CHAPTER XV
A FLITTING
On an orthodox June morning, rare and radiant, but verging on a heat which increased Miss Lacey's appreciation of her happy destiny, she turned the key of her house.
Her carpets were rolled up, and her curtains rolled down; her thin, worn, solid silver was packed in a neighboring attic. Nothing portable of any value was left for a marauding hand, and, moreover, the neighbors on both sides always willingly kept an eye on Miss Martha's interests. They rejoiced generously in that summer work of hers, which she assured them was just play. One summer, several years ago, it had been generally known among Miss Lacey's friends that she had been ailing for some time. Judge Trent was abroad that season, and he made a suggestion to Thinkright, which resulted in an invitation to Miss Martha to visit the Mill Farm. It was then that she made the acquaintance of Edna Derwent, who, when the girl came to need a companion in her playhouse, remembered the smart, stirring woman who had been so happy in the peace and quiet of the locality. The result was several summer outings for Miss Martha, and she never knew that she owed them to the man with whom she had just missed spending her life.
Serene in the safety of her niece, and of her goods, and in the prospect before her, she waited at the station for the train to Portland. Her gray lisle-thread gloves were new, so was her tissue veil and her straw hand-bag. She was conscious that she looked genteel, and her mental sky was as cloudless as the firmament above her while she watched the train draw into the station. She scanned each platform as the cars slowly passed, and soon her search was rewarded by the sight of Miss Derwent's brown-clothed figure and the eyes that laughed a response to the eager face below. Miss Martha trotted briskly up the steps.
"Here you are, my dear. What a day! Did you remember to send that grocery list to Shaw's? Did Jenny come? Oh, yes. There she is. How do you do, Jenny?" greeting Edna's cook, whose stolid rosy face gazed from the chair opposite the one to which Miss Derwent led her friend.
All the way to Portland Miss Martha's tongue kept pace with the velocity of the train. The one subject upon which it halted was her niece. She longed to know all that Edna could tell her, but she hesitated to reveal how slight was her own knowledge.
She cleared her throat before speaking tentatively.
"Judge Trent tells me you saw my niece at the farm."
"Yes, indeed," replied Edna. "I begged her to stay long enough for me to have the pleasure of bringing you together, but she felt that she couldn't do so."
Miss Lacey flushed. "Oh, we've met, you know," she replied.
"Indeed? I didn't understand, then."
"Oh, certainly. Of course I met her in Boston when she came on from the West. Judge Trent,"—Miss Martha swallowed and moved uneasily,—"it wasn't exactly convenient for him to go into the city that day. He's just now been up to the farm to see Sylvia,—and of coursemyvisit with her was very hurried and—unsatisfactory." Miss Martha swallowed the obstacle in her throat again, whatever it was. She had a vague idea that her conscience was rising in revolt against the impression she was endeavoring to make. She was wont to say that some folks might have consciences that spoke in still small voices, but that hers was the yelling kind. On this occasion she repressed it firmly, although the effort reddened her cheeks still further. Conscience or no conscience there were moments when consideration for the proprieties should be paramount.
She continued: "Possibly Sylvia told you that she was still convalescing from a severe illness when she was called upon to pass through the sorrow of losing her dear father,—a very artistic, unpractical soul, my poor brother,—and really it was a mercy the judge had the farm to send her to. Thinkright was of course ready to take her, as he is for every good word and work, and it has turned out so well. He and she have taken the greatest fancy to one another"—
"Then is she there still?" asked Edna, as Miss Lacey paused for a hasty selection of further detail.
"Yes, indeed. We shouldn't think of allowing her to leave, and," very confidentially, "I don't know whether you ever heard of the romance of Thinkright's life?"
Edna shook her head. Miss Martha nodded hers impressively. "Yes. Sylvia's mother. Mh'm. There's something quite touching about this outcome. He seems to consider that he has almost adopted Sylvia,—that she belongs to him."
Edna gave a little exclamation. "Any girl would be fortunate to belong to Thinkright," she returned.
"Yes, indeed. He's a good man, and the judge and I feel perfectly easy"—Miss Martha used that form of speech with subtle satisfaction—"to leave her with him. Of course we're three lone, lorn people, and Thinkright's less closely related to the child than we; but neither the judge nor I would feel it right"—here conscience reared until it threatened to stop her speech altogether. "Will you wait till your advice is asked?" she demanded in fierce, silent parenthesis. Then with a vigorous swallow she finished her sentence,—"feel it right to take her away from him."
Miss Martha leaned back in her chair flushed and guiltily content. She had made her impression, and she was willing to pay for it with vigils if necessary.
"The girl certainly couldn't be in a better place for either mind or body," returned Edna thoughtfully, looking out the window; "but I wonder, since you tell me this, why the evening I was there she was so insistent about going away."
Miss Martha recalled vaguely a quotation concerning the swiftness with which a start in deceit becomes a tangled web.
"You see, she wasn't real well," she returned, "and I suppose she had fancies; but I'm expecting to find her settled and happy by this time. She certainly would be excusable if she was a little notional and restless at first." Then with one deep breath she changed the subject. "I wonder, Edna, if we're going to need a new cook stove this summer?"
