AN UNINVITED GUEST AND A MYSTERY
Patricia had come up to Overlook, had stayed a week, and had gone back
to Fair Harbor, leaving manifold regrets that the visit could not have
been longer. Patricia Illingworth in her happiest mood always made
friends wherever she went, and this time Patricia was in her very
happiest mood.
Polly had listened to the story of the lovers’ “misunderstanding,”
listened with a feeling of guilt and shame at memory of her attempt to
bridge over the quarrel that was not and of which Patricia was never to
hear. That secret belonged alone to John Eustis and herself. If Polly’s
face showed anything of the disquiet in her heart, Patricia did not
perceive it, her eyes for the time being undiscerning beyond a certain
focus. On the third finger of her left hand she wore a modest diamond,
one which befitted the station of a young man who was not far above the
lower rounds of the ladder of success. But, small as it was, it was
cherished as a girl should cherish her betrothal ring regardless of its
size.
To the little patients on Overlook Mountain Patricia seemed a fairy
godmother, indeed, for she had left with them an unbelievable number of
pretty presents, enough to go quite around more than once.
Even Benedicta had been won over--perhaps for the first time in her
life--to a girl of fashion.
“I d’n’ know ’s she’s any better ’n other folks,” Benedicta told Polly
after Patricia was gone; “but when she comes round inside one o’ them
bewilderin’ dresses, an’ smiles to you so sweet an’ convincin’, you’re
ready to give her everything to make her do it again. It’s funny, but
she gits me every time.”
To the next visitor, however, Benedicta showed a silent scorn that was
held back from being a veritable broadside of personal opinions only by
the fact that she was a guest of Polly’s.
One afternoon Annette had laboriously climbed the stairs that led from
the ward to the room occupied by Polly and Lilith, to say:--
“Miss Dudley, there’s a lady that wants to see you.”
“Who is she?”
“I don’t know her,” declared the child.
“Is she walking?” inquired Lilith.
“No’m--I mean, Miss Brooks--she’s standin’ up, ’thout she’s sed down.”
Annette walked across to the window and craned her neck to try to see
over the edge of the veranda roof.
“No, no,” laughed Lilith; “I meant, did she come in a car?”
“No, Miss Brooks, she didn’t; she just came--like Miss Blackstone and
Miss Foster and Mrs. Shaw and--”
“Never mind, dear,” interrupted Polly, cutting short Annette’s list of
the neighbors. “I will see what she wants.”
She ran down lightly. It was probably an agent--their calls were not
infrequent.
Beyond the doorway a girl with her back to the entrance was taken up
with the distant view. Polly caught her breath--and then stepped out to
greet her visitor.
“How do you do, Marietta? This is a surprise, indeed!”
Miss Converse smiled complacently. “I expected to cause some
astonishment up here this morning; but I couldn’t conveniently send
word ahead.”
“You didn’t walk up?”
“Walk? Is that feat one of the Overlook stunts? If it is I must
accomplish it before I leave. I haven’t done so rash a thing yet.
A friend happened to be motoring down, and he was kind enough to
bring me up to Sally’s. I intended to stay there a few days before
throwing myself on your hospitality; but the Robinsons are full to
overflowing--one of the young men occupied a couch hammock last night.
Not that I mind sleeping in the open, I enjoy it myself; but Sally
vetoed that at once, so here I am, a beggar at your door! Later she
says she will be delighted to have me with them. So I shall only be
changing the time of my visit to you.”
Of course, Polly voiced as warm a welcome as she could compass at the
moment, and it evidently satisfied Marietta; to the hostess herself it
sounded stiff and cold.
The visitor talked incessantly, so that Polly’s silence was able to
pass unnoticed. She felt that Marietta had an object in coming; but it
was long before she decided what that object could be. Had it anything
to do with David? His name was not mentioned at first. Polly hesitated
to speak it, and it was finally Marietta who forestalled her.
“You ought to see how changed David is,” she said to Polly. “You’d
hardly know him.”
“Has he grown so stout?” inquired Lilith innocently.
This sent Marietta off in a convulsion of laughter. “Oh, if that isn’t
the very funniest thing!” she exclaimed at the end of her fit of mirth.
“I must repeat that to David. How he will enjoy it!”
Lilith sat silent with reddening face. Polly’s eyes showed warning
glints of displeasure. Finally Miss Converse was ready to explain.
“Oh, I did not mean that at all!” she smiled, halting a moment as if
in satisfied recollections. “Of course, you live so very quietly here,
it isn’t strange that you didn’t understand.” She glanced at Lilith.
“David is a changed man. Why, he is the very life of the camp! He leads
everything that’s going, and there’s something on all the time. We
almost never get a day of rest. I’m actually glad to be where I can
breathe quietly. Up there in the daytime it is rowing or bathing or
hiking or tennis or golf or motor picnic, and there’s a party somewhere
nearly every night. David is in the heart of it all, and the girls just
adore him! He is really adorable! You’d never know him, never, for the
dignified, reticent David Collins of Fair Harbor.”
