THE SKY BRIGHTENS
The General must have thought his housekeeper too valuable to lose,
for May was neither placed under lock and key nor condemned to prison
fare of bread and water. In one way this order of severity would have
been easier to bear than daily meetings with the silent General. Only a
child of coarse calibre can stand out against the silent condemnation
of an elder; to May, who had lived in an atmosphere of sunshine, the
General's demeanor was well-nigh unbearable. Confession trembled on her
lips more than once, but was repressed.
"What good will it do to tell?" she argued with herself. "Uncle Harold
will not believe what I say until something happens to change his
opinion of me."
The last accusation, that of sowing the seeds of tobacco-using, did not
trouble May greatly. That would be easily disposed of when it was known
that she was a girl; no one, then, would believe that she had given a
boy tobacco. But a girl might fire a heap of hay and tell a fib about
it afterwards, both acts being within a girl's province of wickedness.
And if Philip never told, and if her uncle continued to disbelieve her,
might not everybody, Gay, father, mother, all, believe her guilty? This
thought brought May to the verge of despair.
Every morning a message was brought to May, "Will you apologize?" And
to this message the unvarying reply was returned, "No, sir."
This exchange of semi-hostilities was the only intercourse between May
and her uncle. The General began to feel some respect for a nature
that could hold out against the enemy and refuse to yield even under
continuous siege. "He's a naughty boy, but I believe he has the making
of a soldier," thought the old man.
One day the uncle and the mock nephew encountered one another on the
porch.
"Well, boy," said the uncle sitting down as if to make ready for a
confession.
"Oh, Uncle Harold, if you would only believe me!" cried May, overcome
by this unwonted gentleness.
"I will when you tell the truth; take back your words to the doctor and
apologize to Philip," the General replied.
"Can't you see that I'm telling the truth and that I can't apologize to
Philip?" May exclaimed, earnestly, clasping her hands on the General's
arm and looking into his eyes.
The General rose, and put aside the clinging hands. He wanted to take
the childish figure in his arms and forgive all that had passed, but
the determination to conquer the stubborn will opposed to his own
withheld him.
"I shall say no more about the matter. When you have anything to tell
me you can seek me," he said, and then he walked away to hide his
feelings.
"Philip did it!" May's lips formed these words, but no sound came from
them. "Tell him," an inward voice whispered. May looked after the
retreating figure; its outline was so stern that her courage faded and
she turned hopelessly away in the other direction. "What is the use; he
wouldn't believe me," she said to herself.
This encounter bore good fruit, however. It helped May to make an
effort to lift the heavy cloud of suspicion that rested upon her. In
the afternoon she asked Phyllis to walk over to the village with her.
"If Miss Sarah is willing," said Phyllis.
Sarah was willing, but when Phyllis said, "He's going to make that
Brentwood boy speak out," she said, "Haven't you got that idea out of
your head yet?"
"No, Miss Sarah," Phyllis replied, "I'm surer of it than ever since
Dr. Brentwood said Gay had given Philip tobacco—the idea of it! That
Philip is a little scamp; you see if I am not right."
This decided expression of opinion from her meek serving-maid so
surprised Sarah that she allowed Phyllis to depart without saying a
word!
It was indeed May's intention to see Philip, but when Dr. Brentwood's
was reached they were told that Philip had gone, with a companion, to
play near the lake. "But the doctor is in his office," said the maid,
looking significantly at May.
It was plain that she knew the whole story, and thought the young
caller had come to make the expected apology, and so, also, thought
the doctor, who was looking through the window and trying to persuade
himself not to be too severe with the corrupter of Philip's morals.
"I don't care to see the doctor," May replied, with rising color. Then
she added, "I am going to the lake, Phyllis."
"Very well," said Phyllis, now more than ever convinced of the insight
of her conjectures.
Philip and his friend were in a boat a short distance from the shore.
They were not rowing but drifting, and rocking the boat from side to
side.
"I want to see you, Philip; come ashore, please."
The rocking ceased. "I don't want to see you," Philip answered,
telling the truth, in its deepest significance, unintentionally. "I
shall not come ashore." And the rocking was resumed.
"You will have to come ashore some time; I will wait for you," May
answered. "Sit down, Phyllis; I shall wait for him if I stay all night."
They sat down on the grass-fringed edge of the lake. Philip and his
companion rocked, and jumped, and shouted noisily. They were too far
distant for May or Phyllis to hear how it began, but presently they
began to dispute and to push each other, and then, somehow—for no one
ever knows how such accidents occur—they made a false movement, the
boat tipped over on one side, and they went into the water with a great
splash. The boat righted itself and swung idly on the little waves.
"They will drown!" shouted Phyllis, springing to her feet.
"No, they won't," said May. "They will get a good wetting, that's all.
The water can't be deep; besides, Philip told me he could swim."
"They are not swimming," said Phyllis. "We'd better go for somebody."
"Help!" shouted one of the boys, coming to the surface.
At this cry May threw her hat on the bank and walked into the water
without a word.
"Come back!" cried Phyllis, in alarm.
But May kept on. By this time the water was on a level with her chest,
and she struck out boldly. She was a fearless swimmer and the distance
was short, but as she swam along she could not help thinking, uneasily,
"I wonder if I can manage both!"
When she reached them Philip was doing his utmost, in his fright, to
drown himself and his companion, and must have succeeded in doing so
if May had not arrived. She grasped him by the back, and they rose
to the surface, where she made him understand that he must loose his
hold of his companion. This he did and clung to May instead, plunging,
struggling, and screaming, but she was equal to him, and by scolding,
persuading and even threatening him she kept him afloat until the other
boy, who could swim very well, recovered his breath, then together they
got Philip ashore.
