CHAPTER XVII
FUN AND NONSENSE
The next morning the girls were up with the sun. They were in hilariousspirits and made so much noise that Mrs. Danvers, busily gettingbreakfast in the kitchen below, smiled to herself and hugged a big colliethat at that moment strolled leisurely into the room.
The big collie's name was Bruce, and he belonged to Uncle Tom of thelighthouse. But although Uncle Tom was his master and was first in hisdog's heart, Connie's mother was his very next best beloved and Brucespent his time nearly equally between the lighthouse and Uncle Tom andthe cottage and Connie's mother.
Now he answered the woman's hug with a loving look from his beautifuleyes and waved his brush gratefully.
"Bruce darling," said Connie's mother, as she lifted a pan of biscuitsand shoved it into the oven, "it's a perfectly gorgeous morning and aperfectly gorgeous world and you're a perfectly gorgeous dog. Now don'tdeny it. You know you are! How about it?"
To which Bruce responded by a more vigorous waving of his white tippedbrush that very nearly swept a second pan of biscuits off on to thewell-swept floor.
Connie's mother rescued it with a quick motion of her arm and stared atBruce reproachfully.
"Bruce, just suppose you had spoiled it!" she scolded, as she slipped thepan into the oven after its fellow. "Don't you know that I have fourhungry girls to feed, to say nothing of a great big husband----"
"Now what are you saying about me?" asked a man's pleasant voice from thedoorway, adding as Connie's mother turned toward him: "Can't I help,dear? You look rather warm."
"Warm! Well, I should say I was!" said Connie's mother, sweeping a straylock of hair back out of her eyes. "But what do I care when it's such awonderful world? Haven't I got my baby back again, and three others aswell? They're sweet girls, aren't they, John? And Billie Bradley is goingto be a beauty."
"Well, I know some one else who is a beauty," said Mr. Danvers, lookingadmiringly at his wife's rosy face and wide-apart, laughing eyes, addingwith a smile: "Even though she has a big patch of flour under one eye."
"Oh!" cried Connie's mother, and wiped her face vigorously with a pinkand white checked apron. "Now just for that," she said, turning to herhusband, who was still lounging in the doorway, "I'm going to put youout. And Bruce, too. I have enough to do without having a husband whomakes fun of me and a dog who sticks his tail into everything under myfeet all the time. Hurry on," and she pushed her protesting, laughinghusband and the reluctant dog out through the open door and into thebrilliant sunshine beyond.
"Are you going to call us in time for breakfast?" Mr. Danvers called backto his wife over his shoulder.
"Of course," she answered. "I'll send Connie after you." And sheplayfully waved a frying pan at him.
"She put us out, Bruce," said Mr. Danvers laying a caressing hand on thedog's beautiful head as he walked gravely along beside him. "But we loveher just the same, don't we?" And Bruce's answer was to press close toMr. Danvers and wave his tail enthusiastically.
Hardly had Mrs. Danvers had time to put the bacon in the oven to keepwarm and break the eggs into the pan when there was a sound ofskirmishing on the stairs, and a moment later a whirlwind broke in uponher.
"Mother, Mother, Mother, everything smells good!" cried Connie, dancingover to her mother and hugging her so energetically that she almost sentthe eggs, pan and all, on the floor. "Is there anything we can do tohelp?"
"Yes--go away," cried Connie's mother, seeing with dismay that one of theeggs in the pan was broken--and Connie's mother prided herself uponserving perfect eggs. Then, as she saw the surprise in the girls' faces,she relented, left the eggs to their fate, and hugged them all.
"You're darlings," she said. "But you're awfully in the way. Billie, forgoodness sake, hand me that pancake turner. Quick! These eggs are goingto be awful!"
But Billie had jumped to the rescue, and when the eggs were turned out onthe platter with the bacon surrounding them on four sides, they did notlook "awful" at all, but just about the most appetizing things the girlshad ever laid hungry eyes on.
"Oh, let me carry them!"
