There were many Sabbaths indelibly impressed upon Elizabeth's memory, but none that burned its way in as did that afternoon's experience with Trip. The misery of sitting through the long church service, with the awful guilt upon her soul, and the thoughts of approaching retribution, almost made her physically ill. As yet there was very little fortitude in Elizabeth's soul. She was the only coward in the Gordon family, John was wont to say, and, though she dreamed of valorous deeds as the successor of Joan of Arc, in real life she had never yet been able to vindicate herself.
She sat through the sermon, making vows, Jacob-like, that if she ever came through this time of tribulation alive she would go softly all the rest of her days. She would live a life of complete renunciation—selfish pleasures, worldly ambitions centering round Mrs. Jarvis, even dreams of Joan of Arc she would put away forever. She would not finish that enthralling story she was surreptitiously reading in the CheemaunChronicle, the story of Lady Evelina De Lacy and the false Lord Algernon. She would never even wish she had curls like Rosie, but would be glad her hair was straight and plain; and when Mrs. Jarvis came, offering her a fortune and a velvet dress and a gold crown, she would turn away, declaring firmly that for her there could be no pleasure in such worldly joys.
The sermon had never seemed so long. Mr. Murray, a good old man, whose discourses had steadily lengthened with his years, preached on and on. Forest Glen nodded and woke up and nodded again, and finally roused itself to stand up for the closing psalm. As the people slowly and silently filed out of church, still only half-awake, Elizabeth followed her aunt with the feelings of a criminal going to the gallows. She knew that her secret was safe with John and Charles Stuart. The boys might fill her days with tribulation by teasing, but they would never stoop to tell tales. Nevertheless, Elizabeth did not for a moment consider this as an avenue of escape. The integrity of her soul demanded that she go straight to Mr. MacAllister and confess. And then everyone would know she had disgraced the name of Gordon forever, and what Aunt Margaret would say was a thought to make one shudder.
As she went blindly down the aisle, she found herself shoved against Mr. Coulson. He was looking straight ahead of him, very sternly, as though to let her know he realized how wicked and ungenteel she was. But Elizabeth had in memory many blessed occasions upon which her teacher had exonerated her in the face of damaging evidence. She had learned to put unbounded confidence in him. He was a person who understood, and there were so very few people in the world who did understand. He possessed some wonderful divining power, which Elizabeth felt would make it possible for him even to conceive of a person who could carry a dog into Sunday school and yet not be quite a social outcast.
So she slipped up close to him, so close that she forced him to look down at her. He saw the misery in the little girl's deep eyes, and forgot that she was Miss Gordon's niece. "Are you sick, Lizzie?" he asked. Elizabeth shook her head, speechless. She caught his coat and drew him aside as they came outside the door. He was so big and so strong, his very presence thrilled her with hope.
"Oh, Mr. Coulson," she whispered. "I—I—what'll I do? It was me took Trip into Sunday school!"
"Trip?" Mr. Coulson had already forgotten the little incident in his own troubles. "What about it, you poor little mite?"
"Will they put me out of Sunday school? Will Mother MacAllister be angry? Susie Martin's Brag was going to bite him, and I was afraid."
Mr. Coulson laughed. It struck Elizabeth as almost miraculous that anyone who had witnessed that awful scene in Sunday school could ever laugh again. He glanced around and saw that Miss Gordon had already driven off in the little basket phaeton.
"Come along," he said, and taking Elizabeth's hand he led her up to where the MacAllisters were climbing into their buggy. He leaned over and talked in a low tone to Mr. MacAllister and they both laughed, and the latter called, "Hey, hey, Lizzie, come awa', bairn, and jump in!" And Mother MacAllister said, as her arms went around her, "Hoots, toots, and did the lamb do it to save the little dog?" And Charles Stuart looked at her with undisguised admiration in his eyes, and said, "Aw, you goose, what did you go and tell for?" And Elizabeth's soul went straight from the depths right to the highest pinnacle of joy and thankfulness.
Then Mother MacAllister said, "Come away, Mr. Coulson, come home and have supper with father now, come away." Mr. Coulson sprang into the seat opposite, and he was no sooner in his place than Mother MacAllister cried out "Why, father, where are the girls? Come away, children. Come, Annie girl,—come, Sarah Emily! Come away, we're waitin' on you!"
Sarah Emily came forward, and with one leap landed herself upon the front seat with Mr. MacAllister and Charles Stuart; Jean climbed in beside Mr. Coulson, but Annie held back. The young man arose hastily. "Perhaps it's too crowded," he said hurriedly; "I'd better not go this time." Now this was a very absurd statement. For it had never been known that a MacAllister vehicle had ever been filled, much less crowded, and its owner turned upon the young man in wrathful amazement.
"Hoots, man! Ye're haverin'. Sit ye doon there! Annie bairn, jump in. What are ye gawkin' there aboot? Are ye scared o' the master?"
There was no other course but obedience. Mr. Coulson helped the young lady into the buggy and away they rattled up the hill. And Elizabeth, thrilled with joy over her escape, little realized that in saving herself she had done a good deed that day for two people very dear to herself—a deed the results of which lasted through a lifetime.
It all turned out so beautifully. Mother MacAllister, who never in her life was known to do such a wicked thing as go visiting on Sunday, left her guest with Charles Stuart and his father, and went all the way over to The Dale to explain Elizabeth's case to Miss Gordon. And Annie was so radiant, and John was so admiring, that Elizabeth fairly glowed in the family felicity, and the sun went down behind the Long Hill in perfect peace and happiness.
After the excitement of that Sabbath, the days sped somewhat evenly. May budded into June, June blossomed into July, and still the long-looked-for Mrs. Jarvis did not come. Her non-appearance filled Miss Gordon with a sense of keen disappointment, but Elizabeth soon forgot all about her. She had more important things to take her attention.
The 1st of July had come, the first day of the holidays, and Elizabeth went to bed the night before unable to sleep from excitement. Mr. Coulson had bidden them farewell that afternoon. He had resigned and was going to Cheemaun to finish his law studies. Elizabeth and Rosie had cried themselves sick over the good-bys. But it was not grief that was keeping Elizabeth awake. It was the machinations of John and Charles Stuart. On the way home from school she had been made aware by certain nods and winks and significant signs between her two tormentors that some wonderful scheme was on their programme for the morrow. Elizabeth knew as well as though they had shouted it from the treetops that they were going fishing. They always ran away from her when they went fishing. She firmly determined that, come what might, she would go fishing, too.
Just why the sight of those two disappearing down the lane with rods over their shoulders always filled Elizabeth with such unbearable anguish was a question even she could not have answered. Such expeditions with the boys were sources of tears and tribulations. Elizabeth was always meeting with disaster. She was not satisfied unless she was manipulating a rod and line, and she did not know which filled her with the greatest heartrending compunction, the sight of the poor worm writhing on the hook or the poor fish. Then she was always being thrown into a panic of terror by the sight of a snake or a frog or a mud-turtle, and when real dangers did not menace, the boys supplied imaginary ones more terrible.
