Sheila of Big Wreck Cove Part 18

"Well, Sarah Honey was a right good housekeeper," granted Prudence.

At that the girl fell suddenly silent, as she did whenever Sarah Honey's name was mentioned. And yet she knew she must get used to such references to her presumed mother. Prudence frequently recalled incidents which had happened when Sarah Honey visited the Ball house before she was married.

They had supper, a plentiful meal if there was not much variety.

Prudence had made a "two-egg cake" and opened a jar of beach-plum preserves to follow the creamed fish and biscuits.

"I must learn to make biscuit as good as these," said Ida May.

"I expect you are more used to riz bread. City folks are. But on the Cape we don't have that much. Our men folks want hot bread at every meal. We pamper 'em," said Prudence.

"I'm pampered 'most to death, that's a fact," grumbled Cap'n Ira.

Ida May briskly cleared the table and washed the dishes. She would not allow Prudence even to wipe them.

"I'm sitting here like a lady, Ira," said the little old woman.

"This child will work herself to death if we let her."

"A willin' horse always does get driv' too fast," commented Cap'n Ira.

"A new broom sweeps clean," laughed the girl, rinsing out the dishcloths and hanging them on the line behind the stove.

They went outside in the gloaming and sat in a sheltered nook where they could watch the lights twinkling all along the coast to the southward, the revolving lantern at Lighthouse Point, the steady beacon on Eagle's Head, and now and then the flash of the great one of Monomoy Point so far away. It was peaceful, quiet, a.s.suring, and, the girl thought, heavenly! She thought for a moment of Sellers'

restaurant and the little room she had occupied on Hanover Street.

_This_ was contentment.

Old Pareta had brought her trunk and bag and carried them up to the big, well-furnished room she was to occupy. By and by Prudence went up with her to see that she was made comfortable there, and to watch her unpack, for the old woman was not without curiosity regarding the "city fashions."

One window of the room looked to the north. Through this Ida May saw the steady beam of a lamp shining from a house down in what seemed to be a depression behind the Head. She asked Prudence what that was.

"That must be a light at 'Latham's Folly,' Tunis' house, you know,"

said the little old woman, likewise peering through the window.

"Shouldn't be surprised if 'twas right in his room. He sleeps this end of the house. Yes, that's what it is."

"So Captain Latham lives just there?" the girl said softly.

"When he's ash.o.r.e. He and his Aunt Lucretia. They are the only Lathams left of their branch of the family."

Afterward, when Ida May had come upstairs to go to bed, she looked to the northward again. The light was still there. She knelt by the open window in her nightgown and watched the light for a long time.

When it finally was extinguished she crept into bed.

She heard the nasal tones of the two old people below, for her door on the stairs was open. She heard, too, the occasional cry of a night fowl and, in the distance, the barking of an uneasy watchdog.

But after all, and in spite of the many, many thoughts which shuttled to and fro in her mind, she did not lie awake for long. It was a clear and sparkling night; there were no foghorns to disturb her dreams with their raucous warnings, and the surf along the beaches below the Head merely scuffed its way up and down the strand with a soothing "Hush! Hush-sh!"

At dawn, however, there came a noise which roused the newcomer to Wreckers' Head. She awoke with a start. Something had clattered upon her window sill, that window looking toward the north. She sat upright in bed to listen. The clatter was repeated. In the dim, gray light she saw several tiny objects bounding into the room.

She scrambled out of the high four-poster and shrugged her feet into slippers. She crept to the window, holding the nightgown close at the neck. She felt one of the tiny objects under the soft sole of her slipper and stooped to secure it. It was a pebble.

More pebbles rattled on the window sill. She stepped forward then with considerable bravery, and looked down. What she saw at first startled her. A tall, misty, gray object stood below the window, something quite ghostly in appearance, something which moved in the dim light.

"Why, what--"

Then the thing stamped and blew a faint whinny. She saw a pale, long face raised and two pointed ears twitching above it.

"A horse!"

A darker figure rose up suddenly from before the strange animal.

"Ida May!"

"Why, Captain Latham!"

"Cat's foot!" exclaimed the captain of the _Seamew_. "I thought I'd never wake you up without disturbing the old folks. No need to ask _you_ if you rested well."

"Oh, gloriously!" whispered the girl, beaming down upon him, but keeping out of the full range of his vision.

"Sorry I had to wake you, but I'm due at the wharf right now to see that the hands get those clams stowed aboard. We want to get away on the morning tide. I brought Queenie home and thought I'd better tell you."

"Queenie?"

"The Queen of Sheba, you know. I was telling you about Cap'n Ira's old mare."

"Oh, yes! Wait. I'll dress and be right down."

"That's all right," said Tunis. "I'll wait."

She scurried into the clothes she had laid out before going to bed.

In five minutes she crept down the stairs into the kitchen and out of the back door. Tunis, holding the sleepy mare by her rope bridle, met her between the kitchen ell and the barn.

"You look as bright as a new penny," he chuckled. "But it's early yet for you to be astir. I'll put Queenie in her stable and show you where the feed is. Aunt Prue will like to have her back. She sets great store by the old mare. She won't be much bother to you, Ida May."

"Nothing will ever be a bother to me here, Captain Latham," said the girl cheerfully.

"That's the way to talk," he said, with satisfaction. "Just you keep on that tack, Ida May, and things will go swimmingly, I've no doubt."

In ten minutes he was briskly on his way to the town. The girl watched him from the back stoop as long as he was to be seen in the morning mist. Then she went back into the house, made a more careful toilet, and when Cap'n Ira came hobbling into the kitchen an hour later breakfast was in preparation on the glowing stove.

"I swan! This is comfort, and no mistake," chuckled the old man, rubbing his chin reflectively. "You're going to be a blessing in this house, Ida May."

"I hope you'll always say so, Uncle Ira," returned the girl, smiling at him.

"I cal'late. Now I'll get washed, but that derned shavin'."

"You sit down in that rocker and I'll shave you," she said briskly.

"Oh, I can do it! I shaved my own father when he was sick last--"

She stopped, turned away, and fell silent. It was the first time she had spoken of either of her parents, but Cap'n Ira did not notice her sudden confusion. He prepared for the ordeal, making his own lather and opening the razor.

"I can't strop it, Ida May," he groaned. "That's one of the things that's beyont my powers."