One day, in early September, when the sky was blue, and goldenrod and asters were in bloom, when the birds were preparing for their flight southward, and squirrels were busy with theirpreparations for the winter, Victoria, Peter, and Sophy were walking home from Ashmont, two miles away. They left the road at a certain point, and striking into the woods, followed a scarcely perceptible path, which would in time bring them to their own pasture land.
It was a glorious day to be out of doors, and in the free woods. The air was cool and crisp, and yet the sun had a certain warmth which was good to feel when they emerged from the woods and found themselves beneath the open sky.
Peter’s leg was entirely well now, and he walked without even the suggestion of a limp. The accident had been a severe trial in many ways, but his sisters had said to one another more than once during the summer, that Peter had borne it manfully, and had proved that he was possessed of plenty of pluck. He was much less impatient of control, than he once had been, and indeed the girls were less exacting. Honor and Katherine discovered, slowly but surely, that there were other ways of influencing Peter, and probably all boys, than by argument or command, and they acknowledged, at last, that Victoria’s method was more efficacious than theirs.
“Suppose we sit on the rock for a while,” said Vic, as they walked along the cart road in the pasture. “It is too lovely to go indoors, or even to go home. Vacation will soon be over, and we had better make the most of our few days. Heigh-ho! I don’t want to go back to school a bit. I did hope that I could stay at home after this, and help the others, but they all seem to think it is more my duty to go for another year.”
They had climbed the huge mass of rock which long ages ago had been piled there in gigantic confusion. Lichen grew over it now, bushes had found root in the crevices, and mosses and grass made soft resting-places upon the top. It was Victoria’s favorite spot upon the place, and she particularly loved it on a golden September day like the present one.
“I shouldn’t think you’d mind your school a bit,” said Peter. “What would you do if you had to go to that hateful one that I go to? Do you know, Vic, I’ve half a mind to accept Aunt Sophia’s offer and go to boarding-school?”
“Peter, you don’t really mean it?”
“Yes, I do. I was talking to Mr. Madison the other day, and he advised me to. He thinks I’llget a better education. And after all, Vic, it’s pretty good of Aunt Sophia to offer it again after our refusing everything last winter.”
“I know,” said Victoria; “I feel as if we had misjudged Aunt Sophia. She means to be kind to us, and if she has that unfortunate way of acting as if she wanted to run the entire universe, I suppose we ought to make the best of it. It is only her disposition, and as she has had plenty of money all her life, and no one to interfere with her, I suppose there is some excuse for it. She really has been very nice this summer, and it didn’t turn out as badly as I was afraid it would. After all, Peter, I think you are right. We oughtn’t to refuse everything she offers, and it would be of great advantage to you to go to St. Asaph’s. If only she allows the rest of us to continue to earn our living in peace!”
“Look, Vic!” exclaimed Sophy, in an excited whisper. “Who is that peeping up over the river bank? Look, Peter!”
They gazed in the direction that Sophy indicated, but could see nothing.
“I’m sure it was somebody,” continued Sophy, still in the same eager whisper, “and it looked like Dave Carney!”
At this Peter jumped to his feet, and nimbly leaping from rock to rock, ran to the river bank some little distance away. The girls watched him. They saw that he was speaking to some one below the bank. He did not return, and unable to restrain their curiosity further, they too left the rock and followed him. They found him in earnest conversation with a boy in a boat, and that boy was David Carney.
“Why, Dave!” cried Victoria; “have you come back? I am so glad to see you!”
Dave shyly pulled off his cap.
“He says he hasn’t come back to us,” said Peter. “He didn’t mean us to see him. He only came to take a look at the place.”
“Why did you run away, Dave?” asked Victoria.
“I ran away because I knowed it was Jim,” said Carney, looking up at her as she stood above him on the bank. “He always said he was agoing to break into your house sometime. He wanted me to help, but I wouldn’t have nothing to do with it. That made him mad, and we had a quarrel. Jim got into bad company down at Fordham, and I guess they got him into this scrape.”
“I always thought your brother couldn’t be a very nice person,” said Sophy, who had been watching Dave with round and solemn eyes. “He used regular swear words that day I met him with you.”
“I’d have been as bad myself if it hadn’t been for you folks,” said Dave. “I’d have gone straight after him if you hadn’t caught me that time when I was stealing those apples,” he added, looking at Peter. “I only did that because I was hungry. It was the first time, but I guess it wouldn’t have been the last. That morning when they told me there’d been a robbery, I knowed it was Jim, and I couldn’t stay. I knowed you’d think it was me that done it if I ran away, but I couldn’t stay in the place where you folks had been so good to me, and my own brother had broke into the house.”