"No, let me!"
"I'll do it!"
And to a chorus of a score or so other such pleas, the eggs were bornetriumphantly into the dining room and set carefully on the table.
"Now the biscuits!" cried Connie, running back into the kitchen where hermother was just heaping another platter high with golden browndeliciousness.
"Oh, Mother," said Connie, darting a kiss at her mother that landed justexactly on the tip of Mrs. Danvers' pretty astonished nose, "everythingyou cook always looks just exactly like you."
Then she disappeared with the biscuits, leaving her mother to rub hernose and smile somewhat proudly.
"I guess it must have been a compliment," she chuckled, as she followedConnie with a second plate of biscuits, "for they always seem to likewhat I cook."
The girls were already waiting politely but impatiently for her. She wasabout to sit down when she thought of Mr. Danvers. She looked hastily atConnie.
"I told your father I'd send you after him when breakfast was ready," shesaid; and Connie looked dismayed.
"Oh, bother!" she said. "I just know they'll eat all the biscuits beforeI get back."
"No, we won't. We promise," said Billie; but Connie still looked doubtfulenough to make them giggle as she flung out of the door in search of herfather.
She had been gone scarcely two minutes when she returned triumphantlywith her father and Bruce in tow.
"They were just coming back," she told her mother, as she sank into herseat and reached for a biscuit. "Daddy said he smelled the biscuits andthey drew him with----What was it you said they drew you with, Daddy?"
"Irresistible force?" asked Mr. Danvers, as he greeted the girls and tookhis seat at the head of the table. "Now, if they only taste as theysmell----" He smiled at his wife across the table and she handed him aplate full of the golden brown biscuits.
"Who owns the dog?" asked Laura boyishly, as Bruce sat down gravely atMrs. Danvers' side, looking up at her adoringly.
"Oh, please, excuse me; I forgot to introduce him," cried Mrs. Danvers,dimpling and laying her hand lightly on the dog's head. "This is RobertBruce, and he's a thoroughbred and belongs to Uncle Tom, and lives overat the lighthouse."
"The lighthouse," repeated Billie eagerly, then added as though she werethinking aloud: "Oh, but I'm crazy to see it."
"Are you?" asked Connie's mother, looking surprised at Billie'seagerness, for the lighthouse was an old story to her. "Connie can takeyou over there to-day if you would like to go."
"Oh, won't that be lovely!" cried Vi. "I've always wanted to see inside areal lighthouse. I want to know all about the lights and everything. Whencan we go, Mrs. Danvers?"
"Any time you like," answered Mrs. Danvers, her heart warming to theirgirlish enthusiasm. She was falling in love with Connie's friends moreand more every minute. "Uncle Tom receives visitors at all hours of theday."
"And he has lots of 'em," added Connie, nodding over her coffee cup. "Allthe children and the men love him. He can tell so many stories, youknow----"
"And fish stories too, I reckon," put in Connie's mother laughingly. "Youknow you can never really depend upon a sailor's telling the truth."
Good as the breakfast was, the girls found themselves hurrying throughit, so eager were they to see the lighthouse and Uncle Tom. They tookBruce with them at Mrs. Danvers' request, for she was going to be verybusy and the big dog did have a habit of getting in the way.
As the girls swung along the boardwalk they had a wild desire to shoutwith the sheer joy of living. Everything looked so different by daylight.It was not half so thrilling and mysterious, but it was much morebeautiful.
The ocean was calm, for there was almost no wind. The water gleamed andsparkled in the brilliant sunshine, and the beach was almost toodazzlingly white to look upon.
In the d
istance rose the irregular outline of the mainland, but on allother sides there was nothing but an illimitable stretch of long,graceful, rolling combers.
As the girls came out upon the Point, there, before them, rose thelighthouse tower, robbed of the mystery it had worn the night before, yetwearing a quaint, romantic dignity all its own.
"Connie," said Billie happily, "I'm sure this is the most wonderful placein the world."