Mr. Bowdoin cast a quick glance at the envied gloves, and then at
Mercedes' brown hands. "Here, Dolly, chuck those gloves in the
carriage there: they're not allowed down here. McMurtagh, I'm glad to
see your Mercy has more sense. Can't stay to luncheon? Well, remember
me to Mr. James!"
Ah, the marvelous power of kindliness that will give even an old
merchant the perception of a woman, the tact of a diplomat! McMurtagh
went back with a light heart, and Mercedes jumped with delight into
the very finest of the carriages, and was given a seat ("as the
greatest stranger") behind with Mr. Bowdoin, while the other three
girls filled the seat in front, and Harley held the reins upon the
box, a process Mr. Bowdoin affected not to see.
They drove through the little village in the train of other carriages;
and Mercedes sat erect and answered artlessly to Mr. Bowdoin's
questions. He asked her whether she was happy in her home, and she
said she was. (In his kindness the simple-hearted old gentleman still
knew no other way to make a woman tell the truth than by asking her
questions!) Jamie was very good to her, she said, and grandpa most of
all; grandma was cross sometimes. ("Jamie"! "grandpa"! Old Mr. Bowdoin
made a mental note.) But she was very lonely: she had no children to
play with.
Mr. Bowdoin's heart warmed at once. "You must come down here often, my
dear!" he cried; thus again laying up a wigging from his auguster
spouse. But "Jamie"! "Why don't you call your kind friend father,
since you call old McMurtagh grandpa?"
The child shook her head. "He has never asked me to," she said.
"Besides, he is not my father. My father wore gold trimmings and a
sword."
This sounded more like De Soto than Silva.
"Do you remember him?"
"Not much, sir."
"What was his name?"
The child shook her head again. "I do not know, sir. He only called me
Mercedes."
Mr. Bowdoin was fain to rummage in his pocket, either for a
handkerchief or for a lump of Salem "Gibraltars:" both came out
together in a state of happy union. Mercedes took hers simply. Only
Miss Dolly was too proud to eat candy in the carriage. The Salem
Gibraltar is a hard and mouth-filling dainty; and by its
administration little Ann and Jane, who had been chattering in front,
were suddenly reduced to silence.
By this time they had come through to the outer cliff, and were
driving on a turf road high above the sea. The old gentleman was
watching the breakers far below, and Mercedes had a chance to look
about her at the houses. They passed by a great hotel, and she saw
many gayly dressed people on the piazza; she hoped they were going to
stop there, but they drove on to a smallish house upon the very
farthest point. It was not a pretentious place; but Mercedes was
pleased with a fine stone terrace that was built into the very last
reef of the sea, and with the pretty little lawn and the flowers.
As the children rushed into the hall, Ann and Jane struggling to keep
on Mr. Bowdoin's shoulders, they were stopped by a maid, who told them
Mrs. Bowdoin was taking a nap and must not be disturbed. So they were
carried through to the back veranda, where Mr. Bowdoin dumped the
little girls over the railing upon a steep grass slope, down which
they rolled with shrieks of laughter that must have been most damaging
to Mrs. Bowdoin's nerves. Dolly and Mercedes followed after; and the
old gentleman settled himself on a roomy cane chair, his feet on the
rail of the back piazza, a huge spy-glass at his side, and the "Boston
Daily Advertiser" in his hand.
At the foot of the lawn was the cliff; and below, a lovely little
pebble beach covered with the most wonderful shells. Never were such
shells as abounded upon that beach!--tropical, exotic varieties, such
as were found nowhere else. And then--most ideal place of all for a
child--there was a fascinating rocky island in the sea, connected by a
neck of twenty yards of pebble covered hardly at high water; and on
one side of this pebble isthmus was the full surf of the sea, and on
the other the quiet ripple of the waters of the bay. But such an
island! All their own to colonize and govern, and separated from home
by just a breadth of danger.
All good children have some pirate blood; and I doubt if Mercedes
enjoyed it more than Ann and Jane and even haughty Dolly did. And to
the right was the wide Massachusetts Bay, and beyond it far blue
mountains, hazy in the southern sun. Then there were bath-houses, and
little swimming-suits ready for each, into which the other children
quickly got, Mercedes following their example; and they waded on the
quiet side; Mercedes rather timidly, the other children, who could
swim a little, boldly. Old Mr. Bowdoin (who was looking on from above)
shouted to them to know "if they had captured the island."
"Grapes grow on the island," said Ann and Jane.
Dolly was silent; Mercedes would have believed any fairy tale by now.
And they started for it, Harley leading; but the tide was too high,
and at the farther end of the little pebble isthmus the higher
breakers actually came across and poured their foam into the clear
stillness. Ann and Jane were afraid; even Dolly hesitated; as for
Harley, he was stopped by discovering a beautiful new peg-top which
had been cast up by the sea and was rolling around upon the outer
beach.
"Discoverers must be brave!" shouted Mr. Bowdoin from above. And
Mercedes shut her eyes and made a dash through the yard of deeper
water as the breaker on the other side receded. She grasped the rock
by the seaweed and pulled herself up to where it was hot in the sun,
and sat to look about her. There were numerous lovely little pink
shells; and in the crevices above, some beautiful rock crystals, pink
or white. Mercedes touched one, and found it came off easily. She put
it to her lips.
"Why, it's rock candy!" she exclaimed.
There was an explosive chuckle from the old gentleman across the
chasm, and the others swarmed across like Cabot and Pizarro after
Columbus.
"Remember, children, she's queen of the island to-day,--she got there
first!" shouted Mr. Bowdoin, and went back to his spy-glass and his
armchair.
So that day Mercedes was queen; and her realm a real island, bounded
by the real Atlantic, and Harley, at least, was her faithful subject.
At the water's edge was great kelp, and barnacles, and jellyfish, all
pink and purple; and on the summit was a little grove of juniper and
savin bushes, with some wild flowers; and on the cedar branches grew
most beautiful bunches of hothouse grapes. To be sure, they were tied
on by a string.
"'Tis grandpa's put them there," said Dolly, of superior knowledge
already in the world's ways.
"Sh! how mean to tell!" cried Harley.
"And he puts rare shells upon the beach, and tops!"
But Mercedes only thought how nice it was to have such a gentleman for
grandfather; and when she got back to the little house on Salem Street
she acted out all the play to an admiring audience. Jamie met her at
the wharf and walked home with her. It was hot and stuffy in the city
streets, but the flush of pleasure lasted well after she got home. And
she told what soft linen they had had at dinner, and pink bowls to
rinse their hands, and a man in a red waistcoat to wait upon them.
"Isn't she wonderful! Just like a lady born," said Jamie.
John Hughson, a neighbor, took his pipe from his mouth and nodded
open-mouth assent.
"And she talks a little Spanish, and can dance!"
"It's time such little tots were in bed," said Mrs. Hughson, a large
Yankee person, mother to John.
"Just one dance first, Mercy; show the lady," said old Mrs. McMurtagh.
But Mercedes was offended at being called a little tot, and pouted her
lip.
"Come here, dearie," said Jamie.
She went to him; and while he held her with his left hand awkwardly,
he pulled a tiny pair of gloves from his pocket. Mercedes seized them
quickly, and kissed him for it.
"Well, I never! Jamie, ye'll spoil the lassie," said his mother.
But Jamie heeded not. "Now, dearie, dance that little Spanish dance
for me, and you can wear the gloves next Sunday."
But Mercedes looked up at Mrs. Hughson sullenly; then broke away from
Jamie's arms and ran upstairs. And the laugh was at poor Jamie's
expense.