CHAPTER XVITHE GREEK SPIRIT
“What is the Greek spirit, Mr. Fenton?” During one of the rehearsals for the presentation of Odysseus, Lance McClain made this inquiry.
No one else among the group of boys and girls surrounding Mr. Fenton at the moment would have asked the question. Yet, overhearing Lance, a number of them stood waiting for the answer.
The weeks of outdoor work and study had awakened new ideas and interests.
Mr. Fenton did not reply immediately; instead, he appeared to be considering the question deeply.
Frequently he had talked of the Greek spirit. Therefore, what did he actually mean?
“I am glad you put that query to me, Lance,” he returned finally. “Half a dozen times since we began our rehearsals I have spoken of the ‘Greek spirit.’ I have emphasized the wish that we reveal it in the presentation of our tableaux. One ought not to talkglibly and be unable to offer a simple definition.
“At least I can tell you what the ‘Greek spirit’ means to me and why I want us to give expression to it in our pageant.
“Try not to be bored if I discuss the subject seriously for a few moments. You know I have been a student, not a speaker, all my life, and there are times when we all wish for the gift of tongues.”
Observing that Mr. Fenton was addressing not Lance alone who had asked the question, but the crowd of young people nearby, Memory Frean and Sheila Mason, Captain Curtis and several others came and stood on the edge of the crowd.
This afternoon they were together on the side of the stream of water where the tableaux would be presented.
In nearly every detail Tory had been correct in her original conception. The pageant would be presented in the clear green space with the grove of shadowy trees as background.
Across the water the audience were to be seated in a natural outdoor auditorium. On a slight elevation of land near the stream the Father of the Scouts, who had promised to appear for the evening’s entertainment, would read aloud portions of the Odyssey.
This afternoon, however, the Scouts were busy building and arranging details of the outdoor scenery.
It must be as simple as possible to serve their purpose.
Observing the crowd gathering about Mr. Richard Fenton, the builders also stopped their toil to join the others.
A rare experience had come to Mr. Fenton late in life, and although she never realized the fact, Tory Drew was chiefly responsible.
Almost as a recluse Mr. Fenton had spent the years of his middle age. He was under the impression that he was not sympathetic with most people and that they did not care for him. With a sufficient fortune for his needs, he had not found it necessary to engage in an occupation for the sake of making money. Therefore he had devoted most of his time to study and thought.
The result had not brought him a deep satisfaction. In his young manhood he had not planned this kind of existence.
He had contemplated being a public man, a statesman should he reveal the necessary ability. In those days he had been young and meant to make Memory Frean proud of him. They had separated and he had sought consolation among his books.
Then into his own and his sister’s well regulated lives Tory had entered the winter before. She was not Tory to them then, but Victoria Drew, as Miss Victoria Fenton still insisted upon calling her niece.
To Mr. Fenton the young girl had made an unconscious appeal. Lonely and feeling herself out of place in a new and strange environment, she appeared like a gay little tropical bird or flower transferred to a harsher environment. When he and Tory became friends the coldness of the old maid and old bachelor establishment changed to a pleasanter warmth.
Introduced to her girl friends, Mr. Fenton had become a member of their Scout Council. But not until this summer had he developed into their chief mentor, and fairy godfather.
Now to his surprise, added to his other unsought honors, he found himself the director of the Greek pageant, one of the performers as well, and far more popular with his fellow-players than he yet appreciated.
Daily they were coming to him with their problems and their ambitions. As yet their confidences related only to the approaching performance.
Lance’s question was more general than any other that had been propounded. WhileMr. Fenton was replying he looked at Lance with more interest than he had felt in the boy before.
If no one else understood what he was endeavoring to make plain, he believed that Tory and Lance would catch the import of his words.
“Among the nations the Greeks are rarely fortunate,” Mr. Fenton began. “They left us such inheritances that we have remembered their great days; with other nations we are too apt to recall the years of their decay, their mistakes.
“Perhaps one reason for this is that the Greeks were our forefathers, a branch of the Aryan-speaking peoples who in the faint twilight of early history, a nomadic, wandering people, moved southward, and combined with the inhabitants of Crete. This gives us the story of the Odyssey, one of the two great Greek poems, but more filled with legend than the story of the Iliad, which is the siege of Troy.”
Mr. Fenton paused.
“I am not tiring you too much? Still I must go on. We must try as far as we can to understand what we have undertaken to present to others. And I have not yet told you what I mean by the Greek spirit.
“It revealed itself even as far back as these two poems. The Greeks were then possessed of two great passions, the love of adventure and the love of beauty. Those two possessions I want to be equally the heritage of the American Girl and Boy Scouts.