But, for all this, when John and Charles Stuart went abroad Elizabeth must accompany them, and, though her aunt felt that every such expedition removed her niece farther from the genteel ideal, she generally allowed her to go. For there were quieter times at home when the noisy one was away.
Elizabeth knew by experience that the two would be likely to arise at dawn and steal away, and she went to bed that night in the bare white-washed little room, which she and Mary shared, with the determination that she would lie awake until morning and be ready. By persistent pinching of her arms and tossing about, much to poor Mary's discomfort, she managed to keep herself awake for about an hour, but sleep overcame her at last, the dead, dreamless sleep of childhood, and all Elizabeth's joys and sorrows were as naught until morning.
But her restless spirit asserted itself early. When she awoke it was scarcely light. The old clock in the study downstairs had just struck three. The room was quite dark, but a faint light from the window, and a strange hum of life from the outdoor world, told her that morning was approaching.
She slipped stealthily from her bed and, trembling with excitement, ran silently down the long, bare hall to her brothers' room. It was a big chamber above the dining-room. Its only furniture was two beds; a big old four-poster, where John and Malcolm slept on a lumpy straw mattress, and a low "bunk" or box-like structure on casters, where the little boys, Archie and Jamie, lay tossed about in a tangle of bare limbs and blankets. Elizabeth brushed back her hair from her sleepy eyes, and peered into the dim room. The green paper blinds were partly raised, and she could discern through the gloom John's black head on the bolster beside Malcolm's fair one. The black head was hanging half out of bed and its mouth was wide open. Elizabeth giggled softly. She longed to stuff something into that yawning cavity; but she knew that dire consequences followed upon tampering with John. She tiptoed back to her room. The excitement was lulled and she was beginning to feel sleepy. But she suddenly bethought herself that it would be wise to look out and see if Charles Stuart were coming. She remembered with hot indignation how once John had tied a string to his toe, which he let hang out of the window, and how Charles Stuart had come in the gray dawn and pulled the string, and the two had fled away in the dusk, while she slept all unawares. If they had any such plan on foot this time, she would be even with them. She would sit at the window and watch for Charles Stuart. She tiptoed gleefully across the room, and, slipping between the green paper blind and the sash, shoved her head and shoulders out of the open window.
And then her mischievous mood fell from her like a garment, and there stole over her a feeling of awe. Elizabeth had often beheld the sunrise, and, being a passionate lover of nature, her soul had arisen with the day, radiant and full of joy. But never before had she witnessed the first mysterious birth of the dawn, and the wonder of it held her still. It was so strange and unreal. It was surely night, for the stars still hung above the black treetops, and yet it must be day, for above, below, on every side one great unbroken voice of song was pouring forth from the darkness. Or was it dark? It certainly wasn't light. The swamp, away behind old Wully Johnstone's fields, lay in blackness, and there was even a hint of moonlight sifted faintly through the gray veil of the sky. But the white line of birches by the stream stood out a soft, cloudy white, the fields were dimly distinguishable, and here and there a tree had taken form from its dark background.
But the wonder of it was the great chant the whole dark earth was raising to heaven. As June had waned Elizabeth and John had missed many of their bird companions, who were too busy raising their families to sing much. But now it seemed as though every blade of grass and every leaf on the tree was giving forth a voice. At first no separate note could be distinguished. It was one great voice, all-penetrating, all-pervading. But gradually the ear discerned the several parts of the wondrous anthem. The foundation of it seemed to come from behind the line of birches that hedged the stream, and here and there in the darkness of tree or bush an individual song arose to melt again into the grand chorus.
Elizabeth knelt by the open window, lost to everything except the mystery of music and light being woven before her. It was creation's morn again, at which the child's wondering eyes were gazing. Again the divine Fiat had gone forth, "Let there be light." And, moving in stately march to the grand processional, slowly, majestically the light was coming. Softly, almost imperceptibly, the phantom world took shape, and grew clearer as the stars grew paler. Here a bush detached itself from its gray background, yonder a tree grew up tall and stately, there the curve of a hillock swelled up from a dark valley. And as each growing maple or cedar or alder-bush took shape, from its depths there awoke a sleepy little murmur, swelling into a rapturous song and melting away again into the great anthem. Away down the dim lane, near the edge of the pond, stood a noble elm, its topmost branch towering into the gray heavens, its lower limbs sweeping the earth. As it gradually detached itself from the grayness and came forth beautiful and stately, there arose from its heart the musical accompaniment to its birth—not a sleepy little murmur, such as befitted a sumach or a bramble, but a loud, clarion note, one wild shout of joy—and out poured the ecstasy of a robin's song. There was a storm of music on all sides now, a splendid fortissimo, keeping pace with the growing light. Elizabeth, suddenly mindful of former sunrises, leaned far out to look towards the east, holding her breath. Over there might be glories that were not lawful for men to look upon, much less utter. And, yes, there was a great wonder there, no sun's rays as yet, no daylight even, but behind the black trees of Arrow Hill there shone a luminous crystal glow, a light more heart-moving than if the sun had risen in all his pomp of purple and gold. There was an awe, a mystery about this transparent clearness, a great promise of unspeakable glories to come. Elizabeth drew a long breath. She was but a child, perfectly unconscious and unthinking in all that she said and did, but she had a heart capable of being strongly moved by any hint of the Infinite. She did not guess why, did not even imagine the reason, but the tears came to her eyes with a smarting sting, and with them that feeling of overwhelming joy that was half-pain, the feeling that rushed over her so often when her father read some sublime passage from the Scriptures.
One came to her now from the psalm of the night before:
"Who coverest Thyself with light as with a garment; who stretches out the heavens like a curtain."
God Himself must be just behind that mysterious glow, little Elizabeth said to herself reverently. That shining crystal was the garment in which He had wrapped Himself, so that people might not see Him. But she saw Him. Yes, He was there, she knew, and in the uplift of the moment there came to her child's heart a vision that never faded, a vision that many years later bore her up on the wings of poesy to fame.
But Elizabeth was woefully earthbound, tied down by the cares and worries that fall to humanity. As she still hung over the window-sill, gazing enraptured at the heavens, she was brought sharply down to earth. Up near the willows at the gate she dimly descried a dark figure hastening along Champlain's Road. It paused at the gate. Instantly Elizabeth was transformed. From the rapt priestess of the dawn she descended sharply to the keen-eyed spy. That was Charles Stuart just as sure as sure! And John would be up and off in another five minutes. She jerked herself back into the room so suddenly that her head came in crashing contact with the window-frame. Elizabeth was naturally keenly sensitive to pain, but she scarcely noticed the blow. There was no time to even complain. Though her head was spinning, she began to fling on her clothes in mad haste, feverishly watching Mary lest the noise of the crash had awakened her. But Mary slept on soundly; and, reassured, Elizabeth made a frantic toilet. She wrenched herself into her clothes, pulling on garments upside down, inside out, any way that was most expeditious. Buttons would not go into button-holes, strings refused to tie, pins would not hold. But somehow she managed to get herself dressed, after a fashion. There was no time to think of washing, or combing her hair. She crushed her sunbonnet down over her untidy head, snatched up her shoes and stockings, slipped silently into the hall, and took her place behind a huge wardrobe at the head of the stairs, from which hiding-place she could command a view of John's bedroom door. By this time she was bursting with mischievous glee. Wouldn't John and Charles Stuart be good and mad when they found her following them? She knew exactly how to do it. The only way was to dog their footsteps, keeping safely out of sight until they were too far from home to send her back alone. Of course she would have to endure innuendoes all day regarding "Copy cats," but that was nothing to the anguish of being left at home.
