Saying Farewell to the Cabin
"For my part," announced Polly O'Neill, "I am not so heart-broken as I
expected at having to say farewell to Sunrise cabin. It is so different
for us all, with the Princess not here and having to think of her back
home in their big house with only her mother and one little maid of all
work. To think that I used to tell the Princess I thought she ought to be
poor a little while just to find out what it felt like! I could cry my
eyes out now when I realize that it has actually come true."
It was the May meeting of the Sunrise Council Fire and because it was to
be the last meeting for some time which might be held on their old
camping grounds, the girls and their guardian had decided that it should
take place outdoors and that at the close of their regular program there
should be, a general talk over the history of the past year.
Esther rose quietly at this speech of Polly's, partly because she seemed
to wish to find relief in action and then because the May night was cold,
and put several fresh pine logs on their already glowing fire.
"You must not think I am ungrateful, Rose dear," Polly continued. "This
winter has been to me the most wonderful one, sometimes I think the
turning point in my whole life, but if Betty is going to be trying to
take boarders in that big Ashton house to support herself and her mother
and let Dick finish his medical studies, why I think Mollie and mother
and I had better be back in our own tiny cottage to give her our valuable
advice."
"But Betty won't be keeping boarders herself, will she? I thought it was
Mrs. Ashton who was to look after things with Betty to help," Nan Graham
spoke in a kind of awed tone. "Still it wouldn't seem very nice of us to
keep on living here in our cabin, which Betty did a great deal more
toward building than the rest of us, if she were not here to share it."
Mollie shook her head decidedly, so that the feathers of her Indian
head-dress made fantastic small shadows on the ground. "I don't think
that would matter in the least and certainly not to Betty," she said in
her sensible, far-seeing fashion. "Betty would love to think of our being
here and she would come and visit us whenever it were possible, but
circumstances seem to have changed for all of us. Here is mother coming
home from Ireland and Polly and I will want to keep house for her and
look after things while she is at work just as we have always done, and
then Mrs. Meade says she isn't willing for Eleanor to be away from her
any longer, and Nan feels she ought to go home and help her mother with
the younger children, and Esther going away after a while to New York to
study. Dear me, what changes a few months can bring! I am glad they have
not brought such big ones to us, Polly."
Sylvia Wharton had been in the act of wrapping a white woolen shawl about
the small Faith, who was cuddled close to Rose Dyer, but now she stopped
and stared hard at Mollie and then at Polly with an apparently wooden
expression of face.
"What makes you feel things won't be different for you and that your
mother will go back to work?" she stammered, feeling their guardian give
a little warning tug at her dress but unable to change the form of her
question once it had taken a start in that way in her mind.
However, both the sisters only laughed, Polly exclaiming in an amused
tone: "Of course we don't know anything definitely, oh Sylvia, in this
world of surprises, but merely that present indications point the way
Mollie has just mentioned." Fortunately, Polly, who was usually quick as
a flash to follow up any suggestion, had her mind on other than her own
affairs to-night.
"Esther," she continued the next moment, "this is a kind of confessional
to-night, or at least it may be if we girls decide that we are willing to
confide in one another (autobiography is so much more interesting than
history anyhow), so I wonder if you would mind telling us why you changed
your mind so suddenly about going away from Woodford to study. At first
you said nothing in the world would persuade you to go and then all of a
sudden, after Betty's misfortune, when it looked as though you might be a
help to her, you determined to leave. Don't answer me if you don't like,
Esther, I know you have a perfectly good reason. Of course _I_ change my
mind without a reason, but you don't."
Esther now felt that the eyes of all the members of the Camp Fire circle
were fixed upon her and that many of them held the same question that
Polly had just so frankly asked.
For a moment she hesitated, looking a little appealingly at Miss McMurtry
and then at Rose Dyer. Rose nodded her head.
"I would tell just what I felt, Esther, as far as you can," Rose
recommended. "It is only fair to you that Betty's dearest friends should
understand your position, even though you would rather that Betty herself
should not know. I feel you can trust them to keep your secret."
Esther wound the seven strings of honor beads into a single chain before
she spoke. "It sounds rather absurd of me and pretentious I know," she
began slowly; "of course I have a great many reasons in my mind why I
feel it best for me to go away from Woodford right now and the most
important one I cannot tell, but there is another which perhaps I have
the right to let you try to understand. I am not deserting Betty just
when she seems to need me most; it is because Betty now is poor and some
day I may be able to help her if I do go away and succeed with my music
that I am willing to go. You see Betty has done such a lot for me and has
wanted to do so much more and--and--" Esther could not continue with her
confession, but it was hardly necessary, for rising from her place Polly
marched solemnly around their circle and sitting down by Esther put her
arm about her neck.