“Later, in what is known as the Age of Pericles, the Greeks entered into their third ardor, Democracy, the love of freedom. So what I call the Greek spirit is the love and pursuit of these three things: Beauty, Adventure, Freedom.
“I might talk longer and you would understand me less well. Understand, there may be danger in these three desires. One must not seek beauty, adventure and freedom at the expense of other people, but in order to share it with others as the Greeks have done.
“Now I am through with my lecture, will some one give me a hammer? I’ll try to assist Don in building a footstool for one of Penelope’s maids. I’m afraid I am no better carpenter than I am lecturer. Do you understand what I have been trying to explain, Lance? We may talk the question over together some other time.”
Lance nodded.
“I think I do understand what it means in regard to the Scouts.”
A moment he stood dreaming when the others went back to work. Beauty, adventure, freedom, the Scouts were finding in the outdoors during the weeks of their summer camp.
At present in front of the grove of trees Mrs. Phillips was starting a rehearsal of the Greek dance that was to form a part of the coming pageant.
Fascinated, Lance stood watching.
CHAPTER XVIIA CLASSIC REVIVAL
Only now and then does nature allow us a perfect thing.
The day of the presentation of the Greek poem of the Odyssey by the Girl and Boy Scouts was a perfect day.
It occurred during the last week in August. Here at the fringe of the deep woods the afternoon was like early September; there was more color, more radiance than one associates with any other month of the year.
Beyond the woods the wheat fields were golden, the final growth of the summer gardens a riot of purple and rose and blue. The corn fields having ripened, bent their green maturity to the breezes, the silk of the corn tassels made valiant banners. In the forests the beech trees showed bronze leaves amid the midsummer foliage, the sumach and the woodbine were flaunting the scarlet signals of autumn.
Along the road leading from Westhaven to the site in the woods where the Greek pageantwould take place, from an early hour in the afternoon motor cars moved back and forth.
The first cars transported the players and their costumes and such odds and ends of scenery as had to be attended to at the last.
The same cars returned for the families and friends of the actors. Every automobile and carriage the town could spare for the occasion had been commandeered.
The interest the town of Westhaven and several neighboring villages displayed in the Greek pageant was beyond the realms of possibility in the original conception of the Girl and Boy Scouts.
But the summer was closing. In a short time a good many of the summer residents would be returning to their city homes. The thought of a final entertainment, a final memory of the summer days became inspiring.
Moreover, a Greek pageant was unusual presented by groups of American girls and boys. Probably they would make a failure of so ambitious an effort, yet it would be worth while to see.
The first arrivals among the audience found several hundred chairs placed in more or less orderly array upon one side of a stream thatran straight as a ribbon along this part of the countryside.
Upon an elevation a small platform had been constructed with a table and a chair so banked with golden rod and Michaelmas daisies and green boughs that the wooden outlines were concealed.
On the further side of the water was an ingenious structure, half palace and half tent.
The walls were of a heavy white canvas, the roof had been made of narrow lattice and this covered with green branches.
In front was the court yard of the palace. The furnishings were severely simple, a long bench and a table, a few straight chairs, little more than stools, and painted white to suggest marble.
No other paraphernalia of the approaching performance was visible.
Now and then a figure appeared from the background of trees, never one of the players, only some assistant bent upon an errand.
Not upon the shore-line supposed to represent ancient Greece, but immediately facing the audience waved a giant American flag. On either side were the Scout flags, one bearing the imprint of an eagle’s wing, the insignia of the Girl Scouts, the other an elm tree, the flag of the boys.
At four o’clock in the afternoon the pageant began.
Before that hour not only were the seats filled but a number of people were standing.
A guest of honor of the occasion was one of the distinguished men who originated the Scout movement for boys in the United States. Another guest of honor was a member of the National Girl Council, who had come up from the headquarters in New York for no other reason than to be present at the pageant.
With simple Scout ceremonies the entertainment opened.
A few moments after the applause had subsided, a beautiful resonant voice read aloud the first lines describing the Odyssey:
“Sing us the song of the hero, steadfast, skilful and strong,
Taker of Troy’s high towers who wandered for ten years long
Over the perilous waters, through unknown cities of men,
Leading his comrades onward, seeking his home again.
Sing us the song of the Wanderer, sing us the wonderful song.”
A moment later slowly rowing down the stream appeared a solitary figure, Odysseus, seated upon a raft to which were fixed sails and a rudder.
