  Produced by Al Haines. LARKSPUR BY JANE D. ABBOTT AUTHOR OF GROSSET & DUNLAP Made in the United States of America COPYRIGHT, 1919, BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY PRINTED IN UNITED STATES OF AMERICA TO THE FLOWERS OF MY OWN CONTENTS CHAPTER
LARKSPUR CHAPTER I AN OCTOBER DAY On an October day--a sunny day, and except for the yellow leaves that quivered on rapidly bearing branches, very like spring--Patricia Everett, from the window of her home, watched an automobile drive out of sight, carrying her mother and sister away to Florida, and confided to the empty room that she was the very unhappiest girl in the whole world! Conflicting emotions tormented the soul of the little lady. She disliked very much seeing anyone depart from anywhere without her! Then, too, so hurried had been the departure that nothing in the shape of candy, books or toys had been left behind to comfort her! And saddest of all, at the last moment her mother had decided that she must not return to Miss Prindle's because of an epidemic of measles! The curious quiet that had fallen upon the house after the bustle of departure added to Patricia's loneliness. With a heart bursting with pity for herself, she wandered up the stairs to her room--a pretty room, its windows hung in flowered chintz, a bird singing from a cage hanging in the sunshine. When his little mistress walked into the room Peter Pan trilled more gayly than before--it was as though he bade her come to the window and look across the way! If she had looked she would have seen in the kitchen window of the shabby brick house, across the intersecting street, Mrs. Mary Quinn and her daughter Sheila rocking in one another's arms and laughing like two children! Mrs. Quinn's house was old and shabby, its fences tumbling down; hard times often knocked at her door, but with it all her smile was always as bright as the gay geraniums blooming on the spotless sill of the kitchen window that faced the Everett house. Fortune had come to the Quinns that day in the guise of a new lodger. He had taken the second floor bedroom which stretched across the back of the house. Because this room was very big and had a queer, rickety stairway leading to it from the outside of the house, it had never been rented. But with the other lodgers who lived in the front rooms and the tiny side bedroom and the parlor, which had been converted into a "light housekeeping suite," Mrs. Quinn managed to keep her little family most comfortably and to have a bit left over for such luxuries as the flowers, a few books, pretty pictures and crisp muslin curtains. "Faith, Sheila," she had cried, coming into the kitchen where her daughter was preparing apples for the oven. "It's just as though Dame Fortune knew it was your birthday! Now you shall have your music!" "Oh, mother!" cried the girl, dropping her paring knife. "How wonderful!" Then, hesitating: "But maybe I hadn't ought to! That much each week would make things easier if----" But Mrs. Quinn snatched bowl, apples and knife from her daughter's hands. "Don't let's be worrying over what's ahead, sweetness! We'll just take what comes! Didn't I have my bit of music when I was a girl and don't I know the longings that are in you to have things that other girls have, lassie? It's a good daughter you are to me and it's you that has always made the hard things easier----" She stopped suddenly as though something in her throat choked the words. For answer Sheila caught the rough hands that knew only work now and kissed them. Then these two, arms around one another, the bowl tipping dangerously between them, laughed together as though there had never been a single hardship in the world. "We're two sillies--that's what we are! Now we must be about our work or the gentleman will come and the room won't be ready!" "Who is he, mother?" "Sure, child, and I scarcely asked him! His name is Marks and he said he was employed at the Everett Works. I only thought of you, dearie! After supper you run over and see Miss Sheehan about the lessons; two a week--and we'll have a man come to tune up the old piano and we'll just pull it out here where it will be warm and where I can listen to you!" So their work--and there was much for their quick fingers to do before the room could be put in readiness for the new tenant and the supper prepared for the younger Quinns, would be made lighter by their happy plans! But Patricia was too miserable to even glance across at the window where the pink geraniums bloomed. She did not want to think that there was anyone happy anywhere in the world. Sighing deeply she curled herself on her bed, drew from underneath her pillow her beloved diary and wrote upon its open page: "This is such a cruel, sad moment in my life that I must write about it although it is too bad to put it in my nice diary." (Monthly she and Angeline Snow, her dearest friend at Miss Prindle's, exchanged diaries.) "I have been left alone here by a fond but heartless mother and sister who thinks only of herself and her troubles and my father is here at home and he is left, too, only of course my father is a man and he has his business. But the very worst of all because they are afraid of measles and Cis says my