CHAPTER XXIAT THE GRANGER MILLS
"I really think, little Miss Robin, that you ought to go."
"Why, I should think you'd becrazyto go!"
"If I may be so bold's to remind you, the man is waiting for an answer."
Robin looked from her guardian's face to Beryl's to Harkness'.
"You're all conspiring against me, I do believe!" she cried. "I'll go if you say I ought to, but I just hate to. I don't want to meet the young people, there. And I'm dreadfully afraid of Mrs. Granger since Susy spoiled her dress."
"Mrs. Granger was one of your Aunt Mathilde's closest friends—until the death of young Christopher. Then, in the strange mood your aunt encouraged, she let the intimacy drop. I've often wondered if the Grangers did not resent that. You have an opportunity now, Robin, to restore the old terms between the two families, so that when your—aunt returns she will find the old tie awaiting her."
Robin stared, wide-eyed, at her guardian. It was the first time he had spoken of her aunt's return.
"When is my aunt coming back? Do you know I neverthinkof her coming back? Isn't that dreadful? I know she won't like me—"
"Don't let's worry about that now," broke in Cornelius Allendyce with suspicious haste. And Harkness, standing stiffly by the table, waiting instructions, fell suddenly to rearranging the books and magazines which had been in perfect order.
Mrs. Granger's chauffeur had brought a note to the Manor asking Robin to make them a few days' visit during the coming week. "My son and daughter have some young people here and you will find it a lively change from the quiet of your aunt's."
Robin used her last argument. "But you've only been here for a few days, guardian dear. And there's alotmore I want to tell you—oh, that's very important."
"Can't it wait until I come again? I'd have to go back to New York tomorrow, my dear, anyway. Come, this little visit of yours is as necessary to your education as a Forsyth as any of Mr. Tubbs' tiresome lessons. And then, as I said, you can win back my lady Granger's affection."
"Well, I'll go," cried Robin, in such a miserable voice that Beryl gave her a little shake.
Beryl saw in the visit all kinds of adventure. First, Robin must keep her eyes open and determine whether Miss Alicia Granger still mourned for young Christopher or whether she was faithless to his memory. Then there'd be the young people, probably from New York, with all kinds of new clothes and new slang and new stories of that happy whirlin which Beryl fancied all young people of wealth lived. And then there was the son, Tom. And Robin could wear the white and silver georgette dress.
"I wish it were you going instead of me," Robin mourned, not at all encouraged by Beryl's enthusiasm. "You're so tall and pretty, Beryl, and can always think of things to say."
There shone, however, one bright ray in all the gloom—the Granger home, Harkness had said, was only a mile from the Granger Mills. Adam Kraus and Dale had spoken of the Granger Mills as though they were almost perfect. She wanted to see them, at least, on the outside.
With a heart so heavy that she scarcely noticed the sheen of soft green with which the early spring had dressed the hills, Robin arrived at Wyckham, the Granger home, at tea time. She was only conscious of a wide, low door, level with the bricked terrace, flanked by stone seats; that this door opened and revealed a circle of merry-voiced young people gathered around a great fireplace. As the impressive under-butler took her bags from Williams one of the group rose quickly and came toward her. She was very tall and slender with an oval-shaped face and a prominent nose like Mrs. Granger's. Robin knew she was Miss Alicia. She answered something unintelligible to Miss Alicia's informal greeting and let herself be drawn into the circle.
There were four girls, ranging in age anywherefrom sixteen to twenty—three very pretty, obviously conscious of their modish garments and wanting everyone else to be conscious of them, too; another, Rosalyn Crane, tall and tanned and strong in limb and shoulder, with frank dark eyes and red lips which smiled and displayed regular, gleaming-white teeth. Robin liked her best, and Rosalyn Crane felt this and promptly tucked Robin under her wing.
For the next several hours life moved forward for Robin at such a dizzying pace that she felt as though she were sitting apart from her body and watching her flesh-and-bones do things they had never dreamed of doing before; the noisy tea-circle, the room she shared with the nice girl, the casual welcome from Mrs. Granger, the georgette and silver dress and the silver slippers that matched, the beautiful drawing room so alive with color and jollity, the long table gleaming with crystal and silver, the voices, voices, (everyone's but hers) the bare shoulders and the bright eyes and the red, red cheeks, the Japanese servants, velvet-footed, the big, hot-house strawberries, music and dancing, (everyone dancing but her) and then, at last, bed.
Out of the whirl stood two pleasant moments: one when Mr. Granger had spoken to her, the other—Tom.
Mr. Granger had a kind face, all criss-crossed with fine lines that curved up when he smiled. He patted her on the shoulder and said: "A Forsythgirl, eh?" and made Robin feel that he liked her. And she was not afraid of him and answered easily and not in the tongue-tied way she spoke to Miss Alicia and her friends.
