'Smiles', Eliot H. Robinson [books suggested by elon musk TXT] 📗
- Author: Eliot H. Robinson
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Book online «'Smiles', Eliot H. Robinson [books suggested by elon musk TXT] 📗». Author Eliot H. Robinson
"Ethel's right," supplemented his father. "I'm only surprised that you haven't asked her before. You've been in the same house with her for a whole week. Don't let one ... er ... unfortunate experience discourage you."
Donald carefully knocked the ashes from his pipe, got up, walked to the railing, and stood with his back toward them.
Then he laughed, a trifle bitterly.
"Thanks for the advice. I won't pretend that I don't ... care for her; but I can't ask her to marry me, as you suggest—that is, not now."
"Why not, I should like to know?" demanded his sister, impatiently.
"I can't explain, either; but there is a reason. I am bound in honor. Please don't say anything more about it."
But Ethel was not to be silenced so easily.
"I don't know what you are talking about; but it's nonsense, anyway," she answered. "Why, she worships you. Any one can see that."
"Worships me!" echoed Donald, with sarcastic inflection. "What's the sense in exaggerating like that, Ethel? I suppose that she is fond of me in a way; the way you are, but ..."
"I never suspected you of lacking courage before," interrupted the other. "If you haven't the nerve to ask that child yourself, I will. I guess that I'm a better judge of feminine nature than you, Donald."
"You failed to prove it once before," he retorted, and instantly added, with a tone of unusual contrition, "I am sorry I said that. It was unnecessary and unworthy. But, really, I can't allow you to play Mrs. John Alden to my Miles Standish. There is a reason ..."
"Oh, you men. You're all alike, when you climb on some sort of a high horse and become mysterious. I don't know what you are talking about—perhaps you are deluding yourself with an absurdly chivalrous notion about being her guardian—but I tell you this. A normal girl, who is as full of life as Rose, can't be expected to be like the wishy-washy heroines of some murky novel, remain faithful unto death to her first unrequited love, and turn into a sweetly spiritual old maid, waiting for the hero to come and claim her. ''Tain't accordin' ter huming nater,' as Captain Jim says. The mating call is too strong, and she is sure to respond to the love note of another sooner or later;—don't flatter yourself that you are the only man in Smiles' creation. She's as sweet and pure as any girl could be, but she's human, like the rest of us ... that's what makes me love her so, and, unless 'you speak for yourself, John' ..."
"I can't, Ethel, I ... s-s-sh."
The girl's light footsteps on the descending stairs caused him to break off with a low note of warning, and hardly had he resumed his seat before she was sitting on the arm of the chair and rumpling his wavy hair, as naturally as a child, or a sister.
Watching him closely, Ethel saw the veins begin to swell on the back of his muscular hand, as his fingers gripped the other arm of the chair. She sighed, and then a look of wondering distress came into her face as the thought flashed unbidden through her mind, "I wonder if it is possible that he made some unfortunate, entangling alliance in France, after he heard from Marion? It isn't impossible. Men are often caught on the rebound like that."
Donald was the first to make an effort to introduce a new subject into the thoughts of all, by saying, "Doesn't the Water Witch look pretty in this light?" as he pointed to a trim little eighteen-foot race-about, whose highly polished mahogany sides, free from paint, reflected the water which reflected them. "I don't know as I have properly thanked you for having her put in commission for me, Ethel."
"I thought that it would please you, and I had them overhaul and rig her as soon as I learned that you were coming home."
"Please me! Well, I should say 'vraiment.' Come, Smiles, let's run away from all the world beside, and I'll show you my skill as a skipper."
Ethel sent a meaning glance in the direction of her father, but he was laughing; "'Skill as a skipper,' indeed, on such an evening as this! He would be an amateur, for certain, who couldn't steer with one arm free. Whew, there isn't a breath."
"There is going to be, and not many minutes from now. Unless I miss my guess we'll have a thunderstorm, and a west wind which will make short work of this humidity. There, feel that breeze? Ouch, you little devil, get off my foot. It may be large but it wasn't built for a kiddie-car racetrack."
The obstacle had caused an upset, and baby Don, more angry than hurt, to be sure, set up a howl and ran to Smiles' arms for comfort.
"You'll spoil that baby," growled his uncle. "Well, what do you say, are you coming?"
He stood up, and stretched his powerful frame in anticipation of the exercise that he loved.
"If you don't mind, Donald, I'd ... I'd rather not ... to-night," answered Rose.
"I'm afraid that you don't like the ocean; I rather thought that you wouldn't," he responded gently, for he had in mind the fact that both of her parents had met their death by drowning. The girl sat silently for a little while, with her eyes fixed upon the waters, here and there upon the surface of which had begun to appear shadowy streaks of varying tones, as though the Master Painter were deftly sweeping a mighty, invisible brush across the pictured surface. Interblending shades of soft green, gray and violet came and disappeared.