hair will come out and that it will never be thick like hers anyway though I remember you and I said that we hated thick hair when it was yellow like hers they will not let me go back to my dear Prindles and so I am a prisoner in a gilded cage. My Aunt Pen is coming to live with us while my mother is away and I love her and she always lets me do everything I want to do but she is not like you or the other girls at school. And though I have lived here many summers as the poets say, I have no friends because there are only the children I used to meet at silly parties and my mother's friends who are polite and stupid and I shall pine with loneliness. It is all Celia's fault though mother says she is very ill and that she has worn herself out doing war work and she looked very pail and interesting and I guess maybe she worried when Lieut Chauncey Merideth fell out of his airplane but I guess he'll be more careful next time. You remember I never liked him though when he comes back from war though he is only in Texas I guess he'll treat me a little different for he will realise I am almost fourteen if he comes back in time and does not fall out again. I do love my mother but she has been most heartless leaving me sad and lonely and with nothing to do. But as old English Sparrow says there is always work for idle hands to do and I shall find something so as to write to you all about it. I am too old to spend my hours repining. I remember the words of E. Sparrow how we are captains of our souls and I shall keep saying that in my loneliness. I guess now I will go down and order the dessert for dinner----" This sudden thought so comforted Patricia that she closed her diary quickly, put it back under the pillow, slipped off the bed and ran downstairs to the kitchen. She found that Melodia, the cook, had already prepared mince tarts for dinner. They were spread temptingly upon a shelf. Patricia tasted one and immediately ordered Melodia to make nothing but mince tarts for dessert during her mother's absence! Perched on a stool Patricia asked several questions concerning the pleasant odors that came from the big oven. But Melodia seemed to be very indifferent as to the importance of her presence in the kitchen; Patricia was glad to remember that she had promised her mother to carry a report to the Red Cross Headquarters that very afternoon. So, slipping off her stool she stalked majestically away. Now almost at the same moment that Sheila and Mrs. Quinn were laughing in their kitchen over their wonderful fortune and lonely Patricia was cheering her heart by tasting mince tarts, kind-hearted Mrs. Atherton, the official in charge at the Red Cross Headquarters on this October day, was wrinkling her pretty brows over an unusual situation. Before her, watching her face anxiously, stood a man in the uniform of a captain of the United States Army. "Perhaps I acted too hastily--bringing the child here, to leave on your hands, but--you can see how it happened; I'd given my word to that boy to take care of his little sister. If you could have known him! Why, there wasn't a fellow in my company that wouldn't have given up his life for him! They didn't need to--he did it first!" Capt. Allan's voice broke. "I got my orders back to the States and I just had time to go and find RenÉe." "Wouldn't it have been better if you had left her somewhere in Paris?" "You see you don't know the whole story, madam. This Emile LaDue was in the French uniform but he was sort of an American. And that was my promise--that I'd bring her back to America--somewhere. He didn't have time to say anything more--he gave me the address when we were in a shell hole waiting until it was dark enough to creep over to the enemy lines. We went out a few seconds afterwards--crawling along on our stomachs, he one way, I another. I--never saw him again." Mrs. Atherton openly wiped her eyes. The soldier went on: "I'd keep the little girl--just because I loved Emile LaDue, but I haven't any folks or any place to leave her and I have to report back over there! When I'm home for good----" "If Mrs. Everett was here I am sure we could arrange something, but she is out of town." It was at that moment that Patricia walked past the open door on her way from the Secretary's office where she had left her mother's report. Mrs. Atherton's rather high-pitched voice reached her ear. She stood quite still. "The child would make any home happy--she's a dear little thing! Has plenty of clothes, I guess, but right now more than anything else she needs friends and love--quite a bit of that." "A baby!" thought Patricia excitedly; "a war orphan!" Patricia's mother had already adopted six French orphans; Patricia and her classmates at school were supporting several Belgian families and Celia was a godmother to ever so many disabled French soldiers. That all meant only sending money away just so often, but this was quite different--the baby was right here! Patricia had no time to think just what her mother might do in such a case! There was an offended tone in the man's voice as though he might take his war-orphan and go away and not come back! So she walked straight into the room. "Mrs. Atherton, I will take this child immediately." Both