WANDERLUST
"Miss Jenny Ann, I don't think I can endure her," declared Madge
mournfully.
It was late afternoon. The houseboat was gliding serenely along the
river bank. Several yards ahead of her puffed the motor launch. Harry
Sears and George Robinson were in the kitchen of the houseboat, helping
Lillian and Eleanor wash the dinner dishes. Phil sat comfortably in the
motor launch, having her usual argument with Jack Bolling. Tom Curtis
was steering his launch, with a cloud over his usually bright face.
David Brewster was looking after the engine. He was silent and sullen.
But unless he was at work this was his ordinary expression.
"You can see for yourself, Miss Jenny Ann," continued Madge, her lips
trembling with vexation, "that nothing I can do pleases Miss Betsey. I
am just as polite to her as I know how to be, but she just hates me.
According to what she says, everything that goes wrong is my fault. I
have a great mind to leave the houseboat and let you and the other girls
take the trip. It isn't much fun for the rest of the party to have Miss
Betsey and me quarrel all the time. It is unpleasant for everyone, isn't
it?"
Miss Jenny Ann did not answer. Madge caught hold of her impulsively.
"Do scold or preach, whichever you like, Jenny Ann," she pleaded, "but
please answer me. It is not polite to be so silent."
"What is it now?" Miss Jenny Ann inquired teasingly.
The little captain's face sobered. "It isn't a little thing this time,
like my putting the sheet on Miss Betsey's bed wrong side up. It's very
important. Miss Betsey says," whispered Madge in Miss Jenny Ann's ear,
although they were standing some distance away from any one else, "that
nearly every day for the past week some of her money has disappeared out
of her wretched old money bag. Not very much at a time. First she
noticed that three dollars had gone, then five, and now it's ten. She
seems to think that I ought to know how it happens. She doesn't want to
worry you about it. Of course, I know she is mistaken," cried Madge
indignantly. "She just does not know how much money she had. There
hasn't been a single person on this boat this whole week except our
party."
Miss Jenny Ann looked serious. "Does Miss Taylor suspect any one?" she
asked carelessly, not glancing at Madge.
Madge's cheeks reddened. "Miss Betsey says she does not suspect any one,
but she spoke darkly of poor David Brewster. She says he never took
anything that she knows of when he was on her farm, but that his father
was almost a tramp. He came up to New England from goodness-knows-where,
and every now and then he disappears and is gone for months at a time.
Miss Taylor believes that when Tom ties up our boats in the afternoons,
and David goes off and leaves everybody, it is his vagabond blood
showing in him. Isn't it cruel to make the poor fellow responsible for
his father's sins? I am going to stand up for him through thick and
thin. Coming, Miss Betsey," answered Madge cheerfully, in response to a
call from the tyrannical old spinster.
Miss Jenny Ann remained by herself a few moments longer. She wondered
why Miss Taylor required more attention from poor Madge than she did
from any of the other girls. It was certain that she liked her least.
But Miss Jenny Ann shrewdly suspected that prim Miss Betsey thought that
their impetuous captain needed discipline and had set herself to
administer it to her. About David Brewster Miss Jenny Ann was more
worried. She did not like the lad. No one did. He was the discordant
element in their whole party. Lillian and Eleanor fought shy of him.
Phyllis was kind to him but had little to say to him, and the boys in
the motor launch, except Tom, treated him with a kind of scornful
coolness. The boy was neither a gentleman nor a servant. It was small
wonder that generous-hearted Madge championed him. Miss Jenny Ann
understood, from Madge's allusion to David's father, one reason why
Madge was kind to the boy.
Miss Jenny Ann Jones and Miss Betsey Taylor shared one of the houseboat
staterooms. The four girls, to their great joy, bunked together in the
other.
It was exactly a half hour before Miss Betsey would let Madge come out
on deck again. She wished her money carefully counted and a new place
discovered for concealing it. Madge was strangely patient, for she had
had a long talk with Dr. Alden before she left Hartford. He had told her
that she would have a good deal to bear from Miss Betsey. Yet, if she
wished to give the pleasure of the houseboat trip to her friends and to
herself, she must remember the tiresome old adage, "What is worth having
is worth paying for." So far Madge had paid with little grumbling.