As she stood breathless and full of mirth, she was rewarded by the sound of a door creaking, and a stealthy footstep approaching the stair. She crushed back into her hiding-place. She could not help wondering even in the midst of her excitement how John could ever move so quietly. She held her breath as the owner of the soft footfall came into view. And then it returned in a little gasp of astonishment. For it was not John at all, but Annie! Annie at this hour of the morning! Could she be going fishing, too? Elizabeth could not think of any other justifiable reason for getting up so early; Annie certainly looked as if she were on a very important mission. She went down the stairs hurriedly and silently, as though she were being pursued. Elizabeth had for an instant an impulse to call softly after her; but that wiser, older self within her arose and forbade. This ancient Elizabeth respected a secret, and said that here was one into which there must be no intrusion. She felt ashamed of herself, as though she had done something dishonorable like listening at a keyhole, as Sarah Emily had once done.
She heard the old door leading on to the side-porch creak stealthily, then pause, and creak again. Perhaps Annie was ill, and she ought to follow her. She softly tiptoed back to her room and peeped from her window. Her sister was stealing down through the orchard, her light summer dress plainly visible against its dim greenness. She stopped at the bars that led into the pasture field, and as she did, Charles Stuart came vaulting over the fence from the lane and strode towards her. And surely everybody must have been touched with a magic wand, and turned into somebody else; because it wasn't Charles Stuart at all, but Mr. Coulson, to whom Elizabeth had bidden such an agonized farewell only yesterday! He came straight towards Annie, holding out both his hands, and when he reached the bars he leaned over them and kissed her! And then, though Elizabeth was not quite eleven, she knew that she was looking upon something sacred and beautiful, something that should not be exposed to the eyes of another, and she turned swiftly and, running to the bed, hid her face in the clothes beside Mary.
She knelt there, motionless, wondering, and in a few minutes she heard the stealthy foot upon the stair again and the soft rustle of Annie's skirts. She crept into bed and pulled the clothes over her sunbonneted head. She felt she would be doing her sister an irreparable injury if she let her know anyone had witnessed that parting scene.
She lay there, trembling with excitement, until all was still again. She forgot all about the fishing expedition in this new discovery, and lay wideawake wondering why in the world Annie should kiss Mr. Coulson good-by when she had not even gone to school to him, until worn out with wonder and excitement she fell sound asleep. And outside the dawn still marched majestically onward towards the day, in time to its glorious accompaniment of song.
When Elizabeth awoke again it was broad daylight. Sarah Emily was already downstairs, setting the breakfast table, stirring the oatmeal porridge, and singing loudly about the many glittering but false young men who had sought her hand, but had been defeated in their machinations by the finest old lady that ever was seen, who lived on yonder little green.
Fortunately Elizabeth escaped inquiry by slipping from the bed and arranging her clothes in a more respectable manner before Mary was stirring. Mary was delicate, and the only one allowed to lie abed in the morning, or to refuse porridge if she did not want it, so Elizabeth's early morning adventure was not discovered. To her relief also she found John downstairs apparently not going fishing. At breakfast Annie was quieter than usual, but it was characteristic of Elizabeth that she did not by word or sign let her elder sister see that she had the smallest knowledge of the morning's farewell. John was right when he conceded to Lizzie the power of not only keeping secrets,—deathly secrets like a pet toad under the bed or rabbits in the barn,—but at the same time looking as if she had nothing to hide.
It was Elizabeth's turn to help Sarah Emily with the dishes, and after breakfast she wearily dragged her feet towards the kitchen. Tom Teeter had come over and was talking to her father as the latter hoed in the vegetable garden, and Tom always had candies in his pockets. Then Malcolm and John were building a new hen-house in the barnyard, and every stroke of the hammer shouted to Elizabeth to come. She took up the dish-towel drearily and stood looking wistfully down the sunny path that led into the orchard. She realized now that she was utterly worn out with the excitement of her morning adventure. Mary and the little boys were playing in the old wagon that stood in the barnyard. She could hear them laughing and shouting. The old pig was grunting over his trough, the hens were cackling. She really ought to go and gather the eggs. She felt just then that drying dishes was an insupportable burden. It was always so with Elizabeth. She could toil strenuously all day, building a playhouse, or engineering a new game, running, leaping, toiling all unwearied. But when household duties were laid upon her, except when she worked for Mother MacAllister, she was actually overcome with physical weariness. She leaned against the table and yawned aloud.
"Oh, Sarah Emily, don't you hate dishes?" she groaned. "We've got such stacks of them."
But Sarah Emily did not hear. Tom Teeter was standing down there between the rows of cabbages, talking to Mr. Gordon upon the "Conscienceless greed and onmitigated rapacity" of certain emissaries of the opposing political party. To all of which his neighbor was responding with: "Well, well. Deary me, now, Tom."
But Sarah Emily was firmly convinced that Tom was there for other reasons than to talk politics with her master. Sarah Emily was neither fair of face nor graceful of form, neither had a suitor ever been seen to approach the Gordon kitchen; nevertheless, she lived in the pleasant delusion that all the young men of the countryside were dying for love of her. Tom Teeter's condition she believed to be the most hopeless; and, like all other proud belles sure of their power, she flouted him; and the innocent young man, when he thought about her at all, wondered why Sarah Emily disliked him so, and took considerable pleasure in teasing her.
So Sarah Emily made frequent excursions to and from the well as he stood in the garden. She sang loudly and pretended she saw no one.
"The 'first that came courting was young farmer Green,As fine a young gent as ever was seen."
"Oh, Sarah Emily, I'm awfully tired," said Elizabeth, when the young woman had at last settled to washing the dishes. "Don't you 'spose you could do them yourself this time. I really ought to go and help Malc and John with the hen-house."
"No, I don't, you lazy trollop," responded Sarah Emily promptly. "You don't seem to think I ever get tired, an' me with that pinny of yours to iron for Sunday, too!"
Elizabeth was immediately seized with compunction. She caught up the towel and went at her task with feverish haste. But her eyes would stray down the orchard path that led to the barn.
It was only this very morning she had witnessed that strange little scene there in the dewy, music-thrilled twilight. It seemed so unreal now that Elizabeth could almost believe she had dreamed it all. She almost wished she had. For Mr. Coulson was perfection, and Annie was a little better, and it was rather hard to think of her two paragons doing anything that people might laugh at. In the Gordon family life there was something improper attached to any display of affection, and kissing was positively disgraceful. Elizabeth dared not even kiss Jamie, much as she enjoyed it, except when the older boys were at a safe distance. She herself disliked being kissed by grown-up people. Babies and little people were different. She could remember being kissed by her aunt once, on her first arrival, but never since. She and Rosie had sobbed for an hour with their heads on the desk when Mr. Coulson made his good-by speech, but they would never have dreamed of doing what Annie did. And surely they loved him far more.