Mrs. Atherton and the captain gasped at the sudden appearance of Patricia. Patricia, seeing doubt in Mrs. Atherton's eyes, turned to the soldier. "My mother is away, but if you will bring the--the baby to my home I will ask my father, and I know he will let her stay!" Mrs. Atherton hurriedly explained. "This is Miss Patricia Everett, the daughter of the lady of whom I was speaking. Perhaps----" she hesitated. She was thinking rapidly--something, of course, must be done with the child! "This might solve our problem--until you return and wish to make other arrangements." "Oh please bring her," cried Patricia in quite her natural manner. "I can't go back to school because of the measles there and I'd lose my hair and I am dreadfully lonesome, and I should love a baby! We'll go home and I'll send Watkins after Daddy and then we'll tell him." It sounded so logical that even Mrs. Atherton nodded approvingly. "Where is she?" asked Patricia, looking around the room as though some corner might conceal a bundle that would prove to be the little war-orphan. "I left her outside, in the taxi. I wanted to find out what could be done." "Well, let's hurry!" commanded Patricia, turning toward the door. "I know Daddy'll say yes, for you see my mother and sister have ever so many orphans and this will be mine and Daddy's." She was running eagerly ahead of Capt. Allan out of the door and down the long flight of steps. "Can she walk yet?" she whispered excitedly. "I should say so!" he laughed, throwing open the door of the taxicab. And within Patricia beheld staring gravely at her from a corner of the automobile, her small hands clasped tightly in her lap, her pale face framed by a wealth of golden hair that hung in soft curls over her shabby coat--not the war-orphan she had pictured, but a little girl of her own age! "Miss RenÉe LaDue," the Captain said with a sweeping gesture. "And this young lady----" he hesitated a moment, as though the name Mrs. Atherton had spoken had slipped his mind. Patricia, almost too astonished and too delighted to make a sound, stammered: "I'm Patricia Everett, but please, just call me Pat!" CHAPTER II THE CAPTAIN'S STORY Certain that some serious catastrophe must have happened, Thomas Everett ran up the steps of his house with the speed of a schoolboy. Watkins, the chauffeur, had found him at his office. "Miss Pat, sir, says you are to hurry home at once--that it is awfully important." He had repeated her exact words and even imitated her imperative tone. When Mr. Everett had anxiously asked him "what had happened," he had shaken his head and had said: "I don't know, sir, what it is, sir, but I'm sure it is something because I've never seen Miss Pat so excited!" Patricia was awaiting her father in the hall. There were not many things that she had ever wanted that he had refused her--but then this was very different and he might say "No!" She greeted him with a violent hug and, talking so fast that he could not make out one word that she was saying, she dragged him toward the library door. "They're in there, Daddy, and oh, please do let her stay!" she whispered. Within the room Mr. Everett found a tall soldier holding a shy little girl by the hand. The officer introduced himself with a word or two, and with the same directness he had used in telling his story to Mrs. Atherton, he now plunged straight to the point. "I have brought this little girl from France. She is one of--those many--who has lost everyone and everything--through this war!" He was trying to choose his words carefully so as to spare the little girl as much as he could. Realizing his embarrassment Mr. Everett interrupted him. "Pat, dear, take the little girl and show her the birds." Patricia, rather reluctantly led the little stranger off to the small conservatory beyond the dining-room where, in beautiful cages, many different kinds of birds sang joyously. "Thanks, sir," the officer drew a breath. "Taking care of this small lady has been the most difficult thing I ever attempted. I'll tell you the story, sir, so that you can understand. About six months ago a young French officer was attached to our company. He directed the scouting. There were six of us picked out to work with him. I was one of them. We did some mighty ticklish work, sir--for a few weeks there." Almost involuntarily the man's fingers went to the small cross of honor he wore on his tunic. "And we fellows get pretty well acquainted, you know--just lying hours in a shell hole next to another man is like knowing him for years and years back home. It was like that with this Emile LaDue and me. I found out that his father and mother had been born in America--they were both dead, for one night he told me that if anything happened to him--and there was plenty of chance for something to happen any minute--it would leave his little sister all alone in the world. He never talked much about himself--back in the lines he was the bravest, cheeriest one in the crowd, laughing at every sort of hardship, but when we'd get out he'd get quiet and I knew what was on his mind. He'd tell little things at different times. It seems he'd made a promise to his mother that he'd bring the little girl to America to live--and he'd