Without turning her head, she answered, pensively, "It is very, very beautiful and I love it—in a way. But I am afraid of it, too. Yes, I like the lordly mountains better, Don. To me there is always something sinister about the sea, even when it is in as peaceful a mood as this; storms come upon it so swiftly, and it has taken so many precious lives."
Donald laid an understanding hand upon her shoulder for a brief moment.
"I won't urge you," he said. "Let's go for a little walk, then."
"I ... I can't do that, either, Donald. It was meant to be a surprise, but ... Dr. Bentley is coming down from Boston to-night, and I promised ... that is, he has asked me to ... to go somewhere with him." Rose was blushing again.
"Oh, I see. I didn't know that Phil was coming, although, of course, he has a standing invitation, and knows that I'm always delighted to see him," answered Donald, in a tone which he made natural with an effort.
"I invited him especially," broke in Ethel. "And he accepted in a letter to Rose."
Baby Don put an end to the moment of strained silence which succeeded. He laid hold of two of Smiles' fingers and began to pull at her, while saying insistently, "Come down to the beach with me, Aunty Smiles, and hear the waves ro-er." This was a favorite pastime with him.
His grandfather smiled. "The waves are 'ro-ering' as gently as any sucking dove, to-night."
But the baby was not to be turned from his design, and tugged persistently until Rose was obliged to rise, laughing. Muriel also started up.
"I'll go down with you and try out the Water Witch alone—unless, that is, either of you want to come along," said Donald.
His father and Ethel refused, with a show of indignation over the begrudging form which the invitation had taken, and he was not sorry. Neither man nor girl could find anything to say as they walked side by side to the beach, and the former launched the dory tender. As he put off she waved him a cheery good-by, and sent her low voice across the broadening water:
"Come back to us soon. And be careful. It is beginning to get rough already."
With a note in his voice which she did not understand, he called back, "Perhaps I'll sail straight over to France. You wouldn't care."
"Foolish man. You know that I would," she cried, and then turned to join the children in their game of skipping pebbles.
Donald sent the skiff through the choppy waves with vigorous strokes and shot her around at the last moment for a perfect landing. The mainsail and jib went up with rapid jerks while the rings rattled their protest. The strenuous physical exercise brought him temporary relief; but, when he had cast off, taken the tiller and after a few moments of idle jockeying back and forth in the light puffs, squared away for the run seaward before the rising wind, his gloomy thoughts returned, to settle like a flock of phantom harpies and feast on his brain.
Out of nothing grew a vision of Judd's chalky, troubled face, and he felt a sudden rush of sympathy for the crude mountaineer, who had likewise loved and lost. "Smiles wasn't to blame then. She isn't to blame now. She never led either of us on," he said aloud; but his clenched teeth cut through the end of his cigar, nevertheless. With only his moody thought to bear him company, Donald steered seaward.
Starting slowly, the racing craft was momentarily given new impetus by swelling wind and following wave; but the man paid no heed to the things which should have served him as a warning—the higher heaving of the waters, now as gray and as cloudy green as a dripping cliff, and touched with flecks of milky spume; and the uneven tugging of the sail. When he did become aware of the swift change which had taken place, hardly five minutes had passed from the time he had started out, yet a quick glance behind him disclosed a new heaven and a new earth and sea; the old had passed away.
Where else is nature's stupendous power so evident as in the sinister speed with which the armies of the tempest make their swift advance, company on company, regiment on regiment, division on division?
In the moments which had passed unmarked by him in his absorption, the whole western sky had become overcast and blackened by the vaporous army of invasion, whose forecoursing streams of cavalry skirmishers were already high over his head. The earth had lost its laughing colors, and seemed to lie cowering, with its head covered with a dull mantle, and the sea had accepted the challenge of the storm clouds and was beginning to leap forward in swirling, gloomy waves.
With a strong steady pull on the tiller, Donald brought the little craft around in a sweeping curve and headed into the wind, which had suddenly become chill and moist. The boat tilted sharply, and a dash of spray leaped the bow and, changing back to water, ran down the leeward side of the cockpit. A drop of rain splashed on his bared forearm, and then another and another. Through the dark, serried clouds came a dagger thrust of fire, to be followed by a distant detonation which bore his heart back to the shuddering fields of France.
The new picture was impressed on his mind as on the sensitized film of a camera, and simultaneously the action of distant figures were registered upon it. Toiling up the steep bank to the cottage was a marionette made recognizable as Muriel by a tiny dash of red at the waist and on the head. For an instant he wondered if Smiles and his little namesake had already reached the house. Then he caught sight of them, still on
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