Miss Derwent rose to the fascinating bait. She considered it enchanting to live in a house where she could be acquainted with the cook stove; and Miss Martha felt that she had sheered off the thin ice upon solid ground at last.
Arriving in Portland, they took a carriage and drove about, attending to their list of errands, in that charmed air which makes the procession of doctors' signs which lines Congress Street appear an incomprehensible paradox to the exultant, anticipating summer folk.
At last the little party boarded the island steamer, and though a light fog blew in from the sea, it failed to dampen the spirits of Miss Derwent and her chaperon. Even Jenny, the cook, drew a blanket shawl around her, and remained on deck. There was a certain stalwart fisherman at Hawk Island whose image had not been blotted out by the pale suitors of her winter.
The deep roar of the breakers below Anemone Cottage had been wont to have a depressing effect on Mrs. Derwent, and was one of the chief causes of the devout relief she experienced in bidding a permanent farewell to Hawk Island. The green field which lay at the back of the house, in front billowed across to masses of rock leading sixty feet downward to the bottle-green water, churned at this point into a constant unrest by its never ceasing attack upon the gray confusion of points and ledges.
Calm as the sea might be, it never fell entirely quiet here; and as the wind and tide rose, the seething and spouting of foam and spray whitened the entire coast, the rising and bursting of the breakers being accomplished with a thunderous booming which was inspiring music in Miss Derwent's ears.
To-day Benny Merritt was at the wharf with a carriage to meet the newcomers, and he drove them to the cottage under a running fire of questions from Miss Derwent, to which his slow drawl replied with relish.
Miss Lacey was a necessary accompaniment to Miss Derwent, and she therefore dwelt in a reflected light, which made her fussy catechisms and exactions endurable.
"Oh, hear it, hear it!" cried Edna, as the horse pulled up the green ribbon road which led to the cottage. "It's always high tide when I come. I'm the luckiest girl in the world. Hear it, Miss Lacey."
"How can I help hearing it?" returned Miss Martha mildly.
"Isn't it superb!" insisted Edna, looking over the miles of rocking blue as though for the first time.
"Oh, yes, I don't mind it. That is, yes, indeed, it is splendid, Edna. Benny, why haven't you taken off those back shutters?"
Miss Derwent laughed softly. Miss Martha often told people that the surf did not affect her at all disagreeably, and Edna's experience had taught her to appreciate this. After all, it was a good thing to have some one about who could think of shutters, even though the fog had drawn back to a low, smoke-colored fold that softly encircled the horizon, and the gulls were cresting the waves with their white wings.
CHAPTER XVI
EVOLUTION
It was only when they had guests at the Mill Farm that a seven o'clock breakfast was served, and as yet Sylvia was accounted one of that privileged class. Thinkright had asked her when she arrived at what hour it was her custom to breakfast, and she had shrugged her shoulders.
"Father and I never liked to take it before nine o'clock," she said, "but it made the landlady so cross that when we owed for board we usually tried to get down by half past eight."
Thinkright smiled at this. "Here you can go to bed earlier," he returned. "We will try breakfast at seven o'clock." Sylvia looked somewhat aghast, and it was not for some time that she discovered what a concession had been made in her favor.
One morning, a fortnight after Judge Trent's visit, she came out on the stone step at the kitchen door to scent the morning, while Mrs. Lem scoured the cooking dishes.
Cap'n Lem came along. His red face with its white fringe beamed kindly upon her under the old straw hat.
"Wall, now, you're lookin' smaht, Sylvy," he said, as he paused. "Beginnin' to look real kind o' sassy and rosy. I guess they use ye pretty well here." His shrewd blue eyes twinkled at her, and he gave a sharp nod of satisfaction. "Shouldn't wonder if you'd be gittin' up in the mornin' some o' these days."
"Oh, I do," replied Sylvia. "It's no trouble for me any more. Mrs. Lem let me make the coffee this morning, and we all sat down at seven o'clock promptly. Where were you? I don't believe I've seen you at breakfast since I've been here."
The old man's shoulders heaved in his toothless laugh. "Seven o'clock," he said scornfully. "Yew look through a knot-hole in your floor any mornin' when it's handy to four o'clock and yew'll see my breakfast doin's."
Sylvia opened her eyes, genuinely bewildered. "But why do you want to get up in the night?" she asked.
"Night!" he repeated. "What ye talkin' abaout? It's jest the hahnsomest time o' the hull day. I git up to go to the pound, o' course."
"The pound?" Sylvia stared in wonder. "Do you lose cows every day?"
"Cows! What ye talkin' abaout?"
"Why, you said pound. That's for lost cows and dogs, isn't it?"
Cap'n Lem stared a moment, and then cackled merrily.
"So 'tis, some places," he answered. "Geewhitaker! I must tell Lucil that!" His eyes disappeared. When he could open them again he went on: "I never give a thought to that afore. My pound's a net aout in the fishin' ground; an' I go an' haul it every mornin'."
"Oh, may I go with you some time?" asked Sylvia eagerly.