Before reaching the place along the shore where the boat, built by Odysseus on the island of Calypso, was to land, a storm was supposed to beset the hero. The audience beholds him struggle with the storm and then reach a safe harbor.
On the shore he piles up branches and lies down upon a bed of leaves.
A short time passes and Odysseus sleeps.
This opening scene in the tableaux Donald McClain insisted was the most difficult in the entire program. During the rehearsals he had been possessed by the fear that he would not be able to produce the illusion, so that his audience would not take him seriously. Therefore, the tableaux would begin and end in disaster.
Don need not have troubled. Very handsome and heroic he appeared, his dark hair grayed to represent the age of the Greek hero who had wandered so many weary years after the siege of Troy.
While Odysseus slumbers the Princess Nausicaa and her maidens come down toward the river. Unaware of the sleeper, they begin washing their clothes in the river and afterwards spread them out to dry in the sun.
Victoria Drew, as the Princess Nausicaa,wore a gown of bright blue with a Greek design in silver braid. Her bright red-gold hair was bound in a silver fillet. Her maids were Margaret Hale, Edith Linder, Martha Greaves and Julia Murray. Their costumes were white and crimson, yellow and green.
In making a careful study of the costumes worn by the early Greeks, Miss Frean and the Troop Captain had been surprised to find that white did not play so important a part in their dress as they had supposed. Together with their love for the beauty of line and form the Greeks possessed an equal love for color.
Nausicaa and her maidens begin a game of ball on the sands. The princess misses the ball and as it rolls into the water she gives a cry that awakes Odysseus.
He comes forward and asks Nausicaa’s aid.
Together they move toward the palace of the Sea-kings, when the first tableau ends.
The second scene shows Odysseus seated inside the tent narrating his adventures to the good King Alcinous and his wife, Queen Arete.
Again the voice of the interpreter recited further lines from the Greek poem:
“Hither, come hither and hearken awhile, Odysseus, far-famed king!
No sailor ever has passed this way but has paused to hear us sing.
Our song is sweeter than honey, and he that can hear it knows
What he never has learnt from another, and has joy before he goes;
We know what the heroes bore at Troy in the ten long years of strife
We know what happens in all the world, and the secret things of life.”
A thrill of appreciation and sympathy stirred the larger portion of the audience at the outset of the next tableau.
Strangers, slightly puzzled to guess the cause, found that a few hurried words made the situation clearer.
Odysseus has sailed from Crete and comes at last to his own land.
No change of scenery was possible. The hearers learned from the recitation that he had reached the island of Ithaca. Here his ship was moored in a haven between two steep headlands near a shadowy cave, where the water-fairies come to look after their bees and weave their sea-blue garments on the hanging looms.
Odysseus, knowing not that he has reachedhis home at last, walks up the steep incline from the shore. Here he meets the Goddess of wisdom, Pallas Athena.
Contrary to her own judgment Katherine Moore had agreed finally to represent Athena; in spite of the difficulties to be surmounted not to have accepted would have been too ungracious.
From beyond in the grove of trees the Goddess advances. She is seated in a chariot drawn by four children. The children wore costumes of white, short skirts to their knees and sandals on their feet.
The Goddess herself was clad in white with a wreath of green leaves about her hair. Had the audience been closer she would have appeared a pale and fragile Goddess with wide gray eyes set in a delicate, bravely smiling face. For the old-time Kara had been doing her best to return these days in order to cast no gloom upon the pleasure of her friends.
Better for Kara perhaps that the general effect of the tableau was what was desired and not a too apparent view of details!
This, however, was not true concerning the little group of children who drew the chariot.
So startling was Lucy Martin’s beauty that not only the Girl Scouts and their olderfriends discussed it among themselves, the Boy Scouts, not so apt to notice a little girl’s appearance, also spoke of it to one another privately.
Fortunately Lucy, in spite of her wilfulness, was not self-conscious.
To-day evidently she was thinking not of herself but of Katherine Moore and Billy, her former friends from the Gray House on the Hill.
A blond Cupid grown slightly older and thinner, Billy Duncan appeared, with his blond hair and large childish blue eyes and his somewhat expressionless face.
Either the performance of the Greek tableaux or the presence of the little girl who had so dominated him during the years they had spent together at the Gray House made Billy dazed and speechless.
There was no need, however, that he should use any intelligence save to do what Lucy commanded.
Her dark eyes sparkled with a brilliant excitement, her rose cheeks glowed. The stiff aureole of her dark hair made a striking contrast to the whiteness of her childish costume.
The other two children were acquaintances of Lucy’s from the Gray House and equally ready to do her bidding.
