CHAPTER XII
SIDNEY BELONGS
Sidney was too deep in her slough of despond to see that behind Mr.Dugald's shock of surprise was a smiling admiration of her bobbed head.And even Lavender avowed at once that it "looked swell." Two hoursbefore Sidney would have gloried in their approval but with Trude'sletter in her pocket and the humiliating memory of her silly retort toAunt Achsa she was beyond feeling pleasure at anything.
She ate her supper in a heavy silence. Lavender's and Mr. Dugald's highspirits seemed to her as unfitting as jazz at a funeral. She kept hereyes carefully away from Aunt Achsa's face and found a faint solace inonly nibbling at the especially delectable supper until Aunt Achsaasked her anxiously if she "wa'n't well?"
She felt infinitely far removed, too, from the curiosity that hadobsessed her throughout the day. It didn't matter now what Mr. Dugaldand Lavender had been doing over there among the sand dunes!
The next morning Lav invited her to go with him while he helped Cap'nHawkes take a fishing party out to the _Mabel T_. This was one of theodd jobs Lavender often did around the harbor. Sidney had gone with himtwice before and had thoroughly enjoyed it. It was fun to sit in thebow of the old dory and watch the harbor lazily coming to life in thebright morning sun, sails lifting and dipping to the breeze, boatsswinging at their moorings, the low roofs of the houses on the shoreglistening pink against the higher ridges of sand, the dancing waves,their tips touched with gold. She liked to listen to the noisy chatterof the picnicers, to most of whom everything was as novel as it was toher; the women invariably squealed as they climbed aboard the _Mabel T_just as she had squealed the first time she boarded the _Arabella_. Andher greatest thrill came when the tourists took her for a native, likeLavender, asking her questions which she invariably answered glibly.
This was probably the last time she would go out in the harbor withLavender. She thought it, sitting very still behind a barricade of baitpails and baskets. She glared at a tanned girl who was telling hercompanion that they were going to stay on at the Cape through August.The brightness of the morning only deepened her gloom--she could standthings _much_ better if it were pouring rain.
The fishing party and all the paraphernalia shipped safely aboard the_Mabel T_, Lavender let the dory drift as Sidney had begged him to dothe first time she had gone out. He looked at her anticipating hernoisy pleasure only to find her eyes downcast, her face disconsolate.
She felt his glance questioning her and lifted her head.
"I've got to go home."
That he simply stared and said nothing was balm to her. And she caught,too, the strange expression that flashed into the boy's great dark eyes.
"I got a letter yesterday from Trude. She thinks I've stayed longenough--that I am imposing upon Aunt Achsa's hospitality."
Still Lavender said nothing. Now he was looking off to where the sailsof the _Mabel T_ cut the blue of the sky like the wings of a great bird.
"She wants me to write at once just when I am going." Which was ofcourse not _exactly_ the way Trude had written and yet was the correctinterpretation Sidney now put upon her letter.
And still no word from Lavender.
"I--I hate to go. Dreadfully. Will you miss me the least bit, Lav? I--Imean you and Mart--"
"Oh, _hang_ Mart!" burst out the boy hotly. "Who cares 'bout her? I canfool 'round with her _any_time only I don't want to. I--I--" He stoppedshort with a queer inarticulate sound and Sidney gasped. Why, Lavenderwas almost crying!
He really _was_ crying only he was swallowing it all with funny gulpsthat lifted his crooked shoulders. Sidney's heart gave a happy leap.
"Oh, Lav, I'm so _glad_ you are sorry that I am going. We have had suchfun together and you see I've never known any boys before--oh, exceptthe ones I've met at parties and things and they're terribly stupid.But you have been such a peach to me and showed me how to do everythingjust as though I was a boy. I'll miss you, too, Lav--"
"Oh, no, you won't. I mean it isn't the same," muttered Lavender, hisshoulders quiet now. Across his face settled a sullenness that Sidneyhad never seen on it. She did not like it; it made him look ugly. Sheturned away. The boy went on, in a thick voice.
"Y'see, I never do anything with anyone because, well--I'm different.That's why. I c'n always see them lookin' at me curious or pitying andI won't stand it! I just _won't_. I hate it. That's why I wouldn't evergo to school. Some of the kids wouldn't come near me--'fraid oftouchin' me, I guess. And some'd _try_ to touch me--for luck, y'know.It's always been like that--and I get awful lonesome. But some day whenI'm grown up I'm going to save money and go away. Out in the big citiesthere are lots of people that are different--all kinds of shapes andcolors and everything and they are too busy to stop to pity you. Mr.Dugald says so. I'm goin' to study and learn to be a doctor. Not thekind that goes around to see folks like Dr. Blackwell but the kind thatworks in a big laboratory and finds out what cures the sick people.They are just as important Mr. Dugald says. And no one will _see_ methen--they'll just _know_ about me. I don't care how old I am, I'mgoing to do it some time."
