do you know what he said? He received a substantial sum of money from
the Archeological Research Foundation for his work in deciphering the
contents of the Amenotaph urn. He doesn’t need the money, he says, and
because I helped him open the urn, he sent it to me.”
“Golly, what will you do with it?” Jean asked.
“I wrote him last winter, just after I returned, about our plans for
running a camp this summer and he was terribly interested in it. He
wants me to pay Dad back the amount he gave us for repairing the cabins
and the paint and other things we had to buy. I did and now the camp is
really our own business venture. If we don’t make a go of it, it will
be our loss and not Dad’s.”
16. Visiting Celebrities
The first campers were due to arrive the second week in June, but
everything was in complete readiness long before that time. The girls
never wearied of making their tours of inspection to be sure nothing
had been overlooked, and each time it seemed as if they added a few
more finishing touches.
Becky declared it was all so inviting that she felt like closing up the
big house and coaxing the Judge to camp out with her.
Kit and Doris were in one of the cabins that was on a little jutting
point of land near the Peckham mill. Here, the river swept out in a
wide U-shaped curve that was crowned with gray rocks and pines. The
music of the falls reached it, and the road was only about a quarter of
a mile across the fields to the north, but apparently it was completely
isolated.
All at once Tommy came tearing around the rock path, his eyes wide with
excitement, his whole manner full of mystery.
“There’s a car just stopped in the road,” he exclaimed, “and the man in
it asked me who lived in the cabin over here.”
“I never supposed anyone could see that cabin from the road.” Kit’s
tone held a distinct note of disappointment. “What did he want to sell
us, Tommy, lightning rods or sewing machines?”
“Aw, Kit, quit it,” pleaded Tommy. “He’s really in earnest, and he’s
coming over here right now. I told him all about everything, and he
thinks he might want to rent one.”
Kit’s face brightened up at this. “Lead me, Tommy, to this first paying
guest. Doris, don’t you dare to say anything to spoil the inviting
picture which I shall give him. I don’t see what more he could want.”
She hesitated a moment, surveying the river, almost directly below
the sloping rock. “Why, he could almost sit up in bed in the morning
and haul in his fishing line from that river with a fine catch for
breakfast on it.”
“Oh, hurry, Kit, and stop wasting time,” Tommy begged. “He’s really
awfully nice, and he’s in earnest, I know he is.”
So Kit followed Tommy across the fields to the road where the
automobile was waiting. The man must have been about forty years old,
but with his closely cut dark hair and alert smile he appeared much
younger. He wore no hat, and was deeply tanned. It seemed to Kit
at first glance as though she had never seen eyes so full of keen
curiosity and genial friendliness.
“Hello,” he called as soon as she came within hearing distance. “Are
you the young lady in charge of renting these cabins which I see?”
Kit admitted that she was. He nodded his head approvingly and smiled,
a broad pleasant smile which seemed to include the entire landscape.
“I like it here,” he announced with emphasis. “It is sequestered and
silent. I have not met a single car on the road for miles.”
“Oh, that happens often,” said Kit eagerly. “There are days when nobody
passes at all except the mailman.”
“It suits me,” he exclaimed buoyantly. “I must have quiet and perfect
relaxation. I will rent one of your cabins and occupy it at once. I
have been touring this part of the country looking for a spot which
appealed to me.”
“We have one on the hill over there,” Kit suggested. He seemed rather
peculiar, and perhaps it would be just as well to have him as far off
as possible. “It is right on the edge of the pines, and faces the west.
The sunsets are beautiful from there.”
“No, no,” he repeated. “I like the sound of water. I hear falls below
here. I will take that cabin I see over there.”
So the first cabin dweller came to Woodhow. Kit had still been in
doubt, and taking no chances on strangers within the gates, she had
guided Mr. Ormond up to her father to make the closing arrangements on
renting the waterfall cabin. The most amazing part was that he left a
check that first day for full rental for ten weeks.
“I must not be interrupted or bothered by little things,” he told Mr.
Craig. “I must have perfect isolation or I cannot do my work.”
He arrived promptly the following day and arranged to put up the car in
their garage. Tommy and Jack helped him move his things into the cabin.
“Gosh, we’ve lugged down all his belongings to the cabin,” Jack said
when they were finished, “and I can’t find out what in the heck his
business is. He had a lot of heavy bundles, and we asked him a few
questions about them, but he didn’t seem to take kindly to it, so we
let him alone.”
