Izola L. Forrester

“ Polly cried, but her words had no effect. They were right in the path of the Portland, and under her great bow. The Captain was shouting something to them, as he leaned out over the bridge. Bells seemed to be ringing, and the rails were lined with tense, startled faces. Polly could hear some women screaming up on deck. The engines had stopped on the big boat, and she was drifting easily with the incoming tide towards the inlet. It seemed in that second of time as if everybody on the steamer was shouting out something different as Crullers jumped into the water. ”

“ Someway, she began to feel happier and more relaxed than she had since her coming to Queen’s Ferry. The long winter’s work at the Hall had been very confining, and she was not used to that. Out here, in Polly’s garden, all her nature-loving self responded to the growing things about her, and most of all, to the growing girl, whose soul and personality were unfolding, too, in her springtime of youth, with all the unknown possibilities and promises of her random seed.
“I would love to see you out on the range, Polly,” she continued. ”

“ To Ralph, she had always been the little princess royal, ever since he had first met her, that night a year ago, in the spring gloaming. Dorrie and Kit had met the stranger more than half way, and even Helen, the fastidious, had liked him at first sight, but with Jean, there had always been a certain amount of reserve, her absorption in her work always had hedged her around with thorns of aloofness and apparent shyness. “But you see after all, no matter how far one goes, one always comes back, if there are those you love best waiting for you.” ”

“ The girls at Hope had sent down five pounds of fudge as a parting gift to be included in the basket, but best of all, Kit thought, was a young wild turkey, roasted to perfection, and stuffed with chestnuts.
"Isn't this just like Anne!" Kit exclaimed, exultantly. "She knows how I love to nibble on good things to eat. Now we won't have to go into the dining-car for lunch, and it will seem like a regular picnic having it here."
The Dean was like a boy in his enjoyment of the unconventional luncheon. He ordered a wonderful salad as his share and a pot of French cocoa. ”

“ Young girls are chosen to dive for the shells, generally the fairest and purest in the village and they poise themselves in the prow of the canoe and dive just as the sun rises.”
“I shall try it to-morrow morning,” said Polly promptly, her eyes dancing with mischief. “Ted and Sue shall play on their mandolins for me, and I will dive for pearls.”
“And you dare to call me vain,” teased Isabel. “I guess if anyone is to dive, I will.”
“Let’s all dive,” suggested Kate, the peacemaker, laughing. “Tell us some more, please, doctor, and don’t mind these giddy creatures.” ”

“ The two looked at each other with new-born understanding, and Jean’s strong, freckled hand was laid over Polly’s, as it rested on the bench beside her.
“I know, dear. But it usually makes a girl more self-reliant and helpful to others, if she does have to think of her own future, and to lend a helping hand towards feathering the home-nest. That is what we three older children have done, and it binds us in a closer tie of love, each helping the rest to get along as soon as he himself can fly alone, so to speak.” ”

“ I have only pitied the ones who could not see they had no genius. Ah, my dear, when you meet real genius, then you know the difference instantly. It is like the real gems and the paste. There is consecration and no thought of gain. The work is done irresistibly, spontaneously, because they cannot help it. They do not think of so called success, it is only the fulfilment of their own visions that they love. You like to draw and paint, you say, and you have studied some in New York. What then?”
Jean pushed back her hair impulsively. ”

“ It was just this, 'Carry on.' It's what we can't avoid, Kit, no matter whether we find ourselves blazing new trails through the wilderness or trying to find the way to happiness right here in little old Gilead. You have to 'carry on' for those who come after."
Jean called to her for some advice immediately, and she hurried up-stairs. Kit sat cogitating over what she had said, just as Stanley came through the orchard with a huge basket on his shoulder of early sweet apples, the first fruits of the Greenacre harvest. ”

“ As Ted said, the hotel looked like a Mississippi steamboat with its triple rows of bright lights. Far out on the end of the Sickle, they could see the Point light blinking like some great eye.
“Oh, look, Polly,” cried Isabel. “Isn’t it beautiful?”
Polly leaned on the veranda railing and nodded absently, her eyes half closed like the Captain’s, as she watched the bay.
“It makes me feel as though somebody were watching us,” she said. “Doesn’t it seem queer to think that while we are all asleep, the life savers patrol the beach, taking care of things. Grandfather’s a sort of a coast patrol. ”

