THE duties of young Lord Marque, the new man on the Willett estate at
Caranay, left him at leisure only after six o'clock, his day being almost
entirely occupied in driving a large lawn mower.
Life, for John Marque--as he now called himself--had become exquisitely
simple; eating, sleeping, driving a lawn mower--these three manly sports
so entirely occupied the twenty-four hours that he had scarcely time to
do much weeding--and no time at all to sympathise with himself because he
was too busy by day and too sleepy at night.
Sundays he might have taken off for the purpose of condoling with
himself, had it not been for the new telephone operator.
She was a recent incumbent at the railroad station--a tall,
clear-skinned, yellow-haired girl of twenty-five who sat at her
desk all day saying in a low, prettily modulated voice,
"hello--hello--hello--hello" to unseen creatures of whom John Marque
wotted not.
Three things concerning her he had noticed: She wore pink gingham; she
never seemed to see him when he came down to the little sunburnt platform
and seated himself on the edge, feet dangling over the rails; he had
never seen her except when she was seated at the pine table which was
ornamented by her instrument and switchboard. She had a bed-room and
kitchen in the rear. But he never saw her go into them or emerge; never
saw her except seated at her switchboard, either reading or sewing, or,
with the silvery and Greek-like band encircling her hair and supporting
the receiver close to her small ears, repeating in her low, modulated
voice: hello--hello--hello--hello.
He wondered how tall she might be. He had never seen her standing or
walking. He wondered what her direct gaze might be like. Only her
profile had he yet beheld--a sweet, youthful, profile nobly outlined
under the gold of her hair; but under the partly lowered lashes as she
sat sewing or reading or summoning centrals from the vast expanses of
North America, he divined eyes of a soft lilac-blue. And he chewed his
pipe-stem and kicked his feet and thought about them.
Few trains stopped at Caranay except for water; the station, an old-time
farm house of small dimensions, overlooking the track and Willow Brook,
contained ticket office, telephone, and telegraph in one--all presided
over by the telephone operator. Sometimes as many as two people in a week
bought railroad tickets; sometimes a month would pass without anybody
either sending or receiving a telegram. Telephone calls were a little
more frequent.
So the girl had little to do there at her sunny open window, where
mignonette and heliotrope and nasturtiums bloomed in pots, and the big
bumble bees came buzzing and plundering the little window garden. And,
except on Sundays, Marque had little leisure to observe her, although in
the long late June evenings it was still light at eight o'clock, and he
had, without understanding how or why, formed the habit of coming down to
the deserted station platform to smoke his pipe and sometimes to fish in
the shallow waters of Willow Brook, and watch the ripples turn from gold
to purple, and listen to a certain bird that sat singing every day at
sunset on the tip of a fir-balsam across the stream--a black and white
bird with a rosy pink chest.
So lovely the evening song of this bird that Marque, often watching the
girl askance, wondered that the surprising beauty of the melody never
caused her to lift her head from book or sewing, or even rise from the
table and come out to the doorway to listen.
But she never did; and whether or not the bird's singing appealed to her,
he could not determine.
Nobody in the little gossiping hamlet of Caranay seemed to know
more than her name; he himself knew only a few people--men who,
like himself, worked on the Willett place with hoe and rake and
spraying cart and barrow--comrades of roller and mower and weed-fork and
mole-trap--dull-witted cullers of dandelion and rose-beetle. And mostly
their names were Hiram.
These had their own kind in the female line to "go with"--Caranay being
far from the metropolis, and as yet untroubled by the spreading feminine
revolution. Only stray echoes of the doings had as yet penetrated to
Caranay daisy fields; no untoward consequences had as yet ensued except
that old Si Dinglebat's wife, after reading the remains of a New York
paper found on the railroad track, had suddenly, and apparently in a fit
of mental aberration, attacked Si with a mop, accompanying the onslaught
with the reiterated inquiry: "Air wimmen to hev their rights?"
That was the only manifestation of the welt-weh in Caranay--that and the
other welt on Si's dome-like and knobby forehead.
He encountered Marque that evening after supper as that young man, in
clean blue jeans, carrying a fish-pole and smoking his pipe, was
wandering in circles preparatory to a drift in the general direction of
the railroad station.
"Evenin', neighbour!" he said.
"Good evening," said the young man.
"Goin' sparkin'?" inquired Si, overflowing with natural curiosity and
tobacco.
"What?"
"Be you goin' a-sparkin'?"
"Nonsense!" said Marque, reddening. "I don't know any girls in Caranay."
"Waal, I cal'late you know that gal down to the depot, don't ye?"
"No, I don't."
"Hey? I'm a leetle deef."
"No!" shouted Marque, "I don't."
"Don't what?"
"Don't know her, dammit!"
"Aw, quit yer cussin'," said Si, with a gummy wink. "Folks has been
talkin' ever since the fustest time you set onto that there platform and
that Eden gal fooled ye with her lookin' glass."
"What are you talking about?" said Marque impatiently.
"Issy Eden and her pretendin' not to see nobody--an' her a lookin' into
the leetle glass behind her table and a seein' of ye all the time! I know
she kin see because she ketched Hi Orville's boy a-hookin' apples outen
the bar'l that--"
"You mean she is able to see _anybody_ on the platform," said Marque,
confused and astounded.
"You bet she kin. I know because I peeked in the winder an' I seen her
a-lookin' at you when you was fishin'----"
But the young fellow had recovered himself: "All right," he interrupted;
"that isn't your business or mine. Who gave you that crack on the lid?"