“Lucy says he’s made arrangements to buy eggs and chickens from them,”
said Kit, “so I see where our paying guests are going to scatter
prosperity around the neighborhood.”
Ralph McRae arrived the seventeenth of June and took the Turtle Cove
Cabin. The Craigs saw quite a good deal of him, for he was always
dropping in on them. Doris suspected a budding romance, but she
contented herself with watching Jean and investing her with the glamor
of all her favorite heroines.
The first fruits of Jean’s efforts to colonize the cabins came with a
letter from Peg Moffat.
“You’re going to have four of the girls through July anyway, and August
if they like it. I’ve told them the scenery is perfectly gorgeous and
they can draw wherever they like, so be sure and give them the cabins
with the best view.”
The next surprise was a letter from Billie. He could not reach home
before the middle of July, as he was going on another trip with Frank,
but there were five of the boys from his class who wanted to come up
and camp.
“I’ve told them the fishing is swell around there, and they’re going to
make the trip from here in Jeff Saunders’s car. Jeff’s from Georgia, and
most of the guys have never been north. We’re going to join them later
on, so if you’ve got a bunch of cabins together, you better save us
three.”
“We’ll put them all over in the glen, where they can do just as they
please,” Kit decided. “They won’t interfere with high art or our
mysterious stranger.”
Lucy opened her general store the first of June. It stood exactly at
the crossroads, beside Woodhow. Her brothers had erected a little slab
shack, and Lucy had planted wild cucumber and morning glory vines
thickly around the outside, the last week in April, so that by June
they had climbed halfway up.
Inside the store there were two counters, one on either side as you
entered, and these had been Mr. Peckham’s contribution to the good
cause. At first the stocking up of the store had been a problem, but
Becky helped out with the business plan, and by this time nearly
everyone in Elmhurst was taking a keen, personal interest in the
venture.
It was Ma Parmalee who first suggested that Lucy sell on the commission
plan. “I’ve got thirty-five jars of the best kind of preserves and
canned goods in Elmhurst,” she announced one day, when she had stopped
on her way by the crossroads to look over the new establishment. “Most
of them are pints, and besides I’ve got--land, I don’t know how many
glasses of jelly and jam. I’d be willing to give you a good share of
whatever you could make on them, if you could sell them off for me down
here.”
Lucy agreed gladly, and the fruit made a splendid showing along the
upper shelves behind the counters. Not only that, but it began to sell
at once. Mr. Ormond bought up all of the canned peaches after sampling
one jar, and Ralph said he was willing to become responsible for some
of the strawberry jam and spiced pears. Before long, Lucy was looking
around for more supplies.
One morning, just after Tommy had gone whistling out to the barn, Doris
spied a familiar figure coming along the drive toward the house, and
leaned out of the dining room window, calling with all her heart, “Hi,
Billie!”
Billie waved back and came up to the back steps where he found the
other girls. “The camp’s immense,” he said. “We got in late last night
and I knew the way down, so we didn’t disturb anybody. Even found the
old boat in the same place, Doris.”
“Well, you wouldn’t have if I hadn’t hauled it there, where I knew you
could lay your hands on it.”
Billie laughed. He knew from past experience that Doris’s scoldings
didn’t amount to much. He and Frank had brought up a load of supplies
with them but huckleberry pancakes with honey lured them both up
for breakfast that first morning. And even Kit was silent as Frank
related all of his adventures during the year. It seemed to her
that she had never really looked at him before, that is, to get the
best impression, without prejudice. Now, she realized he was quite
good-looking and she noted for the first time his curly yellow hair,
and long, half-closed blue eyes, that always seemed to be laughing at
you. He had dimples, too, and these Kit resented.
“I can’t abide dimples in a boy’s face,” she declared privately to
Jean, when the latter was dwelling on Frank’s good looks.
“But, Kit, Buzzy has dimples, and you always thought he was such a
swell guy.”
“Well, he’s different,” Kit said lamely. “I don’t think I like blond,
curly hair, either.”
They had walked down to the Peckham mill after supper to get some
supplies that Danny Peckham had promised to bring up from Nantic. Just
as they came to the turn of the road there came a strange sound from
the direction of the waterfall cabin, deep, rich strains of music,
almost as low-pitched and thrilling as the sound of the water itself.
