Rosalind at Red Gate Part 28

I found my horse, led him deeper into the wood and threw off the saddle. Then I walked down the road until I found a barn, and crawled into the loft and slept.

CHAPTER XVIII

THE LADY OF THE WHITE b.u.t.tERFLIES

t.i.tANIA: And pluck the wings from painted b.u.t.terflies, To fan the moonbeams from his sleeping eyes: Nod to him, elves, and do him courtesies.

PEASEBLOSSOM: Hail, mortal!

--_Midsummer Night's Dream_.

The twitter of swallows in the eaves wakened me to the first light of day, and after I had taken a dip in the creek I still seemed to be sole proprietor of the world, so quiet lay field and woodland. I followed the lake sh.o.r.e to a fishermen's camp, where, in the good comradeship of outdoors men the world over, I got bread and coffee and no questions asked. I smoked a pipe with the fishermen to kill time, and it was still but a trifle after six o'clock when I started for Red Gate. My mood was not for the open road, and I sought woodland paths, that I might loiter the more. With squirrels scampering before me, and attended by bird-song and the morning drum-beat of the woodp.e.c.k.e.r, I strode on until I came out upon a series of rough pastures, separated by stake-and-rider fences that crawled sinuously through tangles of blackberries and wild roses. As I tramped along a cow-path that traversed these pastures, the dew sparkled on the short gra.s.s, and wings whirred and dipped in salutation before me. My memories of the night vanished in the perfection of the day; I went forth to no renewal of acquaintance with shadows, or with the lurking figures in a dark drama, but to enchantments that were fresh with life and light. Barred gates separated these fallow fields, and I pa.s.sed through one, crossed the intermediate pasture, and opened the gate of the third. Before me lay a field of daisies, bobbing amid wild gra.s.s, the morning wind softly stirring the myriad disks, so that the whole had the effect of quiet motion. The path led on again, but more faintly here. A line of sycamores two hundred yards to my right marked the bed of the Tippecanoe; and on my left hand, beyond a walnut grove, a little filmy dust-cloud hung above the hidden highway. The meadow was a place of utter peace; the very air spoke of holy things. I thrust my cap into my jacket pocket and stood watching the wind crisp the flowers. Then my attention wandered to the mad antics of a squirrel that ran along the fence.

When I turned to the field again I saw Rosalind coming toward me along the path, clad in white, hatless, and her hands lightly brushing the lush gra.s.s that seemed to leap up to touch them. She had not seen me, and I drew back a little for love of the picture she made. Three white b.u.t.terflies fluttered about her head, like an appointed guard of honor, and she caught at them with her hands, turning her head to watch their staggering flight.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Three white b.u.t.terflies fluttered about her head.]

She paused abruptly midway of the daisies, and I walked toward her slowly--it must have been slowly--and I think we were both glad of a moment's respite in which to study each other. Then she spoke at once, as though our meeting had been prearranged.

"I hoped I should see you," she said gravely.

"I had every intention of seeing you! I was killing time until I felt I might decently lift the latch of Red Gate."

She inspected me with her hands clasped behind her.

"Please don't look at me like that!" I laughed. "I camped in a barn last night for fear I shouldn't get here in time."

"I wish to speak to you for a few minutes--to tell you what you may have guessed about us--my father and me."

"Yes; if you like; but only to help you if I can. It is not necessary for you to tell me anything."

She turned and led the way across the daisy field. She walked swiftly, holding back her skirts from the crowding flowers, traversed the garden of Red Gate, and continued down to the house-boat.

"We can be quiet here," she said, throwing open the door. "My father is at Tippecanoe village, shipping one of his canoes. We are early risers, you see!"

The little sitting-room adjoining the shop was calm and cool, and the ripple of the creek was only an emphasis of the prevailing rural quiet.

She sat down by the table in a red-cushioned wicker chair and folded her hands in her lap and smiled a little as she saw me regarding her fixedly. I suppose I had expected to find her clad in saffron robes or in doublet and hose, but the very crispness of her white pique spoke delightfully of present times and manners. My glance rested on the emerald ring; then I looked into her eyes again.

"You see I am really very different," she smiled. "I'm not the same person at all!"

"No; it's wonderful--wonderful!" And I still stared.

She grew grave again.

"I have important things to say to you, but it's just as well for you to see me in the broadest of daylight, so that"--she pondered a moment, as though to be sure of expressing herself clearly--"so that when you see Helen Holbrook in an hour or so in that pretty garden by the lake you will understand that it was not really Rosalind after all that--that--amused you!"

"But the daylight is not helping that idea. You are marvelously alike, and yet--" I floundered miserably in my uncertainty.

