RENEWED ACQUAINTANCE
Mr. Cameron's stay at the Truefelt House was brief enough. He returned
to New York by boat and train on Sunday evening. Nevertheless he found
time for a serious conversation with the new clerk of the hotel.
"This chance for the wife and baby to be here, Bassett, is
providential," the newspaper editor said. "I hope the summer on the
island will do them a world of good. But when the season closes--"
"I've got that on my mind," groaned Joe Bassett. "Very true, Mr.
Cameron, I shall be just as much at sea, then, as ever. If I could once
get into something that would be steady and make us a living! Of course
I thank you for the chance on the _Beacon_ that you gave me. I know I
am not fitted for that sort of work. I might try for a situation as
clerk at some winter resort hotel."
"You might," agreed Mr. Cameron gravely. "I do not feel that I can
advise you. What I have to speak to you about is a telephone call that
came for you after you left the _Beacon_ offices the other day."
"Yes? Of what nature was the call? I thought I had settled all my
affairs as far as they could be settled before accepting Ben's offer
here," and the young man flushed.
"The person who called you seemed to know nothing regarding your
intention of coming to Block Island. He said his name was Inness."
"'Inness'?" repeated Bassett in a puzzled tone.
"He said you would remember him," said Mr. Cameron, watching the hotel
clerk warily. "His message was, that if you would consider leaving New
York--leaving the East, in fact--there was an opening for you at a
distance. He spoke of the climate as probably being beneficial to Mrs.
Bassett."
"Inness said that?" responded the hotel clerk.
"You know who he is?"
"I know him very well," answered the other slowly. "But I do not
understand his sudden interest in me or his knowledge of the state of
Mrs. Bassett's health. That he should feel any interest in my affairs
whatever surprises me."
The flush did not die out of his cheek. Mr. Cameron did not seek to
draw the young man's confidence.
"I merely repeat what he said over the telephone. He seemed to think
you would know how to communicate with him if you wished to do so."
"I presume I do," admitted the clerk thoughtfully. "But--I wonder what
is behind it? I never have considered Inness a friend of mine." And
there the conversation came to an end.
"He is the Griffin's secretary--that Inness," said Carolyn's father,
speaking to her mother about it afterward. "Whether the inquiry over
the 'phone was instigated by Mr. Bassett or not, of course I do not
know. Perhaps the Griffin wants to get Joe out of the way. If anything
should really happen to the young woman or her baby the newspapers
would probably get hold of it and rake up all the scandal. These
wealthy people do not like to have such affairs aired in the public
press."
"And do you suppose that is all Mr. Bassett cares about his son, and
his wife and child?" queried Hannah Cameron thoughtfully.
"I wish you had heard him when I put young Joe's situation up to him
that time. The Griffin is as hard as nails. Yet it might fret him to
have the young fellow so near if anything happened to him. Or, perhaps,
he may be trying to save Joe's mother unpleasant knowledge of the son's
affairs."
"I wonder what sort of woman the older Mrs. Bassett is?" Mrs. Cameron
murmured. "Does she care nothing about her son and his wife and baby?"
"The less we know about it--or worry about it--the better, I fancy,"
returned Mr. Cameron.
"But isn't that a very selfish way of looking at it, Lewis?" sighed his
wife. However, she said no more about the Bassetts at the time.
When Carolyn got up on Monday for her early morning run with Prince,
her father's visit to the island seemed almost like a dream. He had
brought her a new sun hat and some goodies; but now that he was gone
she missed him as she had missed him for all the three weeks since she
had left New York.
"When we get real rich, Princey," she told her closest companion, "Papa
Cameron will have vacations just like _we_ do. Then we shall all be
together all the time."
There was so much to interest her almost every hour of the day that
Carolyn was seldom unhappy. The corroding thoughts of the pale lady and
her baby were blessedly removed. That very Monday she and Prince went
with mamma in the buckboard, drawn by a hired horse, across the island
to the Ball cottage to call on the hotel clerk's wife. Hannah Cameron
being herself a country-bred girl had not forgotten how to drive.