She was recalled to present affairs by Sarah Emily's snatching the plate out of her hand and demanding if she intended to rub it clean off the face of the earth?
Elizabeth took another rather sullenly. But such a mood never lasted longer than half a minute with her, and she was suddenly struck with the notion that Sarah Emily might furnish some valuable information on the subject that was worrying her. Sarah Emily had such a vast experience with young men.
"Sarah Emily," she said, rather hesitatingly, "did anybody—I mean any young man ever—kiss you?"
Sarah Emily gave an hysterical shriek. She doubled up over the table, almost dipping her face into the dish-pan, and went off into a hurricane of giggles.
"Oh, oh, you awful, awful bad girl, Lizzie Gordon!" she screamed, whereupon Elizabeth knew she had not been bad at all, but had said something that had mightily pleased Sarah Emily.
"But did they though?" she insisted, showing her even white teeth in a sympathetic laugh. "Eh, Sarah Emily?"
The young woman straightened herself and suddenly became dignified.
She darted a withering glance at Elizabeth. "Not much, they didn't!" she cried righteously. "Jist let me ketch any o' them—yes, jist any one o' the whole gang up to any such penoeuvres. I'd soon fix 'em!"
There was so much scorn in her demeanor that Elizabeth was disconcerted.
"Why?" she asked anxiously. "Ain't it nice, Sarah Emily?"
"No, it ain't!" snapped Sarah Emily emphatically.
Elizabeth was much taken aback. It was surely not possible that Annie could do anything impolite or ungenteel—Annie, the only one in the family whom Aunt Margaret never scolded. She was puzzled and troubled. There was no one to whom she could take the matter for advice. Elizabeth had no close confidant. John was the nearest, but there were so few things John understood. Then one never dared tell Mary anything. Mary did not mean to be a tell-tale, but somehow everything she knew always oozed out sooner or later. Yes, this was a puzzle Elizabeth must work out alone.
"Well," she said at last, determined to uphold Annie at all costs, "it's all right in stories, anyhow. I mean when people are going to get married some day. I read about it in that story about Lady Evelina in theChronicle. Now, if you were going to get married to Tom Teeter, Sarah Emily——"
Sarah Emily exploded in another spasm of shrieks and giggles. She leaned against the wall, overcome with laughter, wiping her eyes, and declaring that if Lizzie didn't hold still she'd be the death of her.
Elizabeth became impatient. Her older self rose up, protesting that Sarah Emily was very silly, indeed.
"Oh, bother you, Sarah Emily," she cried, "you're a big goose!"
Sarah Emily made a leap towards her. "You jist say that again, Lizzie Gordon, and I'll give you a clout over the head that'll make you jump."
Elizabeth dodged round to the other side of the table, and promptly said it again—said it many times, dancing derisively upon her toes and waving her towel; sang it, too, in the most insulting manner to the tune of "My Grandmother Lives, etc."
Then ensued a mad chase around the table, attended with uproar and disaster. A plate fell crashing to the floor, the dish-pan was upset, the water splashed in all directions, and the small figure with shrieks of laughter dodged this way and that, followed by the big clumsy one shouting vengeance.
And then there suddenly fell a great silence as from the heavens. The door had opened, and Miss Gordon was standing in it. Elizabeth stood rigid in a pool of dish-water, and instinctively felt to find how many buttons of her pinafore were undone. Sarah Emily promptly turned away and went vigorously to work, presenting a solid wall of indifference to her mistress, in the form of a broad pink calico back with a row of black buttons down the middle.
Elizabeth was not so incased in armor. One swift glance of shame and contrition she gave towards her aunt, and then hung her head, waiting for the blow to fall. Miss Gordon had never seemed so remote and so chillingly genteel.
"Elizabeth," she said in a despairing tone, "how is it that I can never trust you for even a few minutes out of my sight? You grow more rebellious and unmanageable every day. I have given up my home, and slaved and worked for you all, and you alone show me no gratitude. I can never make a lady of you, I see. How any child belonging to a Gordon could be so entirely ungenteel——"
On and on Miss Gordon's quiet, well-bred voice continued, every word falling like a whip upon Elizabeth's sensitive heart. She writhed in agony under a sense of her own sinfulness, coupled with a keen sense of injustice. She had been bad—oh, frightfully wicked—but Aunt Margaret never arraigned a culprit for any particular crime without gathering up all her past iniquities and heaping them upon her in one load of despair.
She listened until she could bear no more, and then, darting past her aunt, she tore madly upstairs in a passion of rage and grief. Miss Gordon's genteel voice went steadily on, adding the sin of an evil and uncontrollable temper to Elizabeth's black catalogue. But Elizabeth was out of hearing by this time. She had shut herself, with a sounding bang, into the little bedroom where she and Mary slept, and flung herself upon the mat before the bed. Even in her headlong despair she had refrained from pitching herself upon the bed, which Annie and Jean had arranged so neatly under its faded patch-work quilt. Instead she lay prone upon the floor and wept bitterly. Anger and a sense of injustice came first, and then bitter repentance. She loved her aunt, and Sarah Emily, and she had injured both. She was always doing wrong, always causing trouble. Aunt Margaret could not understand her being a Gordon at all. Probably she wasn't one. Yes, that was the solution of the whole matter. She was an adopted child, and not like the rest. She was sure of it now. Hadn't Aunt Margaret hinted it again and again?
Elizabeth always went through this mental process during her many tempests of anguish. But always, through it all, the older self sat waiting, sometimes quite out of sight, but always there. And in the end she brought up a picture of Elizabeth's mother—the bright little mother whom she never forgot and who used to say, "Little Lizzie is more like me than any of my children." That assurance always came to Elizabeth. No, her whole family might forsake her, but her mother was always her very own. Her mother could never, never have been so cruel as merely to adopt her. Next, as always, came contrition, and deep self-abasement. She stopped crying and lay still, wondering why it was she could never be good like Annie, or even Jean. Then there was Constance Holworth, the lonely girl in the Sunday-school library book. She never got into a temper. And if she ever did, or even thought the smallest wrong thought, she always went down to the drawing-room and said sweetly, "Dear mamma, please forgive me." Even Elizabeth's imagination could not draw a congruous picture of herself speaking thus to Sarah Emily without some strange result. Besides, they had no drawing-room, and evidently one needed that sort of chamber for the proper atmosphere. Elizabeth wondered drearily what a drawing-room could be. Most likely a room in which one sat and drew pictures all day long. This reminded her of her own drawing materials lying in the bottom drawer, one of her birthday presents from Mrs. Jarvis. She half arose, with the thought that she might get out her paint-box or the old faded doll that Mary and she shared, then sank back despairingly upon the mat again. What was the use trying to solace a broken heart with such trifles?