"Sure ye kin." Cap'n Lem slapped his leg and burst forth again. "Haw, haw, haw, Sylvy. Mebbe we'll find some lost sea cows and dogfish caught out there. No knowin'. Well, anyway, I'm glad to see sech a change come over a gal in a few weeks as there has over you. Yes, indeed, you'll be gittin' up in the mornin' some day. It beats all how folks kin stay in bed. I've took garden sass to the Derwents' to Hawk Island, and I've found 'em eatin' breakfast at half past eight. Why, it's jest as easy fer us to git up as 'tis for the cawtage folks to lay."
"Do you mean to say that everybody would get up here if it weren't for me?" asked Sylvia disconcerted.
"Wall, Thinkright's allers done his chores afore he sits down with yer; but Lucil, she's kind o' cawtage folks-y in her feelin's. When my woman was alive I allers did git my own breakfast anyway, and let her lay as long as she wanted, and so I do Lucil. Jes' as like as not she lays till half past five o'clock."
"Well, probably it's because you go to bed so early that it's easy for you."
"No, I don't," replied Cap'n Lem promptly. "Lots o' times when I've had a real wearin' day I feel like settin' up to rest in the evenin'. Time an' ag'in I hain't shet my eyes afore nine o'clock."
Sylvia's small teeth gleamed in her prettiest smile. After all, what was the difference between dining at seven and retiring at eleven, and supping at five o'clock, as they always did at the Mill Farm, and retiring at nine?
"Well, I think it's my duty to make you and my cousin Thinkright more lazy," she said.
The old man shook his head. "I don't cal'late to call myself lazy s'long's I don't git one o' these here motor boats fer fishin'. Let a man use one o' them three years, and by that time he's got to hev an automobile to git from the house to the boat. They're a good thing fer religion though, 'cause they make a man so mad he can't swear. I'm lazy to what I used to be," continued Cap'n Lem after a meditative pause, "when I used to fish all day and then row all night in a calm to git the ketch to market. Tell ye that wuz workin' twenty-five hours out o' the twenty-four; and when a man does that he 'd ought to git a life-sentence, and if he outlives it he'd ought to be hung." The speaker took off his hat and fanned himself. "It's a-goin' to be some scaldin' to-day, Sylvy."
The girl laughed. "Then when I carry the milk down cellar I shall stay there. It's so funny to have the cellar under the parlor as it is here."
"'Tis out o' the common, but the ground was so shoal at the kitchen end it hed to be dug that way. Judge Trent hed that cellar made. I visited him once to Seaton. Did he ever tell ye?"
"No."
"Well, you'd better believe, he and Miss Lacey they jest hove to, and gave me the best time I ever"—
"Sylvy!" Mrs. Lem's voice sounded from within. "You can come now. The water's as hot as Topet and we can begin."
Thinkright had taken an early start that morning with the team. Sylvia would have liked to go with him, but he explained that he had to bring back a cumbersome load and needed all the room in the wagon.
Her talks with him were ushering her farther and farther each day into a new world. Even his silences were so full of peace and strength that she loved to be with him. She found herself gaining a consciousness of that peace,—a faith in the care of a Father for His children which was the motive power of Thinkright's life. That she had found her cousin, and been guided to him, was to her an undoubted proof and corroboration of much that Thinkright told her. She looked back upon the idle, discontented girl of the boarding-house in Springfield with wonder and perplexity that such a state of mind could have existed for her. She had impulsive longings to have her father back that she might help him as she had never known how to do; and then came the thought, so quietly but persistently instilled by Thinkright, that the beam in her own eye need be her only care, for by the riddance of all wrong consciousness in herself good would radiate to her environment, and that her father was being taken care of.
From the first moment of yielding her heart and thought to Thinkright's influence the eagerness of her nature made her long to show him quickly—at once—that she would not be vain, would not be selfish, would be humble, would arrive at that state which would cause her cousin to say of her as he had of Edna Derwent, "She does some very good thinking."
The impulse led her to offer help to Mrs. Lem, which, being accepted, Sylvia found herself making beds, wiping dishes, and weeding a flower garden; and her industry so astonished herself that she wondered that those about her could take it so calmly. Her previous life had consisted of more or less definite yearnings for good times. These "good times" had consisted in an occasional dance or visit to the theatre, and had been the oases in a dull life of idleness varied only by occasional hours when she would pick up her father's materials, and, without permission, would work on one of his unfinished pictures, or else make lively sketches of his friends, to his unfailing amusement.
"I wish you'd be serious over it, Sylvia," he used to say at such times. "There isn't a bit of doubt that some day I should be able to point to you with pride."
Upon which his daughter would be likely to respond that neither of them belonged to the laboring class, and he could not contradict her.
While she was still very young he had perceived her talent, and from time to time in his desultory fashion had instructed her. There were those among his friends who endeavored to rouse his ambition for the girl, but he had not the force to combat her hereditary objection to work, and he always shrugged away their pleas.
"Sylvia's bound for a matrimonial port, anyway," he used to say. "With her face she'll make that harbor fast enough. It would only be throwing money away to start her on a career."
He had made similar speeches often in her hearing, and she recalled them now as with clearer vision she looked out upon life and peered wistfully into the possible vistas of her future.
When her father had seen his end approaching with swiftness, and the realization came that his pretty child was unprepared to meet the world, he had said a good word for his actor friend, as the most practical and substantial admirer on Sylvia's list; and this she remembered, too, with a great wave of gratitude for deliverance.
