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diff --git a/26537-h/26537-h.htm b/26537-h/26537-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..93e1876 --- /dev/null +++ b/26537-h/26537-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,6178 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Windy Hill, by Cornelia Meigs. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p { margin-top: .5em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .5em; + text-indent: 1em; + } + h1 { + text-align: center; font-family: garamond, serif; /* all headings centered */ + } + h5,h6 { + text-align: center; font-family: garamond, serif; /* all headings centered */ + } + h2 { + text-align: center; font-family: garamond, serif; /* all headings centered */ + } + h3 { + text-align: center; font-family: garamond, serif; /* all headings centered */ + } + h4 { + text-align: center; font-family: garamond, serif; /* all headings centered */ + } + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; + } + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + a {text-decoration: none} /* no lines under links */ + div.centered {text-align: center;} /* work around for IE centering with CSS problem part 1 */ + div.centered table {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: left;} /* work around for IE centering with CSS problem part 2 */ + ul {list-style-type: none} /* no bullets on lists */ + ul.nest {margin-top: .15em; margin-bottom: .15em; text-indent: -1.5em;} /* spacing for nested list */ + li {margin-top: .15em; margin-bottom: .15em;} /* spacing for list */ + + .cen {text-align: center; text-indent: 0em;} /* centering paragraphs */ + .sc {font-variant: small-caps;} /* small caps */ + .noin {text-indent: 0em;} /* no indenting */ + .hang {text-indent: -5%;} /* hanging indents */ + .linenum {position: absolute; top: auto; left: 4%;} /* poetry number */ + .note {margin-left: 2em; margin-right: 2em; margin-bottom: 1em;} /* footnote */ + .block {margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 5%;} /* block indent */ + .right {text-align: right; padding-right: 2em;} /* right aligning paragraphs */ + .totoc {position: absolute; right: 2%; font-size: 75%; text-align: right;} /* Table of contents anchor */ + .totoi {position: absolute; right: 2%; font-size: 75%; text-align: right;} /* to Table of Illustrations link */ + .img {text-align: center; padding: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} /* centering images */ + .sidenote {width: 20%; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em; padding-left: 1em; font-size: smaller; float: right; clear: right;} + .tdr {text-align: right; padding-right: .5em;} /* right align cell */ + .tdl {text-align: left;} /* left align cell */ + .tdlsc {text-align: left; font-variant: small-caps;} /* aligning cell content and small caps */ + .tdrsc {text-align: right; font-variant: small-caps;} /* aligning cell content and small caps */ + .tr {margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; margin-top: 5%; margin-bottom: 5%; padding: 1em; background-color: #f6f2f2; color: black; border: dotted black 1px;} /* transcriber's notes */ + .tr2 {margin-left: 30%; margin-right: 30%; margin-top: 5%; margin-bottom: 5%; padding: 1em; border: solid black 3px;} /* ad */ + + .pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; right: 2%; + font-size: 75%; + color: silver; + background-color: inherit; + text-align: right; + text-indent: 0em; + font-style: normal; + font-weight: normal; + font-variant: normal;} /* page numbers */ + + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Windy Hill, by Cornelia Meigs + +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: The Windy Hill + +Author: Cornelia Meigs + +Release Date: September 5, 2008 [EBook #26537] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WINDY HILL *** + + + + +Produced by David Edwards, Jeannie Howse and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<br /> +<hr /> +<br /> + +<div class="tr"> +<p class="cen" style="font-weight: bold;">Transcriber's Note:</p> +<br /> +<p class="noin">Inconsistent hyphenation in the original document has been preserved.</p> +<p class="noin" style="text-align: left;">Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. +For a complete list, please see the <span style="white-space: nowrap;"><a href="#TN">end of this document</a>.</span></p> +<p class="noin">Click on the images to see a larger version.</p> +</div> + +<br /> +<hr /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> + +<div class="img"> +<a href="images/cover.jpg"> +<img border="0" src="images/cover.jpg" width="45%" alt="Front Cover" /></a> +</div> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<hr /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> + +<h2>THE WINDY HILL</h2> + + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<hr /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> + + +<div class="tr2"> +<h3><span style="font-size: 75%;">BY</span><br /> +CORNELIA MEIGS</h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin">The Pool of Stars<br /> +Master Simon's Garden<br /> +The Steadfast Princess<br /> +The Kingdom of the Winding Road</p> +</div> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<hr /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> + +<div class="img"> +<a href="images/frontis.jpg"> +<img border="0" src="images/frontis.jpg" width="55%" alt="frontis" /></a> +</div> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<hr /> +<br /> + +<h1>THE<br /> +WINDY HILL</h1> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> + +<h3><span style="font-size: 75%;">BY</span><br /> +CORNELIA MEIGS</h3> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> + +<h5>New York<br /> +THE MACMILLAN COMPANY<br /> +1922</h5> + +<h5><i>All rights reserved</i></h5> + +<br /> +<hr /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> + +<h4>PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA</h4> + +<h4><span class="sc">Copyright</span>, 1921,<br /> +<span class="sc">By</span> THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.</h4> + +<br /> + +<h5>Set up and electrotyped. Published August, 1921.</h5> + +<br /> +<br /> + +<h5>FERRIS<br /> +PRINTING COMPANY<br /> +NEW YORK CITY</h5> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="toc" id="toc"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>CONTENTS</h3> +<br /> + +<div class="centered"> +<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" width="70%" summary="Table of Contents"> + <tr> + <td class="tdrsc" width="10%">Chapter</td> + <td class="tdl" width="70%"> </td> + <td class="tdrsc" width="20%">Page</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">I</td> + <td class="tdlsc"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">The Beeman</a></td> + <td class="tdr">7</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">II</td> + <td class="tdlsc"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">The Seven Brothers of the Sun</a></td> + <td class="tdr">26</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">III</td> + <td class="tdlsc"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">John Massey's Landlord</a></td> + <td class="tdr">47</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">IV</td> + <td class="tdlsc"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">The Garden Wall</a></td> + <td class="tdr">66</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">V</td> + <td class="tdlsc"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">The Ghost Ship</a></td> + <td class="tdr">77</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">VI</td> + <td class="tdlsc"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">Janet's Adventure</a></td> + <td class="tdr">99</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">VII</td> + <td class="tdlsc"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">The Portrait of Cicely</a></td> + <td class="tdr">113</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">VIII</td> + <td class="tdlsc"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">The Fiddler of Apple Tree Lane</a></td> + <td class="tdr">127</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">IX</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX"><span class="sc">The Fiddler of Apple Tree Lane</span></a> (Continued)</td> + <td class="tdr">145</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">X</td> + <td class="tdlsc"><a href="#CHAPTER_X">A Man of Straw</a></td> + <td class="tdr">159</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">XI</td> + <td class="tdlsc"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI">Three Cousins</a></td> + <td class="tdr">173</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">XII</td> + <td class="tdlsc"><a href="#CHAPTER_XII">Medford River</a></td> + <td class="tdr">195</td> + </tr> +</table> +</div> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span><br /> + +<h2>THE WINDY HILL</h2> +<br /> +<br /> + +<h3>CHAPTER I<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> + +<h4>THE BEEMAN</h4> +<br /> + +<p>The road was a sunny, dusty one, leading upward through Medford +Valley, with half-wooded hills on each side whose far outline quivered +in the hot, breathless air of mid-June afternoon. Oliver Peyton seemed +to have no regard for heat or dust, however, but trudged along with +such a determined stride that people passing turned to look after him, +and more than one swift motor car curved aside to give him room.</p> + +<p>"Want a ride?" inquired one genial farmer, drawing up beside him. +"Where are you going?"</p> + +<p>Oliver turned to answer the first question, meaning to reply with a +relieved "yes," but his square, sunburned face hardened at the second.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I am just going down the road—a little way," he replied stiffly, +shook his head at the repeated offer of a lift, and tramped on in the +dust.</p> + +<p>The next man he met seemed also to feel a curiosity as to his errand, +for he stopped a very old, shambling horse to lean from his seat and +ask <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span>point-blank: "Where may you be going in such a hurry on such a +hot day?"</p> + +<p>Oliver, looking up at the person who addressed him and gauging his +close-set, hard gray eyes and his narrow, dark face, conceived an +instant dislike and distrust of the stranger. He replied shortly, as +he had before, but with less good temper:</p> + +<p>"I am going down the road a little way. And, as you say, I am rather +in a hurry."</p> + +<p>"Oh, are you indeed?" returned the man, measuring the boy up and down +with a disagreeable, inquisitive glance. "In too much of a hurry to +have your manners with you, even!" He shot him a look of keen and +hostile penetration. "It almost looks as though you were running away +from something."</p> + +<p>He stopped for no further comment but went jingling off in his +rattletrap cart, the cloud of dust raised by his old horse's clumsy +feet hanging long in the air behind him. Oliver plodded forward, +muttering dark threats against the disagreeable stranger, and wishing +that he had been sufficiently quick of speech to contradict him.</p> + +<p>Yet the random guess was a correct one, and running away was just what +Oliver was doing. He had not really meant to when he came out through +the pillared gateway of his cousin's place; he had only thought that +he would walk down the road toward the station—and see the train come +in. Yet the resolve had grown within him as he thought of all that had +passed in the last few days, and as he looked <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span>forward to what was +still to come. As he walked down the road, rattling the money in his +pockets, turning over his wrongs in his mind, the thought had come +swiftly to him that he need no longer endure things as they were. It +was three miles to the railroad station; but, once there, he could be +whisked away from all the troubles that had begun to seem unendurable. +The inviting whistle of a train seemed to settle the matter finally.</p> + +<p>"It isn't as though I were afraid of anything," he reflected, looking +back uneasily. "If I thought I were afraid I would never go away and +leave Janet behind like this. No, I am only going because I will not +be made to do what I hate."</p> + +<p>He told himself this several times by way of reassurance, but seemed +always to find it necessary to say it again. There were some strange +things about the place where he and his younger sister Janet had come +to make a visit, things that made him feel, even on the first day, +that the whole house was haunted by some vague disquiet of which no +one would tell him the cause. His Cousin Jasper had changed greatly +since they had last seen him. He had always been a man of quick, +brilliant mind but of mild and silent manners, yet now he was nervous, +irritable, and impatient, in no sense a genial host.</p> + +<p>Janet, Oliver's sister, had already begun to love the place, nor did +she seem to notice the uneasiness that appeared to fill the house. She +did not remember her cousin as well as did her brother and was <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span>thus +less conscious of a change. So far, she had been spending her time +very happily, being shown by Mrs. Brown, the housekeeper, through the +whole of Cousin Jasper's great mansion and inspecting all the +treasures that it contained. It was a new house, built only a year +ago.</p> + +<p>"And a real calamity it was when the work came to an end so soon," +Mrs. Brown had said, "for it kept Mr. Peyton interested and happy all +the time it was going on. We had hoped the south wing would be +building these three months more."</p> + +<p>Janet thought the great rooms were very beautiful, but Oliver did not +like their vast silence in which the slightest sound seemed so +disconcertingly loud. He was not used to such a quiet house, for their +own home was a cozy, shabby dwelling, full of the stir and bustle and +laughter of happy living. Here the boy found that noises would burst +from him in the most unexpected and involuntary manner, noises that +the long rooms and passageways seemed to take up and echo and magnify +a hundred times. Mrs. Brown was constantly urging him "not to disturb +poor Mr. Peyton," and Hotchkiss, the butler, who went about with +silent footsteps, always looked pained when Oliver slammed a door or +made a clatter on the stairs. He had never seen a butler before, +except in the movies, so that he found the presence of Hotchkiss +somewhat oppressive.</p> + +<p>It was the change in his host, however, that had really spoiled the +visit. Jasper Peyton was a cousin <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span>of his mother's, younger than she +and very fond of her and her children. At their house he was always a +much-desired guest, for he had "the fairy-godfather gift," as their +mother put it, and was constantly doing delightful things for them. He +was tall and spare, with a thin, sensitive face that, so it seemed to +Oliver, was always smiling then, but that never smiled now.</p> + +<p>The boy had noted a difference on the evening of their arrival, even +as they drove up to the house through the warm darkness and the +drifting fragrance of the June night.</p> + +<p>"I can hardly remember how Cousin Jasper looks, but I think I will +like his garden," Janet had observed, sniffing vigorously.</p> + +<p>Oliver nodded, but he was not listening. He was looking up at the +lighted house where the door stood open, with Hotchkiss waiting, and +where he could see, through the long windows facing the terrace, that +Cousin Jasper was hurrying through the library to meet them in the +hall. Even at that distance their cousin did not look the same; he +walked slower, he had lost his erect carriage and his old energy of +action. He seemed a thin, high-shouldered ghost of his former self, +with all spirit and cheerfulness gone out of him.</p> + +<p>Janet and Oliver were paying their first visit without their mother, +and, to guests of thirteen and fifteen respectively, such an occasion +was no small cause for excitement. For that reason they were <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span>very +slow to admit that they were not enjoying themselves, but the truth at +last could not be denied. Cousin Jasper, preoccupied and anxious, left +them almost completely to their own devices, neglected to provide any +amusement for them, and seemed, at times, to forget even that they +were there.</p> + +<p>"You are a great comfort to him, my dears. He seems worried and +distracted-like lately," Mrs. Brown had told them. "He does not like +to be in this great house alone."</p> + +<p>To Oliver it seemed that their presence meant very little, a fact +which caused him to puzzle, to chafe and, finally, as was fairly +natural, to grow irritated. After he and Janet had explored the house +and garden, there seemed nothing left to do for Oliver but to stroll +up and down the drive, stare through the tall gates at the motors +going by, or to spend hours in the garage, sitting on a box and +watching Jennings, the chauffeur, tinker with the big car that was so +seldom used. Janet was able to amuse herself better, but her brother, +by the third day, had reached a state of disappointed boredom that was +almost ready, at any small thing, to flare out into open revolt. The +very small thing required was the case of Cousin Eleanor.</p> + +<p>They were all walking up and down the terrace on the third evening, +directly after dinner, the boy and girl trying to accommodate their +quick steps to Cousin Jasper's slower and less vigorous ones. Their +host was talking little; Janet, with an effort, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span>was attending +politely to what he said, but Oliver was allowing his wits to go +frankly woolgathering. It was still light enough to look across the +slopes of the green valley and to see the shining silver river and the +roofs of one or two big houses like their own, set each in its group +of clustering trees. Beyond the stream, with its borders of +yellow-green willows, there rose a smooth, round hill, bare of woods, +or houses, with only one huge tree at the very top and with what +seemed like a tiny cottage clinging to the slope just below the +summit.</p> + +<p>"Where that river bends at the foot of the hill, there ought to be +rapids and good fishing," the boy was thinking. "Perhaps I might get +over there to see, some day."</p> + +<p>He was suddenly conscious, with a flush of guilt, that Cousin Jasper +was asking him a question, but had stopped in the middle of a +sentence, realizing that Oliver was not listening.</p> + +<p>"So," he interrupted himself, "an old man's talk does not interest +you, eh?"</p> + +<p>He followed Oliver's glance down to the crooked river, and made an +attempt to guess his thought.</p> + +<p>"You were looking at that big stone house beyond the stream," he said, +"and I suppose you were wondering who lives there."</p> + +<p>He seemed to be making an effort to turn the conversation into more +interesting channels, so that Oliver immediately gave him his full, +but tardy attention.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span>"A cousin of mine owns the house. We are really all cousins or are +related more or less, we who own the land in Medford Valley. But Tom +Brighton is of closer kin to me than the others and I am very fond of +him. We have both been too busy, just lately, to exchange as many +visits as we used to do, but he has a daughter, Eleanor, just about +your age, Oliver, a thoroughly nice girl, who would make a good +playmate for both of you. I am neglecting your pleasure, I must have +you meet her. You should see each other every day."</p> + +<p>The suggestion seemed to afford Janet great delight; but, for some +reason, it had the opposite effect upon Oliver. Perhaps Cousin Jasper +did not know a great deal about younger people, perhaps he had not +been taking sufficient note of the ways and feelings of this +particular two, for it was quite certain that he had made a mistake. +Oliver cared very little for girls, and to have this one thrust upon +him unawares as a daily companion was not to his liking.</p> + +<p>"It will be very nice for Janet," he remarked ungraciously, "but I—I +don't have much to do with girls."</p> + +<p>Some pure perversity made him picture his Cousin Eleanor as a prim +young person, with sharp elbows and a pinched nose and stringy hair. +She would be lifeless and oppressively good-mannered, he felt certain. +All the ill success of the last three days seemed to be behind his +sudden determination to have none <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span>of her. But Cousin Jasper, having +once conceived the idea, was not to be gainsaid.</p> + +<p>"No, I haven't been doing the proper thing for you. We will have +Eleanor over to lunch to-morrow and you two shall go with Jennings in +the car to fetch her. Don't protest, it won't be any trouble."</p> + +<p>Later, as they went upstairs, Janet pleaded and argued with a +thunderously rebellious Oliver who vowed and insisted that he would +have no unknown female cousin thrust upon him.</p> + +<p>"It is all right for you, Janet," he insisted, "but I won't have +Cousin Jasper arranging any such thing for me. When I told him I +didn't like girls, he should have listened. No, I don't care if it is +wrong, I am going to tell him, to-morrow, just what I think."</p> + +<p>Janet shook her brown, curly head in despair.</p> + +<p>"I believe you will have to do what he says, in the end," she +declared.</p> + +<p>The next morning, at breakfast time, Oliver had not relented, for a +night haunted by visions of this unknown cousin had in no way added to +his peace of mind.</p> + +<p>"I have been thinking about that girl you spoke about," he began, +looking across the table and over the wide bowl of sweet peas to fix +his cousin with a glance of firm determination, "and I don't really +care to meet her. Janet can go to fetch her, but—you mustn't +expect—I don't know how——"</p> + +<p>His defense broke down and Cousin Jasper was ill-advised enough to +laugh.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span>"Stuff and nonsense," he said. "If you are afraid of girls it is time +you got over it. I have telephoned Eleanor already, but she couldn't +come." Oliver brightened, but relapsed, the next moment, into deeper +gloom than ever. "She said that she would be at home later in the +afternoon, so you and Janet are to go over and call on her. I have +ordered the motor for three o'clock."</p> + +<p>It was Janet's suppressed giggle that added the last spark to Oliver's +kindling anger. He was fond of his Cousin Jasper, he was troubled +concerning him, and disturbed by the haunting feeling that something +was wrong in the big house. Yet baffled anxiety often leads to +irritation, and irritation, in Oliver's case, was being tactlessly +pushed into rage. He said little, for he was a boy of few words, nor, +so he told himself, could he really be rude to Cousin Jasper no matter +how foolishly obstinate he was.</p> + +<p>"But I'll get out of it somehow," he reflected stormily as he gulped +down his breakfast and strode out into the garden. "I'll think of a +way."</p> + +<p>Cudgel his brains as he might, however, he could think of no plausible +escape from the difficulty. He had found no excuse by lunch time, and +was relieved that Cousin Jasper did not appear, being deep in some +task in his study. At half past two Janet went upstairs to dress and +Hotchkiss came to Oliver in the library to say:</p> + +<p>"The car was to be ready at three o'clock, sir. Is that correct?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span>To which Oliver replied desperately:</p> + +<p>"Tell Jennings to make it half past three. I am going for a walk."</p> + +<p>So he had plunged out through the gates and, once away down the dusty +road, he became more and more of a rebel and finally a fugitive.</p> + +<p>"I won't go back," he kept saying to himself. "I won't go back."</p> + +<p>There was enough money in his pocket to take him home, and there was a +train from the junction at three. He could telephone from there, very +briefly, that he was going and that Hotchkiss was to send his things. +He was beginning to discover some use for a butler, after all.</p> + +<p>He trudged on, growing very hot, but feeling more and more relieved at +the thought of escape. The way, however, was longer than he had +imagined, and three o'clock came, with the station not yet in sight. +There was another train at five, he remembered, but thought that it +would be better not to spend the intervening time waiting openly on +the platform. He would be missed long before then and Jennings and +Janet, or perhaps even Cousin Jasper himself, would come to look for +him. It would be better for him to cross the nearest meadow and spend +the two hours in the woods, or he might settle the question over which +he had been wondering, whether there were really fish in that sharp +bend of the river.</p> + +<p>He climbed a stone wall and dropped knee-deep into a field of hay and +daisies. Toward the right, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span>a quarter of a mile away, he could see the +house of gray stone standing in the midst of wide, green gardens and +approached by an elm-bordered drive. At that very moment he should +have been rolling up to the door in Cousin Jasper's big car, to +inquire for the much-detested Eleanor Brighton. He made a wry face at +the thought and went hurrying down the slope of the hayfield, passed +through a grove of oak and maple trees, and reached the river. It was +a busy, swift little stream, talking to itself among the tall grasses +as the current swept down toward the sea. A rough bridge spanned it +just below the bend, and here he could stand and see the fish; for +they were there, as he had thought. In the absence of fishing tackle, +he could only watch them, but the sound of a car, passing on a road +near by, made him hurry on.</p> + +<p>Now, he felt, he was away from passers-by indeed! Another stone wall, +patterned with lichen, separated him from the briar-filled wilderness +of an old, abandoned orchard. Each one of the twisted apple trees +looked at least a thousand years of age, so bent, gnarled, and +misshapen had it become. Through the straight rows he could look up +the slope of the round hill that he had so often watched from Cousin +Jasper's garden, he could make out the roof line of the tiny, +dilapidated cottage, and could see that the big tree at the summit was +an oak. The orchard was a deserted waste and the house seemed +uninhabited. Yet just below the summit, the hill <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span>was dotted with +small, boxlike structures, painted white, that might have been chicken +houses, but seemed scarcely large enough. Filled with curiosity, he +went forward to investigate, munching, as he went, a yellow June apple +that he had picked up in the grass.</p> + +<p>A rough lane opened before him, that passed through the orchard and +wound up the hill, with its high grass trodden a little as though, +after all, people did sometimes pass that way. He had climbed only a +little way when he heard voices.</p> + +<p>The tumble-down cottage was not empty, as he had thought, for two +people were standing in the doorway. He stopped abruptly. The man in +worn overalls and the girl beside him, with her bobbed hair, bright +eyes, and faded pink gingham apron, did not look like a very +forbidding pair. But Oliver's uneasy conscience made him feel that any +person he met might guess his plans in some mysterious way and +interfere with his escape. Very quietly he turned about and began to +hurry down the hill. He had retreated too late, however, for the man +had seen him and proceeded to call after him in what seemed a very +peremptory tone:</p> + +<p>"Stop!"</p> + +<p>For a moment, Oliver hesitated, uncertain whether to obey or to take +to his heels and seek safety in the wood below. Could the man have +read his secret, or was the apple in his hand the cause of the +summons? Before he could really <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span>decide, the girl's voice was raised +also—pleading and urgent.</p> + +<p>"We need you," she called. "You must help us. Oh, don't go away!"</p> + +<p>He turned slowly and went toward them through the tall grass, +uncertain, suspicious, afraid even yet that he might fall into some +trap that would delay his flight. His uneasiness was not in any way +quieted by his seeing that one of the white boxes stood, uncovered, +before the two and that it was a beehive.</p> + +<p>"You have come just in time," said the man, "if you are willing to +help us. It is a difficult business, hiving a swarm of bees at this +season, and Polly, here, is no use at all. This is her first day with +the bees this year, and she jumps up and down when they sing around +her head, and that stops everything."</p> + +<p>"I do better usually," the girl confessed humbly, "but I forget, over +the winter, how to be quiet and calm when a million bees are buzzing +in my ear."</p> + +<p>She thrust into Oliver's hand the leather and metal bellows that blows +wood smoke into the hive, and her father began giving him directions +as unconcernedly as though his helping were a matter of course.</p> + +<p>"Just stand beside me, stay very still, and keep blowing smoke; that +is right. Don't move and never mind how close the bees come. There is +no danger of your being stung."</p> + +<p>The square white box was full of wooden frames, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span>hanging one behind +another, like the leaves of a book. One by one the man lifted them +out, swept off the black curtain of bees that clung to them, and +showed the clean, new, sweet-smelling honeycomb.</p> + +<p>"When an old hive gets too crowded, and the bees begin to swarm," he +explained, "we divide them and put some frames and bees into a new, +empty hive. See them going to work already, and look at that piece of +comb that has just been built; one would think that the fairies had +made it."</p> + +<p>Oliver had never seen anything so white and thin and delicate as the +frail new cells ready for the fresh honey. He forgot any dread of the +myriad creatures buzzing about his head, he forgot even his plan, and +his impatience of delay. He bent to peer into the hive, to examine the +young bees just hatching, the fat, black, and brown drones and the +slim, alert queen bee. The girl, now that the responsibility of +helping was off her hands, forgot her own nervousness and pressed +forward also to look and ask questions. She must be about thirteen or +fourteen years old, was Oliver's vague impression of her; she had dark +hair and quick, brown eyes, her cheeks were very pink, and one of them +was decorated with a black smudge from the smoke blower. He was too +intent to notice her much or to remember his fearful dread of girls. +And of course this little thing in the shabby apron was very different +from the threatened Cousin Eleanor.</p> + +<p>He could not see much of the man's face under <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span>the worn straw hat, as +they bent over the hive, but he liked the slow, drawling voice that +answered his innumerable questions and he found the chuckling laugh +irresistibly infectious. The stranger's brown hands moved with steady +skill among the horde of crawling insects, until the last frame was +set in place, the last puff of smoke blown, and the cover was put +down.</p> + +<p>"There, young man," said the beekeeper, "that was a good job well +done, thanks to you; but you must not go yet. Polly and I always have +a little lunch here in the honey house when we have finished, to +revive us after our exhausting labor."</p> + +<p>Oliver was about to protest that he must go on at once, but the man +interrupted him, with a twinkle in his eye.</p> + +<p>"There is a spring behind the house where we wash up," he said. "Polly +will give you some soap and a towel. Wood smoke smells good, but it is +just as black as the soft-coal kind."</p> + +<p>When he looked at himself a moment later in the mirror of the spring, +Oliver realized that he was scarcely fit to start on a journey, since, +in his energetic wielding of the smoker he had smudged his face far +worse than even Polly had. He began splashing and scrubbing, but honey +and soot and the odd, sticky glue with which bees smear their hives +are none of them easy to remove. When he presented himself once more +at the door of the cottage, there was a feast spread out on the rough +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span>table—buttered and toasted biscuits spread with honey, iced cocoa +with whipped cream, and a big square chocolate cake. Quite suddenly he +remembered how far he had walked and how hungry he was and with equal +suddenness forgot his pressing necessity for setting off again. He sat +down on the three-legged stool that the Beeman offered him, sampled +the hot biscuit and the cold drink, and breathed a deep, involuntary +sigh of content. In the presence of these friendly, shabbily dressed +strangers he felt, for the first time since leaving home, really happy +and at ease.</p> + +<p>It seemed dark and cool within the little cottage after the blazing +sunshine outside. The place was evidently no longer used for anything +but a storehouse and a shelter for picnics of this kind, but it was a +quaint, attractive little dwelling and evidently very old. The main +room where they sat had a big-beamed ceiling, deep casement windows, +and a door that swung open in two sections, one above the other. The +upper half was wide open now, framing a sun-bathed picture of the +green slope, the treetops of the orchard, and the rising hills +opposite, with a narrow glimpse of sparkling, blue sea. The air was +very hot and quiet, with the sleepy peacefulness that belongs to +summer afternoons. The round, dense shadow of the oak tree above them +was lengthening so that its cool tip just touched the doorstone.</p> + +<p>Polly, with hands as brown and skillful as her <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span>father's, was still +toasting biscuits before the little fire they had built on the rough +hearth. The Beeman, having taken off his hat, showed a handsome, +cheery face much like his daughter's, except that his big nose was +straight, rather than tilted like her small one, and his eyes were +gray. Their clothes were even older and shabbier than Oliver had at +first observed, but their manners were so easy and cordial that the +whole of the little house seemed filled with the pleasant atmosphere +of friendliness.</p> + +<p>Polly left the fire at last, bringing a plate of hot biscuits, and sat +down beside the table.</p> + +<p>"Daddy always tells me a story when we have finished with the bees," +she began a little shyly. "He said he had one saved up in his head +that I would especially like. You won't mind our going on with it, +will you?"</p> + +<p>Oliver would not mind at all. He felt assured already that he would +like anything that the Beeman had to say.</p> + +<p>"I suppose you must have it, if your heart is set on it," Polly's +father said, "but my tales are usually designed for an audience of +only one. This young gentleman may not like our style of stories, my +dear."</p> + +<p>"I hope he will," replied Polly, "but—oh, daddy, I forgot all about +it, didn't we have an engagement some time about now, at home?"</p> + +<p>"No," he returned so positively that his daughter, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span>though at first a +little puzzled, seemed quite satisfied. "It is quite all right for us +to stay here."</p> + +<p>He chuckled for a moment, as though over some private joke of his own, +then at last laid down his pipe and crossed his legs. Oliver leaned +back against the wall and Polly curled up on the bench by the +fireplace.</p> + +<p>"Are you both quite comfortable?" the Beeman inquired. "Very well, +then I'll begin."</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>CHAPTER II<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> + +<h4>THE SEVEN BROTHERS OF THE SUN</h4> +<br /> + +<p>Nashola did not live in fairyland, although there were seasons when +his country was so beautiful that it might well have belonged to some +such enchanted place. He did not know whether he loved it best when +the thickets were all in bloom with pink crab apple and the brown, +wintry hills had put on their first spring green, or when every valley +was scarlet and golden with frost-touched maple trees in the autumn. +But to-day it was neither, being hot midsummer, with the wild grass +thick and soft on the slope of the hill that he was climbing, and with +the heavy foliage of the oak tree on the summit rustling in a hot, +fitful breeze. It was high noontide with the sunlight all about him, +yet Nashola walked warily and looked back more than once at his +comrades who had dared follow him only halfway up the hill. His was no +ordinary errand, for, all about him, Nashola felt dangers that he +could neither hear nor see. Before him, sitting motionless as a +statue, with his back against the trunk of the oak tree and his keen, +hawk-like face turned toward the hills and the sky, was <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span>Secotan, the +sorcerer and medicine man, whom all of Nashola's tribe praised, +revered, and dreaded.</p> + +<p>None but the full-grown warriors used to venture to have speech with +him, and then only as he sat in the door of his lodge, with the men in +a half circle before him. They never came alone. Along all the +seaboard, the Indians talked of Secotan, the man most potent in spells +and charms and prophecies, who was said to talk with strange spirits +in his lodge by night and who could call up storms out of the sea at +will. This spot at the summit of the hill, where the medicine man sat +so often, sometimes muttering spells, sometimes staring straight +before him across the valley, was magic forbidden ground, where no one +but himself was known to come. Yet the young Nashola, only fifteen +years old, and far from being a warrior, had been told that he must +consult the medicine man and had been in too much haste to seek him in +his own lodge or to wait until he could persuade a comrade to go with +him.