kept putting it off, and then the war came along and he thought it might be too late! That bothered him more than anything else. The last night I was with him we were hiding in a dirty hole--four of us--almost covered with mud and water. He and I lay close together; we could only whisper, for some of the Boche had seen us and we had to keep low until it was darker. We'd been there for hours, not more'n just breathing when he whispered suddenly in my ear: 'Allan, I may not come out of this--and you may. Will you----' You know some of the boys over there have premonitions and they're pretty nearly always true and I suppose he had one! I knew what he wanted to say, and he'd been the bravest and best pal a man could ever find and we'd faced death a hundred times, side by side, and he'd never flunked once, so I whispered: 'Don't you worry--just tell me where I can find your little sister.' He twisted around until he could get a hand into his pocket. He gave me a card. He said: 'She's all alone in the world! Take her back to America--I didn't make good! All her life my mother planned that and when she died I promised to do it!' He tried to tell me something about a box, but a star shell burst right next to us and we had to dig down into the mud and we scarcely breathed for fear the Boche snipers would hear us!" Capt. Allan's voice, halting through the story as though it hurt him to recall the bitter memories, suddenly broke. "Just after that we crawled out--we had to do our job and get back with the stuff the Colonel wanted to know! We divided up--two of us went one way and two the other. I got over and through and back to our lines with the information and I won this"--touching his cross--"and got a sniper's bullet in the shoulder. I was put out of business then--for three weeks." He stopped again--it was very hard for him to tell his tale. Mr. Everett was giving occasional nods of sympathy. "When I got back to my company they told me the Jerries had caught LaDue! He had almost gotten away when he was killed by a hand grenade. The other man with him was made a prisoner. The boys found LaDue when they advanced--they buried him out there with a lot of others! That was always the worst, sir--these good pals that you'd messed with and bunked with under the same muddy blankets and lived with through hours and hours of waiting for no one ever knew what--and then--just flesh and bones out in that desolation and buried--any old place----" He pulled himself together. "Excuse me, sir--I loved the boy--I'd have liked to have just said--oh, good luck, old chap--or something like that! Well, I asked for a furlough to hunt up the little sister and what did they do but order me back to the States on a special mission to the Intelligence Department. I had just twenty-four hours to find the child. I had no trouble, though--she was at the address out in St. Cloud, living with a queer old couple--the man was a veteran of the Franco-Prussian war and the wife raises flowers--only no one in France is buying flowers now! I suppose they were all living on what Emile was sending to them. They didn't want to let the child go--I think they were truly fond of her, but when I told them what I had promised Emile they never said another word. I had to break it to them that he had been killed! I was afraid of RenÉe crying and wondering how I'd comfort her and then I wished that she would cry! She was such a pathetic little thing--all she'd say was 'He told me it would be for America and France!' I tell you, sir, even the little ones are as brave as any!" "Well, old Susette packed her clothes and I started back with her, though I hadn't the ghost of an idea where to take her! I haven't a home or any folks of my own, sir, but I said to myself--there's the Red Cross, they'll tell me! I had come to this town first, sir, so I just brought her along with me and--here we are!" He laughed ruefully. "I guess I didn't think the thing out very much! Over there, you know, homes are smashed up in a twinkling, and so many kiddies--like this little one--are left along by the wayside, that you don't stop to think but just gather 'em in! Our boys can't stand seeing the children suffer, sir--why, I've watched many a one just turn his whole mess right over to a bunch of kids--they're so hungry looking." He paused for a moment. "That's all, sir, and if you can find a place for RenÉe to live where she'll be safe and--happy, I'll gladly give half my pay and take her when I come back!" The story of RenÉe LaDue finished, the officer stood very straight and looked anxiously at his listener. Often during the story Mr. Everett had brushed something suspiciously like tears from his eyes. He rose quickly now and held out his hand. "With what you boys are doing--and giving up--there isn't anything we who have to stay at home could refuse to do! RenÉe shall be taken care of--I promise you that! Nothing must be said about money. When the war is over and you return--then you shall come and claim her if you wish!" The soldier's face beamed with pleasure. "Oh, sir, that is splendid! You can't imagine how responsible I feel about my promise to Emile--or what a fine chap he was!" Mr. Everett took a notebook and a pencil from