VERONICA
For the next few days the right moment for Philip to desert Miss
Burridge never seemed to arrive, and by that time the new establishment
had come to be in very good running order, which was fortunate, as the
expected boarders' dates were drawing near.
Diana approached Philip one morning with a pleased countenance. He was
encouraging the hopeful little sweet peas that stood in a green row
below the porch. She came and sat on the rail above and watched him.
"Miss Burridge is going to allow me to name our domicile," she
announced.
"Brave woman!" said Philip, coaxing the brown earth up against the line
of green with his trowel.
"Which of us is brave?" asked Diana, smiling,--"Miss Priscilla or
myself?"
"What are you going to call it? Olympus?"
"Why should I?" Diana gave a soft, gurgling laugh.
"I thought perhaps it might bring happy memories and prove a palliation
of nostalgia."
"I always have a feeling that you are amusing yourself with me, Mr.
Barrison."
"Have you any objection to my seeing that you are a goddess? What have
you done with Apollo, by the way? Couldn't you persuade him to leave the
gallery?"
"To what gallery do you refer? I do not particularly care for handsome
men," was Miss Wilbur's thoughtful response.
"I'm sorry I'm so beautiful, then," said Philip, extending his little
earth barricade.
Diana looked down from her balcony on his tumbling blond hair.
"You have a very good presence for your purpose," she said.
"What is my purpose?"
"The concert stage, is it not? Perhaps even opera, later?"
"Yes, divine huntress, if I ever succeed in making it."
"You will make it unless you are unpardonably dilatory and neglectful.
Every time you utter a musical tone it sends a vibration coursing
through my nerves with a pleasant thrill."
Philip looked up at the speaker with his sea-blue, curious gaze, which
she received serenely.
"Bully for you, Miss Wilbur. That's all I can say. Bully for you."
"I am glad if that encourages you," she said kindly. "It is quite
outside my own volition."
"Then I don't need to thank you, eh?"
"Oh, not in the least."
Philip laughed and stooped again to his job.
"Let me see, Apollo--he struck liars and knew how to prescribe for the
croup, didn't he, besides being a looker beyond all comers?"
Diana smiled. "You think of everything in terms of humor, do you not?"
she rejoined.
"Perhaps--of most things, but not of you."
"Oh, I think of me most of all."
"Far from it," said Philip. "I wouldn't dare. If my voice gives you a
thrill, yours gives me a chill."
"I can't believe that really," said Diana equably, watching Philip's
expert handling of the trowel. "You are always laughing at me. I don't
in the least understand why, but it doesn't matter at all. I think it is
a quite laudable mission to make people laugh. What a good gardener you
are, Mr. Barrison."
"Oh, isn't he, though!" exclaimed Miss Priscilla, emerging from the
house. "Think of my luck that Phil really likes to fuss with flowers.
Ox-chains couldn't drag him to do it if he didn't like to."
"Really?" returned Diana. "Is she not maligning you, Mr. Barrison? Are
you really the slave of caprice?"
"I deny it," said Philip. "It doesn't sound nice."
"It would be a dire thing for you," declared the girl. "But you do not
ask me what I am naming the Inn."
"Oh, it is an Inn, is it?"
"Yes," put in Miss Priscilla. "Since the leaks are mended, both pipes
and roof, and the stove's up and the chimney draws, I think we can call
it that."
"What is it, then? 'The Dew Drop'?" inquired Philip.
"I particularly dislike puns," said Diana quietly. "I like 'The
Wayside.' Why shouldn't we call it 'The Wayside Inn'?"
"You have my permission," said Philip.
"We do not need anything original, but we do need a name that is lovely.
'The Wayside Inn' is lovely."
"So be it," said Philip.
"And you're not forgettin' what you are goin' to do to-morrow, are you,
dear boy?" said Miss Priscilla ingratiatingly.
"Not if it isn't to go again for the plumber," replied Philip. "His
wrenches and hammers are too handy; and I'm sure one more call up here
would render him dangerous."
"Mr. Buell is a very pleasant man," said Diana. "So is Mr. Blake, the
carpenter. I have learned such interesting expressions from them. Mr.
