Jane Abbott, page 18
"But there was father—you knew him then, didn't you?"
A pretty color suffused Mrs. Westley's cheeks. "Yes—there was father. I said I only cried for half an hour. Two years afterward I was married—and I cried again. Of course I was very, very happy—but I knew I was going away forever from my girlhood."
"Mother——" protested Isobel. "You make me feel dreadfully sad. I wanted to cry yesterday when Sheila Quinn spoke at the Class-day exercises. Wasn't she wonderful when she said how Lincoln School had given us our shield and our armor and that always we must live to be worthy of her trust! I thrilled to my toes. But if it makes one cry to be married——"
"Darling"—and Mrs. Westley took Isobel's hand in hers—"we leave our childhood and again our girlhood with a few tears, perhaps, but always there is the wonder of the bigger life ahead. I think even in dying there must be the same joy. And though we do shed tears over the youth we tenderly lay aside, they are happy tears—tears that sweeten and strengthen the spirit, too."
"Well, I'm glad I have two more years at Highacres," cried Gyp, looking with pity at Isobel's thoughtful face.
"And I'm glad," Isobel added, slowly, "that I decided to go to college. It must be dreadful to know that school is all over. I wouldn't be Amy Mathers for anything. It sounds so silly to hear her talk of all she's going to do next winter—such empty things!" Isobel, in her scorn, had forgotten that only a few weeks back she had wanted to do just what Amy Mathers was planning to do!
"Well,"—Graham stretched his arms—"school's all right but I'm mighty glad vacation has come."
Through their talk Jerry had sat very still. To her the Class-day exercises of the school had opened a great well of sentiment. All through her life, she thought, she would strive to repay by worthiness the great debt of inspiration she owed to the school. She had not thought of it in just that grand way until she had heard Sheila Quinn, until Dana King had given the class prophecy, until Ginny had read the school poem, until Peggy Lee had presented the class gift to the school. A young alumna of the preceding class had welcomed the proud graduates. Dr. Caton had presented the Lincoln Award—to Dana King. A murmur had swept the room when he announced that, through a mistake in the records, the Award went to Dana King instead of either Miss Cox or Miss Travis. Jerry sat next to Ginny and, as Dr. Caton spoke, she squeezed Ginny's hand in a way that said plainly, "If I had it all to do over again I'd do the same thing!" Afterward Dana King had shaken her hand warmly and had declared that he "couldn't understand such good fortune and it meant a lot to him—for it made college possible."
It seemed to Jerry as though they were all standing on a great shining hill from which paths diverged—attractive paths that beckoned; that precious word college—Isobel, Dana King, Peggy Lee were going along that path; Sheila Quinn was going to study to be a nurse. Amy Mather's had chosen a more flowery way. Would her happiness be more lasting than the pretty flowers that lured her? Jerry's own path was a steep, narrow, little path, and led straight away from Highacres—but it led to Sunnyside! So with the little ache that gripped her when she thought that she must very soon leave Highacres forever, was a great joy that in a few days now she would see her precious Sweetheart—and Gyp and Isobel would be with her.
The whole family was in a flutter over the Commencement. Graham's class was to usher; the undergraduates were to march in by classes, the girls in white, carrying sweet-peas, the boys wearing white posies in the lapels of their coats.
Mrs. Westley inspected her young people with shining eyes.
"You look like the most beautiful flowers that ever grew," she cried in the choky way that mothers have at such moments. "I wish I could hug you all—but it would muss you dreadfully."
"Thank goodness, mammy, that you don't find any dirt on me," exclaimed Graham, whose ruddy face shone from an extra "party" scrubbing.
"Am I all right, mother?" begged Isobel, pirouetting in her fluffy white.
Uncle Johnny rushed in. He was very dapper in a new tailcoat and a flower in his buttonhole. He was very nervous, too, for he was to give the address of the day. He pulled a small box from his pocket.