</p> + +<p>Stretched along the river below them was the camp of Nashola's +brown-skinned people, where springs gave them fresh water and where +the eastern hills of the valley gave shelter from the winter storms +that blew in from the sea. Beyond those green hills were rocky slopes, +salt swamps, a stretch of yellow sand, and then the great Atlantic +rollers, tumbling in upon the beach. The Indians of Nashola's village +would go thither sometimes to dig for clams, to fish from the high +rocks, and even, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span>on occasions, to swim in the breakers close to +shore. But they were land-abiding folk, they feared nothing in the +forest, and would launch their canoes in the most headlong rapids of +the inland rivers; yet there was dread and awe in their eyes when they +looked out upon the sea. Not one of them had ever ventured beyond the +island at the mouth of the harbor.</p> + +<p>They were a shifting, wandering people, moving here and there with the +seasons, as the deer and moose moved their grazing grounds, but their +most settled abiding place was this little green valley where they +spent a part of every year. Sometimes word would come drifting in, +through other tribes, of strange, white-faced men who had landed on +their shores, but who always sailed away again, since this was still +the time when America was all the Indians' own. What they did not see +troubled them little and they went on, undisturbed, hunting and +fishing and paying their vows to the spirits and demons that they +thought to be masters of their little world.</p> + +<p>The old, wrinkled squaw who was Nashola's grandmother was the only one +of them all who seemed oppressed with care. The boy, whose parents +were dead, was her special charge and was not, as he should be, like +other Indian lads. He was slim and swift and was as skillful as his +companions with the bow and spear, but he had a strange love for +running along the sea beach with the waves snatching at his bare, +brown legs, and he was really <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span>happy only when he was swimming in the +green water. The day he swam to the island and back again, paying no +heed to the shouts and warnings of his friends, and declaring, when he +landed, that he would have gone farther save that the tide had +turned—that day had brought his old grandmother's patience to an end.</p> + +<p>"It is not fitting that one of our tribe should be so familiar with +the sea," she stormed at him. "We were not born to master that wild +salt water; the gods that rule us have said over and over again that +the woods and rivers are ours, but that we are to have no dealings +with the spirits of the sea. Since I cannot make you listen, you shall +talk to some one who will. You shall go to ask the medicine man if +what I say is not so."</p> + +<p>Nashola had come, therefore, to ask his question, but he found that it +needed a bold heart to advance, without quaking, into that silent +presence and to speak out with Secotan's black eyes seeming to stare +him through and through.</p> + +<p>"Is it true," he began, "that men of our tribe should have no trust in +the sea? My grandmother says that I should hate it and fear it, but I +do not. Must I learn to be afraid?"</p> + +<p>Slowly the man nodded.</p> + +<p>Most Indians grow old quickly, and are withered like dried-up apples +as soon as the later years come upon them. But Secotan, although his +hair was gray, had still the clear-cut face with its arched nose <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span>and +heavy brows of a younger man. Only his eyes, deep, piercing, and very +wise, seemed to show how long he had lived and how much he had +learned.</p> + +<p>"Our fathers and their fathers before them have always known that we +must distrust the sea," he said at last. "No matter how blue and +smiling it may be it can never be our friend. We may swim near the +shore, we may even launch our canoes and journey, if the way be short, +from one harbor to another when the sky is clear and the winds are +asleep. But always we are to remember that the sea is our enemy and a +treacherous enemy in the end."</p> + +<p>He turned away to stare at the hills again, but Nashola lingered, not +yet satisfied. It was unheard-of boldness to question Secotan's words, +yet the boy could not keep his hot protests to himself.</p> + +<p>"But is it not wrong to pretend to fear what we do not?" he objected. +"Do the spirits of the water actually rise up and tell you that we +must keep to the shore? I do not believe it, although my grandmother +says so until my ears ring again."</p> + +<p>Secotan turned his head quickly, as though to hide the ghost of a +smile.</p> + +<p>"The voices of the wind and the breakers and of the thunder all cry +the same message," he declared, "and wise men have learned that it +warns them to hug the land. You must heed your grandmother, even +though her words are shrill and often repeated."</p> + +<p>He would say no more, so Nashola went away, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span>pondering his answer as +he walked down the hill. After all, no harm had come to him from +entering the medicine man's presence unbidden, as his comrades had all +said. He answered their questions very shortly as they came crowding +about him, and to the persistent queries of his grandmother he would +say nothing at all. Yet the others noticed that his canoe lay unused +in the shelter of a rock on the sandy beach where he had left it, and +that he swam in the sea no more.</p> + +<p>The days passed, the hot, quiet summer passing with them. One evening, +as they all sat about the camp fire, one of the older warriors said +quietly:</p> + +<p>"The time is near when our medicine man must go from us."</p> + +<p>"Why?" questioned Nashola's grandmother, while the boy turned quickly +to hear.</p> + +<p>"He has not sat upon the hill nor before the door of his lodge for +three days, and the venison and corn we have carried to him have lain +untouched for all that time. One of us who ventured close heard a cry +from within and groaning. It may be that he must die."</p> + +<p>"But will no one help him?" cried Nashola. It was not proper that a +boy should speak out in the presence of the older warriors, but he +could not keep his wonder to himself.</p> + +<p>"There is danger to common folk in passing too close to the medicine +man's lodge," his grandmother explained quickly. "There are spirits +within who <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span>are his friends but who might destroy us. And when he is +ill unto death and the beings from another world have come to bear his +soul away, then must no man go near."</p> + +<p>"Sometimes a medicine man has a companion to whom he teaches his +wisdom and who takes his place when he is gone," said the man by the +fire. "But even that comrade flees away when death is at hand and the +spirits begin to stand close about his master. Yes, such a man must +die alone."</p> + +<p>All through the night Nashola lay awake, thinking of what he had +heard. Secotan was, he knew, a man of powerful magic, but he could not +forget that there was a look in his eyes and a kindliness in his tone +that seemed human, after all. Must he suffer and die there, without +help, merely because he was greater and wiser than the rest? Or, when +death came close and the host of unearthly beings gathered about him, +would he not feel it of comfort to have a living friend by his side? +It was long past midnight and in the black darkness that comes before +day, before the boy came to final resolution.</p> + +<p>He crawled out from under the shelter of his lodge and slipped +noiselessly through the sleeping camp. Every rustle in the grass, +every stirring leaf in the thicket made him jump and shiver, yet he +kept steadily on. The sharp outline of Secotan's pointed lodge poles +stood out against the stars, halfway up the shoulder of the hill. The +door showed black and open as he came near, but there was no sound +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span>from within. The only thing that seemed alive was a dull, glowing coal +in the ashes of a fire that was not quite dead. The boy stooped down +before the door and spoke in a shaking voice:</p> + +<p>"Secotan, Secotan, do you still live?"</p> + +<p>A hollow, gasping whisper sounded from the shadows within:</p> + +<p>"I am living, but death is very near."</p> + +<p>Nashola stood still for a moment. He could picture that gaunt figure +lying helpless on the ground, with the darkness all about peopled by +strange shapes visible to the sorcerer's eyes alone, crowding spirits +come to carry him away to an unknown world. But even as a wave of icy +terror swept over him, he remembered how fearful it would be to lie +all alone in that haunted darkness, and he bent low and slipped +through the door.</p> + +<p>"I know that all the spirits of the earth and air and water are with +you," he said as he felt his way to the deerskin bed and sat down +beside it, "but I thought, among them all, you might wish for a friend +beside you who was flesh and blood."</p> + +<p>A quivering hand was laid for an instant on his knee.</p> + +<p>"There is no man who does not feel terror when he comes to die alone," +the medicine man whispered, "and Secotan is less of a man than you."</p> + +<p>Through the dragging hours Nashola sat beside him, listening with +strained ears to every sound—the soft moving of a snake through the +grass before <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span>the door, the nibbling of a field mouse at the skin of +the tent, the sharp scream of a bird in the wood captured by a +marauding owl. The blackness grew thinner at last, showing the lodge +poles, the shabby skins of the bed, and finally the sick man's face, +drawn and haggard with pain. As the dawn came up over the hills, he +opened his eyes and spoke:</p> + +<p>"Bring those herbs that hang against the lodge pole and build up the +fire. When the stones about it are hot, wrap them in wet blankets and +lay them in the tent. The gods may have decreed that I am to live."</p> + +<p>Nashola worked frantically all through the day. He filled the lodge +with steam from the hot stones, he brewed bitter drafts of herbs and +held them to Secotan's lips once in every hour by the sun. After a +long time he saw the fever ebb, saw the man's eyes lose their strange +glittering, and heard his voice gather strength each time he spoke. +For three nights and days the boy nursed him, all alone in the lodge, +with men bringing food to leave at the door but with no one willing to +come inside. When at last Nashola went back to his own dwelling, +Secotan was sitting, by his fire, weak and thin, but fairly on the way +to health again.</p> + +<p>The friendship that had grown up during that night of suffering and +terror seemed to become deeper and deeper as time passed. There was +scarcely a day when Nashola did not climb the hill in the late +afternoon to sit under the rustling oak <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span>tree and talk for a long hour +with the medicine man. His companions of his own age looked askance at +such a friendship and his grandmother begged and scolded, but without +avail.</p> + +<p>Almost always, as he sat with his back against the tree, or lay full +length in the long grass that was beginning to be dry and yellow with +the coming autumn, the boy would fix his eyes upon the hills opposite +through which there showed a gleam of sea. Like the picture of some +forbidden thing was that glint of blue, framed by the green slopes and +the sky above. He could see the whitecaps, the dancing glimmer of the +sun, and the gray sea gulls that whirled and hovered and dipped before +his longing gaze. He would lift his head to sniff the salt breeze that +swept through the cleft in the hills, and to listen for that far-off +thunder that could sometimes be heard as the great waves broke on the +beach. At last, one day when he had sat so long with his friend that +dusk was falling and the stars were coming out, he broke through the +silence with a sudden question:</p> + +<p>"Secotan, what lies beyond that sea?"</p> + +<p>The medicine man shook his head without speaking.</p> + +<p>"My grandmother says 'Nothing,'" pursued Nashola, "but I know that +cannot be. Is it one of the things that I must not ask and that you +may not tell me because you are a sorcerer and I am only a boy?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[36]</a></span>Secotan was silent so long that Nashola thought he did not mean to +reply at all. Even when he spoke it did not seem to be an answer.</p> + +<p>"Do you see those seven stars?" he said, "that are rising from the sea +and that march so close together that you keep thinking they are going +to melt into one?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," answered the boy. "I often lie before our lodge door and watch +them go up the sky. There are bigger stars all about them, but somehow +I love those the best, they are so small and bright and seem to look +down on us with such friendly eyes."</p> + +<p>"It is told among the medicine men," Secotan went on slowly, "that +many, many moons ago, long before this oak tree grew upon this hill, +before its father's father had yet been planted as an acorn, our +people came hither across just such a sea as that. Far to the westward +it lay, and they came, a mere handful of bold spirits in their canoes, +across a wide water from some land that we have utterly forgotten. +Some settled down at once upon the shores of the waters they had +crossed, but some pressed eastward, little by little, as the +generations passed. They filled the land with their children and in +the end they came to another sea and went no farther. But the men who +had led them were of a different heart than ours; there were always +some who were not content to hunt and fish and move only as the deer +move or as the seasons change. They <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[37]</a></span>wished to press on, ever on, to +let nothing stop the progress of their march. It is said that when +they came to this sea there were seven brothers who, when their people +would no longer follow, launched their canoes and set off once more to +the eastward, and never came back.</p> + +<p>"They dwell there in the sky, we think, and they shine through those +months of autumn that are dearest of all the year to our people, when +the days are warm and golden before the winter, when the woods are +bare and hunting is easy, when the game is fat from the summer grazing +and our yellow corn is ripe. They come back to us in the Hunter's Moon +and they watch over us all through the cold winter. We call them the +Seven Brothers of the Sun."</p> + +<p>Nashola was silent, waiting, for he knew from his friend's voice that +there was more that he wished to say.</p> + +<p>"Your mother, who is dead, was not of our blood, they tell me. Your +father took her from another tribe and they had brought her captive, +from the north of us, so that she is no kin of ours. Sometimes I think +that there must have run in her veins the blood of those seven +brothers and that, in you, their bold spirit lives again. There is no +one of your kind who loves the sea as you do, who has no shadow of a +fear of it. And you are first, in all my life, who has asked me what +lay beyond."</p> + +<p>"I should like," said Nashola steadily, still <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[38]</a></span>watching the gray water +and the gleam of stars above it, "I should like to go and see."</p> + +<p>"Often I have wondered," the man went on, his voice growing very +earnest, "whether you would not like to come to dwell with me, to +learn the lore that makes me a medicine man and to take my place when +I must go. I, who was taught by the wisest of us all, have waited long +to find some one worthy of that teaching, and able to hold the power +that I have. You can be a greater man than I, Nashola; not only your +whole tribe will do your bidding and hang upon your words, but the men +of our race all up and down the coast will revere you and talk of you +as the greatest sorcerer ever known. Will you come to my lodge, will +you learn from me, will you follow in my way?"</p> + +<p>Nashola tried to speak, choked and tried again.</p> + +<p>"I cannot do it," he said huskily.</p> + +<p>"Why?"</p> + +<p>There was a sharp note of wonder, hurt friendship, even of terror, in +the man's voice.</p> + +<p>"The people of our village say you are not like other men," said the +boy. "They say you can call the friendly spirits of the forest and the +hostile gods of the sea, and that you have wisdom learned in another +world. But I, who am your friend, think it is not so. I love you +dearly, but I know you are a man as I am. I know the sea is only water +and that the forest is only trees. I—I do not believe."</p> + +<p>He got to his feet, blind with misery, and went <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[39]</a></span>stumbling down the +hill. The warm September darkness was thick about him, but up on the +hill the starlight showed plainly the motionless figure sitting +beneath the oak tree, never turning to look after him, uttering no +sound of protest or reproach.</p> + +<p>As September days passed into October, as the Seven Brothers rode +higher in the sky, strange tales, once again, began to come from the +south. More white men had been seen in their ships, sailing up and +down the coast, trading with the Indians, buying the fish that they +had caught and trying to talk to them in an unknown tongue.</p> + +<p>"We have heard stories before and will hear them again," said the +older warriors incredulously. "Such tales are of the sort that old +women tell about the fires on winter nights."</p> + +<p>"What does your friend the medicine man say of these rumors, Nashola?" +asked one of the boys of his own age, but Nashola did not answer. He +went no more up the hill to the big oak tree; he had held no speech +for weeks with Secotan. Yet he would suffer no one to ask him why.</p> + +<p>A day came when the news could no longer be disbelieved. A boy of the +tribe, who had been digging for clams on the beach, came running home +with startling tidings.</p> + +<p>"The white men—the winged canoes—as big as our lodges——" he +gasped. "Come quickly and see!"</p> + +<p>Old men and young, squaws and papooses, every <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[40]</a></span>one deserted the little +settlement by the river and went in wild haste up the eastward hills +to look upon this strange wonder. It was a lowering day with overcast +skies and water of a sullen gray and with ominously little wind. In +speechless wonder the Indians stood gazing, for there indeed were +three white-sailed ships, moving slowly before the lazy breeze, stanch +little fishing vessels of English build, come to see whether this +unexplored stretch of coast would yield them any cargo. As they +watched, the largest one got up more sail, veered away upon a new +tack, and was followed by the others.</p> + +<p>"What can they be? Are they come to destroy us all?" asked a trembling +old woman, and no one could answer.</p> + +<p>"Hush," said another in a moment, "the medicine man is coming."</p> + +<p>Secotan, who so seldom left his own lodge now, and who never mixed +with the village folk, was climbing slowly up the hill after them. +Nashola noticed that he had begun to look old, that his fierce hawk's +face was sunken, and that he walked very slowly, leaning upon his +staff. The men and women drew back respectfully as he advanced and +stood in a silent, waiting circle, while he shaded his eyes and gazed +long at the ships, now growing smaller in the distance.</p> + +<p>"Are they friends or enemies, Secotan?" one of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[41]</a></span>the hunters ventured +to ask, but the medicine man replied only:</p> + +<p>"That must be as the gods decree."</p> + +<p>"Then destroy them for us," cried the old squaw, Nashola's +grandmother. "Call up a storm that will break their wings and shatter +the sides of those giant canoes. Bring wind and rain and thunder and +all the spirits of the sea to overwhelm them."</p> + +<p>There was a breathless silence as Secotan slowly moved forward and +raised his staff. Nashola, standing before the other boys, watched the +medicine man's face with eyes that never wavered. Even as the sorcerer +moved there came a low mutter of thunder across the gray, level floor +of the sea, and a distant streak of darker water showed the coming +wind.</p> + +<p>"There is the storm! The very winds obey him!"</p> + +<p>The cry went up from all the Indians, save only Nashola who stood +silent. The medicine man turned to look at him, then hesitated and +dropped his eyes.</p> + +<p>"Why do you wait? Raise up a hurricane, O greatest of sorcerers," +cried a man behind them.</p> + +<p>"No," shouted Secotan suddenly. He flung down his staff and held up +his empty hands before his face. "I will raise no storm," he cried, "I +will call no spirits from the deep—because I cannot. The wind and +thunder answer no man's bidding—storms come and go at the will of the +Great Spirit <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[42]</a></span>alone. There is one soul here that I love, one being +whom, in all my life, I have had for a friend. In his eyes I will +stand for truth at last, although I had almost learned to believe in +my magic myself. I can do none of those things that you think. I am a +man without power, like every one of you!"</p> + +<p>A roar of anger went up, a dull, savage, guttural sound that died away +almost at once into silence, a quiet more ominous than an outcry could +have been. Terrified by that strange apparition out yonder upon the +waters, the Indians saw themselves deserted by the one person to whom +they could look for courage and counsel. Only half understanding, they +knew, at least, that Nashola had been the means of their medicine +man's downfall. Frenzied hands seized them both and dragged them +headlong down toward the water. Visions of the savage tortures that +his people wreaked upon their enemies passed through the boy's mind, +but he did not struggle or cry out, although Secotan's set face, +beside him, turned gray under its coppery skin. Some one had found +Nashola's canoe, left long unused upon the beach, and had launched it +in the breakers.</p> + +<p>"Let him go back to the sea that he loved, this boy who has never been +one of us. Let the man perish in the storm that is coming without his +call."</p> + +<p>Relentless hands flung them into the frail boat and pushed it out +through the surf. Nashola crawled to the stern and took up the paddle; +a crash of thunder broke over their heads and a wild flare <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[43]</a></span>of +lightning lit the dark water as he dipped the blade. In a moment, rain +was falling in blinding sheets, the wind and spray were roaring in +their ears, and the ebbing tide was carrying them away, out of the +harbor, past the rocky island, straight to the open, angry sea.</p> + +<p>After a long time, Secotan, who had lain inert where he had been +thrown into the boat, got to his knees and took up the second paddle. +Only by keeping the little boat's bow to the wind could immediate +destruction be averted. But the medicine man's strokes were feeble, +affording little help, and at last he laid down the blade.</p> + +<p>"It is of no use, Nashola," he said. "Death rides on the wind and +snatches at us from the black waters. Lay down your paddle and let us +die."</p> + +<p>"No," the boy answered, "even though death is not an hour away, we +will fight it until the very end."</p> + +<p>Darkness shut down about them so that they could scarcely see each +other as they went on in silence. Although each combing, foam-capped +rush of water seemed certain to overwhelm them, there was a strange +exhilaration, a mad thrill in rising to every giant wave and shooting +down its green side in a cloud of spray. One—two—three—each one +seemed the last, and yet there were ever more. Nashola's arms were +numb and heavy, his head reeled, but still he struggled on. He wished +at last that death would come quickly, to still the terrible aching +weariness that possessed his whole being. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[44]</a></span>The worst of the storm had +blown, roaring, past them, but the seas were still heavy and +nothing—nothing, Nashola thought, could ever bring back the strength +to his failing arms.</p> + +<p>Suddenly the clouds were torn apart, showing a glimmer of stars and a +vague glimpse of the tossing black water all about them.</p> + +<p>"Look, look, Nashola," cried the medicine man, pointing upward, "they +have come to help us, your kinsmen, the Seven Brothers of the Sun!"</p> + +<p>But Nashola was not looking at the sky; his eyes were fixed on a +ghostly shape moving close ahead of them and on the fitful gleam of a +ship's lantern that tossed and glimmered in the dark. Dropping his +paddle he put his hands to his mouth and lifted his voice in a long +hail. The light bobbed and swung and an answering shout came through +the darkness.</p> + +<p>To the weather-beaten English sailors, used to the rough adventures of +sailing new and uncharted seas, there was little excitement in picking +up two half-drowned Indians, although they had never done such a thing +before. They warmed the two with blankets, they revived them with +fiery remedies, and they sat about them on the deck, trying to talk to +them by means of signs, but with small success.</p> + +<p>"It is no common thing to see these natives so far from shore," the +mate said to the captain, "for as a rule the Indians distrust the sea. +We cannot find out how these came to be adrift in that canoe. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[45]</a></span>The +young one tries to make us understand, but the old man merely covers +his face and groans. I think he will not believe that we are men like +himself."</p> + +<p>"Bring the boy to me," the captain ordered. "Perhaps we may be able to +understand him."</p> + +<p>In the quiet dawn, when calm had followed the night's storm, the ship +ran in toward a rocky headland to send a boat ashore. Yet when it had +been lowered and Secotan had dropped into it, he turned to see Nashola +standing on the deck above, making no move to follow.</p> + +<p>"I am not coming, Secotan," he declared steadily. "The chief of these +men and I have talked with signs and he wishes to carry me to his home +on this strange winged vessel. He promises that he will bring me safe +back again. Then I can tell you and all of our tribe what these white +men really are. And I have always longed to know what lay beyond this +forbidden sea."</p> + +<p>Secotan did not protest.</p> + +<p>"I have called you friend, I have wished to have you for my brother," +he said, "but I must call you master now, since you have dared what I +can never dare."</p> + +<br /> +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> +<br /> + +<p>Much has been said of the courage of those white men who crossed the +stormy Atlantic in their little vessels to explore an unknown +continent. But what of the brave hearts of those Indians who thought +the white men were spirits come out of the sea, who <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[46]</a></span>did not know what +ships were, yet who still dared to set sail with them? For we know +that there were such dusky voyagers, that they crossed the sea more +than once in the English fishing vessels, and that they brought back +to their own people almost unbelievable tales of cities and palaces, +or harbors crowded with shipping and of whole countrysides covered +with green, tilled fields. With all these wonders, however, they could +tell their comrades that these white beings were mere men like +themselves, to be neither hated nor dreaded as spirits of another +world. Deep dwelling in Nashola was that born leadership that makes +real men see through the long-established doubts and terrors of their +race, who can distinguish the false from the true, who can go forward +through shadowy perils to the clear light of knowledge and success.</p> + +<p>It was in recognition of this that old Secotan, half understanding, +wholly unable to put his feeling into words, standing alone upon the +headland, raised his arms in reverent salute and cried a last good-by +to his comrade:</p> + +<p>"Farewell and good fortune, O Brother of the Sun!"</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[47]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>CHAPTER III<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> + +<h4>JOHN MASSEY'S LANDLORD</h4> +<br /> + +<p>The story had come to an end, but the boy and girl still waited as +though to hear more.</p> + +<p>"But do oak trees grow to be so old?" Oliver inquired at last, looking +out at the moving shadow of the great tree that had now covered the +doorstone.</p> + +<p>"Yes, three hundred years is no impossible age for an oak. All the old +grants of land speak of an oak tree on this hill as one of the +landmarks."</p> + +<p>"How did you know?" began Oliver, and then broke off, with a sudden +jerk of recollection: "Oh, I forgot all about it—my train!"</p> + +<p>He snatched out his watch and stood regarding it with a rueful face. +He had missed the train by more than half an hour.</p> + +<p>"Were you going away?" asked Polly sympathetically. "We are always +missing trains like that, daddy and I. Won't they be surprised to see +you come back!"</p> + +<p>"They—they didn't know I was going," returned Oliver. "They are +wondering now where I am." He was too much agitated to keep from +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[48]</a></span>doing his thinking out loud. "I must be getting back. Thank you for +the story. Good-by."</p> + +<p>He was gone before they could say more, leaving Polly, in fact, with +her mouth open to speak and with the Beeman looking after him with an +amused and quizzical grin, as though he recognized the symptoms of an +uneasy conscience.</p> + +<p>"We never asked him to come again," Polly lamented.</p> + +<p>To which her father answered, "I believe he will come, just the same."</p> + +<p>The smooth machinery of Cousin Jasper's house must have been thrown +out of gear for a moment when the car came round to the door and +Oliver failed to appear. It was running quietly and noiselessly again, +however, by the time he returned. Janet was curled up in a big +armchair in the library, enjoying a book, when he came in. She looked +up at him rather curiously, but only said:</p> + +<p>"Eleanor Brighton's mother telephoned at half past three that Eleanor +had been detained somewhere, she didn't quite know where. She was very +apologetic and hoped we would come some other time. I walked down the +road to look for you, but you weren't in sight. I met such a strange +man, coming in at the gate; he turned all the way around on the seat +of his cart to stare at me. I didn't like him."</p> + +<p>She did not press Oliver with questions and, as a result, he sat down +beside her and told her the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[49]</a></span>whole tale of his afternoon's adventures, +with a glowing description of the Beeman and Polly.</p> + +<p>"I must take you there to see them," he said, "I can't wait to show +you how things look from that hill. And you should see the bees, and +the little house, and hear the wind in the big tree. We will go +to-morrow."</p> + +<p>When Cousin Jasper appeared for dinner, Oliver felt somewhat +apprehensive, but to his relief no questions were asked him. Their +cousin listened rather absently while Janet explained why the proposed +visit had not been made, and he offered no comment. He looked paler +even than usual, with deeper lines in his face, and he sat at the end +of the long table, saying little and eating less. Afterward he sat +with them in the library, still restless and uneasy and speaking only +now and then, in jerking sentences that they could scarcely follow. It +was an evident relief to all three of them when the time came to say +good night.</p> + +<p>Oliver looked back anxiously over his shoulder, as their cousin +returned to his study and as they, at the other end of the long room, +went out into the hall.</p> + +<p>"Something has happened to upset him more than usual," he said. "Do +you think he could have guessed what I intended to do?"</p> + +<p>Janet shook her head emphatically.</p> + +<p>"He couldn't have guessed," she declared. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span>"Even now I can hardly +believe it of you, myself, Oliver."</p> + +<p>Oliver, rather ashamed, was beginning to wonder at himself also.</p> + +<p>They had fallen into the habit of going upstairs early to the +comfortable sitting room into which their bedrooms opened. It was +their own domain, a pleasant, breezy place, with deep wicker chairs, +gay chintz curtains, flower boxes, and wide casements opening on a +balcony. They had both found some rare treasures among the books +downstairs and liked to carry them away for an hour of enjoyment +before it was bedtime.</p> + +<p>Oliver settled himself comfortably beside a window, opened his book, +but did not immediately begin to read. His eyes wandered about the +perfectly appointed room, stared out at the moonlit garden, and then +came back to his sister.</p> + +<p>"Why aren't we happy here, Janet?" he questioned. "It seems as though +we had everything to make us so."</p> + +<p>"Because he isn't happy," returned his sister, with a gesture toward +the study where Cousin Jasper, distraught, worried, and forlorn, must +even then be sitting alone.</p> + +<p>"But why isn't he happy? There is everything here that he could wish +for." Oliver added somewhat bitterly, after a pause: "Why don't +grown-up people tell us things? It is miserable to be old <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[51]</a></span>enough to +notice when affairs go wrong but not to be old enough to have them +explained."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," said Janet hopefully, "we will be able to prove that we +deserve to know. I think that you will, anyway, and then you can tell +me."</p> + +<p>It was not only the younger members of the household who were +struggling with mystery that night, however. Before they had been +reading many minutes, there came a discreet tap at the door and +Hotchkiss appeared upon the threshold. Oliver was wondering what a boy +unused to butlers was supposed to say or do on the occasion of such a +visit, and even Janet, better at guessing the etiquette of such +matters, seemed at a loss. And so also was Hotchkiss, as it presently +began to be evident.</p> + +<p>If the butler had been of the regulation variety, he might perhaps +have known how to ask a few respectful questions without a change of +his professional countenance and have gained his information without +betraying its significance. But as it was, he had for the moment put +off the wooden, expressionless face that he was supposed to wear at +his work, and was openly anxious and disturbed.</p> + +<p>"We're troubled about Mr. Peyton, Mrs. Brown and I," he began, coming +frankly to the point at once. "He had a queer visitor to-day, one who +has just been coming lately and who always leaves him upset. I wonder +if you saw him, a thin man with a brown face and a kind of a way with +him, somehow, in spite of his bad clothes."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[52]</a></span>"Did he drive a shambling old horse?" inquired Oliver, remembering +suddenly the person he had noticed on the road, "and a wagon that +rattled as though it were twenty years old? Yes, we both saw him."</p> + +<p>"Had you ever seen him before?" Hotchkiss asked eagerly, and seemed +disappointed when Oliver replied:</p> + +<p>"No, we had never laid eyes on him before to-day."</p> + +<p>"It is just in the last few weeks that he has been coming here so +often," the man went on. "Before that he came rarely and we didn't +think so much about him. I can remember the first time I saw him, soon +after I had come to Mr. Peyton, a year ago. The fellow rang the bell +as bold as anything, but when I saw that rickety outfit drawn up to +the steps, I was about to tell him that the other entrance was the +place for him. He must have read my eye—he's a sharp one—for he +said, 'Your master won't thank you for turning me away, when I'm a +member of the family,' and sure enough, there was Mr. Peyton behind me +in the hall telling me to bring him in. He was nervous and put out +with everybody after the man was gone, and he is more and more upset +each time he comes. And the fellow begins to come often. I thought +that if he was a member of the family you might know who he was—and +how we could get rid of him."</p> + +<p>The heat of the last words put an end to any <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[53]</a></span>possible thought that +the man's questions were prompted by a servant's unwarranted curiosity +concerning his master. It was plain that Cousin Jasper was a +well-beloved employer and that the two chief persons of his household +had been laying their heads together over the mystery of his evident +trouble.</p> + +<p>Hotchkiss was about to tell them more, when a bell, sounding below, +summoned him away. There was an interval during which they tried to +return to their books, but found their minds occupied with thoughts of +what the butler had said. Who could this man be, whom they had both +noticed and both set down as odious, and whose coming seemed to have +such an unhappy effect upon Cousin Jasper? A relative? It did not seem +possible. Presently Hotchkiss was at the door again, more troubled +than ever.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Peyton wants the motor, but it's Jennings' evening off and he has +gone to town," he said. "Didn't I hear you tell him, Mr. Oliver, that +you knew how to drive that make of car?"