Blake was showing me the fault in one of the gables of this house. He
said the builder had given the roof a 'too quick yank.' Is not that
quaint?"
"Ha, ha, ha," laughed Philip up into the girl's serious face. "Bully for
Matt. You may get the vernacular, after all."
"I'm not quick," said Diana. "I'm afraid I should not prove an apt
pupil."
"But, Philip," said Miss Priscilla, "about to-morrow. You know you'll
have to get the early boat to go to meet Veronica. It's perfectly
splendid of you to go, dear boy. I don't know how I could spare the
time. I've got to get several rooms ready for to-morrow, and the child
is such an utter stranger in this part o' the world."
"Oh, yes, I'll go," said Philip carelessly. "I think the Inn will be
relieved that I can get a hair-cut. My tresses are nearly ready to braid
now."
Diana smiled pensively. "I think you are very amusing, Mr. Barrison,"
she said.
Philip vaulted up over the railing and took a seat beside her, regarding
his earth-stained hands and then her serene countenance, whose gaze was
bent upon him. He shook his head to toss the blond forelock out of his
eyes.
"So my voice gives you a thrill, eh?"
"Oh, decidedly," was the devout response.
"That's a good thing. I thought perhaps you couldn't really be roused
from your dreaminess before the fourth of July, but I have some tones
that in that case will be warranted to set you and the echoes going at
the same time."
Diana clasped her hands. "Oh, utter them," she begged.
"Can't," laughed Philip, wiping his warm forehead with his shirt-sleeve.
"The stage isn't set."
Diana continued to look imploringly ardent. "'Drink to me only with
thine eyes,'" she suggested.
"That's the only way they'll let you do it nowadays," responded Philip,
kicking the heels of his sneakers gently against the railing.
Miss Burridge looked over her spectacles at Diana in her beseeching
attitude, and her eyes widened still further as the girl went on slowly
with her brown gaze fixed on Philip's quizzical countenance:
"How can I bear to leave thee!
One parting kiss I give thee--"
"Dear me," thought Miss Priscilla. "I'd never have believed it of her."
And it occurred to her for the first time that Philip Barrison was a
handsome man.
"Fare_well_," went on Diana, with soft fervor. "'Farewell, my own true
love--'"
"Farewell," sang Philip, falling into the trap and finishing the phrase.
"'Farewe-ell, my own--true--love.'"
"Oh," breathed Diana, and the way her clasped hands fell upon her heart
caused Miss Priscilla much embarrassment.
"I can scarcely wait," said the girl slowly, "to hear you sing a real
song with a real accompaniment. There is such rare penetrating richness
in the quality of your voice."
Miss Burridge cleared her throat. "I shouldn't wonder if Miss Wilbur was
a real help to you, Phil," she said. "Young folks need encouragement."
"And soap-suds," added Philip, regarding his earthy hands and glancing
merrily up at Diana, who was still standing in her attitude of
adoration; but there was no answering merriment in those brown orbs. Her
brain might tell her later that Miss Burridge's patronizing remark had
been amusing, but she would be obliged to think it over.
Philip jumped off the railing, whistling, and followed Miss Priscilla
into the house and to the sink, while Diana, reminiscently humming "The
Soldier's Farewell," descended the steps and wandered away.
When, the next day in town, Philip stood in the Union Station waiting
for Veronica's train, he wondered how he was to know her, but
remembering that Miss Burridge spoke of having instructed her to go the
first thing to the transfer office about her trunk, he turned his steps
thither as the crowds poured off the train. All Boston seemed to have
decided to come to Maine for the summer.
Soon he saw her--he felt at once it was she--looking about undecidedly
as she came. She was a short, plump girl of seventeen or eighteen, at
present bent a little sideways from the weight of the suitcase she was
carrying. Philip strode forward and seized the suitcase with one hand
while he lifted his hat with the other.
"Here, you let that alone!" said the girl decidedly, her round eyes
snapping.
"Isn't this Miss Trueman?"
"Why, yes, it is," she returned, but she still looked suspicious and
clung to her suitcase. Nobody need think she wasn't up to all the
tricks. "Did my aunt send you to meet me?"