The Mill Farm abounded in spots which tempted one to live out of doors. There was the tall pine with its mystical whispered songs. Thinkright had swung a hammock from one of its branches since Judge Trent's visit. From beneath its shade was no view of the sea, but one could lie there and listen to the rhythmic murmur of the waves answering the strains of an Æolian harp which Thinkright's clever hands had fashioned and placed in the shadow of the upper branches. There Sylvia took the books which her cousin gave her to study, and read and study she did, despite the temptation to day-dreaming. Little by little, by gentle implications, Thinkright had conveyed to her that there was to be no thought of her leaving him; and her love moved her strongly to do his bidding and win his approval.
"He doesn't do it for my sake. He does it for God and mother," she reflected, as often as some new proof of his thought for her appeared. Little hints of the old yearnings to be admired, to be paramount, flashed up through her new-found humility at times, but they grew fainter with each discovery of her own ignorance, and her mental world enlarged; and in this inner realm she always found two ideals reigning, a prince and a princess,—John Dunham and Edna Derwent. They were beings who breathed a rarer air than she had ever known. All that was fine in her leaped to a comprehension that the more she developed, the more she should value that in their experience which at present was a sealed book to her. She always classed them together resolutely in her thought. It was a species of self-defense which she had begun to employ from the moment of mental panic which ensued upon Miss Derwent's mention of Dunham's name.
Sylvia had read countless novels, for her father had been insatiate of them; but she had been so confident of her own charm, and so busily engaged in picturing the manner in which she should discourage or make happy her suitors, that the possibilities of her own active heart-interest had not absorbed much of her thought. The coming of John Dunham into her life had changed all that. In a moment of high and sensitive excitement he had dawned upon her vision as a novel type of manhood, and one representing all that was desirable. In vain she knew the superficiality of this judgment. In vain she reasoned her ignorance of him and his character. He had captivated her imagination, and this was the reason that Edna Derwent, as soon as she mentioned him, loomed to Sylvia's stirred thought in the light of a dangerous foe. Edna's very invincibility, however, aided Sylvia's final capitulation to Thinkright. There was neither reason nor comfort for her in desiring to rival the finished and all-conquering Miss Derwent. Thinkright held out the hope that she could alter her own thought; change that sore and miserable consciousness to one where reigned the beauty of peace. Never since that night of bitterness had she strayed from the path which her new light revealed. Judge Trent's visit removed the last doubt as to her remaining with Thinkright, and she knew that if the Mill Farm were to be her home neither Miss Derwent nor Mr. Dunham would remain a stranger to her. Then it became doubly necessary for her to think right concerning them. They had not met for years until this summer; and now there could surely be but one result from their meeting again. So they stood, equal and preëminent, prince and princess of Sylvia's mental realm, and there she meant to let them reign; meant to rejoice in their happiness, and never to permit herself to dream one dream of this ideal man which could not pass under the espionage of Edna's bright eyes.
CHAPTER XVII
THE ROSY CLOUD
Another spot which was a favorite with Sylvia was out beyond the sheltered shores of the basin and the Tide Mill, on the point of land where the open waters of Casco Bay stretched toward the neighboring islands. Here the fir trees were small and huddled together in groups to withstand the buffeting of winter winds; and here Sylvia sat within a rocky nest she knew, during many a happy solitary hour, watching the sword-fishers go out or return, and the smaller mackerel boats flit lightly on their way.
On days when the great waters were gray and racked from storm, she saw, in their turbulence and moaning, pictures of what her life might have been, and then likened it to the quiet embowered waters of the basin, where Thinkright's love held her safe. To feel gratitude was a novel sensation to Sylvia, born with her new life. She could not remember ever having been grateful for anything until she met her cousin.
The afternoon of this day when he had gone alone to town in the farm-wagon she took her books and sought this rocky nest. There was a steady sailing wind, and she wished for Thinkright, who often took her out with him. Placing behind her back the calico-covered cushion she had brought, she sank into her niche and opened her book, but immediately her eye was allured and caught by the view, and again there swept over her a longing, that for weeks had been increasing, to capture this loveliness and make it her own. The general awakening of her thought had long since banished the indifference with which during the first days at the Mill Farm she had viewed its surroundings. In place of apathy now there dwelt a craving to exercise the power which she felt was hers; to paint some of these ever changing, alluring phases of sea and sky whose beauty possessed her very soul.
She longed unspeakably for materials for the work, and mourned that she had not gathered whatever among her father's shabby, neglected belongings might be useful, and brought them with her. She recalled carefully all that had ever been said seriously of her talent. A burning regret for neglected opportunities and a burning desire to make up for lost time now possessed her. She fluttered the leaves of the book in her lap. Out dropped pencil sketches of the Tide Mill and a gallery of the residents at the farm.
There was Cap'n Lem's straw hat shading the nose and chin which drew closer together as the kindly, toothless smile widened. There was Mrs. Lem's majestic pompadour and psyche knot, and the company expression which always dilated her nostrils. There was Minty, her round eyes staring, and her lips pursed; and there was—— No, Sylvia shook her head. There was not Thinkright. As she looked fondly and wistfully at the retreating hair and short beard, the horizontal lines in the brow and the deep-set eyes, she knew that what made her cousin's face precious was not to be conveyed by pencil or brush. Swiftly she turned the paper over, and taking her pencil, with a few sure, swift strokes sketched the back of a pair of slightly bent shoulders and a head revealing one ear and the line of the cheek.