So, whatever the others may have believed, Lucy Martin was convinced that she had taken complete charge of Kara’s tableau.
Watching the little girl, Kara in a measure forgot what she felt to be her own unfitness for her distinguished rôle.
Athena touches Odysseus with her magic wand and he changes into an old man, not wishing to be recognized on his return to his own palace. Athena’s chariot is then drawn back into the grove of trees and Odysseus, now disguised as a beggar, once more sets out for his home. The Goddess has presented him with a worn coat which he places over his former costume.
The tableaux did not consume any length of time, scarcely longer than it requires in the telling, nevertheless the entire drama of Odysseus could not be unfurled in a single afternoon’s pageant.
The meeting of Odysseus with the faithful steward, Eumaeus, played by Mr. Fenton, was presented without the details one finds in the story.
Immediately after the son of Odysseus, Telemachus, makes his appearance.
Neither Lance McClain nor Donald had ever acted until to-day.
They had both been fearful that playing together would have its drawbacks, as one is inclined to be more nervous and critical with regard to one’s own family. Actually the brothers were more surprised by each other than they could have surprised their audience.
The change in costume, the gray in his hair, the lines of makeup on his handsome boyish face, gave Donald a look of maturity, while Lance’s slenderness and the fact that he was several inches smaller carried with it the necessary suggestion of graceful youth.
Together the father and son set forth to their home, crowded with the suitors who, believing Odysseus dead, have come to seek the hand of Penelope.
Instead of going directly to the palace they retire toward the woods to suggest a lapse of time.
So far the Greek tableaux had been dominated by single figures, chiefly the hero of the poem.
Now a change occurs.
In the courtyard before the palace Penelope is seen to appear accompanied by her maidens.
A serene and stately Penelope robed in ivory and gold, her ash-brown hair braided andcoiled low on her neck, a gold band in her hair, Joan Peters had never looked so handsome.
About her the troop of maidens like a swarm of brilliant, many-colored flowers.
They moved from the yard and onto a broad space of ground untouched by tree or shrub. Here the grass had been closely cut so that it formed a velvet greensward.
Penelope stands in the background and her maidens advance.
They were sixteen in number and represented the four seasons.
As Kara’s illness made it impossible for her to be of their number, the sixteen girls were not alone Girl Scouts from the camp in Beechwood Forest. Four of them were gowned in white, four in pale green, four in blue and four in scarlet.
Their costumes were like the simple, flowing draperies of the Greek dancing girls seen upon the friezes of the ancient Parthenon at Athens.
Carefully Mrs. Phillips had made a study of every detail of Greek dancing and costuming. Anxious to impress the people of Westhaven with her ability as a teacher of dancing, she appreciated that no such opportunity as the present one would be offered her again.
Evan Phillips was to lead the Greek Dance of the Four Seasons; one of the dancers representing winter, she was dressed in white and silver.
Advancing, the entire line made a streak of rainbow beauty upon the farther edge of the silver stream of water.
The line recedes, forming a crescent about the solitary dancer.
Then Evan danced alone. Her dancing was a series of graceful gestures, of movements of her arms and postures of her body, not toe dancing or a skilful employment of her feet, such as we associate with modern dancing.
In the midst of her dancing she summons the four seasons to advance. Winter comes first. They seem to be blown forward by a gust of winter wind that sets them dancing and shivering forward. Supposedly the snow falls and their arms, partly covered by delicate white draperies, are raised as a shield.
The sun shines, the snow melts and they move backward to give place to the birth of spring, the four Girl Scouts in shimmering green costumes.
The dance of the Spring recalled Evan Phillips’ dance of the young beech trees, save that it was more stately. As far as possibleher mother had adapted her idea to the Greek model.
Summer follows spring and the dance suggests the blossoming of the flowers. The scarlet succeeds the blue and autumn comes with its portents of flying leaves and birds moving southward.
The dance ends and for the first time the audience broke into enthusiastic applause. Nothing so beautiful had ever been witnessed in Westhaven!
Penelope and her maidens return to the palace. Later Odysseus wanders into his own home, unrecognized by his family and friends.
The Girl Scouts composed the household of Penelope, the Boy Scouts found their opportunity as the impatient suitors of the lady Penelope. They remain about her palace, playing at games, feasting and wasting her substance and that of her son, Telemachus. The hour must be near when she shall make up her mind who is to fill the place of her lost husband, Odysseus.
In the games that took place the Boy Scouts found their chance to exhibit their prowess in outdoor sports.
