  It was quite evident that the picturesque log cabin which nestled against the side of the mountain on a wide, overhanging ledge was indeed their own. The road curved about twenty feet below it, and crude steps had been hewn out of the rocks. The small boy tumbled out of the stage almost before it came to a standstill. “Oh, Julie, look-it, will you! We’ve got a real stairway leading right up to our front door. I’ll beat you to the cabin.” Julie, equally excited, scurried up after her brother and reached the top almost as soon as he did. Then they turned and shouted joyfully to the two below them: “Jane! Dan! Look at us! We’re top of the world.” “Oh, boy!” Gerald capered about, unable to stand still. “I’m glad I came. I bet you, Julie, we’ll have a million adventures, maybe more.” But Dan was calling and so they scampered back down the rocky flight of stairs. The older lad laughed at their enthusiasm. “I know just how you feel,” he told them. “If I weren’t afraid of shocking your sedate sister here, I believe I would—well—I don’t know just what I would do.” “Stand on your head,” Gerald prompted. “Do it, Dan. I’ll dare you.” But the older boy was needed just then to tell the surly driver where the trunks were to be put. “Let me help you, Mr. Wallace.” Dan made an attempt to take one end of a trunk, but the husky man, with the unchangeable countenance, merely grunted his dissent, and swinging a trunk up on his broad shoulders, he began the ascent of the steep stone stairs quite as though it were not a herculean task. Dan followed. “Just leave them on the porch until we get our bearings,” he directed. “We can move them in after we have unpacked.” Then, from the loose change that he had in his pocket, he paid the man. A few moments later the stage rumbled on its way up the road, which circled the mountain and then descended to a hamlet in the valley on the other side. As soon as the four young Abbotts were alone, Dan, slipping an arm about Jane, exclaimed: “Think of it, sister! Isn’t it almost beyond comprehension that we have such magnificence right in our front door-yard.” He took a long breath. The pine trees, though not large, were spicily fragrant. Then, whirling toward her, he caught both of her hands, and there were actually tears in his eyes as he said, “Jane, I’m going to live! I know that I am!” Selfish as the girl was, she could not but respond to her brother’s enthusiasm. The younger children had raced away on a tour of discovery. Their excited voices were heard exclaiming about something they had discovered beyond the cabin. Clear and high Gerry’s voice rang out: “Dan, Jane, come quick! We’ve found Roaring Creek, and it isn’t making a terrible lot of noise at all.” But the older boy had noted the extreme weariness on his sister’s face. He well knew that she had sacrificed herself to come to a country which did not appeal to her; where she had to meet people whom she considered far beneath her, and she had done it all to help him get well. Instantly the boy decided that he would make Jane’s comfort his first care, that her stay with him might be as pleasant as possible, and so he called back: “After a time, Gerald. Come on; I’m going to unlock the door. Don’t you want to see what’s on the inside of our cabin?” “Oh, boy, don’t I, though!” Gerry, closely followed by Julie, raced back to the wide front porch, which was made of logs. Dan took from his satchel a very large key and holding it up, he called merrily, “The key to health and happiness.” “You left out something,” Gerry prompted. “It’s health, wealth and happiness. Maybe we’ll find that lost mine, who knows?” Dan merely laughed at that. “Now,” he said, as he put the key in the lock, “what do you suppose we’ll find on the other side of this door?” What they saw delighted the hearts of three of the young people. A large log cabin room with a long window on either side of the door. At the back was a crude fireplace made of rocks. There was no window on that side of the room, as a wall of the mountain came so close to the cabin that there would have been no view. The rafters were logs with the bark still on, and the furniture had been made of saplings. There were leather cushions in the chairs, but the thing that made Gerald caper about, mad with joy, was a bearskin on one of the walls. “Oh, look-it, will you, Dan? What kind of a bear is it? Do you think it is a grizzly, and do you s’pose it’s that one Dad said came right down here to our ledge? Do you, Dan?” The older boy looked at the rather small bearskin and shook his head. “No, it isn’t a grizzly,” he said. “I think it is the skin of a black bear. But here is another on the floor in front of the fireplace. That’s Dad’s bear, I remember now. This old fellow was the grizzly who was unfortunate enough to come down here to try to help himself to Dad’s supplies.” Jane had dropped wearily into a big chair that really was comfortable with its leather-covered cushions, and Dan, noting how tired she was, exclaimed: “Jane, I’ll unlock the packing trunk and get out some of the bedding, and if you wish, you may lie down for a while. Dad said there were two good beds here and several cots.” Gerald and Julie had darted through a door at one side and, reappearing, they beckoned to their big brother. “We’ve found one of ’em,” the younger lad announced. “It’s in a dandee room! I bet you Jane will choose it for hers.” Then Julie chimed in with: “Jane, please come and see it.” The older girl, who was feeling terribly sorry for herself, rose languidly and went with the small sister. The boys followed. “Why, what a nice room this is!” Dan, truly pleased, remarked. Then anxiously, and