</p> + +<p>Oliver had, indeed, dropped such a hint two days before, hoping that +the dullness of his visit might be lightened by his being invited to +take the car out for a spin. The statement had fallen on quite +unheeding ears in Cousin Jasper's case, but had been treasured up by +the butler.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I can drive it," agreed Oliver, rather doubting whether Cousin +Jasper would really desire him <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[54]</a></span>as a chauffeur. He got up and went +downstairs, to find his cousin waiting in the hall, so nervous and +impatient that he made no other comment than:</p> + +<p>"We must make haste."</p> + +<p>Oliver hurried out to the garage, backed out the heavy car, paused +under the portico for Cousin Jasper to climb in beside him, and sped +away down the drive.</p> + +<p>"Which way?" he asked, as they came out through the gate, and was +directed along the road he had followed that afternoon.</p> + +<p>"You may go as fast as you like, I am in a hurry," was Cousin Jasper's +unexpected permission, so that Oliver, nothing loath, let out the car +to its full speed. It was very dark, for the moon had gone under a +cloud. The road, showing vaguely white through the blackness, was +nearly empty and the tree trunks flashed by, looking unreal in the +glare of the lamps, like the cardboard trees of a scene on the stage. +The big car hummed and the wind sang in Oliver's ears, but for only +the briefest moment, for they seemed to come immediately to a +crossroad, where Cousin Jasper bade him turn. A slower pace was +necessary here, for the going was rough and uneven, yet not so +difficult as that of the narrower lane in which they presently found +themselves. Here the machine lurched among the deep ruts, rustled +through high grass and low-hanging trees, and finally came to a stop +before a gate.</p> + +<p>"No, wait here," directed Cousin Jasper as <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[55]</a></span>Oliver made a move to get +out. "I shall not be gone very long."</p> + +<p>He climbed out and jerked at the gate, which, one hinge being gone, +opened reluctantly to let him pass. He stalked away, a tall, awkward +figure in the brilliant shaft of light from the lamps, walking with a +fierce, determined dignity up the path that disappeared into the dark. +Oliver felt a sudden rush of pity for him and of shame that he had so +nearly deserted him.</p> + +<p>"It must be hard," he thought, "to be so miserable and anxious, and to +have no one to talk it over with. And I do wonder what is the matter?"</p> + +<p>He waited an hour—and another. He had dimmed his lamps and could see +vaguely the outline of a house, with one dull light in a window. A dog +barked somewhere beyond the gate, and presently a child began crying. +It cried a very long time, then at last was quiet, but still no one +came. Oliver fell asleep finally against the comfortable leather +cushions, and slumbered he knew not how long before he was aroused by +the protesting creak of the broken gate. He thought, as he was waking, +that a man's voice, high-pitched with anger, was talking in the dark, +but when he had rubbed the sleep from his eyes, he saw no one but +Cousin Jasper.</p> + +<p>"I had not thought it would be so long," was all his cousin said as he +got in, and after that there was no word spoken until they entered +their own gate and rolled up to the door.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[56]</a></span>"You drive well for a boy. Good night," said Cousin Jasper as he +climbed out and entered the house. In his hurried, awkward way, he was +attempting to express his gratitude, but he had managed to say the +wrong thing.</p> + +<p>"For a boy, indeed," snorted Oliver, as he guided the car into the +door of the garage, and repeated it as he went up the stairs to his +room: "For a boy!"</p> + +<p>The big clock in the hall was solemnly striking one.</p> + +<p>Oliver was wondering, as he came down to breakfast next morning, what +his cousin would say in explanation of their midnight expedition, but +discovered that Cousin Jasper had adopted the simple expedient of +saying nothing at all. The matter was not even referred to until just +as they were leaving the table, and then only indirectly.</p> + +<p>"I should have thought of it before," their host said, "that it might +give you some pleasure to take out the car. Use it every day, if you +wish, and take Jennings or not, just as it suits you. I have real +confidence in your driving, Oliver."</p> + +<p>It was surprising how completely matters were put upon another footing +by what he had said. If Cousin Jasper had confidence in him, Oliver +thought, he need no longer feel like a neglected outsider, one who was +of no use or worth in the household.</p> + +<p>"Get your hat, Janet," he urged promptly.</p> + +<p>He had not an instant's hesitation in deciding where they would go +first.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[57]</a></span>Just as Cousin Jasper was entering his study he turned back to say:</p> + +<p>"Now about your Cousin Eleanor——"</p> + +<p>But Oliver either did not or would not hear, as he sped away toward +the garage. Perhaps Cousin Jasper understood the smile that Janet gave +him, for he smiled himself and said no more.</p> + +<p>In the very shortest time possible, Oliver and Janet were bowling +along the smooth white road with all the blue and golden sunlight of a +cool June morning about them. Oliver laughed when he thought of his +dusty progress along that way the day before. There was little danger +of his running away now, for the dreaded Cousin Eleanor was quite +forgotten and he was certain that the time would not pass slowly since +he had acquired this splendid new plaything.</p> + +<p>He wondered, as the highway spun away beneath the swift wheels, which +of the crossroads that he passed was the one that he had traveled the +evening before, but the night had been so dark and their speed so +great that he was quite unable to decide. It was only after exploring +a good many of Medford Valley's lesser thoroughfares, after awkward +turns in narrow byroads that proved to be mere blind alleys, that they +began to come closer and closer to the foot of the hill. Not being +able to find a direct path, Oliver finally drew up beside the low +stone wall and plunged, on foot, through the high grass of the +orchard.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[58]</a></span>"Wait until I see if they are here," he instructed Janet, "and then I +will come back for you."</p> + +<p>His new acquaintances were sitting on the bench beside the doorway as +he came up the hill, Polly in a very trim blue dress and without her +apron, but the Beeman in his same dilapidated overalls. The girl had a +notebook on her knee and was putting down records at her father's +dictation.</p> + +<p>"Here is our friend in need, of yesterday," said the Beeman cordially +as Oliver came up the path, "but we can't put him to work to-day +because we are just about to set off to fetch some new beehives. There +are more colonies than I thought that need dividing, and I find I am +out of hives."</p> + +<p>"Let me get them for you," Oliver offered at once, and explained the +presence of his sister in the car below.</p> + +<p>"Polly can go with you to show you the way," the Beeman agreed +willingly. "John Massey, who makes our hives for us, lives a good many +miles away, at the upper end of Medford Valley. I shall be glad to +save the time of going myself. Come to the top of the hill, so that I +can point out the direction of the road to you."</p> + +<p>They took the little path beyond the house, leading upward to the very +summit of the hill. In the direction from which Oliver had come, up +the gentler incline of the southern slope, the view was narrowed by +the woods and the orchard, showing only the long vista that led away +toward the high ridge <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[59]</a></span>opposite and the blue dip of shining sea. On +the eastern face of the hill, however, the ground fell away steeply to +a sweep of river and a broad stretch of green farming country. It lays +below like a vast sunken garden, with great square fields for lawns +and clumps of full-leaved, rounded trees for shrubbery. The +yellow-green of wheat and the blue-green of oats stretched out, a +smooth expanse that rippled and crinkled as the wind and the sweeping +shadow of a cloud went slowly down the valley. There were no country +houses of high-walled, steep-roofed magnificence here, only +comfortable farm dwellings with wide eaves and generous barns, a few +with picturesque, pointed silos and slim, high-towering windmills.</p> + +<p>"Most of that farming land belongs to your Cousin Jasper," the Beeman +said, while Oliver, too intent upon staring at the view below him, +failed to wonder how he happened to know so much of their affairs. +"That whole portion of the valley was waste, swampy ground at one +time; it was an uncle of Jasper Peyton's who drained the land thirty +years ago and built dikes to keep the river back. He arranged to rent +it out to tenant farmers, for he said one man should own the whole to +keep up the dikes and see that the stream did not come creeping in +again. Medford River looks lazy and sleepy enough, but it can be a +raging demon when the rains are heavy and the water comes up. Your +cousin owns all of it still except for a portion up there at the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[60]</a></span>bend +of the stream. That has passed out of his hands lately. It is at the +far end, on the last farm, that John Massey lives."</p> + +<p>Oliver from this vantage point could pick out the intricate succession +of lanes and highroad that he must take to cross the river and reach +John Massey's place, showing from here as only a dot of a gray house +at the angle of the stream. The sunshine was very clear and hot over +the valley below, but the oak tree spread its broad shadow all about +them and bowed its lofty head to a fresh, salt-laden wind.</p> + +<p>"See how still the trees are along the river," said the Beeman, "but +the oak tree is never quiet. The breeze comes past that gap in the +hills, yonder where you can look through to the sea, and it seems +never to stop blowing. So we call this place the Windy Hill."</p> + +<p>The three set off on their errand very gayly in the big car, although +Polly and Janet, in the back seat together, were a little shy and +silent at the very first. At the end of a mile, however, they were +beginning to warm toward each other and had set up a brisk chatter +before they had gone three.</p> + +<p>"I knew Janet would like Polly," Oliver was thinking. "She is the sort +of girl I like myself, not like Cousin Eleanor. The kind that makes +you feel that your clothes and your manners are all wrong and that you +haven't anything to say—those are the girls I can't stand."</p> + +<p>He quite forgot that this harsh judgment of his <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span>unknown relative was +not based upon any real evidence.</p> + +<p>When they reached the floor of the valley they found it as level as a +table, with a straight road running from end to end, along which they +sped in a whirling cloud of dust. Other cars passed them, driven by +prosperous farmers, the growl and clatter of motor tractors sounded +from the fields on either hand. Halfway up the valley the character of +the places seemed to change, the houses had the look of needing paint, +the weeds were taller along the fences, and there were no silos nor +tractors to be seen. As they neared John Massey's house, the road came +close to the river, with the high, grass-covered bank of earth that +was the dike rising at their left as they drove along.</p> + +<p>They were obliged to stop where some horses were walking in the road +ahead of them and seemed slow in making way. The big gray and brown +creatures were dragging huge flat stones, each hooked to the traces +with an iron chain, scuffling and scraping along in the dust.</p> + +<p>"I'm sorry," said the sunburned man who drove the last team, looking +back to where the car waited in the road. "We'll make room in a +minute, but the horses are doing all they can."</p> + +<p>"We are in no hurry," responded Oliver. "Where are you taking the +stones and what are they for?"</p> + +<p>"To mend the dike, quite a way downstream. It <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span>takes a lot of patching +to keep banks like these whole and strong, but they guard some +valuable land. The dike looks as though it needed repairs up here at +this end, but nobody does much to it. Mr. Peyton has us go over his +section of the banks every year."</p> + +<p>The horses moved forward, leaving room for them to pass, and the car +went on.</p> + +<p>John Massey's house was the last one at the end of the road, a little +place with a roof that needed new shingles and with sagging steps +leading up to the door. Oliver, with some difficulty, squeezed the big +car through the gate and followed the rutty driveway to the open space +behind the house. There was a stretch of grass, a well, two straggling +apple trees, and a row of beehives. An inquisitive cow came to the +gate of the barnyard and thrust her head over it to stare at them with +the frank curiosity of a country lady who sees little of strangers.</p> + +<p>"Here is John Massey," said Polly, as a rather heavy-faced, shabby man +with kindly blue eyes came out of one of the barns. "My father gave +him some of these beehives and taught him how to make new ones. He is +very clever at it, and it means a good deal to him to make ours, for +he is very poor. He works very hard on his farm, but it never seems to +be much of a success."</p> + +<p>The hives were brought out and paid for and stowed in the back of the +car. Oliver was just making ready for the somewhat difficult feat of +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span>backing the car around in the narrow space between house and barn, +when there came a rattling of wheels through the gate and a loud, +rasping voice was heard calling for John Massey.</p> + +<p>"That's Mr. Anthony Crawford," said the farmer, who had been standing +by the car admiring wistfully its shining sides and heavy tires. "He +owns this place and he comes up here nearly every day to see how I'm +farming it. I don't accomplish much with him always around to give me +sharp words and never a dollar for improvements. I've told him a +hundred times that the dike ought to be looked after this year or +we'll be having a flood, but he always says he guesses it will hold. +Yes, sir, I'm coming."</p> + +<p>The calls had grown too loud to be disregarded, although it was plain +that John Massey was in no haste to obey the summons. In a moment the +owner of the voice came jingling and rattling around the corner of the +house, the same narrow-faced, gray-eyed man that Oliver had met on the +road, driving the same bony, knock-kneed horse.</p> + +<p>"Whoa, there, whoa!" cried the driver, for the old white steed had +caught sight of the car and was testifying to its dislike of it by +grotesque prancings and sidlings that threatened to wreck the +ramshackle trap. "Here, get out of my way!" he ordered Oliver, "that +is, if you know how to handle that snorting locomotive that you think +you're driving."</p> + +<p>Red with anger, Oliver started his engine and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span>embarked upon a +maneuver that was difficult at best, and, under the present +unfavorable circumstances, proved to be nearly impossible. He turned +the car half round, collided with a pigsty, backed into the barnyard +fence, and narrowly missed taking a wheel off Anthony Crawford's +decrepit wagon. That gentleman assisted the process with jeering +remarks and criticisms, while Oliver grew redder and redder with fury +and embarrassment. At last, however, the car was turned and stood for +a moment in the driveway, facing the white horse which seemed to have +resigned itself to the presence of the puffing monster and to be very +reluctant to move.</p> + +<p>"I have got out of your way, now will you be good enough to get out of +mine?" said Oliver very slowly, lest the rage within him should break +out into open insult.</p> + +<p>In spite of his anger he could not help noticing that the man before +him moved with a curious easy grace, and that when he smiled, with a +white flash of teeth, he was almost attractive. It was impossible to +deny that, except for his thin lips and his hard gray eyes, he was +handsome.</p> + +<p>"He must be about Cousin Jasper's age," Oliver thought as he sat +looking at him while the other stared in return.</p> + +<p>"I should like to pass," the boy persisted, since the other made no +move.</p> + +<p>"So you shall, Mr. Oliver Peyton," returned the man, "only don't +expect me to move as fast or as <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span>gracefully as you did. You wonder how +I know your name, I suppose. Well, if that precious Cousin Jasper of +yours and mine were a little more outspoken about his affairs, you +would know all about me. If you want to know where I live, just look +over the back wall of your cousin's garden. Do it some time when he +isn't looking, for he doesn't love to think of what lies behind that +wall where the fruit trees are trained so prettily and where the trees +and shrubs grow so high."</p> + +<p>He had made way at last and the car moved forward, but he turned to +shout a last bitter word after them.</p> + +<p>"If you want to know one of your Cousin Jasper's meanest secrets, look +over the wall."</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>CHAPTER IV<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> + +<h4>THE GARDEN WALL</h4> +<br /> + +<p>It was very early when Oliver rolled out of bed next day, sleepy but +determined. He had decided, at first, to pay no attention to Anthony +Crawford's suggestion, made evidently with malicious purpose; he had, +indeed, almost forgotten it by the time he and Janet reached home. But +Janet had remembered, and she had brought up the question that evening +as they went up to their own quarters rather later than usual, since +Cousin Jasper had been sitting with them in the library and had seemed +unwilling that they should leave him.</p> + +<p>"There is something very wrong in this house," declared Janet. +"Hotchkiss doesn't know what it is, Mrs. Brown doesn't."</p> + +<p>"I think the Beeman knows," Oliver volunteered suddenly, although he +could give no reason for his guess.</p> + +<p>"Anyway," pursued Janet, "some one ought to know, for some one ought +to help Cousin Jasper. I am certain that he has no mean secrets, as +Anthony Crawford said. And so I think one of us should climb up and +look over the wall. It had better be <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span>you," she added wisely but +regretfully, "because, if we both try it, some one is sure to see us."</p> + +<p>It was, therefore, Oliver who was stirring at sunrise, for his +investigations must be made before any one else was up. He let himself +out of the house very quietly and crossed the empty, silent garden. He +had forgotten how beautiful a garden could be in the early morning +with the dew shining on every grass tip and with the flowers all +radiant in the vividness of color of newly created things. There were +gay-colored beds below the terrace and long borders at each side of +the house, then a wide stretch of grass behind the garage, and beyond +that, back of the shrubs and the fruit trees and the thickly growing +vines, was the wall. It was higher than the boundaries at the sides +and front of Cousin Jasper's place, perhaps to afford a better surface +for the grapevines and pear trees trained against it, perhaps for +another reason.</p> + +<p>Oliver walked along it slowly, looking up at the smooth bricks and +wondering how it was to be climbed. The more difficult it appeared the +more determined he became to get to the top. In the middle of the wall +behind a summerhouse stood a stout trellis, the support of an +exceedingly thorny rose vine. Here, he decided, was the place to +scramble up, but he must make haste, for people in the house would be +waking and would see him. Carefully he set a foot upon the lowest bar, +found that it would hold, and began mounting upward.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span>There were trees beyond the wall, not the trimmed, well-kept kind that +grew in Cousin Jasper's garden, but a scrubby growth of box elder and +silver-leaved poplar such as spring up in myriads where the grass is +never cut. Hanging over the top of the coping, he could peer through +their branches and see a house beyond. He was astonished to see the +shingled roof rising so close by, for he had not thought that they had +neighbors who dwelt so near.</p> + +<p>The house was a square one of yellow stone, with overhanging eaves and +small windows and an old-fashioned stoop in front, over which the roof +came down in a long sweep. It must have been built a hundred years +ago, he thought, and it might have seemed a charming, comfortable old +place were it not so unutterably dejected and dingy. Its windows were +cracked, the grass grew tall and ragged upon its lawns, a litter of +rubbish lay about the back door, and the woodwork, that should have +been white, was gray from want of paint.</p> + +<p>"It looks as though the people who lived in it just—didn't care," +Oliver commented. "It is a nice old house, but it seems worn out and +discouraged, somehow, like John Massey's cottage. I wonder who owns +it."</p> + +<p>An open space between the dwelling and the wall had apparently once +been a broad lawn, then had been plowed up for the planting of a patch +of grain, and had at last been left as a neglected waste for weeds and +brambles to flourish undisturbed. An old <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span>scarecrow still stood +knee-deep in the tangled green, left there after the field had been +abandoned, to drop slowly to pieces in the wind and rain. The +grotesque figure, with its outstretched arms and hat set at a rakish +angle, looked familiar for some incomprehensible reason. As Oliver +clung to the wall, squinted through the leaves, and wondered why that +should be, the mystery was suddenly solved. The door of the house +opened with a squeak of rusty hinges and somebody came out on the +step. It was Anthony Crawford. No wonder the scarecrow looked like its +master, for it was wearing his old clothes, garments to which there +always cling a vague resemblance to the person who once wore them.</p> + +<p>A child with very yellow hair came running out upon the doorstone, +laughing aloud at some small joke of his very own. When he saw Anthony +Crawford, however, he sobered suddenly and slipped back into the house +without a sound. The man stood upon the step and stared, with +narrowed, penetrating eyes, over toward the wall. The gables and +chimneys of Cousin Jasper's big house must show through the trees from +where he stood and, judging by the look with which he regarded them, +it seemed that he hated the very roof that sheltered Jasper Peyton. +The luxurious mansion was, in truth, a sharp contrast to the unkempt, +gone-to-seed yellow farmhouse, although Oliver wondered whether, +originally, the old stone dwelling had not been the more attractive of +the two.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span>He leaned forward to see plainer, made an unwise move, and attracted +the attention of the man on the step. The boy flushed scarlet as their +eyes met, for Anthony Crawford, without making a sound, went through a +pantomime of an ecstasy of glee. He had evidently expected to arouse +Oliver's curiosity by his suggestion the day before, and was overcome +with ill-natured delight to catch him in the very act of satisfying +it.</p> + +<p>With a mutter of angry words, Oliver dropped back into the garden.</p> + +<p>"I wasn't looking just because he told me to—I <i>wasn't</i>!" he kept +repeating.</p> + +<p>As he walked toward the house he looked back more than once at the +high wall, wondering at the things it hid. Here was squalid poverty +almost under the windows of the great, handsome house where Cousin +Jasper lived with everything that heart could desire. It was the +poverty, too, of a member of his own family. Here was jealous enmity +also, a hatred that seemed to point ominously to trouble before them, +to all the harm that could be accomplished by an angry, unscrupulous +man. No wonder Cousin Jasper looked changed, and haunted. What hold +did Anthony Crawford have upon his cousin; why should one have so +little and the other so much; why did that high wall forbid all +intercourse with that strange neighbor? It was plain to Oliver at last +that their night ride through lanes and crossroads had been necessary +because the wall cut off <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span>any direct path, and that the goal of their +expedition in the dark had been Anthony Crawford's sagging, one-hinged +gate.</p> + +<p>The morning sun was rising higher, the cheerful sound of a grass +cutter was going up and down the garden, and smoke was mounting from +the kitchen chimney. With some care, lest he should be asked the cause +of his scratched hands and torn sleeve, Oliver slipped into the house +and sought his own room.</p> + +<p>He and Janet talked over all that he had seen, but they could make +little of it and were, indeed, more mystified than ever. At intervals +during the day, they kept coming back to the subject and were still +talking of it that evening as they sat in the library with the long +windows open upon the terrace and upon the flowering garden. They had +come to no conclusion, however, when the study door opened and Cousin +Jasper came toward them across the hall. He looked less troubled +to-night, and was smiling as though he had been looking forward to +this hour they were to spend together. Yet his face changed in a +moment at the sound of rattling wheels on the drive, followed by the +appearance of a troubled Hotchkiss at the door, with the reluctant +question:</p> + +<p>"Will you see Mr. Crawford, sir?"</p> + +<p>The visitor had not waited, but came pushing in behind him.</p> + +<p>"We do not need to stand on ceremony," he <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span>said, "when it is all in +the same family. These are your two guests, eh? You need not introduce +them, we have met before. I saw the boy very recently, in fact; he +seems to be an enterprising fellow and was conducting some +investigations of his own. Well, well, we won't talk of it now."</p> + +<p>Oliver writhed inwardly under his sharp glance, but could muster no +appropriate reply. He was thinking again that Anthony Crawford might +have been handsome except for those restless gray eyes that were set +too near together. Although his host was obviously anxious to lead him +away to the study, the visitor planted himself in the middle of the +library floor and stood his ground firmly.</p> + +<p>"Have you thought over my offer, Jasper?" he said. "Are you ready to +give me my share, or shall I take all?"</p> + +<p>"I have given up what seemed your share," Jasper Peyton returned +steadily, "and rather than quarrel with you further I would gladly +give you all. But I believe to shut one's eyes to justice is wrong, +even in such a matter as this."</p> + +<p>The other's calm broke suddenly under the force of ungovernable anger.</p> + +<p>"You will be sorry," he cried. "You will lose more than those fat +acres by the river and this fine house where you hoped to live so +happily—until I came. You won't give in, will you? Your high +principles—or your stubbornness—will still hold you back from giving +me what is mine? Then I can <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[73]</a></span>tell you that I will drag your good name +down where my own stands, I will publish that disgrace of mine that +you hushed up to save the family pride. You will have people looking +into your own past; they will be saying, 'If one of the family was +crooked, why not another?' There is always a pack of gossips and +scandalmongers who are only too glad to snap at the heels of any +prominent man. I will loose them all upon you, Jasper Peyton, every +one."</p> + +<p>He stopped, perhaps to draw breath, while Cousin Jasper stood before +him, very silent and very white. The man's narrow eyes turned first to +Oliver who was bursting with unexpressed rage and then to Janet who +was regarding him with astonished and horrified disapproval.</p> + +<p>"You do not like my way of talking?" he said to her. "I assure you +that all I have said is the truth."</p> + +<p>"Then I should not think," she replied bluntly, "that you would have +many friends if you often tell them the truth in just that way."</p> + +<p>"I have no friends," he declared. "Friends exist only to hurt you; it +is my belief that men prosper better alone. Have no illusions, trust +nobody, feel that every man's hand is against you, and then you will +know where you stand. That is my policy. Your soft-hearted cousin, +here—his one mistake is that he trusts every one, he likes everybody. +He even trusts me a little, on very small evidence, I can assure you. +He would hate me if he could, but, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span>because we are of the same blood, +he cannot even bring himself to do that. Eh, Jasper, am I not right?"</p> + +<p>"If you think you have said enough to these children," said Cousin +Jasper, wincing, but still quiet, "perhaps we had better discuss this +business further in some other room."</p> + +<p>"Very well," returned the other, quite good-tempered again. "I should +be glad enough to have them hear the whole. But of course if there are +some things that you do not wish known——"</p> + +<p>He walked away toward the study, quite at his ease, humming a tune and +casting sharp, appraising glances about him as though the thought of +ownership were already in his mind. The door beyond the hall closed +behind them.</p> + +<p>"What a hateful man!" cried Janet, almost in tears. "Poor Cousin +Jasper! And we can't do anything to help him."</p> + +<p>Oliver, equally miserable, stood at the window. The moon was coming up +behind the trees, a great red moon just past the full, misshapen and +lopsided, that seemed to be laughing at them. He stamped his foot in +angry impotence.</p> + +<p>"And he doesn't seem to me even to believe in himself; it is as though +he were playing a part, just showing off." He pointed through the +window at the disgraceful cart and dejected old horse standing before +the wide white steps.</p> + +<p>"I don't think he has to drive that wretched <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span>wagon at all. He just +does it to make Cousin Jasper ridiculous."</p> + +<p>The session in the study was prolonged so late that in the end Janet +and Oliver abandoned their sleepy effort to wait until Anthony +Crawford should depart, and went dispiritedly upstairs to bed.</p> + +<p>"I have made up my mind to one thing," said Oliver firmly, as they +reached the top of the stairs, "I am going to ask the Beeman what we +ought to do. I feel as though I had known him always and I am sure he +can help us."</p> + +<p>"But ought we to tell him Cousin Jasper's secrets?" objected Janet +doubtfully, "and, by the way, what is his name? You never told me."</p> + +<p>"Why—I don't know it," exclaimed Oliver in a tone of complete +astonishment. "I never even noticed that I didn't. It doesn't matter, +I will ask him to-morrow. And you understand, from the first minute he +speaks, that you can trust the Beeman."</p> + +<p>He went away to his room where, so it seemed to him, he had been +asleep a long time before the rattle of wheels aroused him. He peered +drowsily through the window and saw the old white horse with its lean, +erect driver move slowly down toward the gate, long-shadowed and +unreal in the moonlight, fantastic omens of some unknown mischief that +was brewing.</p> + +<p>Next morning, as he and Janet left the car beside the orchard wall and +climbed the grassy slope of the hill, Oliver's one misgiving was lest +the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span>Beeman should not be there. But yes, as they came up the steep +path they heard voices and smelled the sharp, pleasant odor of wood +smoke drifting down toward them. The wind was high to-day, singing and +swooping about the hilltop, slamming the swinging door of the house, +and scattering in all directions such bold bees as had ventured out to +ride down the boisterous breeze to the honey-filled meadows below.</p> + +<p>Janet was as warmly welcomed as Oliver, and they were both bidden to +come in and sit down beside the table where Polly was sorting the +little wooden boxes in which the bees build the honeycomb.</p> + +<p>"We were just going to begin a story," said the Beeman. "Polly has +been clamoring for it for half an hour."</p> + +<p>"But I wanted to ask you something," broke in Oliver, too much excited +for good manners. "Couldn't you wait?"</p> + +<p>"I believe," said the Beeman slowly, giving him an odd glance that +seemed to carry a message of complete understanding, "I believe that +sometimes it is better, when you are troubled about something, to cool +off and settle down, and come at an affair slowly. And I think this is +one of the times."</p> + +<p>Oliver nodded. He felt quite sure that the Beeman was right.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>CHAPTER V<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> + +<h4>THE GHOST SHIP</h4> +<br /> + +<p>Cicely Hallowell sighed deeply as she pushed away the heap of papers +before her and brushed back the hair from her aching forehead. She was +weary of her task and the room was growing dark and cold. She was +beginning, moreover, to be uneasily conscious that the two men at the +far end of the long table had forgotten her presence behind the pile +of great ledgers and were talking of things that she was not meant to +hear.</p> + +<p>Half an hour earlier her brother Alan had rushed in to see whether she +were not ready for their afternoon ride and had been disappointedly +impatient when she shook her head.</p> + +<p>"It is a glorious day, so cold and the roads so deep in snow. The +horses are like wild things, and will give us a famous gallop up the +valley. Oh, do come, Cicely."</p> + +<p>But no, she must stay in the big gloomy countinghouse, to finish the +letters that she had promised to copy for her father, while Alan had +flung off, saying over his shoulder, as he departed to take his ride +alone:</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[78]</a></span>"It is very wrong to miss fun and adventure by toiling and moiling +here. Think how the sea will look and how the blasts will be blowing +over our Windy Hill!"</p> + +<p>The place seemed very cheerless and empty after he had gone. The long +windows gave little light on that gray winter afternoon, and the big +fireplace with its glowing logs was at the far end of the room. There +were shadows already on the shelves of heavy ledgers lining the walls, +and on the rows of ship's models all up and down the sides of the big +countingroom. Those lines of dusty volumes held records that Alan was +forever reading, tales of wonderful voyages, of spices and gold dust +and jewels brought home from the Orient, of famines in far lands +broken by the coming of American grain ships, of profits reckoned in +ducats and doubloons and Spanish pieces of eight. Cicely was fond of +drawing and loved, far more than copying dull letters, to make +sketches of those miniature vessels in the glass cases that stood for +the Hallowell ships that had scoured the oceans of the world. They had +been wrecked on coral reefs in hot, distant seas, they had lain +becalmed with priceless cargoes in pirate-infested waters, their crews +were as skillful with the long guns as they were at handling the +sails, their captains were as at home in Shanghai or Calcutta as they +were in the streets of the little seaport town where they had been +born. Cicely could remember when the big <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span>countingroom had been +crowded with clerks and had hummed like a beehive with the myriad +activities of the Hallowell trade. It was a dull and empty place now, +and the fleet of Hallowell ships was scattered, some lying at anchor, +some dismantled and sold, some fallen into the hands of the enemy. For +this was the third year of that struggle with England that the +histories were to call the War of 1812.</p> + +<p>Cicely, for all her thirteen years, looked very small, sitting there +at the end of the long table, in her "sprigged" high-waisted gown, her +feet in their strapped slippers perched on the rung of the high office +stool. She had just taken up her pen to begin writing again when the +voices of the two men by the fire rose so suddenly that she dropped +it, startled. Her father's tone fell almost immediately to strained +quiet, but Martin Hallowell, his partner, went on with angry +insistence. She knew him to be hot-headed and impetuous, but she had +never heard such words from him before.</p> + +<p>With a quick, eager motion that was the embodiment of impatient greed, +Martin was running his finger down the columns of the ledger before +him.</p> + +<p>"There is no ship like a privateer, and no privateer like the +<i>Huntress</i>," he was saying. "Send her on one more voyage and we shall +be rich men."</p> + +<p>There was an ugly tremor in his voice, that quavered and broke in +spite of his attempts to keep it calm.</p> + +<p>"I do not care to be one of those who gathers <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[80]</a></span>riches from a war," +returned Reuben Hallowell, Cicely's father. There was something in the +dry calm of his answer that seemed to stir Martin to uncontrollable +anger.</p> + +<p>"It is like you, Reuben Hallowell," he said, "to be willing to ruin my +plans by your foolish scruples just when a real prize is within reach. +But I vow you shall not do it. You shall be a wealthy man in spite of +yourself, and let me remind you that, two years ago, before we built +the <i>Huntress</i>, you were a precious poor one."