Any girl of sixteen fond of chemistry and cooking can have a first-rate
time on the Great South Beach in summer. Any girl of sixteen
companioned by from one to three youths slightly older than herself,
and of nicely differentiated ages and temperaments, can have a good
time in summer anywhere. Mermaid was as happy on the beach as if
she had been born there as, indeed, for all practical purposes, she
had. She was not “as happy as if she had lived there all her life,”
because no one can be happy in a place that has not gained some charm
by contrast with other places. The girl collected shells and sea
creatures, drifting from chemistry into biology and back again; she
analyzed sea weed and admired it; she divided with Keturah Smiley the
labour of cooking meals to which the salt air gave inimitable savour;
she boated, she swam, waded, tramped the dunes, and sunned herself on
the sands. She read everything from the habits of jellyfish to the
loves of Maurice Hewlett’s heroes and heroines, moving against mediæval
backgrounds as rich and varied as the scenes in old tapestries. She
flirted; and once she found herself in a game of hearts.
Twenty-two-year-old Guy Vanton, rather short, snub-nosed, with black
hair and attractive eyes, had gone into the surf with her and, with the
ignorance of those unacquainted with that shore, had ventured too far
out. The huge curl of a breaker caught him, for a southeast wind was
blowing and the ocean was beginning to show whitecaps. Guy was struck
on the shoulder by the full force of the falling wave, knocked down,
buried, washed about, and dragged out as the tons of water flung upon
the sloping sand shingle receded with a baffled roar. Mermaid, higher
up on the slope, saw him fall. She breasted the water and, as the
bottom sank away from under her feet, struck out, swimming.
Diving head first through the next huge sea she lifted her head and
caught sight of Guy struggling a few yards away. She got up to
him just as another breaker, a colossal wall of a dark glassiness,
towered for a second above them and then toppled down with a noise
like Niagara. Mermaid forced herself and Guy beneath the water, which
carried them some distance up the beach, and just then he began to
clutch her with the grip of one drowning. She broke his hold and, half
swimming, tugging with all her might, got him to a place where she
could touch bottom. Then she worked forward until she stood, partly
supporting him, in a boiling sea waist high. She was nearly exhausted
when she finally dragged him up on the beach beyond the wash of the
sea. It happened that there was no one near by; evidently they had
not been observed from higher up on the shore, so Mermaid began the
task of resuscitation. Fortunately Guy Vanton opened his eyes almost
immediately under her wearied ministrations.
He did not say anything as he gradually recovered himself. The two
sat beside each other on the empty beach. Mermaid, shivering, had
thrown sweaters about herself and Guy. At length young Vanton turned
and looked in her eyes with the curious, shy, wild-animal look that
everyone noticed in his own. At the same time he seized her hand.
“Mermaid, you saved my life--_my_ life.”
He spoke in wonder, as if there were something inexplicable about it.
Mermaid smiled at him, white and tired and anxious.
“You’re all right, Guy?”
His fingers tightened on her hand. There was something steady in the
fire of his look.
“I owe you so much,” he said, brokenly. “Almost everything. You were
my first friend. Five years ago. I--I’ve never been able to make it
up to you, and now I never shall. I’ve--I’ve loved you all this time.
I--won’t you let me kiss you?”
The last words were perhaps laughable, but something that was not a
drop of salt water from his black hair rolled down his cheek. Mermaid’s
own eyes glistened.
“Of course--this once, Guy,” she murmured. His lips brushed her wet
cheek. She rose to her feet a little unsteadily and reaching down her
arm half pulled him to his. “They’ll be frightened if we don’t get
back soon,” she explained. “You--you mustn’t put your arm about me,
Guy. Can you walk all right? See here, I’ll put my arm about you.” She
was matter-of-fact. They went unhurriedly along the shore to where a
boardwalk at the edge of the dunes led to the house Captain Vanton
had rented for the summer. There they parted, with the appearance of
unconcern. Keturah Hand met Mermaid at the door of their cottage.
“Child, is it necessary for you to hug that Vanton boy publicly?” she
inquired. Mermaid explained.
“How did you bring him to?” asked her aunt.
“I kissed him. Now, Aunt Keturah, it’s all right. There was nobody
around and he doesn’t know.”