CHAPTER XII
A LOST OAR
Mrs. Lem's awe of the new Miss Lacey was short-lived. The fact that shecame out of that vague locality known as the West seemed to soothe thehousekeeper's latent suspicion that the young girl might be "bigfeeling." Sylvia was reticent even in the presence of Edna Derwent, andthis silence could not proceed from snobbishness; moreover, her spiritsrose after the departure of the Boston girl, and Mrs. Lem decided thatThinkright's guest was, in spite of her slim height and the dignity ofher black garments, only a shy girl who needed encouraging.
"Do you think Miss Derwent's pretty?" she asked Sylvia after Edna hadmade her adieux.
"Very," answered Sylvia, who was enveloped in the apron the guest hadworn the night before, and was awkwardly wiping dishes as thehousekeeper washed them. Minty had gone to school.
"I know folks most always think so," said Mrs. Lem, whose pompadour hadcollapsed with her theories of Sylvia's New York origin; "but I don'tknow," she went on judicially, "when you come to diagnose Edna'sfeatures they ain't anything so great. Her nose wouldn't ever suitme,--kind of insignificant."
Mrs. Lem's own feature was of the strong Roman variety. "They're justrollin' in gold," she went on. "It's a wonder to me Edna sets suchstore by Anemone Cottage when they've got such a luxuriant home inBoston."
Sylvia listened with lowered eyes intently fixed on her work. She hadwakened this morning with a sensation of relaxation. Some habitualtense resistance had given way. She was subdued and conscious ofrelief, as if from a cessation of responsibility. She realized whatcaused this as her interview with Thinkright rushed back upon herthought. He saw through her. That was her mental admission. He did notadmire her at all, and yet for her mother's sake he would not despiseher. He had made her view herself in a totally new light.
She had promised him to try to be humble. The thought had mingled withthe sea's rhythmic lullaby as it hushed her restless soul to sleep lastnight. He had offered her a new God who was Love,--his God. One whogave him happiness and content. Why should she resist? Was there reallysuch a God? if so, then He had led her to this unheard-of andunsuspected cousin, the one being in the universe who granted her theright to be, her right to rest in his care and protection.
With the thought came a novel rush of gratitude to the unknown God ofwhom she had never thought as a friend, a Father, One to count upon.She had turned her head on the pillow last night and buried her eyeswith a certain gladness and hope.
In quiet she had sat through the hurried breakfast hour this morning,in serenity had bade the guest good-by, and with a novel ambition hadasked Mrs. Lem to be allowed to assist her. A wakened sense, a newoutlook on the world, filled her consciousness now while thehousekeeper rambled on.
Edna Derwent had everything. Very well, it was the lesson thatThinkright had set her, to be willing that Edna should have it, to putaway that heat of envy which had been like a sharp tooth at her vainheart. In the exaltation that followed yielding herself to the learningof this lesson a sense of humor had little place; so she listenedintently to the substance of Mrs. Lem's information with scarcely asmile at its manner.
"I tell you, though, money won't buy everything," went on thehousekeeper, scalding a fresh panful of china. "Here's a fresh wiper,Miss Sylvy. Mr. Derwent's ben entirely incapacitated for business orpleasure for years. What good's his money to him? All them luxuriantcarriages and high-steppin' charges,--he'd give 'em all, I guess, to beable to walk off ten miles the way Thinkright can, and him his ownage."
"It must be hard for Miss Derwent," returned Sylvia, able to-day toaccept this idea.
"Jest so," agreed Mrs. Lem. "The more that her mother jest lovessociety and fine doin's and pines after 'em, so that Edna, who lovesboth father and mother, is caught betwixt the upper and nethergrindstone, as the old sayin' is, and has the life about squoze out ofher sometimes."
Sylvia bit her lip. "It's difficult to imagine it," she replied, "whenone sees her so bright and happy as she has been here."
"Yes, this is the Hawk Island Miss Derwent. I've heard the other sidefrom Thinkright. I lived over on the island summers when she and her paand ma used to be there together, but I never knew any of 'em. I usedto see the child rampagin' around the rocks in sneakers and cottondresses, and her ma readin' to her pa in hammocks on the piazza; butlater years she's gone with 'em to waterin' places in Europe. Leastwisethat's what folks _say_, though where they'll find any more water thanthey can here gets me. You know how some folks is. The fishin' 'salways better somewheres else. Yes," continued Mrs. Lem sagely, "wedon't know what we're doin' when we're envyin' folks. There's askeleton in most family closets. Most everybody's got somethin' tocontend with. I used to think," she lowered her voice, "that theCreator sent 'em for our good. Thinkright says not; so I humor him, andI hope it won't be visited on me. I apologize reg'lar in my prayers atnight. It's jest as well to be on the safe side."
