gulf between
+them. At least she never alluded to it in any way, and accepted
+Winslow's attentions as if she had a perfect right to them. She had
+broken the record by staying with Mrs. Pennington four weeks, and
+even the cats were in subjection.
+
+Winslow was well enough to have gone back to the city and, in fact,
+his father was writing for him. But he couldn't leave Beckwiths',
+apparently. At any rate he stayed on and met Nelly every day and
+cursed himself for a cad and a cur and a weak-brained idiot.
+
+One day he took Nelly for a row up the river. They went further than
+usual around the Bend. Winslow didn't want to go too far, for he knew
+that a party of his city friends, chaperoned by Mrs. Keyton-Wells,
+were having a picnic somewhere up along the river shore that day. But
+Nelly insisted on going on and on, and of course she had her way. When
+they reached a little pine-fringed headland they came upon the
+picnickers, within a stone's throw. Everybody recognized Winslow.
+"Why, there is Burton!" he heard Mrs. Keyton-Wells exclaim, and he
+knew she was putting up her glasses. Will Evans, who was an especial
+chum of his, ran down to the water's edge. "Bless me, Win, where did
+you come from? Come right in. We haven't had tea yet. Bring your
+friend too," he added, becoming conscious that Winslow's friend was a
+mighty pretty girl. Winslow's face was crimson. He avoided Nelly's
+eye.
+
+"Are them people friends of yours?" she asked in a low tone.
+
+"Yes," he muttered.
+
+"Well, let us go ashore if they want us to," she said calmly. "I don't
+mind."
+
+For three seconds Winslow hesitated. Then he pulled ashore and helped
+Nelly to alight on a jutting rock. There was a curious, set expression
+about his fine mouth as he marched Nelly up to Mrs. Keyton-Wells and
+introduced her. Mrs. Keyton-Wells's greeting was slightly cool, but
+very polite. She supposed Miss Ray was some little country girl with
+whom Burton Winslow was carrying on a summer flirtation; respectable
+enough, no doubt, and must be treated civilly, but of course wouldn't
+expect to be made an equal of exactly. The other women took their cue
+from her, but the men were more cordial. Miss Ray might be shabby, but
+she was distinctly fetching, and Winslow looked savage.
+
+Nelly was not a whit abashed, seemingly, by the fashionable circle in
+which she found herself, and she talked away to Will Evans and the
+others in her soft drawl as if she had known them all her life. All
+might have gone passably well, had not a little Riverside imp, by name
+of Rufus Hent, who had been picked up by the picnickers to run their
+errands, come up just then with a pail of water.
+
+"Golly!" he ejaculated in very audible tones. "If there ain't Mrs.
+Pennington's hired girl!"
+
+Mrs. Keyton-Wells stiffened with horror. Winslow darted a furious
+glance at the tell-tale that would have annihilated anything except a
+small boy. Will Evans grinned and went on talking to Nelly, who had
+failed to hear, or at least to heed, the exclamation.
+
+The mischief was done, the social thermometer went down to zero in
+Nelly's neighbourhood. The women ignored her altogether. Winslow set
+his teeth together and registered a mental vow to wring Rufus Hent's
+sunburned neck at the first opportunity. He escorted Nelly to the
+table and waited on her with ostentatious deference, while Mrs.
+Keyton-Wells glanced at him stonily and made up her mind to tell his
+mother when she went home.
+
+Nelly's social ostracism did not affect her appetite. But after lunch
+was over, she walked down to the skiff. Winslow followed her.
+
+"Do you want to go home?" he asked.
+
+"Yes, it's time I went, for the cats may be raidin' the pantry. But
+you must not come; your friends here want you."
+
+"Nonsense!" said Winslow sulkily. "If you are going I am too."
+
+But Nelly was too quick for him; she sprang into the skiff, unwound
+the rope, and pushed off before he guessed her intention.
+
+"I can row myself home and I mean to," she announced, taking up the
+oars defiantly.
+
+"Nelly," he implored.
+
+Nelly looked at him wickedly.
+
+"You'd better go back to your friends. That old woman with the
+eyeglasses is watchin' you."
+
+Winslow said something strong under his breath as he went back to the
+others. Will Evans and his chums began to chaff him about Nelly, but
+he looked so dangerous that they concluded to stop. There is no
+denying that Winslow was in a fearful temper just then with Mrs.
+Keyton-Wells, Evans, himself, Nelly--in fact, with all the world.
+
+His friends drove him home in the evening on their way to the station
+and dropped him at the Beckwith farm. At dusk he went moodily down to
+the shore. Far up the Bend was dim and shadowy and stars were shining
+above the wooded shores. Over the river the Pennington farmhouse
+lights twinkled out alluringly. Winslow watched them until he could
+stand it no longer. Nelly had made off with his skiff, but Perry
+Beckwith's dory was ready to hand. In five minutes, Winslow was
+grounding her on the West shore. Nelly was sitting on a rock at the
+landing place. He went over and sat down silently beside her. A full
+moon was rising above the dark hills up the Bend and in the faint
+light the girl was wonderfully lovely.
+
+"I thought you weren't comin' over at all tonight," she said, smiling
+up at him, "and I was sorry, because I wanted to say goodbye to you."
+
+"Goodbye? Nelly, you're not going away?"
+
+"Yes. The cats were in the pantry when I got home."
+
+"Nelly!"
+
+"Well, to be serious. I'm not goin' for that, but I really am goin'.
+I had a letter from Dad this evenin'. Did you have a good time after I
+left this afternoon? Did Mrs. Keyton-Wells thaw out?"
+
+"Hang Mrs. Keyton-Wells! Nelly, where are you going?"
+
+"To Dad, of course. We used to live down south together, but two
+months ago we broke up housekeepin' and come north. We thought we
+could do better up here, you know. Dad started out to look for a place
+to settle down and I came here while he was prospectin'. He's got a
+house now, he says, and wants me to go right off. I'm goin' tomorrow."
+
+"Nelly, you mustn't go--you mustn't, I tell you," exclaimed Winslow in
+despair. "I love you--I love you--you must stay with me forever."
+
+"You don't know what you're sayin', Mr. Winslow," said Nelly coldly.
+"Why, you can't marry me--a common servant girl."
+
+"I can and I will, if you'll have me," answered Winslow recklessly. "I
+can't ever let you go. I've loved you ever since I first saw you.
+Nelly, won't you be my wife? Don't you love me?"
+
+"Well, yes, I do," confessed Nelly suddenly; and then it was fully
+five minutes before Winslow gave her a chance to say anything else.
+
+"Oh, what will your people say?" she contrived to ask at last. "Won't
+they be in a dreadful state? Oh, it will never do for you to marry
+me."
+
+"Won't it?" said Winslow in a tone of satisfaction. "I rather think it
+will. Of course, my family will rampage a bit at first. I daresay
+Father'll turn me out. Don't worry over that, Nelly. I'm not afraid of
+work. I'm not afraid of anything except losing you."
+
+"You'll have to see what Dad says," remarked Nelly, after another
+eloquent interlude.
+
+"He won't object, will he? I'll write to him or go and see him. Where
+is he?"
+
+"He is in town at the Arlington."
+
+"The Arlington!" Winslow was amazed. The Arlington was the most
+exclusive and expensive hotel in town.
+
+"What is he doing there?"
+
+"Transacting a real estate or railroad deal with your father, I
+believe, or something of that sort."
+
+"Nelly!"
+
+"Well?"
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"Just what I say."
+
+Winslow got up and looked at her.
+
+"Nelly, who are you?"
+
+"Helen Ray Scott, at your service, sir."
+
+"Not Helen Ray Scott, the daughter of the railroad king?"
+
+"The same. Are you sorry that you're engaged to her? If you are,
+she'll stay Nelly Ray."
+
+Winslow dropped back on the seat with a long breath.
+
+"Nelly, I don't understand. Why did you deceive me? I feel stunned."
+
+"Oh, do forgive me," she said merrily. "I shouldn't have, I
+suppose--but you know you took me for the hired girl the very first
+time you saw me, and you patronized me and called me Nelly; so I let
+you think so just for fun. I never thought it would come to this. When
+Father and I came north I took a fancy to come here and stay with Mrs.
+Pennington--who is an old nurse of mine--until Father decided where to
+take up our abode. I got here the night before we met. My trunk was
+delayed so I put on an old cotton dress her niece had left here--and
+you came and saw me. I made Mrs. Pennington keep the secret--she
+thought it great fun; and I really was a great hand to do little
+chores and keep the cats in subjection too. I made mistakes in grammar
+and dropped my g's on purpose--it was such fun to see you wince when I
+did it. It was cruel to tease you so, I suppose, but it was so sweet
+just to be loved for myself--not because I was an heiress and a
+belle--I couldn't bear to tell you the truth. Did you think I
+couldn't read your thoughts this afternoon, when I insisted on going
+ashore? You were a little ashamed of me--you know you were. I didn't
+blame you for that, but if you hadn't gone ashore and taken me as you
+did I would never have spoken to you again. Mrs. Keyton-Wells won't
+snub me next time we meet. And some way I don't think your father will
+turn you out, either. Have you forgiven me yet, Burton?"
+
+"I shall never call you anything but Nelly," said Winslow
+irrelevantly.
+
+
+
+
+The Red Room
+
+
+You would have me tell you the story, Grandchild? 'Tis a sad one and
+best forgotten--few remember it now. There are always sad and dark
+stories in old families such as ours.
+
+Yet I have promised and must keep my word. So sit down here at my feet
+and rest your bright head on my lap, that I may not see in your young
+eyes the shadows my story will bring across their bonny blue.
+
+I was a mere child when it all happened, yet I remember it but too
+well, and I can recall how pleased I was when my father's stepmother,
+Mrs. Montressor--she not liking to be called grandmother, seeing she
+was but turned of fifty and a handsome woman still--wrote to my mother
+that she must send little Beatrice up to Montressor Place for the
+Christmas holidays. So I went joyfully though my mother grieved to
+part with me; she had little to love save me, my father, Conrad
+Montressor, having been lost at sea when but three months wed.
+
+My aunts were wont to tell me how much I resembled him, being, so they
+said, a Montressor to the backbone; and this I took to mean
+commendation, for the Montressors were a well-descended and
+well-thought-of family, and the women were noted for their beauty.
+This I could well believe, since of all my aunts there was not one but
+was counted a pretty woman. Therefore I took heart of grace when I
+thought of my dark face and spindling shape, hoping that when I should
+be grown up I might be counted not unworthy of my race.
+
+The Place was an old-fashioned, mysterious house, such as I delighted
+in, and Mrs. Montressor was ever kind to me, albeit a little stern,
+for she was a proud woman and cared but little for children, having
+none of her own.
+
+But there were books there to pore over without let or hindrance--for
+nobody questioned of my whereabouts if I but kept out of the way--and
+strange, dim family portraits on the walls to gaze upon, until I knew
+each proud old face well, and had visioned a history for it in my own
+mind--for I was given to dreaming and was older and wiser than my
+years, having no childish companions to keep me still a child.
+
+There were always some of my aunts at the Place to kiss and make much
+of me for my father's sake--for he had been their favourite brother.
+My aunts--there were eight of them--had all married well, so said
+people who knew, and lived not far away, coming home often to take tea
+with Mrs. Montressor, who had always gotten on well with her
+step-daughters, or to help prepare for some festivity or other--for
+they were notable housekeepers, every one.
+
+They were all at Montressor Place for Christmas, and I got more
+petting than I deserved, albeit they looked after me somewhat more
+strictly than did Mrs. Montressor, and saw to it that I did not read
+too many fairy tales or sit up later at nights than became my years.
+
+But it was not for fairy tales and sugarplums nor yet for petting that
+I rejoiced to be at the Place at that time. Though I spoke not of it
+to anyone, I had a great longing to see my Uncle Hugh's wife,
+concerning whom I had heard much, both good and bad.
+
+My Uncle Hugh, albeit the oldest of the family, had never married
+until now, and all the countryside rang with talk of his young wife. I
+did not hear as much as I wished, for the gossips took heed to my
+presence when I drew anear and turned to other matters. Yet, being
+somewhat keener of comprehension than they knew, I heard and
+understood not a little of their talk.
+
+And so I came to know that neither proud Mrs. Montressor nor my good
+aunts, nor even my gentle mother, looked with overmuch favour on what
+my Uncle Hugh had done. And I did hear that Mrs. Montressor had chosen
+a wife for her stepson, of good family and some beauty, but that my
+Uncle Hugh would have none of her--a thing Mrs. Montressor found hard
+to pardon, yet might so have done had not my uncle, on his last voyage
+to the Indies--for he went often in his own vessels--married and
+brought home a foreign bride, of whom no one knew aught save that her
+beauty was a thing to dazzle the day and that she was of some strange
+alien blood such as ran not in the blue veins of the Montressors.
+
+Some had much to say of her pride and insolence, and wondered if Mrs.
+Montressor would tamely yield her mistress-ship to the stranger. But
+others, who were taken with her loveliness and grace, said that the
+tales told were born of envy and malice, and that Alicia Montressor
+was well worthy of her name and station.
+
+So I halted between two opinions and thought to judge for myself, but
+when I went to the Place my Uncle Hugh and his bride were gone for a
+time, and I had even to swallow my disappointment and bide their
+return with all my small patience.
+
+But my aunts and their stepmother talked much of Alicia, and they
+spoke slightingly of her, saying that she was but a light woman and
+that no good would come of my Uncle Hugh's having wed her, with other
+things of a like nature. Also they spoke of the company she gathered
+around her, thinking her to have strange and unbecoming companions for
+a Montressor. All this I heard and pondered much over, although my
+good aunts supposed that such a chit as I would take no heed to their
+whisperings.
+
+When I was not with them, helping to whip eggs and stone raisins, and
+being watched to see that I ate not more than one out of five, I was
+surely to be found in the wing hall, poring over my book and grieving
+that I was no more allowed to go into the Red Room.
+
+The wing hall was a narrow one and dim, connecting the main rooms of
+the Place with an older wing, built in a curious way. The hall was
+lighted by small, square-paned windows, and at its end a little
+flight of steps led up to the Red Room.
+
+Whenever I had been at the Place before--and this was often--I had
+passed much of my time in this same Red Room. It was Mrs. Montressor's
+sitting-room then, where she wrote her letters and examined household
+accounts, and sometimes had an old gossip in to tea. The room was
+low-ceilinged and dim, hung with red damask, and with odd, square
+windows high up under the eaves and a dark wainscoting all around it.
+And there I loved to sit quietly on the red sofa and read my fairy
+tales, or talk dreamily to the swallows fluttering crazily against the
+tiny panes.
+
+When I had gone this Christmas to the Place I soon bethought myself of
+the Red Room--for I had a great love for it. But I had got no further
+than the steps when Mrs. Montressor came sweeping down the hall in
+haste and, catching me by the arm, pulled me back as roughly as if it
+had been Bluebeard's chamber itself into which I was venturing.
+
+Then, seeing my face, which I doubt not was startled enough, she
+seemed to repent of her haste and patted me gently on the head.
+
+"There, there, little Beatrice! Did I frighten you, child? Forgive an
+old woman's thoughtlessness. But be not too ready to go where you are
+not bidden, and never venture foot in the Red Room now, for it belongs
+to your Uncle Hugh's wife, and let me tell you she is not over fond of
+intruders."
+
+I felt sorry overmuch to hear this, nor could I see why my new aunt
+should care if I went in once in a while, as had been my habit, to
+talk to the swallows and misplace nothing. But Mrs. Montressor saw to
+it that I obeyed her, and I went no more to the Red Room, but busied
+myself with other matters.
+
+For there were great doings at the Place and much coming and going. My
+aunts were never idle; there was to be much festivity Christmas week
+and a ball on Christmas Eve. And my aunts had promised me--though not
+till I had wearied them of my coaxing--that I should stay up that
+night and see as much of the gaiety as was good for me. So I did their
+errands and went early to bed every night without complaint--though I
+did this the more readily for that, when they thought me safely
+asleep, they would come in and talk around my bedroom fire, saying
+that of Alicia which I should not have heard.
+
+At last came the day when my Uncle Hugh and his wife were expected
+home--though not until my scanty patience was well nigh wearied
+out--and we were all assembled to meet them in the great hall, where a
+ruddy firelight was gleaming.
+
+My Aunt Frances had dressed me in my best white frock and my crimson
+sash, with much lamenting over my skinny neck and arms, and bade me
+behave prettily, as became my bringing up. So I slipped in a corner,
+my hands and feet cold with excitement, for I think every drop of
+blood in my body had gone to my head, and my heart beat so hardly that
+it even pained me.
+
+Then the door opened and Alicia--for so I was used to hearing her
+called, nor did I ever think of her as my aunt in my own mind--came
+in, and a little in the rear my tall, dark uncle.
+
+She came proudly forward to the fire and stood there superbly while
+she loosened her cloak, nor did she see me at all at first, but
+nodded, a little disdainfully, it seemed, to Mrs. Montressor and my
+aunts, who were grouped about the drawing-room door, very ladylike and
+quiet.
+
+But I neither saw nor heard aught at the time save her only, for her
+beauty, when she came forth from her crimson cloak and hood, was
+something so wonderful that I forgot my manners and stared at her as
+one fascinated--as indeed I was, for never had I seen such loveliness
+and hardly dreamed it.
+
+Pretty women I had seen in plenty, for my aunts and my mother were
+counted fair, but my uncle's wife was as little like to them as a
+sunset glow to pale moonshine or a crimson rose to white day-lilies.
+
+Nor can I paint her to you in words as I saw her then, with the long
+tongues of firelight licking her white neck and wavering over the rich
+masses of her red-gold hair.
+
+She was tall--so tall that my aunts looked but insignificant beside
+her, and they were of no mean height, as became their race; yet no
+queen could have carried herself more royally, and all the passion and
+fire of her foreign nature burned in her splendid eyes, that might
+have been dark or light for aught that I could ever tell, but which
+seemed always like pools of warm flame, now tender, now fierce.
+
+Her skin was like a delicate white rose leaf, and when she spoke I
+told my foolish self that never had I heard music before; nor do I
+ever again think to hear a voice so sweet, so liquid, as that which
+rippled over her ripe lips.
+
+I had often in my own mind pictured this, my first meeting with
+Alicia, now in one way, now in another, but never had I dreamed of her
+speaking to me at all, so that it came to me as a great surprise when
+she turned and, holding out her lovely hands, said very graciously:
+
+"And is this the little Beatrice? I have heard much of you--come, kiss
+me, child."
+
+And I went, despite my Aunt Elizabeth's black frown, for the glamour
+of her loveliness was upon me, and I no longer wondered that my Uncle
+Hugh should have loved her.
+
+Very proud of her was he too; yet I felt, rather than saw--for I was
+sensitive and quick of perception, as old-young children ever
+are--that there was something other than pride and love in his face
+when he looked on her, and more in his manner than the fond lover--as
+it were, a sort of lurking mistrust.
+
+Nor could I think, though to me the thought seemed as treason, that
+she loved her husband overmuch, for she seemed half condescending and
+half disdainful to him; yet one thought not of this in her presence,
+but only remembered it when she had gone.
+
+When she went out it seemed to me that nothing was left, so I crept
+lonesomely away to the wing hall and sat down by a window to dream of
+her; and she filled my thoughts so fully that it was no surprise when
+I raised my eyes and saw her coming down the hall alone, her bright
+head shining against the dark old walls.
+
+When she paused by me and asked me lightly of what I was dreaming,
+since I had such a sober face, I answered her truly that it was of
+her--whereat she laughed, as one not ill pleased, and said half
+mockingly:
+
+"Waste not your thoughts so, little Beatrice. But come with me,
+child, if you will, for I have taken a strange fancy to your solemn
+eyes. Perchance the warmth of your young life may thaw out the ice
+that has frozen around my heart ever since I came among these cold
+Montressors."
+
+And, though I understood not her meaning, I went, glad to see the Red
+Room once more. So she made me sit down and talk to her, which I did,
+for shyness was no failing of mine; and she asked me many questions,
+and some that I thought she should not have asked, but I could not
+answer them, so 'twere little harm.
+
+After that I spent a part of every day with her in the Red Room. And
+my Uncle Hugh was there often, and he would kiss her and praise her
+loveliness, not heeding my presence--for I was but a child.
+
+Yet it ever seemed to me that she endured rather than welcomed his
+caresses, and at times the ever-burning flame in her eyes glowed so
+luridly that a chill dread would creep over me, and I would remember
+what my Aunt Elizabeth had said, she being a bitter-tongued woman,
+though kind at heart--that this strange creature would bring on us all
+some evil fortune yet.
+
+Then would I strive to banish such thoughts and chide myself for
+doubting one so kind to me.
+
+When Christmas Eve drew nigh my silly head was full of the ball day
+and night. But a grievous disappointment befell me, for I awakened
+that day very ill with a most severe cold; and though I bore me
+bravely, my aunts discovered it soon, when, despite my piteous
+pleadings, I was put to bed, where I cried bitterly and would not be
+comforted. For I thought I should not see the fine folk and, more
+than all, Alicia.
+
+But that disappointment, at least, was spared me, for at night she
+came into my room, knowing of my longing--she was ever indulgent to my
+little wishes. And when I saw her I forgot my aching limbs and burning
+brow, and even the ball I was not to see, for never was mortal
+creature so lovely as she, standing there by my bed.
+
+Her gown was of white, and there was nothing I could liken the stuff
+to save moonshine falling athwart a frosted pane, and out from it
+swelled her gleaming breast and arms, so bare that it seemed to me a
+shame to look upon them. Yet it could not be denied they were of
+wondrous beauty, white as polished marble.
+
+And all about her snowy throat and rounded arms, and in the masses of
+her splendid hair, were sparkling, gleaming stones, with hearts of
+pure light, which I know now to have been diamonds, but knew not then,
+for never had I seen aught of their like.
+
+And I gazed at her, drinking in her beauty until my soul was filled,
+as she stood like some goddess before her worshipper. I think she read
+my thought in my face and liked it--for she was a vain woman, and to
+such even the admiration of a child is sweet.
+
+Then she leaned down to me until her splendid eyes looked straight
+into my dazzled ones.
+
+"Tell me, little Beatrice--for they say the word of a child is to be
+believed--tell me, do you think me beautiful?"
+
+I found my voice and told her truly that I thought her beautiful
+beyond my dreams of angels--as indeed she was. Whereat she smiled as
+one well pleased.
+
+Then my Uncle Hugh came in, and though I thought that his face
+darkened as he looked on the naked splendour of her breast and arms,
+as if he liked not that the eyes of other men should gloat on it, yet
+he kissed her with all a lover's fond pride, while she looked at him
+half mockingly.
+
+Then said he, "Sweet, will you grant me a favour?"
+
+And she answered, "It may be that I will."
+
+And he said, "Do not dance with that man tonight, Alicia. I mistrust
+him much."
+
+His voice had more of a husband's command than a lover's entreaty. She
+looked at him with some scorn, but when she saw his face grow
+black--for the Montressors brooked scant disregard of their authority,
+as I had good reason to know--she seemed to change, and a smile came
+to her lips, though her eyes glowed balefully.
+
+Then she laid her arms about his neck and--though it seemed to me that
+she had as soon strangled as embraced him--her voice was wondrous
+sweet and caressing as she murmured in his ear.
+
+He laughed and his brow cleared, though he said still sternly, "Do not
+try me too far, Alicia."
+
+Then they went out, she a little in advance and very stately.
+
+After that my aunts also came in, very beautifully and modestly
+dressed, but they seemed to me as nothing after Alicia. For I was
+caught in the snare of her beauty, and the longing to see her again so
+grew upon me that after a time I did an undutiful and disobedient
+thing.
+
+I had been straitly charged to stay in bed, which I did not, but got
+up and put on a gown. For it was in my mind to go quietly down, if by
+chance I might again see Alicia, myself unseen.
+
+But when I reached the great hall I heard steps approaching and,
+having a guilty conscience, I slipped aside into the blue parlour and
+hid me behind the curtains lest my aunts should see me.
+
+Then Alicia came in, and with her a man whom I had never before seen.
+Yet I instantly bethought myself of a lean black snake, with a
+glittering and evil eye, which I had seen in Mrs. Montressor's garden
+two summers agone, and which was like to have bitten me. John, the
+gardener, had killed it, and I verily thought that if it had a soul,
+it must have gotten into this man.
+
+Alicia sat down and he beside her, and when he had put his arms about
+her, he kissed her face and lips. Nor did she shrink from his embrace,
+but even smiled and leaned nearer to him with a little smooth motion,
+as they talked to each other in some strange, foreign tongue.
+
+I was but a child and innocent, nor knew I aught of honour and
+dishonour. Yet it seemed to me that no man should kiss her save only
+my Uncle Hugh, and from that hour I mistrusted Alicia, though I
+understood not then what I afterwards did.
+
+And as I watched them--not thinking of playing the spy--I saw her face
+grow suddenly cold, and she straightened herself up and pushed away
+her lover's arms.
+
+Then I followed her guilty eyes to the door, where stood my Uncle
+Hugh, and all the pride and passion of the Montressors sat on his
+lowering brow. Yet he came forward quietly as Alicia and the snake
+drew apart and stood up.
+
+At first he looked not at his guilty wife but at her lover, and smote
+him heavily in the face. Whereat he, being a coward at heart, as are
+all villains, turned white and slunk from the room with a muttered
+oath, nor was he stayed.
+
+My uncle turned to Alicia, and very calmly and terribly he said, "From
+this hour you are no longer wife of mine!"
+
+And there was that in his tone which told that his forgiveness and
+love should be hers nevermore.
+
+Then he motioned her out and she went, like a proud queen, with her
+glorious head erect and no shame on her brow.
+
+As for me, when they were gone I crept away, dazed and bewildered
+enough, and went back to my bed, having seen and heard more than I had
+a mind for, as disobedient people and eavesdroppers ever do.
+
+But my Uncle Hugh kept his word, and Alicia was no more wife to him,
+save only in name. Yet of gossip or scandal there was none, for the
+pride of his race kept secret his dishonour, nor did he ever seem
+other than a courteous and respectful husband.
+
+Nor did Mrs. Montressor and my aunts, though they wondered much among
+themselves, learn aught, for they dared question neither their brother
+nor Alicia, who carried herself as loftily as ever, and seemed to pine
+for neither lover nor husband. As for me, no one dreamed I knew aught
+of it, and I kept my own counsel as to what I had seen in the blue
+parlour on the night of the Christmas ball.
+
+After the New Year I went home, but ere long Mrs. Montressor sent for
+me again, saying that the house was lonely without little Beatrice. So
+I went again and found all unchanged, though the Place was very quiet,
+and Alicia went out but little from the Red Room.
+
+Of my Uncle Hugh I saw little, save when he went and came on the
+business of his estate, somewhat more gravely and silently than of
+yore, or brought to me books and sweetmeats from town.
+
+But every day I was with Alicia in the Red Room, where she would talk
+to me, oftentimes wildly and strangely, but always kindly. And though
+I think Mrs. Montressor liked our intimacy none too well, she said no
+word, and I came and went as I listed with Alicia, though never quite
+liking her strange ways and the restless fire in her eyes.
+
+Nor would I ever kiss her, after I had seen her lips pressed by the
+snake's, though she sometimes coaxed me, and grew pettish and vexed
+when I would not; but she guessed not my reason.
+
+March came in that year like a lion, exceedingly hungry and fierce,
+and my Uncle Hugh had ridden away through the storm nor thought to be
+back for some days.
+
+In the afternoon I was sitting in the wing hall, dreaming wondrous
+day-dreams, when Alicia called me to the Red Room. And as I went, I
+marvelled anew at her loveliness, for the blood was leaping in her
+face and her jewels were dim before the lustre of her eyes. Her hand,
+when she took mine, was burning hot, and her voice had a strange ring.
+
+"Come, little Beatrice," she said, "come talk to me, for I know not
+what to do with my lone self today. Time hangs heavily in this gloomy
+house. I do verily think this Red Room has an evil influence over me.
+See if your childish prattle can drive away the ghosts that riot in
+these dark old corners--ghosts of a ruined and shamed life! Nay,
+shrink not--do I talk wildly? I mean not all I say--my brain seems on
+fire, little Beatrice. Come; it may be you know some grim old legend
+of this room--it must surely have one. Never was place fitter for a
+dark deed! Tush! never be so frightened, child--forget my vagaries.
+Tell me now and I will listen."
+
+Whereat she cast herself lithely on the satin couch and turned her
+lovely face on me. So I gathered up my small wits and told her what I
+was not supposed to know--how that, generations agone, a Montressor
+had disgraced himself and his name, and that, when he came home to his
+mother, she had met him in that same Red Room and flung at him taunts
+and reproaches, forgetting whose breast had nourished him; and that
+he, frantic with shame and despair, turned his sword against his own
+heart and so died. But his mother went mad with her remorse, and was
+kept a prisoner in the Red Room until her death.
+
+So lamely told I the tale, as I had heard my Aunt Elizabeth tell it,
+when she knew not I listened or understood. Alicia heard me through
+and said nothing, save that it was a tale worthy of the Montressors.
+Whereat I bridled, for I too was a Montressor, and proud of it.
+
+But she took my hand soothingly in hers and said, "Little Beatrice, if
+tomorrow or the next day they should tell you, those cold, proud
+women, that Alicia was unworthy of your love, tell me, would you
+believe them?"
+
+And I, remembering what I had seen in the blue parlour, was
+silent--for I could not lie. So she flung my hand away with a bitter
+laugh, and picked lightly from the table anear a small dagger with a
+jewelled handle.
+
+It seemed to me a cruel-looking toy and I said so--whereat she smiled
+and drew her white fingers down the thin, shining blade in a fashion
+that made me cold.
+
+"Such a little blow with this," she said, "such a little blow--and the
+heart beats no longer, the weary brain rests, the lips and eyes smile
+never again! 'Twere a short path out of all difficulties, my
+Beatrice."
+
+And I, understanding her not, yet shivering, begged her to cast it
+aside, which she did carelessly and, putting a hand under my chin, she
+turned up my face to hers.
+
+"Little, grave-eyed Beatrice, tell me truly, would it grieve you much
+if you were never again to sit here with Alicia in this same Red
+Room?"
+
+And I made answer earnestly that it would, glad that I could say so
+much truly. Then her face grew tender and she sighed deeply.
+
+Presently she opened a quaint, inlaid box and took from it a shining
+gold chain of rare workmanship and exquisite design, and this she hung
+around my neck, nor would suffer me to thank her but laid her hand
+gently on my lips.
+
+"Now go," she said. "But ere you leave me, little Beatrice, grant me
+but the one favour--it may be that I shall never ask another of you.
+Your people, I know--those cold Montressors--care little for me, but
+with all my faults, I have ever been kind to you. So, when the
+morrow's come, and they tell you that Alicia is as one worse than
+dead, think not of me with scorn only but grant me a little pity--for
+I was not always what I am now, and might never have become so had a
+little child like you been always anear me, to keep me pure and
+innocent. And I would have you but the once lay your arms about my
+neck and kiss me."
+
+And I did so, wondering much at her manner--for it had in it a strange
+tenderness and some sort of hopeless longing. Then she gently put me
+from the room, and I sat musing by the hall window until night fell
+darkly--and a fearsome night it was, of storm and blackness. And I
+thought how well it was that my Uncle Hugh had not to return in such a
+tempest. Yet, ere the thought had grown cold, the door opened and he
+strode down the hall, his cloak drenched and wind-twisted, in one hand
+a whip, as though he had but then sprung from his horse, in the other
+what seemed like a crumpled letter.
+
+Nor was the night blacker than his face, and he took no heed of me as
+I ran after him, thinking selfishly of the sweetmeats he had promised
+to bring me--but I thought no more of them when I got to the door of
+the Red Room.
+
+Alicia stood by the table, hooded and cloaked as for a journey, but
+her hood had slipped back, and her face rose from it marble-white,
+save where her wrathful eyes burned out, with dread and guilt and
+hatred in their depths, while she had one arm raised as if to thrust
+him back.
+
+As for my uncle, he stood before her and I saw not his face, but his
+voice was low and terrible, speaking words I understood not then,
+though long afterwards I came to know their meaning.
+
+And he cast foul scorn at her that she should have thought to fly with
+her lover, and swore that naught should again thwart his vengeance,
+with other threats, wild and dreadful enough.
+
+Yet she said no word until he had done, and then she spoke, but what
+she said I know not, save that it was full of hatred and defiance and
+wild accusation, such as a mad woman might have uttered.
+
+And she defied him even then to stop her flight, though he told her to
+cross that threshold would mean her death; for he was a wronged and
+desperate man and thought of nothing save his own dishonour.
+
+Then she made as if to pass him, but he caught her by her white wrist;
+she turned on him with fury, and I saw her right hand reach stealthily
+out over the table behind her, where lay the dagger.
+
+"Let me go!" she hissed.
+
+And he said, "I will not."
+
+Then she turned herself about and struck at him with the dagger--and
+never saw I such a face as was hers at the moment.
+
+He fell heavily, yet held her even in death, so that she had to wrench
+herself free, with a shriek that rings yet in my ears on a night when
+the wind wails over the rainy moors. She rushed past me unheeding, and
+fled down the hall like a hunted creature, and I heard the heavy door
+clang hollowly behind her.
+
+As for me, I stood there looking at the dead man, for I could neither
+move nor speak and was like to have died of horror. And presently I
+knew nothing, nor did I come to my recollection for many a day, when I
+lay abed, sick of a fever and more like to die than live.
+
+So that when at last I came out from the shadow of death, my Uncle
+Hugh had been long cold in his grave, and the hue and cry for his
+guilty wife was well nigh over, since naught had been seen or heard of
+her since she fled the country with her foreign lover.
+
+When I came rightly to my remembrance, they questioned me as to what I
+had seen and heard in the Red Room. And I told them as best I could,
+though much aggrieved that to my questions they would answer nothing
+save to bid me to stay still and think not of the matter.
+
+Then my mother, sorely vexed over my adventures--which in truth were
+but sorry ones for a child--took me home. Nor would she let me keep
+Alicia's chain, but made away with it, how I knew not and little
+cared, for the sight of it was loathsome to me.
+
+It was many years ere I went again to Montressor Place, and I never
+saw the Red Room more, for Mrs. Montressor had the old wing torn down,
+deeming its sorrowful memories dark heritage enough for the next
+Montressor.
+
+So, Grandchild, the sad tale is ended, and you will not see the Red
+Room when you go next month to Montressor Place. The swallows still
+build under the eaves, though--I know not if you will understand their
+speech as I did.
+
+
+
+
+The Setness of Theodosia
+
+
+When Theodosia Ford married Wesley Brooke after a courtship of three
+years, everybody concerned was satisfied. There was nothing
+particularly romantic in either the courtship or marriage. Wesley was
+a steady, well-meaning, rather slow fellow, comfortably off. He was
+not at all handsome. But Theodosia was a very pretty girl with the
+milky colouring of an auburn blonde and large china-blue eyes. She
+looked mild and Madonna-like and was known to be sweet-tempered.
+Wesley's older brother, Irving Brooke, had married a woman who kept
+him in hot water all the time, so Heatherton folks said, but they
+thought there was no fear of that with Wesley and Theodosia. They
+would get along together all right.
+
+Only old Jim Parmelee shook his head and said, "They might, and then
+again they mightn't"; he knew the stock they came of and it was a kind
+you could never predict about.
+
+Wesley and Theodosia were third cousins; this meant that old Henry
+Ford had been the great-great-grandfather of them both. Jim Parmelee,
+who was ninety, had been a small boy when this remote ancestor was
+still alive.
+
+"I mind him well," said old Jim on the morning of Theodosia's wedding
+day. There was a little group about the blacksmith's forge. Old Jim
+was in the centre. He was a fat, twinkling-eyed old man, fresh and
+ruddy in spite of his ninety years. "And," he went on, "he was about
+the settest man you'd ever see or want to see. When old Henry Ford
+made up his mind on any p'int a cyclone wouldn't turn him a
+hairsbreadth--no, nor an earthquake neither. Didn't matter a mite how
+much he suffered for it--he'd stick to it if it broke his heart. There
+was always some story or other going round about old Henry's setness.
+The family weren't quite so bad--only Tom. He was Dosia's
+great-grandfather, and a regular chip of the old block. Since then
+it's cropped out now and again all through the different branches of
+the family. I mistrust if Dosia hasn't got a spice of it, and Wes
+Brooke too, but mebbe not."
+
+Old Jim was the only croaker. Wesley and Theodosia were married, in
+the golden prime of the Indian summer, and settled down on their snug
+little farm. Dosia was a beautiful bride, and Wesley's pride in her
+was amusingly apparent. He thought nothing too good for her, the
+Heatherton people said. It was a sight to make an old heart young to
+see him march up the aisle of the church on Sunday in all the glossy
+splendour of his wedding suit, his curly black head held high and his
+round boyish face shining with happiness, stopping and turning proudly
+at his pew to show Theodosia in.
+
+They always sat alone together in the big pew, and Alma Spencer, who
+sat behind them, declared that they held each other's hands all
+through the service. This lasted until spring; then came a sensation
+and scandal, such as decorous Heatherton had not known since the time
+Isaac Allen got drunk at Centreville Fair and came home and kicked his
+wife.
+
+One evening in early April Wesley came home from the store at "the
+Corner," where he had lingered to talk over politics and farming
+methods with his cronies. This evening he was later than usual, and
+Theodosia had his supper kept warm for him. She met him on the porch
+and kissed him. He kissed her in return, and held her to him for a
+minute, with her bright head on his shoulder. The frogs were singing
+down in the south meadow swamp, and there was a splendour of silvery
+moonrise over the wooded Heatherton hills. Theodosia always remembered
+that moment.
+
+When they went in, Wesley, full of excitement, began to talk of what
+he had heard at the store. Ogden Greene and Tom Cary were going to
+sell out and go to Manitoba. There were better chances for a man out
+there, he said; in Heatherton he might slave all his life and never
+make more than a bare living. Out west he might make a fortune.
+
+Wesley talked on in this strain for some time, rehashing all the
+arguments he had heard Greene and Cary use. He had always been rather
+disposed to grumble at his limited chances in Heatherton, and now the
+great West seemed to stretch before him, full of alluring prospects
+and visions. Ogden and Tom wanted him to go too, he said. He had half
+a notion to. Heatherton was a stick-in-the-mud sort of place anyhow.
+
+"What say, Dosia?"
+
+He looked across the table at her, his eyes bright and questioning.
+Theodosia had listened in silence, as she poured his tea and passed
+him her hot, flaky biscuits. There was a little perpendicular wrinkle
+between her straight eyebrows.
+
+"I think Ogden and Tom are fools," she said crisply. "They have good
+farms here. What do they want to go west for, or you, either? Don't
+get silly notions in your head, Wes."
+
+Wesley flushed.
+
+"Wouldn't you go with me, Dosia?" he said, trying to speak lightly.
+
+"No, I wouldn't," said Theodosia, in her calm, sweet voice. Her face
+was serene, but the little wrinkle had grown deeper. Old Jim Parmelee
+would have known what it meant. He had seen the same expression on
+old Henry Ford's face many a time.
+
+Wesley laughed good-humouredly, as if at a child. His heart was
+suddenly set on going west, and he was sure he could soon bring
+Theodosia around. He did not say anything more about it just then.
+Wesley thought he knew how to manage women.
+
+When he broached the subject again, two days later, Theodosia told him
+plainly that it was no use. She would never consent to leave
+Heatherton and all her friends and go out to the prairies. The idea
+was just rank foolishness, and he would soon see that himself.
+
+All this Theodosia said calmly and sweetly, without any trace of
+temper or irritation. Wesley still believed that he could persuade her
+and he tried perseveringly for a fortnight. By the end of that time he
+discovered that Theodosia was not a great-great-granddaughter of old
+Henry Ford for nothing.
+
+Not that Theodosia ever got angry. Neither did she laugh at him. She
+met his arguments and pleadings seriously enough, but she never
+wavered.
+
+"If you go to Manitoba, Wes, you'll go alone," she said. "I'll never
+go, so there is no use in any more talking."
+
+Wesley was a descendant of old Henry Ford too. Theodosia's unexpected
+opposition roused all the latent stubbornness of his nature. He went
+over to Centreville oftener, and kept his blood at fever heat talking
+to Greene and Cary, who wanted him to go with them and spared no pains
+at inducement.
+
+The matter was gossiped about in Heatherton, of course. People knew
+that Wesley Brooke had caught "the western fever," and wanted to sell
+out and go to Manitoba, while Theodosia was opposed to it. They
+thought Dosia would have to give in in the end, but said it was a pity
+Wes Brooke couldn't be contented to stay where he was well off.
+
+Theodosia's family naturally sided with her and tried to dissuade
+Wesley. But he was mastered by that resentful irritation, roused in a
+man by opposition where he thinks he should be master, which will
+drive him into any cause.
+
+One day he told Theodosia that he was going. She was working her
+butter in her little, snowy-clean dairy under the great willows by the
+well. Wesley was standing in the doorway, his stout, broad-shouldered
+figure filling up the sunlit space. He was frowning and sullen.
+
+"I'm going west in two weeks' time with the boys, Dosia," he said
+stubbornly. "You can come with me or stay here--just exactly as you
+please. But I'm going."
+
+Theodosia went on spatting her balls of golden butter on the print in
+silence. She was looking very neat and pretty in her big white apron,
+her sleeves rolled up high above her plump, dimpled elbows, and her
+ruddy hair curling about her face and her white throat. She looked as
+pliable as her butter.
+
+Her silence angered her husband. He shuffled impatiently.
+
+"Well, what have you to say, Dosia?"
+
+"Nothing," said Theodosia. "If you have made up your mind to go, go
+you will, I suppose. But I will not. There is no use in talking. We've
+been over the ground often enough, Wes. The matter is settled."
+
+Up to that moment Wesley had always believed that his wife would yield
+at last, when she saw that he was determined. Now he realized that she
+never would. Under that exterior of milky, dimpled flesh and calm blue
+eyes was all the iron will of old dead and forgotten Henry Ford. This
+mildest and meekest of girls and wives was not to be moved a
+hairsbreadth by all argument or entreaty, or insistence on a husband's
+rights.
+
+A great, sudden anger came over the man. He lifted his hand and for
+one moment it seemed to Theodosia as if he meant to strike her. Then
+he dropped it with the first oath that had ever crossed his lips.
+
+"You listen to me," he said thickly. "If you won't go with me I'll
+never come back here--never. When you want to do your duty as a wife
+you can come to me. But I'll never come back."
+
+He turned on his heel and strode away. Theodosia kept on spatting her
+butter. The little perpendicular wrinkle had come between her brows
+again. At that moment an odd, almost uncanny resemblance to the old
+portrait of her great-great-grandfather, which hung on the parlour
+wall at home, came out on her girlish face.
+
+The fortnight passed by. Wesley was silent and sullen, never speaking
+to his wife when he could avoid it. Theodosia was as sweet and serene
+as ever. She made an extra supply of shirts and socks for him, put up
+his lunch basket, and packed his trunk carefully. But she never spoke
+of his journey.
+
+He did not sell his farm. Irving Brooke rented it. Theodosia was to
+live in the house. The business arrangements were simple and soon
+concluded.
+
+Heatherton folks gossiped a great deal. They all condemned Theodosia.
+Even her own people sided against her now. They hated to be mixed up
+in a local scandal, and since Wes was bound to go they told Theodosia
+that it was her duty to go with him, no matter how much she disliked
+it. It would be disgraceful not to. They might as well have talked to
+the four winds. Theodosia was immoveable. They coaxed and argued and
+blamed--it all came to the same thing. Even those of them who could be
+"set" enough themselves on occasion could not understand Theodosia,
+who had always been so tractable. They finally gave up, as Wesley had
+done, baffled. Time would bring her to her senses, they said; you just
+had to leave that still, stubborn kind alone.
+
+On the morning of Wesley's departure Theodosia arose at sunrise and
+prepared a tempting breakfast. Irving Brooke's oldest son, Stanley,
+who was to drive Wesley to the station, came over early with his
+express wagon. Wesley's trunk, corded and labelled, stood on the back
+platform. The breakfast was a very silent meal. When it was over
+Wesley put on his hat and overcoat and went to the door, around which
+Theodosia's morning-glory vines were beginning to twine. The sun was
+not yet above the trees and the long shadows lay on the dewy grass.
+The wet leaves were flickering on the old maples that grew along the
+fence between the yard and the clover field beyond. The skies were all
+pearly blue, cleanswept of clouds. From the little farmhouse the green
+meadows sloped down to the valley, where a blue haze wound in and out
+like a glistening ribbon.
+
+Theodosia went out and stood looking inscrutably on, while Wesley and
+Irving hoisted the trunk into the wagon and tied it. Then Wesley came
+up the porch steps and looked at her.
+
+"Dosia," he said a little huskily, "I said I wouldn't ask you to go
+again, but I will. Will you come with me yet?"
+
+"No," said Theodosia gently.
+
+He held out his hand. He did not offer to kiss her.
+
+"Goodbye, Dosia."
+
+"Goodbye, Wes."
+
+There was no tremor of an eyelash with her. Wesley smiled bitterly and
+turned away. When the wagon reached the end of the little lane he
+turned and looked back for the last time. Through all the years that
+followed he carried with him the picture of his wife as he saw her
+then, standing amid the airy shadows and wavering golden lights of the
+morning, the wind blowing the skirt of her pale blue wrapper about
+her feet and ruffling the locks of her bright hair into a delicate
+golden cloud. Then the wagon disappeared around a curve in the road,
+and Theodosia turned and went back into her desolate home.
+
+For a time there was a great buzz of gossip over the affair. People
+wondered over it. Old Jim Parmelee understood better than the others.
+When he met Theodosia he looked at her with a curious twinkle in his
+keen old eyes.
+
+"Looks as if a man could bend her any way he'd a mind to, doesn't
+she?" he said. "Looks is deceiving. It'll come out in her face by and
+by--she's too young yet, but it's there. It does seem unnatteral to
+see a woman so stubborn--you'd kinder look for it more in a man."
+
+Wesley wrote a brief letter to Theodosia when he reached his
+destination. He said he was well and was looking about for the best
+place to settle. He liked the country fine. He was at a place called
+Red Butte and guessed he'd locate there.
+
+Two weeks later he wrote again. He had taken up a claim of three
+hundred acres. Greene and Cary had done the same. They were his
+nearest neighbours and were three miles away. He had knocked up a
+little shack, was learning to cook his own meals, and was very busy.
+He thought the country was a grand one and the prospects good.
+
+Theodosia answered his letter and told him all the Heatherton news.
+She signed herself "Theodosia Brooke," but otherwise there was
+nothing in the letter to indicate that it was written by a wife to
+her husband.
+
+At the end of a year Wesley wrote and once more asked her to go out to
+him. He was getting on well, and was sure she would like the place. It
+was a little rough, to be sure, but time would improve that.
+
+"Won't you let bygones be bygones, Dosia?" he wrote, "and come out to
+me. Do, my dear wife."
+
+Theodosia wrote back, refusing to go. She never got any reply, nor did
+she write again.
+
+People had given up talking about the matter and asking Theodosia when
+she was going out to Wes. Heatherton had grown used to the chronic
+scandal within its decorous borders. Theodosia never spoke of her
+husband to anyone, and it was known that they did not correspond. She
+took her youngest sister to live with her. She had her garden and hens
+and a cow. The farm brought her enough to live on, and she was always
+busy.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+When fifteen years had gone by there were naturally some changes in
+Heatherton, sleepy and; unprogressive as it was. Most of the old
+people were in the little hillside burying-ground that fronted the
+sunrise. Old Jim Parmelee was there with his recollections of four
+generations. Men and women who had been in their prime when Wesley
+went away were old now and the children were grown up and married.
+
+Theodosia was thirty-five and was nothing like! the slim, dimpled girl
+who had stood on the porch steps and watched her husband drive away
+that morning fifteen years ago. She was stout and comely; the auburn
+hair was darker and arched away from her face in smooth, shining waves
+instead of the old-time curls. Her face was unlined and
+fresh-coloured, but no woman could live in subjection to her own
+unbending will for so many years and not show it. Nobody, looking at
+Theodosia now, would have found it hard to believe that a woman with
+such a determined, immoveable face could stick to a course of conduct
+in defiance of circumstances.
+
+Wesley Brooke was almost forgotten. People knew, through
+correspondents of Greene and Cary, that he had prospered and grown
+rich. The curious old story had crystallized into accepted history.
+
+A life may go on without ripple or disturbance for so many years that
+it may seem to have settled into a lasting calm; then a sudden wind of
+passion may sweep over it and leave behind a wake of tempestuous
+waters. Such a time came at last to Theodosia.
+
+One day in August Mrs. Emory Merritt dropped in. Emory Merritt's
+sister was Ogden Greene's wife, and the Merritts kept up an occasional
+correspondence with her. Hence, Cecilia Merritt always knew what was
+to be known about Wesley Brooke, and always told Theodosia because she
+had never been expressly forbidden to do so.
+
+Today she looked slightly excited. Secretly she was wondering if the
+news she brought would have any effect whatever on Theodosia's
+impassive calm.
+
+"Do you know, Dosia, Wesley's real sick? In fact, Phoebe Greene says
+they have very poor hopes of him. He was kind of ailing all the
+spring, it seems, and about a month ago he was took down with some
+kind of slow fever they have out there. Phoebe says they have a hired
+nurse from the nearest town and a good doctor, but she reckons he
+won't get over it. That fever goes awful hard with a man of his
+years."
+
+Cecilia Merritt, who was the fastest talker in Heatherton, had got
+this out before she was brought up by a queer sound, half gasp, half
+cry, from Theodosia. The latter looked as if someone had struck her a
+physical blow.
+
+"Mercy, Dosia, you ain't going to faint! I didn't suppose you'd care.
+You never seemed to care."
+
+"Did you say," asked Theodosia thickly, "that Wesley was sick--dying?"
+
+"Well, that's what Phoebe said. She may be mistaken. Dosia Brooke,
+you're a queer woman. I never could make you out and I never expect
+to. I guess only the Lord who made you can translate you."
+
+Theodosia stood up. The sun was getting low, and the valley beneath
+them, ripening to harvest, was like a river of gold. She folded up her
+sewing with a steady hand.
+
+"It's five o'clock, so I'll ask you to excuse me, Cecilia. I have a
+good deal to attend to. You can ask Emory if he'll drive me to the
+station in the morning. I'm going out to Wes."
+
+"Well, for the land's sake," said Cecilia Merritt feebly, as she tied
+on her gingham sunbonnet. She got up and went home in a daze.
+
+Theodosia packed her trunk and worked all night, dry-eyed, with agony
+and fear tearing at her heart. The iron will had snapped at last, like
+a broken reed, and fierce self-condemnation seized on her. "I've been
+a wicked woman," she moaned.
+
+A week from that day Theodosia climbed down from the dusty stage that
+had brought her from the station over the prairies to the
+unpretentious little house where Wesley Brooke lived. A young girl, so
+like what Ogden Greene's wife had been fifteen years before that
+Theodosia involuntarily exclaimed, "Phoebe," came to the door. Beyond
+her, Theodosia saw the white-capped nurse.
+
+Her voice trembled.
+
+"Does--does Wesley Brooke live here?" she asked.
+
+The girl nodded.
+
+"Yes. But he is very ill at present. Nobody is allowed to see him."
+
+Theodosia put up her hand and loosened her bonnet strings as if they
+were choking her. She had been sick with the fear that Wesley would be
+dead before she got to him. The relief was almost overwhelming.
+
+"But I must see him," she cried hysterically--she, the calm,
+easy-going Dosia, hysterical--"I am his wife--and oh, if he had died
+before I got here!"
+
+The nurse came forward.
+
+"In that case I suppose you must," she conceded. "But he does not
+expect you. I must prepare him for the surprise."
+
+She turned to the door of a room opening off the kitchen, but
+Theodosia, who had hardly heard her, was before her. She was inside
+the room before the nurse could prevent her. Then she stood, afraid
+and trembling, her eyes searching the dim apartment hungrily.
+
+When they fell on the occupant of the bed Theodosia started in bitter
+surprise. All unconsciously she had been expecting to find Wesley as
+he had been when they parted. Could this gaunt, haggard creature, with
+the unkempt beard and prematurely grey hair and the hollow, beseeching
+eyes, be the ruddy, boyish-faced husband of her youth? She gave a
+choking cry of pain and shame, and the sick man turned his head. Their
+eyes met.
+
+Amazement, incredulity, hope, dread, all flashed in succession over
+Wesley Brooke's lined face. He raised himself feebly up.
+
+"Dosia," he murmured.
+
+Theodosia staggered across the room and fell on her knees by the bed.
+She clasped his head to her breast and kissed him again and again.
+
+"Oh, Wes, Wes, can you forgive me? I've been a wicked, stubborn
+woman--and I've spoiled our lives. Forgive me."
+
+He held his thin trembling arms around her and devoured her face with
+his eyes.
+
+"Dosia, when did you come? Did you know I was sick?"
+
+"Wes, I can't talk till you say you've forgiven me."
+
+"Oh, Dosia, you have just as much to forgive. We were both too set. I
+should have been more considerate."
+
+"Just say, I forgive you, Dosia,'" she entreated.
+
+"I forgive you, Dosia," he said gently, "and oh, it's so good to see
+you once more, darling. There hasn't been an hour since I left you
+that I haven't longed for your sweet face. If I had thought you really
+cared I'd have gone back. But I thought you didn't. It broke my heart.
+You did though, didn't you?"
+
+"Oh, yes, yes, yes," she said, holding him more closely, with her
+tears falling.
+
+When the young doctor from Red Butte came that evening he found a
+great improvement in his patient. Joy and happiness, those world-old
+physicians, had done what drugs and medicines had failed to do.
+
+"I'm going to get better, Doc," said Wesley. "My wife has come and
+she's going to stay. You didn't know I was married, did you? I'll tell
+you the story some day. I proposed going back east, but Dosia says
+she'd rather stay here. I'm the happiest man in Red Butte, Doc."
+
+He squeezed Theodosia's hand as he had used to do long ago in
+Heatherton church, and Dosia smiled down at him. There were no
+dimples now, but her smile was very sweet. The ghostly finger of old
+Henry Ford, pointing down through the generations, had lost its power
+to brand with its malediction the life of these, his descendants.
+Wesley and Theodosia had joined hands with their long-lost happiness.
+
+
+
+
+The Story of an Invitation
+
+
+Bertha Sutherland hurried home from the post office and climbed the
+stairs of her boarding-house to her room on the third floor. Her
+roommate, Grace Maxwell, was sitting on the divan by the window,
+looking out into the twilight.
+
+A year ago Bertha and Grace had come to Dartmouth to attend the
+Academy, and found themselves roommates. Bertha was bright, pretty and
+popular, the favourite of her classmates and teachers; Grace was a
+grave, quiet girl, dressed in mourning. She was quite alone in the
+world, the aunt who had brought her up having recently died. At first
+she had felt shy with bright and brilliant Bertha; but they soon
+became friends, and the year that followed was a very pleasant one. It
+was almost ended now, for the terminal exams had begun, and in a
+week's time the school would close for the holidays.
+
+"Have some chocolates, Grace," said Bertha gaily. "I got such good
+news in my letter tonight that I felt I must celebrate it fittingly.
+So I went into Carter's and invested all my spare cash in caramels.
+It's really fortunate the term is almost out, for I'm nearly bankrupt.
+I have just enough left to furnish a 'tuck-out' for commencement
+night, and no more."
+
+"What is your good news, may I ask?" said Grace.
+
+"You know I have an Aunt Margaret--commonly called Aunt Meg--out at
+Riversdale, don't you? There never was such a dear, sweet, jolly aunty
+in the world. I had a letter from her tonight. Listen, I'll read you
+what she says."
+
+    _I want you to spend your holidays with me, my dear. Mary
+    Fairweather and Louise Fyshe and Lily Dennis are coming, too. So
+    there is just room for one more, and that one must be yourself.
+    Come to Riversdale when school closes, and I'll feed you on
+    strawberries and cream and pound cake and doughnuts and mince
+    pies, and all the delicious, indigestible things that school
+    girls love and careful mothers condemn. Mary and Lou and Lil are
+    girls after your own heart, I know, and you shall all do just as
+    you like, and we'll have picnics and parties and merry doings
+    galore._
+
+"There," said Bertha, looking up with a laugh. "Isn't that lovely?"
+
+"How delightful it must be to have friends like that to love you and
+plan for you," said Grace wistfully. "I am sure you will have a
+pleasant vacation, Bertie. As for me, I am going into Clarkman's
+bookstore until school reopens. I saw Mr. Clarkman today and he agreed
+to take me."
+
+Bertha looked surprised. She had not known what Grace's vacation plans
+were.
+
+"I don't think you ought to do that, Grace," she said thoughtfully.
+"You are not strong, and you need a good rest. It will be awfully
+trying to work at Clarkman's all summer."
+
+"There is nothing else for me to do," said Grace, trying to speak
+cheerfully. "You know I'm as poor as the proverbial church mouse,
+Bertie, and the simple truth is that I can't afford to pay my board
+all summer and get my winter outfit unless I do something to earn it.
+I shall be too busy to be lonesome, and I shall expect long, newsy
+letters from you, telling me all your fun--passing your vacation on to
+me at second-hand, you see. Well, I must set to work at those algebra
+problems. I tried them before dark, but I couldn't solve them. My head
+ached and I felt so stupid. How glad I shall be when exams are over."
+
+"I suppose I must revise that senior English this evening," said
+Bertha absently.
+
+But she made no move to do so. She was studying her friend's face. How
+very pale and thin Grace looked--surely much paler and thinner than
+when she had come to the Academy, and she had not by any means been
+plump and rosy then.
+
+I believe she could not stand two months at Clarkman's, thought
+Bertha. If I were not going to Aunt Meg's, I would ask her to go home
+with me. Or even if Aunt Meg had room for another guest, I'd just
+write her all about Grace and ask if I could bring her with me. Aunt
+Meg would understand--she always understands. But she hasn't, so it
+can't be.
+
+Just then a thought darted into Bertha's brain.
+
+"What nonsense!" she said aloud so suddenly and forcibly that Grace
+fairly jumped.
+
+"What is?"
+
+"Oh, nothing much," said Bertha, getting up briskly. "See here, I'm
+going to get to work. I've wasted enough time."
+
+She curled herself up on the divan and tried to study her senior
+English. But her thoughts wandered hopelessly, and finally she gave it
+up in despair and went to bed. There she could not sleep; she lay
+awake and wrestled with herself. It was after midnight when she sat up
+in bed and said solemnly, "I will do it."
+
+Next day Bertha wrote a confidential letter to Aunt Meg. She thanked
+her for her invitation and then told her all about Grace.
+
+"And what I want to ask, Aunt Meg, is that you will let me transfer my
+invitation to Grace, and ask her to go to Riversdale this summer in my
+place. Don't think me ungrateful. No, I'm sure you won't, you always
+understand things. But you can't have us both, and I'd rather Grace
+should go. It will do her so much good, and I have a lovely home of my
+own to go to, and she has none."
+
+Aunt Meg understood, as usual, and was perfectly willing. So she wrote
+to Bertha and enclosed a note of invitation for Grace.
+
+I shall have to manage this affair very carefully, reflected Bertha.
+Grace must never suspect that I did it on purpose. I will tell her
+that circumstances have prevented me from accepting Aunt Meg's
+invitation. That is true enough--no need to say that the circumstances
+are hers, not mine. And I'll say I just asked Aunt Meg to invite her
+in my place and that she has done so.
+
+When Grace came home from her history examination that day, Bertha
+told her story and gave her Aunt Meg's cordial note.
+
+"You must come to me in Bertha's place," wrote the latter. "I feel as
+if I knew you from her letters, and I will consider you as a sort of
+honorary niece, and I'll treat you as if you were Bertha herself."
+
+"Isn't it splendid of Aunt Meg?" said Bertha diplomatically. "Of
+course you'll go, Gracie."
+
+"Oh, I don't know," said Grace in bewilderment. "Are you sure you
+don't want to go, Bertha?"
+
+"Indeed, I do want to go, dreadfully," said Bertha frankly. "But as
+I've told you, it is impossible. But if I am disappointed, Aunt Meg
+musn't be. You must go, Grace, and that is all there is about it."
+
+In the end, Grace did go, a little puzzled and doubtful still, but
+thankful beyond words to escape the drudgery of the counter and the
+noise and heat of the city. Bertha went home, feeling a little bit
+blue in secret, it cannot be denied, but also feeling quite sure that
+if she had to do it all over again, she would do just the same.
+
+The summer slipped quickly by, and finally two letters came to Bertha,
+one from Aunt Meg and one from Grace.
+
+"I've had a lovely time," wrote the latter, "and, oh, Bertie, what do
+you think? I am to stay here always. Oh, of course I am going back to
+school next month, but this is to be my home after this. Aunt Meg--she
+makes me call her that--says I must stay with her for good."
+
+In Aunt Meg's letter was this paragraph:
+
+    _Grace is writing to you, and will have told you that I intend
+    to keep her here. You know I have always wanted a daughter of my
+    own, but my greedy brothers and sisters would never give me one
+    of theirs. So I intend to adopt Grace. She is the sweetest girl
+    in the world, and I am very grateful to you for sending her
+    here. You will not know her when you see her. She has grown
+    plump and rosy._
+
+Bertha folded her letters up with a smile. "I have a vague, delightful
+feeling that I am the good angel in a storybook," she said.
+
+
+
+
+The Touch of Fate
+
+
+Mrs. Major Hill was in her element. This did not often happen, for in
+the remote prairie town of the Canadian Northwest, where her husband
+was stationed, there were few opportunities for match-making. And Mrs.
+Hill was--or believed herself to be--a born matchmaker.
+
+Major Hill was in command of the detachment of Northwest Mounted
+Police at Dufferin Bluff. Mrs. Hill was wont to declare that it was
+the most forsaken place to be found in Canada or out of it; but she
+did her very best to brighten it up, and it is only fair to say that
+the N.W.M.P., officers and men, seconded her efforts.
+
+When Violet Thayer came west to pay a long-promised visit to her old
+schoolfellow, Mrs. Hill's cup of happiness bubbled over. In her secret
+soul she vowed that Violet should never go back east unless it were
+post-haste to prepare a wedding trousseau. There were at least half a
+dozen eligibles among the M.P.s, and Mrs. Hill, after some reflection,
+settled on Ned Madison as the flower of the flock.
+
+"He and Violet are simply made for each other," she told Major Hill
+the evening before Miss Thayer's arrival. "He has enough money and he
+is handsome and fascinating. And Violet is a beauty and a clever woman
+into the bargain. They can't help falling in love, I'm sure; it's
+fate!"
+
+"Perhaps Miss Thayer may be booked elsewhere already," suggested Major
+Hill. He had seen more than one of his wife's card castles fall into
+heartbreaking ruin.
+
+"Oh, no; Violet would have told me if that were the case. It's really
+quite time for her to think of settling down. She is twenty-five, you
+know. The men all go crazy over her, but she's dreadfully hard to
+please. However, she can't help liking Ned. He hasn't a single fault.
+I firmly believe it is foreordained."
+
+And in this belief Mrs. Hill rested securely, but nevertheless did not
+fail to concoct several feminine artifices for the helping on of
+foreordination. It was a working belief with her that it was always
+well to have the gods in your debt.
+
+Violet Thayer came, saw, and conquered. Within thirty-six hours of her
+arrival at Dufferin Bluff she had every one of the half-dozen
+eligibles at her feet, not to mention a score or more ineligibles. She
+would have been surprised indeed had it been otherwise. Miss Thayer
+knew her power, and was somewhat unduly fond of exercising it. But she
+was a very nice girl into the bargain, and so thought one and all of
+the young men who frequented Mrs. Hill's drawing-room and counted it
+richly worth while merely to look at Miss Thayer after having seen
+nothing for weeks except flabby half-breed girls and blue-haired
+squaws.
+
+Madison was foremost in the field, of course. Madison was really a
+nice fellow, and quite deserved all Mrs. Hill's encomiums. He was
+good-looking and well groomed--could sing and dance divinely and play
+the violin to perfection. The other M.P.s were all jealous of him, and
+more so than ever when Violet Thayer came. They did not consider that
+any one of them had the ghost of a chance if Madison entered the lists
+against them.
+
+Violet liked Madison, and was very chummy with him after her own
+fashion. She thought all the M.P.s were nice boys, and they amused
+her, for which she was grateful. She had expected Dufferin Bluff to be
+very dull, and doubtless it would pall after a time, but for a change
+it was delightful.
+
+The sixth evening after her arrival found Mrs. Hill's room crowded, as
+usual, with M.P.s. Violet was looking her best in a distracting new
+gown--Sergeant Fox afterwards described it to a brother officer as a
+"stunning sort of rig between a cream and a blue and a brown"; she
+flirted impartially with all the members of her circle at first, but
+gradually narrowed down to Ned Madison, much to the delight of Mrs.
+Hill, who was hovering around like a small, brilliant butterfly.
+
+Violet was talking to Madison and watching John Spencer out of the
+tail of her eye. Spencer was not an M.P. He had some government post
+at Dufferin Bluff, and this was his first call at Lone Poplar Villa
+since Miss Thayer's arrival. He did not seem to be dazzled by her at
+all, and after his introduction had promptly retired to a corner with
+Major Hill, where they talked the whole evening about the trouble on
+the Indian reservation at Loon Lake.
+
+Possibly this indifference piqued Miss Thayer. Possibly she considered
+it refreshing after the servile adulation of the M.P.s. At any rate,
+when all the latter were gathered about the piano singing a chorus
+with gusto, she shook Madison off and went over to the corner where
+Spencer, deserted by the Major, whose bass was wanted, was sitting in
+solitary state.
+
+He looked up indifferently as Violet shimmered down on the divan
+beside him. Sergeant Robinson, who was watching them jealously from
+the corner beyond the palms, and would have given his eyes, or at
+least one of them, for such a favour, mentally vowed that Spencer was
+the dullest fellow he had ever put those useful members on.
+
+"Don't you sing, Mr. Spencer?" asked Violet by way of beginning a
+conversation, as she turned her splendid eyes full upon him. Robinson
+would have lost his head under them, but Spencer kept his heroically.
+
+"No," was his calmly brief reply, given without any bluntness, but
+with no evident intention of saying anything more.
+
+In spite of her social experience Violet felt disconcerted.
+
+"If he doesn't want to talk to me I won't try to make him," she
+thought crossly. No man had ever snubbed her so before.
+
+Spencer listened immovably to the music for a time. Then he turned to
+his companion with a palpable effort to be civilly sociable.
+
+"How do you like the west, Miss Thayer?" he said.
+
+Violet smiled--the smile most men found dangerous.
+
+"Very much, so far as I have seen it. There is a flavour about the
+life here that I like, but I dare say it would soon pall. It must be
+horribly lonesome here most of the time, especially in winter."
+
+"The M.P.s are always growling that it is," returned Spencer with a
+slight smile. "For my own part I never find it so."
+
+Violet decided that his smile was very becoming to him and that she
+liked the way his dark hair grew over his forehead.
+
+"I don't think I've seen you at Lone Poplar Villa before?" she said.
+
+"No. I haven't been here for some time. I came up tonight to see the
+Major about the Loon Lake trouble."
+
+"Otherwise you wouldn't have come," thought Violet.
+"Flattering--very!" Aloud she said, "Is it serious?"
+
+"Oh, no. A mere squabble among the Indians. Have you ever visited the
+Reservation, Miss Thayer? No? Well, you should get some of your M.P.
+friends to take you out. It would be worth while."
+
+"Why don't you ask me to go yourself?" said Violet audaciously.
+
+Spencer smiled again. "Have I failed in politeness by not doing so? I
+fear you would find me an insufferably dull companion."
+
+So he was not going to ask her after all. Violet felt piqued. She was
+also conscious of a sensation very near akin to disappointment. She
+looked across at Madison. How trim and dapper he was!
+
+"I hate a bandbox man," she said to herself.
+
+Spencer meanwhile had picked up one of Mrs. Hill's novels from the
+stand beside him.
+
+"_Fools of Habit_," he said, glancing at the cover. "I see it is
+making quite a sensation down east. I suppose you've read it?"
+
+"Yes. It is very frivolous and clever--all froth but delightful froth.
+Did you like it?"
+
+Spencer balanced the novel reflectively on his slender brown hand.
+
+"Well, yes, rather. But I don't care for novels as a rule. I don't
+understand them. The hero of this book, now--do you believe that a man
+in love would act as he did?"
+
+"I don't know," said Violet amusedly. "You ought to be a better judge
+than I. You are a man."
+
+"I have never loved anybody, so I am in no position to decide," said
+Spencer.
+
+There was as little self-consciousness in his voice as if he were
+telling her a fact concerning the Loon Lake trouble. Violet rose to
+the occasion.
+
+"You have an interesting experience to look forward to," she said.
+
+Spencer turned his deep-set grey eyes squarely upon her.
+
+"I don't know that. When I said I had never loved, I meant more than
+the love of a man for some particular woman. I meant love in every
+sense. I do not know what it is to have an affection for any human
+being. My parents died before I can remember. My only living relative
+was a penurious old uncle who brought me up for shame's sake and
+kicked me out on the world as soon as he could. I don't make friends
+easily. I have a few acquaintances whom I like, but there is not a
+soul on earth for whom I care, or who cares for me."
+
+"What a revelation love will be to you when it comes," said Violet
+softly. Again he looked into her eyes.
+
+"Do you think it will come?" he asked.
+
+Before she could reply Mrs. Hill pounced upon them. Violet was wanted
+to sing. Mr. Spencer would excuse her, wouldn't he? Mr. Spencer did so
+obligingly. Moreover, he got up and bade his hostess good night.
+Violet gave him her hand.
+
+"You will call again?" she said.
+
+Spencer looked across at Madison--perhaps it was accidental.
+
+"I think not," he said. "If, as you say, love will come some time, it
+would be a very unpleasant revelation if it came in hopeless guise,
+and one never knows what may happen."
+
+Miss Thayer was conscious of a distinct fluttering of her heart as she
+went across to the piano. This was a new sensation for her, and worthy
+of being analyzed. After the M.P.s had gone she asked Mrs. Hill who
+Mr. Spencer was.
+
+"Oh, John Spencer," said Mrs. Hill carelessly. "He's at the head of
+the Land Office here. That's really all I know about him. Jack says he
+is a downright good fellow and all that, you know. But he's no earthly
+good in a social way; he can't talk or he won't. He's flat. So
+different from Mr. Madison, isn't he?"
+
+"Very," said Violet emphatically.
+
+After Mrs. Hill had gone out Violet walked to the nearest mirror and
+looked at herself with her forefinger in the dimple of her chin.
+
+"It is very odd," she said. She did not mean the dimple.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Spencer had told her he was not coming back. She did not believe this,
+but she did not expect him for a few days. Consequently, when he
+appeared the very next evening she was surprised. Madison, to whom she
+was talking when Spencer entered, does not know to this day what she
+had started to say to him, for she never finished her sentence.
+
+"I wonder if it is the Loon Lake affair again?" she thought nervously.
+
+Mrs. Hill came up at this point and whisked Madison off for a waltz.
+Spencer, seeing his chance, came straight across the room to her.
+Sergeant Robinson, who was watching them as usual, is willing to make
+affidavit that Miss Thayer changed colour.
+
+After his greeting Spencer said nothing. He sat beside her, and they
+watched Mrs. Hill and Madison dancing. Violet wondered why she did not
+feel bored. When she saw Madison coming back to her she was conscious
+of an unreasonable anger with him. She got up abruptly.
+
+"Let us go out on the verandah," she said imperiously. "It is
+absolutely stifling in here."
+
+They went out. It was very cool and dusky. The lights of the town
+twinkled out below them, and the prairie bluffs behind them were dark
+and sibilant.
+
+"I am going to drive over to Loon Lake tomorrow afternoon to look into
+affairs there," said Spencer. "Will you go with me?"
+
+Violet reflected a moment. "You didn't ask me as if you really wanted
+me to go," she said.
+
+Spencer put his hand over the white fingers that rested on the
+railing. He bent forward until his breath stirred the tendrils of hair
+on her forehead.
+
+"Yes, I do," he said distinctly. "I want you to go with me to Loon
+Lake tomorrow more than I ever wanted any thing in my life before."
+
+Later on, when everybody had gone, Violet had her bad quarter of an
+hour with Mrs. Hill. That lady felt herself aggrieved.
+
+"I think you treated poor Ned very badly tonight, Vi. He felt really
+blue over it. And it was awfully bad form to go out with Spencer as
+you did and stay there so long. And you oughtn't to flirt with him--he
+doesn't understand the game."
+
+"I'm not going to flirt with him," said Miss Thayer calmly.
+
+"Oh, I suppose it's just your way. Only don't turn the poor fellow's
+head. By the way, Ned is coming up with his camera tomorrow afternoon
+to take us all."
+
+"I'm afraid he won't find me at home," said Violet sweetly. "I am
+going out to Loon Lake with Mr. Spencer."
+
+Mrs. Hill flounced off to bed in a pet. She was disgusted with
+everything, she declared to the Major. Things had been going so
+nicely, and now they were all muddled.
+
+"Isn't Madison coming up to time?" queried the Major sleepily.
+
+"Madison! It's Violet. She is behaving abominably. She treated poor
+Ned shamefully tonight. You saw yourself how she acted with Spencer,
+and she's going to Loon Lake with him tomorrow, she says. I'm sure I
+don't know what she can see in him. He's the dullest, pokiest fellow
+alive--so different from her in every way."
+
+"Perhaps that is why she likes him," suggested the Major. "The
+attraction of opposites and all that, you know."
+
+But Mrs. Hill crossly told him he didn't know anything about it, so,
+being a wise man, he held his tongue.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+During the next two weeks Mrs. Hill was the most dissatisfied woman in
+the four districts, and every M.P. down to the rawest recruit
+anathemized Spencer in secret a dozen times a day. Violet simply
+dropped everyone else, including Madison, in the coolest, most
+unmistakable way.
+
+One night Spencer did not come to Lone Poplar Villa. Violet looked for
+him to the last. When she realized that he was not coming she went to
+the verandah to have it out with herself. As she sat huddled up in a
+dim corner beneath a silkily rustling western maple two M.P.s came out
+and, not seeing her, went on with their conversation.
+
+"Heard about Spencer?" questioned one.
+
+"No. What of him?"
+
+"Well, they say Miss Thayer's thrown him over. Yesterday I was passing
+here about four in the afternoon and I saw Spencer coming in. I went
+down to the Land Office and was chatting to Cribson when the door
+opened about half an hour later and Spencer burst in. He was pale as
+the dead, and looked wild. 'Has Fyshe gone to Rainy River about those
+Crown Lands yet?' he jerked out. Cribson said, 'No.' Then tell him he
+needn't; I'm going myself,' said Spencer and out he bolted. He posted
+off to Rainy River today, and won't be back for a fortnight. She'll be
+gone then."
+
+"Rather rough on Spencer after the way she encouraged him," returned
+the other as they passed out of earshot.
+
+Violet got up. All the callers were gone, and she swept in to Mrs.
+Hill dramatically.
+
+"Edith," she said in the cold, steady voice that, to those who knew
+her, meant breakers ahead for somebody, "Mr. Spencer was here
+yesterday when I was riding with the Major, was he not? What did you
+tell him about me?"
+
+Mrs. Hill looked at Violet's blazing eyes and wilted.
+
+"I--didn't tell him anything--much."
+
+"What was it?"
+
+Mrs. Hill began to sob.
+
+"Don't look at me like that, Violet! He just dropped in and we were
+talking about you--at least I was--and I had heard that Harry St. Maur
+was paying you marked attention before you came west--and--and that
+some people thought you were engaged--and so--and so--"
+
+"You told Mr. Spencer that I was engaged to Harry St. Maur?"
+
+"No-o-o--I just hinted. I didn't mean an-any harm. I never dreamed
+you'd really c-care. I thought you were just amusing yourself--and so
+did everybody--and I wanted Ned Madison--"
+
+Violet had turned very pale.
+
+"I love him," she said hoarsely, "and you've sent him away. He's gone
+to Rainy River. I shall never see him again!"
+
+"Oh, yes, you will," gasped Mrs. Hill faintly. "He'll come back when
+he knows--you c-can write and tell him--"
+
+"Do you suppose I am going to write and ask him to come back?" said
+Violet wildly. "I've enough pride left yet to keep me from doing that
+for a man at whose head I've thrown myself openly--yes, openly, and
+who has never, in words at least, told me he cared anything about me.
+I will never forgive you, Edith!"
+
+Then Mrs. Hill found herself alone with her lacerated feelings. After
+soothing them with a good cry, she set to work thinking seriously.
+There was no doubt she had muddled things badly, but there was no use
+leaving them in a muddle when a word or two fitly spoken might set
+them straight.
+
+Mrs. Hill sat down and wrote a very diplomatic letter before she went
+to bed, and the next morning she waylaid Sergeant Fox and asked him if
+he would ride down to Rainy River with a very important message for
+Mr. Spencer. Sergeant Fox wondered what it could be, but it was not
+his to reason why; it was his only to mount and ride with all due
+speed, for Mrs. Hill's whims and wishes were as stringent and binding
+as the rules of the force.
+
+That evening when Mrs. Hill and Violet--the latter very silent and
+regal--were sitting on the verandah, a horseman came galloping up the
+Rainy River trail. Mrs. Hill excused herself and went in. Five minutes
+later John Spencer, covered with the alkali dust of his twenty miles'
+ride, dismounted at Violet's side.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The M.P.s gave a concert at the barracks that night and Mrs. Hill and
+her Major went to it, as well as everyone else of any importance in
+town except Violet and Spencer. They sat on Major Hill's verandah and
+watched the moon rising over the bluffs and making milk-white
+reflections in the prairie lakes.
+
+"It seems a year of misery since last night," sighed Violet happily.
+
+"You couldn't have been quite as miserable as I was," said Spencer
+earnestly. "You were everything--absolutely everything to me. Other
+men have little rills and driblets of affection for sisters and
+cousins and aunts, but everything in me went out to you. Do you
+remember you told me the first time we met that love would be a
+revelation to me? It has been more. It has been a new gospel. I hardly
+dared hope you could care for me. Even yet I don't know why you do."
+
+"I love you," said Violet gravely, "because you are you."
+
+Than which, of course, there could be no better reason.
+
+
+
+
+The Waking of Helen
+
+
+Robert Reeves looked somewhat curiously at the girl who was waiting on
+him at his solitary breakfast. He had not seen her before, arriving at
+his summer boarding house only the preceding night.
+
+It was a shabby farmhouse on the inland shore of a large bay that was
+noted for its tides, and had wonderful possibilities of light and
+shade for an impressionist. Reeves was an enthusiastic artist. It
+mattered little to him that the boarding accommodations were most
+primitive, the people uncultured and dull, the place itself utterly
+isolated, as long as he could revel in those transcendent sunsets and
+sunrises, those marvellous moonlights, those wonderful purple shores
+and sweeps of shimmering blue water.
+
+The owner of the farm was Angus Fraser, and he and his wife seemed to
+be a reserved, uncouth pair, with no apparent interest in life save to
+scratch a bare living out of their few stony acres. He had an
+impression that they were childless and was at a loss to place this
+girl who poured his tea and brought in his toast. She did not resemble
+either Fraser or his wife. She was certainly not beautiful, being very
+tall and rather awkward, and dressed in a particularly unbecoming dark
+print wrapper. Her luxuriant hair was thick and black, and was coiled
+in a heavy knot at the nape of her neck. Her features were delicate
+but irregular, and her skin was very brown. Her eyes attracted
+Reeves's notice especially; they were large and dark and full of a
+half-unconscious, wistful longing, as if a prisoned soul behind them
+were vainly trying to reveal itself.
+
+Reeves could find out nothing of her from herself, for she responded
+to his tentative questions about the place in the briefest fashion.
+Afterwards he interviewed Mrs. Fraser cautiously, and ascertained that
+the girl's name was Helen Fraser, and that she was Angus's niece.
+
+"Her father and mother are dead and we've brought her up. Helen's a
+good girl in most ways--a little obstinate and sulky now and then--but
+generally she's steady enough, and as for work, there ain't a girl in
+Bay Beach can come up to her in house or field. Angus calculates she
+saves him a man's wages clear. No, I ain't got nothing to say against
+Helen."
+
+Nevertheless, Reeves felt somehow that Mrs. Fraser did not like her
+husband's niece. He often heard her scolding or nagging Helen at her
+work, and noticed that the latter never answered back. But once, after
+Mrs. Angus's tongue had been especially bitter, he met the girl
+hurrying along the hall from the kitchen with her eyes full of tears.
+Reeves felt as if someone had struck him a blow. He went to Angus and
+his wife that afternoon. He wished to paint a shore picture, he said,
+and wanted a model. Would they allow Miss Fraser to pose for him? He
+would pay liberally for her time.
+
+Angus and his wife had no objection. They would pocket the money, and
+Helen could be spared a spell every day as well as not. Reeves told
+Helen of his plan himself, meeting her in the evening as she was
+bringing the cows home from the low shore pastures beyond the marsh.
+He was surprised at the sudden illumination of her face. It almost
+transfigured her from a plain, sulky-looking girl into a beautiful
+woman.
+
+But the glow passed quickly. She assented to his plan quietly, almost
+lifelessly. He walked home with her behind the cows and talked of the
+sunset and the mysterious beauty of the bay and the purple splendour
+of the distant coasts. She listened in silence. Only once, when he
+spoke of the distant murmur of the open sea, she lifted her head and
+looked at him.
+
+"What does it say to you?" she asked.
+
+"It speaks of eternity. And to you?"
+
+"It calls me," she answered simply, "and then I want to go out and
+meet it--and it hurts me too. I can't tell how or why. Sometimes it
+makes me feel as if I were asleep and wanted to wake and didn't know
+how."
+
+She turned and looked out over the bay. A dying gleam of sunset broke
+through a cloud and fell across her hair. For a moment she seemed the
+spirit of the shore personified--all its mystery, all its uncertainty,
+all its elusive charm.
+
+She has possibilities, thought Reeves.
+
+Next day he began his picture. At first he had thought of painting her
+as the incarnation of a sea spirit, but decided that her moods were
+too fitful. So he began to sketch her as "Waiting"--a woman looking
+out across the bay with a world of hopeless longing in her eyes. The
+subject suited her well, and the picture grew apace.
+
+When he was tired of work he made her walk around the shore with him,
+or row up the head of the bay in her own boat. He tried to draw her
+out, at first with indifferent success. She seemed to be frightened of
+him. He talked to her of many things--the far outer world whose echoes
+never reached her, foreign lands where he had travelled, famous men
+and women whom he had met, music, art and books. When he spoke of
+books he touched the right chord. One of those transfiguring flashes
+he delighted to evoke now passed over her plain face.
+
+"That is what I've always wanted," she said hungrily, "and I never get
+them. Aunt hates to see me reading. She says it is a waste of time.
+And I love it so. I read every scrap of paper I can get hold of, but I
+hardly ever see a book."
+
+The next day Reeves took his Tennyson to the shore and began to read
+the _Idylls of the King_ to her.
+
+"It is beautiful," was her sole verbal comment, but her rapt eyes said
+everything.
+
+After that he never went out with her without a book--now one of the
+poets, now some prose classic. He was surprised by her quick
+appreciation of and sympathy with the finest passages. Gradually, too,
+she forgot her shyness and began to talk. She knew nothing of his
+world, but her own world she knew and knew well. She was a mine of
+traditional history about the bay. She knew the rocky coast by heart,
+and every old legend that clung to it. They drifted into making
+excursions along the shore and explored its wildest retreats. The girl
+had an artist's eye for scenery and colour effect.
+
+"You should have been an artist," Reeves told her one day when she had
+pointed out to him the exquisite loveliness of a shaft of light
+falling through a cleft in the rocks across a dark-green pool at their
+base.
+
+"I would rather be a writer," she said slowly, "if I could only write
+something like those books you have read to me. What a glorious
+destiny it must be to have something to say that the whole world is
+listening for, and to be able to say it in words that will live
+forever! It must be the noblest human lot."
+
+"Yet some of those men and women were neither good nor noble," said
+Reeves gently, "and many of them were unhappy."
+
+Helen dismissed the subject as abruptly as she always did when the
+conversation touched too nearly on the sensitive edge of her soul
+dreams.
+
+"Do you know where I am taking you today?" she said.
+
+"No--where?"
+
+"To what the people here call the Kelpy's Cave. I hate to go there. I
+believe there is something uncanny about it, but I think you will like
+to see it. It is a dark little cave in the curve of a small cove, and
+on each side the headlands of rock run far out. At low tide we can
+walk right around, but when the tide comes in it fills the Kelpy's
+Cave. If you were there and let the tide come past the points, you
+would be drowned unless you could swim, for the rocks are so steep and
+high it is impossible to climb them."
+
+Reeves was interested.
+
+"Was anyone ever caught by the tide?"
+
+"Yes," returned Helen, with a shudder. "Once, long ago, before I was
+born, a girl went around the shore to the cave and fell asleep
+there--and the tide came in and she was drowned. She was young and
+very pretty, and was to have been married the next week. I've been
+afraid of the place ever since."
+
+The treacherous cave proved to be a picturesque and innocent-looking
+spot, with the beach of glittering sand before it and the high gloomy
+walls of rock on either hand.
+
+"I must come here some day and sketch it," said Reeves
+enthusiastically, "and you must be the Kelpy, Helen, and sit in the
+cave with your hair wrapped about you and seaweed clinging to it."
+
+"Do you think a kelpy would look like that?" said the girl dreamily.
+"I don't. I think it is a wild, wicked little sea imp, malicious and
+mocking and cruel, and it sits here and watches for victims."
+
+"Well, never mind your sea kelpies," Reeves said, fishing out his
+Longfellow. "They are a tricky folk, if all tales be true, and it is
+supposed to be a very rash thing to talk about them in their own
+haunts. I want to read you 'The Building of the Ship.' You will like
+it, I'm sure."
+
+When the tide turned they went home.
+
+"We haven't seen the kelpy, after all," said Reeves.
+
+"I think I shall see him some day," said Helen gravely. "I think he is
+waiting for me there in that gloomy cave of his, and some time or
+other he will get me."
+
+Reeves smiled at the gloomy fancy, and Helen smiled back at him with
+one of her sudden radiances. The tide was creeping swiftly up over the
+white sands. The sun was low and the bay was swimming in a pale blue
+glory. They parted at Clam Point, Helen to go for the cows and Reeves
+to wander on up the shore. He thought of Helen at first, and the
+wonderful change that had come over her of late; then he began to
+think of another face--a marvellously lovely one with blue eyes as
+tender as the waters before him. Then Helen was forgotten.
+
+The summer waned swiftly. One afternoon Reeves took a fancy to revisit
+the Kelpy's Cave. Helen could not go. It was harvest time, and she was
+needed in the field.
+
+"Don't let the kelpy catch you," she said to him half seriously. "The
+tide will turn early this afternoon, and you are given to
+day-dreaming."
+
+"I'll be careful," he promised laughingly, and he meant to be careful.
+But somehow when he reached the cave its unwholesome charm overcame
+him, and he sat down on the boulder at its mouth.
+
+"An hour yet before tide time," he said. "Just enough time to read
+that article on impressionists in my review and then stroll home by
+the sandshore."
+
+From reading he passed to day-dreaming, and day-dreaming drifted into
+sleep, with his head pillowed on the rocky walls of the cave.
+
+How long he had slept he did not know, but he woke with a start of
+horror. He sprang to his feet, realizing his position instantly. The
+tide was in--far in past the headlands already. Above and beyond him
+towered the pitiless unscalable rocks. There was no way of escape.
+
+Reeves was no coward, but life was sweet to him, and to die like
+that--like a drowned rat in a hole--to be able to do nothing but wait
+for that swift and sure oncoming death! He reeled against the damp
+rock wall, and for a moment sea and sky and prisoning headlands and
+white-lined tide whirled before his eyes.
+
+Then his head grew clearer. He tried to think. How long had he? Not
+more than twenty minutes at the outside. Well, death was sure and he
+would meet it bravely. But to wait--to wait helplessly! He should go;
+mad with the horror of it before those endless minutes would have
+passed!
+
+He took something from his pocket and bent his, head over it, pressing
+his lips to it repeatedly. And then, when he raised his face again, a
+dory was coming around the headland on his right, and Helen Fraser was
+in it.
+
+Reeves was dizzy again with the shock of joy and thankfulness. He ran
+down over the little stretch of sand still uncovered by the tide and
+around to the rocks of the headlands against which the dory was
+already grating. He sprang forward impulsively and caught the girl's
+cold hands in his as she dropped the oars and stood up.
+
+"Helen, you have saved me! How can I ever thank you? I--"
+
+He broke off abruptly, for she was looking up at him, breathlessly and
+voicelessly, with her whole soul in her eyes. He saw in them a
+revelation that amazed him; he dropped her hands and stepped back as
+if she had struck him in the face.
+
+Helen did not notice the change in him. She clasped her hands together
+and her voice trembled.
+
+"Oh, I was afraid I should be too late! When I came in from the field
+Aunt Hannah said you had not come back--and I knew it was tide
+time--and I felt somehow that it had caught you in the cave. I ran
+down over the marsh and took Joe Simmon's dory. If I had not got here
+in time--"
+
+She broke off shiveringly. Reeves stepped into the dory and took up
+the oars.
+
+"The kelpy would have been sure of its victim then," he said, trying
+to speak lightly. "It would have almost served me right for
+neglecting your warning. I was very careless. You must let me row
+back. I am afraid you have overtasked your strength trying to cheat
+the kelpy."
+
+Reeves rowed homeward in an absolute silence. Helen did not speak and
+he could not. When they reached the dory anchorage he helped her out.
+
+"I think I'll go out to the Point for a walk," he said. "I want to
+steady my nerves. You must go right home and rest. Don't be anxious--I
+won't take any more chances with sea kelpies."
+
+Helen went away without a word, and Reeves walked slowly out to the
+Point. He was grieved beyond measure at the discovery he believed he
+had made. He had never dreamed of such a thing. He was not a vain man,
+and was utterly free from all tendency to flirtation. It had never
+occurred to him that the waking of the girl's deep nature might be
+attended with disastrous consequences. He had honestly meant to help
+her, and what had he done?
+
+He felt very uncomfortable; he could not conscientiously blame
+himself, but he saw that he had acted foolishly. And of course he must
+go away at once. And he must also tell her something she ought to
+know. He wished he had told her long ago.
+
+The following afternoon was a perfect one. Reeves was sketching on the
+sandshore when Helen came. She sat down on a camp stool a little to
+one side and did not speak. After a few moments Reeves pushed away his
+paraphernalia impatiently.
+
+"I don't feel in a mood for work," he said. "It is too dreamy a
+day--one ought to do nothing to be in keeping. Besides, I'm getting
+lazy now that my vacation is nearly over. I must go in a few days."
+
+He avoided looking at her, so he did not see the sudden pallor of her
+face.
+
+"So soon?" she said in a voice expressive of no particular feeling.
+
+"Yes. I ought not to have lingered so long. My world will be
+forgetting me and that will not do. It has been a very pleasant summer
+and I shall be sorry to leave Bay Beach."
+
+"But you will come back next summer?" asked Helen quickly. "You said
+you would."
+
+Reeves nerved himself for his very distasteful task.
+
+"Perhaps," he said, with an attempt at carelessness, "but if I do so,
+I shall not come alone. Somebody who is very dear to me will come with
+me--as my wife. I have never told you about her, Helen, but you and I
+are such good friends that I do not mind doing so now. I am engaged to
+a very sweet girl, and we expect to be married next spring."
+
+There was a brief silence. Reeves had been vaguely afraid of a scene
+and was immensely relieved to find his fear unrealized. Helen sat very
+still. He could not see her face. Did she care, after all? Was he
+mistaken?
+
+When she spoke her voice was perfectly calm.
+
+"Thank you, it is very kind of you to tell me about her. I suppose she
+is very beautiful."
+
+"Yes, here is her picture. You can judge for yourself."
+
+Helen took the portrait from his hand and looked at it steadily. It
+was a miniature painted on ivory, and the face looking out from it was
+certainly lovely.
+
+"It is no wonder you love her," said the girl in a low tone as she
+handed it back. "It must be strange to be so beautiful as that."
+
+Reeves picked up his Tennyson.
+
+"Shall I read you something? What will you have?"
+
+"Read 'Elaine,' please. I want to hear that once more."
+
+Reeves felt a sudden dislike to her choice.
+
+"Wouldn't you prefer something else?" he asked, hurriedly turning over
+the leaves. "'Elaine' is rather sad. Shan't I read 'Guinevere'
+instead?"
+
+"No," said Helen in the same lifeless tone. "I have no sympathy for
+Guinevere. She suffered and her love was unlawful, but she was loved
+in return--she did not waste her love on someone who did not want or
+care for it. Elaine did, and her life went with it. Read me the
+story."
+
+Reeves obeyed. When he had finished he held the book out to her.
+
+"Helen, will you take this Tennyson from me in remembrance of our
+friendship and of the Kelpy's Cave? I shall never forget that I owe my
+life to you."
+
+"Thank you."
+
+She took the book and placed a little thread of crimson seaweed that
+had been caught in the sand between the pages of "Elaine." Then she
+rose.
+
+"I must go back now. Aunt will need me. Thank you again for the book,
+Mr. Reeves, and for all your kindness to me."
+
+Reeves was relieved when the interview was over. Her calmness had
+reassured him. She did not care very much, after all; it was only a
+passing fancy, and when he was gone she would soon forget him.
+
+He went away a few days later, and Helen bade him an impassive
+good-bye. When the afternoon was far spent she stole away from the
+house to the shore, with her Tennyson in her hand, and took her way to
+the Kelpy's Cave.
+
+The tide was just beginning to come in. She sat down on the big
+boulder where Reeves had fallen asleep. Beyond stretched the gleaming
+blue waters, mellowing into a hundred fairy shades horizonward.
+
+The shadows of the rocks were around her. In front was the white line
+of the incoming tide; it had almost reached the headlands. A few
+minutes more and escape would be cut off--yet she did not move.
+
+When the dark green water reached her, and the lapping wavelets
+swished up over the hem of her dress, she lifted her head and a sudden
+strange smile flashed over her face.
+
+Perhaps the kelpy understood it.
+
+
+
+
+The Way of the Winning of Anne
+
+
+Jerome Irving had been courting Anne Stockard for fifteen years. He
+had begun when she was twenty and he was twenty-five, and now that
+Jerome was forty, and Anne, in a village where everybody knew
+everybody else's age, had to own to being thirty-five, the courtship
+did not seem any nearer a climax than it had at the beginning. But
+that was not Jerome's fault, poor fellow!
+
+At the end of the first year he had asked Anne to marry him, and Anne
+had refused. Jerome was disappointed, but he kept his head and went on
+courting Anne just the same; that is he went over to Esek Stockard's
+house every Saturday night and spent the evening, he walked home with
+Anne from prayer meeting and singing school and parties when she would
+let him, and asked her to go to all the concerts and socials and
+quilting frolics that came off. Anne never would go, of course, but
+Jerome faithfully gave her the chance. Old Esek rather favoured
+Jerome's suit, for Anne was the plainest of his many daughters, and no
+other fellow seemed at all anxious to run Jerome off the track; but
+she took her own way with true Stockard firmness, and matters were
+allowed to drift on at the will of time or chance.
+
+Three years later Jerome tried his luck again, with precisely the same
+result, and after that he had asked Anne regularly once a year to
+marry him, and just as regularly Anne said no a little more brusquely
+and a little more decidedly every year. Now, in the mellowness of a
+fifteen-year-old courtship, Jerome did not mind it at all. He knew
+that everything comes to the man who has patience to wait.
+
+Time, of course, had not stood still with Anne and Jerome, or with the
+history of Deep Meadows. At the Stockard homestead the changes had
+been many and marked. Every year or two there had been a wedding in
+the big brick farmhouse, and one of old Esek's girls had been the
+bride each time. Julia and Grace and Celia and Betty and Theodosia
+and Clementina Stockard were all married and gone. But Anne had never
+had another lover. There had to be an old maid in every big family she
+said, and she was not going to marry Jerome Irving just for the sake
+of having Mrs. on her tombstone.
+
+Old Esek and his wife had been put away in the Deep Meadows
+burying-ground. The broad, fertile Stockard acres passed into Anne's
+possession. She was a good business-woman, and the farm continued to
+be the best in the district. She kept two hired men and a servant
+girl, and the sixteen-year-old of her oldest sister lived with her.
+There were few visitors at the Stockard place now, but Jerome "dropped
+in" every Saturday night with clockwork regularity and talked to Anne
+about her stock and advised her regarding the rotation of her crops
+and the setting out of her orchards. And at ten o'clock he would take
+his hat and cane and tell Anne to be good to herself, and go home.
+
+Anne had long since given up trying to discourage him; she even
+accepted attentions from him now that she had used to refuse. He
+always walked home with her from evening meetings and was her partner
+in the games at quilting parties. It was great fun for the young
+folks. "Old Jerome and Anne" were a standing joke in Deep Meadows. But
+the older people had ceased to expect anything to come of it.
+
+Anne laughed at Jerome as she had always done, and would not have
+owned for the world that she could have missed him. Jerome was useful,
+she admitted, and a comfortable friend; and she would have liked him
+well enough if he would only omit that ridiculous yearly ceremony of
+proposal.
+
+It was Jerome's fortieth birthday when Anne refused him again. He
+realized this as he went down the road in the moonlight, and doubt and
+dismay began to creep into his heart. Anne and he were both getting
+old--there was no disputing that fact. It was high time that he
+brought her to terms if he was ever going to. Jerome was an
+easy-going mortal and always took things placidly, but he did not
+mean to have all those fifteen years of patient courting go for
+nothing He had thought Anne would get tired of saying no, sooner or
+later, and say yes, if for no other reason than to have a change; but
+getting tired did not seem to run in the Stockard blood. She had said
+no that night just as coolly and decidedly and unsentimentally as she
+said it fifteen years before. Jerome had the sensation of going around
+in a circle and never getting any further on. He made up his mind that
+something must be done, and just as he got to the brook that divides
+Deep Meadows West from Deep Meadows Central an idea struck him; it was
+a good idea and amused him. He laughed aloud and slapped his thigh,
+much to the amusement of two boys who were sitting unnoticed on the
+railing of the bridge.
+
+"There's old Jerome going home from seeing Anne Stockard," said one.
+"Wonder what on earth he's laughing at. Seems to me if I couldn't get
+a wife without hoeing a fifteen-year row, I'd give up trying."
+
+But, then, the speaker was a Hamilton, and the Hamiltons never had any
+perseverance.
+
+Jerome, although a well-to-do man, owning a good farm, had, so to
+speak, no home of his own. The old Irving homestead belonged to his
+older brother, who had a wife and family. Jerome lived with them and
+was so used to it he didn't mind.
+
+At forty a lover must not waste time. Jerome thought out the details
+that night, and next day he opened the campaign. But it was not until
+the evening after that that Anne Stockard heard the news. It was her
+niece, Octavia, who told her. The latter had been having a chat up the
+lane with Sam Mitchell, and came in with a broad smile on her round,
+rosy face and a twinkle in her eyes.