Both girls stood still listening, until Jean whispered, “It must be Mr.
Ormond. He’s playing on a cello, isn’t he?”
“Then, that’s what he does,” Kit’s tone held a touch of admiring awe as
she listened. “And we thought he might be anything from a counterfeiter
to an escaped convict hiding away up here. Oh, Jeannie, why do you
suppose he keeps away from everyone?”
“Probably got a hidden sorrow,” Jean answered. “Still he’s got a
terrific appetite. Mrs. Gorham says she doesn’t see how he ever puts
away the amount of food he does. He buys whole roast chickens and eats
them all himself.”
Just then the music ceased suddenly. The door opened and Mr. Ormond
spoke into the twilight gloom.
“Is that you, Tommy?”
“No, it’s just us girls,” answered Kit. “We’re going down to the mill.”
“Would you mind so very much asking if anyone has telephoned a telegram
up for me from the station? I’m expecting one.”
“There, you see,” Jean said, dubiously, as they went on down the road.
“We just get rid of one mystery, and he hands us another to solve. Who
would he be getting a telegram from?”
Kit laughed and said, “You’re getting just as bad as everyone else
in Elmhurst, Jean. I thought only Mr. Ricketts took an interest in
telegrams and post cards.”
Nevertheless, when Lucy told them that there had been a message phoned
up from Nantic, even Kit showed quick interest.
It was signed “Concetta,” and the message read, “Arrive Nantic,
ten-two. Contract signed. All love and tenderness.”
The girls returned after delivering the message, brimful of the news,
but Mr. Craig laughed at them.
“Why, my goodness,” he said, “I could have told you long ago all about
Bryan Ormond. He’s one of the greatest cellists we have, and is married
to Madame Concetta Doria, the opera singer. He told me when he first
took the cabin for the summer, but as he was composing a new opera, he
wanted absolute solitude up here and asked me not to let anyone know
who he was.”
“Talk about entertaining an angel unawares,” Jean exclaimed. “Now,
Doris, you’ll have your chance, if you can only get acquainted with
her. I can see you perched on their threshold drinking in trills and
quavers the rest of the summer.”
Doris only smiled happily. It was she who had begged the hardest to
bring the piano with them when they moved to Elmhurst. She really
played quite well and had a pleasing voice.
“Have you ever heard her sing, Mother?” she asked.
“Yes, many times. She has a lovely voice and you will like her.”
“And just to think of her coming to live in a cabin at Woodhow,” Doris
said, almost in a whisper. “It seems as if we ought to offer them the
best room in the house.”
“If you did, they would run away. That’s just what they have come here
to escape from, all the fuss and publicity.”
Jean, too, was eagerly expecting Madame Ormond. While not one of the
girls could have explained just exactly how they thought she would
look, still they held a blurred picture of someone unusual, who would
probably dress more or less eccentrically.
Kit was in the kitchen making sandwiches for lunch, when a shadow fell
across the doorway. Jean sat on the edge of the table by the window
picking over blackberries, and the two stared at the intruder. She
was about the same age as Mr. Ormond, a large buoyant type of woman
with a mass of curly ash-blonde hair, sparkling black eyes, and a
wonderful complexion. Perhaps it was her smile that charmed the girls
most, though, at that first glance. It was such a radiant smile of good
fellowship when she peered into the shadowy interior of the kitchen.
“Good morning. I have come for butter and eggs and milk.” She spied
the two-quart pail of berries on the table, and gave a little cry of
interest. “Where do you find those, my dear?”
Jean told her politely that they came from the rock pasture on the hill
behind the house.
“Will you come down to the cabin this afternoon and take me there? My
husband is very, very busy working on his new opera, and I must be
away and let him write in peace, so you and I will have to explore the
woods together, yes?” She smiled down into Jean’s face, and just at
that moment there came from the living room, where Doris was dusting, a
clear, sweet soprano voice.
Madame Ormond laid her finger on her lips and listened, her eyes bright
with attention and interest. “It is still another one of you?” she
asked softly, when the song died away. “You shall bring her down to the
cabin to me and let my husband try her voice with the cello. It is his
big baby, that cello, but it is very wise, it never gives the wrong
decision on a voice, and she has a very beautiful one.”
