JUNE

During the long winter a strong bond of friendship grew between Mrs. Wright and Eliza Brewster. The latter's broken heart seemed to heal in the very act of caring for the exiled lady, and in the consolation of knowing that her own familiarity with the island, and with all domestic cares, gave daily return for the unspeakable benefit of her home.

Upon Mr. Wright she looked from the first with a reflective and judicial eye. He was Mrs. Wright's husband, and that fact made Eliza rigidly careful to do her duty by him; but mentally she classified the adopted islander as a lazy man who had all his days been looking for a soft spot and who had been irresistibly drawn to the freedom and irresponsibility of a life which permitted him to wear a nÉgligÉe shirt during the semi-hibernation of the winter, and made no demands upon him beyond an occasional arising, by request, from the lounge to shovel snow-paths and bring in fuel, and at evening to play checkers with Captain James until an early bedtime.

He liked Eliza's cooking and her nimble, quiet ways, and externally they were at peace; but Captain James's shrewd eyes often read Eliza's suppressed impatience. One spring morning, when he met her in the island road, he attempted a mild protest in favor of the master of the house.

"Mr. Wright's a clever feller," he said argumentatively. "What's wrong with him, Eliza?"

"What have I said about him?" she snapped.

"Don't you suppose I got eyes?" asked Captain James.

Eliza was startled. She must put even greater guard upon herself.

"Now, I ain't a-goin' to talk about him, James. I s'pose it's all right for a great hulk of a man to own a dainty city woman and take her away from her friends and mew her up on a snow-bank to suit his convenience."

"What you goin' back on the island for?" inquired Captain James.

"I ain't goin' back on it. I'm island folks. I find there is something, after all, in this talk about native air."

"It's treated you all right," agreed the other, regarding her countenance critically. "You've dropped off five years this winter. Come summer you'll shed ten more, like enough, and look like you ought to look, Eliza. You ain't any old woman."

Eliza ignored the blandishment.

"I can see in the glass I look better," she returned impersonally, "and it makes me mad to think it's all because I live in the house with a sacrifice. Supposin' I'd come back to this island alone."

"Mrs. Wright don't act like any sacrifice," protested Captain James; "she's chipper as a canary bird."

"Of course she is. That's the kind of a wife a man like that's sure to get. It's been my lot in life, James, to live with angels," added Eliza fiercely. "Can you tell me why I should be just as cantankerous as ever?"

Captain James laughed. "Mebbe there's as much truth in that talk about original sin as there is about native air," he returned. "You always was a limb, Eliza."

She smiled reluctantly. "I warned her before I came," she returned, grave again. "I told her I was bad, and set."

"But you couldn't scare her, eh?"

"Nobody could do that. She ain't afraid of anything above ground. 'T ain't fear makes her yield to Lazy-Bones there; and when she sets out to make him do something he don't want to, she gets him every time." Eliza's eyes wandered to a cottage by the roadside. "There's Betsy Eaton watchin' us. I expect she's wonderin' why we're standin' in the wet so long. Well, I've blown off steam and I'll run home. I s'pose you'll be comin' up to-night to move those little pieces o' wood around."

"Sure thing, Eliza," returned Captain James with a grin. "Lemme teach you the game so you can play it with him times when I don't come."

In the speaker's own parlance he was trying to "get a rise" out of his old friend; and he succeeded. Eliza's eyes flashed almost with the fire of youth.

"I'd throw 'em at him. I know I would—every checker of 'em."

"Well, he'll be fishin' again soon," laughed Captain James soothingly, "now his new boat's about done."

"H'm!" grunted Eliza; and with no other form of farewell, she started to trudge up the hill toward home. The earth was moist and yielding; the chill spring was here, and nature was drawing her green paint-brush over the high wave of the bluff. Little star-flowers bloomed under her energizing kisses, and shivered bravely when the east wind blew.

This morning the sun fell with sufficient warmth on the stone step for Pluto to lie there, and blink at the first sparrow he had seen. On the whole, Eliza's move away from New York had his entire approval. The change from the restrictions of a city flat to this place was in itself a delight, and far from agreeing with Eliza's estimation of the master of the house he found him quite the most sensible human being he had ever encountered. One who appreciated a soft lounge when he saw it, and who always made room for a cat, and never disturbed his slumbers with precipitate movement. Eliza watched their growing intimacy with grim amusement.