"There," she sighed, smiling; "that's better. I know what I should see if he turned around." Then she sank back again, narrowed her eyes, and looked off at the skyline,—the distant dark clump of trees on Hawk Island; the nearer shore of Walrus Island; the ineffable sky. Oh, oh, for paints, for brushes, for paper,—in other words, for money! Health and strength were returning to her in full measure. What work was awaiting her? There was no room in Thinkright's universe for drones. He never referred to her becoming self-supporting, but it was a part of her new realization to see that a parasite could never be a healthy growth. She was not sure enough how much substantial worth was indicated by her talent to ask money from Thinkright for its development, and certainly there was no one else to whom she would turn. She reminded herself that right here came an opportunity to apply the trust and confidence that her guardian was teaching her. It was wrong to shiver under one shadow of doubt. The sun would not go out of its course to shine upon her, but she was beginning to know that an unfaithful consciousness was all that could prevent her coming into that place where it would shine upon her.
"If it is right, the way will open. If it isn't right, then you don't want it," was one of Thinkright's declarations; and for the rest she had only to keep her mental home clean and fragrant, wholesome and loving.
Sylvia's eyes rested on the graceful rolling billows advancing in stately procession from the black clump of trees on Hawk Island.
The Father's Love had brought Edna Derwent a summer of play because she needed it. The same love would bring Sylvia Lacey a season of work if that were best. If it were not right to ask Thinkright for the help for which she longed, then some other way would be provided. Supposing she could succeed in some artistic line! Supposing instead of being a dead weight upon her cousin, or at best an assistant to the housekeeper who had been all-sufficient without her, she were able to help him; really to help Thinkright as he grew older! The thought made her cheeks flush, and her eyes grew soft. She bit her lip and closed her eyes.
"Not to send one doubting thought into the world," she reminded herself. Then her thought arose. "Dear Father, Thou knowest my longing. Help me to know the nothingness of every barricade to thy light that I may receive what I need."
After a minute she looked up to see the waters foaming gently away from her nest. They never reached it except in a storm. At the same moment her eye caught a sailboat entering the broad path of water that led to the Tide Mill. She leaned forward to see the better, and recognized Benny Merritt. She noticed that he had a passenger, but the sail hid all but the woman's skirt from the watcher.
"Miss Derwent is coming to see us," thought Sylvia in a flash, and started to her feet. The tide was high enough for the boatman to go into the basin and land at the nearest point to the farm.
Not so. Benny steered his craft for the same rock-sheltered point where he had landed Miss Derwent the last time.
Sylvia ran along the shore toward them. "You can still get inside the basin," she called impulsively, not realizing that the possibilities of the locality were an old story to Benny. The latter looked up inquiringly toward the voice, but it was the passenger who replied, "No doubt we could, but we have to get out of the basin again, that's the trouble." With these words the speaker, a little woman in a shade hat, sprang up and scrambled ashore.
Sylvia paused. Why should she have supposed that the blue-eyed Benny never carried any passenger except Miss Derwent? This one wore a dress of dark blue denim, and her hat was tied securely under the chin by a ribbon which passed over its crown.
The stranger looked up from under its shade and peered at Sylvia through her eye-glasses, at first indifferently, and then with a start.
"Can this be Sylvia Lacey!" she exclaimed, hastening toward the bareheaded girl. Sylvia had caught up her books and pillow and now stood with her arms full, her color coming and going as she braced herself. All the scene in the hotel returned. The hurt and soreness clamored to be felt again. It was a moment of acute struggle. Before her eyes the Tide Mill rose, its closed shutters resolutely hugging past injuries and excluding the besieging sunlight that searched every crevice to pour in warmth and light.
Miss Martha read something of her niece's thoughts. She had undertaken this visit with dread, and the sudden encounter made her rather tremulous; but, above all things, Benny Merritt must suspect nothing.
"It's the very first day I could come over, my dear," she said hurriedly, "what with home cares and a rough sea; I'm not the best of sailors, but I've thought of you often. Now Benny," turning to him, "I'll be back at this very spot in one hour. I shan't fail, understand, so don't sail off anywhere, or else we shan't reach home in time for tea. Let us get over these rocks into the woods, Sylvia, and then I can take some of your traps. How well you are looking, my dear child."
The very voice was painful to her niece in its associations, but the girl followed as Miss Lacey briskly moved off into the woods before a word could be said to lead Benny into speculation.
Sylvia, while she followed, asked herself if her prayer had been aught beside empty words. Was she really desirous of proving the nothingness of all things that excluded the light? She seemed to see Thinkright looking straight into her eyes. What guests were trying to elbow their way into her mental home? As soon as they had reached the path her aunt turned. Sylvia spoke, and her tone was gentle.
"You needn't carry anything, Aunt Martha. I'm used to running about here loaded."
Miss Lacey glanced up at her quickly. That dark look which had at first met her recognition had now melted into light. There was no mistaking the girl's expression as they stood facing each other behind the shelter of a clump of firs.