“Well,” Kit declared with a deep sigh, after Madame Ormond had gone on
down toward the road with her butter, eggs, and milk, “we’ve always
believed we were an exceptional family. We’ll have to begin our song of
triumph pretty soon. I’ll bet she’ll go up there in the pasture every
day and do her vocal practicing out of hearing of the cello, and Doris
will sit on the nearest rock and play echo.”
Jean was telling Ralph about it that evening while they were sitting in
the cool high air on the front porch as they did almost every evening.
Although the others, with the exception of her mother and father,
didn’t know it yet, Jean was going to be engaged that summer.
Not long after Ralph had come in June he had asked Jean if she had
reached a decision on her art career. “Are you going to go ahead and
get a job in that field and make it your career?” He asked a little
anxiously, after Jean had finished an enthusiastic description of her
previous year’s work in New York.
“I’ve pretty much decided against it, Ralph. I know you’ll be pleased
because you never really wanted me to go through with it, I realize
now. I realize something else, too, and that is how much I really love
the country. How I missed it last winter. The noise of the city got on
my nerves so, that I could hardly wait to get on the train when I was
coming home weekends. Although I never told Mother, I almost dreaded
having to go back when Sunday came.”
“Then you mean you wouldn’t mind living on the Canadian prairie?” Ralph
asked, eagerly. “Are you quite sure that is what you really want?”
“Oh, of course, I’ll want to visit the city once in a while. I don’t
want to forego the opportunities of city life altogether--the plays and
concerts and exhibitions, I mean. As far as my career is concerned, art
is only a hobby, I think, and I’d like my real career to be with you.”
Ralph kissed her tenderly, and together the next day they told Mr. and
Mrs. Craig of their plans.
Jean’s mother and father were very pleased at the news, but were rather
relieved to know that the two did not plan to be married until Jean was
older.
“It will take me quite a long time to get used to the idea of being
parted from my oldest daughter,” remarked Mrs. Craig. “I’m glad you’re
being sensible about it and are going to wait. You’re not completely
grown up yet, Jeannie.”
17. Frank to the Rescue
The first week in August, Jean, who had acted as treasurer of the cabin
fund, announced that it had proved a solid financial success. Every
cabin was full and booked up to the middle of September. The girls from
the Art School had persuaded two more batches to come, and Billie’s boy
friends had turned their cabins into headquarters for the club they
belonged to at school.
Jeff Saunders had used his car back and forth until Kit declared she
was dizzy. “Jeff tears down to Richmond and takes back a couple of
boys, lays off himself for a couple of weeks, and then the car comes
back with three new ones, but I must say that they’re the best behaved
lot of boys I ever saw. You’d hardly know they were around at all,
except for the portable radios going at night. And they certainly have
kept us supplied with fish ever since they came. I think it’s done Dad
a world of good going away with them and kind of turning into a boy
again. Frank said the other day they were going out fishing all night
just as soon as the bass were running.”
Mrs. Gorham was setting the table for lunch and stopped at the last
words, one hand on her hip, and a look of anxiety in her eyes.
“They ain’t calculatin’ to fish over there beyond the dam, are they?
That’s where the Gaskell boy come near drowning a year ago, when his
boat upset. It’s just full of sunken snags for half a mile up the river
above the island.”
“I guess that’s where they’re going just the same. Billie Ellis
thinks that he knows every foot of space on that upper lake and river
just because he’s poled around on it for years with that old leaky,
flat-bottomed boat of his.”
“Well, it’s all right in the daytime,” Mrs. Gorham replied, “but I
wouldn’t give two cents for their safety fishing for bass on a dark
night among those snags.”
It happened that the very next day Kit decided that it was high time
to garner in the crabapple crop and start making jelly. The best trees
around Woodhow were up on the old Cynthy Allen place. While the house
had burned down the year before, still Cynthy’s fruit trees were famous
all over Elmhurst and Mr. Craig had bought up the crop in advance from
her.
It was only about a mile and a half to Cynthy’s place from the
crossroads, but Jean had taken the car to Nantic and Kit had no
inclination to carry several pecks of crabapples in a sack along
a dusty road. Doris and her mother were over at Becky’s for the
afternoon, so that Kit was left to her own devices.
She stood on the porch undecided, a couple of grain sacks thrown over
her shoulder, and suddenly the sparkle of the river through the trees
in the distance caught her eye. Certainly, that was the answer. She
had not had a chance the whole summer to go out in the boat and bask
in idleness. Always before, she had managed to row a little during the
summer so she knew Little River all the way from the Fort Ned Falls
at the crossroads to where it slipped away in a shallow stream to the
upper hills.