Penelope fetches the bow and the quiver full of deadly arrows. She then goes to meet theprinces, her attendants following carrying the axes.
To the suitor who wins at the trial of the bow Penelope vows to give herself in marriage.
Odysseus, with as little trouble as a minstrel fits a new cord to his lyre, bends the mighty bow with an arrow caught up from the table at his side.
Even when the bronze-tipped shaft goes clean through twelve axes set up in a row, the blinded Penelope fails to know her lord.
The last scene reveals Odysseus, his shabby coat cast aside, his figure no longer bent and aged, a shining hero seated opposite Penelope in the courtyard of his home, united at last after long parting.
The Greek tableaux were over. Within a quarter of an hour the audience departed for their homes, the Girl Scouts to their own camp and the boys to theirs on the other side of the hill. Yet not until bed-time was any other subject discussed by the players and their audience than the surprising success of the Greek pageant given that afternoon in the familiar setting of the New England woods.
So the beauty of the past held its re-birth in the present.
CHAPTER XVIIITHE PASSING
Outside the opening into her tent Teresa Peterson sat presumably playing upon the banjo. The sounds she was making were not particularly pleasing. Yet the camp was fairly deserted. Only a few of the other girls were to be seen and they were busy and nowhere near Teresa.
In fact, the camp in Beechwood Forest would be vacant within the next few days. Summer was closing with the soft loveliness that makes one forgive and forget her less charming moods.
Already the evergreen house, which had been the center of the camp life, was being dismantled.
Katherine Moore had returned to the Gray House on the Hill. After the performance of the Greek tableaux she had not been so well and Dr. McClain had additional reasons for desiring her presence in town at this time.
Impatient always to fulfill his own wishes, no sooner was Mr. Hammond aware of Kara’sdeparture to town than he requested permission to have the floor of the old cabin removed and the search begun. Kara was not to be told of the effort until the work was accomplished. Not one chance in a thousand, Mr. Hammond agreed, that any trace of Kara’s past history be located here, therefore she had best not be excited or worried until the task was finished.
This afternoon, as Teresa twanged at her banjo strings, she looked oftener than was good for her music at the group of men who were at work in the evergreen cabin.
So far they had only started the removal of the old boards.
When this was concluded the Girl Scouts had determined to organize the searching parties among themselves. Mr. Hammond would join them; no one else was supposed to feel a sufficiently keen interest in the investigation to be allowed to take part.
In spite of her music Teresa observed Lance McClain coming toward the Girl Scout camp when he was still some distance away. He was not wearing his Scout uniform as might have been expected.
Even at a distance Lance appeared unlike the other boys. He was smaller than a numberof them, more slender and graceful. He had a peculiar carriage of the head. He seemed to bend forward slightly and yet his eyes were nearly always upturned. He apparently did not look at the objects directly in front of him.
“Hello, Lance, I am awfully glad to see you! I was feeling dull,” Teresa called out. “How did you happen to walk over to camp and not be wearing your uniform? Miss Mason is lying down in her tent; if you like I’ll tell her you are here and then you can stay and talk to me, or else I’ll play to you.”
Lance made a funny grimace.
“Thanks awfully, Teresa, but I want to see Dorothy for a special reason. I can’t stay long. I wonder if you will tell me where I can find her?”
Teresa frowned.
“I thought you always claimed to be fond of music, Lance, so I don’t see why you need be in such a hurry.”
Again Teresa twanged at her banjo, a little angrily on this occasion, so that the boy’s sensitive face twitched.
“Oh, for goodness sake don’t make that noise, please, Teresa, and don’t be annoyed. I’d like to talk to you if I had time. I don’tthink I am fond of the banjo as a musical instrument, but I’ve simply got to find Dorothy. If you don’t know where she is will you ask Miss Mason? Tell her it is important or I would not have appeared. Oh, yes, I know the Boy Scouts are more welcome visitors at present than they were, still I really have too much else to do ordinarily!”
So worried was Lance’s expression that Teresa relented.
“You might tell me what you have on your mind. If you don’t wish to, why, I do know where Dorothy is. She and Tory Drew and Louise and little Lucy rowed over to the other side of the lake, not far off. If you are in a hurry you can take the other canoe and join them. It will require less time than walking around the shore and I’ll go with you if you’d like to have me come.”
Lance flushed.
“You will think I am rude I am afraid, Teresa, but it is rather a private matter I want to talk over with Dorothy, so if you don’t object I’ll row over alone. Some other time you and I——”
The girl shrugged her shoulders.
“Oh, it does not make any difference,” she returned, and began humming a gay little tune and playing more softly.