But when she grew up and became a great artist, and drew pictures as big as the Vicar of Wakefield's family group, and all the Gordons came to her drawing-room to wonder and admire,—Sarah Emily and Aunt Margaret the most eager and admiring of all,—then, though she would be very kind to them all, she would never smile. She would always wear a look of heart-broken melancholy, and when people would ask what made the great Miss Gordon, who was Mrs. Jarvis's adopted daughter, so very, very sad, Mrs. Jarvis would explain that dreadful afflictions in her childhood had blighted her whole life. And then Sarah Emily and Aunt Margaret would go away weeping over the havoc they had wrought.
Elizabeth gained so much comfort from these reflections that she came up from the depths of despair sufficiently to take note of her surroundings. The window looking out upon the orchard was open, and from the pasture-field there arose a great noise—whistling, shouting, rattling of tin pails, and barking. She sprang up and darted to the window. That double racket always proclaimed the approach of Charles Stuart and Trip. Yes, there they were, the former just vaulting over the bars, the latter wriggling through them. Charles Stuart had a big tin pail and a small tin cup, and, just as sure as she was a living, breathing person, he and John would be off in two minutes to pick strawberries in Sandy McLachlan's slash!
Elizabeth went down the stairs three steps at a time. Miss Gordon was sitting by the dining-room window, Annie at her side. Both were sewing, and Annie's cheeks so pink and her eyes so bright that her aunt looked at her curiously from time to time. They were interrupted by the bursting open of the door, and like a whirlwind a disheveled little person, wild-eyed and tear-stained, in a dirty, streaked pinafore, flung herself into the room.
"Oh, Aunt Margaret! The boys are going pickin' berries. Can't I go, too? Oh, do let me go?"
Elizabeth stood before her aunt twisting her pinafore into a string in an agony of suspense.
Miss Gordon looked at the turbulent little figure in silent despair, and Annie ventured gently:
"It would be nice to have strawberries for tea, aunt, and Lizzie could help John."
Miss Gordon sighed. "If I could only trust you, Elizabeth," she said. "But I wonder what new trouble you'll get into?"
"Oh, I promise I won't get into any!" gasped Elizabeth in solemn pledge, all unconscious that it was equivalent to a promise from the wind not to blow.
"It's no use promising," said Miss Gordon mournfully. "You know, Elizabeth, I have warned you repeatedly against the wild streak in you, and yet in the face of all my admonitions you still persist in acting in an unladylike manner. Now, when I was a little girl, I never went anywhere with my brother, your dear papa, except perhaps for a little genteel stroll——"
Elizabeth could bear no more. The last prop of endurance gave way at the sight of John and Charles Stuart marching calmly past the window, rattling their tin pails.
"Oh, Aunt Margaret!" she burst out in anguished tones, "couldn't you—would you please finish scolding me when I get back. The boys are gone!"
Miss Gordon paused, completely baffled. This strangest child of all this strange family of William's was quite beyond her.
"Go then," she said, with a gesture of despair. "Go. I have nothing more to say."
Elizabeth was tearing down the garden path before she had finished. To be cast off as hopeless was anguish, but it was nothing to the horror of being kept at home to be made genteel. In a moment more, with shrieks of joy, she was flying down the lane, towards two disgusted looking boys reluctantly awaiting her at the edge of the mill-pond.
"The Slash" was the name given to a piece of partially cleared land lying between the mill-pond and Sandy McLachlan's clearing. The timber on it had been cut down and it had grown up in a wild luxuriance of underbrush and berry bushes. The latter had from time to time been cleared away in patches, and here and there between the fallen tree-trunks were stretches of green grass, where the wild strawberries grew. The Slash was the most delightful place in which to go roaming at large and give oneself up to a buccaneer life. On schooldays, though the Gordons passed through it morning and afternoon, there was little opportunity to linger over its treasures. But the memory of its cool, flowery glades, its sunny uplands, its wealth of berries or wild grapes or hazel-nuts as the season of each came round, always beckoned the children on holidays. The Gordon boys had long used it as a playground. Here they could indulge in games of wild Indians and pirates, setting fire to the brush-wood, cutting down trees, and engaging in such other escapades as were not sufficiently genteel to be carried on under their aunt's eye. So on holidays thither they always repaired, either with the excuse of accompanying Charles Stuart to the mill, or carrying a pail or a fishing-rod to give the proper coloring to their departure.
But on this first summer holiday John and Charles Stuart found themselves, upon setting out, hampered by a much worse encumbrance than a berry-pail.
"Lizzie Gordon!" said her brother sternly, "you ain't comin'."
"I am so!" declared Elizabeth, secure in permission from the powers at home. "Aunt said I could."
John looked at Charles Stuart, and Charles Stuart winked at John and nodded towards the opposite edge of the pond. Elizabeth knew only too well that those significant glances meant, "We'll run away from her and hide as soon as we're into The Slash."
"No, you can't then," she cried triumphantly, just as though they had spoken. "I can beat you at running, Charles Stuart MacAllister."
This was a fact Charles Stuart could not contradict. Elizabeth was the wind itself for speed, and many a time he and John had tried in vain to leave her behind. But her brother knew a manoeuvre that always brought capitulation from the enemy. He turned away and walked for some paces at Charles Stuart's side, then glanced back at Elizabeth resolutely following.
"Aw, you're a nice one," he exclaimed, "followin' boys when they're goin' swimmin'!"
Elizabeth stopped motionless in the pathway. One might bear slights and indignities, even positive opposition, but the insinuation that one was vulgar enough to go swimming at all, much more with boys, was an insult no human being could stand. She turned away slowly, and, as the two inexorable figures went on down the willow path into the ravine, she dropped upon the earth and burst into despairing sobs. To be left so cruelly was bad enough, but what hurt most was John's horrible innuendo. It fairly scorched Elizabeth's soul.
She was lying prone upon the clover-starred grass, weeping bitterly, when she was aroused by a rustle in the willows. A face was looking through the green tangle.
"Aw, hurrah, Lizzie," Charles Stuart was saying, "come on. We're only in fun. We ain't goin' swimmin' at all."
"I won't," wailed Elizabeth. "John doesn't want me; he never does, and I'm going right back home."
Through her vanishing tears she had seen John approaching, and had suddenly became conscious of the fact that if she returned home weeping she would be questioned and matters might not be so comfortable for John. That the young man recognized the danger himself was evident, for he added his olive branch to Charles Stuart's. "Hurrah, Lizzie. Don't be such a baby. Come along. We can't wait."
But Elizabeth was a woman to the very tips of her long, tapering fingers, and finding herself in a position of power was not going to capitulate at once. It was delightful to be coaxed, and by the boys, too. So she merely sat up and, gazing back up the lane, sighed in a hopeless way and said, "You don't want me, I know you don't, I might as well go back."
"Come on, you silly," cried John, now thoroughly alarmed. "Come on now. Mind you, we won't wait. Hurrah, Charles Stuart, and she can stay if she likes."
