A GLEAM OF HOPE
Inspirited by Elfreda's emphatic prediction of good fortune, Grace left
Haven Home in a livelier frame of mind than she had exhibited when
entering the house. As they strolled down the walk she was further
cheered by the sight of a single, half-opened rose, flaunting its
crimson but lonely glory from a late-blooming bush. Elfreda, who was
bent on lightening Grace's mood, soberly assured her that it was merely
another lucky sign. Carefully plucking the fragrant token of good
fortune, Grace breathed a prayer that this might indeed be true.
Tackling her rôle of comforter with a will, Elfreda enlivened the walk
home with numerous accounts of signs and wonders which had visited
friends and acquaintances of hers as heralds of great good fortune. "Of
course, I'm only telling you what I've heard," she said humorously. "I
can't say that I've ever had any direct manifestations that good luck
was signaling to me. Once I went to a bazaar and paid a dollar for the
privilege of drawing a number from a hat. I had a hunch that I'd win
something. I also had my eye on a hand-painted chocolate pot, but my
lucky number drew a toy velocipede instead. Still I was lucky to draw
anything. Then another time I found a horseshoe in the road. I hung it
over the front door and next day it fell down on Pa's head when he was
coming into the house. That was a very unlucky day for me." Elfreda
giggled reminiscently. "Pa raged like a lion. He declared I did it
purposely and pitched the horseshoe into the street. I let it stay
there. I wasn't much impressed with its lucky qualities. Just the same
it didn't cure me of my belief in signs."
Grace's ready laughter held a merry note that was intensely gratifying
to the narrator of the tragic horseshoe episode. She had succeeded even
better than she had expected, was Elfreda's reflection. Then, too, the
unexpected sight of Tom Gray's handwriting on the back of the painting,
coupled with the finding of the rose, had brought a look of new
animation to Grace's too-calm features.
"I am afraid I shall have to take back my promise not to go to Haven
Home again soon," was Grace's half apologetic comment as the two emerged
from Upton Wood upon the highway that wound its way from the outskirts
of Oakdale through the open country beyond the town. "I feel now as
though I wanted to go there often, just to read Tom's message. I like to
think of it as a message. Strange that I never recalled the incident
until to-day."
"It was not intended that you should," maintained Elfreda. "As for
taking back your promise, you never really made one. If I were you,
though, I'd stay away from that house as long as I could. But if I found
that I was determined to go there, then I'd go."
"That is very wise and elastic counsel," asserted Grace. "It can be
stretched to cover all my moods and yearnings."
Arm in arm, the two friends swung briskly along the highway, following
it until they reached the wide tree-lined street in which the Harlowe
residence stood. When within a short distance of the house, their glance
became simultaneously fixed on two childish forms racing toward them at
full speed.
"Here come Elizabeth and Anna May Angerell." An indulgent smile curved
Grace's lips. "They have spied us from afar. They are the dearest little
girls. I can't begin to tell you what a comfort they've been to me this
summer. They're such joyous youngsters. They fairly bubble with
happiness. What a wonderful estate childhood is, Elfreda. Yet we never
realize it until long after it has passed away. I've often wished I
could go back and live it over, even for one day."
"I'd rather be grown up," disagreed Elfreda. "I never had a very good
time when I was little, because I was always grieving over being a prize
fat child. The way of the baby elephant is pretty thorny. Well, well!"
she exclaimed playfully as the two little girls, laughing gleefully,
ended their run by flinging themselves ecstatically upon herself and
Grace. "What's the meaning of this onslaught? If we hadn't been very
large, sturdy persons we might have tumbled over like nine-pins."
"We saw you coming away up the street," joyfully announced Anna May. "We
just had to run. We've been watching at our gate for you quite a while."
"There's company come to see you, Miss Harlowe," burst forth Elizabeth
excitedly. "You can never guess who. It's somebody you've known for a
long time, but it's somebody you don't see very often. We aren't going
to tell you who's on the porch. We want you to be surprised. Do hurry as
fast as ever you can, for the person is anxious to see you."
"We thought we'd tell you the minute we saw you, and then we thought it
would be more fun not to," explained Anna May wriggling with enjoyment
of the great secret.
Elfreda and Grace exchanged lightning glances as they quickened their
pace, a devoted worshipper hanging to an arm of each. Could Elfreda's
prophesy of good fortune have been thus so quickly fulfilled?