Before the sudden fire in his voice Sidney's heart quickened withexcitement. Why, Lavender was revealing to her his innermost soul andit was fine and straight, just as Mr. Dugald had said.
"Oh, Lavender, you're _wonderful_!" she cried, her eyes shining. "Itmust be grand to know just what you want to do and I hope you _won't_have to wait until you're very old. I'm glad you told me. Only, only--"a doubt assailed her. "Won't you _have_ to go to school?"
Lavender flushed. "Sometime, I s'pose. But not here. Mr. Dugaldunderstands how it is and he's helped me. And he says I know more thanthe other fellows in the grade I'd be in if I had kept on going. Hesends me books all winter long and Miss Letty hears me and she got someexamination papers from the teachers at school and I tried them andgee, they were a cinch. Only don't tell anyone--Mart, anyway," headmonished, in sudden alarm. "It's a secret between me and Mr. Dugaldand Miss Letty. Let 'em think I'm a loafer."
The sullen look that had made Lavender's face so ugly disappeared underSidney's understanding. And she in turn forgot her own sorrow in herjoy of Lavender's confidences. Now the golden sun and the dancing watergladdened her and lifted her spirit; all _was_ well in the world.
"I won't tell a soul--_not_ a soul, Lav. Oh--" gasping, "is that whatyou and Mr. Dugald do when you go off like you did yesterday?"
Lavender nodded with a sheepish grin. "Yep, that's our school."
"Oh, what _fun_! To study like that. _I'd_ learn a lot, too. Mart and Iwere dreadfully curious and Mart said she knew that Mr. Dugald waspainting you and didn't want to do it where anyone might see you onaccount of--" Poor Sidney stopped, abruptly in sorry confusion.
"Oh, that's all right! I don't care what _you_ say because you don'tfeel sorry for me. That's why I like to have you 'round. _You_ think Ican do something. Sidney, Mr. Dugald says there was a man who was anelectrical wizard and knew everything and what he didn't know he workedover until he found out and he--he--was--like me--only worse. I'llwork--gee, how I'll work--if I get a chance--" Lavender clenched hislong fingers together and his dark eyes glared fiercely. "I'd cut andrun now from here--if it wasn't for Aunt Achsa."
"Oh, yes,--Aunt Achsa." That brought Sidney sharply back to her owntroubles.
"She's been awful good to me and I can't leave her now even though Idon't do much. Mr. Dugald says that just now my job's right here and Imust show folks that my back can carry its job even if it is--"
"_Don't_, Lav--" cried Sidney, near to the pity that Lavender despised,but he was too engrossed in his own feelings to notice it.
"Of course you can't leave Aunt Achsa. Lav, I feel so cheapand--and--horrid. I was very rude to Aunt Achsa yesterday and hurt herfeelings which was ungrateful of me after her letting me come and doingeverything here to make me happy. It was about my hair. I--I--oh, Iwon't even _repeat_ what I said--it was so silly. And _that's_ reallywhy I must go
home. Trude didn't exactly tell me I had to go--she justsaid perhaps I ought to go and that I must decide. But of course I knownow--after yesterday--Aunt Achsa would not want me to stay--"
"Say, is _that_ all! As though Aunt Achsa is holding anything againstyou! Why, she's the most forgivingest person you ever heard of. Shewants to forgive anyone before they've done anything. She's like that.I'll bet the next second after you said it she'd forgotten what yousaid."
"But it's worse to hurt anyone like that!" cried Sidney miserably, yetwith her heart lifting. For a thought was taking shape--a reasonableand just thought.
"Lavender--do you think--as long as _you_ like to have me here--thatthat would sort of make up for my rudeness? I mean--can't I go and askAunt Achsa to let me stay? I'll tell her how ashamed I am."
"Gee, you're square!" exclaimed Lavender, proudly. "I'll tellyou--we'll go together and ask her. I know just what she'll say butyou'll feel more honest about it."
"Lav, you're wonderful--the way you understand." Sidney's responsivemood leaped out to the boy's. Lavender had found something in her thatwas above his estimation of girls. And _she_ had been vouchsafed aglimpse into the heart that lay beneath the crooked body--with itssensitiveness, its ambition. "We're just like pals," she finishedshyly, "And I'm as proud as can be." Mentally she was resolving to livetrue to Lavender's standard. _That_ would be much finer than to try tobe like Mart. In her effort to attain Mart's showy independence shehad--almost--come to grief, not quite. Lavender seemed certain thatAunt Achsa would want her to stay. And he had said he would go with herwhile she apologized which would make it as easy as could be.