+
+"I guess you've lost your beau this time, Aunt Anne. It looks as if he
+meant to take you at your word at last."
+
+"What on earth do you mean?" asked Anne, a little sharply. She was in
+the pantry counting eggs, and Octavia's interruption made her lose her
+count. "Now I can't remember whether it was six or seven dozen I said
+last. I shall have to count them all over again. I wish, Octavia, that
+you could think of something besides beaus all the time."
+
+"Well, but listen," persisted Octavia wickedly. "Jerome Irving was at
+the social at the Cherry Valley parsonage last night, and he had
+Harriet Warren there--took her there, and drove her home again."
+
+"I don't believe it," cried Anne, before she thought. She dropped an
+egg into the basket so abruptly that the shell broke.
+
+"Oh, it's true enough. Sam Mitchell told me; he was there and saw him.
+Sam says he looked quite beaming, and was dressed to kill, and
+followed Harriet around like her shadow. I guess you won't have any
+more bother with him, Aunt Anne."
+
+In the process of picking the broken egg out of the whole ones Anne
+had recovered her equanimity. She gave a careful little laugh.
+
+"Well, it's to be hoped so. Goodness knows it's time he tried somebody
+else. Go and change your dress for milking, Octavia, and don't spend
+quite so much time gossiping up the lane with Sam Mitchell. He always
+was a fetch-and-carry. Young girls oughtn't to be so pert."
+
+When the subdued Octavia had gone, Anne tossed the broken eggshell out
+of the pantry window viciously enough.
+
+"There's no fool like an old fool. Jerome Irving always was an idiot.
+The idea of his going after Harriet Warren! He's old enough to be her
+father. And a Warren, too! I've seen the time an Irving wouldn't be
+seen on the same side of the road with a Warren. Well, anyhow, I don't
+care, and he needn't suppose I will. It will be a relief not to have
+him hanging around any longer."
+
+It might have been a relief, but Anne felt strangely lonely as she
+walked home alone from prayer meeting the next night. Jerome had not
+been there. The Warrens were Methodists and Anne rightly guessed that
+he had gone to the Methodist prayer meeting at Cherry Valley.
+
+"Dancing attendance on Harriet," she said to herself scornfully.
+
+When she got home she looked at her face in the glass more critically
+than she had done for years. Anne Stockard at her best had never been
+pretty. When young she had been called "gawky." She was very tall and
+her figure was lank and angular. She had a long, pale face and dusky
+hair. Her eyes had been good--a glimmering hazel, large and
+long-lashed. They were pretty yet, but the crow's feet about them were
+plainly visible. There were brackets around her mouth too, and her
+cheeks were hollow. Anne suddenly realized, as she had never realized
+before, that she had grown old--that her youth was left far behind.
+She was an old maid, and Harriet Warren was young, and pretty. Anne's
+long, thin lips suddenly quivered.
+
+"I declare, I'm a worse fool than Jerome," she said angrily.
+
+When Saturday night came Jerome did not. The corner of the big,
+old-fashioned porch where he usually sat looked bare and lonely. Anne
+was short with Octavia and boxed the cat's ears and raged at herself.
+What did she care if Jerome Irving never came again? She could have
+married him years ago if she had wanted to--everybody knew that!
+
+At sunset she saw a buggy drive past her gate. Even at that distance
+she recognized Harriet Warren's handsome, high-coloured profile. It
+was Jerome's new buggy and Jerome was driving. The wheel spokes
+flashed in the sunlight as they crept up the hill. Perhaps they
+dazzled Anne's eyes a little; at least, for that or some other reason
+she dabbed her hand viciously over them as she turned sharply about
+and went upstairs. Octavia was practising her music lesson in the
+parlour below and singing in a sweet shrill voice. The hired men were
+laughing and talking in the yard. Anne slammed down her window and
+banged her door and then lay down on her bed; she said her head ached.
+
+The Deep Meadows people were amused and made joking remarks to Anne,
+which she had to take amiably because she had no excuse for resenting
+them. In reality they stung her pride unendurably. When Jerome had
+gone she realized that she had no other intimate friend and that she
+was a very lonely woman whom nobody cared about. One night--it was
+three weeks afterward--she met Jerome and Harriet squarely. She was
+walking to church with Octavia, and they were driving in the opposite
+direction. Jerome had his new buggy and crimson lap robe. His horse's
+coat shone like satin and had rosettes of crimson on his bridle.
+Jerome was dressed extremely well and looked quite young, with his
+round, ruddy, clean-shaven face and clear blue eyes.
+
+Harriet was sitting primly and consciously by his side; she was a very
+handsome girl with bold eyes and was somewhat overdressed. She wore a
+big flowery hat and a white lace veil and looked at Anne with a
+supercilious smile.
+
+Anne felt dowdy and old; she was very pale. Jerome lifted his hat and
+bowed pleasantly as they drove past. Suddenly Harriet laughed out.
+Anne did not look back, but her face crimsoned darkly. Was that girl
+laughing at her? She trembled with anger and a sharp, hurt feeling.
+When she got home that night she sat a long while by her window.
+
+Jerome was gone--and he let Harriet Warren laugh at her and he would
+never come back to her. Well, it did not matter, but she had been a
+fool. Only it had never occurred to her that Jerome could act so.
+
+"If I'd thought he would I mightn't have been so sharp with him," was
+as far as she would let herself go even in thought.
+
+When four weeks had elapsed Jerome came over one Saturday night. He
+was fluttered and anxious, but hid it in a masterly manner.
+
+Anne was taken by surprise. She had not thought he would ever come
+again, and was off her guard. He had come around the porch corner
+abruptly as she stood there in the dusk, and she started very
+perceptibly.
+
+"Good evening, Anne," he said, easily and unblushingly.
+
+Anne choked up. She was very angry, or thought she was. Jerome
+appeared not to notice her lack of welcome. He sat coolly down in his
+old place. His heart was beating like a hammer, but Anne did not know
+that.
+
+"I suppose," she said cuttingly, "that you're on your way down to the
+bridge. It's almost a pity for you to waste time stopping here at all,
+any more than you have of late. No doubt Harriet'll be expecting you."
+
+A gleam of satisfaction flashed over Jerome's face. He looked shrewdly
+at Anne, who was not looking at him, but was staring uncompromisingly
+out over the poppy beds. A jealous woman always gives herself away. If
+Anne had been indifferent she would not have given him that slap in
+the face.
+
+"I dunno's she will," he replied coolly. "I didn't say for sure
+whether I'd be down tonight or not. It's so long since I had a chat
+with you I thought I'd drop in for a spell. But of course if I'm not
+wanted I can go where I will be."
+
+Anne could not get back her self-control. Her nerves were "all strung
+up," as she would have said. She had a feeling that she was right on
+the brink of a "scene," but she could not help herself.
+
+"I guess it doesn't matter much what I want," she said stonily. "At
+any rate, it hasn't seemed that way lately. You don't care, of course.
+Oh, no! Harriet Warren is all you care about. Well, I wish you joy of
+her."
+
+Jerome looked puzzled, or pretended to. In reality he was hugging
+himself with delight.
+
+"I don't just understand you, Anne," he said hesitatingly "You appear
+to be vexed about something."
+
+"I? Oh, no, I'm not, Mr. Irving. Of course old friends don't count
+now. Well, I've no doubt new ones will wear just as well."
+
+"If it's about my going to see Harriet," said Jerome easily "I don't
+see as how it can matter much to you. Goodness knows, you took enough
+pains to show me you didn't want me. I don't blame you. A woman has a
+right to please herself, and a man ought to have sense to take his
+answer and go. I hadn't, and that's where I made my mistake. I don't
+mean to pester you any more, but we can be real good friends, can't
+we? I'm sure I'm as much your friend as ever I was."
+
+Now, I hold that this speech of Jerome's, delivered in a cool,
+matter-of-fact tone, as of a man stating a case with dispassionate
+fairness, was a masterpiece. It was the last cleverly executed
+movement of the campaign. If it failed to effect a capitulation, he
+was a defeated man. But it did not fail.
+
+Anne had got to that point where an excited woman must go mad or cry.
+Anne cried. She sat flatly down on a chair and burst into tears.
+
+Jerome's hat went one way and his cane another. Jerome himself sprang
+across the intervening space and dropped into the chair beside Anne.
+He caught her hand in his and threw his arm boldly around her waist.
+
+"Goodness gracious, Anne! Do you care after all? Tell me that!"
+
+"I don't suppose it matters to you if I do," sobbed Anne. "It hasn't
+seemed to matter, anyhow."
+
+"Anne, look here! Didn't I come after you for fifteen years? It's you
+I always have wanted and want yet, if I can get you. I don't care a
+rap for Harriet Warren or anyone but you. Now that's the truth right
+out, Anne."
+
+No doubt it was, and Anne was convinced of it. But she had to have her
+cry out--on Jerome's shoulder--and it soothed her nerves wonderfully.
+Later on Octavia, slipping noiselessly up the steps in the dusk, saw a
+sight that transfixed her with astonishment. When she recovered
+herself she turned and fled wildly around the house, running bump into
+Sam Mitchell, who was coming across the yard from a twilight
+conference with the hired men.
+
+"Goodness, Tavy, what's the matter? Y' look 'sif y'd seen a ghost."
+
+Octavia leaned up against the wall in spasms of mirth.
+
+"Oh, Sam," she gasped, "old Jerome Irving and Aunt Anne are sitting
+round there in the dark on the front porch and he had his arms around
+her, kissing her! And they never saw nor heard me, no more'n if they
+were deaf and blind!"
+
+Sam gave a tremendous whistle and then went off into a shout of
+laughter whose echoes reached even to the gloom of the front porch and
+the ears of the lovers. But they did not know he was laughing at them
+and would not have cared if they had. They were too happy for that.
+
+There was a wedding that fall and Anne Stockard was the bride. When
+she was safely his, Jerome confessed all and was graciously forgiven.
+
+"But it was kind of mean to Harriet," said Anne rebukingly, "to go
+with her and get her talked about and then drop her as you did. Don't
+you think so yourself, Jerome?"
+
+Her husband's eyes twinkled.
+
+"Well, hardly that. You see, Harriet's engaged to that Johnson fellow
+out west. 'Tain't generally known, but I knew it and that's why I
+picked on her. I thought it probable that she'd be willing enough to
+flirt with me for a little diversion, even if I was old. Harriet's
+that sort of a girl. And I made up my mind that if that didn't fetch
+it nothing would and I'd give up for good and all. But it did, didn't
+it, Anne?"
+
+"I should say so. It was horrid of you, Jerome--but I daresay it's
+just as well you did or I'd likely never have found out that I
+couldn't get along without you. I did feel dreadful. Poor Octavia
+could tell you I was as cross as X. How did you come to think of it,
+Jerome?"
+
+"A fellow had to do something," said Jerome oracularly, "and I'd have
+done most anything to get you, Anne, that's a fact. And there it
+was--courting fifteen years and nothing to show for it. I dunno,
+though, how I did come to think of it. Guess it was a sort of
+inspiration. Anyhow, I've got you and that's what I set out to do in
+the beginning."
+
+
+
+
+Young Si
+
+
+Mr. Bentley had just driven into the yard with the new summer boarder.
+Mrs. Bentley and Agnes were peeping at her from behind the parlour
+curtains with the keen interest that they--shut in by their restricted
+farm life--always felt in any visitor from the outside world lying
+beyond their boundary of purple misted hills.
+
+Mrs. Bentley was a plump, rosy-cheeked woman with a motherly smile.
+Agnes was a fair, slim schoolgirl, as tall as her mother, with a sweet
+face and a promise of peach blossom prettiness in the years to come.
+The arrival of a summer boarder was a great event in her quiet life.
+
+"Ain't she pretty?" whispered Mrs. Bentley admiringly, as the girl
+came slowly up the green slope before the house. "I do hope she's
+nice. You can generally calculate on men boarders, but girls are
+doubtful. Preserve me from a cranky boarder! I've had enough of them.
+I kinder like her looks, though."
+
+Ethel Lennox had paused at the front door as Mrs. Bentley and Agnes
+came into the hall. Agnes gazed at the stranger with shy, unenvious
+admiration; the latter stood on the stone step just where the big
+chestnut by the door cast flickering gleams and shadows over her dress
+and shining hair.
+
+She was tall, and gowned in some simple white material that fell about
+her in graceful folds. She wore a cluster of pale pink roses at her
+belt, and a big, picturesque white hat shaded her face and the glossy,
+clinging masses of her red hair--hair that was neither auburn nor
+chestnut but simply red. Nor would anyone have wished it otherwise,
+having once seen that glorious mass, with all its wonderful
+possibilities of rippling luxuriance.
+
+Her complexion was of that perfect, waxen whiteness that goes with
+burnished red hair and the darkest of dilated violet eyes. Her
+delicately chiselled features wore what might have been a somewhat too
+decided impress of spirit and independence, had it not been for the
+sweet mouth, red and dimpled and curving, that parted in a slow,
+charming smile as Mrs. Bentley came forward with her kindly welcome.
+
+"You must be real tired, Miss Lennox. It's a long drive from the train
+down here. Agnes, show Miss Lennox up to her room, and tea will be
+ready when you come down."
+
+Agnes came forward with the shy grace that always won friends for her,
+and the two girls went slowly up the broad, old-fashioned staircase,
+while Mrs. Bentley bustled away to bring in the tea and put a goblet
+of damask roses on the table.
+
+"She looks like a picture, doesn't she, John?" she said to her
+husband. "I never saw such a face--and that hair too. Would you have
+believed red hair could be so handsome? She seems real friendly--none
+of your stuck-up fine ladies! I've had all I want of them, I can tell
+you!"
+
+"Sh--sh--sh!" said Mr. Bentley warningly, as Ethel Lennox came in with
+her arm about Agnes.
+
+She looked even more lovely without her hat, with the soft red
+tendrils of hair lying on her forehead. Mrs. Bentley sent a
+telegraphic message of admiration across the table to her husband, who
+was helping the cold tongue and feeling his way to a conversation.
+
+"You'll find it pretty quiet here, Miss Lennox. We're plain folks and
+there ain't much going and coming. Maybe you don't mind that, though?"
+
+"I like it. When one has been teaching school all the year in a noisy
+city, quiet seems the one thing to be desired. Besides, I like to
+fancy myself something of an artist. I paint and sketch a little when
+I have time, and Miss Courtland, who was here last summer, said I
+could not find a more suitable spot. So I came because I knew that
+mackerel fishing was carried on along the shore, and I would have a
+chance to study character among the fishermen."
+
+"Well, the shore ain't far away, and it's pretty--though maybe us
+folks here don't appreciate it rightly, being as we're so used to it.
+Strangers are always going crazy over its 'picturesqueness,' as they
+call it. As for 'character,' I reckon you'll find all you want of that
+among the Pointers; anyway, I never seed such critters as they be.
+When you get tired of painting, maybe you can amuse yourself trying to
+get to the bottom of our mystery."
+
+"Oh, have you a mystery? How interesting!"
+
+"Yes, a mystery--a mystery," repeated Mr. Bentley solemnly, "that
+nobody hain't been able to solve so far. I've give it up--so has
+everyone else. Maybe you'll have better luck."
+
+"But what is it?"
+
+"The mystery," said Mr. Bentley dramatically, "is--Young Si. He's the
+mystery. Last spring, just when the herring struck in, a young chap
+suddenly appeared at the Point. He appeared--from what corner of the
+globe nobody hain't ever been able to make out. He bought a boat and a
+shanty down at my shore and went into a sort of mackerel partnership
+with Snuffy Curtis--Snuffy supplying the experience and this young
+fellow the cash, I reckon. Snuffy's as poor as Job's turkey; it was a
+windfall for him. And there he's fished all summer."
+
+"But his name--Young Si?"
+
+"Well, of course, that isn't it. He did give himself out as Brown, but
+nobody believes that's his handle--sounds unnatteral here. He bought
+his establishment from 'old Si,' who used to fish down there and was a
+mysterious old critter in a way too. So when this young fellow stepped
+in from goodness knows where, some of the Pointers christened him
+Young Si for a joke, and he never gets anything else. Doesn't seem to
+mind it. He's a moody, keep-to-himself sort of chap. Yet he ain't
+unpopular along shore, I believe. Snuffy was telling me they like him
+real well, considering his unsociableness. Anyways, he's as handsome a
+chap as I ever seed, and well eddicated too. He ain't none of your
+ordinary fishermen. Some of us kind of think he's a runaway--got into
+some scrape or another, maybe, and is skulking around here to keep out
+of jail. But wife here won't give in to that."
+
+"No, I never will," said Mrs. Bentley firmly. "Young Si comes here
+often for milk and butter, and he's a perfect gentleman. Nobody'll
+ever convince me that he has done anything to be ashamed of,
+whatever's his reason for wasting his life down there at that shore."
+
+"He ain't wasting his life," chuckled Mr. Bentley. "He's making
+money, Young Si is, though he don't seem to care about that a mite.
+This has been a big year for mackerel, and he's smart. If he didn't
+know much when he begun, he's ahead of Snuffy now. And as for work, I
+never saw his beat. He seems possessed. Up afore sunrise every blessed
+morning and never in bed till midnight, and just slaving away all
+between time. I said to him t'other day, says I: 'Young Si, you'll
+have to let up on this sort of thing and take a rest. You can't stand
+it. You're not a Pointer. Pointers can stand anything, but it'll kill
+you.'
+
+"He give one of them bitter laughs of his. Says he: 'It's no
+difference if it does. Nobody'll care,' and off he walks, sulky like.
+There's something about Young Si I can't understand," concluded Mr.
+Bentley.
+
+Ethel Lennox was interested. A melancholy, mysterious hero in a
+setting of silver-rimmed sand hills and wide blue sweeps of ocean was
+something that ought to lend piquancy to her vacation.
+
+"I should like to see this prince in disguise," she said. "It all
+sounds very romantic."
+
+"I'll take you to the shore after tea if you'd like," said Agnes
+eagerly. "Si's just splendid," she continued in a confidential aside
+as they rose from the table. "Pa doesn't half like him because he
+thinks there's something queer about him. But I do. He's a gentleman,
+as Ma says. I don't believe he's done anything wrong."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Ethel Lennox sauntered out into the orchard to wait for Agnes. She sat
+down under an apple tree and began to read, but soon the book slipped
+from her hands and the beautiful head leaned back against the grey,
+lichened trunk of the old tree. The sweet mouth drooped wistfully.
+There was a sad, far-away look in the violet eyes. The face was not
+that of a happy girl, so thought Agnes as she came down the apple tree
+avenue.
+
+But how pretty she is! she thought. Won't the folks around here stare
+at her! They always do at our boarders, but we've never had one like
+her.
+
+Ethel sprang up. "I had no idea you would be here so soon," she said
+brightly. "Just wait till I get my hat."
+
+When she came out they started off, and presently found themselves
+walking down a grassy, deep-rutted lane that ran through mown hay
+fields, green with their rich aftergrowth, and sheets of pale ripening
+oats and golden-green wheat, until it lost itself in the rolling sand
+hills at the foot of the slope.
+
+Beyond the sand hills stretched the shining expanse of the ocean, of
+the faint, bleached blue of hot August seas, and reaching out into a
+horizon laced with long trails of pinkish cloud. Numberless fishing
+boats dotted the shimmering reaches.
+
+"That furthest-off boat is Young Si's," said Agnes. "He always goes to
+that particular spot."
+
+"Is he really all your father says?" asked Miss Lennox curiously.
+
+"Indeed, he is. He isn't any more like the rest of the shore men than
+you are. He's queer, of course. I don't believe he's happy. It seems
+to me he's worrying over something, but I'm sure it is nothing wrong.
+Here we are," she added, as they passed the sand hills and came out on
+the long, level beach.
+
+To their left the shore curved around in a semi-circle of dazzling
+whiteness; at their right stood a small grey fish-house.
+
+"That's Young Si's place," said Agnes. "He lives there night and day.
+Wouldn't it make anyone melancholy? No wonder he's mysterious. I'm
+going to get his spyglass. He told me I might always use it."
+
+She pushed open the door and entered, followed by Ethel. The interior
+was rough but clean. It was a small room, lighted by one tiny window
+looking out on the water. In one corner a rough ladder led up to the
+loft above. The bare lathed walls were hung with fishing jackets,
+nets, mackerel lines and other shore appurtenances. A little stove
+bore a kettle and a frying pan. A low board table was strewn with
+dishes and the cold remnants of a hasty repast; benches were placed
+along the walls. A fat, bewhiskered kitten, looking as if it were cut
+out of black velvet, was dozing on the window sill.
+
+"This is Young Si's cat," explained Agnes, patting the creature, which
+purred joyously and opened its sleepy green eyes. "It's the only thing
+he cares for, I believe. Witch! Witch! How are you, Witch? Well,
+here's the spyglass. Let's go out and have a look. Si's catching
+mackerel," announced Agnes a few minutes later, after she had
+scrutinized each boat in turn, "and he won't be in for an hour yet. If
+you like, we have time for a walk up the shore."
+
+The sun slipped lower and lower in the creamy sky, leaving a trail of
+sparkles that ran across the water and lost itself in the west. Sea
+gulls soared and dipped, and tiny "sand peeps" flitted along the
+beach. Just as the red rim of the sun dipped in the purpling sea, the
+boats began to come in.
+
+"Most of them will go around to the Point," explained Agnes, with a
+contemptuous sweep of her hand towards a long headland running out
+before them. "They belong there and they're a rough crowd. You don't
+catch Young Si associating with the Pointers. There, he's getting up
+sail. We'll just have time to get back before he comes in."
+
+They hurried back across the dampening sand as the sun disappeared,
+leaving a fiery spot behind him. The shore was no longer quiet and
+deserted. The little spot where the fishing house stood had suddenly
+started into life. Roughly clad boys were running hither and thither,
+carrying fish or water. The boats were hauled up on the skids. A
+couple of shaggy old tars, who had strolled over from the Point to
+hear about Young Si's catch, were smoking their pipes at the corner of
+his shanty. A mellow afterlight was shining over sea and shore. The
+whole scene delighted Ethel's artist eyes.
+
+Agnes nudged her companion.
+
+"There! If you want to see Young Si," she whispered, pointing to the
+skids, where a busy figure was discernible in a large boat, "that's
+him, with his back to us, in the cream-coloured boat. He's counting
+out mackerel. If you go over to that platform behind him, you'll get a
+good look when he turns around. I'm going to coax a mackerel out of
+that stingy old Snuffy, if I can."
+
+She tripped off, and Ethel walked slowly over to the boats. The men
+stared at her in open-mouthed admiration as she passed them and walked
+out on the platform behind Young Si. There was no one near the two.
+The others were all assembled around Snuffy's boat. Young Si was
+throwing out the mackerel with marvellous rapidity, but at the sound
+of a footstep behind him he turned and straightened up his tall form.
+They stood face to face.
+
+"Miles!"
+
+"Ethel!"
+
+Young Si staggered back against the mast, letting two silvery bloaters
+slip through his hands overboard. His handsome, sunburned face was
+very white.
+
+Ethel Lennox turned abruptly and silently and walked swiftly across
+the sand. Agnes felt her arm touched, and turned to see Ethel
+standing, pale and erect, beside her.
+
+"Let us go home," said the latter unsteadily. "It is very damp here--I
+feel chilled."
+
+"Oh, dear!" exclaimed Agnes penitently. "I ought to have told you to
+bring a shawl. It is always damp on the shore after sunset. Here,
+Snuffy, give me my mackerel. Thank you. I'm ready now, Miss Lennox."
+
+They reached the lane before Agnes remembered to ask the question
+Ethel dreaded.
+
+"Oh, did you see Young Si? And what do you think of him?"
+
+Ethel turned her face away and answered with studied carelessness. "He
+seems to be quite a superior fisherman so far as I could see in the
+dim light. It was very dusky there, you know. Let us walk a little
+faster. My shoes are quite wet."
+
+When they reached home, Miss Lennox excused herself on the plea of
+weariness and went straight to her room.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Back at the shore Young Si had recovered himself and stooped again to
+his work. His face was set and expressionless. A dull red burned in
+each bronzed cheek. He threw out the mackerel mechanically, but his
+hands trembled.
+
+Snuffy strolled over to the boat. "See that handsome girl, Si?" he
+asked lazily. "One of the Bentleys' boarders, I hear. Looks as if she
+might have stepped out of a picture frame, don't she?"
+
+"We've no time to waste, Curtis," said Young Si harshly, "with all
+these fish to clean before bedtime. Stop talking and get to work."
+
+Snuffy shrugged his shoulders and obeyed in silence. Young Si was not
+a person to be trifled with. The catch was large and it was late
+before they finished. Snuffy surveyed the full barrels complacently.
+
+"Good day's work," he muttered, "but hard--I'm dead beat out. 'Low
+I'll go to bed. In the name o' goodness, Si, whar be you a-goin' to?"
+
+Young Si had got into a dory and untied it. He made no answer, but
+rowed out from the shore. Snuffy stared at the dory blankly until it
+was lost in the gloom.
+
+"Ef that don't beat all!" he ejaculated. "I wonder if Si is in his
+right senses? He's been actin' quar right along, and now to start off,
+Lord knows whar, at this hour o' night! I really don't believe it's
+safe to stay here alone with him."
+
+Snuffy shook his unkempt head dubiously.
+
+Young Si rowed steadily out over the dark waves. An eastern breeze was
+bringing in a damp sea fog that blurred darkly over the outlines of
+horizon and shore. The young fisherman found himself alone in a world
+of water and grey mist. He stopped rowing and leaned forward on his
+oars.
+
+"To see her here, of all places!" he muttered. "Not a word, scarcely a
+look, after all this long heartbreak! Well, perhaps it is better so.
+And yet to know she is so near! How beautiful she is! And I love her
+more than ever. That is where the sting lies. I thought that in this
+rough life, amid all these rude associations, where nothing could
+remind me of her, I might forget. And now--"
+
+He clenched his hands. The mist was all around and about him,
+creeping, impalpable, phantom-like. The dory rocked gently on the
+swell. From afar came the low persistent murmur of the ocean.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The next day Ethel Lennox declined to visit Si's shore. Instead she
+went to the Point and sketched all day. She went again the next day
+and the next. The Point was the most picturesque part of the shore,
+she averred, and the "types" among its inhabitants most interesting.
+Agnes Bentley ceased to suggest another visit to Si's shore. She had a
+vague perception that her companion did not care to discuss the
+subject.
+
+At the end of a week Mrs. Bentley remarked: "What in the world can
+have happened to Young Si? It's a whole week since he was here for
+milk or butter. He ain't sick, is he?"
+
+Mr. Bentley chuckled amusedly.
+
+"I 'low I can tell you the reason of that. Si's getting his stuff at
+Walden's now. I saw him going there twice this week. 'Liza Walden's
+got ahead of you at last, Mary."
+
+"Well, I never did!" said Mrs. Bentley. "Well, Young Si is the first
+that ever preferred 'Liza Walden's butter to mine. Everyone knows what
+hers is like. She never works her salt half in. Well, Young Si's
+welcome to it, I'm sure; I wish him joy of his exchange."
+
+Mrs. Bentley rattled her dishes ominously. It was plain her faith in
+Young Si had received a severe shock.
+
+Upstairs in her room, Ethel Lennox, with a few undried tears
+glistening on her cheeks, was writing a letter. Her lips were
+compressed and her hand trembled:
+
+"I have discovered that it is no use to run away from fate," she
+wrote. "No matter how hard we try to elude it, and how sure we are
+that we have succeeded, it will rise and meet us where we least expect
+it. I came down here tired and worn out, looking for peace and
+rest--and lo! the most disquieting element of my life is here to
+confront me.
+
+"I'm going to confess, Helen. 'Open confession is good for the soul,'
+you know, and I shall treat myself to a good dose while the mood is
+on.
+
+"You know, of course, that I was once engaged to Miles Lesley. You
+also know that that engagement was broken last autumn for unexplained
+reasons. Well, I will tell you all about it and then mail this letter
+speedily, before I change my mind.
+
+"It is over a year now since Miles and I first became engaged. As you
+are aware, his family is wealthy, and noted for its exclusiveness. I
+was a poor school teacher, and you may imagine with what horror his
+relatives received the news of Miles's attentions to one whom they
+considered his inferior. Now that I have thought the whole matter over
+calmly, I scarcely blame them. It must be hard for aristocratic
+parents who have lavished every care upon a son, and cherished for him
+the highest hopes, when he turns from the women of his own order to
+one considered beneath him in station. But I did not view the subject
+in this light then; and instead of declining his attentions, as I
+perhaps should have done, I encouraged them--I loved him so dearly,
+Nell!--and in spite of family opposition, Miles soon openly declared
+his attachment.
+
+"When his parents found they could not change his purpose, their
+affection for him forced them into outward acquiescence, but their
+reluctant condescension was gall and wormwood to me. I saw things only
+from my own point of view, and was keenly sensitive to their politely
+concealed disapprobation, and my offended vanity found its victim in
+Miles. I belonged to the class who admit and resent slights, instead
+of ignoring them, as do the higher bred, and I thought he would not
+see those offered to me. I grew cold and formal to him. He was very
+patient, but his ways were not mine, and my manner puzzled and annoyed
+him. Our relations soon became strained, and the trifle necessary for
+an open quarrel was easily supplied.
+
+"One evening I went to a large At Home given by his mother. I knew but
+few and, as Miles was necessarily busy with his social duties to her
+guests, I was, after the first hurried greeting, left unattended for a
+time. Not being accustomed to such functions, I resented this as a
+covert insult and, in a fit of jealous pique, I blush to own that I
+took the revenge of a peasant maid and entered into a marked
+flirtation with Fred Currie, who had paid me some attention before my
+engagement. When Miles was at liberty to seek me, he found me, to all
+appearances, quite absorbed in my companion and oblivious of his
+approach. He turned on his heel and went away, nor did he come near me
+the rest of the evening.
+
+"I went home angry enough, but so miserable and repentant that if
+Miles had been his usual patient self when he called the following
+evening I would have begged his forgiveness. But I had gone too far;
+his mother was shocked by my gaucherie, and he was humiliated and
+justly exasperated. We had a short, bitter quarrel. I said a great
+many foolish, unpardonable things, and finally I threw his ring at
+him. He gave me a startled look then, in which there was something of
+contempt, and went away without another word.
+
+"After my anger had passed, I was wretchedly unhappy. I realized how
+unworthily I had acted, how deeply I loved Miles, and how lonely and
+empty my life would be without him. But he did not come back, and soon
+after I learned he had gone away--whither no one knew, but it was
+supposed abroad. Well, I buried my hopes and tears in secret and went
+on with my life as people have to do--a life in which I have learned
+to think, and which, I hope, has made me nobler and better.
+
+"This summer I came here. I heard much about a certain mysterious
+stranger known as 'Young Si' who was fishing mackerel at this shore. I
+was very curious. The story sounded romantic, and one evening I went
+down to see him. I met him face to face and, Helen, it was Miles
+Lesley!
+
+"For one minute earth, sky and sea reeled around me. The next, I
+remembered all, and turned and walked away. He did not follow.
+
+"You may be sure that I now religiously avoid that part of the shore.
+We have never met since, and he has made no effort to see me. He
+clearly shows that he despises me. Well, I despise myself. I am very
+unhappy, Nell, and not only on my own account, for I feel that if
+Miles had never met me, his mother would not now be breaking her heart
+for her absent boy. My sorrow has taught me to understand hers, and I
+no longer resent her pride.
+
+"You need hardly be told after this that I leave here in another week.
+I cannot fabricate a decent excuse to go sooner, or I would."
+
+In the cool twilight Ethel went with Agnes Bentley to mail her letter.
+As they stopped at the door of the little country store, a young man
+came around the corner. It was Young Si. He was in his rough fishing
+suit, with a big herring net trailing over his shoulder, but no
+disguise could effectually conceal his splendid figure. Agnes sprang
+forward eagerly.
+
+"Si, where have you been? Why have you never I been up to see us for
+so long?"
+
+Young Si made no verbal reply. He merely lifted his cap with formal
+politeness and turned on his heel.
+
+"Well, I never!" exclaimed Agnes, as soon as she recovered her powers
+of speech. "If that is how Young Si is going to treat his friends! He
+must have got offended at something. I wonder what it is," she added,
+her curiosity getting the better of her indignation.
+
+When they came out they saw the solitary figure of Young Si far adown,
+crossing the dim, lonely shore fields. In the dusk Agnes failed to
+notice the pallor of her companion's face and the unshed tears in her
+eyes.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"I've just been down to the Point," said Agnes, coming in one sultry
+afternoon about a week later, "and Little Ev said as there was no
+fishing today he'd take us out for that sail tonight if you wanted to
+go."
+
+Ethel Lennox put her drawing away listlessly. She looked pale and
+tired. She was going away the next day, and this was to be her last
+visit to the shore.
+
+About an hour before sunset a boat glided out from the shadow of the
+Point. In it were Ethel Lennox and Agnes, together with Little Ev, the
+sandy-haired, undersized Pointer who owned the boat.
+
+The evening was fine, and an off-shore breeze was freshening up
+rapidly. They did not notice the long, dark bank of livid cloud low in
+the northwest.
+
+"Isn't this glorious!" exclaimed Ethel. Her hat was straining back
+from her head and the red rings of her hair were blowing about her
+face.
+
+Agnes looked about her more anxiously. Wiser in matters of sea and
+shore than her companion, there were some indications she did not
+like.
+
+Young Si, who was standing with Snuffy their skids, lowered his
+spyglass with a start.
+
+"It is Agnes Bentley and--and--that boarder of theirs," he said
+anxiously, "and they've gone out with Little Ev in that wretched,
+leaky tub of his. Where are their eyes that they can't see a squall
+coming up?"
+
+"An' Little Ev don't know as much about managing a boat as a cat!"
+exclaimed Snuffy excitedly. "Sign 'em to come back."
+
+Si shook his head. "They're too far out. I don't know that the squall
+will amount to very much. In a good boat, with someone who knew how to
+manage it, they'd be all right. But with Little Ev--" He began walking
+restlessly up and down the narrow platform.
+
+The boat was now some distance out. The breeze had stiffened to a slow
+strong wind and the dull-grey level of the sea was whipped into
+white-caps.
+
+Agnes bent towards Ethel. "It's getting too rough. I think we'd better
+go back. I'm afraid we're in for a thunder squall. Look at the
+clouds."
+
+A long, sullen muttering verified her words.
+
+"Little Ev," she shouted, "we want to go in."
+
+Little Ev, thus recalled to things about him, looked around in alarm.
+The girls questioned each other with glances of dismay. The sky had
+grown very black, and the peals of thunder came louder and more
+continuously. A jagged bolt of lightning hurtled over the horizon.
+Over land and sea was "the green, malignant light of coming storm."
+
+Little Ev brought the boat's head abruptly round as a few heavy drops
+of rain fell.
+
+"Ev, the boat is leaking!" shrieked Agnes, above the wind. "The
+water's coming in!"
+
+"Bail her out then," shouted Ev, struggling with the sail. "There's
+two cans under the seat. I've got to lower this sail. Bail her out."
+
+"I'll help you," said Ethel.
+
+She was very pale, but her manner was calm. Both girls bailed
+energetically.
+
+Young Si, watching through the glass, saw them. He dropped it and ran
+to his boat, white and resolute.
+
+"They've sprung a leak. Here, Curtis, launch the boat. We've got to go
+out or Ev will drown them."
+
+They shot out from the shore just as the downpour came, blotting out
+sea and land in one driving sheet of white rain.
+
+"Young Si is coming off for us," said Agnes. "We'll be all right if he
+gets here in time. This boat is going to sink, sure."
+
+Little Ev was completely demoralized by fear. The girls bailed
+unceasingly, but the water gained every minute. Young Si was none too
+soon.
+
+"Jump, Ev!" he shouted as his boat shot alongside. "Jump for your
+life!"
+
+He dragged Ethel Lennox in as he spoke. Agnes sprang from one boat to
+the other like a cat, and Little Ev jumped just as a thunderous crash
+seemed to burst above them and air and sky were filled with blue
+flame.
+
+The danger was past, for the squall had few difficulties for Si and
+Snuffy. When they reached the shore, Agnes, who had quite recovered
+from her fright, tucked her dripping skirts about her and announced
+her determination to go straight home with Snuffy.
+
+"I can't get any wetter than I am," she said cheerfully. "I'll send Pa
+down in the buggy for Miss Lennox. Light the fire in your shanty, Si,
+and let her get dry. I'll be as quick as I can."
+
+Si picked Ethel up in his strong arms and carried her into the
+fish-house. He placed her on one of the low benches and hurriedly
+began to kindle a fire. Ethel sat up dazedly and pushed back the
+dripping masses of her bright hair. Young Si turned and looked down at
+her with a passionate light in his eyes. She put out her cold, wet
+hands wistfully.
+
+"Oh, Miles!" she whispered.
+
+Outside, the wind shook the frail building and tore the shuddering sea
+to pieces. The rain poured down. It was already settling in for a
+night of storm. But, inside, Young Si's fire was casting cheery flames
+over the rude room, and Young Si himself was kneeling by Ethel Lennox
+with his arm about her and her head on his broad shoulder. There were
+happy tears in her eyes and her voice quivered as she said, "Miles,
+can you forgive me? If you knew how bitterly I have repented--"
+
+"Never speak of the past again, my sweet. In my lonely days and nights
+down here by the sea, I have forgotten all but my love."
+
+"Miles, how did you come here? I thought you were in Europe."
+
+"I did travel at first. I came down here by chance, and resolved to
+cut myself utterly adrift from my old life and see if I could not
+forget you. I was not very successful." He smiled down into her eyes.
+"And you were going away tomorrow. How perilously near we have been to
+not meeting! But how are we going to explain all this to our friends
+along shore?"
+
+"I think we had better not explain it at all. I will go away tomorrow,
+as I intended, and you can quietly follow soon. Let 'Young Si' remain
+the mystery he has always been."
+
+"That will be best--decidedly so. They would never understand if we
+did tell them. And I daresay they would be very much disappointed to
+find I was not a murderer or a forger or something of that sort. They
+have always credited me with an evil past. And you and I will go back
+to our own world, Ethel. You will be welcome there now, sweet--my
+family, too, have learned a lesson, and will do anything to promote my
+happiness."
+
+Agnes drove Ethel Lennox to the station next day. The fierce wind that
+had swept over land and sea seemed to have blown away all the hazy
+vapours and oppressive heats in the air, and the morning dawned as
+clear and fresh as if the sad old earth with all her passionate tears
+had cleansed herself from sin and stain and come forth radiantly pure
+and sweet. Ethel bubbled over with joyousness. Agnes wondered at the
+change in her.
+
+"Good-bye, Miss Lennox," she said wistfully. "You'll come back to see
+us some time again, won't you?"
+
+"Perhaps," smiled Ethel, "and if not, Agnes, you must come and see me.
+Some day I may tell you a secret."
+
+About a week later Young Si suddenly vanished, and his disappearance
+was a nine-day's talk along shore. His departure was as mysterious as
+his advent. It leaked out that he had quietly disposed of his boat and
+shanty to Snuffy Curtis, sent his mackerel off and, that done, slipped
+from the Pointers' lives, never more to re-enter them.
+
+Little Ev was the last of the Pointers to see him tramping along the
+road to the station in the dusk of the autumn twilight. And the next
+morning Agnes Bentley, going out of doors before the others, found on
+the doorstep a basket containing a small, vociferous black kitten with
+a card attached to its neck. On it was written: "Will Agnes please
+befriend Witch in memory of Young Si?"
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories,
+1896 to 1901, by Lucy Maud Montgomery
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MONTGOMERY SHORT STORIES ***
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+<pre>
+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to
+1901, by Lucy Maud Montgomery
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901
+
+Author: Lucy Maud Montgomery
+
+Release Date: March 19, 2008 [EBook #24873]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MONTGOMERY SHORT STORIES ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Alicia Williams, Jeannie Howse and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+<br />
+<hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901</h2>
+<br />
+
+<div class="block">
+<p>Lucy Maud Montgomery was born at Clifton (now New London), Prince
+Edward Island, Canada, on November 30, 1874. She achieved
+international fame in her lifetime, putting Prince Edward Island and
+Canada on the world literary map. Best known for her "Anne of Green
+Gables" books, she was also a prolific writer of short stories and
+poetry. She published some 500 short stories and poems and twenty
+novels before her death in 1942. The Project Gutenberg collection of
+her short stories was gathered from numerous sources and is presented
+in chronological publishing order:</p>
+
+<div class="block">
+<p class="noin">Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901<br />
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1902 to 1903<br />
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1904<br />
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1905 to 1906<br />
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1907 to 1908<br />
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1909 to 1922</p>
+</div>
+</div>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="toc" id="toc"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>Short Stories 1896 to 1901</h2>
+<br />
+
+<div class="centered">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" width="50%" summary="List of Stories">
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl" width="80%"><a href="#A_Case_of_Trespass">A Case of Trespass</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr" width="20%">1897</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#A_Christmas_Inspiration">A Christmas Inspiration</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1901</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#A_Christmas_Mistake">A Christmas Mistake</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1899</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#A_Strayed_Allegiance">A Strayed Allegiance</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1897</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#An_Invitation">An Invitation Given on Impulse</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1900</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#Detected">Detected by the Camera</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1897</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#In_Spite_of_Myself">In Spite of Myself</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1896</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#Kismet">Kismet</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1899</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#Lilians_Business">Lillian's Business Venture</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1900</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#Miriams_Lover">Miriam's Lover</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1901</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#Miss_Calista">Miss Calista's Peppermint Bottle</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1900</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#The_Jest">The Jest that Failed</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1901</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#The_Penningtons_Girl">The Pennington's Girl</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1900</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#The_Red_Room">The Red Room</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1898</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#The_Setness_of">The Setness of Theodosia</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1901</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#Story_of_an_Invitation">The Story of An Invitation</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1901</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#The_Touch_of_Fate">The Touch of Fate</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1899</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#Waking_of_Helen">The Waking of Helen</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1901</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#Way_of_the_Winning">The Way of Winning Anne</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1899</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+  <td class="tdl"><a href="#Young_Si">Young Si</a></td>
+  <td class="tdr">1901</td>
+  </tr>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="A_Case_of_Trespass" id="A_Case_of_Trespass"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>A Case of Trespass<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>It was the forenoon of a hazy, breathless day, and
+Dan Phillips was trouting up one of the back creeks
+of the Carleton pond. It was somewhat cooler up
+the creek than out on the main body of water, for
+the tall birches and willows, crowding down to the brim,
+threw cool, green shadows across it and shut out the scorching
+glare, while a stray breeze now and then rippled down the
+wooded slopes, rustling the beech leaves with an airy, pleasant
+sound.</p>
+
+<p>Out in the pond the glassy water creamed and shimmered
+in the hot sun, unrippled by the faintest breath of air. Across
+the soft, pearly tints of the horizon blurred the smoke of the
+big factory chimneys that were owned by Mr. Walters, to
+whom the pond and adjacent property also belonged.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Walters was a comparative stranger in Carleton, having
+but recently purchased the factories from the heirs of the
+previous owner; but he had been in charge long enough to
+establish a reputation for sternness and inflexibility in all his
+business dealings.</p>
+
+<p>One or two of his employees, who had been discharged by
+him on what they deemed insufficient grounds, helped to
+deepen the impression that he was an unjust and arbitrary
+man, merciless to all offenders, and intolerant of the slightest
+infringement of his cast-iron rules.</p>
+
+<p>Dan Phillips had been on the pond ever since sunrise. The
+trout had risen well in the early morning, but as the day wore
+on, growing hotter and hotter, they refused to bite, and for
+half an hour Dan had not caught one.</p>
+
+<p>He had a goodly string of them already, however, and he
+surveyed them with satisfaction as he rowed his leaky little
+skiff to the shore of the creek.</p>
+
+<p>"Pretty good catch," he soliloquized. "Best I've had this
+summer, so far. That big spotted one must weigh near a
+pound. He's a beauty. They're a good price over at the hotels
+now, too. I'll go home and get my dinner and go straight over
+with them. That'll leave me time for another try at them
+about sunset. Whew, how hot it is! I must take Ella May home
+a bunch of them blue flags. They're real handsome!"</p>
+
+<p>He tied his skiff under the crowding alders, gathered a big
+bunch of the purple flag lilies with their silky petals, and
+started homeward, whistling cheerily as he stepped briskly
+along the fern-carpeted wood path that wound up the hill
+under the beeches and firs.</p>
+
+<p>He was a freckled, sunburned lad of thirteen years. His
+neighbours all said that Danny was "as smart as a steel trap,"
+and immediately added that they wondered where he got his
+smartness from&mdash;certainly not from his father!</p>
+
+<p>The elder Phillips had been denominated "shiftless and
+slack-twisted" by all who ever had any dealings with him in
+his unlucky, aimless life&mdash;one of those improvident, easygoing
+souls who sit contentedly down to breakfast with a very
+faint idea where their dinner is to come from.</p>
+
+<p>When he had died, no one had missed him, unless it were
+his patient, sad-eyed wife, who bravely faced her hard lot, and
+toiled unremittingly to keep a home for her two children&mdash;Dan
+and a girl two years younger, who was a helpless cripple,
+suffering from some form of spinal disease.</p>
+
+<p>Dan, who was old and steady for his years, had gone manfully
+to work to assist his mother. Though he had been disappointed
+in all his efforts to obtain steady employment, he was
+active and obliging, and earned many a small amount by odd
+jobs around the village, and by helping the Carleton farmers
+in planting and harvest.</p>
+
+<p>For the last two years, however, his most profitable source
+of summer income had been the trout pond. The former
+owner had allowed anyone who wished to fish in his pond,
+and Dan made a regular business of it, selling his trout at
+the big hotels over at Mosquito Lake. This, in spite of its
+unattractive name, was a popular summer resort, and Dan
+always found a ready market for his catch.</p>
+
+<p>When Mr. Walters purchased the property it somehow
+never occurred to Dan that the new owner might not be so
+complaisant as his predecessor in the matter of the best trouting
+pond in the country.</p>
+
+<p>To be sure, Dan often wondered why it was the pond was
+so deserted this summer. He could not recall having seen a
+single person on it save himself. Still, it did not cross his mind
+that there could be any particular reason for this.</p>
+
+<p>He always fished up in the cool, dim creeks, which long
+experience had taught him were best for trout, and came and
+went by a convenient wood path; but he had no thought of
+concealment in so doing. He would not have cared had all
+Carleton seen him.</p>
+
+<p>He had done very well with his fish so far, and prices for
+trout at the Lake went up every day. Dan was an enterprising
+boy, and a general favourite with the hotel owners. They
+knew that he could always be depended on.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Phillips met him at the door when he reached home.</p>
+
+<p>"See, Mother," said Dan exultantly, as he held up his
+fish. "Just look at that fellow, will you? A pound if he's an
+ounce! I ought to get a good price for these, I can tell you.
+Let me have my dinner now, and I'll go right over to the
+Lake with them."</p>
+
+<p>"It's a long walk for you, Danny," replied his mother pityingly,
+"and it's too hot to go so far. I'm afraid you'll get sun-struck
+or something. You'd better wait till the cool of the
+evening. You're looking real pale and thin this while back."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I'm all right, Mother," assured Dan cheerfully. "I
+don't mind the heat a bit. A fellow must put up with some
+inconveniences. Wait till I bring home the money for these
+fish. And I mean to have another catch tonight. It's you that's
+looking tired. I wish you didn't have to work so hard, Mother.
+If I could only get a good place you could take it easier. Sam
+French says that Mr. Walters wants a boy up there at the factory,
+but I know I wouldn't do. I ain't big enough. Perhaps
+something will turn up soon though. When our ship comes
+in, Mother, we'll have our good times."</p>
+
+<p>He picked up his flags and went into the little room where
+his sister lay.</p>
+
+<p>"See what I've brought you, Ella May!" he said, as he
+thrust the cool, moist clusters into her thin, eager hands.
+"Did you ever see such beauties?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Dan, how lovely they are! Thank you ever so much!
+If you are going over to the Lake this afternoon, will you
+please call at Mrs. Henny's and get those nutmeg geranium
+slips she promised me? Just look how nice my others are
+growing. The pink one is going to bloom."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll bring you all the geranium slips at the Lake, if you
+like. When I get rich, Ella May, I'll build you a big conservatory,
+and I'll get every flower in the world in it for you. You
+shall just live and sleep among posies. Is dinner ready,
+Mother? Trouting's hungry work, I tell you. What paper is
+this?"</p>
+
+<p>He picked up a folded newspaper from the table.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, that's only an old Lake <i>Advertiser</i>," answered Mrs.
+Phillips, as she placed the potatoes on the table and wiped her
+moist, hot face with the corner of her gingham apron. "Letty
+Mills brought it in around a parcel this morning. It's four
+weeks old, but I kept it to read if I ever get time. It's so seldom
+we see a paper of any kind nowadays. But I haven't looked at it
+yet. Why, Danny, what on earth is the matter?"</p>
+
+<p>For Dan, who had opened the paper and glanced over the
+first page, suddenly gave a choked exclamation and turned
+pale, staring stupidly at the sheet before him.</p>
+
+<p>"See, Mother," he gasped, as she came up in alarm and
+looked over his shoulder. This is what they read:</p>
+
+<div class="block"><p class="cen">Notice</p>
+
+<p>Anyone found fishing on my pond at Carleton after
+date will be prosecuted according to law, without
+respect of persons.</p>
+
+<p>June First.</p>
+
+<p class="right">H.C. Walters.</p>
+
+</div>
+
+<p>"Oh, Danny, what does it mean?"</p>
+
+<p>Dan went and carefully closed the door of Ella May's room
+before he replied. His face was pale and his voice shaky.</p>
+
+<p>"Mean? Well, Mother, it just means that I've been stealing
+Mr. Walters's trout all summer&mdash;<i>stealing</i> them. That's what
+it means."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Danny! But you didn't know."</p>
+
+<p>"No, but I ought to have remembered that he was the new
+owner, and have asked him. I never thought. Mother, what
+does 'prosecuted according to law' mean?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know, I'm sure, Danny. But if this is so, there's
+only one thing to be done. You must go straight to Mr. Walters
+and tell him all about it."</p>
+
+<p>"Mother, I don't dare to. He is a dreadfully hard man. Sam
+French's father says&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I wouldn't believe a word Sam French's father says about
+Mr. Walters!" said Mrs. Phillips firmly. "He's got a spite
+against him because he was dismissed. Besides, Danny, it's
+the only right thing to do. You know that. We're poor, but we
+have never done anything underhand yet."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, Mother, I know," said Dan, gulping his fear bravely
+down. "I'll go, of course, right after dinner. I was only scared
+at first. I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll clean these trout nicely
+and take them to Mr. Walters, and tell him that, if he'll only
+give me time, I'll pay him back every cent of money I got for
+all I sold this summer. Then maybe he'll let me off, seeing as I
+didn't know about the notice."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll go with you, Danny."</p>
+
+<p>"No, I'll go alone, Mother. You needn't go with me," said
+Dan heroically. To himself he said that his mother had troubles
+enough. He would never subject her to the added ordeal
+of an interview with the stern factory owner. He would beard
+the lion in his den himself, if it had to be done.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't tell Ella May anything about it. It would worry her.
+And don't cry, Mother, I guess it'll be all right. Let me have
+my dinner now and I'll go straight off."</p>
+
+<p>Dan ate his dinner rapidly; then he carefully cleaned his
+trout, put them in a long basket, with rhubarb leaves over
+them, and started with an assumed cheerfulness very far from
+his real feelings.</p>
+
+<p>He had barely passed the gate when another boy came
+shuffling along&mdash;a tall, raw-boned lad, with an insinuating
+smile and shifty, cunning eyes. The newcomer nodded familiarly
+to Dan.</p>
+
+<p>"Hello, sonny. Going over to the Lake with your catch, are
+you? You'll fry up before you get there. There'll be nothing
+left of you but a crisp."</p>
+
+<p>"No, I'm not going to the Lake. I'm going up to the factory
+to see Mr. Walters."</p>
+
+<p>Sam French gave a long whistle of surprise.</p>
+
+<p>"Why, Dan, what's taking you there? You surely ain't
+thinking of trying for that place, are you? Walters wouldn't
+look at you. Why, he wouldn't take <i>me</i>! You haven't the ghost
+of a chance."</p>
+
+<p>"No, I'm not going for that. Sam, did you know that Mr.
+Walters had a notice in the Lake <i>Advertiser</i> that nobody
+could fish in his pond this summer?"</p>
+
+<p>"Course I did&mdash;the old skinflint! He's too mean to live,
+that's what. He never goes near the pond himself. Regular dog
+in the manger, he is. Dad says&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Sam, why didn't you tell me about that notice?"</p>
+
+<p>"Gracious, didn't you know? I s'posed everybody did, and
+here I've been taking you for the cutest chap this side of
+sunset&mdash;fishing away up in that creek where no one could see
+you, and cutting home through the woods on the sly. You
+don't mean to tell me you never saw that notice?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, I didn't. Do you think I'd have gone near the pond if I
+had? I never saw it till today, and I'm going straight to Mr.
+Walters now to tell him about it."</p>
+
+<p>Sam French stopped short in the dusty road and stared at
+Dan in undisguised amazement.</p>
+
+<p>"Dan Phillips," he ejaculated, "have you plum gone out of
+your mind? Boy alive, you needn't be afraid that I'd peach on
+you. I'm too blamed glad to see anyone get the better of that
+old Walters, smart as he thinks himself. Gee! To dream of
+going to him and telling him you've been fishing in his pond!
+Why, he'll put you in jail. You don't know what sort of a man
+he is. Dad says&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Never mind what your dad says, Sam. My mind's
+made up."</p>
+
+<p>"Dan, you chump, listen to me. That notice says
+'prosecuted according to law.' Why, Danny, he'll put you in
+prison, or fine you, or something dreadful."</p>
+
+<p>"I can't help it if he does," said Danny stoutly. "You get
+out of here, Sam French, and don't be trying to scare me. I
+mean to be honest, and how can I be if I don't own up to Mr.
+Walters that I've been stealing his trout all summer?"</p>
+
+<p>"Stealing, fiddlesticks! Dan, I used to think you were a
+chap with some sense, but I see I was mistaken. You ain't
+done no harm. Walters will never miss them trout. If you're
+so dreadful squeamish that you won't fish no more, why, you
+needn't. But just let the matter drop and hold your tongue
+about it. That's <i>my</i> advice."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, it isn't my mother's, then. I mean to go by <i>hers</i>. You
+needn't argue no more, Sam. I'm going."</p>
+
+<p>"Go, then!" said Sam, stopping short in disgust. "You're a
+big fool, Dan, and serve you right if Walters lands you off to
+jail; but I don't wish you no ill. If I can do anything for your
+family after you're gone, I will, and I'll try and give your
+remains Christian burial&mdash;if there are any remains. So long,
+Danny! Give my love to old Walters!"</p>
+
+<p>Dan was not greatly encouraged by this interview. He
+shrank more than ever from the thought of facing the stern
+factory owner. His courage had almost evaporated when he
+entered the office at the factory and asked shakily for Mr.
+Walters.</p>
+
+<p>"He's in his office there," replied the clerk, "but he's very
+busy. Better leave your message with me."</p>
+
+<p>"I must see Mr. Walters himself, please," said Dan firmly,
+but with inward trepidation.</p>
+
+<p>The clerk swung himself impatiently from his stool and
+ushered Dan into Mr. Walters's private office.</p>
+
+<p>"Boy to see you, sir," he said briefly, as he closed the
+ground-glass door behind him.</p>
+
+<p>Dan, dizzy and trembling, stood in the dreaded presence.
+Mr. Walters was writing at a table covered with a businesslike
+litter of papers. He laid down his pen and looked up with a
+frown as the clerk vanished. He was a stern-looking man with
+deep-set grey eyes and a square, clean-shaven chin. There was
+not an ounce of superfluous flesh on his frame, and his voice
+and manner were those of the decided, resolute, masterful
+man of business.</p>
+
+<p>He pointed to a capacious leather chair and said concisely,
+"What is your business with me, boy?"</p>
+
+<p>Dan had carefully thought out a statement of facts beforehand,
+but every word had vanished from his memory. He had
+only a confused, desperate consciousness that he had a theft
+to confess and that it must be done as soon as possible. He did
+not sit down.</p>
+
+<p>"Please, Mr. Walters," he began desperately, "I came to
+tell you&mdash;your notice&mdash;I never saw it before&mdash;and I've been
+fishing on your pond all summer&mdash;but I didn't know&mdash;honest&mdash;I've
+brought you all I caught today&mdash;and I'll pay back for
+them all&mdash;some time."</p>
+
+<p>An amused, puzzled expression crossed Mr. Walters's noncommittal
+face. He pushed the leather chair forward.</p>
+
+<p>"Sit down, my boy," he said kindly. "I don't quite understand
+this somewhat mixed-up statement of yours. You've
+been fishing on my pond, you say. Didn't you see my notice in
+the <i>Advertiser</i>?"</p>
+
+<p>Dan sat down more composedly. The revelation was over
+and he was still alive.</p>
+
+<p>"No, sir. We hardly ever see an <i>Advertiser</i>, and nobody
+told me. I'd always been used to fishing there, and I never
+thought but what it was all right to keep on. I know I ought to
+have remembered and asked you, but truly, sir, I didn't mean
+to steal your fish. I used to sell them over at the hotels. We
+saw the notice today, Mother and me, and I came right up. I've
+brought you the trout I caught this morning, and&mdash;if only you
+won't prosecute me, sir, I'll pay back every cent I got for the
+others&mdash;every cent, sir&mdash;if you'll give me time."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Walters passed his hand across his mouth to conceal
+something like a smile.</p>
+
+<p>"Your name is Dan Phillips, isn't it?" he said irrelevantly,
+"and you live with your mother, the Widow Phillips, down
+there at Carleton Corners, I understand."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, sir," said Dan, wondering how Mr. Walters knew so
+much about him, and if these were the preliminaries of prosecution.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Walters took up his pen and drew a blank sheet
+towards him.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, Dan, I put that notice in because I found that many
+people who used to fish on my pond, irrespective of leave or
+licence, were accustomed to lunch or camp on my property,
+and did not a little damage. I don't care for trouting myself;
+I've no time for it. However, I hardly think you'll do much
+damage. You can keep on fishing there. I'll give you a written
+permission, so that if any of my men see you they won't interfere
+with you. As for these trout here, I'll buy them from you
+at Mosquito Lake prices, and will say no more about the matter.
+How will that do?"</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you, sir," stammered Dan. He could hardly
+believe his ears. He took the slip of paper Mr. Walters handed
+to him and rose to his feet.</p>
+
+<p>"Wait a minute, Dan. How was it you came to tell me this?
+You might have stopped your depredations, and I should not
+have been any the wiser."</p>
+
+<p>"That wouldn't have been honest, sir," said Dan, looking
+squarely at him.</p>
+
+<p>There was a brief silence. Mr. Walters thrummed meditatively
+on the table. Dan waited wonderingly.</p>
+
+<p>Finally the factory owner said abruptly, "There's a vacant
+place for a boy down here. I want it filled as soon as possible.
+Will you take it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Walters! <i>Me!</i>" Dan thought the world must be turning
+upside down.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, you. You are rather young, but the duties are not
+hard or difficult to learn. I think you'll do. I was resolved not
+to fill that place until I could find a perfectly honest and trustworthy
+boy for it. I believe I have found him. I discharged the
+last boy because he lied to me about some trifling offence for
+which I would have forgiven him if he had told the truth. I can
+bear with incompetency, but falsehood and deceit I cannot
+and will not tolerate," he said, so sternly that Dan's face
+paled. "I am convinced that you are incapable of either. Will
+you take the place, Dan?"</p>
+
+<p>"I will if you think I can fill it, sir. I will do my best."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I believe you will. Perhaps I know more about you
+than you think. Businessmen must keep their eyes open.
+We'll regard this matter as settled then. Come up tomorrow
+at eight o'clock. And one word more, Dan. You have perhaps
+heard that I am an unjust and hard master. I am not the former,
+and you will never have occasion to find me the latter if
+you are always as truthful and straightforward as you have
+been today. You might easily have deceived me in this matter.
+That you did not do so is the best and only recommendation I
+require. Take those trout up to my house and leave them.
+That will do. Good afternoon."</p>
+
+<p>Dan somehow got his dazed self through the glass door and
+out of the building. The whole interview had been such a surprise
+to him that he was hardly sure whether or not he had
+dreamed it all.</p>
+
+<p>"I feel as if I were some person else," he said to himself, as
+he started down the hot white road. "But Mother was right.
+I'll stick to her motto. I wonder what Sam will say to this."</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="A_Christmas_Inspiration" id="A_Christmas_Inspiration"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>A Christmas Inspiration<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>"Well, I really think Santa Claus has been very
+good to us all," said Jean Lawrence, pulling
+the pins out of her heavy coil of fair hair
+and letting it ripple over her shoulders.</p>
+
+<p>"So do I," said Nellie Preston as well as she
+could with a mouthful of chocolates. "Those
+blessed home folks of mine seem to have divined
+by instinct the very things I most wanted."</p>
+
+<p>It was the dusk of Christmas Eve and they were
+all in Jean Lawrence's room at No. 16 Chestnut
+Terrace. No. 16 was a boarding-house, and boarding-houses
+are not proverbially cheerful places in
+which to spend Christmas, but Jean's room, at least,
+was a pleasant spot, and all the girls had brought
+their Christmas presents in to show each other.
+Christmas came on Sunday that year and the
+Saturday evening mail at Chestnut Terrace had been
+an exciting one.</p>
+
+<p>Jean had lighted the pink-globed lamp on her
+table and the mellow light fell over merry faces as
+the girls chatted about their gifts. On the table was
+a big white box heaped with roses that betokened
+a bit of Christmas extravagance on somebody's
+part. Jean's brother had sent them to her from
+Montreal, and all the girls were enjoying them in
+common.</p>
+
+<p>No. 16 Chestnut Terrace was overrun with girls
+generally. But just now only five were left; all the
+others had gone home for Christmas, but these five
+could not go and were bent on making the best
+of it.</p>
+
+<p>Belle and Olive Reynolds, who were sitting on
+the bed&mdash;Jean could never keep them off it&mdash;were
+High School girls; they were said to be always
+laughing, and even the fact that they could not go
+home for Christmas because a young brother had
+measles did not dampen their spirits.</p>
+
+<p>Beth Hamilton, who was hovering over the
+roses, and Nellie Preston, who was eating candy,
+were art students, and their homes were too far
+away to visit. As for Jean Lawrence, she was an
+orphan, and had no home of her own. She worked
+on the staff of one of the big city newspapers and
+the other girls were a little in awe of her cleverness,
+but her nature was a "chummy" one and her room
+was a favourite rendezvous. Everybody liked frank,
+open-handed and hearted Jean.</p>
+
+<p>"It was so funny to see the postman when he
+came this evening," said Olive. "He just bulged with
+parcels. They were sticking out in every direction."</p>
+
+<p>"We all got our share of them," said Jean with a
+sigh of content.</p>
+
+<p>"Even the cook got six&mdash;I counted."</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Allen didn't get a thing&mdash;not even a
+letter," said Beth quickly. Beth had a trick of seeing
+things that other girls didn't.</p>
+
+<p>"I forgot Miss Allen. No, I don't believe she
+did," answered Jean thoughtfully as she twisted up
+her pretty hair. "How dismal it must be to be so
+forlorn as that on Christmas Eve of all times. Ugh!
+I'm glad I have friends."</p>
+
+<p>"I saw Miss Allen watching us as we opened our
+parcels and letters," Beth went on. "I happened to
+look up once, and such an expression as was on her
+face, girls! It was pathetic and sad and envious all
+at once. It really made me feel bad&mdash;for five minutes,"
+she concluded honestly.</p>
+
+<p>"Hasn't Miss Allen any friends at all?" asked Beth.</p>
+
+<p>"No, I don't think she has," answered Jean. "She
+has lived here for fourteen years, so Mrs. Pickrell
+says. Think of that, girls! Fourteen years at Chestnut
+Terrace! Is it any wonder that she is thin and
+dried-up and snappy?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nobody ever comes to see her and she never
+goes anywhere," said Beth. "Dear me! She must
+feel lonely now when everybody else is being
+remembered by their friends. I can't forget her
+face tonight; it actually haunts me. Girls, how
+would you feel if you hadn't anyone belonging
+to you, and if nobody thought about you at
+Christmas?"</p>
+
+<p>"Ow!" said Olive, as if the mere idea made her
+shiver.</p>
+
+<p>A little silence followed. To tell the truth, none
+of them liked Miss Allen. They knew that she did
+not like them either, but considered them frivolous
+and pert, and complained when they made a
+racket.</p>
+
+<p>"The skeleton at the feast," Jean called her,
+and certainly the presence of the pale, silent,
+discontented-looking woman at the No. 16 table
+did not tend to heighten its festivity.</p>
+
+<p>Presently Jean said with a dramatic flourish,
+"Girls, I have an inspiration&mdash;a Christmas inspiration!"</p>
+
+<p>"What is it?" cried four voices.</p>
+
+<p>"Just this. Let us give Miss Allen a Christmas
+surprise. She has not received a single present and
+I'm sure she feels lonely. Just think how we would
+feel if we were in her place."</p>
+
+<p>"That is true," said Olive thoughtfully. "Do you
+know, girls, this evening I went to her room with
+a message from Mrs. Pickrell, and I do believe she
+had been crying. Her room looked dreadfully bare
+and cheerless, too. I think she is very poor. What
+are we to do, Jean?"</p>
+
+<p>"Let us each give her something nice. We can
+put the things just outside of her door so that she
+will see them whenever she opens it. I'll give her
+some of Fred's roses too, and I'll write a Christmassy
+letter in my very best style to go with them," said
+Jean, warming up to her ideas as she talked.</p>
+
+<p>The other girls caught her spirit and entered into
+the plan with enthusiasm.</p>
+
+<p>"Splendid!" cried Beth. "Jean, it is an inspiration,
+sure enough. Haven't we been horribly selfish&mdash;thinking
+of nothing but our own gifts and fun
+and pleasure? I really feel ashamed."</p>
+
+<p>"Let us do the thing up the very best way we
+can," said Nellie, forgetting even her beloved
+chocolates in her eagerness. "The shops are open
+yet. Let us go up town and invest."</p>
+
+<p>Five minutes later five capped and jacketed
+figures were scurrying up the street in the frosty,
+starlit December dusk. Miss Allen in her cold little
+room heard their gay voices and sighed. She was
+crying by herself in the dark. It was Christmas for
+everybody but her, she thought drearily.</p>
+
+<p>In an hour the girls came back with their
+purchases.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, let's hold a council of war," said Jean jubilantly.
+"I hadn't the faintest idea what Miss Allen
+would like so I just guessed wildly. I got her a lace
+handkerchief and a big bottle of perfume and a
+painted photograph frame&mdash;and I'll stick my own
+photo in it for fun. That was really all I could afford.
+Christmas purchases have left my purse dreadfully
+lean."</p>
+
+<p>"I got her a glove-box and a pin tray," said Belle,
+"and Olive got her a calendar and Whittier's poems.
+And besides we are going to give her half of that
+big plummy fruit cake Mother sent us from home.
+I'm sure she hasn't tasted anything so delicious for
+years, for fruit cakes don't grow on Chestnut Terrace
+and she never goes anywhere else for a meal."</p>
+
+<p>Beth had bought a pretty cup and saucer and said
+she meant to give one of her pretty water-colours
+too. Nellie, true to her reputation, had invested in
+a big box of chocolate creams, a gorgeously striped
+candy cane, a bag of oranges, and a brilliant lampshade
+of rose-coloured crepe paper to top off with.</p>
+
+<p>"It makes such a lot of show for the money," she
+explained. "I am bankrupt, like Jean."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, we've got a lot of pretty things," said Jean
+in a tone of satisfaction. "Now we must do them
+up nicely. Will you wrap them in tissue paper, girls,
+and tie them with baby ribbon&mdash;here's a box of
+it&mdash;while I write that letter?"</p>
+
+<p>While the others chatted over their parcels Jean
+wrote her letter, and Jean could write delightful
+letters. She had a decided talent in that respect, and
+her correspondents all declared her letters to be
+things of beauty and joy forever. She put her best
+into Miss Allen's Christmas letter. Since then she
+has written many bright and clever things, but I
+do not believe she ever in her life wrote anything
+more genuinely original and delightful than that
+letter. Besides, it breathed the very spirit of Christmas,
+and all the girls declared that it was splendid.</p>
+
+<p>"You must all sign it now," said Jean, "and I'll put
+it in one of those big envelopes; and, Nellie, won't
+you write her name on it in fancy letters?"</p>
+
+<p>Which Nellie proceeded to do, and furthermore
+embellished the envelope by a border of chubby
+cherubs, dancing hand in hand around it and a
+sketch of No. 16 Chestnut Terrace in the corner
+in lieu of a stamp. Not content with this she hunted
+out a huge sheet of drawing paper and drew upon
+it an original pen-and-ink design after her own
+heart. A dudish cat&mdash;Miss Allen was fond of the
+No. 16 cat if she could be said to be fond of anything&mdash;was
+portrayed seated on a rocker arrayed
+in smoking jacket and cap with a cigar waved airily
+aloft in one paw while the other held out a placard
+bearing the legend "Merry Christmas." A second
+cat in full street costume bowed politely, hat in paw,
+and waved a banner inscribed with "Happy New
+Year," while faintly suggested kittens gambolled
+around the border. The girls laughed until they
+cried over it and voted it to be the best thing Nellie
+had yet done in original work.</p>
+
+<p>All this had taken time and it was past eleven
+o'clock. Miss Allen had cried herself to sleep long
+ago and everybody else in Chestnut Terrace was
+abed when five figures cautiously crept down the
+hall, headed by Jean with a dim lamp. Outside of
+Miss Allen's door the procession halted and the girls
+silently arranged their gifts on the floor.</p>
+
+<p>"That's done," whispered Jean in a tone of satisfaction
+as they tiptoed back. "And now let us go
+to bed or Mrs. Pickrell, bless her heart, will be
+down on us for burning so much midnight oil. Oil
+has gone up, you know, girls."</p>
+
+<p>It was in the early morning that Miss Allen
+opened her door. But early as it was, another door
+down the hall was half open too and five rosy faces
+were peering cautiously out. The girls had been
+up for an hour for fear they would miss the sight
+and were all in Nellie's room, which commanded
+a view of Miss Allen's door.</p>
+
+<p>That lady's face was a study. Amazement, incredulity,
+wonder, chased each other over it, succeeded
+by a glow of pleasure. On the floor before her was
+a snug little pyramid of parcels topped by Jean's
+letter. On a chair behind it was a bowl of delicious
+hot-house roses and Nellie's placard.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Allen looked down the hall but saw
+nothing, for Jean had slammed the door just in
+time. Half an hour later when they were going
+down to breakfast Miss Allen came along the hall
+with outstretched hands to meet them. She had
+been crying again, but I think her tears were happy
+ones; and she was smiling now. A cluster of Jean's
+roses were pinned on her breast.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, girls, girls," she said, with a little tremble in
+her voice, "I can never thank you enough. It was so
+kind and sweet of you. You don't know how much
+good you have done me."</p>
+
+<p>Breakfast was an unusually cheerful affair at No.
+16 that morning. There was no skeleton at the feast
+and everybody was beaming. Miss Allen laughed
+and talked like a girl herself.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, how surprised I was!" she said. "The roses
+were like a bit of summer, and those cats of Nellie's
+were so funny and delightful. And your letter too,
+Jean! I cried and laughed over it. I shall read it every
+day for a year."</p>
+
+<p>After breakfast everyone went to Christmas
+service. The girls went uptown to the church they
+attended. The city was very beautiful in the
+morning sunshine. There had been a white frost
+in the night and the tree-lined avenues and public
+squares seemed like glimpses of fairyland.</p>
+
+<p>"How lovely the world is," said Jean.</p>
+
+<p>"This is really the very happiest Christmas
+morning I have ever known," declared Nellie. "I
+never felt so really Christmassy in my inmost soul
+before."</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose," said Beth thoughtfully, "that it is
+because we have discovered for ourselves the old
+truth that it is more blessed to give than to receive.
+I've always known it, in a way, but I never realized
+it before."</p>
+
+<p>"Blessing on Jean's Christmas inspiration," said
+Nellie. "But, girls, let us try to make it an all-the-year-round
+inspiration, I say. We can bring a little
+of our own sunshine into Miss Allen's life as long as
+we live with her."</p>
+
+<p>"Amen to that!" said Jean heartily. "Oh, listen,
+girls&mdash;the Christmas chimes!"</p>
+
+<p>And over all the beautiful city was wafted the
+grand old message of peace on earth and good will
+to all the world.</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="A_Christmas_Mistake" id="A_Christmas_Mistake"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>A Christmas Mistake<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>"Tomorrow is Christmas," announced Teddy
+Grant exultantly, as he sat on the floor
+struggling manfully with a refractory bootlace
+that was knotted and tagless and stubbornly
+refused to go into the eyelets of Teddy's patched
+boots. "Ain't I glad, though. Hurrah!"</p>
+
+<p>His mother was washing the breakfast dishes in
+a dreary, listless sort of way. She looked tired and
+broken-spirited. Ted's enthusiasm seemed to grate
+on her, for she answered sharply:</p>
+
+<p>"Christmas, indeed. I can't see that it is anything
+for us to rejoice over. Other people may be glad
+enough, but what with winter coming on I'd
+sooner it was spring than Christmas. Mary Alice,
+do lift that child out of the ashes and put its shoes
+and stockings on. Everything seems to be at sixes
+and sevens here this morning."</p>
+
+<p>Keith, the oldest boy, was coiled up on the sofa
+calmly working out some algebra problems, quite
+oblivious to the noise around him. But he looked
+up from his slate, with his pencil suspended above
+an obstinate equation, to declaim with a flourish:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Christmas comes but once a year,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And then Mother wishes it wasn't here."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>"I don't, then," said Gordon, son number two,
+who was preparing his own noon lunch of bread
+and molasses at the table, and making an atrocious
+mess of crumbs and sugary syrup over everything.
+"I know one thing to be thankful for, and that is
+that there'll be no school. We'll have a whole week
+of holidays."</p>
+
+<p>Gordon was noted for his aversion to school and
+his affection for holidays.</p>
+
+<p>"And we're going to have turkey for dinner,"
+declared Teddy, getting up off the floor and rushing
+to secure his share of bread and molasses,
+"and cranb'ry sauce and&mdash;and&mdash;pound cake! Ain't
+we, Ma?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, you are not," said Mrs. Grant desperately,
+dropping the dishcloth and snatching the baby on
+her knee to wipe the crust of cinders and molasses
+from the chubby pink-and-white face. "You may as
+well know it now, children, I've kept it from you so
+far in hopes that something would turn up, but
+nothing has. We can't have any Christmas dinner
+tomorrow&mdash;we can't afford it. I've pinched and
+saved every way I could for the last month, hoping
+that I'd be able to get a turkey for you anyhow, but
+you'll have to do without it. There's that doctor's
+bill to pay and a dozen other bills coming in&mdash;and
+people say they can't wait. I suppose they can't, but
+it's kind of hard, I must say."</p>
+
+<p>The little Grants stood with open mouths and
+horrified eyes. No turkey for Christmas! Was the
+world coming to an end? Wouldn't the government
+interfere if anyone ventured to dispense with a
+Christmas celebration?</p>
+
+<p>The gluttonous Teddy stuffed his fists into his
+eyes and lifted up his voice. Keith, who understood
+better than the others the look on his mother's face,
+took his blubbering young brother by the collar and
+marched him into the porch. The twins, seeing the
+summary proceeding, swallowed the outcries they
+had intended to make, although they couldn't keep
+a few big tears from running down their fat cheeks.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Grant looked pityingly at the disappointed
+faces about her.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't cry, children, you make me feel worse.
+We are not the only ones who will have to do
+without a Christmas turkey. We ought to be very
+thankful that we have anything to eat at all. I hate
+to disappoint you, but it can't be helped."</p>
+
+<p>"Never mind, Mother," said Keith, comfortingly,
+relaxing his hold upon the porch door, whereupon
+it suddenly flew open and precipitated Teddy, who
+had been tugging at the handle, heels over head
+backwards. "We know you've done your best. It's
+been a hard year for you. Just wait, though. I'll soon
+be grown up, and then you and these greedy
+youngsters shall feast on turkey every day of the
+year. Hello, Teddy, have you got on your feet again?
+Mind, sir, no more blubbering!"</p>
+
+<p>"When I'm a man," announced Teddy with
+dignity, "I'd just like to see you put me in the porch.
+And I mean to have turkey all the time and I won't
+give you any, either."</p>
+
+<p>"All right, you greedy small boy. Only take
+yourself off to school now, and let us hear no more
+squeaks out of you. Tramp, all of you, and give
+Mother a chance to get her work done."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Grant got up and fell to work at her dishes
+with a brighter face.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, we mustn't give in; perhaps things will
+be better after a while. I'll make a famous bread
+pudding, and you can boil some molasses taffy and
+ask those little Smithsons next door to help you pull
+it. They won't whine for turkey, I'll be bound. I
+don't suppose they ever tasted such a thing in all
+their lives. If I could afford it, I'd have had them
+all in to dinner with us. That sermon Mr. Evans
+preached last Sunday kind of stirred me up. He said
+we ought always to try and share our Christmas joy
+with some poor souls who had never learned the
+meaning of the word. I can't do as much as I'd like
+to. It was different when your father was alive."</p>
+
+<p>The noisy group grew silent as they always did
+when their father was spoken of. He had died the
+year before, and since his death the little family had
+had a hard time. Keith, to hide his feelings, began
+to hector the rest.</p>
+
+<p>"Mary Alice, do hurry up. Here, you twin nuisances,
+get off to school. If you don't you'll be late
+and then the master will give you a whipping."</p>
+
+<p>"He won't," answered the irrepressible Teddy.
+"He never whips us, he doesn't. He stands us on the
+floor sometimes, though," he added, remembering
+the many times his own chubby legs had been seen
+to better advantage on the school platform.</p>
+
+<p>"That man," said Mrs. Grant, alluding to the
+teacher, "makes me nervous. He is the most abstracted
+creature I ever saw in my life. It is a wonder
+to me he doesn't walk straight into the river some
+day. You'll meet him meandering along the street,
+gazing into vacancy, and he'll never see you nor
+hear a word you say half the time."</p>
+
+<p>"Yesterday," said Gordon, chuckling over the
+remembrance, "he came in with a big piece of
+paper he'd picked up on the entry floor in one hand
+and his hat in the other&mdash;and he stuffed his hat into
+the coal-scuttle and hung up the paper on a nail as
+grave as you please. Never knew the difference till
+Ned Slocum went and told him. He's always doing
+things like that."</p>
+
+<p>Keith had collected his books and now marched
+his brothers and sisters off to school. Left alone
+with the baby, Mrs. Grant betook herself to her
+work with a heavy heart. But a second interruption
+broke the progress of her dish-washing.</p>
+
+<p>"I declare," she said, with a surprised glance
+through the window, "if there isn't that absent-minded
+schoolteacher coming through the yard!
+What can he want? Dear me, I do hope Teddy
+hasn't been cutting capers in school again."</p>
+
+<p>For the teacher's last call had been in October
+and had been occasioned by the fact that the irrepressible
+Teddy would persist in going to school
+with his pockets filled with live crickets and in
+driving them harnessed to strings up and down the
+aisle when the teacher's back was turned. All mild
+methods of punishment having failed, the teacher
+had called to talk it over with Mrs. Grant, with the
+happy result that Teddy's behaviour had improved&mdash;in
+the matter of crickets at least.</p>
+
+<p>But it was about time for another outbreak.
+Teddy had been unnaturally good for too long a
+time. Poor Mrs. Grant feared that it was the calm
+before a storm, and it was with nervous haste that
+she went to the door and greeted the young
+teacher.</p>
+
+<p>He was a slight, pale, boyish-looking fellow, with
+an abstracted, musing look in his large dark eyes.
+Mrs. Grant noticed with amusement that he wore
+a white straw hat in spite of the season. His eyes
+were directed to her face with his usual unseeing
+gaze.</p>
+
+<p>"Just as though he was looking through me at
+something a thousand miles away," said Mrs. Grant
+afterwards. "I believe he was, too. His body was
+right there on the step before me, but where his
+soul was is more than you or I or anybody can tell."</p>
+
+<p>"Good morning," he said absently. "I have just
+called on my way to school with a message from
+Miss Millar. She wants you all to come up and have
+Christmas dinner with her tomorrow."</p>
+
+<p>"For the land's sake!" said Mrs. Grant blankly.
+"I don't understand." To herself she thought, "I
+wish I dared take him and shake him to find if he's
+walking in his sleep or not."</p>
+
+<p>"You and all the children&mdash;every one," went on
+the teacher dreamily, as if he were reciting a lesson
+learned beforehand. "She told me to tell you to be
+sure and come. Shall I say that you will?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes, that is&mdash;I suppose&mdash;I don't know," said
+Mrs. Grant incoherently. "I never expected&mdash;yes,
+you may tell her we'll come," she concluded
+abruptly.</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you," said the abstracted messenger,
+gravely lifting his hat and looking squarely through
+Mrs. Grant into unknown regions. When he had
+gone Mrs. Grant went in and sat down, laughing in
+a sort of hysterical way.</p>
+
+<p>"I wonder if it is all right. Could Cornelia really
+have told him? She must, I suppose, but it is enough
+to take one's breath."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Grant and Cornelia Millar were cousins,
+and had once been the closest of friends, but that
+was years ago, before some spiteful reports and ill-natured
+gossip had come between them, making
+only a little rift at first that soon widened into a
+chasm of coldness and alienation. Therefore this
+invitation surprised Mrs. Grant greatly.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Cornelia was a maiden lady of certain
+years, with a comfortable bank account and a handsome,
+old-fashioned house on the hill behind the
+village. She always boarded the schoolteachers and
+looked after them maternally; she was an active
+church worker and a tower of strength to struggling
+ministers and their families.</p>
+
+<p>"If Cornelia has seen fit at last to hold out the
+hand of reconciliation I'm glad enough to take it.
+Dear knows, I've wanted to make up often enough,
+but I didn't think she ever would. We've both of
+us got too much pride and stubbornness. It's the
+Turner blood in us that does it. The Turners were
+all so set. But I mean to do my part now she has
+done hers."</p>
+
+<p>And Mrs. Grant made a final attack on the dishes
+with a beaming face.</p>
+
+<p>When the little Grants came home and heard
+the news, Teddy stood on his head to express his
+delight, the twins kissed each other, and Mary Alice
+and Gordon danced around the kitchen.</p>
+
+<p>Keith thought himself too big to betray any joy
+over a Christmas dinner, but he whistled while
+doing the chores until the bare welkin in the yard
+rang, and Teddy, in spite of unheard of misdemeanours,
+was not collared off into the porch once.</p>
+
+<p>When the young teacher got home from school
+that evening he found the yellow house full of all
+sorts of delectable odours. Miss Cornelia herself
+was concocting mince pies after the famous family
+recipe, while her ancient and faithful handmaiden,
+Hannah, was straining into moulds the cranberry
+jelly. The open pantry door revealed a tempting
+array of Christmas delicacies.</p>
+
+<p>"Did you call and invite the Smithsons up to
+dinner as I told you?" asked Miss Cornelia anxiously.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," was the dreamy response as he glided
+through the kitchen and vanished into the hall.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Cornelia crimped the edges of her pies
+delicately with a relieved air. "I made certain he'd
+forget it," she said. "You just have to watch him as
+if he were a mere child. Didn't I catch him yesterday
+starting off to school in his carpet slippers? And
+in spite of me he got away today in that ridiculous
+summer hat. You'd better set that jelly in the out-pantry
+to cool, Hannah; it looks good. We'll give
+those poor little Smithsons a feast for once in their
+lives if they never get another."</p>
+
+<p>At this juncture the hall door flew open and Mr.
+Palmer appeared on the threshold. He seemed considerably
+agitated and for once his eyes had lost
+their look of space-searching.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Millar, I am afraid I did make a mistake
+this morning&mdash;it has just dawned on me. I am
+almost sure that I called at Mrs. Grant's and invited
+her and her family instead of the Smithsons. And
+she said they would come."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Cornelia's face was a study.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Palmer," she said, flourishing her crimping
+fork tragically, "do you mean to say you went
+and invited Linda Grant here tomorrow? Linda
+Grant, of all women in this world!"</p>
+
+<p>"I did," said the teacher with penitent wretchedness.
+"It was very careless of me&mdash;I am very sorry.
+What can I do? I'll go down and tell them I made
+a mistake if you like."</p>
+
+<p>"You can't do that," groaned Miss Cornelia,
+sitting down and wrinkling up her forehead in dire
+perplexity. "It would never do in the world. For
+pity's sake, let me think for a minute."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Cornelia did think&mdash;to good purpose evidently,
+for her forehead smoothed out as her meditations
+proceeded and her face brightened. Then
+she got up briskly. "Well, you've done it and no
+mistake. I don't know that I'm sorry, either.
+Anyhow, we'll leave it as it is. But you must go
+straight down now and invite the Smithsons too.
+And for pity's sake, don't make any more mistakes."</p>
+
+<p>When he had gone Miss Cornelia opened her
+heart to Hannah. "I never could have done it myself&mdash;never;
+the Turner is too strong in me. But I'm
+glad it is done. I've been wanting for years to make
+up with Linda. And now the chance has come,
+thanks to that blessed blundering boy, I mean to
+make the most of it. Mind, Hannah, you never
+whisper a word about its being a mistake. Linda
+must never know. Poor Linda! She's had a hard
+time. Hannah, we must make some more pies, and
+I must go straight down to the store and get some
+more Santa Claus stuff; I've only got enough to go
+around the Smithsons."</p>
+
+<p>When Mrs. Grant and her family arrived at the
+yellow house next morning Miss Cornelia herself
+ran out bareheaded to meet them. The two women
+shook hands a little stiffly and then a rill of long-repressed
+affection trickled out from some secret
+spring in Miss Cornelia's heart and she kissed her
+new-found old friend tenderly. Linda returned the
+kiss warmly, and both felt that the old-time friendship
+was theirs again.</p>
+
+<p>The little Smithsons all came and they and the
+little Grants sat down on the long bright dining
+room to a dinner that made history in their small
+lives, and was eaten over again in happy dreams for
+months.</p>
+
+<p>How those children did eat! And how beaming
+Miss Cornelia and grim-faced, soft-hearted Hannah
+and even the absent-minded teacher himself enjoyed
+watching them!</p>
+
+<p>After dinner Miss Cornelia distributed among
+the delighted little souls the presents she had bought
+for them, and then turned them loose in the big
+shining kitchen to have a taffy pull&mdash;and they had
+it to their hearts' content! And as for the shocking,
+taffyfied state into which they got their own rosy
+faces and that once immaculate domain&mdash;well, as
+Miss Cornelia and Hannah never said one word
+about it, neither will I.</p>
+
+<p>The four women enjoyed the afternoon in their
+own way, and the schoolteacher buried himself in
+algebra to his own great satisfaction.</p>
+
+<p>When her guests went home in the starlit
+December dusk, Miss Cornelia walked part of the
+way with them and had a long confidential talk
+with Mrs. Grant. When she returned it was to find
+Hannah groaning in and over the kitchen and the
+schoolteacher dreamily trying to clean some
+molasses off his boots with the kitchen hairbrush.
+Long-suffering Miss Cornelia rescued her property
+and despatched Mr. Palmer into the woodshed to
+find the shoe-brush. Then she sat down and
+laughed.</p>
+
+<p>"Hannah, what will become of that boy yet?
+There's no counting on what he'll do next. I don't
+know how he'll ever get through the world, I'm
+sure, but I'll look after him while he's here at least.
+I owe him a huge debt of gratitude for this Christmas
+blunder. What an awful mess this place is in!
+But, Hannah, did you ever in the world see anything
+so delightful as that little Tommy Smithson
+stuffing himself with plum cake, not to mention
+Teddy Grant? It did me good just to see them."</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="A_Strayed_Allegiance" id="A_Strayed_Allegiance"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>A Strayed Allegiance<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>"Will you go to the Cove with me this afternoon?"</p>
+
+<p>It was Marian Lesley who asked the question.</p>
+
+<p>Esterbrook Elliott unpinned with a masterful touch
+the delicate cluster of Noisette rosebuds she wore at
+her throat and transferred them to his buttonhole as he
+answered courteously: "Certainly. My time, as you
+know, is entirely at your disposal."</p>
+
+<p>They were standing in the garden under the creamy
+bloom of drooping acacia trees. One long plume of
+blossoms touched lightly the soft, golden-brown coils
+of the girl's hair and cast a wavering shadow over the
+beautiful, flower-like face beneath it.</p>
+
+<p>Esterbrook Elliott, standing before her, thought
+proudly that he had never seen a woman who might
+compare with her. In every detail she satisfied his
+critical, fastidious taste. There was not a discordant
+touch about her.</p>
+
+<p>Esterbrook Elliott had always loved Marian Lesley&mdash;or
+thought he had. They had grown up together from
+childhood. He was an only son and she an only daughter.
+It had always been an understood thing between
+the two families that the boy and girl should marry.
+But Marian's father had decreed that no positive pledge
+should pass between them until Marian was twenty-one.</p>
+
+<p>Esterbrook accepted his mapped-out destiny and selected
+bride with the conviction that he was an exceptionally
+lucky fellow. Out of all the women in the
+world Marian was the very one whom he would have
+chosen as mistress of his fine, old home. She had been
+his boyhood's ideal. He believed that he loved her
+sincerely, but he was not too much in love to be blind
+to the worldly advantages of his marriage with his
+cousin.</p>
+
+<p>His father had died two years previously, leaving
+him wealthy and independent. Marian had lost her
+mother in childhood; her father died when she was
+eighteen. Since then she had lived alone with her aunt.
+Her life was quiet and lonely. Esterbrook's companionship
+was all that brightened it, but it was enough.
+Marian lavished on him all the rich, womanly love of
+her heart. On her twenty-first birthday they were formally
+betrothed. They were to be married in the following
+autumn.</p>
+
+<p>No shadow had drifted across the heaven of her
+happiness. She believed herself secure in her lover's
+unfaltering devotion. True, at times she thought his
+manner lacked a lover's passionate ardour. He was
+always attentive and courteous. She had only to utter a
+wish to find that it had been anticipated; he spent
+every spare minute at her side.</p>
+
+<p>Yet sometimes she half wished he would betray more
+lover-like impatience and intensity. Were all lovers as
+calm and undemonstrative?</p>
+
+<p>She reproached herself for this incipient disloyalty as
+often as it vexingly intruded its unwelcome presence
+across her inner consciousness. Surely Esterbrook was
+fond and devoted enough to satisfy the most exacting
+demands of affection. Marian herself was somewhat
+undemonstrative and reserved. Passing acquaintances
+called her cold and proud. Only the privileged few
+knew the rich depths of womanly tenderness in her
+nature.</p>
+
+<p>Esterbrook thought that he fully appreciated her. As
+he had walked homeward the night of their betrothal,
+he had reviewed with unconscious criticism his mental
+catalogue of Marian's graces and good qualities, admitting,
+with supreme satisfaction, that there was not one
+thing about her that he could wish changed.</p>
+
+<p>This afternoon, under the acacias, they had been
+planning about their wedding. There was no one to
+consult but themselves.</p>
+
+<p>They were to be married early in September and
+then go abroad. Esterbrook mapped out the details of
+their bridal tour with careful thoughtfulness. They would
+visit all the old-world places that Marian wished to see.
+Afterwards they would come back home. He discussed
+certain changes he wished to make in the old Elliott
+mansion to fit it for a young and beautiful mistress.</p>
+
+<p>He did most of the planning. Marian was content to
+listen in happy silence. Afterwards she had proposed
+this walk to the Cove.</p>
+
+<p>"What particular object of charity have you found at
+the Cove now?" asked Esterbrook, with lazy interest,
+as they walked along.</p>
+
+<p>"Mrs. Barrett's little Bessie is very ill with fever,"
+answered Marian. Then, catching his anxious look, she
+hastened to add, "It is nothing infectious&mdash;some kind
+of a slow, sapping variety. There is no danger, Esterbrook."</p>
+
+<p>"I was not afraid for myself," he replied quietly.
+"My alarm was for you. You are too precious to me,
+Marian, for me to permit you to risk health and life, if
+it were dangerous. What a Lady Bountiful you are to
+those people at the Cove. When we are married you
+must take me in hand and teach me your creed of
+charity. I'm afraid I've lived a rather selfish life. You
+will change all that, dear. You will make a good man of
+me."</p>
+
+<p>"You are that now, Esterbrook," she said softly. "If
+you were not, I could not love you."</p>
+
+<p>"It is a negative sort of goodness, I fear. I have never
+been tried or tempted severely. Perhaps I should fail
+under the test."</p>
+
+<p>"I am sure you would not," answered Marian
+proudly.</p>
+
+<p>Esterbrook laughed; her faith in him was pleasant.
+He had no thought but that he would prove worthy of
+it.</p>
+
+<p>The Cove, so-called, was a little fishing hamlet situated
+on the low, sandy shore of a small bay. The
+houses, clustered in one spot, seemed like nothing so
+much as larger shells washed up by the sea, so grey
+and bleached were they from long exposure to sea
+winds and spray.</p>
+
+<p>Dozens of ragged children were playing about them,
+mingled with several disreputable yellow curs that
+yapped noisily at the strangers.</p>
+
+<p>Down on the sandy strip of beach below the houses
+groups of men were lounging about. The mackerel,
+season had not yet set in; the spring herring netting
+was past. It was holiday time among the sea folks.
+They were enjoying it to the full, a happy, ragged
+colony, careless of what the morrows might bring forth.</p>
+
+<p>Out beyond, the boats were at anchor, floating as
+gracefully on the twinkling water as sea birds, their tall
+masts bowing landward on the swell. A lazy, dreamful
+calm had fallen over the distant seas; the horizon blues
+were pale and dim; faint purple hazes blurred the outlines
+of far-off headlands and cliffs; the yellow sands
+sparkled in the sunshine as if powdered with jewels.</p>
+
+<p>A murmurous babble of life buzzed about the hamlet,
+pierced through by the shrill undertones of the
+wrangling children, most of whom had paused in their
+play to scan the visitors with covert curiosity.</p>
+
+<p>Marian led the way to a house apart from the others
+at the very edge of the shelving rock. The dooryard
+was scrupulously clean and unlittered; the little footpath
+through it was neatly bordered by white clam
+shells; several thrifty geraniums in bloom looked out
+from the muslin-curtained windows.</p>
+
+<p>A weary-faced woman came forward to meet them.</p>
+
+<p>"Bessie's much the same, Miss Lesley," she said, in
+answer to Marian's inquiry. "The doctor you sent was
+here today and did all he could for her. He seemed
+quite hopeful. She don't complain or nothing&mdash;just lies
+there and moans. Sometimes she gets restless. It's very
+kind of you to come so often, Miss Lesley. Here, Magdalen,
+will you put this basket the lady's brought up
+there on the shelf?"</p>
+
+<p>A girl, who had been sitting unnoticed with her back
+to the visitors, at the head of the child's cot in one
+corner of the room, stood up and slowly turned around.
+Marian and Esterbrook Elliott both started with involuntary
+surprise. Esterbrook caught his breath like a
+man suddenly awakened from sleep. In the name of all
+that was wonderful, who or what could this girl be, so
+little in harmony with her surroundings?</p>
+
+<p>Standing in the crepuscular light of the corner, her
+marvellous beauty shone out with the vivid richness of
+some rare painting. She was tall, and the magnificent
+proportions of her figure were enhanced rather than
+marred by the severely plain dress of dark print that
+she wore. The heavy masses of her hair, a shining
+auburn dashed with golden foam, were coiled in a rich,
+glossy knot at the back of the classically modelled head
+and rippled back from a low brow whose waxen fairness
+even the breezes of the ocean had spared.</p>
+
+<p>The girl's face was a full, perfect oval, with features
+of faultless regularity, and the large, full eyes were of
+tawny hazel, darkened into inscrutable gloom in the
+dimness of the corner.</p>
+
+<p>Not even Marian Lesley's face was more delicately
+tinted, but not a trace of colour appeared in the smooth,
+marble-like cheeks; yet the waxen pallor bore no trace
+of disease or weakness, and the large, curving mouth
+was of an intense crimson.</p>
+
+<p>She stood quite motionless. There was no trace of
+embarrassment or self-consciousness in her pose. When
+Mrs. Barrett said, "This is my niece, Magdalen Crawford,"
+she merely inclined her head in grave, silent
+acknowledgement. As she moved forward to take Marian's
+basket, she seemed oddly out of place in the low,
+crowded room. Her presence seemed to throw a strange
+restraint over the group.</p>
+
+<p>Marian rose and went over to the cot, laying her
+slender hand on the hot forehead of the little sufferer.
+The child opened its brown eyes questioningly.</p>
+
+<p>"How are you today, Bessie?"</p>
+
+<p>"Mad'len&mdash;I want Mad'len," moaned the little plaintive
+voice.</p>
+
+<p>Magdalen came over and stood beside Marian Lesley.</p>
+
+<p>"She wants me," she said in a low, thrilling voice;
+free from all harsh accent or intonation. "I am the only
+one she seems to know always. Yes, darling, Mad'len
+is here&mdash;right beside you. She will not leave you."</p>
+
+<p>She knelt by the little cot and passed her arm under
+the child's neck, drawing the curly head close to her
+throat with a tender, soothing motion.</p>
+
+<p>Esterbrook Elliott watched the two women intently&mdash;the
+one standing by the cot, arrayed in simple yet
+costly apparel, with her beautiful, high-bred face, and
+the other, kneeling on the bare, sanded floor in her
+print dress, with her splendid head bent low over the
+child and the long fringe of burnished lashes sweeping
+the cold pallor of the oval cheek.</p>
+
+<p>From the moment that Magdalen Crawford's haunting
+eyes had looked straight into his for one fleeting
+second, an unnamable thrill of pain and pleasure stirred
+his heart, a thrill so strong and sudden and passionate
+that his face paled with emotion; the room seemed to
+swim before his eyes in a mist out of which gleamed
+that wonderful face with its mesmeric, darkly radiant
+eyes, burning their way into deeps and abysses of his
+soul hitherto unknown to him.</p>
+
+<p>When the mist cleared away and his head grew steadier,
+he wondered at himself. Yet he trembled in every
+limb and the only clear idea that struggled out of his
+confused thoughts was an overmastering desire to take
+that cold face between his hands and kiss it until its
+passionless marble glowed into warm and throbbing
+life.</p>
+
+<p>"Who is that girl?" he said abruptly, when they had
+left the cottage. "She is the most beautiful woman I
+have ever seen&mdash;present company always excepted,"
+he concluded, with a depreciatory laugh.</p>
+
+<p>The delicate bloom on Marian's face deepened slightly.</p>
+
+<p>"You had much better to have omitted that last sentence,"
+she said quietly, "it was so palpably an afterthought.