Sylvia's grave little mouth broke into a sudden smile, but her eyeswere wistful.
"I should love to believe as my cousin does," she answered. "He said wemust judge everything by the fruits, and he is so good, so good."
"Yes, Thinkright's fruits is all right," agreed Mrs. Lem, squeezing outher dishcloth. "He ain't any feeble critter either, I tell you. WhenJudge Trent's here and somethin' goes wrong, and he scowls under thembrows o' his, I often feel like sayin' to him, 'Thinkright ain't evenafraid of his Creator; and I guess he ain't goin' to care for a fewscowls o' _yours_.' Judge Trent gees and haws some, but he always hasto come around if Thinkright's sure he's right. There ain't only onething that man's afraid of, and that's doin' wrong; and though youhain't seen so very much o' the world yet, you'll find out that's quitean ovation in the way o' lookin' at things."
Sylvia's brain made a vain grasp for the word Mrs. Lem was trying touse. Two days afterward when she was out on the basin in Thinkright'srowboat "innovation" came to relieve her bewilderment.
Minty's lean, strong arms had often rowed her about the little saltlake, but Sylvia was ambitious to be her own boatman; and thisafternoon she was practicing by herself, catching crabs and splashing,laughing at her own awkwardness until, breathing fast, her pale cheekspink from exertion, she pulled in her oars and floated on the blueripples, looking at the full green of leafy boughs among the sombrerichness of the evergreens, and listening to the spring gladness of therobin's songs.
It was all very lovely. The Tide Mill only refused to be cheered.Silent, enduring, wrapped in memories, it stood gray andunapproachable.
"Poor old thing," murmured Sylvia, addressing it. "You're not thinkingright." She laughed softly, and ran her hands through her thick curls.
Instantly an oar glided off the boat. She jumped for it, but it was toolate. Nearly capsizing, her heart beat as the boat rocked back intosafety and she tried to scull after the runaway with the remaining oar.Her inexperience and the clumsiness of the boat baffled her. Thefloating oar rose and fell, gently increasing its distance, and splashas she might she could not gain upon it.
A curt voice suddenly called from the shore behind her, "Here, girl,girl! Stop that. Be quiet, and probably you'll float in."
She turned involuntarily, and beheld, standing on the verge, a small,elderly man wearing a silk hat and scowling while he motioned to herimperiously.
Obediently she ceased her ineffectual splashing, and the boat dancedand floated shoreward.
"Then why doesn't the oar float in, too?" she asked anxiously.
"Ask Neptune," returned the stranger curtly.
"I mustn't lose that oar," cried the girl.
"Why didn't you take care of it, then?" rejoined the judge, and theboat just then venturing near him and curtsying, he jumped aboard ofher with an agility that astonished the passenger. The craft rocked inthe shock.
"Sit still," commanded the judge, and Sylvia remained motionless whilehe seized the oar, and going to the end of the boat, began scullingwith a practiced hand, which was at strange variance with his costume.
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bsp; The trouble in Sylvia's eyes vanished, and two little stars dancedtherein as she saw by the steady approach of their craft that the lostwas as good as found, and so had leisure to gaze furtively at hergondolier. The down-drawn corners of the judge's lips, his shaggy frownat the oar coquetting on the ripples with a breeze which was flappingthe skirts of his formal frock coat, and the firm set forward of hishigh silk hat, formed an incongruous picture.
He took no notice of her gaze. "The currents in this basin," he saidhalf to himself, "are most aggravating."
"They seem to have soured the disposition of the Tide Mill," venturedSylvia.
"Eh?" returned the judge, glancing down into the eyes that laughed asmischievously as the small pearly teeth. The sunshine, glinting in thesilky curls and brightening them to red, seemed laughing too.
"If you've never seen the Tide Mill before, do look at it," she wenton. "Doesn't it seem as if it was refusing to be comforted?"
"It couldn't make its salt," remarked the judge briefly.
"Queer, with so much about," returned Sylvia demurely.
The lawyer caught her starry gaze again. He took no notice of herlittle joke.
"Can you swim?" he asked sternly.
"No," she returned.
"Then you've no business out here in a boat without some older person."
Sylvia was wearing Minty's blue sweater, and the heated, rosy faceabove it looked like that of a child. Judge Trent after his unexpectedarrival had come down to the Basin to search for the pale and mourningniece concerning whom his conscience had been awakened. He had beenlooking for the black-clothed figure on the walk, at the moment whenthe dilemma of the awkward child in the boat had attracted hisattention.