As he entered the silver canoe and started paddling across the shallow lake Lance regretted his decision. His was a nature not so uncommon as people suppose. He disliked hurting people in small ways, in larger and more important ways he was apparently indifferent.
He liked Teresa and thought her extremely pretty.
After all, Dorothy would not be alone, although they could go off somewhere nearby together. Yet Lance knew he would not particularly object to the presence of Louise Miller and Tory Drew.
No difficulty arose in discovering the group of girls. Before Lance shoved his boat from the shore he observed them at a point about three-quarters of the way down the opposite shore. He could not distinguish one from the other nor tell the exact number.
As he approached nearer he observed that Tory was seated with an easel in front of her, and at a short distance away Lucy was posing. The other girls were not in sight.
So intent was Tory upon her work that she did not see Lance until he was within a few yards. Then he called out to her, and Lucy, glad of a chance to change her position, ran down to meet him.
They came up hand in hand.
“Not so bad, Tory, for a girl, and one no older than you!” Lance murmured, staring at the drawing of the youthful artist, his brows drawn into a fine line, half of criticism, half envy.
Donald and Dorothy McClain and most of her younger companions would have felt only enthusiastic admiration for Tory’s work. Had they known, Lance’s attitude was more flattering. He expected more of Tory’s ability than the others knew how to expect.
She shook her head.
“This is my third attempt, Lance, to make a picture of Lucy that I shall be willing to submit to the judges in our Council or show father. I can’t try again, we are going away from camp so soon. Now and then I think this may do, and at others I am discouraged. I must not talk about myself. How did you happen to turn up here? Are you looking for Dorothy? I hope there is nothing the matter, you are so serious.”
Before it became necessary for Lance to reply a voice interrupted him.
Overhearing the conversation, Dorothy and Louise Miller, who had not been far away, were returning.
With an unexpected display of affection, Dorothy McClain, not accustomed to showing her emotions, put her arm through her brother’s and held tight to him.
“What are you doing not in your Scout uniform, Lance? We were just saying that it was too dreadful to think that our summer camping days in Beechwood Forest would soon be a thing of the past. Nevertheless, I will be kind of glad to return to my own family. Tory and Ouida and I have been making all sorts of plans for the winter. You must help us with some of them, Lance, you and Don.”
“Afraid I won’t be able to, Dorothy,” Lance answered in an odd voice.
The three girls studied him more intently.
Lucy, seldom interested in the conversation of older persons, had wandered away and was throwing pebbles into the clear water.
“Why not, Lance? You are not usually unaccommodating, and though you may consider you are wasting your valuable time to spend any of it with girls, you won’t count Tory and Ouida and me with the others?”
“I won’t be at home next winter, Dorothy, at least I think not. I came out to camp this afternoon to have a private conversation withyou, but if Ouida and Tory won’t be bored I don’t mind if they hear what I wish to say. Perhaps if you don’t see things my way to the extent I want you to, they may help me.”
Dorothy looked frightened. “Oh, Lance! What in the world are you going to propose? Please don’t ask me to take your part if you have been having an argument with father. I may not think you are in the right. Suppose we have afternoon tea before you tell us anything. We brought the tea things over in the canoe and Ouida and I have been collecting the materials for a fire.”
Doggedly Lance shook his head.
“No, it will take more than a half hour before the water can possibly boil. I can’t wait so long.
“I have had an argument with father, Dorothy. I don’t see how you managed to guess. I went in to see him yesterday and stayed all night at home. We talked until after midnight. I am going back home now after I have confided in you, so I did not care to wear my uniform.”
As if she suddenly had grown tired, Dorothy seated herself on the ground, Lance standing above and staring down at her an eager, appealing light in his brown eyes.
Embarrassed by their own position, Tory and Louise were moving away when a swift inclination of Lance’s hand beckoned them to remain.
“I want you to stay, please do. I believe Dot is going to be difficult. I did not think so when I came out to talk things over with her. She is always claiming that I am her favorite brother yet when it comes to a test she is far oftener on any one’s side than mine.”
“That is not because I do not care for you but because I feel you are often wrong, Lance, and for your own sake I am obliged to differ with you,” Dorothy answered, as if she were on the defensive.
“Oh, well, all right, here goes. Perhaps I am wrong again,” Lance returned. “Nevertheless you and father might as well understand that I am in earnest and sooner or later mean to have my way.”
At this instant Lance sat down beside his sister, Tory and Ouida following his example, but a few feet away as if they were interested but reluctant.
Persuasively Lance placed his arm around his sister.