+Yes, she is wonderfully lovely&mdash;a strange
+beauty, I fancied. There seemed something odd and
+uncanny about it to me. She must be Mrs. Barrett's
+niece. I remember that when I was down here about a
+month ago Mrs. Barrett told me she expected a niece of
+hers to live with her&mdash;for a time at least. Her parents
+were both dead, the father having died recently. Mrs.
+Barrett seemed troubled about her. She said that the
+girl had been well brought up and used to better
+things than the Cove could give her, and she feared
+that she would be very discontented and unhappy. I
+had forgotten all about it until I saw the girl today. She
+certainly seems to be a very superior person; she will
+find the Cove very lonely, I am sure. It is not probable
+she will stay there long. I must see what I can do for
+her, but her manner seemed rather repellent, don't you
+think?"</p>
+
+<p>"Hardly," responded Esterbrook curtly. "She seemed
+surprisingly dignified and self-possessed, I fancied, for
+a girl in her position. A princess could not have looked
+and bowed more royally. There was not a shadow of
+embarrassment in her manner, in spite of the incongruity
+of her surroundings. You had much better leave her
+alone, Marian. In all probability she would resent any
+condescension on your part. What wonderful, deep,
+lovely eyes she has."</p>
+
+<p>Again the sensitive colour flushed Marian's cheek as
+his voice lapsed unconsciously into a dreamy, retrospective
+tone, and a slight restraint came over her
+manner, which did not depart. Esterbrook went away
+at sunset. Marian asked him to remain for the evening,
+but he pleaded some excuse.</p>
+
+<p>"I shall come tomorrow afternoon," he said, as he
+stooped to drop a careless good-bye kiss on her face.</p>
+
+<p>Marian watched him wistfully as he rode away, with
+an unaccountable pain in her heart. She felt more acutely
+than ever that there were depths in her lover's nature
+that she was powerless to stir into responsive life.</p>
+
+<p>Had any other that power? She thought of the girl at
+the Cove, with her deep eyes and wonderful face. A
+chill of premonitory fear seized upon her.</p>
+
+<p>"I feel exactly as if Esterbrook had gone away from
+me forever," she said slowly to herself, stooping to
+brush her cheek against a dew-cold, milk-white acacia
+bloom, "and would never come back to me again. If
+that could happen, I wonder what there would be left
+to live for?"</p>
+
+<br />
+<hr style='width: 15%;' />
+<br />
+
+<p>Esterbrook Elliott meant, or honestly thought he meant,
+to go home when he left Marian. Nevertheless, when
+he reached the road branching off to the Cove he
+turned his horse down it with a flush on his dark
+cheek. He realized that the motive of the action was
+disloyal to Marian and he felt ashamed of his weakness.</p>
+
+<p>But the desire to see Magdalen Crawford once more
+and to look into the depths of her eyes was stronger
+than all else, and overpowered every throb of duty and
+resistance.</p>
+
+<p>He saw nothing of her when he reached the Cove.
+He could think of no excuse for calling at the Barrett
+cottage, so he rode slowly past the hamlet and along
+the shore.</p>
+
+<p>The sun, red as a smouldering ember, was half buried
+in the silken violet rim of the sea; the west was a
+vast lake of saffron and rose and ethereal green, through
+which floated the curved shallop of a thin new moon,
+slowly deepening from lustreless white, through
+gleaming silver, into burnished gold, and attended by one
+solitary, pearl-white star. The vast concave of sky above
+was of violet, infinite and flawless. Far out dusky amethystine
+islets clustered like gems on the shining breast
+of the bay. The little pools of water along the low
+shores glowed like mirrors of polished jacinth. The
+small, pine-fringed headlands ran out into the water,
+cutting its lustrous blue expanse like purple wedges.</p>
+
+<p>As Esterbrook turned one of them he saw Magdalen
+standing out on the point of the next, a short distance
+away. Her back was towards him, and her splendid
+figure was outlined darkly against the vivid sky.</p>
+
+<p>Esterbrook sprang from his horse and left the animal
+standing by itself while he walked swiftly out to her.
+His heart throbbed suffocatingly. He was conscious of
+no direct purpose save merely to see her.</p>
+
+<p>She turned when he reached her with a slight start of
+surprise. His footsteps had made no sound on the
+tide-rippled sand.</p>
+
+<p>For a few moments they faced each other so, eyes
+burning into eyes with mute soul-probing and questioning.
+The sun had disappeared, leaving a stain of fiery
+red to mark his grave; the weird, radiant light was
+startlingly vivid and clear. Little crisp puffs and flakes
+of foam scurried over the point like elfin things. The
+fresh wind, blowing up the bay, tossed the lustrous
+rings of hair about Magdalen's pale face; all the routed
+shadows of the hour had found refuge in her eyes.</p>
+
+<p>Not a trace of colour appeared in her face under
+Esterbrook Elliott's burning gaze. But when he said
+"Magdalen!" a single, hot scorch of crimson flamed up
+into her cheeks protestingly. She lifted her hand with a
+splendid gesture, but no word passed her lips.</p>
+
+<p>"Magdalen, have you nothing to say to me?" he
+asked, coming closer to her with an imploring passion
+in his face never seen by Marian Lesley's eyes. He
+reached out his hand, but she stepped back from his
+touch.</p>
+
+<p>"What should I have to say to you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Say that you are glad to see me."</p>
+
+<p>"I am not glad to see you. You have no right to come
+here. But I knew you would come."</p>
+
+<p>"You knew it? How?"</p>
+
+<p>"Your eyes told me so today. I am not blind&mdash;I can
+see further than those dull fisher folks. Yes, I knew
+you would come. That is why I came here tonight&mdash;so
+that you would find me alone and I could tell you that
+you were not to come again."</p>
+
+<p>"Why must you tell me that, Magdalen?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because, as I have told you, you have no right to
+come."</p>
+
+<p>"But if I will not obey you? If I will come in defiance
+of your prohibition?"</p>
+
+<p>She turned her steady luminous eyes on his pale, set
+face.</p>
+
+<p>"You would stamp yourself as a madman, then,"
+she said coldly. "I know that you are Miss Lesley's
+promised husband. Therefore, you are either false to
+her or insulting to me. In either case the companionship
+of Magdalen Crawford is not what you must seek.
+Go!"</p>
+
+<p>She turned away from him with an imperious gesture
+of dismissal. Esterbrook Elliott stepped forward
+and caught one firm, white wrist.</p>
+
+<p>"I shall not obey you," he said in a low, intense
+tone; his fine eyes burned into hers. "You may send
+me away, but I will come back, again and yet again
+until you have learned to welcome me. Why should
+you meet me like an enemy? Why can we not be
+friends?"</p>
+
+<p>The girl faced him once more.</p>
+
+<p>"Because," she said proudly, "I am not your equal.
+There can be no friendship between us. There ought
+not to be. Magdalen Crawford, the fisherman's niece,
+is no companion for you. You will be foolish, as well as
+disloyal, if you ever try to see me again. Go back to the
+beautiful, high-bred woman you love and forget me.
+Perhaps you think I am talking strangely. Perhaps you
+think me bold and unwomanly to speak so plainly to
+you, a stranger. But there are some circumstances in
+life when plain-speaking is best. I do not want to see
+you again. Now, go back to your own world."</p>
+
+<p>Esterbrook Elliott slowly turned from her and walked
+in silence back to the shore. In the shadows of the
+point he stopped to look back at her, standing out like
+some inspired prophetess against the fiery background
+of the sunset sky and silver-blue water. The sky overhead
+was thick-sown with stars; the night breeze was
+blowing up from its lair in distant, echoing sea caves.
+On his right the lights of the Cove twinkled out through
+the dusk.</p>
+
+<p>"I feel like a coward and a traitor," he said slowly.
+"Good God, what is this madness that has come over
+me? Is this my boasted strength of manhood?"</p>
+
+<p>A moment later the hoof beats of his horse died
+away up the shore.</p>
+
+<p>Magdalen Crawford lingered on the point until the
+last dull red faded out into the violet gloom of the June
+sea dusk, than which nothing can be rarer or diviner,
+and listened to the moan and murmur of the sea far
+out over the bay with sorrowful eyes and sternly set
+lips.</p>
+
+<p>The next day, when the afternoon sun hung hot and
+heavy over the water, Esterbrook Elliott came again to
+the Cove. He found it deserted. A rumour of mackerel
+had come, and every boat had sailed out in the rose-red
+dawn to the fishing grounds. But down on a strip
+of sparkling yellow sand he saw Magdalen Crawford
+standing, her hand on the rope that fastened a small
+white dory to the fragment of a half-embedded wreck.</p>
+
+<p>She was watching a huddle of gulls clustered on the
+tip of a narrow, sandy spit running out to the left. She
+turned at the sound of his hurried foot-fall behind her.
+Her face paled slightly, and into the depths of her eyes
+leapt a passionate, mesmeric glow that faded as quickly
+as it came.</p>
+
+<p>"You see I have come back in spite of your command,
+Magdalen."</p>
+
+<p>"I do see it," she answered in a gravely troubled
+voice. "You are a madman who refuses to be warned."</p>
+
+<p>"Where are you going, Magdalen?" She had loosened
+the rope from the wreck.</p>
+
+<p>"I am going to row over to Chapel Point for salt.
+They think the boats will come in tonight loaded with
+mackerel&mdash;look at them away out there by the score&mdash;and
+salt will be needed."</p>
+
+<p>"Can you row so far alone?"</p>
+
+<p>"Easily. I learned to row long ago&mdash;for a pastime
+then. Since coming here I find it of great service to
+me."</p>
+
+<p>She stepped lightly into the tiny shallop and picked
+up an oar. The brilliant sunshine streamed about her,
+burnishing the rich tints of her hair into ruddy gold.
+She balanced herself to the swaying of the dory with
+the grace of a sea bird. The man looking at her felt his
+brain reel.</p>
+
+<p>"Good-bye, Mr. Elliott."</p>
+
+<p>For answer he sprang into the dory and, snatching
+an oar, pushed against the old wreck with such energy
+that the dory shot out from the shore like a foam bell.
+His sudden spring had set it rocking violently. Magdalen
+almost lost her footing and caught blindly at his
+arm. As her fingers closed on his wrist a thrill as of fire
+shot through his every vein.</p>
+
+<p>"Why have you done this, Mr. Elliott? You must go
+back."</p>
+
+<p>"But I will not," he said masterfully, looking straight
+into her eyes with an imperiousness that sat well upon
+him. "I am going to row you over to Chapel Point. I
+have the oars&mdash;I will be master this once, at least."</p>
+
+<p>For an instant her eyes flashed defiant protest, then
+drooped before his. A sudden, hot blush crimsoned
+her pale face. His will had mastered hers; the girl
+trembled from head to foot, and the proud, sensitive,
+mouth quivered.</p>
+
+<p>Into the face of the man watching her breathlessly
+flashed a triumphant, passionate joy. He put out his
+hand and gently pushed her down into the seat. Sitting
+opposite, he took up the oars and pulled out over the
+sheet of sparkling blue water, through which at first
+the bottom of white sand glimmered wavily but afterwards
+deepened to translucent, dim depths of greenness.</p>
+
+<p>His heart throbbed tumultuously. Once the thought
+of Marian drifted across his mind like a chill breath
+of wind, but it was forgotten when his eyes met
+Magdalen's.</p>
+
+<p>"Tell me about yourself, Magdalen," he said at last,
+breaking the tremulous, charmed, sparkling silence.</p>
+
+<p>"There is nothing to tell," she answered with characteristic
+straightforwardness. "My life has been a very
+uneventful one. I have never been rich, or very well
+educated, but&mdash;it used to be different from now. I had
+some chance before&mdash;before Father died."</p>
+
+<p>"You must have found it very lonely and strange
+when you came here first."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. At first I thought I should die&mdash;but I do not
+mind it now. I have made friends with the sea; it has
+taught me a great deal. There is a kind of inspiration in
+the sea. When one listens to its never-ceasing murmur
+afar out there, always sounding at midnight and midday,
+one's soul goes out to meet Eternity. Sometimes it
+gives me so much pleasure that it is almost pain."</p>
+
+<p>She stopped abruptly.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know why I am talking to you like this."</p>
+
+<p>"You are a strange girl, Magdalen. Have you no
+other companion than the sea?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. Why should I wish to have? I shall not be here
+long."</p>
+
+<p>Elliott's face contracted with a spasm of pain.</p>
+
+<p>"You are not going away, Magdalen?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes&mdash;in the fall. I have my own living to earn, you
+know. I am very poor. Uncle and Aunt are very kind,
+but I cannot consent to burden them any longer than I
+can help."</p>
+
+<p>A sigh that was almost a moan broke from Esterbrook
+Elliott's lips.</p>
+
+<p>"You must not go away, Magdalen. You must stay
+here&mdash;with me!"</p>
+
+<p>"You forget yourself," she said proudly. "How dare
+you speak to me so? Have you forgotten Miss Lesley?
+Or are you a traitor to us both?"</p>
+
+<p>Esterbrook made no answer. He bowed his pale,
+miserable face before her, self-condemned.</p>
+
+<p>The breast of the bay sparkled with its countless
+gems like the breast of a fair woman. The shores were
+purple and amethystine in the distance. Far out, bluish,
+phantom-like sails clustered against the pallid horizon.
+The dory danced like a feather over the ripples. They
+were close under the shadow of Chapel Point.</p>
+
+<br />
+<hr style="width: 15%;" />
+<br />
+
+<p>Marian Lesley waited in vain for her lover that afternoon.
+When he came at last in the odorous dusk of the
+June night she met him on the acacia-shadowed verandah
+with cold sweetness. Perhaps some subtle woman-instinct
+whispered to her where and how he had spent
+the afternoon, for she offered him no kiss, nor did she
+ask him why he had failed to come sooner.</p>
+
+<p>His eyes lingered on her in the dim light, taking in
+every detail of her sweet womanly refinement and loveliness,
+and with difficulty he choked back a groan.
+Again he asked himself what madness had come over
+him, and again for an answer rose up the vision of
+Magdalen Crawford's face as he had seen it that day,
+crimsoning beneath his gaze.</p>
+
+<p>It was late when he left. Marian watched him out of
+sight, standing under the acacias. She shivered as with
+a sudden chill. "I feel as I think Vashti must have felt,"
+she murmured aloud, "when, discrowned and unqueened,
+she crept out of the gates of Shushan to hide
+her broken heart. I wonder if Esther has already usurped
+my sceptre. Has that girl at the Cove, with her pale,
+priestess-like face and mysterious eyes, stolen his heart
+from me? Perhaps not, for it may never have been
+mine. I know that Esterbrook Elliott will be true to the
+letter of his vows to me, no matter what it may cost
+him. But I want no pallid shadow of the love that
+belongs to another. The hour of abdication is at hand,
+I fear. And what will be left for throneless Vashti then?"</p>
+
+<p>Esterbrook Elliott, walking home through the mocking
+calm of the night, fought a hard battle with himself.</p>
+
+<p>He was face to face with the truth at last&mdash;the bitter
+knowledge that he had never loved Marian Lesley,
+save with a fond, brotherly affection, and that he did
+love Magdalen Crawford with a passion that threatened
+to sweep before it every vestige of his honour and
+loyalty.</p>
+
+<p>He had seen her but three times&mdash;and his throbbing
+heart lay in the hollow of her cold white hand.</p>
+
+<p>He shut his eyes and groaned. What madness. What
+unutterable folly! He was not free&mdash;he was bound to
+another by every cord of honour and self-respect. And,
+even were he free, Magdalen Crawford would be no fit
+wife for him&mdash;in the eyes of the world, at least. A girl
+from the Cove&mdash;a girl with little education and no
+social standing&mdash;aye! but he loved her.</p>
+
+<p>He groaned again and again in his misery. Afar down
+the slope the bay waters lay like an inky strip and the
+distant, murmurous plaint of the sea came out of the
+stillness of the night; the lights at the Cove glimmered
+faintly.</p>
+
+<p>In the week that followed he went to the Cove every
+day. Sometimes he did not see Magdalen; at other
+times he did. But at the end of the week he had conquered
+in the bitter, heart-crushing struggle with himself.
+If he had weakly given way to the first mad sweep
+of a new passion, the strength of his manhood reasserted
+itself at last. Faltering and wavering were over,
+though there was passionate pain in his voice when he
+said at last, "I am not coming back again, Magdalen."</p>
+
+<p>They were standing in the shadow of the pine-fringed
+point that ran out to the left of the Cove. They had
+been walking together along the shore, watching the
+splendour of the sea sunset that flamed and glowed in
+the west, where there was a sea of mackerel clouds,
+crimson and amber tinted, with long, ribbon-like strips
+of apple-green sky between. They had walked in silence,
+hand in hand, as children might have done, yet
+with the stir and throb of a mighty passion seething in
+their hearts.</p>
+
+<p>Magdalen turned as Esterbrook spoke, and looked at
+him in a long silence. The bay stretched out before
+them, tranced and shimmering; a few stars shone down
+through the gloom of dusk. Right across the translucent
+greens and roses and blues of the west hung a
+dark, unsightly cloud, like the blurred outline of a
+monstrous bat. In the dim, reflected light the girl's
+mournful face took on a weird, unearthly beauty. She
+turned her eyes from Esterbrook Elliott's set white face
+to the radiant gloom of the sea.</p>
+
+<p>"That is best," she answered at last, slowly.</p>
+
+<p>"Best&mdash;yes! Better that we had never met! I love
+you&mdash;you know it&mdash;words are idle between us. I never
+loved before&mdash;I thought I did. I made a mistake and I
+must pay the penalty of that mistake. You understand
+me?"</p>
+
+<p>"I understand," she answered simply.</p>
+
+<p>"I do not excuse myself&mdash;I have been weak and
+cowardly and disloyal. But I have conquered myself&mdash;I
+will be true to the woman to whom I am pledged. You
+and I must not meet again. I will crush this madness to
+death. I think I have been delirious ever since that day
+I saw you first, Magdalen. My brain is clearer now. I
+see my duty and I mean to do it at any cost. I dare not
+trust myself to say more. Magdalen, I have much for
+which to ask your forgiveness."</p>
+
+<p>"There is nothing to forgive," she said steadily. "I
+have been as much to blame as you. If I had been as
+resolute as I ought to have been&mdash;if I had sent you
+away the second time as I did the first&mdash;this would not
+have come to pass. I have been weak too, and I deserve
+to atone for my weakness by suffering. There is
+only one path open to us. Esterbrook, good-bye." Her
+voice quivered with an uncontrollable spasm of pain,
+but the misty, mournful eyes did not swerve from his.
+The man stepped forward and caught her in his arms.</p>
+
+<p>"Magdalen, good-bye, my darling. Kiss me once&mdash;only
+once&mdash;before I go."</p>
+
+<p>She loosened his arms and stepped back proudly.</p>
+
+<p>"No! No man kisses my lips unless he is to be my
+husband. Good-bye, dear."</p>
+
+<p>He bowed his head silently and went away, looking
+back not once, else he might have seen her kneeling on
+the damp sand weeping noiselessly and passionately.</p>
+
+<br />
+<hr style="width: 15%;" />
+<br />
+
+<p>Marian Lesley looked at his pale, determined face the
+next evening and read it like an open book.</p>
+
+<p>She had grown paler herself; there were purple shadows
+under the sweet violet eyes that might have hinted
+of her own sleepless nights.</p>
+
+<p>She greeted him calmly, holding out a steady, white
+hand of welcome. She saw the traces of the struggle
+through which he had passed and knew that he had
+come off victor.</p>
+
+<p>The knowledge made her task a little harder. It would
+have been easier to let slip the straining cable than to
+cast it from her when it lay unresistingly in her hand.</p>
+
+<p>For an instant her heart thrilled with an unutterably
+sweet hope. Might he not forget in time? Need she
+snap in twain the weakened bond between them after
+all? Perhaps she might win back her lost sceptre, yet
+if&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Womanly pride throttled the struggling hope. No
+divided allegiance, no hollow semblance of queenship
+for her!</p>
+
+<p>Her opportunity came when Esterbrook asked with
+grave earnestness if their marriage might not be hastened
+a little&mdash;could he not have his bride in August?
+For a fleeting second Marian closed her eyes and the
+slender hands, lying among the laces in her lap, clasped
+each other convulsively.</p>
+
+<p>Then she said quietly, "Sometimes I have thought,
+Esterbrook, that it might be better&mdash;if we were never
+married at all."</p>
+
+<p>Esterbrook turned a startled face upon her.</p>
+
+<p>"Not married at all! Marian, what do you mean?"</p>
+
+<p>"Just what I say. I do not think we are as well suited
+to each other after all as we have fancied. We have
+loved each other as brother and sister might&mdash;that is
+all. I think it will be best to be brother and sister
+forever&mdash;nothing more."</p>
+
+<p>Esterbrook sprang to his feet.</p>
+
+<p>"Marian, do you know what you are saying? You
+surely cannot have heard&mdash;no one could have told
+you&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I have heard nothing," she interrupted hurriedly.
+"No one has told me anything. I have only said what I
+have been thinking of late. I am sure we have made a
+mistake. It is not too late to remedy it. You will not
+refuse my request, Esterbrook? You will set me free?"</p>
+
+<p>"Good heavens, Marian!" he said hoarsely. "I cannot
+realize that you are in earnest. Have you ceased to care
+for me?" The rigidly locked hands were clasped a little
+tighter.</p>
+
+<p>"No&mdash;I shall always care for you as my friend if you
+will let me. But I know we could not make each other
+happy&mdash;the time for that has gone by. I would never
+be satisfied, nor would you. Esterbrook, will you release
+me from a promise which has become an irksome
+fetter?"</p>
+
+<p>He looked down on her upturned face mistily. A
+great joy was surging up in his heart&mdash;yet it was mingled
+with great regret.</p>
+
+<p>He knew&mdash;none better&mdash;what was passing out of his
+life, what he was losing when he lost that pure, womanly
+nature.</p>
+
+<p>"If you really mean this, Marian," he said slowly, "if
+you really have come to feel that your truest love is not
+and never can be mine&mdash;that I cannot make you happy&mdash;then
+there is nothing for me to do but to grant your
+request. You are free."</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you, dear," she said gently, as she stood up.</p>
+
+<p>She slipped his ring from her finger and held it out
+to him. He took it mechanically. He still felt dazed and
+unreal.</p>
+
+<p>Marian held out her hand.</p>
+
+<p>"Good-night, Esterbrook," she said, a little wearily.
+"I feel tired. I am glad you see it all in the same light as
+I do."</p>
+
+<p>"Marian," he said earnestly, clasping the outstretched
+hand, "are you sure that you will be happy&mdash;are you
+sure that you are doing a wise thing?"</p>
+
+<p>"Quite sure," she answered, with a faint smile. "I am
+not acting rashly. I have thought it all over carefully.
+Things are much better so, dear. We will always be
+friends. Your joys and sorrows will be to me as my
+own. When another love comes to bless your life,
+Esterbrook, I will be glad. And now, good-night. I
+want to be alone now."</p>
+
+<p>At the doorway he turned to look back at her, standing
+in all her sweet stateliness in the twilight duskness,
+and the keen realization of all he had lost made him
+bow his head with a quick pang of regret.</p>
+
+<p>Then he went out into the darkness of the summer
+night.</p>
+
+<p>An hour later he stood alone on the little point where
+he had parted with Magdalen the night before. A restless
+night wind was moaning through the pines that
+fringed the bank behind him; the moon shone down
+radiantly, turning the calm expanse of the bay into a
+milk-white sheen.</p>
+
+<p>He took Marian's ring from his pocket and kissed it
+reverently. Then he threw it from him far out over the
+water. For a second the diamond flashed in the moonlight;
+then, with a tiny splash, it fell among the ripples.</p>
+
+<p>Esterbrook turned his face to the Cove, lying dark
+and silent in the curve between the crescent headlands.
+A solitary light glimmered from the low eaves of the
+Barrett cottage.</p>
+
+<p>Tomorrow, was his unspoken thought, I will be free;
+to go back to Magdalen.</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="An_Invitation" id="An_Invitation"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>An Invitation Given on Impulse<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>It was a gloomy Saturday morning. The trees in
+the Oaklawn grounds were tossing wildly in the
+gusts of wind, and sodden brown leaves were
+blown up against the windows of the library,
+where a score of girls were waiting for the principal to
+bring the mail in.</p>
+
+<p>The big room echoed with the pleasant sound of girlish
+voices and low laughter, for in a fortnight school
+would close for the holidays, and they were all talking
+about their plans and anticipations.</p>
+
+<p>Only Ruth Mannering was, as usual, sitting by herself
+near one of the windows, looking out on the misty lawn.
+She was a pale, slender girl, with a sad face, and was
+dressed in rather shabby black. She had no special friend
+at Oaklawn, and the other girls did not know much about
+her. If they had thought about it at all, they would probably
+have decided that they did not like her; but for the
+most part they simply overlooked her.</p>
+
+<p>This was not altogether their fault. Ruth was poor and
+apparently friendless, but it was not her poverty that was
+against her. Lou Scott, who was "as poor as a church
+mouse," to quote her own frank admission, was the most
+popular girl in the seminary, the boon companion of the
+richest girls, and in demand with everybody. But Lou
+was jolly and frank and offhanded, while Ruth was painfully
+shy and reserved, and that was the secret of the
+whole matter.</p>
+
+<p>There was "no fun in her," the girls said, and so it came
+about that she was left out of their social life, and was
+almost as solitary at Oaklawn as if she had been the only
+girl there. She was there for the special purpose of studying
+music, and expected to earn her own living by teaching
+it when she left. She believed that the girls looked
+down on her on this account; this was unjust, of course,
+but Ruth had no idea how much her own coldness and
+reserve had worked against her.</p>
+
+<p>Across the room Carol Golden was, as usual, the centre
+of an animated group; Golden Carol as her particular
+friends sometimes called her, partly because of her beautiful
+voice, and partly because of her wonderful fleece of
+golden hair. Carol was one of the seminary pets, and
+seemed to Ruth Mannering to have everything that she
+had not.</p>
+
+<p>Presently the mail was brought in, and there was a
+rush to the table, followed by exclamations of satisfaction
+or disappointment. In a few minutes the room was almost
+deserted. Only two girls remained: Carol Golden,
+who had dropped into a big chair to read her many
+letters; and Ruth Mannering, who had not received any
+and had gone silently back to her part of the window.</p>
+
+<p>Presently Carol gave a little cry of delight. Her mother
+had written that she might invite any friend she wished
+home with her to spend the holidays. Carol had asked for
+this permission, and now that it had come was ready to
+dance for joy. As to whom she would ask, there could be
+only one answer to that. Of course it must be her particular
+friend, Maud Russell, who was the cleverest and prettiest
+girl at Oaklawn, at least so her admirers said. She
+was undoubtedly the richest, and was the acknowledged
+"leader." The girls affectionately called her "Princess,"
+and Carol adored her with that romantic affection that is
+found only among school girls. She knew, too, that Maud
+would surely accept her invitation because she did not
+intend to go home. Her parents were travelling in Europe,
+and she expected to spend her holidays with some
+cousins, who were almost strangers to her.</p>
+
+<p>Carol was so much pleased that she felt as if she must
+talk to somebody, so she turned to Ruth.</p>
+
+<p>"Isn't it delightful to think that we'll all be going home
+in a fortnight?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, very&mdash;for those that have homes to go to," said
+Ruth drearily.</p>
+
+<p>Carol felt a quick pang of pity and self-reproach.
+"Haven't you?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>Ruth shook her head. In spite of herself, the kindness
+of Carol's tone brought the tears to her eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"My mother died a year ago," she said in a trembling
+voice, "and since then I have had no real home. We were
+quite alone in the world, Mother and I, and now I have
+nobody."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I'm so sorry for you," cried Carol impulsively. She
+leaned forward and took Ruth's hand in a gentle way.
+"And do you mean to say that you'll have to stay here all
+through the holidays? Why, it will be horrid."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I shall not mind it much," said Ruth quickly,
+"with study and practice most of the time. Only now,
+when everyone is talking about it, it makes me wish that I
+had some place to go."</p>
+
+<p>Carol dropped Ruth's hand suddenly in the shock of a
+sudden idea that darted into her mind.</p>
+
+<p>A stray girl passing through the hall called out, "Ruth,
+Miss Siviter wishes to see you about something in Room
+C."</p>
+
+<p>Ruth got up quickly. She was glad to get away, for it
+seemed to her that in another minute she would break
+down altogether.</p>
+
+<p>Carol Golden hardly noticed her departure. She gathered
+up her letters and went abstractedly to her room,
+unheeding a gay call for "Golden Carol" from a group of
+girls in the corridor. Maud Russell was not in and Carol
+was glad. She wanted to be alone and fight down that
+sudden idea.</p>
+
+<p>"It is ridiculous to think of it," she said aloud, with a
+petulance very unusual in Golden Carol, whose disposition
+was as sunny as her looks. "Why, I simply cannot. I
+have always been longing to ask Maud to visit me, and
+now that the chance has come I am not going to throw it
+away. I am very sorry for Ruth, of course. It must be
+dreadful to be all alone like that. But it isn't my fault. And
+she is so fearfully quiet and dowdy&mdash;what would they all
+think of her at home? Frank and Jack would make such
+fun of her. I shall ask Maud just as soon as she comes in."</p>
+
+<p>Maud did come in presently, but Carol did not give her
+the invitation. Instead, she was almost snappish to her
+idol, and the Princess soon went out again in something
+of a huff.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, dear," cried Carol, "now I've offended her. What
+has got into me? What a disagreeable thing a conscience
+is, although I'm sure I don't know why mine should be
+prodding me so! I don't want to invite Ruth Mannering
+home with me for the holidays, but I feel exactly as if I
+should not have a minute's peace of mind all the time if I
+didn't. Mother would think it all right, of course. She
+would not mind if Ruth dressed in calico and never said
+anything but yes and no. But how the boys would laugh!
+I simply won't do it, conscience or no conscience."</p>
+
+<p>In view of this decision it was rather strange that the
+next morning, Carol Golden went down to Ruth Mannering's
+lonely little room on Corridor Two and said, "Ruth,
+will you go home with me for the holidays? Mother wrote
+me to invite anyone I wished to. Don't say you can't
+come, dear, because you must."</p>
+
+<p>Carol never, as long as she lived, forgot Ruth's face at
+that moment.</p>
+
+<p>"It was absolutely transfigured," she said afterwards. "I
+never saw anyone look so happy in my life."</p>
+
+<br />
+<hr style="width: 15%;" />
+<br />
+
+<p>A fortnight later unwonted silence reigned at Oaklawn.
+The girls were scattered far and wide, and Ruth Mannering
+and Carol Golden were at the latter's home.</p>
+
+<p>Carol was a very much surprised girl. Under the influence
+of kindness and pleasure Ruth seemed transformed
+into a different person. Her shyness and reserve melted
+away in the sunny atmosphere of the Golden home. Mrs.
+Golden took her into her motherly heart at once; and as
+for Frank and Jack, whose verdict Carol had so dreaded,
+they voted Ruth "splendid." She certainly got along very
+well with them; and if she did not make the social sensation
+that pretty Maud Russell might have made, the
+Goldens all liked her and Carol was content.</p>
+
+<p>"Just four days more," sighed Carol one afternoon,
+"and then we must go back to Oaklawn. Can you realize
+it, Ruth?"</p>
+
+<p>Ruth looked up from her book with a smile. Even in
+appearance she had changed. There was a faint pink in
+her cheeks and a merry light in her eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"I shall not be sorry to go back to work," she said. "I
+feel just like it because I have had so pleasant a time here
+that it has heartened me up for next term. I think it will
+be very different from last. I begin to see that I kept to
+myself too much and brooded over fancied slights."</p>
+
+<p>"And then you are to room with me since Maud is not
+coming back," said Carol. "What fun we shall have. Did
+you ever toast marshmallows over the gas? Why, I declare,
+there is Mr. Swift coming up the walk. Look, Ruth! He is
+the richest man in Westleigh."</p>
+
+<p>Ruth peeped out of the window over Carol's shoulder.</p>
+
+<p>"He reminds me of somebody," she said absently, "but
+I can't think who it is. Of course, I have never seen him
+before. What a good face he has!"</p>
+
+<p>"He is as good as he looks," said Carol, enthusiastically.
+"Next to Father, Mr. Swift is the nicest man in the
+world. I have always been quite a pet of his. His wife is
+dead, and so is his only daughter. She was a lovely girl
+and died only two years ago. It nearly broke Mr. Swift's
+heart. And he has lived alone ever since in that great big
+house up at the head of Warner Street, the one you admired
+so, Ruth, the last time we were uptown. There's
+the bell for the second time, Mary can't have heard it. I'll
+go myself."</p>
+
+<p>As Carol showed the caller into the room, Ruth rose to
+leave and thus came face to face with him. Mr. Swift
+started perceptibly.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Swift, this is my school friend, Miss Mannering,"
+said Carol.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Swift seemed strangely agitated as he took Ruth's
+timidly offered hand.</p>
+
+<p>"My dear young lady," he said hurriedly, "I am going
+to ask you what may seem a very strange question. What
+was your mother's name?"</p>
+
+<p>"Agnes Hastings," answered Ruth in surprise. And
+then Carol really thought that Mr. Swift had gone crazy,
+for he drew Ruth into his arms and kissed her.</p>
+
+<p>"I knew it," he said. "I was sure you were Agnes'
+daughter, for you are the living image of what she was
+when I last saw her. Child, you don't know me, but I am
+your Uncle Robert. Your mother was my half-sister."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Mr. Swift!" cried Carol, and then she ran for her
+mother.</p>
+
+<p>Ruth turned pale and dropped into a chair, and Mr.
+Swift sat down beside her.</p>
+
+<p>"To think that I have found you at last, child. How
+puzzled you look. Did your mother never speak of me?
+How is she? Where is she?"</p>
+
+<p>"Mother died last year," said Ruth.</p>
+
+<p>"Poor Agnes! And I never knew! Don't cry, little girl. I
+want you to tell me all about it. She was much younger
+than I was, and when our mother died my stepfather
+went away and took her with him. I remained with my
+father's people and eventually lost all trace of my sister. I
+was a poor boy then, but things have looked up with me
+and I have often tried to find her."</p>
+
+<p>By this time Carol had returned with her father and
+mother, and there was a scene&mdash;laughing, crying, explaining&mdash;and
+I don't really know which of the two girls
+was the more excited, Carol or Ruth. As for Mr. Swift, he
+was overjoyed to find his niece and wanted to carry her
+off with him then and there, but Mrs. Golden insisted on
+her finishing her visit. When the question of returning to
+Oaklawn came up, Mr. Swift would not hear of it at first,
+but finally yielded to Carol's entreaties and Ruth's own
+desire.</p>
+
+<p>"I shall graduate next year, Uncle, and then I can come
+back to you for good."</p>
+
+<p>That evening when Ruth was alone in her room, trying
+to collect her thoughts and realize that the home and
+love that she had so craved were really to be hers at last,
+Golden Carol was with her mother in the room below,
+talking it all over.</p>
+
+<p>"Just think, Mother, if I had not asked Ruth to come
+here, this would not have happened. And I didn't want
+to, I wanted to ask Maud so much, and I was dreadfully
+disappointed when I couldn't&mdash;for I really couldn't. I
+could not help remembering the look in Ruth's eyes
+when she said that she had no home to go to, and so I
+asked her instead of Maud. How dreadful it would have
+been if I hadn't."</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="Detected" id="Detected"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>Detected by the Camera<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>One summer I was attacked by the craze for amateur
+photography. It became chronic afterwards,
+and I and my camera have never since been parted.
+We have had some odd adventures together, and
+one of the most novel of our experiences was that in
+which we played the part of chief witness against
+Ned Brooke.</p>
+
+<p>I may say that my name is Amy Clarke, and that I
+believe I am considered the best amateur photographer
+in our part of the country. That is all I need
+tell you about myself.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Carroll had asked me to photograph his
+place for him when the apple orchards were in
+bloom. He has a picturesque old-fashioned country
+house behind a lawn of the most delightful old
+trees and flanked on each side by the orchards. So I
+went one June afternoon, with all my accoutrements,
+prepared to "take" the Carroll establishment
+in my best style.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Carroll was away but was expected home
+soon, so we waited for him, as all the family
+wished to be photographed under the big maple at
+the front door. I prowled around among the shrubbery
+at the lower end of the lawn and, after a great
+deal of squinting from various angles, I at last fixed
+upon the spot from which I thought the best view
+of the house might be obtained. Then Gertie and
+Lilian Carroll and I got into the hammocks and
+swung at our leisure, enjoying the cool breeze
+sweeping through the maples.</p>
+
+<p>Ned Brooke was hanging around as usual,
+watching us furtively. Ned was one of the hopeful
+members of a family that lived in a tumble-down
+shanty just across the road from the Carrolls. They
+were wretchedly poor, and old Brooke, as he was
+called, and Ned were employed a good deal by Mr.
+Carroll&mdash;more out of charity than anything else, I
+fancy.</p>
+
+<p>The Brookes had a rather shady reputation. They
+were notoriously lazy, and it was suspected that
+their line of distinction between their own and
+their neighbours' goods was not very clearly
+drawn. Many people censured Mr. Carroll for encouraging
+them at all, but he was too kind-hearted
+to let them suffer actual want and, as a consequence,
+one or the other of them was always dodging
+about his place.</p>
+
+<p>Ned was a lank, tow-headed youth of about fourteen,
+with shifty, twinkling eyes that could never
+look you straight in the face. His appearance was
+anything but prepossessing, and I always felt,
+when I looked at him, that if anyone wanted to do a
+piece of shady work by proxy, Ned Brooke would
+be the very lad for the business.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Carroll came at last, and we all went down to
+meet him at the gate. Ned Brooke also came shuffling
+along to take the horse, and Mr. Carroll tossed
+the reins to him and at the same time handed a
+pocketbook to his wife.</p>
+
+<p>"Just as well to be careful where you put that,"
+he said laughingly. "There's a sum in it not to be
+picked up on every gooseberry bush. Gilman Harris
+paid me this morning for that bit of woodland I
+sold him last fall&mdash;five hundred dollars. I promised
+that you and the girls should have it to get a new
+piano, so there it is for you."</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you," said Mrs. Carroll delightedly.
+"However, you'd better put it back in your pocket
+till we go in. Amy is in a hurry."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Carroll took back the pocketbook and
+dropped it carelessly into the inside pocket of the
+light overcoat that he wore.</p>
+
+<p>I happened to glance at Ned Brooke just then,
+and I could not help noticing the sudden crafty, eager
+expression that flashed over his face. He eyed
+the pocketbook in Mr. Carroll's hands furtively,
+after which he went off with the horse in a great
+hurry.</p>
+
+<p>The girls were exclaiming and thanking their father,
+and nobody noticed Ned Brooke's behaviour
+but myself, and it soon passed out of my mind.</p>
+
+<p>"Come to take the place, are you, Amy?" said
+Mr. Carroll. "Well, everything is ready, I think. I
+suppose we'd better proceed. Where shall we
+stand? You had better group us as you think best."</p>
+
+<p>Whereupon I proceeded to arrange them in due
+order under the maple. Mrs. Carroll sat in a chair,
+while her husband stood behind her. Gertie stood
+on the steps with a basket of flowers in her hand,
+and Lilian was at one side. The two little boys,
+Teddy and Jack, climbed up into the maple, and
+little Dora, the dimpled six-year-old, stood gravely
+in the foreground with an enormous grey cat
+hugged in her chubby arms.</p>
+
+<p>It was a pretty group in a pretty setting, and I
+thrilled with professional pride as I stepped back
+for a final, knowing squint at it all. Then I went to
+my camera, slipped in the plate, gave them due
+warning and took off the cap.</p>
+
+<p>I took two plates to make sure and then the thing
+was over, but as I had another plate left I thought I
+might as well take a view of the house by itself, so I
+carried my camera to a new place and had just got
+everything ready to lift the cap when Mr. Carroll
+came down and said:</p>
+
+<p>"If you girls want to see something pretty, come
+to the back field with me. That will wait till you
+come back, won't it, Amy?"</p>
+
+<p>So we all betook ourselves to the back field, a
+short distance away, where Mr. Carroll proudly displayed
+two of the prettiest little Jersey cows I had
+ever seen.</p>
+
+<p>We returned to the house by way of the back lane
+and, as we came in sight of the main road, my
+brother Cecil drove up and said that if I were ready,
+I had better go home with him and save myself a
+hot, dusty walk.</p>
+
+<p>The Carrolls all went down to the fence to speak
+to Cecil, but I dashed hurriedly down through the
+orchard, leaped over the fence into the lawn and
+ran to the somewhat remote corner where I had left
+my camera. I was in a desperate hurry, for I knew
+Cecil's horse did not like to be kept waiting, so I
+never even glanced at the house, but snatched off
+the cap, counted two and replaced it.</p>
+
+<p>Then I took out my plate, put it in the holder and
+gathered up my traps. I suppose I was about five
+minutes at it all and I had my back to the house the
+whole time, and when I laid all my things ready
+and emerged from my retreat, there was nobody to
+be seen about the place.</p>
+
+<p>As I hurried up through the lawn, I noticed Ned
+Brooke walking at a smart pace down the lane, but
+the fact did not make any particular impression on
+me at the time, and was not recalled until afterwards.</p>
+
+<p>Cecil was waiting for me, so I got in the buggy
+and we drove off. On arriving home I shut myself
+up in my dark room and proceeded to develop the
+first two negatives of the Carroll housestead. They
+were both excellent, the first one being a trifle the
+better, so that I decided to finish from it. I intended
+also to develop the third, but just as I finished the
+others, a half-dozen city cousins swooped down
+upon us and I had to put away my paraphernalia,
+emerge from my dark retreat and fly around to entertain
+them.</p>
+
+<p>The next day Cecil came in and said:</p>
+
+<p>"Did you hear, Amy, that Mr. Carroll has lost a
+pocketbook with five hundred dollars in it?"</p>
+
+<p>"No!" I exclaimed. "How? When? Where?"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't overwhelm a fellow. I can answer only
+one question&mdash;last night. As to the 'how,' they
+don't know, and as to the 'where'&mdash;well, if they
+knew that, there might be some hope of finding it.
+The girls are in a bad way. The money was to get
+them their longed-for piano, it seems, and now it's
+gone."</p>
+
+<p>"But how did it happen, Cecil?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, Mr. Carroll says that Mrs. Carroll handed
+the pocketbook back to him at the gate yesterday,
+and he dropped it in the inside pocket of his over-coat&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I saw him do it," I cried.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, and then, before he went to be photographed,
+he hung his coat up in the hall. It hung
+there until the evening, and nobody seems to have
+thought about the money, each supposing that
+someone else had put it carefully away. After tea
+Mr. Carroll put on the coat and went to see somebody
+over at Netherby. He says the thought of the
+pocketbook never crossed his mind; he had forgotten
+all about putting it in that coat pocket. He came
+home across the fields about eleven o'clock and
+found that the cows had broken into the clover hay,
+and he had a great chase before he got them out.
+When he went in, just as he entered the door, the
+remembrance of the money flashed over him. He
+felt in his pocket, but there was no pocketbook
+there; he asked his wife if she had taken it out. She
+had not, and nobody else had. There was a hole in
+the pocket, but Mr. Carroll says it was too small for
+the pocketbook to have worked through. However,
+it must have done so&mdash;unless someone took it out
+of his pocket at Netherby, and that is not possible,
+because he never had his coat off, and it was in an
+inside pocket. It's not likely that they will ever see it
+again. Someone may pick it up, of course, but the
+chances are slim. Mr. Carroll doesn't know his exact
+path across the fields, and if he lost it while he
+was after the cows, it's a bluer show still. They've
+been searching all day, of course. The girls are
+awfully disappointed."</p>
+
+<p>A sudden recollection came to me of Ned
+Brooke's face as I had seen it the day before at the
+gate, coupled with the remembrance of seeing him
+walking down the lane at a quick pace, so unlike
+his usual shambling gait, while I ran through the
+lawn.</p>
+
+<p>"How do they know it was lost?" I said. "Perhaps
+it was stolen before Mr. Carroll went to Netherby."</p>
+
+<p>"They think not," said Cecil. "Who would have
+stolen it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Ned Brooke. I saw him hanging around. And
+you never saw such a look as came over his face
+when he heard Mr. Carroll say there was five hundred
+dollars in that pocketbook."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I did suggest to them that Ned might
+know something about it, for I remembered having
+seen him go down the lane while I was waiting for
+you, but they won't hear of such a thing. The
+Brookes are kind of prot&eacute;g&eacute;s of theirs, you know,
+and they won't believe anything bad of them. If
+Ned did take it, however, there's not a shadow of
+evidence against him."</p>
+
+<p>"No, I suppose not," I answered thoughtfully,
+"but the more I think it over, the more I'm convinced
+that he took it. You know, we all went to the
+back field to look at the Jerseys, and all that time
+the coat was hanging there in the hall, and not a
+soul in the house. And it was just after we came
+back that I saw Ned scuttling down the lane so
+fast."</p>
+
+<p>I mentioned my suspicions to the Carrolls a few
+days afterwards, when I went down with the photographs,
+and found that they had discovered no
+trace of the lost pocketbook. But they seemed
+positively angry when I hinted that Ned Brooke
+might know more about its whereabouts than anyone
+else. They declared that they would as soon
+think of suspecting one of themselves as Ned, and
+altogether they seemed so offended at my suggestion
+that I held my peace and didn't irritate them by
+any more suppositions.</p>
+
+<p>Afterwards, in the excitement of our cousins'
+visit, the matter passed out of my mind completely.
+They stayed two weeks, and I was so busy the
+whole time that I never got a chance to develop that
+third plate and, in fact, I had forgotten all about it.</p>
+
+<p>One morning soon after they went away, I remembered
+the plate and decided to go and develop
+it. Cecil went with me, and we shut ourselves up in
+our den, lit our ruby lantern and began operations.
+I did not expect much of the plate, because it had
+been exposed and handled carelessly, and I
+thought that it might prove to be underexposed or
+light-struck. So I left Cecil to develop it while I prepared
+the fixing bath. Cecil was whistling away
+when suddenly he gave a tremendous "whew" of
+astonishment and sprang to his feet.</p>
+
+<p>"Amy, Amy, look here!" he cried.</p>
+
+<p>I rushed to his side and looked at the plate as he
+held it up in the rosy light. It was a splendid one,
+and the Carroll house came out clear, with the
+front door and the steps in full view.</p>
+
+<p>And there, just in the act of stepping from the
+threshold, was the figure of a boy with an old straw
+hat on his head and&mdash;in his hand&mdash;the pocketbook!</p>
+
+<p>He was standing with his head turned towards
+the corner of the house as if listening, with one
+hand holding his ragged coat open and the other
+poised in mid-air with the pocketbook, as if he
+were just going to put it in his inside pocket. The
+whole scene was as clear as noonday, and nobody
+with eyes in his head could have failed to recognize
+Ned Brooke.</p>
+
+<p>"Goodness!" I gasped. "In with it&mdash;quick!"</p>
+
+<p>And we doused the thing into the fixing bath and
+then sat down breathlessly and looked at each
+other.</p>
+
+<p>"I say, Amy," said Cecil, "what a sell this will be
+on the Carrolls! Ned Brooke couldn't do such a
+thing&mdash;oh, no! The poor injured boy at whom everyone
+has such an unlawful pick! I wonder if this
+will convince them."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you think they can get it all back?" I asked.
+"It's not likely he would have dared to use any of it
+yet."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know. We'll have a try, anyhow. How
+long before this plate will be dry enough to carry
+down to the Carrolls as circumstantial evidence?"</p>
+
+<p>"Three hours or thereabouts," I answered, "but
+perhaps sooner. I'll take two prints off when it is
+ready. I wonder what the Carrolls will say."</p>
+
+<p>"It's a piece of pure luck that the plate should
+have turned out so well after the slap-dash way in
+which it was taken and used. I say, Amy, isn't this
+quite an adventure?"</p>
+
+<p>At last the plate was dry, and I printed two
+proofs. We wrapped them up carefully and
+marched down to Mr. Carroll's.</p>
+
+<p>You never saw people so overcome with astonishment
+as the Carrolls were when Cecil, with
+the air of a statesman unfolding the evidence of
+some dreadful conspiracy against the peace and
+welfare of the nation, produced the plate and the
+proofs, and held them out before them.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Carroll and Cecil took the proofs and went
+over to the Brooke shanty. They found only Ned
+and his mother at home. At first Ned, when taxed
+with his guilt, denied it, but when Mr. Carroll confronted
+him with the proofs, he broke down in a
+spasm of terror and confessed all. His mother produced
+the pocketbook and the money&mdash;they had
+not dared to spend a single cent of it&mdash;and Mr. Carroll
+went home in triumph.</p>
+
+<p>Perhaps Ned Brooke ought not to have been let
+off so easily as he was, but his mother cried and
+pleaded, and Mr. Carroll was too kind-hearted to
+resist. So he did not punish them at all, save by
+utterly discarding the whole family and their concerns.
+The place got too hot for them after the story
+came out, and in less than a month all moved
+away&mdash;much to the benefit of Mapleton.</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="In_Spite_of_Myself" id="In_Spite_of_Myself"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>In Spite of Myself<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>My trunk was packed and I had arranged with my
+senior partner&mdash;I was the junior member of a law
+firm&mdash;for a month's vacation. Aunt Lucy had written
+that her husband had gone on a sea trip and she
+wished me to superintend the business of his farm and mills
+in his absence, if I could arrange to do so. She added that
+"Gussie" thought it was a pity to trouble me, and wanted to
+do the overseeing herself, but that she&mdash;Aunt Lucy&mdash;preferred
+to have a man at the head of affairs.</p>
+
+<p>I had never seen my step-cousin, Augusta Ashley, but I
+knew, from Aunt Lucy's remarks concerning her, pretty
+much what sort of person she was&mdash;just the precise kind I disliked
+immeasurably. I had no idea what her age was, but
+doubtless she was over thirty, tall, determined, aggressive,
+with a "faculty" for managing, a sharp, probing nose, and a
+y-formation between her eyebrows. I knew the type, and I
+was assured that the period of sojourn with my respected
+aunt would be one of strife between Miss Ashley and myself.</p>
+
+<p>I wrote to Aunt Lucy to expect me, made all necessary
+arrangements, and went to bid Nellie goodbye. I had made up
+my mind to marry Nellie. I had never openly avowed myself
+her suitor, but we were cousins, and had grown up together,
+so that I knew her well enough to be sure of my ground. I liked
+her so well that it was easy to persuade myself that I was in
+love with her. She more nearly fulfilled the requirements of
+my ideal wife than anyone I knew. She was pleasant to look
+upon, without being distractingly pretty; small and fair and
+womanly. She dressed nicely, sang and played agreeably,
+danced well, and had a cheerful, affectionate disposition. She
+was not alarmingly clever, had no "hobbies," and looked up
+to me as heir to all the wisdom of the ages&mdash;what man does
+not like to be thought clever and brilliant? I had no formidable
+rival, and our families were anxious for the match. I considered
+myself a lucky fellow. I felt that I would be very lonely
+without Nellie when I was away, and she admitted frankly
+that she would miss me awfully. She looked so sweet that I
+was on the point of asking her then and there to marry me.
+Well, fate interfered in the guise of a small brother, so I said
+goodbye and left, mentally comparing her to my idea of Miss
+Augusta Ashley, much to the latter's disadvantage.</p>
+
+<p>When I stepped from the train at a sleepy country station
+next day I was promptly waylaid by a black-eyed urchin who
+informed me that Mrs. Ashley had sent him with an express
+wagon for my luggage, and that "Miss Gussie" was waiting
+with the carriage at the store, pointing down to a small building
+before whose door a girl was trying to soothe her frightened
+horse.</p>
+
+<p>As I went down the slope towards her I noticed she was tall&mdash;quite
+too tall for my taste. I dislike women who can look
+into my eyes on a level&mdash;but I had to admit that her form was
+remarkably symmetrical and graceful. She put out her hand&mdash;it
+was ungloved and large, but white and firm, with a cool,
+pleasant touch&mdash;and said, with a composure akin to indifference,
+"Mr. Carslake, I presume. Mother could not come to
+meet you, so she sent me. Will you be kind enough to hold my
+horse for a few minutes? I want to get something in the
+store." Whereupon she calmly transferred the reins to me and
+disappeared.</p>
+
+<p>At the time she certainly did not impress me as pretty, yet
+neither could I call her plain. Taken separately, her features
+were good. Her nose was large and straight, the mouth also a
+trifle large but firm and red, the brow wide and white, shadowed
+by a straying dash of brown curl or two. She had a certain
+cool, statuesque paleness, accentuated by straight, fine,
+black brows, and her eyes were a bluish grey; but the pupils,
+as I afterward found out, had a trick of dilating into wells of
+blackness which, added to a long fringe of very dark lashes,
+made her eyes quite the most striking feature of her face. Her
+expression was open and frank, and her voice clear and musical
+without being sweet. She looked about twenty-two.</p>
+
+<p>At the time I did not fancy her appearance and made a
+mental note to the effect that I would never like Miss Ashley.
+I had no use for cool, businesslike women&mdash;women should
+have no concern with business. Nellie would never have
+troubled her dear, curly head over it.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Ashley came out with her arms full of packages,
+stowed them away in the carriage, got in, told me which road
+to take, and did not again speak till we were out of the village
+and driving along a pretty country lane, arched over with
+crimson maples and golden-brown beeches. The purplish
+haze of a sunny autumn day mellowed over the fields, and the
+bunch of golden rod at my companion's belt was akin to the
+plumed ranks along the fences. I hazarded the remark that it
+was a fine day; Miss Ashley gravely admitted that it was.
+Then a deep smile seemed to rise somewhere in her eyes and
+creep over her face, discovering a dimple here and there as it
+proceeded.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't let's talk about the weather&mdash;the subject is rather
+stale," she said. "I suppose you are wondering why on earth
+Mother had to drag you away out here. I tried to show her how
+foolish it was, but I didn't succeed. Mother thinks there must
+be a man at the head of affairs or they'll never go right. I could
+have taken full charge easily enough; I haven't been Father's
+'boy' all my life for nothing. There was no need to take you
+away from your business."</p>
+
+<p>I protested. I said I was going to take a vacation anyway,
+and business was not pressing just then. I also hinted that,
+while I had no doubt of her capacity, she might have found the
+duties of superintendent rather arduous.</p>
+
+<p>"Not at all," she said, with a serenity that made me groan
+inwardly. "I like it. Father always said I was a born business
+manager. You'll find Ashley's Mills very quiet, I'm afraid. It's
+a sort of charmed Sleepy Hollow. See, there's home," as we
+turned a maple-blazoned corner and looked from the crest of
+one hill across to that of another. "Home" was a big, white,
+green-shuttered house buried amid a riot of autumn colour,
+with a big grove of dark green spruces at the back. Below them
+was a glimpse of a dark blue mill pond and beyond it long
+sweeps of golden-brown meadow land, sloping up till they
+dimmed in horizon mists of pearl and purple.</p>
+
+<p>"How pretty," I exclaimed admiringly.</p>
+
+<p>"Isn't it?" said Gussie proudly. "I love it." Her pupils
+dilated into dark pools, and I rather unwillingly admitted that
+Miss Ashley was a fine-looking girl.</p>
+
+<p>As we drove up Aunt Lucy was standing on the steps of the
+verandah, over whose white roof trailed a luxuriant creeper,
+its leaves tinged by October frosts into lovely wine reds and
+tawny yellows. Gussie sprang out, barely touching my
+offered hand with her fingertips.</p>
+
+<p>"There's Mother waiting to pounce on you and hear all the
+family news," she said, "so go and greet her like a dutiful
+nephew."</p>
+
+<p>"I must take out your horse for you first," I said politely.</p>
+
+<p>"Not at all," said Miss Ashley, taking the reins from my
+hands in a way not to be disputed. "I always unharness Charley
+myself. No one understands him half so well. Besides, I'm
+used to it. Didn't I tell you I'd always been Father's boy?"</p>
+
+<p>"I well believe it," I thought in disgust, as she led the horse
+over to the well and I went up to Aunt Lucy. Through the sitting-room
+windows I kept a watchful eye on Miss Ashley as
+she watered and deftly unharnessed Charley and led him into
+his stable with sundry pats on his nose. Then I saw no more of
+her till she came in to tell us tea was ready, and led the way
+out to the dining room.</p>
+
+<p>It was evident Miss Gussie held the reins of household
+government, and no doubt worthily. Those firm, capable
+white hands of hers looked as though they might be equal to a
+good many emergencies. She talked little, leaving the conversation
+to Aunt Lucy and myself, though she occasionally
+dropped in an apt word. Toward the end of the meal, however,
+she caught hold of an unfortunate opinion I had incautiously
+advanced and tore it into tatters. The result was a spirited
+argument, in which Miss Gussie held her own with such ability
+that I was utterly routed and found another grievance
+against her. It was very humiliating to be worsted by a girl&mdash;a
+country girl at that, who had passed most of her life on a farm!
+No doubt she was strong-minded and wanted to vote. I was
+quite prepared to believe anything of her.</p>
+
+<p>After tea Miss Ashley proposed a walk around the premises,
+in order to initiate me into my duties. Apart from his
+farm, Mr. Ashley owned large grist-and saw-mills and did a
+flourishing business, with the details of which Miss Gussie
+seemed so conversant that I lost all doubt of her ability to run
+the whole thing as she had claimed. I felt quite ignorant in the
+light of her superior knowledge, and our walk was enlivened
+by some rather too lively discussions between us. We walked
+about together, however, till the shadows of the firs by the
+mills stretched nearly across the pond and the white moon
+began to put on a silvery burnish. Then we wound up by a bitter
+dispute, during which Gussie's eyes were very black and
+each cheek had a round, red stain on it. She had a little air of
+triumph at having defeated me.</p>
+
+<p>"I have to go now and see about putting away the milk, and
+I dare say you're not sorry to be rid of me," she said, with a
+demureness I had not credited her with, "but if you come to
+the verandah in half an hour I'll bring you out a glass of new
+milk and some pound cake I made today by a recipe that's
+been in the family for one hundred years, and I hope it will
+choke you for all the snubs you've been giving me." She
+walked away after this amiable wish, and I stood by the pond
+till the salmon tints faded from its waters and stars began to
+mirror themselves brokenly in its ripples. The mellow air
+was full of sweet, mingled eventide sounds as I walked back
+to the house. Aunt Lucy was knitting on the verandah. Gussie
+brought out cake and milk and chatted to us while we ate,
+in an inconsequent girlish way, or fed bits of cake to a green-eyed
+goblin in the likeness of a black cat.</p>
+
+<p>She appeared in such an amiable light that I was half
+inclined to reconsider my opinion of her. When I went to my
+room the vase full of crimson leaves on my table suggested
+Gussie, and I repented of my unfriendliness for a moment&mdash;and
+only for a moment. Gussie and her mother passed
+through the hall below, and Aunt Lucy's soft voice floated up
+through my half-open door.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, how do you like your cousin, my dear?"</p>
+
+<p>Whereat that decided young lady promptly answered, "I
+think he is the most conceited youth I've met for some time."</p>
+
+<p>Pleasant, wasn't it? I thought of Nellie's meek admiration
+of all my words and ways, and got her photo out to soothe my
+vanity. For the first time it struck me that her features were
+somewhat insipid. The thought seemed like disloyalty, so I
+banished it and went to bed.</p>
+
+<p>I expected to dream of that disagreeable Gussie, but I did
+not, and I slept so soundly that it was ten o'clock the next
+morning before I woke. I sprang out of bed in dismay, dressed
+hastily, and ran down, not a little provoked at myself.
+Through the window I saw Gussie in the garden digging up
+some geraniums. She was enveloped in a clay-stained brown
+apron, a big flapping straw hat half hid her face, and she wore a
+pair of muddy old kid gloves. Her whole appearance was disreputable,
+and the face she turned to me as I said "Good
+morning" had a diagonal streak of clay across it. I added slovenliness
+to my already long list of her demerits.</p>
+
+<p>"Good afternoon, rather. Don't you know what time it is?
+The men were here three hours ago for their orders. I thought
+it a pity to disturb your peaceful dreams, so I gave them
+myself and sent them off."</p>
+
+<p>I was angrier than ever. A nice beginning I had made. And
+was that girl laughing at me?</p>
+
+<p>"I expected to be called in time, certainly," I said stiffly. "I
+am not accustomed to oversleep myself. I promise it will not
+occur again."</p>
+
+<p>My dignity was quite lost on Gussie. She peeled off her
+gloves cheerfully and said, "I suppose you'd like some breakfast.
+Just wait till I wash my hands and I'll get you some. Then
+if you're pining to be useful you can help me take up these
+geraniums."</p>
+
+<p>There was no help for it. After I had breakfasted I went,
+with many misgivings. We got on fairly well, however. Gussie
+was particularly lively and kept me too busy for argument.
+I quite enjoyed the time and we did not quarrel until nearly
+the last, when we fell out bitterly over some horticultural
+problem and went in to dinner in sulky silence. Gussie disappeared
+after dinner and I saw no more of her. I was glad of this,
+but after a time I began to find it a little dull. Even a dispute
+would have been livelier. I visited the mills, looked over the
+farm, and then carelessly asked Aunt Lucy where Miss Ashley
+was. Aunt Lucy replied that she had gone to visit a friend
+and would not be back till the next day.</p>
+
+<p>This was satisfactory, of course, highly so. What a relief it
+was to be rid of that girl with her self-assertiveness and independence.
+I said to myself that I hoped her friend would keep
+her for a week. I forgot to be disappointed that she had not
+when, next afternoon, I saw Gussie coming in at the gate with
+a tolerably large satchel and an armful of golden rod. I sauntered
+down to relieve her, and we had a sharp argument under
+way before we were halfway up the lane. As usual Gussie
+refused to give in that she was wrong.</p>
+
+<p>Her walk had brought a faint, clear tint to her cheeks and
+her rippling dusky hair had half slipped down on her neck.
+She said she had to make some cookies for tea and if I had
+nothing better to do I might go and talk to her while she
+mixed them. It was not a gracious invitation but I went,
+rather than be left to my own company.</p>
+
+<p>By the end of the week I was as much at home at Ashley
+Mills as if I had lived there all my life. Gussie and I were
+thrown together a good deal, for lack of other companions,
+and I saw no reason to change my opinion of her. She could be
+lively and entertaining when she chose, and at times she
+might be called beautiful. Still, I did not approve of her&mdash;at
+least I thought so, most of the time. Once in a while came a
+state of feeling which I did not quite understand.</p>
+
+<p>One evening I went to prayer meeting with Aunt Lucy and
+Gussie. I had not seen the minister of Ashley Mills before,
+though Gussie and her mother seemed to know him intimately.
+I had an idea that he was old and silvery-haired and
+benevolent-looking. So I was rather surprised to find him as
+young as myself&mdash;a tall, pale, intellectual-looking man, with
+a high, white brow and dark, earnest eyes&mdash;decidedly
+attractive.</p>
+
+<p>I was still more surprised when, after the service, he joined
+Gussie at the door and went down the steps with her. I felt
+distinctly ill-treated as I fell back with Aunt Lucy. There was
+no reason why I should&mdash;none; it ought to have been a relief.
+Rev. Carroll Martin had every right to see Miss Ashley home
+if he chose. Doubtless a girl who knew all there was to be
+known about business, farming, and milling, to say nothing
+of housekeeping and gardening, could discuss theology also.
+It was none of my business.</p>
+
+<p>I don't know what kept me awake so late that night. As a
+consequence I overslept myself. I had managed to redeem my
+reputation on this point, but here it was lost again. I felt cross
+and foolish and cantankerous when I went out.</p>
+
+<p>There was some unusual commotion at the well. It was an
+old-fashioned open one, with a chain and windlass. Aunt
+Lucy was peering anxiously down its mouth, from which a
+ladder was sticking. Just as I got there Gussie emerged from
+its depths with a triumphant face. Her skirt was muddy and
+draggled, her hair had tumbled down, and she held a dripping
+black cat.</p>
+
+<p>"Coco must have fallen into the well last night," she
+explained, as I helped her to the ground. "I missed him at
+milking-time, and when I came to the well this morning I
+heard the most ear-splitting yowls coming up from it. I
+couldn't think where he could possibly be, for the water was
+quite calm, until I saw he had crept into a little crevice in the
+stones on the side. So I got a ladder and went down after him."</p>
+
+<p>"You should have called me," I said sourly. "You might
+have killed yourself, going down there."</p>
+
+<p>"And Coco might have tumbled in and drowned while you
+were getting up," retorted Gussie. "Besides, what was the
+need? I could go down as well as you."</p>
+
+<p>"No doubt," I said, more sharply than I had any business
+to. "I don't dream of disputing your ability to do anything you
+may take it into your head to do. Most young ladies are not in
+the habit of going down wells, however."</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps not," she rejoined, with freezing calmness. "But,
+as you may have discovered, I am not 'most young ladies.' I
+am myself, Augusta Ashley, and accountable to nobody but
+myself if I choose to go down the well every day for pure love
+of it."</p>
+
+<p>She walked off in her wet dress with her muddy cat. Gussie
+Ashley was the only girl I ever saw who could be dignified
+under such circumstances.</p>
+
+<p>I was in a very bad humour with myself as I went off to see
+about having the well cleaned out. I had offended Gussie and I
+knew she would not be easily appeased. Nor was she. For a
+week she kept me politely, studiously, at a distance, in spite
+of my most humble advances. Rev. Carroll was a frequent
+caller, ostensibly to make arrangements about a Sunday
+school they were organizing in a poor part of the community.
+Gussie and he held long conversations on this enthralling
+subject. Then Gussie went on another visit to her friend, and
+when she came back so did Rev. Carroll.</p>
+
+<p>One calm, hazy afternoon I was coming slowly up from
+the mills. Happening to glance at the kitchen roof, I gasped. It
+was on fire in one place. Evidently the dry shingles had caught
+fire from a spark. There was not a soul about save Gussie,
+Aunt Lucy, and myself. I dashed wildly into the kitchen,
+where Gussie was peeling apples.</p>
+
+<p>"The house is on fire," I exclaimed. Gussie dropped her
+knife and turned pale.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't wake Mother," was all she said, as she snatched a
+bucket of water from the table. The ladder was still lying by
+the well. In a second I had raised it to the roof and, while Gussie
+went up it like a squirrel and dashed the water on the
+flames, I had two more buckets ready for her.</p>
+
+<p>Fortunately the fire had made little headway, though a few
+minutes more would have given it a dangerous start. The
+flames hissed and died out as Gussie threw on the water, and
+in a few seconds only a small black hole in the shingles
+remained. Gussie slid down the ladder. She trembled in every
+limb, but she put out her wet hand to me with a faint, triumphant
+smile. We shook hands across the ladder with a cordiality
+never before expressed.</p>
+
+<p>For the next week, in spite of Rev. Carroll, I was happy
+when I thought of Gussie and miserable when I thought of
+Nellie. I held myself in some way bound to her and&mdash;was she
+not my ideal? Undoubtedly!</p>
+
+<p>One day I got a letter from my sister. It was long and
+newsy, and the eighth page was most interesting.</p>
+
+<p>"If you don't come home and look after Nellie," wrote
+Kate, "you'll soon not have her to look after. You remember
+that old lover of hers, Rod Allen? Well, he's home from the
+west now, immensely rich, they say, and his attentions to
+Nellie are the town talk. I think she likes him too. If you bury
+yourself any longer at Ashley Mills I won't be responsible for
+the consequences."</p>
+
+<p>This lifted an immense weight from my mind, but the
+ninth page hurled it back again.</p>
+
+<p>"You never say anything of Miss Ashley in your letters.
+What is she like&mdash;young or old, ugly or pretty, clever or dull? I
+met a lady recently who knows her and thinks she is charming.
+She also said Miss Ashley was to be married soon to Rev.
+Something-or-Other. Is it true?"</p>
+
+<p>Aye, was it? Quite likely. Kate's letter made a very miserable
+man of me. Gussie found me a dull companion that day.
+After several vain attempts to rouse me to interest she gave
+it up.</p>
+
+<p>"There's no use talking to you," she said impatiently. "I
+believe you are homesick. That letter you got this morning
+looked suspicious. Anyhow, I hope you'll get over it before I
+get back."</p>
+
+<p>"Are you going away again?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. I am going to stay a few days with Flossie." Flossie
+was that inseparable chum of hers.</p>
+
+<p>"You seem to spend a good deal of your time with her," I
+remarked discontentedly.</p>
+
+<p>Gussie opened her eyes at my tone.</p>
+
+<p>"Why, of course," she said. "Flossie and I have always been
+chums. And she needs me more than ever just now, for she is
+awfully busy. She is to be married next month."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I see&mdash;and you&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm to be bridesmaid, of course, and we've heaps to do.
+Flossie wanted to wait until Christmas, but Mr. Martin
+is in a&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Martin," I interrupted. "Is Mr. Martin going to marry
+your friend?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, yes. Didn't you know? They just suit each other.
+There he comes now. He's going to drive me over, and I'm not
+ready. Talk to him, for pity's sake, while I go and dress."</p>
+
+<p>I never enjoyed a conversation more. Rev. Carroll Martin
+was a remarkably interesting man.</p>
+
+<p>Nellie married Rod Allen at Christmas and I was best
+man. Nellie made a charming little bride, and Rod fairly
+worshipped her. My own wedding did not come off until
+spring, as Gussie said she could not get ready before that.</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="Kismet" id="Kismet"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>Kismet<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>The fifth heat in the free-for-all was just over.
+"Lu-Lu" had won, and the crowd on the grand stand and
+the hangers-on around the track were cheering themselves
+hoarse. Clear through the noisy clamour shrilled a woman's
+cry.</p>
+
+<p>"Ah&mdash;I have dropped my scorecard."</p>
+
+<p>A man in front of her turned.</p>
+
+<p>"I have an extra one, madame. Will you accept it?"</p>
+
+<p>Her small, modishly-gloved hand closed eagerly on it
+before she lifted her eyes to his face. Both started convulsively.
+The man turned very pale, but the woman's ripe-tinted
+face coloured darkly.</p>
+
+<p>"You?" she faltered.</p>
+
+<p>His lips parted in the coldly-grave smile she remembered
+and hated.</p>
+
+<p>"You are not glad to see me," he said calmly, "but that,
+I suppose, was not to be expected. I did not come here to
+annoy you. This meeting is as unexpected to me as to you.
+I had no suspicion that for the last half-hour I had been
+standing next to my&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>She interrupted him by an imperious gesture. Still
+clutching the scorecard she half-turned from him. Again
+he smiled, this time with a tinge of scorn, and shifted his
+eyes to the track.</p>
+
+<p>None of the people around them had noticed the little
+by-play. All eyes were on the track, which was being
+cleared for the first heat of another race. The free-for-all
+horses were being led away blanketed. The crowd cheered
+"Lu-Lu" as she went past, a shapeless oddity. The backers
+of "Mascot", the rival favourite, looked gloomy.</p>
+
+<p>The woman noticed nothing of all this. She was small,
+very pretty, still young, and gowned in a quite unmistakable
+way. She studied the man's profile furtively. He
+looked older than when she had seen him last&mdash;there
+were some silver threads gleaming in his close-clipped dark
+hair and short, pointed beard. Otherwise there was little
+change in the quiet features and somewhat stern grey eyes.
+She wondered if he had cared at all.</p>
+
+<p>They had not met for five years. She shut her eyes and
+looked in on her past. It all came back very vividly. She
+had been eighteen when they were married&mdash;a gay, high-spirited
+girl and the season's beauty. He was much older
+and a quiet, serious student. Her friends had wondered
+why she married him&mdash;sometimes she wondered herself,
+but she had loved him, or thought so.</p>
+
+<p>The marriage had been an unhappy one. She was fond
+of society and gaiety, he wanted quiet and seclusion. She
+Was impulsive and impatient, he deliberate and grave. The
+strong wills clashed. After two years of an unbearable sort
+of life they had separated&mdash;quietly, and without scandal
+of any sort. She had wanted a divorce, but he would not
+agree to that, so she had taken her own independent
+fortune and gone back to her own way of life. In the
+following five years she had succeeded in burying all remembrance
+well out of sight. No one knew if she were
+satisfied or not; her world was charitable to her and she
+lived a gay and quite irreproachable life. She wished that
+she had not come to the races. It was such an irritating
+encounter. She opened her eyes wearily; the dusty track,
+the flying horses, the gay dresses of the women on the
+grandstand, the cloudless blue sky, the brilliant September
+sunshine, the purple distances all commingled in a glare
+that made her head ache. Before it all she saw the tall
+figure by her side, his face turned from her, watching the
+track intently.</p>
+
+<p>She wondered with a vague curiosity what induced him
+to come to the races. Such things were not greatly in his
+line. Evidently their chance meeting had not disturbed
+him. It was a sign that he did not care. She sighed a little
+wearily and closed her eyes. When the heat was over he
+turned to her.</p>
+
+<p>"May I ask how you have been since&mdash;since we met last?
+You are looking extremely well. Has Vanity Fair palled in
+any degree?"</p>
+
+<p>She was angry at herself and him. Where had her careless
+society manner and well-bred composure gone? She felt
+weak and hysterical. What if she should burst into tears
+before the whole crowd&mdash;before those coldly critical grey
+eyes? She almost hated him.</p>
+
+<p>"No&mdash;why should it? I have found it very pleasant&mdash;and
+I have been well&mdash;very well. And you?"</p>
+
+<p>He jotted down the score carefully before he replied.</p>
+
+<p>"I? Oh, a book-worm and recluse always leads a placid
+life. I never cared for excitement, you know. I came down
+here to attend a sale of some rare editions, and a well-meaning
+friend dragged me out to see the races. I find it
+rather interesting, I must confess, much more so than I
+should have fancied. Sorry I can't stay until the end. I must
+go as soon as the free-for-all is over, if not before. I have
+backed 'Mascot'; you?"</p>
+
+<p>"'Lu-Lu'" she answered quickly&mdash;it almost seemed
+defiantly. How horribly unreal it was&mdash;this carrying on
+of small talk, as if they were the merest of chance-met
+acquaintances! "She belongs to a friend of mine, so I am
+naturally interested."</p>
+
+<p>"She and 'Mascot' are ties now&mdash;both have won two
+heats. One more for either will decide it. This is a good
+day for the races. Excuse me."</p>
+
+<p>He leaned over and brushed a scrap of paper from her
+grey cloak. She shivered slightly.</p>
+
+<p>"You are cold! This stand is draughty."</p>
+
+<p>"I am not at all cold, thank you. What race is this?&mdash;oh!
+the three-minute one."</p>
+
+<p>She bent forward with assumed interest to watch the
+scoring. She was breathing heavily. There were tears in her
+eyes&mdash;she bit her lips savagely and glared at the track
+until they were gone.</p>
+
+<p>Presently he spoke again, in the low, even tone demanded
+by circumstances.</p>
+
+<p>"This is a curious meeting, is it not?&mdash;quite a flavor of
+romance! By-the-way, do you read as many novels as ever?"</p>
+
+<p>She fancied there was mockery in his tone. She remembered
+how very frivolous he used to consider her novel-reading.
+Besides, she resented the personal tinge. What
+right had he?</p>
+
+<p>"Almost as many," she answered carelessly.</p>
+
+<p>"I was very intolerant, wasn't I?" he said after a pause.
+"You thought so&mdash;you were right. You have been happier
+since you&mdash;left me?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," she said defiantly, looking straight into his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"And you do not regret it?"</p>
+
+<p>He bent down a little. His sleeve brushed against her
+shoulder. Something in his face arrested the answer she
+meant to make.</p>
+
+<p>"I&mdash;I&mdash;did not say that," she murmured faintly.</p>
+
+<p>There was a burst of cheering. The free-for-all horses
+were being brought out for the sixth heat. She turned
+away to watch them. The scoring began, and seemed likely
+to have no end. She was tired of it all. It didn't matter a
+pin to her whether "Lu-Lu" or "Mascot" won. What <i>did</i>
+matter! Had Vanity Fair after all been a satisfying exchange
+for love? He <i>had</i> loved her once, and they had been
+happy at first. She had never before said, even in her own
+heart: "I am sorry," but&mdash;suddenly, she felt his hand on
+her shoulder, and looked up. Their eyes met. He stooped
+and said almost in a whisper:</p>
+
+<p>"Will you come back to me?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know," she whispered breathlessly, as one half-fascinated.</p>
+
+<p>"We were both to blame&mdash;but I the most. I was too
+hard on you&mdash;I ought to have made more allowance. We
+are wiser now both of us. Come back to me&mdash;my wife."</p>
+
+<p>His tone was cold and his face expressionless. It was on
+her lips to cry out "No," passionately.</p>
+
+<p>But the slender, scholarly hand on her shoulder was
+trembling with the intensity of his repressed emotion. He
+<i>did</i> care, then. A wild caprice flashed into her brain. She
+sprang up.</p>
+
+<p>"See," she cried, "they're off now. This heat will probably
+decide the race. If 'Lu-Lu' wins I will not go back to
+you, if 'Mascot' does I will. That is my decision."</p>
+
+<p>He turned paler, but bowed in assent. He knew by
+bitter experience how unchangeable her whims were, how
+obstinately she clung to even the most absurd.</p>
+
+<p>She leaned forward breathlessly. The crowd hung silently
+on the track. "Lu-Lu" and "Mascot" were neck and neck,
+getting in splendid work. Half-way round the course "Lu-Lu"
+forged half a neck ahead, and her backers went mad.
+But one woman dropped her head in her hands and dared
+look no more. One man with white face and set lips
+watched the track unswervingly.</p>
+
+<p>Again "Mascot" crawled up, inch by inch. They were on
+the home stretch, they were equal, the cheering broke out,
+then silence, then another terrific burst, shouts, yells and
+clappings&mdash;"Mascot" had won the free-for-all. In the
+front row a woman stood up, swayed and shaken as a leaf
+in the wind. She straightened her scarlet hat and readjusted
+her veil unsteadily. There was a smile on her lips and tears
+in her eyes. No one noticed her. A man beside her drew
+her hand through his arm in a quiet proprietary fashion.
+They left the grand stand together.</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="Lilians_Business" id="Lilians_Business"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>Lilian's Business Venture<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>Lilian Mitchell turned into the dry-goods store
+on Randall Street, just as Esther Miller and Ella
+Taylor came out. They responded coldly to her
+greeting and exchanged significant glances as they
+walked away.</p>
+
+<p>Lilian's pale face crimsoned. She was a tall, slender girl of
+about seventeen, and dressed in mourning. These girls had
+been her close friends once. But that was before the Mitchells
+had lost their money. Since then Lilian had been cut by many
+of her old chums and she felt it keenly.</p>
+
+<p>The clerks in the store were busy and Lilian sat down to
+wait her turn. Near to her two ladies were also waiting and
+chatting.</p>
+
+<p>"Helen wants me to let her have a birthday party," Mrs.
+Saunders was saying wearily. "She has been promised it so
+long and I hate to disappoint the child, but our girl left last
+week, and I cannot possibly make all the cakes and things
+myself. I haven't the time or strength, so Helen must do without
+her party."</p>
+
+<p>"Talking of girls," said Mrs. Reeves impatiently, "I am
+almost discouraged. It is so hard to get a good all-round one.
+The last one I had was so saucy I had to discharge her, and the
+one I have now cannot make decent bread. I never had good
+luck with bread myself either."</p>
+
+<p>"That is Mrs. Porter's great grievance too. It is no light
+task to bake bread for all those boarders. Have you made your
+jelly yet?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. Maria cannot make it, she says, and I detest messing
+with jelly. But I really must see to it soon."</p>
+
+<p>At this point a saleswoman came up to Lilian, who made
+her small purchases and went out.</p>
+
+<p>"There goes Lilian Mitchell," said Mrs. Reeves in an
+undertone. "She looks very pale. They say they are dreadfully
+poor since Henry Mitchell died. His affairs were in a bad
+condition, I am told."</p>
+
+<p>"I am sorry for Mrs. Mitchell," responded Mrs. Saunders.
+"She is such a sweet woman. Lilian will have to do something,
+I suppose, and there is so little chance for a girl here."</p>
+
+<p>Lilian, walking down the street, was wearily turning over
+in her mind the problems of her young existence. Her father
+had died the preceding spring. He had been a supposedly prosperous
+merchant; the Mitchells had always lived well, and
+Lilian was a petted and only child. Then came the shock of
+Henry Mitchell's sudden death and of financial ruin. His
+affairs were found to be hopelessly involved; when all the
+debts were paid there was left only the merest pittance&mdash;barely
+enough for house-rent&mdash;for Lilian and her mother to
+live upon. They had moved into a tiny cottage in an
+unfashionable locality, and during the summer Lilian had
+tried hard to think of something to do. Mrs. Mitchell was a
+delicate woman, and the burden of their situation fell on
+Lilian's young shoulders.</p>
+
+<p>There seemed to be no place for her. She could not teach
+and had no particular talent in any line. There was no opening
+for her in Willington, which was a rather sleepy little place,
+and Lilian was almost in despair.</p>
+
+<p>"There really doesn't seem to be any real place in the
+world for me, Mother," she said rather dolefully at the supper
+table. "I've no talent at all; it is dreadful to have been born
+without one. And yet I <i>must</i> do something, and do it soon."</p>
+
+<p>And Lilian, after she had washed up the tea dishes, went
+upstairs and had a good cry.</p>
+
+<p>But the darkest hour, so the proverb goes, is just before the
+dawn, and after Lilian had had her cry out and was sitting at
+her window in the dusk, watching a thin new moon shining
+over the trees down the street, her inspiration came to her. A
+minute later she whirled into the tiny sitting-room where her
+mother was sewing.</p>
+
+<p>"Mother, our fortune is made! I have an idea!"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't lose it, then," said Mrs. Mitchell with a smile.
+"What is it, my dear?"</p>
+
+<p>Lilian sobered herself, sat down by her mother's side, and
+proceeded to recount the conversation she had heard in the
+store that afternoon.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, Mother, this is where my brilliant idea comes in.
+You have often told me I am a born cook and I always have
+good luck. Now, tomorrow morning I shall go to Mrs.
+Saunders and offer to furnish all the good things for Helen's
+birthday party, and then I'll ask Mrs. Reeves and Mrs. Porter if
+I may make their bread for them. That will do for a beginning,
+I like cooking, you know, and I believe that in time I can work
+up a good business."</p>
+
+<p>"It seems to be a good idea," said Mrs. Mitchell thoughtfully,
+"and I am willing that you should try. But have you
+thought it all out carefully? There will be many difficulties."</p>
+
+<p>"I know. I don't expect smooth sailing right along, and perhaps
+I'll fail altogether; but somehow I don't believe I will."</p>
+
+<p>"A great many of your old friends will think&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes; I know <i>that</i> too, but I am not going to mind it,
+Mother. I don't think there is any disgrace in working for my
+living. I'm going to do my best and not care what people say."</p>
+
+<p>Early next morning Lilian started out. She had carefully
+thought over the details of her small venture, considered
+ways and means, and decided on the most advisable course.
+She would not attempt too much, and she felt sure of success.</p>
+
+<p>To secure competent servants was one of the problems of
+Willington people. At Drayton, a large neighbouring town,
+were several factories, and into these all the working girls
+from Willington had crowded, leaving very few who were
+willing to go out to service. Many of those who did were poor
+cooks, and Lilian shrewdly suspected that many a harassed
+housekeeper in the village would be glad to avail herself of the
+new enterprise.</p>
+
+<p>Lilian was, as she had said of herself, "a born cook." This
+was her capital, and she meant to make the most of it. Mrs.
+Saunders listened to her businesslike details with surprise
+and delight.</p>
+
+<p>"It is the very thing," she said. "Helen is so eager for that
+party, but I could not undertake it myself. Her birthday is Friday.
+Can you have everything ready by then?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I think so," said Lilian briskly, producing her notebook.
+"Please give me the list of what you want and I will do
+my best."</p>
+
+<p>From Mrs. Saunders she went to Mrs. Reeves and found a
+customer as soon as she had told the reason of her call. "I'll
+furnish all the bread and rolls you need," she said, "and they
+will be good, too. Now, about your jelly. I can make good jelly,
+and I'll be very glad to make yours."</p>
+
+<p>When she left, Lilian had an order for two dozen glasses of
+apple jelly, as well as a standing one for bread and rolls. Mrs.
+Porter was next visited and grasped eagerly at the opportunity.</p>
+
+<p>"I know your bread will be good," she said, "and you may
+count on me as a regular customer."</p>
+
+<p>Lilian thought she had enough on hand for a first attempt
+and went home satisfied. On her way she called at the grocery
+store with an order that surprised Mr. Hooper. When she told
+him of her plan he opened his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"I must tell my wife about that. She isn't strong and she
+doesn't like cooking."</p>
+
+<p>After dinner Lilian went to work, enveloped in a big apron,
+and whipped eggs, stoned raisins, stirred, concocted, and
+baked until dark. When bedtime came she was so tired that
+she could hardly crawl upstairs; but she felt happy too, for the
+day had been a successful one.</p>
+
+<p>And so also were the days and weeks and months that followed.
+It was hard and constant work, but it brought its
+reward. Lilian had not promised more than she could perform,
+and her customers were satisfied. In a short time she
+found herself with a regular and growing business on her
+hands, for new customers were gradually added and always
+came to stay.</p>
+
+<p>People who gave parties found it very convenient to follow
+Mrs. Saunders's example and order their supplies from Lilian.
+She had a very busy winter and, of course, it was not all plain
+sailing. She had many difficulties to contend with. Sometimes
+days came on which everything seemed to go wrong&mdash;when
+the stove smoked or the oven wouldn't heat properly,
+when cakes fell flat and bread was sour and pies behaved as
+only totally depraved pies can, when she burned her fingers
+and felt like giving up in despair.</p>
+
+<p>Then, again, she found herself cut by several of her old
+acquaintances. But she was too sensible to worry much over
+this. The friends really worth having were still hers, her
+mother's face had lost its look of care, and her business was
+prospering. She was hopeful and wide awake, kept her wits
+about her and looked out for hints, and learned to laugh over
+her failures.</p>
+
+<p>During the winter she and her mother had managed to do
+most of the work themselves, hiring little Mary Robinson
+next door on especially busy days, and now and then calling
+in the assistance of Jimmy Bowen and his hand sled to carry
+orders to customers. But when spring came Lilian prepared to
+open up her summer campaign on a much larger scale. Mary
+Robinson was hired for the season, and John Perkins was
+engaged to act as carrier with his express wagon. A summer
+kitchen was boarded in in the backyard, and a new range
+bought; Lilian began operations with a striking advertisement
+in the Willington <i>News</i> and an attractive circular sent
+around to all her patrons. Picnics and summer weddings were
+frequent. In bread and rolls her trade was brisk and constant.
+She also took orders for pickles, preserves, and jellies, and this
+became such a flourishing branch that a second assistant had
+to be hired.</p>
+
+<p>It was a cardinal rule with Lilian never to send out any
+article that was not up to her standard. She bore the loss of her
+failures, and sometimes stayed up half of the night to fill an
+order on time. "Prompt and perfect" was her motto.</p>
+
+<p>The long hot summer days were very trying, and sometimes
+she got very tired of it all. But when on the anniversary
+of her first venture she made up her accounts she was well
+pleased. To be sure, she had not made a fortune; but she had
+paid all their expenses, had a hundred dollars clear, and had
+laid the solid foundations of a profitable business.</p>
+
+<p>"Mother," she said jubilantly, as she wiped a dab of flour
+from her nose and proceeded to concoct the icing for Blanche
+Remington's wedding cake, "don't you think my business
+venture has been a decided success?"</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Mitchell surveyed her busy daughter with a motherly
+smile. "Yes, I think it has," she said.</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="Miriams_Lover" id="Miriams_Lover"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>Miriam's Lover<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>I had been reading a ghost story to Mrs. Sefton,
+and I laid it down at the end with a little shrug of
+contempt.</p>
+
+<p>"What utter nonsense!" I said.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Sefton nodded abstractedly above her fancywork.</p>
+
+<p>"That is. It is a very commonplace story indeed. I
+don't believe the spirits of the departed trouble
+themselves to revisit the glimpses of the moon for
+the purpose of frightening honest mortals&mdash;or
+even for the sake of hanging around the favourite
+haunts of their existence in the flesh. If they ever
+appear, it must be for a better reason than that."</p>
+
+<p>"You don't surely think that they ever do appear?"
+I said incredulously.</p>
+
+<p>"We have no proof that they do not, my dear."</p>
+
+<p>"Surely, Mary," I exclaimed, "you don't mean to
+say that you believe people ever do or can see spirits&mdash;ghosts,
+as the word goes?"</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't say I believed it. I never saw anything of
+the sort. I neither believe nor disbelieve. But you
+know queer things do happen at times&mdash;things
+you can't account for. At least, people who you
+know wouldn't lie say so. Of course, they may be
+mistaken. And I don't think that everybody can see
+spirits either, provided they are to be seen. It requires
+people of a certain organization&mdash;with a
+spiritual eye, as it were. We haven't all got that&mdash;in
+fact, I think very few of us have. I dare say you
+think I'm talking nonsense."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, yes, I think you are. You really surprise
+me, Mary. I always thought you the least likely person
+in the world to take up with such ideas. Something
+must have come under your observation to
+develop such theories in your practical head. Tell
+me what it was."</p>
+
+<p>"To what purpose? You would remain as sceptical
+as ever."</p>
+
+<p>"Possibly not. Try me; I may be convinced."</p>
+
+<p>"No," returned Mrs. Sefton calmly. "Nobody
+ever is convinced by hearsay. When a person has
+once seen a spirit&mdash;or thinks he has&mdash;he thenceforth
+believes it. And when somebody else is intimately
+associated with that person and knows all
+the circumstances&mdash;well, he admits the possibility,
+at least. That is my position. But by the time it gets
+to the third person&mdash;the outsider&mdash;it loses power.
+Besides, in this particular instance the story isn't
+very exciting. But then&mdash;it's true."</p>
+
+<p>"You have excited my curiosity. You must tell me
+the story."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, first tell me what you think of this. Suppose
+two people, both sensitively organized individuals,
+loved each other with a love stronger than
+life. If they were apart, do you think it might be
+possible for their souls to communicate with each
+other in some inexplicable way? And if anything
+happened to one, don't you think that that one
+could and would let the spirit of the other know?"</p>
+
+<p>"You're getting into too deep waters for me,
+Mary," I said, shaking my head. "I'm not an authority
+on telepathy, or whatever you call it. But
+I've no belief in such theories. In fact, I think they
+are all nonsense. I'm sure you must think so too in
+your rational moments."</p>
+
+<p>"I dare say it is all nonsense," said Mrs. Sefton
+slowly, "but if you had lived a whole year in the
+same house with Miriam Gordon, you would have
+been tainted too. Not that she had 'theories'&mdash;at
+least, she never aired them if she had. But there
+was simply something about the girl herself that
+gave a person strange impressions. When I first
+met her I had the most uncanny feeling that she
+was all spirit&mdash;soul&mdash;what you will! no flesh, anyhow.
+That feeling wore off after a while, but she
+never seemed like other people to me.</p>
+
+<p>"She was Mr. Sefton's niece. Her father had died
+when she was a child. When Miriam was twenty
+her mother had married a second time and went to
+Europe with her husband. Miriam came to live
+with us while they were away. Upon their return
+she was herself to be married.</p>
+
+<p>"I had never seen Miriam before. Her arrival was
+unexpected, and I was absent from home when she
+came. I returned in the evening, and when I saw
+her first she was standing under the chandelier in
+the drawing room. Talk about spirits! For five seconds
+I thought I had seen one.</p>
+
+<p>"Miriam was a beauty. I had known that before,
+though I think I hardly expected to see such wonderful
+loveliness. She was tall and extremely graceful,
+dark&mdash;at least her hair was dark, but her skin
+was wonderfully fair and clear. Her hair was
+gathered away from her face, and she had a high,
+pure, white forehead, and the straightest, finest,
+blackest brows. Her face was oval, with very large
+and dark eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"I soon realized that Miriam was in some mysterious
+fashion different from other people. I think
+everyone who met her felt the same way. Yet it was
+a feeling hard to define. For my own part I simply
+felt as if she belonged to another world, and that
+part of the time she&mdash;her soul, you know&mdash;was
+back there again.</p>
+
+<p>"You must not suppose that Miriam was a disagreeable
+person to have in the house. On the contrary,
+it was the very reverse. Everybody liked her.
+She was one of the sweetest, most winsome girls I
+ever knew, and I soon grew to love her dearly. As
+for what Dick called her 'little queernesses'&mdash;well,
+we got used to them in time.</p>
+
+<p>"Miriam was engaged, as I have told you, to a
+young Harvard man named Sidney Claxton. I
+knew she loved him very deeply. When she
+showed me his photograph, I liked his appearance
+and said so. Then I made some teasing remark
+about her love-letters&mdash;just for a joke, you know.
+Miriam looked at me with an odd little smile and
+said quickly:</p>
+
+<p>"'Sidney and I never write to each other.'</p>
+
+<p>"'Why, Miriam!' I exclaimed in astonishment.
+'Do you mean to tell me you never hear from him
+at all?'</p>
+
+<p>"'No, I did not say that. I hear from him every
+day&mdash;every hour. We do not need to write letters.
+There are better means of communication between
+two souls that are in perfect accord with each
+other.'</p>
+
+<p>"'Miriam, you uncanny creature, what do you
+mean?' I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"But Miriam only gave another queer smile and
+made no answer at all. Whatever her beliefs or theories
+were, she would never discuss them.</p>
+
+<p>"She had a habit of dropping into abstracted reveries
+at any time or place. No matter where she
+was, this, whatever it was, would come over her.
+She would sit there, perhaps in the centre of a gay
+crowd, and gaze right out into space, not hearing
+or seeing a single thing that went on around her.</p>
+
+<p>"I remember one day in particular; we were sewing
+in my room. I looked up and saw that Miriam's
+work had dropped on her knee and she was leaning
+forward, her lips apart, her eyes gazing upward
+with an unearthly expression.</p>
+
+<p>"'Don't look like that, Miriam!' I said, with a little
+shiver. 'You seem to be looking at something a
+thousand miles away!'</p>
+
+<p>"Miriam came out of her trance or reverie and
+said, with a little laugh:</p>
+
+<p>"'How do you know but that I was?'</p>
+
+<p>"She bent her head for a minute or two. Then
+she lifted it again and looked at me with a sudden
+contraction of her level brows that betokened vexation.</p>
+
+<p>"'I wish you hadn't spoken to me just then,' she
+said. 'You interrupted the message I was receiving.
+I shall not get it at all now.'</p>
+
+<p>"'Miriam,' I implored. 'I so wish my dear girl,
+that you wouldn't talk so. It makes people think
+there is something queer about you. Who in the
+world was sending you a message, as you call it?'</p>
+
+<p>"'Sidney,' said Miriam simply.</p>
+
+<p>"'Nonsense!'</p>
+
+<p>"'You think it is nonsense because you don't understand
+it,' was her calm response.</p>
+
+<p>"I recall another event was when some caller
+dropped in and we had drifted into a discussion
+about ghosts and the like&mdash;and I've no doubt we
+all talked some delicious nonsense. Miriam said
+nothing at the time, but when we were alone I
+asked her what she thought of it.</p>
+
+<p>"'I thought you were all merely talking against
+time,' she retorted evasively.</p>
+
+<p>"'But, Miriam, do you really think it is possible
+for ghosts&mdash;'</p>
+
+<p>"'I detest that word!'</p>
+
+<p>"'Well, spirits then&mdash;to return after death, or to
+appear to anyone apart from the flesh?'</p>
+
+<p>"'I will tell you what I know. If anything were to
+happen to Sidney&mdash;if he were to die or be killed&mdash;he
+would come to me himself and tell me.'</p>
+
+<p>"One day Miriam came down to lunch looking
+pale and worried. After Dick went out, I asked her
+if anything were wrong.</p>
+
+<p>"'Something has happened to Sidney,' she replied,
+'some painful accident&mdash;I don't know what.'</p>
+
+<p>"'How do you know?' I cried. Then, as she
+looked at me strangely, I added hastily, 'You
+haven't been receiving any more unearthly messages,
+have you? Surely, Miriam, you are not so
+foolish as to really believe in that!'</p>
+
+<p>"'I know,' she answered quickly. 'Belief or disbelief
+has nothing to do with it. Yes, I have had a
+message. I know that some accident has happened
+to Sidney&mdash;painful and inconvenient but not particularly
+dangerous. I do not know what it is.
+Sidney will write me that. He writes when it is absolutely
+necessary.'</p>
+
+<p>"'Aerial communication isn't perfected yet
+then?' I said mischievously. But, observing how
+really worried she seemed, I added, 'Don't fret,
+Miriam. You may be mistaken.'</p>
+
+<p>"Well, two days afterwards she got a note from
+her lover&mdash;the first I had ever known her to receive&mdash;in
+which he said he had been thrown from
+his horse and had broken his left arm. It had happened
+the very morning Miriam received her message.</p>
+
+<p>"Miriam had been with us about eight months
+when one day she came into my room hurriedly.
+She was very pale.</p>
+
+<p>"'Sidney is ill&mdash;dangerously ill. What shall I do?'</p>
+
+<p>"I knew she must have had another of those
+abominable messages&mdash;or thought she had&mdash;and
+really, remembering the incident of the broken
+arm, I couldn't feel as sceptical as I pretended to. I
+tried to cheer her, but did not succeed. Two hours
+later she had a telegram from her lover's college
+chum, saying that Mr. Claxton was dangerously ill
+with typhoid fever.</p>
+
+<p>"I was quite alarmed about Miriam in the days
+that followed. She grieved and fretted continually.