“ When anything is in your heart, it bubbles out like a spring, doesn’t it, sorrow or happiness? But when we are happiest or saddest, well, we just can’t say anything. It is all here, ’way down deep in our hearts, but we can’t seem to lift it out, and exhibit it. So you see, girlie, while I may have seemed independent and self-sufficient all winter long, I was really eating my heart out for very lonesomeness. Can you understand?”
Polly nodded sympathetically. She always could understand the other person’s point of view.
“That is why the girls never became really acquainted with you, then. ”

“ I don’t want to get all freckled in that sunlight,” came Isabel’s tones from the shadiest corner of the porch.
“Pull her forth, girls,” ordered Polly, gaily. “She’s too exclusive. She just wants to set herself up before us as a mirror of style, and we won’t have it. Pull her forth, and walk her in the sun till she’s as freckled as a cowslip. What do you think, Dorothy, this young person wants to wear a bathing cap with a bow on the front and a ruffle around it like an old maid’s nightcap, and she takes a bar of violet scented soap with her into the deep blue sea when she trips down to bathe. ”

“ When Kit came down the staircase, she glanced into the library and saw Marcelle in there alone, bending down before the long wall bookcases. Across the wide hall there were groups of boys and girls in the two long double parlors, laughing and talking together, and every couch and settee along the T-shaped hall was occupied, but Marcelle was alone.
Whoever had built Hope College had managed to work out some of his dreams of old world beauty. The library was wainscoted in some dull satin finished wood, with the graining of olive wood. ”

“ Those scrawny hands with their knotted knuckles and large veins. Jean thought of what Cousin Roxy had said, that Cynthy’s hands had been so beautiful. She ran upstairs to find the rose. It was in a big cretonne covered “catch-all” box, tucked away with odds and ends of silks and laces, a large hand-made French rose of silk and velvet, its petals shaded delicately from palest pink at the heart to deep crimson at the outer rim. There was a black lace veil in the box too that seemed to go with it, so Jean took them both back downstairs, and Cynthy’s face was a study as she looked at them. ”

“ Very stiffly and anxiously they both sat in the saddles, Isabel with her back stiff as a poker, Ruth precise and resolute, her knees gripping the pony’s sides as though she had been on a pony express. “Don’t be afraid, girls,” she called to them. “They won’t bolt or kick a bit. Let them take the trail, and they’ll follow after the rest like sheep. Just hold them up a bit when you come to a steep incline, that’s all.”
“Don gave me a quirt,” said Polly, holding up the short braided whip.
“You’d better not wave it over Jinks’ head, young lady,” Jean laughed. ”

“ She looked down at the “Knob,” as they soon grew accustomed to calling the island. There was a fine incurved beach for bathing, with a great, tumbled mass of rocks at the farther end that rose higher and higher at the end pointing towards the bay. Young willow and scrub pine grew short and thick wherever they could get a footing in the rock crevices, and there was plenty of grass, but it was tall and sharp pointed and tinted queer colors from the tide.
“You can walk away out yonder into the water at low tide,” said Tom. “The beach is a fine one, better than we’ve got at Fair Havens. ”

“ Kit exclaimed, sinking with a luxurious sigh of content down among the cushions on the broad couch in Anne's room, "I'd give anything, sometimes, if I'd been an only child; of course, you've got a brother, but you're the only girl. You don't know what it is to be one of four. I share my room with Helen, back home, and all honors with Jean. Then, of course, Doris is the baby, and while we all love each other devotedly, still you do have to elbow your way through a large family, if you want to keep on being yourself. ”

“ Jean thought over this last when she was alone, and smiled to herself. Why on earth did one have to give outward and visible signs of temperament, she wondered, before people believed one had sensitive feelings or responsive emotions? Must one wear one’s heart on one’s sleeve, so to speak, for a sort of personal barometer? Bab was high strung and temperamental too; so was Kit. They both indulged now and then in mental fireworks, but nobody took them seriously, or considered it a mark of genius. ”

“ We’re only plain people, Jean, lass.”
“Oh, mother, the girls at Calvert are not what the world calls wealthy. They seem so to us because we have so little in a way. We are rich in land and stock, and love, but very little real cash. It’s only a different scale of values, dear. What difference does it make whether father gives one of us a yearling or a new pony for a birthday gift, and down yonder, the Admiral gives Polly a new camera, or a necklace. It all comes to the same thing. Peggie will hold her own among them all, dear, and they will love her too. ”

“ Anne declared with a sigh, as they rose to leave.
"We are late now," rejoined Kit, cheerfully. "They'll prize us all the more if we keep ourselves kind of scarce. Rex told me to order walnut sundae for him, and wait until he comes back."
Just at this moment Anne laid her finger on her lips and glanced impressively at a table on the other side of the room. There sat Amy with Peggy Porter and Norma, all of them dreamily imbibing ice cream sodas, just as though Shakespearian rehearsals were occasions unknown in their engagement calendars. ”