And Tom Granger looked like his father. He had a jolly way of talking, too, and talked mostly to Rosalyn Crane. He had sat between her and Robin at dinner and had made Robin feel quite comfortable by acting as though they were old acquaintances and did not need to keep up a fire of banter like the others.
The next morning Robin came downstairs to find the house deserted except for the noiseless butlers who stared at her as though she were some strange freak. Apparently no one stirred before noon, for Tom, coming in from the garage, greeted her with a pleasant: "Say, you're an early bird, aren't you?" and then directed one of the butlers to bring her some breakfast in the sun-room.
"You'vegot some sense. Al's crowd will miss half of this glorious day!" he commented, leading Robin into a glass-enclosed room, in the centre of which splashed a jolly fountain.
Tom sat with her while she ate the breakfast the Jap brought on a lacquered tray. He kept up a fire of breezy talk just as though she were the nice Rosalyn Crane. It was mostly about the baseball nine at Hotchkiss, of which he was manager, and the new golf holes and an inter-school swimmingmatch and such things, concerning which poor Robin knew nothing, but he was so boyish and jolly that Robin did not feel in the least shy or awkward.
"Say, don't you want to go with me while I try out my new car? The road toward Cornwall is good and I've bet that I can get her up to sixty. Great morning, too. Are you game?"
Robin felt game for anything that would take her away from Miss Alicia's friends—except Rosalyn. Tom took her back to the garage and tucked her into half of the low seat and climbed in beside her.
For the next two hours they tore back and forth over the Cornwall road at a pace that caught Robin's breath in her throat. Occasionally Tom talked, but most of the time he bent over the wheel, his eyes on the road ahead with a frenzied challenge in them, as though the innocent stretch of macadam was prey for his vengeance.
Just outside of the town he slowed the car down to a snail's pace.
"Some baby, isn't she?" he asked and at Robin's perplexed eyes he went off into rollicking laughter. "Why sheeatsthe road! Dad said I couldn't get it out of her. I'll tell the world. Whew!"
Robin sat forward, suddenly alert.
"Are those the Mills?"
"Yep."
They were not so very unlike the Forsyth Mills—brick walls, dust, dirt, smoke, towering chimneys,and noise, noise. But beyond them and the river were rows of neat little white cottages, each with a yard, already green.
"Best mills in New England. But Dad's prouder of his model village—as Mother calls those cottages over there—than of his profit sheet. And look at the school—Dad wanted a school good enough for his own son and daughter, but Mother wouldn't let us go. I wish she had—I'll bet there's enough good batting material right in this town to whip every nine in this part of the country. There's Dad's library, too—"
But Robin did not heed the direction of his nod. She had suddenly seen something that made her heart leap into her throat; Adam Kraus walking into the office building carrying the square box with the leather handles, which she knew contained Dale's model. He was taking it to Mr. Granger.
A panic gripped Robin. She must do something to save that model for the Forsyth Mills—she did not know just what, butsomething—
"Stop, oh, stop. Couldn't I see your—father? I'dliketo."
Tom looked puzzled, but good-naturedly turned the car. Robin climbed out with amazing speed.
"Take me to his office, oh,pleasetake me," she begged, with such earnestness that Tom wondered if she'd gone "clean dotty."
Inside the office building there was no sign ofAdam Kraus, for the reason, though Robin did not know it, that it was his second visit; he was there by appointment, and he had used a stairway that led directly to Mr. Granger's office, while Tom took Robin through the main office where a neatly dressed girl blocked their way.
Mr. Granger was busy but the young lady could wait, this efficient young person informed them, quite indifferent to the fact that she addressed Thomas Granger and Gordon Forsyth. And Robin walked into an enclosure, half consulting room, half waiting room, and sat down with fast beating heart, upon a leather and mahogany chair.
"I'll wait out here 'til you see Dad," Tom told her, to her relief, and she heard him telling one of the clerks how his "baby" could make sixty as easy—
Suddenly Robin took in other voices, one deep, one soft and drawling. A door at the end of the room stood half-open. She leaned toward it, alertly listening.
"And you say this invention is your own, Kraus? Have you your patents?"
"My applications have all gone in and I have some of the patents. Yes, sir, it's my own."
"Doran reported very favorably. With one or two changes—suppose we find Doran, now." There came the sound of a chair scraping backward. "Oh, the model will be quite safe here. I want Doran to point out one or two things on our new loom. Itwill only take a moment. Then we'll bring him back here."
Oh, would they come out through the waiting-room—thought Robin, shrinking back. And what had Adam Kraus said?
But Mr. Granger had opened another door—Robin heard it close. She stepped noiselessly toward that half-open door at the end of the room. Her head was clear, her heart atingle.