"Oh, my dear, my dear!" exclaimed Miss Martha brokenly, grasping her niece's arms and gazing into her eyes, "I am very glad to see you."
"You were kind to come," returned Sylvia, and she kissed Miss Martha's cheek under the scooping hat. Then they walked on.
"What these few weeks have done for you, Sylvia! Perfect rest, good food, the best air in the world, regular hours and no care, ought to work a miracle when one is nineteen, and they have in you. If it hadn't been for those short curls of yours I shouldn't have recognized you at first."
They moved slowly along the path, and Sylvia asked for Miss Derwent.
"She's as happy as the days are long," declared Miss Lacey. "She told me to bring you back if I could."
"How kind. Thinkright will sail me over some day to call. He went to town this morning. I hope he'll not miss your visit altogether."
As soon as they had reached the clearing from which the farmhouse was visible Sylvia gave an exclamation of satisfaction. "There they are; there are the horses! He has come."
They could see the team taken out from the wagon, standing near the barn, their harness dangling while Thinkright and Cap'n Lem were stooping over some object which the wagon hid from the view of those below.
"Wouldn't you like to go and speak to him?" asked Sylvia.
Miss Martha looked at her curiously. The eager tone and the face all alight were eloquent. Well, Thinkright doubtless deserved it.
"Yes, let's go and see what they are working over."
Sylvia dropped her cushion, and the books on top of it, and the two hurried toward the barn.
Before the engrossed men perceived their approach Sylvia saw that it was a slender, graceful boat which was absorbing their attention. It was varnished within and without, the golden brown wood glinting in the sun. Two pairs of oars lay on the grass.
"Oh, Thinkright, what a beauty!" exclaimed Sylvia. The men looked up, smiling. "Here is Aunt Martha," added the girl.
"Just in the nick of time, Martha," said Thinkright, coming forward and shaking hands. "We've a beauty here to show you."
Miss Martha came forward to greet Cap'n Lem.
"Glad to see you back, Miss Marthy. What d'ye think o' this plaything, hey?"
"Why, I think itisa plaything!" returned Miss Lacey briskly. "What are you going to do with it, Cap'n Lem? Use it for an ornament on the lawn and plant flowers in it?"
"Wall, I guess I can't afford no sech a vase as that,—not till my ship comes in."
"But it's a mere toy for the ocean, as you say," rejoined Miss Martha. "Who would go out in that shell?"
"This child here," said Thinkright, while Sylvia's eyes grew more eager. "It's just the thing for the basin."
"Thinkright, you haven't bought me a boat!" the girl cried.
He shook his head and smiled. "No, not I. Your Uncle Calvin has sent you this."
"And if it hain't got the durndest name for a yaller bo't that ever I see," remarked Cap'n Lem.
"Yes," added Thinkright. "We're surprised at the name, for it is Judge Trent's own selection. It scarcely seems characteristic."
Sylvia and her aunt hurried around the other side of the little craft. In neat, small black letters was printed, The Rosy Cloud.
Sylvia gazed, then she colored to the roots of the silky curls and laughed. The others watched her curiously.
"Do you know what he was aiming at?" asked Thinkright.
"Yes," she nodded. "He was aiming high."
Miss Lacey kept her sharp eyes on the conscious young face, devoured with curiosity.
"Tell us the joke, Sylvia," she begged.
"It isn't a joke, it's earnest," returned the girl, and a warm feeling arose in her heart for the eagle-eyed man in the high hat. "Did you ever hear of anything so surprising, Thinkright, and so kind?"
"He told me he was going to order it when he went away," responded her cousin; then he turned toward Miss Lacey. "Calvin found this child of ours trying to learn to row in an old general utility tub I have down at the basin, and he thought she deserved better things."
The speaker looked at Sylvia, who came close to him and took hold of his hand, while she continued to look at her new possession.
It was Love expressed to her again; and the guest she had tried with gentleness to win, sweet Humility, sank deeper into her heart, and sent up a note of gratitude that she had not a few minutes ago tried to punish Aunt Martha by word or look and so embittered this moment.
"It's amazing, simply amazing in Calvin!" thought Miss Martha. "She must have bewitched him, and what could he have meant by 'The Rosy Cloud,' and why should she blush over it?"
Thinkright walked to the house with the visitor a few minutes later, while Cap'n Lem stayed to put up the horses and Sylvia lingered to examine her light oars.
"Calvin's outdone himself," remarked Miss Martha. "He must have taken a great fancy to her."
"It looks that way," responded Thinkright.
"And you don't know what he could possibly mean by that poetical name, do you?"
"I haven't an idea," returned her companion, well pleased that such was the case, for he could see that otherwise it might go hard with him.
"And I daresay you're quite as bewitched with her as Calvin," pursued Miss Lacey curiously.
"I'm under her little thumb, but luckily she doesn't know it," was the reply.
"Well, I think it's high time I came over to get acquainted with her myself," remarked Miss Martha.
"High time, Martha," returned Thinkright, smiling. "It's high time you got in the game."
CHAPTER XVIII
HAWK ISLAND
An hour later Miss Martha had the escort of her niece down to the shore again. She peered about alertly for a sign of her boatman.