The pale lady's husband was to walk across the island three or four
evenings each week to be with his family, and altogether the pale
lady was happier. She had been brought up in luxury and had known
nothing of poverty until her marriage, but she was not a complaining,
fault-finding person. That she and her baby had a chance for life
again, and that her husband had work, were two blessings for which she
could not fail to be thankful.
Yet there was a weight upon the pale lady's mind and this fact was
observed by more than Carolyn. How could young Mrs. Bassett escape
anxiety under the circumstances?
As her husband had admitted to Mr. Cameron, their outlook for the
future was very, very uncertain. Nor did the offer made Joe Bassett
by Inness, his father's secretary, encourage the pale lady much. To
go away--far, far away from familiar surroundings--is not a cheering
thought.
In addition, she was quite sure the offer was made her husband merely
for the purpose of getting them out of the way. His father desired
them all at a distance. Even the innocent little baby! He wished not
to run the chance of having his son and the latter's family where he
might cross their path. In no other way could she look at this offer of
distant employment.
There was, too, in the young woman's mind a corroding thought. It had
begun troubling her soon after her marriage.
It had been a reckless marriage. She was forced to admit this. She
would not have untied the knot the Church had tied; but she feared she
had done Joe a wrong in wedding him.
They loved. They were happy despite their poverty--especially after the
baby came. But she realized that Joe, like herself, had been brought
up to do nothing useful. His naturally sweet disposition had been all
that saved him, under his mother's indulgence, from being a perfectly
useless member of society.
As it was he lacked initiative, self-confidence, and real ability to
work. He was not lazy, but nothing he had as yet undertaken seemed
fitted to such business talents as he might possess.
Baby Laird's mother, therefore, was by no means relieved of her mental
trouble by coming to the island. If one's mind is not at peace one may
not gain much benefit from the most healthful surroundings. She was too
anxious of mind to absorb energy and happiness in these new and better
conditions. Baby Laird almost immediately began to improve; but his
mother remained the pale lady.
Carolyn considered Barzilla Ball and his sister, Molly I., very
interesting persons. By this time she had learned her mistake and
knew that the island girl's surname was not "Eyeball." Molly Icivilla,
however, seemed to the little Carolyn to be a very odd name.
Most island names, however, appeared to be rather odd. The parents
seemed to have tricked the children out with queer given names, while
local custom added to the peculiar nomenclature.
The little girl began to understand Captain Littlefield's joke about
the impossibility of carrying on a war on Block Island. The families
had so intermarried that it was difficult to distinguish some of the
men and their wives from other couples of the same surname.
Perhaps that is why Miss Ball's parents had called her "Icivilla";
there was not likely to be another with that name on the island--or
anywhere else.
On this Monday evening the Camerons remained to supper and did not
start homeward until after the pale lady's husband arrived. He and
Barzilla Ball were already good friends, and they sat down on the stone
bench beside the cottage door to discuss the swordfishing business.
Barzilla was pretty nearly a man of one idea. At least, his mind and
heart were set upon the trade he followed.
It was a clear and starlit evening, and sleepy as Carolyn May was, she
managed to stay awake during most of the ride back to the hotel to
watch the stars which hung between sky and sea and seemed almost within
touch if one might climb the steeple of the West Side church.
"If we could climb up that steeple, Princey and me," she prattled to
her mother, "I believe we might catch that star--see! It winked at me
then."
"Why, Carolyn! You don't really suppose that you are of so much
importance that the star sees you and you alone, do you?" asked her
mother curiously.
The little girl was quite warmly argumentative. "Why not, Mamma?" she
asked. "Look at all those stars up there. Surely there are enough to
go around. Papa says there are millions and millions in the Milky Way
alone. There! That star winked at me again." And she finally fell
asleep on the buckboard seat trying to count the "winks" with which the
star favoured her.