He, Adam Kraus, haddaredto say the invention was his! The wicked man, the traitor—to betray Dale's trust, his friendship!
The office was quite empty. And on the big desk, amid a litter of papers and letters and books and ledgers, stood the little model in its clumsy box.
Robin caught it up and held it close to her, defiantly. She snatched a pencil and scrawled a few lines on the back of an envelope, then she tiptoed out into the consulting office and on through the main office. Tom was waiting at the end of the room. It seemed to Robin as though hundreds of eyes accused her; in reality only a few lifted from the work of the day to stare at the young girl Tom Granger had brought to see his father. And if anyone wondered why she carried the queer box, no one of them was likely to presume to question any friend of the Grangers.
"Did y'see Dad?" But Tom, to Robin's relief,took that for granted and turned back to his acquaintance among the clerks.
"I'll take you out with me andproveit to you!"
Robin wanted to beg Tom to run but she did not dare. He asked to carry the box and she let him, for fear, if she refused, he might suspect something. Queer shivers raced up and down her spine and a dreadful sinking feeling attacked her heart and dragged at her throat so that she could scarcely speak.
He helped her into the car and climbed in himself. He leisurely experimented with the gears, until Robin almost screamed in her anxiety. Then just as he started the motor, a shout hailed them from the office door, and both turned to see Adam Kraus tearing down the steps bareheaded, wildly waving his arms, followed by a half-dozen clerks and Mr. Granger, himself.
"Go!Go!" implored Robin, catching his arm, and so frightened rang her voice that Tom instinctively obeyed and stepped on the accelerator with such force that the car shot forward. "Oh,faster! Faster!" she sobbed. "He's coming." A backward glance had told her that Adam Kraus intended to give chase; still bareheaded, he had jumped into a Ford standing in the road.
"Well, I don't know what we're running away from, but my baby can give anything on wheels a good go-by!" laughed Tom, his eyes keen. Heleaned over the wheel, his face fixed on the road with its "eat-her-up" tensity.
They turned into the Cornwall road. At a rise Robin saw the other car with its bareheaded driver tearing after them.
"Oh, he's coming," she moaned, sinking down into the seat.
"Say, Miss Forsyth——I'm keen——on—running——away—but what—the—deuce—from? Who's that——fellow——following—us——why are you——afraid?" He flung the words jerkily, sideways, at Robin.
"I'll tell you—afterwards," Robin gasped back. The wind whistled past her, she lost her hat. She crouched in her seat, her hands clinging tightly to the box, her head turned as though expecting their pursuer to overtake them any moment.
Suddenly Tom frowned. At the same time the engine gave a grating "b-r-r-r."
"Oh, what is it?"
"Oil's getting low——Bad——" she caught in answer. "Pulling some——I'll——fool him, though—" He slowed down.
"Don't—" implored Robin.
"We'll turn down this road.He'llgo straight on. Clever, eh? Say, I wouldn't have guessed you had all this spunk in you!" he took the time to say, casting her an admiring glance.
He made the turn and the "baby" ploughed through the soft rough road at a perilous clip. The road wound through thickly wooded hills, up and down, apparently leading to nowhere.
Suddenly it twisted up a long hill. Tom's car climbed easily, slackening its speed for a few moments at the top. Turning, Robin could make out the course over which they had come and, to her horror, the little car plunging over it.
"Look—look!" she cried.
"Well, I'll be—blowed!" Tom Granger stared as though he could not believe his eyes. "He saw the marks of my new tires, I guess. He's a sharp one. Cheer up—we're not caught yet." He increased the speed; they tore down the slope in breakneck haste.
But, in the hollow, the car slopped out of the muddy ruts, gave a sickening lurch sidewise and dropped with a jolt into mud to the axles.
His face white with excitement Tom Granger tore at the gears, tried to go back, to go forward, but in vain. And, presently, they both heard the distant throb of a motor.
Robin jumped down from the car, hugging her box. "I'll run. Good-bye, Tom, thank yousomuch!" She was far too excited to realize the familiar way in which she had addressed him. She had cleared the ditch and stood on the fringe of the deep woods.
"I'll tell you sometime—about it!" she flung to him. "I'm—not—stealing! That man—will know—" and she disappeared among the leafing undergrowth.
"Well, I'll—be—Oh, Isay, Miss Forsyth, don't—" But the boy's attention, quite naturally, turned to meet the enemy, who at that moment appeared over the crest of the hill.
CHAPTER XXIITHE GREEN BEADS
Beryl waved Robin off to the Granger's with a forced cheerfulness. Left alone, she sat in the room she shared with Robin and stared unhappily at the disarray left from the frenzied packing and unpacking.
Nothing exciting like going off to a house-party of young people with two bags full of lovely clothes would ever,everhappen to her!