“ Just as Polly set her teeth, and tried to make straight for the other boat, the great white steamer, City of Portland, hove into sight, steaming up the channel. Then something that Polly had either read or heard flashed through her mind. A sailing vessel has the right of way. But Crullers did not know that, and when she saw that monster bearing straight down on her, all her courage and presence of mind left her. The one thing she did remember were the ring buoys in the lockers at the stern. ”

“ The wagon swayed perilously, but Ella Lou held to her course, and suddenly they felt the rise of the shore line again. Overhead, there had flown a vanguard of frightened birds, flying ahead of the smothering clouds of smoke that poured now in blinding masses down from the burning woods. The cries and calls of the men working along the back fire line reached the little group on the far shore, faintly.
As the mare climbed up the bank, dripping wet and snorting, Cousin Roxy glanced back over her shoulder at the way they had come. Cynthy gave one look too, and covered her face with her hands. ”

“ All at once she knew that she was going to lose the race, and the strangest part of it was, she could see Nancy win, and feel a great wave of joy over it. As the Pirate’s boom passed her, she slackened her own main sheet, turned her head and smiled at Nancy, and the first cheer that went up for the winner of the Junior Cup, was when Polly stood up, and waved her hand with a clear,
“Hurrah! Hurrah!”
Tom promptly stood on his head, as the shouts rang out over the bay, and shore. The Admiral himself helped Nancy out as if she had been a queen. ”

“ It stood high upon the bluff, its college dominating the shady serenity of its quiet avenues.
"The Dean doesn't keep a carriage or car," said Rex as they alighted at the gray stone station covered with clambering vines. "Besides, he thought I was bringing a boy, who would not mind the hike up the hill!"
"I don't mind a bit," returned Kit. "I like it. It seems so good to find real hills after all. I thought everything out here was just prairie. I do hope they won't be watching for us. It will be ever so much easier if I can just walk in before they get any kind of a shock, don't you know." ”

“ CRULLERS’ PAROLE “Oh, grandfather, dear—” exclaimed Polly, holding up a slice temptingly on a plate, “Shortcake?”
“No, Polly, don’t coax me. Not a bite to eat. I’ve just been riding along the river. And girls, that reminds me.” The Admiral sank into one of the deep-seated garden chairs, and held up his finger at them all mysteriously. “I have seen her again.”
“The same girl?” asked Polly eagerly, bending forward and even forgetting the shortcake.
“The same one. I never saw a girl ride so splendidly in all my life. She is the admiration of every one along the river road. ”

“ You gain so much more when you share your knowledge with others. Do you know what this west window makes me think of, Jean?” He pointed one hand to the small side window that looked far down the valley. “Somewhere over yonder lies New York. Often times through the past year, I have stood there, and felt like Dante at his tower window, in old Guido Di Rimini’s castle at Ravenna. Joe’s pigeons circling around down there make me think of the doves which he called ‘Hope’s messengers’ bringing him memories in his exile from his beloved Florence.” ”

“ Kate put in. “It’s the unknown danger that scares you.”
“I mean firemen, and soldiers, and life-savers—”
“And mothers and fathers, and heroes generally,” put in Polly, as she sat on a sofa cushion, her long, brown curls falling loosely around her, and her pink kimono slipped on over her night gown, for the nights were always cool on the bay. “I know what you mean, Ruth. It’s because they have so much else to think about that they haven’t time to worry. Tom’s all ready to make a business of being a hero, and he doesn’t realize it is being a hero. He thinks it’s lots of fun.” ”

“ Kit burst forth, eagerly. "Think what glorious fun it would be to train them, and make them understand how much more interesting you can make life if you only take the right point of view."
"Yes, but supposing what seemed to be the right point of view to you, Kit, was not the right point of view to them at all. Every one looks at life from his own angle."
"Carlota always said that, too," Jean put in. "I remember at our art class each student would see the subject from a different angle and sketch accordingly. Carlota said it was exactly like life, where each one gets his own perspective." ”

“ But the biggest surprise of all came when Bryan Ormond, who had stirred the musical circles of two worlds, took his place on the little country platform and played for them on his 'cello. The Judge and Mrs. Ellis enjoyed it just as the Robbinses did. It was a novel treat to hear the strains of Lizst and Chopin sounding in the purple silences of those old country hills, but when he had finished, Cynthy leaned over to Kit, who sat next to her and who was in an uplifted rhapsody of meditation. ”