</p> + +<p>The Hallowell partners were not brothers, but cousins, with Cicely's +father much the older of the two. They had inherited the business from +their fathers, for such an ill-assorted pair would never have been +joined together from choice. Many of their discussions ended in stormy +words, but never before had Martin's dark face showed such white-hot, +quivering rage as when he arose now, gathered up his papers, and went +away to his own room, closing the door smartly behind him. Cicely got +up also and went down the long countingroom to where her father sat by +the fire.</p> + +<p>"I heard what you and Cousin Martin were saying," she told him +hesitatingly, "I am afraid you did not remember that I was there. But +it does not matter, for I did not understand what Cousin Martin was so +angry about."</p> + +<p>"There is no reason why you should not understand," her father +replied, rather slowly and wearily, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span>she thought, "although sometimes +I am not certain that I understand these troubled times myself. Across +the seas the Emperor Napoleon, a long-nosed, short-bodied man of +infinite genius for setting the world by the ears, has been warring +with England for the last ten years and more. He and the British, with +their blockades and embargoes and Orders in Council have long been +striving to ruin each other, yet have achieved their greatest success +in ruining a peaceable old gentleman in America who relies on his +ships to bring him a livelihood. To oppress neutral shipping leads in +the end to war, although I vow that often Congress must have felt that +it should toss up a penny to determine whether the declaration should +be against France or England. Some stubborn British minister, however, +decided to countenance the stealing of sailors from our ships to fill +up the scanty crews of their own navy, and a stubborn British nation +felt that it must back him, so in the end the war was with England."</p> + +<p>"And have we not won many glorious victories?" asked Cicely.</p> + +<p>"Ay, there have been victories; out of her fleet of seven hundred and +thirty sail, England has lost a handful to us and we have shown how +small our navy is and how great is its spirit. There have been +passages of arms on land, also, of which we do not love to talk. And +we have sent out our privateer vessels, armed ships that prey upon +England's commerce, yet do not belong to our navy. They have <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span>done +great things, have cut deep into England's overseas trade, and have +brought home many a valuable prize to fill the pockets of their +owners. Such a vessel is our <i>Huntress</i>, built at your Cousin Martin's +instigation and launched at the moment when our fortunes were at their +lowest ebb. Since we had not sufficient funds to equip her, nearly +every one in this town put money into her, from John Harwood the +minister down to Jack Marvin who digs our garden. It was a patriotic +venture and a risky one, but she has brought home great profits in +prize money and our own share has reëstablished the firm of Hallowell. +Your Cousin Martin says that one more voyage will bring us not only +profit, but real wealth. But I say," he struck his hand suddenly upon +the table, "I say that there shall not be another."</p> + +<p>"Why?" The question was startled from Cicely by his sudden vehemence, +yet it was not from him that she was to receive the answer. The door +opened to admit Martin Hallowell, who had come back, apparently, for a +last word.</p> + +<p>"You say," he began at once, "that the <i>Huntress</i> needs refitting and +cannot be made seaworthy in less than a month?"</p> + +<p>His partner nodded.</p> + +<p>"I say that she shall sail in a week," declared Martin.</p> + +<p>"And I say no," cried Reuben Hallowell.</p> + +<p>"You say, too, that the war is nearly over, that the Peace Commission +is sitting at Ghent, and that <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span>rumors are coming home that they are +near to an agreement. That is your excuse for wishing to keep our +privateers at home. You are a foolish and an overscrupulous man, +Reuben Hallowell, for I say that such a reason makes all the more +haste for her to be gone. We should reap what profit we can while +there is yet time." He leaned forward, his dark, eager face close to +theirs, all caution forgotten in the intensity of his purpose. "Once +at sea the <i>Huntress</i> is beyond reach of tidings or orders. If she +should take her last and richest prizes a little after peace has been +declared, who will ever know it?"</p> + +<p>He was silent and stood staring at them with unwavering, defiant eyes. +Cicely could hear her sharply drawn breath as she waited for her +father to answer.</p> + +<p>"We are partners no longer, Martin Hallowell," he said. "We were not +born to work together and it is clear that we have come to the parting +of the ways. To-morrow we will make division of our holdings, for I +tell you plainly that I will have no more to do with you and your +dishonest schemes."</p> + +<p>"It shall be as you say," Martin agreed, quick to press home an +advantage. "And since it was I who urged the building and launching of +the <i>Huntress</i>, it is only proper that she should fall to my share. +She shall sail this day week, as I have told you. And you, my dear +cousin, for your effort to stop her, shall soon be a most regretful +man."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span>He went out, this time closing the door very gently behind him. The +echoes of his vague threat seemed to hang in the great room long after +he was gone.</p> + +<p>"What—what can he do?" questioned Cicely.</p> + +<p>Her father, with a visible effort, answered cheerfully, "An angry man +loves to threaten, but we have naught to fear from him. And now," he +gathered the big ledger under his arm, "I must work for a little in +the countingroom and then we will go home."</p> + +<p>Cicely, left alone, went back to fetch her letters and stopped for a +moment at one of the long windows to look down upon the harbor where +the <i>Huntress</i> dipped and swayed at anchor, a stately, beautiful thing +that seemed to quiver with life as she rocked in the choppy seas, her +shimmering reflection, beginning to be colored by the sunset, rocking +and dancing with her.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I must draw it," cried Cicely, catching up a sheet of fresh +paper. "If only the light holds and the ship does not swing round with +the tide!"</p> + +<p>The minutes passed while she worked eagerly, but finally was forced to +lay down her pencil, unable to see more in the dusk. The door flew +open and some one came in with the impulsive rush that belonged only +to her brother Alan.</p> + +<p>"What, Cicely, still here and trying to draw in the dark? Let me see +what you have done," he exclaimed. He lit a candle and examined the +paper. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span>"I vow, that is good. Oh, Cicely, that <i>Huntress</i> is a +wonderful ship!"</p> + +<p>For some reason there was a cold clutch at Cicely's heart.</p> + +<p>"Yes?" she answered faintly.</p> + +<p>"I have just had such a talk with Cousin Martin," the boy went on +excitedly. "I did not quite understand the way of it, but he said that +he and my father were to divide, and that the <i>Huntress</i> was to be his +own, entire. He wants me to go with her on her next voyage. He says +the war is not nearly done and that there will be many months of +fighting and prize-taking still. He thinks a great fellow of sixteen +like me should have been a ship's officer long ago, and I think so, +too. What a good fellow Cousin Martin is!"</p> + +<p>Alan admired his elder cousin greatly, Cicely well knew, and he had, +indeed, a touch of the same excitable, headstrong nature. She could +well understand how Martin Hallowell had dazzled the boy with tales of +what he would see and do. Had there been such a plan in her cousin's +mind when he first uttered his threat against her father? Or had it +only flashed upon him as he met Alan running up the stairs, eager, +vigorous, and ready for any adventure?</p> + +<p>"It is all arranged," declared Alan, "except just to tell my father."</p> + +<p>"No, no," she cried wildly, but he did not even listen.</p> + +<p>"I will go in and speak to him now," he said. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span>She could not even cry +out as the door closed behind him.</p> + +<p>Alan had his father's stern and steady pride, but there were +differences of temperament that led to frequent clashes of will +between them. Reuben Hallowell loved both his motherless children, but +he understood his son less well than his daughter. What would be the +result of that interview, Cicely wondered, sitting quaking beside the +candle that burned so lonely in the gloom. Would her father know how +to be firm and patient, how to undo the harm that Martin Hallowell had +wrought? It seemed, as she sat there, shivering, that she could not +endure the suspense.</p> + +<p>She had not long to wait. The door banged open and Alan stood for a +moment on the threshold.</p> + +<p>"My father forbids my sailing on the <i>Huntress</i>. I have told him I +should go in spite of him," he said.</p> + +<p>He walked away along the corridor and down the stone steps, his feet +quicker and lighter than Martin Hallowell's but his footsteps +sounding, in some vague, terrible way, like his cousin's as he strode +out and down the stairs.</p> + +<p>Her father came in a moment later.</p> + +<p>"You should have been at home long since this, my child," was all he +said, and they went out together, without further talk of the matter, +into the sharp air of the snowy night.</p> + +<p>At the corner of the steep, narrow street, Cicely caught sight of +Martin Hallowell talking to a man <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span>whom she recognized as an old +seaman who had sailed for years upon the Hallowell ships. Something +Martin had said must have angered the sailor, for he was talking +loudly, regardless of who might hear.</p> + +<p>"No," the old man was saying, "there's not every one in the world will +do your bidding, though you may think so. You can defy the old one and +talk over the young one to go your way, but there's one man will not +sail on any ship of yours and that's Ben Barton. I'll starve ashore +first."</p> + +<p>Cicely's quick ear caught his words as she and her father passed by on +the other side of the snow-muffled street. It did not seem that Reuben +Hallowell had heard.</p> + +<p>One day passed, two, three, four days, and Cicely's one thought was +that the <i>Huntress</i> was to sail in seven. Workmen were swarming all +over her like bees, hammering, calking, and painting, yet it was plain +that they could not do in a week what needed a month to finish. Alan +was at the wharf all day, holding frequent conferences with his +cousin. Reuben Hallowell went to and fro among the townspeople, urging +them to say that the ship in which they were part owners must abide at +home. But either because they were less sure of peace than he, or +because their eyes were blinded by past good fortune and hopes of +future gain, they would not listen. Between father and son no words +were passed, since <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span>each was waiting for the other's stubborn pride to +give way.</p> + +<p>On the fifth day Cicely had gone out to ride, on a clear, snowy +afternoon, with the white world shining before her and with the +highway iron-hard under the horses' feet. She missed Alan sorely, for +this was their favorite road, up the valley to the west of the town, +as far as the round bare hill with the single oak tree that they liked +to call theirs. The servant with her had dropped behind, and she was +just turning her horse into the bypath leading to the hill when she +saw a sturdy figure coming down the slope. The brown face, tattooed +hands, and the small bundle of possessions done up in a blue +handkerchief could only be a sailor's, a sailor who proved to be Ben +Barton.</p> + +<p>"I'm going to the next seaport to find another berth, since I've +refused to sail on the <i>Huntress</i>," he explained in answer to her +questions. "Mr. Martin has had to get a new skipper and a new crew, +for none of the old hands would sail when they heard it was against +your father's wishes. There was a bark came in from Delaware to be +laid up for repairs, with mostly Swedes aboard, and they have manned +the <i>Huntress</i> from her. The ship is to sail on Friday at midnight, +with the turning tide, but she goes without Ben Barton."</p> + +<p>He dropped his voice and came nearer.</p> + +<p>"I will tell you this—though I should not," he said. "There's some +one to join at the last minute, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span>who will get into a boat waiting at +the wharf in the dark, some one you love, miss, who ought to be +stopping ashore with the rest of us. You should find some way to keep +him back."</p> + +<p>"Oh, if I only could!" she cried.</p> + +<p>"There's only you can do it," he answered. "Hallowell blood can only +be ruled by Hallowell blood, as we say on Hallowell ships. Well, I'll +be going on again. I had climbed the path, there, to take one more +look at the harbor, where you can see it between the hills. Maybe your +father will find a place for me when his vessels go to sea for trade +again, and I'll never forget him nor you, Miss Cicely. Do you remember +how you and your brother once hid under the wharf, and called out from +that echoing place as though you were lost souls out of the sea? There +was one honest old sailorman that nearly lost his wits for terror, +since we seafaring folk have no love for ghosts. Mark my words, there +will no good come to the <i>Huntress</i> from setting sail of a Friday. For +that alone I would stay ashore though there's other things to hold me, +too."</p> + +<p>He strode away down the snowy road, leaving Cicely, smiling at first +at the recollection of that game that had so frightened him when she +and her brother had played at ghosts, then grave in a moment when she +thought how soon that brother was to be gone. On Friday, the day after +to-morrow, he <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span>would sail unless she could stop him. But how could +she?</p> + +<p>The next day she made the desperate effort of appealing to her father, +but quite in vain. Reuben Hallowell would not believe either that the +<i>Huntress</i> would sail or that his son would go with her.</p> + +<p>"And if Alan wishes to cut himself off from his own people forever, +let him," he said finally, unable to endure the thought that any one +should dare to defy his will. Friday came, the shadows of Friday night +stole through the big house, yet nothing had been done.</p> + +<p>Cicely sat by the fire in her chintz-hung bedroom, leaning back +against the flowered cushion of the big armchair, gazing into the +flames. In the next room she could hear vague sounds of Alan's +preparations, feet going to and fro, a door opening and closing, a +pair of heavy boots dropped upon the floor. The night was dark +outside, with a blustering wind and occasional flurries of snow that +struck sharply against the window.</p> + +<p>It was ten o'clock. The sounds had ceased as though Alan had finished +making ready and was waiting, perhaps sitting silent in the dark, +perhaps lying down for an hour or two of sleep before the fateful hour +of the high tide. Cicely heard her father, below, barring the door, +putting out the candles, making ready for a night that would surely +bring him no sleep. Presently he passed her door, glanced inside, and +came in to stand for a minute <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span>beside her fire. How worn he had grown +to look just within the space of this last week! He said scarcely a +word; it was as though his unhappiness merely craved company and +shrank from the knowledge of what the night might bring.</p> + +<p>At last he said, "You should be in bed. Good night, my dear."</p> + +<p>As he went out he turned to look back at her with a glance of haggard, +helpless misery. It was as though he said:</p> + +<p>"My pride has bound and stifled me. I cannot speak a word to stop him, +but won't you, can't you, persuade him, somehow, not to go?"</p> + +<p>Very carefully and without a sound, Cicely rose and went to her +closet, to take down her warm fur cloak. She had realized, in the +moment of seeing her father's pleading look, that she had a plan, one +that had been in her mind ever since the day that she had talked with +Ben Barton. What she had really lacked was courage to put it into +execution. Yet now, as she drew the cloak about her and pulled down +her hood, her hands did not even tremble, nor did her determination +falter. The house was absolutely still as she stole noiselessly down +the stairs and slipped out of the door.</p> + +<p>For a girl who had almost never been allowed upon the street alone, +the wintry night should have been full of terrors, but to Cicely they +meant nothing. As she ran down the steep High Street with the gale +blustering behind her, she saw things that <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span>she had never believed +existed—a burly waterman quarreling with his wife behind a dirty +lighted window, the open door of a tavern showing a candle-lit room +with a crowd of shouting sailors drinking within, a furtive black +shadow that skulked into an alleyway and remained there, silent and +hidden, as she passed.</p> + +<p>She reached the wharves at last, where the wind was stronger and where +the waves slapped and dashed against the barnacled piles, throwing +their spray against the windows of the locked warehouses. Even now she +did not hesitate. She ran, a gray, flitting form, across the open +space at the head of the wharf and disappeared.</p> + +<p>There was a wait of a few minutes, then came the dip of oars through +the dark and the sound of men's voices talking above the high wind. +Martin Hallowell was coming ashore in the boat that was to carry Alan +away. Beyond them, the lights of the <i>Huntress</i> showed where she was +getting up sail. Martin made the landing with some difficulty, climbed +the ladder to the wharf, and stood bracing himself against the heavy +wind.</p> + +<p>"We are a little early," he said. "Hold fast there with the boat hook. +He will be here in a——"</p> + +<p>His voice was drowned by a strange sound, an unearthly wailing that +seemed to rise from the water beneath, but which filled the air until +there was no saying from what direction it came. It lifted and +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span>dropped, hung sobbing and echoing above the water, then died away.</p> + +<p>"Holy St. Anthony help us!" cried the nearest sailor. "It is the soul +of some poor drowned creature caught among the weeds."</p> + +<p>"Give way," roared the man at the rudder, and with one accord the oars +dropped into the water.</p> + +<p>"Stop, wait! It—it is nothing, you fools," cried Martin Hallowell, +but his own voice quavered with terror, and carried little reassurance +to the frightened men.</p> + +<p>The boat hung doubtfully a ship's length from the pier, the oars +dipping to hold it into the wind, the men hesitating, ashamed of their +terror yet fearing to come closer. Again the cry broke forth, +resounding again and again, mingling in terrible, ghostly fashion with +the splashing and gurgling of the water. The boat shot away into the +dark, just as Alan came running down the wharf, shouting to them to +come back. The sailors, however, bent to their oars, unheeding; the +lantern in the stern dipped and jerked as they rowed away, and the +light finally went out of sight as the boat drew alongside the +<i>Huntress</i>. It was just possible to make out the big ship as she +weighed anchor and, rolling and plunging, moved slowly out into the +tideway.</p> + +<p>"She's gone—without me!" cried Alan. "Oh, they might have come back, +the cowards!"</p> + +<p>"Did you hear that—that terrible sound?" asked Martin Hallowell. In a +second's pause <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span>between the breaking of two waves, it was possible to +hear his teeth chatter.</p> + +<p>"Terrible!" cried Alan in disgust. "That was only my sister Cicely, +hiding under the wharf. It was a game we once played to frighten Ben +Barton. Come out," he ordered sternly, kneeling down and thrusting an +arm into the dark space to help her.</p> + +<p>Out Cicely came, wet and shivering, with her hair streaked with mud +and her hands scratched and cut by the sharp barnacles. Her face +showed white in the dark as she looked up appealingly at her brother, +but he turned from her without a sign. Before she could follow him, +Martin Hallowell had seized her by the arm.</p> + +<p>"You?" he cried. "You?"</p> + +<p>He shook her until she was dizzy, until the dark, windy world spun +before her eyes, he cried out at her with a terrible voice and with +words that she only half understood. All the rage stored up within him +during his bitter struggle to get his ship under way, all the baffled +hopes of his small-spirited revenge, all the shame for his recent +terror broke forth into blind fury against the girl who had stood in +his way.</p> + +<p>"I will teach you," he shouted, grasping her arm tighter until she +winced with pain, "I will show you that you can't——"</p> + +<p>His words were cut short by a stinging blow across the mouth from +which he staggered back, dropping <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[95]</a></span>Cicely's arm and staring in gaping +astonishment at his assailant.</p> + +<p>"That is my sister," said Alan, very stiff and quiet and suddenly very +like his father. "Whatever she has done you are not to touch her. She +has ruined my chance of sailing with the <i>Huntress</i>, but at least she +has shown me what—what you are, Martin Hallowell."</p> + +<p>With his arm about Cicely, Alan went down the pier, while Martin, +confounded and silenced, stood staring after them. The two said +nothing as they climbed the High Street, although much must have been +passing in the boy's mind. As he pushed open their own door and came +into the dusky hallway he spoke for the first time.</p> + +<p>"Can you wait here by the fire a minute, Cicely? I am going up first +to—to tell my father what a fool I have been."</p> + +<br /> +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> +<br /> + +<p>The weeks of winter passed, news came that peace had been signed on +Christmas Eve, one after another the ships of war came straggling +home. Some had taken prizes, all had been harried by the winter +storms—and none brought news of the <i>Huntress</i>. One Carolina vessel +that put in for repairs told of picking up a crew adrift in boats and +of setting them aboard a ship bound for Chesapeake Bay and the coast +of Delaware.</p> + +<p>"They were most of them Swedes," the sailors told Alan, "and they were +not very willing to talk <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span>of the ship they had lost, but it might have +been the <i>Huntress</i>."</p> + +<p>Reuben Hallowell was straining all his resources to send his idle +ships to sea and to reëstablish the trade of peace. Yet when he urged +his fellow townsmen to strive to gain the commerce America had lost, +lest it be gone forever, they still hung back.</p> + +<p>"We must know first where we stand," they said. "There is hope still +that we have not lost the <i>Huntress</i> and that she will come to port +with fortune for us all."</p> + +<p>A stormy February passed and there came at last a gusty day of March. +It was a Sunday, with the air clean after a shower, and with all the +townspeople moving down the High Street from their churches at the +hour of noon. There had been a tempest of wind and rain, but it had +cleared leaving the waters still gray but with the sky turning to +blue. Cicely was among the first, walking with her father and brother, +and had stopped, as they came to their own door, to glance down at the +harbor laid out in a circle of moving blue water below them.</p> + +<p>"Oh, look, look!" she cried suddenly.</p> + +<p>A ship was sailing slowly up the bay, a stately ship that dipped a +little and rose again as she came, but held her course steady for the +wharves. Her sails shone white in the fitful sun, the lines of her +hull showed dark against the gray water, the tracery of her rigging +and even the colors of her flag were distinct against the sky, and +yet—she did not seem <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span>like any ship they had ever seen before. Cicely +having drawn that vessel, line for line, masts, hull, ropes, and +spars, knew that this was the <i>Huntress</i>, yet what was so strange +about her? Why was she so steady in those changing gusts of wind, what +was there that made her sails so shining and transparent, like the +texture of a cloud?</p> + +<p>The girl was aware that, among the crowd that had gathered to watch +the strange vision, Martin Hallowell was pushing to the front, gazing +with all his eyes. Ben Barton, too, who had come back the week before, +to ask for a place on Reuben Hallowell's ships, was pressing close to +Alan's elbow.</p> + +<p>"The wind's dead off shore and here she comes straight in," she heard +the old sailor mutter. "Not even the <i>Huntress</i> could sail like that. +And yet it is the <i>Huntress</i> right enough."</p> + +<p>The vessel came nearer and nearer, then of a sudden stopped, quivered, +as though struck by a violent adverse wind. Her main topsail blew out +suddenly and went streaming forth in the gale, a jib split to ribbons +before their eyes, and spar after spar was carried away. She careened, +as though before a hurricane, her foremast came down with a soundless +smother of sail and wreckage. Further and further she tilted, and then +suddenly she had vanished and there was nothing left but the March +sunshine and the tossing, empty bay.</p> + +<p>The crowd stood breathless, waiting for some one <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span>to speak. It was +only Ben Barton who was able to find his voice.</p> + +<p>"I've heard of such things before," he said. "The wise skippers all +say it is a mirage, but the wiser sailormen say it is a message from +another world. She's gone, our <i>Huntress</i> is, and there's no wind +under heaven will ever blow her home again."</p> + +<p>Martin Hallowell had swung on his heel and was walking away down the +street facing the fact, finally, that his venture was at an end. A +tall man with dangling watch seals edged up to Cicely's father.</p> + +<p>"I am satisfied at last, Reuben Hallowell, that our ship is lost," he +said. "We did wrong to wait for war to make our fortunes, and it is +high time that we went back to the lesser risks and the smaller gains +of peace. Will you let me join in lading your next vessel? You are the +only man among us who has known when a war ends and peace begins."</p> + +<p>"I'm thinking there will be some tall ships sailing out of this port +soon," said Ben Barton, speaking low to Cicily and Alan. "It will be +on a better craft than the <i>Huntress</i> even that your brother will be +officer before long. What seas we'll cruise, he and I, and what +treasures we'll bring back to you, Miss Cicely. I'd go with the son of +Reuben Hallowell to the ends of the earth—if only he never asks me to +put to sea of a Friday!"</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>CHAPTER VI<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> + +<h4>JANET'S ADVENTURE</h4> +<br /> + +<p>Throughout the telling of the story, Polly and Janet had been very +busy sorting and putting together the little honey boxes that were to +be set in larger frames and hung in the upper story of the beehives. +There was now such a great heap of them ready that the Beeman gathered +them into a basket and, summoning Oliver to help him, carried them +outside. He did not, immediately, go down the slope to the beehives, +but set the basket on the step and sat down on the bench beside it.</p> + +<p>"You had something to tell me," he said, "something that disturbed and +excited you. I thought it might be better for you to wait a little. I +should like to hear it now."</p> + +<p>"Yes, it is clearer in my head now," Oliver agreed. "It is about my +Cousin Jasper that we are visiting. I want to help him, though"—he +smiled at the recollection, yet made frank confession—"that first day +I was here I was so angry I almost hated him."</p> + +<p>"If I thought that were true," responded his friend gravely, "I should +have to ask you never to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span>come here again, not only because I am fond +of your cousin myself, but because I value my bees. There is an old +superstition that you must not hate where bees are, for they feel it +and pine away and die. I cannot have my bees destroyed."</p> + +<p>The boy, looking up quickly at his broad, friendly smile, realized +that the man believed neither the old superstition, nor that Oliver +entertained any evil feelings.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," went on the Beeman, "the bees were in some danger that +first day. You had it in mind, then, to go away for good, I think."</p> + +<p>Oliver nodded. He wondered how he could ever have made that selfish +resolution to run away.</p> + +<p>"How did you know?" he asked.</p> + +<p>"I had guessed it from—oh, various things. I am about the age of your +Cousin Jasper, but I know more than he about people of your years from +being Polly's father. I even had some idea of what was the immediate +cause of your going." The boy flushed so guiltily that he went on, in +kindly haste, "I am troubled about Jasper Peyton myself—yes, don't +look surprised, I know him well enough to call him that. We all know +one another in Medford Valley. I—I even work for him sometimes. Now +tell me what you think is wrong."</p> + +<p>Oliver, as he set forth his tale, had a feeling that not all of it was +new to his listener, but he hearkened attentively to all that the boy +had to say, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span>frowning when he heard of Anthony Crawford's insistent +and disagreeable visits.</p> + +<p>"Your cousin doesn't know how to deal with a man like that," he +commented. "He is too upright himself to know the mean, small, +underhand ways that such a person will take to get what he wants. I +know Anthony Crawford, too, and what he is trying to accomplish. It +will take all of us, every one, to beat him. But we will, Oliver, I +vow we will."</p> + +<p>"What can we do, what can I do?" the boy persisted. He felt ready to +accomplish great things at once. "And can't you explain to me what it +is all about?"</p> + +<p>To his great disappointment, the other shook his head.</p> + +<p>"I feel that if your cousin does not wish to tell you himself, I ought +not to," he said, "though I should like you to know. But there are two +things that you can do. One is not to be impatient with your cousin +when he makes tactless mistakes about—about how you are to be +entertained. He depends on you and Janet for a little cheerfulness in +his house."</p> + +<p>"That isn't much to do," observed Oliver. "I hope the other is more."</p> + +<p>"It is only this. To borrow a boat from John Massey—can you manage a +sailboat? Good, I thought you looked like the sort of boy who +could—and take a cruise up and down Medford River where it skirts +that level farming land in the valley. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[102]</a></span>I want you to bring me word of +how the dikes are holding. You may not see what bearing that has upon +the matter, but I assure you it means a great deal. Anthony Crawford +thinks that he is a very clever man, but he is preparing a pitfall for +himself, unless I am very much mistaken. And you and I may be at hand +to see him tumble into it. The only thing is to see that he doesn't +harm others as well as himself."</p> + +<p>Oliver had one more question to ask.</p> + +<p>"I want to know your last name, and Polly's," he said. "I can't think +how you knew mine and I had quite forgotten to wonder about yours +until Janet reminded me that I had never heard it. I have no name for +you but the Beeman."</p> + +<p>"If you want a longer name for Polly, you can call her Polly +Marshall," his friend answered, "but as for me I rather like being +called the Beeman. We will keep to that title a little longer if you +are willing. And now it is high time that I gave some attention to my +bees."</p> + +<p>Oliver had no difficulty, later in the day, in borrowing the sailboat +from John Massey, although he was obliged to give the vague message, +"that man who keeps bees up the hill said you would lend her to me."</p> + +<p>"Sure, I will," replied John Massey heartily. "Just be careful you +don't go aground on the bars. The river is shallow for this time of +year, though it can be pretty fierce when the floods are up."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[103]</a></span>Oliver shook out the shabby sail, set the rudder for a long tack +downstream, and was off. The breeze was coming in gentle puffs, so +that the boat moved slowly through the water, the ripples making a +sleepy whisper under the bow and the tiller, now and then, jerking +lazily under his hand. One side of the stream was marshy so that he +pushed into tall grass and cat-tails and startled an indignant +kingfisher who was dozing on a dead tree. The bird went skimming off, +a flash of blue and white that he followed as he came about.</p> + +<p>On the other side, the current ran close beside the high banks of +earth that protected the fields within. The channel was scoured deep +and the restless stream was cutting into the dikes, washing long black +scars just above the water line.</p> + +<p>"That oughtn't to be," pronounced Oliver, and was glad to see that, +farther downstream, the carving away of the earth had been stopped by +patches of broken stone. For at least a mile, however, at the bend of +the river, the banks were crumbling and neglected.</p> + +<p>He could look up and see, first the farms of the low-lying land, the +treetops and pointed silos just showing above the dike, then the +hillside, with the wavering white line of the road, then that strange, +shabby dwelling of yellow stone almost hidden in its cluster of trees. +Above it showed Cousin Jasper's house, very big and red, set upon the +slope almost at the top of the ridge. On the other side of the stream +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[104]</a></span>there were fewer dwellings, the wooded slope rising to the more open +green of the orchard and then to the grassy declivity of the Windy +Hill. As he neared the bridge he passed a long gray stone house with +its gardens a glowing mass of color that came down to the water's very +edge. This, he remembered, was the abode of Cousin Eleanor, and he +laughed at himself as, even at this safe distance, he steered his +course very cautiously along the opposite bank.</p> + +<p>At the bridge he was obliged to turn, and run before the wind to make +his way upstream again. He lay stretched out comfortably along the +rail, paying little attention to the boat and thinking of many things. +There was Cousin Jasper—how Oliver had misjudged him that day he +thought of running away. His cousin had been tactless and stubborn, +but the Cousin Eleanor affair had been well meant, after all.</p> + +<p>"I'll never meet her, though. I won't give in," he declared, almost +aloud, and realized, in a breath, that his persistence and Cousin +Jasper's were both cut from the same piece.</p> + +<p>"I'm sorry for him and I'll help him," he told himself, "and perhaps +he will learn something about boys after a while."</p> + +<p>And there was Anthony Crawford! He flushed again as he thought of the +man's gleeful delight when he had caught him looking over the wall. +What power could he have, and what was the disgrace of which he had +spoken? The Beeman was <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[105]</a></span>almost as mysterious as the others also; he +had certainly managed to evade the question when Oliver had asked his +name.</p> + +<p>"The only one that there isn't a mystery about is Polly," he declared +as he came to John Massey's little landing and rounded with a sweep to +the boat's mooring.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile Janet, who had been left to her own devices, had stumbled +into an adventure of her own. She had made ready to go with her +brother, but Cousin Jasper had called her to look at some new roses +and had delayed her so long that the impatient Oliver had finally gone +without her. When Cousin Jasper had returned to the house, she +wandered rather disconsolately up and down the hedged paths and, +finally coming to the big gate, she stood looking out. The road +stretched away invitingly across the hillsides, the sleepy stillness +of the afternoon was broken only by the occasional drone of a motor +and by the grinding wheels of a big hay wagon that labored along the +highway in the dust.</p> + +<p>She walked out along the road, thinking that she would find a vantage +point to look down to the river and see how Oliver was faring. The way +presently crossed an open ridge whence she could see the smooth stream +and the sail creeping slowly out from the green shore. For some time +she stood watching its progress, wishing vainly that she might have +gone, until she became suddenly aware that some one was staring at +her. Turning, she saw that a child <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[106]</a></span>with very yellow hair and very +round blue eyes was sitting between two alder bushes on the edge of a +ditch, gazing at her intently.</p> + +<p>"What are you doing?" she asked, astonished, for the youngster, a +square little boy of four or five years old, seemed far too small to +be on the road alone.</p> + +<p>"I was wishing I could go home," he answered.