They started down the ravine again; and, seeing that her air of grieved dignity was liable to be lost in the willows, Elizabeth got to her feet and went scrambling after them.
Down at the bottom of the hollow, where the little stream widened into a lazy brown pond, lay Mr. MacAllister's saw-mill. It ran for only a few months in the spring and early summer and was now closed. Only, away down the valley where the road wound into the lumber yard, the banging of boards told that someone was preparing to haul away a load.
None of The Dale children ever passed the mill without a visit, and of course Charles Stuart always explored it all with a fine air of proprietorship. So they scrambled over the silent place with its sweet smell of running water and fresh sawdust. They beat a clamorous tattoo upon the big circular saw, they went down to the lower regions and explored the dark hole where the big water-wheel hung motionless, with only the drip, drip of water from the flume above. They rode on the little car that brought the logs up from the pond, and in as many ways as possible risked life and limb as boys must ever do.
In all these hazardous ventures Elizabeth joined. She was desperately frightened, but knew she must win her spurs at the outset or run the awful risk of being left behind even yet. Her conduct proved satisfactory, and by the time they reached the other side of the pond, and had climbed the steep bank, clinging to the bracken and dog-wood, friendly relations had been once more established. When the boys had once got over the disgrace of feeling that a girl was tagging after them, and took Elizabeth on her own merits, these three generally got on very amicably. She was often a great nuisance, but on the whole they got as much fun as trouble from her panics over snakes and field-mice, and, when out of sight of The Dale, they voted her as good a fellow as the rest.
So away they went over The Slash, tearing through underbrush, and pausing occasionally to glance over the patches of grass for strawberries. They soon decided that there were so many they could soon fill their pails, and John suggested they sit down and eat the lunch Charles Stuart had brought, for he was sure it must be dinner-time by the look of the sun.
Mother MacAllister, with a motherly thought for the Gordons, had put up a substantial repast of bread and pork and generous wedges of pie and a pile of cookies big enough to make glad the heart of any boy. This, supplemented by some thick slices of bread and butter which John had begged from Sarah Emily, made a great feast. They grew very merry over it, and when it was finished, up from the bottom of John's pail came a book—the real reason for the berry-picking expedition. Just whether it would be forbidden by their aunt or not, John and Elizabeth had not run the risk of inquiring. It was a tremendously funny book, so funny that the last time they had read a chapter—it was up in the hay-mow on a rainy Saturday—Elizabeth had laughed so loud that they had almost been discovered. John could go off into one of his silent fits of laughter in the same room as Aunt Margaret and never be discovered, but Elizabeth was prone to scream and dance, and when anything funny seized her Sandy McLachlan's slash was only at a safe distance from home.
So, as the book was so very enjoyable, they had decided that it had better be read in private. Elizabeth had some conscientious scruples, which she had been bold enough to utter, but they were silenced by John's quoting no less an authority than Mr. Coulson. The schoolmaster had been overheard saying to Tom Teeter that he had spent all one Saturday forenoon reading "Innocents Abroad." And he had told Annie some of the funny stories in it, hence John had begged it from Malcolm, who had borrowed it from a High School boy in Cheemaun.
So the three sat them down in a shady nook, against a mossy log, and listened with delight while John read. They took turns at reading aloud; Charles Stuart was the best reader, and Elizabeth the worst. She either read very slowly and stumbled over all the long words, or else so fast one could not follow her. But Charles Stuart was a wonderful reader, one of the best in school. Indeed, Mr. Coulson declared that Charles Stuart would make a greater public speaker than Tom Teeter some day, if he set his mind to oratory.
But to-day it was John's turn to read, and when the extracts were not too funny he progressed fairly well, toiling along in a quiet monotone. When the story became very laughable, however, he proved a great trial to his listeners. Before he could utter the joke, his voice would fail and he would collapse into helpless laughter. When importuned by his audience to speak out and let them know what the fun was, he would make agonized attempts to utter the words, failing again and again, until Charles Stuart would snatch the book from him. Sometimes the sight of John struggling to utter in anguishing whispers the thing that was rendering him helpless was far funnier than Mark Twain himself, and Elizabeth and Charles Stuart would roll over on the grass in shrieks of laughter long before they heard what the joke was about.
But such irresponsible conduct could not continue, and when the cool part of the day had been consumed in the shade, they had to turn out in the blazing noon-day sun to hunt for strawberries. The three adventurers would have preferred the shade and Mark Twain, or else a dash through the woods, but they were true Canadians, born with that innate idea that he who does not work should not eat. So to work they went of their own free will. The strawberries were plentiful, and soon the tin cups, heaped with their luscious loads, were being carried to the pails beneath the bass-wood bushes. Elizabeth never grew weary picking strawberries. This was a task infinitely removed from being shut into a hot kitchen with a dish-towel, while the boys played in the barnyard. The glory of the day, the sense of freedom from restraint, the beauty of the rosy clusters, hiding shyly beneath their pretty leaves, all combined to make work seem play. She picked so furiously that she was a spur to even Charles Stuart, accustomed as he was to hard work at his farm-home, and lest they be beaten by a girl the boys toiled strenuously.
By the time the afternoon sun had begun to wane, the big pails were filled and shaken down and filled again, the pickers had eaten almost as much more, and surfeited, hot, and thirsty they found themselves on the edge of the slash that bordered the woods.
Down the leafy pathway which led towards the school they could see Sandy McLachlan's log house standing in its little clearing.
"Hurrah over and ask old Sandy for a drink," cried Charles Stuart. "I'm chokin'."
Elizabeth followed them into the woods, full of delight. It would be such fun to visit Eppie in the afternoon, just as if they were grown-up ladies, and she had come to stay to tea.
There was a strange, deserted air about the little place. There was nobody in the tiny garden, where Eppie's sunflowers and sweet peas stood blazing in the sunshine. There was even no sign of life about the little log house. They went up the hard beaten path to the door. It was open, and they peeped in. Eppie's pink sunbonnet was lying on a chair and the crumbs of the late dinner were still scattered over the bare pine table.
"They must be down at the barn," said Charles Stuart. "I'm goin' to have a drink, anyhow."
A rusty tin dipper hung over the well, and they helped themselves. The sound of the pump brought a little figure round the corner of the old log barn.
At the sight of Elizabeth, Eppie came running up the path. She was barefooted, as Eppie always was except on Sundays, and wore a coarse, gray wincey dress and a big apron. Poor Eppie's clothes were all much too large for her, for the little girl had no woman's deft hand to dress her. She shyly slipped past the boys and took hold of Elizabeth's hand. Her big, pathetic eyes shone with joy. "Oh, Lizzie, I'll be that glad to see you," she whispered in her old-fashioned way. Perhaps it was her long dress, but somehow Elizabeth always had the impression that poor Eppie had always been old and grown-up. "Come away down to the barn and see grandaddy," she added, including the boys. "There's two men down there an' they're goin' to take grandaddy's house away from him, only the master says he won't let them."
Here was exciting news. The boys ran on ahead, and Elizabeth and Eppie quickly followed, the former plying her hostess with wondering questions.
