They were awakened the next morning by a persistent and none too gentle
knocking at the back door, and Nina, slipping on a dressing gown,
hurried to respond. She opened the door upon a riotous, glittering June
morning, and Margie, clear-eyed and glowing as the dawn--but far from
amiable.
“Here’s your breakfast!” she said, thrusting a wooden box into Nina’s
hands.
“Oh, but how awfully good and kind!” cried Nina. “I never--”
“Bill said you didn’t have a thing in the house,” Margie remarked,
scornfully, “and couldn’t even light the stove. So he told me to bring
this.”
Her brusque contempt was a little too much even for the gentle Nina.
“It’s very kind of you,” she said, with a polite smile. “But we’d have
managed somehow--”
Margie shrugged her shoulders.
“Well, Bill told me to bring your breakfast,” she said. “And to ask what
you wanted from the store.”
“Thank you, but I couldn’t think--” Nina began, but with another
disdainful shrug Margie had turned away.
“We’ll have to swallow our pride,” Rose suggested from the doorway.
“Let’s be quick, too, before it gets cold.”
“I’m going to dress first,” said Nina. “Because when that scornful
Margie goes out, I’m going to follow. I’ll follow her all day long till
she goes to the store.”
And she meant that. She dressed herself with all her usual unobtrusive
art, and she kept an eye on the house next door. In the very act of
lifting her second cup of coffee to her lips, she heard the front door
slam. She sprang up, pulled on a delightful little hat, and ran out of
her own front door.
Margie was walking quickly up the road, a strong, lithe young figure in
a jersey and a short skirt, bareheaded in the sun. And after her went
the slender and elegant Mrs. De Haaven, going to market for the first
time in her life.
In a happy mood Rose set to work; she washed the dishes, made the bed,
set the little place in order, and then began unpacking the two big
trunks. Most of the clothes could stay in them, but there were all sorts
of other things--silver toilet articles, photographs, books, writing
materials, all the dear, friendly things that had often made even hotel
rooms look homelike. They worked wonders here. The only trouble was,
that there was no shelf for the books, and no flowers.
“I’ll make a shelf!” Rose told herself.
So she went out on the beach and found a suitable small board; then she
screwed two coat hooks into the wall beneath the sitting room window,
laid the board across them, and stood the favorite books on this in a
row.
“Crude, but well-meaning!” she observed, surveying her first piece of
carpentering with a smile, and she went out to see if there were any
flowers about to delight Nina with when she came home.
The first thing she saw was Bill coming down the road. Her impulse was
to step back into the house, but she was ashamed of such weakness; Bill
ought to be spoken to and thanked. So she sat down on the steps, and
Bill, catching sight of her, swung off his hat with that same fine
gesture.
“_Comment ça va?_” he inquired, standing bareheaded before her.
Certainly she had not expected French from Bill, but she politely
suppressed her surprise and answered cheerfully:
“_Tres bien, merci, monsieur!_ I was just wondering if there were any
wild flowers growing about here?”
She looked up at him, but hastily glanced aside, for Bill was looking
down at her with a smile which disconcerted her.
“Flowers, eh?” he said.
They were both silent for a time. Then Rose began, in a somewhat formal
tone:
“My sister and I are both very grateful for--”
A crash interrupted her.
“What’s that?” asked Bill.
“It sounds like my shelf,” she replied, ruefully.
“Did _you_ try to put up a shelf?” Bill demanded. “Let’s have a look at
it.”
Somehow she did not want Bill to come into their house. Not that she
distrusted or disliked him, but he made her uneasy. Still, she could not
very well refuse to let him come, so, with a good grace, she opened the
door and they entered.
His blond head almost reached the ceiling; his great shoulders blocked
all the sunshine from the window; he seemed completely to fill the
little room. And she did not like him to be there.
The pretty little things she had set out on the table seemed like a
child’s toys, the house was like a doll’s house, and she herself, with
her ineffectual shelf, felt altogether too diminished. He had been
staring at the fallen shelf and the coat hooks for some time with an odd
expression--as if he felt sorry for her.
“Look here!” he said. “When you want anything of that sort done, tell
me.”
“There’s no reason on earth why I should trouble you, Mr.--”
“Morgan,” said he. “It wouldn’t be a trouble. There’s nothing I wouldn’t
do for you. Nothing!”
The earnestness with which he spoke confused her.
“Thank you, Mr. Morgan,” she began, hastily. “But--”
“Look here!” he interrupted. “I’ve got to go away--and I don’t like to
leave you like this. You can’t look after yourself any better than a
baby.”
Rose turned scarlet.
“You’re mistaken, Mr. Morgan!” she declared, with a cold little smile.
“You’re very much mistaken!”
“No,” he said. “No, I’m not. I knew, the first moment I saw you--”
“We won’t discuss the matter, if you please.”
“I’m not discussing anything,” said he, with a sort of gentleness. “I’m
only telling you that you’ve got me to count on whenever you need me.”
Her hands clenched, but she answered quietly enough:
“I can’t imagine any possibility of ‘needing’ you, Mr. Morgan.”
He turned toward the door.
“I don’t mean to make a nuisance of myself,” he declared, gravely. And
then he smiled. “I’m going away,” he added. “But I’m coming back!”
The screen door banged after him, and Rose sat down on the couch and
began to cry.
“Beast!” she cried. “I’d like to shake him!”
But the idea of her shaking Mr. Morgan made her laugh. She dried her
tears, ashamed of her temper, and when Nina got back, she was her usual
good-natured, delightful self again. She did not mention the episode to
Nina; it would only distress her.
“And I think I’m capable of managing Mr. Morgan!” she told herself,
grimly.