his pocket. "Please give me some of the facts concerning this child," he said in a business-like manner. As Capt. Allan repeated them he entered each in the little book. "And you know nothing more concerning Emile's family?" "Only a little more--back in the hospital I talked with a French surgeon who had known Emile's father. He said he had been a sculptor--until he grew blind. I imagine they were very poor. The doctor said that Emile had been studying, too--in Paris. I remembered he had said something once to me that had made me think he was just waiting to finish his studies to keep his promise to his mother--to come to America to live!" Thomas Everett shook his head. "Oh, what this war has done! The boy was doubtless gifted!" He sighed deeply. "When it is possible go to Paris and, for the child's sake, find out all you can of her family. In the meantime----" But at this point Patricia, too impatient to longer await her father's decision, burst into the room! CHAPTER III RENÉE FINDS A HOME At her first introduction in the taxi-cab Patricia had undertaken to converse with Miss RenÉe in the stilted French she had learned at Miss Prindle's. But RenÉe had answered in perfect English. Now, with the singing of the birds to tune their voices to a happy note, with the pretty flowers bringing a smile to RenÉe's sad little face, it was easy to bridge over the formality of "getting acquainted." RenÉe exclaimed in delight over the birds and the flowers and Pat rattled on like a small magpie, though all the while straining her ears to catch a single word or tone of her father's voice from the library. She had her own way--sometimes a rather naughty way--of getting what she wanted from her family, but this was so different, and she wanted it so very much that she felt very anxious and uncertain! So after she had waited what seemed to her a very long time she abruptly led RenÉe back to the library. As they entered the room her father held out both hands. One took one of hers, with the other he drew RenÉe close to him. "My dear little girl, Capt. Allan is going to leave you with us for a little while! And I have given him my promise that you shall be as safe and happy as it is possible for us to make you----" He wanted to say a great deal more to make RenÉe feel at home but Patricia interrupted him with a tempestuous hug that almost swept him from his feet. "Oh, you dear, dear Daddy!" Then she threw her arms around RenÉe's neck. "Oh, I am so happy!" she was crying over and over, as though she had been the homeless one and RenÉe had taken her in. "Don't forget me, Miss Everett," the soldier put in so comically that Patricia almost embraced him, too! Instead she shook both his hands delightedly. As RenÉe turned to Capt. Allan her lips trembled a little, for she had learned to love and trust him and already looked upon him as her guardian. "Just you be brave and happy, little sister!" he said softly to her, "and as soon as I can I will come back!" Then he shook hands with each one of them and RenÉe shyly kissed him. Mr. Everett went with him to the door. Patricia, knowing how hard the parting was for her little guest, seized her hand and dragged her toward a door at the end of the big hall. "Let's go and find Melodia! I know something she's got!" Only a few moments before Melodia had been telling the butler and the upstairs maid about "that Miss Pat's giving her orders so comical" and they were all laughing merrily over it when Miss Pat burst in upon them, leading RenÉe by the hand. "Melodia, I have a guest only she's going to live with us! Please make lots of tarts, and can't RenÉe have just a little one now? Jasper, carry Miss RenÉe's trunk to my room--it's in the front hall! Maggie, please get a cot from the storeroom and put it right next to my bed." She turned toward the pantry. "I'll take some tarts now, Melodia, for Miss RenÉe is hungry! Don't all stand and stare like that, but please do as I tell you!" She helped herself as she spoke to two of the juiciest of the tempting tarts. "Well, I never!" Jasper and Maggie and Melodia all exclaimed. Patricia turned with dignity. "Miss RenÉe has come from France. She is a--a----" She was going to say "war-orphan" but suddenly it occurred to her that that might make RenÉe unhappy. So she finished: "Her brother has died for us in France and left her all alone!" Patricia used an expression she had heard often. "You three and Daddy and me have a debt to pay--and we are going to pay it!" The three servants were deeply impressed by the grandness of Patricia's words and manner; and, too, RenÉe's sad little face won their hearts in an instant. Jasper coughed violently and hurried away to find the trunk. Melodia wiped her eye with the corner of her apron. "The dear little thing! Well, we'll just make you happy and put flesh on your bones, bless your heart, missy!" Patricia, satisfied that she had properly established RenÉe in the household, then led her upstairs to her own room. RenÉe, accustomed to the tiny chamber under the gable at St. Cloud, exclaimed with admiration when Patricia opened the door. Already Jasper had put down the queer old trunk and was busily engaged unfastening its buckles and straps. Maggie was watching, much