</p> + +<p>There was a slight quivering of his chin as he spoke, as though the +problem was rather a desperate one, but he was determined not to cry. +"I was wishing on that hay wagon when it went by," he explained +sedately. "I shut my eyes so I wouldn't see it again and break the +luck, and when I opened them, you were there."</p> + +<p>He climbed over the ditch and came to her side to tuck his hand +confidently into hers. There seemed to be no doubt in his mind that +she would take him home.</p> + +<p>"Can you show me where you live?" she asked as they went along +together.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes," he answered cheerfully. "There was a cow eating beside the +road, and I passed it once, but it looked at me so hard when I went by +that I was afraid to go back. I'll show you."</p> + +<p>They walked along for some distance, he tramping sturdily by her side +and chattering contentedly, giving her all sorts of miscellaneous and +unsought information, that his name was Martin, that he had a little +brother, that the brother was crying when <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[107]</a></span>he went away from home, +that his mother was crying a little, too, that they had a red calf in +the barn, and that there was a scarecrow in the field beside their +house. He led her into a crossroad, then down a narrow, shady lane, +where, as he had said, there was a mannerly old black cow grazing +beside the way, who came to the end of her tether rope to greet them.</p> + +<p>"I'm not afraid with you here," young Martin asserted boldly, and was +even persuaded to pat the smooth black and white face of the friendly +creature while Janet fed her a handful of clover.</p> + +<p>When they reached a broken-hinged gate at the end of the lane, the +girl began to realize that she was coming to the same place that +Oliver had described to her. She stopped, feeling that she would +rather not go on, but the little boy tugged at her hand.</p> + +<p>"My father isn't here," he told her, as though some unhappy knowledge +of his father's character made him understand her hesitation, "and my +mother's crying."</p> + +<p>With some reluctance, Janet pushed open the gate and went in.</p> + +<p>A faded, shabbily dressed woman sat on one of the unpainted benches of +the shady stoop, holding a baby in her arms. As Martin had said, slow +tears of helpless misery were rolling down her cheeks, while from the +bundle that she held came the worn-out, tired wail of a sick child.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[108]</a></span>"I don't know much, but I would like to help you," Janet said, sitting +down beside her, while the woman choked with a fresh gush of tears at +the unexpected offer of aid and sympathy.</p> + +<p>"I don't dare put the baby down, he cries so," she managed to say at +last. "Could you go into the kitchen and heat some water and bring out +the blanket that I hung up to warm? I don't doubt the fire is out by +now, but I haven't been able to move for fear he would begin choking +again. Do you think you can manage?"</p> + +<p>Janet managed very well, with Martin trotting at her heels to tell her +where things could be found. She heated the water, warmed the +blankets, and even rummaged out the tea caddy and brewed a cup of hot +tea for the weary mother.</p> + +<p>"You are a real blessing, my dear," said the woman as she put down the +empty cup. "This boy has been sick with croup all night and I had +quite forgotten that I had no breakfast."</p> + +<p>"Has his father gone for the doctor?" Janet asked, as she brought out +a cushion for the baby, who seemed to be quieter now and almost ready +to drop asleep.</p> + +<p>"No," replied the woman briefly.</p> + +<p>She offered no explanation. It was evidently not a thing to be +expected that Anthony Crawford should take an interest in an ailing +child.</p> + +<p>As Janet went back and forth, she was struck by the surprising charm +that the old house showed <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[109]</a></span>within, quite out of keeping with its +littered door-yard and outward disrepair. The white woodwork had gone +long unpainted, it was true, and the floors were worn and uneven, but +there was an airy spaciousness in the rooms, a comfortable dignity in +the old mahogany furniture, and the grace of real beauty in the curved +white staircase with its dark, polished rail. Everything was +spotlessly clean, from the faded rag rugs to the cracked panes of the +windows. The kitchen was, to her, the place of chief delight, for it +ran all across the back of the house, with a row of low windows +wreathed in ivy and commanding a wide view across the meadow lands +beside the river. There was a modern cooking stove at one end of the +room, a cheap, hideous, ineffective affair, but at the other was still +the old fireplace, with its swinging crane, its warming cupboards, and +its broad, stone-flagged hearth.</p> + +<p>The baby was so much better that his mother was actually able to smile +and to lean back contentedly in the corner of the bench.</p> + +<p>"He is better off out here in the air," she said. "I believe he will +be able to sleep in a little while. Now if I just had a strip of +flannel to wrap around his chest! You would have to go up into the +garret to look for it, and maybe rummage in one or two of the boxes. +But I believe there should be some in the big cedar chest back under +the eaves."</p> + +<p>Guided by the faithful Martin, Janet climbed the stairs to the garret, +where, in the warm, dusty air <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[110]</a></span>that smelled of hot shingles and +lavender, she went poking about, seeking the roll of flannel that Mrs. +Crawford assured her was there. She could find everything else in the +world—old clocks, spindle-legged chairs, a high-backed, mahogany +sofa, and a spinning wheel. At last she discovered what she needed in +a box far under the eaves, but in pulling it out so that she could +raise the lid, she knocked down a row of pictures that leaned against +it. She bent to pick them up and set them in order again, then stopped +to stare at them with a gasp of delighted astonishment.</p> + +<p>Janet loved beautiful things, especially pictures, and she could be +sure, at one glance, that these were pictures such as one does not +often see. She remembered being taken by her father to a famous +gallery to see a landscape so much akin to the one before her that +they had undoubtedly been painted by the same artist, a green hillside +with sailing clouds above it, on a clear October day, "the sort that +makes you feel that you can see a hundred miles," as Janet put it. +There was another, a winding white road running up a wind-swept valley +with the trees bowing to a storm and a spatter of rain slanting across +the hill, there was a portrait of a fierce old lady and another of a +man with lace ruffles and a satin coat. There was a long, cool wave, +breaking upon a beach where the whiteness of the sun-splashed sand was +so vivid as almost to hurt her eyes.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[111]</a></span>She set them out in a row against the eaves and sat back on her heels +to look her fill. Such pictures, to be gathered here in the dusty +attic, to crack and warp and fade into ruin! She could not understand +how they could have come there, nor did she spend much thought in +wondering, so lost was she in that pure delight that the sight of +truly beautiful things can bring. An old print with a cracked glass +and broken frame caught her attention almost the last of all. It +showed a ship, a tall frigate, under full sail, and had all the quaint +primness of the pictures of a hundred years ago. The group of people +supposed to be standing on the wharf was composed of gentlemen in very +tight trousers and ladies with very sloping shoulders and absurd, tiny +parasols. The vessel floated on impossible scalloped billows, but no +old-fashioned stiffness could disguise the free beauty of the ship's +lines and the grace of her curving sails. Her name was inscribed in +faded gold letters below—"The <i>Huntress</i>, 1813." The Beeman's tale +was still so vivid in her mind that there was no need for her to +wonder where she had heard that name before.</p> + +<p>"Why, it was a real story," she exclaimed, "and I thought he was only +making it up!"</p> + +<p>As she moved the print to a better light, a smaller picture, almost +lost among the rest, fell down between two frames and rolled across +the floor. She took it up and saw that it was a miniature, painted on +ivory and framed in gold, the portrait of a young <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[112]</a></span>girl with +high-piled brown hair and eager, smiling eyes.</p> + +<p>"It looks like Polly," Janet thought, "but it could not really be a +picture of her."</p> + +<p>She turned it over and found the single name engraved on the back, +"Cicely, æt. 17."</p> + +<p>"Martin," she cried in the sudden inspiration of discovery, "Martin, +come here quickly and tell me what is your whole name."</p> + +<p>The little boy came out from a far corner where he had been examining +dusty treasures on his own account and stood for a minute just where a +beam of slanting sunlight dropped through the tiny window under the +roof.</p> + +<p>"Martin Hallowell Crawford," he said.</p> + +<p>She would always remember just how he looked, standing there with the +sunshine on his yellow mop of curly hair, his chubby face smiling and +then whitening suddenly as they both heard a sound behind them. She +turned to see Anthony Crawford standing upon the stair.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[113]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>CHAPTER VII<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> + +<h4>THE PORTRAIT OF CICELY</h4> +<br /> + +<p>If Janet had needed any further clue to Anthony Crawford's character, +she would have had it in the sudden trembling terror of his little +son. She was shaking herself, yet she mustered an outward appearance +of courage for a moment, as she turned to face him squarely and to +hear his biting words:</p> + +<p>"First the brother, peering over the wall, then the sister, rummaging +through my house. Did Jasper Peyton send you here to find where I kept +the picture of Cicely Hallowell that he was so reluctant to give up to +me?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't know it was Cicely Hallowell," returned Janet, trying to +speak steadily. "I didn't even know that she was a real person; I +thought she was just some one in a story."</p> + +<p>Then as Crawford stepped nearer, as little Martin gave a sudden squeak +of alarm, blind panic took possession of her. She ran toward the +stairs and, though the man put out his arm to intercept her, she +dodged under it with undignified agility and plunged down the steps. +They were of the broad, shallow <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[114]</a></span>kind that made her feel, for all her +speed, that she would never reach the bottom, yet she came at last +into the hall below and out upon the stoop. She fled past Mrs. +Crawford, sitting with the sleeping baby across her lap and looking up +anxiously, with good cause for misgiving since she had heard her +husband go up the stair.</p> + +<p>It was only when she was safely outside the gate that Janet stopped to +draw breath, to realize how her knees were trembling and how her heart +was pounding. Yet it stopped suddenly and seemed to miss a beat when +she realized something further, that she still held in her hand the +miniature of Cicely Hallowell.</p> + +<p>"Can I go back?" she wondered desperately, but knew instantly that she +could never find courage to do so. She went on, hurrying and stumbling +as she made her way down the lane. Only once she ventured to look over +her shoulder and saw Anthony Crawford standing on the doorstep staring +after her while the scarecrow that was so vaguely like him seemed to +be lifting its straw-filled arm in a mocking gesture of farewell.</p> + +<p>Janet and Oliver held an anxious conference that evening as they sat +on the terrace, for until that moment they had not been alone +together. She brought out the miniature and told of the astonishing +and disturbing manner in which it had come into her possession, while +Oliver wondered, in frank dismay, how it was to be restored to its +owner.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[115]</a></span>"I can't think how I came to carry it away with me," wailed Janet. "Of +course it was clutched tight in my hand and I was so frightened that I +didn't think of anything but getting away. I thought of putting it +down on the grass by the gate, but it is too valuable to risk being +lost like that. And that man will say I stole it. I don't know what to +do."</p> + +<p>"We shall have to give it back to him," said Oliver firmly. "To-morrow +we will——" but he stopped in the middle of his sentence, unable, +even in imagination, to contemplate facing Anthony Crawford and giving +him the miniature.</p> + +<p>"Shall we tell Cousin Jasper?" Janet suggested, but Oliver declared +against it.</p> + +<p>"Anthony Crawford will be quite ready to say that Cousin Jasper sent +you to get it from him. The miniature and the pictures seem to be part +of the trouble, though I don't understand why. So if that man comes +here with such an accusation, it would be better for Cousin Jasper to +be able to say he knew nothing about it."</p> + +<p>"Yes," assented Janet. "I believe, if he knew, Cousin Jasper would try +to shield us and Anthony Crawford would use it as one more thing to +hold over him. I am beginning to understand both of them better. +We—we have overlooked a good many things about Cousin Jasper."</p> + +<p>It was only a few minutes later that Cousin Jasper joined them, nor +had he yet sat down in the long <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[116]</a></span>wicker chair that Oliver placed for +him, before Hotchkiss came out with a message.</p> + +<p>"John Massey is in the kitchen, sir, and he says to tell you that he +would like to see you about something important."</p> + +<p>"Bring him out here," Cousin Jasper directed, and, when the somewhat +embarrassed visitor in his worn best clothes appeared upon the terrace +he got up with as elaborate courtesy as he would have accorded the +most distinguished guest.</p> + +<p>"What is it, John?" he asked, for the sunburned farmer was evidently +an old acquaintance. The other burst out with his news and his errand +at once.</p> + +<p>"I've been turned off, sir," he said. "Told to leave the farm, with no +notice at all and my crops all in the ground. I'll admit I'm a little +behind on my rent, but not many landlords around here collect as +closely as Mr. Crawford does; they get all their money at the end of +the season and don't haggle over it month by month when the farmer has +nothing coming in. And what can you do on land that's never improved? +He lets the place run down and then turns me out because I can't make +a fortune for him on it. I—I was wondering if you couldn't do +something for me, sir."</p> + +<p>"Do something for you?" echoed Jasper Peyton. "I can't use any +influence with Anthony Crawford, if that is what you wish."</p> + +<p>"I don't understand it," the man persisted. "Three years ago you were +my landlord and none <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[117]</a></span>of us ever had dealings with Anthony Crawford +except that we used to know him when he was a boy. The whole bottom +land along the river was yours and all your tenants were farming it +for a fair rent and every one was satisfied. But then—he comes, and +the upper half is his, we hear, and it is bad luck for us, as we soon +know. Everything runs down, no one is treated fairly, and here I am, +turned off at a word, and all his doing. Couldn't you make room for me +farther down the river somewhere, sir, where the land is yours?"</p> + +<p>He looked so red and anxious and unhappy that Janet's heart was fairly +wrung for him. His wife was ailing, she knew, the season was backward, +and here he stood, facing the loss of all his work and the necessity +of beginning all over again. She waited eagerly to hear what offer +Cousin Jasper would make.</p> + +<p>"I—I can't help you, John," he said at last, very slowly and heavily. +"Even if I made room for you on one of the lower farms, it would only +stir up trouble, and you might wake up some day to find that Anthony +Crawford was your landlord again, after all. I can give you the money +to pay your rent, if you wish to stay where you are, but that is all +that I can do. There are times when we are none of us free agents, or +masters of our own affairs."</p> + +<p>"I don't care to stay on, sir," John Massey returned. "I've had too +many words with Anthony <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[118]</a></span>Crawford for things ever to go easy again. +I've been patching up the dike with my own spare time, and maybe the +farm has suffered by my doing it; anyway he says so and calls me a +fool. I thought perhaps you would help me, since I'd been your tenant +so long before <i>he</i> came." His voice, dragging with disappointment, +trailed lower and lower. "I don't seem to know just where to turn. +Well, good night to you, sir." He turned and walked heavily away.</p> + +<p>They sat very silent after he was gone. Oliver was leaning against the +terrace rail, Janet in her big chair was clenching her hands in her +lap, Cousin Jasper, with his hands on the railing, stood in absolute +quiet, staring out over the garden. The light of the house came +through the long windows, falling on his face that was so pale and +tired. He had seemed weary and unhappy for some time, but to-night he +looked desperate. The minutes passed, but still he stood in silence, +staring straight before him.</p> + +<p>The sight of his distress seemed more than either of the two could +bear. Oliver could think of nothing to say, but stood dumbly helpless, +while Janet moved closer to their cousin and spoke with shy +hesitation:</p> + +<p>"Couldn't we help you? Won't you tell us what you are thinking?"</p> + +<p>"I was only thinking," Cousin Jasper answered very slowly, "I was +wondering, as I do sometimes lately, how strangely life can change and +twist itself <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[119]</a></span>and make things seem other than they should be. If you +have lived all your years following your own sense of honor, if you +have tried, in everything you do, to be fair and just, how can it be, +when the years have passed, that suddenly all the results of honest +dealing should be swept away? How can it be that a man who has +disgraced himself, whose ways are known to be everything that is +devious and unfair, how can he gain power over you, threaten to take +from you everything that is yours, even say that he can destroy your +good name? How can every effort you make toward a fair settlement only +render matters worse? Is there really something so wrong with the +world that a dishonest man can work more harm than a man of honor can +ever undo? Do <i>you</i> think so?" he concluded, turning to regard them +from under his knitted brows as if he must, in his distress, find some +word of reassurance somewhere.</p> + +<p>"No," said Oliver emphatically, finding his voice somewhat to his own +surprise. "I don't think so at all. I believe a man who does +dishonorable things can—can mix you up and make you miserable, but he +can't go on forever. His plans are bound to come to grief in the end."</p> + +<p>His halting words carried the real earnestness of conviction. They +seemed to give Cousin Jasper some sort of comfort, for his face +relaxed, he moved from his tense attitude, and turned to walk up and +down the terrace through the patches of light and shadow that lay +between the windows. Janet thrust <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[120]</a></span>a friendly, affectionate hand under +his arm as she walked beside him. It was a hot night, at June's very +highest tide, with the garden at the summit of its beauty. The Madonna +lilies were in bloom, showing ghostly white through the dark, rows and +ranks and armies of them all up and down the walks and borders, +sending sudden ripples of sweetness upward to the terrace whenever the +faint breeze stirred. There was no moon yet, but the stars were thick +overhead, and the moving lanterns of the fireflies glimmered among the +trees, low down still as they always are in the first hours of the +dark. Janet was thinking that when the world was so beautiful, it was +difficult to believe that things could go entirely wrong in it, but +she did not find it possible to put her idea into words. It may have +been that Cousin Jasper was thinking the same thing as he stopped and +stood for a long time at the head of the brick-paved stair leading +down from the end of the terrace into the garden. At last he began to +descend slowly, unable to make out the steps in the dark, so that he +put his hand on her shoulder to steady himself. He spoke very +suddenly.</p> + +<p>"It is not only in body but in spirit that the old must sometimes lean +upon the young," he said, and then, with his voice quite cheerful +again, began to talk of how well the flowers were doing this year.</p> + +<p>Oliver had followed them to the top of the stair and stood above them, +listening, but not, apparently, to what Cousin Jasper was saying. His +head was <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span>bent and he was straining every nerve to hear some far-off +sound. His face looked troubled, then cleared suddenly as he came down +the steps.</p> + +<p>"Cousin Jasper," he said, "didn't I tell you that the gardener wanted +you to know that the night-blooming cereus is open just now? Suppose +we walk out to the back of the garden and see it."</p> + +<p>His cousin hesitated.</p> + +<p>"It is rather late," he answered. "It will be open still to-morrow +night."</p> + +<p>"Janet has never seen one," persisted Oliver, putting a firm arm +through Cousin Jasper's, "and it might rain or something to-morrow +night. She would be so disappointed and so would the gardener."</p> + +<p>They went down the last steps together, into the sea of white lilies +and drifting fragrance, and disappeared into the darkness toward the +back of the garden.</p> + +<p>In spite of his insistence, Oliver did not seem so deeply interested +as the others in the plant that was slowly opening its pink flowers +that have so brief and beautiful a season. The gardener, hastily +summoned, came across the lawn to exhibit his favorite plant with the +greatest pride, but Oliver left the others to admire and ask questions +and, in ten minutes, came back alone. Coming upon the terrace again, +he saw Hotchkiss, just inside the long window, ushering out a visitor +who was talking in loud, easily recognizable tones.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span>"No, he doesn't seem to be here," Anthony Crawford was saying, "though +I didn't believe you, until you let me come in and see for myself. I +had something of great importance to say to him—and to the girl. +Well, I will come again to-morrow."</p> + +<p>He passed down the room and must have come very close to the light, +for his shadow loomed suddenly, misshapen and bulky, all across the +library, even dropping its black length over the terrace outside. It +followed him, a striding giant, from window to window and then +dwindled suddenly again as Anthony Crawford himself stood under the +light in the doorway giving Hotchkiss final directions.</p> + +<p>"Be sure to tell him that I shall be here to-morrow night and that I +shall expect him to be at home," he ordered, then climbed into the +creaking cart and drove away.</p> + +<p>Hotchkiss stood peering into the dark after him, evidently sending no +good wishes to speed him homeward. Seeing Oliver coming up the steps +at the far end of the terrace, he walked down to speak to him.</p> + +<p>"There was something more than usual wrong to-night," he said +anxiously. "He vowed that he must see Mr. Peyton and didn't want to +take my word for it that he was out. It was fortunate that he had gone +into the garden."</p> + +<p>"Yes," responded Oliver, "I thought I heard that miserable rattletrap +turning in at the gate and I remembered, all of a sudden, that the +gardener <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span>told me yesterday about the night-blooming cereus. I—I +thought they ought to look at it at once."</p> + +<p>Hotchkiss had been nervous and agitated during what must have been a +stormy interview, and he found this sudden relief too great for the +composure even of a butler. He burst into a great laugh of delight and +slapped his knee in ecstasy.</p> + +<p>"That was the way to serve him!" he cried. "To think that prying +scoundrel found some one that was too clever for him, for once."</p> + +<p>Oliver grinned broadly, but recovered himself in a moment.</p> + +<p>"Hotchkiss," he said with great gravity, "you would never do for the +movies."</p> + +<p>Janet was eating her breakfast very deliberately next morning, +lingering even after Cousin Jasper had left them and while Oliver sat +back in his chair fidgeting in frank impatience. When her brother +finally urged her to make haste she broke forth into an explanation +that was almost a wail.</p> + +<p>"It is because I can't forget where we have to go to-day," she +declared. "Oh, why—why did I make such a terrible mistake and carry +that miserable picture away?"</p> + +<p>Even Oliver looked none too cheerful at the prospect before them.</p> + +<p>"We have to do it," he agreed, "but I think we will go over to the +Windy Hill first. I promised Polly's father I would tell him what I +saw from the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span>boat. But after that there will be plenty of time and we +will go to Anthony Crawford's."</p> + +<p>"I ought to go alone," Janet said, "for it was I who made the trouble. +And shall we tell the Beeman?"</p> + +<p>"Not until afterward," replied Oliver. "If there is difficulty about +the picture it would be easier if no one were concerned but just +ourselves. And indeed you won't go alone! We are in this thing +together."</p> + +<p>It had rained in the night so heavily that the clumps of larkspur and +more tender plants were beaten down and only the shower-loving lilies +lifted their wet, shining faces above the green. The sky was still +overcast, with threats of another downpour, yet the two put on their +raincoats and set forth undeterred.</p> + +<p>"There is an old apple shed in the corner of the orchard where we can +leave the car," said Oliver. "Polly showed me, last time, where we +could drive in."</p> + +<p>The highway was smooth and wet and the river was perceptibly higher +under the bridge. They pressed onward, up the grass-covered road, +drove through the gap in the orchard wall, and felt their way along +the open lane between the apple trees. The car was finally housed in +the shelter of the shed and Janet and Oliver raced up the hill, for +the first drops of a new shower were just beginning to fall, and +Polly, in the doorway of the cottage, was beckoning them to make +haste. The downpour was <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span>a sharp one that pattered on the roof, ran +streaming from the eaves, and blotted out the hills opposite. The +grass and the orchard, however, seemed to grow greener every moment +under the refreshing rain, and the clumps of pink hollyhocks that +crowded about the doorstep lifted their heads gratefully.</p> + +<p>"We can't do much with the bees for an hour or two," observed the +Beeman, sitting down in the corner with his pipe. "Now tell me what +you saw on the river, Oliver. I noticed your sail and knew that you +were out."</p> + +<p>Oliver made his report upon the scouring banks while the Beeman +listened and nodded gravely.</p> + +<p>"That is something we must look into," he declared. "It is like +Anthony to have let things go. And now, if you have time to wait, +suppose we have a story."</p> + +<p>They had ample time, they assured him, being only too glad to postpone +the errand that must come later. They were eager for another tale, +moreover, for they were beginning to realize that these were not mere +haphazard narratives, but stories with some definite bearing upon the +places and people about them.</p> + +<p>"We have plenty of time," Oliver assured him. "We are in no hurry at +all. You might even make it a very long one."</p> + +<p>The Beeman nodded assent with that queer smile <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span>that seemed to betray +an uncanny understanding of the whole situation.</p> + +<p>"A long one it shall be," he agreed, "for I have a good deal to tell +you."</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[127]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>CHAPTER VIII<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> + +<h4>THE FIDDLER OF APPLE TREE LANE</h4> +<br /> + +<p>People said that the Brighton children could "never manage," when it +was said that they were planning to live in the little cottage on the +hill above Medford Valley.</p> + +<p>"There's always a wind there from the sea, dearie," said old Granny +Fullerton to Barbara Brighton. "It will search out your very bones, +come winter."</p> + +<p>Barbara shook her head cheerfully. A plump and rosy young person of +twelve years old does not worry much about cold winds.</p> + +<p>People said also, with the strange blindness of those who can live +close by for years and yet never know what is in their neighbors' +hearts, that it was an odd thing that Howard Brighton should have +built that little house so far from the town in the midst of that +great stretch of wild land where so few folk lived.</p> + +<p>"It is marshy in the valley and wooded on the hills," Granny Fullerton +said to Barbara, "with never a neighbor for miles. Of course the land +has been in your family time out of mind, but those that <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[128]</a></span>are your +nearest kin have always lived in the town. What could Howard Brighton +have been thinking to do such a thing!"</p> + +<p>They did not know how he had toiled and planned in his narrow little +office down near the wharves of the seaport town, how he and his wife +had dreamed together that their three children should live in some +other place than on the cramped, stony street where they had been +born. After his wife's death he had still gone forward with his dream +and, when he found that he had, himself, not very long to live, he had +made haste to build the cottage that they had so greatly desired.</p> + +<p>"It is pleasure enough to think of the children's having it," he said +to a plain-spoken neighbor who remonstrated with him on the ground +that he could never live there. "The boys will be old enough to care +for their sister, and the house on the hill will be just the place for +a little maid to grow up."</p> + +<p>His children were of widely separated ages, for Ralph, the eldest, was +twenty-one, Felix seventeen, and Barbara, as has been said, only +twelve. It happened also that they had not all of them the same +tastes, for while the two younger ones loved the country and looked +forward to living on the Windy Hill, Ralph's desire was to go on +working in the dusty office where he had already begun to prosper.</p> + +<p>"He is a good getter, but a poor spender," the neighbors said, and in +this were right. Ralph, with <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[129]</a></span>his first success, had begun to think +too much of money and too little of other things.</p> + +<p>In the end the cottage was never finished, only the main portion, a +tiny dwelling, was completed without the two broad wings with which +Howard Brighton had meant to enlarge it and which he did not live to +build. When their father had gone from them his children found that he +had left everything he had to Ralph, since the laws of seventy-five +years ago made some difficulty over property being held by those who +were not of age.</p> + +<p>"Ralph has a wise head on his young shoulders and will know how to +take good care of the younger ones," was the comment of busy tongues.</p> + +<p>Perhaps Ralph heard them, with the result that he felt older and wiser +than he really was, but of that no one can be sure.</p> + +<p>It was on a clear, warm day of mid-July when they moved from the +airless street of the town to their new, wind-swept dwelling on the +hill.</p> + +<p>"It looks like home already," Barbara said as they came up to the +door, for, with its wide, low roof, its broad windows, and its +swinging half doors that let in the sunshine and the fresh breezes, it +seemed indeed a place in which to forget their sadness and to find a +new, happy life. The rustling voice of the oak tree above seemed to be +bidding them welcome, and a tall clump of hollyhocks by the +door-stone, shell pink and white, seemed to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span>have come into bloom that +very day just for their home-coming.</p> + +<p>Barbara ran from room to room, exclaiming in delight over the new +freedom, while the two brothers sat on the doorstep to look down over +their new domain and to talk of the future. Their father had planned +to turn the meadow below into an orchard, and had even managed to set +out the first half of the little trees, slim, tiny saplings that +dotted the sloping green.</p> + +<p>"We will put in the others next autumn and spring," Felix said, "and I +will be building new cupboards and shelves for old Chloe in the +kitchen, I will mend the press in Barbara's room and I will finish off +the garret chamber under the eaves for myself, and there I can play +the fiddle to my heart's content and never disturb you at all. I think +that life will be very pleasant here."</p> + +<p>So their lives swung into the new channel, with Chloe, Barbara's old +nurse, to cook for them and with Felix to tend the apple trees and the +little garden, to saw and hammer and whistle all day at the task of +setting the new place in order.</p> + +<p>"It's a pity you haven't a proper, handsome house, with long windows +from the ceiling to the floor and a high roof and a carved front door +and with black marble chimneypieces instead of these rough stone +fireplaces," Chloe would sigh, for she thought that the elegance of +that time was none too good for the people she loved. It may be that +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[131]</a></span>Ralph sighed with her, but Felix and Barbara were frankly delighted +with the painted floors, the casement windows, and the low, big-beamed +rooms. In the evenings, as the two would sit on the wide doorstep, the +voice of Felix's violin would mingle with the voice of the wind in the +oak, while Barbara listened, entranced, for her brother was a real +master of his instrument. It would laugh and sing and sigh, while +Barbara pressed closer and closer to his knee while the stars came out +and the evening breeze stirred the hollyhocks and the great branches +of the oak tree. Ralph rode every day to the town to labor over heavy +account books in his cramped little office and he always brought home +a sheaf of papers under his arm. He would sit at the table inside the +window in the candlelight and, as the music rose outside, singing to +the child and the flowers and the stars, he would scowl and fidget and +tap irritably on the table with the point of his pen, for he did not +love his brother's playing.</p> + +<p>"There is too much time spent on it," he would say, "when you might be +doing useful things."</p> + +<p>"I have no head for adding up your endless columns of dollars and +cents," Felix would answer, "so I must make myself useful in my own +way."</p> + +<p>A warm, golden October had painted the valley with blazing colors, had +turned the oak tree to ruddy bronze, and had afforded ideal weather +for the further planting of the orchard. Here Felix was at work, with +Barbara following at his heels, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[132]</a></span>and helping, when each tree was +planted, to hold it upright while he pressed down the earth about its +roots.</p> + +<p>"We will leave an open space through the center," he said, "a lane +that will lead straight up toward the house, so that when Ralph and I +come home we can look up to the open door and the hollyhocks around +the step. Only," he shook his head regretfully, "I am afraid Ralph +won't see the flowers. His head is too full of dollar signs when he +comes home from the town."</p> + +<p>Barbara turned about to look through the orchard. Some one came +trudging along between the little trees, his heavy, tired feet +crunching in the leaves.</p> + +<p>"Oh, it's a peddler," she cried eagerly, for she was always pleased +when these traveling merchants came past, with their laces and gay +embroideries and colored beads to dazzle the eyes of little girls. But +this was a peddler of another sort, a dark-faced man with melting +black eyes and eager speech that was less than half of it English. He +was an immigrant Italian, newly come to this great America, he managed +to explain, and he was trying to sell the trinkets and small household +treasures that he had brought with him.</p> + +<p>They led him up to the house, for he was weary and hungry, and while +Barbara brought him food, Felix was plying him with questions as to +where he had come from and whither he was going. He had <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[133]</a></span>meant to +settle down in the little seaport, so he told them, but—here he +became so voluble that it was almost impossible to understand him—he +did not wish to stop there now, he must go on—on.</p> + +<p>"It is the gold," he cried excitedly, making wide gestures with both +his brown hands, "the beautiful yellow gold. They find it everywhere!"</p> + +<p>He brought out a tattered newspaper to let them see for themselves +what he could not explain. News traveled slowly in those days, so that +in this out-of-the-way corner of Medford Valley the brother and sister +now heard for the first time of the discovery of gold in California. +Yet in the towns and where people could gather to tell one another +ever-growing stories, the world was rapidly going mad over tales of +gold lying loose for the gathering, of nuggets as big as a fist, of +rivers running yellow with the precious shining dust.