In factnothingexciting would ever happen. She'd just go on and on wanting things all her life.
She did not envy Robin, for Robin was such a dear no one could ever envy her, but she wished she could have justsomeof the chances Robin had—and did not appreciate. She straightened. Oh, with just one of Robin's dresses, couldn't she sail into that drawing room at Wyckham and hold her own with the proudest of them? Mrs. Granger and the haughty Alicia had no terrors forher, and if they tried to snub her, she'd put her violin under her chin and then—
The peal of the doorbell reverberated through the quiet house. Beryl heard Harkness' slow step, as he went to the door; then it climbed the stairs and stopped outside of Robin's room.
"Miss Beryl—a telegram."
"For me?" Beryl drew back. She had never received a telegram in her life and the yellow envelope frightened her.
"The boy said as to sign here."
Beryl wrote her name mechanically in letters that zigzagged crazily. Harkness lingered while she tore open the envelope, concern struggling with curiosity on his face.
"It's from Robin's guardian. He—he wants—oh, Harkness, am I readingright? He says I must come to New York atonce—tonight, if I can. He'll meet me—it'sextremelyimportant. Why, Harkness, what in the world has happened? It doesn't sound awful, does it? Did you ever know of anything so mysterious in your life?"
Harkness never had. He read the telegram with brows drawn together.
"Mebbe they left out something," he suggested, turning the sheet and scrutinizing its back.
"Well, I'llhaveto go." Beryl's voice betrayed her deep excitement. "Icancatch the evening train. Oh, Harkness, how often I've watched that go out and wished I was on it! And now I'm going to be. I'm going to New York! Harkness, be adearand hurry some dinner, will you? I'll pack. And oh, will you take a note to mother for me? I'll not have time to stop. Or wait—I won't tell her I'm going until I know what it's for—she'd worry. Isn't that best?"
"Yes, that's best. I'll get you some nice dinner, don't you fret. And Joe'll take you down to the station in the truck, he will, for like as not he'll be meetin' the train anyways for his wife's niece who lives Boston way. She's a-goin' to help Joe's wife—"
"Oh, that'll benice. But please hurry, Harkness. That boy's waiting for his book. And I can't think."
Two hours later Beryl sat upright on the plush seat of the evening train, her old suitcase at her feet packed with every garment she possessed.
"This is more fun than all your old house-parties," she apostrophized the black square of window, which dimly reflected her glowing face. Then she lost herself in a delicious "I wonder" as to why she had been summoned so mysteriously to New York.
Cornelius Allendyce and Miss Effie met her at the end of her wonderful journey, no part of which had wearied her in the least, and their smiling faces put at rest the tiny misgiving that had persisted that she might be walking into some sort of a scheme to separate her from Robin.
"I am glad you got my telegram in time to catch tonight's train. I've made an important appointment for you tomorrow morning with a friend of mine." But not another word concerning the mystery would the lawyer say. Both he and his sister went about with a queer smile, and treated Beryl as fond (and rich) parents might a good child on Christmas Eve.
The next morning Miss Effie started the two ofthem off for the "appointment" with a fluttery excitement bordering on hysteria.
"You'll think, my dear, you've rubbed Aladdin's lamp," she whispered to Beryl, patting down the neat white collar of Beryl's coat.
Beryl thought of her words when she followed Mr. Allendyce through a long dim room, crowded with treasures of fabric and ceramic, rich in coloring, fragrant of oriental perfumes.
"He's a collector," Cornelius Allendyce explained, nodding sideways and hurrying on to a room in the back, as though their errand had nothing to do with the curious things about them.
"Ah, there, Eugene, we're here! Miss Lynch, this is Eugene Dominez, known to two continents as that rare specimen, an honest collector; to me, the only man I can't beat at chess!"
A very small man rose from a great carved chair. He had a thin, leathery face with an exaggerated nose, stretched out as though from sniffing for curios in dusty dim corners. When he smiled his eyes shut and his mouth twisted until he looked like a jolly little gnome.
"Ah-ha! You admit you cannot beat me!" He spoke with a soft accent. "And this is the little lady who owns the green beads." And he peered closely at Beryl.
The green beads! She had not thought of them once.
"Sit down. Sit down. I will ask you to tell me a story. Then I will tellyoua story. First, my dear young lady, tell me where you found the beads?" As he spoke, he drew open a drawer, and took from it the envelope Robin had given to her guardian.
Beryl answered briefly, for the simple reason that she found difficulty managing her tongue.
"An—an old priest—back in Ireland—gave them—to us. He'd found them in an antique shop in London."
"Ah, so! Just so! So! So!" crowed the gnome-like man, jumping up and down in his great chair. "Now I will tellyoua story."