A smart horse and a shiny top-buggy were standing in the barnyard. In the vehicle two men were seated, and beside them stood old Sandy and Mr. Coulson. The schoolmaster was using the first two or three days of his holidays in which to bid farewell to his Forest Glen friends. Elizabeth had heard him say he would do so, yesterday in school, and as she caught sight of him she could not help thinking he must have said good-by to hundreds and hundreds of people that day, since he had started so early. The speculation passed dimly through her mind as to how many of them he had kissed.
But her chief feeling was one of joy at the sight of him, and keeping hold of Eppie's hand she went round to the side of the horse where he stood. Elizabeth was shy and frightened in the presence of strangers, unless some unusual encouragement brought her older self to the fore, when she could converse with the ease of an accomplished society woman. But the sight of these smart-looking strangers, evidently from town, filled her with discomfort, and she shyly drew up behind Mr. Coulson.
"But, Mr. Oliver," he was saying, "there must surely be some justice in his claim. Why, Mr. McLachlan has lived here for twenty years, and changed the place from dense woods to what you see now."
The elder man in the buggy, a stout, good-natured looking fellow, lazily blew a whiff of smoke from his cigar and smiled in a superior way. "Mr. Huntley," he said, turning to the young man at his side, "when Mr. Coulson enters your office, I'm afraid you're going to have trouble drilling him into the mysteries of meum and tuum as interpreted by the law."
"Yes, as interpreted by the law," repeated Mr. Coulson rather hotly. "The law sometimes speaks in a foreign language. If I thought my study of it was going to warp my ideas of right and wrong I'd go back home and pitch hay for the rest of my life."
The young man in the carriage looked at him closely. He was a handsome young fellow, about Mr. Coulson's own age, with a clever, clean-cut face. "There's something in your contention, John," he said, "but I'm acting for my client remember, and he has his ideas of right and wrong, too. He's paying for the place."
The young teacher's face fell, and old Sandy McLachlan, who had been watching him with eyes pitifully anxious, came a step nearer.
"They will not be turning me off?" he asked, half-fearfully, half-defiantly. "I would be working on this place for twenty years. Mr. Jarvis would be telling me it will be mine, as long as I live. And what will become of me and my little Eppie?"
"Well, well, Mr. McLachlan," said the jolly-looking man, not losing a whit of his jollity at the sight of the old man's distress. "Well, well, we won't discuss the matter any further to-day. You won't be disturbed until the fall anyway. And Mr. Huntley here will see that justice is done, whatever happens. He's one of the cleverest young lawyers in Cheemaun, you know."
"Hech!" interrupted old Sandy, his eyes blazing. "Yes, it is that I will be fearing. The Lord peety the man that will be falling into the hands of a clever lawyer!"
The comfortable-looking man seemed to take this as a grand joke. He laughed heartily and dug his elbow into the side of his young companion. "Hear that, Blake? Ha, ha! you lawyers deserve all you get. Ha! ha! that's good!"
The young man at his side did not reply to the raillery. He was looking past Mr. Coulson at the group of four children, standing open-mouthed, gazing at the men, and breathlessly listening to every word. He was particularly struck with the smallest one, a little girl in a torn, berry-stained blue pinafore and a sunbonnet of the same material. Her two small brown hands held in a tight grasp the hand of old Sandy's granddaughter, her cheeks were crimson, and her big eyes were blazing with an expression of mingled wrath and fear.
"Whose youngsters?" he asked, nodding towards them. "They don't all belong here, do they?" Mr. Coulson turned, and for the first time noticed the berry-pickers. "Hello! Charles Stuart and John Gordon and Lizzie herself!" he cried. "Been picking berries, eh?"
"Who's the little brown thing with all the eyes and hair?" asked Mr. Huntley.
Mr. Coulson took Elizabeth's hand and drew her up to the side of the buggy. "This gentleman wants to know your name, Lizzie," he said.
"It's 'Lizbeth Jarvis Gordon," said that young lady with great dignity. She was not the least bit shy or frightened now. Had she liked this Mr. Huntley she might have been, but she was filled with a longing to stand up boldly and denounce him as a cruel monster who was trying to turn Eppie and her grandfather out of Forest Glen. She looked straight into his face with big, accusing eyes.
"Jarvis!" said the young man in surprise. "That's a familiar name. Where did you get it, Miss 'Lizbeth Jarvis Gordon?"
Elizabeth gave that haughty turn to her long neck, which the conduct of Charles Stuart and John so often called forth. She looked away straight over the fence-tops. It might be rude, it certainly was not genteel, but she positively refused to converse with a scoundrel who would ill-use Eppie.
Mr. Coulson looked down at her averted face and tightly closed lips, and an amused look flitted over his countenance. He understood this peculiar little Lizzie fairly well, and lately had been feeling very sympathetic towards her, for special reasons of his own.
"She's a namesake of Mrs. Jarvis," he explained. "But you're not in favor. There's a deep friendship here, you understand." He nodded significantly towards Eppie, standing back pale and tearful.
"Oh, I see. And I'm the ogre in the fairy-tale." The young man laughed. "Well, well, Queen Elizabeth, I hope we'll meet again under more friendly auspices. In the meantime, here's something to remember me by." He dived into his pocket, and the two boys behind Elizabeth gave a gasp of astonishment. He was holding towards her a shining silver American dollar!
And then, for the first time in his life, John Gordon felt a thrill of pride in Lizzie. For the little girl stepped hastily back, her hands clasped tightly behind her. Her face grew crimson with shame and anger. Why, no one was ever given money to except the beggars and crossing-sweepers she had read about in the Sunday-school library books! And she—a Gordon—to be offered a coin, as if she were a charity orphan, and by such a horrid, horrid, bad man as this! She flashed him one look of deeply offended dignity, and, catching hold of John's coat, slipped behind him.
The man named Oliver burst again into loud laughter, and slapped his companion on the back.
"Ha! ha! Blake! Turned down that time, all right. Queen Elizabeth's a mighty haughty young lady!"
The young man pretended to laugh, but he really looked annoyed, as he crushed his scorned money back into his pocket, and took up the reins. He did not glance again at the haughty Queen Elizabeth, but nodded curtly to old Sandy. "Good-by, Mr. McLachlan. Don't forget to drop into my office when you're in town. Good-by, Coulson. See you Monday, I suppose."
And, giving his horse a sharp cut with the whip, he went whizzing off down the lane.
"Lizzie Gordon," said Mr. Coulson, catching hold of her sunbonnet and giving her a little shake, "you gave that young man a severer rebuke than I managed in half-an-hour's hard talk. Now, cheer up, Sandy. Things aren't hopeless yet."
"Och, and it iss not hopeless I will be," said the old man, with a stately air. His face lit up, and his eyes took on a far-away look. "I haf never seen the righteous forsaken nor his seed begging bread. That will be the word of God, Mr. Coulson, and not even the lawyers can be breaking that. I will not be righteous, oh, no! The Lord forbid that I say such a word, for it is the evil tongue I will be hafing that will be uttering ungodly words when the dogs will be coming into the house o' the Lord—and a curse on them for pollutin' the holy place! But, indeed an' indeed, it is a miserable sinner I will be. But my father would be a great man of prayer, and versed in the Scriptures, and for his sake the Almighty will not be letting the wee thing come to want. Oh, no, indeed."