"Now I told Benny that I shouldn't fail"—she began with annoyance. "Oh, there he is," for the top of the mast was visible beyond a farther jutting point of rock. "Benny!" she called. His hand appeared and waved a signal. "I suppose we shall have to go over there. I should like to know why he couldn't stay where I told him to. Benny," as they drew near enough to be heard, "you gave me a start for a minute. Why didn't you wait for me in that same place?"
Benny glanced toward Sylvia. "Thought yew mightn't care to squat on that rock all night," he drawled imperturbably.
"What do you mean? Oh—wasn't the tide right?"
"No; most likely it didn't hear what you said. Anyways, it didn't wait. It kep' on a-goin' down jest the same."
Miss Martha's lips drew in. "You absurd boy. Benny, this is my niece, another Miss Lacey; and Sylvia, this is Benny Merritt. We couldn't get along without him at the island; and now we must fly. How's the wind, Benny?"
"Pretty good chance; we'll have to beat some."
"Well, you mustn't let the boat tip," responded Miss Martha, as she crept gingerly along the slippery rocks, and helped by Sylvia jumped in and took her seat. "Don't fall so in love with The Rosy Cloud that you can't come to see us, Sylvia, and do be careful with your new toy. It doesn't look much more substantial than a cloud to me. Benny, lookout!" For the wind had seized the sail and flapped it noisily before it set firmly. The last words Sylvia caught were, "You are letting it tip now. You know I don't like it, Benny."
Sylvia laughed as she sprang up the bank. Even in this brief visit she had observed how habitually the uppermost thought in her aunt's mind effervesced into speech, and she saw how natural had been Miss Martha's lack of repression at Hotel Frisbie. She felt for Benny Merritt with his nervous passenger, but her sympathy was wasted. When Miss Lacey sailed alone with Benny she always kept up an intermittent stream of directions and suggestions to which the boy paid not the slightest attention.
"Doin' my best, Miss Marthy," he used to reply sometimes. "If ye say so I'll stop and let ye get out and walk."
Each time the boat had to come about for a new tack, necessitating the sail's passing over Miss Martha's head, the air was vibrant with her small shrieks and louder suggestions; but to-day, every time they settled down for the smooth run, a pensiveness fell upon her.
"The Mill Farm is looking real prosperous, Benny," she remarked during one of these calms.
"I s'pose so," returned the boy. "More folks comin' to the islands every summer. More folks to want their truck."
"Seems to me," observed Miss Martha, "I used to hear that things weren't very pleasant between the mainland folks and the islanders."
"Used to be so. Hated each other, I've heard my father say, but sence I've been a-growin' up things have changed. We've ben findin' out that they wasn't all potato vines, and they've ben findin' out that we ain't all fish scales. My father says Thinkright Johnson's at the bottom o' the change."
"Thinkright's a good man," returned Miss Martha, and with that she fell into pensive mood again until time for another acute moment of dodging the sail and coming about.
To think that in those few hours Judge Trent should have come to take such an interest in Sylvia. So her thoughts ran. Was it the girl's good looks, or was it simply that twinges of the judge's conscience had induced the wish to make theamende honorable, and that the gift of the expensive boat was an effort to reinstate the giver in his own eyes?
Something of an intimate nature must have passed between them. To what could "the rosy cloud" have reference which should bring such conscious color to Sylvia's softly rounded cheek?
Miss Lacey shook her head. "If I only had Thinkright's chance," she thought, "I'd find out; but men are so queer. Probably he won't make the least effort. Provoking!"
She was correct in her suspicion. Thinkright did not ask any questions. He suspected that the judge's interview with his niece might have brought to light some of her new ideas, and he knew the judge's opinion of all that class of thought which he termed transcendental; but however ironical might be the reference in the boat's name, he would not have gone to the trouble of having it lettered thereon without a kindly intent.
Thinkright was satisfied, and contented himself with building a small boathouse on the waterside for Sylvia's new possession. She was his constant companion during the work, and sat beside him on the grass while he sawed and hammered, waiting upon him whenever opportunity offered.
He missed an eagerness of enthusiasm which he would have expected in the girl regarding the handsome boat. He could not know how fervently she wished that Uncle Calvin had given her instead the money it had cost. She could not express this thought to her cousin for obvious reasons; but as she sat beside him on an old log she built air castles that grew faster than the little boathouse.
"There isn't anything too good to be true, is there, Thinkright?" she said to him during a pause one day.
He came over and took a seat beside her, wiping his lined brow with his handkerchief.
She looked at him wistfully. "I'm expecting something very good to happen to me," she added.
"That's right; and something has. How about The Rosy Cloud?"
She sighed, and leaned her head against her companion's blue cotton shoulder.
"It's beautiful. I shall have all sorts of fine times with it. Think of throwing a lot of cushions inside, and taking a good story, then rowing out into the middle of the basin to float and read. All the trees would be leaning forward and beckoning, and I shouldn't know which The Rosy Cloud would favor."
Thinkright clasped his knee. "The Tide Mill would do its share of beckoning, remember. Look out for the current."
"The poor old thing!" remarked Sylvia. "Sometimes the mill looks so dignified and pathetic that I sympathize with it, and then again it seems just sulky and obstinate."
"We're very apt to read our feelings into the landscape," returned the other.