"A little graduating gift for my Bonnie." It was a circlet pin of sapphires. He fastened it against the soft, white folds of her dress. "You know what a ring is symbolic of, Isobel? Things eternal—everlasting—never ending. That's like my faith in you." He lifted the pretty, flushed, happy face and kissed it. "Come on, now—everybody ready?"
If they had not all been so excited over the Commencement they must have noticed that there was something very different in Uncle Johnny's manner—a certain breathless exaltation such as one feels when one has girded one's self for a great deed.
He had made up his mind to something. The day before, while he had been preparing the Commencement address, all kinds of thoughts had haunted him—thoughts concerning Barbara Lee. That half-hour with her in her little office, when she had told him she was going away, had opened his eyes. He had cried out: "What will we do without you?" He had really meant, "What will I do without you?"
Absurd—he tried to reason the whole thing calmly—absurd that this slip of a girl, who knew Chinese, had become necessary to his happiness! How in thunder had it happened? But there is no answer to that—and he was in no state of mind to reason; she was going away—and he could not let her go away.
So all the while he was dashing off splendid things about loyalty (John Westley had won several oratorical contests at college) his brain was asking humbly, "Will she laugh at an old bachelor like me—if I tell her?" He had hated the face he saw in the mirror, edged above his ears with closely-clipped gray hair. Thirty-six years old; he had not thought that so very old until now; contrasted with Barbara Lee's splendid youth it seemed like ninety.
"I'll tell her—just the same," was his final determination; she was on her way to the "stars," but he wanted her to know that he loved her with a strength and constancy the greater for his thirty-six years.
From the platform he stared out over the sea of serious young faces—and saw only the one. He stood before them all, speaking with an earnestness and a beauty of thought that was inspired—not by the detached group of graduates, listening with shining eyes, but by Barbara Lee, sitting with a rapt expression that seemed to separate herself and him from the others and bring them very close.
"Loyalty" was his theme; "loyalty to God, loyalty to one's highest ideals, loyalty to one's country, to one's fellowmen."
After he had finished there was the stir which always marks, in a gathering of people, a high pitch of feeling. Then someone sang, clear, soprano notes that drifted through the room and mingled with the spring gladness. The air was fragrant with the sweetness of the blossoms which decked the big room; through the long windows came the freshness of the June world outside. It was a day, an hour, sacred to the rites of youth. More than one man and woman, worn a little with living, sat there with reverence in their hearts for these young people who, strong with the promise of their day, stood at the start——
Then the school sang their Alma Mater—the undergraduates singing the first two verses, the graduates singing the last. The dear, familiar notes rang with a truer, braver cadence—one voice, clearer than the others, broke suddenly with feeling.
"Wasn't it all perfectly beautiful?" cried Gyp as the audience moved slowly after the files of graduates. "You couldn't tell which was best of the program and it was sad, wasn't it? Wasn't Uncle Johnny splendid? And didn't the girls look fine? You know Sheila Quinn was just sick over her dress—it was so plain—and she looked as lovely as any of the others. Oh, goodness, think how you'd feel if we were graduating. But I hope our Commencement will be just as nice! There's Barbara Lee, let's hug her—think how dreadful to have her go away. And Dana King's just waiting for you, Jerry——" Gyp ended her outburst by rushing to Miss Lee and throwing her long arms about her shoulders.
John Westley advanced upon them—with the strange new look still in his eyes.
"Gyp—you're wrinkling Miss Lee's pinkness." He tried to make his tone light. "Will you come into the library for a moment, Miss Lee? There's a book I want you to find for me." His eyes pleaded. Wondering a little, Barbara Lee walked away with him.
"Well, I never——" declared Gyp, disgusted. Then, in the stress of saying good-by to some of her schoolmates, she forgot Uncle Johnny and Barbara Lee.
John Westley had felt that the library would be quite deserted. Standing in the embrasure of the window through which the June light streamed, he told Barbara Lee in awkward, earnest words all that was in his heart. There was a humility in his voice, as he offered her his love, that brought a tender smile to the corners of her lips.