"The children of this neighborhood should every one be taught to swimand manage a boat, girls as well as boys," he went on. "They are not.It is a very stupid mistake."
"I do want to learn very much," returned Sylvia meekly. "Minty Foster,a little girl here, has given me one lesson, and I came out to practicethis afternoon."
"Minty can row very well," said the judge. "I hope you've learned alesson about watching your tools. Experience is a good teacher." As hespoke he reached the runaway oar and snatched it up dripping.
"Oh, I'm so much obliged," said Sylvia. She possessed a dimple in onecheek, and it was very busy while Judge Trent, his lips down-drawn,pushed both oars through the rowlocks beside her.
This accomplished, he sat down in the end of the boat and looked ather. She grasped the oars, wondering what he expected her to do. Shefelt that it would be a dangerous thing to splash that broadcloth, andshe dared not laugh beneath the frowning, speculative gaze.
"I thought I knew all the people around these parts," he said, whileSylvia let the boat float. "I never saw you before."
"I'm a visitor," returned the girl. "Isn't it beautiful here?"
"There isn't any better place in this world," returned the lawyerimpassively, "and I doubt very much if there is in the next."
He saw now that his companion was older than he had thought. Herecalled, too, that she had made some comment on the Tide Mill.
"What was it you said about the Tide Mill?" he asked.
"Only that it _will_ look so sad and unapproachable even when the sunshines like this; as if its feelings had been hurt and it could neverpardon or forget."
The judge continued to gaze. He was being penetrated by a suspicion.This girl knew Minty Foster. Supposing--
But he had called on Miss Derwent, and she had verified Thinkright'sdescription. It was her impression of muteness, pallor, sadness, whichhad decided the judge to drop his affairs and have a look at the farm.What did Edna mean? What did Thinkright mean? Was it a plot to work onhis sympathies? This smiling maid with mischief in her eyes frolickingrecklessly in the clumsy old rowboat was the opposite type from thecold, pale specimen he had braced himself to meet in the Basin path.She would have been suitably environed in its changeless sombre firs.This girl, with her length of limb and graceful breadth of shoulder,had greater affinity with the white birches delicately fluttering theirlight bright greens as they leaned eagerly toward the water and Sylvia.
"The Tide Mill hurt beyond pardon, eh?" he returned. "Well, possibly it_didn't_ relish the epithets of the men who sank their money in it."
The flight of fancy was unprecedented for the speaker. He was sensibleof unwonted excitement in a possibility.
His companion was still dimpling at the lean figure in the roomy frockcoat and high hat.
Laura had been a small woman. The judge was considering that if hiscompanion should rise she would equal or overtop his height.
Starved. Very needy. So Thinkright had put it. Nonsense. This _riante_dryad of the birches could be nothing to him.
"Shows a small disposition, though, after all these years," he addedafter the brief pause. "Don't you think so? Nursing injuries andbearing malice and all that sort of business?"
The smile died from Sylvia's face. She half averted it, and trailed herfingers through the quiet ripples. "Thinkright says so," she answered.
And then the judge knew that those young lips so suddenly grave hadkissed his picture good-night, that that young head had been pillowedon his sister's breast, and had constituted whatever brightness was inher troubled life.
A strange tightening constricted his throat, for, the temporary heat ofthe girl's exertion with the oars passing away, he saw her cheeks pale,and it was with a grave glance that she looked at him again. "Do youknow Thinkright Johnson?" she asked.
He nodded.
"I suppose he is the best man in the world," she added. "Don't you?"
The high hat nodded again. Judge Trent would not have given unqualifiedassent to so sweeping an assertion, but, poorer than Dunham on a recentoccasion, he had not even monosyllables at his command. It didsomething novel to him to remember Laura and then picture this girlalone at the Hotel Frisbie.
They floated in silence for nearly a minute, then the judge spoke:"Thinkright has some very good ideas. It's an excellent practice, forinstance, to forgive your enemies, and even on some special occasionsto stretch a point and forgive your friends."
The young girl looked up at him. If this stranger knew her cousin hecould not be quite a stranger. "He is trying to teach me to thinkright," she said simply. "It seemed at first as if it were going to beeasy even though it was different; but, oh, it's hard sometimes! I getsore inside just as my arms used to in the gymnasium at school. Fatherwrote me a note once to get me excused from physical exercise; but,"she gave a little laugh and shrugged the shoulders of the blue sweater,"Thinkright won't write me any note of excuse."
"H'm," thought the judge uncomfortably, "I guess she's got some of theTrent old Adam to buck up against." His gaze did not remove from thehalf-averted head with its sun-crowned, red-gold aureole.
"Who'd have thought Sam Lacey's carrot-top could be made over intothat?" he mused.