It was the very next day that Carolyn experienced a curious
adventure--a meeting that she could scarcely believe was real, much
as she was given to the expectation of strange adventures. As she
ran on the bathing beach with Prince she came face to face with the
stern looking man whose automobile she had seen for a second time at
the Corners, and who had given her at their first meeting outside of
Central Park a twenty dollar bank note for the pale lady.
His appearance rather shocked the little girl for a few moments. She
stopped stock-still on the sands while Prince raced wildly ahead of
her. The man was walking with his cigar and cane beside a wheel chair
in which was being rolled by a negro the haughty looking woman whom
Carolyn May supposed must be the man's wife.
They passed the little girl in her dripping bathing suit and cap
without a second glance. Of course, they would not know Carolyn May
again; but she could not forget them so easily. The incident of the
wrecked go-cart had been too exciting for her ever to forget it, she
was sure.
The chair rolled on, away from the line of bathing houses, leaving
scarcely a mark upon the hard strand. Prince came racing back to his
little mistress and stopped for a moment to make friends with these new
people whom he had not observed before.
The stern looking man relaxed sufficiently to drag his cane on the sand
for the mongrel to jump at. The querulous voice of the woman in the
chair was almost immediately raised in complaint:
"Drive that dog away, George! He is wet, and if he shakes himself he
will spoil my gown."
The coloured man left the back of the chair to drive Prince away. The
latter was all for play--and perhaps he noted a twinkle in the eye
of the man, who continued to drag his cane. Prince barked and made a
playful dive for the coloured man's shoes.
"Ma soul an' body!" gasped the serving man. "Dat dawg'll sho' 'nuff eat
me up!"
"Oh, no, he won't!" cried Carolyn. "He's had his dinner. Prince, don't
do that! Come here, Prince."
The gentleman turned, then, to look at the child. He smiled as the
mongrel returned to the side of his little mistress.
"Who are you?" he asked. "Do you and your dog come from the sea?"
"No, sir," said Carolyn. "We come from New York."
"Well, well! Then this is not a little mermaid and her dog!" went on
the man.
"Oh, no, sir! I know what mermaids are. They have tails."
"Well, your dog has a tail. At least, an apology for one," said the
man, his eyes still twinkling. "It may be that he is a merdog."
"Come away, George," said the woman.
The coloured man promptly pushed on the chair; but the gentleman
lingered, smiling at Carolyn.
"Did I ever see you before?" he asked, curiously.
"Oh, yes, sir!" Carolyn replied.
"I thought there was something familiar about you--or your dog," he
said whimsically. "Where did I have the pleasure of meeting you before,
young lady?"
"It wasn't a pleasure," returned the little girl frankly. "You smashed
my pale lady's baby's go-cart."
"What!" exclaimed the man, and a rising flush altered the expression of
his grey face. "Are you _that_ child?"
"Yes, sir. You gave me twenty dollars for my pale lady."
"And who sent it back to me?" the man demanded sharply.
"Indeed, I didn't, sir," said Carolyn May, rather startled by his sharp
tone.
"But it was returned, with an impudent note. 'Money cannot pay for
everything.'"
"I--I don't know anything about that," stammered the little girl. "I
think maybe Mr. Laird is too proud to take money from anybody."
"'Laird,' eh? So _that's_ the name, is it?" and the gentleman suddenly
calmed himself. "Proud, indeed? Are you sure your friends are not
planning to bring a shyster's suit against me?"
Carolyn stared. She did not know what the man meant. But she saw his
momentary anger was passing.
"Well," he said, "you are no party to it at least. I am glad to have
met you again, little girl. Are you staying on the island for long?"
"Oh, yes, sir. Me and mamma and Prince are going to live here all
summer. And my papa comes here over Sunday, when he can."
"I shall see you again, then," said the man, and moved on.
Carolyn May was quite full of this curious adventure when she rejoined
her mother.