"I couldn't have held him a minute longer," gasped the boy, when they
were on land again. "Philip hung hold of me so—why, I should think he
must have been as strong as ten men—and he grabbed me every time I
tried to swim a stroke and pulled me down. Oh, it was awful!"
"I thought you could swim," said May, "else I'd have been there sooner."
She didn't say "Philip told me he could swim," and for the first time
since their acquaintance began, Philip appreciated May's forbearance
and realized that the "girl-boy," "coward," and "sissy," had returned
his evil conduct with good. His shame would have increased had he known
that he was indebted to a girl for his safety.
"You're a good swimmer," said Philip's companion.
"I ought to be," said May, beginning to wring blouse and knickerbocker
to get rid of the water. "Father taught my brother and me to swim when
we were four years old, and he says we took to the water as naturally
as Newfoundland puppies. How do you feel, Philip?" May added, with an
anxious glance at Philip, who had not spoken, and who stood at her
side, shivering, and looking blue and pinched about his nose and mouth.
"Queer," Philip replied, faintly.
"You must move around," May said, taking Philip's hands and chafing
them smartly. "The best thing to do is to start for home. Wring
yourself out a little, Philip; then we'll go."
But Philip protested that he was dying and couldn't walk a step, and
that somebody must go for his grandfather's carriage.
"I'll go," said Philip's friend.
"No," said May, decidedly, "Philip must keep moving or he'll take cold.
Come, Philip, take my arm, and your friend——"
"My name is Rob Lawrence," interrupted the boy.
"And Rob will take your other arm, and you can get along nicely," May
continued.
Philip took the proffered arms very meekly and the procession moved;
Philip, Rob and May abreast, and Phyllis in the next rank, carrying
May's hat and weeping quietly from sheer excitement. When they reached
the Brentwood's, they helped exhausted Philip in at a side door. "I
want you to come in with me," he said.
"I can't, I'm so wet," said May; "I'll come down by and by."
"I want you to come in now; I may be dead by and by," said Philip,
tragically.
So they went in, Rob, May, and Phyllis, the latter privately convinced
that some new infliction was in store for her favorite. This was an
unnecessary suspicion, as she soon learned.
The maid preceded them into the drawing-room, crying,—
"Oh, docther, docther, Master Philip is drownded, and the Gineral's boy
pulled him out alive!"
Then there was a great flurry! Grandmamma Brentwood tried to faint and
the General, who was making an afternoon call, supplied her with water,
and a bouquet of roses, from a handy vase! The water and indignation
brought the old lady out of her swoon, and just then Philip and May
and Rob, all dripping like half-wrung clothes, came in, followed by
faithful Phyllis.
"Grandpapa!" said Philip, and oh, how hard the words came! "when I was
drowning—I threw the matches in the hay. I didn't really mean to do
it—I was ashamed when I was being pulled ashore—that tobacco and stuff
was mine—and—Gay told the truth and I—didn't!"
This was incoherent, but everybody understood it. The General opened
his arms to May, then and there, and she nestled within them and nobody
as much as thought of the damage her water-soaked clothing might do to
the General's "old-school" finery. Doctor and Mrs. Brentwood looked
sadly at their shame-faced grandchild. As for Phyllis, it was the
happiest moment of her life—not only was her pet completely vindicated,
but now she could prove to her mistress that her reasoning powers had
not been injured by excess of romance reading.
The doctor was ashamed of the part his belief in Philip had caused him
to play. "Gay," said he, "why didn't you tell in the first place that
Philip set the hay afire?"
"I thought Philip would tell," May replied. "And he has told and that
is all there is about it." May glanced at Philip with a forgiving
smile, and he smiled in return, with full appreciation of her
magnanimity.
"No, that is not all," said the doctor, sternly. "You shall say what
punishment shall be Philip's."
"Punishment!" echoed May in astonishment. "I should think he'd had
enough already! with doing what he was ashamed of, and half drowning
besides."
"He'd have been wholly drowned if it hadn't been for you. And so would
I," Rob ventured to say.
"What shall we do to him?" persisted the doctor. "He made you suffer;
it is only justice that you should select his punishment."
"I shouldn't call that justice," said May decidedly. "I should call it
paying him back, and father won't let us think of doing such things. If
you please, Doctor Brentwood, I think we'll call it square as it is."
She turned to Philip and added, earnestly, "You won't be so hateful
again, will you?"
"No," Philip replied, so soberly that May did not doubt his sincerity.
Then somebody was wise enough to realize that the children were
courting lung fever and rheumatism. May scampered for home, and was
dressed in a dry suit before the General and Phyllis got there, and
before Sarah knew anything about it.
When Sarah heard the story she expressed no surprise. "Phyllis and I
have thought for some time that Philip knew more about it than he chose
to tell," she said.
This cool assertion naturally surprised Phyllis, but a little later she
received a second shock of surprise beside which the first faded into
insignificance. Sarah gave her a bunch of keys, saying,—
"The keys of the small storeroom. Hereafter you will deal out the
stores to the farm hands. Anybody that ferreted out Philip's mischief
deserves to have the control of keys." Then, because Phyllis didn't
know what to say, she added, "Take them; don't stand there looking as
if you hadn't an idea in your head."
"Yes'm," said Phyllis, accepting the keys without another word.
As for the General, he held May on his knees all the evening, so proud,
so happy, and so contrite was he. May would hear no reproaches, but the
General silently vowed never again to doubt his "little soldier."
But bless you, he did! Within twenty-four hours the unfortunate "little
soldier" was once more in disgrace.