"I wanted you to know," he finished, simply. "I don't suppose—what I can offer—can find any place in your heart alongside of your splendid dreams—but, I wanted you to know that you have——"
"There's more than one way to the stars——" she interrupted, lifting glowing eyes to his.
Gyp had said good-by to everyone she could lay a finger on. Then she remembered Uncle Johnny.
"Do you s'pose they're in the library yet?"
She and Jerry tiptoed along the corridor and peeped in the door. To their embarrassed amazement Uncle Johnny and Barbara Lee were standing looking out of the window—with their hands clasped.
Gyp coughed—a cough that was really a funny sputter.
"Did—did you find your book, Uncle Johnny?"
Uncle Johnny turned—without a blush.
"Hello, Gyp!" (As though he'd never seen her before!) "I didn't find the book—because I wasn't really after a book. But I did find what I wanted. What would you say, Gyp and Jerry, if I told you that your Barbara Lee is not going away?"
* * *
CHAPTER XXVII
CRAIG WINTON
"Ka-a-a-a-a-a-a" echoed through the wooded slopes of Kettle. Startled, birds winged away from the treetops, little wild creatures skurried through the undergrowth, yet in the care-free, silvery tinkle of those merry voices there was no note to alarm.
Jerry was leading Isobel and Gyp down the trail from Rocky Top. Baskets, swinging from their shoulders, told of the jolly day's outing. Isobel and Gyp were dressed in khaki middies and short skirts; Isobel's hair was drawn back simply from her face and bound with a bright red ribbon; Gyp's cheeks were tanned a ruddy brown, against which her lips shone scarlet. Jerry wore the boyish outfit in which John Westley had found her. Three happier, merrier girls could not have been found the world over.
A week—a week of hourly wonders, had passed since the girls had arrived at Sunnyside with Uncle Johnny. To Jerry the homecoming was even sweeter than she had dreamed. And to find her precious mother "exactly" the same, she whispered in the privacy of a close hug, dispelled a little fear that had tormented her.
"Why, darling, did you think I'd be different?"
"I don't know——" Jerry had colored, but tightened the clasp of her arms. "It's been so dreadfully long! I thought maybe—I'd forgotten——"
And Little-Dad had not changed a bit, nor the house, nor the garden, nor Bigboy—not a thing, Jerry had found on an excited round. The old lilac bushes were in full leaf, the syringas were in blossom, there were still daffodils in the corner near the fir-tree gate; glossy, spiky leaves marked a row of onions just where her onions had always grown—Little-Dad had put in her seed; the sun slanted in gold-brown bars across the bare floor of the familiar, low-ceilinged living-room, softening to a ruddy glow the bindings of the familiar books everywhere. Her own little room was just as she had left it. Oh, the wonder, the joy of coming back! How different it would have been if there had been any change. What if Sweetheart—she rushed headlong to hug her mother again.
Then there was the fun of taking Gyp and Isobel everywhere. They were genuinely enraptured with all her favorite haunts; the magic of Kettle caught them just as it had caught Uncle Johnny that day he ran away from his guide. Every morning they were up with the birds and off over the trail to return laden with the treasures of Kettle, wild strawberries, lingering trillium, wild currant blossoms, moist baby ferns. Together these girls brought to quiet Sunnyside a gaiety it had not known before. To Mrs. Westley, after her lonely winter, it was as though a radiant summer sun had flooded suddenly through a gray mist.
And Jerry had to tell her mother everything that had happened all through the winter. She saved it all for such moments as she and her mother stole to wander off together; it was easier to talk to mother alone, and then there were so many things she wanted only mother to know—concerning most of them she had written, to be sure, but she liked to think it all over again, herself—those first days of school, the classes, the teachers, the Ravens, basketball and hockey and that never-to-be-forgotten day at Haskin's Hill, the Everett party, the two "real plays," the great vaulted church where music floated from hidden pipes—only concerning the debate and that stormy evening when she had discarded her "charity" clothes did she keep silent. School, school, school; Mrs. Westley, listening intently, smiling wistfully at her big girl, in spirit lived with her through each experience, happy or trying, rejoicing that she had had them. And yet in her eyes there lingered a furtive questioning. Jerry, reveling in her own happiness, did not realize that her mother was watching her every expression with the anguishing fear that her Jerry might have changed. And she had changed; she had grown, though she was still as straight as one of Kettle's young fir trees; her winter's experience had left its mark on her sunny face in a new firmness of the lips, a thoughtfulness behind the shining eyes.