“ Helen put in, leaning her chin on her palms on the edge of the table, her feet up in the big old red rocker. “She’s going to study forestry and be a government expert, and maybe take up a big claim herself. She says she’s bound she’ll live on a mountain top.”
“Well, she can if she likes,” Jean said. “I like Mother Nature’s cosy corners, don’t you, Motherie? When you get up as high as you can on any old mountain top, what’s the use? You only realize how much you need wings.” ”

“ Polly walked down with them to the wide entrance gates, where Aunty Welcome waited, with a bouquet of fresh cut roses for each girl.
Up on the veranda the Admiral surveyed the scene with a good deal of satisfaction.
“They make me think of a lot of butterflies, Tan,” he told the old setter. “Or flowers, Tan, that’s the best simile, a garden of girls. It keeps the heart young just to listen to their laughter, old fellow.” ”

“ Kit answered, practically, but with an affectionate squeeze that took away any offense from her words. "You know that old favorite saying of Cousin Roxy's, 'It's better to aim at the stars and hit the bar post, than to aim at the bar post and hit the ground.'"
Helen turned around, an anxious look in her blue eyes.
"You're always so matter-of-fact, Kit. You see, I am fourteen now, and it's about time I was having some kind of an ambition. Isn't there anything at all that you long to do more than anything in the world? ”

“ Kit screwed her face up till it looked like Cynthy Allan’s, and prowled towards the youngest of the family with portentous gestures.
“ ’Tain’t a ghost, and ’tain’t a spook, and ’tain’t a banshee. It’s the shadow of your self when you’re sound asleep, and it goeth questing forth on mischief bent. Yours hovers over the chicken coops all night long, Dorrie, and mine flits out to the eagles’ nests on mountain tops, and Helenita’s digs into old chests of romance, and hauls out caskets of jewels and scented gowns by ye hundreds.” ”

“ Ted agreed, pushing back her red curls restlessly. “Fraulein called it the personal quality in art, the gift of expression. What was that old painter’s name who used such a wonderful red in his pictures, and when he died they found it was his heart’s blood he had been painting with. I guess that’s personal expression, isn’t it? I haven’t any, Miss Calvert says. I haven’t any artistic sense.”
“We all have it,” Polly insisted. “You cannot help but have it, because it’s the gift of yourself. What do you like to do more than anything else in the world?” ”

“ Don't talk too long. You know how he is when he gets absorbed in anything."
Kit promised and joined the Dean. He had carried back the statue of Annui and stood before it regarding it with perplexity. Kit slipped her arm through his. It seemed as though there had sprung up a new comradeship and understanding between them since their last talk.
"Won't he tell you his secrets, Uncle Cassius?" she asked. "He has such an aggravating smile, just as if he were amused at baffling you." ”

“ Last year and once when I was a youngster just out of college, and bent on globe-trotting. Ceylon, you know, is the great pearl market of the world, and yet the season of the catch lasts only six weeks. But during those six weeks, instead of a long, jungle-fringed beach, there rise the tents and houses of the pearl seekers, like a city of magic. Every morning you can see the long boats go out, hundreds of them, and each carrying from sixty to seventy men.”
“Divers?” asked Polly. ”

“ Let her cavort gaily in motor cars, and live side by each with Angora cats in the lap of luxury. Who cares? The really great ones of the earth have dwelt in penury and loneliness on the solitary heights.”
“You look so funny brandishing that dish towel, and spouting, Kit,” Helen said, placidly. “I’m sure I can understand how Jean feels and I like it. It is odd about Carlota wearing black and white, isn’t it? I wish Jean had told more about her. I shall always imagine her in a little straight gown of dull violet velvet, with a cap of pearls.” ”

“ It was turned fairly to them, so they had a good view of the prow with its figure-head, a great golden sea-horse, curving proudly up from the waves.
“But its head looks like a dragon’s instead of a horse’s. I wonder how they travel through the water?” asked Ted.
“Just as easily as a jelly fish,” laughed Polly. “They don’t seem to help themselves at all, just go along with their heads held up high, as if they thought they owned the whole ocean. And they are such tiny things, that it seems comical. Think if a sea horse and a sea cow were to get into a quarrel. ”

“ And a very fair, young Nancy she made too, with her dark hair arranged by Cousin Roxy in puffs over her ears, and the plain stuff gown with its white kerchief crossed in front. On the wall were stretched ’possum and squirrel pelts, and an old spinning wheel stood beside the fireplace.
“You looked dear, Jean,” Helen whispered when the curtain fell. “Your eyes were just like Mother’s. Is my hair all right?” ”