"By gum," he said, "Hetty done it. I was that took! Forty year, and she
ain't never throwed s'much as a dish pan at me. I wa'n't lookin' for no
sech thing at my time o' life, young man. So when I come in to wash up
for supper, I sez to my woman, 'Hello, Het,' sez I, an' she up an'
screeched an' fetched me a clip.
"'Lord a'mighty!' sez I. 'Look out what ye doin',' sez I. 'Air wimmen to
hev their rights?' sez she, makin' for me some more. 'Is wimmen to be
free?' she sez.
"'Yew bet,' sez I, grabbin' onto her. 'I'll make free with ye,' sez I.
An' I up an' tuk an' spanked Hetty--the first time in forty year, young
man! An' it done her good, I guess, for she ain't never cooked like she
cooked supper to-night. God a'mighty, what biscuits them was!"
Marque listened indifferently, scarcely following the details of the
domestic episode because his mind was full of the girl at the station and
the amazing discovery that all these days she could have seen him
perfectly well at any moment if she had chosen to take the trouble,
without moving more than her dark, silky lashes. Had she ever taken that
trouble? He did not know, of course. He would like to have known.
He nodded absently to the hero of the welt-weh clash, and, pipe in one
hand, pole in the other, walked slowly down the road, crossed the track,
and seated himself on the platform's edge.
She was at her desk, reading. And the young man felt himself turning red
as he realised that, if she had chosen, she could have seen him sitting
here every evening with his eyes fixed--yes, sentimentally fixed upon the
back of her head and her pretty white neck and the lovely contour of her
delicately curved cheek.
All by himself he sat there and blushed, head lowered, apparently fussing
with his line and hook and trying to keep his eyes off her, without much
success.
His angling methods were simple; he crossed the grass-grown track, set
his pole in position, and returned to seat himself on the platform's
edge, where he could see his floating cork and--her. Then, as usual, he
relapsed into meditation.
If only just once she had ever betrayed the slightest knowledge of his
presence in her vicinity he might, little by little, cautiously, and by
degrees, have ventured to speak to her.
But she never had evinced the slightest shadow of interest in anything as
far as he had noticed.
Now, as he sat there, the burnt out pipe between his teeth, watching
alternately his rod and his divinity, the rose-breasted grosbeak began to
sing in the pink light of sunset. Clear, pure, sweet, the song rang
joyously from the tip of the balsam's silver-green spire. He rested his
head on one hand and listened.
The song of this bird, the odour of heliotrope, the ruddy sunlight
netting the ripples--these, for him, must forever suggest her.
He had curious fancies about her and himself. He knew that, if she ever
did turn and look at him out of those lilac-tinted eyes, he must fall in
love with her, irrevocably. He admitted to himself that already he was in
love with all he could see of her--the white neck and dull gold hair, the
fair cheek's curve, the glimpse of her hand as she deliberately turned a
page in the book she was reading.
But that evening passed as had the others; night came; she lowered her
curtain; a faint tracery of lamplight glimmered around the edges; and, as
always, he lighted his pipe and took his fish, and shouldered his pole
and went home to die the little death we call sleep until the sun of toil
should glitter above the eastern hills once more.
A few days later he decided to make an ass of himself, having been sent
with a wagon to Moss Centre, a neighbouring metropolis.
First he sent a telegram to himself at Caranay, signing it William Smith.
Then he went to the drug store telephone, and called up Caranay.
"Hello! What number, please?" came a far, sweet voice; and Marque
trembled: "No number. I want to speak to Mr. Marque--Mr. John Marque."
"He isn't here."
"Are you sure?"
"Perfectly. I saw him driving one of Mr. Willett's wagons across the
track this morning."
"Oh, that's too bad. Could I--might I--ask a little information of you?"
"Certainly."
"What sort of a fellow is this John Marque? He doesn't amount to much I
understand."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, I might want to employ him, but I don't believe he is the sort of
man to trust----"
"You are mistaken!" she said crisply.
"You mean he is all right?"
"Absolutely."
"Honest?"
"Of course."
"Capable?"
"Certainly."
"Sober?"
"Perfectly."
"M-moral?"
"Unquestionably!" she said indignantly.
"Are you sure?"
"I am."
"How do you know?"
"I have means of information which I am not at liberty to disclose. Who
is this speaking?"
"William Smith of Minnow Hollow."
"Are you going to take Mr. Marque to Minnow Hollow?"
"I may."
"You can't. Mr. Willett employs him."
"Suppose I offer him better wages----"
"He is perfectly satisfied here."
"But I----"
"No! Mr. Marque does not care to leave Caranay."
"But----"
"I am sorry. It is useless to even suggest it to him. Good-bye!"
With cheeks flushed and a slightly worried expression she resumed her
sewing through the golden stillness of the afternoon. Now and then the
clank of wagon wheels crossing the metals caused her to glance swiftly
into her mirror to see what was going on behind her. And at last she saw
Marque drive up, cross the track, then, giving the reins to the boy who
sat beside him, turn and walk directly toward the station. And her heart
gave a bound.
For the first time he came directly to her window; she saw and heard him,
knew he was waiting behind the mignonette and heliotrope, and went on
serenely sewing.
"Miss Eden?"
She waited another moment--time enough to place her sewing leisurely on
the table. Then, very slowly she turned in her chair and looked at him
out of her dark lilac-hued eyes.
He heard himself saying, as in a dream:
"Is there a telegram for me?"
And, as her delicate lifted brows questioned him:
"I am John Marque," he said.
She picked up the telegram which lay on her table and handed it to him.
"Thank you," he said. After he had gone she realised that she had not
spoken.
[Illustration]