"Once upon a time, as you say, a beautiful Queen of the fifteenth century, while travelling through a forest, came upon a roving band of gypsies. So great was her beauty that the gypsy chief gave to her a necklace of precious jade, upon each bead of which had been tooled a crown, so infinitesimal as to be seen only through a strong lens. The chief told the fair Queen that the necklace brought good fortune to whosoever possessed it. But so proud was the young Queen of the precious beads and the good fortune that was to be hers that she boasted of them to her Court and aroused the envy of many until a knave among her courtiers stole them from her. For generations these beads, the workmanship of a Magyar artisan, have passed from owner to owner, alwaysmysteriously, for, because of the good fortune they had power to bestow, no one parted with them except from the most dire necessity, and only lost them through theft. Ah," he held up one of the glowing green globes, "the stories they could tell of greed and dishonor and cunning! The lies that have been told for them! And an old priest found them at last! It is many years since there has been any trace." He stared at Beryl as though to see through her into the past. Then he roused quickly and shook his shoulders. "They have hung about the necks of crowned people, good people—and wicked people. Perhaps they have brought good fortune—as the Magyar chieftain said they would. Who knows? You, my dear—you are a girl with a sensible head on a pair of straight shoulders—tell me, do you care more for the superstition of this necklace—than for the money I will pay you for it—say, fifteen thousand dollars?"
Beryl stood up so suddenly that her chair tumbled backward, making a crashing noise in the subdued stillness of the little room.
"Are you joking?" she asked in a queer, choky voice.
"No, he is not joking. And I told you he is known the world over as an honest collector," broke in Cornelius Allendyce.
"Fifteen—thousand—dollars! Why, that's anawfullybig amount, isn't it?" Beryl appealedhelplessly to the lawyer. "Why—ofcourseI'll sell it—if you're sure it's what you think it is. I—I don't want—"
The little collector handed her one of the beads and a strong magnifying glass. "Look!" he commanded. Beryl obeyed. There, quite plainly, she made out a tiny crown.
She laughed hysterically. "I see it! I thought that was a scratch. I never noticed it was on every one. Oh, how queer! A queen wore these!" She rolled the bead slowly in the palm of her hand. Then she handed it back. "But I'd much rather have the money than the beads even if a dozen queens wore them." Her sound practicalness rang harshly in the exotic atmosphere of the room.
"I explained to Mr. Dominez your situation—and your ambition," Cornelius Allendyce put in almost apologetically.
"Mr. Allendyce will represent you in this deal, Miss Lynch, if you care to think the sale over. However, I am giving you a final offer. You are young and—"
Beryl reached out both hands with childish impulsiveness. "Oh, I want the moneynow!I want to spend it. I want—oh, you don'tknowall I want—" She stopped abruptly, confused by the smiles on both men's faces.
"Mr. Dominez will give you a partial payment in cash and the rest I will deposit in the bank toyour credit," explained Cornelius Allendyce. "You need not feel ashamed of your excitement, my dear; fortune like this does not come often to anyone. It's hard, indeed, not to believe that the little beadshavemagic."
"I'm dreaming. I'm justplain dreamingand I'll wake up in a minute and find I'm Beryl Lynch, poor as ever!" Beryl whispered to herself as she followed Robin's guardian out into the sunshine of the street. She felt of her bulging pocketbook, into which she had put the roll of bills the little collector had smilingly given her, and which Robin's guardian had counted over, quite seriously. It felt real but it justcouldn'tbe true—
"Now where, my dear? You ought to make this day one you'll never forget."
"Don't I have to go right back to Wassumsic? Oh, then—then—can I go to see Jacques Henri and tell him? I know the way—I can take the Ninth Avenue Elevated—or—Would it beveryfoolish if I took a taxi?" Beryl colored furiously.
"Not at all, Miss Beryl, not at all. Take the taxi and keep it there to return to my house; then you and Miss Effie put your heads together and decide just what you want to do first with your money."
Beryl rejoiced that it was a nice shiny taxi, quite like a real lady's car. She sniffed delightedly the leathery smell, sat bolt upright with her chin in the air.
"Go straight down Fifth Avenue," she instructed the driver.
Spring, with its eternal sorcery, caressed the great city. Its spell threw a sheen over the drab things Beryl remembered so well, the brick schoolhouse, the Settlement, the dirty narrow street flanked by dull-brown tenements with their endless fire escapes mounting higher and higher, hung now with bedding of every color. The street swarmed with children returning from school, and they gathered about the automobile climbing on to the running board on either side and peering through the windows.
"It's the Lynch girl," someone cried and another answered jeeringly.
"Aw, git off! Wot she doin' in this swell autymobile?"
Beryl did not mind in the least the street urchins; even though she had lived among them, neither she nor Dale had ever been of them, thanks to her mother's watchful care. She smiled at them and fled into the dark alley way that led to the court which, all through her childhood, had been her playground.