in his voice there was a note that was almost imploring, he asked: “Jane, dear, don’t you think you can be comfortable in here?” The girl’s heart was touched by the tone more than the words, and she turned away that she might not show how near, how very near, she had been to crying out her unhappiness. It was hardship to her to be in a log cabin where there were none of the luxuries and conveniences to which she had been used. She smiled at her brother, but he saw her lips tremble. He was tempted to tell her to go back to civilization, since it was all going to be so hard for her, but something prompted him to wait one week. Inwardly he resolved: “If Jane is not happy here by one week from today, I am going to insist that she return to Newport and to the friend Merry for whom she cares so much.” But Jane, too, had been making a resolve, and so when she spoke her voice sounded more cheerful. “It is a nice room,” she said. “That wide window has a wonderful view of the mountains and the valley.” It was hard to keep from adding, “If anyone cares for such a view, which I do not.” But instead she looked up at the rafters. “What are those great bundles that are hanging up there?” she inquired. Dan laughed. “Why, those bundles, Dad said, contain the mattress and bedding which he and mother stored away. They are wrapped in canvas and so he expected that we would find them in good condition.” “But how are we to get them?” Julie wanted to know. Gerald’s quick eyes found the answer to that. “Look-it!” he cried, pointing. “There’s a ladder nailed right against the back wall. I’ll skin up that in two jiffs. Give me your knife, Dan. I’ll cut the ropes.” The boy was soon sliding along a rafter. “Out of the way down below there!” he shouted the warning. “Here they come!” There was a soft thud, followed by another as the two great bundles fell to the floor. An excellent mattress was in one of them and clean warm blankets in the other. “Now, I’ll get the sheets from the packing trunk and a pillow case, and in less than no time at all we’ll have a fine bed in our lady’s chamber.” Dan led Jane to another large comfortable though rustic chair as he said: “The rest of us are going to pretend that you are a princess today and we are going to wait upon you. By tomorrow, when you have had a long sleep, perhaps you will want to be a mountain girl.” Again there was the yearning note in his voice. How he hoped that Jane would want to stay, but a week would tell. Jane was quite willing to pretend that she was a princess and be waited upon, and so half an hour later, when the bed in her room was made, she consented to lie down and try to make up the many hours of sleep that she had lost on the train. Hardly had her head touched the pillow before she was sound asleep. Two of her windows, that swung inward, were wide open and a soft mountain breeze wafted to her the scent of the pines. Even though she was not conscious of it, the peace of the mountains was quieting her restless soul. She had supposed that, as soon as she were alone, she would sob out her unhappiness, but her weariness had been too great, and not a tear had been shed. Julie reported that Jane had gone right to sleep and Dan’s face brightened. Surely his sister-pal would feel better when she awakened and how could she help loving it all, so high up on their wonderful mountain. The younger children had gone on another trip of exploration, and soon burst back into the big living-room with the information that on the other side of the cabin there were two smaller bedrooms and a real kitchen. Dan held up a warning hand and framed the word “quiet” with his lips, and so the excited children took his hands and dragged him from the deep easy chair where he had sought to rest for a moment and showed him what lay behind the two doors on the other side of the cabin. “Aren’t these little bedrooms the cunningest?” Julie whispered. “See the front one has a bed in it like Jane’s and the other has the cot. But there are three of us, so what shall we do?” Julie’s brown eyes were suddenly serious and inquiring. “That’s easy!” Dan told her. “Dad said there were several cots. See, there they are, hanging up on the rafters. I shall take one of those and put it out on the wide front porch. That’s where I want to sleep. I don’t want to be shut in by walls. And Julie may have this pretty front room with the bed and Gerald the other. Now, let’s get them made up, just as quietly as we can. Then we will unpack the supplies that you got from the store, Julie, and prepare a noon meal.” The cots were untied from the rafters and one was placed on the porch in the position chosen by Dan, then the bedding was put on all of them and it was 11 o’clock and the sun was riding hot and high above the mountain when Julie, suddenly becoming demure, announced that she wanted Dan to go to sleep also, and that she and Gerald would get the lunch. The older boy did not require much urging and when he saw the eager light in the eyes of the little girl, who had in the beginning supposed that she alone was to be the one to take care of him, he decided to do as she wished. Julie had had six months’ training with her grandmother, who believed that a girl could not begin too young to learn how to cook, and she had often boasted that she had a very apt pupil. He soon heard the children whispering and laughing happily at the back of the cabin, then a door was closed softly and the lad heard only the soughing in the pine trees close to the porch and the humming of the winged insects far and near. Then he, too, fell into a much needed slumber. |
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