“Dot, does it ever occur to you that a fellow may have a right to his mistakes? The restof my family is so almighty sensible that if I am never to be allowed to have my own way I’ll never learn anything.
“Do you remember about two weeks ago when Mr. Fenton talked to us about the Greek spirit? He said that to him it represented, beauty, adventure and freedom.”
Dorothy sighed.
“Dear me, Lance, I was afraid at the time you might take Mr. Fenton’s speech personally! What are you planning to do in quest of beauty, freedom and adventure?”
Dorothy’s expression was worried but amused, and Lance flushed. Upon only one subject was he particularly sensitive, his devotion to music and his own lack of any knowledge of it.
In a measure his sister could surmise something of what he had in mind.
“My effort was not to be a very serious one, Dot,” he said slowly; “at least I did not feel it go until after my talk with father. He seems to have gone up in the air. I don’t want to spend next winter in Westhaven. I simply can not endure any longer never having music lessons from any one who knows how to teach and not even hearing any music worth listening to.”
Lance set his teeth.
“I don’t ask anyone to understand, you can’t if you try.”
Dorothy’s blue eyes grew more troubled.
“I know, Lance, but I do try,” she returned. “And I would give anything, make any sacrifice I knew how to make if father were willing or had the money to send you to New York to study. But he is not willing and he has not the money.”
“I know, that is just it. I don’t mean to ask him for money. I have been writing letters to people in New York and trying to get work and now I have succeeded in landing something that will give me enough to live on, so you won’t have to worry.”
“But, Lance, there is school. You are only fifteen and you can’t stop school, it is even against the law. You must have pretended you were older.”
“I can go to school at night when I have finished working; I explained this to father,” Lance argued patiently.
“What about the music? When will you have money or time for lessons?” Tory interrupted, not intending to intrude upon the discussion, but in her interest forgetting her resolution.
A little less self-confident Lance appeared.
“Honestly, I don’t know, Tory,” he replied. “I think I feel that if once I get where music is, the opportunity will come to me as rain and sunshine come to trees and the things that need them. Gee whiz, I am talking like a poet or a girl! Father would not think this line of conversation convincing. You’ll think up a better line of argument, won’t you Dorothy? Then when your time comes and you want something a whole lot I’ll do my best for you.”
“But, Lance, I—” Dorothy hesitated—“I don’t want you to go away from home; I don’t think it best for you. You ought to wait several years anyhow. You are not strong and you’d be ill. You don’t believe it, but father cares more for you than for the rest of us because you are more like mother. Please put things off a while longer in your own mind. Truly, father will not consent for the present.”
Lance got up.
“All right, Dorothy, don’t say anything to father on the subject. If you try to do your best for me what you really think will be plain enough. I am sorry to have interrupted you; I’m off.”
Nor would Lance remain in spite of the pleading of his sister and friends.
Disconsolately they watched the slender figure in the canoe push away from shore.
Afterwards they made no pretence of cheerfulness. Tory would not return to her drawing; Dorothy was too depressed even to assist in making tea.
An hour later they were on the way back to their own camp.
CHAPTER XIXLETTERS
Mr. Jeremy Hammond personally conducted the search.
The evergreen cabin had been erected without foundation save a number of cross beams. There was no cellar except one a few feet square under the small room that served as a kitchen. The logs that upheld the old house were singularly free from decay.
Standing upon one of them, a line of Girl Scouts on either side of him, Mr. Hammond gazed downward with an air of discouragement.
“I am obliged to confess I see no place that gives one a right to believe we shall discover a secret treasure,” he remarked. “I am glad Kara is unaware of our effort. I was wrong in speaking to her on the subject. I suppose I am hopelessly romantic and have been cherishing the idea of some day discovering further information about the little girl I rescued a number of years ago. We shall find nothing here.”
Tory touched him on the arm.
“Please, Mr. Hammond, don’t let us start out upon our search in such a hopeless spirit. I feel as you say you do about Kara. Ever since I met her I have been convinced we would learn that she had a delightful background of some kind, which would explain why she is so brave and charming.”
Mr. Hammond smiled.
“No, Tory, I cannot go so far as you. I have never anticipated so much. Besides, I do not consider it necessary. Personality is the strongest force in the world, not the question of one’s immediate ancestors. I am not decrying the ancestors, only if one possesses an unusual personality it may come from further back in the stream of life and the stream was the same for us all in the beginning.
“I have merely hoped to come across a clue which might give Kara an idea of her parentage, or perhaps, a relative who would be kind and interested in her.”
Tory looked disappointed.
