THE GIRL ON THE ISLAND
"Phil, it looks like only a little more than half a mile over to the
island. Do you think we can make it?" asked Madge, casting speculative
eyes toward the distant island.
"Of course we can," declared Phyllis. "I'm sorry that Eleanor and Miss
Jones did not come with us. But they have become so domestic that they
can't be persuaded to leave the houseboat. Nelly told me she
positively loved to polish kettles and things," Phil replied.
Lillian, Phyllis and Madge were in their own rowboat, the "Water
Witch," which had been expressed to them from Harborpoint. They were
no longer in the quiet inlet of the bay, where their houseboat was
anchored, but rowing out toward the more open water. On one side of
them they could see the beach in front of a large summer hotel. Across
from it lay a small island, to which they were rowing.
"Miss Jones doesn't like to have us start off alone this way. She has
grown dreadfully nervous about us since our experience in the cabin,"
remarked Lillian. "That is why she didn't approve of Madge's plan this
morning."
"I thought Madge was going to fly into little bits when Miss Jones
suggested it was not safe for us to row about here in our own little
'Water Witch,'" teased Phil.
"Phil, please don't discuss my temper," answered Madge crossly. "If
there is one thing I hate worse than another, it is to hear people talk
about my faults. Of course, I know I have a perfectly detestable
temper, but I hardly said a word to Miss Jenny Ann. Please tell me
what fun we could have on our holiday if we never dared to go ten feet
away from the houseboat?"
"None whatever," answered Lillian, "only you needn't be so cross with
Phil and me. We were not discussing your faults. You are altogether
too ready to become angry over a trifle." There was indignation and
reproof in Lillian's tone.
Madge plied her oars in silence. She knew that she had behaved badly.
"Isn't it exactly like me?" she thought to herself. "If I am sweet and
agreeable one minute, and feel pleased with myself, I can surely count
on doing something disagreeable the next. Now I have made Lillian and
Phil cross with me and probably have hurt Miss Jenny Ann's feelings and
spoiled this beautiful day for us all."
Eleanor's soft voice broke in upon her self-arraignment. "Don't
squabble, girls. The day is altogether too perfect. None of you are
really cross. Now, are you?"
Three pairs of eyes met hers, then the little dispute ended in a
general laugh.
Madge and Phil rowed faster than ever after this little falling out.
They could see the shores of Fisherman's Island not far ahead, with
several dories and small fishing craft anchored along the banks. They
were heading toward an open beach, where there was no sign of life.
"Girls, look out!" warned Lillian. She was sitting in the bow of their
skiff, and could see another rowboat moving toward them, the two pairs
of oars rising and falling in perfect accord. The boat was so close to
them that Lillian was afraid Phil and Madge might cross oars with it.
But as the other boat glided smoothly up alongside of their skiff, the
oars were drawn swiftly inboard, almost before the girls knew what had
happened.
"I suppose you don't speak to people on the water whom you might be
persuaded to notice on land," called Tom Curtis reproachfully.
"O Mr. Curtis! how do you do?" laughed Madge. "You see, we are not
possessed with eyes in the backs of our heads, or we should have
recognized you. Goodness gracious! If there isn't my cousin, Jack
Bolling! I never dreamed you knew him. Why didn't you tell me? Jack,
where did you come from?"
Tom looked at Jack, and Jack looked at Tom. "Age before beauty, Mr.
Curtis," bowed Jack. "You answer first."
"To tell you the solemn truth, I did not know your cousin until this
morning," Tom explained. "But when I saw a not specially bad-looking
fellow mooning about our hotel as though lost I went over and spoke to
him. It wasn't long before I found out he knew you young ladies. I
told him about meeting you in the woods the other day, and we shook
hands on it. Now, Bolling, it is your turn. How did you happen to
turn up in this particular place?"
Jack was apparently looking at Lillian and Madge, but he had really
glanced first at Phyllis Alden, to see how she had borne the shock of
his presence. Jack had guessed correctly that Phyllis did not like
him. To tell the truth, she looked anything but pleased. She did not
like boys. She could do most of the things they could, and they were,
to her mind, a nuisance. They were always on hand, trying to help and
to pretend that girls were weaker than they were in order to domineer
over them. The worst of it was, Madge, Lillian and Eleanor might think
the newcomers would add to the fun. So, though Phyllis did not mean to
be rude either to Tom or to Jack, she was far from enthusiastic, and
could not help showing it.
"Of course, I had to come down to see what your houseboat looked like
after I got your note telling me where you were," explained Jack. "I
knew there was a hotel near here, so, as soon as school closed, I ran
down for a few days to see how you were getting on. You see, I was
really very much interested in the houseboat." Jack made this last
remark directly to Phyllis. She merely glanced carelessly away in the
opposite direction.
"We rowed up from the hotel to the houseboat, but we couldn't see a
soul aboard. 'The ship was still as still could be,'" declared Tom.
"Then we started for a row and found you." There was no doubt that Tom
was looking straight at Madge.
"We are rowing over to the island," remarked Lillian graciously.
"How strange! We were going over there, too, weren't we, Mr. Bolling?"
quizzed Tom.
"Then catch us if you can!" challenged Phyllis. With a sign to Madge
the two girls began rowing their boat through the water with the speed
of an arrow. The first spurt told, for the island was not far away,
and the girls' boat grated on the beach before the boys had time to
land. But Tom and Jack did jump out and run through the water to pull
the "Water Witch" ashore, much to Phil's disgust.