+One of her troubles was that she received no more
+messages; she said it was because Sidney was too ill
+to send them. Anyhow, she had to content herself
+with the means of communication used by ordinary
+mortals.</p>
+
+<p>"Sidney's mother, who had gone to nurse him,
+wrote every day, and at last good news came. The
+crisis was over and the doctor in attendance
+thought Sidney would recover. Miriam seemed like
+a new creature then, and rapidly recovered her
+spirits.</p>
+
+<p>"For a week reports continued favourable. One
+night we went to the opera to hear a celebrated
+prima donna. When we returned home Miriam
+and I were sitting in her room, chatting over the
+events of the evening.</p>
+
+<p>"Suddenly she sat straight up with a sort of convulsive
+shudder, and at the same time&mdash;you may
+laugh if you like&mdash;the most horrible feeling came
+over me. I didn't see anything, but I just felt that
+there was something or someone in the room besides
+ourselves.</p>
+
+<p>"Miriam was gazing straight before her. She rose
+to her feet and held out her hands.</p>
+
+<p>"'Sidney!' she said.</p>
+
+<p>"Then she fell to the floor in a dead faint.</p>
+
+<p>"I screamed for Dick, rang the bell and rushed to
+her.</p>
+
+<p>"In a few minutes the whole household was
+aroused, and Dick was off posthaste for the doctor,
+for we could not revive Miriam from her death-like
+swoon. She seemed as one dead. We worked over
+her for hours. She would come out of her faint for a
+moment, give us an unknowing stare and go shudderingly
+off again.</p>
+
+<p>"The doctor talked of some fearful shock, but I
+kept my own counsel. At dawn Miriam came back
+to life at last. When she and I were left alone, she
+turned to me.</p>
+
+<p>"'Sidney is dead,' she said quietly. 'I saw him&mdash;just
+before I fainted. I looked up, and he was standing
+between me and you. He had come to say
+farewell.'</p>
+
+<p>"What could I say? Almost while we were talking
+a telegram came. He was dead&mdash;he had died at the
+very hour at which Miriam had seen him."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Sefton paused, and the lunch bell rang.</p>
+
+<p>"What do you think of it?" she queried as we
+rose.</p>
+
+<p>"Honestly, I don't know what I think of it," I answered
+frankly.</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="Miss_Calista" id="Miss_Calista"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>Miss Calista's Peppermint Bottle<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>Miss Calista was perplexed. Her nephew, Caleb
+Cramp, who had been her right-hand man for
+years and whom she had got well broken into her
+ways, had gone to the Klondike, leaving her to fill
+his place with the next best man; but the next best
+man was slow to appear, and meanwhile Miss Calista
+was looking about her warily. She could afford
+to wait a while, for the crop was all in and the fall
+ploughing done, so that the need of a successor to
+Caleb was not as pressing as it might otherwise
+have been. There was no lack of applicants, such as
+they were. Miss Calista was known to be a kind
+and generous mistress, although she had her
+"ways," and insisted calmly and immovably upon
+wholehearted compliance with them. She had a
+small, well-cultivated farm and a comfortable
+house, and her hired men lived in clover. Caleb
+Cramp had been perfection after his kind, and
+Miss Calista did not expect to find his equal. Nevertheless,
+she set up a certain standard of requirements;
+and although three weeks, during which
+Miss Calista had been obliged to put up with the
+immature services of a neighbour's boy, had
+elapsed since Caleb's departure, no one had as yet
+stepped into his vacant and coveted shoes.</p>
+
+<p>Certainly Miss Calista was somewhat hard to
+please, but she was not thinking of herself as she
+sat by her front window in the chilly November
+twilight. Instead, she was musing on the degeneration
+of hired men, and reflecting that it was high
+time the wheat was thrashed, the house banked,
+and sundry other duties attended to.</p>
+
+<p>Ches Maybin had been up that afternoon to negotiate
+for the vacant place, and had offered to give
+satisfaction for smaller wages than Miss Calista had
+ever paid. But he had met with a brusque refusal,
+scarcely as civil as Miss Calista had bestowed on
+drunken Jake Stinson from the Morrisvale Road.</p>
+
+<p>Not that Miss Calista had any particular prejudice
+against Ches Maybin, or knew anything
+positively to his discredit. She was simply unconsciously
+following the example of a world that exerts
+itself to keep a man down when he is down
+and prevent all chance of his rising. Nothing succeeds
+like success, and the converse of this is likewise
+true&mdash;that nothing fails like failure. There was
+not a person in Cooperstown who would not have
+heartily endorsed Miss Calista's refusal.</p>
+
+<p>Ches Maybin was only eighteen, although he
+looked several years older, and although no flagrant
+misdoing had ever been proved against him,
+suspicion of such was not wanting. He came of a
+bad stock, people said sagely, adding that what was
+bred in the bone was bound to come out in the
+flesh. His father, old Sam Maybin, had been a shiftless
+and tricky rascal, as everybody knew, and had
+ended his days in the poorhouse. Ches's mother
+had died when he was a baby, and he had come up
+somehow, in a hand-to-mouth fashion, with all the
+cloud of heredity hanging over him. He was always
+looked at askance, and when any mischief came to
+light in the village, it was generally fastened on
+him as a convenient and handy scapegoat. He was
+considered sulky and lazy, and the local prophets
+united in predicting a bad end for him sooner or
+later; and, moreover, diligently endeavoured by
+their general treatment of him to put him in a fair
+way to fulfil their predictions. Miss Calista, when
+she had shut Chester Maybin out into the chill
+gloom of the November dusk, dismissed him from
+her thoughts. There were other things of more moment
+to her just then than old Sam Maybin's hopeful
+son.</p>
+
+<p>There was nobody in the house but herself, and
+although this was neither alarming nor unusual, it
+was unusual&mdash;and Miss Calista considered it
+alarming&mdash;that the sum of five hundred dollars
+should at that very moment be in the upper right-hand
+drawer of the sideboard, which sum had
+been up to the previous day safe in the coffers of
+the Millageville bank. But certain unfavourable
+rumours were in course of circulation about that
+same institution, and Miss Calista, who was
+nothing if not prudent, had gone to the bank that
+very morning and withdrawn her deposit. She intended
+to go over to Kerrytown the very next day
+and deposit it in the Savings Bank there. Not another
+day would she keep it in the house, and,
+indeed, it worried her to think she must keep it even
+for the night, as she had told Mrs. Galloway that
+afternoon during a neighbourly back-yard chat.</p>
+
+<p>"Not but what it's safe enough," she said, "for
+not a soul but you knows I've got it. But I'm not
+used to have so much by me, and there are always
+tramps going round. It worries me somehow. I
+wouldn't give it a thought if Caleb was here. I
+s'pose being all alone makes me nervous."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Calista was still rather nervous when she
+went to bed that night, but she was a woman of
+sound sense and was determined not to give way to
+foolish fears. She locked doors and windows carefully,
+as was her habit, and saw that the fastenings
+were good and secure. The one on the dining-room
+window, looking out on the back yard, wasn't; in
+fact, it was broken altogether; but, as Miss Calista
+told herself, it had been broken just so for the last
+six years, and nobody had ever tried to get in at it
+yet, and it wasn't likely anyone would begin tonight.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Calista went to bed and, despite her worry,
+slept soon and soundly. It was well on past midnight
+when she suddenly wakened and sat bolt upright
+in bed. She was not accustomed to waken in
+the night, and she had the impression of having
+been awakened by some noise. She listened
+breathlessly. Her room was directly over the dining-room,
+and an empty stovepipe hole opened up
+through the ceiling of the latter at the head of her
+bed.</p>
+
+<p>There was no mistake about it. Something or
+some person was moving about stealthily in the
+room below. It wasn't the cat&mdash;Miss Calista had
+shut him in the woodshed before she went to bed,
+and he couldn't possibly get out. It must certainly
+be a beggar or tramp of some description.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Calista might be given over to nervousness
+in regard to imaginary thieves, but in the presence
+of real danger she was cool and self-reliant. As
+noiselessly and swiftly as any burglar himself, Miss
+Calista slipped out of bed and into her clothes.
+Then she tip-toed out into the hall. The late moonlight,
+streaming in through the hall windows, was
+quite enough illumination for her purpose, and she
+got downstairs and was fairly in the open doorway
+of the dining-room before a sound betrayed her
+presence.</p>
+
+<p>Standing at the sideboard, hastily ransacking the
+neat contents of an open drawer, stood a man's figure,
+dimly visible in the moonlight gloom. As Miss
+Calista's grim form appeared in the doorway, the
+midnight marauder turned with a start and then,
+with an inarticulate cry, sprang, not at the courageous
+lady, but at the open window behind him.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Calista, realizing with a flash of comprehension
+that he was escaping her, had a
+woman-like impulse to get a blow in anyhow; she
+grasped and hurled at her unceremonious caller
+the first thing that came to hand&mdash;a bottle of peppermint
+essence that was standing on the sideboard.</p>
+
+<p>The missile hit the escaping thief squarely on the
+shoulder as he sprang out of the window, and the
+fragments of glass came clattering down on the sill.
+The next moment Miss Calista found herself alone,
+standing by the sideboard in a half-dazed fashion,
+for the whole thing had passed with such lightning-like
+rapidity that it almost seemed as if it were
+the dissolving end of a bad dream. But the open
+drawer and the window, where the bits of glass
+were glistening in the moonlight, were no dream.
+Miss Calista recovered herself speedily, closed the
+window, lit the lamp, gathered up the broken glass,
+and set up the chairs which the would-be thief had
+upset in his exit. An examination of the sideboard
+showed the precious five hundred safe and sound
+in an undisturbed drawer.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Calista kept grim watch and ward there until
+morning, and thought the matter over exhaustively.
+In the end she resolved to keep her own
+counsel. She had no clue whatever to the thief's
+whereabouts or identity, and no good would come
+of making a fuss, which might only end in throwing
+suspicion on someone who might be quite innocent.</p>
+
+<p>When the morning came Miss Calista lost no
+time in setting out for Kerrytown, where the
+money was soon safely deposited in the bank. She
+heaved a sigh of relief when she left the building.</p>
+
+<p>I feel as if I could enjoy life once more, she said to
+herself. Goodness me, if I'd had to keep that
+money by me for a week itself, I'd have been a raving
+lunatic by the end of it.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Calista had shopping to do and friends to
+visit in town, so that the dull autumn day was well
+nigh spent when she finally got back to Cooperstown
+and paused at the corner store to get a
+bundle of matches.</p>
+
+<p>The store was full of men, smoking and chatting
+around the fire, and Miss Calista, whose pet abomination
+was tobacco smoke, was not at all minded to
+wait any longer than she could help. But Abiram
+Fell was attending to a previous customer, and Miss
+Calista sat grimly down by the counter to wait her
+turn.</p>
+
+<p>The door opened, letting in a swirl of raw
+November evening wind and Ches Maybin. He
+nodded sullenly to Mr. Fell and passed down the
+store to mutter a message to a man at the further
+end.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Calista lifted her head as he passed and
+sniffed the air as a charger who scents battle. The
+smell of tobacco was strong, and so was that of the
+open boxes of dried herring on the counter, but
+plainly, above all the commingled odours of a
+country grocery, Miss Calista caught a whiff of
+peppermint, so strong as to leave no doubt of its
+origin. There had been no hint of it before Ches
+Maybin's entrance.</p>
+
+<p>The latter did not wait long. He was out and
+striding along the shadowy road when Miss Calista
+left the store and drove smartly after him. It never
+took Miss Calista long to make up her mind about
+anything, and she had weighed and passed judgement
+on Ches Maybin's case while Mr. Fell was
+doing up her matches.</p>
+
+<p>The lad glanced up furtively as she checked her
+fat grey pony beside him.</p>
+
+<p>"Good evening, Chester," she said with brisk
+kindness. "I can give you a lift, if you are going my
+way. Jump in, quick&mdash;Dapple is a little restless."</p>
+
+<p>A wave of crimson, duskily perceptible under his
+sunburned skin, surged over Ches Maybin's face. It
+almost seemed as if he were going to blurt out a
+blunt refusal. But Miss Calista's face was so
+guileless and her tone so friendly, that he thought
+better of it and sprang in beside her, and Dapple
+broke into an impatient trot down the long hill
+lined with its bare, wind-writhen maples.</p>
+
+<p>After a few minutes' silence Miss Calista turned
+to her moody companion.</p>
+
+<p>"Chester," she said, as tranquilly as if about to
+ask him the most ordinary question in the world,
+"why did you climb into my house last night and
+try to steal my money?"</p>
+
+<p>Ches Maybin started convulsively, as if he meant
+to spring from the buggy at once, but Miss Calista's
+hand was on his arm in a grasp none the less firm
+because of its gentleness, and there was a warning
+gleam in her grey eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"It won't mend matters trying to get clear of me,
+Chester. I know it was you and I want an answer&mdash;a
+truthful one, mind you&mdash;to my question. I am
+your friend, and I am not going to harm you if you
+tell me the truth."</p>
+
+<p>Her clear and incisive gaze met and held irresistibly
+the boy's wavering one. The sullen obstinacy of
+his face relaxed.</p>
+
+<p>"Well," he muttered finally, "I was just desperate,
+that's why. I've never done anything real bad
+in my life before, but people have always been
+down on me. I'm blamed for everything, and nobody
+wants anything to do with me. I'm willing to
+work, but I can't get a thing to do. I'm in rags and I
+haven't a cent, and winter's coming on. I heard you
+telling Mrs. Galloway yesterday about the money. I
+was behind the fir hedge and you didn't see me. I
+went away and planned it all out. I'd get in some
+way&mdash;and I meant to use the money to get away
+out west as far from here as I could, and begin life
+there, where nobody knew me, and where I'd have
+some sort of a chance. I've never had any here. You
+can put me in jail now, if you like&mdash;they'll feed and
+clothe me there, anyhow, and I'll be on a level with
+the rest."</p>
+
+<p>The boy had blurted it all out sullenly and half-chokingly.
+A world of rebellion and protest against
+the fate that had always dragged him down was
+couched in his voice.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Calista drew Dapple to a standstill before
+her gate.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm not going to send you to jail, Chester. I believe
+you've told me the truth. Yesterday you
+wanted me to give you Caleb's place and I refused.
+Well, I offer it to you now. If you'll come, I'll hire
+you, and give you as good wages as I gave him."</p>
+
+<p>Ches Maybin looked incredulous.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Calista, you can't mean it."</p>
+
+<p>"I do mean it, every word. You say you have
+never had a chance. Well, I am going to give you
+one&mdash;a chance to get on the right road and make a
+man of yourself. Nobody shall ever know about last
+night's doings from me, and I'll make it my business
+to forget them if you deserve it. What do you
+say?"</p>
+
+<p>Ches lifted his head and looked her squarely in
+the face.</p>
+
+<p>"I'll come," he said huskily. "It ain't no use to try
+and thank you, Miss Calista. But I'll live my
+thanks."</p>
+
+<p>And he did. The good people of Cooperstown
+held up their hands in horror when they heard that
+Miss Calista had hired Ches Maybin, and prophesied
+that the deluded woman would live to repent
+her rash step. But not all prophecies come true.
+Miss Calista smiled serenely and kept on her own
+misguided way. And Ches Maybin proved so efficient
+and steady that the arrangement was continued,
+and in due time people outlived their old
+suspicions and came to regard him as a thoroughly
+smart and trustworthy young man.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Calista has made a man of Ches Maybin,"
+said the oracles. "He ought to be very grateful to
+her."</p>
+
+<p>And he was. But only he and Miss Calista and
+the peppermint bottle ever knew the precise extent
+of his gratitude, and they never told.</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="The_Jest" id="The_Jest"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>The Jest That Failed<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>"I think it is simply a disgrace to have a person like
+that in our class," said Edna Hayden in an injured
+tone.</p>
+
+<p>"And she doesn't seem a bit ashamed of it,
+either," said Agnes Walters.</p>
+
+<p>"Rather proud of it, I should say," returned her roommate,
+spitefully. "It seems to me that if I were so poor that I had to
+'room' myself and dress as dowdily as she does that I really
+couldn't look anybody in the face. What must the boys think
+of her? And if it wasn't for her being in it, our class would be
+the smartest and dressiest in the college&mdash;even those top-lofty
+senior girls admit that."</p>
+
+<p>"It's a shame," said Agnes, conclusively. "But she needn't
+expect to associate with our set. I, for one, won't have anything
+to do with her."</p>
+
+<p>"Nor I. I think it is time she should be taught her place. If
+we could only manage to inflict some decided snub on her,
+she might take the hint and give up trying to poke herself in
+where she doesn't belong. The idea of her consenting to be
+elected on the freshmen executive! But she seems impervious
+to snubs."</p>
+
+<p>"Edna, let's play a joke on her. It will serve her right. Let us
+send an invitation in somebody's name to the senior 'prom.'"</p>
+
+<p>"The very thing! And sign Sidney Hill's name to it. He's
+the handsomest and richest fellows at Payzant, and belongs to
+one of the best families in town, and he's awfully fastidious
+besides. No doubt she will feel immensely flattered and, of
+course, she'll accept. Just think how silly she'll feel when she
+finds out he never sent it. Let's write it now, and send it at
+once. There is no time to lose, for the 'prom' is on Thursday
+night."</p>
+
+<p>The freshmen co-eds at Payzant College did not like Grace
+Seeley&mdash;that is to say, the majority of them. They were a
+decidedly snobbish class that year. No one could deny that
+Grace was clever, but she was poor, dressed very plainly&mdash;"dowdily,"
+the girls said&mdash;and "roomed" herself, that phrase
+meaning that she rented a little unfurnished room and
+cooked her own meals over an oil stove.</p>
+
+<p>The "senior prom," as it was called, was the annual reception
+which the senior class gave in the middle of every
+autumn term. It was the smartest and gayest of all the college
+functions, and a Payzant co-ed who received an invitation to
+it counted herself fortunate. The senior girls were included as
+a matter of course, but a junior, soph, or freshie could not go
+unless one of the senior boys invited her.</p>
+
+<p>Grace Seeley was studying Greek in her tiny room that
+afternoon when the invitation was brought to her. It was
+scrupulously orthodox in appearance and form, and Grace
+never doubted that it was genuine, although she felt much
+surprised that Sidney Hill, the leader of his class and the foremost
+figure in all college sports and societies, should have
+asked her to go with him to the senior prom.</p>
+
+<p>But she was girlishly pleased at the prospect. She was as
+fond of a good time as any other girl, and she had secretly
+wished very much that she could go to the brilliant and much
+talked about senior prom.</p>
+
+<p>Grace was quite unaware of her own unpopularity among
+her class co-eds, although she thought it was very hard to get
+acquainted with them. Without any false pride herself, and of
+a frank, independent nature, it never occurred to her that
+the other Payzant freshies could look down on her because
+she was poor, or resent her presence among them because she
+dressed plainly.</p>
+
+<p>She straightway wrote a note of acceptance to Sidney Hill,
+and that young man naturally felt much mystified when he
+opened and read it in the college library next morning.</p>
+
+<p>"Grace Seeley," he pondered. "That's the jolly girl with
+the brown eyes that I met at the philomathic the other night.
+She thanks me for my invitation to the senior prom, and
+accepts with pleasure. Why, I certainly never invited her or
+anyone else to go with me to the senior prom. There must be
+some mistake."</p>
+
+<p>Grace passed him at this moment on her way to the Latin
+classroom. She bowed and smiled in a friendly fashion and
+Sidney Hill felt decidedly uncomfortable. What was he to
+do? He did not like to think of putting Miss Seeley in a false
+position because somebody had sent her an invitation in
+his name.</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose it is some cad who has a spite at me that has
+done it," he reflected, "but if so I'll spoil his game. I'll take
+Miss Seeley to the prom as if I had never intended doing anything
+else. She shan't be humiliated just because there is
+someone at Payzant who would stoop to that sort of thing."</p>
+
+<p>So he walked up the hall with Grace and expressed his
+pleasure at her acceptance, and on the evening of the prom he
+sent her a bouquet of white carnations, whose spicy fragrance
+reminded her of her own little garden at home. Grace thought
+it extremely nice of him, and dressed in a flutter of pleasant
+anticipation.</p>
+
+<p>Her gown was a very simple one of sheer white organdie,
+and was the only evening dress she had. She knew there
+would be many smarter dresses at the reception, but the
+knowledge did not disturb her sensible head in the least.</p>
+
+<p>She fingered the dainty white frills lovingly as she remembered
+the sunny summer days at home in the little sewing-room,
+where cherry boughs poked their blossoms in at the
+window, when her mother and sisters had helped her to make
+it, with laughing prophesies and speculations as to its first
+appearance. Into seam and puff and frill many girlish hopes
+and dreams had been sewn, and they all came back to Grace as
+she put it on, and helped to surround her with an atmosphere
+of happiness.</p>
+
+<p>When she was ready she picked up her bouquet and looked
+herself over in the mirror, from the top of her curly head to the
+tips of her white shoes, with a little nod of satisfaction. Grace
+was not exactly pretty, but she had such a bright, happy face
+and such merry brown eyes and such a friendly smile that she
+was very pleasant to look upon, and a great many people
+thought so that night.</p>
+
+<p>Grace had never in all her life before had so good a time as
+she had at that senior prom. The seniors were quick to discover
+her unaffected originality and charm, and everywhere
+she went she was the centre of a merry group. In short, Grace,
+as much to her own surprise as anyone's, found herself a
+social success.</p>
+
+<p>Presently Sidney brought his brother up to be introduced,
+and the latter said:</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Seeley, will you excuse my asking if you have a
+brother or any relative named Max Seeley?"</p>
+
+<p>Grace nodded. "Oh, yes, my brother Max. He is a doctor
+out west."</p>
+
+<p>"I was sure of it," said Murray Hill triumphantly. "You
+resemble him so strongly. Please don't consider me as a
+stranger a minute longer, for Max and I are like brothers.
+Indeed, I owe my life to him. Last summer I was out there on a
+surveying expedition, and I took typhoid in a little out-of-the-way
+place where good nursing was not to be had for love or
+money. Your brother attended me and he managed to pull me
+through. He never left me day or night until I was out of danger,
+and he worked like a Trojan for me."</p>
+
+<p>"Dear old Max," said Grace, her brown eyes shining with
+pride and pleasure. "That is so like him. He is such a dear
+brother and I haven't seen him for four years. To see somebody
+who knows him so well is next best thing to seeing
+himself."</p>
+
+<p>"He is an awfully fine fellow," said Mr. Hill heartily, "and
+I'm delighted to have met the 'little sister' he used to talk so
+much about. I want you to come ever and meet my mother
+and sister. They have heard me talk so much about Max that
+they think almost as much of him as I do, and they will be
+glad to meet his sister."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Hill, a handsome, dignified lady who was one of the
+chaperones of the prom, received Grace warmly, while
+Beatrice Hill, an extremely pretty, smartly gowned girl, made
+her feel at home immediately.</p>
+
+<p>"You came with Sid, didn't you?" she whispered. "Sid is so
+sly&mdash;he never tells us whom he is going to take anywhere. But
+when I saw you come in with him I knew I was going to like
+you, you looked so jolly. And you're really the sister of that
+splendid Dr. Seeley who saved Murray's life last summer?
+And to think you've been at Payzant nearly a whole term and
+we never knew it!"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, how have you enjoyed our prom, Miss Seeley?"
+asked Sid, as they walked home together under the arching
+elms of the college campus.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! it was splendid," said Grace enthusiastically.
+"Everybody was so nice. And then to meet someone who
+could tell me so much about Max! I must write them home all
+about it before I sleep, just to calm my head a bit. Mother and
+the girls will be so interested, and I must send Lou and Mab a
+carnation apiece for their scrapbooks."</p>
+
+<p>"Give me one back, please," said Sid. And Grace with a
+little blush, did so.</p>
+
+<p>That night, while Grace was slipping the stems of her carnations
+and putting them into water, three little bits of conversation
+were being carried on which it is necessary to report
+in order to round up this story neatly and properly, as all
+stories should be rounded up.</p>
+
+<p>In the first place, Beatrice Hill was saying to Sidney, "Oh,
+Sid, that Miss Seeley you had at the prom is a lovely girl. I
+don't know when I've met anyone I liked so much. She was
+so jolly and friendly and she didn't put on learned airs at all,
+as so many of those Payzant girls do. I asked her all about herself
+and she told me, and all about her mother and sisters and
+home and the lovely times they had together, and how hard
+they worked to send her to college too, and how she taught
+school in vacations and 'roomed' herself to help along. Isn't it
+so brave and plucky of her! I know we are going to be great
+friends."</p>
+
+<p>"I hope so," said Sidney briefly, "because I have an idea
+that she and I are going to be very good friends too."</p>
+
+<p>And Sidney went upstairs and put away a single white carnation
+very carefully.</p>
+
+<p>In the second place, Mrs. Hill was saying to her eldest
+son, "I liked that Miss Seeley very much. She seemed a very
+sweet girl."</p>
+
+<p>And, finally, Agnes Walters and Edna Hayden were discussing
+the matter in great mystification in their room.</p>
+
+<p>"I can't understand it at all," said Agnes slowly. "Sid Hill
+took her to the prom and he must have sent her those carnations
+too. She could never have afforded them herself. And
+did you see the fuss his people made over her? I heard Beatrice
+telling her that she was coming to call on her tomorrow, and
+Mrs. Hill said she must look upon 'Beechlawn' as her second
+home while she was at Payzant. If the Hills are going to take
+her up we'll have to be nice to her."</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose," said Edna conclusively, "the truth of the matter
+is that Sid Hill meant to ask her anyway. I dare say he
+asked her long ago, and she would know our invitation was a
+fraud. So the joke is on ourselves, after all."</p>
+
+<p>But, as you and I know, that, with the exception of the last
+sentence, was not the truth of the matter at all.</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="The_Penningtons_Girl" id="The_Penningtons_Girl"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>The Penningtons' Girl<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>Winslow had been fishing&mdash;or pretending to&mdash;all
+the morning, and he was desperately thirsty. He
+boarded with the Beckwiths on the Riverside East
+Shore, but he was nearer Riverside West, and he
+knew the Penningtons well. He had often been there for bait
+and milk and had listened times out of mind to Mrs. Pennington's
+dismal tales of her tribulations with hired girls. She
+never could get along with them, and they left, on an average,
+after a fortnight's trial. She was on the lookout for one now, he
+knew, and would likely be cross, but he thought she would
+give him a drink.</p>
+
+<p>He rowed his skiff into the shore and tied it to a fir that
+hung out from the bank. A winding little footpath led up to
+the Pennington farmhouse, which crested the hill about
+three hundred yards from the shore. Winslow made for the
+kitchen door and came face to face with a girl carrying
+a pail of water&mdash;Mrs. Pennington's latest thing in hired girls,
+of course.</p>
+
+<p>Winslow's first bewildered thought was "What a goddess!"
+and he wondered, as he politely asked for a drink,
+where on earth Mrs. Pennington had picked her up. She
+handed him a shining dipper half full and stood, pail in hand,
+while he drank it.</p>
+
+<p>She was rather tall, and wore a somewhat limp, faded print
+gown, and a big sunhat, beneath which a glossy knot of chestnut
+showed itself. Her skin was very fair, somewhat freckled,
+and her mouth was delicious. As for her eyes, they were grey,
+but beyond that simply defied description.</p>
+
+<p>"Will you have some more?" she asked in a soft, drawling
+voice.</p>
+
+<p>"No, thank you. That was delicious. Is Mrs. Pennington
+home?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. She has gone away for the day."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I suppose I can sit down here and rest a while.
+You've no serious objections, have you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no."</p>
+
+<p>She carried her pail into the kitchen and came out again
+presently with a knife and a pan of apples. Sitting down on a
+bench under the poplars she proceeded to peel them with a
+disregard of his presence that piqued Winslow, who was not
+used to being ignored in this fashion. Besides, as a general
+rule, he had been quite good friends with Mrs. Pennington's
+hired girls. She had had three strapping damsels during his
+sojourn in Riverside, and he used to sit on this very doorstep
+and chaff them. They had all been saucy and talkative. This
+girl was evidently a new species.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you think you'll get along with Mrs. Pennington?" he
+asked finally. "As a rule she fights with her help, although she
+is a most estimable woman."</p>
+
+<p>The girl smiled quite broadly.</p>
+
+<p>"I guess p'r'aps she's rather hard to suit," was the answer,
+"but I like her pretty well so far. I think we'll get along with
+each other. If we don't I can leave&mdash;like the others did."</p>
+
+<p>"What is your name?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nelly Ray."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, Nelly, I hope you'll be able to keep your place. Let
+me give you a bit of friendly advice. Don't let the cats get into
+the pantry. That is what Mrs. Pennington has quarrelled with
+nearly every one of her girls about."</p>
+
+<p>"It is quite a bother to keep them out, ain't it?" said Nelly
+calmly. "There's dozens of cats about the place. What on
+earth makes them keep so many?"</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Pennington has a mania for cats. He and Mrs. Pennington
+have a standing disagreement about it. The last girl
+left here because she couldn't stand the cats; they affected her
+nerves, she said. I hope you don't mind them."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no; I kind of like cats. I've been tryin' to count them.
+Has anyone ever done that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not that I know of. I tried but I had to give up in despair&mdash;never
+could tell when I was counting the same cat over again.
+Look at that black goblin sunning himself on the woodpile. I
+say, Nelly, you're not going, are you?"</p>
+
+<p>"I must. It's time to get dinner. Mr. Pennington will be in
+from the fields soon."</p>
+
+<p>The next minute he heard her stepping briskly about the
+kitchen, shooing out intruding cats, and humming a darky air
+to herself. He went reluctantly back to the shore and rowed
+across the river in a brown study.</p>
+
+<p>I don't know whether Winslow was afflicted with chronic
+thirst or not, or whether the East side water wasn't so good as
+that of the West side; but I do know that he fairly haunted the
+Pennington farmhouse after that. Mrs. Pennington was home
+the next time he went, and he asked her about her new girl. To
+his surprise the good lady was unusually reticent. She
+couldn't really say very much about Nelly. No, she didn't
+belong anywhere near Riverside. In fact, she&mdash;Mrs. Pennington&mdash;didn't
+think she had any settled home at present. Her
+father was travelling over the country somewhere. Nelly was
+a good little girl, and very obliging. Beyond this Winslow
+could get no more information, so he went around and talked
+to Nelly, who was sitting on the bench under the poplars and
+seemed absorbed in watching the sunset.</p>
+
+<p>She dropped her g's badly and made some grammatical
+errors that caused Winslow's flesh to creep on his bones. But
+any man could have forgiven mistakes from such dimpled
+lips in such a sweet voice.</p>
+
+<p>He asked her to go for a row up the river in the twilight and
+she assented; she handled an oar very well, he found out, and
+the exercise became her. Winslow tried to get her to talk
+about herself, but failed signally and had to content himself
+with Mrs. Pennington's meagre information. He told her
+about himself frankly enough&mdash;how he had had fever in the
+spring and had been ordered to spend the summer in the
+country and do nothing useful until his health was fully
+restored, and how lonesome it was in Riverside in general and
+at the Beckwith farm in particular. He made out quite a dismal
+case for himself and if Nelly wasn't sorry for him, she
+should have been.</p>
+
+<br />
+<hr style="width: 15%;" />
+<br />
+
+<p>At the end of a fortnight Riverside folks began to talk
+about Winslow and the Penningtons' hired girl. He was
+reported to be "dead gone" on her; he took her out rowing
+every evening, drove her to preaching up the Bend on Sunday
+nights, and haunted the Pennington farmhouse. Wise folks
+shook their heads over it and wondered that Mrs. Pennington
+allowed it. Winslow was a gentleman, and that Nelly Ray,
+whom nobody knew anything about, not even where she
+came from, was only a common hired girl, and he had no business
+to be hanging about her. She was pretty, to be sure; but
+she was absurdly stuck-up and wouldn't associate with other
+Riverside "help" at all. Well, pride must have a fall; there
+must be something queer about her when she was so awful
+sly as to her past life.</p>
+
+<p>Winslow and Nelly did not trouble themselves in the least
+over all this gossip; in fact, they never even heard it. Winslow
+was hopelessly in love, when he found this out he was aghast.
+He thought of his father, the ambitious railroad magnate; of
+his mother, the brilliant society leader; of his sisters, the
+beautiful and proud; he was honestly frightened. It would
+never do; he must not go to see Nelly again. He kept this prudent
+resolution for twenty-four hours and then rowed over to
+the West shore. He found Nelly sitting on the bank in her old
+faded print dress and he straightway forgot everything he
+ought to have remembered.</p>
+
+<p>Nelly herself never seemed to be conscious of the social
+gulf between them. At least she never alluded to it in any way,
+and accepted Winslow's attentions as if she had a perfect right
+to them. She had broken the record by staying with Mrs.
+Pennington four weeks, and even the cats were in subjection.</p>
+
+<p>Winslow was well enough to have gone back to the city
+and, in fact, his father was writing for him. But he couldn't
+leave Beckwiths', apparently. At any rate he stayed on and
+met Nelly every day and cursed himself for a cad and a cur and
+a weak-brained idiot.</p>
+
+<p>One day he took Nelly for a row up the river. They went
+further than usual around the Bend. Winslow didn't want to
+go too far, for he knew that a party of his city friends,
+chaperoned by Mrs. Keyton-Wells, were having a picnic
+somewhere up along the river shore that day. But Nelly
+insisted on going on and on, and of course she had her way.
+When they reached a little pine-fringed headland they came
+upon the picnickers, within a stone's throw. Everybody
+recognized Winslow. "Why, there is Burton!" he heard Mrs.
+Keyton-Wells exclaim, and he knew she was putting up her
+glasses. Will Evans, who was an especial chum of his, ran
+down to the water's edge. "Bless me, Win, where did you
+come from? Come right in. We haven't had tea yet. Bring your
+friend too," he added, becoming conscious that Winslow's
+friend was a mighty pretty girl. Winslow's face was crimson.
+He avoided Nelly's eye.</p>
+
+<p>"Are them people friends of yours?" she asked in a low
+tone.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," he muttered.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, let us go ashore if they want us to," she said calmly.
+"I don't mind."</p>
+
+<p>For three seconds Winslow hesitated. Then he pulled
+ashore and helped Nelly to alight on a jutting rock. There was
+a curious, set expression about his fine mouth as he marched
+Nelly up to Mrs. Keyton-Wells and introduced her. Mrs.
+Keyton-Wells's greeting was slightly cool, but very polite.
+She supposed Miss Ray was some little country girl with
+whom Burton Winslow was carrying on a summer flirtation;
+respectable enough, no doubt, and must be treated civilly, but
+of course wouldn't expect to be made an equal of exactly. The
+other women took their cue from her, but the men were more
+cordial. Miss Ray might be shabby, but she was distinctly
+fetching, and Winslow looked savage.</p>
+
+<p>Nelly was not a whit abashed, seemingly, by the fashionable
+circle in which she found herself, and she talked away to
+Will Evans and the others in her soft drawl as if she had
+known them all her life. All might have gone passably well,
+had not a little Riverside imp, by name of Rufus Hent, who
+had been picked up by the picnickers to run their errands,
+come up just then with a pail of water.</p>
+
+<p>"Golly!" he ejaculated in very audible tones. "If there ain't
+Mrs. Pennington's hired girl!"</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Keyton-Wells stiffened with horror. Winslow darted
+a furious glance at the tell-tale that would have annihilated
+anything except a small boy. Will Evans grinned and went on
+talking to Nelly, who had failed to hear, or at least to heed, the
+exclamation.</p>
+
+<p>The mischief was done, the social thermometer went
+down to zero in Nelly's neighbourhood. The women ignored
+her altogether. Winslow set his teeth together and registered
+a mental vow to wring Rufus Hent's sunburned neck at the
+first opportunity. He escorted Nelly to the table and waited
+on her with ostentatious deference, while Mrs. Keyton-Wells
+glanced at him stonily and made up her mind to tell his
+mother when she went home.</p>
+
+<p>Nelly's social ostracism did not affect her appetite. But
+after lunch was over, she walked down to the skiff. Winslow
+followed her.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you want to go home?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, it's time I went, for the cats may be raidin' the pantry.
+But you must not come; your friends here want you."</p>
+
+<p>"Nonsense!" said Winslow sulkily. "If you are going I
+am too."</p>
+
+<p>But Nelly was too quick for him; she sprang into the skiff,
+unwound the rope, and pushed off before he guessed her
+intention.</p>
+
+<p>"I can row myself home and I mean to," she announced,
+taking up the oars defiantly.</p>
+
+<p>"Nelly," he implored.</p>
+
+<p>Nelly looked at him wickedly.</p>
+
+<p>"You'd better go back to your friends. That old woman
+with the eyeglasses is watchin' you."</p>
+
+<p>Winslow said something strong under his breath as he
+went back to the others. Will Evans and his chums began to
+chaff him about Nelly, but he looked so dangerous that they
+concluded to stop. There is no denying that Winslow was in a
+fearful temper just then with Mrs. Keyton-Wells, Evans, himself,
+Nelly&mdash;in fact, with all the world.</p>
+
+<p>His friends drove him home in the evening on their way to
+the station and dropped him at the Beckwith farm. At dusk he
+went moodily down to the shore. Far up the Bend was dim and
+shadowy and stars were shining above the wooded shores.
+Over the river the Pennington farmhouse lights twinkled out
+alluringly. Winslow watched them until he could stand it no
+longer. Nelly had made off with his skiff, but Perry Beckwith's
+dory was ready to hand. In five minutes, Winslow was
+grounding her on the West shore. Nelly was sitting on a rock
+at the landing place. He went over and sat down silently
+beside her. A full moon was rising above the dark hills up the
+Bend and in the faint light the girl was wonderfully lovely.</p>
+
+<p>"I thought you weren't comin' over at all tonight," she
+said, smiling up at him, "and I was sorry, because I wanted to
+say goodbye to you."</p>
+
+<p>"Goodbye? Nelly, you're not going away?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. The cats were in the pantry when I got home."</p>
+
+<p>"Nelly!"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, to be serious. I'm not goin' for that, but I really am
+goin'. I had a letter from Dad this evenin'. Did you have a good
+time after I left this afternoon? Did Mrs. Keyton-Wells thaw
+out?"</p>
+
+<p>"Hang Mrs. Keyton-Wells! Nelly, where are you going?"</p>
+
+<p>"To Dad, of course. We used to live down south together,
+but two months ago we broke up housekeepin' and come
+north. We thought we could do better up here, you know. Dad
+started out to look for a place to settle down and I came here
+while he was prospectin'. He's got a house now, he says, and
+wants me to go right off. I'm goin' tomorrow."</p>
+
+<p>"Nelly, you mustn't go&mdash;you mustn't, I tell you,"
+exclaimed Winslow in despair. "I love you&mdash;I love you&mdash;you
+must stay with me forever."</p>
+
+<p>"You don't know what you're sayin', Mr. Winslow," said
+Nelly coldly. "Why, you can't marry me&mdash;a common servant
+girl."</p>
+
+<p>"I can and I will, if you'll have me," answered Winslow
+recklessly. "I can't ever let you go. I've loved you ever since I
+first saw you. Nelly, won't you be my wife? Don't you love
+me?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, yes, I do," confessed Nelly suddenly; and then it
+was fully five minutes before Winslow gave her a chance to
+say anything else.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, what will your people say?" she contrived to ask at
+last. "Won't they be in a dreadful state? Oh, it will never do
+for you to marry me."</p>
+
+<p>"Won't it?" said Winslow in a tone of satisfaction. "I
+rather think it will. Of course, my family will rampage a bit at
+first. I daresay Father'll turn me out. Don't worry over that,
+Nelly. I'm not afraid of work. I'm not afraid of anything
+except losing you."</p>
+
+<p>"You'll have to see what Dad says," remarked Nelly, after
+another eloquent interlude.</p>
+
+<p>"He won't object, will he? I'll write to him or go and see
+him. Where is he?"</p>
+
+<p>"He is in town at the Arlington."</p>
+
+<p>"The Arlington!" Winslow was amazed. The Arlington
+was the most exclusive and expensive hotel in town.</p>
+
+<p>"What is he doing there?"</p>
+
+<p>"Transacting a real estate or railroad deal with your father,
+I believe, or something of that sort."</p>
+
+<p>"Nelly!"</p>
+
+<p>"Well?"</p>
+
+<p>"What do you mean?"</p>
+
+<p>"Just what I say."</p>
+
+<p>Winslow got up and looked at her.</p>
+
+<p>"Nelly, who are you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Helen Ray Scott, at your service, sir."</p>
+
+<p>"Not Helen Ray Scott, the daughter of the railroad king?"</p>
+
+<p>"The same. Are you sorry that you're engaged to her? If
+you are, she'll stay Nelly Ray."</p>
+
+<p>Winslow dropped back on the seat with a long breath.</p>
+
+<p>"Nelly, I don't understand. Why did you deceive me? I feel
+stunned."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, do forgive me," she said merrily. "I shouldn't have, I
+suppose&mdash;but you know you took me for the hired girl the
+very first time you saw me, and you patronized me and called
+me Nelly; so I let you think so just for fun. I never thought it
+would come to this. When Father and I came north I took a
+fancy to come here and stay with Mrs. Pennington&mdash;who is an
+old nurse of mine&mdash;until Father decided where to take up our
+abode. I got here the night before we met. My trunk was
+delayed so I put on an old cotton dress her niece had left here&mdash;and
+you came and saw me. I made Mrs. Pennington keep the
+secret&mdash;she thought it great fun; and I really was a great hand
+to do little chores and keep the cats in subjection too. I made
+mistakes in grammar and dropped my g's on purpose&mdash;it was
+such fun to see you wince when I did it. It was cruel to tease
+you so, I suppose, but it was so sweet just to be loved for
+myself&mdash;not because I was an heiress and a belle&mdash;I couldn't
+bear to tell you the truth. Did you think I couldn't read your
+thoughts this afternoon, when I insisted on going ashore? You
+were a little ashamed of me&mdash;you know you were. I didn't
+blame you for that, but if you hadn't gone ashore and taken
+me as you did I would never have spoken to you again. Mrs.
+Keyton-Wells won't snub me next time we meet. And some
+way I don't think your father will turn you out, either. Have
+you forgiven me yet, Burton?"</p>
+
+<p>"I shall never call you anything but Nelly," said Winslow
+irrelevantly.</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="The_Red_Room" id="The_Red_Room"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>The Red Room<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>You would have me tell you the story, Grandchild?
+'Tis a sad one and best forgotten&mdash;few remember it
+now. There are always sad and dark stories in old
+families such as ours.</p>
+
+<p>Yet I have promised and must keep my word. So
+sit down here at my feet and rest your bright head
+on my lap, that I may not see in your young eyes
+the shadows my story will bring across their bonny
+blue.</p>
+
+<p>I was a mere child when it all happened, yet I
+remember it but too well, and I can recall how
+pleased I was when my father's stepmother, Mrs.
+Montressor&mdash;she not liking to be called grandmother,
+seeing she was but turned of fifty and a
+handsome woman still&mdash;wrote to my mother that
+she must send little Beatrice up to Montressor Place
+for the Christmas holidays. So I went joyfully
+though my mother grieved to part with me; she
+had little to love save me, my father, Conrad
+Montressor, having been lost at sea when but three
+months wed.</p>
+
+<p>My aunts were wont to tell me how much I resembled
+him, being, so they said, a Montressor to
+the backbone; and this I took to mean commendation,
+for the Montressors were a well-descended
+and well-thought-of family, and the women were
+noted for their beauty. This I could well believe,
+since of all my aunts there was not one but was
+counted a pretty woman. Therefore I took heart of
+grace when I thought of my dark face and spindling
+shape, hoping that when I should be grown
+up I might be counted not unworthy of my race.</p>
+
+<p>The Place was an old-fashioned, mysterious
+house, such as I delighted in, and Mrs. Montressor
+was ever kind to me, albeit a little stern, for she was
+a proud woman and cared but little for children,
+having none of her own.</p>
+
+<p>But there were books there to pore over without
+let or hindrance&mdash;for nobody questioned of my
+whereabouts if I but kept out of the way&mdash;and
+strange, dim family portraits on the walls to gaze
+upon, until I knew each proud old face well, and
+had visioned a history for it in my own mind&mdash;for I
+was given to dreaming and was older and wiser
+than my years, having no childish companions to
+keep me still a child.</p>
+
+<p>There were always some of my aunts at the Place
+to kiss and make much of me for my father's sake&mdash;for
+he had been their favourite brother. My aunts&mdash;there
+were eight of them&mdash;had all married well, so
+said people who knew, and lived not far away, coming
+home often to take tea with Mrs. Montressor,
+who had always gotten on well with her step-daughters,
+or to help prepare for some festivity or
+other&mdash;for they were notable housekeepers, every
+one.</p>
+
+<p>They were all at Montressor Place for Christmas,
+and I got more petting than I deserved, albeit they
+looked after me somewhat more strictly than did
+Mrs. Montressor, and saw to it that I did not read
+too many fairy tales or sit up later at nights than
+became my years.</p>
+
+<p>But it was not for fairy tales and sugarplums nor
+yet for petting that I rejoiced to be at the Place at
+that time. Though I spoke not of it to anyone, I had
+a great longing to see my Uncle Hugh's wife, concerning
+whom I had heard much, both good and
+bad.</p>
+
+<p>My Uncle Hugh, albeit the oldest of the family,
+had never married until now, and all the countryside
+rang with talk of his young wife. I did not
+hear as much as I wished, for the gossips took heed
+to my presence when I drew anear and turned to
+other matters. Yet, being somewhat keener of comprehension
+than they knew, I heard and understood
+not a little of their talk.</p>
+
+<p>And so I came to know that neither proud Mrs.
+Montressor nor my good aunts, nor even my gentle
+mother, looked with overmuch favour on what
+my Uncle Hugh had done. And I did hear that Mrs.
+Montressor had chosen a wife for her stepson, of
+good family and some beauty, but that my Uncle
+Hugh would have none of her&mdash;a thing Mrs. Montressor
+found hard to pardon, yet might so have done had
+not my uncle, on his last voyage to the Indies&mdash;for he
+went often in his own vessels&mdash;married and brought
+home a foreign bride, of whom no one knew aught
+save that her beauty was a thing to dazzle the day
+and that she was of some strange alien blood such as
+ran not in the blue veins of the Montressors.</p>
+
+<p>Some had much to say of her pride and insolence,
+and wondered if Mrs. Montressor would
+tamely yield her mistress-ship to the stranger. But
+others, who were taken with her loveliness and
+grace, said that the tales told were born of envy and
+malice, and that Alicia Montressor was well worthy
+of her name and station.</p>
+
+<p>So I halted between two opinions and thought to
+judge for myself, but when I went to the Place my
+Uncle Hugh and his bride were gone for a time,
+and I had even to swallow my disappointment and
+bide their return with all my small patience.</p>
+
+<p>But my aunts and their stepmother talked much
+of Alicia, and they spoke slightingly of her, saying
+that she was but a light woman and that no good
+would come of my Uncle Hugh's having wed her,
+with other things of a like nature. Also they spoke
+of the company she gathered around her, thinking
+her to have strange and unbecoming companions
+for a Montressor. All this I heard and pondered
+much over, although my good aunts supposed that
+such a chit as I would take no heed to their whisperings.</p>
+
+<p>When I was not with them, helping to whip eggs
+and stone raisins, and being watched to see that I
+ate not more than one out of five, I was surely to be
+found in the wing hall, poring over my book and
+grieving that I was no more allowed to go into the
+Red Room.</p>
+
+<p>The wing hall was a narrow one and dim, connecting
+the main rooms of the Place with an older
+wing, built in a curious way. The hall was lighted
+by small, square-paned windows, and at its end a
+little flight of steps led up to the Red Room.</p>
+
+<p>Whenever I had been at the Place before&mdash;and this
+was often&mdash;I had passed much of my time in this
+same Red Room. It was Mrs. Montressor's sitting-room
+then, where she wrote her letters and examined
+household accounts, and sometimes had an
+old gossip in to tea. The room was low-ceilinged
+and dim, hung with red damask, and with odd,
+square windows high up under the eaves and a
+dark wainscoting all around it. And there I loved to
+sit quietly on the red sofa and read my fairy tales,
+or talk dreamily to the swallows fluttering crazily
+against the tiny panes.</p>
+
+<p>When I had gone this Christmas to the Place I
+soon bethought myself of the Red Room&mdash;for I had
+a great love for it. But I had got no further than the
+steps when Mrs. Montressor came sweeping down
+the hall in haste and, catching me by the arm,
+pulled me back as roughly as if it had been Bluebeard's
+chamber itself into which I was venturing.</p>
+
+<p>Then, seeing my face, which I doubt not was
+startled enough, she seemed to repent of her haste
+and patted me gently on the head.</p>
+
+<p>"There, there, little Beatrice! Did I frighten you,
+child? Forgive an old woman's thoughtlessness.
+But be not too ready to go where you are not bidden,
+and never venture foot in the Red Room now,
+for it belongs to your Uncle Hugh's wife, and let me
+tell you she is not over fond of intruders."</p>
+
+<p>I felt sorry overmuch to hear this, nor could I see
+why my new aunt should care if I went in once in a
+while, as had been my habit, to talk to the swallows
+and misplace nothing. But Mrs. Montressor saw to
+it that I obeyed her, and I went no more to the Red
+Room, but busied myself with other matters.</p>
+
+<p>For there were great doings at the Place and
+much coming and going. My aunts were never idle;
+there was to be much festivity Christmas week and
+a ball on Christmas Eve. And my aunts had promised
+me&mdash;though not till I had wearied them of my
+coaxing&mdash;that I should stay up that night and see
+as much of the gaiety as was good for me. So I did
+their errands and went early to bed every night
+without complaint&mdash;though I did this the more
+readily for that, when they thought me safely
+asleep, they would come in and talk around my
+bedroom fire, saying that of Alicia which I should
+not have heard.</p>
+
+<p>At last came the day when my Uncle Hugh and
+his wife were expected home&mdash;though not until
+my scanty patience was well nigh wearied out&mdash;and
+we were all assembled to meet them in the
+great hall, where a ruddy firelight was gleaming.</p>
+
+<p>My Aunt Frances had dressed me in my best
+white frock and my crimson sash, with much lamenting
+over my skinny neck and arms, and bade
+me behave prettily, as became my bringing up. So I
+slipped in a corner, my hands and feet cold with
+excitement, for I think every drop of blood in my
+body had gone to my head, and my heart beat so
+hardly that it even pained me.</p>
+
+<p>Then the door opened and Alicia&mdash;for so I was
+used to hearing her called, nor did I ever think of
+her as my aunt in my own mind&mdash;came in, and a
+little in the rear my tall, dark uncle.</p>
+
+<p>She came proudly forward to the fire and stood
+there superbly while she loosened her cloak, nor
+did she see me at all at first, but nodded, a little
+disdainfully, it seemed, to Mrs. Montressor and my
+aunts, who were grouped about the drawing-room
+door, very ladylike and quiet.</p>
+
+<p>But I neither saw nor heard aught at the time
+save her only, for her beauty, when she came forth
+from her crimson cloak and hood, was something
+so wonderful that I forgot my manners and stared
+at her as one fascinated&mdash;as indeed I was, for never
+had I seen such loveliness and hardly dreamed it.</p>
+
+<p>Pretty women I had seen in plenty, for my aunts
+and my mother were counted fair, but my uncle's
+wife was as little like to them as a sunset glow to
+pale moonshine or a crimson rose to white day-lilies.</p>
+
+<p>Nor can I paint her to you in words as I saw her
+then, with the long tongues of firelight licking her
+white neck and wavering over the rich masses of
+her red-gold hair.</p>
+
+<p>She was tall&mdash;so tall that my aunts looked but
+insignificant beside her, and they were of no mean
+height, as became their race; yet no queen could
+have carried herself more royally, and all the passion
+and fire of her foreign nature burned in her
+splendid eyes, that might have been dark or light
+for aught that I could ever tell, but which seemed
+always like pools of warm flame, now tender, now
+fierce.</p>
+
+<p>Her skin was like a delicate white rose leaf, and
+when she spoke I told my foolish self that never
+had I heard music before; nor do I ever again think
+to hear a voice so sweet, so liquid, as that which
+rippled over her ripe lips.</p>
+
+<p>I had often in my own mind pictured this, my
+first meeting with Alicia, now in one way, now in
+another, but never had I dreamed of her speaking
+to me at all, so that it came to me as a great surprise
+when she turned and, holding out her lovely
+hands, said very graciously:</p>
+
+<p>"And is this the little Beatrice? I have heard much
+of you&mdash;come, kiss me, child."</p>
+
+<p>And I went, despite my Aunt Elizabeth's black
+frown, for the glamour of her loveliness was upon
+me, and I no longer wondered that my Uncle Hugh
+should have loved her.</p>
+
+<p>Very proud of her was he too; yet I felt, rather
+than saw&mdash;for I was sensitive and quick of perception,
+as old-young children ever are&mdash;that there
+was something other than pride and love in his face
+when he looked on her, and more in his manner
+than the fond lover&mdash;as it were, a sort of lurking
+mistrust.</p>
+
+<p>Nor could I think, though to me the thought
+seemed as treason, that she loved her husband
+overmuch, for she seemed half condescending and
+half disdainful to him; yet one thought not of this
+in her presence, but only remembered it when she
+had gone.</p>
+
+<p>When she went out it seemed to me that nothing
+was left, so I crept lonesomely away to the wing
+hall and sat down by a window to dream of her;
+and she filled my thoughts so fully that it was no
+surprise when I raised my eyes and saw her coming
+down the hall alone, her bright head shining
+against the dark old walls.</p>
+
+<p>When she paused by me and asked me lightly of
+what I was dreaming, since I had such a sober face,
+I answered her truly that it was of her&mdash;whereat
+she laughed, as one not ill pleased, and said half
+mockingly:</p>
+
+<p>"Waste not your thoughts so, little Beatrice. But
+come with me, child, if you will, for I have taken a
+strange fancy to your solemn eyes. Perchance the
+warmth of your young life may thaw out the ice
+that has frozen around my heart ever since I came
+among these cold Montressors."</p>
+
+<p>And, though I understood not her meaning, I
+went, glad to see the Red Room once more. So she
+made me sit down and talk to her, which I did, for
+shyness was no failing of mine; and she asked me
+many questions, and some that I thought she
+should not have asked, but I could not answer
+them, so 'twere little harm.</p>
+
+<p>After that I spent a part of every day with her in
+the Red Room. And my Uncle Hugh was there
+often, and he would kiss her and praise her loveliness,
+not heeding my presence&mdash;for I was but a
+child.</p>
+
+<p>Yet it ever seemed to me that she endured rather
+than welcomed his caresses, and at times the ever-burning
+flame in her eyes glowed so luridly that a
+chill dread would creep over me, and I would remember
+what my Aunt Elizabeth had said, she
+being a bitter-tongued woman, though kind at
+heart&mdash;that this strange creature would bring on us
+all some evil fortune yet.</p>
+
+<p>Then would I strive to banish such thoughts and
+chide myself for doubting one so kind to me.</p>
+
+<p>When Christmas Eve drew nigh my silly head
+was full of the ball day and night. But a grievous
+disappointment befell me, for I awakened that day
+very ill with a most severe cold; and though I bore
+me bravely, my aunts discovered it soon, when, despite
+my piteous pleadings, I was put to bed,
+where I cried bitterly and would not be comforted.
+For I thought I should not see the fine folk and,
+more than all, Alicia.</p>
+
+<p>But that disappointment, at least, was spared
+me, for at night she came into my room, knowing
+of my longing&mdash;she was ever indulgent to my little
+wishes. And when I saw her I forgot my aching
+limbs and burning brow, and even the ball I was
+not to see, for never was mortal creature so lovely
+as she, standing there by my bed.</p>
+
+<p>Her gown was of white, and there was nothing I
+could liken the stuff to save moonshine falling
+athwart a frosted pane, and out from it swelled her
+gleaming breast and arms, so bare that it seemed to
+me a shame to look upon them. Yet it could not be
+denied they were of wondrous beauty, white as
+polished marble.</p>
+
+<p>And all about her snowy throat and rounded
+arms, and in the masses of her splendid hair, were
+sparkling, gleaming stones, with hearts of pure
+light, which I know now to have been diamonds,
+but knew not then, for never had I seen aught of
+their like.</p>
+
+<p>And I gazed at her, drinking in her beauty until
+my soul was filled, as she stood like some goddess
+before her worshipper. I think she read my thought
+in my face and liked it&mdash;for she was a vain woman,
+and to such even the admiration of a child is sweet.</p>
+
+<p>Then she leaned down to me until her splendid
+eyes looked straight into my dazzled ones.</p>
+
+<p>"Tell me, little Beatrice&mdash;for they say the word of
+a child is to be believed&mdash;tell me, do you think me
+beautiful?"</p>
+
+<p>I found my voice and told her truly that I thought
+her beautiful beyond my dreams of angels&mdash;as
+indeed she was. Whereat she smiled as one well
+pleased.</p>
+
+<p>Then my Uncle Hugh came in, and though I
+thought that his face darkened as he looked on the
+naked splendour of her breast and arms, as if he
+liked not that the eyes of other men should gloat on
+it, yet he kissed her with all a lover's fond pride,
+while she looked at him half mockingly.</p>
+
+<p>Then said he, "Sweet, will you grant me a
+favour?"</p>
+
+<p>And she answered, "It may be that I will."</p>
+
+<p>And he said, "Do not dance with that man tonight,
+Alicia. I mistrust him much."</p>
+
+<p>His voice had more of a husband's command
+than a lover's entreaty. She looked at him with
+some scorn, but when she saw his face grow
+black&mdash;for the Montressors brooked scant disregard
+of their authority, as I had good reason to
+know&mdash;she seemed to change, and a smile came to
+her lips, though her eyes glowed balefully.</p>
+
+<p>Then she laid her arms about his neck and&mdash;though
+it seemed to me that she had as soon strangled
+as embraced him&mdash;her voice was wondrous
+sweet and caressing as she murmured in his ear.</p>
+
+<p>He laughed and his brow cleared, though he said
+still sternly, "Do not try me too far, Alicia."</p>
+
+<p>Then they went out, she a little in advance and
+very stately.</p>
+
+<p>After that my aunts also came in, very beautifully
+and modestly dressed, but they seemed to me as
+nothing after Alicia. For I was caught in the snare of
+her beauty, and the longing to see her again so
+grew upon me that after a time I did an undutiful
+and disobedient thing.</p>
+
+<p>I had been straitly charged to stay in bed, which I
+did not, but got up and put on a gown. For it was in
+my mind to go quietly down, if by chance I might
+again see Alicia, myself unseen.</p>
+
+<p>But when I reached the great hall I heard steps
+approaching and, having a guilty conscience, I
+slipped aside into the blue parlour and hid me behind
+the curtains lest my aunts should see me.</p>
+
+<p>Then Alicia came in, and with her a man whom I
+had never before seen. Yet I instantly bethought
+myself of a lean black snake, with a glittering and
+evil eye, which I had seen in Mrs. Montressor's
+garden two summers agone, and which was like to
+have bitten me. John, the gardener, had killed it,
+and I verily thought that if it had a soul, it must
+have gotten into this man.</p>
+
+<p>Alicia sat down and he beside her, and when he
+had put his arms about her, he kissed her face and
+lips. Nor did she shrink from his embrace, but even
+smiled and leaned nearer to him with a little
+smooth motion, as they talked to each other in
+some strange, foreign tongue.</p>
+
+<p>I was but a child and innocent, nor knew I aught
+of honour and dishonour. Yet it seemed to me that
+no man should kiss her save only my Uncle Hugh,
+and from that hour I mistrusted Alicia, though I
+understood not then what I afterwards did.</p>
+
+<p>And as I watched them&mdash;not thinking of playing
+the spy&mdash;I saw her face grow suddenly cold, and
+she straightened herself up and pushed away her
+lover's arms.</p>
+
+<p>Then I followed her guilty eyes to the door,
+where stood my Uncle Hugh, and all the pride and
+passion of the Montressors sat on his lowering
+brow. Yet he came forward quietly as Alicia and the
+snake drew apart and stood up.</p>
+
+<p>At first he looked not at his guilty wife but at her
+lover, and smote him heavily in the face. Whereat
+he, being a coward at heart, as are all villains,
+turned white and slunk from the room with a muttered
+oath, nor was he stayed.</p>
+
+<p>My uncle turned to Alicia, and very calmly and
+terribly he said, "From this hour you are no longer
+wife of mine!"</p>
+
+<p>And there was that in his tone which told that his
+forgiveness and love should be hers nevermore.</p>
+
+<p>Then he motioned her out and she went, like a
+proud queen, with her glorious head erect and no
+shame on her brow.</p>
+
+<p>As for me, when they were gone I crept away,
+dazed and bewildered enough, and went back to
+my bed, having seen and heard more than I had a
+mind for, as disobedient people and eavesdroppers
+ever do.</p>
+
+<p>But my Uncle Hugh kept his word, and Alicia
+was no more wife to him, save only in name. Yet of
+gossip or scandal there was none, for the pride of
+his race kept secret his dishonour, nor did he ever
+seem other than a courteous and respectful husband.</p>
+
+<p>Nor did Mrs. Montressor and my aunts, though
+they wondered much among themselves, learn
+aught, for they dared question neither their brother
+nor Alicia, who carried herself as loftily as ever,
+and seemed to pine for neither lover nor husband.
+As for me, no one dreamed I knew aught of it, and
+I kept my own counsel as to what I had seen in the
+blue parlour on the night of the Christmas ball.</p>
+
+<p>After the New Year I went home, but ere long
+Mrs. Montressor sent for me again, saying that the
+house was lonely without little Beatrice. So I went
+again and found all unchanged, though the Place
+was very quiet, and Alicia went out but little from
+the Red Room.</p>
+
+<p>Of my Uncle Hugh I saw little, save when he
+went and came on the business of his estate, somewhat
+more gravely and silently than of yore, or
+brought to me books and sweetmeats from town.</p>
+
+<p>But every day I was with Alicia in the Red Room,
+where she would talk to me, oftentimes wildly and
+strangely, but always kindly. And though I think
+Mrs. Montressor liked our intimacy none too well,
+she said no word, and I came and went as I listed
+with Alicia, though never quite liking her strange
+ways and the restless fire in her eyes.</p>
+
+<p>Nor would I ever kiss her, after I had seen her
+lips pressed by the snake's, though she sometimes
+coaxed me, and grew pettish and vexed when I
+would not; but she guessed not my reason.</p>
+
+<p>March came in that year like a lion, exceedingly
+hungry and fierce, and my Uncle Hugh had ridden
+away through the storm nor thought to be back for
+some days.</p>
+
+<p>In the afternoon I was sitting in the wing hall,
+dreaming wondrous day-dreams, when Alicia
+called me to the Red Room. And as I went, I marvelled
+anew at her loveliness, for the blood was
+leaping in her face and her jewels were dim before
+the lustre of her eyes. Her hand, when she took
+mine, was burning hot, and her voice had a strange
+ring.</p>
+
+<p>"Come, little Beatrice," she said, "come talk to
+me, for I know not what to do with my lone self
+today. Time hangs heavily in this gloomy house. I
+do verily think this Red Room has an evil influence
+over me. See if your childish prattle can drive away
+the ghosts that riot in these dark old corners&mdash;ghosts
+of a ruined and shamed life! Nay, shrink
+not&mdash;do I talk wildly? I mean not all I say&mdash;my
+brain seems on fire, little Beatrice. Come; it may be
+you know some grim old legend of this room&mdash;it
+must surely have one. Never was place fitter for a
+dark deed! Tush! never be so frightened, child&mdash;forget
+my vagaries. Tell me now and I will listen."</p>
+
+<p>Whereat she cast herself lithely on the satin
+couch and turned her lovely face on me. So I
+gathered up my small wits and told her what I was
+not supposed to know&mdash;how that, generations
+agone, a Montressor had disgraced himself and his
+name, and that, when he came home to his mother,
+she had met him in that same Red Room and flung
+at him taunts and reproaches, forgetting whose
+breast had nourished him; and that he, frantic with
+shame and despair, turned his sword against his
+own heart and so died. But his mother went mad
+with her remorse, and was kept a prisoner in the
+Red Room until her death.</p>
+
+<p>So lamely told I the tale, as I had heard my Aunt
+Elizabeth tell it, when she knew not I listened or
+understood. Alicia heard me through and said
+nothing, save that it was a tale worthy of the
+Montressors. Whereat I bridled, for I too was a
+Montressor, and proud of it.</p>
+
+<p>But she took my hand soothingly in hers and
+said, "Little Beatrice, if tomorrow or the next day
+they should tell you, those cold, proud women,
+that Alicia was unworthy of your love, tell me,
+would you believe them?"</p>
+
+<p>And I, remembering what I had seen in the blue
+parlour, was silent&mdash;for I could not lie. So she flung
+my hand away with a bitter laugh, and picked
+lightly from the table anear a small dagger with a
+jewelled handle.</p>
+
+<p>It seemed to me a cruel-looking toy and I said
+so&mdash;whereat she smiled and drew her white fingers
+down the thin, shining blade in a fashion that
+made me cold.</p>
+
+<p>"Such a little blow with this," she said, "such a
+little blow&mdash;and the heart beats no longer, the
+weary brain rests, the lips and eyes smile never
+again! 'Twere a short path out of all difficulties, my
+Beatrice."</p>
+
+<p>And I, understanding her not, yet shivering,
+begged her to cast it aside, which she did carelessly
+and, putting a hand under my chin, she turned up
+my face to hers.</p>
+
+<p>"Little, grave-eyed Beatrice, tell me truly, would
+it grieve you much if you were never again to sit
+here with Alicia in this same Red Room?"</p>
+
+<p>And I made answer earnestly that it would, glad
+that I could say so much truly. Then her face grew
+tender and she sighed deeply.</p>
+
+<p>Presently she opened a quaint, inlaid box and
+took from it a shining gold chain of rare workmanship
+and exquisite design, and this she hung
+around my neck, nor would suffer me to thank her
+but laid her hand gently on my lips.</p>
+
+<p>"Now go," she said. "But ere you leave me, little
+Beatrice, grant me but the one favour&mdash;it may be
+that I shall never ask another of you. Your people, I
+know&mdash;those cold Montressors&mdash;care little for me,
+but with all my faults, I have ever been kind to you.
+So, when the morrow's come, and they tell you
+that Alicia is as one worse than dead, think not of
+me with scorn only but grant me a little pity&mdash;for I
+was not always what I am now, and might never
+have become so had a little child like you been always
+anear me, to keep me pure and innocent.
+And I would have you but the once lay your arms
+about my neck and kiss me."</p>
+
+<p>And I did so, wondering much at her manner&mdash;for
+it had in it a strange tenderness and some sort
+of hopeless longing. Then she gently put me from
+the room, and I sat musing by the hall window until
+night fell darkly&mdash;and a fearsome night it was, of
+storm and blackness. And I thought how well it
+was that my Uncle Hugh had not to return in such
+a tempest. Yet, ere the thought had grown cold,
+the door opened and he strode down the hall, his
+cloak drenched and wind-twisted, in one hand a
+whip, as though he had but then sprung from his
+horse, in the other what seemed like a crumpled
+letter.</p>
+
+<p>Nor was the night blacker than his face, and he
+took no heed of me as I ran after him, thinking selfishly
+of the sweetmeats he had promised to bring
+me&mdash;but I thought no more of them when I got to
+the door of the Red Room.</p>
+
+<p>Alicia stood by the table, hooded and cloaked as
+for a journey, but her hood had slipped back, and
+her face rose from it marble-white, save where her
+wrathful eyes burned out, with dread and guilt and
+hatred in their depths, while she had one arm
+raised as if to thrust him back.</p>
+
+<p>As for my uncle, he stood before her and I saw
+not his face, but his voice was low and terrible,
+speaking words I understood not then, though
+long afterwards I came to know their meaning.</p>
+
+<p>And he cast foul scorn at her that she should
+have thought to fly with her lover, and swore that
+naught should again thwart his vengeance, with
+other threats, wild and dreadful enough.</p>
+
+<p>Yet she said no word until he had done, and then
+she spoke, but what she said I know not, save that
+it was full of hatred and defiance and wild accusation,
+such as a mad woman might have uttered.</p>
+
+<p>And she defied him even then to stop her flight,
+though he told her to cross that threshold would
+mean her death; for he was a wronged and desperate
+man and thought of nothing save his own dishonour.</p>
+
+<p>Then she made as if to pass him, but he caught
+her by her white wrist; she turned on him with
+fury, and I saw her right hand reach stealthily out
+over the table behind her, where lay the dagger.</p>
+
+<p>"Let me go!" she hissed.</p>
+
+<p>And he said, "I will not."</p>
+
+<p>Then she turned herself about and struck at him
+with the dagger&mdash;and never saw I such a face as
+was hers at the moment.</p>
+
+<p>He fell heavily, yet held her even in death, so that
+she had to wrench herself free, with a shriek that
+rings yet in my ears on a night when the wind
+wails over the rainy moors. She rushed past me unheeding,
+and fled down the hall like a hunted creature,
+and I heard the heavy door clang hollowly
+behind her.</p>
+
+<p>As for me, I stood there looking at the dead man,
+for I could neither move nor speak and was like to
+have died of horror. And presently I knew nothing,
+nor did I come to my recollection for many a day,
+when I lay abed, sick of a fever and more like to die
+than live.</p>
+
+<p>So that when at last I came out from the shadow
+of death, my Uncle Hugh had been long cold in his
+grave, and the hue and cry for his guilty wife was
+well nigh over, since naught had been seen or
+heard of her since she fled the country with her
+foreign lover.</p>
+
+<p>When I came rightly to my remembrance, they
+questioned me as to what I had seen and heard in
+the Red Room. And I told them as best I could,
+though much aggrieved that to my questions they
+would answer nothing save to bid me to stay still
+and think not of the matter.</p>
+
+<p>Then my mother, sorely vexed over my adventures&mdash;which
+in truth were but sorry ones for a
+child&mdash;took me home. Nor would she let me keep
+Alicia's chain, but made away with it, how I knew
+not and little cared, for the sight of it was loathsome
+to me.</p>
+
+<p>It was many years ere I went again to Montressor
+Place, and I never saw the Red Room more, for
+Mrs. Montressor had the old wing torn down,
+deeming its sorrowful memories dark heritage
+enough for the next Montressor.</p>
+
+<p>So, Grandchild, the sad tale is ended, and you
+will not see the Red Room when you go next
+month to Montressor Place. The swallows still
+build under the eaves, though&mdash;I know not if you
+will understand their speech as I did.</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="The_Setness_of" id="The_Setness_of"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>The Setness of Theodosia<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>When Theodosia Ford married Wesley Brooke
+after a courtship of three years, everybody concerned
+was satisfied. There was nothing particularly
+romantic in either the courtship or marriage.
+Wesley was a steady, well-meaning, rather slow
+fellow, comfortably off. He was not at all handsome.
+But Theodosia was a very pretty girl with
+the milky colouring of an auburn blonde and large
+china-blue eyes. She looked mild and Madonna-like
+and was known to be sweet-tempered. Wesley's
+older brother, Irving Brooke, had married a
+woman who kept him in hot water all the time,
+so Heatherton folks said, but they thought there
+was no fear of that with Wesley and Theodosia.
+They would get along together all right.</p>
+
+<p>Only old Jim Parmelee shook his head and said,
+"They might, and then again they mightn't"; he
+knew the stock they came of and it was a kind
+you could never predict about.</p>
+
+<p>Wesley and Theodosia were third cousins; this
+meant that old Henry Ford had been the great-great-grandfather
+of them both. Jim Parmelee,
+who was ninety, had been a small boy when this
+remote ancestor was still alive.</p>
+
+<p>"I mind him well," said old Jim on the morning
+of Theodosia's wedding day. There was a little
+group about the blacksmith's forge. Old Jim was
+in the centre. He was a fat, twinkling-eyed old
+man, fresh and ruddy in spite of his ninety years.
+"And," he went on, "he was about the settest
+man you'd ever see or want to see. When old
+Henry Ford made up his mind on any p'int a
+cyclone wouldn't turn him a hairsbreadth&mdash;no,
+nor an earthquake neither. Didn't matter a mite
+how much he suffered for it&mdash;he'd stick to it if it
+broke his heart. There was always some story or
+other going round about old Henry's setness. The
+family weren't quite so bad&mdash;only Tom. He was
+Dosia's great-grandfather, and a regular chip of
+the old block. Since then it's cropped out now
+and again all through the different branches of
+the family. I mistrust if Dosia hasn't got a spice
+of it, and Wes Brooke too, but mebbe not."</p>
+
+<p>Old Jim was the only croaker. Wesley and
+Theodosia were married, in the golden prime of
+the Indian summer, and settled down on their
+snug little farm. Dosia was a beautiful bride, and
+Wesley's pride in her was amusingly apparent.
+He thought nothing too good for her, the Heatherton
+people said. It was a sight to make an old
+heart young to see him march up the aisle of the
+church on Sunday in all the glossy splendour of
+his wedding suit, his curly black head held high
+and his round boyish face shining with happiness,
+stopping and turning proudly at his pew to
+show Theodosia in.</p>
+
+<p>They always sat alone together in the big pew,
+and Alma Spencer, who sat behind them, declared
+that they held each other's hands all through the
+service. This lasted until spring; then came a sensation
+and scandal, such as decorous Heatherton
+had not known since the time Isaac Allen got
+drunk at Centreville Fair and came home and
+kicked his wife.</p>
+
+<p>One evening in early April Wesley came home
+from the store at "the Corner," where he had
+lingered to talk over politics and farming methods
+with his cronies. This evening he was later than
+usual, and Theodosia had his supper kept warm
+for him. She met him on the porch and kissed
+him. He kissed her in return, and held her to him
+for a minute, with her bright head on his shoulder.
+The frogs were singing down in the south
+meadow swamp, and there was a splendour of
+silvery moonrise over the wooded Heatherton
+hills. Theodosia always remembered that
+moment.</p>
+
+<p>When they went in, Wesley, full of excitement,
+began to talk of what he had heard at the
+store. Ogden Greene and Tom Cary were going
+to sell out and go to Manitoba. There were better
+chances for a man out there, he said; in Heatherton
+he might slave all his life and never make
+more than a bare living. Out west he might make
+a fortune.</p>
+
+<p>Wesley talked on in this strain for some time,
+rehashing all the arguments he had heard Greene
+and Cary use. He had always been rather disposed
+to grumble at his limited chances in Heatherton,
+and now the great West seemed to stretch
+before him, full of alluring prospects and visions.
+Ogden and Tom wanted him to go too, he said.
+He had half a notion to. Heatherton was a stick-in-the-mud
+sort of place anyhow.</p>
+
+<p>"What say, Dosia?"</p>
+
+<p>He looked across the table at her, his eyes
+bright and questioning. Theodosia had listened in
+silence, as she poured his tea and passed him her
+hot, flaky biscuits. There was a little perpendicular
+wrinkle between her straight eyebrows.</p>
+
+<p>"I think Ogden and Tom are fools," she said
+crisply. "They have good farms here. What do
+they want to go west for, or you, either? Don't
+get silly notions in your head, Wes."</p>
+
+<p>Wesley flushed.</p>
+
+<p>"Wouldn't you go with me, Dosia?" he said,
+trying to speak lightly.</p>
+
+<p>"No, I wouldn't," said Theodosia, in her calm,
+sweet voice. Her face was serene, but the little
+wrinkle had grown deeper. Old Jim Parmelee
+would have known what it meant. He had seen
+the same expression on old Henry Ford's face
+many a time.</p>
+
+<p>Wesley laughed good-humouredly, as if at a
+child. His heart was suddenly set on going west,
+and he was sure he could soon bring Theodosia
+around. He did not say anything more about it
+just then. Wesley thought he knew how to manage
+women.</p>
+
+<p>When he broached the subject again, two days
+later, Theodosia told him plainly that it was no
+use. She would never consent to leave Heatherton
+and all her friends and go out to the prairies. The
+idea was just rank foolishness, and he would soon
+see that himself.</p>
+
+<p>All this Theodosia said calmly and sweetly,
+without any trace of temper or irritation. Wesley
+still believed that he could persuade her and he
+tried perseveringly for a fortnight. By the end of
+that time he discovered that Theodosia was not a
+great-great-granddaughter of old Henry Ford for
+nothing.</p>
+
+<p>Not that Theodosia ever got angry. Neither
+did she laugh at him. She met his arguments and
+pleadings seriously enough, but she never
+wavered.</p>
+
+<p>"If you go to Manitoba, Wes, you'll go alone,"
+she said. "I'll never go, so there is no use in any
+more talking."</p>
+
+<p>Wesley was a descendant of old Henry Ford
+too. Theodosia's unexpected opposition roused all
+the latent stubbornness of his nature. He went
+over to Centreville oftener, and kept his blood at
+fever heat talking to Greene and Cary, who
+wanted him to go with them and spared no pains
+at inducement.</p>
+
+<p>The matter was gossiped about in Heatherton,
+of course. People knew that Wesley Brooke had
+caught "the western fever," and wanted to sell
+out and go to Manitoba, while Theodosia was
+opposed to it. They thought Dosia would have to
+give in in the end, but said it was a pity Wes
+Brooke couldn't be contented to stay where he
+was well off.</p>
+
+<p>Theodosia's family naturally sided with her and
+tried to dissuade Wesley. But he was mastered
+by that resentful irritation, roused in a man by
+opposition where he thinks he should be master,
+which will drive him into any cause.</p>
+
+<p>One day he told Theodosia that he was going.
+She was working her butter in her little, snowy-clean
+dairy under the great willows by the well.
+Wesley was standing in the doorway, his stout,
+broad-shouldered figure filling up the sunlit space.
+He was frowning and sullen.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm going west in two weeks' time with the
+boys, Dosia," he said stubbornly. "You can come
+with me or stay here&mdash;just exactly as you please.
+But I'm going."</p>
+
+<p>Theodosia went on spatting her balls of golden
+butter on the print in silence. She was looking
+very neat and pretty in her big white apron, her
+sleeves rolled up high above her plump, dimpled
+elbows, and her ruddy hair curling about her face
+and her white throat. She looked as pliable as her
+butter.</p>
+
+<p>Her silence angered her husband. He shuffled
+impatiently.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, what have you to say, Dosia?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing," said Theodosia. "If you have made
+up your mind to go, go you will, I suppose. But
+I will not. There is no use in talking. We've been
+over the ground often enough, Wes. The matter
+is settled."</p>
+
+<p>Up to that moment Wesley had always believed
+that his wife would yield at last, when she saw
+that he was determined. Now he realized that she
+never would. Under that exterior of milky, dimpled
+flesh and calm blue eyes was all the iron will
+of old dead and forgotten Henry Ford. This mildest
+and meekest of girls and wives was not to be
+moved a hairsbreadth by all argument or entreaty,
+or insistence on a husband's rights.</p>
+
+<p>A great, sudden anger came over the man. He
+lifted his hand and for one moment it seemed to
+Theodosia as if he meant to strike her. Then he
+dropped it with the first oath that had ever
+crossed his lips.</p>
+
+<p>"You listen to me," he said thickly. "If you
+won't go with me I'll never come back here&mdash;never.
+When you want to do your duty as a wife
+you can come to me. But I'll never come back."</p>
+
+<p>He turned on his heel and strode away. Theodosia
+kept on spatting her butter. The little perpendicular
+wrinkle had come between her brows
+again. At that moment an odd, almost uncanny
+resemblance to the old portrait of her great-great-grandfather,
+which hung on the parlour wall at
+home, came out on her girlish face.</p>
+
+<p>The fortnight passed by. Wesley was silent and
+sullen, never speaking to his wife when he could
+avoid it. Theodosia was as sweet and serene as
+ever. She made an extra supply of shirts and
+socks for him, put up his lunch basket, and
+packed his trunk carefully. But she never spoke
+of his journey.</p>
+
+<p>He did not sell his farm. Irving Brooke rented it.
+Theodosia was to live in the house. The business
+arrangements were simple and soon concluded.</p>
+
+<p>Heatherton folks gossiped a great deal. They
+all condemned Theodosia. Even her own people
+sided against her now. They hated to be mixed
+up in a local scandal, and since Wes was bound
+to go they told Theodosia that it was her duty to
+go with him, no matter how much she disliked it.
+It would be disgraceful not to. They might as well
+have talked to the four winds. Theodosia was
+immoveable. They coaxed and argued and
+blamed&mdash;it all came to the same thing. Even those
+of them who could be "set" enough themselves
+on occasion could not understand Theodosia, who
+had always been so tractable. They finally gave
+up, as Wesley had done, baffled. Time would
+bring her to her senses, they said; you just had
+to leave that still, stubborn kind alone.</p>
+
+<p>On the morning of Wesley's departure Theodosia
+arose at sunrise and prepared a tempting
+breakfast. Irving Brooke's oldest son, Stanley,
+who was to drive Wesley to the station, came over
+early with his express wagon. Wesley's trunk,
+corded and labelled, stood on the back platform.
+The breakfast was a very silent meal. When it was
+over Wesley put on his hat and overcoat and went
+to the door, around which Theodosia's morning-glory
+vines were beginning to twine. The sun was
+not yet above the trees and the long shadows lay
+on the dewy grass. The wet leaves were flickering
+on the old maples that grew along the fence between
+the yard and the clover field beyond. The
+skies were all pearly blue, cleanswept of clouds.
+From the little farmhouse the green meadows
+sloped down to the valley, where a blue haze
+wound in and out like a glistening ribbon.</p>
+
+<p>Theodosia went out and stood looking inscrutably
+on, while Wesley and Irving hoisted the trunk
+into the wagon and tied it. Then Wesley came up
+the porch steps and looked at her.</p>
+
+<p>"Dosia," he said a little huskily, "I said I
+wouldn't ask you to go again, but I will. Will you
+come with me yet?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," said Theodosia gently.</p>
+
+<p>He held out his hand. He did not offer to kiss
+her.</p>
+
+<p>"Goodbye, Dosia."</p>
+
+<p>"Goodbye, Wes."</p>
+
+<p>There was no tremor of an eyelash with her.
+Wesley smiled bitterly and turned away. When
+the wagon reached the end of the little lane he
+turned and looked back for the last time. Through
+all the years that followed he carried with him the
+picture of his wife as he saw her then, standing
+amid the airy shadows and wavering golden
+lights of the morning, the wind blowing the skirt
+of her pale blue wrapper about her feet and ruffling
+the locks of her bright hair into a delicate
+golden cloud. Then the wagon disappeared around
+a curve in the road, and Theodosia turned and
+went back into her desolate home.</p>
+
+<p>For a time there was a great buzz of gossip over
+the affair. People wondered over it. Old Jim Parmelee
+understood better than the others. When
+he met Theodosia he looked at her with a curious
+twinkle in his keen old eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"Looks as if a man could bend her any way
+he'd a mind to, doesn't she?" he said. "Looks is
+deceiving. It'll come out in her face by and by&mdash;she's
+too young yet, but it's there. It does seem
+unnatteral to see a woman so stubborn&mdash;you'd
+kinder look for it more in a man."</p>
+
+<p>Wesley wrote a brief letter to Theodosia when
+he reached his destination. He said he was well
+and was looking about for the best place to settle.
+He liked the country fine. He was at a place called
+Red Butte and guessed he'd locate there.</p>
+
+<p>Two weeks later he wrote again. He had taken
+up a claim of three hundred acres. Greene and
+Cary had done the same. They were his nearest
+neighbours and were three miles away. He had
+knocked up a little shack, was learning to cook
+his own meals, and was very busy. He thought
+the country was a grand one and the prospects
+good.</p>
+
+<p>Theodosia answered his letter and told him all
+the Heatherton news. She signed herself "Theodosia
+Brooke," but otherwise there was nothing
+in the letter to indicate that it was written by a
+wife to her husband.</p>
+
+<p>At the end of a year Wesley wrote and once
+more asked her to go out to him. He was getting
+on well, and was sure she would like the place.
+It was a little rough, to be sure, but time would
+improve that.</p>
+
+<p>"Won't you let bygones be bygones, Dosia?" he
+wrote, "and come out to me. Do, my dear wife."</p>
+
+<p>Theodosia wrote back, refusing to go. She never
+got any reply, nor did she write again.</p>
+
+<p>People had given up talking about the matter
+and asking Theodosia when she was going out to
+Wes. Heatherton had grown used to the chronic
+scandal within its decorous borders. Theodosia
+never spoke of her husband to anyone, and it was
+known that they did not correspond. She took her
+youngest sister to live with her. She had her garden
+and hens and a cow. The farm brought her
+enough to live on, and she was always busy.</p>
+
+<br />
+<hr style="width: 15%;" />
+<br />
+
+<p>When fifteen years had gone by there were naturally
+some changes in Heatherton, sleepy and;
+unprogressive as it was. Most of the old people
+were in the little hillside burying-ground that
+fronted the sunrise. Old Jim Parmelee was there
+with his recollections of four generations. Men
+and women who had been in their prime when
+Wesley went away were old now and the children
+were grown up and married.</p>
+
+<p>Theodosia was thirty-five and was nothing like!
+the slim, dimpled girl who had stood on the porch
+steps and watched her husband drive away that
+morning fifteen years ago. She was stout and
+comely; the auburn hair was darker and arched
+away from her face in smooth, shining waves
+instead of the old-time curls. Her face was unlined
+and fresh-coloured, but no woman could live in
+subjection to her own unbending will for so many
+years and not show it. Nobody, looking at Theodosia
+now, would have found it hard to believe
+that a woman with such a determined, immoveable
+face could stick to a course of conduct in
+defiance of circumstances.</p>
+
+<p>Wesley Brooke was almost forgotten. People
+knew, through correspondents of Greene and
+Cary, that he had prospered and grown rich. The
+curious old story had crystallized into accepted
+history.</p>
+
+<p>A life may go on without ripple or disturbance
+for so many years that it may seem to have settled
+into a lasting calm; then a sudden wind of passion
+may sweep over it and leave behind a wake of
+tempestuous waters. Such a time came at last to
+Theodosia.</p>
+
+<p>One day in August Mrs. Emory Merritt dropped
+in. Emory Merritt's sister was Ogden Greene's
+wife, and the Merritts kept up an occasional correspondence
+with her. Hence, Cecilia Merritt
+always knew what was to be known about Wesley
+Brooke, and always told Theodosia because
+she had never been expressly forbidden to do
+so.</p>
+
+<p>Today she looked slightly excited. Secretly she
+was wondering if the news she brought would
+have any effect whatever on Theodosia's impassive
+calm.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know, Dosia, Wesley's real sick? In
+fact, Phoebe Greene says they have very poor
+hopes of him. He was kind of ailing all the spring,
+it seems, and about a month ago he was took
+down with some kind of slow fever they have out
+there. Phoebe says they have a hired nurse from
+the nearest town and a good doctor, but she reckons
+he won't get over it. That fever goes awful
+hard with a man of his years."</p>
+
+<p>Cecilia Merritt, who was the fastest talker in
+Heatherton, had got this out before she was
+brought up by a queer sound, half gasp, half cry,
+from Theodosia. The latter looked as if someone
+had struck her a physical blow.</p>
+
+<p>"Mercy, Dosia, you ain't going to faint! I didn't
+suppose you'd care. You never seemed to care."</p>
+
+<p>"Did you say," asked Theodosia thickly, "that
+Wesley was sick&mdash;dying?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, that's what Phoebe said. She may be
+mistaken. Dosia Brooke, you're a queer woman. I
+never could make you out and I never expect to.
+I guess only the Lord who made you can translate
+you."</p>
+
+<p>Theodosia stood up. The sun was getting low,
+and the valley beneath them, ripening to harvest,
+was like a river of gold. She folded up her sewing
+with a steady hand.</p>
+
+<p>"It's five o'clock, so I'll ask you to excuse me,
+Cecilia. I have a good deal to attend to. You can
+ask Emory if he'll drive me to the station in the
+morning. I'm going out to Wes."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, for the land's sake," said Cecilia Merritt
+feebly, as she tied on her gingham sunbonnet.
+She got up and went home in a daze.</p>
+
+<p>Theodosia packed her trunk and worked all
+night, dry-eyed, with agony and fear tearing at
+her heart. The iron will had snapped at last, like
+a broken reed, and fierce self-condemnation
+seized on her. "I've been a wicked woman," she
+moaned.</p>
+
+<p>A week from that day Theodosia climbed down
+from the dusty stage that had brought her from
+the station over the prairies to the unpretentious
+little house where Wesley Brooke lived. A young
+girl, so like what Ogden Greene's wife had been
+fifteen years before that Theodosia involuntarily
+exclaimed, "Phoebe," came to the door. Beyond
+her, Theodosia saw the white-capped nurse.</p>
+
+<p>Her voice trembled.</p>
+
+<p>"Does&mdash;does Wesley Brooke live here?" she
+asked.</p>
+
+<p>The girl nodded.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. But he is very ill at present. Nobody is
+allowed to see him."</p>
+
+<p>Theodosia put up her hand and loosened her
+bonnet strings as if they were choking her. She
+had been sick with the fear that Wesley would be
+dead before she got to him. The relief was almost
+overwhelming.</p>
+
+<p>"But I must see him," she cried hysterically&mdash;she,
+the calm, easy-going Dosia, hysterical&mdash;"I am
+his wife&mdash;and oh, if he had died before I got
+here!"</p>
+
+<p>The nurse came forward.</p>
+
+<p>"In that case I suppose you must," she conceded.
+"But he does not expect you. I must prepare
+him for the surprise."</p>
+
+<p>She turned to the door of a room opening off
+the kitchen, but Theodosia, who had hardly heard
+her, was before her. She was inside the room
+before the nurse could prevent her. Then she
+stood, afraid and trembling, her eyes searching
+the dim apartment hungrily.</p>
+
+<p>When they fell on the occupant of the bed
+Theodosia started in bitter surprise. All unconsciously
+she had been expecting to find Wesley as
+he had been when they parted. Could this gaunt,
+haggard creature, with the unkempt beard and
+prematurely grey hair and the hollow, beseeching
+eyes, be the ruddy, boyish-faced husband of her
+youth? She gave a choking cry of pain and
+shame, and the sick man turned his head. Their
+eyes met.</p>
+
+<p>Amazement, incredulity, hope, dread, all
+flashed in succession over Wesley Brooke's lined
+face. He raised himself feebly up.</p>
+
+<p>"Dosia," he murmured.</p>
+
+<p>Theodosia staggered across the room and fell
+on her knees by the bed. She clasped his head to
+her breast and kissed him again and again.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Wes, Wes, can you forgive me? I've been
+a wicked, stubborn woman&mdash;and I've spoiled our
+lives. Forgive me."</p>
+
+<p>He held his thin trembling arms around her and
+devoured her face with his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"Dosia, when did you come? Did you know I
+was sick?"</p>
+
+<p>"Wes, I can't talk till you say you've forgiven
+me."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Dosia, you have just as much to forgive.
+We were both too set. I should have been more
+considerate."</p>
+
+<p>"Just say, I forgive you, Dosia,'" she entreated.</p>
+
+<p>"I forgive you, Dosia," he said gently, "and oh,
+it's so good to see you once more, darling. There
+hasn't been an hour since I left you that I haven't
+longed for your sweet face. If I had thought you
+really cared I'd have gone back. But I thought you
+didn't. It broke my heart. You did though, didn't
+you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes, yes, yes," she said, holding him
+more closely, with her tears falling.</p>
+
+<p>When the young doctor from Red Butte came
+that evening he found a great improvement in his
+patient. Joy and happiness, those world-old physicians,
+had done what drugs and medicines had
+failed to do.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm going to get better, Doc," said Wesley.
+"My wife has come and she's going to stay. You
+didn't know I was married, did you? I'll tell you
+the story some day. I proposed going back east,
+but Dosia says she'd rather stay here. I'm the happiest
+man in Red Butte, Doc."</p>
+
+<p>He squeezed Theodosia's hand as he had used
+to do long ago in Heatherton church, and Dosia
+smiled down at him. There were no dimples now,
+but her smile was very sweet. The ghostly finger
+of old Henry Ford, pointing down through the
+generations, had lost its power to brand with its
+malediction the life of these, his descendants.
+Wesley and Theodosia had joined hands with
+their long-lost happiness.</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="Story_of_an_Invitation" id="Story_of_an_Invitation"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>The Story of an Invitation<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>Bertha Sutherland hurried home from the post
+office and climbed the stairs of her boarding-house
+to her room on the third floor. Her
+roommate, Grace Maxwell, was sitting on the
+divan by the window, looking out into the twilight.</p>
+
+<p>A year ago Bertha and Grace had come to Dartmouth
+to attend the Academy, and found themselves roommates.
+Bertha was bright, pretty and popular, the favourite
+of her classmates and teachers; Grace was a grave,
+quiet girl, dressed in mourning. She was quite alone in
+the world, the aunt who had brought her up having recently
+died. At first she had felt shy with bright and
+brilliant Bertha; but they soon became friends, and the
+year that followed was a very pleasant one. It was almost
+ended now, for the terminal exams had begun, and in a
+week's time the school would close for the holidays.</p>
+
+<p>"Have some chocolates, Grace," said Bertha gaily. "I got
+such good news in my letter tonight that I felt I must
+celebrate it fittingly. So I went into Carter's and invested
+all my spare cash in caramels. It's really fortunate the
+term is almost out, for I'm nearly bankrupt. I have just
+enough left to furnish a 'tuck-out' for commencement
+night, and no more."</p>
+
+<p>"What is your good news, may I ask?" said Grace.</p>
+
+<p>"You know I have an Aunt Margaret&mdash;commonly called
+Aunt Meg&mdash;out at Riversdale, don't you? There never was
+such a dear, sweet, jolly aunty in the world. I had a letter
+from her tonight. Listen, I'll read you what she says."</p>
+
+<div class="block"><p class="noin"><i>I want you to spend your holidays with me, my dear.
+Mary Fairweather and Louise Fyshe and Lily Dennis
+are coming, too. So there is just room for one more,
+and that one must be yourself. Come to Riversdale
+when school closes, and I'll feed you on strawberries
+and cream and pound cake and doughnuts and mince
+pies, and all the delicious, indigestible things that
+school girls love and careful mothers condemn. Mary
+and Lou and Lil are girls after your own heart, I know,
+and you shall all do just as you like, and we'll have
+picnics and parties and merry doings galore.</i></p></div>
+
+<p>"There," said Bertha, looking up with a laugh. "Isn't
+that lovely?"</p>
+
+<p>"How delightful it must be to have friends like that to
+love you and plan for you," said Grace wistfully. "I am
+sure you will have a pleasant vacation, Bertie. As for me, I
+am going into Clarkman's bookstore until school reopens.
+I saw Mr. Clarkman today and he agreed to take
+me."</p>
+
+<p>Bertha looked surprised. She had not known what
+Grace's vacation plans were.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think you ought to do that, Grace," she said
+thoughtfully. "You are not strong, and you need a good
+rest. It will be awfully trying to work at Clarkman's all
+summer."</p>
+
+<p>"There is nothing else for me to do," said Grace, trying
+to speak cheerfully. "You know I'm as poor as the proverbial
+church mouse, Bertie, and the simple truth is that I
+can't afford to pay my board all summer and get my
+winter outfit unless I do something to earn it. I shall be
+too busy to be lonesome, and I shall expect long, newsy
+letters from you, telling me all your fun&mdash;passing your
+vacation on to me at second-hand, you see. Well, I must
+set to work at those algebra problems. I tried them before
+dark, but I couldn't solve them. My head ached and I felt
+so stupid. How glad I shall be when exams are over."</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose I must revise that senior English this
+evening," said Bertha absently.</p>
+
+<p>But she made no move to do so. She was studying her
+friend's face. How very pale and thin Grace looked&mdash;surely
+much paler and thinner than when she had come to
+the Academy, and she had not by any means been plump
+and rosy then.</p>
+
+<p>I believe she could not stand two months at Clarkman's,
+thought Bertha. If I were not going to Aunt Meg's, I
+would ask her to go home with me. Or even if Aunt Meg
+had room for another guest, I'd just write her all about
+Grace and ask if I could bring her with me. Aunt Meg
+would understand&mdash;she always understands. But she
+hasn't, so it can't be.</p>
+
+<p>Just then a thought darted into Bertha's brain.</p>
+
+<p>"What nonsense!" she said aloud so suddenly and
+forcibly that Grace fairly jumped.</p>
+
+<p>"What is?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, nothing much," said Bertha, getting up briskly.
+"See here, I'm going to get to work. I've wasted enough
+time."</p>
+
+<p>She curled herself up on the divan and tried to study
+her senior English. But her thoughts wandered hopelessly,
+and finally she gave it up in despair and went to bed.
+There she could not sleep; she lay awake and wrestled
+with herself. It was after midnight when she sat up in
+bed and said solemnly, "I will do it."</p>
+
+<p>Next day Bertha wrote a confidential letter to Aunt
+Meg. She thanked her for her invitation and then told her
+all about Grace.</p>
+
+<p>"And what I want to ask, Aunt Meg, is that you will let
+me transfer my invitation to Grace, and ask her to go to
+Riversdale this summer in my place. Don't think me ungrateful.
+No, I'm sure you won't, you always understand
+things. But you can't have us both, and I'd rather Grace
+should go. It will do her so much good, and I have a
+lovely home of my own to go to, and she has none."</p>
+
+<p>Aunt Meg understood, as usual, and was perfectly willing.
+So she wrote to Bertha and enclosed a note of invitation
+for Grace.</p>
+
+<p>I shall have to manage this affair very carefully, reflected
+Bertha. Grace must never suspect that I did it on
+purpose. I will tell her that circumstances have prevented
+me from accepting Aunt Meg's invitation. That is true
+enough&mdash;no need to say that the circumstances are hers,
+not mine. And I'll say I just asked Aunt Meg to invite her
+in my place and that she has done so.</p>
+
+<p>When Grace came home from her history examination
+that day, Bertha told her story and gave her Aunt Meg's
+cordial note.</p>
+
+<p>"You must come to me in Bertha's place," wrote the
+latter. "I feel as if I knew you from her letters, and I will
+consider you as a sort of honorary niece, and I'll treat you
+as if you were Bertha herself."</p>
+
+<p>"Isn't it splendid of Aunt Meg?" said Bertha diplomatically.
+"Of course you'll go, Gracie."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I don't know," said Grace in bewilderment. "Are
+you sure you don't want to go, Bertha?"</p>
+
+<p>"Indeed, I do want to go, dreadfully," said Bertha
+frankly. "But as I've told you, it is impossible. But if I am
+disappointed, Aunt Meg musn't be. You must go, Grace,
+and that is all there is about it."</p>
+
+<p>In the end, Grace did go, a little puzzled and doubtful
+still, but thankful beyond words to escape the drudgery
+of the counter and the noise and heat of the city. Bertha
+went home, feeling a little bit blue in secret, it cannot be
+denied, but also feeling quite sure that if she had to do it
+all over again, she would do just the same.</p>
+
+<p>The summer slipped quickly by, and finally two letters
+came to Bertha, one from Aunt Meg and one from Grace.</p>
+
+<p>"I've had a lovely time," wrote the latter, "and, oh, Bertie,
+what do you think? I am to stay here always. Oh, of
+course I am going back to school next month, but this is
+to be my home after this. Aunt Meg&mdash;she makes me call
+her that&mdash;says I must stay with her for good."</p>
+
+<p>In Aunt Meg's letter was this paragraph:</p>
+
+<div class="block"><p class="noin"><i>Grace is writing to you, and will have told you that I
+intend to keep her here. You know I have always wanted
+a daughter of my own, but my greedy brothers and
+sisters would never give me one of theirs. So I intend
+to adopt Grace. She is the sweetest girl in the world,
+and I am very grateful to you for sending her here. You
+will not know her when you see her. She has grown
+plump and rosy.</i></p></div>
+
+<p>Bertha folded her letters up with a smile. "I have a
+vague, delightful feeling that I am the good angel in a
+storybook," she said.</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="The_Touch_of_Fate" id="The_Touch_of_Fate"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>The Touch of Fate<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>Mrs. Major Hill was in her element. This did not
+often happen, for in the remote prairie town of the
+Canadian Northwest, where her husband was stationed,
+there were few opportunities for match-making.