"She certainly did."
"Then you know her name. What's her name?" The upward look was so
childlike in its shrewdness that it stirred the spirit of mischief.
"Why--let me see, Lucilla, isn't it?"
"You give me that suitcase this minute." The girl pulled on the handle
with a muscular little hand.
"Why, Veronica," Philip's smile became a laugh. "Santa Veronica, what a
very unsaintlike voice and expression you're using."
She laughed, too, then, and relinquished her burden. "You do know me.
Who are you?"
"Miss Burridge's man-of-all-work. Name, Philip Barrison."
"So she gave you such a job as this. How did you pick me out?"
"That wild look around for the transfer office." They were now moving
toward it.
"It wasn't wild. I didn't need you at all. Aunt Priscilla needn't have
bothered. I have a tongue in my head and money in my pocket, and Puppa
said that's all anybody needs if she has any brains."
"But I have to do what my employer orders, you see," replied Philip.
Veronica looked him over. Fresh from the barber and in correct summer
garb, he was an extremely good-looking object.
"Oh, yes, it isn't your fault," she returned generously, "but is it a
swell place Aunt Priscilla's got?" She looked him over again while he
stopped at the transfer window and checked her trunk.
"The Wayside Inn," replied Philip with dignity.
"Well, I've come to help her," said the girl. "But I've never done any
serving. I haven't any uniform or anything like that."
"It isn't necessary. Look at me. I don't look like a footman--or a
butler--or anything like that, do I?"
"No," said Veronica, her round eyes very serious. "You look like
a--like a common--gentleman."
"Thank you, Miss Trueman. I'll try to deserve your praise."
Philip took her and her suitcase across town in a cab, and aboard the
little steamer, and found the best spot he could for them to sit.
"Puppa says this bay is noted for its picturesqueness," said Veronica,
when they were settled.
"Quite right," returned Philip, putting in her lap one of the magazines
he had bought on the wharf.
"No, thank you," she returned. "I shan't read. I'm going to look.
Puppa'll expect me to tell him all about it. He was delighted at my
having a chance to come to the seashore. He thought it would do my
health so much good."
Philip regarded her round cheeks, round eyes, and round, rosy mouth.
"Your health? You look to me as though if you felt any better you'd have
to call the doctor."
"Yes, I'm not really ailing--but I freckle. Isn't it a shame?" She put
one hand to her nose which had an upward tilt.
"Oh, that's all right," laughed Philip. "Call 'em beauty spots."
She sat, pensively continuing to cover her nose with her silk-gloved
hand.
"Perhaps you're hungry. I ought to have bought you some chocolates,"
said Philip. "Perhaps there's time still." He looked at his watch.
Veronica smiled. It was a pleasant operation to view and disclosed a
dimple. "Did Aunt Priscilla give you money to buy me candy? Don't
bother. I have some gum. Would you like some?" As she spoke, she opened
her handbag.
Philip bent a dreadful frown upon her. "Do you chew gum?" he asked
severely.
"Yes, sometimes, of course. Everybody does."
"Then you deserve to freckle. You deserve all the awful things that can
befall a girl."
"Well, for a hired man," said Veronica, her hand pausing in its
exploration, "you have the most nerve of any one I ever saw."
She seemed quite heated by this condemnation, and instead of the gum
drew out a vanity box and, looking in the mirror, powdered her nose
deliberately.
Philip opened his magazine. The whistle blew and the boat began to back
out of the slip. Veronica regarded her companion from time to time out
of the tail of her eye, and at a moment when his manner indicated
absorption in what he was reading, she replaced the vanity case in her
bag and when her hand reappeared, it conveyed something to her mouth.
"I wouldn't," said Philip, without looking up. She colored hotly.
"Nobody asked you to," she retorted.
Then all was silence while the steamer, getting its direction, began
moving toward the islands that dotted the bay.
The girl suddenly started.
"If there aren't those people!" she ejaculated.
"What people?" asked Philip.
"They came on in the same car with me from Boston. See that dark man
over there with a young boy? I couldn't help noticing them on the train.