There was a sublime faith in the old man's heart that rose above worldly disaster. His little granddaughter crept up to him and laid her little brown hand on his coarse shirt-sleeve.
"The place will be ours, anyway; won't it, grandaddy?" she whispered tremulously. "They couldn't be turning us out, could they?"
As he looked down at her, the old man's mood changed. His fighting blood was rising.
"Eh, them lawyers!" he cried fiercely. "I will be begging your pardon, Mr. Coulson," he added apologetically. "But it will be a great peety that a fine man like yourself would be hafing anything to do with the tribe. But if they had jist been hafing the Gaelic, I would haf been giving it to them. Och, but it will be a peety about the English. It would be but a poor spoke, indeed."
"Well, Sandy, let us hope that there are some honest lawyers. I'm going into Mr. Huntley's office on Monday, and I'll do my best for you. Don't worry."
When the farewells had been said, and Elizabeth had comforted Eppie in parting, the berry-pickers found to their joy that Mr. Coulson was to accompany them for a short distance, on his way to Wully Johnstone's. They had many eager questions to ask him. What were those men doing? the boys demanded. How dared they try to turn old Sandy away? What had they to do with his place, anyway? Mr. Coulson explained that they could not understand it all, for law was a very complex thing indeed. But all this property of Sandy's, as well as Tom Teeter's land, and everything between here and The Dale, had once belonged to Mr. Jarvis, and now belonged to the lady for whom Lizzie was called. Mrs. Jarvis had come to Cheemaun this summer and had asked her lawyer to sell all this property. And now it would appear that old Sandy's farm was for sale, too. For Sandy had no deed of his property; in fact, had merely worked it for Mr. Jarvis, who, Sandy declared, had told him that all south of the Birch Creek belonged to him. But it wasn't in writing, and lawyers did not believe anything they didn't see.
The children listened dismayed, and each proffered his own opinion as to the line of conduct old Sandy should pursue. Charles Stuart would barricade the gates and put up a palisade round the whole farm, the way they did in the old Indian days. Yes, and he would buy a gun and shoot dead anyone who set foot on his property. John heartily agreed with the plan, introducing modifications. A palisade would require all the soldiers in the County of Simcoe to man it. Instead, he would lay mines and torpedoes and deadly man-traps up the lane and all through the bush, so that no approach could be made to the house.
The two walked on ahead, consumed with excitement over the warlike plans, and Elizabeth and Mr. Coulson fell behind. He saw the distress in the little girl's face, and made light of the situation. Eppie would be all right, she need not worry. No one would touch her, not even Mr. Huntley, who was after all not such a bad young man. And, to change the subject to something brighter, he said:
"It's just fine luck you came along this way. I'm going away to-morrow, and I thought I shouldn't see you again."
"But I was up when you were at our place this morning," said Elizabeth, and no sooner were the words out than she could have bitten off her tongue for its indiscretion. She did not need the startled, dismayed look in the young man's eyes, or his crimsoning face, to tell her she had made a shocking mistake, for the older inner self rose up in severe accusation.
"Oh, Mr. Coulson!" she stopped in the pathway and regarded him with deep contrition. "Oh, I didn't mean that! I—I mean I couldn't help seeing. I was watching for fear John would run away on me, and go fishing. And nobody else saw—and Annie doesn't even know. And you know I wouldn't ever, ever tell, don't you?"
She looked up at him with such desperate anxiety that he could not but have confidence in her. His own face cleared.
"You're sure nobody else saw?" he whispered.
"Oh, yes, certain," breathed Elizabeth. "I—I—" she stopped, overcome by the tears of shame that were filling her eyes.
Her teacher took her hand. He could never bear to see a little girl in distress. "There now," he said. "It's all right, Lizzie. But you know, little girl, this is something I can't explain to you, because you are too little to understand. You will know all about it some day. But listen." He stopped and looked at her closely. "I know we can trust you, little Lizzie," he said.
Elizabeth looked up at him through her tears. It was entirely the wise old Elizabeth that was there.
"Yes," she said solemnly, "I wouldn't tell."
He slipped his little note-book from his pocket and scribbled in it. It might be just as well to warn Annie. The two boys had disappeared round a curve in the leafy pathway ahead. He folded the note carefully and handed it to her. "You won't lose it, Lizzie?" he asked. "And you'll give it to Annie when there's no one around?"
"Yes! yes!" cried Elizabeth. She slipped it into the pocket of her blue pinafore, and smiled up at him. She felt wonderfully grown-up and important. Mr. Coulson was putting confidence in her. They had a secret between them, he and she. She said good-by to him at the place where the path to Wully Johnstone's branched off, and away she ran after the boys, dancing with joy.
When the weary and hungry berry-pickers reached home they had an exciting tale to tell and many questions to ask. Tom Teeter came over after tea to give his opinion upon poor old Sandy's case. Jake Martin across from him was trying to buy Sandy's land, folk said, and if Martin did such a thing, then he, Tom Teeter, considered him a more penurious and niggardly miser, that would skin his neighbor's grasshoppers for their hide and tallow, than he had already proven himself to be.
Mr. MacAllister had dropped in, too, as he very often did of an evening, and suspended his work to discuss the question of the moment. Mr. MacAllister's double business of farmer and mill-owner, while not at all taxing his physique, was too much for his mental powers, and he was frequently compelled to have recourse to Mr. Gordon for help. Mr. MacAllister had a peculiar method of calculating the selling price of lumber, which he very appropriately termed "the long way of figgerin'." It was so long that it frequently covered boards and shingles, and even the walls of the mill, before the final number of dollars and cents appeared, the result being that the lumber sawn was all out of proportion to the number of figures required to compute its value.
So Mr. Gordon was frequently appealed to, and with a few magic strokes he would reduce the Long Way to its proper size. On this evening the problem was put aside for the discussion of poor Sandy's affairs. Mr. Martin was known as a hard man throughout the countryside, and Mr. MacAllister gave it as his opinion that if Sandy had Jake Martin and the lawyers after him, he might as well get out of the country. There was no hope for a man when the law got him. For the law was a scheme used by smart folks in town to cheat people out of their earnings.
Mr. Gordon said, "Well, well, well," and, "Indeed and indeed," and hoped things would not be quite so bad. But his sister looked worried in her stately, reserved fashion. To be sure, this business might bring Mrs. Jarvis to her door, who could tell, especially as Mr. Oliver and Mr. Huntley had both seen Elizabeth. But what an Elizabeth to be described to that lady! On the whole, she was worried, and when the visitors were gone she followed her brother into his study and asked to see the paper signed by the late Mr. Jarvis, stating that they had really a lawful claim upon The Dale. And she was not surprised, though much dismayed, to find that her unbusinesslike brother had no such document in his possession.