"Then,"--and she smiled at my discomfiture, "if you can't tell us apart, it makes no difference whether you ever see me again or not.

You see, Mr.--but _did_ you ever tell me what your name is? Well, I know it, anyhow, Mr. Donovan."

The little work-table was between us, and on it lay the foil which her father had s.n.a.t.c.hed from the wall the night before. I still stood, gazing down at Rosalind. Fashion, I saw, had done something for the amazing resemblance. She wore her hair in the pompadour of the day, with exactly Helen's sweep; and her white gown was identical with that worn that year by thousands of young women. She had even the same gestures, the same little way of resting her cheek against her hand that Helen had; and before she spoke she moved her head a trifle to one side, with a pretty suggestion of just having been startled from a reverie, that was Helen's trick precisely.

She forgot for a moment our serious affairs, to which I was not in the least anxious to turn, in her amus.e.m.e.nt at my perplexity.

"It must be even more extraordinary than I imagined. I have not seen Helen for seven years. She is my cousin; and when we were children together at Stamford our mothers used to dress us alike to further the resemblance. Our mothers, you may not know, were not only sisters; they were twin sisters! But Helen is, I think, a trifle taller than I am. This little mark"--she touched the peak--"is really very curious.

Both our mothers and our grandmother had it. And you see that I speak a little more rapidly than she does--at least that used to be the case.

I don't know my grown-up cousin at all. We probably have different tastes, temperaments, and all that."

"I am positive of it!" I exclaimed; yet I was really sure of nothing, save that I was talking to an exceedingly pretty girl, who was amazingly like another very pretty girl whom I knew much better.

"You are her guardian, so to speak, Mr. Donovan. You are taking care of my Aunt Pat and my cousin. Just how that came about I don't know."

"They were sent to St. Agatha's by Father Stoddard, an old friend of mine. They had suffered many annoyances, to put it mildly, and came here to get away from their troubles."

"Yes; I understand. Uncle Henry has acted outrageously. I have not ranged the country at night for nothing. I have even learned a few things from you," she laughed. "And you must continue to serve Aunt Patricia and my cousin. You see,"--and she smiled her grave smile--"my father and I are an antagonistic element."

"No; not as between you and Miss Patricia! I'm sure of that. It is Henry Holbrook that I am to protect her from. You and your father do not enter into it."

"If you don't mind telling me, Mr. Donovan, I should like to know whether Aunt Pat has mentioned us."

"Only once, when I first saw her and she explained why she had come.

She seemed greatly moved when she spoke of your father. Since then she has never referred to him. But the day we cruised up to Battle Orchard and Henry Holbrook's man tried to smash our launch, she was shaken out of herself, and she declared war when we got home. Then I was on the lake with her the night of the carnival. Helen did not go with us.

And when you paddled by us, Miss Pat was quite disturbed at the sight of you; but she thought it was an illusion, and--I thought it was Helen!"

"I have been home only a few weeks, but I came just in time to be with father in his troubles. My uncle's enmity is very bitter, as you have seen. I do not understand it. Father has told me little of their difficulties; but I know," she said, lifting her head proudly, "I know that my father has done nothing dishonorable. He has told me so, and I am content with that."

I bowed, not knowing what to say.

"I have been here only once or twice before, and for short visits only.

Most of the time I have been at a convent in Canada, where I was known as Rosalind Hartridge. Rosalind, you know, is really my name: I was named for Helen's mother. The Sisters took pity on my loneliness, and were very kind to me. But now I am never going to leave my father again."

She spoke with no unkindness or bitterness, but with a gravity born of deep feeling. I marked now the lighter _timbre_ of her voice, that was quite different from her cousin's; and she spoke more rapidly, as she had said, her naturally quick speech catching at times the cadence of cultivated French. And she was a simpler nature--I felt that; she was really very unlike Helen.

"You manage a canoe pretty well," I ventured, still studying her face, her voice, her ways, eagerly.

"That was very foolish, wasn't it?--my running in behind the procession that way!" and she laughed softly at the recollection. "But that was professional pride! That was one of my father's best canoes, and he helped me to decorate it. He takes a great delight in his work; it's all he has left! And I wanted to show those people at Port Annandale what a really fine canoe--a genuine Hartridge--was like. I did not expect to run into you or Aunt Pat."

"You should have gone on and claimed the prize. It was yours of right.

When your star vanished I thought the world had come to an end."

"It hadn't, you see! I put out the lights so that I could get home unseen."

"You gave us a shock. Please don't do it again; and please, if you and your cousin are to meet, kindly let it be on solid ground. I'm a little afraid, even now, that you are a lady of dreams."