A little amused smile on Polly’s face made Lilith wonder; but neither
of them said much. Miss Converse did not need assistance. She talked
until Lilith actually felt sleepy and finally excused herself on plea
of some urgent duty. Polly longed to follow; but her guest gave her
no chance for withdrawal, and it was late before she could obtain a
release.
On the morning after Marietta’s arrival as Polly was passing through
the kitchen, Benedicta called her aside and with a show of secrecy
closed the door which opened on the dining-room porch.
“Miss Polly”--she lowered her tone--“there ain’t anything much for
dinner! Somebody’s got to go down to Overlook, an’ it better be me.”
“Where’s Grocer Jack?”
“More ’n I know. I told him we shouldn’t want anything Monday and
he needn’t stop. I saw Mis’ Seldon last night and she said he was
’most sick when he was at her house; so I take it he ain’t comin’.
It’s too late for him now. I’ve got to have some sugar for certain
to-day--there’s cookies an’ shortcake an’ lots of things wantin’ sugar.
An’ steak I must get--and eggs if Young Ben has got any. We ate up the
last scrap of meat for breakfast--my! how that piece of vainglory does
eat!”
“Miss Converse?”
“Huh!--yere. I’d like to shut her up in the closet till she learned how
to behave.”
“What’s the matter with her?” smiled Polly.
Benedicta shrugged her shoulders with another “Huh!”--“I’m goin’ now,”
she said.
It was two o’clock when she returned. The children had had a luncheon,
and were taking their afternoon rest. She drove directly to the garage,
without a glance toward the veranda where Polly and the White Nurse
were sitting.
Polly met her at the kitchen door with proffers of assistance.
“No, you go ’long to your comp’ny,” returned the housekeeper. “I don’t
need any help.”
Polly turned away, but was arrested by a little exclamation from
Benedicta who was opening her parcels.
“What’s the matter?”
“Nothin’,” was the short answer.
“Better let me put the things in the pantry while you start dinner,”
urged Polly. “I can fill the sugar bowls, too--where is the sugar?” She
took up a paper bag, but it held rye flour.
“You just tend to your business,” spoke up Benedicta, “and let mine
alone. Thank you, but I don’t wa--need you round.”
Polly went at once. What could be the matter with Benedicta!
The dessert was not what Polly had looked for, only a shortcake made
with canned peaches. What the sugar had been especially wanted for was
the fresh fruit set aside for the shortcake.
“You don’t get many berries up here, do you?” observed Marietta.
“Yes, indeed,” answered Lilith, “we have loads of them.”
“Oh!” was the reply, in a tone that seemed to add, “Where are they,
pray?”
Polly ventured again into Benedicta’s domain. “If you are going to make
cookies for tea, as you spoke of,” she said, “suppose you have cocoanut
cookies. Marietta has heard of yours, and says she enjoys cocoanut very
much.”
“I ain’t goin’ to make cookies this afternoon.”
Polly greeted Benedicta’s glance with a little puzzled smile.
“I s’pose I may as well tell you an’ done with it,” the housekeeper
began, her face flooded with crimson. “I clean forgot the sugar.”
“Oh,” said Polly regretfully, “that’s too bad! Perhaps I might drive
down pretty soon, I don’t know--”
“I do’ want yer to,” Benedicta answered decisively. “I’ll borrow some
at Young Ben’s.”
Polly went away thinking hard. What had occurred to make Benedicta
forget one of the most important purchases--Benedicta who rarely forgot
anything? And was it only pride that caused her to try to hide it?
But for Marietta Polly would have dwelt longer upon the housekeeper’s
singular behavior. The visitor gave her hostess plenty of food for
thought, and that not of the pleasantest kind.
“I never would have believed that you could be satisfied with this dead
existence,” Marietta remarked with emphasis, as the girls sat together
on the bank of the brook that ran back of the house.
“Dead!” Polly repeated, a tiny scowl fretting her smooth forehead.
“Anything but that, I should call it.”
“Well, not much like what you have been accustomed to. I should die to
be shut out from everything, the way you are up here.”
Polly’s cheeks grew red, and a queer little smile came and went.
“I think it is a beautiful thing to help little children to be better
and happier; don’t you?”
Marietta gave a short laugh, and lifted her eyebrows. “Oh, of course,
if you put it that way. I’d rather be excused--at my age. It is all
right enough for those who are on the shelf.”
Polly could not trust an answer. The red on her cheeks deepened, and if
Marietta had seen her eyes at that moment she would have discovered an
ominous dash.
Marietta, however, was flinging pebbles in the brook and was watching
the rings they made.
How long the uninvited guest would have remained at Sunrise Chalet
if Sally Robinson had not come over with the announcement that her
room was vacant and waiting for her is uncertain. As it was, she went
home with Sally, not at all to Polly’s displeasure. She had felt that
she could not bear the strain of being constantly on the watch for
what Marietta would say next about David. It had been an unpleasant
experience from first to last, and she wondered over and over what had
been the girl’s object in coming.
Benedicta was plainly glad that the visitor was gone; but in these days
she said little about anything, her forbidding silence being remarked
upon by everybody, from the White Nurse down to Little Duke.