You see how stupid the boy looks. He seemed so helpless, and the man
just ignored him when he asked questions, and treated him so mean. I
just hate that man."
Philip regarded the couple. They presented a contrast. The man was
heavily built with a sallow, dark face, his restless eyes and body
continually moving with what seemed an habitual impatience. The boy,
perhaps fourteen years of age, had a vacant look, his lips were parted,
and his position, slumped down in a camp-chair, indicated a total lack
of interest in his surroundings.
"Tell me about Aunt Priscilla," said Veronica suddenly. "I haven't seen
her since I was twelve years old. My mother died then. She was Aunt
Priscilla's sister and Aunt Pris was willing to take me if Pa wanted her
to, but he didn't and we moved away, and I've never seen her since. Of
course, she writes sometimes and so do I. Has she many boarders?"
"Only one so far, but then she's a goddess. You've read your mythology,
haven't you? This is the goddess Diana."
"Say, you're awfully fresh, do you know that?" remarked Veronica. "You
treat me all the time as if I was a baby. I've graduated from high
school and very likely I know just as much as you do."
"I shouldn't doubt that," returned Philip. "On the level, you'll see
when you get to the Inn that I'm telling the truth. Diana is passing
for the present under the title of Miss Wilbur."
"One boarder!" exclaimed Veronica with troubled brow. "Why, Aunt
Priscilla doesn't need two helpers like you and me."
"Oh, there are plenty more boarders coming," said Philip. "This boat may
be full of them for all we know. She is expecting people to-night. Let's
look around and decide who we'll take up there with us."
"I'll tell you one person I'd choose first of all. See that woman with
her back to us with a blue motor veil around her shoulders? I noticed
her just when I was pointing out that devil and the boy to you."
"You use strong language, Miss Trueman. Couldn't you spare my feelings
and call our dark friend Mephisto?"
"Sounds too good for him. I'd like to use me-fist-o on him, I know
that." Veronica giggled, and went on: "Do you see her?"
"I do. My vision is excellent."
"Well, she was on the train, too, and once I saw her smile at that poor
shy boy and show him how to get a drink of water. We were all in a day
car. Chair car crowded. You can't see her face, but she's the sweetest
thing." Then with a change of voice: "Oh, wouldn't it jar you! There's
fuss-tail. See that dame with the white flower in her hat, looking over
the rail? I suppose she's watching to see if the fishes behave
themselves. She was on the train, too, and nothing suited her from
Boston to Portland. She was too hot, or she felt a draught, or she
didn't like the fruit the train-boy brought, or something else was
wrong, every minute."
"We won't take her, then," said Philip.
"I should say not. She'd sour the milk. What's the island like?"
"Diana says it resembles Arcadia strikingly, and she ought to know."
"But I never was in Arcadia," objected Veronica.
"Well, it is just a green hill popping right up out of the Atlantic,
with plenty of New England rocks in the fields, and drifts of daisies
and wild roses for decoration, and huge rocky teeth around the shore
that grind the waves into spray and spit it up flying toward the sky."
"What kind of folks? Just folks that come in summer?"
"Not at all. Old families. New England's aristocracy. These islands are
the only place where there are no aliens, just the simon-pure
descendants of Plymouth Rock. As I say aristocrats. I was born there."
"You were?" returned Veronica curiously.
"I were."
"Well, I was born in Maine, in Bangor. I guess that's just about as
good."
"No, it's not as good," said Philip gravely. "Nevertheless, I forgive
you."
"Tell me more about the island."
"Well, it has one road."
"Only one street?"
"No, no street. Just one road which has its source in a green field on
the south and loses itself in the beach on the north after it has passed
the by-path that leads to the haunted farm."
"Oh, go away!" scoffed Veronica.
"I can't. The walking won't be good for another hour."
"Who lives at the farm?"
"The ha'nts."
"Nobody else?"
"No, it isn't likely. It's at the head of Brook Cove where the pirates
used to come in at a day when it was laughable to think that passenger
boats would ever touch at this island."
Veronica's eyes grew rounder than before.
"Do you suppose there's gold packed in around there if people could
only find it?"