"Birds of a feather flock together," was frequently her mental comment.

As the spring unfolded, and the early mornings were less chill, Mr. Wright again took up his suspended practice of making sunrise visits to his pond. At first Pluto considered this a foolish practice; but at last he learned to connect it with attractive pieces of fish which came his way, and again he paid tribute of admiration to the hand which always discriminated so nicely just which point back of his ears should be scratched in order to establish the most friendly relations.

Eliza's threat that he should reside in the chicken-house had come to naught, for it had required but a few days for Pluto to recover from the savagery to which his novel contact with Mother Earth at first reduced him; and he again became a domestic animal full of content in the equally novel petting which now fell to his share.

One day Eliza with amused memory of her childish terrors pushed open the door of the forlorn chicken-house, and looked in; but one look was enough. She closed it again quickly on the dirt and cobwebs. Its small windows were opaque with the dust of years. It was almost picturesque with its leaking roof which had once been red, huddling close to earth under the protection of those hardy old warriors, the balm-of-Gilead trees.

"If 'twas mine," mused Eliza, as she withdrew from the dirt and damp of the close interior, "I'd clean it with a good fire. It's hopeless."

A sparrow lit on the despised roof, and poured a song toward the sea.

"That's so," said Eliza looking up at the tiny creature with a smile. "It is spring. It's a wonder to be in a place where there ain't one o' your English cousins."

She turned and nearly trod on Pluto. His green eyes were fixed on the bird. His lithe body crouched in the fresh grass and quivered along its length in the intensity of his upward gaze.

"Pluto Brewster!" she exclaimed in desperation. "Supposin' you ever should catch a bird up here!" She stooped and boxed his ears. He laid them back and, blinking the eager eyes, crouched lower.

Mrs. Wright on her doorstep saw Eliza approaching, the cat under her arm.

"He was lookin' at a sparrow," announced Eliza.

Mrs. Wright laughed. "I've heard that a cat may look even at a king," she said.

"If Pluto should kill birds!" exclaimed his owner desperately.

"Would you, little tiger?" asked Mrs. Wright, closing her hand over the cat's face and giving it a little shake.

Pluto was beginning to consider that women were a sad mistake. He struggled to get free and Eliza dropped him.

"How the spring has stolen past us," said Mrs. Wright. "Do you realize Eliza that even June is moving on its way? Look over there at the Fabian cottage."

"Why that's James out on the veranda."

"Yes, he has had a letter from Mrs. Fabian. She wants him to open the house. To-day is Kathleen Fabian's Commencement."

"That's so," said Eliza coolly. "You showed me the invitation."

"It was rather nice of her to remember me, way off here, and little as I know them."

"I guess Kathleen would be an agreeable enough girl if she was let alone," said Eliza.

She had for some time now given up anxiety lest the high words over the barrel in Phil's studio bear bad fruit for him; for a letter had set her mind at rest on that score, and she felt instinctively that she had Kathleen Fabian to thank for that.

"But any girl would be slow to cut off friendly relations with a feller like Mr. Sidney," she considered, prejudice still holding her in a strong grasp.

"So they're comin'," said Eliza, in a lifeless voice. The winter had been very happy. She began to long for the fall.

"Yes, very soon."

"Is your niece comin' with 'em?"

"No; she will keep busy until July." Mrs. Wright drew a deep breath.

"Oh, how lovely this is, Eliza," she went on. "This morning makes me think of Stopford Brooke's lines,—

Our mountain—what a height we should see we had if that sea could roll back; we can feel the warmth in its breast this morning, and the lovely miracles it is putting forth. Why don't you look happier, Eliza?" Mrs. Wright smiled as she asked the question. Her friend's eyes were gloomily following the movements of Captain James in the distance as he beat rugs on the grass beside the boulder cottage.

"I guess you know why," rejoined Eliza briefly.