There were several old rowboats lying bottom-side-up on the shore above
the falls. Kit selected the newest of the lot, a slender green boat
that Billie rarely used, although she had never tried rowing anything
but a flat-bottomed boat. It was the very first time also that she had
been out in a boat alone, but this fact never daunted Kit. She rowed
up the river with a firm level stroke, thoroughly enjoying herself and
the novelty of solitude. When she passed the island, Frank was down on
the little stretch of beach cleaning a mess of fish for supper. She
called to him across the water, and he held up a string of pickerel
invitingly. There had been a thunderstorm and a quick midsummer rain
the early part of the afternoon, and the campers had been quick to take
advantage of the fishing.
“I’ll stop for them on my way back,” Kit called. “Just going up after
crabapples at the Allen place.” She had swerved the boat toward the
bank on the opposite side of the island, without looking behind her,
when suddenly Frank sprang to his feet and shouted across the water,
“To the left, Kit--hard to the left, do you hear!”
Instead of obeying without question, Kit turned her head to see what he
was warning her against, and before she could stop herself the rowboat
was caught in an eddy that formed a miniature maelstrom at this point,
caused by a large sunken tree that fell nearly to midstream from the
shore. The frail rowboat overturned like a crumpled leaf. It seemed
to Frank as long as he lived he would never forget the sight of her
upturned face, as it slipped down into the dark, swirling water.
She did not cry out, or even seem to make an attempt to swim, it all
happened so suddenly. There was only the horrible, warm silence of
the drowsy, midsummer landscape, and the dancing, pitching rowboat,
twirling around and around in circles.
It seemed an hour to him before he had plunged into the river, and swam
across to the spot where she had disappeared. The gripping horror was
that she hadn’t come up at all. Even before he reached the spot where
he had seen her go under, Frank dove and swam under water with his eyes
open. The river bottom was a mass of swaying vegetation and gnarled,
sunken roots of old trees. It seemed for the moment like outreaching
fingers clutching upward. He could see the black trunk of the tree,
but there was no sign of Kit until he was fairly upon her, and then he
found her, her dress and hair held fast on the bare branches.
Billie had been in the cabin, getting the potatoes on for dinner, and
otherwise performing his duties as assistant camp cook. He had heard
Frank’s voice calling to someone, but had not taken the trouble to look
out until he failed to find a favorite pot on its accustomed hook.
Sticking his head out the door, he called down to the beach, “Say,
Frank, where’s the aluminum pot with the big handle?”
He listened for an answer but none came, and after a second call he
started to investigate. The sudden complete disappearance of Frank
mystified him. Their favorite boat lay in its accustomed place on the
shore with oars beside it, and there were the fish beside the cleaning
board just as he had left them a moment ago.
“Well, I’ll be darned,” muttered Billie when there came a cry across
the river--Frank calling for help.
Billie could just see him swimming with one long overhand stroke, and
holding up something on his other shoulder. Not stopping to figure it
out, Billie pushed the boat off to the rescue.
There was no sign of life, at least to Billie’s fear-struck eyes, in
the limp, dripping figure which Frank laid so tenderly in the bottom
of the boat.
“Quit shaking like that, Bill,” he ordered in husky sternness. “You row
to the island as fast as you can.”
On the way across he knelt beside her, applying first-aid methods,
while Billie rowed blindly, trying to choke back the dry sobs that
would rise in his throat. It did not seem as if it could possibly be
Kit lying there so white and still. When they reached the shore of the
island, Frank carried her in his arms to his own cot.
“Hadn’t I better go for help?” Billie asked.
“There isn’t time,” Frank answered shortly. “Warm those blankets, get
me the bottle of spirits of ammonia, and unlace her shoes.”
All the time he was talking, he worked over Kit as swiftly and tenderly
as any nurse, but it seemed hours to Billie before there came at last
a half-sobbing sigh from her lips, as the agonized lungs caught their
first breath of air, and she opened her eyes.
Neither Frank nor Billie spoke as she stared from one to the other
in slow surprise, taking in the interior of the cabin, and Frank’s
dripping clothing. Then she said, crazily, “Billie, did I lose the
crabapples, or haven’t I gotten them yet?”