Mistress Anne Part 24

And don't worry about _what_ I drank. It was white grape juice. Mrs.

Nancy won't have anything stronger.

Well, after that I ate, and didn't know what I ate, for everything seemed as dry as dust. I know my cheeks were red and that my eyes shone, and I smiled until my face ached. And all the while I watched Jimmie and Jimmie watched me, and pretty soon, Uncle Rod, I understood why Jimmie was there.

He was making love to Eve Chesley!

Making love is very different from being in love, isn't it? Perhaps love is something that Jimmie really doesn't understand. But he was using on Eve all of the charming tricks that he had tried on me. She is more sophisticated, and they mean less to her than to me, but I could see him bending toward her in that flattering worshipful way of his--and when he took one of her roses and touched it to his lips and then to her cheek, everything was dark for a minute. That kind of kiss was the only kind that Jimmie Ford ever gave me, but to me it had meant that he--cared--and that I cared--and here he was doing it before the eyes of all the world--and for love of another woman!

After supper he came around the table and spoke to me. I suppose he thought he had to. I don't know what he said and I don't care. I only know that I wanted to get away. I think it was then that Geoffrey Fox guessed. For when Jimmie had gone he said, very gently, "Would you like to go home? You look like your own little ghost, Mistress Anne."

But I had promised one more dance to Dr. Richard, and I wanted to dance it. If you could have seen at the table how he towered above Jimmie Ford.

And when he stood up to make a little speech in response to a toast from Dutton Ames, his voice rang out in such a--man's way. Do you remember Jimmie Ford's falsetto?

I had my dance with him, and then Geoffrey took me home, and all the way I kept remembering the things Dr. Richard had said to me, such pleasant friendly things, and when his mother told me "good-night" she took my face between her hands and kissed me. "You must come often, little Cynthia Warfield," she said. "Richard and I both want you."

But now that I am at home again, I can't think of anything but how Jimmie Ford has spoiled it all. When you have given something, you can't ever really take it back, can you? When you've given faith and constancy to one man, what have you left to give another?

The river is beginning to show like a silver streak, and a rooster is crowing. Oh, Uncle Rod, if you were only here. Write and tell me that you love me.

Your

LITTLE GIRL.

_In the Telegraph Tower._

MY VERY DEAR:

It is after supper, and Beulah and I are out here with Eric. He likes to have her come, and I play propriety, for Mrs. Bower, in common with most women of her cla.s.s, is very careful of her daughter. I know you don't like that word "cla.s.s," but please don't think I am using it sn.o.bbishly.

Indeed, I think Beulah is much better brought up than the daughters of folk who think themselves much finer, and Mrs. Bower in her simple way is doing some very effective chaperoning.

Eric is on night duty in the telegraph tower this week; the other operator has the day work. The evenings are long, so Beulah brings her sewing, and keeps Eric company. They really don't have much to say to each other, so that I am not interrupted when I write. They seem to like to sit and look out on the river and the stars and the moon coming up behind the hills.

It is all settled now. Eric told me yesterday. "I am very happy," he said; "I have been a lonely man."

They are to be married in June, and the things that she is making are to go into the cedar chest which her father has given her. He found it one day when he was in Baltimore, and when he showed it to her, he shone with pleasure. He's a good old Peter, and he is so glad that Beulah is to marry Eric. Eric will rent a little house not far up the road. It is a dear of a cottage, and Peggy and I call it the Playhouse. We sit on the porch when we come home from school, and peep in at the windows and plan what we would put into it if we had the furnishing of it. I should like a house like that, Uncle Rod, for you and me and Diogenes. We'd live happy ever after, wouldn't we? Some day the world is going to build "teacherages" just as it now builds parsonages, and the little houses will help to dignify and uplift the profession.

Your dear letter came just in time, and it was just right. I should have gone to pieces if you had pitied me, for I was pitying myself dreadfully.

But when I read "Little School-teacher, what would you tell your scholars?" I knew what you wanted me to answer. I carried your letter in my pocket to school, and when I rang the bell I kept saying over and over to myself, "Life is what we make it. Life is what we make it," and all at once the bells began to ring it:

"Life is--what we--make it-- Life is--what we--make it."

When the children came in, before we began the day's work, I talked to them. I find it is always uplifting when we have failed in anything to try to tell others how not to fail! Perhaps it isn't preaching what we practice, but at least it supplies a working theory.

I made up a fairy-story for them, too, about a Princess who was so ill and unhappy that all the kingdom was searched far and wide for some one to cure her. And at last an old crone was found who swore that she had the right remedy. "What is it?" all the wise men asked; but the old woman said, "It is written in this scroll. To-morrow the Princess must start out alone upon a journey. Whatever difficulty she encounters she must open this scroll and read, and the scroll will tell her what to do."