</p> + +<p>"Listen, Barbara; why, it can't be true!" cried Felix as he read +aloud, the Italian interrupting excitedly, trying to tell them more. +It was for this that he had abandoned his plans, that he was selling +everything he had to follow a far, golden dream across the country to +California.</p> + +<p>"A terrible journey, they say," he admitted, "but what does one care, +with such fortune at the other end?"</p> + +<p>He had little left to sell, nor had they much money to buy; but, so +carried away were they by his ardor, they would have given him +anything they <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[134]</a></span>had. There was a carved ivory crucifix, a silver chain +and, at the very bottom of his bag, a square box that gave forth a +curious humming noise.</p> + +<p>"Take care," he cautioned, as Barbara would have peeped within, "they +fly away—the bees!"</p> + +<p>"Bees?" she echoed in astonishment.</p> + +<p>Yes, he had brought all the way to America a queen bee and her retinue +of workers, for Italian bees, he told them gravely, were known the +world over for their beauty, industry, and gentleness.</p> + +<p>"They sting you only if you hurt them," he declared. "Other times, +never."</p> + +<p>He explained how they were to be put into a hive and just how they +were to be tended, for he was wise in the bee lore of Italy. Felix had +seen some of the farmers round about struggling with the wild black +bees whose tempers were so vicious that the only way to gather their +honey was to smoke the whole hiveful to death. The man opened the box +a little way to let the yellow-banded creatures crawl over his +fingers, to show their gentleness.</p> + +<p>"I must sell them quick," he said, "for they live not much longer in a +box."</p> + +<p>They bought the bees, Felix and Barbara, though it took every penny +they had in the house and even the store in the little carved box on +the mantel which they were all saving, by Ralph's advice, against a +rainy day. The man went away down through the orchard, turning to wave +his ragged <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[135]</a></span>hat in joyful good-by, for now he had sold everything and +was off and away to California.</p> + +<p>Felix sat on the doorstep, watching him go, while Barbara moved about +inside, laying the table for supper. A thought suddenly struck her and +she went to the door.</p> + +<p>"Felix," she said, "I wonder what Ralph will say?"</p> + +<p>But Felix was not listening.</p> + +<p>"Gold," he repeated softly. "Did you hear what he said, Barbara? The +sands of the rivers yellow with it, the Indians giving their children +nuggets to play with, a year's earnings to be picked up in a day!"</p> + +<p>He was so lost in his dream that he could talk of nothing else. It was +not the sort of gold that Ralph loved, minted coins that could be +saved and counted and stacked away, but it was the shining treasure of +romance, wealth that, unlike dully satisfying riches, meant battle and +adventure and triumph after overwhelming odds. He did at last consent +to help Barbara house the bees in a suitable dwelling, but he talked +still of the tale he had heard and his eyes were shining with the +wonder of it.</p> + +<p>"Did you hear him say that there was just one beaten trail across the +plains, all the way from the Mississippi to California? Think of a +road, a single road, two thousand miles long, reaching out through the +wilderness, over the deserts, through the mountains, with no towns or +houses or people, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[136]</a></span>just one lonely highway—and gold at the far end!"</p> + +<p>Ralph was late that evening, late and tired and impatient after an +unsatisfactory day. He brushed past Felix, still sitting on the step, +flung down his bundle of papers, and went over to the fire. The little +carved money box stood open on the mantel, revealing its emptiness.</p> + +<p>"What is this?" he asked Barbara sternly, as she stood in the corner, +twisting her apron and finding, suddenly, that it was very difficult +to explain. Felix came in, the light of excitement still on his face, +eager to tell the tale.</p> + +<p>He began to recount what they had heard, so carried away that he never +noticed the gathering thundercloud upon his brother's face. The +plains, the mountains, the shining rivers running to the sea—he +seemed to conjure up all of them as he told the story, but Ralph's +face never changed.</p> + +<p>"So," cut in the elder brother at last when the younger stopped for +breath, "it is for a fairy tale like this that you have wasted your +time and your substance, have emptied my money box. You bought bees +with it—<i>bees</i>! To buy bees when the forest is full of them and you +can have a swarm from any neighbor for the asking. You spend <i>my</i> +money that some lying rascal may be helped upon his way!"</p> + +<p>"It was our money," Felix reminded him gently, beginning to be +awakened from his dream by the bitter anger of the other's tone.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[137]</a></span>"Mine," repeated Ralph. A cold fury seemed to possess him, which +discussions over money could alone bring forth. "Have you forgotten +that everything here is mine, given me by our father? The bread you +eat, the roof over your head, they belong to me; do you understand?"</p> + +<p>Barbara saw, in the firelight, that Felix's face flushed, then turned +white. No one but herself could know just how such words would hurt +him, how his pride, his love for his brother, and his sturdy +independence were all cut to the very quick. He went out of the room +without a word and could be heard climbing the ladderlike stairs that +led to the room he had made for himself under the eaves. Ralph sat +down by the fire, muttering uneasily something about "it all blowing +over." With lagging steps Barbara went on setting the table.</p> + +<p>They were not prepared to see Felix come down the stairs a few minutes +later with his coat and cap and with his violin under his arm.</p> + +<p>"I will take no man's charity, not even my brother's," he said +huskily, as he stood still for a moment on the threshold. Then he was +gone.</p> + +<p>Barbara leaned over the half door and watched him go down the path, +saw him pass through the lane of tiny apple trees, saw the dusk gather +about him as he went on, a smaller and smaller, plodding figure that +disappeared at last into the dark. The autumn wind in the oak tree +sounded blustering and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[138]</a></span>cold as she closed the door and turned back to +the room again.</p> + +<p>"He has only gone down to the town, he will come back to-morrow," +growled Ralph, but Barbara knew better.</p> + +<p>"He has gone to look for gold," she cried, and, sitting down on the +bench by the fire, she buried her face in her hands and burst into +tears.</p> + +<br /> +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> +<br /> + +<p>Felix used to think, as the days and weeks passed, and as that strange +journey upon which he had launched so suddenly dragged on and on, that +the grassy slope above the orchard and the cool dark foliage of the +oak tree must be the very greenest and fairest things on earth. There +was no green now before his aching eyes, only the wide stretch of +yellow-brown prairie, a rough trail, deep in dust, winding across it, +a line of white-topped wagons crawling like ants over the vast plain, +and a blue arch of sky above, blinding-bright with the heat.</p> + +<p>It was October when he went away from home, it was a month later when, +by leisurely stage and slow canal boat, he arrived at the Mississippi +River, the outpost of established travel. Here he was obliged to wait +until spring, for even in the rush of '49 there were few bold enough +to attempt the overland trail in winter. He turned his hand to every +sort of work, he did odd jobs during the day and played his violin for +dancing at night, he grew lean and out-at-elbows and graver than he +used to be. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[139]</a></span>He slept in strange places and ate stranger food, he +suffered pangs of hunger and of homesickness, but he never thought of +going back. His violin went everywhere with him, and in more than one +of the little towns along the big river, people began to demand the +boy fiddler who could make such gay music for their merrymakings.</p> + +<p>When at last the snow melted, the wild geese flew northward, and the +wilderness trail was open again, he had no difficulty in finding an +emigrant party to which to attach himself. Abner Blythe was a lean, +hard Yankee, but he had lived for years in the Middle West and had +made journeys out into the prairie, although he had never gone the +whole of the way to the mountains and the coast. He knew how to drive +cattle with the long black-snake whip, whose snapping lash alone can +voice the master's orders and which can flick the ear or flank of a +wandering steer at the outermost limit of reach. His frail, eager-eyed +little wife was to go with them, their boy of five, and a company of +helpers who were to drive the wagons of supplies and to serve for +protection against Indians.</p> + +<p>The road was crowded at first, and the prairie grass grew green and +high, full of wild strawberries, pink wild roses, and meadow larks. +But as they journeyed slowly westward, as spring passed into summer, +the green turned to brown under the burning sun, the low bluffs and +tree-bordered water-courses were left behind, and they came to the +wide, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[140]</a></span>hot plains that seemed to have no end. At the beginning they +sometimes passed farmhouses to the right and left of the trail, built +by some struggling pioneer, where there was a little stream of water +and where a few trees were planted. The places looked to Felix like +the Noah's Ark he used to play with when he was small—the tiny, toy +trees, the square toy house, little toy animals set out on the bare, +brown floor of the prairie. Even the gaunt women in shapeless garments +who always came to the door to watch the wagon train go by were not +unlike the stiff wooden figures of Mrs. Noah. At last, however, even +the scattered houses came to an end and there was nothing before them +but the wilderness.</p> + +<p>It was desperately hot, with the blazing sun above and the scorching +winds swooping over the prairie to blow in their faces like the blast +of a furnace. They made long stops at noontime, resting in the shade +of the wagons and pressed on late into the night, so that not an hour +might be lost. They went by herds of buffalo, big, clumsy, inert +creatures, that looked so formidable from in front and so +insignificant from behind. They saw slim, swift little antelope and, +on the far horizon, they sometimes made out moving dots that must be +Indians. Their numbers and their vigilance, however, seemed great +enough to keep them safe from attack.</p> + +<p>A deadly weariness began to fall upon them all, so that Abner Blythe +became morose and silent, his <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[141]</a></span>wife looked haggard and hollow-eyed, +the men grew irritable, and the animals lagged more and more. Others +who had passed that way had left many of their footsore beasts behind +them—horses, oxen, cows, and sheep—to fall a prey at once to the +great gray prairie wolves that hung behind every wagon train, waiting +for the stragglers who could not keep up.</p> + +<p>"It is only the human beings who have the courage to go on," Abner +Blythe said to Felix. "You would think that horses were stronger than +men and oxen the strongest of all, but the beasts give up and lie down +by the road to die, yet the men keep on. It is not strength but spirit +that carries us all to our journey's end."</p> + +<p>There was one high-spirited black mare, the dearly beloved of Felix's +heart, who, whether dragging at the heavy wagon or cantering under the +saddle, was always full of energy and fire. She was the boy's especial +charge, and, as the weeks passed, the two became such friends as are +only produced by long companionship and unbelievable hardships endured +together. It was a dreadful hour when, one night as they were making +camp, the little mare lay down and not even for a feed of oats or the +precious lump of sugar offered her, would she get up again. The very +spirit that had driven her forward more bravely than the rest had +produced greater exhaustion now.</p> + +<p>"We will have to go on without her," said <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[142]</a></span>Abner Blythe dejectedly, as +they sat about the camp fire.</p> + +<p>Felix was feeding the flame with the sparse fuel, and Anna Blythe, +Abner's wife, was sitting on a roll of blankets with her child on her +lap. The little boy was ill and lay wailing against her shoulder.</p> + +<p>"Don't leave the mare," Felix begged. "A day or two of rest will cure +her entirely. There is water here, and grass beside the stream. We +could camp two or three days until she can go on."</p> + +<p>Abner shook his head wearily.</p> + +<p>"We have no time to waste," he declared. "It is August now and we must +cross the mountains before the middle of September. We haven't a day, +not even an hour, to lose."</p> + +<p>Anna Blythe sighed a deep, quivering sigh. Felix knew that she loved +the little horse, too, and, so he sometimes thought, she was herself +so weary that she often longed to lie down beside the trail and perish +as the tired dumb animals did. She had never made complaint before, +but to-night, perhaps appalled by the thought of the mountains still +to be crossed, she burst out into fierce questioning:</p> + +<p>"Abner, why don't we turn back? What is it all for? Can gold, all the +gold we could ever gather, repay us for this terrible journey? We are +little more than halfway and the worst is still before us. We could go +back while there is still time. Why do we go on?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[143]</a></span>Abner, spreading his big hands upon his knees, sat staring into the +fire.</p> + +<p>"I don't know," he said at last, "I vow I don't know. It is not the +excitement, nor the gold that drives us, there is no telling what it +may be. Our country must go on, she must press forward to new +opportunities, she must dwell in new places. It is through people like +us that such growth comes about, we don't ourselves know why. A little +ambition, a little hope, a great blind impulse, and we go forward. +That is all."</p> + +<p>They sat very still while the fire died out into charring embers and +darkness filled the wide sky above them, showing the whole circling +march of the stars like a sky at sea.</p> + +<p>"We must be moving," Abner said at last, "we can make a few miles more +before it is time to sleep."</p> + +<p>They all arose wearily and made ready to go on. Felix went to where +the black mare lay and passed his hand down her smooth neck. She +whinnied and thrust her soft nose against his cheek, but would make no +effort to move. He stood for a moment thinking deeply. Very clearly +did he understand Abner's unreasoning desire to go forward, but, +perhaps because he was only a boy, he did not feel that same wish so +completely and passionately. There were other ideas in his mind, and +uppermost among them was the feeling that one can not desert a +well-loved friend. Just as the foremost wagon creaked <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[144]</a></span>into motion and +rumbled forward into the dark, his resolution found its way into +words.</p> + +<p>"I think I will stay with the mare," he said. "In three days at least +she will be rested enough to go on, and then I can easily overtake +you. We don't want to lose her." He tried to hide the depth of his +feeling with commonplace words. "It wouldn't be sensible, when we have +so few horses."</p> + +<p>Abner did not consent willingly, but he agreed at last.</p> + +<p>"She'll travel fast when she is on her feet again," he said, "and I +don't like leaving her myself."</p> + +<p>Felix took some provisions from the cook's wagon, gathered up his +blankets, slung his gun over his shoulder, and, as a last thought, +reached in for his violin. It would be good company in the dark, he +thought.</p> + +<p>"Keep your gun cocked for Indians," were Abner's last instructions, +"look out for rattlesnakes at the water holes, and catch us up when +you can. Good luck to you."</p> + +<p>The boy stood beside the trail and listened to the slow complaining of +the wheels and the shuffling of the feet of horses and oxen in the +dust as the whole train moved onward. For a little while he could hear +them and could see the bulk of the wagon tops outlined against the +stars, then the long roll of the prairie hid them and he was left all +alone in the wide, wild, empty plain.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[145]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>CHAPTER IX<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> + +<h4>THE FIDDLER OF APPLE TREE LANE <i>(Continued)</i></h4> +<br /> + +<p>Felix tended the little horse as best he could, bringing her grass, +which she would not eat and water, which she drank gratefully. At +last, unbelievably tired, he built up the fire and lay down to sleep. +His heavy eyes were just closing when he saw a black shadow move +silently across the basin of the little watercourse and heard the +crunch of a pebble dislodged by a softly padding foot. As he sat up, a +big gray wolf, as unafraid as a dog, from long following at the heels +of the emigrant trains, came out into the circle of light. With its +head lowered and its eyes shining in the dark, it sat down—to wait.</p> + +<p>The fire dwindled, for there was little to burn save the dried twigs +from the bushes that lined the stream, nor did Felix dare to leave the +horse long enough to gather a fresh supply. More gray figures came +through the dark to gather in a wide, waiting circle all about the +fire. Within the limits of their brutish minds lay the knowledge that +fires would die down, that strength of man and beast would fail, and +that, once a straggler could not go on, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[146]</a></span>patient waiting always made +him their prey at last. Felix cocked his gun, took long aim at a pair +of green eyes glittering in the dark, but in the end lowered the +muzzle without firing. The flash of a rifle and its report carried far +over the level prairie, and there were other eyes that might be +watching for human stragglers, fiercer and hungrier eyes even than +were the wolves'. As the foremost animal drew a little closer, he took +up his violin and began to play.</p> + +<p>He had a strange audience, the greedy white-fanged beasts that slunk +away at the first strains of the unwonted sound, stole back, yet moved +uneasily away again, the little fat, inquisitive prairie dogs that +popped out of their burrows and sat up to listen, the circling +nighthawks that wheeled and called overhead. Hour after hour he +played, but whenever he paused the hungry circle drew in about him and +he was forced to raise his aching arm and ply his bow again. The first +hint of dawn was brightening the sky when the creatures of the night +began to slip away, and Felix, laying down his violin, suddenly +laughed aloud.</p> + +<p>"I wish that Granny Fullerton, who thought that it wasn't quite safe +for us to live on the Windy Hill," he said, "I wish that she could see +me now!"</p> + +<p>Then he lay down, pillowed his head upon his arm, and fell so fast +asleep that, as he said afterward, "a whole tribe of Indians could +have ridden over him and he would never have moved."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[147]</a></span>It was, indeed, horse's feet that aroused him, but not, by good +fortune, the unshod hoofs of Indian ponies. A band of men was riding +toward him from the westward, hard, grizzled men, weather-beaten and +toil-worn beyond anything Felix had ever seen.</p> + +<p>"We met your party back yonder," said their leader. "They asked us to +look out for you as we went by. Glad to see the Indians haven't got +you yet."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" exclaimed Felix, sitting up and rubbing his eyes, "Have +you—have you been in California?"</p> + +<p>The man nodded. He drew out of his pocket a greasy little buckskin +bag, opened the strings, and poured a stream of something yellow into +the boy's hand.</p> + +<p>"Ever see gold dust before?" he asked.</p> + +<p>It was Felix's first sight of the odd, flattened flakes of metal that +shine dully in your hand, that are no two alike, so that you can turn +them over and over, always seeing different shapes and sizes, +different gleams and lights upon their changing surfaces.</p> + +<p>"There's a lot of it back there where we've been," the man said, +grinning slowly as he saw Felix's excited face. "We left it there for +you and those like you."</p> + +<p>"And did you find all you wanted? Are you going home now to be rich +and comfortable all your days?" the boy inquired.</p> + +<p>The man's grin grew broader still.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[148]</a></span>"You don't know gold miners, sonny," he said. "We've been at work on +the American River diggings, where your folks ahead there are going, +and we found it good enough, but we've heard of something better. Over +to the southward of that valley there's another one deeper, wilder, +hard to get into but with the richest pay dirt you ever dreamed of. We +staked out our claims and left one man to hold it, while we go back to +the States for supplies and better equipment. The gold's harder to get +out, but it's there all right. It makes American River look like +nothing at all."</p> + +<p>He turned in the saddle and looked up the little stream bed where the +water lay in shallow pools below the overhanging bushes. The black +mare had at last struggled to her feet and was now grazing on the +sparse grass that bordered the river.</p> + +<p>"It is none too safe for you to be here alone, young fellow," the man +observed. "There's a band of Indians have been doing considerable +mischief around this neighborhood just lately. We've been hearing of +them from every party as we came along."</p> + +<p>"I'm not afraid," returned Felix stoutly. "One boy and one horse would +be hard to find in this great wide prairie. Aren't you afraid you will +meet the Indians yourselves?"</p> + +<p>"Afraid!" The other laughed aloud. "Why, we're looking for them and it +will be a sorry day for them when we find them." He sobered and went +on <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[149]</a></span>earnestly: "The woman in that party you left called out a message +for you as we came by. 'Tell him,' she said to us, 'that the horse is +his and that he is to go back with you to the States. Tell him, God +bless him,' she said. We'll be glad enough to have you if you care to +come with us," he concluded.</p> + +<p>Felix looked at the long, empty trail before him; he looked up at the +prospector's hard brown face, and then at the little heap of gold dust +in his hand.</p> + +<p>"I'll not go back—just yet," he said. "There are things I must see +first."</p> + +<p>They rode jingling away, the sun glinting on their gun barrels and +pistol butts until they disappeared in the shimmering hot distance of +the dusty trail. Felix, as the heat of the day increased, led the mare +up the watercourse to where the bushes were tall enough to afford a +little shade. He, himself, crawled under a rock beside one of the +pools and lay there very quietly, waiting for the long, sleepy day to +pass. It was noontime, with the world so still that he could actually +hear the water of the stream filtering through the sand as it ran +sluggishly from pool to pool, when a new sound caught his attention. +There was a shuffling of muffled feet, a stone dislodged from the bank +above, the click of metal against metal, but every noise so stealthy +and quiet that he could hardly believe he heard.</p> + +<p>He did not dare to move, but peered through the branches of the bush +beside him and saw a strange cavalcade passing on the high bank above, +little <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[150]</a></span>brown and buckskin and piebald Indian ponies, their unshod +hoofs stepping lightly and quietly over the dry grass, each with a +painted, red-skinned rider, armed and decorated with all of an +Indian's trappings of war. The feathered war bonnets that crowned +their heads and reached to their heels were of every gay color, their +fierce faces were daubed with red and ocher, they carried, some of +them, guns, more of them rude lances and bows and arrows. Felix was so +near that he could make out the strings of beads and claws of wild +animals about their necks, could see their red skins glisten, and +could watch the muscles of their slim thighs move and ripple as they +guided their wise little horses more by pressure of the knee than by +use of the rude Indian bridles. Not one of them spoke, once a pony +snorted in the dust, but that was the only sound as they moved past +him and turned into the trail with their faces eastward. The whole +procession might have been a vision—a mirage of the high, hot +noontide and of the boy's tired brain. But after the men were gone and +he had crawled out from his hiding place he could see the horses' +footprints in the dust and could assure himself that they were real.</p> + +<p>After a long time he heard shots, very faint and far away, lasting for +an hour or more before the hush of the prairie fell again. The cool +night came at last, and the little mare, visibly strengthened by the +rest and grazing, came trotting to him, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[151]</a></span>splashing happily through the +water of the pool. Those gray enemies of the night before did not come +near, nor, though he waited two days, watchful and alert, did any of +the Indians return. He thought of that band of men he had talked with, +hard, seasoned, and well armed for the struggle. From the very first +he had felt little doubt as to what the issue of such a battle would +be.</p> + +<p>It seems too long to tell of how Felix mounted the mare at last and +cantered away along the trail, rejoicing in swift motion again after +the long wait and the crawling pace of the ox team. Nor can it be +fully told how he and his friends toiled forward across the plain, +over that dreaded stretch of desert that came at the far edge of it, +up the tempest-swept, snow-covered mountains, until that wondrous +minute when the endless bleak slopes suddenly fell away before them +and they looked down into the wide green wonder of a new land. In less +than a week from that day, Felix's long dream had come true; he was +standing knee-deep in a rushing stream with a miner's pan in his +excited hands, he saw the gravel wash away, the muddy earth dissolve, +the black sand settle to the bottom to be dried and blown away, +leaving—it did not even then seem believable—the sparkling grains of +yellow gold.</p> + +<p>They did well, he and Abner Blythe. Though their backs ached at the +end of the day and they came home to sleep, worn out, wet, and dirty, +their buckskin bags filled slowly with gold dust as the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[152]</a></span>autumn +passed. Yet Felix could not put from his mind the talk of the man he +had met on the prairie, the tale of higher mountains, deeper valleys, +and richer diggings over to the southward. When the rains came and +there was little work to do, he thought of those words more and more, +and when the open weather came once more he gathered supplies, said +good-by one day to Abner and Anna, and set forth to seek a further, +greater fortune for them all.</p> + +<p>It was a toilsome journey over the mountains, for very few had as yet +passed that way. The deep, shadowy cañons, the rushing streams, the +smooth faces of granite walls seemed impassable barriers, but Felix at +last passed them all and came into the wild, rugged valley of Bear +Creek. He staked his claim, put up his little tent, and went down to +the river to wash his first pan of gold. Yes, the prospector had been +right; here in this bleak, far region the toil was much heavier, but +the reward was unbelievably great.</p> + +<p>There were not yet many miners who had come so far, but the one whose +claim was next to Felix's and whose rough shanty stood almost side by +side with his tent had been there among the first. He was a friend of +those men from whom the boy had first heard of the place, and he +willingly showed the newcomer the best slope for his claim and the +easiest way to wash the gold.</p> + +<p>"There's room for all, so far," he said. "The <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[153]</a></span>others below there on +American River haven't had time to get discontented yet, but there +will be a rush up here soon. When the place begins to be crowded there +will be jumping of claims, and robbery and fights, with knives out and +blood shed, just as you have seen it down there. But we will be +peaceable and friendly here as long as we can."</p> + +<p>The old miner seemed to take a great fancy to Felix and helped him +with advice and kindness in unnumbered ways. He had built himself a +little hut of pine logs roofed with bark as a better protection than a +tent against the mountain storms. Felix sat there with him one night +before the rude stone hearth, while the rain fell in deluges outside +and the wind went calling and blustering down the valley. The miner +piled the fuel high upon the fire and, as the hours passed, told story +after story of wild adventure, of desperate escape, of bold crime, and +of the quick, merciless justice of the frontier. At last his fund of +narrative seemed to come to an end and he was silent for a little.</p> + +<p>"Yes, these are rich diggings," he said finally, going back to the +subject of which they had first been talking, "but—there is more gold +even than this somewhere beyond. A man I knew once, a prospector, told +me a strange story. He was captured by the Indians and carried off to +the south, over beyond the mountains to the edge of the desert. He +escaped from them, but he got lost, trying to go back, and wandered +for days, nearly dying with <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[154]</a></span>thirst, torn and cut by the cactus +thorns, blind and nearly crazed by the terrible heat. He came to the +foot of a hill that he was too weak to climb and he lay down there to +die. But a rain fell and he lay soaking in it all night, drinking what +gathered in a rock pool beside him, with rattlesnakes and lizards, he +said, crawling up to drink with him and he never cared. In the morning +his head was clear and he looked up the hill to see the outcropping of +such a gold mine as you never dreamed of. Lying there on the open +slope was the gold-bearing quartz in plain sight, to be picked up with +your bare hands. He took some with him, but not much, for gold is +heavy when you are staggering weak, and he went on and on, lost again +and nearly dead, but at last he came to a settlement. He lay in a +Mexican's house, raving with fever for weeks, but in the end he got +well. But when he tried to go back to his mine he could never find the +way."</p> + +<p>Felix was listening eagerly, but he did not interrupt or even ask a +question when the man paused. The deep voice rasped huskily, for +evidently the miner was telling his tale with an intent purpose.</p> + +<p>"I have always meant, some day, to go and look for that mine myself, +when I found a comrade I could trust, one who would not be afraid of +the hardship and the danger. The way there is a terrible journey, but +I believe I know almost to a certainty where the place must be. Will +you come, boy—will you come?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[155]</a></span>Felix got up and went to the tiny square window to look out. His voice +was thick with excitement, but he did not answer directly.</p> + +<p>"The storm has passed," he said, "and I must go back to my tent. I—I +will think about what you say and tell you in the morning."</p> + +<p>He went out into the dark, wet night, closing the door with a hand +that shook and fumbled against the wooden latch.</p> + +<p>The old miner must have slept little, for it was scarcely dawn before +he had crossed the muddy slope to Felix's tent. Early as he was, the +boy was before him, gathering up his possessions and thrusting them +into his pack.</p> + +<p>"You're going?" cried the man joyfully, but Felix shook his head.</p> + +<p>"I'm going back," he said and beyond that he would tell him nothing.</p> + +<p>He could not explain how, in the watches of the night, there had come +to him the realization that the fever for finding gold is more +consuming than the fever for getting it, that there is always the +thirst to go on, to leave what one has and seek some new, dazzling +discovery that seems just out of reach. To follow adventure is one +thing; but, as the years pass, to surrender a whole life to a single +and selfish desire is quite another. Some indwelling wisdom had told +Felix that it was time to turn back, but he had no words by which to +make the other understand. The old miner had given up to the dream +long ago; <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[156]</a></span>he would always be seeking something richer and better, +always leaving it for some golden vision that would lure him forward +until at last he would disappear in the mountains or the desert and +never return.</p> + +<p>"I am going to turn over my claim here to Abner Blythe," declared +Felix. "It will make him rich and his wife happy, and you had better +stay to work it with him, for I am going home."</p> + +<p>"I can't stay." The miner seemed to understand also, but he was as +brief and inarticulate as was the boy. "I'm one of those that has to +go on—and on."</p> + +<p>He turned away and walked back to his cabin through the rain-drenched +flowers and the dripping green bushes. Who may know what pictures +either of dark regret or of golden hope were passing before his eyes +as vividly as were Felix's memories of the low cottage on the hill, of +the apple trees that would be in bloom now all up and down Medford +Valley, of the wind talking in the oak tree outside his window. A +quarrel with one's only brother looks suddenly very small when so many +thousand miles are stretched out between.</p> + +<br /> +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> +<br /> + +<p>Ralph had often said that the hollyhocks were growing too many and +should be uprooted, but Barbara's begging for their lives somehow +always saved them in the end. They had spread out from the door and +advanced down the hill in marching <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[157]</a></span>regiments, a glowing mass of +color. The singing, yellow-banded bees were busy all day in the cups +of scarlet fading to pink and white, and white shading into yellow. +The afternoon sun was behind them, lighting them to unwonted glory, +when Felix came plodding along the lane on each side of which the +apple trees were beginning to grow tall. Barbara was in the garden +cutting sweet peas into her apron and Ralph, beside her, was standing +in silence, watching the bees. A dozen times the girl had read that +same thought in his mind, that he would give ten years of life to +unsay the words that had driven his brother away and that had taught +himself such a bitter lesson. Then suddenly Barbara uttered such a cry +of joy that even the bees hummed and hovered lower, and slow old Chloe +came hurrying to the door. The old woman smiled, with tears running +down her wrinkled face, as she saw who it was that came trudging up +the hill.</p> + +<p>"There's good luck come back to this house at last," she said aloud an +hour later when Felix, as the twilight was falling, sat down upon the +doorstep and began to play his violin.</p> + +<p>He never grew tired of telling the tale of his adventurous journey, +nor did his sister and brother ever grow tired of listening. Ralph +Brighton had lost, in that one dreadful hour, his love for dollar +signs, and he nodded in wise agreement over Felix's decision to give +up the quest for gold. Barbara would hearken in awed fascination to +that story of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[158]</a></span>the man lost in the desert, whose eyes looked once upon +fabulous wealth but who could never find it again.</p> + +<p>Wherever gold mines are, there is to be found such a legend, a tale of +greater riches just beyond men's knowledge. No matter how dazzling is +the wealth at hand there is always that tantalizing story of the lost +mine, sometimes reputed to be far and inaccessible, sometimes only +just over the next hill, yet always as difficult to discover as the +end of the rainbow. But, as Abner Blythe said, it is so a country +grows, and when men cease from following rainbows, then will the world +stand still.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[159]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>CHAPTER X<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> + +<h4>A MAN OF STRAW</h4> +<br /> + +<p>The shower had lifted and was moving away down the valley, a gray mist +of rain with a slowly following flood of sunshine. Oliver got up and +said without enthusiasm:</p> + +<p>"We must go now, we have an errand we must do. Come along, Janet."</p> + +<p>She rose to go with him but looked back wistfully several times as she +went, with lagging feet, down the hill. She had wished that the story +might last forever, so that she need not face Anthony Crawford at the +end of it.</p> + +<p>They said nothing to each other as they climbed into the car and +threaded the twisting lanes and byroads that would take them to the +house they sought. Oliver was rehearsing within himself what he should +say when they presented the picture. "My sister carried this away by +mistake, we thought that we should return it to you as soon as +possible.