+And Mrs. Hill was&mdash;or believed herself to be&mdash;a born
+matchmaker.</p>
+
+<p>Major Hill was in command of the detachment of Northwest
+Mounted Police at Dufferin Bluff. Mrs. Hill was wont to
+declare that it was the most forsaken place to be found in
+Canada or out of it; but she did her very best to brighten it up,
+and it is only fair to say that the N.W.M.P., officers and men,
+seconded her efforts.</p>
+
+<p>When Violet Thayer came west to pay a long-promised
+visit to her old schoolfellow, Mrs. Hill's cup of happiness
+bubbled over. In her secret soul she vowed that Violet should
+never go back east unless it were post-haste to prepare a wedding
+trousseau. There were at least half a dozen eligibles
+among the M.P.s, and Mrs. Hill, after some reflection, settled
+on Ned Madison as the flower of the flock.</p>
+
+<p>"He and Violet are simply made for each other," she told
+Major Hill the evening before Miss Thayer's arrival. "He has
+enough money and he is handsome and fascinating. And
+Violet is a beauty and a clever woman into the bargain. They
+can't help falling in love, I'm sure; it's fate!"</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps Miss Thayer may be booked elsewhere already,"
+suggested Major Hill. He had seen more than one of his wife's
+card castles fall into heartbreaking ruin.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no; Violet would have told me if that were the case.
+It's really quite time for her to think of settling down. She
+is twenty-five, you know. The men all go crazy over her,
+but she's dreadfully hard to please. However, she can't help
+liking Ned. He hasn't a single fault. I firmly believe it is
+foreordained."</p>
+
+<p>And in this belief Mrs. Hill rested securely, but nevertheless
+did not fail to concoct several feminine artifices for the
+helping on of foreordination. It was a working belief with her
+that it was always well to have the gods in your debt.</p>
+
+<p>Violet Thayer came, saw, and conquered. Within thirty-six
+hours of her arrival at Dufferin Bluff she had every one of
+the half-dozen eligibles at her feet, not to mention a score or
+more ineligibles. She would have been surprised indeed had it
+been otherwise. Miss Thayer knew her power, and was somewhat
+unduly fond of exercising it. But she was a very nice girl
+into the bargain, and so thought one and all of the young men
+who frequented Mrs. Hill's drawing-room and counted it
+richly worth while merely to look at Miss Thayer after having
+seen nothing for weeks except flabby half-breed girls and
+blue-haired squaws.</p>
+
+<p>Madison was foremost in the field, of course. Madison was
+really a nice fellow, and quite deserved all Mrs. Hill's encomiums.
+He was good-looking and well groomed&mdash;could sing and
+dance divinely and play the violin to perfection. The other
+M.P.s were all jealous of him, and more so than ever when
+Violet Thayer came. They did not consider that any one of
+them had the ghost of a chance if Madison entered the lists
+against them.</p>
+
+<p>Violet liked Madison, and was very chummy with him
+after her own fashion. She thought all the M.P.s were nice
+boys, and they amused her, for which she was grateful. She
+had expected Dufferin Bluff to be very dull, and doubtless it
+would pall after a time, but for a change it was delightful.</p>
+
+<p>The sixth evening after her arrival found Mrs. Hill's room
+crowded, as usual, with M.P.s. Violet was looking her best in a
+distracting new gown&mdash;Sergeant Fox afterwards described it
+to a brother officer as a "stunning sort of rig between a cream
+and a blue and a brown"; she flirted impartially with all the
+members of her circle at first, but gradually narrowed down to
+Ned Madison, much to the delight of Mrs. Hill, who was
+hovering around like a small, brilliant butterfly.</p>
+
+<p>Violet was talking to Madison and watching John Spencer
+out of the tail of her eye. Spencer was not an M.P. He had some
+government post at Dufferin Bluff, and this was his first call
+at Lone Poplar Villa since Miss Thayer's arrival. He did not
+seem to be dazzled by her at all, and after his introduction had
+promptly retired to a corner with Major Hill, where they
+talked the whole evening about the trouble on the Indian reservation
+at Loon Lake.</p>
+
+<p>Possibly this indifference piqued Miss Thayer. Possibly
+she considered it refreshing after the servile adulation of the
+M.P.s. At any rate, when all the latter were gathered about the
+piano singing a chorus with gusto, she shook Madison off and
+went over to the corner where Spencer, deserted by the Major,
+whose bass was wanted, was sitting in solitary state.</p>
+
+<p>He looked up indifferently as Violet shimmered down on
+the divan beside him. Sergeant Robinson, who was watching
+them jealously from the corner beyond the palms, and would
+have given his eyes, or at least one of them, for such a favour,
+mentally vowed that Spencer was the dullest fellow he had
+ever put those useful members on.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you sing, Mr. Spencer?" asked Violet by way of
+beginning a conversation, as she turned her splendid eyes full
+upon him. Robinson would have lost his head under them,
+but Spencer kept his heroically.</p>
+
+<p>"No," was his calmly brief reply, given without any bluntness,
+but with no evident intention of saying anything more.</p>
+
+<p>In spite of her social experience Violet felt disconcerted.</p>
+
+<p>"If he doesn't want to talk to me I won't try to make him,"
+she thought crossly. No man had ever snubbed her so before.</p>
+
+<p>Spencer listened immovably to the music for a time. Then
+he turned to his companion with a palpable effort to be civilly
+sociable.</p>
+
+<p>"How do you like the west, Miss Thayer?" he said.</p>
+
+<p>Violet smiled&mdash;the smile most men found dangerous.</p>
+
+<p>"Very much, so far as I have seen it. There is a flavour
+about the life here that I like, but I dare say it would soon pall.
+It must be horribly lonesome here most of the time, especially
+in winter."</p>
+
+<p>"The M.P.s are always growling that it is," returned
+Spencer with a slight smile. "For my own part I never find
+it so."</p>
+
+<p>Violet decided that his smile was very becoming to him
+and that she liked the way his dark hair grew over his forehead.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think I've seen you at Lone Poplar Villa before?"
+she said.</p>
+
+<p>"No. I haven't been here for some time. I came up tonight
+to see the Major about the Loon Lake trouble."</p>
+
+<p>"Otherwise you wouldn't have come," thought Violet.
+"Flattering&mdash;very!" Aloud she said, "Is it serious?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no. A mere squabble among the Indians. Have you
+ever visited the Reservation, Miss Thayer? No? Well, you
+should get some of your M.P. friends to take you out. It would
+be worth while."</p>
+
+<p>"Why don't you ask me to go yourself?" said Violet audaciously.</p>
+
+<p>Spencer smiled again. "Have I failed in politeness by not
+doing so? I fear you would find me an insufferably dull
+companion."</p>
+
+<p>So he was not going to ask her after all. Violet felt piqued.
+She was also conscious of a sensation very near akin to disappointment.
+She looked across at Madison. How trim and
+dapper he was!</p>
+
+<p>"I hate a bandbox man," she said to herself.</p>
+
+<p>Spencer meanwhile had picked up one of Mrs. Hill's
+novels from the stand beside him.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Fools of Habit</i>," he said, glancing at the cover. "I see it is
+making quite a sensation down east. I suppose you've read
+it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. It is very frivolous and clever&mdash;all froth but delightful
+froth. Did you like it?"</p>
+
+<p>Spencer balanced the novel reflectively on his slender
+brown hand.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, yes, rather. But I don't care for novels as a rule. I
+don't understand them. The hero of this book, now&mdash;do you
+believe that a man in love would act as he did?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know," said Violet amusedly. "You ought to be a
+better judge than I. You are a man."</p>
+
+<p>"I have never loved anybody, so I am in no position to
+decide," said Spencer.</p>
+
+<p>There was as little self-consciousness in his voice as if he
+were telling her a fact concerning the Loon Lake trouble. Violet
+rose to the occasion.</p>
+
+<p>"You have an interesting experience to look forward to,"
+she said.</p>
+
+<p>Spencer turned his deep-set grey eyes squarely upon her.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know that. When I said I had never loved, I meant
+more than the love of a man for some particular woman. I
+meant love in every sense. I do not know what it is to have an
+affection for any human being. My parents died before I can
+remember. My only living relative was a penurious old uncle
+who brought me up for shame's sake and kicked me out on
+the world as soon as he could. I don't make friends easily. I
+have a few acquaintances whom I like, but there is not a soul
+on earth for whom I care, or who cares for me."</p>
+
+<p>"What a revelation love will be to you when it comes,"
+said Violet softly. Again he looked into her eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you think it will come?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>Before she could reply Mrs. Hill pounced upon them. Violet
+was wanted to sing. Mr. Spencer would excuse her,
+wouldn't he? Mr. Spencer did so obligingly. Moreover, he got
+up and bade his hostess good night. Violet gave him her hand.</p>
+
+<p>"You will call again?" she said.</p>
+
+<p>Spencer looked across at Madison&mdash;perhaps it was accidental.</p>
+
+<p>"I think not," he said. "If, as you say, love will come some
+time, it would be a very unpleasant revelation if it came in
+hopeless guise, and one never knows what may happen."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Thayer was conscious of a distinct fluttering of her
+heart as she went across to the piano. This was a new sensation
+for her, and worthy of being analyzed. After the M.P.s had
+gone she asked Mrs. Hill who Mr. Spencer was.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, John Spencer," said Mrs. Hill carelessly. "He's at the
+head of the Land Office here. That's really all I know about
+him. Jack says he is a downright good fellow and all that, you
+know. But he's no earthly good in a social way; he can't talk or
+he won't. He's flat. So different from Mr. Madison, isn't he?"</p>
+
+<p>"Very," said Violet emphatically.</p>
+
+<p>After Mrs. Hill had gone out Violet walked to the nearest
+mirror and looked at herself with her forefinger in the dimple
+of her chin.</p>
+
+<p>"It is very odd," she said. She did not mean the dimple.</p>
+
+<br />
+<hr style="width: 15%;" />
+<br />
+
+<p>Spencer had told her he was not coming back. She did not
+believe this, but she did not expect him for a few days. Consequently,
+when he appeared the very next evening she was surprised.
+Madison, to whom she was talking when Spencer
+entered, does not know to this day what she had started to say
+to him, for she never finished her sentence.</p>
+
+<p>"I wonder if it is the Loon Lake affair again?" she thought
+nervously.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Hill came up at this point and whisked Madison off
+for a waltz. Spencer, seeing his chance, came straight across
+the room to her. Sergeant Robinson, who was watching them
+as usual, is willing to make affidavit that Miss Thayer
+changed colour.</p>
+
+<p>After his greeting Spencer said nothing. He sat beside her,
+and they watched Mrs. Hill and Madison dancing. Violet
+wondered why she did not feel bored. When she saw Madison
+coming back to her she was conscious of an unreasonable
+anger with him. She got up abruptly.</p>
+
+<p>"Let us go out on the verandah," she said imperiously. "It
+is absolutely stifling in here."</p>
+
+<p>They went out. It was very cool and dusky. The lights of
+the town twinkled out below them, and the prairie bluffs
+behind them were dark and sibilant.</p>
+
+<p>"I am going to drive over to Loon Lake tomorrow afternoon
+to look into affairs there," said Spencer. "Will you go
+with me?"</p>
+
+<p>Violet reflected a moment. "You didn't ask me as if you
+really wanted me to go," she said.</p>
+
+<p>Spencer put his hand over the white fingers that rested on
+the railing. He bent forward until his breath stirred the tendrils
+of hair on her forehead.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I do," he said distinctly. "I want you to go with me to
+Loon Lake tomorrow more than I ever wanted any thing in my
+life before."</p>
+
+<p>Later on, when everybody had gone, Violet had her bad
+quarter of an hour with Mrs. Hill. That lady felt herself
+aggrieved.</p>
+
+<p>"I think you treated poor Ned very badly tonight, Vi. He
+felt really blue over it. And it was awfully bad form to go out
+with Spencer as you did and stay there so long. And you
+oughtn't to flirt with him&mdash;he doesn't understand the game."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm not going to flirt with him," said Miss Thayer calmly.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I suppose it's just your way. Only don't turn the poor
+fellow's head. By the way, Ned is coming up with his camera
+tomorrow afternoon to take us all."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm afraid he won't find me at home," said Violet sweetly.
+"I am going out to Loon Lake with Mr. Spencer."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Hill flounced off to bed in a pet. She was disgusted
+with everything, she declared to the Major. Things had been
+going so nicely, and now they were all muddled.</p>
+
+<p>"Isn't Madison coming up to time?" queried the Major
+sleepily.</p>
+
+<p>"Madison! It's Violet. She is behaving abominably. She
+treated poor Ned shamefully tonight. You saw yourself how
+she acted with Spencer, and she's going to Loon Lake with
+him tomorrow, she says. I'm sure I don't know what she can
+see in him. He's the dullest, pokiest fellow alive&mdash;so different
+from her in every way."</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps that is why she likes him," suggested the Major.
+"The attraction of opposites and all that, you know."</p>
+
+<p>But Mrs. Hill crossly told him he didn't know anything
+about it, so, being a wise man, he held his tongue.</p>
+
+<br />
+<hr style="width: 15%;" />
+<br />
+
+<p>During the next two weeks Mrs. Hill was the most dissatisfied
+woman in the four districts, and every M.P. down to
+the rawest recruit anathemized Spencer in secret a dozen
+times a day. Violet simply dropped everyone else, including
+Madison, in the coolest, most unmistakable way.</p>
+
+<p>One night Spencer did not come to Lone Poplar Villa. Violet
+looked for him to the last. When she realized that he was
+not coming she went to the verandah to have it out with herself.
+As she sat huddled up in a dim corner beneath a silkily
+rustling western maple two M.P.s came out and, not seeing
+her, went on with their conversation.</p>
+
+<p>"Heard about Spencer?" questioned one.</p>
+
+<p>"No. What of him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, they say Miss Thayer's thrown him over. Yesterday
+I was passing here about four in the afternoon and I saw
+Spencer coming in. I went down to the Land Office and was
+chatting to Cribson when the door opened about half an hour
+later and Spencer burst in. He was pale as the dead, and looked
+wild. 'Has Fyshe gone to Rainy River about those Crown
+Lands yet?' he jerked out. Cribson said, 'No.' Then tell him
+he needn't; I'm going myself,' said Spencer and out he bolted.
+He posted off to Rainy River today, and won't be back for a
+fortnight. She'll be gone then."</p>
+
+<p>"Rather rough on Spencer after the way she encouraged
+him," returned the other as they passed out of earshot.</p>
+
+<p>Violet got up. All the callers were gone, and she swept in to
+Mrs. Hill dramatically.</p>
+
+<p>"Edith," she said in the cold, steady voice that, to those
+who knew her, meant breakers ahead for somebody, "Mr.
+Spencer was here yesterday when I was riding with the Major,
+was he not? What did you tell him about me?"</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Hill looked at Violet's blazing eyes and wilted.</p>
+
+<p>"I&mdash;didn't tell him anything&mdash;much."</p>
+
+<p>"What was it?"</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Hill began to sob.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't look at me like that, Violet! He just dropped in and
+we were talking about you&mdash;at least I was&mdash;and I had heard
+that Harry St. Maur was paying you marked attention before
+you came west&mdash;and&mdash;and that some people thought you were
+engaged&mdash;and so&mdash;and so&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"You told Mr. Spencer that I was engaged to Harry St.
+Maur?"</p>
+
+<p>"No-o-o&mdash;I just hinted. I didn't mean an-any harm. I never
+dreamed you'd really c-care. I thought you were just amusing
+yourself&mdash;and so did everybody&mdash;and I wanted Ned
+Madison&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Violet had turned very pale.</p>
+
+<p>"I love him," she said hoarsely, "and you've sent him
+away. He's gone to Rainy River. I shall never see him again!"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes, you will," gasped Mrs. Hill faintly. "He'll come
+back when he knows&mdash;you c-can write and tell him&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Do you suppose I am going to write and ask him to come
+back?" said Violet wildly. "I've enough pride left yet to keep
+me from doing that for a man at whose head I've thrown
+myself openly&mdash;yes, openly, and who has never, in words at
+least, told me he cared anything about me. I will never forgive
+you, Edith!"</p>
+
+<p>Then Mrs. Hill found herself alone with her lacerated feelings.
+After soothing them with a good cry, she set to work
+thinking seriously. There was no doubt she had muddled
+things badly, but there was no use leaving them in a muddle
+when a word or two fitly spoken might set them straight.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Hill sat down and wrote a very diplomatic letter
+before she went to bed, and the next morning she waylaid Sergeant
+Fox and asked him if he would ride down to Rainy River
+with a very important message for Mr. Spencer. Sergeant Fox
+wondered what it could be, but it was not his to reason why; it
+was his only to mount and ride with all due speed, for Mrs.
+Hill's whims and wishes were as stringent and binding as the
+rules of the force.</p>
+
+<p>That evening when Mrs. Hill and Violet&mdash;the latter very
+silent and regal&mdash;were sitting on the verandah, a horseman
+came galloping up the Rainy River trail. Mrs. Hill excused
+herself and went in. Five minutes later John Spencer, covered
+with the alkali dust of his twenty miles' ride, dismounted at
+Violet's side.</p>
+
+<br />
+<hr style="width: 15%;" />
+<br />
+
+<p>The M.P.s gave a concert at the barracks that night and
+Mrs. Hill and her Major went to it, as well as everyone else of
+any importance in town except Violet and Spencer. They sat
+on Major Hill's verandah and watched the moon rising over
+the bluffs and making milk-white reflections in the prairie
+lakes.</p>
+
+<p>"It seems a year of misery since last night," sighed Violet
+happily.</p>
+
+<p>"You couldn't have been quite as miserable as I was," said
+Spencer earnestly. "You were everything&mdash;absolutely everything
+to me. Other men have little rills and driblets of affection
+for sisters and cousins and aunts, but everything in me
+went out to you. Do you remember you told me the first time
+we met that love would be a revelation to me? It has been
+more. It has been a new gospel. I hardly dared hope you could
+care for me. Even yet I don't know why you do."</p>
+
+<p>"I love you," said Violet gravely, "because you are you."</p>
+
+<p>Than which, of course, there could be no better reason.</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="Waking_of_Helen" id="Waking_of_Helen"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>The Waking of Helen<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>Robert Reeves looked somewhat curiously at the girl
+who was waiting on him at his solitary breakfast. He
+had not seen her before, arriving at his summer boarding
+house only the preceding night.</p>
+
+<p>It was a shabby farmhouse on the inland shore of a
+large bay that was noted for its tides, and had wonderful
+possibilities of light and shade for an impressionist.
+Reeves was an enthusiastic artist. It mattered little to
+him that the boarding accommodations were most primitive,
+the people uncultured and dull, the place itself
+utterly isolated, as long as he could revel in those
+transcendent sunsets and sunrises, those marvellous
+moonlights, those wonderful purple shores and sweeps
+of shimmering blue water.</p>
+
+<p>The owner of the farm was Angus Fraser, and he
+and his wife seemed to be a reserved, uncouth pair,
+with no apparent interest in life save to scratch a bare
+living out of their few stony acres. He had an impression
+that they were childless and was at a loss to place
+this girl who poured his tea and brought in his toast.
+She did not resemble either Fraser or his wife. She was
+certainly not beautiful, being very tall and rather awkward,
+and dressed in a particularly unbecoming dark
+print wrapper. Her luxuriant hair was thick and black,
+and was coiled in a heavy knot at the nape of her neck.
+Her features were delicate but irregular, and her skin
+was very brown. Her eyes attracted Reeves's notice especially;
+they were large and dark and full of a half-unconscious,
+wistful longing, as if a prisoned soul behind
+them were vainly trying to reveal itself.</p>
+
+<p>Reeves could find out nothing of her from herself,
+for she responded to his tentative questions about the
+place in the briefest fashion. Afterwards he interviewed
+Mrs. Fraser cautiously, and ascertained that the girl's
+name was Helen Fraser, and that she was Angus's niece.</p>
+
+<p>"Her father and mother are dead and we've brought
+her up. Helen's a good girl in most ways&mdash;a little
+obstinate and sulky now and then&mdash;but generally she's
+steady enough, and as for work, there ain't a girl in
+Bay Beach can come up to her in house or field. Angus
+calculates she saves him a man's wages clear. No, I
+ain't got nothing to say against Helen."</p>
+
+<p>Nevertheless, Reeves felt somehow that Mrs. Fraser
+did not like her husband's niece. He often heard her
+scolding or nagging Helen at her work, and noticed
+that the latter never answered back. But once, after
+Mrs. Angus's tongue had been especially bitter, he met
+the girl hurrying along the hall from the kitchen with
+her eyes full of tears. Reeves felt as if someone had
+struck him a blow. He went to Angus and his wife
+that afternoon. He wished to paint a shore picture,
+he said, and wanted a model. Would they allow Miss
+Fraser to pose for him? He would pay liberally for
+her time.</p>
+
+<p>Angus and his wife had no objection. They would
+pocket the money, and Helen could be spared a spell
+every day as well as not. Reeves told Helen of his plan
+himself, meeting her in the evening as she was bringing
+the cows home from the low shore pastures beyond
+the marsh. He was surprised at the sudden illumination
+of her face. It almost transfigured her from a plain,
+sulky-looking girl into a beautiful woman.</p>
+
+<p>But the glow passed quickly. She assented to his
+plan quietly, almost lifelessly. He walked home with
+her behind the cows and talked of the sunset and the
+mysterious beauty of the bay and the purple splendour
+of the distant coasts. She listened in silence. Only once,
+when he spoke of the distant murmur of the open sea,
+she lifted her head and looked at him.</p>
+
+<p>"What does it say to you?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>"It speaks of eternity. And to you?"</p>
+
+<p>"It calls me," she answered simply, "and then I
+want to go out and meet it&mdash;and it hurts me too. I can't
+tell how or why. Sometimes it makes me feel as if I
+were asleep and wanted to wake and didn't know
+how."</p>
+
+<p>She turned and looked out over the bay. A dying
+gleam of sunset broke through a cloud and fell across
+her hair. For a moment she seemed the spirit of the
+shore personified&mdash;all its mystery, all its uncertainty,
+all its elusive charm.</p>
+
+<p>She has possibilities, thought Reeves.</p>
+
+<p>Next day he began his picture. At first he had thought
+of painting her as the incarnation of a sea spirit, but
+decided that her moods were too fitful. So he began to
+sketch her as "Waiting"&mdash;a woman looking out across
+the bay with a world of hopeless longing in her eyes.
+The subject suited her well, and the picture grew
+apace.</p>
+
+<p>When he was tired of work he made her walk around
+the shore with him, or row up the head of the bay in
+her own boat. He tried to draw her out, at first with
+indifferent success. She seemed to be frightened of
+him. He talked to her of many things&mdash;the far outer
+world whose echoes never reached her, foreign lands
+where he had travelled, famous men and women whom
+he had met, music, art and books. When he spoke of
+books he touched the right chord. One of those transfiguring
+flashes he delighted to evoke now passed over
+her plain face.</p>
+
+<p>"That is what I've always wanted," she said hungrily,
+"and I never get them. Aunt hates to see me
+reading. She says it is a waste of time. And I love it so.
+I read every scrap of paper I can get hold of, but I
+hardly ever see a book."</p>
+
+<p>The next day Reeves took his Tennyson to the shore
+and began to read the <i>Idylls of the King</i> to her.</p>
+
+<p>"It is beautiful," was her sole verbal comment, but
+her rapt eyes said everything.</p>
+
+<p>After that he never went out with her without a
+book&mdash;now one of the poets, now some prose classic.
+He was surprised by her quick appreciation of and
+sympathy with the finest passages. Gradually, too, she
+forgot her shyness and began to talk. She knew nothing
+of his world, but her own world she knew and
+knew well. She was a mine of traditional history about
+the bay. She knew the rocky coast by heart, and every
+old legend that clung to it. They drifted into making
+excursions along the shore and explored its wildest
+retreats. The girl had an artist's eye for scenery and
+colour effect.</p>
+
+<p>"You should have been an artist," Reeves told her
+one day when she had pointed out to him the exquisite
+loveliness of a shaft of light falling through a cleft in
+the rocks across a dark-green pool at their base.</p>
+
+<p>"I would rather be a writer," she said slowly, "if I
+could only write something like those books you have
+read to me. What a glorious destiny it must be to have
+something to say that the whole world is listening for,
+and to be able to say it in words that will live forever! It
+must be the noblest human lot."</p>
+
+<p>"Yet some of those men and women were neither
+good nor noble," said Reeves gently, "and many of
+them were unhappy."</p>
+
+<p>Helen dismissed the subject as abruptly as she always
+did when the conversation touched too nearly on
+the sensitive edge of her soul dreams.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know where I am taking you today?" she
+said.</p>
+
+<p>"No&mdash;where?"</p>
+
+<p>"To what the people here call the Kelpy's Cave. I
+hate to go there. I believe there is something uncanny
+about it, but I think you will like to see it. It is a dark
+little cave in the curve of a small cove, and on each side
+the headlands of rock run far out. At low tide we can
+walk right around, but when the tide comes in it fills
+the Kelpy's Cave. If you were there and let the tide
+come past the points, you would be drowned unless
+you could swim, for the rocks are so steep and high it
+is impossible to climb them."</p>
+
+<p>Reeves was interested.</p>
+
+<p>"Was anyone ever caught by the tide?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," returned Helen, with a shudder. "Once, long
+ago, before I was born, a girl went around the shore
+to the cave and fell asleep there&mdash;and the tide came
+in and she was drowned. She was young and very
+pretty, and was to have been married the next week.
+I've been afraid of the place ever since."</p>
+
+<p>The treacherous cave proved to be a picturesque and
+innocent-looking spot, with the beach of glittering sand
+before it and the high gloomy walls of rock on either
+hand.</p>
+
+<p>"I must come here some day and sketch it," said
+Reeves enthusiastically, "and you must be the Kelpy,
+Helen, and sit in the cave with your hair wrapped
+about you and seaweed clinging to it."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you think a kelpy would look like that?" said
+the girl dreamily. "I don't. I think it is a wild, wicked
+little sea imp, malicious and mocking and cruel, and it
+sits here and watches for victims."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, never mind your sea kelpies," Reeves said,
+fishing out his Longfellow. "They are a tricky folk, if all
+tales be true, and it is supposed to be a very rash thing
+to talk about them in their own haunts. I want to read
+you 'The Building of the Ship.' You will like it, I'm
+sure."</p>
+
+<p>When the tide turned they went home.</p>
+
+<p>"We haven't seen the kelpy, after all," said Reeves.</p>
+
+<p>"I think I shall see him some day," said Helen gravely.
+"I think he is waiting for me there in that gloomy cave
+of his, and some time or other he will get me."</p>
+
+<p>Reeves smiled at the gloomy fancy, and Helen smiled
+back at him with one of her sudden radiances. The tide
+was creeping swiftly up over the white sands. The sun
+was low and the bay was swimming in a pale blue
+glory. They parted at Clam Point, Helen to go for the
+cows and Reeves to wander on up the shore. He thought
+of Helen at first, and the wonderful change that had
+come over her of late; then he began to think of another
+face&mdash;a marvellously lovely one with blue eyes as
+tender as the waters before him. Then Helen was
+forgotten.</p>
+
+<p>The summer waned swiftly. One afternoon Reeves
+took a fancy to revisit the Kelpy's Cave. Helen could
+not go. It was harvest time, and she was needed in the
+field.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't let the kelpy catch you," she said to him half
+seriously. "The tide will turn early this afternoon, and
+you are given to day-dreaming."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll be careful," he promised laughingly, and he
+meant to be careful. But somehow when he reached
+the cave its unwholesome charm overcame him, and
+he sat down on the boulder at its mouth.</p>
+
+<p>"An hour yet before tide time," he said. "Just enough
+time to read that article on impressionists in my review
+and then stroll home by the sandshore."</p>
+
+<p>From reading he passed to day-dreaming, and day-dreaming
+drifted into sleep, with his head pillowed on
+the rocky walls of the cave.</p>
+
+<p>How long he had slept he did not know, but he
+woke with a start of horror. He sprang to his feet,
+realizing his position instantly. The tide was in&mdash;far in
+past the headlands already. Above and beyond him
+towered the pitiless unscalable rocks. There was no
+way of escape.</p>
+
+<p>Reeves was no coward, but life was sweet to him,
+and to die like that&mdash;like a drowned rat in a hole&mdash;to be
+able to do nothing but wait for that swift and sure
+oncoming death! He reeled against the damp rock wall,
+and for a moment sea and sky and prisoning headlands
+and white-lined tide whirled before his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>Then his head grew clearer. He tried to think. How
+long had he? Not more than twenty minutes at the
+outside. Well, death was sure and he would meet it
+bravely. But to wait&mdash;to wait helplessly! He should go;
+mad with the horror of it before those endless minutes
+would have passed!</p>
+
+<p>He took something from his pocket and bent his,
+head over it, pressing his lips to it repeatedly. And
+then, when he raised his face again, a dory was coming
+around the headland on his right, and Helen Fraser
+was in it.</p>
+
+<p>Reeves was dizzy again with the shock of joy and
+thankfulness. He ran down over the little stretch of
+sand still uncovered by the tide and around to the rocks
+of the headlands against which the dory was already
+grating. He sprang forward impulsively and caught the
+girl's cold hands in his as she dropped the oars and
+stood up.</p>
+
+<p>"Helen, you have saved me! How can I ever thank
+you? I&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>He broke off abruptly, for she was looking up at
+him, breathlessly and voicelessly, with her whole soul
+in her eyes. He saw in them a revelation that amazed
+him; he dropped her hands and stepped back as if she
+had struck him in the face.</p>
+
+<p>Helen did not notice the change in him. She clasped
+her hands together and her voice trembled.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I was afraid I should be too late! When I came
+in from the field Aunt Hannah said you had not come
+back&mdash;and I knew it was tide time&mdash;and I felt somehow
+that it had caught you in the cave. I ran down
+over the marsh and took Joe Simmon's dory. If I had
+not got here in time&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>She broke off shiveringly. Reeves stepped into the
+dory and took up the oars.</p>
+
+<p>"The kelpy would have been sure of its victim then,"
+he said, trying to speak lightly. "It would have almost
+served me right for neglecting your warning. I was
+very careless. You must let me row back. I am afraid
+you have overtasked your strength trying to cheat the
+kelpy."</p>
+
+<p>Reeves rowed homeward in an absolute silence. Helen
+did not speak and he could not. When they reached
+the dory anchorage he helped her out.</p>
+
+<p>"I think I'll go out to the Point for a walk," he said.
+"I want to steady my nerves. You must go right home
+and rest. Don't be anxious&mdash;I won't take any more
+chances with sea kelpies."</p>
+
+<p>Helen went away without a word, and Reeves walked
+slowly out to the Point. He was grieved beyond measure
+at the discovery he believed he had made. He had
+never dreamed of such a thing. He was not a vain
+man, and was utterly free from all tendency to flirtation.
+It had never occurred to him that the waking of
+the girl's deep nature might be attended with disastrous
+consequences. He had honestly meant to help
+her, and what had he done?</p>
+
+<p>He felt very uncomfortable; he could not conscientiously
+blame himself, but he saw that he had acted
+foolishly. And of course he must go away at once. And
+he must also tell her something she ought to know. He
+wished he had told her long ago.</p>
+
+<p>The following afternoon was a perfect one. Reeves
+was sketching on the sandshore when Helen came.
+She sat down on a camp stool a little to one side and
+did not speak. After a few moments Reeves pushed
+away his paraphernalia impatiently.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't feel in a mood for work," he said. "It is too
+dreamy a day&mdash;one ought to do nothing to be in keeping.
+Besides, I'm getting lazy now that my vacation is
+nearly over. I must go in a few days."</p>
+
+<p>He avoided looking at her, so he did not see the
+sudden pallor of her face.</p>
+
+<p>"So soon?" she said in a voice expressive of no particular
+feeling.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. I ought not to have lingered so long. My world
+will be forgetting me and that will not do. It has been a
+very pleasant summer and I shall be sorry to leave Bay
+Beach."</p>
+
+<p>"But you will come back next summer?" asked Helen
+quickly. "You said you would."</p>
+
+<p>Reeves nerved himself for his very distasteful task.</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps," he said, with an attempt at carelessness,
+"but if I do so, I shall not come alone. Somebody who
+is very dear to me will come with me&mdash;as my wife. I
+have never told you about her, Helen, but you and I
+are such good friends that I do not mind doing so now.
+I am engaged to a very sweet girl, and we expect to be
+married next spring."</p>
+
+<p>There was a brief silence. Reeves had been vaguely
+afraid of a scene and was immensely relieved to find
+his fear unrealized. Helen sat very still. He could not
+see her face. Did she care, after all? Was he mistaken?</p>
+
+<p>When she spoke her voice was perfectly calm.</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you, it is very kind of you to tell me about
+her. I suppose she is very beautiful."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, here is her picture. You can judge for yourself."</p>
+
+<p>Helen took the portrait from his hand and looked at
+it steadily. It was a miniature painted on ivory, and the
+face looking out from it was certainly lovely.</p>
+
+<p>"It is no wonder you love her," said the girl in a low
+tone as she handed it back. "It must be strange to be so
+beautiful as that."</p>
+
+<p>Reeves picked up his Tennyson.</p>
+
+<p>"Shall I read you something? What will you have?"</p>
+
+<p>"Read 'Elaine,' please. I want to hear that once more."</p>
+
+<p>Reeves felt a sudden dislike to her choice.</p>
+
+<p>"Wouldn't you prefer something else?" he asked,
+hurriedly turning over the leaves. "'Elaine' is rather
+sad. Shan't I read 'Guinevere' instead?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," said Helen in the same lifeless tone. "I have
+no sympathy for Guinevere. She suffered and her love
+was unlawful, but she was loved in return&mdash;she did
+not waste her love on someone who did not want or
+care for it. Elaine did, and her life went with it. Read
+me the story."</p>
+
+<p>Reeves obeyed. When he had finished he held the
+book out to her.</p>
+
+<p>"Helen, will you take this Tennyson from me in
+remembrance of our friendship and of the Kelpy's Cave?
+I shall never forget that I owe my life to you."</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you."</p>
+
+<p>She took the book and placed a little thread of crimson
+seaweed that had been caught in the sand between
+the pages of "Elaine." Then she rose.</p>
+
+<p>"I must go back now. Aunt will need me. Thank you
+again for the book, Mr. Reeves, and for all your kindness
+to me."</p>
+
+<p>Reeves was relieved when the interview was over.
+Her calmness had reassured him. She did not care very
+much, after all; it was only a passing fancy, and when
+he was gone she would soon forget him.</p>
+
+<p>He went away a few days later, and Helen bade him
+an impassive good-bye. When the afternoon was far
+spent she stole away from the house to the shore, with
+her Tennyson in her hand, and took her way to the
+Kelpy's Cave.</p>
+
+<p>The tide was just beginning to come in. She sat
+down on the big boulder where Reeves had fallen
+asleep. Beyond stretched the gleaming blue waters,
+mellowing into a hundred fairy shades horizonward.</p>
+
+<p>The shadows of the rocks were around her. In front
+was the white line of the incoming tide; it had almost
+reached the headlands. A few minutes more and escape
+would be cut off&mdash;yet she did not move.</p>
+
+<p>When the dark green water reached her, and the
+lapping wavelets swished up over the hem of her dress,
+she lifted her head and a sudden strange smile flashed
+over her face.</p>
+
+<p>Perhaps the kelpy understood it.</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="Way_of_the_Winning" id="Way_of_the_Winning"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>The Way of the Winning of Anne<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>Jerome Irving had been courting Anne Stockard
+for fifteen years. He had begun when she was
+twenty and he was twenty-five, and now that
+Jerome was forty, and Anne, in a village where
+everybody knew everybody else's age, had to own to being
+thirty-five, the courtship did not seem any nearer a climax
+than it had at the beginning. But that was not Jerome's fault,
+poor fellow!</p>
+
+<p>At the end of the first year he had asked Anne to marry
+him, and Anne had refused. Jerome was disappointed, but he
+kept his head and went on courting Anne just the same; that
+is he went over to Esek Stockard's house every Saturday
+night and spent the evening, he walked home with Anne from
+prayer meeting and singing school and parties when she
+would let him, and asked her to go to all the concerts and
+socials and quilting frolics that came off. Anne never would
+go, of course, but Jerome faithfully gave her the chance. Old
+Esek rather favoured Jerome's suit, for Anne was the plainest
+of his many daughters, and no other fellow seemed at all anxious
+to run Jerome off the track; but she took her own way
+with true Stockard firmness, and matters were allowed to
+drift on at the will of time or chance.</p>
+
+<p>Three years later Jerome tried his luck again, with precisely
+the same result, and after that he had asked Anne regularly
+once a year to marry him, and just as regularly Anne said
+no a little more brusquely and a little more decidedly every
+year. Now, in the mellowness of a fifteen-year-old courtship,
+Jerome did not mind it at all. He knew that everything comes
+to the man who has patience to wait.</p>
+
+<p>Time, of course, had not stood still with Anne and Jerome,
+or with the history of Deep Meadows. At the Stockard homestead
+the changes had been many and marked. Every year or
+two there had been a wedding in the big brick farmhouse, and
+one of old Esek's girls had been the bride each time. Julia and
+Grace and Celia and Betty and Theodosia and Clementina
+Stockard were all married and gone. But Anne had never had
+another lover. There had to be an old maid in every big family
+she said, and she was not going to marry Jerome Irving just for
+the sake of having Mrs. on her tombstone.</p>
+
+<p>Old Esek and his wife had been put away in the Deep
+Meadows burying-ground. The broad, fertile Stockard acres
+passed into Anne's possession. She was a good business-woman,
+and the farm continued to be the best in the district.
+She kept two hired men and a servant girl, and the sixteen-year-old
+of her oldest sister lived with her. There
+were few visitors at the Stockard place now, but Jerome
+"dropped in" every Saturday night with clockwork regularity
+and talked to Anne about her stock and advised her regarding
+the rotation of her crops and the setting out of her orchards.
+And at ten o'clock he would take his hat and cane and tell
+Anne to be good to herself, and go home.</p>
+
+<p>Anne had long since given up trying to discourage him;
+she even accepted attentions from him now that she had used
+to refuse. He always walked home with her from evening
+meetings and was her partner in the games at quilting parties.
+It was great fun for the young folks. "Old Jerome and Anne"
+were a standing joke in Deep Meadows. But the older people
+had ceased to expect anything to come of it.</p>
+
+<p>Anne laughed at Jerome as she had always done, and
+would not have owned for the world that she could have
+missed him. Jerome was useful, she admitted, and a comfortable
+friend; and she would have liked him well enough if he
+would only omit that ridiculous yearly ceremony of proposal.</p>
+
+<p>It was Jerome's fortieth birthday when Anne refused him
+again. He realized this as he went down the road in the
+moonlight, and doubt and dismay began to creep into his
+heart. Anne and he were both getting old&mdash;there was no
+disputing that fact. It was high time that he brought her to
+terms if he was ever going to. Jerome was an easy-going
+mortal and always took things placidly, but he did not mean
+to have all those fifteen years of patient courting go for nothing
+He had thought Anne would get tired of saying no,
+sooner or later, and say yes, if for no other reason than to
+have a change; but getting tired did not seem to run in the
+Stockard blood. She had said no that night just as coolly and
+decidedly and unsentimentally as she said it fifteen years
+before. Jerome had the sensation of going around in a circle
+and never getting any further on. He made up his mind that
+something must be done, and just as he got to the brook that
+divides Deep Meadows West from Deep Meadows Central
+an idea struck him; it was a good idea and amused him. He
+laughed aloud and slapped his thigh, much to the amusement
+of two boys who were sitting unnoticed on the railing
+of the bridge.</p>
+
+<p>"There's old Jerome going home from seeing Anne
+Stockard," said one. "Wonder what on earth he's laughing at.
+Seems to me if I couldn't get a wife without hoeing a fifteen-year
+row, I'd give up trying."</p>
+
+<p>But, then, the speaker was a Hamilton, and the Hamiltons
+never had any perseverance.</p>
+
+<p>Jerome, although a well-to-do man, owning a good farm,
+had, so to speak, no home of his own. The old Irving homestead
+belonged to his older brother, who had a wife and family.
+Jerome lived with them and was so used to it he didn't
+mind.</p>
+
+<p>At forty a lover must not waste time. Jerome thought out
+the details that night, and next day he opened the campaign.
+But it was not until the evening after that that Anne Stockard
+heard the news. It was her niece, Octavia, who told her. The
+latter had been having a chat up the lane with Sam Mitchell,
+and came in with a broad smile on her round, rosy face and a
+twinkle in her eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"I guess you've lost your beau this time, Aunt Anne. It
+looks as if he meant to take you at your word at last."</p>
+
+<p>"What on earth do you mean?" asked Anne, a little sharply.
+She was in the pantry counting eggs, and Octavia's interruption
+made her lose her count. "Now I can't remember
+whether it was six or seven dozen I said last. I shall have to
+count them all over again. I wish, Octavia, that you could
+think of something besides beaus all the time."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, but listen," persisted Octavia wickedly. "Jerome
+Irving was at the social at the Cherry Valley parsonage last
+night, and he had Harriet Warren there&mdash;took her there, and
+drove her home again."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't believe it," cried Anne, before she thought. She
+dropped an egg into the basket so abruptly that the shell
+broke.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, it's true enough. Sam Mitchell told me; he was there
+and saw him. Sam says he looked quite beaming, and was
+dressed to kill, and followed Harriet around like her shadow.
+I guess you won't have any more bother with him, Aunt
+Anne."</p>
+
+<p>In the process of picking the broken egg out of the whole
+ones Anne had recovered her equanimity. She gave a careful
+little laugh.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, it's to be hoped so. Goodness knows it's time he
+tried somebody else. Go and change your dress for milking,
+Octavia, and don't spend quite so much time gossiping up the
+lane with Sam Mitchell. He always was a fetch-and-carry.
+Young girls oughtn't to be so pert."</p>
+
+<p>When the subdued Octavia had gone, Anne tossed the broken
+eggshell out of the pantry window viciously enough.</p>
+
+<p>"There's no fool like an old fool. Jerome Irving always was
+an idiot. The idea of his going after Harriet Warren! He's old
+enough to be her father. And a Warren, too! I've seen the time
+an Irving wouldn't be seen on the same side of the road with a
+Warren. Well, anyhow, I don't care, and he needn't suppose I
+will. It will be a relief not to have him hanging around any
+longer."</p>
+
+<p>It might have been a relief, but Anne felt strangely lonely
+as she walked home alone from prayer meeting the next
+night. Jerome had not been there. The Warrens were Methodists
+and Anne rightly guessed that he had gone to the
+Methodist prayer meeting at Cherry Valley.</p>
+
+<p>"Dancing attendance on Harriet," she said to herself
+scornfully.</p>
+
+<p>When she got home she looked at her face in the glass
+more critically than she had done for years. Anne Stockard at
+her best had never been pretty. When young she had been
+called "gawky." She was very tall and her figure was lank and
+angular. She had a long, pale face and dusky hair. Her eyes had
+been good&mdash;a glimmering hazel, large and long-lashed. They
+were pretty yet, but the crow's feet about them were plainly
+visible. There were brackets around her mouth too, and her
+cheeks were hollow. Anne suddenly realized, as she had never
+realized before, that she had grown old&mdash;that her youth was
+left far behind. She was an old maid, and Harriet Warren was
+young, and pretty. Anne's long, thin lips suddenly quivered.</p>
+
+<p>"I declare, I'm a worse fool than Jerome," she said angrily.</p>
+
+<p>When Saturday night came Jerome did not. The corner of
+the big, old-fashioned porch where he usually sat looked bare
+and lonely. Anne was short with Octavia and boxed the cat's
+ears and raged at herself. What did she care if Jerome Irving
+never came again? She could have married him years ago if
+she had wanted to&mdash;everybody knew that!</p>
+
+<p>At sunset she saw a buggy drive past her gate. Even at that
+distance she recognized Harriet Warren's handsome, high-coloured
+profile. It was Jerome's new buggy and Jerome was
+driving. The wheel spokes flashed in the sunlight as they
+crept up the hill. Perhaps they dazzled Anne's eyes a little; at
+least, for that or some other reason she dabbed her hand
+viciously over them as she turned sharply about and went
+upstairs. Octavia was practising her music lesson in the parlour
+below and singing in a sweet shrill voice. The hired men
+were laughing and talking in the yard. Anne slammed down
+her window and banged her door and then lay down on her
+bed; she said her head ached.</p>
+
+<p>The Deep Meadows people were amused and made joking
+remarks to Anne, which she had to take amiably because she
+had no excuse for resenting them. In reality they stung her
+pride unendurably. When Jerome had gone she realized that
+she had no other intimate friend and that she was a very
+lonely woman whom nobody cared about. One night&mdash;it was
+three weeks afterward&mdash;she met Jerome and Harriet squarely.
+She was walking to church with Octavia, and they were driving
+in the opposite direction. Jerome had his new buggy and
+crimson lap robe. His horse's coat shone like satin and had
+rosettes of crimson on his bridle. Jerome was dressed
+extremely well and looked quite young, with his round,
+ruddy, clean-shaven face and clear blue eyes.</p>
+
+<p>Harriet was sitting primly and consciously by his side; she
+was a very handsome girl with bold eyes and was somewhat
+overdressed. She wore a big flowery hat and a white lace veil
+and looked at Anne with a supercilious smile.</p>
+
+<p>Anne felt dowdy and old; she was very pale. Jerome lifted
+his hat and bowed pleasantly as they drove past. Suddenly
+Harriet laughed out. Anne did not look back, but her face
+crimsoned darkly. Was that girl laughing at her? She trembled
+with anger and a sharp, hurt feeling. When she got home that
+night she sat a long while by her window.</p>
+
+<p>Jerome was gone&mdash;and he let Harriet Warren laugh at her
+and he would never come back to her. Well, it did not matter,
+but she had been a fool. Only it had never occurred to her that
+Jerome could act so.</p>
+
+<p>"If I'd thought he would I mightn't have been so sharp
+with him," was as far as she would let herself go even in
+thought.</p>
+
+<p>When four weeks had elapsed Jerome came over one
+Saturday night. He was fluttered and anxious, but hid it in a
+masterly manner.</p>
+
+<p>Anne was taken by surprise. She had not thought he would
+ever come again, and was off her guard. He had come around
+the porch corner abruptly as she stood there in the dusk, and
+she started very perceptibly.</p>
+
+<p>"Good evening, Anne," he said, easily and unblushingly.</p>
+
+<p>Anne choked up. She was very angry, or thought she was.
+Jerome appeared not to notice her lack of welcome. He sat
+coolly down in his old place. His heart was beating like a
+hammer, but Anne did not know that.</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose," she said cuttingly, "that you're on your way
+down to the bridge. It's almost a pity for you to waste time
+stopping here at all, any more than you have of late. No doubt
+Harriet'll be expecting you."</p>
+
+<p>A gleam of satisfaction flashed over Jerome's face. He
+looked shrewdly at Anne, who was not looking at him, but
+was staring uncompromisingly out over the poppy beds. A
+jealous woman always gives herself away. If Anne had been
+indifferent she would not have given him that slap in the face.</p>
+
+<p>"I dunno's she will," he replied coolly. "I didn't say for sure
+whether I'd be down tonight or not. It's so long since I had a
+chat with you I thought I'd drop in for a spell. But of course if
+I'm not wanted I can go where I will be."</p>
+
+<p>Anne could not get back her self-control. Her nerves were
+"all strung up," as she would have said. She had a feeling that
+she was right on the brink of a "scene," but she could not help
+herself.</p>
+
+<p>"I guess it doesn't matter much what I want," she said
+stonily. "At any rate, it hasn't seemed that way lately. You
+don't care, of course. Oh, no! Harriet Warren is all you care
+about. Well, I wish you joy of her."</p>
+
+<p>Jerome looked puzzled, or pretended to. In reality he was
+hugging himself with delight.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't just understand you, Anne," he said hesitatingly
+"You appear to be vexed about something."</p>
+
+<p>"I? Oh, no, I'm not, Mr. Irving. Of course old friends don't
+count now. Well, I've no doubt new ones will wear just as
+well."</p>
+
+<p>"If it's about my going to see Harriet," said Jerome easily
+"I don't see as how it can matter much to you. Goodness
+knows, you took enough pains to show me you didn't want
+me. I don't blame you. A woman has a right to please herself,
+and a man ought to have sense to take his answer and go. I
+hadn't, and that's where I made my mistake. I don't mean to
+pester you any more, but we can be real good friends, can't
+we? I'm sure I'm as much your friend as ever I was."</p>
+
+<p>Now, I hold that this speech of Jerome's, delivered in a
+cool, matter-of-fact tone, as of a man stating a case with dispassionate
+fairness, was a masterpiece. It was the last
+cleverly executed movement of the campaign. If it failed to
+effect a capitulation, he was a defeated man. But it did not fail.</p>
+
+<p>Anne had got to that point where an excited woman must
+go mad or cry. Anne cried. She sat flatly down on a chair and
+burst into tears.</p>
+
+<p>Jerome's hat went one way and his cane another. Jerome
+himself sprang across the intervening space and dropped into
+the chair beside Anne. He caught her hand in his and threw
+his arm boldly around her waist.</p>
+
+<p>"Goodness gracious, Anne! Do you care after all? Tell me
+that!"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't suppose it matters to you if I do," sobbed Anne. "It
+hasn't seemed to matter, anyhow."</p>
+
+<p>"Anne, look here! Didn't I come after you for fifteen years?
+It's you I always have wanted and want yet, if I can get you. I
+don't care a rap for Harriet Warren or anyone but you. Now
+that's the truth right out, Anne."</p>
+
+<p>No doubt it was, and Anne was convinced of it. But she
+had to have her cry out&mdash;on Jerome's shoulder&mdash;and it soothed
+her nerves wonderfully. Later on Octavia, slipping noiselessly
+up the steps in the dusk, saw a sight that transfixed her
+with astonishment. When she recovered herself she turned
+and fled wildly around the house, running bump into Sam
+Mitchell, who was coming across the yard from a twilight
+conference with the hired men.</p>
+
+<p>"Goodness, Tavy, what's the matter? Y' look 'sif y'd seen a
+ghost."</p>
+
+<p>Octavia leaned up against the wall in spasms of mirth.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Sam," she gasped, "old Jerome Irving and Aunt Anne
+are sitting round there in the dark on the front porch and he
+had his arms around her, kissing her! And they never saw nor
+heard me, no more'n if they were deaf and blind!"</p>
+
+<p>Sam gave a tremendous whistle and then went off into a
+shout of laughter whose echoes reached even to the gloom of
+the front porch and the ears of the lovers. But they did not
+know he was laughing at them and would not have cared if
+they had. They were too happy for that.</p>
+
+<p>There was a wedding that fall and Anne Stockard was the
+bride. When she was safely his, Jerome confessed all and was
+graciously forgiven.</p>
+
+<p>"But it was kind of mean to Harriet," said Anne rebukingly,
+"to go with her and get her talked about and then drop
+her as you did. Don't you think so yourself, Jerome?"</p>
+
+<p>Her husband's eyes twinkled.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, hardly that. You see, Harriet's engaged to that Johnson
+fellow out west. 'Tain't generally known, but I knew it
+and that's why I picked on her. I thought it probable that she'd
+be willing enough to flirt with me for a little diversion, even if
+I was old. Harriet's that sort of a girl. And I made up my mind
+that if that didn't fetch it nothing would and I'd give up for
+good and all. But it did, didn't it, Anne?"</p>
+
+<p>"I should say so. It was horrid of you, Jerome&mdash;but I daresay
+it's just as well you did or I'd likely never have found out that
+I couldn't get along without you. I did feel dreadful. Poor
+Octavia could tell you I was as cross as X. How did you come
+to think of it, Jerome?"</p>
+
+<p>"A fellow had to do something," said Jerome oracularly,
+"and I'd have done most anything to get you, Anne, that's a
+fact. And there it was&mdash;courting fifteen years and nothing to
+show for it. I dunno, though, how I did come to think of it.
+Guess it was a sort of inspiration. Anyhow, I've got you and
+that's what I set out to do in the beginning."</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<a name="Young_Si" id="Young_Si"></a><hr />
+<br />
+
+<h2>Young Si<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h2>
+<br />
+
+<p>Mr. Bentley had just driven into the yard with the new
+summer boarder. Mrs. Bentley and Agnes were peeping
+at her from behind the parlour curtains with the
+keen interest that they&mdash;shut in by their restricted farm
+life&mdash;always felt in any visitor from the outside world
+lying beyond their boundary of purple misted hills.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Bentley was a plump, rosy-cheeked woman with
+a motherly smile. Agnes was a fair, slim schoolgirl, as
+tall as her mother, with a sweet face and a promise of
+peach blossom prettiness in the years to come. The
+arrival of a summer boarder was a great event in her
+quiet life.</p>
+
+<p>"Ain't she pretty?" whispered Mrs. Bentley admiringly,
+as the girl came slowly up the green slope before
+the house. "I do hope she's nice. You can generally
+calculate on men boarders, but girls are doubtful. Preserve
+me from a cranky boarder! I've had enough of
+them. I kinder like her looks, though."</p>
+
+<p>Ethel Lennox had paused at the front door as Mrs.
+Bentley and Agnes came into the hall. Agnes gazed at
+the stranger with shy, unenvious admiration; the latter
+stood on the stone step just where the big chestnut by
+the door cast flickering gleams and shadows over her
+dress and shining hair.</p>
+
+<p>She was tall, and gowned in some simple white
+material that fell about her in graceful folds. She wore a
+cluster of pale pink roses at her belt, and a big, picturesque
+white hat shaded her face and the glossy, clinging
+masses of her red hair&mdash;hair that was neither auburn
+nor chestnut but simply red. Nor would anyone have
+wished it otherwise, having once seen that glorious
+mass, with all its wonderful possibilities of rippling
+luxuriance.</p>
+
+<p>Her complexion was of that perfect, waxen whiteness
+that goes with burnished red hair and the darkest
+of dilated violet eyes. Her delicately chiselled features
+wore what might have been a somewhat too decided
+impress of spirit and independence, had it not been for
+the sweet mouth, red and dimpled and curving, that
+parted in a slow, charming smile as Mrs. Bentley came
+forward with her kindly welcome.</p>
+
+<p>"You must be real tired, Miss Lennox. It's a long
+drive from the train down here. Agnes, show Miss
+Lennox up to her room, and tea will be ready when
+you come down."</p>
+
+<p>Agnes came forward with the shy grace that always
+won friends for her, and the two girls went slowly up
+the broad, old-fashioned staircase, while Mrs. Bentley
+bustled away to bring in the tea and put a goblet of
+damask roses on the table.</p>
+
+<p>"She looks like a picture, doesn't she, John?" she
+said to her husband. "I never saw such a face&mdash;and
+that hair too. Would you have believed red hair could
+be so handsome? She seems real friendly&mdash;none of
+your stuck-up fine ladies! I've had all I want of them, I
+can tell you!"</p>
+
+<p>"Sh&mdash;sh&mdash;sh!" said Mr. Bentley warningly, as Ethel
+Lennox came in with her arm about Agnes.</p>
+
+<p>She looked even more lovely without her hat, with
+the soft red tendrils of hair lying on her forehead. Mrs.
+Bentley sent a telegraphic message of admiration across
+the table to her husband, who was helping the cold
+tongue and feeling his way to a conversation.</p>
+
+<p>"You'll find it pretty quiet here, Miss Lennox. We're
+plain folks and there ain't much going and coming.
+Maybe you don't mind that, though?"</p>
+
+<p>"I like it. When one has been teaching school all the
+year in a noisy city, quiet seems the one thing to be
+desired. Besides, I like to fancy myself something of an
+artist. I paint and sketch a little when I have time, and
+Miss Courtland, who was here last summer, said I
+could not find a more suitable spot. So I came because I
+knew that mackerel fishing was carried on along the
+shore, and I would have a chance to study character
+among the fishermen."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, the shore ain't far away, and it's pretty&mdash;though
+maybe us folks here don't appreciate it rightly, being as
+we're so used to it. Strangers are always going crazy
+over its 'picturesqueness,' as they call it. As for 'character,'
+I reckon you'll find all you want of that among the
+Pointers; anyway, I never seed such critters as they be.
+When you get tired of painting, maybe you can amuse
+yourself trying to get to the bottom of our mystery."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, have you a mystery? How interesting!"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, a mystery&mdash;a mystery," repeated Mr. Bentley
+solemnly, "that nobody hain't been able to solve so far.
+I've give it up&mdash;so has everyone else. Maybe you'll
+have better luck."</p>
+
+<p>"But what is it?"</p>
+
+<p>"The mystery," said Mr. Bentley dramatically, "is&mdash;Young
+Si. He's the mystery. Last spring, just when the
+herring struck in, a young chap suddenly appeared at
+the Point. He appeared&mdash;from what corner of the globe
+nobody hain't ever been able to make out. He bought a
+boat and a shanty down at my shore and went into a
+sort of mackerel partnership with Snuffy Curtis&mdash;Snuffy
+supplying the experience and this young fellow the
+cash, I reckon. Snuffy's as poor as Job's turkey; it was a
+windfall for him. And there he's fished all summer."</p>
+
+<p>"But his name&mdash;Young Si?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, of course, that isn't it. He did give himself out
+as Brown, but nobody believes that's his handle&mdash;sounds
+unnatteral here. He bought his establishment from 'old
+Si,' who used to fish down there and was a mysterious
+old critter in a way too. So when this young fellow
+stepped in from goodness knows where, some of the
+Pointers christened him Young Si for a joke, and he
+never gets anything else. Doesn't seem to mind it. He's
+a moody, keep-to-himself sort of chap. Yet he ain't
+unpopular along shore, I believe. Snuffy was telling me
+they like him real well, considering his unsociableness.
+Anyways, he's as handsome a chap as I ever seed, and
+well eddicated too. He ain't none of your ordinary
+fishermen. Some of us kind of think he's a runaway&mdash;got
+into some scrape or another, maybe, and is skulking
+around here to keep out of jail. But wife here won't
+give in to that."</p>
+
+<p>"No, I never will," said Mrs. Bentley firmly. "Young
+Si comes here often for milk and butter, and he's a
+perfect gentleman. Nobody'll ever convince me that he
+has done anything to be ashamed of, whatever's his
+reason for wasting his life down there at that shore."</p>
+
+<p>"He ain't wasting his life," chuckled Mr. Bentley.
+"He's making money, Young Si is, though he don't
+seem to care about that a mite. This has been a big year
+for mackerel, and he's smart. If he didn't know much
+when he begun, he's ahead of Snuffy now. And as for
+work, I never saw his beat. He seems possessed. Up
+afore sunrise every blessed morning and never in bed
+till midnight, and just slaving away all between time. I
+said to him t'other day, says I: 'Young Si, you'll have to
+let up on this sort of thing and take a rest. You can't
+stand it. You're not a Pointer. Pointers can stand anything,
+but it'll kill you.'</p>
+
+<p>"He give one of them bitter laughs of his. Says he:
+'It's no difference if it does. Nobody'll care,' and off he
+walks, sulky like. There's something about Young Si I
+can't understand," concluded Mr. Bentley.</p>
+
+<p>Ethel Lennox was interested. A melancholy, mysterious
+hero in a setting of silver-rimmed sand hills and
+wide blue sweeps of ocean was something that ought
+to lend piquancy to her vacation.</p>
+
+<p>"I should like to see this prince in disguise," she
+said. "It all sounds very romantic."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll take you to the shore after tea if you'd like," said
+Agnes eagerly. "Si's just splendid," she continued in a
+confidential aside as they rose from the table. "Pa doesn't
+half like him because he thinks there's something queer
+about him. But I do. He's a gentleman, as Ma says. I
+don't believe he's done anything wrong."</p>
+
+<br />
+<hr style="width: 15%;" />
+<br />
+
+<p>Ethel Lennox sauntered out into the orchard to wait for
+Agnes. She sat down under an apple tree and began to
+read, but soon the book slipped from her hands and
+the beautiful head leaned back against the grey, lichened
+trunk of the old tree. The sweet mouth drooped
+wistfully. There was a sad, far-away look in the violet
+eyes. The face was not that of a happy girl, so thought
+Agnes as she came down the apple tree avenue.</p>
+
+<p>But how pretty she is! she thought. Won't the folks
+around here stare at her! They always do at our boarders,
+but we've never had one like her.</p>
+
+<p>Ethel sprang up. "I had no idea you would be here
+so soon," she said brightly. "Just wait till I get my
+hat."</p>
+
+<p>When she came out they started off, and presently
+found themselves walking down a grassy, deep-rutted
+lane that ran through mown hay fields, green with
+their rich aftergrowth, and sheets of pale ripening oats
+and golden-green wheat, until it lost itself in the rolling
+sand hills at the foot of the slope.</p>
+
+<p>Beyond the sand hills stretched the shining expanse
+of the ocean, of the faint, bleached blue of hot August
+seas, and reaching out into a horizon laced with long
+trails of pinkish cloud. Numberless fishing boats dotted
+the shimmering reaches.</p>
+
+<p>"That furthest-off boat is Young Si's," said Agnes.
+"He always goes to that particular spot."</p>
+
+<p>"Is he really all your father says?" asked Miss Lennox
+curiously.</p>
+
+<p>"Indeed, he is. He isn't any more like the rest of the
+shore men than you are. He's queer, of course. I don't
+believe he's happy. It seems to me he's worrying over
+something, but I'm sure it is nothing wrong. Here we
+are," she added, as they passed the sand hills and
+came out on the long, level beach.</p>
+
+<p>To their left the shore curved around in a semi-circle
+of dazzling whiteness; at their right stood a small grey
+fish-house.</p>
+
+<p>"That's Young Si's place," said Agnes. "He lives
+there night and day. Wouldn't it make anyone melancholy?
+No wonder he's mysterious. I'm going to get his
+spyglass. He told me I might always use it."</p>
+
+<p>She pushed open the door and entered, followed by
+Ethel. The interior was rough but clean. It was a small
+room, lighted by one tiny window looking out on the
+water. In one corner a rough ladder led up to the loft
+above. The bare lathed walls were hung with fishing
+jackets, nets, mackerel lines and other shore appurtenances.
+A little stove bore a kettle and a frying pan. A low
+board table was strewn with dishes and the cold remnants
+of a hasty repast; benches were placed along the
+walls. A fat, bewhiskered kitten, looking as if it were
+cut out of black velvet, was dozing on the window sill.</p>
+
+<p>"This is Young Si's cat," explained Agnes, patting
+the creature, which purred joyously and opened its
+sleepy green eyes. "It's the only thing he cares for, I
+believe. Witch! Witch! How are you, Witch? Well, here's
+the spyglass. Let's go out and have a look. Si's catching
+mackerel," announced Agnes a few minutes later, after
+she had scrutinized each boat in turn, "and he won't
+be in for an hour yet. If you like, we have time for a
+walk up the shore."</p>
+
+<p>The sun slipped lower and lower in the creamy sky,
+leaving a trail of sparkles that ran across the water and
+lost itself in the west. Sea gulls soared and dipped, and
+tiny "sand peeps" flitted along the beach. Just as the
+red rim of the sun dipped in the purpling sea, the
+boats began to come in.</p>
+
+<p>"Most of them will go around to the Point," explained
+Agnes, with a contemptuous sweep of her
+hand towards a long headland running out before them.
+"They belong there and they're a rough crowd. You
+don't catch Young Si associating with the Pointers.
+There, he's getting up sail. We'll just have time to get
+back before he comes in."</p>
+
+<p>They hurried back across the dampening sand as the
+sun disappeared, leaving a fiery spot behind him. The
+shore was no longer quiet and deserted. The little spot
+where the fishing house stood had suddenly started
+into life. Roughly clad boys were running hither and
+thither, carrying fish or water. The boats were hauled
+up on the skids. A couple of shaggy old tars, who had
+strolled over from the Point to hear about Young Si's
+catch, were smoking their pipes at the corner of his
+shanty. A mellow afterlight was shining over sea and
+shore. The whole scene delighted Ethel's artist eyes.</p>
+
+<p>Agnes nudged her companion.</p>
+
+<p>"There! If you want to see Young Si," she whispered,
+pointing to the skids, where a busy figure was
+discernible in a large boat, "that's him, with his back to
+us, in the cream-coloured boat. He's counting out mackerel.
+If you go over to that platform behind him, you'll
+get a good look when he turns around. I'm going to
+coax a mackerel out of that stingy old Snuffy, if I can."</p>
+
+<p>She tripped off, and Ethel walked slowly over to the
+boats. The men stared at her in open-mouthed admiration
+as she passed them and walked out on the platform
+behind Young Si. There was no one near the two.
+The others were all assembled around Snuffy's boat.
+Young Si was throwing out the mackerel with marvellous
+rapidity, but at the sound of a footstep behind him
+he turned and straightened up his tall form. They stood
+face to face.</p>
+
+<p>"Miles!"</p>
+
+<p>"Ethel!"</p>
+
+<p>Young Si staggered back against the mast, letting
+two silvery bloaters slip through his hands overboard.
+His handsome, sunburned face was very white.</p>
+
+<p>Ethel Lennox turned abruptly and silently and walked
+swiftly across the sand. Agnes felt her arm touched,
+and turned to see Ethel standing, pale and erect, beside
+her.</p>
+
+<p>"Let us go home," said the latter unsteadily. "It is
+very damp here&mdash;I feel chilled."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, dear!" exclaimed Agnes penitently. "I ought to
+have told you to bring a shawl. It is always damp on
+the shore after sunset. Here, Snuffy, give me my mackerel.
+Thank you. I'm ready now, Miss Lennox."</p>
+
+<p>They reached the lane before Agnes remembered to
+ask the question Ethel dreaded.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, did you see Young Si? And what do you think
+of him?"</p>
+
+<p>Ethel turned her face away and answered with studied
+carelessness. "He seems to be quite a superior
+fisherman so far as I could see in the dim light. It was
+very dusky there, you know. Let us walk a little faster.
+My shoes are quite wet."</p>
+
+<p>When they reached home, Miss Lennox excused herself
+on the plea of weariness and went straight to her
+room.</p>
+
+<br />
+<hr style="width: 15%;" />
+<br />
+
+<p>Back at the shore Young Si had recovered himself and
+stooped again to his work. His face was set and expressionless.
+A dull red burned in each bronzed cheek. He
+threw out the mackerel mechanically, but his hands
+trembled.</p>
+
+<p>Snuffy strolled over to the boat. "See that handsome
+girl, Si?" he asked lazily. "One of the Bentleys' boarders,
+I hear. Looks as if she might have stepped out of a
+picture frame, don't she?"</p>
+
+<p>"We've no time to waste, Curtis," said Young Si
+harshly, "with all these fish to clean before bedtime.
+Stop talking and get to work."</p>
+
+<p>Snuffy shrugged his shoulders and obeyed in silence.
+Young Si was not a person to be trifled with. The
+catch was large and it was late before they finished.
+Snuffy surveyed the full barrels complacently.</p>
+
+<p>"Good day's work," he muttered, "but hard&mdash;I'm
+dead beat out. 'Low I'll go to bed. In the name o'
+goodness, Si, whar be you a-goin' to?"</p>
+
+<p>Young Si had got into a dory and untied it. He made
+no answer, but rowed out from the shore. Snuffy stared
+at the dory blankly until it was lost in the gloom.</p>
+
+<p>"Ef that don't beat all!" he ejaculated. "I wonder if Si
+is in his right senses? He's been actin' quar right along,
+and now to start off, Lord knows whar, at this hour o'
+night! I really don't believe it's safe to stay here alone
+with him."</p>
+
+<p>Snuffy shook his unkempt head dubiously.</p>
+
+<p>Young Si rowed steadily out over the dark waves.
+An eastern breeze was bringing in a damp sea fog that
+blurred darkly over the outlines of horizon and shore.
+The young fisherman found himself alone in a world of
+water and grey mist. He stopped rowing and leaned
+forward on his oars.</p>
+
+<p>"To see her here, of all places!" he muttered. "Not a
+word, scarcely a look, after all this long heartbreak!
+Well, perhaps it is better so. And yet to know she is so
+near! How beautiful she is! And I love her more than
+ever. That is where the sting lies. I thought that in this
+rough life, amid all these rude associations, where nothing
+could remind me of her, I might forget. And now&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>He clenched his hands. The mist was all around and
+about him, creeping, impalpable, phantom-like. The
+dory rocked gently on the swell. From afar came the
+low persistent murmur of the ocean.</p>
+
+<br />
+<hr style="width: 15%;" />
+<br />
+
+<p>The next day Ethel Lennox declined to visit Si's shore.
+Instead she went to the Point and sketched all day. She
+went again the next day and the next. The Point was
+the most picturesque part of the shore, she averred, and
+the "types" among its inhabitants most interesting.
+Agnes Bentley ceased to suggest another visit to Si's
+shore. She had a vague perception that her companion
+did not care to discuss the subject.</p>
+
+<p>At the end of a week Mrs. Bentley remarked: "What
+in the world can have happened to Young Si? It's a
+whole week since he was here for milk or butter. He
+ain't sick, is he?"</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Bentley chuckled amusedly.</p>
+
+<p>"I 'low I can tell you the reason of that. Si's getting
+his stuff at Walden's now. I saw him going there twice
+this week. 'Liza Walden's got ahead of you at last,
+Mary."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I never did!" said Mrs. Bentley. "Well, Young
+Si is the first that ever preferred 'Liza Walden's butter
+to mine. Everyone knows what hers is like. She never
+works her salt half in. Well, Young Si's welcome to it,
+I'm sure; I wish him joy of his exchange."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Bentley rattled her dishes ominously. It was
+plain her faith in Young Si had received a severe shock.</p>
+
+<p>Upstairs in her room, Ethel Lennox, with a few
+undried tears glistening on her cheeks, was writing a
+letter. Her lips were compressed and her hand trembled:</p>
+
+<p>"I have discovered that it is no use to run away from
+fate," she wrote. "No matter how hard we try to elude
+it, and how sure we are that we have succeeded, it will
+rise and meet us where we least expect it. I came down
+here tired and worn out, looking for peace and rest&mdash;and
+lo! the most disquieting element of my life is here
+to confront me.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm going to confess, Helen. 'Open confession is
+good for the soul,' you know, and I shall treat myself
+to a good dose while the mood is on.</p>
+
+<p>"You know, of course, that I was once engaged to
+Miles Lesley. You also know that that engagement was
+broken last autumn for unexplained reasons. Well, I
+will tell you all about it and then mail this letter speedily,
+before I change my mind.</p>
+
+<p>"It is over a year now since Miles and I first became
+engaged. As you are aware, his family is wealthy, and
+noted for its exclusiveness. I was a poor school teacher,
+and you may imagine with what horror his relatives
+received the news of Miles's attentions to one whom
+they considered his inferior. Now that I have thought
+the whole matter over calmly, I scarcely blame them. It
+must be hard for aristocratic parents who have lavished
+every care upon a son, and cherished for him the
+highest hopes, when he turns from the women of his
+own order to one considered beneath him in station.
+But I did not view the subject in this light then; and
+instead of declining his attentions, as I perhaps should
+have done, I encouraged them&mdash;I loved him so dearly,
+Nell!&mdash;and in spite of family opposition, Miles soon
+openly declared his attachment.</p>
+
+<p>"When his parents found they could not change his
+purpose, their affection for him forced them into outward
+acquiescence, but their reluctant condescension
+was gall and wormwood to me. I saw things only from
+my own point of view, and was keenly sensitive to
+their politely concealed disapprobation, and my offended
+vanity found its victim in Miles. I belonged to the class
+who admit and resent slights, instead of ignoring them,
+as do the higher bred, and I thought he would not see
+those offered to me. I grew cold and formal to him. He
+was very patient, but his ways were not mine, and my
+manner puzzled and annoyed him. Our relations soon
+became strained, and the trifle necessary for an open
+quarrel was easily supplied.</p>
+
+<p>"One evening I went to a large At Home given by
+his mother. I knew but few and, as Miles was necessarily
+busy with his social duties to her guests, I was, after
+the first hurried greeting, left unattended for a time.
+Not being accustomed to such functions, I resented
+this as a covert insult and, in a fit of jealous pique, I
+blush to own that I took the revenge of a peasant maid
+and entered into a marked flirtation with Fred Currie,
+who had paid me some attention before my engagement.
+When Miles was at liberty to seek me, he found
+me, to all appearances, quite absorbed in my companion
+and oblivious of his approach. He turned on his
+heel and went away, nor did he come near me the rest
+of the evening.</p>
+
+<p>"I went home angry enough, but so miserable and
+repentant that if Miles had been his usual patient self
+when he called the following evening I would have
+begged his forgiveness. But I had gone too far; his
+mother was shocked by my gaucherie, and he was
+humiliated and justly exasperated. We had a short,
+bitter quarrel. I said a great many foolish, unpardonable
+things, and finally I threw his ring at him. He gave
+me a startled look then, in which there was something
+of contempt, and went away without another word.</p>
+
+<p>"After my anger had passed, I was wretchedly unhappy.
+I realized how unworthily I had acted, how
+deeply I loved Miles, and how lonely and empty my
+life would be without him. But he did not come back,
+and soon after I learned he had gone away&mdash;whither
+no one knew, but it was supposed abroad. Well, I
+buried my hopes and tears in secret and went on with
+my life as people have to do&mdash;a life in which I have
+learned to think, and which, I hope, has made me
+nobler and better.</p>
+
+<p>"This summer I came here. I heard much about a
+certain mysterious stranger known as 'Young Si' who
+was fishing mackerel at this shore. I was very curious.
+The story sounded romantic, and one evening I went
+down to see him. I met him face to face and, Helen, it
+was Miles Lesley!</p>
+
+<p>"For one minute earth, sky and sea reeled around
+me. The next, I remembered all, and turned and walked
+away. He did not follow.</p>
+
+<p>"You may be sure that I now religiously avoid that
+part of the shore. We have never met since, and he has
+made no effort to see me. He clearly shows that he
+despises me. Well, I despise myself. I am very unhappy,
+Nell, and not only on my own account, for I
+feel that if Miles had never met me, his mother would
+not now be breaking her heart for her absent boy. My
+sorrow has taught me to understand hers, and I no
+longer resent her pride.</p>
+
+<p>"You need hardly be told after this that I leave here
+in another week. I cannot fabricate a decent excuse to
+go sooner, or I would."</p>
+
+<p>In the cool twilight Ethel went with Agnes Bentley to
+mail her letter. As they stopped at the door of the little
+country store, a young man came around the corner. It
+was Young Si. He was in his rough fishing suit, with a
+big herring net trailing over his shoulder, but no disguise
+could effectually conceal his splendid figure. Agnes
+sprang forward eagerly.</p>
+
+<p>"Si, where have you been? Why have you never I
+been up to see us for so long?"</p>
+
+<p>Young Si made no verbal reply. He merely lifted his
+cap with formal politeness and turned on his heel.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I never!" exclaimed Agnes, as soon as she
+recovered her powers of speech. "If that is how Young
+Si is going to treat his friends! He must have got offended
+at something. I wonder what it is," she added,
+her curiosity getting the better of her indignation.</p>
+
+<p>When they came out they saw the solitary figure of
+Young Si far adown, crossing the dim, lonely shore
+fields. In the dusk Agnes failed to notice the pallor of
+her companion's face and the unshed tears in her eyes.</p>
+
+<br />
+<hr style="width: 15%;" />
+<br />
+
+<p>"I've just been down to the Point," said Agnes, coming
+in one sultry afternoon about a week later, "and Little
+Ev said as there was no fishing today he'd take us out
+for that sail tonight if you wanted to go."</p>
+
+<p>Ethel Lennox put her drawing away listlessly. She
+looked pale and tired. She was going away the next
+day, and this was to be her last visit to the shore.</p>
+
+<p>About an hour before sunset a boat glided out from
+the shadow of the Point. In it were Ethel Lennox and
+Agnes, together with Little Ev, the sandy-haired, undersized
+Pointer who owned the boat.</p>
+
+<p>The evening was fine, and an off-shore breeze was
+freshening up rapidly. They did not notice the long,
+dark bank of livid cloud low in the northwest.</p>
+
+<p>"Isn't this glorious!" exclaimed Ethel. Her hat was
+straining back from her head and the red rings of her
+hair were blowing about her face.</p>
+
+<p>Agnes looked about her more anxiously. Wiser in
+matters of sea and shore than her companion, there
+were some indications she did not like.</p>
+
+<p>Young Si, who was standing with Snuffy their
+skids, lowered his spyglass with a start.</p>
+
+<p>"It is Agnes Bentley and&mdash;and&mdash;that boarder of
+theirs," he said anxiously, "and they've gone out with
+Little Ev in that wretched, leaky tub of his. Where are
+their eyes that they can't see a squall coming up?"</p>
+
+<p>"An' Little Ev don't know as much about managing
+a boat as a cat!" exclaimed Snuffy excitedly. "Sign 'em
+to come back."</p>
+
+<p>Si shook his head. "They're too far out. I don't know
+that the squall will amount to very much. In a good
+boat, with someone who knew how to manage it, they'd
+be all right. But with Little Ev&mdash;" He began walking
+restlessly up and down the narrow platform.</p>
+
+<p>The boat was now some distance out. The breeze
+had stiffened to a slow strong wind and the dull-grey
+level of the sea was whipped into white-caps.</p>
+
+<p>Agnes bent towards Ethel. "It's getting too rough. I
+think we'd better go back. I'm afraid we're in for a
+thunder squall. Look at the clouds."</p>
+
+<p>A long, sullen muttering verified her words.</p>
+
+<p>"Little Ev," she shouted, "we want to go in."</p>
+
+<p>Little Ev, thus recalled to things about him, looked
+around in alarm. The girls questioned each other with
+glances of dismay. The sky had grown very black, and
+the peals of thunder came louder and more continuously.
+A jagged bolt of lightning hurtled over the horizon.
+Over land and sea was "the green, malignant
+light of coming storm."</p>
+
+<p>Little Ev brought the boat's head abruptly round as a
+few heavy drops of rain fell.</p>
+
+<p>"Ev, the boat is leaking!" shrieked Agnes, above the
+wind. "The water's coming in!"</p>
+
+<p>"Bail her out then," shouted Ev, struggling with the
+sail. "There's two cans under the seat. I've got to lower
+this sail. Bail her out."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll help you," said Ethel.</p>
+
+<p>She was very pale, but her manner was calm. Both
+girls bailed energetically.</p>
+
+<p>Young Si, watching through the glass, saw them. He
+dropped it and ran to his boat, white and resolute.</p>
+
+<p>"They've sprung a leak. Here, Curtis, launch the
+boat. We've got to go out or Ev will drown them."</p>
+
+<p>They shot out from the shore just as the downpour
+came, blotting out sea and land in one driving sheet of
+white rain.</p>
+
+<p>"Young Si is coming off for us," said Agnes. "We'll
+be all right if he gets here in time. This boat is going to
+sink, sure."</p>
+
+<p>Little Ev was completely demoralized by fear. The
+girls bailed unceasingly, but the water gained every
+minute. Young Si was none too soon.</p>
+
+<p>"Jump, Ev!" he shouted as his boat shot alongside.
+"Jump for your life!"</p>
+
+<p>He dragged Ethel Lennox in as he spoke. Agnes
+sprang from one boat to the other like a cat, and Little
+Ev jumped just as a thunderous crash seemed to burst
+above them and air and sky were filled with blue flame.</p>
+
+<p>The danger was past, for the squall had few difficulties
+for Si and Snuffy. When they reached the shore,
+Agnes, who had quite recovered from her fright, tucked
+her dripping skirts about her and announced her determination
+to go straight home with Snuffy.</p>
+
+<p>"I can't get any wetter than I am," she said cheerfully.
+"I'll send Pa down in the buggy for Miss Lennox.
+Light the fire in your shanty, Si, and let her get dry. I'll
+be as quick as I can."</p>
+
+<p>Si picked Ethel up in his strong arms and carried her
+into the fish-house. He placed her on one of the low
+benches and hurriedly began to kindle a fire. Ethel sat
+up dazedly and pushed back the dripping masses of
+her bright hair. Young Si turned and looked down at
+her with a passionate light in his eyes. She put out her
+cold, wet hands wistfully.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Miles!" she whispered.</p>
+
+<p>Outside, the wind shook the frail building and tore
+the shuddering sea to pieces. The rain poured down. It
+was already settling in for a night of storm. But, inside,
+Young Si's fire was casting cheery flames over the rude
+room, and Young Si himself was kneeling by Ethel
+Lennox with his arm about her and her head on his
+broad shoulder. There were happy tears in her eyes
+and her voice quivered as she said, "Miles, can you
+forgive me? If you knew how bitterly I have repented&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Never speak of the past again, my sweet. In my
+lonely days and nights down here by the sea, I have
+forgotten all but my love."</p>
+
+<p>"Miles, how did you come here? I thought you were
+in Europe."</p>
+
+<p>"I did travel at first. I came down here by chance,
+and resolved to cut myself utterly adrift from my old
+life and see if I could not forget you. I was not very
+successful." He smiled down into her eyes. "And you
+were going away tomorrow. How perilously near we
+have been to not meeting! But how are we going to
+explain all this to our friends along shore?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think we had better not explain it at all. I will go
+away tomorrow, as I intended, and you can quietly
+follow soon. Let 'Young Si' remain the mystery he has
+always been."</p>
+
+<p>"That will be best&mdash;decidedly so. They would never
+understand if we did tell them. And I daresay they
+would be very much disappointed to find I was not a
+murderer or a forger or something of that sort. They
+have always credited me with an evil past. And you
+and I will go back to our own world, Ethel. You will be
+welcome there now, sweet&mdash;my family, too, have
+learned a lesson, and will do anything to promote my
+happiness."</p>
+
+<p>Agnes drove Ethel Lennox to the station next day.
+The fierce wind that had swept over land and sea
+seemed to have blown away all the hazy vapours and
+oppressive heats in the air, and the morning dawned
+as clear and fresh as if the sad old earth with all her
+passionate tears had cleansed herself from sin and stain
+and come forth radiantly pure and sweet. Ethel bubbled
+over with joyousness. Agnes wondered at the
+change in her.</p>
+
+<p>"Good-bye, Miss Lennox," she said wistfully. "You'll
+come back to see us some time again, won't you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps," smiled Ethel, "and if not, Agnes, you
+must come and see me. Some day I may tell you a
+secret."</p>
+
+<p>About a week later Young Si suddenly vanished, and
+his disappearance was a nine-day's talk along shore.
+His departure was as mysterious as his advent. It leaked
+out that he had quietly disposed of his boat and shanty
+to Snuffy Curtis, sent his mackerel off and, that done,
+slipped from the Pointers' lives, never more to re-enter
+them.</p>
+
+<p>Little Ev was the last of the Pointers to see him tramping
+along the road to the station in the dusk of the
+autumn twilight. And the next morning Agnes Bentley,
+going out of doors before the others, found on the
+doorstep a basket containing a small, vociferous black
+kitten with a card attached to its neck. On it was
+written: "Will Agnes please befriend Witch in memory
+of Young Si?"</p>
+
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<hr />
+<br />
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories,
+1896 to 1901, by Lucy Maud Montgomery
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MONTGOMERY SHORT STORIES ***
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to
+1901, by Lucy Maud Montgomery
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901
+
+Author: Lucy Maud Montgomery
+
+Release Date: March 19, 2008 [EBook #24873]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MONTGOMERY SHORT STORIES ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Alicia Williams, Jeannie Howse and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901
+
+
+Lucy Maud Montgomery was born at Clifton (now New London), Prince
+Edward Island, Canada, on November 30, 1874. She achieved
+international fame in her lifetime, putting Prince Edward Island and
+Canada on the world literary map. Best known for her "Anne of Green
+Gables" books, she was also a prolific writer of short stories and
+poetry. She published some 500 short stories and poems and twenty
+novels before her death in 1942. The Project Gutenberg collection of
+her short stories was gathered from numerous sources and is presented
+in chronological publishing order:
+
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1902 to 1903
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1904
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1905 to 1906
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1907 to 1908
+Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1909 to 1922
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+Short Stories 1896 to 1901
+
+    A Case of Trespass                                       1897
+    A Christmas Inspiration                                  1901
+    A Christmas Mistake                                      1899
+    A Strayed Allegiance                                     1897
+    An Invitation Given on Impulse                           1900
+    Detected by the Camera                                   1897
+    In Spite of Myself                                       1896
+    Kismet                                                   1899
+    Lillian's Business Venture                               1900
+    Miriam's Lover                                           1901
+    Miss Calista's Peppermint Bottle                         1900
+    The Jest that Failed                                     1901
+    The Pennington's Girl                                    1900
+    The Red Room                                             1898
+    The Setness of Theodosia                                 1901
+    The Story of An Invitation                               1901
+    The Touch of Fate                                        1899
+    The Waking of Helen                                      1901
+    The Way of Winning Anne                                  1899
+    Young Si                                                 1901
+
+
+
+
+A Case of Trespass
+
+
+It was the forenoon of a hazy, breathless day, and Dan Phillips was
+trouting up one of the back creeks of the Carleton pond. It was
+somewhat cooler up the creek than out on the main body of water, for
+the tall birches and willows, crowding down to the brim, threw cool,
+green shadows across it and shut out the scorching glare, while a
+stray breeze now and then rippled down the wooded slopes, rustling the
+beech leaves with an airy, pleasant sound.
+
+Out in the pond the glassy water creamed and shimmered in the hot sun,
+unrippled by the faintest breath of air. Across the soft, pearly tints
+of the horizon blurred the smoke of the big factory chimneys that were
+owned by Mr. Walters, to whom the pond and adjacent property also
+belonged.
+
+Mr. Walters was a comparative stranger in Carleton, having but
+recently purchased the factories from the heirs of the previous owner;
+but he had been in charge long enough to establish a reputation for
+sternness and inflexibility in all his business dealings.
+
+One or two of his employees, who had been discharged by him on what
+they deemed insufficient grounds, helped to deepen the impression that
+he was an unjust and arbitrary man, merciless to all offenders, and
+intolerant of the slightest infringement of his cast-iron rules.
+
+Dan Phillips had been on the pond ever since sunrise. The trout had
+risen well in the early morning, but as the day wore on, growing
+hotter and hotter, they refused to bite, and for half an hour Dan had
+not caught one.
+
+He had a goodly string of them already, however, and he surveyed them
+with satisfaction as he rowed his leaky little skiff to the shore of
+the creek.
+
+"Pretty good catch," he soliloquized. "Best I've had this summer, so
+far. That big spotted one must weigh near a pound. He's a beauty.
+They're a good price over at the hotels now, too. I'll go home and
+get my dinner and go straight over with them. That'll leave me time
+for another try at them about sunset. Whew, how hot it is! I must take
+Ella May home a bunch of them blue flags. They're real handsome!"
+
+He tied his skiff under the crowding alders, gathered a big bunch of
+the purple flag lilies with their silky petals, and started homeward,
+whistling cheerily as he stepped briskly along the fern-carpeted wood
+path that wound up the hill under the beeches and firs.
+
+He was a freckled, sunburned lad of thirteen years. His neighbours all
+said that Danny was "as smart as a steel trap," and immediately added
+that they wondered where he got his smartness from--certainly not from
+his father!
+
+The elder Phillips had been denominated "shiftless and slack-twisted"
+by all who ever had any dealings with him in his unlucky, aimless
+life--one of those improvident, easygoing souls who sit contentedly
+down to breakfast with a very faint idea where their dinner is to come
+from.
+
+When he had died, no one had missed him, unless it were his patient,
+sad-eyed wife, who bravely faced her hard lot, and toiled
+unremittingly to keep a home for her two children--Dan and a girl two
+years younger, who was a helpless cripple, suffering from some form of
+spinal disease.
+
+Dan, who was old and steady for his years, had gone manfully to work
+to assist his mother. Though he had been disappointed in all his
+efforts to obtain steady employment, he was active and obliging, and
+earned many a small amount by odd jobs around the village, and by
+helping the Carleton farmers in planting and harvest.
+
+For the last two years, however, his most profitable source of summer
+income had been the trout pond. The former owner had allowed anyone
+who wished to fish in his pond, and Dan made a regular business of it,
+selling his trout at the big hotels over at Mosquito Lake. This, in
+spite of its unattractive name, was a popular summer resort, and Dan
+always found a ready market for his catch.
+
+When Mr. Walters purchased the property it somehow never occurred to
+Dan that the new owner might not be so complaisant as his predecessor
+in the matter of the best trouting pond in the country.
+
+To be sure, Dan often wondered why it was the pond was so deserted
+this summer. He could not recall having seen a single person on it
+save himself. Still, it did not cross his mind that there could be any
+particular reason for this.
+
+He always fished up in the cool, dim creeks, which long experience had
+taught him were best for trout, and came and went by a convenient wood
+path; but he had no thought of concealment in so doing. He would not
+have cared had all Carleton seen him.
+
+He had done very well with his fish so far, and prices for trout at
+the Lake went up every day. Dan was an enterprising boy, and a general
+favourite with the hotel owners. They knew that he could always be
+depended on.
+
+Mrs. Phillips met him at the door when he reached home.
+
+"See, Mother," said Dan exultantly, as he held up his fish. "Just look
+at that fellow, will you? A pound if he's an ounce! I ought to get a
+good price for these, I can tell you. Let me have my dinner now, and
+I'll go right over to the Lake with them."
+
+"It's a long walk for you, Danny," replied his mother pityingly, "and
+it's too hot to go so far. I'm afraid you'll get sun-struck or
+something. You'd better wait till the cool of the evening. You're
+looking real pale and thin this while back."
+
+"Oh, I'm all right, Mother," assured Dan cheerfully. "I don't mind the
+heat a bit. A fellow must put up with some inconveniences. Wait till I
+bring home the money for these fish. And I mean to have another catch
+tonight. It's you that's looking tired. I wish you didn't have to work
+so hard, Mother. If I could only get a good place you could take it
+easier. Sam French says that Mr. Walters wants a boy up there at the
+factory, but I know I wouldn't do. I ain't big enough. Perhaps
+something will turn up soon though. When our ship comes in, Mother,
+we'll have our good times."
+
+He picked up his flags and went into the little room where his sister
+lay.
+
+"See what I've brought you, Ella May!" he said, as he thrust the cool,
+moist clusters into her thin, eager hands. "Did you ever see such
+beauties?"
+
+"Oh, Dan, how lovely they are! Thank you ever so much! If you are
+going over to the Lake this afternoon, will you please call at Mrs.
+Henny's and get those nutmeg geranium slips she promised me? Just look
+how nice my others are growing. The pink one is going to bloom."
+
+"I'll bring you all the geranium slips at the Lake, if you like. When
+I get rich, Ella May, I'll build you a big conservatory, and I'll get
+every flower in the world in it for you. You shall just live and sleep
+among posies. Is dinner ready, Mother? Trouting's hungry work, I tell
+you. What paper is this?"
+
+He picked up a folded newspaper from the table.
+
+"Oh, that's only an old Lake _Advertiser_," answered Mrs. Phillips, as
+she placed the potatoes on the table and wiped her moist, hot face
+with the corner of her gingham apron. "Letty Mills brought it in
+around a parcel this morning. It's four weeks old, but I kept it to
+read if I ever get time. It's so seldom we see a paper of any kind
+nowadays. But I haven't looked at it yet. Why, Danny, what on earth is
+the matter?"
+
+For Dan, who had opened the paper and glanced over the first page,
+suddenly gave a choked exclamation and turned pale, staring stupidly
+at the sheet before him.
+
+"See, Mother," he gasped, as she came up in alarm and looked over his
+shoulder. This is what they read:
+
+    Notice
+
+    Anyone found fishing on my pond at Carleton after date will be
+    prosecuted according to law, without respect of persons.
+
+    June First.                                H.C. Walters.
+
+"Oh, Danny, what does it mean?"
+
+Dan went and carefully closed the door of Ella May's room before he
+replied. His face was pale and his voice shaky.
+
+"Mean? Well, Mother, it just means that I've been stealing Mr.
+Walters's trout all summer--_stealing_ them. That's what it means."
+
+"Oh, Danny! But you didn't know."
+
+"No, but I ought to have remembered that he was the new owner, and
+have asked him. I never thought. Mother, what does 'prosecuted
+according to law' mean?"
+
+"I don't know, I'm sure, Danny. But if this is so, there's only one
+thing to be done. You must go straight to Mr. Walters and tell him all
+about it."
+
+"Mother, I don't dare to. He is a dreadfully hard man. Sam French's
+father says--"
+
+"I wouldn't believe a word Sam French's father says about Mr.
+Walters!" said Mrs. Phillips firmly. "He's got a spite against him
+because he was dismissed. Besides, Danny, it's the only right thing to
+do. You know that. We're poor, but we have never done anything
+underhand yet."
+
+"Yes, Mother, I know," said Dan, gulping his fear bravely down. "I'll
+go, of course, right after dinner. I was only scared at first. I'll
+tell you what I'll do. I'll clean these trout nicely and take them to
+Mr. Walters, and tell him that, if he'll only give me time, I'll pay
+him back every cent of money I got for all I sold this summer. Then
+maybe he'll let me off, seeing as I didn't know about the notice."
+
+"I'll go with you, Danny."
+
+"No, I'll go alone, Mother. You needn't go with me," said Dan
+heroically. To himself he said that his mother had troubles enough. He
+would never subject her to the added ordeal of an interview with the
+stern factory owner. He would beard the lion in his den himself, if it
+had to be done.
+
+"Don't tell Ella May anything about it. It would worry her. And don't
+cry, Mother, I guess it'll be all right. Let me have my dinner now and
+I'll go straight off."
+
+Dan ate his dinner rapidly; then he carefully cleaned his trout, put
+them in a long basket, with rhubarb leaves over them, and started with
+an assumed cheerfulness very far from his real feelings.
+
+He had barely passed the gate when another boy came shuffling along--a
+tall, raw-boned lad, with an insinuating smile and shifty, cunning
+eyes. The newcomer nodded familiarly to Dan.
+
+"Hello, sonny. Going over to the Lake with your catch, are you? You'll
+fry up before you get there. There'll be nothing left of you but a
+crisp."
+
+"No, I'm not going to the Lake. I'm going up to the factory to see Mr.
+Walters."
+
+Sam French gave a long whistle of surprise.
+
+"Why, Dan, what's taking you there? You surely ain't thinking of
+trying for that place, are you? Walters wouldn't look at you. Why, he
+wouldn't take _me_! You haven't the ghost of a chance."
+
+"No, I'm not going for that. Sam, did you know that Mr. Walters had a
+notice in the Lake _Advertiser_ that nobody could fish in his pond
+this summer?"
+
+"Course I did--the old skinflint! He's too mean to live, that's what.
+He never goes near the pond himself. Regular dog in the manger, he is.
+Dad says--"
+
+"Sam, why didn't you tell me about that notice?"
+
+"Gracious, didn't you know? I s'posed everybody did, and here I've
+been taking you for the cutest chap this side of sunset--fishing away
+up in that creek where no one could see you, and cutting home through
+the woods on the sly. You don't mean to tell me you never saw that
+notice?"
+
+"No, I didn't. Do you think I'd have gone near the pond if I had? I
+never saw it till today, and I'm going straight to Mr. Walters now to
+tell him about it."
+
+Sam French stopped short in the dusty road and stared at Dan in
+undisguised amazement.
+
+"Dan Phillips," he ejaculated, "have you plum gone out of your mind?
+Boy alive, you needn't be afraid that I'd peach on you. I'm too blamed
+glad to see anyone get the better of that old Walters, smart as he
+thinks himself. Gee! To dream of going to him and telling him you've
+been fishing in his pond! Why, he'll put you in jail. You don't know
+what sort of a man he is. Dad says--"
+
+"Never mind what your dad says, Sam. My mind's made up."
+
+"Dan, you chump, listen to me. That notice says 'prosecuted according
+to law.' Why, Danny, he'll put you in prison, or fine you, or
+something dreadful."
+
+"I can't help it if he does," said Danny stoutly. "You get out of
+here, Sam French, and don't be trying to scare me. I mean to be
+honest, and how can I be if I don't own up to Mr. Walters that I've
+been stealing his trout all summer?"
+
+"Stealing, fiddlesticks! Dan, I used to think you were a chap with
+some sense, but I see I was mistaken. You ain't done no harm. Walters
+will never miss them trout. If you're so dreadful squeamish that you
+won't fish no more, why, you needn't. But just let the matter drop and
+hold your tongue about it. That's _my_ advice."
+
+"Well, it isn't my mother's, then. I mean to go by _hers_. You needn't
+argue no more, Sam. I'm going."
+
+"Go, then!" said Sam, stopping short in disgust. "You're a big fool,
+Dan, and serve you right if Walters lands you off to jail; but I don't
+wish you no ill. If I can do anything for your family after you're
+gone, I will, and I'll try and give your remains Christian burial--if
+there are any remains. So long, Danny! Give my love to old Walters!"
+
+Dan was not greatly encouraged by this interview. He shrank more than
+ever from the thought of facing the stern factory owner. His courage
+had almost evaporated when he entered the office at the factory and
+asked shakily for Mr. Walters.
+
+"He's in his office there," replied the clerk, "but he's very busy.
+Better leave your message with me."
+
+"I must see Mr. Walters himself, please," said Dan firmly, but with
+inward trepidation.
+
+The clerk swung himself impatiently from his stool and ushered Dan
+into Mr. Walters's private office.
+
+"Boy to see you, sir," he said briefly, as he closed the ground-glass
+door behind him.
+
+Dan, dizzy and trembling, stood in the dreaded presence. Mr. Walters
+was writing at a table covered with a businesslike litter of papers.
+He laid down his pen and looked up with a frown as the clerk vanished.
+He was a stern-looking man with deep-set grey eyes and a square,
+clean-shaven chin. There was not an ounce of superfluous flesh on his
+frame, and his voice and manner were those of the decided, resolute,
+masterful man of business.
+
+He pointed to a capacious leather chair and said concisely, "What is
+your business with me, boy?"
+
+Dan had carefully thought out a statement of facts beforehand, but
+every word had vanished from his memory. He had only a confused,
+desperate consciousness that he had a theft to confess and that it
+must be done as soon as possible. He did not sit down.
+
+"Please, Mr. Walters," he began desperately, "I came to tell you--your
+notice--I never saw it before--and I've been fishing on your pond all
+summer--but I didn't know--honest--I've brought you all I caught
+today--and I'll pay back for them all--some time."
+
+An amused, puzzled expression crossed Mr. Walters's noncommittal face.
+He pushed the leather chair forward.
+
+"Sit down, my boy," he said kindly. "I don't quite understand this
+somewhat mixed-up statement of yours. You've been fishing on my pond,
+you say. Didn't you see my notice in the _Advertiser_?"
+
+Dan sat down more composedly. The revelation was over and he was still
+alive.
+
+"No, sir. We hardly ever see an _Advertiser_, and nobody told me. I'd
+always been used to fishing there, and I never thought but what it was
+all right to keep on. I know I ought to have remembered and asked you,
+but truly, sir, I didn't mean to steal your fish. I used to sell them
+over at the hotels. We saw the notice today, Mother and me, and I came
+right up. I've brought you the trout I caught this morning, and--if
+only you won't prosecute me, sir, I'll pay back every cent I got for
+the others--every cent, sir--if you'll give me time."
+
+Mr. Walters passed his hand across his mouth to conceal something like
+a smile.
