The Opened Shutters Part 62

"Rumble and roar as much as you like. I know what is behind the mask."

She sat down and righted the umbrella, and while the horses descended the hill she looked and looked, feasting her eyes on every well-remembered landmark.

The Tide Mill loomed out of the mist.

"Poor dear!" she said, apostrophizing it. "Are things just as desperate as ever?"

Tears were glistening on the closed shutters, and running down the weather-beaten sides.

"I think when the mill is crying like that, it always seems as if it were softening a little, Thinkright. Don't you? As if there were greater chance of its opening its eyes and taking notice once more."

Thinkright gave a low laugh. "Your miracle hasn't come to pa.s.s yet, has it?"

"No, but I'm going to hope, still."

"That's right. If those shutters ever open I think you'll have to be the prime mover. No one else seems to care."

"_You_ care, Thinkright," replied the girl wistfully. "There shouldn't be anything sad or hopeless around the Mill Farm, least of all that dear old neglected thing that named it."

"You're a very fanciful little girl," was the reply; but there was nothing disapproving in the glance her companion bent upon her.

As they drove up to the farmhouse, the living-room door flew open, and Minty was disclosed, prevented by her mother from going out into the rain, and expending pent-up energy by hopping up and down with irrepressible eagerness.

Mrs. Lem appeared behind her, wreathed in smiles, and coiffured and arrayed in her company best.

"It's so good to be home again," cried Sylvia, "so good, so good!" and she jumped out of the wagon and seized Minty's hands and danced around the living-room in the rubber coat until the child's laughter rang out gleefully.

"And how have you been, Mrs. Lem?" she asked when their breath was gone.

"Smart," replied that lady, regarding the girl admiringly, and wondering whether by patience and perseverance she might force her own hair to go into the shape of Sylvia's.

"I do hope you've brought us a change in the weather," went on Mrs.

Lem. "When it hain't ben actually rainin' the past two weeks, there's ben so much timidity in the atmosphere that I've got hoa.r.s.e as a crow, and we'll all be webfooted pretty soon if it don't clear up."

"You shall have sunshine to-morrow," declared Sylvia.

"I hain't touched the Rosy Cloud yet," said Minty, "even though you wrote I could. Thinkright said I might let her git stove on a rock, and he'd druther I'd wait."

"Very well, Minty, to-morrow we shall begin making up for lost time.

Let them watch us."

Cap'n Lem soon appeared, and the five made a happy supper party. During the meal the clouds lightened and the rain abated. Mrs. Lem would not hear to Sylvia's a.s.sisting in clearing away, but sent her upstairs to unpack her trunk. She was at work at it when the western sun suddenly shone out.

"The rainbow, the rainbow!" shouted Minty at the foot of the stairs.

"Where?" cried Sylvia.

"Over the mill."

Sylvia ran into Thinkright's room, which was on the eastern side of the house, and, throwing open a window, fell on her knees before it. In a protecting, splendid arch a perfect rainbow spanned the cloud above the mill. Rays of sunlight struck full upon the sightless eyes, and kissed its gray face until the tears sparkled into diamonds and the old building was beset with glory.

"The bow of promise," murmured Sylvia. She stretched out her hands to the mill. "Just open them a little way," she said. "You're no unhappier than I was, but I've found it such a good world! Just open your shutters and look. You'll always be glad. Perhaps you can't have everything you want, perhaps not the very thing you want most. What of that? Can't you trust? I'm learning to. 'Love alone will stay,' and it won't forget. It never forgets."

The girl's eyes lifted to the glorifying arch. One end curved to a distant forest and was lost, and the other dipped deep within the ocean. The Tide Mill grew to radiance beneath its caress. It seemed on the point of yielding, and opening gently to the setting sun.

At the climax of color Sylvia, smiling, dropped her eyelids. She would not see it fade. Suddenly, her ear was caught by a note as of a distant bell; then a tangle of bells, tiny, musical, and the song of the hermit thrush rang out from the far thicket.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Bar of music]

Sylvia caught her lip between her teeth, and her heart swelled.

The next morning nature, as always after a gloomy season, seemed trying to cause forgetfulness of its sulks and tears by bringing the whole battery of its charms to bear upon sea and land.

After breakfast Thinkright produced a key from his pocket. "There, my girl," he said, "is the key to the boathouse. I know you can scarcely wait."

"That's true," replied Sylvia. "Come on, Minty."

The child's round eyes were fixed solemnly on some point beyond Sylvia's shoulder.

"I don't know as I care 'bout goin' boatin' this mornin'," she replied decorously.

"What?" returned Sylvia, astonished. She remembered now how remarkably quiet the child had been throughout breakfast. "Why, how do you feel, Minty?"

"Smart," returned the child, still with her gaze on the uncertain point in s.p.a.ce.

Thinkright's eyes had a humorous twinkle. "I want Minty to help me a little while this morning," he said. "She'll see you later."

Sylvia turned to him, demurring. "She has been looking forward to it so much," she said.

"Yes, I know. She won't have to wait long," he replied kindly, putting his arm around the child's shoulders.

Mrs. Lem, her hair strained back in its least decorative twist, fixed her offspring with black eyes that snapped.

"You're a-goin' to have a good time with Thinkright, ain't you, Minty?"

she asked, and the child's breath caught through her little nose as she replied promptly:--

"Yes, I be."

Sylvia looked from one to the other uncertainly, but Thinkright was patting the little shoulder he held, and he nodded at her rea.s.suringly.

"Run along, Sylvia. You'll find everything in good shape."

"I never saw such a man," thought the girl as she went down the hill.

"How did he know that it would mean so much to me to go out alone just this first morning? Oh, Thinkright, Thinkright," she sighed. "How great it is to have come where you are; to have one's skylight always open, and the trap door always closed!"

She ran lightly in among the evergreens, and touched their bright buds here and there.

"That's right, precious things," she said, giving a lingering look up and down the familiar woodland path by the water side.