As she climbed, a dreadful thought appalled her. What if dear old Jacques Henri had moved away—or died! But, no, at the very moment she let the fear halt her climbing step she heard the dear sound of his violin. She crept to his door and softly opened it.
The old man stood near his window, through which he could see a slit of blue sky between two walls. On the sill were the pink geraniums he nursed through winter and summer, their pinkness brightening the gloom of the bare, dim room. Jacques Henri called them his family.
"Jacques Henri!" Beryl ran to him and threw her strong arms about him.
"Hold! Let me look. My girl? Ah, do my old eyes tell me false things? No, it's my little Beryl!"
Beryl took his violin from him, kissed its strings lightly and laid it carefully upon the table. Then she pushed the startled old man back into the one comfortable chair and perched herself upon its arm.
"Listen, dear Jacques Henri, and I'll tell you the strangest story that you ever heard—about Queens and gypsies and green beads and a girl you know. Don't sayoneword until I'm through." And Beryl told in all its wonderful detail, the happenings of the morning.
"And don't you see what it means? I can begin to study atonce! Right this minute! And,oh, how I'll work and practice and learn until—"
She caught up the old man's violin and its bow and drew it across the strings.
"Play!" commanded Jacques Henri, without so much as a word for the Aladdin-lamp tale she had told him.
Beryl played and as she played she wished with all her might she could summon the power that had been hers on Christmas night. She wanted to play for Jacques Henri as she had played then. But she could not.
"Stop!"
Beryl laid the violin down.
The old man scowled at her until she shifted nervously under his searching eyes.
"Your fingers—they are clever, your ear is true—but there is nothing—ofyou—in what you play! Do you know what I mean?"
He did not wait for Beryl to answer; he went on, with a shake of his great head and his eyes still fixed upon her.
"You come to me and tell me your good fortune and what you will do; howyoucan study andyoucan work andyoucan learn to make good music—and you have no word for what that money will mean to your saint of a mother—aye, the best woman God ever made! Shame to you, selfish girl, that you should put your ambition before her dreams!"
The color dyed Beryl's face. "I never thought—" she muttered, then stopped abruptly, ashamed of her own admission.
"No, you never thought! Do you ever think much beyond yourself?" Then, afraid that he had spoken too harshly, he laid his hand affectionately upon Beryl's shoulder. "But you are young, mydear, and youth is careless. Jacques Henri knows that there is good in you—my eyes are wise and I can see into your heart. It is an honest little heart—you will heed in time. Ambition is a greedy thing—watch out that you keep it in your clever head and do not let it wrap its hard sinews about your heart, crushing all that is beautiful there. Listen to me, child; think you that your music can reach into the souls of people if you do not feel that music in your own good soul? Your fingers may be clever and your body strong, but your music will be cold, cold, if the heart inside you is a little, cold, mean thing! Many's the one, I grant you, content to feed the passing plaudits of the crowd, but not the master—he must go further, he must give of himself to all that they may carry something beautiful of his gift away in their hearts.Thatis the master.Thatis music."
Beryl, always so ready in self-defense, stood mute before the old man's charge. She had been scolded too often by this dear recluse to resent it; she had, too, faith in anything he might say.
Then: "You just ought to know Robin," she burst out, irrelevantly, eager that her old teacher should believe that, even though she might be a selfish, thoughtless girl herself, she could recognize and respect the good qualities in others.
"Forgive your old friend if he has hurt you. Go now to your blessed mother and lay your good fortune at her feet. That I might see her face!"
"And if she wants to use—someof the money, will you help me?" asked Beryl, in a meek voice.
"Ah, most surely. And proudly."
Beryl rode back to Miss Erne's in a contritely humble mood.
"I wish there were some sort of medicine one could take to make them better inside their hearts! I wouldn't carehownasty it tasted," she mourned, impatient at the long, hard climb that must be hers if she ever made of herself what her Jacques Henri wanted.
All of Miss Effie's coaxing could not keep Beryl from taking the afternoon train to Wassumsic.
"I must tell my mother about the beads—at once!" she answered, firmly.
CHAPTER XXIIIROBIN'S RESCUE
Just as the shrill of the train whistle echoed through the little valley, Moira Lynch set her lighted lamp in the window. She did not sing tonight as she performed the customary ceremony, nor had she for many nights. Her throat seemed too tired, her arms dropped with the weight of her lamp, a dull little pain at the back of her neck gripped her with a pulling clutch.
The doctor had told her she was "tired out." She had gone to him very secretly, lest Dale or big Danny should know and worry. But even to be "just tired out" was very terrifying to Mother Moira—if her arms and head and heart failed, who would take care of big Danny and keep a little home for Dale and watch over Beryl?
