I had seen her looming through the haze. She seemed to be coming
rapidly, and there was little wind. I mentioned it.
"Fergus had a motor put in her this year," Old Goodwin answered. "He
hated to. Said it was spoiling a beautiful boat, but he had to do it."
Then there was a noise up the path, and Tom Ellis appeared with Cecily.
"Hello, people," he said. "Are we the first? I was afraid we would be,
but I couldn't hold Cecily any longer."
Cecily smiled. "Don't take any notice of him, Eve, and he'll run down
pretty soon."
"And," Tom went on, "Cecily could have painted for another half hour and
earned fifty dollars more. You see what a sacrifice I have made for
you."
"And your country."
"Country comes first, doesn't it, Adam? Ought to, but I'm afraid the
clams had a good deal to do with it. What do you think of my uniform?"
Tom had on the worst looking clothes that I have ever seen on a
respectable man who did no work. They were soaked with a mixture of oil
and grease and dirt, and spattered with mud, which covered them in great
patches here and there, and one sleeve of his coat was torn nearly off.
It looked as if a machinist, in his oily jumper, had rolled in wet clay.
His rubber boots were those of a mixer of mortar and concrete.
"I am lost in admiration, Tom," I said. "The others will hardly be able
to equal that."
"No," Tom returned proudly; and he threw down his rake. He had brought
an instrument very like a potato digger, a short-handled rake with huge
tines. "The only private, you know. I thought my uniform ought to have
distinction. Cleaned up Mr. Goodwin's cars for the purpose." Old Goodwin
laughed suddenly at that. "Then I whitewashed the henhouse, with this
artistic result. It's quite fun whitewashing henhouses. Ever try it,
Adam? Did it with a pump and hose. Whitewash on the windows is an inch
thick."
I laughed. "I have had that pleasure in the distant past, and I don't
want any more of it. But you have not accounted for the mud."
Tom surveyed the mud and shook his head.
"Can't account for it," he said. "Haven't been near any mud. I can't
imagine how it got there, unless Cecily borrowed the clothes. But this
party, Adam, is a sort of farewell party for me. I've enlisted. I go
to-morrow."
"Go to-morrow!" I cried. "Where? And what have you enlisted for?"
"That is somewhat ambiguous as a question, but I will answer all its
meanings. I've enlisted because my country needs me. All the posters
say so. That one of the old gentleman in the star-spangled hat looking
right at you and pointing right at you, and saying, 'Your country needs
YOU,' or words to that effect, was what got me finally. I couldn't get
away from it. He was pointing at me and looking at me, wherever I went.
And I've enlisted for four years, and--"
"Four _years_!" gasped Cecily, wide-eyed. "You never told me that, Tom."
"Didn't I? It must have been an oversight, Cecily. You won't mind, will
you? And I've enlisted to go to Newport and drive some admiral or other
around in a large gray car. Oh, it's not half bad. When the submarines
begin to school off Nantucket, perhaps they'll let me go out there once
in a while and get a load."
"Tom," said Eve, patting his arm, her eyes shining again, "I think it's
splendid. I could kiss you for it."
"Wait, Eve, until Cecily's not around," Tom whispered; "and perhaps Adam
could be spared. _Then_, if you like--"
"I'm going to Newport to-morrow," Cecily broke in decidedly. "I'm going
to _live_ there."
"Oh, I say!" said Tom. And Old Goodwin offered to take them both over
next day in his new car, and let Tom drive. And he offered further to
ferry Cecily back and forth as often as she liked, and to lend them a
car if they wished.
So everybody was happy,--excepting perhaps Tom and Cecily,--and the
Arcadia was just rounding to her anchorage, and we watched while the
shining mahogany launch put off. But, before coming in, the launch went
slowly along the whole length of Old Goodwin's ocean steamer. I could
see Captain Fergus looking at the work as though he were inspecting it,
and once he boomed forth a question, which was answered as if he had a
right to ask it, and then the launch made for the landing.
I wondered at it, but I wondered more at Eve. For Eve has pacifist
leanings, as I have reason to know and as I have said before; and here
she was with all the signs of approval for Tom's action, and ready to
kiss him for it. It might be that Eve was entirely willing that the war
should be fought vicariously, and that she would sacrifice all her
friends in the cause--but not her family. That was not like Eve. I
refused to believe it of her. And I turned away and was musing upon this
matter when there came down the path Captain Fergus and Mrs. Fergus, and
Jimmy Wales and Bobby and Ogilvie; and, some distance behind them,
Elizabeth and Olivia. And that was strange, too, that those two girls
should be coming by themselves when Bobby and Jack Ogilvie were just
ahead; but I could not be bothering myself about all the queer things
that people did--or did not do. They did not concern me. There were
enough things that did concern me to bother about.
All the company were there. I drew near to Eve.
"If Alice Carbonnel were here now," I said, "and Harrison, we should be
complete."
"Alice!" Eve returned. "I wish that I knew!"
Alice Carbonnel was in Belgium, the last we knew, and Harrison Rindge,
her husband, was hunting for her. I hope he has found her--safe. We are
very fond of Alice Carbonnel, Eve and I.
"There is somebody else to come, Adam," said Eve. "You would never
guess. It is my mother."
I smiled, remembering another day when I had met Eve just at that spot
to take her to another clambake; a smoking dome upon a point, beneath a
pine.
The point and the pine belonged to a queer fellow that I knew--knew
well, I thought sometimes, and sometimes not.
And so I smiled, remembering. "Eve," I said, "do governesses have
mothers?"
And she smiled too, and she slipped her hand within my arm, and looked
up at me with that light in her eyes that makes them pass all wonders.
"Oh, Adam," she said, "that was a happy day--for me. Oh, but it was
hard, and I was afraid."
"A happier day for me," I said, pressing her arm close to my side. "But
here comes your mother."
And Mrs. Goodwin came sailing down the path, with our little daughter
skipping beside her, and she smiled as she came, which was not what she
had been used to do in that time that I remembered. And our company
being all assembled, and the beds being uncovered, although the tide was
not yet at its lowest, I gave the order to dig. So we dug, even Mrs.
Goodwin digging three clams, and she was not clad as a clammer should be
clad, but she had some rubber boots, new ones and thin as gossamer,
which a clamshell cut through. And thereafter she sat upon the bank and
cheered us on, and gibed at our raiment; as if the body were not more
than raiment.
We dug for an hour, and got clams enough for a regiment. All the baskets
were filled to overflowing. And we stopped digging, one by one, and
straightened our backs slowly, with many creaks and groans, and we
drifted to the bank and in and out; and when the drifting process was
over, I found myself next to Eve, with Elizabeth on the other side of
her, and Ogilvie completing the circle. Bobby stood afar off, looking
out over the water as if he were seeing his best friend swallowed by a
submarine; and Olivia watched him from a distance.
"I notice, Jack," Elizabeth observed, "that Olivia has a lonesome look."
Ogilvie turned and looked, and turned back again and smiled.
"She has, hasn't she? Bobby too."