"I wish," she said thoughtfully, "that he had given my pale lady
another go-cart instead of a twenty dollar bill. Then she could not so
easily have sent it back, could she?"
"Perhaps not," agreed her mother.
"And then, you see," went on the little girl, "I could go over there to
Miss Molly I. Ball's house and wheel Baby Laird out along the path. You
know, there's an awful nice path there right along on top of that bank,
where the life saving men walk. It's just as _smooth_! And I could
wheel him there."
"Maybe we can find a carriage here on the island," said her mother.
"Even a secondhand one would do, don't you think?"
"Why, yes. Baby Laird wouldn't mind, I'm sure," said Carolyn May,
eagerly. "Let us look for a secondhand store."
Better than that, they asked Captain Ozias Littlefield, and he knew
almost at once just where a baby carriage could be bought.
"Miz John-Will Mott has got a baby cart. Had it when her Stella Ietta
was little. Stella I. is married five-six year now, and it looks as
though she'll never need a baby shay. You leave it to me, Miz Cameron,
and I'll git it for you cheap. If Miz Mott suspected an off woman
wanted that old carriage, the price would go up like one o' these her
hydroplanes ye see, yes-sir-ree-sir! 'Cordin' to her doctrine, summer
visitors was made to be gouged. If all us islanders was like that
woman, Block Island would be a howlin' wilderness in summer, as well as
winter--and the visitors would do the howlin'!"
Captain Ozias made the bargain, and the baby carriage, in very good
condition, was sent over to the West Side cottage for Baby Laird's
use. The hotel clerk warmly thanked Carolyn and her mother for their
thoughtfulness.
"I believe this little girl is our good angel," he said. "She is a
ministering spirit and nothing very bad can happen where she is."
It seemed that the hotel clerk was rather a poor prophet; that was
proved to be the case before the next morning.
Carolyn had been sleeping as soundly for hours as a little girl could
sleep in her small room off Mrs. Cameron's larger one. Prince usually
curled down on the rug beside his little mistress's bed; but now she
heard him pattering about over the straw matting that covered the
floors of both rooms. His claws made a scratchy sound on the matting,
and he trotted from door to window and from window to door.
It had been cool when they went to bed, with rain and a fresh gale
blowing; so the windows were only open an inch or two at bottom and
top. Prince went to the hall door and crouched down, sniffing at the
crack. Then he whined.
"Prince!" said the little girl sleepily. "Come here. You'll wake mamma."
He seemed to come to her reluctantly, squatted down beside her bed
and laid his head on the coverlet where her hand could rest lightly
upon his muzzle. Then she fell asleep again and she dreamed a very
unpleasant dream. She dreamed two men came into her room and took hold
of her. One held her body so that she could not squirm and the other
put his hand over her mouth and nose so that she could not breathe.
Carolyn knew the men. They were the chauffeur of the man who had given
her the twenty-dollar bill for the pale lady and the dark man with the
very black eyes and eyebrows--both of whom she had last seen at the
Corners when she visited Uncle Joe Stagg. The black-browed man was he
who in her dream put his hand over her mouth.
The little girl woke up struggling and trying to scream. She was very
much frightened, and when she got her eyes open she was even more
surprised than she was terrified.
It really was very difficult for her to breathe. There was a feeling of
oppression on her chest. She could not see very clearly, for the air
was thick and there was a strange, lurid glow in it. Prince had dropped
down upon the mat and was curled in a round ball. He was sleeping
sterterously.
"Oh, Mamma! Mamma Cameron!" Carolyn called, panting for the breath
which, when she drew it in, seemed to hurt her.
She could not hear her mother at all. She crept out of bed, and almost
fell over Prince, who roused with none of his usual promptness. He,
too, seemed oppressed by the stifling quality of the atmosphere in the
rooms.
"Mamma! Oh, Mamma Cameron!" sobbed the little girl again.
She was very much frightened as she stumbled into the larger chamber
with Prince whining and coughing at her heels.