"I understand you perfectly now, Esther, though I want you to believe
that no one of us has ever doubted you. You are too unselfish and too
unworldly to care to make a big success in the world with your talent if
it is only for yourself, but the thought that maybe you can some day
bring back wealth and happiness again to the Princess makes most any
effort worth while?"
Esther bowed her head, too full of emotion to answer Polly's question in
words.
"I supposed I cared for Betty a lot, I have known her so much longer than
you have," Polly went on thoughtfully, "but I don't half love her as you
do, Esther, even in this little while. I suppose it is because you
haven't any relatives of your own and your father is still so new to you.
But didn't you have a baby brother or some one long years ago----?"
Polly's remark was never finished because Miss Dyer now got up quickly.
Because the evenings were so cool the May Council Fire had started early
and though it was well nigh over, there was still a faint reflection of
daylight.
"I thought I heard the wheels of a wagon several moments ago," she
explained, "and now I think I can see Dr. Barton's buggy being driven
this way. I wonder what in the world he can want with us at this time of
the evening? Polly, will you come back to the cabin with me to see."
The Council Fire was being held at no great distance from the Sunrise
cabin, but perhaps it was Rose Dyer's purpose at this moment to separate
Polly and Esther.
Of course Polly followed with entire willingness, but a few feet from
their door, seeing Dr. Barton's buggy draw nearer and that it held two
occupants instead of one, her face crimsoned and she bit her lips to
control her vexation. She was returning to join the girls when Dr.
Barton's voice called after her: "Don't go away, Miss O'Neill, please,
our call is upon your sister and you. I was driving through the woods and
found Mr. Webster with a telegram which had been telephoned to the farm
and which he was bringing out to you and I offered to give him a lift."
Although neither of the two young men had received any invitation to
alight, they both got out of the buggy and both wearing somewhat
crestfallen expressions, stood gazing at the two young women.
"I will call Mollie," Polly declared stiffly, drawing back from Billy's
hand which held a square of paper in it.
"You need not speak to me, Miss O'Neill, simply because I happen to be
your messenger boy," the young man said as haughtily as Polly could have
spoken. "And you need not feel any contamination at accepting this
message from me. The telegram was telephoned out to our farm and my
mother wrote it down, so I haven't the faintest idea what the paper
contains."
Without showing any further signs of recognizing the speaker, Polly
reached for the paper, but the next instant her frightened cry for Mollie
brought her sister, Sylvia Wharton, and half a dozen other persons to her
side. "I must have read it wrong, it is so dark, or your mother must have
made some mistake!" Polly cried, forgetting her policy of silence in her
agitation. And then standing with a white face and clenched teeth she
watched Mollie read the message.
Mollie did not betray any great grief or anger, only a considerable
amount of surprise, so that Polly for an instant believed her own eyes
must have deceived her.
"Why, I can't quite understand it," Mollie said aloud, seeing the puzzled
group of faces around her. "Mother telegraphs that she and Mr. Wharton,
Sylvia's father, have been engaged to be married for the past few months
and that she was coming home to tell us about it and to ask us if we were
willing, but something has happened or else Mr. Wharton has just
persuaded her, for they are married already and are sailing for home
to-morrow. Mother says she is very happy and hopes we will forgive her
and be almost as overjoyed as she is in coming home to us. At least that
is what I think the cablegram means. Billy was mistaken in thinking it a
telegram. How do you feel, Polly dear? I am too dazed to take it all in."
"I feel," said Polly, with a return to her old passionate, uncontrolled
manner, "that I shall never be happy again as long as I live." And then
observing a slow, hurt look in Sylvia Wharton's usually unmoved face, she
turned for an instant toward her. "I don't mean to hurt your feelings,
Sylvia, or to say anything against your father, but it just isn't
possible for you to understand what this means to me." And with this
thoroughly Polly-like point of view she ran away and hid herself inside
the cabin.
Billy Webster walked off with Mollie and the other Camp Fire girls to
talk things over, giving Dr. Barton a chance to linger for a few moments
with Rose Dyer.
"I don't know why you seem so offended with me these days, Miss Rose,"
that young man was soon saying in rather an humble voice for so stern and
upright a judge of other people's duties, "but may I say that I think
your work among the Camp Fire girls this winter has been quite wonderful
and that I never dreamed you could or would be interested in anything
outside of society? Oh, Rose----"
"Rose of the World," Rose Dyer finished in a slightly mocking tone, which
did not show whether or not she had forgiven the young man's former
opinion of her.
However, he _was_ obstinate and so would not be interrupted. "Oh, Rose of
a Thousand Leaves," he ended for himself.