With her habitual optimism she tried to laugh away her alarm, but the pulling ache persisted and her arms trembled under tasks that before had seemed as nothing. She told herself that it was all her own fault that her big Danny seemed harder to please, but when, under a particularly trying moment, she broke down and cried, she knew she was reaching the end of her endurance.
"Did the train stop?" queried big Danny.
"Sure and it did!" cried Mrs. Moira, trying tothrow excitement into her voice to please the invalid man. Big Danny took childish pleasure in listening for the incoming and New York-bound trains.
"What's keeping Dale? Prob'bly hanging 'round the Inn!"
Mrs. Moira smothered the quick retort that sprang to her lips in defense of her boy.
"He'll be here any minute," she said instead, comfortingly. "There he is now!" Her quick ear had caught a step outside.
Beryl, not Dale, opened the door and confronted them. Suppressed excitement, impatience, eagerness, an inward disgust of herself for being a "selfish thing anyway" combined to give Beryl's face such an unnatural pallor and haggard tensity of expression that big Danny whirled his chair toward her and Mrs. Lynch caught her hands over her heart.
"Beryl?" she cried, standing quite still.
Beryl walked to her and very quietly gathered her into her young arms.
"Don't look so scared, Mom, dear. Oh,don'tcry! Why, I'm near crying myself! After I've told you all that has happened I shall justbawl. I'm too dreadfully happy. Sit down here, Mom, and hold my hand tight. Wait—I must take my things off first."
In a twinkling she had her stage "set" for her surprise. Strangely stirred herself, she had to gulp once or twice before she could begin her story. Itwas difficult to keep it coherent, too, because Mrs. Moira interrupted her so often with little unnecessary questions.
"Did you really go to New York?"
"And 'twas all night you stayed at the Allendyces themselves?"
Because of her mother's agitation, Beryl abandoned the details with which she had planned to lead up to the great surprise. She plunged abruptly to the point of the story.
"Those beads. Theyweren'tjust plain beads. They were a precious necklace made by some queer people, ages and ages ago.Queenshave worn 'em and all sorts of wicked people and they've gone from hand to hand—I s'pose I ought to say neck to neck—for all these years and then, suddenly, no one could find them. And Mr. Allendyce's friend—the collector—gave methis moneyoutright for them and—"
Mrs. Lynch suddenly sprang to furious life. She stood erect, her eyes flashing, her fingers working in and out, her lips trembling.
"You sold my—you sold my beads!Beryl Lynch, howdaredyou. My—my—"
Beryl stared at her. She could not speak for sheer amazement.
"My beads! They—were—the last—thing—I—had that held—me—to—my—dreams." Her voice died off in a heart-broken whisper that hurt Beryl to the soul.
"Mother! Mother,pleasedon't. It isn't toolate. I can get them back. I didn't know you cared, don't you see?"
Beryl of course did not know about the pulling ache at the back of Mother Moira's neck or she would have understood that her mother's hysteria was due partly to that. She had never seen her mother look so queer and old and pale and it frightened her.
Mrs. Lynch crossed the room until she stood behind Danny's chair. Involuntarily her hand moved to his shoulder.
"No, you wouldn't know. It isn't your fault. Of course it's just beads they were, but they belonged to the young part of me when my heart was that light and full of beautiful dreams and so strong that it hurt the inside of me. And nothing in this world was too fine for the likes of my Danny and me. And we thought 'twas just ours for the asking. And then when the clouds come—" her hand pressed big Danny's shoulder ever so lightly, "I told myself the dreams were my own and no one couldtake themaway from me and if I couldn't make them come true, as true for himself and me, sure, I'd keep them for my boy and girl. And 'twas the beads were like a dear voice out of the past telling me to be strong, for Father Murphy, with the saints in Heaven now, God rest him, gave them to me himself with his blessing and saying might my dreams come true! Ah, well—sure it's a punishment, maybe, for me wanting things just for my own—"
"Mother!" broke in Beryl, sternly. "As if youcould be punished for anything! Will you tell me one thing? Which would you rather have—those beads—or—or—a nice little farm in the hills with a cow and chickens and pigs and a little orchard and—and a Ford—and a girl to do the cooking so's you could stay with Pop, and Dale studying engineering in some college, if he wanted to, and me—"
"Beryl Lynch, are ye crazy?" cried big Danny, suspecting that the girl was in someway trying to mock her mother.
"No, I'm not crazy, though I ought to be, with old Jacques Henri scolding me and now mother—" She bit her lip childishly. "Will you please just answer me, mother?"
"A farm—with a garden—and a cow—and trees and a good stretch of the green meadow—ah, sure I'd think it a bit of Heaven."