"Will these new friends, Jerry, these fine times you have had make you love Sunnyside less—or be discontented here?" Her mother had interrupted her flood of confidences to say.
Jerry stared in such astonishment that her mother laughed, a shaky laugh, and kissed her.
"Because, my dear, remember you are only Jerauld Travis of Kettle Mountain, and your life must lie just here. Oh, my precious, I thank God I have you back!" she added with an intensity of emotion that startled and puzzled Jerry.
"Why, mother, honest truly there's never been a moment when I wasn't glad I was only Jerauld Travis, and I wouldn't trade places with a soul, only——" and Jerry could not finish, for she did not know just what she wanted to say. She was oddly disturbed. Did her mother begrudge her those happy weeks at Highacres? Had she been afraid of something? And was she the same Jerry who had wished on the Wishing-rock to just see the world which lay beyond her mountain? Didn't she want to go away again—sometime, to college? And what would her mother say if she told her that?
Jerry managed to lock away these tormenting thoughts while she and the girls were roaming Kettle. Certainly there was not a shadow in the face she lifted now to the caress of the mountain breeze nor in the voice that caroled its "Ka-a-a-a-a" and laughed as the echoes answered.
From the Witches' Glade where the trail sloped down between white birches, the girls ran fleetly, leaped the little gate through the fringe of fir trees and, laughing and panting, tumbled upon the veranda of the bungalow straight into Uncle Johnny's arms!
Uncle Johnny had only stopped at Kettle long enough to unload his girls and their baggage, then he had hurried on to Boston to consult the lawyers who were tracing Craig Winton. He had not expected to return for three or four weeks. "Not until I have this thing off my mind," he had explained to Isobel and Gyp.
Isobel, though she now looked at it from another angle, still thought it very foolish to pursue the search for this Craig Winton. The Boston men had reported that their search had led them to a blank wall and that there was little use spending more money on it. But in spite of this, Uncle Johnny had persisted in going ahead on some clue of his own and wasting precious time away from Barbara Lee. Both Isobel and Gyp, from thinking that no woman in the world was good enough for Uncle Johnny, had now veered around to the happy conviction that heaven had patterned Barbara Lee especially for Uncle Johnny's pleasure. They beamed upon the engagement with such approval that even Uncle Johnny, head over heels in love as he was, grew a little embarrassed by their enthusiasm. Gyp also became reconciled to the school library as a setting for the proposal and declared that, thereafter, the library at Highacres would be enshrined in her heart as something other than a room to "make one's head ache." But both girls were disgusted that Uncle Johnny could cheerfully leave the lady of his choice and go off on a search that appeared so useless! It was contrary to all their rules of romance.
Something in Uncle Johnny's face and his unexpected appearance drew an exclamation from each of the girls. Almost in the same voice, with no more greeting than to vigorously grasp him by shoulder and arm, they cried: "Did you find her? Have you come to stay?"
He hesitated just a moment and glanced questioningly at Mrs. Travis. Then for the first time the girls noticed that Mrs. Travis was very pale, that her eyes burned dark against the whiteness of her skin as though she had been racked by a great agitation and her hands clasped tightly the back of a chair. She nodded to John Westley.
"Yes, my search is ended. You see I had the right clue—though it was only the mention of a pair of eyes. Do you remember in Uncle Peter's letter about Craig Winton's eyes? 'They were glowing like they were lighted within.' Well, have you ever seen a pair of eyes like that? I have—only where Craig Winton's were sad with disappointment, these others glow from the pure joy of being alive——"