"Let's go now!" she said aloud, unmindful of the fact that Lavendercould not possibly be following her high flight of thought.
"Where?"
"Home--to Aunt Achsa." Sidney said it very simply. And to her it seemedlike home, now. With a warm feeling in her heart she thought of herselfas truly belonging to them all and to Sunset Lane and the homelycottage.
"All right." With a dexterous motion Lavender swung his strength intothe oars. The dory cut the shining water. Sidney stared solemnlystraight ahead, going over in her mind just what she would say to AuntAchsa.
At sight of the two Aunt Achsa paused in one of her multitudinoustasks. It was not usual for either the boy or the girl to appear untilnoontime. Her first thought was an anxiety that something had happened.She fluttered out to meet them.
"There ain't anything happened, has there?" her fond eyes on Lavender.
"I'll say something's _most_ happened," the boy began. "Sidney herethinks she ought to go home on account of something she saidyesterday--"
"Lav, let me do it," implored Sidney. "Aunt Achsa, I--I'm so ashamed ofthe way I answered you yesterday about my hair. I ought to have toldyou--you had a right--but I guess I wanted to feel grown up andindependent. And I am sorry."
At Sidney's halting confession Aunt Achsa looked what Lavender, withhis odd coinage of words, had described as the "most forgivingestperson." She actually blushed.
"Why, law's sake, child, your Aunt Ascha didn't mind--don't worry yourlittle head over that. I ain't forgotten how a girl feels even if itwas a long spell ago that I was fifteen. Old as I am my tongue getsloose in my head lots of times and runs away with itself. That's a waytongues has of doing. And you worryin' over it and thinkin' about goinghome! Why, why--it's _nice_ to have you here. Only last evening I saidit to Mr. Dugald. It's like you were one of us--"
"Do you really mean that, Aunt Achsa? I'm not company any moreor--or--a distant cousin?"
"Not a bit. And now long's you and Lavender's come home in the middleof the morning, which I will say give me a turn, you can set down onthe step out there and pit these cherries for me!"
"Cherry pie?" cried Sidney, glad over everything.
"Better. I'll bet pickled cherries!" Lavender had spied the row ofglistening glass jars on the table. "And they're licking good."
Sidney took the checkered apron Aunt Achsa handed her and tied it abouther slim person, then they sat down upon the step in the sunshine andfell to their task. From the shade of the lilac bush Nip and Tuckregarded them with their inscrutably wise eyes. Without doubt Nip andTuck knew why Sidney's voice lifted so gaily as the red juice trickleddown her brown arms.
When Mr. Dugald returned for dinner he had to hear how nearly Sidneyhad come to going home. "Why, that's the worst thing I've heard," heexclaimed with exaggerated alarm, "Now, you wouldn't really go and dothat, would you?" His eyes laughed above the serious twist of his lips;Sidney wondered if he was remembering that first night of her coming.
"I think we ought to celebrate this crisis through which we havelived," he declared. "What say to a picnic supper over at the backsideand a call upon Captain Nelson. He'll be expecting us about this time.If I commandeer Pete Cady's Ford you can go, too, Aunt Achsa."
When he was in his rollicking mood Aunt Achsa could never resist herMr. Dugald. Though she'd as soon trust herself in one of "themar-y-planes" as in Pete Cady's Ford, which only went under stress ofmany inward convulsions and ear-splitting explosions, she accepted Mr.Dugald's invitation and fell at once to planning the "supper," thoughtheir dinner was not yet cleared away.
"I'll write a letter and mail it and then stop and tell Mart. Mart maygo, may she not?" Sidney asked anxiously.
Yes, Mart must go, too. Plainly the occasion _was_ a momentous one.
And to Trude Sidney wrote, hastily, for Lavender was waiting and therewould be time for a swim on the _Arabella_ before they started off inthe Ford.
"--Aunt Achsa and Lavender both want me to stay _very_ much. They likeme and I am just one of the family. I help Aunt Achsa too, in a greatmany ways and Lavender and I are like pals--it's just as though I had abrother which I never thought would be any fun but now I know it wouldbe a lot especially if the brother was a twin. You must not worry whenI do not write often for there is so much to do that I don't have a bitof time--"
And in her excited state of mind Sidney forgot to tell Trude about hershorn braids.