</p> + +<p>"And then he will say something sharp and unkind, and I won't know +what to answer," he reflected drearily. "I will want to say that I am +sure it <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[160]</a></span>isn't his anyway and that Janet did well to take it, even by +accident. But what is the use of stirring up more trouble? Well, I can +only explain and then get away as quickly as we can."</p> + +<p>It is probable that Janet, who sat by him in low-spirited silence, was +really suffering less than he. Oliver had undertaken the +responsibility of returning the picture, and Oliver was a dependable +boy who could manage it far better than she could. She thought little +of what was to be said or done and was only anxious to have the affair +over.</p> + +<p>They left the car in the lane and walked together toward the sagging +gate. A man was just coming through it, who proved, as they came near, +to be John Massey. His good-natured, friendly face was pale under its +sunburn and drawn into unfamiliar lines of anger and despair.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Peyton sent me the money to settle up my rent," he told them, +"and I came up here to pay it and arrange about leaving. Crawford +wants me to stay until the first of the month, but I am going to-day. +He has never stocked the farm with the tools and machinery a landlord +is supposed to furnish, so I've bought them myself, what I could, and +now he says they are his. He wants to know how I can prove that I paid +for them, when every one knows that it was his place to do it. He +laughed at me when I said it would ruin me entirely. He said one man's +gain was always from another man's loss. I vow there is the spirit of +a devil in him."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[161]</a></span>He looked back at the house among the trees, clenching his big hands +and muttering to himself in helpless fury.</p> + +<p>"He just stood there grinning, even guessing my thoughts, for he said, +'You could knock me down, I know, but it would be no satisfaction to +you, for I would get back at you through the law. It would cost you +more than it is worth, John Massey.' It was what I knew was true +myself, so I kept my hands off him and came away."</p> + +<p>Janet and Oliver stood looking at him miserably, knowing that there +was nothing to be done.</p> + +<p>"Get into the car and wait for us," Oliver directed at last. "We will +take you home when we have finished here. We won't stay long."</p> + +<p>"You won't want to," observed John Massey bitterly. "He is in a famous +bad temper."</p> + +<p>They went through the gate with Janet's steps lagging more than ever. +There was something almost uncanny about a man who could cause such +misery to other people and yet go unscathed himself. They saw him +almost immediately as they came up the path. He had been cutting down +some weeds in the neglected field and was standing in the middle of +it, close beside the scarecrow. He did not move, but waited for them +to come close, evidently meditating what he could say that would hurt +and anger them the most. He began to speak the moment they came near, +giving Oliver no opening for what he had meant to say:</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[162]</a></span>"So Jasper Peyton, having sent one of you to steal my picture, has +lost courage and sent two of you to bring it back again. Very clever, +very clever of him indeed!"</p> + +<p>"He knew nothing about it," Janet was beginning passionately, when +Oliver silenced her by a touch on her shoulder.</p> + +<p>"He knows that," he reminded her calmly; "he is only trying to make +you angry."</p> + +<p>He caught a look of smoldering fury in Anthony Crawford's eye and a +note of surprised irritation in his voice.</p> + +<p>"Well," the man snapped, "am I to have my property or not?"</p> + +<p>"You are to have it. We will not keep anything that you even claim as +yours," returned Oliver.</p> + +<p>He felt hot rage surging up within him, yet he strove to keep it down. +He had realized, of a sudden, that this man who could hurt his Cousin +Jasper so deeply, who could ruin John Massey, could harm neither him +nor Janet in the least. Oliver had felt real dread as he came through +the gate, he had been haunted by the vague terror of what Anthony +Crawford might be able to do, but he looked upon him now with +disillusioned eyes, knowing him for nothing but a small-minded, +selfish, spiteful man whose power over them was nothing at all.</p> + +<p>"If I can only keep as calm as he can, he will never get the better of +me," the boy thought <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[163]</a></span>desperately as he struggled with his own rising +tide of anger.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps you would be glad to have me establish my real rights," said +Crawford. "You would like to have it brought up in court, perhaps, how +your sister was found going through my possessions, and how she +happened, quite by chance, of course, to select the most portable and +valuable article in my house and carry it away with her. She would +like, I am sure, to have public opportunity to make all that quite +plain."</p> + +<p>Oliver heard Janet's gasp of panic-stricken horror, but he still, by a +great effort, retained his own presence of mind.</p> + +<p>"We are not afraid of you," he asserted, looking straight into the +other's narrow, shifting eyes. "I am nearly as big as you and I could +roll you over and over in the mud of this wet field, only that would +give you the legal hold on me that is just what you wish. You can't do +us any real harm, no matter what you pretend. I don't believe you have +anything behind those threats you make to Cousin Jasper, I don't think +you believe in your claims yourself. You're a bluff; like this +scarecrow here, you're nothing but a bogy man, stuffed with straw!"</p> + +<p>He caught the scarecrow by the shoulder, venting his rage upon the +helpless bundle of rags, shaking it even out of its ridiculous +resemblance to its master, until it fell to bits about his feet. He +flung down the miniature upon the heap of rags and, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[164]</a></span>followed by +Janet, walked away across the field. Anthony Crawford stood looking +after him, never offering a word. When Oliver reached the path he +became aware that John Massey was leaning over the gate, grinning in +half-terrified delight. The rain was beginning to fall steadily again +as they came out into the lane and climbed into the car.</p> + +<p>It rained all of the afternoon, but ceased at nightfall, just in time, +so Janet said, "to keep Mrs. Brown from nervous prostration." Oliver +could not quite understand how plump, comfortable Mrs. Brown could be +threatened with such a malady, for he had forgotten that next day +there was to be a much heralded outing for all the members of Cousin +Jasper's household. The occasion was a celebration at the next +village, a glorified edition of the ordinary country fair in which +farmers, summer visitors, and the residents of the bigger estates were +all accustomed to take part. A magnificent affair it was to be with +exhibitions, merry-go-rounds, peanut and lemonade stands, motor races, +a horse show—something to please the taste of every variety of +person. It was Cousin Jasper's custom to give the whole staff of +servants a holiday for the festival, although the cook usually waited +to serve an early lunch and Mrs. Brown came home before the others, to +set out a late supper. No influence on earth could ever persuade +Cousin Jasper to attend one of these merrymakings, but every other +person under his roof was absorbed in looking forward to the great +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[165]</a></span>day of the summer. Elaborate preparations had been made and all that +was now in question was the weather, for to make such an event a +success it seemed absolutely necessary to have one of those clear, +blazing-hot days that seem specially to belong to circuses, fairs, and +midsummer festivals.</p> + +<p>Janet was to go under the safe, but excited, wing of Mrs. Brown, and +Oliver, also, was looking forward to the day with some anticipation.</p> + +<p>"I wonder if the Beeman and Polly will be there," he thought, and went +off into further speculation as to what the Beeman would look like in +the more civilized clothes that such an occasion would demand. "I +might not even know him," he reflected.</p> + +<p>When the day came, however, cloudless, hot, just what such a day +should be, Oliver suddenly announced that he was not going.</p> + +<p>"I don't like to leave Cousin Jasper all alone when he is so worried," +he said to Janet, but could not explain why there should be any cause +for misgiving. "I didn't care a great deal about going anyway." He +refused to listen to her suggestion that she should stay also.</p> + +<p>Lines of motors were rolling down the road from early morning onward, +filled with flannel-coated or befrilled holiday makers or laden with +farmers and farmers' wives and farmers' children. Janet and Mrs. +Brown, the one an excited flutter of white organdie skirts, the other +a ponderous rustle of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[166]</a></span>tight brown taffeta, departed at ten o'clock +and by one the great house was empty of all save Oliver and Cousin +Jasper.</p> + +<p>The afternoon seemed very still and very long, as one hour followed +another. Oliver strolled out to the gate and stood looking down the +road, but the procession of motors had long since come to an end, so +that the highway stretched, white and empty, to the far end of the +valley. Yet as he stood, idly staring out in the hot quiet, he thought +that he saw a small, dilapidated vehicle come round a distant turn and +advance slowly toward him. When it was near enough for him to +recognize the old white horse, the driver pulled up suddenly, turned +the cart sharply about in the road, and rattled away in the direction +from which he had come. Could it be that he had seen the boy there in +the open gate, and therefore had decided not to come in? Oliver could +scarcely believe that this was the reason.</p> + +<p>An hour later, when he had gone back to the house, he saw a ragged, +barefoot youth in faded overalls come shuffling up the drive. He +delivered to Oliver a letter addressed to Cousin Jasper and said it +was "from Mr. Crawford and he was to be sure to get an answer."</p> + +<p>Oliver carried it away to the study and stood waiting, looking out +through the window, while Cousin Jasper should read it and write a +reply. The brightness of the holiday weather seemed to be <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[167]</a></span>growing dim +somehow; the sun was still shining but with a touch of greenish, +unreal light.</p> + +<p>"I hope there isn't going to be a storm," he thought. His reflections +were interrupted by a sound in the room behind him; Cousin Jasper was +tearing the letter sharply to pieces.</p> + +<p>"Anthony has sent what he calls an ultimatum," he said, trying to +smile and not succeeding. "Tell the boy there is no answer."</p> + +<p>The messenger, on being so informed, seemed reluctant to believe it.</p> + +<p>"He said I must have one, not to come back without it," he kept +insisting.</p> + +<p>How Anthony Crawford had found any one to carry his letter on this day +when Medford Valley seemed quite emptied of inhabitants seemed rather +a mystery, yet he had not only found one but had impressed him +forcibly with the necessity of fulfilling his errand. It was only +after he had received a coin from Oliver's pocket and a large apple +from the fruit dish in the dining room, that the shabby youth finally +decided to go away.</p> + +<p>"He said I wasn't to come back without an answer, so if I haven't one +I needn't go back at all." He seemed to find this solution of the +difficulty an excellent one and went striding away, whistling +cheerfully.</p> + +<p>Whatever final threat Anthony Crawford's letter had contained, it +seemed to be unusually disturbing to Cousin Jasper. Having evidently +made up his <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[168]</a></span>mind to ignore it, he seemed, just as plainly, to be able +to think of nothing else. He seemed unwilling to be alone, and yet to +be very bad company, for he was restless, silent, and, when Oliver, +with an effort, tried to talk of cheerful things, was completely +inattentive. They went into the garden at last to see how the flowers +were faring. The sunshine was more unreal than ever, and sudden, +fitful gusts of wind were beginning to stir the trees. They had +inspected the flowers and were halfway across the lawn on their way to +the house when the sun vanished, the wind rose to a roar, and, before +they could reach the steps, the blinding rain was upon them.</p> + +<p>It was not an ordinary thunderstorm, but one of those sinister +tempests that occasionally break the tension of a hot summer day. +Oliver, inside the hastily closed windows, could see the trees lashing +helplessly, and could hear them groaning and snapping as one great +branch after another came crashing to the ground. It was only a few +minutes that the furious wind lasted, as it swept across the garden, +but it left destruction in its wake. The beds of lilies were drenched +and flattened, the smooth lawn was strewn with twigs and broken +boughs, half a dozen trees were split, and one huge Lombardy poplar, +with a mass of earth and roots turned upward, lay prone across the +driveway.</p> + +<p>It was half past six by Oliver's watch, then seven, then eight. No one +had come home. Cousin <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[169]</a></span>Jasper was growing more and more restless and +overwrought, Oliver was anxious—and hungry. He saw his cousin gather +up the fragments of the letter, piece them together for rereading, +then fling them from him once more. The boy wandered about aimlessly +in the solitude of the big house, wishing that this long miserable day +would reach an end and that Janet and Mrs. Brown would come home. It +grew dark and no one returned, although, after a long time, the +telephone began to ring.</p> + +<p>It was Mrs. Brown's voice, nervous and only half audible, that sounded +at the far end. Yes, she and Miss Janet were quite safe, they had been +under shelter during the storm, but there had been such damage by the +wind that both the railway and the road were blocked. They would not +be able to get home for some hours, she feared.</p> + +<p>"Could you, Mr. Oliver, just slip down to the kitchen and make poor +Mr. Peyton a cup of tea and some toast? It is so bad for him to wait +so late for his dinner. You will find the tea in the right-hand +cupboard and the butter——"</p> + +<p>The unsatisfactory connection cut her off, leaving Oliver standing +aghast at her suggestion. "Just slip down to the kitchen," indeed, +when he did not even know the way to that region of the house. And +make tea! It seemed an utterly impossible task.</p> + +<p>Through the long vista of rooms he could see Cousin Jasper in his +study, sitting before his desk, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[170]</a></span>and, fancying himself unseen, +suddenly bowing his head in his hands.</p> + +<p>"It won't do," thought Oliver determinedly, "he must have some one to +help him, some one that knows more about this wretched business. There +is that Cousin Tom he talks about, Eleanor's father. I can't think of +any one else. I will send for him."</p> + +<p>If he could only have found the Beeman! He even searched the telephone +book for the name of Marshall, but found none. And he had never +discovered where the Beeman and Polly lived. Yes, the only choice was +Cousin Tom.</p> + +<p>He got the connection with some difficulty and asked for Mr. Brighton.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Brighton is at dinner," returned the smooth voice of a +well-trained servant; "he cannot be interrupted."</p> + +<p>"But this is very important," insisted Oliver. "I am quite sure that +if he knew——"</p> + +<p>"My orders are that he is not to be disturbed," was the politely firm +answer while the boy raged and fumed impotently.</p> + +<p>"Then tell him," Oliver directed, "that his cousin, Mr. Jasper Peyton, +is in very great trouble and needs to see him as—as soon as he finds +it quite convenient."</p> + +<p>His voice was trembling with anger and he slammed down the receiver +without waiting for a reply.</p> + +<p>"There was no use sending for him, after all," <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[171]</a></span>he reflected in black +discouragement. He was not used to such treatment nor did he think +that a man should surround himself with so much ceremony that he could +not hear a plea for help. "He is just what Cousin Eleanor's father +would be," was his disgusted verdict. "I was a fool to hope for any +help there. If it had been the Beeman——"</p> + +<p>Never had the house seemed so enormous or so silent as it was +to-night. He went out through a swinging door, attempting to find the +kitchen, fumbling down a passage, feeling in likely places for +electric buttons, and not discovering them. He bumped his head against +unexpected doors and cupboards, he upset something with a horrifying +crash in the butler's pantry. At last he found the right door and the +proper light switch, and stood in the big, shining white kitchen, +looking about him helplessly at all the complicated apparatus of +cookery, clean, polished, and complete, and utterly useless to him.</p> + +<p>"This is no place for a boy," he exclaimed stormily after he had +pinched his fingers in a drawer, spilled the water, and produced a +roaring, spitting flame in the gas burner that blew up in his face and +then went out. After fifteen minutes of miserable effort he at last +heard the water boil noisily in the kettle where he had placed water +and tea together. He poured out a cupful of the poisonous brew and +stood regarding it in despair.</p> + +<p>"I wish Mrs. Brown would come home," he <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[172]</a></span>groaned. "I'd be glad of any +woman, any girl, even Cousin Eleanor."</p> + +<p>He had opened a window, for the place was hot and close and through +this he could hear, of a sudden, the sound of an automobile coming up +the drive. He dashed through the dark passage, hurried to the great +front door, and flung it open. There was a crunching of big wheels on +the gravel and the snorting of an engine checked suddenly to a stop. +It was not Mrs. Brown and Janet, for, though he heard voices, they +were not theirs. The car had stopped beyond the fallen tree and some +one was coming across the grass—two people, for the voices were a +man's and a girl's. Apparently Cousin Tom had not stopped to finish +his dinner, after all, and he had brought Cousin Eleanor.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I'll be glad to see even her," he thought desperately.</p> + +<p>The two came nearer, a man in white flannels, but bareheaded in the +hurry of his coming, and a girl in white also. There was something +familiar in the swing of those broad shoulders, in the tone of that +voice. Yet Oliver stood, blinking stupidly, holding to the side of the +door, too dazed to speak when the two stepped out of the dark and came +up the steps—the Beeman and Polly.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[173]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>CHAPTER XI<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> + +<h4>THREE COUSINS</h4> +<br /> + +<p>"Good gracious, Oliver, do you mean to say you really did not know? We +used to talk it over, Polly and I, and wonder whether you were not +beginning to see through us. Janet had some suspicions, and when she +met us at the fair this afternoon, she understood who we were at last. +Now I will present you to Miss Eleanor Marshall Brighton, known to her +own family as Polly. I would not have broken this thing to you so +suddenly, if I had taken time to think."</p> + +<p>Oliver listened to Cousin Tom's half-apologetic explanations, yet he +scarcely heard them, but still stood leaning against the doorpost, +gaping with astonishment. Of course he had always known that there was +something unusual about the Beeman, but as to who he really was he had +never had an inkling. And this was Cousin Eleanor, the girl he had +pictured so definitely that it seemed she could not be other than the +prim, detested person he had so dreaded meeting. It was the very +vividness of his idea of her that had stood in the way of his guessing +the truth. But if the Beeman were really Cousin Tom, then <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[174]</a></span>he could, +of course, put everything right and—more immediate cause for +rejoicing—Polly could cook!</p> + +<p>"Oh, come down to the kitchen and get Cousin Jasper something to eat," +he begged. "He is almost starved. It is half past eight and he had +lunch at twelve."</p> + +<p>He gave Tom Brighton a rapid account of what had happened that day—of +the letter, of Cousin Jasper's increasing agitation, of his final +desperate call for help on his own responsibility.</p> + +<p>"Poor Oliver, what a day you have had, while the rest of us were +enjoying ourselves at the fair!" said Cousin Tom. "Polly and I +happened to come home early before the storm, so that your message +found us and we came at once."</p> + +<p>"And he is starved himself," put in Polly. "He has not had anything to +eat any more than Cousin Jasper."</p> + +<p>It was wonderful to watch Polly making short shrift of the remains of +his own awkward preparations, to see her skillful manipulation of the +gas burners and her marvelous dexterity with the egg beater. And this +slim, eager, shy Polly, with her crinkled brown hair and her freckled +nose, this was really Eleanor Brighton. Oliver sat down limply upon +one of the kitchen chairs to contemplate the wonder of it anew.</p> + +<p>"I did not know who you were, myself, that first day," she said, +"though Daddy guessed at once and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[175]</a></span>even suspected that you were +planning to go away. Janet told us all about it this afternoon, how +Cousin Jasper made such a mistake and thought that he could force you +to meet a girl that you were sure you wouldn't like. I would have done +just the same myself if my father had tried to make me meet you, only +he is too wise for such a thing."</p> + +<p>But Oliver could only shake his head and marvel that he had not +guessed.</p> + +<p>Later, after Cousin Jasper and Oliver had feasted on the supper of +Polly's providing, they all gathered about the table in the library +and Cousin Tom unlocked the battered old strong box that he had +brought in from the car.</p> + +<p>"As I am the family lawyer," he explained to Oliver—"yes, bees are +only a hobby, and my real business is the law—I have in my possession +most of the records belonging to this affair. I have gone into the +whole matter of Anthony's claims from the very beginning and I am +prepared to fight him for every inch that he demands."</p> + +<p>He began taking papers from the box, fat rolls of legal documents, +letters with their edges worn into tatters and addressed in the +crabbed writing of a century ago, title deeds discolored and yellow +with age, most of them fastened with great red seals, a mass of musty +records that looked dry and dull indeed.</p> + +<p>While he was spreading them out upon the table, the door opened +quietly and Janet slipped in. She <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[176]</a></span>assured them that she had dined and +had not got wet, that, except for Mrs. Brown's terrible fever of +anxiety lest Cousin Jasper should not be properly cared for, all had +gone well. Might she listen, please, and was there going to be another +story?</p> + +<p>"Not of just the same kind that I have been telling you up yonder on +the Windy Hill," replied Tom Brighton, "although here you see the +source of all those tales and of a hundred others like them. They are +all buried here in these dusty papers, the history of your forbears +and of the lands in Medford Valley. It goes all the way back, does the +record, to the time when our several times great-grandfather bought +the first tract from the Indian, Nashola. I am always glad to think +that the red man had enough intelligence and the white man enough +honor to make something like a real bargain, that this valley was +purchased for what the wild lands were worth instead of being paid for +with a gun, a drink of bad spirits, and a handful of beads. See, here +is Nashola's name; he learned to write after a fashion, although the +Indian witnesses signed only with a mark. And here is the signature of +that first one of our kin to settle in the New World, Matthew +Hallowell."</p> + +<p>"Hallowell?" echoed Oliver. "Did he belong to those same Hallowells in +the story, who quarreled over the <i>Huntress</i>?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," was the answer, "he was the beginning of a vigorous line, +living in and near Medford <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[177]</a></span>Valley until there came at last the +Hallowell who moved to the seaport town, who built his first ship +there and launched into foreign trade. They became great merchants, +the Hallowells, in that time between the Revolution and the War of +1812 when Yankee ships and Yankee owners were lords of the high seas. +But fortune failed after the death of Reuben Hallowell; his son Alan +loved sailing rather than trading and his daughter Cicely married a +junior partner in a lesser firm, Howard Brighton, who thought it +better for his sons and daughter to go to live on the lands in Medford +Valley that had belonged to their mother and had been given by her to +him. Cicely's children were Ralph and Felix and Barbara Brighton, of +all of whom you have heard."</p> + +<p>"How have they heard, Tom?" asked Cousin Jasper, and the Beeman +smiled.</p> + +<p>"I have been filling up their minds with family history, for I knew +that they must understand about this whole affair some day and it +would take too long to tell them all the facts at once. So we have +come now to the latest portion of the story," he went on, turning +again to the younger members of his audience, "to a period when three +cousins, Jasper Peyton, Anthony Crawford, and Tom Brighton used to +spend much time together when they were growing up.</p> + +<p>"Jasper and I are first cousins, since my father was Ralph Brighton +and his mother was that younger sister, Barbara. I have had no +reluctance in telling <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[178]</a></span>you of that bitter mistake my father made and +the quarrel with his brother, for he spoke of it often himself and +said that, in all his life, he never learned a more valuable lesson. +Felix did not marry, since his zeal for the orchard and the bees and +later for farming on a larger and larger scale seemed to occupy his +every thought. It was he who reclaimed the marshy, waste ground in the +valley, 'for,' he said, 'it is wrong that we on the seaboard leave our +home acres and move farther and farther westward, looking for new land +that is easy to till. It is a wasteful policy, even for a new +country.' That was one of the things he had learned on his long +journey across the West and back again."</p> + +<p>"But I do not understand about Anthony Crawford," put in Oliver. "I +haven't seen yet where he comes in at all."</p> + +<p>"He calls us cousin, but it is a distant kinship, since he is grandson +of that Martin Hallowell who broke with his partner Reuben over the +matter of the <i>Huntress</i>. He used to come often to stay in Medford +Valley, for he had been left without parents and Felix Brighton was +his guardian. My Aunt Barbara, Jasper's mother, had lost her husband +early, and she went to live with her brother Felix in the yellow stone +farmhouse that had come to him from some earlier Hallowell who had +built it a hundred years ago. How we loved the place and how happy we +all were there, for I spent almost as much time under that wide, +friendly roof as did Anthony. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[179]</a></span>How patient and good Jasper's mother +was to three mischievous, active boys, and how unceasingly, wisely +kind was Felix Brighton! He has done much for us, Jasper and me, and +he would, if he could, have made a man of Anthony.</p> + +<p>"He was not like the other two of us, we could see that even when we +were children. He was quicker and more clever than we, and he was +better, or at least wiser, at holding his tongue and keeping his +temper when the occasion served. But the key to his whole character +was that he could never see any possession in the hands of another +without instinctively wishing to have it for himself. I have seen him +move heaven and earth to get something that he did not really want, +merely because it seemed of value when it belonged to some one else. +There was no one more clever than he at acquiring what he desired.</p> + +<p>"Felix Brighton prospered greatly, but he never moved out of the +comfortable farmhouse of which we were all so fond. It became very +beautiful under his hands, extended and improved and filled with the +rarest treasures of his gathering. He was especially fond of pictures, +so that there was a wealth of portraits and landscapes that he had +collected or inherited, that glowed like jewels on the mellow old +walls. He did us unnumbered kindnesses when we were boys, and when, on +growing up, we decided that we would all three be lawyers, he set us +up as partners, Peyton, Crawford & Brighton. We felt <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[180]</a></span>very important +with our law books, our profound knowledge, our newly painted sign and +very little else. Even while we were studying, it was plain that +Anthony, in his erratic, changeable way, was the cleverest of us all.</p> + +<p>"And then history repeated itself, as it so often does. The grandson +of Martin Hallowell and the two great-grandsons of Reuben fell out +with each other over just such a questionable enterprise as had +wrecked a partnership a hundred years ago. I can see him now as he +came hurrying into our office that day full of the plan for his great +scheme—just a quibble of the law and the thing was done. We were all +to be made rich and successful by it, he explained. There is no use in +describing to you the intricacies of his idea; it was one of those +shoal waters in which the honesty of young lawyers can sometimes come +to grief. The pursuit of law will winnow out the true from the false; +it makes an upright man a hundred times more certain and more proud of +his honor: it searches out the small, weak places of a meaner man's +soul.</p> + +<p>"Anthony tried to make this project sound quite simple and +straightforward, but I can remember how narrowly he watched us and +how, when he attempted to laugh at our objections, his voice cracked +into shrill falsetto, under pressure of his excitement. I would have +argued with him, explained, tried to dissuade him, but Jasper scorned +my temporizing and would have had none of it. His sense of justice +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[181]</a></span>blazed high within him and his words leaped forth, a very avalanche of +scorn and wrath. Anthony heard him through without replying, then +turned on his heel and went out. Our partnership was at an end. Later +we heard that he had become involved with his scheme even before he +spoke to us, that he had made himself liable for a sum of money, and +that, to pay it—don't wince, Jasper, these children must know the +truth—to pay it he forged Felix Brighton's name.</p> + +<p>"There is something very terrible in the sudden destruction of your +confidence in some one you have loved and trusted. Anthony is greatly +changed now, although there is still a little of his old charm left. +Yet you would not think of him as some one who had been an intimate +part of our lives, a comrade whose cleverness we admired and whose +honesty we had never doubted. And then he was suddenly blotted out of +our existence. The wrong he had done was hushed up, he disappeared +somewhere in the West, and it seemed that we were never to hear of him +again. The years went by, Jasper's mother and then our Uncle Felix +went from us. He had given me the lands on the west side of the river, +since I was already owner of the cottage, the Windy Hill, and the bees +that he had taught me to tend and love. To Jasper he had given the +yellow stone house that had been like home for us all and his intimate +possessions, the treasures it contained. He had given him also the +drained farm lands by <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[182]</a></span>the river, a legacy that was an occupation in +itself. He had seen that Jasper's bent was not really for the law, but +that his best calling was the care of such an estate as this. More +years passed, I became more and more absorbed in my own work down in +the seaport town that has become a city, spending my holidays and my +vacations in caring for the bees, not seeing Jasper so often, for he +was over-busy also. And then Anthony came home.</p> + +<p>"Whatever he had been doing in all this time we have no way of +knowing. He had altered greatly, so that there seemed nothing left of +his old self except his cleverness, some lingering affection for the +place where he had been happy as a boy, and that old habit of coveting +what other people had. He came back with a claim to make, one that +went back as far as the day when Reuben and Martin Hallowell quarreled +and made a hasty division of what had belonged to them in common. +There had always been a slight doubt as to the title of the land upon +which the yellow stone farmhouse stood, and to the upper end of the +farms by the river. Anthony knew of it from the days when we studied +law together and he came back determined to make that property his. I +will not deny that he had some slight basis for his claim. He would +accept no compromise or offer of purchase, so in the end Jasper gave +in to him."</p> + +<p>Cousin Jasper had not spoken throughout Tom Brighton's recounting of +the whole affair. But now <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[183]</a></span>he took up the tale himself, going over the +ground that, very evidently, he had pondered and argued and weighed +within himself a hundred times.</p> + +<p>"I had much and he had nothing, he was in real want and had a wife and +two children besides. There was, as Tom says, some real basis for his +claim since the title had never been made quite clear. And there is, +further, no more bitter thing than a family quarrel, a division over +the settlement of property, this one asking for what is more than his, +that one fighting to hold what is not his own—no, it was unthinkable. +So we settled the matter peaceably enough. I built a new house above +him on the hill and he settled down in the place that had been home to +all of us. He seemed to have repented of the wrong he had done and we +were ready to forget it. I do not think that I ever doubted the +honesty of his purpose, at first. Then it came to my wishing for some +of the old possessions for my new house and he vowed that every one of +them was his."</p> + +<p>"I know," said Janet, nodding quickly. "He wouldn't give up the +pictures, though he did not care for them himself. They were stored in +the dust and dirt under the eaves and he asked me if you had sent me +to see where he kept them. He only wanted them because they were +yours."</p> + +<p>"I suppose he meant to sell them some day," Cousin Jasper answered, +"for there were several that were of almost as much value as the house +itself. But less than ever was I willing to bicker and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[184]</a></span>haggle over +what I had really loved, and since he would not sell them to me I gave +the matter up. Even then, there was a little justice on his side, for +the pictures had been purchased with money from the lands that he +called his. But it was my great mistake, since he did not understand +at all why I yielded to him, and from that time he made certain that +he had but to force me and I would relinquish everything."</p> + +<p>Oliver muttered something angrily and went to stand by the window. He +wanted a minute to think it out, to understand clearly before the tale +went on. He could see just how Anthony had read Cousin Jasper's +character, sensitive, high-strung, with strong affections that not +even great wrongs could quite break down. But how mistaken the man had +been who thought Jasper Peyton was a weak-willed person to be led +anywhere!</p> + +<p>"His success in getting made him greedy for more," went on Cousin +Jasper, "and he began to push his claims further and further until I +verily believe he began to think that everything I had should be his +own. When I refused to yield one more inch, then the difficulties +began indeed. He let the old house fall into unbelievable disrepair +and he took the stand that since I was defrauding him, he was too poor +to do otherwise. I built the high wall across the garden so that I +need not see the home I had loved dropping to pieces before my eyes. +At that his anger seemed to pass beyond control. He <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[185]</a></span>claims this, and +he claims that, but I know that his final aim is the whole of what I +have. He sent me a letter to-day, I do not understand why he did not +come himself. He says that he is about to take public action, that he +will bring into court the story of how Felix Brighton became his +guardian and used that position as a blind to live in possession of +Anthony's inheritance. Oh, I cannot repeat it all, his threats against +our good name and against the memory of those who are gone."