"The idea of letting anybody rob you of your happiness," said Mrs. Wright. "I shall have to put Marcus Aurelius side of your bed so you can read him before you go to sleep. I thought you were more of a philosopher, Eliza."

"You ain't half through your disappointments in me yet," returned Eliza drily.

"Ho!" exclaimed Mrs. Wright, resting her hand on the shoulder of her companion as she stood a step below her. "I haven't begun on them yet."

"Just s'posin'," said Eliza, looking about at the fair prospect, "that Mrs. Ballard could be with us to see the summer comin'. How comfortable we'd make her!"

"I don't believe she'd come," said Mrs. Wright gently, "as much as she loves us."

"That's what he said," returned Eliza musingly. "He said we hadn't ought to believe we could make her happier than she is."

"He? Who?"

"Mr. Sidney."

"Good for the boy," said Mrs. Wright, who had heard so much and often about Philip that she felt as if she had met him.

"Why can't we go on here just as we have," said Eliza regretfully. "Why must folks come?"

"Listen to the grudging one!" exclaimed Mrs. Wright lightly. "And what a different doctrine Nature is preaching us this morning. Look where you will, no limitations—none. Illimitable sky, illimitable sea. That's the way it should be in our hearts, Eliza, illimitable love."

"I dare say," returned the other with a world of obstinacy in her tone.

"The world can't be full of Mrs. Ballards, but they're all our brothers and sisters just the same. Mr. Brooke goes on in his verse to say:—

I don't like that hard look to come in your eyes, Eliza. The feeling behind it turns life as dry as desert dust wherever it holds sway."

"I told you—" began Eliza slowly.

"I know all about that," interrupted Mrs. Wright, "but little by little you'll find that all hard wilfulness is flat, stale, and unprofitable. Now you'd better spend this week before the Fabians come in trying that recipe every time you think of them. 'A little love, a little trust, a soft impulse.'"

"And what will Mrs. Fabian be doin' all that time?" asked Eliza hardily. "Do you suppose she'll have any soft impulses toward me until I give her her aunt's things? That barrel upstairs in the back bedroom has got her grandmother's china and silver in it."

"What do you want of it, Eliza?" asked Mrs. Wright.

"To keep it away from her," was the prompt reply; and the speaker saw a cloud pass over the eyes she had learned to love. "Anyway, Mrs. Wright," she went on earnestly, "she left 'em all to me, all her things, Mrs. Ballard did."

"I see," said Mrs. Wright thoughtfully. "Doubtless her grateful heart longed to leave you her money, and deciding to do otherwise she felt she wished you to have something equivalent."

While they talked, Captain James had started across the field toward them, and now he drew near, walking beneath the bold and intricate curves made by wheeling swallows, the deep blue of their backs flashing iridescent in the sunlight.

"Say," he called, "these fellers have set up housekeepin' over there in the Fabian porch. Snug as bugs in rugs they are. Darned if I know what to do."

"Who?—the swallows?" asked Mrs. Wright.

"Yes." Captain James seated himself on a rustic bench in the sun. "It's the new wind-break they had put up last summer did the mischief. Always been too blowy other springs for 'em to try it."

"You dislike to disturb them? Is that the trouble?" asked Mrs. Wright.

"I dislike to get my head took off," returned Captain James. "Mrs. Fabian'll have the law on me if I don't knock the nest down and clean up, and Kathleen'll read me the riot act if I do."

The speaker pushed his hat to one side and scratched his head.

Eliza regarded him unsmiling.

"Do you always take care of their cottage?" she asked.

"Ever since they've had one," he answered. "Used to take Kathleen and Edgar out to my pound when they wa'n't knee high to a grasshopper."

"And now she has graduated from college. Think of it," said Mrs. Wright.

"Wa'n't I invited?" asked Captain James proudly. "I guess I was. All engraved up pretty, and Kathleen's card inside. When they fledged Edgar and shoved him out o' the nest he didn't remember me; but little sober-sides there, she wa'n't goin' to forget an old friend. Edgar's boots nor his hat don't exactly fit him, late years," went on Captain James good-humoredly, "but Kathleen always was a brick and she ain't got over it. I guess I'll let the swallers alone till she's had her say anyway."