+
+"Your name is Dan Phillips, isn't it?" he said irrelevantly, "and you
+live with your mother, the Widow Phillips, down there at Carleton
+Corners, I understand."
+
+"Yes, sir," said Dan, wondering how Mr. Walters knew so much about
+him, and if these were the preliminaries of prosecution.
+
+Mr. Walters took up his pen and drew a blank sheet towards him.
+
+"Well, Dan, I put that notice in because I found that many people who
+used to fish on my pond, irrespective of leave or licence, were
+accustomed to lunch or camp on my property, and did not a little
+damage. I don't care for trouting myself; I've no time for it.
+However, I hardly think you'll do much damage. You can keep on
+fishing there. I'll give you a written permission, so that if any of
+my men see you they won't interfere with you. As for these trout here,
+I'll buy them from you at Mosquito Lake prices, and will say no more
+about the matter. How will that do?"
+
+"Thank you, sir," stammered Dan. He could hardly believe his ears. He
+took the slip of paper Mr. Walters handed to him and rose to his feet.
+
+"Wait a minute, Dan. How was it you came to tell me this? You might
+have stopped your depredations, and I should not have been any the
+wiser."
+
+"That wouldn't have been honest, sir," said Dan, looking squarely at
+him.
+
+There was a brief silence. Mr. Walters thrummed meditatively on the
+table. Dan waited wonderingly.
+
+Finally the factory owner said abruptly, "There's a vacant place for a
+boy down here. I want it filled as soon as possible. Will you take
+it?"
+
+"Mr. Walters! _Me!_" Dan thought the world must be turning upside
+down.
+
+"Yes, you. You are rather young, but the duties are not hard or
+difficult to learn. I think you'll do. I was resolved not to fill that
+place until I could find a perfectly honest and trustworthy boy for
+it. I believe I have found him. I discharged the last boy because he
+lied to me about some trifling offence for which I would have forgiven
+him if he had told the truth. I can bear with incompetency, but
+falsehood and deceit I cannot and will not tolerate," he said, so
+sternly that Dan's face paled. "I am convinced that you are incapable
+of either. Will you take the place, Dan?"
+
+"I will if you think I can fill it, sir. I will do my best."
+
+"Yes, I believe you will. Perhaps I know more about you than you
+think. Businessmen must keep their eyes open. We'll regard this matter
+as settled then. Come up tomorrow at eight o'clock. And one word more,
+Dan. You have perhaps heard that I am an unjust and hard master. I am
+not the former, and you will never have occasion to find me the latter
+if you are always as truthful and straightforward as you have been
+today. You might easily have deceived me in this matter. That you did
+not do so is the best and only recommendation I require. Take those
+trout up to my house and leave them. That will do. Good afternoon."
+
+Dan somehow got his dazed self through the glass door and out of the
+building. The whole interview had been such a surprise to him that he
+was hardly sure whether or not he had dreamed it all.
+
+"I feel as if I were some person else," he said to himself, as he
+started down the hot white road. "But Mother was right. I'll stick to
+her motto. I wonder what Sam will say to this."
+
+
+
+
+A Christmas Inspiration
+
+
+"Well, I really think Santa Claus has been very good to us all," said
+Jean Lawrence, pulling the pins out of her heavy coil of fair hair and
+letting it ripple over her shoulders.
+
+"So do I," said Nellie Preston as well as she could with a mouthful of
+chocolates. "Those blessed home folks of mine seem to have divined by
+instinct the very things I most wanted."
+
+It was the dusk of Christmas Eve and they were all in Jean Lawrence's
+room at No. 16 Chestnut Terrace. No. 16 was a boarding-house, and
+boarding-houses are not proverbially cheerful places in which to spend
+Christmas, but Jean's room, at least, was a pleasant spot, and all the
+girls had brought their Christmas presents in to show each other.
+Christmas came on Sunday that year and the Saturday evening mail at
+Chestnut Terrace had been an exciting one.
+
+Jean had lighted the pink-globed lamp on her table and the mellow
+light fell over merry faces as the girls chatted about their gifts. On
+the table was a big white box heaped with roses that betokened a bit
+of Christmas extravagance on somebody's part. Jean's brother had sent
+them to her from Montreal, and all the girls were enjoying them in
+common.
+
+No. 16 Chestnut Terrace was overrun with girls generally. But just now
+only five were left; all the others had gone home for Christmas, but
+these five could not go and were bent on making the best of it.
+
+Belle and Olive Reynolds, who were sitting on the bed--Jean could
+never keep them off it--were High School girls; they were said to be
+always laughing, and even the fact that they could not go home for
+Christmas because a young brother had measles did not dampen their
+spirits.
+
+Beth Hamilton, who was hovering over the roses, and Nellie Preston,
+who was eating candy, were art students, and their homes were too far
+away to visit. As for Jean Lawrence, she was an orphan, and had no
+home of her own. She worked on the staff of one of the big city
+newspapers and the other girls were a little in awe of her
+cleverness, but her nature was a "chummy" one and her room was a
+favourite rendezvous. Everybody liked frank, open-handed and hearted
+Jean.
+
+"It was so funny to see the postman when he came this evening," said
+Olive. "He just bulged with parcels. They were sticking out in every
+direction."
+
+"We all got our share of them," said Jean with a sigh of content.
+
+"Even the cook got six--I counted."
+
+"Miss Allen didn't get a thing--not even a letter," said Beth quickly.
+Beth had a trick of seeing things that other girls didn't.
+
+"I forgot Miss Allen. No, I don't believe she did," answered Jean
+thoughtfully as she twisted up her pretty hair. "How dismal it must be
+to be so forlorn as that on Christmas Eve of all times. Ugh! I'm glad
+I have friends."
+
+"I saw Miss Allen watching us as we opened our parcels and letters,"
+Beth went on. "I happened to look up once, and such an expression as
+was on her face, girls! It was pathetic and sad and envious all at
+once. It really made me feel bad--for five minutes," she concluded
+honestly.
+
+"Hasn't Miss Allen any friends at all?" asked Beth.
+
+"No, I don't think she has," answered Jean. "She has lived here for
+fourteen years, so Mrs. Pickrell says. Think of that, girls! Fourteen
+years at Chestnut Terrace! Is it any wonder that she is thin and
+dried-up and snappy?"
+
+"Nobody ever comes to see her and she never goes anywhere," said Beth.
+"Dear me! She must feel lonely now when everybody else is being
+remembered by their friends. I can't forget her face tonight; it
+actually haunts me. Girls, how would you feel if you hadn't anyone
+belonging to you, and if nobody thought about you at Christmas?"
+
+"Ow!" said Olive, as if the mere idea made her shiver.
+
+A little silence followed. To tell the truth, none of them liked Miss
+Allen. They knew that she did not like them either, but considered
+them frivolous and pert, and complained when they made a racket.
+
+"The skeleton at the feast," Jean called her, and certainly the
+presence of the pale, silent, discontented-looking woman at the No. 16
+table did not tend to heighten its festivity.
+
+Presently Jean said with a dramatic flourish, "Girls, I have an
+inspiration--a Christmas inspiration!"
+
+"What is it?" cried four voices.
+
+"Just this. Let us give Miss Allen a Christmas surprise. She has not
+received a single present and I'm sure she feels lonely. Just think
+how we would feel if we were in her place."
+
+"That is true," said Olive thoughtfully. "Do you know, girls, this
+evening I went to her room with a message from Mrs. Pickrell, and I do
+believe she had been crying. Her room looked dreadfully bare and
+cheerless, too. I think she is very poor. What are we to do, Jean?"
+
+"Let us each give her something nice. We can put the things just
+outside of her door so that she will see them whenever she opens it.
+I'll give her some of Fred's roses too, and I'll write a Christmassy
+letter in my very best style to go with them," said Jean, warming up
+to her ideas as she talked.
+
+The other girls caught her spirit and entered into the plan with
+enthusiasm.
+
+"Splendid!" cried Beth. "Jean, it is an inspiration, sure enough.
+Haven't we been horribly selfish--thinking of nothing but our own
+gifts and fun and pleasure? I really feel ashamed."
+
+"Let us do the thing up the very best way we can," said Nellie,
+forgetting even her beloved chocolates in her eagerness. "The shops
+are open yet. Let us go up town and invest."
+
+Five minutes later five capped and jacketed figures were scurrying up
+the street in the frosty, starlit December dusk. Miss Allen in her
+cold little room heard their gay voices and sighed. She was crying by
+herself in the dark. It was Christmas for everybody but her, she
+thought drearily.
+
+In an hour the girls came back with their purchases.
+
+"Now, let's hold a council of war," said Jean jubilantly. "I hadn't
+the faintest idea what Miss Allen would like so I just guessed wildly.
+I got her a lace handkerchief and a big bottle of perfume and a
+painted photograph frame--and I'll stick my own photo in it for fun.
+That was really all I could afford. Christmas purchases have left my
+purse dreadfully lean."
+
+"I got her a glove-box and a pin tray," said Belle, "and Olive got her
+a calendar and Whittier's poems. And besides we are going to give her
+half of that big plummy fruit cake Mother sent us from home. I'm sure
+she hasn't tasted anything so delicious for years, for fruit cakes
+don't grow on Chestnut Terrace and she never goes anywhere else for a
+meal."
+
+Beth had bought a pretty cup and saucer and said she meant to give one
+of her pretty water-colours too. Nellie, true to her reputation, had
+invested in a big box of chocolate creams, a gorgeously striped candy
+cane, a bag of oranges, and a brilliant lampshade of rose-coloured
+crepe paper to top off with.
+
+"It makes such a lot of show for the money," she explained. "I am
+bankrupt, like Jean."
+
+"Well, we've got a lot of pretty things," said Jean in a tone of
+satisfaction. "Now we must do them up nicely. Will you wrap them in
+tissue paper, girls, and tie them with baby ribbon--here's a box of
+it--while I write that letter?"
+
+While the others chatted over their parcels Jean wrote her letter, and
+Jean could write delightful letters. She had a decided talent in that
+respect, and her correspondents all declared her letters to be things
+of beauty and joy forever. She put her best into Miss Allen's
+Christmas letter. Since then she has written many bright and clever
+things, but I do not believe she ever in her life wrote anything more
+genuinely original and delightful than that letter. Besides, it
+breathed the very spirit of Christmas, and all the girls declared that
+it was splendid.
+
+"You must all sign it now," said Jean, "and I'll put it in one of
+those big envelopes; and, Nellie, won't you write her name on it in
+fancy letters?"
+
+Which Nellie proceeded to do, and furthermore embellished the envelope
+by a border of chubby cherubs, dancing hand in hand around it and a
+sketch of No. 16 Chestnut Terrace in the corner in lieu of a stamp.
+Not content with this she hunted out a huge sheet of drawing paper and
+drew upon it an original pen-and-ink design after her own heart. A
+dudish cat--Miss Allen was fond of the No. 16 cat if she could be said
+to be fond of anything--was portrayed seated on a rocker arrayed in
+smoking jacket and cap with a cigar waved airily aloft in one paw
+while the other held out a placard bearing the legend "Merry
+Christmas." A second cat in full street costume bowed politely, hat in
+paw, and waved a banner inscribed with "Happy New Year," while faintly
+suggested kittens gambolled around the border. The girls laughed until
+they cried over it and voted it to be the best thing Nellie had yet
+done in original work.
+
+All this had taken time and it was past eleven o'clock. Miss Allen had
+cried herself to sleep long ago and everybody else in Chestnut Terrace
+was abed when five figures cautiously crept down the hall, headed by
+Jean with a dim lamp. Outside of Miss Allen's door the procession
+halted and the girls silently arranged their gifts on the floor.
+
+"That's done," whispered Jean in a tone of satisfaction as they
+tiptoed back. "And now let us go to bed or Mrs. Pickrell, bless her
+heart, will be down on us for burning so much midnight oil. Oil has
+gone up, you know, girls."
+
+It was in the early morning that Miss Allen opened her door. But early
+as it was, another door down the hall was half open too and five rosy
+faces were peering cautiously out. The girls had been up for an hour
+for fear they would miss the sight and were all in Nellie's room,
+which commanded a view of Miss Allen's door.
+
+That lady's face was a study. Amazement, incredulity, wonder, chased
+each other over it, succeeded by a glow of pleasure. On the floor
+before her was a snug little pyramid of parcels topped by Jean's
+letter. On a chair behind it was a bowl of delicious hot-house roses
+and Nellie's placard.
+
+Miss Allen looked down the hall but saw nothing, for Jean had slammed
+the door just in time. Half an hour later when they were going down to
+breakfast Miss Allen came along the hall with outstretched hands to
+meet them. She had been crying again, but I think her tears were happy
+ones; and she was smiling now. A cluster of Jean's roses were pinned
+on her breast.
+
+"Oh, girls, girls," she said, with a little tremble in her voice, "I
+can never thank you enough. It was so kind and sweet of you. You don't
+know how much good you have done me."
+
+Breakfast was an unusually cheerful affair at No. 16 that morning.
+There was no skeleton at the feast and everybody was beaming. Miss
+Allen laughed and talked like a girl herself.
+
+"Oh, how surprised I was!" she said. "The roses were like a bit of
+summer, and those cats of Nellie's were so funny and delightful. And
+your letter too, Jean! I cried and laughed over it. I shall read it
+every day for a year."
+
+After breakfast everyone went to Christmas service. The girls went
+uptown to the church they attended. The city was very beautiful in the
+morning sunshine. There had been a white frost in the night and the
+tree-lined avenues and public squares seemed like glimpses of
+fairyland.
+
+"How lovely the world is," said Jean.
+
+"This is really the very happiest Christmas morning I have ever
+known," declared Nellie. "I never felt so really Christmassy in my
+inmost soul before."
+
+"I suppose," said Beth thoughtfully, "that it is because we have
+discovered for ourselves the old truth that it is more blessed to give
+than to receive. I've always known it, in a way, but I never realized
+it before."
+
+"Blessing on Jean's Christmas inspiration," said Nellie. "But, girls,
+let us try to make it an all-the-year-round inspiration, I say. We can
+bring a little of our own sunshine into Miss Allen's life as long as
+we live with her."
+
+"Amen to that!" said Jean heartily. "Oh, listen, girls--the Christmas
+chimes!"
+
+And over all the beautiful city was wafted the grand old message of
+peace on earth and good will to all the world.
+
+
+
+
+A Christmas Mistake
+
+
+"Tomorrow is Christmas," announced Teddy Grant exultantly, as he sat
+on the floor struggling manfully with a refractory bootlace that was
+knotted and tagless and stubbornly refused to go into the eyelets of
+Teddy's patched boots. "Ain't I glad, though. Hurrah!"
+
+His mother was washing the breakfast dishes in a dreary, listless sort
+of way. She looked tired and broken-spirited. Ted's enthusiasm seemed
+to grate on her, for she answered sharply:
+
+"Christmas, indeed. I can't see that it is anything for us to rejoice
+over. Other people may be glad enough, but what with winter coming on
+I'd sooner it was spring than Christmas. Mary Alice, do lift that
+child out of the ashes and put its shoes and stockings on. Everything
+seems to be at sixes and sevens here this morning."
+
+Keith, the oldest boy, was coiled up on the sofa calmly working out
+some algebra problems, quite oblivious to the noise around him. But he
+looked up from his slate, with his pencil suspended above an obstinate
+equation, to declaim with a flourish:
+
+    "Christmas comes but once a year,
+    And then Mother wishes it wasn't here."
+
+"I don't, then," said Gordon, son number two, who was preparing his
+own noon lunch of bread and molasses at the table, and making an
+atrocious mess of crumbs and sugary syrup over everything. "I know one
+thing to be thankful for, and that is that there'll be no school.
+We'll have a whole week of holidays."
+
+Gordon was noted for his aversion to school and his affection for
+holidays.
+
+"And we're going to have turkey for dinner," declared Teddy, getting
+up off the floor and rushing to secure his share of bread and
+molasses, "and cranb'ry sauce and--and--pound cake! Ain't we, Ma?"
+
+"No, you are not," said Mrs. Grant desperately, dropping the dishcloth
+and snatching the baby on her knee to wipe the crust of cinders and
+molasses from the chubby pink-and-white face. "You may as well know it
+now, children, I've kept it from you so far in hopes that something
+would turn up, but nothing has. We can't have any Christmas dinner
+tomorrow--we can't afford it. I've pinched and saved every way I could
+for the last month, hoping that I'd be able to get a turkey for you
+anyhow, but you'll have to do without it. There's that doctor's bill
+to pay and a dozen other bills coming in--and people say they can't
+wait. I suppose they can't, but it's kind of hard, I must say."
+
+The little Grants stood with open mouths and horrified eyes. No turkey
+for Christmas! Was the world coming to an end? Wouldn't the government
+interfere if anyone ventured to dispense with a Christmas celebration?
+
+The gluttonous Teddy stuffed his fists into his eyes and lifted up his
+voice. Keith, who understood better than the others the look on his
+mother's face, took his blubbering young brother by the collar and
+marched him into the porch. The twins, seeing the summary proceeding,
+swallowed the outcries they had intended to make, although they
+couldn't keep a few big tears from running down their fat cheeks.
+
+Mrs. Grant looked pityingly at the disappointed faces about her.
+
+"Don't cry, children, you make me feel worse. We are not the only ones
+who will have to do without a Christmas turkey. We ought to be very
+thankful that we have anything to eat at all. I hate to disappoint
+you, but it can't be helped."
+
+"Never mind, Mother," said Keith, comfortingly, relaxing his hold
+upon the porch door, whereupon it suddenly flew open and precipitated
+Teddy, who had been tugging at the handle, heels over head backwards.
+"We know you've done your best. It's been a hard year for you. Just
+wait, though. I'll soon be grown up, and then you and these greedy
+youngsters shall feast on turkey every day of the year. Hello, Teddy,
+have you got on your feet again? Mind, sir, no more blubbering!"
+
+"When I'm a man," announced Teddy with dignity, "I'd just like to see
+you put me in the porch. And I mean to have turkey all the time and I
+won't give you any, either."
+
+"All right, you greedy small boy. Only take yourself off to school
+now, and let us hear no more squeaks out of you. Tramp, all of you,
+and give Mother a chance to get her work done."
+
+Mrs. Grant got up and fell to work at her dishes with a brighter face.
+
+"Well, we mustn't give in; perhaps things will be better after a
+while. I'll make a famous bread pudding, and you can boil some
+molasses taffy and ask those little Smithsons next door to help you
+pull it. They won't whine for turkey, I'll be bound. I don't suppose
+they ever tasted such a thing in all their lives. If I could afford
+it, I'd have had them all in to dinner with us. That sermon Mr. Evans
+preached last Sunday kind of stirred me up. He said we ought always
+to try and share our Christmas joy with some poor souls who had never
+learned the meaning of the word. I can't do as much as I'd like to. It
+was different when your father was alive."
+
+The noisy group grew silent as they always did when their father was
+spoken of. He had died the year before, and since his death the little
+family had had a hard time. Keith, to hide his feelings, began to
+hector the rest.
+
+"Mary Alice, do hurry up. Here, you twin nuisances, get off to school.
+If you don't you'll be late and then the master will give you a
+whipping."
+
+"He won't," answered the irrepressible Teddy. "He never whips us, he
+doesn't. He stands us on the floor sometimes, though," he added,
+remembering the many times his own chubby legs had been seen to better
+advantage on the school platform.
+
+"That man," said Mrs. Grant, alluding to the teacher, "makes me
+nervous. He is the most abstracted creature I ever saw in my life. It
+is a wonder to me he doesn't walk straight into the river some day.
+You'll meet him meandering along the street, gazing into vacancy, and
+he'll never see you nor hear a word you say half the time."
+
+"Yesterday," said Gordon, chuckling over the remembrance, "he came in
+with a big piece of paper he'd picked up on the entry floor in one
+hand and his hat in the other--and he stuffed his hat into the
+coal-scuttle and hung up the paper on a nail as grave as you please.
+Never knew the difference till Ned Slocum went and told him. He's
+always doing things like that."
+
+Keith had collected his books and now marched his brothers and sisters
+off to school. Left alone with the baby, Mrs. Grant betook herself to
+her work with a heavy heart. But a second interruption broke the
+progress of her dish-washing.
+
+"I declare," she said, with a surprised glance through the window, "if
+there isn't that absent-minded schoolteacher coming through the yard!
+What can he want? Dear me, I do hope Teddy hasn't been cutting capers
+in school again."
+
+For the teacher's last call had been in October and had been
+occasioned by the fact that the irrepressible Teddy would persist in
+going to school with his pockets filled with live crickets and in
+driving them harnessed to strings up and down the aisle when the
+teacher's back was turned. All mild methods of punishment having
+failed, the teacher had called to talk it over with Mrs. Grant, with
+the happy result that Teddy's behaviour had improved--in the matter of
+crickets at least.
+
+But it was about time for another outbreak. Teddy had been unnaturally
+good for too long a time. Poor Mrs. Grant feared that it was the calm
+before a storm, and it was with nervous haste that she went to the
+door and greeted the young teacher.
+
+He was a slight, pale, boyish-looking fellow, with an abstracted,
+musing look in his large dark eyes. Mrs. Grant noticed with amusement
+that he wore a white straw hat in spite of the season. His eyes were
+directed to her face with his usual unseeing gaze.
+
+"Just as though he was looking through me at something a thousand
+miles away," said Mrs. Grant afterwards. "I believe he was, too. His
+body was right there on the step before me, but where his soul was is
+more than you or I or anybody can tell."
+
+"Good morning," he said absently. "I have just called on my way to
+school with a message from Miss Millar. She wants you all to come up
+and have Christmas dinner with her tomorrow."
+
+"For the land's sake!" said Mrs. Grant blankly. "I don't understand."
+To herself she thought, "I wish I dared take him and shake him to find
+if he's walking in his sleep or not."
+
+"You and all the children--every one," went on the teacher dreamily,
+as if he were reciting a lesson learned beforehand. "She told me to
+tell you to be sure and come. Shall I say that you will?"
+
+"Oh, yes, that is--I suppose--I don't know," said Mrs. Grant
+incoherently. "I never expected--yes, you may tell her we'll come,"
+she concluded abruptly.
+
+"Thank you," said the abstracted messenger, gravely lifting his hat
+and looking squarely through Mrs. Grant into unknown regions. When he
+had gone Mrs. Grant went in and sat down, laughing in a sort of
+hysterical way.
+
+"I wonder if it is all right. Could Cornelia really have told him? She
+must, I suppose, but it is enough to take one's breath."
+
+Mrs. Grant and Cornelia Millar were cousins, and had once been the
+closest of friends, but that was years ago, before some spiteful
+reports and ill-natured gossip had come between them, making only a
+little rift at first that soon widened into a chasm of coldness and
+alienation. Therefore this invitation surprised Mrs. Grant greatly.
+
+Miss Cornelia was a maiden lady of certain years, with a comfortable
+bank account and a handsome, old-fashioned house on the hill behind
+the village. She always boarded the schoolteachers and looked after
+them maternally; she was an active church worker and a tower of
+strength to struggling ministers and their families.
+
+"If Cornelia has seen fit at last to hold out the hand of
+reconciliation I'm glad enough to take it. Dear knows, I've wanted to
+make up often enough, but I didn't think she ever would. We've both
+of us got too much pride and stubbornness. It's the Turner blood in us
+that does it. The Turners were all so set. But I mean to do my part
+now she has done hers."
+
+And Mrs. Grant made a final attack on the dishes with a beaming face.
+
+When the little Grants came home and heard the news, Teddy stood on
+his head to express his delight, the twins kissed each other, and Mary
+Alice and Gordon danced around the kitchen.
+
+Keith thought himself too big to betray any joy over a Christmas
+dinner, but he whistled while doing the chores until the bare welkin
+in the yard rang, and Teddy, in spite of unheard of misdemeanours, was
+not collared off into the porch once.
+
+When the young teacher got home from school that evening he found the
+yellow house full of all sorts of delectable odours. Miss Cornelia
+herself was concocting mince pies after the famous family recipe,
+while her ancient and faithful handmaiden, Hannah, was straining into
+moulds the cranberry jelly. The open pantry door revealed a tempting
+array of Christmas delicacies.
+
+"Did you call and invite the Smithsons up to dinner as I told you?"
+asked Miss Cornelia anxiously.
+
+"Yes," was the dreamy response as he glided through the kitchen and
+vanished into the hall.
+
+Miss Cornelia crimped the edges of her pies delicately with a relieved
+air. "I made certain he'd forget it," she said. "You just have to
+watch him as if he were a mere child. Didn't I catch him yesterday
+starting off to school in his carpet slippers? And in spite of me he
+got away today in that ridiculous summer hat. You'd better set that
+jelly in the out-pantry to cool, Hannah; it looks good. We'll give
+those poor little Smithsons a feast for once in their lives if they
+never get another."
+
+At this juncture the hall door flew open and Mr. Palmer appeared on
+the threshold. He seemed considerably agitated and for once his eyes
+had lost their look of space-searching.
+
+"Miss Millar, I am afraid I did make a mistake this morning--it has
+just dawned on me. I am almost sure that I called at Mrs. Grant's and
+invited her and her family instead of the Smithsons. And she said they
+would come."
+
+Miss Cornelia's face was a study.
+
+"Mr. Palmer," she said, flourishing her crimping fork tragically, "do
+you mean to say you went and invited Linda Grant here tomorrow? Linda
+Grant, of all women in this world!"
+
+"I did," said the teacher with penitent wretchedness. "It was very
+careless of me--I am very sorry. What can I do? I'll go down and tell
+them I made a mistake if you like."
+
+"You can't do that," groaned Miss Cornelia, sitting down and wrinkling
+up her forehead in dire perplexity. "It would never do in the world.
+For pity's sake, let me think for a minute."
+
+Miss Cornelia did think--to good purpose evidently, for her forehead
+smoothed out as her meditations proceeded and her face brightened.
+Then she got up briskly. "Well, you've done it and no mistake. I don't
+know that I'm sorry, either. Anyhow, we'll leave it as it is. But you
+must go straight down now and invite the Smithsons too. And for pity's
+sake, don't make any more mistakes."
+
+When he had gone Miss Cornelia opened her heart to Hannah. "I never
+could have done it myself--never; the Turner is too strong in me. But
+I'm glad it is done. I've been wanting for years to make up with
+Linda. And now the chance has come, thanks to that blessed blundering
+boy, I mean to make the most of it. Mind, Hannah, you never whisper a
+word about its being a mistake. Linda must never know. Poor Linda!
+She's had a hard time. Hannah, we must make some more pies, and I must
+go straight down to the store and get some more Santa Claus stuff;
+I've only got enough to go around the Smithsons."
+
+When Mrs. Grant and her family arrived at the yellow house next
+morning Miss Cornelia herself ran out bareheaded to meet them. The two
+women shook hands a little stiffly and then a rill of long-repressed
+affection trickled out from some secret spring in Miss Cornelia's
+heart and she kissed her new-found old friend tenderly. Linda returned
+the kiss warmly, and both felt that the old-time friendship was theirs
+again.
+
+The little Smithsons all came and they and the little Grants sat down
+on the long bright dining room to a dinner that made history in their
+small lives, and was eaten over again in happy dreams for months.
+
+How those children did eat! And how beaming Miss Cornelia and
+grim-faced, soft-hearted Hannah and even the absent-minded teacher
+himself enjoyed watching them!
+
+After dinner Miss Cornelia distributed among the delighted little
+souls the presents she had bought for them, and then turned them loose
+in the big shining kitchen to have a taffy pull--and they had it to
+their hearts' content! And as for the shocking, taffyfied state into
+which they got their own rosy faces and that once immaculate
+domain--well, as Miss Cornelia and Hannah never said one word about
+it, neither will I.
+
+The four women enjoyed the afternoon in their own way, and the
+schoolteacher buried himself in algebra to his own great satisfaction.
+
+When her guests went home in the starlit December dusk, Miss Cornelia
+walked part of the way with them and had a long confidential talk with
+Mrs. Grant. When she returned it was to find Hannah groaning in and
+over the kitchen and the schoolteacher dreamily trying to clean some
+molasses off his boots with the kitchen hairbrush. Long-suffering Miss
+Cornelia rescued her property and despatched Mr. Palmer into the
+woodshed to find the shoe-brush. Then she sat down and laughed.
+
+"Hannah, what will become of that boy yet? There's no counting on what
+he'll do next. I don't know how he'll ever get through the world, I'm
+sure, but I'll look after him while he's here at least. I owe him a
+huge debt of gratitude for this Christmas blunder. What an awful mess
+this place is in! But, Hannah, did you ever in the world see anything
+so delightful as that little Tommy Smithson stuffing himself with plum
+cake, not to mention Teddy Grant? It did me good just to see them."
+
+
+
+
+A Strayed Allegiance
+
+
+"Will you go to the Cove with me this afternoon?"
+
+It was Marian Lesley who asked the question.
+
+Esterbrook Elliott unpinned with a masterful touch the delicate
+cluster of Noisette rosebuds she wore at her throat and transferred
+them to his buttonhole as he answered courteously: "Certainly. My
+time, as you know, is entirely at your disposal."
+
+They were standing in the garden under the creamy bloom of drooping
+acacia trees. One long plume of blossoms touched lightly the soft,
+golden-brown coils of the girl's hair and cast a wavering shadow over
+the beautiful, flower-like face beneath it.
+
+Esterbrook Elliott, standing before her, thought proudly that he had
+never seen a woman who might compare with her. In every detail she
+satisfied his critical, fastidious taste. There was not a discordant
+touch about her.
+
+Esterbrook Elliott had always loved Marian Lesley--or thought he had.
+They had grown up together from childhood. He was an only son and she
+an only daughter. It had always been an understood thing between the
+two families that the boy and girl should marry. But Marian's father
+had decreed that no positive pledge should pass between them until
+Marian was twenty-one.
+
+Esterbrook accepted his mapped-out destiny and selected bride with the
+conviction that he was an exceptionally lucky fellow. Out of all the
+women in the world Marian was the very one whom he would have chosen
+as mistress of his fine, old home. She had been his boyhood's ideal.
+He believed that he loved her sincerely, but he was not too much in
+love to be blind to the worldly advantages of his marriage with his
+cousin.
+
+His father had died two years previously, leaving him wealthy and
+independent. Marian had lost her mother in childhood; her father died
+when she was eighteen. Since then she had lived alone with her aunt.
+Her life was quiet and lonely. Esterbrook's companionship was all that
+brightened it, but it was enough. Marian lavished on him all the rich,
+womanly love of her heart. On her twenty-first birthday they were
+formally betrothed. They were to be married in the following autumn.
+
+No shadow had drifted across the heaven of her happiness. She believed
+herself secure in her lover's unfaltering devotion. True, at times she
+thought his manner lacked a lover's passionate ardour. He was always
+attentive and courteous. She had only to utter a wish to find that it
+had been anticipated; he spent every spare minute at her side.
+
+Yet sometimes she half wished he would betray more lover-like
+impatience and intensity. Were all lovers as calm and undemonstrative?
+
+She reproached herself for this incipient disloyalty as often as it
+vexingly intruded its unwelcome presence across her inner
+consciousness. Surely Esterbrook was fond and devoted enough to
+satisfy the most exacting demands of affection. Marian herself was
+somewhat undemonstrative and reserved. Passing acquaintances called
+her cold and proud. Only the privileged few knew the rich depths of
+womanly tenderness in her nature.
+
+Esterbrook thought that he fully appreciated her. As he had walked
+homeward the night of their betrothal, he had reviewed with
+unconscious criticism his mental catalogue of Marian's graces and good
+qualities, admitting, with supreme satisfaction, that there was not
+one thing about her that he could wish changed.
+
+This afternoon, under the acacias, they had been planning about their
+wedding. There was no one to consult but themselves.
+
+They were to be married early in September and then go abroad.
+Esterbrook mapped out the details of their bridal tour with careful
+thoughtfulness. They would visit all the old-world places that Marian
+wished to see. Afterwards they would come back home. He discussed
+certain changes he wished to make in the old Elliott mansion to fit it
+for a young and beautiful mistress.
+
+He did most of the planning. Marian was content to listen in happy
+silence. Afterwards she had proposed this walk to the Cove.
+
+"What particular object of charity have you found at the Cove now?"
+asked Esterbrook, with lazy interest, as they walked along.
+
+"Mrs. Barrett's little Bessie is very ill with fever," answered
+Marian. Then, catching his anxious look, she hastened to add, "It is
+nothing infectious--some kind of a slow, sapping variety. There is no
+danger, Esterbrook."
+
+"I was not afraid for myself," he replied quietly. "My alarm was for
+you. You are too precious to me, Marian, for me to permit you to risk
+health and life, if it were dangerous. What a Lady Bountiful you are
+to those people at the Cove. When we are married you must take me in
+hand and teach me your creed of charity. I'm afraid I've lived a
+rather selfish life. You will change all that, dear. You will make a
+good man of me."
+
+"You are that now, Esterbrook," she said softly. "If you were not, I
+could not love you."
+
+"It is a negative sort of goodness, I fear. I have never been tried or
+tempted severely. Perhaps I should fail under the test."
+
+"I am sure you would not," answered Marian proudly.
+
+Esterbrook laughed; her faith in him was pleasant. He had no thought
+but that he would prove worthy of it.
+
+The Cove, so-called, was a little fishing hamlet situated on the low,
+sandy shore of a small bay. The houses, clustered in one spot, seemed
+like nothing so much as larger shells washed up by the sea, so grey
+and bleached were they from long exposure to sea winds and spray.
+
+Dozens of ragged children were playing about them, mingled with
+several disreputable yellow curs that yapped noisily at the strangers.
+
+Down on the sandy strip of beach below the houses groups of men were
+lounging about. The mackerel, season had not yet set in; the spring
+herring netting was past. It was holiday time among the sea folks.
+They were enjoying it to the full, a happy, ragged colony, careless of
+what the morrows might bring forth.
+
+Out beyond, the boats were at anchor, floating as gracefully on the
+twinkling water as sea birds, their tall masts bowing landward on the
+swell. A lazy, dreamful calm had fallen over the distant seas; the
+horizon blues were pale and dim; faint purple hazes blurred the
+outlines of far-off headlands and cliffs; the yellow sands sparkled in
+the sunshine as if powdered with jewels.
+
+A murmurous babble of life buzzed about the hamlet, pierced through by
+the shrill undertones of the wrangling children, most of whom had
+paused in their play to scan the visitors with covert curiosity.
+
+Marian led the way to a house apart from the others at the very edge
+of the shelving rock. The dooryard was scrupulously clean and
+unlittered; the little footpath through it was neatly bordered by
+white clam shells; several thrifty geraniums in bloom looked out from
+the muslin-curtained windows.
+
+A weary-faced woman came forward to meet them.
+
+"Bessie's much the same, Miss Lesley," she said, in answer to Marian's
+inquiry. "The doctor you sent was here today and did all he could for
+her. He seemed quite hopeful. She don't complain or nothing--just lies
+there and moans. Sometimes she gets restless. It's very kind of you to
+come so often, Miss Lesley. Here, Magdalen, will you put this basket
+the lady's brought up there on the shelf?"
+
+A girl, who had been sitting unnoticed with her back to the visitors,
+at the head of the child's cot in one corner of the room, stood up and
+slowly turned around. Marian and Esterbrook Elliott both started with
+involuntary surprise. Esterbrook caught his breath like a man suddenly
+awakened from sleep. In the name of all that was wonderful, who or
+what could this girl be, so little in harmony with her surroundings?
+
+Standing in the crepuscular light of the corner, her marvellous beauty
+shone out with the vivid richness of some rare painting. She was tall,
+and the magnificent proportions of her figure were enhanced rather
+than marred by the severely plain dress of dark print that she wore.
+The heavy masses of her hair, a shining auburn dashed with golden
+foam, were coiled in a rich, glossy knot at the back of the
+classically modelled head and rippled back from a low brow whose waxen
+fairness even the breezes of the ocean had spared.
+
+The girl's face was a full, perfect oval, with features of faultless
+regularity, and the large, full eyes were of tawny hazel, darkened
+into inscrutable gloom in the dimness of the corner.
+
+Not even Marian Lesley's face was more delicately tinted, but not a
+trace of colour appeared in the smooth, marble-like cheeks; yet the
+waxen pallor bore no trace of disease or weakness, and the large,
+curving mouth was of an intense crimson.
+
+She stood quite motionless. There was no trace of embarrassment or
+self-consciousness in her pose. When Mrs. Barrett said, "This is my
+niece, Magdalen Crawford," she merely inclined her head in grave,
+silent acknowledgement. As she moved forward to take Marian's basket,
+she seemed oddly out of place in the low, crowded room. Her presence
+seemed to throw a strange restraint over the group.
+
+Marian rose and went over to the cot, laying her slender hand on the
+hot forehead of the little sufferer. The child opened its brown eyes
+questioningly.
+
+"How are you today, Bessie?"
+
+"Mad'len--I want Mad'len," moaned the little plaintive voice.
+
+Magdalen came over and stood beside Marian Lesley.
+
+"She wants me," she said in a low, thrilling voice; free from all
+harsh accent or intonation. "I am the only one she seems to know
+always. Yes, darling, Mad'len is here--right beside you. She will not
+leave you."
+
+She knelt by the little cot and passed her arm under the child's neck,
+drawing the curly head close to her throat with a tender, soothing
+motion.
+
+Esterbrook Elliott watched the two women intently--the one standing by
+the cot, arrayed in simple yet costly apparel, with her beautiful,
+high-bred face, and the other, kneeling on the bare, sanded floor in
+her print dress, with her splendid head bent low over the child and
+the long fringe of burnished lashes sweeping the cold pallor of the
+oval cheek.
+
+From the moment that Magdalen Crawford's haunting eyes had looked
+straight into his for one fleeting second, an unnamable thrill of pain
+and pleasure stirred his heart, a thrill so strong and sudden and
+passionate that his face paled with emotion; the room seemed to swim
+before his eyes in a mist out of which gleamed that wonderful face
+with its mesmeric, darkly radiant eyes, burning their way into deeps
+and abysses of his soul hitherto unknown to him.
+
+When the mist cleared away and his head grew steadier, he wondered at
+himself. Yet he trembled in every limb and the only clear idea that
+struggled out of his confused thoughts was an overmastering desire to
+take that cold face between his hands and kiss it until its
+passionless marble glowed into warm and throbbing life.
+
+"Who is that girl?" he said abruptly, when they had left the cottage.
+"She is the most beautiful woman I have ever seen--present company
+always excepted," he concluded, with a depreciatory laugh.
+
+The delicate bloom on Marian's face deepened slightly.
+
+"You had much better to have omitted that last sentence," she said
+quietly, "it was so palpably an afterthought. Yes, she is wonderfully
+lovely--a strange beauty, I fancied. There seemed something odd and
+uncanny about it to me. She must be Mrs. Barrett's niece. I remember
+that when I was down here about a month ago Mrs. Barrett told me she
+expected a niece of hers to live with her--for a time at least. Her
+parents were both dead, the father having died recently. Mrs. Barrett
+seemed troubled about her. She said that the girl had been well
+brought up and used to better things than the Cove could give her, and
+she feared that she would be very discontented and unhappy. I had
+forgotten all about it until I saw the girl today. She certainly seems
+to be a very superior person; she will find the Cove very lonely, I am
+sure. It is not probable she will stay there long. I must see what I
+can do for her, but her manner seemed rather repellent, don't you
+think?"
+
+"Hardly," responded Esterbrook curtly. "She seemed surprisingly
+dignified and self-possessed, I fancied, for a girl in her position. A
+princess could not have looked and bowed more royally. There was not a
+shadow of embarrassment in her manner, in spite of the incongruity of
+her surroundings. You had much better leave her alone, Marian. In all
+probability she would resent any condescension on your part. What
+wonderful, deep, lovely eyes she has."
+
+Again the sensitive colour flushed Marian's cheek as his voice lapsed
+unconsciously into a dreamy, retrospective tone, and a slight
+restraint came over her manner, which did not depart. Esterbrook went
+away at sunset. Marian asked him to remain for the evening, but he
+pleaded some excuse.
+
+"I shall come tomorrow afternoon," he said, as he stooped to drop a
+careless good-bye kiss on her face.
+
+Marian watched him wistfully as he rode away, with an unaccountable
+pain in her heart. She felt more acutely than ever that there were
+depths in her lover's nature that she was powerless to stir into
+responsive life.
+
+Had any other that power? She thought of the girl at the Cove, with
+her deep eyes and wonderful face. A chill of premonitory fear seized
+upon her.
+
+"I feel exactly as if Esterbrook had gone away from me forever," she
+said slowly to herself, stooping to brush her cheek against a
+dew-cold, milk-white acacia bloom, "and would never come back to me
+again. If that could happen, I wonder what there would be left to live
+for?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Esterbrook Elliott meant, or honestly thought he meant, to go home
+when he left Marian. Nevertheless, when he reached the road branching
+off to the Cove he turned his horse down it with a flush on his dark
+cheek. He realized that the motive of the action was disloyal to
+Marian and he felt ashamed of his weakness.
+
+But the desire to see Magdalen Crawford once more and to look into the
+depths of her eyes was stronger than all else, and overpowered every
+throb of duty and resistance.
+
+He saw nothing of her when he reached the Cove. He could think of no
+excuse for calling at the Barrett cottage, so he rode slowly past the
+hamlet and along the shore.
+
+The sun, red as a smouldering ember, was half buried in the silken
+violet rim of the sea; the west was a vast lake of saffron and rose
+and ethereal green, through which floated the curved shallop of a thin
+new moon, slowly deepening from lustreless white, through gleaming
+silver, into burnished gold, and attended by one solitary, pearl-white
+star. The vast concave of sky above was of violet, infinite and
+flawless. Far out dusky amethystine islets clustered like gems on the
+shining breast of the bay. The little pools of water along the low
+shores glowed like mirrors of polished jacinth. The small,
+pine-fringed headlands ran out into the water, cutting its lustrous
+blue expanse like purple wedges.
+
+As Esterbrook turned one of them he saw Magdalen standing out on the
+point of the next, a short distance away. Her back was towards him,
+and her splendid figure was outlined darkly against the vivid sky.
+
+Esterbrook sprang from his horse and left the animal standing by
+itself while he walked swiftly out to her. His heart throbbed
+suffocatingly. He was conscious of no direct purpose save merely to
+see her.
+
+She turned when he reached her with a slight start of surprise. His
+footsteps had made no sound on the tide-rippled sand.
+
+For a few moments they faced each other so, eyes burning into eyes
+with mute soul-probing and questioning. The sun had disappeared,
+leaving a stain of fiery red to mark his grave; the weird, radiant
+light was startlingly vivid and clear. Little crisp puffs and flakes
+of foam scurried over the point like elfin things. The fresh wind,
+blowing up the bay, tossed the lustrous rings of hair about Magdalen's
+pale face; all the routed shadows of the hour had found refuge in her
+eyes.
+
+Not a trace of colour appeared in her face under Esterbrook Elliott's
+burning gaze. But when he said "Magdalen!" a single, hot scorch of
+crimson flamed up into her cheeks protestingly. She lifted her hand
+with a splendid gesture, but no word passed her lips.
+
+"Magdalen, have you nothing to say to me?" he asked, coming closer to
+her with an imploring passion in his face never seen by Marian
+Lesley's eyes. He reached out his hand, but she stepped back from his
+touch.
+
+"What should I have to say to you?"
+
+"Say that you are glad to see me."
+
+"I am not glad to see you. You have no right to come here. But I knew
+you would come."
+
+"You knew it? How?"
+
+"Your eyes told me so today. I am not blind--I can see further than
+those dull fisher folks. Yes, I knew you would come. That is why I
+came here tonight--so that you would find me alone and I could tell
+you that you were not to come again."
+
+"Why must you tell me that, Magdalen?"
+
+"Because, as I have told you, you have no right to come."
+
+"But if I will not obey you? If I will come in defiance of your
+prohibition?"
+
+She turned her steady luminous eyes on his pale, set face.
+
+"You would stamp yourself as a madman, then," she said coldly. "I know
+that you are Miss Lesley's promised husband. Therefore, you are either
+false to her or insulting to me. In either case the companionship of
+Magdalen Crawford is not what you must seek. Go!"
+
+She turned away from him with an imperious gesture of dismissal.
+Esterbrook Elliott stepped forward and caught one firm, white wrist.
+
+"I shall not obey you," he said in a low, intense tone; his fine eyes
+burned into hers. "You may send me away, but I will come back, again
+and yet again until you have learned to welcome me. Why should you
+meet me like an enemy? Why can we not be friends?"
+
+The girl faced him once more.
+
+"Because," she said proudly, "I am not your equal. There can be no
+friendship between us. There ought not to be. Magdalen Crawford, the
+fisherman's niece, is no companion for you. You will be foolish, as
+well as disloyal, if you ever try to see me again. Go back to the
+beautiful, high-bred woman you love and forget me. Perhaps you think I
+am talking strangely. Perhaps you think me bold and unwomanly to speak
+so plainly to you, a stranger. But there are some circumstances in
+life when plain-speaking is best. I do not want to see you again. Now,
+go back to your own world."
+
+Esterbrook Elliott slowly turned from her and walked in silence back
+to the shore. In the shadows of the point he stopped to look back at
+her, standing out like some inspired prophetess against the fiery
+background of the sunset sky and silver-blue water. The sky overhead
+was thick-sown with stars; the night breeze was blowing up from its
+lair in distant, echoing sea caves. On his right the lights of the
+Cove twinkled out through the dusk.
+
+"I feel like a coward and a traitor," he said slowly. "Good God, what
+is this madness that has come over me? Is this my boasted strength of
+manhood?"
+
+A moment later the hoof beats of his horse died away up the shore.
+
+Magdalen Crawford lingered on the point until the last dull red faded
+out into the violet gloom of the June sea dusk, than which nothing can
+be rarer or diviner, and listened to the moan and murmur of the sea
+far out over the bay with sorrowful eyes and sternly set lips.
+
+The next day, when the afternoon sun hung hot and heavy over the
+water, Esterbrook Elliott came again to the Cove. He found it
+deserted. A rumour of mackerel had come, and every boat had sailed
+out in the rose-red dawn to the fishing grounds. But down on a strip
+of sparkling yellow sand he saw Magdalen Crawford standing, her hand
+on the rope that fastened a small white dory to the fragment of a
+half-embedded wreck.
+
+She was watching a huddle of gulls clustered on the tip of a narrow,
+sandy spit running out to the left. She turned at the sound of his
+hurried foot-fall behind her. Her face paled slightly, and into the
+depths of her eyes leapt a passionate, mesmeric glow that faded as
+quickly as it came.
+
+"You see I have come back in spite of your command, Magdalen."
+
+"I do see it," she answered in a gravely troubled voice. "You are a
+madman who refuses to be warned."
+
+"Where are you going, Magdalen?" She had loosened the rope from the
+wreck.
+
+"I am going to row over to Chapel Point for salt. They think the boats
+will come in tonight loaded with mackerel--look at them away out there
+by the score--and salt will be needed."
+
+"Can you row so far alone?"
+
+"Easily. I learned to row long ago--for a pastime then. Since coming
+here I find it of great service to me."
+
+She stepped lightly into the tiny shallop and picked up an oar. The
+brilliant sunshine streamed about her, burnishing the rich tints of
+her hair into ruddy gold. She balanced herself to the swaying of the
+dory with the grace of a sea bird. The man looking at her felt his
+brain reel.
+
+"Good-bye, Mr. Elliott."
+
+For answer he sprang into the dory and, snatching an oar, pushed
+against the old wreck with such energy that the dory shot out from the
+shore like a foam bell. His sudden spring had set it rocking
+violently. Magdalen almost lost her footing and caught blindly at his
+arm. As her fingers closed on his wrist a thrill as of fire shot
+through his every vein.
+
+"Why have you done this, Mr. Elliott? You must go back."
+
+"But I will not," he said masterfully, looking straight into her eyes
+with an imperiousness that sat well upon him. "I am going to row you
+over to Chapel Point. I have the oars--I will be master this once, at
+least."
+
+For an instant her eyes flashed defiant protest, then drooped before
+his. A sudden, hot blush crimsoned her pale face. His will had
+mastered hers; the girl trembled from head to foot, and the proud,
+sensitive, mouth quivered.
+
+Into the face of the man watching her breathlessly flashed a
+triumphant, passionate joy. He put out his hand and gently pushed her
+down into the seat. Sitting opposite, he took up the oars and pulled
+out over the sheet of sparkling blue water, through which at first the
+bottom of white sand glimmered wavily but afterwards deepened to
+translucent, dim depths of greenness.
+
+His heart throbbed tumultuously. Once the thought of Marian drifted
+across his mind like a chill breath of wind, but it was forgotten when
+his eyes met Magdalen's.
+
+"Tell me about yourself, Magdalen," he said at last, breaking the
+tremulous, charmed, sparkling silence.
+
+"There is nothing to tell," she answered with characteristic
+straightforwardness. "My life has been a very uneventful one. I have
+never been rich, or very well educated, but--it used to be different
+from now. I had some chance before--before Father died."
+
+"You must have found it very lonely and strange when you came here
+first."
+
+"Yes. At first I thought I should die--but I do not mind it now. I
+have made friends with the sea; it has taught me a great deal. There
+is a kind of inspiration in the sea. When one listens to its
+never-ceasing murmur afar out there, always sounding at midnight and
+midday, one's soul goes out to meet Eternity. Sometimes it gives me so
+much pleasure that it is almost pain."
+
+She stopped abruptly.
+
+"I don't know why I am talking to you like this."
+
+"You are a strange girl, Magdalen. Have you no other companion than
+the sea?"
+
+"No. Why should I wish to have? I shall not be here long."
+
+Elliott's face contracted with a spasm of pain.
+
+"You are not going away, Magdalen?"
+
+"Yes--in the fall. I have my own living to earn, you know. I am very
+poor. Uncle and Aunt are very kind, but I cannot consent to burden
+them any longer than I can help."
+
+A sigh that was almost a moan broke from Esterbrook Elliott's lips.
+
+"You must not go away, Magdalen. You must stay here--with me!"
+
+"You forget yourself," she said proudly. "How dare you speak to me so?
+Have you forgotten Miss Lesley? Or are you a traitor to us both?"
+
+Esterbrook made no answer. He bowed his pale, miserable face before
+her, self-condemned.
+
+The breast of the bay sparkled with its countless gems like the breast
+of a fair woman. The shores were purple and amethystine in the
+distance. Far out, bluish, phantom-like sails clustered against the
+pallid horizon. The dory danced like a feather over the ripples. They
+were close under the shadow of Chapel Point.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Marian Lesley waited in vain for her lover that afternoon. When he
+came at last in the odorous dusk of the June night she met him on the
+acacia-shadowed verandah with cold sweetness. Perhaps some subtle
+woman-instinct whispered to her where and how he had spent the
+afternoon, for she offered him no kiss, nor did she ask him why he had
+failed to come sooner.
+
+His eyes lingered on her in the dim light, taking in every detail of
+her sweet womanly refinement and loveliness, and with difficulty he
+choked back a groan. Again he asked himself what madness had come over
+him, and again for an answer rose up the vision of Magdalen Crawford's
+face as he had seen it that day, crimsoning beneath his gaze.
+
+It was late when he left. Marian watched him out of sight, standing
+under the acacias. She shivered as with a sudden chill. "I feel as I
+think Vashti must have felt," she murmured aloud, "when, discrowned
+and unqueened, she crept out of the gates of Shushan to hide her
+broken heart. I wonder if Esther has already usurped my sceptre. Has
+that girl at the Cove, with her pale, priestess-like face and
+mysterious eyes, stolen his heart from me? Perhaps not, for it may
+never have been mine. I know that Esterbrook Elliott will be true to
+the letter of his vows to me, no matter what it may cost him. But I
+want no pallid shadow of the love that belongs to another. The hour of
+abdication is at hand, I fear. And what will be left for throneless
+Vashti then?"
+
+Esterbrook Elliott, walking home through the mocking calm of the
+night, fought a hard battle with himself.
+
+He was face to face with the truth at last--the bitter knowledge that
+he had never loved Marian Lesley, save with a fond, brotherly
+affection, and that he did love Magdalen Crawford with a passion that
+threatened to sweep before it every vestige of his honour and
+loyalty.
+
+He had seen her but three times--and his throbbing heart lay in the
+hollow of her cold white hand.
+
+He shut his eyes and groaned. What madness. What unutterable folly! He
+was not free--he was bound to another by every cord of honour and
+self-respect. And, even were he free, Magdalen Crawford would be no
+fit wife for him--in the eyes of the world, at least. A girl from the
+Cove--a girl with little education and no social standing--aye! but he
+loved her.
+
+He groaned again and again in his misery. Afar down the slope the bay
+waters lay like an inky strip and the distant, murmurous plaint of the
+sea came out of the stillness of the night; the lights at the Cove
+glimmered faintly.
+
+In the week that followed he went to the Cove every day. Sometimes he
+did not see Magdalen; at other times he did. But at the end of the
+week he had conquered in the bitter, heart-crushing struggle with
+himself. If he had weakly given way to the first mad sweep of a new
+passion, the strength of his manhood reasserted itself at last.
+Faltering and wavering were over, though there was passionate pain in
+his voice when he said at last, "I am not coming back again,
+Magdalen."
+
+They were standing in the shadow of the pine-fringed point that ran
+out to the left of the Cove. They had been walking together along the
+shore, watching the splendour of the sea sunset that flamed and glowed
+in the west, where there was a sea of mackerel clouds, crimson and
+amber tinted, with long, ribbon-like strips of apple-green sky
+between. They had walked in silence, hand in hand, as children might
+have done, yet with the stir and throb of a mighty passion seething in
+their hearts.
+
+Magdalen turned as Esterbrook spoke, and looked at him in a long
+silence. The bay stretched out before them, tranced and shimmering; a
+few stars shone down through the gloom of dusk. Right across the
+translucent greens and roses and blues of the west hung a dark,
+unsightly cloud, like the blurred outline of a monstrous bat. In the
+dim, reflected light the girl's mournful face took on a weird,
+unearthly beauty. She turned her eyes from Esterbrook Elliott's set
+white face to the radiant gloom of the sea.
+
+"That is best," she answered at last, slowly.
+
+"Best--yes! Better that we had never met! I love you--you know
+it--words are idle between us. I never loved before--I thought I did.
+I made a mistake and I must pay the penalty of that mistake. You
+understand me?"
+
+"I understand," she answered simply.
+
+"I do not excuse myself--I have been weak and cowardly and disloyal.
+But I have conquered myself--I will be true to the woman to whom I am
+pledged. You and I must not meet again. I will crush this madness to
+death. I think I have been delirious ever since that day I saw you
+first, Magdalen. My brain is clearer now. I see my duty and I mean to
+do it at any cost. I dare not trust myself to say more. Magdalen, I
+have much for which to ask your forgiveness."
+
+"There is nothing to forgive," she said steadily. "I have been as much
+to blame as you. If I had been as resolute as I ought to have been--if
+I had sent you away the second time as I did the first--this would not
+have come to pass. I have been weak too, and I deserve to atone for my
+weakness by suffering. There is only one path open to us. Esterbrook,
+good-bye." Her voice quivered with an uncontrollable spasm of pain,
+but the misty, mournful eyes did not swerve from his. The man stepped
+forward and caught her in his arms.
+
+"Magdalen, good-bye, my darling. Kiss me once--only once--before I
+go."
+
+She loosened his arms and stepped back proudly.
+
+"No! No man kisses my lips unless he is to be my husband. Good-bye,
+dear."
+
+He bowed his head silently and went away, looking back not once, else
+he might have seen her kneeling on the damp sand weeping noiselessly
+and passionately.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Marian Lesley looked at his pale, determined face the next evening and
+read it like an open book.
+
+She had grown paler herself; there were purple shadows under the sweet
+violet eyes that might have hinted of her own sleepless nights.
+
+She greeted him calmly, holding out a steady, white hand of welcome.
+She saw the traces of the struggle through which he had passed and
+knew that he had come off victor.
+
+The knowledge made her task a little harder. It would have been easier
+to let slip the straining cable than to cast it from her when it lay
+unresistingly in her hand.
+
+For an instant her heart thrilled with an unutterably sweet hope.
+Might he not forget in time? Need she snap in twain the weakened bond
+between them after all? Perhaps she might win back her lost sceptre,
+yet if--
+
+Womanly pride throttled the struggling hope. No divided allegiance, no
+hollow semblance of queenship for her!
+
+Her opportunity came when Esterbrook asked with grave earnestness if
+their marriage might not be hastened a little--could he not have his
+bride in August? For a fleeting second Marian closed her eyes and the
+slender hands, lying among the laces in her lap, clasped each other
+convulsively.
+
+Then she said quietly, "Sometimes I have thought, Esterbrook, that it
+might be better--if we were never married at all."
+
+Esterbrook turned a startled face upon her.
+
+"Not married at all! Marian, what do you mean?"
+
+"Just what I say. I do not think we are as well suited to each other
+after all as we have fancied. We have loved each other as brother and
+sister might--that is all. I think it will be best to be brother and
+sister forever--nothing more."
+
+Esterbrook sprang to his feet.
+
+"Marian, do you know what you are saying? You surely cannot have
+heard--no one could have told you--"
+
+"I have heard nothing," she interrupted hurriedly. "No one has told me
+anything. I have only said what I have been thinking of late. I am
+sure we have made a mistake. It is not too late to remedy it. You will
+not refuse my request, Esterbrook? You will set me free?"
+
+"Good heavens, Marian!" he said hoarsely. "I cannot realize that you
+are in earnest. Have you ceased to care for me?" The rigidly locked
+hands were clasped a little tighter.
+
+"No--I shall always care for you as my friend if you will let me. But
+I know we could not make each other happy--the time for that has gone
+by. I would never be satisfied, nor would you. Esterbrook, will you
+release me from a promise which has become an irksome fetter?"
+
+He looked down on her upturned face mistily. A great joy was surging
+up in his heart--yet it was mingled with great regret.
+
+He knew--none better--what was passing out of his life, what he was
+losing when he lost that pure, womanly nature.
+
+"If you really mean this, Marian," he said slowly, "if you really have
+come to feel that your truest love is not and never can be mine--that
+I cannot make you happy--then there is nothing for me to do but to
+grant your request. You are free."
+
+"Thank you, dear," she said gently, as she stood up.
+
+She slipped his ring from her finger and held it out to him. He took
+it mechanically. He still felt dazed and unreal.
+
+Marian held out her hand.
+
+"Good-night, Esterbrook," she said, a little wearily. "I feel tired. I
+am glad you see it all in the same light as I do."
+
+"Marian," he said earnestly, clasping the outstretched hand, "are you
+sure that you will be happy--are you sure that you are doing a wise
+thing?"
+
+"Quite sure," she answered, with a faint smile. "I am not acting
+rashly. I have thought it all over carefully. Things are much better
+so, dear. We will always be friends. Your joys and sorrows will be to
+me as my own. When another love comes to bless your life, Esterbrook,
+I will be glad. And now, good-night. I want to be alone now."
+
+At the doorway he turned to look back at her, standing in all her
+sweet stateliness in the twilight duskness, and the keen realization
+of all he had lost made him bow his head with a quick pang of regret.
+
+Then he went out into the darkness of the summer night.
+
+An hour later he stood alone on the little point where he had parted
+with Magdalen the night before. A restless night wind was moaning
+through the pines that fringed the bank behind him; the moon shone
+down radiantly, turning the calm expanse of the bay into a milk-white
+sheen.
+
+He took Marian's ring from his pocket and kissed it reverently. Then
+he threw it from him far out over the water. For a second the diamond
+flashed in the moonlight; then, with a tiny splash, it fell among the
+ripples.
+
+Esterbrook turned his face to the Cove, lying dark and silent in the
+curve between the crescent headlands. A solitary light glimmered from
+the low eaves of the Barrett cottage.
+
+Tomorrow, was his unspoken thought, I will be free; to go back to
+Magdalen.
+
+
+
+
+An Invitation Given on Impulse
+
+
+It was a gloomy Saturday morning. The trees in the Oaklawn grounds
+were tossing wildly in the gusts of wind, and sodden brown leaves were
+blown up against the windows of the library, where a score of girls
+were waiting for the principal to bring the mail in.
+
+The big room echoed with the pleasant sound of girlish voices and low
+laughter, for in a fortnight school would close for the holidays, and
+they were all talking about their plans and anticipations.
+
+Only Ruth Mannering was, as usual, sitting by herself near one of the
+windows, looking out on the misty lawn. She was a pale, slender girl,
+with a sad face, and was dressed in rather shabby black. She had no
+special friend at Oaklawn, and the other girls did not know much about
+her. If they had thought about it at all, they would probably have
+decided that they did not like her; but for the most part they simply
+overlooked her.
+
+This was not altogether their fault. Ruth was poor and apparently
+friendless, but it was not her poverty that was against her. Lou
+Scott, who was "as poor as a church mouse," to quote her own frank
+admission, was the most popular girl in the seminary, the boon
+companion of the richest girls, and in demand with everybody. But Lou
+was jolly and frank and offhanded, while Ruth was painfully shy and
+reserved, and that was the secret of the whole matter.
+
+There was "no fun in her," the girls said, and so it came about that
+she was left out of their social life, and was almost as solitary at
+Oaklawn as if she had been the only girl there. She was there for the
+special purpose of studying music, and expected to earn her own living
+by teaching it when she left. She believed that the girls looked down
+on her on this account; this was unjust, of course, but Ruth had no
+idea how much her own coldness and reserve had worked against her.
+
+Across the room Carol Golden was, as usual, the centre of an animated
+group; Golden Carol as her particular friends sometimes called her,
+partly because of her beautiful voice, and partly because of her
+wonderful fleece of golden hair. Carol was one of the seminary pets,
+and seemed to Ruth Mannering to have everything that she had not.
+
+Presently the mail was brought in, and there was a rush to the table,
+followed by exclamations of satisfaction or disappointment. In a few
+minutes the room was almost deserted. Only two girls remained: Carol
+Golden, who had dropped into a big chair to read her many letters; and
+Ruth Mannering, who had not received any and had gone silently back to
+her part of the window.
+
+Presently Carol gave a little cry of delight. Her mother had written
+that she might invite any friend she wished home with her to spend the
+holidays. Carol had asked for this permission, and now that it had
+come was ready to dance for joy. As to whom she would ask, there could
+be only one answer to that. Of course it must be her particular
+friend, Maud Russell, who was the cleverest and prettiest girl at
+Oaklawn, at least so her admirers said. She was undoubtedly the
+richest, and was the acknowledged "leader." The girls affectionately
+called her "Princess," and Carol adored her with that romantic
+affection that is found only among school girls. She knew, too, that
+Maud would surely accept her invitation because she did not intend to
+go home. Her parents were travelling in Europe, and she expected to
+spend her holidays with some cousins, who were almost strangers to
+her.
+
+Carol was so much pleased that she felt as if she must talk to
+somebody, so she turned to Ruth.
+
+"Isn't it delightful to think that we'll all be going home in a
+fortnight?"
+
+"Yes, very--for those that have homes to go to," said Ruth drearily.
+
+Carol felt a quick pang of pity and self-reproach. "Haven't you?" she
+asked.
+
+Ruth shook her head. In spite of herself, the kindness of Carol's tone
+brought the tears to her eyes.
+
+"My mother died a year ago," she said in a trembling voice, "and since
+then I have had no real home. We were quite alone in the world, Mother
+and I, and now I have nobody."
+
+"Oh, I'm so sorry for you," cried Carol impulsively. She leaned
+forward and took Ruth's hand in a gentle way. "And do you mean to say
+that you'll have to stay here all through the holidays? Why, it will
+be horrid."
+
+"Oh, I shall not mind it much," said Ruth quickly, "with study and
+practice most of the time. Only now, when everyone is talking about
+it, it makes me wish that I had some place to go."
+
+Carol dropped Ruth's hand suddenly in the shock of a sudden idea that
+darted into her mind.
+
+A stray girl passing through the hall called out, "Ruth, Miss Siviter
+wishes to see you about something in Room C."
+
+Ruth got up quickly. She was glad to get away, for it seemed to her
+that in another minute she would break down altogether.
+
+Carol Golden hardly noticed her departure. She gathered up her letters
+and went abstractedly to her room, unheeding a gay call for "Golden
+Carol" from a group of girls in the corridor. Maud Russell was not in
+and Carol was glad. She wanted to be alone and fight down that sudden
+idea.
+
+"It is ridiculous to think of it," she said aloud, with a petulance
+very unusual in Golden Carol, whose disposition was as sunny as her
+looks. "Why, I simply cannot. I have always been longing to ask Maud
+to visit me, and now that the chance has come I am not going to throw
+it away. I am very sorry for Ruth, of course. It must be dreadful to
+be all alone like that. But it isn't my fault. And she is so fearfully
+quiet and dowdy--what would they all think of her at home? Frank and
+Jack would make such fun of her. I shall ask Maud just as soon as she
+comes in."
+
+Maud did come in presently, but Carol did not give her the invitation.
+Instead, she was almost snappish to her idol, and the Princess soon
+went out again in something of a huff.
+
+"Oh, dear," cried Carol, "now I've offended her. What has got into me?
+What a disagreeable thing a conscience is, although I'm sure I don't
+know why mine should be prodding me so! I don't want to invite Ruth
+Mannering home with me for the holidays, but I feel exactly as if I
+should not have a minute's peace of mind all the time if I didn't.
+Mother would think it all right, of course. She would not mind if Ruth
+dressed in calico and never said anything but yes and no. But how the
+boys would laugh! I simply won't do it, conscience or no conscience."
+
+In view of this decision it was rather strange that the next morning,
+Carol Golden went down to Ruth Mannering's lonely little room on
+Corridor Two and said, "Ruth, will you go home with me for the
+holidays? Mother wrote me to invite anyone I wished to. Don't say you
+can't come, dear, because you must."
+
+Carol never, as long as she lived, forgot Ruth's face at that moment.
+
+"It was absolutely transfigured," she said afterwards. "I never saw
+anyone look so happy in my life."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A fortnight later unwonted silence reigned at Oaklawn. The girls were
+scattered far and wide, and Ruth Mannering and Carol Golden were at
+the latter's home.
+
+Carol was a very much surprised girl. Under the influence of kindness
+and pleasure Ruth seemed transformed into a different person. Her
+shyness and reserve melted away in the sunny atmosphere of the Golden
+home. Mrs. Golden took her into her motherly heart at once; and as for
+Frank and Jack, whose verdict Carol had so dreaded, they voted Ruth
+"splendid." She certainly got along very well with them; and if she
+did not make the social sensation that pretty Maud Russell might have
+made, the Goldens all liked her and Carol was content.
+
+"Just four days more," sighed Carol one afternoon, "and then we must
+go back to Oaklawn. Can you realize it, Ruth?"
+
+Ruth looked up from her book with a smile. Even in appearance she had
+changed. There was a faint pink in her cheeks and a merry light in her
+eyes.
+
+"I shall not be sorry to go back to work," she said. "I feel just like
+it because I have had so pleasant a time here that it has heartened me
+up for next term. I think it will be very different from last. I begin
+to see that I kept to myself too much and brooded over fancied
+slights."
+
+"And then you are to room with me since Maud is not coming back," said
+Carol. "What fun we shall have. Did you ever toast marshmallows over
+the gas? Why, I declare, there is Mr. Swift coming up the walk. Look,
+Ruth! He is the richest man in Westleigh."
+
+Ruth peeped out of the window over Carol's shoulder.
+
+"He reminds me of somebody," she said absently, "but I can't think who
+it is. Of course, I have never seen him before. What a good face he
+has!"
+
+"He is as good as he looks," said Carol, enthusiastically. "Next to
+Father, Mr. Swift is the nicest man in the world. I have always been
+quite a pet of his. His wife is dead, and so is his only daughter. She
+was a lovely girl and died only two years ago. It nearly broke Mr.
+Swift's heart. And he has lived alone ever since in that great big
+house up at the head of Warner Street, the one you admired so, Ruth,
+the last time we were uptown. There's the bell for the second time,
+Mary can't have heard it. I'll go myself."
+
+As Carol showed the caller into the room, Ruth rose to leave and thus
+came face to face with him. Mr. Swift started perceptibly.
+
+"Mr. Swift, this is my school friend, Miss Mannering," said Carol.
+
+Mr. Swift seemed strangely agitated as he took Ruth's timidly offered
+hand.
+
+"My dear young lady," he said hurriedly, "I am going to ask you what
+may seem a very strange question. What was your mother's name?"
+
+"Agnes Hastings," answered Ruth in surprise. And then Carol really
+thought that Mr. Swift had gone crazy, for he drew Ruth into his arms
+and kissed her.
+
+"I knew it," he said. "I was sure you were Agnes' daughter, for you
+are the living image of what she was when I last saw her. Child, you
+don't know me, but I am your Uncle Robert. Your mother was my
+half-sister."
+
+"Oh, Mr. Swift!" cried Carol, and then she ran for her mother.
+
+Ruth turned pale and dropped into a chair, and Mr. Swift sat down
+beside her.
+
+"To think that I have found you at last, child. How puzzled you look.
+Did your mother never speak of me? How is she? Where is she?"
+
+"Mother died last year," said Ruth.
+
+"Poor Agnes! And I never knew! Don't cry, little girl. I want you to
+tell me all about it. She was much younger than I was, and when our
+mother died my stepfather went away and took her with him. I remained
+with my father's people and eventually lost all trace of my sister. I
+was a poor boy then, but things have looked up with me and I have
+often tried to find her."
+
+By this time Carol had returned with her father and mother, and there
+was a scene--laughing, crying, explaining--and I don't really know
+which of the two girls was the more excited, Carol or Ruth. As for Mr.
+Swift, he was overjoyed to find his niece and wanted to carry her off
+with him then and there, but Mrs. Golden insisted on her finishing her
+visit. When the question of returning to Oaklawn came up, Mr. Swift
+would not hear of it at first, but finally yielded to Carol's
+entreaties and Ruth's own desire.
+
+"I shall graduate next year, Uncle, and then I can come back to you
+for good."
+
+That evening when Ruth was alone in her room, trying to collect her
+thoughts and realize that the home and love that she had so craved
+were really to be hers at last, Golden Carol was with her mother in
+the room below, talking it all over.
+
+"Just think, Mother, if I had not asked Ruth to come here, this would
+not have happened. And I didn't want to, I wanted to ask Maud so much,
+and I was dreadfully disappointed when I couldn't--for I really
+couldn't. I could not help remembering the look in Ruth's eyes when
+she said that she had no home to go to, and so I asked her instead of
+Maud. How dreadful it would have been if I hadn't."
+
+
+
+
+Detected by the Camera
+
+
+One summer I was attacked by the craze for amateur photography. It
+became chronic afterwards, and I and my camera have never since been
+parted. We have had some odd adventures together, and one of the most
+novel of our experiences was that in which we played the part of chief
+witness against Ned Brooke.
+
+I may say that my name is Amy Clarke, and that I believe I am
+considered the best amateur photographer in our part of the country.
+That is all I need tell you about myself.
+
+Mr. Carroll had asked me to photograph his place for him when the
+apple orchards were in bloom. He has a picturesque old-fashioned
+country house behind a lawn of the most delightful old trees and
+flanked on each side by the orchards. So I went one June afternoon,
+with all my accoutrements, prepared to "take" the Carroll
+establishment in my best style.
+
+Mr. Carroll was away but was expected home soon, so we waited for him,
+as all the family wished to be photographed under the big maple at the
+front door. I prowled around among the shrubbery at the lower end of
+the lawn and, after a great deal of squinting from various angles, I
+at last fixed upon the spot from which I thought the best view of the
+house might be obtained. Then Gertie and Lilian Carroll and I got into
+the hammocks and swung at our leisure, enjoying the cool breeze
+sweeping through the maples.
+
+Ned Brooke was hanging around as usual, watching us furtively. Ned was
+one of the hopeful members of a family that lived in a tumble-down
+shanty just across the road from the Carrolls. They were wretchedly
+poor, and old Brooke, as he was called, and Ned were employed a good
+deal by Mr. Carroll--more out of charity than anything else, I fancy.
+
+The Brookes had a rather shady reputation. They were notoriously lazy,
+and it was suspected that their line of distinction between their own
+and their neighbours' goods was not very clearly drawn. Many people
+censured Mr. Carroll for encouraging them at all, but he was too
+kind-hearted to let them suffer actual want and, as a consequence, one
+or the other of them was always dodging about his place.
+
+Ned was a lank, tow-headed youth of about fourteen, with shifty,
+twinkling eyes that could never look you straight in the face. His
+appearance was anything but prepossessing, and I always felt, when I
+looked at him, that if anyone wanted to do a piece of shady work by
+proxy, Ned Brooke would be the very lad for the business.
+
+Mr. Carroll came at last, and we all went down to meet him at the
+gate. Ned Brooke also came shuffling along to take the horse, and Mr.
+Carroll tossed the reins to him and at the same time handed a
+pocketbook to his wife.
+
+"Just as well to be careful where you put that," he said laughingly.
+"There's a sum in it not to be picked up on every gooseberry bush.
+Gilman Harris paid me this morning for that bit of woodland I sold him
+last fall--five hundred dollars. I promised that you and the girls
+should have it to get a new piano, so there it is for you."
+
+"Thank you," said Mrs. Carroll delightedly. "However, you'd better put
+it back in your pocket till we go in. Amy is in a hurry."
+
+Mr. Carroll took back the pocketbook and dropped it carelessly into
+the inside pocket of the light overcoat that he wore.
+
+I happened to glance at Ned Brooke just then, and I could not help
+noticing the sudden crafty, eager expression that flashed over his
+face. He eyed the pocketbook in Mr. Carroll's hands furtively, after
+which he went off with the horse in a great hurry.
+
+The girls were exclaiming and thanking their father, and nobody
+noticed Ned Brooke's behaviour but myself, and it soon passed out of
+my mind.
+
+"Come to take the place, are you, Amy?" said Mr. Carroll. "Well,
+everything is ready, I think. I suppose we'd better proceed. Where
+shall we stand? You had better group us as you think best."
+
+Whereupon I proceeded to arrange them in due order under the maple.
+Mrs. Carroll sat in a chair, while her husband stood behind her.
+Gertie stood on the steps with a basket of flowers in her hand, and
+Lilian was at one side. The two little boys, Teddy and Jack, climbed
+up into the maple, and little Dora, the dimpled six-year-old, stood
+gravely in the foreground with an enormous grey cat hugged in her
+chubby arms.
+
+It was a pretty group in a pretty setting, and I thrilled with
+professional pride as I stepped back for a final, knowing squint at it
+all. Then I went to my camera, slipped in the plate, gave them due
+warning and took off the cap.
+
+I took two plates to make sure and then the thing was over, but as I
+had another plate left I thought I might as well take a view of the
+house by itself, so I carried my camera to a new place and had just
+got everything ready to lift the cap when Mr. Carroll came down and
+said:
+
+"If you girls want to see something pretty, come to the back field
+with me. That will wait till you come back, won't it, Amy?"
+
+So we all betook ourselves to the back field, a short distance away,
+where Mr. Carroll proudly displayed two of the prettiest little Jersey
+cows I had ever seen.
+
+We returned to the house by way of the back lane and, as we came in
+sight of the main road, my brother Cecil drove up and said that if I
+were ready, I had better go home with him and save myself a hot, dusty
+walk.
+
+The Carrolls all went down to the fence to speak to Cecil, but I
+dashed hurriedly down through the orchard, leaped over the fence into
+the lawn and ran to the somewhat remote corner where I had left my
+camera. I was in a desperate hurry, for I knew Cecil's horse did not
+like to be kept waiting, so I never even glanced at the house, but
+snatched off the cap, counted two and replaced it.
+
+Then I took out my plate, put it in the holder and gathered up my
+traps. I suppose I was about five minutes at it all and I had my back
+to the house the whole time, and when I laid all my things ready and
+emerged from my retreat, there was nobody to be seen about the place.
+
+As I hurried up through the lawn, I noticed Ned Brooke walking at a
+smart pace down the lane, but the fact did not make any particular
+impression on me at the time, and was not recalled until afterwards.
+
+Cecil was waiting for me, so I got in the buggy and we drove off. On
+arriving home I shut myself up in my dark room and proceeded to
+develop the first two negatives of the Carroll housestead. They were
+both excellent, the first one being a trifle the better, so that I
+decided to finish from it. I intended also to develop the third, but
+just as I finished the others, a half-dozen city cousins swooped down
+upon us and I had to put away my paraphernalia, emerge from my dark
+retreat and fly around to entertain them.
+
+The next day Cecil came in and said:
+
+"Did you hear, Amy, that Mr. Carroll has lost a pocketbook with five
+hundred dollars in it?"
+
+"No!" I exclaimed. "How? When? Where?"
+
+"Don't overwhelm a fellow. I can answer only one question--last night.
+As to the 'how,' they don't know, and as to the 'where'--well, if they
+knew that, there might be some hope of finding it. The girls are in a
+bad way. The money was to get them their longed-for piano, it seems,
+and now it's gone."
+
+"But how did it happen, Cecil?"
+
+"Well, Mr. Carroll says that Mrs. Carroll handed the pocketbook back
+to him at the gate yesterday, and he dropped it in the inside pocket
+of his over-coat--"
+
+"I saw him do it," I cried.
+
+"Yes, and then, before he went to be photographed, he hung his coat up
+in the hall. It hung there until the evening, and nobody seems to have
+thought about the money, each supposing that someone else had put it
+carefully away. After tea Mr. Carroll put on the coat and went to see
+somebody over at Netherby. He says the thought of the pocketbook never
+crossed his mind; he had forgotten all about putting it in that coat
+pocket. He came home across the fields about eleven o'clock and found
+that the cows had broken into the clover hay, and he had a great chase
+before he got them out. When he went in, just as he entered the door,
+the remembrance of the money flashed over him. He felt in his pocket,
+but there was no pocketbook there; he asked his wife if she had taken
+it out. She had not, and nobody else had. There was a hole in the
+pocket, but Mr. Carroll says it was too small for the pocketbook to
+have worked through. However, it must have done so--unless someone
+took it out of his pocket at Netherby, and that is not possible,
+because he never had his coat off, and it was in an inside pocket.
+It's not likely that they will ever see it again. Someone may pick it
+up, of course, but the chances are slim. Mr. Carroll doesn't know his
+exact path across the fields, and if he lost it while he was after the
+cows, it's a bluer show still. They've been searching all day, of
+course. The girls are awfully disappointed."
+
+A sudden recollection came to me of Ned Brooke's face as I had seen it
+the day before at the gate, coupled with the remembrance of seeing him
+walking down the lane at a quick pace, so unlike his usual shambling
+gait, while I ran through the lawn.
+
+"How do they know it was lost?" I said. "Perhaps it was stolen before
+Mr. Carroll went to Netherby."
+
+"They think not," said Cecil. "Who would have stolen it?"
+
+"Ned Brooke. I saw him hanging around. And you never saw such a look
+as came over his face when he heard Mr. Carroll say there was five
+hundred dollars in that pocketbook."
+
+"Well, I did suggest to them that Ned might know something about it,
+for I remembered having seen him go down the lane while I was waiting
+for you, but they won't hear of such a thing. The Brookes are kind of
+proteges of theirs, you know, and they won't believe anything bad of
+them. If Ned did take it, however, there's not a shadow of evidence
+against him."
+
+"No, I suppose not," I answered thoughtfully, "but the more I think it
+over, the more I'm convinced that he took it. You know, we all went to
+the back field to look at the Jerseys, and all that time the coat was
+hanging there in the hall, and not a soul in the house. And it was
+just after we came back that I saw Ned scuttling down the lane so
+fast."
+
+I mentioned my suspicions to the Carrolls a few days afterwards, when
+I went down with the photographs, and found that they had discovered
+no trace of the lost pocketbook. But they seemed positively angry when
+I hinted that Ned Brooke might know more about its whereabouts than
+anyone else. They declared that they would as soon think of suspecting
+one of themselves as Ned, and altogether they seemed so offended at my
+suggestion that I held my peace and didn't irritate them by any more
+suppositions.
+
+Afterwards, in the excitement of our cousins' visit, the matter passed
+out of my mind completely. They stayed two weeks, and I was so busy
+the whole time that I never got a chance to develop that third plate
+and, in fact, I had forgotten all about it.
+
+One morning soon after they went away, I remembered the plate and
+decided to go and develop it. Cecil went with me, and we shut
+ourselves up in our den, lit our ruby lantern and began operations. I
+did not expect much of the plate, because it had been exposed and
+handled carelessly, and I thought that it might prove to be
+underexposed or light-struck. So I left Cecil to develop it while I
+prepared the fixing bath. Cecil was whistling away when suddenly he
+gave a tremendous "whew" of astonishment and sprang to his feet.
+
+"Amy, Amy, look here!" he cried.
+
+I rushed to his side and looked at the plate as he held it up in the
+rosy light. It was a splendid one, and the Carroll house came out
+clear, with the front door and the steps in full view.
+
+And there, just in the act of stepping from the threshold, was the
+figure of a boy with an old straw hat on his head and--in his
+hand--the pocketbook!
+
+He was standing with his head turned towards the corner of the house
+as if listening, with one hand holding his ragged coat open and the
+other poised in mid-air with the pocketbook, as if he were just going
+to put it in his inside pocket. The whole scene was as clear as
+noonday, and nobody with eyes in his head could have failed to
+recognize Ned Brooke.
+
+"Goodness!" I gasped. "In with it--quick!"
+
+And we doused the thing into the fixing bath and then sat down
+breathlessly and looked at each other.
+
+"I say, Amy," said Cecil, "what a sell this will be on the Carrolls!
+Ned Brooke couldn't do such a thing--oh, no! The poor injured boy at
+whom everyone has such an unlawful pick! I wonder if this will
+convince them."
+
+"Do you think they can get it all back?" I asked. "It's not likely he
+would have dared to use any of it yet."
+
+"I don't know. We'll have a try, anyhow. How long before this plate
+will be dry enough to carry down to the Carrolls as circumstantial
+evidence?"
+
+"Three hours or thereabouts," I answered, "but perhaps sooner. I'll
+take two prints off when it is ready. I wonder what the Carrolls will
+say."
+
+"It's a piece of pure luck that the plate should have turned out so
+well after the slap-dash way in which it was taken and used. I say,
+Amy, isn't this quite an adventure?"
+
+At last the plate was dry, and I printed two proofs. We wrapped them
+up carefully and marched down to Mr. Carroll's.
+
+You never saw people so overcome with astonishment as the Carrolls
+were when Cecil, with the air of a statesman unfolding the evidence of
+some dreadful conspiracy against the peace and welfare of the nation,
+produced the plate and the proofs, and held them out before them.
+
+Mr. Carroll and Cecil took the proofs and went over to the Brooke
+shanty. They found only Ned and his mother at home. At first Ned, when
+taxed with his guilt, denied it, but when Mr. Carroll confronted him
+with the proofs, he broke down in a spasm of terror and confessed all.
+His mother produced the pocketbook and the money--they had not dared
+to spend a single cent of it--and Mr. Carroll went home in triumph.
+
+Perhaps Ned Brooke ought not to have been let off so easily as he was,
+but his mother cried and pleaded, and Mr. Carroll was too kind-hearted
+to resist. So he did not punish them at all, save by utterly
+discarding the whole family and their concerns. The place got too hot
+for them after the story came out, and in less than a month all moved
+away--much to the benefit of Mapleton.
+
+
+
+
+In Spite of Myself
+
+
+My trunk was packed and I had arranged with my senior partner--I was
+the junior member of a law firm--for a month's vacation. Aunt Lucy had
+written that her husband had gone on a sea trip and she wished me to
+superintend the business of his farm and mills in his absence, if I
+could arrange to do so. She added that "Gussie" thought it was a pity
+to trouble me, and wanted to do the overseeing herself, but that
+she--Aunt Lucy--preferred to have a man at the head of affairs.
+
+I had never seen my step-cousin, Augusta Ashley, but I knew, from Aunt
+Lucy's remarks concerning her, pretty much what sort of person she
+was--just the precise kind I disliked immeasurably. I had no idea what
+her age was, but doubtless she was over thirty, tall, determined,
+aggressive, with a "faculty" for managing, a sharp, probing nose, and
+a y-formation between her eyebrows. I knew the type, and I was assured
+that the period of sojourn with my respected aunt would be one of
+strife between Miss Ashley and myself.
+
+I wrote to Aunt Lucy to expect me, made all necessary arrangements,
+and went to bid Nellie goodbye. I had made up my mind to marry Nellie.
+I had never openly avowed myself her suitor, but we were cousins, and
+had grown up together, so that I knew her well enough to be sure of my
+ground. I liked her so well that it was easy to persuade myself that I
+was in love with her. She more nearly fulfilled the requirements of my
+ideal wife than anyone I knew. She was pleasant to look upon, without
+being distractingly pretty; small and fair and womanly. She dressed
+nicely, sang and played agreeably, danced well, and had a cheerful,
+affectionate disposition. She was not alarmingly clever, had no
+"hobbies," and looked up to me as heir to all the wisdom of the
+ages--what man does not like to be thought clever and brilliant? I had
+no formidable rival, and our families were anxious for the match. I
+considered myself a lucky fellow. I felt that I would be very lonely
+without Nellie when I was away, and she admitted frankly that she
+would miss me awfully. She looked so sweet that I was on the point of
+asking her then and there to marry me. Well, fate interfered in the
+guise of a small brother, so I said goodbye and left, mentally
+comparing her to my idea of Miss Augusta Ashley, much to the latter's
+disadvantage.
+
+When I stepped from the train at a sleepy country station next day I
+was promptly waylaid by a black-eyed urchin who informed me that Mrs.
+Ashley had sent him with an express wagon for my luggage, and that
+"Miss Gussie" was waiting with the carriage at the store, pointing
+down to a small building before whose door a girl was trying to soothe
+her frightened horse.
+
+As I went down the slope towards her I noticed she was tall--quite too
+tall for my taste. I dislike women who can look into my eyes on a
+level--but I had to admit that her form was remarkably symmetrical and
+graceful. She put out her hand--it was ungloved and large, but white
+and firm, with a cool, pleasant touch--and said, with a composure akin
+to indifference, "Mr. Carslake, I presume. Mother could not come to
+meet you, so she sent me. Will you be kind enough to hold my horse for
+a few minutes? I want to get something in the store." Whereupon she
+calmly transferred the reins to me and disappeared.
+
+At the time she certainly did not impress me as pretty, yet neither
+could I call her plain. Taken separately, her features were good. Her
+nose was large and straight, the mouth also a trifle large but firm
+and red, the brow wide and white, shadowed by a straying dash of brown
+curl or two. She had a certain cool, statuesque paleness, accentuated
+by straight, fine, black brows, and her eyes were a bluish grey; but
+the pupils, as I afterward found out, had a trick of dilating into
+wells of blackness which, added to a long fringe of very dark lashes,
+made her eyes quite the most striking feature of her face. Her
+expression was open and frank, and her voice clear and musical without
+being sweet. She looked about twenty-two.
+
+At the time I did not fancy her appearance and made a mental note to
+the effect that I would never like Miss Ashley. I had no use for cool,
+businesslike women--women should have no concern with business. Nellie
+would never have troubled her dear, curly head over it.
+
+Miss Ashley came out with her arms full of packages, stowed them away
+in the carriage, got in, told me which road to take, and did not again
+speak till we were out of the village and driving along a pretty
+country lane, arched over with crimson maples and golden-brown
+beeches. The purplish haze of a sunny autumn day mellowed over the
+fields, and the bunch of golden rod at my companion's belt was akin to
+the plumed ranks along the fences. I hazarded the remark that it was a
+fine day; Miss Ashley gravely admitted that it was. Then a deep smile
+seemed to rise somewhere in her eyes and creep over her face,
+discovering a dimple here and there as it proceeded.
+
+"Don't let's talk about the weather--the subject is rather stale," she
+said. "I suppose you are wondering why on earth Mother had to drag you
+away out here. I tried to show her how foolish it was, but I didn't
+succeed. Mother thinks there must be a man at the head of affairs or
+they'll never go right. I could have taken full charge easily enough;
+I haven't been Father's 'boy' all my life for nothing. There was no
+need to take you away from your business."
+
+I protested. I said I was going to take a vacation anyway, and
+business was not pressing just then. I also hinted that, while I had
+no doubt of her capacity, she might have found the duties of
+superintendent rather arduous.
+
+"Not at all," she said, with a serenity that made me groan inwardly.
+"I like it. Father always said I was a born business manager. You'll
+find Ashley's Mills very quiet, I'm afraid. It's a sort of charmed
+Sleepy Hollow. See, there's home," as we turned a maple-blazoned
+corner and looked from the crest of one hill across to that of
+another. "Home" was a big, white, green-shuttered house buried amid a
+riot of autumn colour, with a big grove of dark green spruces at the
+back. Below them was a glimpse of a dark blue mill pond and beyond it
+long sweeps of golden-brown meadow land, sloping up till they dimmed
+in horizon mists of pearl and purple.
+
+"How pretty," I exclaimed admiringly.
+
+"Isn't it?" said Gussie proudly. "I love it." Her pupils dilated into
+dark pools, and I rather unwillingly admitted that Miss Ashley was a
+fine-looking girl.
+
+As we drove up Aunt Lucy was standing on the steps of the verandah,
+over whose white roof trailed a luxuriant creeper, its leaves tinged
+by October frosts into lovely wine reds and tawny yellows. Gussie
+sprang out, barely touching my offered hand with her fingertips.
+
+"There's Mother waiting to pounce on you and hear all the family
+news," she said, "so go and greet her like a dutiful nephew."
+
+"I must take out your horse for you first," I said politely.
+
+"Not at all," said Miss Ashley, taking the reins from my hands in a
+way not to be disputed. "I always unharness Charley myself. No one
+understands him half so well. Besides, I'm used to it. Didn't I tell
+you I'd always been Father's boy?"
+
+"I well believe it," I thought in disgust, as she led the horse over
+to the well and I went up to Aunt Lucy. Through the sitting-room
+windows I kept a watchful eye on Miss Ashley as she watered and deftly
+unharnessed Charley and led him into his stable with sundry pats on
+his nose. Then I saw no more of her till she came in to tell us tea
+was ready, and led the way out to the dining room.
+
+It was evident Miss Gussie held the reins of household government, and
+no doubt worthily. Those firm, capable white hands of hers looked as
+though they might be equal to a good many emergencies. She talked
+little, leaving the conversation to Aunt Lucy and myself, though she
+occasionally dropped in an apt word. Toward the end of the meal,
+however, she caught hold of an unfortunate opinion I had incautiously
+advanced and tore it into tatters. The result was a spirited argument,
+in which Miss Gussie held her own with such ability that I was utterly
+routed and found another grievance against her. It was very
+humiliating to be worsted by a girl--a country girl at that, who had
+passed most of her life on a farm! No doubt she was strong-minded and
+wanted to vote. I was quite prepared to believe anything of her.
+
+After tea Miss Ashley proposed a walk around the premises, in order to
+initiate me into my duties. Apart from his farm, Mr. Ashley owned
+large grist-and saw-mills and did a flourishing business, with the
+details of which Miss Gussie seemed so conversant that I lost all
+doubt of her ability to run the whole thing as she had claimed. I felt
+quite ignorant in the light of her superior knowledge, and our walk
+was enlivened by some rather too lively discussions between us. We
+walked about together, however, till the shadows of the firs by the
+mills stretched nearly across the pond and the white moon began to put
+on a silvery burnish. Then we wound up by a bitter dispute, during
+which Gussie's eyes were very black and each cheek had a round, red
+stain on it. She had a little air of triumph at having defeated me.
+
+"I have to go now and see about putting away the milk, and I dare say
+you're not sorry to be rid of me," she said, with a demureness I had
+not credited her with, "but if you come to the verandah in half an
+hour I'll bring you out a glass of new milk and some pound cake I made
+today by a recipe that's been in the family for one hundred years, and
+I hope it will choke you for all the snubs you've been giving me." She
+walked away after this amiable wish, and I stood by the pond till the
+salmon tints faded from its waters and stars began to mirror
+themselves brokenly in its ripples. The mellow air was full of sweet,
+mingled eventide sounds as I walked back to the house. Aunt Lucy was
+knitting on the verandah. Gussie brought out cake and milk and chatted
+to us while we ate, in an inconsequent girlish way, or fed bits of
+cake to a green-eyed goblin in the likeness of a black cat.
+
+She appeared in such an amiable light that I was half inclined to
+reconsider my opinion of her. When I went to my room the vase full of
+crimson leaves on my table suggested Gussie, and I repented of my
+unfriendliness for a moment--and only for a moment. Gussie and her
+mother passed through the hall below, and Aunt Lucy's soft voice
+floated up through my half-open door.
+
+"Well, how do you like your cousin, my dear?"
+
+Whereat that decided young lady promptly answered, "I think he is the
+most conceited youth I've met for some time."
+
+Pleasant, wasn't it? I thought of Nellie's meek admiration of all my
+words and ways, and got her photo out to soothe my vanity. For the
+first time it struck me that her features were somewhat insipid. The
+thought seemed like disloyalty, so I banished it and went to bed.
+
+I expected to dream of that disagreeable Gussie, but I did not, and I
+slept so soundly that it was ten o'clock the next morning before I
+woke. I sprang out of bed in dismay, dressed hastily, and ran down,
+not a little provoked at myself. Through the window I saw Gussie in
+the garden digging up some geraniums. She was enveloped in a
+clay-stained brown apron, a big flapping straw hat half hid her face,
+and she wore a pair of muddy old kid gloves. Her whole appearance was
+disreputable, and the face she turned to me as I said "Good morning"
+had a diagonal streak of clay across it. I added slovenliness to my
+already long list of her demerits.
+
+"Good afternoon, rather. Don't you know what time it is? The men were
+here three hours ago for their orders. I thought it a pity to disturb
+your peaceful dreams, so I gave them myself and sent them off."
+
+I was angrier than ever. A nice beginning I had made. And was that
+girl laughing at me?
+
+"I expected to be called in time, certainly," I said stiffly. "I am
+not accustomed to oversleep myself. I promise it will not occur
+again."
+
+My dignity was quite lost on Gussie. She peeled off her gloves
+cheerfully and said, "I suppose you'd like some breakfast. Just wait
+till I wash my hands and I'll get you some. Then if you're pining to
+be useful you can help me take up these geraniums."
+
+There was no help for it. After I had breakfasted I went, with many
+misgivings. We got on fairly well, however. Gussie was particularly
+lively and kept me too busy for argument. I quite enjoyed the time and
+we did not quarrel until nearly the last, when we fell out bitterly
+over some horticultural problem and went in to dinner in sulky
+silence. Gussie disappeared after dinner and I saw no more of her. I
+was glad of this, but after a time I began to find it a little dull.
+Even a dispute would have been livelier. I visited the mills, looked
+over the farm, and then carelessly asked Aunt Lucy where Miss Ashley
+was. Aunt Lucy replied that she had gone to visit a friend and would
+not be back till the next day.
+
+This was satisfactory, of course, highly so. What a relief it was to
+be rid of that girl with her self-assertiveness and independence. I
+said to myself that I hoped her friend would keep her for a week. I
+forgot to be disappointed that she had not when, next afternoon, I saw
+Gussie coming in at the gate with a tolerably large satchel and an
+armful of golden rod. I sauntered down to relieve her, and we had a
+sharp argument under way before we were halfway up the lane. As usual
+Gussie refused to give in that she was wrong.
+
+Her walk had brought a faint, clear tint to her cheeks and her
+rippling dusky hair had half slipped down on her neck. She said she
+had to make some cookies for tea and if I had nothing better to do I
+might go and talk to her while she mixed them. It was not a gracious
+invitation but I went, rather than be left to my own company.
+
+By the end of the week I was as much at home at Ashley Mills as if I
+had lived there all my life. Gussie and I were thrown together a good
+deal, for lack of other companions, and I saw no reason to change my
+opinion of her. She could be lively and entertaining when she chose,
+and at times she might be called beautiful. Still, I did not approve
+of her--at least I thought so, most of the time. Once in a while came
+a state of feeling which I did not quite understand.
+
+One evening I went to prayer meeting with Aunt Lucy and Gussie. I had
+not seen the minister of Ashley Mills before, though Gussie and her
+mother seemed to know him intimately. I had an idea that he was old
+and silvery-haired and benevolent-looking. So I was rather surprised
+to find him as young as myself--a tall, pale, intellectual-looking
+man, with a high, white brow and dark, earnest eyes--decidedly
+attractive.
+
+I was still more surprised when, after the service, he joined Gussie
+at the door and went down the steps with her. I felt distinctly
+ill-treated as I fell back with Aunt Lucy. There was no reason why I
+should--none; it ought to have been a relief. Rev. Carroll Martin had
+every right to see Miss Ashley home if he chose. Doubtless a girl who
+knew all there was to be known about business, farming, and milling,
+to say nothing of housekeeping and gardening, could discuss theology
+also. It was none of my business.
+
+I don't know what kept me awake so late that night. As a consequence I
+overslept myself. I had managed to redeem my reputation on this point,
+but here it was lost again. I felt cross and foolish and cantankerous
+when I went out.
+
+There was some unusual commotion at the well. It was an old-fashioned
+open one, with a chain and windlass. Aunt Lucy was peering anxiously
+down its mouth, from which a ladder was sticking. Just as I got there
+Gussie emerged from its depths with a triumphant face. Her skirt was
+muddy and draggled, her hair had tumbled down, and she held a dripping
+black cat.
+
+"Coco must have fallen into the well last night," she explained, as I
+helped her to the ground. "I missed him at milking-time, and when I
+came to the well this morning I heard the most ear-splitting yowls
+coming up from it. I couldn't think where he could possibly be, for
+the water was quite calm, until I saw he had crept into a little
+crevice in the stones on the side. So I got a ladder and went down
+after him."
+
+"You should have called me," I said sourly. "You might have killed
+yourself, going down there."
+
+"And Coco might have tumbled in and drowned while you were getting
+up," retorted Gussie. "Besides, what was the need? I could go down as
+well as you."
+
+"No doubt," I said, more sharply than I had any business to. "I don't
+dream of disputing your ability to do anything you may take it into
+your head to do. Most young ladies are not in the habit of going down
+wells, however."
+
+"Perhaps not," she rejoined, with freezing calmness. "But, as you may
+have discovered, I am not 'most young ladies.' I am myself, Augusta
+Ashley, and accountable to nobody but myself if I choose to go down
+the well every day for pure love of it."
+
+She walked off in her wet dress with her muddy cat. Gussie Ashley was
+the only girl I ever saw who could be dignified under such
+circumstances.
+
+I was in a very bad humour with myself as I went off to see about
+having the well cleaned out. I had offended Gussie and I knew she
+would not be easily appeased. Nor was she. For a week she kept me
+politely, studiously, at a distance, in spite of my most humble
+advances. Rev. Carroll was a frequent caller, ostensibly to make
+arrangements about a Sunday school they were organizing in a poor part
+of the community. Gussie and he held long conversations on this
+enthralling subject. Then Gussie went on another visit to her friend,
+and when she came back so did Rev. Carroll.
+
+One calm, hazy afternoon I was coming slowly up from the mills.
+Happening to glance at the kitchen roof, I gasped. It was on fire in
+one place. Evidently the dry shingles had caught fire from a spark.