</p> + +<p>Cousin Jasper's voice dropped wearily into silence. Oliver dug his +hands deep into his pockets and stood staring and scowling out through +the window although all that he saw was the blackness outside and the +dim reflection of his own face upon the pane.</p> + +<p>"Our Uncle Felix never had the least notion that Anthony had a claim +upon the place," Tom Brighton was saying behind him. "It was a legal +technicality that Anthony was clever enough to find and make the most +of. I do not at all believe in his right to it, even yet."</p> + +<p>"He doesn't believe in it himself," Oliver made his declaration, +whirling suddenly about upon them. "I told him that he was only +bluffing and he could not even deny it. How I hate him," he cried +huskily. "It is lucky that there are none of your bees near by, just +now!"</p> + +<p>Jasper Peyton looked at him in blank inquiry, but the Beeman smiled, +yet shook his head at the same time.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[186]</a></span>"It is not only bees that are destroyed by hating," he said, "it is +every good thing in life that dries up and blows away under the force +of dislike and bitterness. Look at Anthony, who vows he has no +affection for any one, who does not believe in friends or kindliness. +He has hurt others, he has brought no happiness to himself, and, +unless I am mistaken, he is going to wreck his whole scheme in one +tremendous crash that we cannot now foresee. A lawyer, like myself, +sees many hard, miserable, sordid things, but a Beeman has leisure to +speculate as to whither they tend. And they all tend to the same +thing."</p> + +<p>They sat for some time about the table, explaining, discussing, and +questioning, until finally the muffled booming of the clock in the +hall proclaimed the hour of ten. Polly's eyes were beginning to look +heavy, a fact that did not escape her father's watchful observation.</p> + +<p>"These girls have had a long day and it is time for them to be in +bed," he announced. "We have been over this whole matter and made +things clear, and we have only to decide, since we are to fight +Anthony in court, just what stand we will make. We will talk that +over, Jasper, while Oliver takes your car and drives Polly home."</p> + +<p>"I'll go with them," said Janet, jumping up also. She had been +listening, bright-eyed and alert, through all of the story and showed +no signs of sleepiness. Oliver tore himself away with some regret, for +he <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[187]</a></span>did not wish to miss a word of the plans the two men were making. +But Polly was evidently weary and ready to go home.</p> + +<p>"Come along, Cousin Eleanor," he said briskly, and the three went, +laughing, out through the door and down the steps.</p> + +<p>It was very dark when Oliver brought out the big car and, skirting the +fallen tree, made his way carefully down the drive. A bank of clouds +to the eastward was all that was left of the storm, however, and +through this the moon was breaking, with promise to rise clear, and +come out into an empty sky. Oliver slowed down the car as they came to +the gate and stopped for a moment to consider. The wind had dropped so +completely that they could hear every sound of the summer night, even +the dull, far-off roar of the flooded river.</p> + +<p>"Do you know," he began slowly, "we never remembered to tell them that +John Massey has left his place. I don't think any one but ourselves +knows that he went away immediately; they will be thinking that he is +still there, watching the dike. And to-night—listen how loud the +river sounds!"</p> + +<p>"Suppose we go down and look," said Polly. "It will not take us long +and the road runs close to the bank."</p> + +<p>He turned the car accordingly and they sped down the steep road, the +sky growing brighter above them and the darkness fading as the moon +came out. When they reached the last incline the whole of the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[188]</a></span>valley +lands, spread below them, were so flooded with light that the broad +picture looked like an etching—white fields, black trees with blacker +splashes of shade, sharp-cut, pointed shadows of houses and farm +buildings, the silver expanse of the river, and the straight, white +ribbon of the road. It was all very still and peaceful, with scarcely +a light in any house and no single moving figure upon the highway. +Medford Valley, worn out with its day of merrymaking, was wrapped in +heavy sleep. Very strangely, the sight of this unsuspecting, +slumbering community seemed to fill them all with sudden misgiving.</p> + +<p>"I hope there's nothing wrong," muttered Oliver, swinging the car into +its highest speed as they dashed down the road.</p> + +<p>John Massey's house lay still and dark in the moonlight, its windows +staring with the blank eyes that an uninhabited dwelling always shows +the moment home life has gone out of it. They stopped the car near his +gate and climbed out, all three of them, to walk at the foot of the +high, grass-covered bank and search for signs of danger. It looked +firm and solid enough, with its thick, green sod, its fringe of +willows along the top, but with the whispering haste of the river +sounding plainly against its outer wall. Standing on tiptoe, they +could catch sight of the swift, sliding water, risen so high that it +touched the very top of the bank. The roar of the swollen current +could be heard all across the valley, but it <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[189]</a></span>was not so ominous, +somehow, as the smaller voices of the ripples sucking and gurgling so +close to their ears.</p> + +<p>They walked along, three ghostly figures in the moonlight, until +Janet, who happened to be ahead, stopped suddenly.</p> + +<p>"I hear something strange; I don't understand what it is," she said.</p> + +<p>Oliver stepped forward, bending his head to listen. Yes, he could hear +it, too.</p> + +<p>The sound was a soft hissing, as though a tiny snake might be hidden +in the grass at their feet. But there was no grass thick enough for +such shelter, only a few sparse stalks, rising in a drift of sand at +the foot of the dike. The noise was made by the moving of the sand +particles, as they stirred and seethed, with drops of water bubbling +between them like the trickle of a spring. As they watched, the round +wet space widened; it had been as big as a cup, now it was like a +dinner plate.</p> + +<p>"It's a leak in the bank." Oliver regarded it intently, thinking it +quite too small to be dangerous. "I ought to be able to put my thumb +in it," he added cheerfully, "but either there is something wrong with +that Dutch story or there is something wrong with this hole."</p> + +<p>"It isn't a joke," said Polly quickly. "They always begin that way. +It—oh, run, run!"</p> + +<p>For the boiling circle of sand had changed suddenly to a spout of +muddy water that shot upward, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[190]</a></span>spreading into a wide, brown pool that +came washing over the grass to hide the spot where they had stood a +moment before. From the higher ground of the road they watched it +follow them, rising, pausing a little, then rising again.</p> + +<p>"Back up the car or you will have to drive through the water," +directed Polly. "Henry Brook's is the nearest house where we can find +help. If that leak is to be blocked, the men will have to be quick."</p> + +<p>They were in the car, Oliver had backed it round almost within its own +length, and they were flying up the road before Polly had finished +speaking. "Once, years ago, this long stretch of dike caved in and the +whole current of the river came roaring down through the bottom lands. +But there were no houses here then."</p> + +<p>They came to a crossroad, turned into it, and stopped short before a +gate. Oliver did not take time to open it, but tumbled over the top, +raced across the grass, and thundered at the door of a dark, silent +house. Oh, why did country people sleep so soundly? He knocked and +knocked again and, after what seemed an interminable time, saw a light +above and heard a window open.</p> + +<p>"What do you want?" The farmer's big voice sounded none too pleased, +but it changed quickly when Oliver told his news. "A break in the +dike? Where? On Anthony Crawford's land, is it? Well, that's just +where it would be. We don't any of us, around here, have much +friendship for Crawford. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[191]</a></span>Of course if the leak is very bad it will +threaten us all. I'll spread the alarm while you go to get Mr. +Peyton."</p> + +<p>They were away up the road again; but, fast as they flew, the news +seemed to travel faster. The rural telephone and the comfortable +country habit of "listening in" on every message can spread tidings +broadcast at a moment's notice. The largest farm, at the foot of the +valley, had a great bell swung above its central barn, a bell whose +excited voice could carry but one of two messages—flood or fire. +Before they were halfway up the hill its wild clanging was calling all +across the valley.</p> + +<p>Up Cousin Jasper's avenue they came with a rush, flung themselves out +of the car, and ran to the house. The two men were still bending over +the papers, Cousin Jasper, with his thin, intent face, listening, Tom +Brighton talking steadily, his eyes alight with that cheerful, eager +kindliness that had so drawn Oliver to him from the first moment. They +both turned in astonishment as the three came bursting in.</p> + +<p>"A break in the dike at John Massey's place? And where was John +Massey?" Cousin Tom questioned sharply. "Gone? If we had known that he +had left, neither Jasper nor I would have been sitting here so quietly +all evening, with the river in flood. And you have given the alarm? +That is good."</p> + +<p>There was a bustle of hasty preparations, but they were still standing +in the hall when there came <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[192]</a></span>the sound of flying wheels on the drive +and the uneven hoofbeats of an uncertain old horse urged to utmost +speed.</p> + +<p>"It's Anthony Crawford," said Oliver suddenly.</p> + +<p>The man came in, the outcast cousin who had turned his hand against +them all. His face was white, his gray eyes were burning with +excitement, his voice was harsh and choked when he tried to speak.</p> + +<p>"The dike—I see you know already. I went down over the hill to look +and saw the moonlight on that pool of water. It was at John Massey's +place. I came to get help."</p> + +<p>Cousin Tom alone answered.</p> + +<p>"Why was John Massey gone?" he said.</p> + +<p>Oliver stepped forward to Tom Brighton's side and looked curiously at +the man who been their enemy. He could see his hands shake as they +crushed his battered old hat between them.</p> + +<p>"We had quarreled," Anthony Crawford explained, his voice suddenly +gone little and husky. "I turned him away three days ago and—and we +had some words, so that he wouldn't stay even overnight after that. He +watched the dike—and now the water is coming in."</p> + +<p>One more question Cousin Tom asked.</p> + +<p>"Why did you come to us?" he inquired steadily. "It would have been +quicker to go down through the fields to the farms in the valley, to +call out Henry Brook and send him with men and shovels and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[193]</a></span>sandbags +to stop the flood. To get here is a mile by the road and there was no +time to lose." He pressed his question mercilessly. "Why did you come +to us?"</p> + +<p>Anthony Crawford moistened his dry lips, but he did not speak. There +was a pause, though all of them knew that every second the waters of +Medford River were sweeping higher and higher. It was finally Tom +Brighton who answered his own question.</p> + +<p>"You were afraid to go elsewhere. It was your doing, this flood; you +took the land, you neglected the dikes, you sent John Massey away who +would have watched against such a disaster as this. You were afraid to +face those men, below, and tell them what you had done."</p> + +<p>The other nodded.</p> + +<p>"I haven't a friend in Medford Valley to help me—except you. Yes, I +was afraid to face them; the break is in just the place where it may +flood the whole bottom land. I thought they wouldn't move to help me +until it was too late. And, on my life, Tom Brighton, if we can stop +the flood I do not care what becomes of me."</p> + +<p>It was quite true, as they could all see, that the man's desperate +terror was not all for himself, that the situation was far too bad for +that. He was picturing how the whole torrent of Medford River might +soon be sweeping across those fields of ripening grain, those +comfortable barns with their cows <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[194]</a></span>and sheep and horses, those +pleasant white farmhouses where a hundred people lay asleep. He was +seeing how, little by little, he had built up the wrong that was to be +his ruin, he had driven away his friends, he had seized the land, he +had turned off its guardian, and now, in a wild whirlwind, the results +of his misdoing were upon him. He did not look at Tom Brighton's set +face but at Jasper Peyton, the one he had wronged most.</p> + +<p>"A man can't live without friends," he said. "Will you stand by me, +Jasper, not for what I deserve, but for what I need?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," answered Jasper Peyton. He smiled suddenly, with all the old, +tense misery quite gone from his face. "We're going to stand by you, +Anthony, all of us. We are with you still."</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[195]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>CHAPTER XII<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> + +<h4>MEDFORD RIVER</h4> +<br /> + +<p>Cousin Tom was giving rapid directions as they went out to the waiting +automobiles. "I will go on with Jasper and we will pick up some men +from the farms as we pass. Anthony, you had better come with Oliver, +we shall want to crowd in all the farmers we can. What is it, Polly? +You want to come with me? I suspect you think you are going to keep +your father out of danger and I think the same of you. There is room +in front here, between us; jump in!"</p> + +<p>The engine grumbled and roared and the first car slid away into the +shadows.</p> + +<p>"Get in," said Oliver curtly to Anthony Crawford, while Janet opened +the door of the second motor and slipped to the far side to give him +room. None of the three spoke as they went down the drive behind +Cousin Tom. As they came through the gate they could hear, faintly, +the wild clanging of the bell in the valley below.</p> + +<p>Oliver was too much occupied with his driving to have any other +thought, Janet was awed into silence by the alien presence at her +side, but Anthony <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[196]</a></span>Crawford, in that same husky, broken voice, +suddenly began to speak as though he were following his thoughts out +loud.</p> + +<p>"I don't know why I came back to Medford Valley," he said. "I had +lived through every sort of thing since I went away, but I was making +good at last. Martha—that's the girl I married, she was a miner's +daughter—had helped me to go straight. I was working in a mine, +harder work than I had ever dreamed of in my life. It was good for me, +yet I kept telling myself that it was being in prison. Perhaps it was, +but I had forgotten that prison was the place where I ought to be."</p> + +<p>Oliver tilted back his head that he might hear better, but his only +answer was an inarticulate sound like a mutter of agreement. To reach +the valley as soon as possible and without mishap, was more important +to him, at that moment, than explanations. But Janet looked up with +round, wondering eyes, eager to hear the rest.</p> + +<p>"I kept thinking how it was here at home, so green and clean and +peaceful, not like that stark, bare mountain country where I seemed to +be working my whole life away. I told myself that a certain portion of +Medford Valley belonged to me, that I could come back and live a life +of dignified idleness, if only I had my rights, if only Jasper would +give me what was my own."</p> + +<p>"But it wasn't true. You knew that he wouldn't keep what belonged to +you," burst out Janet.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[197]</a></span>"I knew it wasn't true, but people love to deceive themselves, and I +had to explain to Martha. She would never have come if she had known +how things really stood; she was unwilling, even as it was. But I was +so sure, I thought I knew Jasper so well, exactly how I could threaten +him, just where I could hurt him most. Had I not learned, when I was a +boy, how proud and sensitive and generous he could be? I was as +successful as I had hoped to be, but I wanted more and more, and see +where it has brought me in the end!"</p> + +<p>It seemed a relief to him to confess the very whole of his +wrong-doing, to leave hidden no single meanness or small-souled +thought. It was as though, in the clean night air, in the face of two +just and clear-seeing companions, he wished to cast aside all the +wrong of the past before making a new beginning.</p> + +<p>"I am going away," he said. "It isn't because I found that my plan +didn't pay as I had hoped it would. It is because I was happier back +there in the West, serving out a sentence at hard labor, learning to +live by the work of my hands rather than by my dishonorable wits. I +can look back over my life and see just where my honesty began to +waver, just when I first compromised with my own conscience and +persuaded myself that something was fair and honest when I knew it was +not. We had all the same chance, Jasper and Tom and I; look at them +and look at me. You may wonder why I say all this to you. Perhaps it +is because you alone saw <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[198]</a></span>through me, dared to tell me that I had no +confidence even in my own claims, called me a man of straw and a bogy. +Well, after to-night I am going back, to be a real man again."</p> + +<p>For the first time Oliver slackened the speed of the car and nearly +stopped in the road.</p> + +<p>"Do you want to go now?" he inquired shortly. "We can take you to the +station if you do. They don't need us down there, as they do the +others."</p> + +<p>"No, not now. I must know what my criminal bungling has amounted to, +first. When I have seen the flood go down, then it will be time to go. +I want to see this thing through."</p> + +<p>They had straightened out into the level road and were forced to drive +more slowly, for the highway was no longer empty. A big tractor was +lumbering ahead, farm wagons turned out for them to pass, and hastily +dressed men were thronging alongside. Two of them jumped upon the +running board, but, seeing who sat in the car, muttered some +imprecation and dropped off again. Anthony Crawford stood up and +opened the door.</p> + +<p>"I'll walk," he announced briefly. "Load in all the men you can carry. +You will need every one."</p> + +<p>Janet climbed over to the place beside her brother, and the tonneau +filled up with men, who crowded the seats, clung to the step and the +fenders, and sat in a row across the back of the car. They came to the +end of the road at last where, in that place that had been so empty +and quiet half an hour ago, there was <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[199]</a></span>now gathered a surging crowd of +men, of horses, tractors, automobiles, and wagons. Oliver could see, +on a knoll above the others, Polly standing with two farmers' wives, +the only women there.</p> + +<p>At first he could not see the water, but, as they pressed into the +crowd, he caught sight of the broad pool, dark even in the moonlight. +It was over the road, now, through the fence, and had crept halfway +across the stretch of grass before John Massey's door. Tom Brighton's +white-clad figure was going back and forth among the men, but it was +Cousin Jasper, standing high above the others on the seat of a wagon, +who was directing operations and getting this confused army of workers +into rapid organization.</p> + +<p>"Tom, take half the men to shovel dirt and pile up the sand sacks, and +send the other half back to the sand pits to fill them. Clear the road +so that the wagons can go back and forth. Henry Brook, take out your +horses and join your team with Johnson's, the tractor can pull two +wagons and we need four horses to each of the others. Now, go to it +and bring the sandbags as fast as they can be filled. We can't save +John Massey's house, but we will build a dam to hold the water a +hundred yards back, where the ground begins to rise. And remember, you +can't be too quick if you want to save the valley."</p> + +<p>Oliver took off his coat and jumped out of the car.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[200]</a></span>"Go over where Polly is," he told Janet "I am going into this game +with the others."</p> + +<p>He was in every portion of it, as the night wore by, never quite +knowing how he passed from one task to another, but following orders +blindly, hour after hour. He helped to dig, but was not quite so quick +as the others; he carried the sacks of sand that were brought up, +loaded high upon the wagons, but he had not the quick swing of the +more sturdy farmers. He found himself at last on the high, vibrating +seat of the heavy tractor, rumbling down the road with a line of +wagons behind him, stopping at the sand pits to have them filled, then +turning laboriously to haul them back again. The owner sat beside him +on the first trip, directing him how to manage the unfamiliar machine, +but as they made ready for a second he ejaculated, "You'll do," and +jumped down to labor with the diggers. Oliver was left to drive his +clumsy, powerful steed alone.</p> + +<p>He saw the broad, semicircular wall of piled sandbags, banked with +earth, rise slowly as the men worked with feverish haste, he saw the +water come up to the foot of it, seem to hesitate, and then creep up +the side. He saw, suddenly, just as they had all stopped to breathe, a +long portion of the dike begin to tremble, then cave in with a +hideous, sucking crash that shook the ground under them, he saw the +flood of muddy water come roaring in and sweep against the painfully +built rampart which swayed and crumbled to its fall.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[201]</a></span>In a wild turmoil of running, shouting men, backing wagons and rearing +horses, he managed to extricate the clumsy monster that had been put +under his care, brought it laboring and snorting out on higher ground +and fell to work again. The barrier they had set up with so much toil +was tumbling and collapsing in great gaps where the hungry current +flung against it, but it held just long enough for them to raise +another wall, longer, higher, firmer than the other and built with the +frantic haste of desperate men.</p> + +<p>The hours went by, it was long after midnight, with the sky growing +pale for the morning. Once or twice Oliver had seen Anthony Crawford +working among the rest, carrying sacks of sand, jostled and cursed by +the men about him, but in spite of their abuse, toiling steadily +onward. When the dike collapsed and the men ran for their lives, one +wagon lurched off the road; its driver was flung from the seat and +caught under the wheel, while the horses, having jammed the tongue +against the bank, reared and plunged helplessly. Oliver saw Anthony +Crawford run out, with the swift, muddy water flowing knee-deep around +him, watched him extricate the man, drag him to the seat, and back the +frantic horses away from the bank to bring them struggling through the +water to safety. There was no time for words of commendation. Both men +at once went back to their task of carrying sacks as the slow building +of another wall began.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[202]</a></span>Some one had built a fire on the knoll, and here the farmers' wives, +with Janet and Polly among them, were boiling coffee, frying bacon, +and serving out food to the hungry, worn-out men. Oliver had munched a +generous sandwich as he drove down the road. As he came back again he +noticed a strange lull and observed that the men were leaning on their +shovels and that the work had ceased. Tom Brighton, wet and muddy from +head to foot, motioned him to come near.</p> + +<p>"We've done all we can," the big farmer beside them was saying, "the +sacks are nearly gone and the men are dead beat. If she breaks through +now, the whole valley will have to go under."</p> + +<p>The water was halfway up the side of the earth-banked wall and was +still rising. Here and there a muddy trickle came oozing through, to +be stopped by a clod of earth, but otherwise there was nothing to do. +To Oliver it seemed that they stood for hours, staring, waiting as the +water lifted slowly, rose half an inch, paused and rose again. It was +three-fourths of the way up; it was a foot below the lip of the wall. +The space of a foot dwindled to six inches.</p> + +<p>"If there should be a wind, now," said the man beside him hoarsely.</p> + +<p>Oliver looked back along the valley at the arch of sky showing blue +instead of gray, at the trees moving gently in a morning breeze that +touched the hilltop, but that did not stir the still air below. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[203]</a></span>He +heard Tom Brighton suddenly draw a sharp breath and he looked back +quickly. Was that space above the water a little wider, was there a +wet black line that stretched all along the rough wall where the flood +had touched and fallen again? He was not dreaming; it was true. The +level of the muddy tide was dropping, the crest of the flood had +passed.</p> + +<p>It was broad daylight now, with the morning sunlight moving slowly +down the slope into the valley. For the first time Oliver could see +clearly the sullen, yellow pool of water, the crevasse in the dike, +and John Massey's little house, submerged to its very eaves. He +watched the shining streak of wet earth that marked the drop in the +water, he saw it broaden into a ribbon and from a ribbon turn into a +wide, glistening zone of safety that proved to all the danger had gone +by.</p> + +<p>"We can go now," said Cousin Tom at last. "There is work enough still +to do, but it is time for us all to rest a little. We are certainly a +wet and weary-looking crew."</p> + +<p>They had breakfast, all of the cousins together, at Cousin Jasper's +house, where Mrs. Brown, having spent half the night wringing her +hands in helpless anxiety, had seemed to spend the other half +superintending the preparation of a feast that should be truly worthy +of the occasion. The guests were all cheerful and were still so keyed +up by the struggle of the night that they did not yet feel weariness. +Anthony Crawford sat on one side of Cousin <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[204]</a></span>Jasper, Tom Brighton on +the other, while the three younger members of the party watched them +wonderingly from the other end of the table. Everything, for the +moment, seemed forgotten except the old comradeship of their boyhood. +The only reminder of the unhappy days just passed lay in the +atmosphere of relief and peacefulness that seemed to pervade the whole +house.</p> + +<p>The windows stood wide open and the morning wind came in to lift the +long curtains and to stir the great bowl of flowers on the table. +Oliver, hungrily devouring chicken and rolls and bacon and sausages +and hot waffles with maple sirup, was saying little but was listening +earnestly to the jokes and laughter of Cousin Jasper. After a day and +night of anxiety, depression, struggle, and victory, he seemed +suddenly to have become a new man. They were talking, the three +elders, of their early adventures together, but Oliver noticed that +the reminiscences never traveled beyond a certain year, that their +stories would go forward to the time when they were nearly grown, and +then would slip back to their younger days again. Some black memory +was laid across the happy recollection of their friendship, cutting +off all that came after; yet they talked and laughed easily of the +bright, remote happiness that was common to them all. The boy noticed, +also, as they sat together, that Anthony was like the others in +certain ways, that his eyes could light with the same merriment as +Cousin Jasper's, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[205]</a></span>and that his chin was cut in the same determined +line as Tom Brighton's. Yet—no—there was something about his face +that never could be quite like theirs.</p> + +<p>They had finished at last, and Anthony Crawford, pushing back his +chair, came abruptly out of the past into the present. He thrust his +hand into the inner pocket of his coat and brought out some +legal-looking papers like those that Cousin Tom had locked away in the +tin box.</p> + +<p>"Here is the deed that you made out, Jasper, for the house and the +land that you gave up to me. I put it in my pocket yesterday morning; +it seems a year ago. The purpose I had then is something that I would +rather forget, if I ever can. But this is what I do with it now."</p> + +<p>He tore the heavy paper into pieces, smaller and smaller, as though he +could not demolish completely enough the record of what he had +demanded. The breeze from the garden sent the scraps fluttering over +the table and across the rug, it carried the round, red seal along the +tablecloth and dropped it into Janet's lap.</p> + +<p>"Tom will have to make out some official papers," he said, "but I want +you to understand this fully, that there among those fragments lies +the end of this whole affair."</p> + +<p>Cousin Jasper was about to speak, but Tom Brighton broke in ahead of +him.</p> + +<p>"It has turned out better than we could have <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[206]</a></span>hoped, Anthony," he +began, "so that we can all agree to let bygones be bygones."</p> + +<p>Anthony Crawford turned very slowly and looked, with those penetrating +gray eyes, at Oliver.</p> + +<p>"We owe a great deal to these children here," he said, "and as for one +of them——"</p> + +<p>Convinced that something was about to be said of him, Oliver got up +quickly, pretending that it was merely because he had finished his +breakfast and wished to be excused, hurried across the room, and +slipped out through one of the long windows that opened on the +terrace. He could still hear Anthony Crawford's voice, however, in the +room behind him saying:</p> + +<p>"It was these children who found the leak in the dike; it was Oliver +who thought of going to look for it. It was Oliver who saw through me, +saw that I had not a shred of honor or honesty behind my claim and +told me what I was."</p> + +<p>The boy moved farther away from the window so that he could not hear +and stood, his hands clenched on the terrace rail, looking out over +the garden, across the pools of color and stretches of green lawn, +over the wall and down the white road that led away the length of the +valley. No matter what words they might speak of him they could never +make him forget how he had walked away down that road, meaning to +leave all this vaguely understood trouble behind him. Only a chance +meeting, the Beeman's friendly smile, the interest of a <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[207]</a></span>story that +had caught him for a moment, and all would have been changed. No, +there should be no words of praise for him.</p> + +<p>The voices were louder behind him, for the three men were passing +through the library, and Cousin Jasper was speaking just within.</p> + +<p>"We still have to talk over this matter of rebuilding the dike," he +said. "We must have your advice in that, Anthony."</p> + +<p>"Go into the study," Anthony Crawford replied. "I must speak to Oliver +for a moment."</p> + +<p>He came out through the window while the others walked on together. +Oliver turned to face him.</p> + +<p>"I am going now," Anthony said quietly. "I thought you would be ready +to help me when it was time."</p> + +<p>Oliver reddened when he remembered the promptness of his offer the +evening before.</p> + +<p>"Do you need to go," he said awkwardly, "when you are friends again +with every one here? Even the men in the valley don't hate you," he +added bluntly, "after what you did last night. I believe Cousin Jasper +will want you to stay."</p> + +<p>"If I let him tell me so, I will not go," the other replied quickly. +"It must be this minute, while my mind is still made up, or never. I +will write to Martha to follow, I cannot even trust myself to wait for +her. It is better that I should go, better for them, in the study +there, better for the community, for myself, even better for you, +Oliver, I <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[208]</a></span>know. Come," he insisted, as the boy still hesitated, "my +confidence in you will be less great if you do not tell me that you +know it also."</p> + +<p>"Yes," returned Oliver grudgingly at last. "Yes, I know it too."</p> + +<p>They drove away down the rain-washed, empty road with the early +morning wind rushing about their ears. As they climbed to the highest +ridge, Anthony Crawford stood up to look back down the sun-filled, +green length of Medford Valley. Yet he did not speak until they had +reached the station, with the train thundering in just as they drew up +beside the platform.</p> + +<p>"Good-by, Oliver," he said briefly.</p> + +<p>The boy knew that the word of farewell was not for him but for all +that the man was leaving—friends, memories, the place that he had +loved in his strange, crooked way, all that he was putting behind him +forever. A bell rang, a voice shouted the unintelligible something +that stands for "All aboard," the train ground into motion, and he was +gone.</p> + +<p>Almost every one in Medford Valley must have slept that morning +through the long hours until far past noon. But by four o'clock Oliver +had slumbered all his weariness away, and so had Janet. They were +restless after their excitement of the night before, and they found +the house very still and with Cousin Jasper nowhere visible. They went +out to the garage, got into the car, and set off along the familiar +way toward the Windy Hill.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[209]</a></span>"Just to see if they are there," as Oliver said to Janet.</p> + +<p>They came up the slope through the grass and saw the blue wood smoke +rising lazily above them, unmistakable signal that the Beeman was at +work. Polly greeted them gayly, for she, like them, was quite +refreshed by the hours of slumber that had passed. Her father still +looked weary, as though he had spent the interval in troubled thought +rather than sleep, but he hailed them cheerily. All up and down the +hill was a subdued and busy humming, for the day after rain is the +best of all seasons for bees to gather honey.</p> + +<p>"We thought we must find out what the storm had done to our hives," +the Beeman said. "Only three were blown over, but there must have been +a great commotion. Now we have everything set to rights and we are not +in the mood, to tell the truth, for a great deal more work to-day."</p> + +<p>"Are you too tired," Janet asked, "for—for a story?"</p> + +<p>"No," he answered, "stories come easily for a man who has had training +as Polly's father. I thought there was no one like her for demanding +stories, but you are just such another."</p> + +<p>They sat down on the grass with the broad shadow of the oak tree lying +all about them and stretching farther and farther as the afternoon sun +moved down the sky. They had chosen the steeper slope of the hill so +that they could look down upon the whole <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[210]</a></span>length of the winding +stream, the scattered house-tops, and the wide green of those +gardenlike stretches that still lay, safe and serene, ripening their +grain beside the river. The Beeman's eyes moved up and down the +valley, resting longest upon the slope opposite, where the yellow +farmhouse stood at the edge of its grove of trees and showed its wide +gray roof, its white thread of pathway leading up to the door, its row +of broad windows that were beginning to flash and shine under the +touch of the level rays of the sun.</p> + +<p>"Poor Anthony," he said slowly at last, "to be banished from a place +he loved so much. And yet a person thinks it a little thing when he +first confuses right with wrong!"</p> + +<p>He drew a long breath and then turned to the girls with his old cheery +smile.</p> + +<p>"A story?" he repeated. "It will not be like the others, a tale from +old dusty chronicles of Medford Valley, to tell you things that you +should know. We have lived the last chapter of that tale and now we +will go on to something new."</p> + +<p>Oliver leaned back luxuriously in the grass, to stare up at the clear +sky and the dark outline of the oak tree, clear-cut against the blue. +Its heavy branches were just stirring in the unfailing breeze that +blew in from the sea, and its rustling mingled sleepily with the +Beeman's voice as he began:</p> + +<p>"Once upon a time——"</p> + + +<br /> +<hr /> +<br /> + + +<div class="tr"> +<p class="cen"><a name="TN" id="TN"></a>Typographical errors corrected in text:</p> +<br /> +Page 16: himeslf replaced with himself<br /> +Page 124: aferward replaced with afterward<br /> +Page 159: 'byroads that would take take them to the house' + replaced with + 'byroads that would take them to the house'<br /> +Page 173: realy replaced with really<br /> +Page 180: attemped replaced with attempted<br /> +</div> + +<br /> +<hr /> +<br /> + + + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Windy Hill, by Cornelia Meigs + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WINDY HILL *** + +***** This file should be named 26537-h.htm or 26537-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/2/6/5/3/26537/ + +Produced by David Edwards, Jeannie Howse and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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