THE HOUSE BEHIND THE WORLD
"How many letters for me, Bridget?" trilled Grace Harlowe as she raced
across the lawn to the front steps with the reckless enthusiasm of a
small boy. A glimpse of the postman's retreating back had brought her
scurrying from the garden to collect her own.
"Sure and it's a deal of mail ye be always gettin', Miss Grace,"
commented Bridget proudly, as she handed the eager-faced questioner a
small stack of letters that brought a sparkle of pleasant anticipation
to Grace's gray eyes.
"More than I deserve, I am sorry to say. I'm by no means a perfect
correspondent. Thank you, Bridget." With a bright little nod, Grace
skipped joyfully up the steps and made harbor in the big porch swing.
"I'll read them as they come," she decided, "then each one will be a
fresh surprise. Hello! Here's Miriam first of all. That means Anne
delivered my message." Hastily tearing open the envelope, Grace drew
forth a single sheet of thick white paper and read:
"DEAR GRACE:
"How I wish I could suddenly drop in on you this morning for a long
talk. There is so much I should like to tell you which I haven't
time to write. Anne, the faithful, delivered your message. Don't
worry about my not waiting for you. I won't buy even a paper of
pins without your august sanction and approval. I am anxiously
looking forward to seeing you. So are Kathleen, Anne, Arline and
Mabel Ashe.
"Elfreda is with me. She is a never-failing joy, and to quote her
pet phrase, 'I can see' that there will be a vast amount of
celebrating done when you arrive. Please forgive me for not writing
much this time. I am expecting Everett and his sister at any
moment. We are going to motor down to their home on Long Island for
the day. I have decided to put in the time usefully until they have
arrived. Hence this fragmentary epistle. Kindly note my laudable
promptness as a correspondent and fall in line. With much love,
"As always,
"MIRIAM."
"I'll reply this very morning," nobly resolved Grace. "Oh!" She gave a
gleeful chuckle as she recognized a dear, familiar script. "It's from
Emma, good old friend." The chuckle continued as she perused the flowery
salutation:
"MOST GRACIOUS AND ESTIMABLE GRACE:
"Having made a triumphal return to the humble habitation of the
Deans, of whom I am which, I now derive a most excruciating
pleasure in taking up my sadly neglected pen to inform you that I
am well and hope you are the same. By this time you are no doubt
mourning me as hopelessly lost in the wilds of darkest Deanery.
Such is not the case. Though I have wandered disconsolately about
my childhood haunts and camped out despondently under the fruitful
pear-tree in our back yard, which, so far as I can remember, has
never boasted of a single solitary pear, I am by no means lost. In
fact, I am really beginning to feel quite at home. But how I miss
you! Living in a 'Graceless' world is a cross even to a person of
my excellent and amiable qualities.
"There's a grain of comfort in store, thank goodness. Before many
weeks the Sempers will congregate together somewhere for a glorious
reunion. Elfreda has written me that you are soon to be in New York
City. I suppose the momentous question of 'Where shall we reunite?'
will be decided then."
Grace read on through page after page of the long letter, written in
Emma's most humorous vein. Finishing it at last, she gathered the
closely written sheets together with a happy little sigh. Good-natured,
fun-loving Emma Dean occupied a foremost place in her affections. Grace
wondered sometimes if the bond between them did not stretch as tightly
even as that between herself and Anne. Emma had been and always would be
the perfect comrade.
"You're next, Mabel," she murmured as she scanned the third envelope on
the scarcely depleted pile. "I suppose you are going to tell me
that----"
The loud purr of an automobile stopping before the house left Mabel's
message still unread. Depositing her wealth of correspondence on the
seat of the swing, Grace tripped down the steps and on down the walk.
"Good morning, dear Fairy Godmother," she greeted hospitably. "Good
morning, Tom. Something nice is going to happen. I can read it in your
faces."
"That depends on whatever your conception of 'nice' may be," returned
Tom mysteriously. Slipping from the driver's seat, he caught her
outstretched hand in both his own, his gray eyes alive with the light of
a joyful anticipation which Grace had been quick to catch.
"Good morning, my dear," called Mrs. Gray from the car. "Run in the
house and get your hat. We are bound on a most mysterious mission. You
are the third person needed to carry it out."
"I'll be with you in a moment." Turning, Grace hastened up the walk to
the house, wondering mightily what lay in store for her. "Mrs. Gray and
Tom are waiting outside for me in the automobile, Mother," she
announced, appearing suddenly on the shady back porch, where her mother
sat quietly hemstitching a table cloth for Grace's Hope Chest. "Come out
and see them."
Smiling to herself, Mrs. Harlowe laid aside her labor of love and
followed her daughter's impetuous lead. Catching up her broad-brimmed
Panama hat from the hall rack, Grace placed it on her head without
stopping to consult the hall mirror. Linking her arm in her mother's,
she towed her gently along toward the automobile to meet the unexpected
arrivals.
"Won't you come with us, Mrs. Harlowe?" invited Mrs. Gray. The two women
exchanged not only greetings but significant smiles as well.
"Thank you; not this morning. I prefer to leave Grace to you and Tom."
Again her eyes met those of the older woman with the same enigmatic
smile.
"There is mystery in the very air," declared Grace gayly. "I can tell by
the way you two are exchanging eye-signals. Whatever the great secret
is, Mother knows it. Now don't you?" she challenged, her affectionate
gaze resting on Mrs. Harlowe.
"I'll answer that question when you come back," parried her mother.