"I don't, but a great many people thought there might be. It is much
more fun to hunt for pirate gold than to go fishing in squally weather,
and it has been hunted for, faithfully."
"And not any found?" said Veronica sympathetically.
"That's the mournful fact."
"But who were the farmers, and why did they stop farming? Was it the
ghosts?"
"No, I think it was the rocks. It was found more profitable to farm the
sea. You know abandoned farms are fashionable in New England, anyway, so
the ghosts have a rather swell residence at the old Dexter place. I
spent the first eight years of my life on the island. Then it was an
undiscovered Arcadia. Now--why, you will go up to The Wayside Inn in a
motor--that is, if I can get hold of Bill Lindsay before somebody else
grabs him. Lots of people know a good thing when they see it, and lots
of people have seen the island."
The wharf was full of people to welcome the little steamer as it drew
in, and there was a grand rush of passengers for the coveted motor. It
seemed to Veronica that she heard her aunt's name on many lips, and
Philip found himself feeling responsible for the trunk checks of
everybody who was seeking Miss Burridge.
The upshot of it all was, by the time he had safeguarded the baggage of
the arrivals and sent them on their way, he and Veronica were left to
climb the road and pursue the walk toward home.
"Didn't that old hawk-nose say he was going to Aunt Priscilla's?"
"It's a very good-looking nose," remarked Philip. "But so far as I could
see, all your friends of the train were bound for the same place."
"He'll be lucky," said Veronica viciously, "if I don't put Paris green
in his tea. Oh, what a beautiful view of the sea!" she exclaimed as they
reached the summit of the hill.
They had not walked far when Bill Lindsay's Ford came whirring back over
the much-traveled road, and he turned around for them.
"After all," said Philip, as the machine started back up the island,
"your lady of the blue veil should set off the affliction of Mephisto's
presence."
"Did she come?" asked Veronica delightedly.
"Yes, didn't you see me pack her in with the woman whose halo won't fit?
The dull boy sat between them."
"Well," said Veronica, "then there's no great loss without some small
gain."
When the motor reached the Inn, Miss Priscilla was pleased with the way
Veronica dropped her hat and jacket in the kitchen, and after drinking
the one cup of cocoa upon which her aunt insisted, was ready to help her
carry in the late supper for the new guests with whom Philip sat down at
table. Veronica, coming and going, tried to make out his status in the
house.
"That Mr. Barrison you sent to meet me," she said to her aunt when the
meal was over, "told me he was your man-of-all-work. He don't act much
like it."
"Law, child," Miss Priscilla laughed. "He has been lately. Phil's a dear
boy when he isn't a wretch, and he's helped me out ever since I came. I
won't ever forget how good he's been. Now, let's sit down and let me see
you eat this fresh omelette and tell me all about yourself. I see you're
just like your mother, handy and capable, and let me tell you, it takes
a big load off me, Veronica."
Just as she finished speaking, Diana Wilbur came in from the twilight
stroll she had been taking.
"Miss Wilbur, this is my little niece, Veronica Trueman," said Miss
Priscilla. "She has come to help me, and high time, too. Four people
came to-night and there will be more to-morrow."
Diana approached the newcomer and looked down upon her kindly after
taking her offered hand.
"You must have had an inspiring ride down the bay, Miss Veronica," she
said. "I have been taking a walk to see the sun set. It was heavenly
to-night. Such translucent rose-color, and violet that shimmered into
turquoise, and robin's-egg blue. How fortunate for the new people to get
that first impression! Well, Miss Burridge," Diana sighed. "Of course we
must be glad to see them, but it has been a very subtle joy to retire
and to waken with no human sounds about us. I shall always remember this
last two weeks."
"I'm glad you feel that way," said Miss Priscilla. "I thought, though,
that you'd heard lots o' sounds. Phil makes enough noise for a regiment
when he is dressin' in the mornin'."
"You can scarcely call such melodious tones noise, can you?" replied
Miss Wilbur gently. "His flute is more liquid than that of the hermit
thrush."
"I never heard him play the flute." Miss Priscilla looked surprised.