“And what have you been doing ever since?” asked Peter.
“I hid for a few days. Then I heard Jim was caught, so after that I went to Boston and got some work off and on down on the wharves. I’m out of it now, and I came out to Fordham, and a fellow I know loaned me this here boat, and Icouldn’t help coming up to see how it looked here. I didn’t mean you to see me.”
“And will you come back to us now?” asked Peter.
“Come back!” repeated Dave. “You don’t want me to come back, and me running away, and having a brother in jail for robbing you?”
“Why, of course! I never supposed you had anything to do with it. I said so all along.”
Dave’s eyes rested upon the other boy’s face with an expression of dog-like devotion. Then he turned to Victoria.
“No, he never did think so,” said she; “but I must confess, Dave, that when you ran away, the rest of us doubted you. But we must talk to my sisters about it. Will you come up to-night and hear what they think?”
And Carney promised that he would.
The Starrs returned to the house in great excitement, eager to impart their news to the sisters at once, but they found a still greater surprise awaiting them. On the piazza were Aunt Sophia and Mr. Abbott in earnest conversation. Mr. Abbott, whom they had not seen at Glen Arden for so many months! He had been abroad for hishealth, and although his wards knew that his steamer was in, they had scarcely expected to see him so soon.
“To tell you the truth, Dickinson,” Mrs. Wentworth Ward was saying as Peter and his sisters came around the corner of the house, “even though I so strongly disapproved of their plans at first, I am really quite proud of the girls. They have done well, and they deserve to succeed. If Peter will only do as I wish and go to St. Asaph’s—”
Here she stopped, for Peter himself came into sight, but her remarks proved that in spite of all that had been said to the contrary, Mrs. Wentworth Ward was broad-minded enough to know when she was mistaken, and generous enough to acknowledge the fact.
Honor and Katherine came home from an errand which they had been doing at almost the same moment that Peter and the younger sisters returned, and the welcome which Mr. Abbott received proved that they were indeed glad to see him again.
There was much to be told to him, the history of the summer and of the robbery, and now the account that Peter and Vic had to give of themeeting with Carney. They were so sure of Dave’s innocence of any complicity in the affair that it was impossible for the others not to be impressed by their story, and even Mrs. Wentworth Ward gave an unwilling assent to his being taken back for another trial. Therefore it was decided that when Dave should come for his answer that night he was to be told to stay.
“But what about these Madisons whom I hear quoted so much?” said Mr. Abbott, looking quizzically from one to the other of his wards.
“The nicest people in the world,” said Katherine, eagerly. “We have had such a lovely time with them this summer, Mr. Abbott! Miss Madison is the most charming woman I ever knew. We play together a great deal, she on the violin and I on the piano. There is a brother, Roger, too, who is very nice. We all like them immensely.”
Victoria, Peter, and Sophy joined in the chorus of praise, as did even Mrs. Wentworth Ward, but Honor was noticeably silent.
Mr. Abbott remained to dinner and even to supper also, staying long enough to see Dave Carney and convince himself, as he did the moment he looked at him, that he was an honest fellow. Healso desired to meet Miss Madison and her brother, about whom he had heard so much. When he finally returned to Boston, there was a twinkle in his kind eyes and a satisfied expression upon his face.
He had heard now a complete history of the past year, and he felt confident that the coming one would be even more of a success. The Starrs had tried their wings and had proved that they could fly.
That same evening Mrs. Wentworth Ward called Victoria into her room.
“My dear,” she said, “do you remember what I said to you one day in the early summer in regard to Katherine and young Madison?”
“Yes, Aunt Sophia, I do indeed!” replied Vic.
“I want to tell you something else, then,” said her aunt. “I think I was mistaken. In fact, I find that I have made a number of mistakes about you all. I think now that it is friendship, mere friendship, between him and Katherine. It is very rare, but this time I believe it to be the case. Katherine finds the sister more absorbing and interesting than the brother, and the real object of his interest is not Katherine, but Honor. I think you will find that I am right.”
And after events proved, greatly to Mrs. Wentworth Ward’s own satisfaction, and indeed to that of all concerned, that she had indeed guessed correctly.
And when Honor was told by Roger and Victoria together that he was “the man who bought the etching,” she took the news so quietly that Victoria came to the conclusion that much-dreaded events never turn out to be as unpleasant as one fears that they will be,—a conclusion that was frequently proved to be a true one during the remainder of her life.
THE END.
MALVERN.A Neighborhood Story. 341 pages.
With five Illustrations byAlice Barber Stephens.
Cloth. $1.50.
A SUCCESSFUL VENTURE. 340 pages.
With five Illustrations byAlice Barber Stephens.
Cloth. $1.50.