"Going to be over there this afternoon, Captain James?" asked Mrs. Wright.

"Yes. I've got Betsy Eaton washin' the dishes and cleanin' now, and I'll be back again on the rugs later."

"Let us go over, Eliza," said Mrs. Wright. "I want you to see what a beautiful cottage it is."

Eliza looked at her with steady significance. "I'm goin' to be too busy," she said slowly.

Captain James sighed and rose. "Handsome day," he remarked, as he trudged off to dinner.

"To-morrow, then?" asked Mrs. Wright.

"No," responded Eliza firmly, freed of Captain James's presence, "nor the day after that. I ain't double-faced, Mrs. Wright. I can't go in when they ain't there, if I wouldn't when they are there."

Mrs. Wright laughed softly. "My square-toed Eliza," she said, turning into the house. "Oh, I forgot to say there's a letter for you here. Mr. Wright must have left it on the table."

Eliza had stooped over the row of sweet peas coming up thriftily about the house, and she rose slowly and followed her friend indoors, but when she saw the small stubbed writing on the envelope her eyes brightened. Twice before during the winter had it come to cheer her.

"Mr. Sidney!" she said, and sat down to enjoy her letter to the full.

"Dear Eliza," it began.

"We had a hot day yesterday. Pat's tongue hung out and he assured me that the only thing that would do him any good was to take off his flesh and sit in his bones. They tell me the summer is here to stay, and I am going to make an aisle through my opposite neighbor, the storeroom, and get at the window in there so as to get a draught through. The sun bakes the stable roof, but I wouldn't mind it if the perspiration didn't run into my eyes. This state of things makes me an easy prey to Aunt Isabel's kind insistence that I shall spend a week with her. She says two; but that will depend on how much fog there is and whether I have to waste time.

"I can't compliment you on being a complete letter-writer, but I judge you have had a good winter and kept from freezing. You say the islands have looked like frosted wedding cakes. The first part sounds good to me. I hope you've saved some over. That's the sort of wedding cake I'd like to dream on just now. You may believe my heart often goes homing to the mountains. What would I give for one night under the windy trees. The very stars are hot here—but—I like it!

"I've had a wonderful winter. I can't say I'm a belle at the Academy. One of the teachers turned on me the other day and said he would thank me to stop trying to teach him how to teach me. He said my 'stand-and-deliver' methods might be de rigueur west of the Rockies, but something less aggressive would be more becoming a student here who knew as little as I did. They all have a hunted look as they come near me; for I don't care a straw how much they snub me if I can only get from them what I'm after; and I glow with the consciousness that I have accomplished a lot, even though my strenuous path is strewn with the wounded and I have some bruises myself.

"Dear Aunt Mary! I send her a wireless every night. I wonder if she gets it!

"Aunt Isabel has been a trump to me the whole winter, patient with my neglect, and letting me go my own gait; but she brought a thermometer over to the stable in my absence one day and sat down in my room waiting for it to go up. It didn't lag, and I found her sitting there in a wilted state, and she declared that she should stay until I promised to go with her to the island and get a coat of tan. So I promised. It will be great to get a breath, and great to see you again, Eliza. Kindly arrange that the third week in June shall be free from fog. My time will be precious.

"Give my compliments to Mrs. Wright and tell her I had a pleasant chat with her niece one morning in the park while I was sketching.

"Tell Pluto to be ready to pose with you if old ocean veils himself.

"With my best to you,

"As ever
"Philip Sidney."

"Now, then, Eliza," said Mrs. Wright when her companion had read this epistle aloud.

"Now, then, what?" returned Eliza happily.

"He'll be a link. He'll have to be. You can't be crabbed and offish and spoil his one vacation."

"Do you mean Mrs. Fabian?" Eliza gave her rare laugh as she pushed the letter back into its envelope. "If she could help her nephew from runnin' after common folks, she would; but she certainly won't run after him. We shan't clash any."

"I'm glad I'm going to see the boy," said Mrs. Wright. Violet had written of him: at first with girlish enthusiasm, but after the park interview more grudgingly. It seemed rather silly in a grown man to be so amused by the airs of a robin! For some unknown reason the memory of that foolishness had rankled for days.