_LeClare’s Story: The Initialed Tree._
“It’s only a boy and girl story, but, all the same, that’s why I’ve
been a gold digger. At our first meeting on the plains I said I was
from the Eastern provinces. That was all right for the time. The truth
happens to be, though, that our native homes are separated only by the
fifteen miles of intervening water channels of the Archipelago. When
you look to the southward from your farm on The Front, across the great
expanse of water, dotted here and there with wooded islands, and then
extend the view to the sloping sides of the irregular mountain range
which meets the eye, you may perhaps see there, reposing sleepily upon
the banks of the winding Salmon, a small American village. Four miles
down the river, after traversing for the full distance the cranberry
marshes of Arcadia, its waters are gathered into one of the nearest
channels of the St. Lawrence. The approach is so unpretentious that the
coming of its added volume is only recognized by the idler drifting in
his canoe along the shores of the Archipelago from the blue and gray
color line made by the mingling of the waters. For it is just here at
this line that the now docile mountain cataracts of the Adirondacks are
greeted by the turquoise-blue waters flowing seaward from the Great
Lakes.
“In Darrington, this village on the Salmon, lived Lucy Maynard. Two
miles to the eastward, upon one of the fertile farms in the valley of
the St. Lawrence, was my home. There I was taught the law of the Ten
Commandments, living in the midst of sunshine and happiness and blest
with the love of a devoted father and mother. This is only a childish
romance, Andy, and perhaps you don’t care to hear it.”
“Go on, Edmond,” came the reply. “You know my story. Now tell me
yours.”
“At the age of seventeen I had been considered by my parents a graduate
from the district school, and at the beginning of the Autumn term I was
entered in the intermediate grade of the high school up in the village
of Darrington. This was an auspicious event in my hitherto uneventful
career. Living always upon the farm, my playmates and acquaintances
were of the neighboring farm children. Tramping the same way to the
district school-house, we had pelted the croaking frogs in the ditches
by the roadside, and fired stones at the rows of swallows swinging
upon the telegraph wires, and in the season we picked the daisies from
the nearby fields, handing them roughly, almost rudely, to the girl of
our choice amongst the strolling group of school children; while in
the Autumn, in the groves by the roadside, we hurled sticks high into
the chestnut trees, then scrambled upon our hands and knees at a lucky
throw we had made, each to pocket his catch. Simple and healthful were
our sports. Barefooted we stubbed our toes in the game of ‘tag’ and at
ball games in ‘Three Old Cats,’ where ‘over the fence is out.’ We were
each a star player of the national game. Happy children of the country,
Andy, primitive in thought, with gentle rural manners, acquired in the
religious homes of a Scotch Presbyterian settlement. Once a week upon
the Sunday, since childhood, I attended with my father and mother the
church at Darrington, and there wistfully, shyly, I looked across the
high backs of the family pews at the children of the villagers. In my
childish mind their lot in life was greatly to be envied and admired,
compared with mine. Their ‘store’ clothes and their pert, familiar
manner placed them in my estimation so far above my station in the
social scale that my deference toward them amounted to something like
worship.
“In one of the family seats, across and several pews advanced from
ours, moving restlessly about between her father and mother, was a
handsome, large-eyed child, forever looking backward, and, of course
I fancied, often glancing in my direction. She was Lucy Maynard. For
years, and until I entered the village high school, we had seen each
other upon Sundays, across the backs of the seats, never a word
from either, nor a smile of recognition, Lucy’s large, brown eyes
looking toward me as she knelt on her knees upon the seat; then, as I
returned her wistful gaze, she would sink slowly down upon her mother’s
shoulder, burying her face from view. I saw her grow to be a young
lady, a village lady; she saw me an awkward country boy. In childhood I
dared to return her glances. As a boy of seventeen, when I found myself
that autumn in the village high school, in the same class with the girl
always before me in my youthful day dreams, I had not the courage even
to look in the direction of the seat which she occupied.
“Everything seemed strange to me, Andy. I knew nothing in common with
the village boys. They played ball differently; they called their game
of ‘hide and seek’ by another name, and they didn’t even throw stones
at a mark as we had done in the country. Some of the boys tolerated my
backwardness and others turned up their noses at my awkward attempts
at being agreeable. But one silent champion I felt I always had during
those first weeks of my introduction into that school. Standing near
in the hallways, with others girls in our class, at recess, Lucy
Maynard, with that soulful look from those large, brown eyes, reproved
the boy whose rude remark was aimed at the defenseless, or the one
slowest at repartee in the gossip under discussion.
“A few weeks of the Autumn term had passed, and the class in
mathematics had been requested to remain after the grades had been
dismissed, to receive further instruction from the professor. A board
walk extends the full length of the campus from the school-house,
ending in a turnstile at the street. The class dismissed, I hurried out
of the building. Rustling behind me in a quick step came a young lady.
I knew instinctively it was Lucy.
“‘Don’t you think it is about time you had something to say to me, Mr.
LeClare?’ she said, as she came beside me. ‘I won’t think you are a bit
nice if you go on like this.’ I felt my face turning red, and I forgot
everything I had learned a thousand times before to say to her. Then
I begged her pardon for nearly stepping upon her, and I felt that I
was about to collapse. The turnstile came to my assistance, and, as
Lucy lived in an opposite direction from that in which I had to go, we
parted. I had regained enough of my scattered senses, though, to thank
her for having spoken to me.
“The Winter term of school had come and gone, and the Summer closing
was at hand. The other boys in my class had soon overlooked my
misfortune, as they considered it, of having lived in the country, and
I was proud of the devotion of Lucy, whose name was now paired off with
mine, as were the other boys and girls paired off in our same class. To
celebrate the close of the school, the class proposed a basket party
to be held upon the bank of the St. Lawrence, each male member of the
party offering to row his share of the ladies in his separate boat down
the winding Salmon, a five miles jaunt. With Lucy at the helm, my craft
sped down stream propelled by a youthful spirit of pride and enthusiasm.
“Dinner under the trees on Tyno’s Point was quickly over, and the young
admirers soon found some interesting object to engage their attention
in pairs. Lucy and I, always quieter when alone, had realized that
very shortly we would not see each other as often, and that perhaps in
the next year we should be sent away to different colleges.
“And thus it came about that as we knelt carving our initials, one
above the other, on the trunk of a basswood tree, we queried: ‘Shall
we always grow up together in life as our names will always remain
together on this tree?’ Lucy said: ‘I will cut one stroke in the
frame to inclose our names which says we will,’ and she cut a strip
in the bark over the initials. Then she looked into my eyes with that
soul-pleading look, and I at once cut a line down one side. Lucy
immediately cut the mark for the opposite side, and three sides of the
frame were then formed. It was my turn, and I hesitated, for I knew
what it meant to both of us. I thought it too early for an engagement.
Lucy sank slowly down by the side of the tree, as she used to do from
the back of the seat in church upon her mother’s shoulder, and waited
for me to say something. I was wrong, Andy. I said we’d better wait
before we made the other stroke to complete the frame. There was an
awkward silence; Lucy toyed with the penknife she held in her hand, but
looked no more at the initials cut into the bark of the tree.”
[Illustration]