This afternoon, as she reappeared on deck, her red lips were pouting and
her cheeks were a deeper color. Her resentment against Miss Betsey was
at its height.
No one noticed the little captain standing alone on deck. Usually she
would have thought nothing of it, but this evening she was tired and
cross. It did not seem fair for her to have to take all the trouble with
their houseboat boarder on her shoulders. She could hear Lillian,
Nellie, Harry Sears and George Robinson singing on the upper deck of the
little houseboat. Phyllis was talking busily to Jack Bolling and did not
even glance over toward Madge from her seat on the launch. Madge knew
that Tom was angry because she had not joined him in the motor boat
earlier in the afternoon, when the boats had put in to the shore. She
had not been able to go on account of Miss Betsey, but she certainly had
no intention of explaining anything to Tom. He could think what he
chose.
The two boats were in the habit of landing several times during a day's
cruise. Ordinarily they went ashore just before sunset, and the boys and
girls had their dinner together in some sequestered place. They then
spent the night with the houseboat and motor boat at anchor. But this
evening it was so lovely, gliding along the face of the river, with its
hills on one side and meadows and orchards on the other, that Miss
Jenny Ann requested Tom not to land until just about bed-time.
Madge stood looking at the sunset for a few minutes. There was nothing
to do and no one wished to talk to her. She would go to bed. A little
later she tumbled into her bed and shed a few tears, she was so sorry
for herself. She did not waken until the other three girls came in for
the night at about ten o'clock.
"Is there anything the matter, Madge?" whispered Phil before she crept
into the berth above her chum. "We missed you dreadfully."
Madge gave Phyllis a repentant kiss. She knew that she had been absurd.
But now that Phyllis had awakened her, she could not go back to sleep
again. It was a hot August night, with a moon almost in the full. Not a
breath of air was stirring along the river. The moonlight shone through
the little cabin window, flooding the room with its radiance. Madge felt
that if she could only get a breath of air, she might be able to go to
sleep. Just now she was suffocating. Yet the other girls were breathing
gently. She slipped softly into her clothes, put on a long light coat,
tucked her hair under a boy's cap and stole silently out on the
houseboat deck. All was solemn and still. She was the only person awake
on either of the two boats. An almost tropical heat made the moon look
red and ominous. Madge was oppressed by its mysterious reflection on
the water. The shore seemed peaceful, deserted. She went noiselessly
down the gang plank. She walked up and down the bank, keeping the boats
in sight. However, the shore was not quiet. The ceaseless hum of the
August insects set her nerves on edge.
"Katy did, Katy did," the noise was insistent. To Madge's ears the name
was transposed. "David did, David did," it rang. Yet she did not really
believe that David had stolen Miss Betsey Taylor's money. If not David,
who else? Surely the money could never be found in the new hiding place
where she and Miss Taylor had stored it that afternoon. It was quite
secure from thievish fingers.
It was lonely along the river bank. The sudden hooting of an owl sent
her flying toward the houseboat. She waited a second before going
aboard. The "Water Witch" was floating peacefully on the water, tied to
the rail of the "Merry Maid!"
All at once the passionate love which Madge felt for the water, that she
believed to be an inheritance, woke in her. It was wrong and reckless in
her, yet the desire to be alone out there on the river was
uncontrollable. She went swiftly to their little rowboat, and without
making a single unnecessary sound she rowed straight out into the
moonlight that streamed across the water.
No one heard her or saw her leave the shelter of the two boats. Only
David, who was also awake, thought for an instant that he caught the
splash of a pair of oars skimming past the motor launch. He supposed it
to be some idle oarsman who lived along the river, and he never glanced
out of his cabin window.
Madge rowed for more than an hour in the golden moonlight, meeting no
one. A cool breeze sprang up. Her restlessness, impatience and suspicion
passed away. She felt that she would like to move on forever up this
silent river, near her well-loved Virginia shores. It never dawned upon
her how far she had gone, or that she might be missed, or that the river
would be dark when the moon went down. Neither did she consider that she
was not familiar with the spot where the houseboat and motor boat were
anchored. Tom had chosen the landing place for the night after she had
gone into her stateroom.