Well, the Princess started out, and when she had traveled a little way she found that she was hungry and tired, and she cried: "Oh, I haven't anything to eat." Then the scroll said, "Read me," and she opened the scroll and read: "There is corn in the fields. You must sh.e.l.l it and grind it on a stone and mix it with water, and bake it into the best bread that you can." So the Princess sh.e.l.led the corn and ground it and mixed it with water, and baked it, and it tasted as sweet as honey and as crisp as apples. And the Princess ate with an appet.i.te, and then she lay down to rest. And in the night a storm came up and there was no shelter, and the Princess cried out, "Oh, what shall I do?" and the scroll said, "Read me." So she opened the scroll and read: "There is wood on the ground. You must gather it and stack it and build the best little house that you can." So the Princess worked all that day and the next and the next, and when the hut was finished it was strong and dry and no storms could destroy it. So the Princess stayed there in the little hut that she had made, and ate the sweet loaves that she had baked, and one day a great black bear came down the road, and the Princess cried out, "Oh, I have no weapon; what shall I do?" And the scroll said, "Read me." So she opened the scroll and read, "Walk straight up to the bear, and make the best fight that you can." So the Princess, trembling, walked straight up to the big black bear, and behold! when he saw her coming, he ran away!

Now the year was up, and the king sent his wise men to bring the Princess home, and one day they came to her little hut and carried her back to the palace, and she was so rosy and well that everybody wondered. Then the king called the people together, and said, "Oh, Princess, speak to us, and let us know how you were cured." So the Princess told them of how she had baked the bread, and built the hut, and conquered the bear; and of how she had found health and happiness. For the bread that you make with your own hands is the sweetest, and the shelter that you build for yourself is the snuggest, and the fear that you face is no fear at all.

The children liked my story, and I felt very brave when I had finished it. You see, I have been forgetting our sunsets, and I have been shivery and shaky when I should have faced my Big Black Bear!

Beulah is ready to go--and so--good-night. The moon is high up and round, and as pure gold as your own loving heart.

Ever your own

ANNE.

CHAPTER XI

_In Which Brinsley Speaks of the Way to Win a Woman._

AND now spring was coming to the countryside. The snow melted, and the soft rains fell, and on sunny days Diogenes, splashing in the little puddles, picked and pulled at his feathers as he preened himself in the shelter of the south bank which overlooked the river.

Some of the feathers were tipped with shining green and some with brown.

Some of them fell by the way, some floated out on blue tides, and one of them was wafted by the wind to the feet of Geoffrey Fox, as, on a certain morning, he, too, stood on the south bank.

He picked it up and stuck it in his hat. "I'll wear it for my lady," he said to the old drake, "and much good may it do me!"

The old drake lifted his head toward the sky, and gave a long cry. But it was not for Anne that he called. She still gave him food and drink. He still met her at the gate. If her mind was less upon him than in the past, it mattered little. The things that held meaning for him this morning were the glory of the sunshine, and the softness of the breeze.

Stirring within him was a need above and beyond anything that Geoffrey could give, or Anne. He listened not for the step of the little school-teacher, but for the whirring wings of some comrade of his own kind. Again and again he sent forth his cry to the empty air.

Geoffrey's heart echoed the cry. His book was finished, and it was time for him to go. Yet he was held by a tie stronger than any which had hitherto bound him. Here in the big old house at Bower's was the one thing that his heart wanted.

"I could make her happy," he whispered to that inner self which warned him. "With her as my wife and with my book a success, I could defy fate."

The day was Sat.u.r.day, and all the eager old fishermen had arrived the night before. Brinsley Tyson coming out with his rod in his hand and a broad-brimmed hat on his head invited Geoffrey to join him. "I've a motor boat that will take us out to the island after we have done a morning's fishing, and Mrs. Bower has put up a lunch."

"The glare is bad for my eyes."

"Been working them too hard?"

"Yes."

"There's an awning and smoked gla.s.ses if you'll wear them. And I don't want to go alone. David went back on me; he's got a new book. It's a puzzle to me why any man should want to read when he can have a day's fishing."

"If people didn't read what would become of my books?"

"Let 'em read. But not on days like this." Brinsley's fat face was upturned to the sun. With a vine-wreath instead of his broad hat and tunic in place of his khaki he might have posed for any of the plump old G.o.ds who loved the good things of life.

Geoffrey, because he had nothing else to do, went with him. Anne was invisible. On Sat.u.r.day mornings she did all of the things she had left undone during the week. She mended and sewed and washed her brushes, and washed her hair, and gave all of her little belongings a special rub and scrub, and showed herself altogether exquisite and housewifely.