“ Kit said, looking around her speculatively. "I wish I were going to live here. Peggy, you'll have to entertain us often. It's so kind of solitary and restful, isn't it, up here?"
"Solitary," scoffed Peggy. "I've been here four days getting settled, and you might just as well call the side show of a circus solitary. There isn't even the ghost of privacy. I'm mobbed every time I try to sit and meditate."
"Who wants to meditate, anyway?" asked Amy. "Don't you feel 'the rushing torrent of ambition's flood sweeping away the barriers' and—what else did the Dean say?" ”

“ A cabin boy carried the suitcases and various wraps away and the girls seated themselves in the cosy wicker-chairs under the wide awning, and tried to think it was not all a dream.
All about them lay the beautiful river, broadening out as it approached Chesapeake Bay. To the east the water glittered like quicksilver under the sun’s rays, and gulls darted back and forth with graceful, wide spread wings. ”

“ Kit and Helen had always been the two who had loved to make believe they were “somebody else,” as Helen called it. “Let’s play we’re somebody else,” had been their unfailing slogan for diversion and variety, but Jean lived in the world of reality. She was Jean Robbins, living today, not Melisande in an enchanted forest, nor Berengaria, not even Kit’s favorite warrior maid, Jeanne D’Arc. ”

“ You have no idea, Kit, how I have dreaded going back to the city and leaving things as they are. Dad seems to get so discouraged now when matters go wrong, and that throws the load of keeping up right on mother's shoulders."
"I know it," Kit rejoined, "but if it's anything to you all, I'd be willing to bet anything that right this minute Uncle Cassius is springing some glad tidings down-stairs that will turn the tide of fortune."
"Oh, Kit," begged Doris, "don't you and Jean talk like that, because I can't understand what you're driving at; tell it all out at once." ”

“ For men must work and women must weep,
And there’s little to earn, and many to keep,
Though the harbor bar be moaning.” “Oh, Polly, don’t, please,” cried Ruth and Isabel together. “It makes the cold chills run down your back.”
“Well, now, I never feel that way about it,” said the Captain, contentedly. “Our times are in His hands, do you mind? Our times are in His hands. Don’t you ever forget that. When I was a youngster like you girls and Tom here, I used to reason along those lines too, and I’d be hoping I’d die this way and that way, and I’d be wishing for a chariot and some angels. ”

“ I’ve been so homesick abroad just to look at a crooked apple tree in bloom that I didn’t know what to do. Each man to his ‘ain acre.’ Where were you born, Carlota?”
“At the Villa Marina. Ah, but you should see it.” Carlota’s dark face glowed with love and pride. “It is dull terra cotta color, and then dull green too, the mold of ages, I think, like the under side of an olive leaf, and flowers everywhere, and poplars in long avenues. My father laughs at our love for it, and says it is just a mouldy old ruin, but every summer we spend there. Some day perhaps you could come to see us, Jean. ”

“ This club has a real reason for its existence, a purpose, and we must make it worth while. It always seems to me as if girls could do so much better if they would hold hands, and work in unison—”
“Co-operate,” suggested Ruth.
“Yes, that’s just the right word,” Polly agreed, earnestly. “Boys always co-operate in their clubs. They seem to have the real feeling of fellowship. You know what I mean, Kate? Where all work together for the honor and glory of the whole, not just for yourself as a member.”
“Fraulein called it the esprit de corps,” said Ruth. ”

“ I don’t believe age amounts to a thing, really and truly, except for wrinkles and rheumatism. I’ll bet two cents when I’m as old as Cynthy is, I’ll be hankering after pink satin slippers and a breakfast cap with rosebuds.”
Jean laughed happily. The outing had brought the bright color to her cheeks, and it seemed as if she felt a premonition of good tidings even before they reached the house up on the pine-crowned hill. She was singing with Doris as they turned in at the gateway and went up the winding drive, but Kit’s eagle eye discovered signs of fresh tracks in the snow. ”

“ Polly said severely. “He’s a great deal worse than you are. If it wasn’t for mother’s good, sensible, Massachusetts spirit in me, I’d be so puffed up that I’d blow away with the first strong breeze. But I do like to be praised, indeed, I do. I just love to be loved and appreciated.”
Miss Calvert kissed her, and stood in the doorway, as the two went down the broad steps from the veranda. The Admiral’s carriage was waiting, with old Balaam on the box, smiling till his face looked like a piece of shirred black satin. ”