IDLEWILD
The first part of the way to Idlewild was unfamiliar to Anne.
Apparently she had never walked far on the foot-path around her
father’s place. But as they approached the end of the mile walk she
grew more animated. She remembered this point of rocks, that tree,
this cliff above the surf. And when finally they came to the solid
and substantial wall which Mr. Poole had built to separate his land
from mere pasture, her spirits rose greatly.
They climbed the pretty stile, “quite English,” as Cicely said. Then
Anne became the Golden Girl once more, and began to show the others
about with an air of importance.
“These are the steps leading down to the landing pier where Father
usually keeps our yacht,” she announced. “It’s no use going down
now, for the _Day Dream_ isn’t in commission this summer. This is
the path to the house. Isn’t it pretty, and easy to walk on, it’s
so nicely gravelled? See these beautiful lawns! Father had the
underbrush cleared away and all tidied up. It cost a great deal of
money to start the sods, I heard him say. Grass doesn’t like to grow
on these rocks. But he made it!”
“I think the wild tangle that we have passed through is lovely,” said
Cicely. “The underbrush in New England is always a surprise to me. We
have lawns and trimmed trees in England, of course. But we don’t see
anything wild like this.”
“Well, anybody can have a wild place around here,” said Anne loftily.
“Father made this to be different. He copied somebody’s place in
Italy, I believe.”
“Yes, here’s an Italian pergola,” said Norma. “And here’s a brick
terrace. That’s Italian too.”
There was a neglected tennis-court on the lawn in front of the
garage; and a sunken garden, dried up and weedy. Anne looked at the
flower-beds in surprise and some mortification.
“Why, how badly the garden looks!” she exclaimed. “I thought Father
always left somebody to take care of the place until we came again.
But this looks as if nobody had been near it since last summer.”
“It would take more than one man to keep this big place in order,”
said Cicely, who knew about such things.
“Oh, yes! Father employed three gardeners,” said Anne, “and I don’t
know how many other men. I shall write him they aren’t doing their
duty. He will be very angry when he knows. He can’t bear to see
things out of order.” Anne remembered more than one exhibition of her
father’s bad temper.
They were walking along the neat paths on top of the cliff, in front
of the great house with its shuttered windows. The dead leaves of
last fall lay brown on the unraked lawns. The wind had blown and torn
the bushes here and there. Everything looked forlorn and unhappy.
Anne grew more and more uneasy, even as she pointed out the elaborate
arrangements of the place; the big garage, the water tower, the
lighting plant, the ice house, the stable where her pony had been
kept. Anne did not know where he was now; perhaps in Canada.
Presently they came to a low house with wire pens adjacent. “This was
the chicken house,” said Anne. “We had pigeons and rabbits, too. But
the hutches are all empty. Why, I wonder what has become of my white
rabbit? I had a lovely one named Plon. Those dreadful servants have
not taken care of him!”
“Perhaps your father did not intend to keep the place,” suggested
Norma. “It looks--well, finished.”
“I’m sure he is coming down another summer,” said Anne quickly. “It
is only this year he had to go away on business, he said. It is the
fault of the caretakers that the place looks so badly.”
“Why, here is one leetle garden growing nicely as can be!” cried
Gilda, who had been exploring by herself. “See, ze roses are all in
ze bud!”
“It is my own little garden!” cried Anne, running to where Gilda
stood. “I was afraid to visit it, for fear it would be dead. I have
taken care of it all myself for ever so many summers, ever since I
was a tiny tot. I never let anyone else weed it. And here is my herb
garden behind it; but that does not look so well.”
“I didn’t know you ever worked, Anne,” said Nancy innocently, “even
in a garden.”
“Work in a garden is only play,” said Anne.
“We will remember that!” chorused the Round Robin. “Our vegetable
garden never gets half enough attention,” explained Nancy. “We’ll
introduce you to-morrow!” But Anne was bending over the little plot
she called her garden, fingering the plants lovingly. Rosebushes,
mignonette, poppies, morning glories, sweet william, iris were all
in bud, nicely weeded and trimmed. It was like a little oasis in a
desert of desolation.
“I don’t understand why this looks so well, when everything else is
neglected,” said Anne, greatly puzzled. “It certainly seems as if
somebody had been tending it. Whoever it is, I wish he had looked
after my pets too. I’m afraid the poor things are all dead!”
“Maybe zey went away to be wild rabbits again,” suggested Gilda
sympathetically. “Zere are wild rabbits here. I saw one yesterday.”
“Oh, did you? What was he like?” Anne was all eagerness. But it was
a little brown bunny which Gilda had spied in the woods; not the big
white Plon.
The girls went up on the piazza of the great house, trying to
imagine how the interior would look when the windows and doors
were open. “The hammocks always hung here,” explained Anne. “And
we had afternoon tea in this corner when the screens were up. This
is the glassed-in breakfast room. You can’t see it now because of
the shutters. My rooms are above it, there. I have three all to
myself, done in pale blue. Not much like camp, is it?” She smiled
complacently. “Though I do like a tent, really,” she confessed. “I
shall ask father to build me a sleeping-porch next season.”
“But don’t you like trees close by, as we have at Round Robin?”
asked Nancy. “Mr. Poole must have cut off a lot of trees from this
place. It seems bare to me.”
“Yes,” said Anne, “they cut off the trees to make a better view. I
remember Father said so. I had forgotten it was quite so bare around
the house.” She looked about with new eyes, used to the sifted sun
and shade of the intimate woods. “But what a wonderful thing it was
that Father could turn this scraggy old New England pasture into such
a foreign-looking place! Our friends who visited here called Father a
magician.”
“Plain American is good enough for me!” said Nancy. “I like it the
way we have at Round Robin, cosy and simple.”
“Well!” said Anne abruptly. “Let’s not stay any longer. It makes me
homesick to see the place so.” She did indeed look disappointed and
sad. The place was not so imposing as she had remembered. The girls
were not so greatly impressed as she had hoped they would be.
“I’ll tell you what!” suggested Nancy. “Let’s go and see Nelly’s
home. It’s only a little way from here.”
“All right!” the Club was ready. But Anne objected. “Oh! I’m too
tired,” she said. “I’d rather go right home.”
“Oh, come on! It’s such a little way,” urged Nancy. “Cap’n Sackett
wants to see you, I know, Anne. He is always talking about you, and
how you used to come down often when you were a tiny tot.”
“Why don’t you care to go there any more?” asked Norma bluntly. “I
should, if anybody wanted to see me so much.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Anne hesitated. “When I was little there seemed
plenty of time. But now it is different. There is always so much
going on at Idlewild--riding and driving and tennis and golf and
company and yachting parties. But I did go down once every summer.
Father made me.”
“Well, to-day will make at least once this summer; and there’s no
time like the present,” urged Nancy. “Nelly will never forgive us if
she hears we were so near and did not go a little further to see her.
But if you like, you could wait here for us to pick you up on the
way back, Anne.”
“No, I will go too,” said Anne, who had no mind to wait in the
lonesomeness of Idlewild.
It was less than half a mile from Idlewild to the Cove, across
Mr. Poole’s well laid-out golf links. This too showed the lack of
care. Already the trespassing weeds and lawless grasses were taking
advantage of the generous July sun to riot and grow bold. The unkempt
green was really no less beautiful; but it shocked Anne.
“I shall write Father to-night,” she repeated. “It is dreadful!”