"Yes," went on the girl, her eyes as she leaned on her cousin's shoulder resting on the deserted, weather-beaten building in the distance, "when I first came, my heart just yearned toward that old mill. It looked just as I felt. It had made up its mind never to forgive. I had made up my mind never to forgive. Love has opened my locked shutters, and do you know, Thinkright, some afternoons those closed mill blinds seem to be melting in the sun. They grow so soft and rosy, I watch them fascinated. It seems as if they were giving way and I find myself expecting to see them slowly turn back. Oh," impulsively, "I want them to turn back! Couldn't we get a ladder and row out there some day and climb up and open them?"
Thinkright smiled. "They're nailed tight, dear, and they don't belong to us."
Sylvia shook her head. "Well," she persisted whimsically, "I believe they will open some time. I shan't be content until they do; and somehow or other I shall be mixed up with it."
"Is that the good thing you are expecting?" asked Thinkright, smiling, "to become a house-breaker?"
"No. Love will open the shutters yet. You don't understand me."
"Nothing that Love should accomplish would surprise me in the least," was the response. "Well, what is your hope then,—the thing you referred to a few minutes ago?"
Sylvia's eyes looked across the water. "I'd better not tell you yet," she replied. "It isn't your problem. It's mine."
"Very well," agreed Thinkright. "Just keep remembering 'Thy will be done,'—His great Will for good. His great Will that all shall be on earth as it is in heaven; that all shall be good and harmonious; and then your own little will and its puny strength won't get in the way, and you will find yourself helping to carry out your Father's designs."
Sylvia took a deep breath. "That is what I want to do. Once I should have been so happy, so contented to float in my boat with cushions and a good story!"
"Well," Thinkright smiled, "I hope you're not going to lose that ability. It has its place."
Sylvia turned her curly head until she met his shining eyes. "I'm too strong now to play all the time," she said.
Her companion patted her arm. "Mrs. Lem says you are a regular busy bee."
"Yes, but she did perfectly well without me."
Her companion met her gaze for a silent moment and speculated as to what its gravity might mean.
"Are you thinking again of the stage, Sylvia?"
"No, no!" she exclaimed vehemently, for instantly a vision of Nat rose before her. "I"—she hesitated, looked out again to the water and back at her cousin. She was sorely tempted to tell him, but the old motive restrained her in time. That was not the way for the solution to come, merely by making herself a heavier tax upon Thinkright's simple fortunes.
"Then you have some definite idea of what you would like to do?" he asked.
His manner was quiet, but there was a note of mental exultation within him at the healthful symptom.
"Yes, but it isn't time yet to tell you of it."
He put his arm around her. "Very well. What more can we wish to be sure of than Omnipotence and Omnipresence. You know that it is only good that is constructive. Evil is destructive, and in the end even destroys itself. So long as you want only good you are safe in the everlasting arms and are blessed." The speaker changed his position and his tone.
"This is rest enough now for me, little girl. I must be up and doing, for we want to get that boat of yours out of dry dock."
It was about a week later that Sylvia made her first visit to Hawk Island. Thinkright sailed her over. It was the longest trip she had made by water, and the changing aspect of mainland and islands from each new viewpoint delighted her.
The landmark which most interested her was the dark clump of trees by which she had always distinguished Hawk Island. It began to spread and alter in form as they approached, until it became a low forest, cresting the hill which gradually rose some seventy feet above the water. At last they entered a still cove which made a natural harbor in the island's side, and there Thinkright moored his boat. As soon as they stepped out upon the shore Sylvia saw a girl hurrying toward them down the sloping grass, and waving her hand. She wore a short dark skirt and a white waist and no hat.
"We've been watching you with the glass," she said, greeting them. "Your note came last night. I'm so glad you had such a perfect morning."
Her cheeks were brown and her eyes danced with good cheer. "Why, Miss Sylvia, your aunt told me; yet I was not prepared to see such a change. There's nothing like Casco Bay, is there?"
Sylvia's gaze clung to the vivacious face, and she had a realization of the small part which time plays in our mental processes. It seemed to her that transforming years had passed since that evening when she shivered outside the door of the Mill Farm, and heard this same laughing voice within.
"Miss Lacey is watching for us." Edna took Thinkright's arm, and they began to walk up the path through a green meadow. Snowdrifts of daisies whitened the field. "The dear things are lasting so much longer than usual this year," said Edna, as Sylvia exclaimed over their charm. "We have the last of things out in this exposed spot, you see, and I think it's quite as pleasant as having the first of them the way you do in your sheltered nook."
The breeze freshened as they ascended, and at last they stood on the crest of the green ridge.
To the south of the island the pointed firs made a dark, irregular sky-line against the azure. Here there were no trees, nothing to obstruct the illimitable stretches of water and picturesque shore. It was a nearer and more overwhelming view of what had taken Sylvia's breath when she discovered the mighty sea on that first day, driving to the Mill Farm.
How far away seemed that day and the sore heart whose resentment embittered all the beauty; when her hand was against every man because she believed every man's hand to be against her.
As the three stood there, watching, in silence, Edna saw the blue eyes fill, and her heart warmed toward her guest, although she could not guess at the flood of feeling that forced those bright drops from their fountain.