ASSOCIATIONS
The windows of the Rainbow Lodge stood open to the sun and wind. In the
bedrooms once occupied by the old Ranch Girls the new Ranch Girls were
arranging their possessions. Yet only a week had gone by since their
decision to rent the big house and already it was being prepared to
receive tenants.
Mrs. Perry, who did not desire to continue a guest of Peter Stevens,
nor to leave Cecil in order to return to her Long Island home, had been
delighted with the opportunity.
She had telegraphed a number of friends to join her and shortly
expected to fill Rainbow Castle with guests.
At this early hour of the morning Lina Colter was folding and putting
away her clothes in the drawers of an old-fashioned pine bureau. She
had carried a number of things over by hand in order to avoid the
trouble of packing and unpacking so promptly.
During the summer months Lina's appearance had altered for the better.
She was prettier and less serious looking than upon the afternoon when
the arrow of silver had appeared out of space. Until this summer her
tastes and inclinations had kept her too often indoors. She had studied
and read too much to be good for her health, preferring books to human
beings.
Her stepmother's influence and her growing friendship with Cecil Perry
had altered this. Different as were their tastes and temperaments, she
and her stepmother were developing a delightful relation. They were
helping each other in various ways without thought of the difference in
their age and positions.
Moreover, for the first time in their girlhood, one of their boy
acquaintances was open in his declaration of liking her better than
Jeanette. As Cecil Perry wished to learn to ride and swim, shoot,
play tennis, Lina had done her best to be useful. Not so skillful at
any sport as Jeanette, Cecil had preferred her aid to Jeanette's half
scornful attitude.
At present Lina had chosen to occupy the room at the Rainbow Lodge that
had been her own mother's. About the walls she could see faded pictures
of the four original Ranch Girls. These she intended to tear down and
replace with her own and her sisters' photographs. In the pauses of her
work Lina kept studying them, finding the idea of destroying the old
relics more difficult than she had anticipated.
Here was a photograph of her own stepmother, then Jacqueline Ralston,
mounted on her pony. Here was another, standing at the edge of the
Rainbow Mine, the origin of their fortune.
In another group were Jacqueline and Frieda Ralston, Olive in an Indian
costume, taken soon after her discovery by the Ranch Girls and her
arrival at the ranch, Jean, who was their cousin and adopted sister.
As this especial group picture was faded almost past recognition, after
staring at it, Lina slowly tore it off the wall, tossing it aside
into a waste-paper basket. She and Eda were to occupy this bedroom.
The lodge was not large enough to allow each member of the family a
separate room. Not pleased with the prospect, she and the other girls
were accepting it as a part of their sacrifice. Via and Jeanette were
to be together.
At present Lina could hear Jeanette moving about in the room adjoining
her own. Her stepmother was to occupy the room which had been hers as a
girl. At the present moment she was downstairs in the old living-room
of the lodge, seeing that it was put in order.
As a matter of fact Jack was actually standing before the big,
old-fashioned fireplace, with her hands thrust into the pockets of her
corduroy coat. Her eyes were filled with tears.
It was not easy coming back to the old lodge where she had lived as a
girl with a family of half-grown daughters, who were not really her own.
These first weeks and months of making friends with her stepdaughters
in her new relation to them, Jack had found as difficult as any in
her career. So far as Lina and Via were concerned, she was no longer
nervous or overanxious. She was devoted to them and they seemed to care
for her. Via's health was not so strong as it should have been and a
matter of worry to her family, but there was no immediate cause for
unhappiness.
Eda was still a child with a little half-wild streak in her, part
shyness and oddly fascinating. The time would surely come when she and
Eda would be drawn close together.
Jeanette was the problem. If she had been difficult from the beginning,
she was more a problem now.
What troubled Jack at this instant, however, was not Jeanette's
weakness or faults of character, but her own. From the outset she had
not resented Jeanette's antagonism toward her, understanding and hoping
in time to overcome it. Since the day of their riding contest, she
realized that she could no longer like Jeanette. Probably she could not
be fair to her.
Jeanette had revealed the traits of character she most disliked. In a
crisis she had not been honorable. This did not seem possible in her
father's daughter, yet with days and weeks in which to confess her
fault, she had shown no sign of wishing to speak, not the slightest
inclination toward repentance.
Jeanette's one expressed wish had been to turn her back upon her family
and friends and completely change her environment. By this she expected
to escape any consequences of her own misdoing.
Was she altogether sure of this? Had there never been moments when
she had glimpsed an altered expression upon Jeanette's face, an
unconscious drooping of her shoulders, a more wistful curve to her lips.
Gazing about the old lodge sitting-room, still filled with so many
recollections of her own girlhood and the girlhood of the former Ranch
Girls, Jack, now the wife of her former guardian, was more concerned
with the problem of her own nature than with the faults of her
stepdaughter.
In the last ten days she realized that she no longer liked Jeanette,
nor wished her to continue a member of their household. No longer did
she desire to gain her friendship, or to bring her to a different state
of mind.
It was her chief weakness of character to feel an insufficient charity
toward the human beings who offended against her own code. If Jeanette
had no sense of honor she would never be able to teach her to acquire
it.
Within the next few moments Jack was expecting her husband to join her.
Should she confess to him that she did not wish Jeanette to remain at
home? Should she tell him that the problem was too great for her and
was making her unhappy? He would at once consent that Jeanette go away
to school and even allow her to pay Jeanette's expenses rather than see
her disturbed. In their original discussion of the subject this side
of the question had not occurred to him.
Some one was riding toward the house.
Walking over to the window, Jack looked out.
The figure on horseback was not her husband, whom she looked for, but
Cecil Perry.
He stopped his horse and waved his hand toward her.
A moment later he began calling, not Lina's name as she expected, but
Jeanette's.
Soon after Jeanette ran downstairs and they stood talking together.
A few moments after, still waiting for her husband and watching idly
from her window, Mrs. Colter saw Cecil and Jeanette start off together
in the direction of the big house. Cecil was leading his horse.
As always, apparently they were in the midst of a heated discussion.