"I'll hold you to your word," came the retort. Dropping a soft kiss on
her mother's pink cheek, Grace accepted Tom's hand and stepped into the
tonneau of the waiting automobile.
"Whither away, good prince?" she called mischievously to Tom as the
machine glided down the street.
"That's a secret, curious princess. Wait and you will see," flung back
Tom teasingly.
"Of course I'm curious," calmly admitted Grace, as she settled back in
her seat. "Who wouldn't be? I wouldn't have let you tell me, though, if
you had tried. I am quite ready to wait and see what happens."
Nevertheless, as they spun along the smooth road in the summer sunshine,
Grace cast more than one speculative glance about her, trying to glean
some faint hint of their destination. Although conversation went on
briskly between herself and her Fairy Godmother, her keen eyes lost no
detail that might possibly furnish her with a clue.
"We'll have to leave the car here and walk a little way," announced Tom,
when half an hour later, after traveling the highway that skirted Upton
Wood, he slowed down in a shady spot on the other side of the short
stretch of forest.
"Very well," came Mrs. Gray's placid voice from the tonneau. "I shall
not leave the car, Tom. You may do the honors."
"Come on, Grace." Leaving the driver's seat, Tom opened the door of the
tonneau and stretched forth an inviting hand.
"I know where we are going," she cried triumphantly, as she accepted the
proffered assistance. "We are going to take a look at Upton Heights. How
nice! I haven't seen the quaint old place since I came home from
college. You know I've always loved it and wished I owned it. It's such
a wonderful forest retreat. When I was a little girl, I used to love to
play that the world ended there. I always called it the House Behind the
World."
Further mysterious and affectionate eye-signals were flashed between
Mrs. Gray and Tom as Grace made this fervent speech. "Come and look at
it again," said Tom briefly. There was a touch of exultation in his even
tones.
Hand in hand, like two children, the youthful pair swung gayly along the
narrow path that led from the highway to picturesque Upton Heights.
Nearing it, they became suddenly silent in the face of its undeniable
claim to beauty. Dazzlingly white against the magnificent trees which
surrounded it, it stood in the middle of a grassy plateau that rolled
gently down to the woodland path in long sloping green terraces.
"How beautiful it looks!" Grace gazed almost reverently at the rambling
old house with its wide, high-pillared verandas. It was like some
gracious, stately person whose very watchword was hospitality, she
thought. Built more than a century before, by a long-since departed
Upton, it had not been used as a residence by his descendants. Due to a
clause of command in the original owner's will, it had ever afterward
been sedulously kept in repair. To her beauty-loving soul, it now seemed
to have taken on a new lease of life. The house itself rejoiced in a
fresh white luster and the grounds showed recent care.
"It was nice in you to bring me here, Tom," she again said. "You knew I
loved this old place, didn't you?"
"Yes. Suppose we go closer to it," suggested Tom, drawing her gently
forward.
Her hand still in his, Grace allowed him to conduct her to the flight of
white stone steps set in the terrace. They led upward to the wide
flagstone walk which in turn stretched levelly up to meet the spacious
veranda.
"Shut your eyes," directed Tom, when they had mounted the steps to the
veranda floor. His terse direction contained a touch of repressed
excitement which informed Grace that the surprise was at hand. But what
it might be she had not the remotest suspicion.
Obediently her long lashes swept her cheeks in compliance with love's
command.
Dropping her hand, Tom approached the massive front door. There was a
curious clicking sound, like the turn of a key in a lock, then Tom was
back at her side. His hand again caught one of her own. Again he drew
her forward. There was a slight tremor in his voice as he said:
"Open your eyes, Princess, and enter your castle."
Her veiling eye-lids lifting, Grace found herself on the threshold of
Upton Heights, peering wonderingly into the dim reception hall with its
huge fireplace, beam ceiling and curving Colonial staircase.
"It's a splendid surprise, Tom!" she exclaimed warmly. "I've always
wished to see the inside of this wonderful place. How in the world did
you ever manage to get the key to it?"
Tom smiled very tenderly into the eager face so near his own. "You've
missed the biggest part of the surprise, Grace," he answered. "Don't you
understand yet why we came out here? Do you think I would invite a royal
princess to enter her castle if it weren't really her very own?"
"You don't mean--you can't mean--Oh, Tom!" Grace drew a quick, ecstatic
breath that was half sob. A vagrant breeze set the leaves of the
sentinel trees to sighing their approval as they looked down on the
little tableau of human happiness.
"It is your very own House Behind the World, dear," Tom assured her.
"Our future home. It is the gift of our Fairy Godmother to both of us.
She purchased it of Robert Upton the day after we came from Overton. She
had spoken of it to Mr. Upton long ago and was only waiting for the good
news of our engagement. She knew how much you had always cared about
it."
"We must go straight down to the automobile and make her come back with
us," was Grace's happy cry. "I am so anxious to explore our marvelous
new possession. But we must have our Fairy Godmother with us. I can't
really believe yet that anything so glorious has happened to ordinary
me. It's more than a surprise. It's a positive miracle. My own beautiful
House Behind the World! But I know an even better name for it. It's not
one I thought of myself. That glory belongs to Kathleen West. You know,
Tom, she once wrote an allegorical play. We produced it when I was in my
senior year at Overton. I played the part of Loyalheart who leaves Haven
Home to go into the Land of College. When first it began to dawn upon me
that you meant this wonder to be my very own, it came to me like a flash
that it was more than the House Behind the World. Don't you see, Tom?
It's really and truly, Haven Home!"