disturbed. "Miss Pat, I wish your mother was home! I know she wouldn't want me to bring a cot in here a-cluttering up the tidiness of your room when there's the blue room and the violet room empty and that room on the third floor----" Alarmed that Maggie might separate them, Patricia exclaimed quickly: "I don't--care! We won't make things untidy! I want her in here!" "What's all this about?" interrupted Mr. Everett, coming at that moment to the door. Patricia, RenÉe, Jasper and Maggie all turned to him. But Patricia, catching his coat, pulled him to her so that, by reaching on tip-toe, she could whisper in his ear: "You see, Daddy, I want her right in here! Maggie says that it will make things untidy but we can't let her get homesick or--or unhappy, and she might if she's left all alone in the blue room or the vi'let room----" Patricia rubbed her cheek coaxingly against her father's shoulder, then added solemnly: "I guess I know what it is to be lonesome, for I have been lots and lots of times--just because everyone was so grownup and I hadn't anyone to be with like a little sister, and now--please, Daddy, we will keep the room as neat as can be!" RenÉe's eyes echoed Patricia's pleadings. "Well, well, Maggie, we'll have to let them decide things, I guess," he laughed, "at least until Miss Penelope comes!" In all the excitement Patricia had quite forgotten the approaching arrival of Aunt Pen. "Aunty Pen, Aunty Pen," she cried, catching RenÉe's hands and, swinging her around. "I'd just clean forgotten she was coming! You'll love her!" Certainly little RenÉe had not time to be unhappy--each moment seemed to bring something new! While Patricia was explaining all about Aunty Pen and why she was coming, and her story had, of course, to include Celia and even the Lieut. Chauncey Meredith and his fall from his airplane, Maggie, scolding a little under her breath, was spreading snowy sheets over a bed-lounge which Patricia had drawn up close to her own little bed. In the next moment, Aunt Pen again forgotten, Patricia was tumbling her own possessions from one of the drawers of the mahogany chest to make room for the contents of RenÉe's little trunk. "We'll just share everything," she cried. "We'll have just the same halves! And let's hang up your dresses now!" Poor RenÉe did not need the generous space of one-half of Patricia's wardrobe for her shabby dresses--they were only four in number and sadly worn! But she hung them away proudly, telling Patricia that no one in France now wore new things! "Poor Susette used to spend hours mending my clothes, trying to make them hold together," laughed RenÉe, tenderly recalling her good old friend at St. Cloud. "Tell me all about her!" So, sitting cross-legged on the floor beside the almost empty trunk, RenÉe described Susette and the cottage at St. Cloud and the wonderful flowers that had used to sell so well before the war, and the school where she had gone after her mother had died; how she and Emile always talked in English because her mother had made them promise, and how in the long, anxious, lonely days after Emile had gone, she had used to teach simple English words to Susette as they sat together among the flowers that nobody wanted to buy! From the bottom of the trunk RenÉe drew a box covered with worn leather, tooled and colored like the binding of a beautiful book. So old was it that the colors blended and looked all blue and gold and green. RenÉe lifted it tenderly, as though it was precious! "Oh, how queer and how be-ut-iful!" cried Patricia, all admiration and curiosity. "What do you keep in it?" RenÉe held the box very close to her. "I don't know! It was my mother's and now it's Emile's and mine, or"--she carefully corrected herself--"I suppose it's just mine. But we don't know what is in it for we never had the key! My mother died before she could tell Emile where it was! And Emile made me promise before he went away that I would keep the box and never let anyone open it!" "And you haven't even the teeniest idea what is in it? Didn't you ever just shake it?" "Oh, lots of times!" confessed RenÉe. "But nothing makes any noise. And of course I would keep my promise to Emile." Patricia rocked back and forth on her heels in joy. "Oh, what a spliffy mystery! I can't wait to write to the girls!" Then she laughed at RenÉe's bewilderment. "Spliffy is a word we learned at Miss Prindle's and it means scrumptious or delicious or grand! Don't you love a mystery? And isn't it the lov-li-est box?" "Emile said it must have been made by some Italian master years and years ago. I have this queer locket, too--it was my mother's," and from a little bag, wrapped in folds and folds of tissue paper, RenÉe drew a curious gold locket. "It is much too big to wear but I am very careful of it--it is all I have! I pretend that the box and the locket both once upon a time belonged to some royal prince in Venice! Once, when I was little, mother took Emile and me to Venice--she had been sick and she had to go where the sun was warm!" Patricia, who had always considered herself an experienced and much traveled young lady, suddenly felt very small and young compared to RenÉe and all that she had done! "Is Venice like the pictures--all