“Kara has plenty of people who are interested in her, and friends may be as satisfactory as relatives.” In this sentiment Mr. Hammond may or may not have agreed. Already he had commenced tapping on the logs with the end of his cane and diggingunderneath in any stray spot that he hoped might develop into the receptacle of a box or treasure of some kind.
The girls went about upon their own quests. Unfortunate that there was no greater amount of space, no secret chambers and passages to be investigated. This would have lent a glamour, a romance that nothing about the little evergreen cabin afforded.
An hour and the exploration became of necessity over.
Nothing of any interest had been unearthed.
Disconsolately Mr. Hammond seated himself upon an upturned stool. A few of the Girl Scouts clustered about him; the others unwilling to give up, were still poking about in unlikely places.
Alone Tory Drew’s original ardor continued unquenched.
All day she had a vision of herself going to Kara at the old Gray House with information that would bring a new happiness into the clear gray eyes grown so wistful in these weeks of a summer time they had thought to be so happy.
No one place had been more thoroughly searched than the corners of the old brick fireplace that divided the living room and the kitchen with a single chimney.
Yet kneeling down once more Tory began a last search, poking about into impossible crannies.
Exhausted, she finally surrendered. No reward was to be theirs, and they had only been wasting valuable energy and time.
Nevertheless Tory did not feel in the mood for discussing this obvious fact with the others.
Near the old fireplace was a small collection of loose bricks. Arranging them into a low square Tory seated herself, leaning her head against the left corner of the chimney.
Suddenly she had a sensation of dizziness. Her head seemed to be swimming from the fatigue perhaps and the disappointment of her futile search.
She straightened, biting her lips and wondering why she was not more physically uncomfortable than she felt herself to be.
Then hearing a crumbling noise behind her, Tory turned her eyes. The bricks against which her head had been resting had been loosened. She had not been dizzy, the movement had taken placein them.
Picking up a stick that lay beside her feet she thrust it idly inside a tiny crevice.
Actually by this time Tory had lost interest in what had been an ardent enthusiasm earlier in the day.
She was excited, however, when a brick, displaced from its former position, tumbled to the ground, yet for the moment uttered no exclamation that might attract attention.
Thrusting her hand into the opening she tugged at another brick. The exertion was unnecessary. It yielded at once to her touch. Two other bricks were as easily removed.
Tory then discovered a hollow opening several feet deep.
There was nothing visible inside; the space appeared dark and empty.
Then Tory did call out and Mr. Hammond and the group of Girl Scouts crowded close about her.
“Would you mind thrusting your hand inside and seeing if there is anything stored away? I don’t think it very nice of me to ask you because I am afraid of touching something spooky or clammy. Do you mind?”
Apparently Mr. Hammond did not object. Unmindful of his coat sleeve, he was thrusting the entire length of his arm into the hollow recess.
“I wonder if this was not a Dutch oven that was covered over when it failed to be used. In that case I may find a petrified loaf of bread or pumpkin pie,” Mr. Hammondremarked in a slightly ironical tone, bored by this time.
An instant later his expression altered sufficiently for the group of girls watching to become conscious of the change. The next he drew forth a small package of letters tied together with a worn cord.
Were they of the remotest interest or value?
No one could say. At least the audience was willing to offer them the benefit of an investigation.
Joan Peters went away to her tent, returning with a candle.
If there was anything else inside the dark enclosure the lighted candle would show it forth.
Except for the letters the recess was empty.
Mr. Hammond continued to hold the packet and stare at it.
“Don’t you think you had best open the letters and read what they say?” Tory asked restlessly, wishing that Mr. Hammond would give her the opportunity. After all, she had been the real discoverer, even if her hands had not first touched the yellowed papers. Perhaps they would contain thrilling information for Kara. She might be an heiress or possessed of a more romantic heritage.
Mr. Hammond appeared doubtful.
“I don’t know; I don’t feel as if I were at liberty to open the letters. I have no authority and they can have no association with me. Perhaps I had best speak first to Dr. McClain and then take them to Kara.”
“But, Mr. Hammond,” Dorothy McClain protested, “why should you conclude that a small package of letters discovered in the way that we have come across these can have any connection with Katherine Moore? The letters may have been thrust into the old fireplace to burn and been forgotten. Surely there can be no objection to your looking over them first! Then you may be able to decide to whom they should be presented. After all, the little evergreen cabin belongs to our Troop of Girl Scouts. Mr. Fenton bought the place and gave it to us. You have our permission. Besides, we would like to look at the letters with you. I am so excited I really cannot endure to wait any longer.”