"It's not Mr. Gray." Elizabeth had remembered that long ago Grace had
answered her eager inquiry for "nice Mr. Tom" by saying that he had gone
on a journey from which he might return at any time. She had remembered,
too, how sad her dear Miss Grace had looked when she told her. When the
two children had posted themselves at the gate to watch for Grace,
Elizabeth had remarked confidentially to Anna May, "If Mr. Gray was
sitting on the porch waiting for Miss Harlowe, we couldn't surprise her.
We'd just tell her straight out. We wouldn't want to make her guess
that, would we?" And Anna May had replied: "No, siree. We ought to tell
her the first thing that it's not him, so that she won't look
disappointed when she sees who the company is."
The startled light that had leaped into Grace's eyes died as Elizabeth
frankly excluded Tom's name from the guessing contest. She inwardly
rebuked herself for thus clutching at every straw which the wind blew in
her direction. On catching a first glimpse of the veranda, she cried out
sharply. Relaxing her light hold on Elfreda's arm and dropping
Elizabeth's hand, she darted to the gate, slammed it behind her and
raced up the walk to the steps, an animated flash of blue on the autumn
landscape.
"Jean!" she almost shouted. "Where, oh, where did you come from?" The
next instant she held one of the hunter's rough hands in both hers, half
laughing, half crying.
"Mam'selle Grace, it is of a truth the great 'appiness to see you," was
the old man's sincere greeting, his small black eyes shining with
feeling. "Jean has come far. Long way," he waved a comprehensive hand
toward the west. "I come because I hav' learn that you hav' the
trouble."
"But how long have you been in Oakdale and who told you about Tom?"
questioned Grace anxiously. "We have gone to your cabin in Upton Wood
several times, in the hope that you had returned. The first time we went
we saw the sign on the door."
"I put him there," nodded Jean, "because I go 'way for long time. Many
weeks I stay in Canada. Only to-day I come back. Then----"
"Did some one in Oakdale tell you Tom was missing?" interrogated Grace,
cutting almost impatiently into Jean's narrative.
"No, Mam'selle. Only I hav' speak the _bon jour_ to my frien's as I come
through the town. Some days have pass since firs' I see this." Jean
pulled a newspaper from a pocket of his weather-stained coat. Spreading
it open and laboriously perusing the first page, he tendered it to
Grace, pointing out a column in it.
Grace needed but to glance at it to recognize it as a copy of the
newspaper recording Tom Gray's disappearance, which Hippy had brought
her. "How did you ever happen to come across this, Jean?" Her query held
a note of positive awe.
"It is of a truth strange," admitted Jean. "W'en I stay long time in
Canada I come back to this country to Minnesota. I go to Duluth, w'ere I
hav' ol' frien'. I spen' two days by him an' talk about many t'ings
w'ich 'appen to us long ago w'en we hunt together. He tell me about a
young man who come up north an' get los'. Nobody can fin'. He show me
this paper an' say, 'W'en I read this I t'ink you, Jean, can fin' this
young man, because you great hunter.' Then I look an' see the young man
is M'sieu' Tom, an' the paper is ol' one. So I leave my pack skins wit'
my frien' and come here quick on the train, because I know Mam'selle
Grace will tell all. Then I go fin' M'sieu' Tom," ended Jean, wagging
his gray head with deep determination.
"Talk about miracles!" burst forth Elfreda Briggs. "It's the most
remarkable thing I ever knew to happen." Elfreda had lost no time in
overtaking Grace on the veranda. The Angerell children had not followed,
however. They had trotted on home, well satisfied with the result of
their mission.
"It is truly marvelous. And to think that Mother isn't at home this
afternoon to hear it. It was splendid in you to wait here for me, Jean."
Grace turned a glowing face toward the old hunter. "As for your going to
find Tom, I am _sure_ that you _will_ find him. I was so amazed at
seeing you, I forgot to introduce you to my friend Miss Briggs. She
knows all about you, already."
Elfreda extended a prompt hand of welcome to the intrepid old trapper,
who grasped it warmly, saying: "The frien's of Mam'selle Grace are also
the frien's of ol' Jean."
"Jean, before I tell you all I know about Tom's disappearance, I think
it would be better for the three of us to go on to Mrs. Gray's home and
talk things over. She will be so glad to see you. She has suffered
dreadfully. We have all suffered. But I feel now as though at last the
light had begun to break."