+There was not a soul about save Gussie, Aunt Lucy, and myself. I
+dashed wildly into the kitchen, where Gussie was peeling apples.
+
+"The house is on fire," I exclaimed. Gussie dropped her knife and
+turned pale.
+
+"Don't wake Mother," was all she said, as she snatched a bucket of
+water from the table. The ladder was still lying by the well. In a
+second I had raised it to the roof and, while Gussie went up it like a
+squirrel and dashed the water on the flames, I had two more buckets
+ready for her.
+
+Fortunately the fire had made little headway, though a few minutes
+more would have given it a dangerous start. The flames hissed and died
+out as Gussie threw on the water, and in a few seconds only a small
+black hole in the shingles remained. Gussie slid down the ladder. She
+trembled in every limb, but she put out her wet hand to me with a
+faint, triumphant smile. We shook hands across the ladder with a
+cordiality never before expressed.
+
+For the next week, in spite of Rev. Carroll, I was happy when I
+thought of Gussie and miserable when I thought of Nellie. I held
+myself in some way bound to her and--was she not my ideal?
+Undoubtedly!
+
+One day I got a letter from my sister. It was long and newsy, and the
+eighth page was most interesting.
+
+"If you don't come home and look after Nellie," wrote Kate, "you'll
+soon not have her to look after. You remember that old lover of hers,
+Rod Allen? Well, he's home from the west now, immensely rich, they
+say, and his attentions to Nellie are the town talk. I think she likes
+him too. If you bury yourself any longer at Ashley Mills I won't be
+responsible for the consequences."
+
+This lifted an immense weight from my mind, but the ninth page hurled
+it back again.
+
+"You never say anything of Miss Ashley in your letters. What is she
+like--young or old, ugly or pretty, clever or dull? I met a lady
+recently who knows her and thinks she is charming. She also said Miss
+Ashley was to be married soon to Rev. Something-or-Other. Is it true?"
+
+Aye, was it? Quite likely. Kate's letter made a very miserable man of
+me. Gussie found me a dull companion that day. After several vain
+attempts to rouse me to interest she gave it up.
+
+"There's no use talking to you," she said impatiently. "I believe you
+are homesick. That letter you got this morning looked suspicious.
+Anyhow, I hope you'll get over it before I get back."
+
+"Are you going away again?" I asked.
+
+"Yes. I am going to stay a few days with Flossie." Flossie was that
+inseparable chum of hers.
+
+"You seem to spend a good deal of your time with her," I remarked
+discontentedly.
+
+Gussie opened her eyes at my tone.
+
+"Why, of course," she said. "Flossie and I have always been chums. And
+she needs me more than ever just now, for she is awfully busy. She is
+to be married next month."
+
+"Oh, I see--and you--"
+
+"I'm to be bridesmaid, of course, and we've heaps to do. Flossie
+wanted to wait until Christmas, but Mr. Martin is in a--"
+
+"Mr. Martin," I interrupted. "Is Mr. Martin going to marry your
+friend?"
+
+"Why, yes. Didn't you know? They just suit each other. There he comes
+now. He's going to drive me over, and I'm not ready. Talk to him, for
+pity's sake, while I go and dress."
+
+I never enjoyed a conversation more. Rev. Carroll Martin was a
+remarkably interesting man.
+
+Nellie married Rod Allen at Christmas and I was best man. Nellie made
+a charming little bride, and Rod fairly worshipped her. My own wedding
+did not come off until spring, as Gussie said she could not get ready
+before that.
+
+
+
+
+Kismet
+
+
+The fifth heat in the free-for-all was just over. "Lu-Lu" had won, and
+the crowd on the grand stand and the hangers-on around the track were
+cheering themselves hoarse. Clear through the noisy clamour shrilled a
+woman's cry.
+
+"Ah--I have dropped my scorecard."
+
+A man in front of her turned.
+
+"I have an extra one, madame. Will you accept it?"
+
+Her small, modishly-gloved hand closed eagerly on it before she lifted
+her eyes to his face. Both started convulsively. The man turned very
+pale, but the woman's ripe-tinted face coloured darkly.
+
+"You?" she faltered.
+
+His lips parted in the coldly-grave smile she remembered and hated.
+
+"You are not glad to see me," he said calmly, "but that, I suppose,
+was not to be expected. I did not come here to annoy you. This meeting
+is as unexpected to me as to you. I had no suspicion that for the last
+half-hour I had been standing next to my--"
+
+She interrupted him by an imperious gesture. Still clutching the
+scorecard she half-turned from him. Again he smiled, this time with a
+tinge of scorn, and shifted his eyes to the track.
+
+None of the people around them had noticed the little by-play. All
+eyes were on the track, which was being cleared for the first heat of
+another race. The free-for-all horses were being led away blanketed.
+The crowd cheered "Lu-Lu" as she went past, a shapeless oddity. The
+backers of "Mascot", the rival favourite, looked gloomy.
+
+The woman noticed nothing of all this. She was small, very pretty,
+still young, and gowned in a quite unmistakable way. She studied the
+man's profile furtively. He looked older than when she had seen him
+last--there were some silver threads gleaming in his close-clipped
+dark hair and short, pointed beard. Otherwise there was little change
+in the quiet features and somewhat stern grey eyes. She wondered if he
+had cared at all.
+
+They had not met for five years. She shut her eyes and looked in on
+her past. It all came back very vividly. She had been eighteen when
+they were married--a gay, high-spirited girl and the season's beauty.
+He was much older and a quiet, serious student. Her friends had
+wondered why she married him--sometimes she wondered herself, but she
+had loved him, or thought so.
+
+The marriage had been an unhappy one. She was fond of society and
+gaiety, he wanted quiet and seclusion. She Was impulsive and
+impatient, he deliberate and grave. The strong wills clashed. After
+two years of an unbearable sort of life they had separated--quietly,
+and without scandal of any sort. She had wanted a divorce, but he
+would not agree to that, so she had taken her own independent fortune
+and gone back to her own way of life. In the following five years she
+had succeeded in burying all remembrance well out of sight. No one
+knew if she were satisfied or not; her world was charitable to her and
+she lived a gay and quite irreproachable life. She wished that she had
+not come to the races. It was such an irritating encounter. She opened
+her eyes wearily; the dusty track, the flying horses, the gay dresses
+of the women on the grandstand, the cloudless blue sky, the brilliant
+September sunshine, the purple distances all commingled in a glare
+that made her head ache. Before it all she saw the tall figure by her
+side, his face turned from her, watching the track intently.
+
+She wondered with a vague curiosity what induced him to come to the
+races. Such things were not greatly in his line. Evidently their
+chance meeting had not disturbed him. It was a sign that he did not
+care. She sighed a little wearily and closed her eyes. When the heat
+was over he turned to her.
+
+"May I ask how you have been since--since we met last? You are looking
+extremely well. Has Vanity Fair palled in any degree?"
+
+She was angry at herself and him. Where had her careless society
+manner and well-bred composure gone? She felt weak and hysterical.
+What if she should burst into tears before the whole crowd--before
+those coldly critical grey eyes? She almost hated him.
+
+"No--why should it? I have found it very pleasant--and I have been
+well--very well. And you?"
+
+He jotted down the score carefully before he replied.
+
+"I? Oh, a book-worm and recluse always leads a placid life. I never
+cared for excitement, you know. I came down here to attend a sale of
+some rare editions, and a well-meaning friend dragged me out to see
+the races. I find it rather interesting, I must confess, much more so
+than I should have fancied. Sorry I can't stay until the end. I must
+go as soon as the free-for-all is over, if not before. I have backed
+'Mascot'; you?"
+
+"'Lu-Lu'" she answered quickly--it almost seemed defiantly. How
+horribly unreal it was--this carrying on of small talk, as if they
+were the merest of chance-met acquaintances! "She belongs to a friend
+of mine, so I am naturally interested."
+
+"She and 'Mascot' are ties now--both have won two heats. One more for
+either will decide it. This is a good day for the races. Excuse me."
+
+He leaned over and brushed a scrap of paper from her grey cloak. She
+shivered slightly.
+
+"You are cold! This stand is draughty."
+
+"I am not at all cold, thank you. What race is this?--oh! the
+three-minute one."
+
+She bent forward with assumed interest to watch the scoring. She was
+breathing heavily. There were tears in her eyes--she bit her lips
+savagely and glared at the track until they were gone.
+
+Presently he spoke again, in the low, even tone demanded by
+circumstances.
+
+"This is a curious meeting, is it not?--quite a flavor of romance!
+By-the-way, do you read as many novels as ever?"
+
+She fancied there was mockery in his tone. She remembered how very
+frivolous he used to consider her novel-reading. Besides, she resented
+the personal tinge. What right had he?
+
+"Almost as many," she answered carelessly.
+
+"I was very intolerant, wasn't I?" he said after a pause. "You thought
+so--you were right. You have been happier since you--left me?"
+
+"Yes," she said defiantly, looking straight into his eyes.
+
+"And you do not regret it?"
+
+He bent down a little. His sleeve brushed against her shoulder.
+Something in his face arrested the answer she meant to make.
+
+"I--I--did not say that," she murmured faintly.
+
+There was a burst of cheering. The free-for-all horses were being
+brought out for the sixth heat. She turned away to watch them. The
+scoring began, and seemed likely to have no end. She was tired of it
+all. It didn't matter a pin to her whether "Lu-Lu" or "Mascot" won.
+What _did_ matter! Had Vanity Fair after all been a satisfying
+exchange for love? He _had_ loved her once, and they had been happy at
+first. She had never before said, even in her own heart: "I am sorry,"
+but--suddenly, she felt his hand on her shoulder, and looked up. Their
+eyes met. He stooped and said almost in a whisper:
+
+"Will you come back to me?"
+
+"I don't know," she whispered breathlessly, as one half-fascinated.
+
+"We were both to blame--but I the most. I was too hard on you--I ought
+to have made more allowance. We are wiser now both of us. Come back
+to me--my wife."
+
+His tone was cold and his face expressionless. It was on her lips to
+cry out "No," passionately.
+
+But the slender, scholarly hand on her shoulder was trembling with the
+intensity of his repressed emotion. He _did_ care, then. A wild
+caprice flashed into her brain. She sprang up.
+
+"See," she cried, "they're off now. This heat will probably decide the
+race. If 'Lu-Lu' wins I will not go back to you, if 'Mascot' does I
+will. That is my decision."
+
+He turned paler, but bowed in assent. He knew by bitter experience how
+unchangeable her whims were, how obstinately she clung to even the
+most absurd.
+
+She leaned forward breathlessly. The crowd hung silently on the track.
+"Lu-Lu" and "Mascot" were neck and neck, getting in splendid work.
+Half-way round the course "Lu-Lu" forged half a neck ahead, and her
+backers went mad. But one woman dropped her head in her hands and
+dared look no more. One man with white face and set lips watched the
+track unswervingly.
+
+Again "Mascot" crawled up, inch by inch. They were on the home
+stretch, they were equal, the cheering broke out, then silence, then
+another terrific burst, shouts, yells and clappings--"Mascot" had won
+the free-for-all. In the front row a woman stood up, swayed and shaken
+as a leaf in the wind. She straightened her scarlet hat and readjusted
+her veil unsteadily. There was a smile on her lips and tears in her
+eyes. No one noticed her. A man beside her drew her hand through his
+arm in a quiet proprietary fashion. They left the grand stand
+together.
+
+
+
+
+Lilian's Business Venture
+
+
+Lilian Mitchell turned into the dry-goods store on Randall Street,
+just as Esther Miller and Ella Taylor came out. They responded coldly
+to her greeting and exchanged significant glances as they walked away.
+
+Lilian's pale face crimsoned. She was a tall, slender girl of about
+seventeen, and dressed in mourning. These girls had been her close
+friends once. But that was before the Mitchells had lost their money.
+Since then Lilian had been cut by many of her old chums and she felt
+it keenly.
+
+The clerks in the store were busy and Lilian sat down to wait her
+turn. Near to her two ladies were also waiting and chatting.
+
+"Helen wants me to let her have a birthday party," Mrs. Saunders was
+saying wearily. "She has been promised it so long and I hate to
+disappoint the child, but our girl left last week, and I cannot
+possibly make all the cakes and things myself. I haven't the time or
+strength, so Helen must do without her party."
+
+"Talking of girls," said Mrs. Reeves impatiently, "I am almost
+discouraged. It is so hard to get a good all-round one. The last one I
+had was so saucy I had to discharge her, and the one I have now cannot
+make decent bread. I never had good luck with bread myself either."
+
+"That is Mrs. Porter's great grievance too. It is no light task to
+bake bread for all those boarders. Have you made your jelly yet?"
+
+"No. Maria cannot make it, she says, and I detest messing with jelly.
+But I really must see to it soon."
+
+At this point a saleswoman came up to Lilian, who made her small
+purchases and went out.
+
+"There goes Lilian Mitchell," said Mrs. Reeves in an undertone. "She
+looks very pale. They say they are dreadfully poor since Henry
+Mitchell died. His affairs were in a bad condition, I am told."
+
+"I am sorry for Mrs. Mitchell," responded Mrs. Saunders. "She is such
+a sweet woman. Lilian will have to do something, I suppose, and there
+is so little chance for a girl here."
+
+Lilian, walking down the street, was wearily turning over in her mind
+the problems of her young existence. Her father had died the preceding
+spring. He had been a supposedly prosperous merchant; the Mitchells
+had always lived well, and Lilian was a petted and only child. Then
+came the shock of Henry Mitchell's sudden death and of financial ruin.
+His affairs were found to be hopelessly involved; when all the debts
+were paid there was left only the merest pittance--barely enough for
+house-rent--for Lilian and her mother to live upon. They had moved
+into a tiny cottage in an unfashionable locality, and during the
+summer Lilian had tried hard to think of something to do. Mrs.
+Mitchell was a delicate woman, and the burden of their situation fell
+on Lilian's young shoulders.
+
+There seemed to be no place for her. She could not teach and had no
+particular talent in any line. There was no opening for her in
+Willington, which was a rather sleepy little place, and Lilian was
+almost in despair.
+
+"There really doesn't seem to be any real place in the world for me,
+Mother," she said rather dolefully at the supper table. "I've no
+talent at all; it is dreadful to have been born without one. And yet I
+_must_ do something, and do it soon."
+
+And Lilian, after she had washed up the tea dishes, went upstairs and
+had a good cry.
+
+But the darkest hour, so the proverb goes, is just before the dawn,
+and after Lilian had had her cry out and was sitting at her window in
+the dusk, watching a thin new moon shining over the trees down the
+street, her inspiration came to her. A minute later she whirled into
+the tiny sitting-room where her mother was sewing.
+
+"Mother, our fortune is made! I have an idea!"
+
+"Don't lose it, then," said Mrs. Mitchell with a smile. "What is it,
+my dear?"
+
+Lilian sobered herself, sat down by her mother's side, and proceeded
+to recount the conversation she had heard in the store that afternoon.
+
+"Now, Mother, this is where my brilliant idea comes in. You have often
+told me I am a born cook and I always have good luck. Now, tomorrow
+morning I shall go to Mrs. Saunders and offer to furnish all the good
+things for Helen's birthday party, and then I'll ask Mrs. Reeves and
+Mrs. Porter if I may make their bread for them. That will do for a
+beginning, I like cooking, you know, and I believe that in time I can
+work up a good business."
+
+"It seems to be a good idea," said Mrs. Mitchell thoughtfully, "and I
+am willing that you should try. But have you thought it all out
+carefully? There will be many difficulties."
+
+"I know. I don't expect smooth sailing right along, and perhaps I'll
+fail altogether; but somehow I don't believe I will."
+
+"A great many of your old friends will think--"
+
+"Oh, yes; I know _that_ too, but I am not going to mind it, Mother. I
+don't think there is any disgrace in working for my living. I'm going
+to do my best and not care what people say."
+
+Early next morning Lilian started out. She had carefully thought over
+the details of her small venture, considered ways and means, and
+decided on the most advisable course. She would not attempt too much,
+and she felt sure of success.
+
+To secure competent servants was one of the problems of Willington
+people. At Drayton, a large neighbouring town, were several factories,
+and into these all the working girls from Willington had crowded,
+leaving very few who were willing to go out to service. Many of those
+who did were poor cooks, and Lilian shrewdly suspected that many a
+harassed housekeeper in the village would be glad to avail herself of
+the new enterprise.
+
+Lilian was, as she had said of herself, "a born cook." This was her
+capital, and she meant to make the most of it. Mrs. Saunders listened
+to her businesslike details with surprise and delight.
+
+"It is the very thing," she said. "Helen is so eager for that party,
+but I could not undertake it myself. Her birthday is Friday. Can you
+have everything ready by then?"
+
+"Yes, I think so," said Lilian briskly, producing her notebook.
+"Please give me the list of what you want and I will do my best."
+
+From Mrs. Saunders she went to Mrs. Reeves and found a customer as
+soon as she had told the reason of her call. "I'll furnish all the
+bread and rolls you need," she said, "and they will be good, too. Now,
+about your jelly. I can make good jelly, and I'll be very glad to make
+yours."
+
+When she left, Lilian had an order for two dozen glasses of apple
+jelly, as well as a standing one for bread and rolls. Mrs. Porter was
+next visited and grasped eagerly at the opportunity.
+
+"I know your bread will be good," she said, "and you may count on me
+as a regular customer."
+
+Lilian thought she had enough on hand for a first attempt and went
+home satisfied. On her way she called at the grocery store with an
+order that surprised Mr. Hooper. When she told him of her plan he
+opened his eyes.
+
+"I must tell my wife about that. She isn't strong and she doesn't like
+cooking."
+
+After dinner Lilian went to work, enveloped in a big apron, and
+whipped eggs, stoned raisins, stirred, concocted, and baked until
+dark. When bedtime came she was so tired that she could hardly crawl
+upstairs; but she felt happy too, for the day had been a successful
+one.
+
+And so also were the days and weeks and months that followed. It was
+hard and constant work, but it brought its reward. Lilian had not
+promised more than she could perform, and her customers were
+satisfied. In a short time she found herself with a regular and
+growing business on her hands, for new customers were gradually added
+and always came to stay.
+
+People who gave parties found it very convenient to follow Mrs.
+Saunders's example and order their supplies from Lilian. She had a
+very busy winter and, of course, it was not all plain sailing. She had
+many difficulties to contend with. Sometimes days came on which
+everything seemed to go wrong--when the stove smoked or the oven
+wouldn't heat properly, when cakes fell flat and bread was sour and
+pies behaved as only totally depraved pies can, when she burned her
+fingers and felt like giving up in despair.
+
+Then, again, she found herself cut by several of her old
+acquaintances. But she was too sensible to worry much over this. The
+friends really worth having were still hers, her mother's face had
+lost its look of care, and her business was prospering. She was
+hopeful and wide awake, kept her wits about her and looked out for
+hints, and learned to laugh over her failures.
+
+During the winter she and her mother had managed to do most of the
+work themselves, hiring little Mary Robinson next door on especially
+busy days, and now and then calling in the assistance of Jimmy Bowen
+and his hand sled to carry orders to customers. But when spring came
+Lilian prepared to open up her summer campaign on a much larger scale.
+Mary Robinson was hired for the season, and John Perkins was engaged
+to act as carrier with his express wagon. A summer kitchen was boarded
+in in the backyard, and a new range bought; Lilian began operations
+with a striking advertisement in the Willington _News_ and an
+attractive circular sent around to all her patrons. Picnics and summer
+weddings were frequent. In bread and rolls her trade was brisk and
+constant. She also took orders for pickles, preserves, and jellies,
+and this became such a flourishing branch that a second assistant had
+to be hired.
+
+It was a cardinal rule with Lilian never to send out any article that
+was not up to her standard. She bore the loss of her failures, and
+sometimes stayed up half of the night to fill an order on time.
+"Prompt and perfect" was her motto.
+
+The long hot summer days were very trying, and sometimes she got very
+tired of it all. But when on the anniversary of her first venture she
+made up her accounts she was well pleased. To be sure, she had not
+made a fortune; but she had paid all their expenses, had a hundred
+dollars clear, and had laid the solid foundations of a profitable
+business.
+
+"Mother," she said jubilantly, as she wiped a dab of flour from her
+nose and proceeded to concoct the icing for Blanche Remington's
+wedding cake, "don't you think my business venture has been a decided
+success?"
+
+Mrs. Mitchell surveyed her busy daughter with a motherly smile. "Yes,
+I think it has," she said.
+
+
+
+
+Miriam's Lover
+
+
+I had been reading a ghost story to Mrs. Sefton, and I laid it down at
+the end with a little shrug of contempt.
+
+"What utter nonsense!" I said.
+
+Mrs. Sefton nodded abstractedly above her fancywork.
+
+"That is. It is a very commonplace story indeed. I don't believe the
+spirits of the departed trouble themselves to revisit the glimpses of
+the moon for the purpose of frightening honest mortals--or even for
+the sake of hanging around the favourite haunts of their existence in
+the flesh. If they ever appear, it must be for a better reason than
+that."
+
+"You don't surely think that they ever do appear?" I said
+incredulously.
+
+"We have no proof that they do not, my dear."
+
+"Surely, Mary," I exclaimed, "you don't mean to say that you believe
+people ever do or can see spirits--ghosts, as the word goes?"
+
+"I didn't say I believed it. I never saw anything of the sort. I
+neither believe nor disbelieve. But you know queer things do happen at
+times--things you can't account for. At least, people who you know
+wouldn't lie say so. Of course, they may be mistaken. And I don't
+think that everybody can see spirits either, provided they are to be
+seen. It requires people of a certain organization--with a spiritual
+eye, as it were. We haven't all got that--in fact, I think very few of
+us have. I dare say you think I'm talking nonsense."
+
+"Well, yes, I think you are. You really surprise me, Mary. I always
+thought you the least likely person in the world to take up with such
+ideas. Something must have come under your observation to develop such
+theories in your practical head. Tell me what it was."
+
+"To what purpose? You would remain as sceptical as ever."
+
+"Possibly not. Try me; I may be convinced."
+
+"No," returned Mrs. Sefton calmly. "Nobody ever is convinced by
+hearsay. When a person has once seen a spirit--or thinks he has--he
+thenceforth believes it. And when somebody else is intimately
+associated with that person and knows all the circumstances--well, he
+admits the possibility, at least. That is my position. But by the time
+it gets to the third person--the outsider--it loses power. Besides, in
+this particular instance the story isn't very exciting. But then--it's
+true."
+
+"You have excited my curiosity. You must tell me the story."
+
+"Well, first tell me what you think of this. Suppose two people, both
+sensitively organized individuals, loved each other with a love
+stronger than life. If they were apart, do you think it might be
+possible for their souls to communicate with each other in some
+inexplicable way? And if anything happened to one, don't you think
+that that one could and would let the spirit of the other know?"
+
+"You're getting into too deep waters for me, Mary," I said, shaking my
+head. "I'm not an authority on telepathy, or whatever you call it. But
+I've no belief in such theories. In fact, I think they are all
+nonsense. I'm sure you must think so too in your rational moments."
+
+"I dare say it is all nonsense," said Mrs. Sefton slowly, "but if you
+had lived a whole year in the same house with Miriam Gordon, you would
+have been tainted too. Not that she had 'theories'--at least, she
+never aired them if she had. But there was simply something about the
+girl herself that gave a person strange impressions. When I first met
+her I had the most uncanny feeling that she was all spirit--soul--what
+you will! no flesh, anyhow. That feeling wore off after a while, but
+she never seemed like other people to me.
+
+"She was Mr. Sefton's niece. Her father had died when she was a child.
+When Miriam was twenty her mother had married a second time and went
+to Europe with her husband. Miriam came to live with us while they
+were away. Upon their return she was herself to be married.
+
+"I had never seen Miriam before. Her arrival was unexpected, and I was
+absent from home when she came. I returned in the evening, and when I
+saw her first she was standing under the chandelier in the drawing
+room. Talk about spirits! For five seconds I thought I had seen one.
+
+"Miriam was a beauty. I had known that before, though I think I
+hardly expected to see such wonderful loveliness. She was tall and
+extremely graceful, dark--at least her hair was dark, but her skin was
+wonderfully fair and clear. Her hair was gathered away from her face,
+and she had a high, pure, white forehead, and the straightest, finest,
+blackest brows. Her face was oval, with very large and dark eyes.
+
+"I soon realized that Miriam was in some mysterious fashion different
+from other people. I think everyone who met her felt the same way. Yet
+it was a feeling hard to define. For my own part I simply felt as if
+she belonged to another world, and that part of the time she--her
+soul, you know--was back there again.
+
+"You must not suppose that Miriam was a disagreeable person to have in
+the house. On the contrary, it was the very reverse. Everybody liked
+her. She was one of the sweetest, most winsome girls I ever knew, and
+I soon grew to love her dearly. As for what Dick called her 'little
+queernesses'--well, we got used to them in time.
+
+"Miriam was engaged, as I have told you, to a young Harvard man named
+Sidney Claxton. I knew she loved him very deeply. When she showed me
+his photograph, I liked his appearance and said so. Then I made some
+teasing remark about her love-letters--just for a joke, you know.
+Miriam looked at me with an odd little smile and said quickly:
+
+"'Sidney and I never write to each other.'
+
+"'Why, Miriam!' I exclaimed in astonishment. 'Do you mean to tell me
+you never hear from him at all?'
+
+"'No, I did not say that. I hear from him every day--every hour. We
+do not need to write letters. There are better means of communication
+between two souls that are in perfect accord with each other.'
+
+"'Miriam, you uncanny creature, what do you mean?' I asked.
+
+"But Miriam only gave another queer smile and made no answer at all.
+Whatever her beliefs or theories were, she would never discuss them.
+
+"She had a habit of dropping into abstracted reveries at any time or
+place. No matter where she was, this, whatever it was, would come over
+her. She would sit there, perhaps in the centre of a gay crowd, and
+gaze right out into space, not hearing or seeing a single thing that
+went on around her.
+
+"I remember one day in particular; we were sewing in my room. I looked
+up and saw that Miriam's work had dropped on her knee and she was
+leaning forward, her lips apart, her eyes gazing upward with an
+unearthly expression.
+
+"'Don't look like that, Miriam!' I said, with a little shiver. 'You
+seem to be looking at something a thousand miles away!'
+
+"Miriam came out of her trance or reverie and said, with a little
+laugh:
+
+"'How do you know but that I was?'
+
+"She bent her head for a minute or two. Then she lifted it again and
+looked at me with a sudden contraction of her level brows that
+betokened vexation.
+
+"'I wish you hadn't spoken to me just then,' she said. 'You
+interrupted the message I was receiving. I shall not get it at all
+now.'
+
+"'Miriam,' I implored. 'I so wish my dear girl, that you wouldn't talk
+so. It makes people think there is something queer about you. Who in
+the world was sending you a message, as you call it?'
+
+"'Sidney,' said Miriam simply.
+
+"'Nonsense!'
+
+"'You think it is nonsense because you don't understand it,' was her
+calm response.
+
+"I recall another event was when some caller dropped in and we had
+drifted into a discussion about ghosts and the like--and I've no doubt
+we all talked some delicious nonsense. Miriam said nothing at the
+time, but when we were alone I asked her what she thought of it.
+
+"'I thought you were all merely talking against time,' she retorted
+evasively.
+
+"'But, Miriam, do you really think it is possible for ghosts--'
+
+"'I detest that word!'
+
+"'Well, spirits then--to return after death, or to appear to anyone
+apart from the flesh?'
+
+"'I will tell you what I know. If anything were to happen to
+Sidney--if he were to die or be killed--he would come to me himself
+and tell me.'
+
+"One day Miriam came down to lunch looking pale and worried. After
+Dick went out, I asked her if anything were wrong.
+
+"'Something has happened to Sidney,' she replied, 'some painful
+accident--I don't know what.'
+
+"'How do you know?' I cried. Then, as she looked at me strangely, I
+added hastily, 'You haven't been receiving any more unearthly
+messages, have you? Surely, Miriam, you are not so foolish as to
+really believe in that!'
+
+"'I know,' she answered quickly. 'Belief or disbelief has nothing to
+do with it. Yes, I have had a message. I know that some accident has
+happened to Sidney--painful and inconvenient but not particularly
+dangerous. I do not know what it is. Sidney will write me that. He
+writes when it is absolutely necessary.'
+
+"'Aerial communication isn't perfected yet then?' I said
+mischievously. But, observing how really worried she seemed, I added,
+'Don't fret, Miriam. You may be mistaken.'
+
+"Well, two days afterwards she got a note from her lover--the first I
+had ever known her to receive--in which he said he had been thrown
+from his horse and had broken his left arm. It had happened the very
+morning Miriam received her message.
+
+"Miriam had been with us about eight months when one day she came into
+my room hurriedly. She was very pale.
+
+"'Sidney is ill--dangerously ill. What shall I do?'
+
+"I knew she must have had another of those abominable messages--or
+thought she had--and really, remembering the incident of the broken
+arm, I couldn't feel as sceptical as I pretended to. I tried to cheer
+her, but did not succeed. Two hours later she had a telegram from her
+lover's college chum, saying that Mr. Claxton was dangerously ill with
+typhoid fever.
+
+"I was quite alarmed about Miriam in the days that followed. She
+grieved and fretted continually. One of her troubles was that she
+received no more messages; she said it was because Sidney was too ill
+to send them. Anyhow, she had to content herself with the means of
+communication used by ordinary mortals.
+
+"Sidney's mother, who had gone to nurse him, wrote every day, and at
+last good news came. The crisis was over and the doctor in attendance
+thought Sidney would recover. Miriam seemed like a new creature then,
+and rapidly recovered her spirits.
+
+"For a week reports continued favourable. One night we went to the
+opera to hear a celebrated prima donna. When we returned home Miriam
+and I were sitting in her room, chatting over the events of the
+evening.
+
+"Suddenly she sat straight up with a sort of convulsive shudder, and
+at the same time--you may laugh if you like--the most horrible feeling
+came over me. I didn't see anything, but I just felt that there was
+something or someone in the room besides ourselves.
+
+"Miriam was gazing straight before her. She rose to her feet and held
+out her hands.
+
+"'Sidney!' she said.
+
+"Then she fell to the floor in a dead faint.
+
+"I screamed for Dick, rang the bell and rushed to her.
+
+"In a few minutes the whole household was aroused, and Dick was off
+posthaste for the doctor, for we could not revive Miriam from her
+death-like swoon. She seemed as one dead. We worked over her for
+hours. She would come out of her faint for a moment, give us an
+unknowing stare and go shudderingly off again.
+
+"The doctor talked of some fearful shock, but I kept my own counsel.
+At dawn Miriam came back to life at last. When she and I were left
+alone, she turned to me.
+
+"'Sidney is dead,' she said quietly. 'I saw him--just before I
+fainted. I looked up, and he was standing between me and you. He had
+come to say farewell.'
+
+"What could I say? Almost while we were talking a telegram came. He
+was dead--he had died at the very hour at which Miriam had seen him."
+
+Mrs. Sefton paused, and the lunch bell rang.
+
+"What do you think of it?" she queried as we rose.
+
+"Honestly, I don't know what I think of it," I answered frankly.
+
+
+
+
+Miss Calista's Peppermint Bottle
+
+
+Miss Calista was perplexed. Her nephew, Caleb Cramp, who had been her
+right-hand man for years and whom she had got well broken into her
+ways, had gone to the Klondike, leaving her to fill his place with the
+next best man; but the next best man was slow to appear, and meanwhile
+Miss Calista was looking about her warily. She could afford to wait a
+while, for the crop was all in and the fall ploughing done, so that
+the need of a successor to Caleb was not as pressing as it might
+otherwise have been. There was no lack of applicants, such as they
+were. Miss Calista was known to be a kind and generous mistress,
+although she had her "ways," and insisted calmly and immovably upon
+wholehearted compliance with them. She had a small, well-cultivated
+farm and a comfortable house, and her hired men lived in clover. Caleb
+Cramp had been perfection after his kind, and Miss Calista did not
+expect to find his equal. Nevertheless, she set up a certain standard
+of requirements; and although three weeks, during which Miss Calista
+had been obliged to put up with the immature services of a neighbour's
+boy, had elapsed since Caleb's departure, no one had as yet stepped
+into his vacant and coveted shoes.
+
+Certainly Miss Calista was somewhat hard to please, but she was not
+thinking of herself as she sat by her front window in the chilly
+November twilight. Instead, she was musing on the degeneration of
+hired men, and reflecting that it was high time the wheat was
+thrashed, the house banked, and sundry other duties attended to.
+
+Ches Maybin had been up that afternoon to negotiate for the vacant
+place, and had offered to give satisfaction for smaller wages than
+Miss Calista had ever paid. But he had met with a brusque refusal,
+scarcely as civil as Miss Calista had bestowed on drunken Jake Stinson
+from the Morrisvale Road.
+
+Not that Miss Calista had any particular prejudice against Ches
+Maybin, or knew anything positively to his discredit. She was simply
+unconsciously following the example of a world that exerts itself to
+keep a man down when he is down and prevent all chance of his rising.
+Nothing succeeds like success, and the converse of this is likewise
+true--that nothing fails like failure. There was not a person in
+Cooperstown who would not have heartily endorsed Miss Calista's
+refusal.
+
+Ches Maybin was only eighteen, although he looked several years older,
+and although no flagrant misdoing had ever been proved against him,
+suspicion of such was not wanting. He came of a bad stock, people said
+sagely, adding that what was bred in the bone was bound to come out
+in the flesh. His father, old Sam Maybin, had been a shiftless and
+tricky rascal, as everybody knew, and had ended his days in the
+poorhouse. Ches's mother had died when he was a baby, and he had come
+up somehow, in a hand-to-mouth fashion, with all the cloud of heredity
+hanging over him. He was always looked at askance, and when any
+mischief came to light in the village, it was generally fastened on
+him as a convenient and handy scapegoat. He was considered sulky and
+lazy, and the local prophets united in predicting a bad end for him
+sooner or later; and, moreover, diligently endeavoured by their
+general treatment of him to put him in a fair way to fulfil their
+predictions. Miss Calista, when she had shut Chester Maybin out into
+the chill gloom of the November dusk, dismissed him from her thoughts.
+There were other things of more moment to her just then than old Sam
+Maybin's hopeful son.
+
+There was nobody in the house but herself, and although this was
+neither alarming nor unusual, it was unusual--and Miss Calista
+considered it alarming--that the sum of five hundred dollars should at
+that very moment be in the upper right-hand drawer of the sideboard,
+which sum had been up to the previous day safe in the coffers of the
+Millageville bank. But certain unfavourable rumours were in course of
+circulation about that same institution, and Miss Calista, who was
+nothing if not prudent, had gone to the bank that very morning and
+withdrawn her deposit. She intended to go over to Kerrytown the very
+next day and deposit it in the Savings Bank there. Not another day
+would she keep it in the house, and, indeed, it worried her to think
+she must keep it even for the night, as she had told Mrs. Galloway
+that afternoon during a neighbourly back-yard chat.
+
+"Not but what it's safe enough," she said, "for not a soul but you
+knows I've got it. But I'm not used to have so much by me, and there
+are always tramps going round. It worries me somehow. I wouldn't give
+it a thought if Caleb was here. I s'pose being all alone makes me
+nervous."
+
+Miss Calista was still rather nervous when she went to bed that night,
+but she was a woman of sound sense and was determined not to give way
+to foolish fears. She locked doors and windows carefully, as was her
+habit, and saw that the fastenings were good and secure. The one on
+the dining-room window, looking out on the back yard, wasn't; in fact,
+it was broken altogether; but, as Miss Calista told herself, it had
+been broken just so for the last six years, and nobody had ever tried
+to get in at it yet, and it wasn't likely anyone would begin tonight.
+
+Miss Calista went to bed and, despite her worry, slept soon and
+soundly. It was well on past midnight when she suddenly wakened and
+sat bolt upright in bed. She was not accustomed to waken in the night,
+and she had the impression of having been awakened by some noise. She
+listened breathlessly. Her room was directly over the dining-room, and
+an empty stovepipe hole opened up through the ceiling of the latter at
+the head of her bed.
+
+There was no mistake about it. Something or some person was moving
+about stealthily in the room below. It wasn't the cat--Miss Calista
+had shut him in the woodshed before she went to bed, and he couldn't
+possibly get out. It must certainly be a beggar or tramp of some
+description.
+
+Miss Calista might be given over to nervousness in regard to imaginary
+thieves, but in the presence of real danger she was cool and
+self-reliant. As noiselessly and swiftly as any burglar himself, Miss
+Calista slipped out of bed and into her clothes. Then she tip-toed out
+into the hall. The late moonlight, streaming in through the hall
+windows, was quite enough illumination for her purpose, and she got
+downstairs and was fairly in the open doorway of the dining-room
+before a sound betrayed her presence.
+
+Standing at the sideboard, hastily ransacking the neat contents of an
+open drawer, stood a man's figure, dimly visible in the moonlight
+gloom. As Miss Calista's grim form appeared in the doorway, the
+midnight marauder turned with a start and then, with an inarticulate
+cry, sprang, not at the courageous lady, but at the open window behind
+him.
+
+Miss Calista, realizing with a flash of comprehension that he was
+escaping her, had a woman-like impulse to get a blow in anyhow; she
+grasped and hurled at her unceremonious caller the first thing that
+came to hand--a bottle of peppermint essence that was standing on the
+sideboard.
+
+The missile hit the escaping thief squarely on the shoulder as he
+sprang out of the window, and the fragments of glass came clattering
+down on the sill. The next moment Miss Calista found herself alone,
+standing by the sideboard in a half-dazed fashion, for the whole thing
+had passed with such lightning-like rapidity that it almost seemed as
+if it were the dissolving end of a bad dream. But the open drawer and
+the window, where the bits of glass were glistening in the moonlight,
+were no dream. Miss Calista recovered herself speedily, closed the
+window, lit the lamp, gathered up the broken glass, and set up the
+chairs which the would-be thief had upset in his exit. An examination
+of the sideboard showed the precious five hundred safe and sound in an
+undisturbed drawer.
+
+Miss Calista kept grim watch and ward there until morning, and thought
+the matter over exhaustively. In the end she resolved to keep her own
+counsel. She had no clue whatever to the thief's whereabouts or
+identity, and no good would come of making a fuss, which might only
+end in throwing suspicion on someone who might be quite innocent.
+
+When the morning came Miss Calista lost no time in setting out for
+Kerrytown, where the money was soon safely deposited in the bank. She
+heaved a sigh of relief when she left the building.
+
+I feel as if I could enjoy life once more, she said to herself.
+Goodness me, if I'd had to keep that money by me for a week itself,
+I'd have been a raving lunatic by the end of it.
+
+Miss Calista had shopping to do and friends to visit in town, so that
+the dull autumn day was well nigh spent when she finally got back to
+Cooperstown and paused at the corner store to get a bundle of matches.
+
+The store was full of men, smoking and chatting around the fire, and
+Miss Calista, whose pet abomination was tobacco smoke, was not at all
+minded to wait any longer than she could help. But Abiram Fell was
+attending to a previous customer, and Miss Calista sat grimly down by
+the counter to wait her turn.
+
+The door opened, letting in a swirl of raw November evening wind and
+Ches Maybin. He nodded sullenly to Mr. Fell and passed down the store
+to mutter a message to a man at the further end.
+
+Miss Calista lifted her head as he passed and sniffed the air as a
+charger who scents battle. The smell of tobacco was strong, and so was
+that of the open boxes of dried herring on the counter, but plainly,
+above all the commingled odours of a country grocery, Miss Calista
+caught a whiff of peppermint, so strong as to leave no doubt of its
+origin. There had been no hint of it before Ches Maybin's entrance.
+
+The latter did not wait long. He was out and striding along the
+shadowy road when Miss Calista left the store and drove smartly after
+him. It never took Miss Calista long to make up her mind about
+anything, and she had weighed and passed judgement on Ches Maybin's
+case while Mr. Fell was doing up her matches.
+
+The lad glanced up furtively as she checked her fat grey pony beside
+him.
+
+"Good evening, Chester," she said with brisk kindness. "I can give you
+a lift, if you are going my way. Jump in, quick--Dapple is a little
+restless."
+
+A wave of crimson, duskily perceptible under his sunburned skin,
+surged over Ches Maybin's face. It almost seemed as if he were going
+to blurt out a blunt refusal. But Miss Calista's face was so guileless
+and her tone so friendly, that he thought better of it and sprang in
+beside her, and Dapple broke into an impatient trot down the long
+hill lined with its bare, wind-writhen maples.
+
+After a few minutes' silence Miss Calista turned to her moody
+companion.
+
+"Chester," she said, as tranquilly as if about to ask him the most
+ordinary question in the world, "why did you climb into my house last
+night and try to steal my money?"
+
+Ches Maybin started convulsively, as if he meant to spring from the
+buggy at once, but Miss Calista's hand was on his arm in a grasp none
+the less firm because of its gentleness, and there was a warning gleam
+in her grey eyes.
+
+"It won't mend matters trying to get clear of me, Chester. I know it
+was you and I want an answer--a truthful one, mind you--to my
+question. I am your friend, and I am not going to harm you if you tell
+me the truth."
+
+Her clear and incisive gaze met and held irresistibly the boy's
+wavering one. The sullen obstinacy of his face relaxed.
+
+"Well," he muttered finally, "I was just desperate, that's why. I've
+never done anything real bad in my life before, but people have always
+been down on me. I'm blamed for everything, and nobody wants anything
+to do with me. I'm willing to work, but I can't get a thing to do. I'm
+in rags and I haven't a cent, and winter's coming on. I heard you
+telling Mrs. Galloway yesterday about the money. I was behind the fir
+hedge and you didn't see me. I went away and planned it all out. I'd
+get in some way--and I meant to use the money to get away out west as
+far from here as I could, and begin life there, where nobody knew me,
+and where I'd have some sort of a chance. I've never had any here.
+You can put me in jail now, if you like--they'll feed and clothe me
+there, anyhow, and I'll be on a level with the rest."
+
+The boy had blurted it all out sullenly and half-chokingly. A world of
+rebellion and protest against the fate that had always dragged him
+down was couched in his voice.
+
+Miss Calista drew Dapple to a standstill before her gate.
+
+"I'm not going to send you to jail, Chester. I believe you've told me
+the truth. Yesterday you wanted me to give you Caleb's place and I
+refused. Well, I offer it to you now. If you'll come, I'll hire you,
+and give you as good wages as I gave him."
+
+Ches Maybin looked incredulous.
+
+"Miss Calista, you can't mean it."
+
+"I do mean it, every word. You say you have never had a chance. Well,
+I am going to give you one--a chance to get on the right road and make
+a man of yourself. Nobody shall ever know about last night's doings
+from me, and I'll make it my business to forget them if you deserve
+it. What do you say?"
+
+Ches lifted his head and looked her squarely in the face.
+
+"I'll come," he said huskily. "It ain't no use to try and thank you,
+Miss Calista. But I'll live my thanks."
+
+And he did. The good people of Cooperstown held up their hands in
+horror when they heard that Miss Calista had hired Ches Maybin, and
+prophesied that the deluded woman would live to repent her rash step.
+But not all prophecies come true. Miss Calista smiled serenely and
+kept on her own misguided way. And Ches Maybin proved so efficient
+and steady that the arrangement was continued, and in due time people
+outlived their old suspicions and came to regard him as a thoroughly
+smart and trustworthy young man.
+
+"Miss Calista has made a man of Ches Maybin," said the oracles. "He
+ought to be very grateful to her."
+
+And he was. But only he and Miss Calista and the peppermint bottle
+ever knew the precise extent of his gratitude, and they never told.
+
+
+
+
+The Jest That Failed
+
+
+"I think it is simply a disgrace to have a person like that in our
+class," said Edna Hayden in an injured tone.
+
+"And she doesn't seem a bit ashamed of it, either," said Agnes
+Walters.
+
+"Rather proud of it, I should say," returned her roommate, spitefully.
+"It seems to me that if I were so poor that I had to 'room' myself and
+dress as dowdily as she does that I really couldn't look anybody in
+the face. What must the boys think of her? And if it wasn't for her
+being in it, our class would be the smartest and dressiest in the
+college--even those top-lofty senior girls admit that."
+
+"It's a shame," said Agnes, conclusively. "But she needn't expect to
+associate with our set. I, for one, won't have anything to do with
+her."
+
+"Nor I. I think it is time she should be taught her place. If we could
+only manage to inflict some decided snub on her, she might take the
+hint and give up trying to poke herself in where she doesn't belong.
+The idea of her consenting to be elected on the freshmen executive!
+But she seems impervious to snubs."
+
+"Edna, let's play a joke on her. It will serve her right. Let us send
+an invitation in somebody's name to the senior 'prom.'"
+
+"The very thing! And sign Sidney Hill's name to it. He's the
+handsomest and richest fellows at Payzant, and belongs to one of the
+best families in town, and he's awfully fastidious besides. No doubt
+she will feel immensely flattered and, of course, she'll accept. Just
+think how silly she'll feel when she finds out he never sent it. Let's
+write it now, and send it at once. There is no time to lose, for the
+'prom' is on Thursday night."
+
+The freshmen co-eds at Payzant College did not like Grace Seeley--that
+is to say, the majority of them. They were a decidedly snobbish class
+that year. No one could deny that Grace was clever, but she was poor,
+dressed very plainly--"dowdily," the girls said--and "roomed" herself,
+that phrase meaning that she rented a little unfurnished room and
+cooked her own meals over an oil stove.
+
+The "senior prom," as it was called, was the annual reception which
+the senior class gave in the middle of every autumn term. It was the
+smartest and gayest of all the college functions, and a Payzant co-ed
+who received an invitation to it counted herself fortunate. The senior
+girls were included as a matter of course, but a junior, soph, or
+freshie could not go unless one of the senior boys invited her.
+
+Grace Seeley was studying Greek in her tiny room that afternoon when
+the invitation was brought to her. It was scrupulously orthodox in
+appearance and form, and Grace never doubted that it was genuine,
+although she felt much surprised that Sidney Hill, the leader of his
+class and the foremost figure in all college sports and societies,
+should have asked her to go with him to the senior prom.
+
+But she was girlishly pleased at the prospect. She was as fond of a
+good time as any other girl, and she had secretly wished very much
+that she could go to the brilliant and much talked about senior prom.
+
+Grace was quite unaware of her own unpopularity among her class
+co-eds, although she thought it was very hard to get acquainted with
+them. Without any false pride herself, and of a frank, independent
+nature, it never occurred to her that the other Payzant freshies could
+look down on her because she was poor, or resent her presence among
+them because she dressed plainly.
+
+She straightway wrote a note of acceptance to Sidney Hill, and that
+young man naturally felt much mystified when he opened and read it in
+the college library next morning.
+
+"Grace Seeley," he pondered. "That's the jolly girl with the brown
+eyes that I met at the philomathic the other night. She thanks me for
+my invitation to the senior prom, and accepts with pleasure. Why, I
+certainly never invited her or anyone else to go with me to the senior
+prom. There must be some mistake."
+
+Grace passed him at this moment on her way to the Latin classroom. She
+bowed and smiled in a friendly fashion and Sidney Hill felt decidedly
+uncomfortable. What was he to do? He did not like to think of putting
+Miss Seeley in a false position because somebody had sent her an
+invitation in his name.
+
+"I suppose it is some cad who has a spite at me that has done it," he
+reflected, "but if so I'll spoil his game. I'll take Miss Seeley to
+the prom as if I had never intended doing anything else. She shan't be
+humiliated just because there is someone at Payzant who would stoop to
+that sort of thing."
+
+So he walked up the hall with Grace and expressed his pleasure at her
+acceptance, and on the evening of the prom he sent her a bouquet of
+white carnations, whose spicy fragrance reminded her of her own little
+garden at home. Grace thought it extremely nice of him, and dressed in
+a flutter of pleasant anticipation.
+
+Her gown was a very simple one of sheer white organdie, and was the
+only evening dress she had. She knew there would be many smarter
+dresses at the reception, but the knowledge did not disturb her
+sensible head in the least.
+
+She fingered the dainty white frills lovingly as she remembered the
+sunny summer days at home in the little sewing-room, where cherry
+boughs poked their blossoms in at the window, when her mother and
+sisters had helped her to make it, with laughing prophesies and
+speculations as to its first appearance. Into seam and puff and frill
+many girlish hopes and dreams had been sewn, and they all came back to
+Grace as she put it on, and helped to surround her with an atmosphere
+of happiness.
+
+When she was ready she picked up her bouquet and looked herself over
+in the mirror, from the top of her curly head to the tips of her
+white shoes, with a little nod of satisfaction. Grace was not exactly
+pretty, but she had such a bright, happy face and such merry brown
+eyes and such a friendly smile that she was very pleasant to look
+upon, and a great many people thought so that night.
+
+Grace had never in all her life before had so good a time as she had
+at that senior prom. The seniors were quick to discover her unaffected
+originality and charm, and everywhere she went she was the centre of a
+merry group. In short, Grace, as much to her own surprise as anyone's,
+found herself a social success.
+
+Presently Sidney brought his brother up to be introduced, and the
+latter said:
+
+"Miss Seeley, will you excuse my asking if you have a brother or any
+relative named Max Seeley?"
+
+Grace nodded. "Oh, yes, my brother Max. He is a doctor out west."
+
+"I was sure of it," said Murray Hill triumphantly. "You resemble him
+so strongly. Please don't consider me as a stranger a minute longer,
+for Max and I are like brothers. Indeed, I owe my life to him. Last
+summer I was out there on a surveying expedition, and I took typhoid
+in a little out-of-the-way place where good nursing was not to be had
+for love or money. Your brother attended me and he managed to pull me
+through. He never left me day or night until I was out of danger, and
+he worked like a Trojan for me."
+
+"Dear old Max," said Grace, her brown eyes shining with pride and
+pleasure. "That is so like him. He is such a dear brother and I
+haven't seen him for four years. To see somebody who knows him so well
+is next best thing to seeing himself."
+
+"He is an awfully fine fellow," said Mr. Hill heartily, "and I'm
+delighted to have met the 'little sister' he used to talk so much
+about. I want you to come ever and meet my mother and sister. They
+have heard me talk so much about Max that they think almost as much
+of him as I do, and they will be glad to meet his sister."
+
+Mrs. Hill, a handsome, dignified lady who was one of the chaperones of
+the prom, received Grace warmly, while Beatrice Hill, an extremely
+pretty, smartly gowned girl, made her feel at home immediately.
+
+"You came with Sid, didn't you?" she whispered. "Sid is so sly--he
+never tells us whom he is going to take anywhere. But when I saw you
+come in with him I knew I was going to like you, you looked so jolly.
+And you're really the sister of that splendid Dr. Seeley who saved
+Murray's life last summer? And to think you've been at Payzant nearly
+a whole term and we never knew it!"
+
+"Well, how have you enjoyed our prom, Miss Seeley?" asked Sid, as they
+walked home together under the arching elms of the college campus.
+
+"Oh! it was splendid," said Grace enthusiastically. "Everybody was so
+nice. And then to meet someone who could tell me so much about Max! I
+must write them home all about it before I sleep, just to calm my head
+a bit. Mother and the girls will be so interested, and I must send Lou
+and Mab a carnation apiece for their scrapbooks."
+
+"Give me one back, please," said Sid. And Grace with a little blush,
+did so.
+
+That night, while Grace was slipping the stems of her carnations and
+putting them into water, three little bits of conversation were being
+carried on which it is necessary to report in order to round up this
+story neatly and properly, as all stories should be rounded up.
+
+In the first place, Beatrice Hill was saying to Sidney, "Oh, Sid, that
+Miss Seeley you had at the prom is a lovely girl. I don't know when
+I've met anyone I liked so much. She was so jolly and friendly and she
+didn't put on learned airs at all, as so many of those Payzant girls
+do. I asked her all about herself and she told me, and all about her
+mother and sisters and home and the lovely times they had together,
+and how hard they worked to send her to college too, and how she
+taught school in vacations and 'roomed' herself to help along. Isn't
+it so brave and plucky of her! I know we are going to be great
+friends."
+
+"I hope so," said Sidney briefly, "because I have an idea that she and
+I are going to be very good friends too."
+
+And Sidney went upstairs and put away a single white carnation very
+carefully.
+
+In the second place, Mrs. Hill was saying to her eldest son, "I liked
+that Miss Seeley very much. She seemed a very sweet girl."
+
+And, finally, Agnes Walters and Edna Hayden were discussing the matter
+in great mystification in their room.
+
+"I can't understand it at all," said Agnes slowly. "Sid Hill took her
+to the prom and he must have sent her those carnations too. She could
+never have afforded them herself. And did you see the fuss his people
+made over her? I heard Beatrice telling her that she was coming to
+call on her tomorrow, and Mrs. Hill said she must look upon
+'Beechlawn' as her second home while she was at Payzant. If the Hills
+are going to take her up we'll have to be nice to her."
+
+"I suppose," said Edna conclusively, "the truth of the matter is that
+Sid Hill meant to ask her anyway. I dare say he asked her long ago,
+and she would know our invitation was a fraud. So the joke is on
+ourselves, after all."
+
+But, as you and I know, that, with the exception of the last sentence,
+was not the truth of the matter at all.
+
+
+
+
+The Penningtons' Girl
+
+
+Winslow had been fishing--or pretending to--all the morning, and he
+was desperately thirsty. He boarded with the Beckwiths on the
+Riverside East Shore, but he was nearer Riverside West, and he knew
+the Penningtons well. He had often been there for bait and milk and
+had listened times out of mind to Mrs. Pennington's dismal tales of
+her tribulations with hired girls. She never could get along with
+them, and they left, on an average, after a fortnight's trial. She was
+on the lookout for one now, he knew, and would likely be cross, but he
+thought she would give him a drink.
+
+He rowed his skiff into the shore and tied it to a fir that hung out
+from the bank. A winding little footpath led up to the Pennington
+farmhouse, which crested the hill about three hundred yards from the
+shore. Winslow made for the kitchen door and came face to face with a
+girl carrying a pail of water--Mrs. Pennington's latest thing in hired
+girls, of course.
+
+Winslow's first bewildered thought was "What a goddess!" and he
+wondered, as he politely asked for a drink, where on earth Mrs.
+Pennington had picked her up. She handed him a shining dipper half
+full and stood, pail in hand, while he drank it.
+
+She was rather tall, and wore a somewhat limp, faded print gown, and a
+big sunhat, beneath which a glossy knot of chestnut showed itself. Her
+skin was very fair, somewhat freckled, and her mouth was delicious. As
+for her eyes, they were grey, but beyond that simply defied
+description.
+
+"Will you have some more?" she asked in a soft, drawling voice.
+
+"No, thank you. That was delicious. Is Mrs. Pennington home?"
+
+"No. She has gone away for the day."
+
+"Well, I suppose I can sit down here and rest a while. You've no
+serious objections, have you?"
+
+"Oh, no."
+
+She carried her pail into the kitchen and came out again presently
+with a knife and a pan of apples. Sitting down on a bench under the
+poplars she proceeded to peel them with a disregard of his presence
+that piqued Winslow, who was not used to being ignored in this
+fashion. Besides, as a general rule, he had been quite good friends
+with Mrs. Pennington's hired girls. She had had three strapping
+damsels during his sojourn in Riverside, and he used to sit on this
+very doorstep and chaff them. They had all been saucy and talkative.
+This girl was evidently a new species.
+
+"Do you think you'll get along with Mrs. Pennington?" he asked
+finally. "As a rule she fights with her help, although she is a most
+estimable woman."
+
+The girl smiled quite broadly.
+
+"I guess p'r'aps she's rather hard to suit," was the answer, "but I
+like her pretty well so far. I think we'll get along with each other.
+If we don't I can leave--like the others did."
+
+"What is your name?"
+
+"Nelly Ray."
+
+"Well, Nelly, I hope you'll be able to keep your place. Let me give
+you a bit of friendly advice. Don't let the cats get into the pantry.
+That is what Mrs. Pennington has quarrelled with nearly every one of
+her girls about."
+
+"It is quite a bother to keep them out, ain't it?" said Nelly calmly.
+"There's dozens of cats about the place. What on earth makes them keep
+so many?"
+
+"Mr. Pennington has a mania for cats. He and Mrs. Pennington have a
+standing disagreement about it. The last girl left here because she
+couldn't stand the cats; they affected her nerves, she said. I hope
+you don't mind them."
+
+"Oh, no; I kind of like cats. I've been tryin' to count them. Has
+anyone ever done that?"
+
+"Not that I know of. I tried but I had to give up in despair--never
+could tell when I was counting the same cat over again. Look at that
+black goblin sunning himself on the woodpile. I say, Nelly, you're not
+going, are you?"
+
+"I must. It's time to get dinner. Mr. Pennington will be in from the
+fields soon."
+
+The next minute he heard her stepping briskly about the kitchen,
+shooing out intruding cats, and humming a darky air to herself. He
+went reluctantly back to the shore and rowed across the river in a
+brown study.
+
+I don't know whether Winslow was afflicted with chronic thirst or not,
+or whether the East side water wasn't so good as that of the West
+side; but I do know that he fairly haunted the Pennington farmhouse
+after that. Mrs. Pennington was home the next time he went, and he
+asked her about her new girl. To his surprise the good lady was
+unusually reticent. She couldn't really say very much about Nelly. No,
+she didn't belong anywhere near Riverside. In fact, she--Mrs.
+Pennington--didn't think she had any settled home at present. Her
+father was travelling over the country somewhere. Nelly was a good
+little girl, and very obliging. Beyond this Winslow could get no more
+information, so he went around and talked to Nelly, who was sitting on
+the bench under the poplars and seemed absorbed in watching the
+sunset.
+
+She dropped her g's badly and made some grammatical errors that caused
+Winslow's flesh to creep on his bones. But any man could have forgiven
+mistakes from such dimpled lips in such a sweet voice.
+
+He asked her to go for a row up the river in the twilight and she
+assented; she handled an oar very well, he found out, and the exercise
+became her. Winslow tried to get her to talk about herself, but failed
+signally and had to content himself with Mrs. Pennington's meagre
+information. He told her about himself frankly enough--how he had had
+fever in the spring and had been ordered to spend the summer in the
+country and do nothing useful until his health was fully restored, and
+how lonesome it was in Riverside in general and at the Beckwith farm
+in particular. He made out quite a dismal case for himself and if
+Nelly wasn't sorry for him, she should have been.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+At the end of a fortnight Riverside folks began to talk about Winslow
+and the Penningtons' hired girl. He was reported to be "dead gone" on
+her; he took her out rowing every evening, drove her to preaching up
+the Bend on Sunday nights, and haunted the Pennington farmhouse. Wise
+folks shook their heads over it and wondered that Mrs. Pennington
+allowed it. Winslow was a gentleman, and that Nelly Ray, whom nobody
+knew anything about, not even where she came from, was only a common
+hired girl, and he had no business to be hanging about her. She was
+pretty, to be sure; but she was absurdly stuck-up and wouldn't
+associate with other Riverside "help" at all. Well, pride must have a
+fall; there must be something queer about her when she was so awful
+sly as to her past life.
+
+Winslow and Nelly did not trouble themselves in the least over all
+this gossip; in fact, they never even heard it. Winslow was hopelessly
+in love, when he found this out he was aghast. He thought of his
+father, the ambitious railroad magnate; of his mother, the brilliant
+society leader; of his sisters, the beautiful and proud; he was
+honestly frightened. It would never do; he must not go to see Nelly
+again. He kept this prudent resolution for twenty-four hours and then
+rowed over to the West shore. He found Nelly sitting on the bank in
+her old faded print dress and he straightway forgot everything he
+ought to have remembered.
+
+Nelly herself never seemed to be conscious of the social gulf between
+them. At least she never alluded to it in any way, and accepted
+Winslow's attentions as if she had a perfect right to them. She had
+broken the record by staying with Mrs. Pennington four weeks, and
+even the cats were in subjection.
+
+Winslow was well enough to have gone back to the city and, in fact,
+his father was writing for him. But he couldn't leave Beckwiths',
+apparently. At any rate he stayed on and met Nelly every day and
+cursed himself for a cad and a cur and a weak-brained idiot.
+
+One day he took Nelly for a row up the river. They went further than
+usual around the Bend. Winslow didn't want to go too far, for he knew
+that a party of his city friends, chaperoned by Mrs. Keyton-Wells,
+were having a picnic somewhere up along the river shore that day. But
+Nelly insisted on going on and on, and of course she had her way. When
+they reached a little pine-fringed headland they came upon the
+picnickers, within a stone's throw. Everybody recognized Winslow.
+"Why, there is Burton!" he heard Mrs. Keyton-Wells exclaim, and he
+knew she was putting up her glasses. Will Evans, who was an especial
+chum of his, ran down to the water's edge. "Bless me, Win, where did
+you come from? Come right in. We haven't had tea yet. Bring your
+friend too," he added, becoming conscious that Winslow's friend was a
+mighty pretty girl. Winslow's face was crimson. He avoided Nelly's
+eye.
+
+"Are them people friends of yours?" she asked in a low tone.
+
+"Yes," he muttered.
+
+"Well, let us go ashore if they want us to," she said calmly. "I don't
+mind."
+
+For three seconds Winslow hesitated. Then he pulled ashore and helped
+Nelly to alight on a jutting rock. There was a curious, set expression
+about his fine mouth as he marched Nelly up to Mrs. Keyton-Wells and
+introduced her. Mrs. Keyton-Wells's greeting was slightly cool, but
+very polite. She supposed Miss Ray was some little country girl with
+whom Burton Winslow was carrying on a summer flirtation; respectable
+enough, no doubt, and must be treated civilly, but of course wouldn't
+expect to be made an equal of exactly. The other women took their cue
+from her, but the men were more cordial. Miss Ray might be shabby, but
+she was distinctly fetching, and Winslow looked savage.
+
+Nelly was not a whit abashed, seemingly, by the fashionable circle in
+which she found herself, and she talked away to Will Evans and the
+others in her soft drawl as if she had known them all her life. All
+might have gone passably well, had not a little Riverside imp, by name
+of Rufus Hent, who had been picked up by the picnickers to run their
+errands, come up just then with a pail of water.
+
+"Golly!" he ejaculated in very audible tones. "If there ain't Mrs.
+Pennington's hired girl!"
+
+Mrs. Keyton-Wells stiffened with horror. Winslow darted a furious
+glance at the tell-tale that would have annihilated anything except a
+small boy. Will Evans grinned and went on talking to Nelly, who had
+failed to hear, or at least to heed, the exclamation.
+
+The mischief was done, the social thermometer went down to zero in
+Nelly's neighbourhood. The women ignored her altogether. Winslow set
+his teeth together and registered a mental vow to wring Rufus Hent's
+sunburned neck at the first opportunity. He escorted Nelly to the
+table and waited on her with ostentatious deference, while Mrs.
+Keyton-Wells glanced at him stonily and made up her mind to tell his
+mother when she went home.
+
+Nelly's social ostracism did not affect her appetite. But after lunch
+was over, she walked down to the skiff. Winslow followed her.
+
+"Do you want to go home?" he asked.
+
+"Yes, it's time I went, for the cats may be raidin' the pantry. But
+you must not come; your friends here want you."
+
+"Nonsense!" said Winslow sulkily. "If you are going I am too."
+
+But Nelly was too quick for him; she sprang into the skiff, unwound
+the rope, and pushed off before he guessed her intention.
+
+"I can row myself home and I mean to," she announced, taking up the
+oars defiantly.
+
+"Nelly," he implored.
+
+Nelly looked at him wickedly.
+
+"You'd better go back to your friends. That old woman with the
+eyeglasses is watchin' you."
+
+Winslow said something strong under his breath as he went back to the
+others. Will Evans and his chums began to chaff him about Nelly, but
+he looked so dangerous that they concluded to stop. There is no
+denying that Winslow was in a fearful temper just then with Mrs.
+Keyton-Wells, Evans, himself, Nelly--in fact, with all the world.
+
+His friends drove him home in the evening on their way to the station
+and dropped him at the Beckwith farm. At dusk he went moodily down to
+the shore. Far up the Bend was dim and shadowy and stars were shining
+above the wooded shores. Over the river the Pennington farmhouse
+lights twinkled out alluringly. Winslow watched them until he could
+stand it no longer. Nelly had made off with his skiff, but Perry
+Beckwith's dory was ready to hand. In five minutes, Winslow was
+grounding her on the West shore. Nelly was sitting on a rock at the
+landing place. He went over and sat down silently beside her. A full
+moon was rising above the dark hills up the Bend and in the faint
+light the girl was wonderfully lovely.
+
+"I thought you weren't comin' over at all tonight," she said, smiling
+up at him, "and I was sorry, because I wanted to say goodbye to you."
+
+"Goodbye? Nelly, you're not going away?"
+
+"Yes. The cats were in the pantry when I got home."
+
+"Nelly!"
+
+"Well, to be serious. I'm not goin' for that, but I really am goin'.
+I had a letter from Dad this evenin'. Did you have a good time after I
+left this afternoon? Did Mrs. Keyton-Wells thaw out?"
+
+"Hang Mrs. Keyton-Wells! Nelly, where are you going?"
+
+"To Dad, of course. We used to live down south together, but two
+months ago we broke up housekeepin' and come north. We thought we
+could do better up here, you know. Dad started out to look for a place
+to settle down and I came here while he was prospectin'. He's got a
+house now, he says, and wants me to go right off. I'm goin' tomorrow."
+
+"Nelly, you mustn't go--you mustn't, I tell you," exclaimed Winslow in
+despair. "I love you--I love you--you must stay with me forever."
+
+"You don't know what you're sayin', Mr. Winslow," said Nelly coldly.
+"Why, you can't marry me--a common servant girl."
+
+"I can and I will, if you'll have me," answered Winslow recklessly. "I
+can't ever let you go. I've loved you ever since I first saw you.
+Nelly, won't you be my wife? Don't you love me?"
+
+"Well, yes, I do," confessed Nelly suddenly; and then it was fully
+five minutes before Winslow gave her a chance to say anything else.
+
+"Oh, what will your people say?" she contrived to ask at last. "Won't
+they be in a dreadful state? Oh, it will never do for you to marry
+me."
+
+"Won't it?" said Winslow in a tone of satisfaction. "I rather think it
+will. Of course, my family will rampage a bit at first. I daresay
+Father'll turn me out. Don't worry over that, Nelly. I'm not afraid of
+work. I'm not afraid of anything except losing you."
+
+"You'll have to see what Dad says," remarked Nelly, after another
+eloquent interlude.
+
+"He won't object, will he? I'll write to him or go and see him. Where
+is he?"
+
+"He is in town at the Arlington."
+
+"The Arlington!" Winslow was amazed. The Arlington was the most
+exclusive and expensive hotel in town.
+
+"What is he doing there?"
+
+"Transacting a real estate or railroad deal with your father, I
+believe, or something of that sort."
+
+"Nelly!"
+
+"Well?"
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"Just what I say."
+
+Winslow got up and looked at her.
+
+"Nelly, who are you?"
+
+"Helen Ray Scott, at your service, sir."
+
+"Not Helen Ray Scott, the daughter of the railroad king?"
+
+"The same. Are you sorry that you're engaged to her? If you are,
+she'll stay Nelly Ray."
+
+Winslow dropped back on the seat with a long breath.
+
+"Nelly, I don't understand. Why did you deceive me? I feel stunned."
+
+"Oh, do forgive me," she said merrily. "I shouldn't have, I
+suppose--but you know you took me for the hired girl the very first
+time you saw me, and you patronized me and called me Nelly; so I let
+you think so just for fun. I never thought it would come to this. When
+Father and I came north I took a fancy to come here and stay with Mrs.
+Pennington--who is an old nurse of mine--until Father decided where to
+take up our abode. I got here the night before we met. My trunk was
+delayed so I put on an old cotton dress her niece had left here--and
+you came and saw me. I made Mrs. Pennington keep the secret--she
+thought it great fun; and I really was a great hand to do little
+chores and keep the cats in subjection too. I made mistakes in grammar
+and dropped my g's on purpose--it was such fun to see you wince when I
+did it. It was cruel to tease you so, I suppose, but it was so sweet
+just to be loved for myself--not because I was an heiress and a
+belle--I couldn't bear to tell you the truth. Did you think I
+couldn't read your thoughts this afternoon, when I insisted on going
+ashore? You were a little ashamed of me--you know you were. I didn't
+blame you for that, but if you hadn't gone ashore and taken me as you
+did I would never have spoken to you again. Mrs. Keyton-Wells won't
+snub me next time we meet. And some way I don't think your father will
+turn you out, either. Have you forgiven me yet, Burton?"
+
+"I shall never call you anything but Nelly," said Winslow
+irrelevantly.
+
+
+
+
+The Red Room
+
+
+You would have me tell you the story, Grandchild? 'Tis a sad one and
+best forgotten--few remember it now. There are always sad and dark
+stories in old families such as ours.
+
+Yet I have promised and must keep my word. So sit down here at my feet
+and rest your bright head on my lap, that I may not see in your young
+eyes the shadows my story will bring across their bonny blue.
+
+I was a mere child when it all happened, yet I remember it but too
+well, and I can recall how pleased I was when my father's stepmother,
+Mrs. Montressor--she not liking to be called grandmother, seeing she
+was but turned of fifty and a handsome woman still--wrote to my mother
+that she must send little Beatrice up to Montressor Place for the
+Christmas holidays. So I went joyfully though my mother grieved to
+part with me; she had little to love save me, my father, Conrad
+Montressor, having been lost at sea when but three months wed.
+
+My aunts were wont to tell me how much I resembled him, being, so they
+said, a Montressor to the backbone; and this I took to mean
+commendation, for the Montressors were a well-descended and
+well-thought-of family, and the women were noted for their beauty.
+This I could well believe, since of all my aunts there was not one but
+was counted a pretty woman. Therefore I took heart of grace when I
+thought of my dark face and spindling shape, hoping that when I should
+be grown up I might be counted not unworthy of my race.
+
+The Place was an old-fashioned, mysterious house, such as I delighted
+in, and Mrs. Montressor was ever kind to me, albeit a little stern,
+for she was a proud woman and cared but little for children, having
+none of her own.
+
+But there were books there to pore over without let or hindrance--for
+nobody questioned of my whereabouts if I but kept out of the way--and
+strange, dim family portraits on the walls to gaze upon, until I knew
+each proud old face well, and had visioned a history for it in my own
+mind--for I was given to dreaming and was older and wiser than my
+years, having no childish companions to keep me still a child.
+
+There were always some of my aunts at the Place to kiss and make much
+of me for my father's sake--for he had been their favourite brother.
+My aunts--there were eight of them--had all married well, so said
+people who knew, and lived not far away, coming home often to take tea
+with Mrs. Montressor, who had always gotten on well with her
+step-daughters, or to help prepare for some festivity or other--for
+they were notable housekeepers, every one.
+
+They were all at Montressor Place for Christmas, and I got more
+petting than I deserved, albeit they looked after me somewhat more
+strictly than did Mrs. Montressor, and saw to it that I did not read
+too many fairy tales or sit up later at nights than became my years.
+
+But it was not for fairy tales and sugarplums nor yet for petting that
+I rejoiced to be at the Place at that time. Though I spoke not of it
+to anyone, I had a great longing to see my Uncle Hugh's wife,
+concerning whom I had heard much, both good and bad.
+
+My Uncle Hugh, albeit the oldest of the family, had never married
+until now, and all the countryside rang with talk of his young wife. I
+did not hear as much as I wished, for the gossips took heed to my
+presence when I drew anear and turned to other matters. Yet, being
+somewhat keener of comprehension than they knew, I heard and
+understood not a little of their talk.
+
+And so I came to know that neither proud Mrs. Montressor nor my good
+aunts, nor even my gentle mother, looked with overmuch favour on what
+my Uncle Hugh had done. And I did hear that Mrs. Montressor had chosen
+a wife for her stepson, of good family and some beauty, but that my
+Uncle Hugh would have none of her--a thing Mrs. Montressor found hard
+to pardon, yet might so have done had not my uncle, on his last voyage
+to the Indies--for he went often in his own vessels--married and
+brought home a foreign bride, of whom no one knew aught save that her
+beauty was a thing to dazzle the day and that she was of some strange
+alien blood such as ran not in the blue veins of the Montressors.
+
+Some had much to say of her pride and insolence, and wondered if Mrs.
+Montressor would tamely yield her mistress-ship to the stranger. But
+others, who were taken with her loveliness and grace, said that the
+tales told were born of envy and malice, and that Alicia Montressor
+was well worthy of her name and station.
+
+So I halted between two opinions and thought to judge for myself, but
+when I went to the Place my Uncle Hugh and his bride were gone for a
+time, and I had even to swallow my disappointment and bide their
+return with all my small patience.
+
+But my aunts and their stepmother talked much of Alicia, and they
+spoke slightingly of her, saying that she was but a light woman and
+that no good would come of my Uncle Hugh's having wed her, with other
+things of a like nature. Also they spoke of the company she gathered
+around her, thinking her to have strange and unbecoming companions for
+a Montressor. All this I heard and pondered much over, although my
+good aunts supposed that such a chit as I would take no heed to their
+whisperings.
+
+When I was not with them, helping to whip eggs and stone raisins, and
+being watched to see that I ate not more than one out of five, I was
+surely to be found in the wing hall, poring over my book and grieving
+that I was no more allowed to go into the Red Room.
+
+The wing hall was a narrow one and dim, connecting the main rooms of
+the Place with an older wing, built in a curious way. The hall was
+lighted by small, square-paned windows, and at its end a little
+flight of steps led up to the Red Room.
+
+Whenever I had been at the Place before--and this was often--I had
+passed much of my time in this same Red Room. It was Mrs. Montressor's
+sitting-room then, where she wrote her letters and examined household
+accounts, and sometimes had an old gossip in to tea. The room was
+low-ceilinged and dim, hung with red damask, and with odd, square
+windows high up under the eaves and a dark wainscoting all around it.
+And there I loved to sit quietly on the red sofa and read my fairy
+tales, or talk dreamily to the swallows fluttering crazily against the
+tiny panes.
+
+When I had gone this Christmas to the Place I soon bethought myself of
+the Red Room--for I had a great love for it. But I had got no further
+than the steps when Mrs. Montressor came sweeping down the hall in
+haste and, catching me by the arm, pulled me back as roughly as if it
+had been Bluebeard's chamber itself into which I was venturing.
+
+Then, seeing my face, which I doubt not was startled enough, she
+seemed to repent of her haste and patted me gently on the head.
+
+"There, there, little Beatrice! Did I frighten you, child? Forgive an
+old woman's thoughtlessness. But be not too ready to go where you are
+not bidden, and never venture foot in the Red Room now, for it belongs
+to your Uncle Hugh's wife, and let me tell you she is not over fond of
+intruders."
+
+I felt sorry overmuch to hear this, nor could I see why my new aunt
+should care if I went in once in a while, as had been my habit, to
+talk to the swallows and misplace nothing. But Mrs. Montressor saw to
+it that I obeyed her, and I went no more to the Red Room, but busied
+myself with other matters.
+
+For there were great doings at the Place and much coming and going. My
+aunts were never idle; there was to be much festivity Christmas week
+and a ball on Christmas Eve. And my aunts had promised me--though not
+till I had wearied them of my coaxing--that I should stay up that
+night and see as much of the gaiety as was good for me. So I did their
+errands and went early to bed every night without complaint--though I
+did this the more readily for that, when they thought me safely
+asleep, they would come in and talk around my bedroom fire, saying
+that of Alicia which I should not have heard.
+
+At last came the day when my Uncle Hugh and his wife were expected
+home--though not until my scanty patience was well nigh wearied
+out--and we were all assembled to meet them in the great hall, where a
+ruddy firelight was gleaming.
+
+My Aunt Frances had dressed me in my best white frock and my crimson
+sash, with much lamenting over my skinny neck and arms, and bade me
+behave prettily, as became my bringing up. So I slipped in a corner,
+my hands and feet cold with excitement, for I think every drop of
+blood in my body had gone to my head, and my heart beat so hardly that
+it even pained me.
+
+Then the door opened and Alicia--for so I was used to hearing her
+called, nor did I ever think of her as my aunt in my own mind--came
+in, and a little in the rear my tall, dark uncle.
+
+She came proudly forward to the fire and stood there superbly while
+she loosened her cloak, nor did she see me at all at first, but
+nodded, a little disdainfully, it seemed, to Mrs. Montressor and my
+aunts, who were grouped about the drawing-room door, very ladylike and
+quiet.
+
+But I neither saw nor heard aught at the time save her only, for her
+beauty, when she came forth from her crimson cloak and hood, was
+something so wonderful that I forgot my manners and stared at her as
+one fascinated--as indeed I was, for never had I seen such loveliness
+and hardly dreamed it.
+
+Pretty women I had seen in plenty, for my aunts and my mother were
+counted fair, but my uncle's wife was as little like to them as a
+sunset glow to pale moonshine or a crimson rose to white day-lilies.
+
+Nor can I paint her to you in words as I saw her then, with the long
+tongues of firelight licking her white neck and wavering over the rich
+masses of her red-gold hair.
+
+She was tall--so tall that my aunts looked but insignificant beside
+her, and they were of no mean height, as became their race; yet no
+queen could have carried herself more royally, and all the passion and
+fire of her foreign nature burned in her splendid eyes, that might
+have been dark or light for aught that I could ever tell, but which
+seemed always like pools of warm flame, now tender, now fierce.
+
+Her skin was like a delicate white rose leaf, and when she spoke I
+told my foolish self that never had I heard music before; nor do I
+ever again think to hear a voice so sweet, so liquid, as that which
+rippled over her ripe lips.
+
+I had often in my own mind pictured this, my first meeting with
+Alicia, now in one way, now in another, but never had I dreamed of her
+speaking to me at all, so that it came to me as a great surprise when
+she turned and, holding out her lovely hands, said very graciously:
+
+"And is this the little Beatrice? I have heard much of you--come, kiss
+me, child."
+
+And I went, despite my Aunt Elizabeth's black frown, for the glamour
+of her loveliness was upon me, and I no longer wondered that my Uncle
+Hugh should have loved her.
+
+Very proud of her was he too; yet I felt, rather than saw--for I was
+sensitive and quick of perception, as old-young children ever
+are--that there was something other than pride and love in his face
+when he looked on her, and more in his manner than the fond lover--as
+it were, a sort of lurking mistrust.
+
+Nor could I think, though to me the thought seemed as treason, that
+she loved her husband overmuch, for she seemed half condescending and
+half disdainful to him; yet one thought not of this in her presence,
+but only remembered it when she had gone.
+
+When she went out it seemed to me that nothing was left, so I crept
+lonesomely away to the wing hall and sat down by a window to dream of
+her; and she filled my thoughts so fully that it was no surprise when
+I raised my eyes and saw her coming down the hall alone, her bright
+head shining against the dark old walls.
+
+When she paused by me and asked me lightly of what I was dreaming,
+since I had such a sober face, I answered her truly that it was of
+her--whereat she laughed, as one not ill pleased, and said half
+mockingly:
+
+"Waste not your thoughts so, little Beatrice. But come with me,
+child, if you will, for I have taken a strange fancy to your solemn
+eyes. Perchance the warmth of your young life may thaw out the ice
+that has frozen around my heart ever since I came among these cold
+Montressors."
+
+And, though I understood not her meaning, I went, glad to see the Red
+Room once more. So she made me sit down and talk to her, which I did,
+for shyness was no failing of mine; and she asked me many questions,
+and some that I thought she should not have asked, but I could not
+answer them, so 'twere little harm.
+
+After that I spent a part of every day with her in the Red Room. And
+my Uncle Hugh was there often, and he would kiss her and praise her
+loveliness, not heeding my presence--for I was but a child.
+
+Yet it ever seemed to me that she endured rather than welcomed his
+caresses, and at times the ever-burning flame in her eyes glowed so
+luridly that a chill dread would creep over me, and I would remember
+what my Aunt Elizabeth had said, she being a bitter-tongued woman,
+though kind at heart--that this strange creature would bring on us all
+some evil fortune yet.
+
+Then would I strive to banish such thoughts and chide myself for
+doubting one so kind to me.
+
+When Christmas Eve drew nigh my silly head was full of the ball day
+and night. But a grievous disappointment befell me, for I awakened
+that day very ill with a most severe cold; and though I bore me
+bravely, my aunts discovered it soon, when, despite my piteous
+pleadings, I was put to bed, where I cried bitterly and would not be
+comforted. For I thought I should not see the fine folk and, more
+than all, Alicia.
+
+But that disappointment, at least, was spared me, for at night she
+came into my room, knowing of my longing--she was ever indulgent to my
+little wishes. And when I saw her I forgot my aching limbs and burning
+brow, and even the ball I was not to see, for never was mortal
+creature so lovely as she, standing there by my bed.
+
+Her gown was of white, and there was nothing I could liken the stuff
+to save moonshine falling athwart a frosted pane, and out from it
+swelled her gleaming breast and arms, so bare that it seemed to me a
+shame to look upon them. Yet it could not be denied they were of
+wondrous beauty, white as polished marble.
+
+And all about her snowy throat and rounded arms, and in the masses of
+her splendid hair, were sparkling, gleaming stones, with hearts of
+pure light, which I know now to have been diamonds, but knew not then,
+for never had I seen aught of their like.
+
+And I gazed at her, drinking in her beauty until my soul was filled,
+as she stood like some goddess before her worshipper. I think she read
+my thought in my face and liked it--for she was a vain woman, and to
+such even the admiration of a child is sweet.
+
+Then she leaned down to me until her splendid eyes looked straight
+into my dazzled ones.
+
+"Tell me, little Beatrice--for they say the word of a child is to be
+believed--tell me, do you think me beautiful?"
+
+I found my voice and told her truly that I thought her beautiful
+beyond my dreams of angels--as indeed she was. Whereat she smiled as
+one well pleased.
+
+Then my Uncle Hugh came in, and though I thought that his face
+darkened as he looked on the naked splendour of her breast and arms,
+as if he liked not that the eyes of other men should gloat on it, yet
+he kissed her with all a lover's fond pride, while she looked at him
+half mockingly.
+
+Then said he, "Sweet, will you grant me a favour?"
+
+And she answered, "It may be that I will."
+
+And he said, "Do not dance with that man tonight, Alicia. I mistrust
+him much."
+
+His voice had more of a husband's command than a lover's entreaty. She
+looked at him with some scorn, but when she saw his face grow
+black--for the Montressors brooked scant disregard of their authority,
+as I had good reason to know--she seemed to change, and a smile came
+to her lips, though her eyes glowed balefully.
+
+Then she laid her arms about his neck and--though it seemed to me that
+she had as soon strangled as embraced him--her voice was wondrous
+sweet and caressing as she murmured in his ear.
+
+He laughed and his brow cleared, though he said still sternly, "Do not
+try me too far, Alicia."
+
+Then they went out, she a little in advance and very stately.
+
+After that my aunts also came in, very beautifully and modestly
+dressed, but they seemed to me as nothing after Alicia. For I was
+caught in the snare of her beauty, and the longing to see her again so
+grew upon me that after a time I did an undutiful and disobedient
+thing.
+
+I had been straitly charged to stay in bed, which I did not, but got
+up and put on a gown. For it was in my mind to go quietly down, if by
+chance I might again see Alicia, myself unseen.
+
+But when I reached the great hall I heard steps approaching and,
+having a guilty conscience, I slipped aside into the blue parlour and
+hid me behind the curtains lest my aunts should see me.
+
+Then Alicia came in, and with her a man whom I had never before seen.
+Yet I instantly bethought myself of a lean black snake, with a
+glittering and evil eye, which I had seen in Mrs. Montressor's garden
+two summers agone, and which was like to have bitten me. John, the
+gardener, had killed it, and I verily thought that if it had a soul,
+it must have gotten into this man.
+
+Alicia sat down and he beside her, and when he had put his arms about
+her, he kissed her face and lips. Nor did she shrink from his embrace,
+but even smiled and leaned nearer to him with a little smooth motion,
+as they talked to each other in some strange, foreign tongue.
+
+I was but a child and innocent, nor knew I aught of honour and
+dishonour. Yet it seemed to me that no man should kiss her save only
+my Uncle Hugh, and from that hour I mistrusted Alicia, though I
+understood not then what I afterwards did.
+
+And as I watched them--not thinking of playing the spy--I saw her face
+grow suddenly cold, and she straightened herself up and pushed away
+her lover's arms.
+
+Then I followed her guilty eyes to the door, where stood my Uncle
+Hugh, and all the pride and passion of the Montressors sat on his
+lowering brow. Yet he came forward quietly as Alicia and the snake
+drew apart and stood up.
+
+At first he looked not at his guilty wife but at her lover, and smote
+him heavily in the face. Whereat he, being a coward at heart, as are
+all villains, turned white and slunk from the room with a muttered
+oath, nor was he stayed.
+
+My uncle turned to Alicia, and very calmly and terribly he said, "From
+this hour you are no longer wife of mine!"
+
+And there was that in his tone which told that his forgiveness and
+love should be hers nevermore.
+
+Then he motioned her out and she went, like a proud queen, with her
+glorious head erect and no shame on her brow.
+
+As for me, when they were gone I crept away, dazed and bewildered
+enough, and went back to my bed, having seen and heard more than I had
+a mind for, as disobedient people and eavesdroppers ever do.
+
+But my Uncle Hugh kept his word, and Alicia was no more wife to him,
+save only in name. Yet of gossip or scandal there was none, for the
+pride of his race kept secret his dishonour, nor did he ever seem
+other than a courteous and respectful husband.
+
+Nor did Mrs. Montressor and my aunts, though they wondered much among
+themselves, learn aught, for they dared question neither their brother
+nor Alicia, who carried herself as loftily as ever, and seemed to pine
+for neither lover nor husband. As for me, no one dreamed I knew aught
+of it, and I kept my own counsel as to what I had seen in the blue
+parlour on the night of the Christmas ball.
+
+After the New Year I went home, but ere long Mrs. Montressor sent for
+me again, saying that the house was lonely without little Beatrice. So
+I went again and found all unchanged, though the Place was very quiet,
+and Alicia went out but little from the Red Room.
+
+Of my Uncle Hugh I saw little, save when he went and came on the
+business of his estate, somewhat more gravely and silently than of
+yore, or brought to me books and sweetmeats from town.
+
+But every day I was with Alicia in the Red Room, where she would talk
+to me, oftentimes wildly and strangely, but always kindly. And though
+I think Mrs. Montressor liked our intimacy none too well, she said no
+word, and I came and went as I listed with Alicia, though never quite
+liking her strange ways and the restless fire in her eyes.
+
+Nor would I ever kiss her, after I had seen her lips pressed by the
+snake's, though she sometimes coaxed me, and grew pettish and vexed
+when I would not; but she guessed not my reason.
+
+March came in that year like a lion, exceedingly hungry and fierce,
+and my Uncle Hugh had ridden away through the storm nor thought to be
+back for some days.
+
+In the afternoon I was sitting in the wing hall, dreaming wondrous
+day-dreams, when Alicia called me to the Red Room. And as I went, I
+marvelled anew at her loveliness, for the blood was leaping in her
+face and her jewels were dim before the lustre of her eyes. Her hand,
+when she took mine, was burning hot, and her voice had a strange ring.
+
+"Come, little Beatrice," she said, "come talk to me, for I know not
+what to do with my lone self today. Time hangs heavily in this gloomy
+house. I do verily think this Red Room has an evil influence over me.
+See if your childish prattle can drive away the ghosts that riot in
+these dark old corners--ghosts of a ruined and shamed life! Nay,
+shrink not--do I talk wildly? I mean not all I say--my brain seems on
+fire, little Beatrice. Come; it may be you know some grim old legend
+of this room--it must surely have one. Never was place fitter for a
+dark deed! Tush! never be so frightened, child--forget my vagaries.
+Tell me now and I will listen."
+
+Whereat she cast herself lithely on the satin couch and turned her
+lovely face on me. So I gathered up my small wits and told her what I
+was not supposed to know--how that, generations agone, a Montressor
+had disgraced himself and his name, and that, when he came home to his
+mother, she had met him in that same Red Room and flung at him taunts
+and reproaches, forgetting whose breast had nourished him; and that
+he, frantic with shame and despair, turned his sword against his own
+heart and so died. But his mother went mad with her remorse, and was
+kept a prisoner in the Red Room until her death.
+
+So lamely told I the tale, as I had heard my Aunt Elizabeth tell it,
+when she knew not I listened or understood. Alicia heard me through
+and said nothing, save that it was a tale worthy of the Montressors.
+Whereat I bridled, for I too was a Montressor, and proud of it.
+
+But she took my hand soothingly in hers and said, "Little Beatrice, if
+tomorrow or the next day they should tell you, those cold, proud
+women, that Alicia was unworthy of your love, tell me, would you
+believe them?"
+
+And I, remembering what I had seen in the blue parlour, was
+silent--for I could not lie. So she flung my hand away with a bitter
+laugh, and picked lightly from the table anear a small dagger with a
+jewelled handle.
+
+It seemed to me a cruel-looking toy and I said so--whereat she smiled
+and drew her white fingers down the thin, shining blade in a fashion
+that made me cold.
+
+"Such a little blow with this," she said, "such a little blow--and the
+heart beats no longer, the weary brain rests, the lips and eyes smile
+never again! 'Twere a short path out of all difficulties, my
+Beatrice."
+
+And I, understanding her not, yet shivering, begged her to cast it
+aside, which she did carelessly and, putting a hand under my chin, she
+turned up my face to hers.
+
+"Little, grave-eyed Beatrice, tell me truly, would it grieve you much
+if you were never again to sit here with Alicia in this same Red
+Room?"
+
+And I made answer earnestly that it would, glad that I could say so
+much truly. Then her face grew tender and she sighed deeply.
+
+Presently she opened a quaint, inlaid box and took from it a shining
+gold chain of rare workmanship and exquisite design, and this she hung
+around my neck, nor would suffer me to thank her but laid her hand
+gently on my lips.
+
+"Now go," she said. "But ere you leave me, little Beatrice, grant me
+but the one favour--it may be that I shall never ask another of you.
+Your people, I know--those cold Montressors--care little for me, but
+with all my faults, I have ever been kind to you. So, when the
+morrow's come, and they tell you that Alicia is as one worse than
+dead, think not of me with scorn only but grant me a little pity--for
+I was not always what I am now, and might never have become so had a
+little child like you been always anear me, to keep me pure and
+innocent. And I would have you but the once lay your arms about my
+neck and kiss me."
+
+And I did so, wondering much at her manner--for it had in it a strange
+tenderness and some sort of hopeless longing. Then she gently put me
+from the room, and I sat musing by the hall window until night fell
+darkly--and a fearsome night it was, of storm and blackness. And I
+thought how well it was that my Uncle Hugh had not to return in such a
+tempest. Yet, ere the thought had grown cold, the door opened and he
+strode down the hall, his cloak drenched and wind-twisted, in one hand
+a whip, as though he had but then sprung from his horse, in the other
+what seemed like a crumpled letter.
+
+Nor was the night blacker than his face, and he took no heed of me as
+I ran after him, thinking selfishly of the sweetmeats he had promised
+to bring me--but I thought no more of them when I got to the door of
+the Red Room.
+
+Alicia stood by the table, hooded and cloaked as for a journey, but
+her hood had slipped back, and her face rose from it marble-white,
+save where her wrathful eyes burned out, with dread and guilt and
+hatred in their depths, while she had one arm raised as if to thrust
+him back.
+
+As for my uncle, he stood before her and I saw not his face, but his
+voice was low and terrible, speaking words I understood not then,
+though long afterwards I came to know their meaning.
+
+And he cast foul scorn at her that she should have thought to fly with
+her lover, and swore that naught should again thwart his vengeance,
+with other threats, wild and dreadful enough.
+
+Yet she said no word until he had done, and then she spoke, but what
+she said I know not, save that it was full of hatred and defiance and
+wild accusation, such as a mad woman might have uttered.
+
+And she defied him even then to stop her flight, though he told her to
+cross that threshold would mean her death; for he was a wronged and
+desperate man and thought of nothing save his own dishonour.
+
+Then she made as if to pass him, but he caught her by her white wrist;
+she turned on him with fury, and I saw her right hand reach stealthily
+out over the table behind her, where lay the dagger.
+
+"Let me go!" she hissed.
+
+And he said, "I will not."
+
+Then she turned herself about and struck at him with the dagger--and
+never saw I such a face as was hers at the moment.
+
+He fell heavily, yet held her even in death, so that she had to wrench
+herself free, with a shriek that rings yet in my ears on a night when
+the wind wails over the rainy moors. She rushed past me unheeding, and
+fled down the hall like a hunted creature, and I heard the heavy door
+clang hollowly behind her.
+
+As for me, I stood there looking at the dead man, for I could neither
+move nor speak and was like to have died of horror. And presently I
+knew nothing, nor did I come to my recollection for many a day, when I
+lay abed, sick of a fever and more like to die than live.
+
+So that when at last I came out from the shadow of death, my Uncle
+Hugh had been long cold in his grave, and the hue and cry for his
+guilty wife was well nigh over, since naught had been seen or heard of
+her since she fled the country with her foreign lover.
+
+When I came rightly to my remembrance, they questioned me as to what I
+had seen and heard in the Red Room. And I told them as best I could,
+though much aggrieved that to my questions they would answer nothing
+save to bid me to stay still and think not of the matter.
+
+Then my mother, sorely vexed over my adventures--which in truth were
+but sorry ones for a child--took me home. Nor would she let me keep
+Alicia's chain, but made away with it, how I knew not and little
+cared, for the sight of it was loathsome to me.
+
+It was many years ere I went again to Montressor Place, and I never
+saw the Red Room more, for Mrs. Montressor had the old wing torn down,
+deeming its sorrowful memories dark heritage enough for the next
+Montressor.
+
+So, Grandchild, the sad tale is ended, and you will not see the Red
+Room when you go next month to Montressor Place. The swallows still
+build under the eaves, though--I know not if you will understand their
+speech as I did.
+
+
+
+
+The Setness of Theodosia
+
+
+When Theodosia Ford married Wesley Brooke after a courtship of three
+years, everybody concerned was satisfied. There was nothing
+particularly romantic in either the courtship or marriage. Wesley was
+a steady, well-meaning, rather slow fellow, comfortably off. He was
+not at all handsome. But Theodosia was a very pretty girl with the
+milky colouring of an auburn blonde and large china-blue eyes. She
+looked mild and Madonna-like and was known to be sweet-tempered.
+Wesley's older brother, Irving Brooke, had married a woman who kept
+him in hot water all the time, so Heatherton folks said, but they
+thought there was no fear of that with Wesley and Theodosia. They
+would get along together all right.
+
+Only old Jim Parmelee shook his head and said, "They might, and then
+again they mightn't"; he knew the stock they came of and it was a kind
+you could never predict about.
+
+Wesley and Theodosia were third cousins; this meant that old Henry
+Ford had been the great-great-grandfather of them both. Jim Parmelee,
+who was ninety, had been a small boy when this remote ancestor was
+still alive.
+
+"I mind him well," said old Jim on the morning of Theodosia's wedding
+day. There was a little group about the blacksmith's forge. Old Jim
+was in the centre. He was a fat, twinkling-eyed old man, fresh and
+ruddy in spite of his ninety years. "And," he went on, "he was about
+the settest man you'd ever see or want to see. When old Henry Ford
+made up his mind on any p'int a cyclone wouldn't turn him a
+hairsbreadth--no, nor an earthquake neither. Didn't matter a mite how
+much he suffered for it--he'd stick to it if it broke his heart. There
+was always some story or other going round about old Henry's setness.
+The family weren't quite so bad--only Tom. He was Dosia's
+great-grandfather, and a regular chip of the old block. Since then
+it's cropped out now and again all through the different branches of
+the family. I mistrust if Dosia hasn't got a spice of it, and Wes
+Brooke too, but mebbe not."
+
+Old Jim was the only croaker. Wesley and Theodosia were married, in
+the golden prime of the Indian summer, and settled down on their snug
+little farm. Dosia was a beautiful bride, and Wesley's pride in her
+was amusingly apparent. He thought nothing too good for her, the
+Heatherton people said. It was a sight to make an old heart young to
+see him march up the aisle of the church on Sunday in all the glossy
+splendour of his wedding suit, his curly black head held high and his
+round boyish face shining with happiness, stopping and turning proudly
+at his pew to show Theodosia in.
+
+They always sat alone together in the big pew, and Alma Spencer, who
+sat behind them, declared that they held each other's hands all
+through the service. This lasted until spring; then came a sensation
+and scandal, such as decorous Heatherton had not known since the time
+Isaac Allen got drunk at Centreville Fair and came home and kicked his
+wife.
+
+One evening in early April Wesley came home from the store at "the
+Corner," where he had lingered to talk over politics and farming
+methods with his cronies. This evening he was later than usual, and
+Theodosia had his supper kept warm for him. She met him on the porch
+and kissed him. He kissed her in return, and held her to him for a
+minute, with her bright head on his shoulder. The frogs were singing
+down in the south meadow swamp, and there was a splendour of silvery
+moonrise over the wooded Heatherton hills. Theodosia always remembered
+that moment.
+
+When they went in, Wesley, full of excitement, began to talk of what
+he had heard at the store. Ogden Greene and Tom Cary were going to
+sell out and go to Manitoba. There were better chances for a man out
+there, he said; in Heatherton he might slave all his life and never
+make more than a bare living. Out west he might make a fortune.
+
+Wesley talked on in this strain for some time, rehashing all the
+arguments he had heard Greene and Cary use. He had always been rather
+disposed to grumble at his limited chances in Heatherton, and now the
+great West seemed to stretch before him, full of alluring prospects
+and visions. Ogden and Tom wanted him to go too, he said. He had half
+a notion to. Heatherton was a stick-in-the-mud sort of place anyhow.
+
+"What say, Dosia?"
+
+He looked across the table at her, his eyes bright and questioning.
+Theodosia had listened in silence, as she poured his tea and passed
+him her hot, flaky biscuits. There was a little perpendicular wrinkle
+between her straight eyebrows.
+
+"I think Ogden and Tom are fools," she said crisply. "They have good
+farms here. What do they want to go west for, or you, either? Don't
+get silly notions in your head, Wes."
+
+Wesley flushed.
+
+"Wouldn't you go with me, Dosia?" he said, trying to speak lightly.
+
+"No, I wouldn't," said Theodosia, in her calm, sweet voice. Her face
+was serene, but the little wrinkle had grown deeper. Old Jim Parmelee
+would have known what it meant. He had seen the same expression on
+old Henry Ford's face many a time.
+
+Wesley laughed good-humouredly, as if at a child. His heart was
+suddenly set on going west, and he was sure he could soon bring
+Theodosia around. He did not say anything more about it just then.
+Wesley thought he knew how to manage women.
+
+When he broached the subject again, two days later, Theodosia told him
+plainly that it was no use. She would never consent to leave
+Heatherton and all her friends and go out to the prairies. The idea
+was just rank foolishness, and he would soon see that himself.
+
+All this Theodosia said calmly and sweetly, without any trace of
+temper or irritation. Wesley still believed that he could persuade her
+and he tried perseveringly for a fortnight. By the end of that time he
+discovered that Theodosia was not a great-great-granddaughter of old
+Henry Ford for nothing.