"I refer to the marvelous, God-bestowed instrument that dwells within
him," explained Diana.
"I think myself," said Miss Priscilla, clearing her throat, "that it's
kind o' cozy to hear a man whistlin' and shoutin' around in the mornin'
while he's dressin'. I suppose he'll be leavin' us pretty soon now. I
hate to see him go, he's gettin' the plants into such good shape; and
wasn't he good about scythin' paths so we wouldn't get wet to our knees
every time we left the house? I don't know how you ever had the courage
to wade over to this piazza before I came, Miss Wilbur."
"Mr. Barrison certainly did smooth our paths."
"He told me he was Aunt Priscilla's man-of-all-work," said Veronica,
busy with her omelette.
"So he has been," replied Diana seriously: "out of the goodness of his
heart and the cleverness of his hands; but he is a great artist, Miss
Veronica, or at least he will be."
"Do you mean he paints?"
"No, he sings: and it is singing--such as must have sounded when the
stars sang together."
"Dear me," said Veronica, "I wish I'd asked him to pipe up when we were
on the boat."
Diana let her gaze rest for a moment of silence on the sacrilegious
speaker, then she excused herself, saying she would go up to her room.
As soon as the door had closed behind her, Veronica looked up and
bestowed upon her aunt a meaning wink.
"She's got it bad, hasn't she?" she said.
Miss Burridge put her finger to her lips warningly. "Sh!" she breathed.
"Sometimes I think she has: but, law, Phil's nothing but a boy."
"And she's nothing but a girl," said Veronica practically. "That's the
way it usually begins."
Miss Burridge laughed. "What do you know about it, you child?"
"Not so much as I'd like to. Puppa would never let anybody stay after
ten o'clock, and you don't really get warmed up before ten o'clock."
"Why, Veronica Trueman, how you talk!"
"Don't speak of how I talk!" said Veronica. "Hasn't that Miss Wilbur got
language! I guess Mr. Barrison likes her, too. He told me she was a
goddess."
"Oh, Phil's just full of fun. He always will be a rapscallion at heart,
no matter how great he ever gets to be."
"Well, he doesn't want anybody else to stop saying prunes and prisms. He
didn't even want me to chew gum. Anybody that's as unnatural as that had
better marry a goddess. Now, let's go for those dishes, Aunt Priscilla."
"You good child!" said Miss Burridge appreciatively. "I can't really ask
Genevieve to stay in the evenin'. She's the little girl who comes every
day and prepares vegetables and washes dishes. Now, one minute,
Veronica, while I get the names o' these new people straight. I've got
their letters here." Miss Priscilla took them down from the
chimney-piece. "There's Mrs. Lowell, _she_'s alone, and Miss Emerson,
_she_'s alone, and Mr. Nicholas Gayne and his nephew, Herbert Gayne. I
wonder how long I'll remember that."
"I know them all," said Veronica sententiously. "The whole bunch came on
in the same car with me from Boston. It's my plan to poison Mr. Gayne."
"Don't talk that way, child."
"You'll agree to it when you see how mean he is to his nephew. The boy
isn't all there."
"What do you mean?"
"Has rooms to let in the upper story, you know." Veronica touched her
round forehead. "Mrs. Lowell is a queen and Miss Emerson isn't; or else
Miss Emerson is a queen and Mrs. Lowell isn't. I'll know which is
t'other to-morrow."
"You seem to have made up your mind about them all."
"Oh, yes!" said Veronica. "You don't have to eat a whole jar of butter
to find out whether it's good. All I need is a three-minute taste of
anybody, and I had three hours and a half of them. Now, come on, Aunt
Priscilla, let's put some transparent water in the metal bowl, and the
snowy foam of soap within it." She rolled up her naughty eyes as she
spoke.
Miss Burridge gave the girl a rebuking look, and then laughed. "Don't
you go to makin' fun of her now," she said. "She's my star boarder, no
matter who else comes, I'm in love with her whether Phil is or not.
She's genuine, that girl is,--genuine."
"And you don't want me to be imitation," giggled Veronica. "I see."
Then the two went at the clearing-up and dish-washing in high
good-humor.