colors like shells and funny boats and people singing?" But RenÉe had no chance to answer. The doorbell clanged and in a moment they heard a cheery voice answering Mr. Everett's greeting. "It's Aunt Pen--come on!" cried Patricia, rushing headlong down the stairs. CHAPTER IV GARDENS "I'm certainly very glad you've come, Penelope; my family, which has so suddenly increased, is going to need a guiding hand!" Penelope Everett, called by some a "strong-minded woman" because she had, since her college days, worn low-heeled shoes, boyish coats, comfortable hats and simple dresses, was Thomas Everett's favorite sister. Though many years younger than he, there was a directness about her, a something in the way she carried her head, poised squarely, that made him feel he could put anything upon her shoulders. She gave a cheery laugh now in response to the seriousness of his manner. Patricia and RenÉe had long since gone to bed, side by side. RenÉe had cuddled down under the soft coverings with a little sigh of content. Very tired with long days of travel she had dropped off to sleep quickly, while Patricia's voice, pitched to a low tone, had gone on in an endless account of "what we'll do to-morrow!" Aunt Pen, tiptoeing in a little later, had found Patricia's hand clasping RenÉe's tightly under the covers. She recalled that now as she sat with her brother before the library fire. "Do you know, Thomas, you've done the most wonderful thing in the world for Pat?" Pat's father stared at her. He had thought she meant to praise him for taking in the lonely little girl from France! "Why--what do you mean?" "Just this--Pat's going to have something now that she's never had before--true comradeship!" Thomas Everett nodded his head. "That is so! Pat said something queer to me, about being lonely lots of times!" "Of course she's been lonely--often! She's almost a stranger in her own home! You whisk her from school to the seashore or some such place and then back--to another school! And everything on earth is done for her, she doesn't have to think of anything for herself, let alone for anyone else!" Pat's father laughed. "Why, I thought we were bringing her up along the most model lines! But perhaps you have some new fads now!" He liked to tease Penelope. "Poor Pat has been the victim of too many fads already! I tell you, brother, this war has shown us a whole lot of silly mistakes we were making in our living!" "Before you go one bit further, Penelope dear, do promise to speak in words of one syllable! I know all about steel but I must admit I'm very stupid about girls!" "Thomas, you're not stupid--you just don't think about them and yet your two girls are more precious to you than the whole steel market! And what are you doing with them? Look at Celia--how has she stood the trials of this wartime? Goodness knows, you've spent enough money on her to have made a strong woman of her!" "But she's young, Pen----" "Celia's twenty-one--that's the age they've been drafting the boys to go and fight for us! She's a few years older than some who have died over in France. And now she's had a nervous breakdown! Why in the world should Celia have any nerves at all?" "You're right, Pen, but----" "This draft we have had in this country has been a wonderful thing; it has sorted out our manhood. But I'm sorry the women couldn't have had it, too, I wonder how many would have measured up to the standards, and why not? Because we older ones make mistakes with the girls--like Pat!" Penelope was standing now, very straight, before the fire, her eyes bright in her earnestness. "I tell you we've reached a wonderful day, brother--we can see things as we never saw them before! Silly old prejudices and habits and notions have been swept aside. Do you know one thing we've learned? That it is something even greater than love for one's country that has made men go out and fight--to victory; it's a love for right and justice! And in one of John Randolph's books he tells us that it is that love for right and justice that will make the real brotherhood of men and nations! Who is going to carry on this ideal as we have found it? Why, our boys and girls--girls like Pat!" "Pen, your eloquence makes me feel as though I had never known the real meaning of the word duty!" "Oh, it isn't half so much--duty, Tom, as it is plain common sense. I've often thought that raising girls and boys is something like a garden! If you were planning a garden and wanted to grow something beautiful--oh, say larkspur, for I don't think any garden is perfect without it and no flower is harder to get started--wouldn't you want to know that you were putting in seed that would grow into hardy blossoms, blooming year after year, keeping your garden lovely and the world richer for their beauty?" Penelope paused long enough to draw a deep breath. "There at Miss Prindle's Pat is learning to speak French and Latin and how to use her hands and feet and walk out of a room properly and a dinner-table-speaking acquaintance with art and the masters and ancient history--and that's all very well, but how much will she know of the problems she must face by and by unless she begins to mingle with the sort of people that make up this world? And