+
+Not that Theodosia ever got angry. Neither did she laugh at him. She
+met his arguments and pleadings seriously enough, but she never
+wavered.
+
+"If you go to Manitoba, Wes, you'll go alone," she said. "I'll never
+go, so there is no use in any more talking."
+
+Wesley was a descendant of old Henry Ford too. Theodosia's unexpected
+opposition roused all the latent stubbornness of his nature. He went
+over to Centreville oftener, and kept his blood at fever heat talking
+to Greene and Cary, who wanted him to go with them and spared no pains
+at inducement.
+
+The matter was gossiped about in Heatherton, of course. People knew
+that Wesley Brooke had caught "the western fever," and wanted to sell
+out and go to Manitoba, while Theodosia was opposed to it. They
+thought Dosia would have to give in in the end, but said it was a pity
+Wes Brooke couldn't be contented to stay where he was well off.
+
+Theodosia's family naturally sided with her and tried to dissuade
+Wesley. But he was mastered by that resentful irritation, roused in a
+man by opposition where he thinks he should be master, which will
+drive him into any cause.
+
+One day he told Theodosia that he was going. She was working her
+butter in her little, snowy-clean dairy under the great willows by the
+well. Wesley was standing in the doorway, his stout, broad-shouldered
+figure filling up the sunlit space. He was frowning and sullen.
+
+"I'm going west in two weeks' time with the boys, Dosia," he said
+stubbornly. "You can come with me or stay here--just exactly as you
+please. But I'm going."
+
+Theodosia went on spatting her balls of golden butter on the print in
+silence. She was looking very neat and pretty in her big white apron,
+her sleeves rolled up high above her plump, dimpled elbows, and her
+ruddy hair curling about her face and her white throat. She looked as
+pliable as her butter.
+
+Her silence angered her husband. He shuffled impatiently.
+
+"Well, what have you to say, Dosia?"
+
+"Nothing," said Theodosia. "If you have made up your mind to go, go
+you will, I suppose. But I will not. There is no use in talking. We've
+been over the ground often enough, Wes. The matter is settled."
+
+Up to that moment Wesley had always believed that his wife would yield
+at last, when she saw that he was determined. Now he realized that she
+never would. Under that exterior of milky, dimpled flesh and calm blue
+eyes was all the iron will of old dead and forgotten Henry Ford. This
+mildest and meekest of girls and wives was not to be moved a
+hairsbreadth by all argument or entreaty, or insistence on a husband's
+rights.
+
+A great, sudden anger came over the man. He lifted his hand and for
+one moment it seemed to Theodosia as if he meant to strike her. Then
+he dropped it with the first oath that had ever crossed his lips.
+
+"You listen to me," he said thickly. "If you won't go with me I'll
+never come back here--never. When you want to do your duty as a wife
+you can come to me. But I'll never come back."
+
+He turned on his heel and strode away. Theodosia kept on spatting her
+butter. The little perpendicular wrinkle had come between her brows
+again. At that moment an odd, almost uncanny resemblance to the old
+portrait of her great-great-grandfather, which hung on the parlour
+wall at home, came out on her girlish face.
+
+The fortnight passed by. Wesley was silent and sullen, never speaking
+to his wife when he could avoid it. Theodosia was as sweet and serene
+as ever. She made an extra supply of shirts and socks for him, put up
+his lunch basket, and packed his trunk carefully. But she never spoke
+of his journey.
+
+He did not sell his farm. Irving Brooke rented it. Theodosia was to
+live in the house. The business arrangements were simple and soon
+concluded.
+
+Heatherton folks gossiped a great deal. They all condemned Theodosia.
+Even her own people sided against her now. They hated to be mixed up
+in a local scandal, and since Wes was bound to go they told Theodosia
+that it was her duty to go with him, no matter how much she disliked
+it. It would be disgraceful not to. They might as well have talked to
+the four winds. Theodosia was immoveable. They coaxed and argued and
+blamed--it all came to the same thing. Even those of them who could be
+"set" enough themselves on occasion could not understand Theodosia,
+who had always been so tractable. They finally gave up, as Wesley had
+done, baffled. Time would bring her to her senses, they said; you just
+had to leave that still, stubborn kind alone.
+
+On the morning of Wesley's departure Theodosia arose at sunrise and
+prepared a tempting breakfast. Irving Brooke's oldest son, Stanley,
+who was to drive Wesley to the station, came over early with his
+express wagon. Wesley's trunk, corded and labelled, stood on the back
+platform. The breakfast was a very silent meal. When it was over
+Wesley put on his hat and overcoat and went to the door, around which
+Theodosia's morning-glory vines were beginning to twine. The sun was
+not yet above the trees and the long shadows lay on the dewy grass.
+The wet leaves were flickering on the old maples that grew along the
+fence between the yard and the clover field beyond. The skies were all
+pearly blue, cleanswept of clouds. From the little farmhouse the green
+meadows sloped down to the valley, where a blue haze wound in and out
+like a glistening ribbon.
+
+Theodosia went out and stood looking inscrutably on, while Wesley and
+Irving hoisted the trunk into the wagon and tied it. Then Wesley came
+up the porch steps and looked at her.
+
+"Dosia," he said a little huskily, "I said I wouldn't ask you to go
+again, but I will. Will you come with me yet?"
+
+"No," said Theodosia gently.
+
+He held out his hand. He did not offer to kiss her.
+
+"Goodbye, Dosia."
+
+"Goodbye, Wes."
+
+There was no tremor of an eyelash with her. Wesley smiled bitterly and
+turned away. When the wagon reached the end of the little lane he
+turned and looked back for the last time. Through all the years that
+followed he carried with him the picture of his wife as he saw her
+then, standing amid the airy shadows and wavering golden lights of the
+morning, the wind blowing the skirt of her pale blue wrapper about
+her feet and ruffling the locks of her bright hair into a delicate
+golden cloud. Then the wagon disappeared around a curve in the road,
+and Theodosia turned and went back into her desolate home.
+
+For a time there was a great buzz of gossip over the affair. People
+wondered over it. Old Jim Parmelee understood better than the others.
+When he met Theodosia he looked at her with a curious twinkle in his
+keen old eyes.
+
+"Looks as if a man could bend her any way he'd a mind to, doesn't
+she?" he said. "Looks is deceiving. It'll come out in her face by and
+by--she's too young yet, but it's there. It does seem unnatteral to
+see a woman so stubborn--you'd kinder look for it more in a man."
+
+Wesley wrote a brief letter to Theodosia when he reached his
+destination. He said he was well and was looking about for the best
+place to settle. He liked the country fine. He was at a place called
+Red Butte and guessed he'd locate there.
+
+Two weeks later he wrote again. He had taken up a claim of three
+hundred acres. Greene and Cary had done the same. They were his
+nearest neighbours and were three miles away. He had knocked up a
+little shack, was learning to cook his own meals, and was very busy.
+He thought the country was a grand one and the prospects good.
+
+Theodosia answered his letter and told him all the Heatherton news.
+She signed herself "Theodosia Brooke," but otherwise there was
+nothing in the letter to indicate that it was written by a wife to
+her husband.
+
+At the end of a year Wesley wrote and once more asked her to go out to
+him. He was getting on well, and was sure she would like the place. It
+was a little rough, to be sure, but time would improve that.
+
+"Won't you let bygones be bygones, Dosia?" he wrote, "and come out to
+me. Do, my dear wife."
+
+Theodosia wrote back, refusing to go. She never got any reply, nor did
+she write again.
+
+People had given up talking about the matter and asking Theodosia when
+she was going out to Wes. Heatherton had grown used to the chronic
+scandal within its decorous borders. Theodosia never spoke of her
+husband to anyone, and it was known that they did not correspond. She
+took her youngest sister to live with her. She had her garden and hens
+and a cow. The farm brought her enough to live on, and she was always
+busy.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+When fifteen years had gone by there were naturally some changes in
+Heatherton, sleepy and; unprogressive as it was. Most of the old
+people were in the little hillside burying-ground that fronted the
+sunrise. Old Jim Parmelee was there with his recollections of four
+generations. Men and women who had been in their prime when Wesley
+went away were old now and the children were grown up and married.
+
+Theodosia was thirty-five and was nothing like! the slim, dimpled girl
+who had stood on the porch steps and watched her husband drive away
+that morning fifteen years ago. She was stout and comely; the auburn
+hair was darker and arched away from her face in smooth, shining waves
+instead of the old-time curls. Her face was unlined and
+fresh-coloured, but no woman could live in subjection to her own
+unbending will for so many years and not show it. Nobody, looking at
+Theodosia now, would have found it hard to believe that a woman with
+such a determined, immoveable face could stick to a course of conduct
+in defiance of circumstances.
+
+Wesley Brooke was almost forgotten. People knew, through
+correspondents of Greene and Cary, that he had prospered and grown
+rich. The curious old story had crystallized into accepted history.
+
+A life may go on without ripple or disturbance for so many years that
+it may seem to have settled into a lasting calm; then a sudden wind of
+passion may sweep over it and leave behind a wake of tempestuous
+waters. Such a time came at last to Theodosia.
+
+One day in August Mrs. Emory Merritt dropped in. Emory Merritt's
+sister was Ogden Greene's wife, and the Merritts kept up an occasional
+correspondence with her. Hence, Cecilia Merritt always knew what was
+to be known about Wesley Brooke, and always told Theodosia because she
+had never been expressly forbidden to do so.
+
+Today she looked slightly excited. Secretly she was wondering if the
+news she brought would have any effect whatever on Theodosia's
+impassive calm.
+
+"Do you know, Dosia, Wesley's real sick? In fact, Phoebe Greene says
+they have very poor hopes of him. He was kind of ailing all the
+spring, it seems, and about a month ago he was took down with some
+kind of slow fever they have out there. Phoebe says they have a hired
+nurse from the nearest town and a good doctor, but she reckons he
+won't get over it. That fever goes awful hard with a man of his
+years."
+
+Cecilia Merritt, who was the fastest talker in Heatherton, had got
+this out before she was brought up by a queer sound, half gasp, half
+cry, from Theodosia. The latter looked as if someone had struck her a
+physical blow.
+
+"Mercy, Dosia, you ain't going to faint! I didn't suppose you'd care.
+You never seemed to care."
+
+"Did you say," asked Theodosia thickly, "that Wesley was sick--dying?"
+
+"Well, that's what Phoebe said. She may be mistaken. Dosia Brooke,
+you're a queer woman. I never could make you out and I never expect
+to. I guess only the Lord who made you can translate you."
+
+Theodosia stood up. The sun was getting low, and the valley beneath
+them, ripening to harvest, was like a river of gold. She folded up her
+sewing with a steady hand.
+
+"It's five o'clock, so I'll ask you to excuse me, Cecilia. I have a
+good deal to attend to. You can ask Emory if he'll drive me to the
+station in the morning. I'm going out to Wes."
+
+"Well, for the land's sake," said Cecilia Merritt feebly, as she tied
+on her gingham sunbonnet. She got up and went home in a daze.
+
+Theodosia packed her trunk and worked all night, dry-eyed, with agony
+and fear tearing at her heart. The iron will had snapped at last, like
+a broken reed, and fierce self-condemnation seized on her. "I've been
+a wicked woman," she moaned.
+
+A week from that day Theodosia climbed down from the dusty stage that
+had brought her from the station over the prairies to the
+unpretentious little house where Wesley Brooke lived. A young girl, so
+like what Ogden Greene's wife had been fifteen years before that
+Theodosia involuntarily exclaimed, "Phoebe," came to the door. Beyond
+her, Theodosia saw the white-capped nurse.
+
+Her voice trembled.
+
+"Does--does Wesley Brooke live here?" she asked.
+
+The girl nodded.
+
+"Yes. But he is very ill at present. Nobody is allowed to see him."
+
+Theodosia put up her hand and loosened her bonnet strings as if they
+were choking her. She had been sick with the fear that Wesley would be
+dead before she got to him. The relief was almost overwhelming.
+
+"But I must see him," she cried hysterically--she, the calm,
+easy-going Dosia, hysterical--"I am his wife--and oh, if he had died
+before I got here!"
+
+The nurse came forward.
+
+"In that case I suppose you must," she conceded. "But he does not
+expect you. I must prepare him for the surprise."
+
+She turned to the door of a room opening off the kitchen, but
+Theodosia, who had hardly heard her, was before her. She was inside
+the room before the nurse could prevent her. Then she stood, afraid
+and trembling, her eyes searching the dim apartment hungrily.
+
+When they fell on the occupant of the bed Theodosia started in bitter
+surprise. All unconsciously she had been expecting to find Wesley as
+he had been when they parted. Could this gaunt, haggard creature, with
+the unkempt beard and prematurely grey hair and the hollow, beseeching
+eyes, be the ruddy, boyish-faced husband of her youth? She gave a
+choking cry of pain and shame, and the sick man turned his head. Their
+eyes met.
+
+Amazement, incredulity, hope, dread, all flashed in succession over
+Wesley Brooke's lined face. He raised himself feebly up.
+
+"Dosia," he murmured.
+
+Theodosia staggered across the room and fell on her knees by the bed.
+She clasped his head to her breast and kissed him again and again.
+
+"Oh, Wes, Wes, can you forgive me? I've been a wicked, stubborn
+woman--and I've spoiled our lives. Forgive me."
+
+He held his thin trembling arms around her and devoured her face with
+his eyes.
+
+"Dosia, when did you come? Did you know I was sick?"
+
+"Wes, I can't talk till you say you've forgiven me."
+
+"Oh, Dosia, you have just as much to forgive. We were both too set. I
+should have been more considerate."
+
+"Just say, I forgive you, Dosia,'" she entreated.
+
+"I forgive you, Dosia," he said gently, "and oh, it's so good to see
+you once more, darling. There hasn't been an hour since I left you
+that I haven't longed for your sweet face. If I had thought you really
+cared I'd have gone back. But I thought you didn't. It broke my heart.
+You did though, didn't you?"
+
+"Oh, yes, yes, yes," she said, holding him more closely, with her
+tears falling.
+
+When the young doctor from Red Butte came that evening he found a
+great improvement in his patient. Joy and happiness, those world-old
+physicians, had done what drugs and medicines had failed to do.
+
+"I'm going to get better, Doc," said Wesley. "My wife has come and
+she's going to stay. You didn't know I was married, did you? I'll tell
+you the story some day. I proposed going back east, but Dosia says
+she'd rather stay here. I'm the happiest man in Red Butte, Doc."
+
+He squeezed Theodosia's hand as he had used to do long ago in
+Heatherton church, and Dosia smiled down at him. There were no
+dimples now, but her smile was very sweet. The ghostly finger of old
+Henry Ford, pointing down through the generations, had lost its power
+to brand with its malediction the life of these, his descendants.
+Wesley and Theodosia had joined hands with their long-lost happiness.
+
+
+
+
+The Story of an Invitation
+
+
+Bertha Sutherland hurried home from the post office and climbed the
+stairs of her boarding-house to her room on the third floor. Her
+roommate, Grace Maxwell, was sitting on the divan by the window,
+looking out into the twilight.
+
+A year ago Bertha and Grace had come to Dartmouth to attend the
+Academy, and found themselves roommates. Bertha was bright, pretty and
+popular, the favourite of her classmates and teachers; Grace was a
+grave, quiet girl, dressed in mourning. She was quite alone in the
+world, the aunt who had brought her up having recently died. At first
+she had felt shy with bright and brilliant Bertha; but they soon
+became friends, and the year that followed was a very pleasant one. It
+was almost ended now, for the terminal exams had begun, and in a
+week's time the school would close for the holidays.
+
+"Have some chocolates, Grace," said Bertha gaily. "I got such good
+news in my letter tonight that I felt I must celebrate it fittingly.
+So I went into Carter's and invested all my spare cash in caramels.
+It's really fortunate the term is almost out, for I'm nearly bankrupt.
+I have just enough left to furnish a 'tuck-out' for commencement
+night, and no more."
+
+"What is your good news, may I ask?" said Grace.
+
+"You know I have an Aunt Margaret--commonly called Aunt Meg--out at
+Riversdale, don't you? There never was such a dear, sweet, jolly aunty
+in the world. I had a letter from her tonight. Listen, I'll read you
+what she says."
+
+    _I want you to spend your holidays with me, my dear. Mary
+    Fairweather and Louise Fyshe and Lily Dennis are coming, too. So
+    there is just room for one more, and that one must be yourself.
+    Come to Riversdale when school closes, and I'll feed you on
+    strawberries and cream and pound cake and doughnuts and mince
+    pies, and all the delicious, indigestible things that school
+    girls love and careful mothers condemn. Mary and Lou and Lil are
+    girls after your own heart, I know, and you shall all do just as
+    you like, and we'll have picnics and parties and merry doings
+    galore._
+
+"There," said Bertha, looking up with a laugh. "Isn't that lovely?"
+
+"How delightful it must be to have friends like that to love you and
+plan for you," said Grace wistfully. "I am sure you will have a
+pleasant vacation, Bertie. As for me, I am going into Clarkman's
+bookstore until school reopens. I saw Mr. Clarkman today and he agreed
+to take me."
+
+Bertha looked surprised. She had not known what Grace's vacation plans
+were.
+
+"I don't think you ought to do that, Grace," she said thoughtfully.
+"You are not strong, and you need a good rest. It will be awfully
+trying to work at Clarkman's all summer."
+
+"There is nothing else for me to do," said Grace, trying to speak
+cheerfully. "You know I'm as poor as the proverbial church mouse,
+Bertie, and the simple truth is that I can't afford to pay my board
+all summer and get my winter outfit unless I do something to earn it.
+I shall be too busy to be lonesome, and I shall expect long, newsy
+letters from you, telling me all your fun--passing your vacation on to
+me at second-hand, you see. Well, I must set to work at those algebra
+problems. I tried them before dark, but I couldn't solve them. My head
+ached and I felt so stupid. How glad I shall be when exams are over."
+
+"I suppose I must revise that senior English this evening," said
+Bertha absently.
+
+But she made no move to do so. She was studying her friend's face. How
+very pale and thin Grace looked--surely much paler and thinner than
+when she had come to the Academy, and she had not by any means been
+plump and rosy then.
+
+I believe she could not stand two months at Clarkman's, thought
+Bertha. If I were not going to Aunt Meg's, I would ask her to go home
+with me. Or even if Aunt Meg had room for another guest, I'd just
+write her all about Grace and ask if I could bring her with me. Aunt
+Meg would understand--she always understands. But she hasn't, so it
+can't be.
+
+Just then a thought darted into Bertha's brain.
+
+"What nonsense!" she said aloud so suddenly and forcibly that Grace
+fairly jumped.
+
+"What is?"
+
+"Oh, nothing much," said Bertha, getting up briskly. "See here, I'm
+going to get to work. I've wasted enough time."
+
+She curled herself up on the divan and tried to study her senior
+English. But her thoughts wandered hopelessly, and finally she gave it
+up in despair and went to bed. There she could not sleep; she lay
+awake and wrestled with herself. It was after midnight when she sat up
+in bed and said solemnly, "I will do it."
+
+Next day Bertha wrote a confidential letter to Aunt Meg. She thanked
+her for her invitation and then told her all about Grace.
+
+"And what I want to ask, Aunt Meg, is that you will let me transfer my
+invitation to Grace, and ask her to go to Riversdale this summer in my
+place. Don't think me ungrateful. No, I'm sure you won't, you always
+understand things. But you can't have us both, and I'd rather Grace
+should go. It will do her so much good, and I have a lovely home of my
+own to go to, and she has none."
+
+Aunt Meg understood, as usual, and was perfectly willing. So she wrote
+to Bertha and enclosed a note of invitation for Grace.
+
+I shall have to manage this affair very carefully, reflected Bertha.
+Grace must never suspect that I did it on purpose. I will tell her
+that circumstances have prevented me from accepting Aunt Meg's
+invitation. That is true enough--no need to say that the circumstances
+are hers, not mine. And I'll say I just asked Aunt Meg to invite her
+in my place and that she has done so.
+
+When Grace came home from her history examination that day, Bertha
+told her story and gave her Aunt Meg's cordial note.
+
+"You must come to me in Bertha's place," wrote the latter. "I feel as
+if I knew you from her letters, and I will consider you as a sort of
+honorary niece, and I'll treat you as if you were Bertha herself."
+
+"Isn't it splendid of Aunt Meg?" said Bertha diplomatically. "Of
+course you'll go, Gracie."
+
+"Oh, I don't know," said Grace in bewilderment. "Are you sure you
+don't want to go, Bertha?"
+
+"Indeed, I do want to go, dreadfully," said Bertha frankly. "But as
+I've told you, it is impossible. But if I am disappointed, Aunt Meg
+musn't be. You must go, Grace, and that is all there is about it."
+
+In the end, Grace did go, a little puzzled and doubtful still, but
+thankful beyond words to escape the drudgery of the counter and the
+noise and heat of the city. Bertha went home, feeling a little bit
+blue in secret, it cannot be denied, but also feeling quite sure that
+if she had to do it all over again, she would do just the same.
+
+The summer slipped quickly by, and finally two letters came to Bertha,
+one from Aunt Meg and one from Grace.
+
+"I've had a lovely time," wrote the latter, "and, oh, Bertie, what do
+you think? I am to stay here always. Oh, of course I am going back to
+school next month, but this is to be my home after this. Aunt Meg--she
+makes me call her that--says I must stay with her for good."
+
+In Aunt Meg's letter was this paragraph:
+
+    _Grace is writing to you, and will have told you that I intend
+    to keep her here. You know I have always wanted a daughter of my
+    own, but my greedy brothers and sisters would never give me one
+    of theirs. So I intend to adopt Grace. She is the sweetest girl
+    in the world, and I am very grateful to you for sending her
+    here. You will not know her when you see her. She has grown
+    plump and rosy._
+
+Bertha folded her letters up with a smile. "I have a vague, delightful
+feeling that I am the good angel in a storybook," she said.
+
+
+
+
+The Touch of Fate
+
+
+Mrs. Major Hill was in her element. This did not often happen, for in
+the remote prairie town of the Canadian Northwest, where her husband
+was stationed, there were few opportunities for match-making. And Mrs.
+Hill was--or believed herself to be--a born matchmaker.
+
+Major Hill was in command of the detachment of Northwest Mounted
+Police at Dufferin Bluff. Mrs. Hill was wont to declare that it was
+the most forsaken place to be found in Canada or out of it; but she
+did her very best to brighten it up, and it is only fair to say that
+the N.W.M.P., officers and men, seconded her efforts.
+
+When Violet Thayer came west to pay a long-promised visit to her old
+schoolfellow, Mrs. Hill's cup of happiness bubbled over. In her secret
+soul she vowed that Violet should never go back east unless it were
+post-haste to prepare a wedding trousseau. There were at least half a
+dozen eligibles among the M.P.s, and Mrs. Hill, after some reflection,
+settled on Ned Madison as the flower of the flock.
+
+"He and Violet are simply made for each other," she told Major Hill
+the evening before Miss Thayer's arrival. "He has enough money and he
+is handsome and fascinating. And Violet is a beauty and a clever woman
+into the bargain. They can't help falling in love, I'm sure; it's
+fate!"
+
+"Perhaps Miss Thayer may be booked elsewhere already," suggested Major
+Hill. He had seen more than one of his wife's card castles fall into
+heartbreaking ruin.
+
+"Oh, no; Violet would have told me if that were the case. It's really
+quite time for her to think of settling down. She is twenty-five, you
+know. The men all go crazy over her, but she's dreadfully hard to
+please. However, she can't help liking Ned. He hasn't a single fault.
+I firmly believe it is foreordained."
+
+And in this belief Mrs. Hill rested securely, but nevertheless did not
+fail to concoct several feminine artifices for the helping on of
+foreordination. It was a working belief with her that it was always
+well to have the gods in your debt.
+
+Violet Thayer came, saw, and conquered. Within thirty-six hours of her
+arrival at Dufferin Bluff she had every one of the half-dozen
+eligibles at her feet, not to mention a score or more ineligibles. She
+would have been surprised indeed had it been otherwise. Miss Thayer
+knew her power, and was somewhat unduly fond of exercising it. But she
+was a very nice girl into the bargain, and so thought one and all of
+the young men who frequented Mrs. Hill's drawing-room and counted it
+richly worth while merely to look at Miss Thayer after having seen
+nothing for weeks except flabby half-breed girls and blue-haired
+squaws.
+
+Madison was foremost in the field, of course. Madison was really a
+nice fellow, and quite deserved all Mrs. Hill's encomiums. He was
+good-looking and well groomed--could sing and dance divinely and play
+the violin to perfection. The other M.P.s were all jealous of him, and
+more so than ever when Violet Thayer came. They did not consider that
+any one of them had the ghost of a chance if Madison entered the lists
+against them.
+
+Violet liked Madison, and was very chummy with him after her own
+fashion. She thought all the M.P.s were nice boys, and they amused
+her, for which she was grateful. She had expected Dufferin Bluff to be
+very dull, and doubtless it would pall after a time, but for a change
+it was delightful.
+
+The sixth evening after her arrival found Mrs. Hill's room crowded, as
+usual, with M.P.s. Violet was looking her best in a distracting new
+gown--Sergeant Fox afterwards described it to a brother officer as a
+"stunning sort of rig between a cream and a blue and a brown"; she
+flirted impartially with all the members of her circle at first, but
+gradually narrowed down to Ned Madison, much to the delight of Mrs.
+Hill, who was hovering around like a small, brilliant butterfly.
+
+Violet was talking to Madison and watching John Spencer out of the
+tail of her eye. Spencer was not an M.P. He had some government post
+at Dufferin Bluff, and this was his first call at Lone Poplar Villa
+since Miss Thayer's arrival. He did not seem to be dazzled by her at
+all, and after his introduction had promptly retired to a corner with
+Major Hill, where they talked the whole evening about the trouble on
+the Indian reservation at Loon Lake.
+
+Possibly this indifference piqued Miss Thayer. Possibly she considered
+it refreshing after the servile adulation of the M.P.s. At any rate,
+when all the latter were gathered about the piano singing a chorus
+with gusto, she shook Madison off and went over to the corner where
+Spencer, deserted by the Major, whose bass was wanted, was sitting in
+solitary state.
+
+He looked up indifferently as Violet shimmered down on the divan
+beside him. Sergeant Robinson, who was watching them jealously from
+the corner beyond the palms, and would have given his eyes, or at
+least one of them, for such a favour, mentally vowed that Spencer was
+the dullest fellow he had ever put those useful members on.
+
+"Don't you sing, Mr. Spencer?" asked Violet by way of beginning a
+conversation, as she turned her splendid eyes full upon him. Robinson
+would have lost his head under them, but Spencer kept his heroically.
+
+"No," was his calmly brief reply, given without any bluntness, but
+with no evident intention of saying anything more.
+
+In spite of her social experience Violet felt disconcerted.
+
+"If he doesn't want to talk to me I won't try to make him," she
+thought crossly. No man had ever snubbed her so before.
+
+Spencer listened immovably to the music for a time. Then he turned to
+his companion with a palpable effort to be civilly sociable.
+
+"How do you like the west, Miss Thayer?" he said.
+
+Violet smiled--the smile most men found dangerous.
+
+"Very much, so far as I have seen it. There is a flavour about the
+life here that I like, but I dare say it would soon pall. It must be
+horribly lonesome here most of the time, especially in winter."
+
+"The M.P.s are always growling that it is," returned Spencer with a
+slight smile. "For my own part I never find it so."
+
+Violet decided that his smile was very becoming to him and that she
+liked the way his dark hair grew over his forehead.
+
+"I don't think I've seen you at Lone Poplar Villa before?" she said.
+
+"No. I haven't been here for some time. I came up tonight to see the
+Major about the Loon Lake trouble."
+
+"Otherwise you wouldn't have come," thought Violet.
+"Flattering--very!" Aloud she said, "Is it serious?"
+
+"Oh, no. A mere squabble among the Indians. Have you ever visited the
+Reservation, Miss Thayer? No? Well, you should get some of your M.P.
+friends to take you out. It would be worth while."
+
+"Why don't you ask me to go yourself?" said Violet audaciously.
+
+Spencer smiled again. "Have I failed in politeness by not doing so? I
+fear you would find me an insufferably dull companion."
+
+So he was not going to ask her after all. Violet felt piqued. She was
+also conscious of a sensation very near akin to disappointment. She
+looked across at Madison. How trim and dapper he was!
+
+"I hate a bandbox man," she said to herself.
+
+Spencer meanwhile had picked up one of Mrs. Hill's novels from the
+stand beside him.
+
+"_Fools of Habit_," he said, glancing at the cover. "I see it is
+making quite a sensation down east. I suppose you've read it?"
+
+"Yes. It is very frivolous and clever--all froth but delightful froth.
+Did you like it?"
+
+Spencer balanced the novel reflectively on his slender brown hand.
+
+"Well, yes, rather. But I don't care for novels as a rule. I don't
+understand them. The hero of this book, now--do you believe that a man
+in love would act as he did?"
+
+"I don't know," said Violet amusedly. "You ought to be a better judge
+than I. You are a man."
+
+"I have never loved anybody, so I am in no position to decide," said
+Spencer.
+
+There was as little self-consciousness in his voice as if he were
+telling her a fact concerning the Loon Lake trouble. Violet rose to
+the occasion.
+
+"You have an interesting experience to look forward to," she said.
+
+Spencer turned his deep-set grey eyes squarely upon her.
+
+"I don't know that. When I said I had never loved, I meant more than
+the love of a man for some particular woman. I meant love in every
+sense. I do not know what it is to have an affection for any human
+being. My parents died before I can remember. My only living relative
+was a penurious old uncle who brought me up for shame's sake and
+kicked me out on the world as soon as he could. I don't make friends
+easily. I have a few acquaintances whom I like, but there is not a
+soul on earth for whom I care, or who cares for me."
+
+"What a revelation love will be to you when it comes," said Violet
+softly. Again he looked into her eyes.
+
+"Do you think it will come?" he asked.
+
+Before she could reply Mrs. Hill pounced upon them. Violet was wanted
+to sing. Mr. Spencer would excuse her, wouldn't he? Mr. Spencer did so
+obligingly. Moreover, he got up and bade his hostess good night.
+Violet gave him her hand.
+
+"You will call again?" she said.
+
+Spencer looked across at Madison--perhaps it was accidental.
+
+"I think not," he said. "If, as you say, love will come some time, it
+would be a very unpleasant revelation if it came in hopeless guise,
+and one never knows what may happen."
+
+Miss Thayer was conscious of a distinct fluttering of her heart as she
+went across to the piano. This was a new sensation for her, and worthy
+of being analyzed. After the M.P.s had gone she asked Mrs. Hill who
+Mr. Spencer was.
+
+"Oh, John Spencer," said Mrs. Hill carelessly. "He's at the head of
+the Land Office here. That's really all I know about him. Jack says he
+is a downright good fellow and all that, you know. But he's no earthly
+good in a social way; he can't talk or he won't. He's flat. So
+different from Mr. Madison, isn't he?"
+
+"Very," said Violet emphatically.
+
+After Mrs. Hill had gone out Violet walked to the nearest mirror and
+looked at herself with her forefinger in the dimple of her chin.
+
+"It is very odd," she said. She did not mean the dimple.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Spencer had told her he was not coming back. She did not believe this,
+but she did not expect him for a few days. Consequently, when he
+appeared the very next evening she was surprised. Madison, to whom she
+was talking when Spencer entered, does not know to this day what she
+had started to say to him, for she never finished her sentence.
+
+"I wonder if it is the Loon Lake affair again?" she thought nervously.
+
+Mrs. Hill came up at this point and whisked Madison off for a waltz.
+Spencer, seeing his chance, came straight across the room to her.
+Sergeant Robinson, who was watching them as usual, is willing to make
+affidavit that Miss Thayer changed colour.
+
+After his greeting Spencer said nothing. He sat beside her, and they
+watched Mrs. Hill and Madison dancing. Violet wondered why she did not
+feel bored. When she saw Madison coming back to her she was conscious
+of an unreasonable anger with him. She got up abruptly.
+
+"Let us go out on the verandah," she said imperiously. "It is
+absolutely stifling in here."
+
+They went out. It was very cool and dusky. The lights of the town
+twinkled out below them, and the prairie bluffs behind them were dark
+and sibilant.
+
+"I am going to drive over to Loon Lake tomorrow afternoon to look into
+affairs there," said Spencer. "Will you go with me?"
+
+Violet reflected a moment. "You didn't ask me as if you really wanted
+me to go," she said.
+
+Spencer put his hand over the white fingers that rested on the
+railing. He bent forward until his breath stirred the tendrils of hair
+on her forehead.
+
+"Yes, I do," he said distinctly. "I want you to go with me to Loon
+Lake tomorrow more than I ever wanted any thing in my life before."
+
+Later on, when everybody had gone, Violet had her bad quarter of an
+hour with Mrs. Hill. That lady felt herself aggrieved.
+
+"I think you treated poor Ned very badly tonight, Vi. He felt really
+blue over it. And it was awfully bad form to go out with Spencer as
+you did and stay there so long. And you oughtn't to flirt with him--he
+doesn't understand the game."
+
+"I'm not going to flirt with him," said Miss Thayer calmly.
+
+"Oh, I suppose it's just your way. Only don't turn the poor fellow's
+head. By the way, Ned is coming up with his camera tomorrow afternoon
+to take us all."
+
+"I'm afraid he won't find me at home," said Violet sweetly. "I am
+going out to Loon Lake with Mr. Spencer."
+
+Mrs. Hill flounced off to bed in a pet. She was disgusted with
+everything, she declared to the Major. Things had been going so
+nicely, and now they were all muddled.
+
+"Isn't Madison coming up to time?" queried the Major sleepily.
+
+"Madison! It's Violet. She is behaving abominably. She treated poor
+Ned shamefully tonight. You saw yourself how she acted with Spencer,
+and she's going to Loon Lake with him tomorrow, she says. I'm sure I
+don't know what she can see in him. He's the dullest, pokiest fellow
+alive--so different from her in every way."
+
+"Perhaps that is why she likes him," suggested the Major. "The
+attraction of opposites and all that, you know."
+
+But Mrs. Hill crossly told him he didn't know anything about it, so,
+being a wise man, he held his tongue.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+During the next two weeks Mrs. Hill was the most dissatisfied woman in
+the four districts, and every M.P. down to the rawest recruit
+anathemized Spencer in secret a dozen times a day. Violet simply
+dropped everyone else, including Madison, in the coolest, most
+unmistakable way.
+
+One night Spencer did not come to Lone Poplar Villa. Violet looked for
+him to the last. When she realized that he was not coming she went to
+the verandah to have it out with herself. As she sat huddled up in a
+dim corner beneath a silkily rustling western maple two M.P.s came out
+and, not seeing her, went on with their conversation.
+
+"Heard about Spencer?" questioned one.
+
+"No. What of him?"
+
+"Well, they say Miss Thayer's thrown him over. Yesterday I was passing
+here about four in the afternoon and I saw Spencer coming in. I went
+down to the Land Office and was chatting to Cribson when the door
+opened about half an hour later and Spencer burst in. He was pale as
+the dead, and looked wild. 'Has Fyshe gone to Rainy River about those
+Crown Lands yet?' he jerked out. Cribson said, 'No.' Then tell him he
+needn't; I'm going myself,' said Spencer and out he bolted. He posted
+off to Rainy River today, and won't be back for a fortnight. She'll be
+gone then."
+
+"Rather rough on Spencer after the way she encouraged him," returned
+the other as they passed out of earshot.
+
+Violet got up. All the callers were gone, and she swept in to Mrs.
+Hill dramatically.
+
+"Edith," she said in the cold, steady voice that, to those who knew
+her, meant breakers ahead for somebody, "Mr. Spencer was here
+yesterday when I was riding with the Major, was he not? What did you
+tell him about me?"
+
+Mrs. Hill looked at Violet's blazing eyes and wilted.
+
+"I--didn't tell him anything--much."
+
+"What was it?"
+
+Mrs. Hill began to sob.
+
+"Don't look at me like that, Violet! He just dropped in and we were
+talking about you--at least I was--and I had heard that Harry St. Maur
+was paying you marked attention before you came west--and--and that
+some people thought you were engaged--and so--and so--"
+
+"You told Mr. Spencer that I was engaged to Harry St. Maur?"
+
+"No-o-o--I just hinted. I didn't mean an-any harm. I never dreamed
+you'd really c-care. I thought you were just amusing yourself--and so
+did everybody--and I wanted Ned Madison--"
+
+Violet had turned very pale.
+
+"I love him," she said hoarsely, "and you've sent him away. He's gone
+to Rainy River. I shall never see him again!"
+
+"Oh, yes, you will," gasped Mrs. Hill faintly. "He'll come back when
+he knows--you c-can write and tell him--"
+
+"Do you suppose I am going to write and ask him to come back?" said
+Violet wildly. "I've enough pride left yet to keep me from doing that
+for a man at whose head I've thrown myself openly--yes, openly, and
+who has never, in words at least, told me he cared anything about me.
+I will never forgive you, Edith!"
+
+Then Mrs. Hill found herself alone with her lacerated feelings. After
+soothing them with a good cry, she set to work thinking seriously.
+There was no doubt she had muddled things badly, but there was no use
+leaving them in a muddle when a word or two fitly spoken might set
+them straight.
+
+Mrs. Hill sat down and wrote a very diplomatic letter before she went
+to bed, and the next morning she waylaid Sergeant Fox and asked him if
+he would ride down to Rainy River with a very important message for
+Mr. Spencer. Sergeant Fox wondered what it could be, but it was not
+his to reason why; it was his only to mount and ride with all due
+speed, for Mrs. Hill's whims and wishes were as stringent and binding
+as the rules of the force.
+
+That evening when Mrs. Hill and Violet--the latter very silent and
+regal--were sitting on the verandah, a horseman came galloping up the
+Rainy River trail. Mrs. Hill excused herself and went in. Five minutes
+later John Spencer, covered with the alkali dust of his twenty miles'
+ride, dismounted at Violet's side.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The M.P.s gave a concert at the barracks that night and Mrs. Hill and
+her Major went to it, as well as everyone else of any importance in
+town except Violet and Spencer. They sat on Major Hill's verandah and
+watched the moon rising over the bluffs and making milk-white
+reflections in the prairie lakes.
+
+"It seems a year of misery since last night," sighed Violet happily.
+
+"You couldn't have been quite as miserable as I was," said Spencer
+earnestly. "You were everything--absolutely everything to me. Other
+men have little rills and driblets of affection for sisters and
+cousins and aunts, but everything in me went out to you. Do you
+remember you told me the first time we met that love would be a
+revelation to me? It has been more. It has been a new gospel. I hardly
+dared hope you could care for me. Even yet I don't know why you do."
+
+"I love you," said Violet gravely, "because you are you."
+
+Than which, of course, there could be no better reason.
+
+
+
+
+The Waking of Helen
+
+
+Robert Reeves looked somewhat curiously at the girl who was waiting on
+him at his solitary breakfast. He had not seen her before, arriving at
+his summer boarding house only the preceding night.
+
+It was a shabby farmhouse on the inland shore of a large bay that was
+noted for its tides, and had wonderful possibilities of light and
+shade for an impressionist. Reeves was an enthusiastic artist. It
+mattered little to him that the boarding accommodations were most
+primitive, the people uncultured and dull, the place itself utterly
+isolated, as long as he could revel in those transcendent sunsets and
+sunrises, those marvellous moonlights, those wonderful purple shores
+and sweeps of shimmering blue water.
+
+The owner of the farm was Angus Fraser, and he and his wife seemed to
+be a reserved, uncouth pair, with no apparent interest in life save to
+scratch a bare living out of their few stony acres. He had an
+impression that they were childless and was at a loss to place this
+girl who poured his tea and brought in his toast. She did not resemble
+either Fraser or his wife. She was certainly not beautiful, being very
+tall and rather awkward, and dressed in a particularly unbecoming dark
+print wrapper. Her luxuriant hair was thick and black, and was coiled
+in a heavy knot at the nape of her neck. Her features were delicate
+but irregular, and her skin was very brown. Her eyes attracted
+Reeves's notice especially; they were large and dark and full of a
+half-unconscious, wistful longing, as if a prisoned soul behind them
+were vainly trying to reveal itself.
+
+Reeves could find out nothing of her from herself, for she responded
+to his tentative questions about the place in the briefest fashion.
+Afterwards he interviewed Mrs. Fraser cautiously, and ascertained that
+the girl's name was Helen Fraser, and that she was Angus's niece.
+
+"Her father and mother are dead and we've brought her up. Helen's a
+good girl in most ways--a little obstinate and sulky now and then--but
+generally she's steady enough, and as for work, there ain't a girl in
+Bay Beach can come up to her in house or field. Angus calculates she
+saves him a man's wages clear. No, I ain't got nothing to say against
+Helen."
+
+Nevertheless, Reeves felt somehow that Mrs. Fraser did not like her
+husband's niece. He often heard her scolding or nagging Helen at her
+work, and noticed that the latter never answered back. But once, after
+Mrs. Angus's tongue had been especially bitter, he met the girl
+hurrying along the hall from the kitchen with her eyes full of tears.
+Reeves felt as if someone had struck him a blow. He went to Angus and
+his wife that afternoon. He wished to paint a shore picture, he said,
+and wanted a model. Would they allow Miss Fraser to pose for him? He
+would pay liberally for her time.
+
+Angus and his wife had no objection. They would pocket the money, and
+Helen could be spared a spell every day as well as not. Reeves told
+Helen of his plan himself, meeting her in the evening as she was
+bringing the cows home from the low shore pastures beyond the marsh.
+He was surprised at the sudden illumination of her face. It almost
+transfigured her from a plain, sulky-looking girl into a beautiful
+woman.
+
+But the glow passed quickly. She assented to his plan quietly, almost
+lifelessly. He walked home with her behind the cows and talked of the
+sunset and the mysterious beauty of the bay and the purple splendour
+of the distant coasts. She listened in silence. Only once, when he
+spoke of the distant murmur of the open sea, she lifted her head and
+looked at him.
+
+"What does it say to you?" she asked.
+
+"It speaks of eternity. And to you?"
+
+"It calls me," she answered simply, "and then I want to go out and
+meet it--and it hurts me too. I can't tell how or why. Sometimes it
+makes me feel as if I were asleep and wanted to wake and didn't know
+how."
+
+She turned and looked out over the bay. A dying gleam of sunset broke
+through a cloud and fell across her hair. For a moment she seemed the
+spirit of the shore personified--all its mystery, all its uncertainty,
+all its elusive charm.
+
+She has possibilities, thought Reeves.
+
+Next day he began his picture. At first he had thought of painting her
+as the incarnation of a sea spirit, but decided that her moods were
+too fitful. So he began to sketch her as "Waiting"--a woman looking
+out across the bay with a world of hopeless longing in her eyes. The
+subject suited her well, and the picture grew apace.
+
+When he was tired of work he made her walk around the shore with him,
+or row up the head of the bay in her own boat. He tried to draw her
+out, at first with indifferent success. She seemed to be frightened of
+him. He talked to her of many things--the far outer world whose echoes
+never reached her, foreign lands where he had travelled, famous men
+and women whom he had met, music, art and books. When he spoke of
+books he touched the right chord. One of those transfiguring flashes
+he delighted to evoke now passed over her plain face.
+
+"That is what I've always wanted," she said hungrily, "and I never get
+them. Aunt hates to see me reading. She says it is a waste of time.
+And I love it so. I read every scrap of paper I can get hold of, but I
+hardly ever see a book."
+
+The next day Reeves took his Tennyson to the shore and began to read
+the _Idylls of the King_ to her.
+
+"It is beautiful," was her sole verbal comment, but her rapt eyes said
+everything.
+
+After that he never went out with her without a book--now one of the
+poets, now some prose classic. He was surprised by her quick
+appreciation of and sympathy with the finest passages. Gradually, too,
+she forgot her shyness and began to talk. She knew nothing of his
+world, but her own world she knew and knew well. She was a mine of
+traditional history about the bay. She knew the rocky coast by heart,
+and every old legend that clung to it. They drifted into making
+excursions along the shore and explored its wildest retreats. The girl
+had an artist's eye for scenery and colour effect.
+
+"You should have been an artist," Reeves told her one day when she had
+pointed out to him the exquisite loveliness of a shaft of light
+falling through a cleft in the rocks across a dark-green pool at their
+base.
+
+"I would rather be a writer," she said slowly, "if I could only write
+something like those books you have read to me. What a glorious
+destiny it must be to have something to say that the whole world is
+listening for, and to be able to say it in words that will live
+forever! It must be the noblest human lot."
+
+"Yet some of those men and women were neither good nor noble," said
+Reeves gently, "and many of them were unhappy."
+
+Helen dismissed the subject as abruptly as she always did when the
+conversation touched too nearly on the sensitive edge of her soul
+dreams.
+
+"Do you know where I am taking you today?" she said.
+
+"No--where?"
+
+"To what the people here call the Kelpy's Cave. I hate to go there. I
+believe there is something uncanny about it, but I think you will like
+to see it. It is a dark little cave in the curve of a small cove, and
+on each side the headlands of rock run far out. At low tide we can
+walk right around, but when the tide comes in it fills the Kelpy's
+Cave. If you were there and let the tide come past the points, you
+would be drowned unless you could swim, for the rocks are so steep and
+high it is impossible to climb them."
+
+Reeves was interested.
+
+"Was anyone ever caught by the tide?"
+
+"Yes," returned Helen, with a shudder. "Once, long ago, before I was
+born, a girl went around the shore to the cave and fell asleep
+there--and the tide came in and she was drowned. She was young and
+very pretty, and was to have been married the next week. I've been
+afraid of the place ever since."
+
+The treacherous cave proved to be a picturesque and innocent-looking
+spot, with the beach of glittering sand before it and the high gloomy
+walls of rock on either hand.
+
+"I must come here some day and sketch it," said Reeves
+enthusiastically, "and you must be the Kelpy, Helen, and sit in the
+cave with your hair wrapped about you and seaweed clinging to it."
+
+"Do you think a kelpy would look like that?" said the girl dreamily.
+"I don't. I think it is a wild, wicked little sea imp, malicious and
+mocking and cruel, and it sits here and watches for victims."
+
+"Well, never mind your sea kelpies," Reeves said, fishing out his
+Longfellow. "They are a tricky folk, if all tales be true, and it is
+supposed to be a very rash thing to talk about them in their own
+haunts. I want to read you 'The Building of the Ship.' You will like
+it, I'm sure."
+
+When the tide turned they went home.
+
+"We haven't seen the kelpy, after all," said Reeves.
+
+"I think I shall see him some day," said Helen gravely. "I think he is
+waiting for me there in that gloomy cave of his, and some time or
+other he will get me."
+
+Reeves smiled at the gloomy fancy, and Helen smiled back at him with
+one of her sudden radiances. The tide was creeping swiftly up over the
+white sands. The sun was low and the bay was swimming in a pale blue
+glory. They parted at Clam Point, Helen to go for the cows and Reeves
+to wander on up the shore. He thought of Helen at first, and the
+wonderful change that had come over her of late; then he began to
+think of another face--a marvellously lovely one with blue eyes as
+tender as the waters before him. Then Helen was forgotten.
+
+The summer waned swiftly. One afternoon Reeves took a fancy to revisit
+the Kelpy's Cave. Helen could not go. It was harvest time, and she was
+needed in the field.
+
+"Don't let the kelpy catch you," she said to him half seriously. "The
+tide will turn early this afternoon, and you are given to
+day-dreaming."
+
+"I'll be careful," he promised laughingly, and he meant to be careful.
+But somehow when he reached the cave its unwholesome charm overcame
+him, and he sat down on the boulder at its mouth.
+
+"An hour yet before tide time," he said. "Just enough time to read
+that article on impressionists in my review and then stroll home by
+the sandshore."
+
+From reading he passed to day-dreaming, and day-dreaming drifted into
+sleep, with his head pillowed on the rocky walls of the cave.
+
+How long he had slept he did not know, but he woke with a start of
+horror. He sprang to his feet, realizing his position instantly. The
+tide was in--far in past the headlands already. Above and beyond him
+towered the pitiless unscalable rocks. There was no way of escape.
+
+Reeves was no coward, but life was sweet to him, and to die like
+that--like a drowned rat in a hole--to be able to do nothing but wait
+for that swift and sure oncoming death! He reeled against the damp
+rock wall, and for a moment sea and sky and prisoning headlands and
+white-lined tide whirled before his eyes.
+
+Then his head grew clearer. He tried to think. How long had he? Not
+more than twenty minutes at the outside. Well, death was sure and he
+would meet it bravely. But to wait--to wait helplessly! He should go;
+mad with the horror of it before those endless minutes would have
+passed!
+
+He took something from his pocket and bent his, head over it, pressing
+his lips to it repeatedly. And then, when he raised his face again, a
+dory was coming around the headland on his right, and Helen Fraser was
+in it.
+
+Reeves was dizzy again with the shock of joy and thankfulness. He ran
+down over the little stretch of sand still uncovered by the tide and
+around to the rocks of the headlands against which the dory was
+already grating. He sprang forward impulsively and caught the girl's
+cold hands in his as she dropped the oars and stood up.
+
+"Helen, you have saved me! How can I ever thank you? I--"
+
+He broke off abruptly, for she was looking up at him, breathlessly and
+voicelessly, with her whole soul in her eyes. He saw in them a
+revelation that amazed him; he dropped her hands and stepped back as
+if she had struck him in the face.
+
+Helen did not notice the change in him. She clasped her hands together
+and her voice trembled.
+
+"Oh, I was afraid I should be too late! When I came in from the field
+Aunt Hannah said you had not come back--and I knew it was tide
+time--and I felt somehow that it had caught you in the cave. I ran
+down over the marsh and took Joe Simmon's dory. If I had not got here
+in time--"
+
+She broke off shiveringly. Reeves stepped into the dory and took up
+the oars.
+
+"The kelpy would have been sure of its victim then," he said, trying
+to speak lightly. "It would have almost served me right for
+neglecting your warning. I was very careless. You must let me row
+back. I am afraid you have overtasked your strength trying to cheat
+the kelpy."
+
+Reeves rowed homeward in an absolute silence. Helen did not speak and
+he could not. When they reached the dory anchorage he helped her out.
+
+"I think I'll go out to the Point for a walk," he said. "I want to
+steady my nerves. You must go right home and rest. Don't be anxious--I
+won't take any more chances with sea kelpies."
+
+Helen went away without a word, and Reeves walked slowly out to the
+Point. He was grieved beyond measure at the discovery he believed he
+had made. He had never dreamed of such a thing. He was not a vain man,
+and was utterly free from all tendency to flirtation. It had never
+occurred to him that the waking of the girl's deep nature might be
+attended with disastrous consequences. He had honestly meant to help
+her, and what had he done?
+
+He felt very uncomfortable; he could not conscientiously blame
+himself, but he saw that he had acted foolishly. And of course he must
+go away at once. And he must also tell her something she ought to
+know. He wished he had told her long ago.
+
+The following afternoon was a perfect one. Reeves was sketching on the
+sandshore when Helen came. She sat down on a camp stool a little to
+one side and did not speak. After a few moments Reeves pushed away his
+paraphernalia impatiently.
+
+"I don't feel in a mood for work," he said. "It is too dreamy a
+day--one ought to do nothing to be in keeping. Besides, I'm getting
+lazy now that my vacation is nearly over. I must go in a few days."
+
+He avoided looking at her, so he did not see the sudden pallor of her
+face.
+
+"So soon?" she said in a voice expressive of no particular feeling.
+
+"Yes. I ought not to have lingered so long. My world will be
+forgetting me and that will not do. It has been a very pleasant summer
+and I shall be sorry to leave Bay Beach."
+
+"But you will come back next summer?" asked Helen quickly. "You said
+you would."
+
+Reeves nerved himself for his very distasteful task.
+
+"Perhaps," he said, with an attempt at carelessness, "but if I do so,
+I shall not come alone. Somebody who is very dear to me will come with
+me--as my wife. I have never told you about her, Helen, but you and I
+are such good friends that I do not mind doing so now. I am engaged to
+a very sweet girl, and we expect to be married next spring."
+
+There was a brief silence. Reeves had been vaguely afraid of a scene
+and was immensely relieved to find his fear unrealized. Helen sat very
+still. He could not see her face. Did she care, after all? Was he
+mistaken?
+
+When she spoke her voice was perfectly calm.
+
+"Thank you, it is very kind of you to tell me about her. I suppose she
+is very beautiful."
+
+"Yes, here is her picture. You can judge for yourself."
+
+Helen took the portrait from his hand and looked at it steadily. It
+was a miniature painted on ivory, and the face looking out from it was
+certainly lovely.
+
+"It is no wonder you love her," said the girl in a low tone as she
+handed it back. "It must be strange to be so beautiful as that."
+
+Reeves picked up his Tennyson.
+
+"Shall I read you something? What will you have?"
+
+"Read 'Elaine,' please. I want to hear that once more."
+
+Reeves felt a sudden dislike to her choice.
+
+"Wouldn't you prefer something else?" he asked, hurriedly turning over
+the leaves. "'Elaine' is rather sad. Shan't I read 'Guinevere'
+instead?"
+
+"No," said Helen in the same lifeless tone. "I have no sympathy for
+Guinevere. She suffered and her love was unlawful, but she was loved
+in return--she did not waste her love on someone who did not want or
+care for it. Elaine did, and her life went with it. Read me the
+story."
+
+Reeves obeyed. When he had finished he held the book out to her.
+
+"Helen, will you take this Tennyson from me in remembrance of our
+friendship and of the Kelpy's Cave? I shall never forget that I owe my
+life to you."
+
+"Thank you."
+
+She took the book and placed a little thread of crimson seaweed that
+had been caught in the sand between the pages of "Elaine." Then she
+rose.
+
+"I must go back now. Aunt will need me. Thank you again for the book,
+Mr. Reeves, and for all your kindness to me."
+
+Reeves was relieved when the interview was over. Her calmness had
+reassured him. She did not care very much, after all; it was only a
+passing fancy, and when he was gone she would soon forget him.
+
+He went away a few days later, and Helen bade him an impassive
+good-bye. When the afternoon was far spent she stole away from the
+house to the shore, with her Tennyson in her hand, and took her way to
+the Kelpy's Cave.
+
+The tide was just beginning to come in. She sat down on the big
+boulder where Reeves had fallen asleep. Beyond stretched the gleaming
+blue waters, mellowing into a hundred fairy shades horizonward.
+
+The shadows of the rocks were around her. In front was the white line
+of the incoming tide; it had almost reached the headlands. A few
+minutes more and escape would be cut off--yet she did not move.
+
+When the dark green water reached her, and the lapping wavelets
+swished up over the hem of her dress, she lifted her head and a sudden
+strange smile flashed over her face.
+
+Perhaps the kelpy understood it.
+
+
+
+
+The Way of the Winning of Anne
+
+
+Jerome Irving had been courting Anne Stockard for fifteen years. He
+had begun when she was twenty and he was twenty-five, and now that
+Jerome was forty, and Anne, in a village where everybody knew
+everybody else's age, had to own to being thirty-five, the courtship
+did not seem any nearer a climax than it had at the beginning. But
+that was not Jerome's fault, poor fellow!
+
+At the end of the first year he had asked Anne to marry him, and Anne
+had refused. Jerome was disappointed, but he kept his head and went on
+courting Anne just the same; that is he went over to Esek Stockard's
+house every Saturday night and spent the evening, he walked home with
+Anne from prayer meeting and singing school and parties when she would
+let him, and asked her to go to all the concerts and socials and
+quilting frolics that came off. Anne never would go, of course, but
+Jerome faithfully gave her the chance. Old Esek rather favoured
+Jerome's suit, for Anne was the plainest of his many daughters, and no
+other fellow seemed at all anxious to run Jerome off the track; but
+she took her own way with true Stockard firmness, and matters were
+allowed to drift on at the will of time or chance.
+
+Three years later Jerome tried his luck again, with precisely the same
+result, and after that he had asked Anne regularly once a year to
+marry him, and just as regularly Anne said no a little more brusquely
+and a little more decidedly every year. Now, in the mellowness of a
+fifteen-year-old courtship, Jerome did not mind it at all. He knew
+that everything comes to the man who has patience to wait.
+
+Time, of course, had not stood still with Anne and Jerome, or with the
+history of Deep Meadows. At the Stockard homestead the changes had
+been many and marked. Every year or two there had been a wedding in
+the big brick farmhouse, and one of old Esek's girls had been the
+bride each time. Julia and Grace and Celia and Betty and Theodosia
+and Clementina Stockard were all married and gone. But Anne had never
+had another lover. There had to be an old maid in every big family she
+said, and she was not going to marry Jerome Irving just for the sake
+of having Mrs. on her tombstone.
+
+Old Esek and his wife had been put away in the Deep Meadows
+burying-ground. The broad, fertile Stockard acres passed into Anne's
+possession. She was a good business-woman, and the farm continued to
+be the best in the district. She kept two hired men and a servant
+girl, and the sixteen-year-old of her oldest sister lived with her.
+There were few visitors at the Stockard place now, but Jerome "dropped
+in" every Saturday night with clockwork regularity and talked to Anne
+about her stock and advised her regarding the rotation of her crops
+and the setting out of her orchards. And at ten o'clock he would take
+his hat and cane and tell Anne to be good to herself, and go home.
+
+Anne had long since given up trying to discourage him; she even
+accepted attentions from him now that she had used to refuse. He
+always walked home with her from evening meetings and was her partner
+in the games at quilting parties. It was great fun for the young
+folks. "Old Jerome and Anne" were a standing joke in Deep Meadows. But
+the older people had ceased to expect anything to come of it.
+
+Anne laughed at Jerome as she had always done, and would not have
+owned for the world that she could have missed him. Jerome was useful,
+she admitted, and a comfortable friend; and she would have liked him
+well enough if he would only omit that ridiculous yearly ceremony of
+proposal.
+
+It was Jerome's fortieth birthday when Anne refused him again. He
+realized this as he went down the road in the moonlight, and doubt and
+dismay began to creep into his heart. Anne and he were both getting
+old--there was no disputing that fact. It was high time that he
+brought her to terms if he was ever going to. Jerome was an
+easy-going mortal and always took things placidly, but he did not
+mean to have all those fifteen years of patient courting go for
+nothing He had thought Anne would get tired of saying no, sooner or
+later, and say yes, if for no other reason than to have a change; but
+getting tired did not seem to run in the Stockard blood. She had said
+no that night just as coolly and decidedly and unsentimentally as she
+said it fifteen years before. Jerome had the sensation of going around
+in a circle and never getting any further on. He made up his mind that
+something must be done, and just as he got to the brook that divides
+Deep Meadows West from Deep Meadows Central an idea struck him; it was
+a good idea and amused him. He laughed aloud and slapped his thigh,
+much to the amusement of two boys who were sitting unnoticed on the
+railing of the bridge.
+
+"There's old Jerome going home from seeing Anne Stockard," said one.
+"Wonder what on earth he's laughing at. Seems to me if I couldn't get
+a wife without hoeing a fifteen-year row, I'd give up trying."
+
+But, then, the speaker was a Hamilton, and the Hamiltons never had any
+perseverance.
+
+Jerome, although a well-to-do man, owning a good farm, had, so to
+speak, no home of his own. The old Irving homestead belonged to his
+older brother, who had a wife and family. Jerome lived with them and
+was so used to it he didn't mind.
+
+At forty a lover must not waste time. Jerome thought out the details
+that night, and next day he opened the campaign. But it was not until
+the evening after that that Anne Stockard heard the news. It was her
+niece, Octavia, who told her. The latter had been having a chat up the
+lane with Sam Mitchell, and came in with a broad smile on her round,
+rosy face and a twinkle in her eyes.
+
+"I guess you've lost your beau this time, Aunt Anne. It looks as if he
+meant to take you at your word at last."
+
+"What on earth do you mean?" asked Anne, a little sharply. She was in
+the pantry counting eggs, and Octavia's interruption made her lose her
+count. "Now I can't remember whether it was six or seven dozen I said
+last. I shall have to count them all over again. I wish, Octavia, that
+you could think of something besides beaus all the time."
+
+"Well, but listen," persisted Octavia wickedly. "Jerome Irving was at
+the social at the Cherry Valley parsonage last night, and he had
+Harriet Warren there--took her there, and drove her home again."
+
+"I don't believe it," cried Anne, before she thought. She dropped an
+egg into the basket so abruptly that the shell broke.
+
+"Oh, it's true enough. Sam Mitchell told me; he was there and saw him.
+Sam says he looked quite beaming, and was dressed to kill, and
+followed Harriet around like her shadow. I guess you won't have any
+more bother with him, Aunt Anne."
+
+In the process of picking the broken egg out of the whole ones Anne
+had recovered her equanimity. She gave a careful little laugh.
+
+"Well, it's to be hoped so. Goodness knows it's time he tried somebody
+else. Go and change your dress for milking, Octavia, and don't spend
+quite so much time gossiping up the lane with Sam Mitchell. He always
+was a fetch-and-carry. Young girls oughtn't to be so pert."
+
+When the subdued Octavia had gone, Anne tossed the broken eggshell out
+of the pantry window viciously enough.
+
+"There's no fool like an old fool. Jerome Irving always was an idiot.
+The idea of his going after Harriet Warren! He's old enough to be her
+father. And a Warren, too! I've seen the time an Irving wouldn't be
+seen on the same side of the road with a Warren. Well, anyhow, I don't
+care, and he needn't suppose I will. It will be a relief not to have
+him hanging around any longer."
+
+It might have been a relief, but Anne felt strangely lonely as she
+walked home alone from prayer meeting the next night. Jerome had not
+been there. The Warrens were Methodists and Anne rightly guessed that
+he had gone to the Methodist prayer meeting at Cherry Valley.
+
+"Dancing attendance on Harriet," she said to herself scornfully.
+
+When she got home she looked at her face in the glass more critically
+than she had done for years. Anne Stockard at her best had never been
+pretty. When young she had been called "gawky." She was very tall and
+her figure was lank and angular. She had a long, pale face and dusky
+hair. Her eyes had been good--a glimmering hazel, large and
+long-lashed. They were pretty yet, but the crow's feet about them were
+plainly visible. There were brackets around her mouth too, and her
+cheeks were hollow. Anne suddenly realized, as she had never realized
+before, that she had grown old--that her youth was left far behind.
+She was an old maid, and Harriet Warren was young, and pretty. Anne's
+long, thin lips suddenly quivered.
+
+"I declare, I'm a worse fool than Jerome," she said angrily.
+
+When Saturday night came Jerome did not. The corner of the big,
+old-fashioned porch where he usually sat looked bare and lonely. Anne
+was short with Octavia and boxed the cat's ears and raged at herself.
+What did she care if Jerome Irving never came again? She could have
+married him years ago if she had wanted to--everybody knew that!
+
+At sunset she saw a buggy drive past her gate. Even at that distance
+she recognized Harriet Warren's handsome, high-coloured profile. It
+was Jerome's new buggy and Jerome was driving. The wheel spokes
+flashed in the sunlight as they crept up the hill. Perhaps they
+dazzled Anne's eyes a little; at least, for that or some other reason
+she dabbed her hand viciously over them as she turned sharply about
+and went upstairs. Octavia was practising her music lesson in the
+parlour below and singing in a sweet shrill voice. The hired men were
+laughing and talking in the yard. Anne slammed down her window and
+banged her door and then lay down on her bed; she said her head ached.
+
+The Deep Meadows people were amused and made joking remarks to Anne,
+which she had to take amiably because she had no excuse for resenting
+them. In reality they stung her pride unendurably. When Jerome had
+gone she realized that she had no other intimate friend and that she
+was a very lonely woman whom nobody cared about. One night--it was
+three weeks afterward--she met Jerome and Harriet squarely. She was
+walking to church with Octavia, and they were driving in the opposite
+direction. Jerome had his new buggy and crimson lap robe. His horse's
+coat shone like satin and had rosettes of crimson on his bridle.
+Jerome was dressed extremely well and looked quite young, with his
+round, ruddy, clean-shaven face and clear blue eyes.
+
+Harriet was sitting primly and consciously by his side; she was a very
+handsome girl with bold eyes and was somewhat overdressed. She wore a
+big flowery hat and a white lace veil and looked at Anne with a
+supercilious smile.
+
+Anne felt dowdy and old; she was very pale. Jerome lifted his hat and
+bowed pleasantly as they drove past. Suddenly Harriet laughed out.
+Anne did not look back, but her face crimsoned darkly. Was that girl
+laughing at her? She trembled with anger and a sharp, hurt feeling.
+When she got home that night she sat a long while by her window.
+
+Jerome was gone--and he let Harriet Warren laugh at her and he would
+never come back to her. Well, it did not matter, but she had been a
+fool. Only it had never occurred to her that Jerome could act so.
+
+"If I'd thought he would I mightn't have been so sharp with him," was
+as far as she would let herself go even in thought.
+
+When four weeks had elapsed Jerome came over one Saturday night. He
+was fluttered and anxious, but hid it in a masterly manner.
+
+Anne was taken by surprise. She had not thought he would ever come
+again, and was off her guard. He had come around the porch corner
+abruptly as she stood there in the dusk, and she started very
+perceptibly.
+
+"Good evening, Anne," he said, easily and unblushingly.
+
+Anne choked up. She was very angry, or thought she was. Jerome
+appeared not to notice her lack of welcome. He sat coolly down in his
+old place. His heart was beating like a hammer, but Anne did not know
+that.
+
+"I suppose," she said cuttingly, "that you're on your way down to the
+bridge. It's almost a pity for you to waste time stopping here at all,
+any more than you have of late. No doubt Harriet'll be expecting you."
+
+A gleam of satisfaction flashed over Jerome's face. He looked shrewdly
+at Anne, who was not looking at him, but was staring uncompromisingly
+out over the poppy beds. A jealous woman always gives herself away. If
+Anne had been indifferent she would not have given him that slap in
+the face.
+
+"I dunno's she will," he replied coolly. "I didn't say for sure
+whether I'd be down tonight or not. It's so long since I had a chat
+with you I thought I'd drop in for a spell. But of course if I'm not
+wanted I can go where I will be."
+
+Anne could not get back her self-control. Her nerves were "all strung
+up," as she would have said. She had a feeling that she was right on
+the brink of a "scene," but she could not help herself.
+
+"I guess it doesn't matter much what I want," she said stonily. "At
+any rate, it hasn't seemed that way lately. You don't care, of course.
+Oh, no! Harriet Warren is all you care about. Well, I wish you joy of
+her."
+
+Jerome looked puzzled, or pretended to. In reality he was hugging
+himself with delight.
+
+"I don't just understand you, Anne," he said hesitatingly "You appear
+to be vexed about something."
+
+"I? Oh, no, I'm not, Mr. Irving. Of course old friends don't count
+now. Well, I've no doubt new ones will wear just as well."
+
+"If it's about my going to see Harriet," said Jerome easily "I don't
+see as how it can matter much to you. Goodness knows, you took enough
+pains to show me you didn't want me. I don't blame you. A woman has a
+right to please herself, and a man ought to have sense to take his
+answer and go. I hadn't, and that's where I made my mistake. I don't
+mean to pester you any more, but we can be real good friends, can't
+we? I'm sure I'm as much your friend as ever I was."
+
+Now, I hold that this speech of Jerome's, delivered in a cool,
+matter-of-fact tone, as of a man stating a case with dispassionate
+fairness, was a masterpiece. It was the last cleverly executed
+movement of the campaign. If it failed to effect a capitulation, he
+was a defeated man. But it did not fail.
+
+Anne had got to that point where an excited woman must go mad or cry.
+Anne cried. She sat flatly down on a chair and burst into tears.
+
+Jerome's hat went one way and his cane another. Jerome himself sprang
+across the intervening space and dropped into the chair beside Anne.
+He caught her hand in his and threw his arm boldly around her waist.
+
+"Goodness gracious, Anne! Do you care after all? Tell me that!"
+
+"I don't suppose it matters to you if I do," sobbed Anne. "It hasn't
+seemed to matter, anyhow."
+
+"Anne, look here! Didn't I come after you for fifteen years? It's you
+I always have wanted and want yet, if I can get you. I don't care a
+rap for Harriet Warren or anyone but you. Now that's the truth right
+out, Anne."
+
+No doubt it was, and Anne was convinced of it. But she had to have her
+cry out--on Jerome's shoulder--and it soothed her nerves wonderfully.
+Later on Octavia, slipping noiselessly up the steps in the dusk, saw a
+sight that transfixed her with astonishment. When she recovered
+herself she turned and fled wildly around the house, running bump into
+Sam Mitchell, who was coming across the yard from a twilight
+conference with the hired men.
+
+"Goodness, Tavy, what's the matter? Y' look 'sif y'd seen a ghost."
+
+Octavia leaned up against the wall in spasms of mirth.
+
+"Oh, Sam," she gasped, "old Jerome Irving and Aunt Anne are sitting
+round there in the dark on the front porch and he had his arms around
+her, kissing her! And they never saw nor heard me, no more'n if they
+were deaf and blind!"
+
+Sam gave a tremendous whistle and then went off into a shout of
+laughter whose echoes reached even to the gloom of the front porch and
+the ears of the lovers. But they did not know he was laughing at them
+and would not have cared if they had. They were too happy for that.
+
+There was a wedding that fall and Anne Stockard was the bride. When
+she was safely his, Jerome confessed all and was graciously forgiven.
+
+"But it was kind of mean to Harriet," said Anne rebukingly, "to go
+with her and get her talked about and then drop her as you did. Don't
+you think so yourself, Jerome?"
+
+Her husband's eyes twinkled.
+
+"Well, hardly that. You see, Harriet's engaged to that Johnson fellow
+out west. 'Tain't generally known, but I knew it and that's why I
+picked on her. I thought it probable that she'd be willing enough to
+flirt with me for a little diversion, even if I was old. Harriet's
+that sort of a girl. And I made up my mind that if that didn't fetch
+it nothing would and I'd give up for good and all. But it did, didn't
+it, Anne?"
+
+"I should say so. It was horrid of you, Jerome--but I daresay it's
+just as well you did or I'd likely never have found out that I
+couldn't get along without you. I did feel dreadful. Poor Octavia
+could tell you I was as cross as X. How did you come to think of it,
+Jerome?"
+
+"A fellow had to do something," said Jerome oracularly, "and I'd have
+done most anything to get you, Anne, that's a fact. And there it
+was--courting fifteen years and nothing to show for it. I dunno,
+though, how I did come to think of it. Guess it was a sort of
+inspiration. Anyhow, I've got you and that's what I set out to do in
+the beginning."
+
+
+
+
+Young Si
+
+
+Mr. Bentley had just driven into the yard with the new summer boarder.
+Mrs. Bentley and Agnes were peeping at her from behind the parlour
+curtains with the keen interest that they--shut in by their restricted
+farm life--always felt in any visitor from the outside world lying
+beyond their boundary of purple misted hills.
+
+Mrs. Bentley was a plump, rosy-cheeked woman with a motherly smile.
+Agnes was a fair, slim schoolgirl, as tall as her mother, with a sweet
+face and a promise of peach blossom prettiness in the years to come.
+The arrival of a summer boarder was a great event in her quiet life.
+
+"Ain't she pretty?" whispered Mrs. Bentley admiringly, as the girl
+came slowly up the green slope before the house. "I do hope she's
+nice. You can generally calculate on men boarders, but girls are
+doubtful. Preserve me from a cranky boarder! I've had enough of them.
+I kinder like her looks, though."
+
+Ethel Lennox had paused at the front door as Mrs. Bentley and Agnes
+came into the hall. Agnes gazed at the stranger with shy, unenvious
+admiration; the latter stood on the stone step just where the big
+chestnut by the door cast flickering gleams and shadows over her dress
+and shining hair.
+
+She was tall, and gowned in some simple white material that fell about
+her in graceful folds. She wore a cluster of pale pink roses at her
+belt, and a big, picturesque white hat shaded her face and the glossy,
+clinging masses of her red hair--hair that was neither auburn nor
+chestnut but simply red. Nor would anyone have wished it otherwise,
+having once seen that glorious mass, with all its wonderful
+possibilities of rippling luxuriance.
+
+Her complexion was of that perfect, waxen whiteness that goes with
+burnished red hair and the darkest of dilated violet eyes. Her
+delicately chiselled features wore what might have been a somewhat too
+decided impress of spirit and independence, had it not been for the
+sweet mouth, red and dimpled and curving, that parted in a slow,
+charming smile as Mrs. Bentley came forward with her kindly welcome.
+
+"You must be real tired, Miss Lennox. It's a long drive from the train
+down here. Agnes, show Miss Lennox up to her room, and tea will be
+ready when you come down."
+
+Agnes came forward with the shy grace that always won friends for her,
+and the two girls went slowly up the broad, old-fashioned staircase,
+while Mrs. Bentley bustled away to bring in the tea and put a goblet
+of damask roses on the table.
+
+"She looks like a picture, doesn't she, John?" she said to her
+husband. "I never saw such a face--and that hair too. Would you have
+believed red hair could be so handsome? She seems real friendly--none
+of your stuck-up fine ladies! I've had all I want of them, I can tell
+you!"
+
+"Sh--sh--sh!" said Mr. Bentley warningly, as Ethel Lennox came in with
+her arm about Agnes.
+
+She looked even more lovely without her hat, with the soft red
+tendrils of hair lying on her forehead. Mrs. Bentley sent a
+telegraphic message of admiration across the table to her husband, who
+was helping the cold tongue and feeling his way to a conversation.
+
+"You'll find it pretty quiet here, Miss Lennox. We're plain folks and
+there ain't much going and coming. Maybe you don't mind that, though?"
+
+"I like it. When one has been teaching school all the year in a noisy
+city, quiet seems the one thing to be desired. Besides, I like to
+fancy myself something of an artist. I paint and sketch a little when
+I have time, and Miss Courtland, who was here last summer, said I
+could not find a more suitable spot. So I came because I knew that
+mackerel fishing was carried on along the shore, and I would have a
+chance to study character among the fishermen."
+
+"Well, the shore ain't far away, and it's pretty--though maybe us
+folks here don't appreciate it rightly, being as we're so used to it.
+Strangers are always going crazy over its 'picturesqueness,' as they
+call it. As for 'character,' I reckon you'll find all you want of that
+among the Pointers; anyway, I never seed such critters as they be.
+When you get tired of painting, maybe you can amuse yourself trying to
+get to the bottom of our mystery."
+
+"Oh, have you a mystery? How interesting!"
+
+"Yes, a mystery--a mystery," repeated Mr. Bentley solemnly, "that
+nobody hain't been able to solve so far. I've give it up--so has
+everyone else. Maybe you'll have better luck."
+
+"But what is it?"
+
+"The mystery," said Mr. Bentley dramatically, "is--Young Si. He's the
+mystery. Last spring, just when the herring struck in, a young chap
+suddenly appeared at the Point. He appeared--from what corner of the
+globe nobody hain't ever been able to make out. He bought a boat and a
+shanty down at my shore and went into a sort of mackerel partnership
+with Snuffy Curtis--Snuffy supplying the experience and this young
+fellow the cash, I reckon. Snuffy's as poor as Job's turkey; it was a
+windfall for him. And there he's fished all summer."
+
+"But his name--Young Si?"
+
+"Well, of course, that isn't it. He did give himself out as Brown, but
+nobody believes that's his handle--sounds unnatteral here. He bought
+his establishment from 'old Si,' who used to fish down there and was a
+mysterious old critter in a way too. So when this young fellow stepped
+in from goodness knows where, some of the Pointers christened him
+Young Si for a joke, and he never gets anything else. Doesn't seem to
+mind it. He's a moody, keep-to-himself sort of chap. Yet he ain't
+unpopular along shore, I believe. Snuffy was telling me they like him
+real well, considering his unsociableness. Anyways, he's as handsome a
+chap as I ever seed, and well eddicated too. He ain't none of your
+ordinary fishermen. Some of us kind of think he's a runaway--got into
+some scrape or another, maybe, and is skulking around here to keep out
+of jail. But wife here won't give in to that."
+
+"No, I never will," said Mrs. Bentley firmly. "Young Si comes here
+often for milk and butter, and he's a perfect gentleman. Nobody'll
+ever convince me that he has done anything to be ashamed of,
+whatever's his reason for wasting his life down there at that shore."
+
+"He ain't wasting his life," chuckled Mr. Bentley. "He's making
+money, Young Si is, though he don't seem to care about that a mite.
+This has been a big year for mackerel, and he's smart. If he didn't
+know much when he begun, he's ahead of Snuffy now. And as for work, I
+never saw his beat. He seems possessed. Up afore sunrise every blessed
+morning and never in bed till midnight, and just slaving away all
+between time. I said to him t'other day, says I: 'Young Si, you'll
+have to let up on this sort of thing and take a rest. You can't stand
+it. You're not a Pointer. Pointers can stand anything, but it'll kill
+you.'
+
+"He give one of them bitter laughs of his. Says he: 'It's no
+difference if it does. Nobody'll care,' and off he walks, sulky like.
+There's something about Young Si I can't understand," concluded Mr.
+Bentley.
+
+Ethel Lennox was interested. A melancholy, mysterious hero in a
+setting of silver-rimmed sand hills and wide blue sweeps of ocean was
+something that ought to lend piquancy to her vacation.
+
+"I should like to see this prince in disguise," she said. "It all
+sounds very romantic."
+
+"I'll take you to the shore after tea if you'd like," said Agnes
+eagerly. "Si's just splendid," she continued in a confidential aside
+as they rose from the table. "Pa doesn't half like him because he
+thinks there's something queer about him. But I do. He's a gentleman,
+as Ma says. I don't believe he's done anything wrong."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Ethel Lennox sauntered out into the orchard to wait for Agnes. She sat
+down under an apple tree and began to read, but soon the book slipped
+from her hands and the beautiful head leaned back against the grey,
+lichened trunk of the old tree. The sweet mouth drooped wistfully.
+There was a sad, far-away look in the violet eyes. The face was not
+that of a happy girl, so thought Agnes as she came down the apple tree
+avenue.
+
+But how pretty she is! she thought. Won't the folks around here stare
+at her! They always do at our boarders, but we've never had one like
+her.
+
+Ethel sprang up. "I had no idea you would be here so soon," she said
+brightly. "Just wait till I get my hat."
+
+When she came out they started off, and presently found themselves
+walking down a grassy, deep-rutted lane that ran through mown hay
+fields, green with their rich aftergrowth, and sheets of pale ripening
+oats and golden-green wheat, until it lost itself in the rolling sand
+hills at the foot of the slope.
+
+Beyond the sand hills stretched the shining expanse of the ocean, of
+the faint, bleached blue of hot August seas, and reaching out into a
+horizon laced with long trails of pinkish cloud. Numberless fishing
+boats dotted the shimmering reaches.
+
+"That furthest-off boat is Young Si's," said Agnes. "He always goes to
+that particular spot."
+
+"Is he really all your father says?" asked Miss Lennox curiously.
+
+"Indeed, he is. He isn't any more like the rest of the shore men than
+you are. He's queer, of course. I don't believe he's happy. It seems
+to me he's worrying over something, but I'm sure it is nothing wrong.
+Here we are," she added, as they passed the sand hills and came out on
+the long, level beach.
+
+To their left the shore curved around in a semi-circle of dazzling
+whiteness; at their right stood a small grey fish-house.
+
+"That's Young Si's place," said Agnes. "He lives there night and day.
+Wouldn't it make anyone melancholy? No wonder he's mysterious. I'm
+going to get his spyglass. He told me I might always use it."
+
+She pushed open the door and entered, followed by Ethel. The interior
+was rough but clean. It was a small room, lighted by one tiny window
+looking out on the water. In one corner a rough ladder led up to the
+loft above. The bare lathed walls were hung with fishing jackets,
+nets, mackerel lines and other shore appurtenances. A little stove
+bore a kettle and a frying pan. A low board table was strewn with
+dishes and the cold remnants of a hasty repast; benches were placed
+along the walls. A fat, bewhiskered kitten, looking as if it were cut
+out of black velvet, was dozing on the window sill.
+
+"This is Young Si's cat," explained Agnes, patting the creature, which
+purred joyously and opened its sleepy green eyes. "It's the only thing
+he cares for, I believe. Witch! Witch! How are you, Witch? Well,
+here's the spyglass. Let's go out and have a look. Si's catching
+mackerel," announced Agnes a few minutes later, after she had
+scrutinized each boat in turn, "and he won't be in for an hour yet. If
+you like, we have time for a walk up the shore."
+
+The sun slipped lower and lower in the creamy sky, leaving a trail of
+sparkles that ran across the water and lost itself in the west. Sea
+gulls soared and dipped, and tiny "sand peeps" flitted along the
+beach. Just as the red rim of the sun dipped in the purpling sea, the
+boats began to come in.
+
+"Most of them will go around to the Point," explained Agnes, with a
+contemptuous sweep of her hand towards a long headland running out
+before them. "They belong there and they're a rough crowd. You don't
+catch Young Si associating with the Pointers. There, he's getting up
+sail. We'll just have time to get back before he comes in."
+
+They hurried back across the dampening sand as the sun disappeared,
+leaving a fiery spot behind him. The shore was no longer quiet and
+deserted. The little spot where the fishing house stood had suddenly
+started into life. Roughly clad boys were running hither and thither,
+carrying fish or water. The boats were hauled up on the skids. A
+couple of shaggy old tars, who had strolled over from the Point to
+hear about Young Si's catch, were smoking their pipes at the corner of
+his shanty. A mellow afterlight was shining over sea and shore. The
+whole scene delighted Ethel's artist eyes.
+
+Agnes nudged her companion.
+
+"There! If you want to see Young Si," she whispered, pointing to the
+skids, where a busy figure was discernible in a large boat, "that's
+him, with his back to us, in the cream-coloured boat. He's counting
+out mackerel. If you go over to that platform behind him, you'll get a
+good look when he turns around. I'm going to coax a mackerel out of
+that stingy old Snuffy, if I can."
+
+She tripped off, and Ethel walked slowly over to the boats. The men
+stared at her in open-mouthed admiration as she passed them and walked
+out on the platform behind Young Si. There was no one near the two.
+The others were all assembled around Snuffy's boat. Young Si was
+throwing out the mackerel with marvellous rapidity, but at the sound
+of a footstep behind him he turned and straightened up his tall form.
+They stood face to face.
+
+"Miles!"
+
+"Ethel!"
+
+Young Si staggered back against the mast, letting two silvery bloaters
+slip through his hands overboard. His handsome, sunburned face was
+very white.
+
+Ethel Lennox turned abruptly and silently and walked swiftly across
+the sand. Agnes felt her arm touched, and turned to see Ethel
+standing, pale and erect, beside her.
+
+"Let us go home," said the latter unsteadily. "It is very damp here--I
+feel chilled."
+
+"Oh, dear!" exclaimed Agnes penitently. "I ought to have told you to
+bring a shawl. It is always damp on the shore after sunset. Here,
+Snuffy, give me my mackerel. Thank you. I'm ready now, Miss Lennox."
+
+They reached the lane before Agnes remembered to ask the question
+Ethel dreaded.
+
+"Oh, did you see Young Si? And what do you think of him?"
+
+Ethel turned her face away and answered with studied carelessness. "He
+seems to be quite a superior fisherman so far as I could see in the
+dim light. It was very dusky there, you know. Let us walk a little
+faster. My shoes are quite wet."
+
+When they reached home, Miss Lennox excused herself on the plea of
+weariness and went straight to her room.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Back at the shore Young Si had recovered himself and stooped again to
+his work. His face was set and expressionless. A dull red burned in
+each bronzed cheek. He threw out the mackerel mechanically, but his
+hands trembled.
+
+Snuffy strolled over to the boat. "See that handsome girl, Si?" he
+asked lazily. "One of the Bentleys' boarders, I hear. Looks as if she
+might have stepped out of a picture frame, don't she?"
+
+"We've no time to waste, Curtis," said Young Si harshly, "with all
+these fish to clean before bedtime. Stop talking and get to work."
+
+Snuffy shrugged his shoulders and obeyed in silence. Young Si was not
+a person to be trifled with. The catch was large and it was late
+before they finished. Snuffy surveyed the full barrels complacently.
+
+"Good day's work," he muttered, "but hard--I'm dead beat out. 'Low
+I'll go to bed. In the name o' goodness, Si, whar be you a-goin' to?"
+
+Young Si had got into a dory and untied it. He made no answer, but
+rowed out from the shore. Snuffy stared at the dory blankly until it
+was lost in the gloom.
+
+"Ef that don't beat all!" he ejaculated. "I wonder if Si is in his
+right senses? He's been actin' quar right along, and now to start off,
+Lord knows whar, at this hour o' night! I really don't believe it's
+safe to stay here alone with him."
+
+Snuffy shook his unkempt head dubiously.
+
+Young Si rowed steadily out over the dark waves. An eastern breeze was
+bringing in a damp sea fog that blurred darkly over the outlines of
+horizon and shore. The young fisherman found himself alone in a world
+of water and grey mist. He stopped rowing and leaned forward on his
+oars.
+
+"To see her here, of all places!" he muttered. "Not a word, scarcely a
+look, after all this long heartbreak! Well, perhaps it is better so.
+And yet to know she is so near! How beautiful she is! And I love her
+more than ever. That is where the sting lies. I thought that in this
+rough life, amid all these rude associations, where nothing could
+remind me of her, I might forget. And now--"
+
+He clenched his hands. The mist was all around and about him,
+creeping, impalpable, phantom-like. The dory rocked gently on the
+swell. From afar came the low persistent murmur of the ocean.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The next day Ethel Lennox declined to visit Si's shore. Instead she
+went to the Point and sketched all day. She went again the next day
+and the next. The Point was the most picturesque part of the shore,
+she averred, and the "types" among its inhabitants most interesting.
+Agnes Bentley ceased to suggest another visit to Si's shore. She had a
+vague perception that her companion did not care to discuss the
+subject.
+
+At the end of a week Mrs. Bentley remarked: "What in the world can
+have happened to Young Si? It's a whole week since he was here for
+milk or butter. He ain't sick, is he?"
+
+Mr. Bentley chuckled amusedly.
+
+"I 'low I can tell you the reason of that. Si's getting his stuff at
+Walden's now. I saw him going there twice this week. 'Liza Walden's
+got ahead of you at last, Mary."
+
+"Well, I never did!" said Mrs. Bentley. "Well, Young Si is the first
+that ever preferred 'Liza Walden's butter to mine. Everyone knows what
+hers is like. She never works her salt half in. Well, Young Si's
+welcome to it, I'm sure; I wish him joy of his exchange."
+
+Mrs. Bentley rattled her dishes ominously. It was plain her faith in
+Young Si had received a severe shock.
+
+Upstairs in her room, Ethel Lennox, with a few undried tears
+glistening on her cheeks, was writing a letter. Her lips were
+compressed and her hand trembled:
+
+"I have discovered that it is no use to run away from fate," she
+wrote. "No matter how hard we try to elude it, and how sure we are
+that we have succeeded, it will rise and meet us where we least expect
+it. I came down here tired and worn out, looking for peace and
+rest--and lo! the most disquieting element of my life is here to
+confront me.
+
+"I'm going to confess, Helen. 'Open confession is good for the soul,'
+you know, and I shall treat myself to a good dose while the mood is
+on.
+
+"You know, of course, that I was once engaged to Miles Lesley. You
+also know that that engagement was broken last autumn for unexplained
+reasons. Well, I will tell you all about it and then mail this letter
+speedily, before I change my mind.
+
+"It is over a year now since Miles and I first became engaged. As you
+are aware, his family is wealthy, and noted for its exclusiveness. I
+was a poor school teacher, and you may imagine with what horror his
+relatives received the news of Miles's attentions to one whom they
+considered his inferior. Now that I have thought the whole matter over
+calmly, I scarcely blame them. It must be hard for aristocratic
+parents who have lavished every care upon a son, and cherished for him
+the highest hopes, when he turns from the women of his own order to
+one considered beneath him in station. But I did not view the subject
+in this light then; and instead of declining his attentions, as I
+perhaps should have done, I encouraged them--I loved him so dearly,
+Nell!--and in spite of family opposition, Miles soon openly declared
+his attachment.
+
+"When his parents found they could not change his purpose, their
+affection for him forced them into outward acquiescence, but their
+reluctant condescension was gall and wormwood to me. I saw things only
+from my own point of view, and was keenly sensitive to their politely
+concealed disapprobation, and my offended vanity found its victim in
+Miles. I belonged to the class who admit and resent slights, instead
+of ignoring them, as do the higher bred, and I thought he would not
+see those offered to me. I grew cold and formal to him. He was very
+patient, but his ways were not mine, and my manner puzzled and annoyed
+him. Our relations soon became strained, and the trifle necessary for
+an open quarrel was easily supplied.
+
+"One evening I went to a large At Home given by his mother. I knew but
+few and, as Miles was necessarily busy with his social duties to her
+guests, I was, after the first hurried greeting, left unattended for a
+time. Not being accustomed to such functions, I resented this as a
+covert insult and, in a fit of jealous pique, I blush to own that I
+took the revenge of a peasant maid and entered into a marked
+flirtation with Fred Currie, who had paid me some attention before my
+engagement. When Miles was at liberty to seek me, he found me, to all
+appearances, quite absorbed in my companion and oblivious of his
+approach. He turned on his heel and went away, nor did he come near me
+the rest of the evening.
+
+"I went home angry enough, but so miserable and repentant that if
+Miles had been his usual patient self when he called the following
+evening I would have begged his forgiveness. But I had gone too far;
+his mother was shocked by my gaucherie, and he was humiliated and
+justly exasperated. We had a short, bitter quarrel. I said a great
+many foolish, unpardonable things, and finally I threw his ring at
+him. He gave me a startled look then, in which there was something of
+contempt, and went away without another word.
+
+"After my anger had passed, I was wretchedly unhappy. I realized how
+unworthily I had acted, how deeply I loved Miles, and how lonely and
+empty my life would be without him. But he did not come back, and soon
+after I learned he had gone away--whither no one knew, but it was
+supposed abroad. Well, I buried my hopes and tears in secret and went
+on with my life as people have to do--a life in which I have learned
+to think, and which, I hope, has made me nobler and better.
+
+"This summer I came here. I heard much about a certain mysterious
+stranger known as 'Young Si' who was fishing mackerel at this shore. I
+was very curious. The story sounded romantic, and one evening I went
+down to see him. I met him face to face and, Helen, it was Miles
+Lesley!
+
+"For one minute earth, sky and sea reeled around me. The next, I
+remembered all, and turned and walked away. He did not follow.
+
+"You may be sure that I now religiously avoid that part of the shore.
+We have never met since, and he has made no effort to see me. He
+clearly shows that he despises me. Well, I despise myself. I am very
+unhappy, Nell, and not only on my own account, for I feel that if
+Miles had never met me, his mother would not now be breaking her heart
+for her absent boy. My sorrow has taught me to understand hers, and I
+no longer resent her pride.
+
+"You need hardly be told after this that I leave here in another week.
+I cannot fabricate a decent excuse to go sooner, or I would."
+
+In the cool twilight Ethel went with Agnes Bentley to mail her letter.
+As they stopped at the door of the little country store, a young man
+came around the corner. It was Young Si. He was in his rough fishing
+suit, with a big herring net trailing over his shoulder, but no
+disguise could effectually conceal his splendid figure. Agnes sprang
+forward eagerly.
+
+"Si, where have you been? Why have you never I been up to see us for
+so long?"
+
+Young Si made no verbal reply. He merely lifted his cap with formal
+politeness and turned on his heel.
+
+"Well, I never!" exclaimed Agnes, as soon as she recovered her powers
+of speech. "If that is how Young Si is going to treat his friends! He
+must have got offended at something. I wonder what it is," she added,
+her curiosity getting the better of her indignation.
+
+When they came out they saw the solitary figure of Young Si far adown,
+crossing the dim, lonely shore fields. In the dusk Agnes failed to
+notice the pallor of her companion's face and the unshed tears in her
+eyes.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"I've just been down to the Point," said Agnes, coming in one sultry
+afternoon about a week later, "and Little Ev said as there was no
+fishing today he'd take us out for that sail tonight if you wanted to
+go."
+
+Ethel Lennox put her drawing away listlessly. She looked pale and
+tired. She was going away the next day, and this was to be her last
+visit to the shore.
+
+About an hour before sunset a boat glided out from the shadow of the
+Point. In it were Ethel Lennox and Agnes, together with Little Ev, the
+sandy-haired, undersized Pointer who owned the boat.
+
+The evening was fine, and an off-shore breeze was freshening up
+rapidly. They did not notice the long, dark bank of livid cloud low in
+the northwest.
+
+"Isn't this glorious!" exclaimed Ethel. Her hat was straining back
+from her head and the red rings of her hair were blowing about her
+face.
+
+Agnes looked about her more anxiously. Wiser in matters of sea and
+shore than her companion, there were some indications she did not
+like.
+
+Young Si, who was standing with Snuffy their skids, lowered his
+spyglass with a start.
+
+"It is Agnes Bentley and--and--that boarder of theirs," he said
+anxiously, "and they've gone out with Little Ev in that wretched,
+leaky tub of his. Where are their eyes that they can't see a squall
+coming up?"
+
+"An' Little Ev don't know as much about managing a boat as a cat!"
+exclaimed Snuffy excitedly. "Sign 'em to come back."
+
+Si shook his head. "They're too far out. I don't know that the squall
+will amount to very much. In a good boat, with someone who knew how to
+manage it, they'd be all right. But with Little Ev--" He began walking
+restlessly up and down the narrow platform.
+
+The boat was now some distance out. The breeze had stiffened to a slow
+strong wind and the dull-grey level of the sea was whipped into
+white-caps.
+
+Agnes bent towards Ethel. "It's getting too rough. I think we'd better
+go back. I'm afraid we're in for a thunder squall. Look at the
+clouds."
+
+A long, sullen muttering verified her words.
+
+"Little Ev," she shouted, "we want to go in."
+
+Little Ev, thus recalled to things about him, looked around in alarm.
+The girls questioned each other with glances of dismay. The sky had
+grown very black, and the peals of thunder came louder and more
+continuously. A jagged bolt of lightning hurtled over the horizon.
+Over land and sea was "the green, malignant light of coming storm."
+
+Little Ev brought the boat's head abruptly round as a few heavy drops
+of rain fell.
+
+"Ev, the boat is leaking!" shrieked Agnes, above the wind. "The
+water's coming in!"
+
+"Bail her out then," shouted Ev, struggling with the sail. "There's
+two cans under the seat. I've got to lower this sail. Bail her out."
+
+"I'll help you," said Ethel.
+
+She was very pale, but her manner was calm. Both girls bailed
+energetically.
+
+Young Si, watching through the glass, saw them. He dropped it and ran
+to his boat, white and resolute.
+
+"They've sprung a leak. Here, Curtis, launch the boat. We've got to go
+out or Ev will drown them."
+
+They shot out from the shore just as the downpour came, blotting out
+sea and land in one driving sheet of white rain.
+
+"Young Si is coming off for us," said Agnes. "We'll be all right if he
+gets here in time. This boat is going to sink, sure."
+
+Little Ev was completely demoralized by fear. The girls bailed
+unceasingly, but the water gained every minute. Young Si was none too
+soon.
+
+"Jump, Ev!" he shouted as his boat shot alongside. "Jump for your
+life!"
+
+He dragged Ethel Lennox in as he spoke. Agnes sprang from one boat to
+the other like a cat, and Little Ev jumped just as a thunderous crash
+seemed to burst above them and air and sky were filled with blue
+flame.
+
+The danger was past, for the squall had few difficulties for Si and
+Snuffy. When they reached the shore, Agnes, who had quite recovered
+from her fright, tucked her dripping skirts about her and announced
+her determination to go straight home with Snuffy.
+
+"I can't get any wetter than I am," she said cheerfully. "I'll send Pa
+down in the buggy for Miss Lennox. Light the fire in your shanty, Si,
+and let her get dry. I'll be as quick as I can."
+
+Si picked Ethel up in his strong arms and carried her into the
+fish-house. He placed her on one of the low benches and hurriedly
+began to kindle a fire. Ethel sat up dazedly and pushed back the
+dripping masses of her bright hair. Young Si turned and looked down at
+her with a passionate light in his eyes. She put out her cold, wet
+hands wistfully.
+
+"Oh, Miles!" she whispered.
+
+Outside, the wind shook the frail building and tore the shuddering sea
+to pieces. The rain poured down. It was already settling in for a
+night of storm. But, inside, Young Si's fire was casting cheery flames
+over the rude room, and Young Si himself was kneeling by Ethel Lennox
+with his arm about her and her head on his broad shoulder. There were
+happy tears in her eyes and her voice quivered as she said, "Miles,
+can you forgive me? If you knew how bitterly I have repented--"
+
+"Never speak of the past again, my sweet. In my lonely days and nights
+down here by the sea, I have forgotten all but my love."
+
+"Miles, how did you come here? I thought you were in Europe."
+
+"I did travel at first. I came down here by chance, and resolved to
+cut myself utterly adrift from my old life and see if I could not
+forget you. I was not very successful." He smiled down into her eyes.
+"And you were going away tomorrow. How perilously near we have been to
+not meeting! But how are we going to explain all this to our friends
+along shore?"
+
+"I think we had better not explain it at all. I will go away tomorrow,
+as I intended, and you can quietly follow soon. Let 'Young Si' remain
+the mystery he has always been."
+
+"That will be best--decidedly so. They would never understand if we
+did tell them. And I daresay they would be very much disappointed to
+find I was not a murderer or a forger or something of that sort. They
+have always credited me with an evil past. And you and I will go back
+to our own world, Ethel. You will be welcome there now, sweet--my
+family, too, have learned a lesson, and will do anything to promote my
+happiness."
+
+Agnes drove Ethel Lennox to the station next day. The fierce wind that
+had swept over land and sea seemed to have blown away all the hazy
+vapours and oppressive heats in the air, and the morning dawned as
+clear and fresh as if the sad old earth with all her passionate tears
+had cleansed herself from sin and stain and come forth radiantly pure
+and sweet. Ethel bubbled over with joyousness. Agnes wondered at the
+change in her.
+
+"Good-bye, Miss Lennox," she said wistfully. "You'll come back to see
+us some time again, won't you?"
+
+"Perhaps," smiled Ethel, "and if not, Agnes, you must come and see me.
+Some day I may tell you a secret."
+
+About a week later Young Si suddenly vanished, and his disappearance
+was a nine-day's talk along shore. His departure was as mysterious as
+his advent. It leaked out that he had quietly disposed of his boat and
+shanty to Snuffy Curtis, sent his mackerel off and, that done, slipped
+from the Pointers' lives, never more to re-enter them.
+
+Little Ev was the last of the Pointers to see him tramping along the
+road to the station in the dusk of the autumn twilight. And the next
+morning Agnes Bentley, going out of doors before the others, found on
+the doorstep a basket containing a small, vociferous black kitten with
+a card attached to its neck. On it was written: "Will Agnes please
+befriend Witch in memory of Young Si?"
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories,
+1896 to 1901, by Lucy Maud Montgomery
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MONTGOMERY SHORT STORIES ***
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