"I really have an errand to do on this island, Miss Morton," continued
Tom, as the party started up the beach. "I wanted first to ask you if
I could bring my mother to call on you and your chaperon this
afternoon? I am awfully anxious to have an all-day sailing party
to-morrow. And I thought perhaps you and your friends and chaperon
would go with us? There is an old fellow over here who takes people
out sailing, and I am anxious to have a talk with him. Don't think I
am such a duffer that I can't sail a boat myself, but my mother is so
nervous about the water that I take a professional sailor along to keep
her from worrying. She has had a great deal to make her nervous," Tom
ended. "I wonder if you and your friends would mind walking over to
the other side of the island with me to see this man? It is not a long
walk."
The party started off, Phyllis keeping strictly in the background.
Madge walked with Tom and Lillian with Jack, so she felt a little out
of it.
"If you don't mind," she proposed, after the party had walked a few
yards, "I will sit down here on the beach and wait until you come back
from your talk with the sailor man. I will stay right here, so you can
find me when you return."
Phil found herself a comfortable, flat rock, and sat looking idly out
over the bay. Gradually she fell into a little reverie.
A sudden cry of pain roused Phil from her daydream. Springing to her
feet, she rushed down the beach, seeing nothing, but following the
direction of the cry. Rounding a curve of the beach she came upon a
dirty, half-tumbled down tent. In front of it stood a burly man with
both hands on the shoulders of a young girl, whom he was shaking
violently. So intent was he upon what he was doing, he did not notice
Phil approaching. She saw him shove the girl inside the tent and close
the outside flap. "Now, stay in there till you git tired of it," he
growled as he turned and walked away.
A sound of low sobbing greeted Phil's ears as she came up in front of
the tent and stood waiting, hardly knowing what to do. The sobs
continued, with a note of pain in them that went straight to Phil's
tender heart. The sight or sound of physical suffering made a special
appeal to her. It was Phyllis's secret ambition some day to study
medicine, an ambition which she had confided to no one save Madge.
Although the figure she had seen was almost that of a woman, the
sobbing sounded like that of a child. There was no other noise in the
tent, so Phil knew the girl was alone.
"Won't you please come out?" she called softly, not knowing what else
to do or say. "Tell me what is grieving you so. I am only a girl like
yourself, and I would like to help you."
"I dare not come out," the other girl answered. "My father said I must
stay in here."
Phil opened the flap of the old tent and walked inside. "What is the
matter?" she inquired gently, bending over the figure lying on the
ground and trying to lift her.
The girl sat up and pushed back her unkempt hair. She had a deep,
glowing scar just over her temple. But her hair was a wonderful color,
and only once before Phil remembered having seen eyes so deeply blue.
"Why," Phil exclaimed with a start of surprise, "I have seen you
somewhere before. Don't you remember me?"
The girl shook her head. "I do not remember anything," she answered
quietly.
"But I saw you on the canal boat. Your father was the man who helped
us secure our houseboat. What are you doing here?"
"We have come here for many years, I think," the girl answered
confusedly. "In the early spring my father catches shad along the bay.
Then all summer he takes people out sailing from the big place over
there." She pointed across the water in the direction of the hotel.
"Our boat is on the other side of the island." The girl clasped her
head in her long, sun-burned hands. "It is there that it hurts," she
declared, touching the ugly, jagged scar.
Phil gave a little, sympathetic cry and put her hand on the girl's
shoulder.
"When I work a long time in the sun my head hurts," the girl went on
listlessly. "I have been washing all day on the beach. I came up here
to hide, and my father found me. He was angry because I had stopped
work."
"Did he strike you?" Phil cried in horror, gazing at the slender,
delicate creature and thinking of the rough, coarse man.
"Not this time," the girl replied. "Sometimes they strike me and then
I am afraid. Only there is one thing I shall never, never do, no
matter how much they beat me. I can not remember everything, but I
know that I will not do this one thing."
"What is it?" asked Phil. "Whom do you mean by 'they,' and what do
'they' wish you to do?"
The girl shook her head. "I can not tell you." She shuddered, and
Phil felt she had no right to insist on knowing.
"I like to hide in this tent," the girl went on sorrowfully. "I come
here whenever I can get away from the others. I would like to stay
here always. But, now he has found me, there is no place where I can
rest."
"Have you a mother, or brothers and sisters?" Phil asked.
"There is the man's second wife, but she is not my mother. She has
many little children. I think I must be very old. I seem to have
lived such a long time."
"Can't you remember your own mother?" Phil inquired.
The girl shook her head mournfully. "I can remember nothing," she said
again. "Don't go," she begged, as Phil rose to leave her. "I have
never known a girl like you before."
"I must go," answered Phil regretfully. "My friends will be waiting
for me up the beach, and they will not know where to find me. Won't
you come to see me and my friends? We are spending our holiday on a
houseboat not very far from here. We would love to have you come."
"I am not allowed to leave the island or to go among people," the girl
replied. "My father says I have no sense. So, if I wander away, or
talk to strangers, people will think that I am crazy and shut me up in
some dreadful, dark place."
Tears of sympathy rose to Phyllis's eyes. She wished Madge and the
other girls were with her. It was too dreadful to think of this lovely
creature frightened into submission by her cruel father. "We will come
to see you, then," she said gently. "And I will bring you something to
keep your head from aching. My father is a physician, and he will tell
me what I must give you. I will bring my friends to the island with
me. Whenever you can get away, come to this tent and we will try to
find you. We shall have good times together, and some day we may be
able to help you. You know how to write, don't you? Then, if you are
ever in trouble or danger, leave a note under this old piece of carpet.
Now good-bye."
The girl stood in the door of her tent to watch Phyllis on her way.
She stared intently after her until her visitor turned the curve of the
beach and was lost to view, then, leaning her head against the side of
the tent, she burst forth into low, despairing sobs.