For a long time Madge rowed on, regardless of time. She was dreaming of
her own father. To-night she felt that she would find him. The night
seemed trying to convey to her the message, "He lives."
It was nearly one o'clock when the moon went down. Madge felt, rather
than saw, the darkness on the water. She was so oblivious to time that
she believed for a few minutes that the moon had only gone behind a
cloud. At last she realized that it was now time for her to turn back.
She had been rowing in the middle of the river, where the water was
deep, and she was unfamiliar with the line of the shore. Yet she knew
that here and there along either bank of the river there were shoals and
shallow places where rocks jutted out of the water. Once or twice Tom
steered them past places in the river where there were falls and swift
eddies in the current. Now she awoke to the fact that she was in danger.
She could go down the river in the center of the stream as she had come
up. But in the black darkness she could not pull in close to the river
bank without nearing perilous places. Yet, unless she kept near the
shore, how could she ever spy either the houseboat or the motor launch?
Madge rowed slowly and cautiously along. She tried to keep at a safe
distance from the land while she strained her eyes for a glimmer of
light that might come from either one of their boats. She was growing
tired, for she was beginning to feel the effects of her long row. Her
arms and back ached. All at once she became stupidly sleepy. She
wondered dimly what on earth Miss Jenny Ann and the girls would do if
they discovered that she had disappeared. What would Miss Betsey Taylor
think of her now, when she learned that she, Madge Morton, had gone out
on the river alone at night without a word to any one?
Madge sleepily pulled on her oars. She wished that she had persuaded
Phil to come out on the water with her. Now the loneliness of the
deserted river began to oppress her. She could have fallen over in the
boat from sheer exhaustion. Through the darkness she suddenly saw a
flickering light. Thank goodness, she was home at last! The light came
from the left bank of the river, where their boats were moored. Madge
rowed joyfully toward it. A little further in she saw that the light was
on land. She had seen only its reflection in the water.
After another half hour's steady pulling Madge believed that she must
have passed by their boats. Surely she could not have gone so far up the
river as she had rowed down. She turned her boat and began to retrace
her way, then drew in a few yards nearer the shore. Danger or no danger,
she must not pass the houseboat by again. She wondered if she would have
to stay out on the water until the dawn came to show her the way home.
She would have to cease rowing and let the boat drift. She was too
tired to keep on. She was growing so drowsy. All at once the "Water
Witch" trembled violently. It gave a forward leap in the dark and went
downward. Madge was thrown roughly forward. But she kept a firm grasp on
her oars. She could not see, yet she knew exactly what had happened. Her
boat had gone over some falls in the river. There was nothing for her to
do but to try to stay in her boat. The "Water Witch" might overturn, or
else right herself, at the end of her downward plunge.
The little skiff did neither. At the end of the falls she was caught in
a swift whirlpool. Crouched in the boat, with her teeth clenched and her
eyes watching the white spray that she could see even in the darkness,
Madge felt her boat rotate like a wheel. She had never let go her oars.
Now she braced herself with all her strength and gave one forward, final
pull. The "Water Witch" leaped ahead. It was safely out of the eddy and
in the current. But Madge's oar struck against a rock. It snapped in two
and the lower half went floating with the stream. There was a grating
sound, then she felt her boat ground between two rocks and stick fast.
Ahead the river seemed to gurgle and splash alarmingly. There might be
other falls and whirlpools in her course. Madge had sense enough to
know when she was beaten. If she pushed out from the rocks, where her
boat was caught, with her single oar, she might find herself in far
worse danger. She was grateful that the "Water Witch" had run aground.
Madge lay down in the bottom of her boat. She would wait until the
daylight came and see what was best to be done. She did not mean to go
to sleep, for she realized her peril. She idly watched a single star
that shone through the clouds, then her heavy eyelids closed and she
fell asleep to the sound of the water beating against the side of her
skiff.