"Mother, you can have it! You can have it!" Beryl rushed to and knelt by big Danny's chair. "That's what I was trying to tell you. That man will give you fifteen thousand dollars for those beads! Really, truly. See, he gave me all this money today. And Mr. Allendyce will put the rest in the bank. Oh, I know it's hard to believe but it's true. You can ask Mr. Allendyce."
Big Danny, with trembling hands, took the roll of bills from Beryl's purse. They were undisputable proof of her story.
"Moira girl, 'tis true!" Big Danny's voice trembled.
"'Tis Father Murphy's blessing," whispered Mrs. Lynch, a strange light in her eyes. "May I be worthy of it!" Then she roused and laughed, a tinkling laugh. "Ah—my girl shall have her music, now! Oh, it's too wonderful."
"Where's Dale?" cried Beryl, her heart jubilant that the unexpected crisis had passed. "Won't he be surprised?"
"What ever can be keeping the boy? 'Tis long past the hour."
"Now, mother, don't you begin a-worrying. Dale's old enough to look after himself."
"It's a fussing old hen I am, as true as true!" And because once more her heart was so light inside of her that it hurt, she kissed her big Danny on the top of his head.
"I wish Dale would come. I ought to go back to the Manor. Harkness is probably worrying his head off over my strange visit to New York."
But Harkness had other things to worry about.
Dale burst in upon his family just a few moments after Beryl had spoken but she did not tell her story. He gave her no opportunity.
"Gordon Forsyth's lost!"
"Lost?"
"Yes. Somewhere in the woods between Cornwall and South Falls. Strangest thing you ever heard. She made young Tom Granger run off with her—goodness knows where they were headed for, and when his car went into the ditch she made a dashfor the woods and that's the last anyone's seen of her."
"Why, Dale, she couldn't—" cried Beryl.
"Couldn't? Easiest thing in the world. Woods are thick and miles deep through there."
"I mean she couldn't be running off with Tom Granger. Why, she never met him until yesterday—"
"Well, it wasn't exactlywithhim but she made him,takeher off. She was running away from some one. Granger's been over here talking to Norris. They called me in. Seems Kraus had taken my model to sell to Granger, and called it his own, and Miss Gordon heard him. And she just walked in when they weren't in the room and—took it. Granger wouldn't say any more. He's too worried. What I think is that Kraus chased them—Miss Gordon and Tom Granger—"
"Howthrilling! Whatan adventure," exclaimed Beryl, her eyes shining. Oh, exciting thingswerehappening!
"Thrilling! Won't be thrilling if anything's happened to the kid. It's four hours now and Granger's had a bunch of men hunting ever since his son walked into the office and gave the alarm. Can you give me a bite in a hurry, Mom? The Manor car's going to take six of us over to meet young Granger and make a thorough search."
"But it's tired to death you look now, Dale. Can't—"
"I'm not tired—just bothered. Mom, I hate to think of that little thing getting into this fix just for my model. Granger was awfully decent about the thing; told Norris he was a fool not to jump at it. He said he had some sort of a note Miss Robin had left and it seemed to amuse him, but he didn't offer to show it. It isn't only because she's a Forsyth I care, but she's such a square little thing. Hurry up, please, Mom, Williams may stop any moment."
"Iought to go up to the Manor. They must be in an awful state."
"Wait, as soon as ever I can fix your father I'll go with you myself," cried Mrs. Lynch.
Toward noon of the next day, in answer to an urgent telegram, Cornelius Allendyce arrived at the Manor, having come down from New York by motor. Just as he was gulping down the coffee Harkness had brought to him, Mr. Granger, Senior, was ushered in.
The men knew one another well. They shook hands, then Cornelius Allendyce motioned him to a chair opposite him at the table.
The lawyer only needed to look at the other man's face to know that he brought no good news.
"Tom telephoned from Cornwall at six o'clock. Not a sign. Not so much as a red hair! Strangest thing I ever heard of. They're going to search theravines today—easy enough for her to stumble into them if she was frightened or hurrying. Then there's the kidnapping possibility!"
"Improbable!" protested the lawyer.
"Well,nothing'simprobable. You'd have said it wasn't to be thought of that a youngster like that would run off with that model. I want to give you the details of this whole matter—they'd be extremely interesting if one were not so concerned." He told of his two interviews with Adam Kraus and of Dale's invention. "A master contrivance. I can't understand your man, here, letting it get away from him. Why, it's worth a lot to me, but in these Mills—well, you may not know what I think of your mills," he laughed. "I'll tell you another time. The girl saw this Kraus go into my office, and persuaded my boy, who'd been taking her for a ride, to stop. She was waiting in my outer office and heard Kraus claim the invention as his own—scoundrel that he was—and when I took Kraus to see my head foreman, didn't she walk in, help herself to the model and leave me this." He drew an envelope from his pocket and handed it to Cornelius Allendyce. "Read it."