above all else--unless you build up for her a strong body that will mean a brave heart and a clear head, what service, I ask you, can she give to her fellowmen and her country?" "You're certainly right, Pen! And now, if you've finished a very good sermon, let's get down to business. I take it you want to--raise larkspur! I don't know much about 'em, even in gardens! I've left these things to the children's mother!" Penelope dropped into a chair with a little, ashamed laugh. "My sermon does sound as though I was criticizing Caroline dreadfully! I know she is devoted to the girls. And so am I--and so are you. She's bringing them up just the way she was brought up!" "Well, what shall we do?" asked Pat's father with the tone of a conspirator. "You've started doing right now the very best thing in the world--bringing that poor little girl into the family! Patricia loves her already and she'll learn for the first time to consider another child before herself. She's never had to do it before! Why, to-night I found her carefully dividing her clothes so that RenÉe might have just as many things as she had." "Does RenÉe need clothes? I'll----" "Now don't spoil it all by buying new things--let Patricia give up some of her own! It is making her very happy. Through RenÉe she is going to know something of the trials that come to others and she is going to learn to want to be helpful. She has gone to sleep now holding RenÉe's hand." Both their minds turned to RenÉe. "A curious tragedy--this, that has brought this child into our circle! Caroline might have made some other arrangement, but Pat's heart was set upon keeping her--and she will have her own way!" "Pat's mother is too absorbed now in Celia to think much about it and when she returns RenÉe will win her love with her little face! What a story the child's life makes with just what we know! The family must have been American--evidently exiled; they loved this country, else why would the mother have made the brother promise to come back? I hope sometime we will know more about them!" "Capt. Allan has promised to look them up as soon as he can!" "Captain Allan----" Penelope breathed, her face flaming, then turning white. When her brother had told her RenÉe's story, so intent had she been upon the tragedy of little RenÉe and the poor Emile that she had not heeded the name of the American officer. "Can it be the same?" she thought now, a wild fluttering at her heart. Then she sternly admonished herself. "Of course not! Don't be silly! There are hundreds of Allans and I don't even know that he joined the army!" She said aloud, very calmly: "Love has given to RenÉe what money couldn't--she has been well educated, I believe! Her mother taught her, she says, and after her mother's death she went to a communal school near St. Cloud. She will help our Pat a great deal!" "Yes, I'm very glad we have her with us! And now, Pen, I'll put you in command--head gardener, or whatever you want to call yourself! Raise your larkspur--only let a mere father be of what help he can! Things are pressing pretty hard at the Works--I can't help but fear that the winter may bring serious problems of unemployment and we must be ready to solve them! A few weeks will see the end of this war--it is in sight now! By the way, we are just completing the formula for a new explosive--more powerful than any the world has ever known! If the enemy knew it the war would end to-morrow!" Penelope shuddered. "Why do we need it?" "My dear, that little formula alone, scrap of paper as it is, will be a safeguard against future wars! The government is sending on experts to go over the experiments and the formulas. And, if they are satisfied, it will be my gift--the gift of my men--to our country!" Penelope listened with divided attention, her mind not so much upon the wonders of shot and shell as upon the problems of the two little girls upstairs. She stared into the crackling flames. "Do you think Miss Pat will fall into your plans, sister? Remember she is sadly spoiled!" Pen laughed. "She'll never know we're making plans--wait and see! The first thing we must do is to make RenÉe feel that this is home and then--well, we must fill their days with sunshine--flowers and children grow better with that, you know! And I promise you, Thomas, that after a few months--if I'm let alone that long--you'll agree that my hobbies are commonsense things after all!" "You're generally right, sister--I've found that out from long, sad experience! Grow your larkspur and I'll help! And now I move that we call the plot finished and go to bed--you've worn me out!" With two fingers he tipped her face toward him and kissed her good-night. Each was very fond of the other--it was this affection that bound Penelope's heart so closely to her brother's children. Long after he had gone she sat alone before the fire, her elbows on her knees, her chin dropped into the palms of her hands. And as she mused over her plans, between her and the flames danced pictures of what she would like to do to help Pat, and now RenÉe, grow into "hardy blossoms, blooming year after year, keeping the garden lovely and the world richer for their beauty!" |
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