The next day I wrote a letter to Jean asking her to get me several boxes of the latest style gold-edged note paper with my monogram embossed thereon, and insisted that she have the stationer hurry the order through. "I want the very newest and most exquisite style you can find," I wrote her, "for I am about to begin a most particular correspondence and if you will take pity upon my loneliness enough to run down any time within the next few weeks I"ll tell you the name of my distant correspondent. Yet, for fear you will not be able to get here before your curiosity consumes you, I"ll let you into the secret enough to satisfy you that the gentleman is a "medicine man" and he is now wandering on a foreign strand. And if you should hear that I have done such an unladylike thing as to _send_ for him, you will know in your heart that it is not entirely on account of father"s rheumatism and Mammy Lou"s still threatening right side.
"But come, dear Jean, if you love me, for I am very lonesome, with absolutely n.o.body but Neva and her mother to divert my mind."
Poor little Neva! I must not wind up this chapter without some little word about her, for there is going to be only one more chapter after this, and there will be no room for Neva in that. This final word may be written next week--it may not be written until a whole year has pa.s.sed, but whenever it is it will be the last, for I know that if Mammy Lou"s definition of the period is correct it will wind up the age of Eve.
But Neva! We left her a lovelorn la.s.s grieving over the perfidies of Hiram, the fickle. We find her again a college girl, breathing academic atmosphere from the ta.s.sel of her mortar-board down to the rubber heel of her "gym" shoes. She cares for nothing but school, and the sororities therein. She knows all the places up in the city where one is most likely to come across the college boys one desires most to see; and the cla.s.s of ices that take the longest time to consume while one is sitting watching these boys pa.s.s by. She sometimes does not know the name of a certain desirable young man, but she always knows the name of his high-sounding Greek letter brotherhood.
"She don"t talk about nothing but "frats" and "spats" and things like that," her mother one time complained after a brief visit from Neva.
"And she calls some of her mates by the curiousest names I ever heard.
There"s one she likes a good deal that she says is a _new Phi Chi_; and another one that she has to look to some because she"s a "_old Tau!_""
"The stage has to be pa.s.sed through," mother said to Mrs. Sullivan comfortingly, "for it"s as certain and as harmless as chicken-pox."
But Mammy Lou takes a much more serious view of Neva"s collegiate career and high-flown talk.
"Education ain"t no good for girls," she often declares emphatically, "for it spoils their powers of emmanuel labor. You can just as sh.o.r.e count on a educated girl makin" a lazy wife as you can count on damp weather makin" a baby"s hair curl an" a ol" woman"s feet hurt!"
CHAPTER XVII
MAY DAY
""For lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone; the flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land.""
I quoted this bit of cla.s.sic loveliness softly as I looked out this morning very early from my bedroom window and feasted upon the scene of sweet spring beauty which was everywhere spread before my eyes. Yet the cause of the verse coming to my mind at the moment was due much more to the feeling in my heart than to the scenery all about me, although each seemed a reflection of the other.
"How many years ago to-day was it that we looked down into the old well in the lot and tried to see our future husband"s face?" Jean inquired with a wistful little smile as she came over to the window and dropped her chin on my shoulder, peering out upon the fresh green landscape. One of her arms slipped affectionately around me, while with the other hand she toyed with the fresh white curtain at the window. It was upon this hand that there gleamed the ring which Guilford had at last persuaded her to let him place there.
"More years than we are proud to own, considering that we are still spinsters," I answered lightly and a little at random, for my thoughts were wandering, though I am glad to state that they did not have such a long journey to travel now as formerly. Each of my foreign letters lately has borne a postmark a little nearer home.
"I"m not going to be a spinster long, thank you," she responded quickly, holding her left hand close to her face so that she could catch some of the myriads of tiny rainbows in her eyes. "And I don"t any longer need to look down into an old well upon this magic day to catch a glimpse of my future husband"s face."
"Still--let"s do it again to-day!"
"All right," she agreed readily, smiling at the enthusiasm of my eyes.
"I"m in for anything that will take us out into this glorious sunshine."
Throughout the course of the morning we managed to dig out from ancient trunks of debris two white sunbonnets which Mammy Lou graciously freshened for us, plying her "raw starch" and sound advice with equal vigor during the task. We accepted the bonnets and admonitions gratefully, and donning short skirts and low-collared blouses we prepared for a tramp through the woods before the hour for the phenomenon in the well.
We had skirted around back of the orchard fence and had found an ideal resting-place under a clump of softly green sweet-gum trees, where we might sit in the delicate shade and read the magazines we had brought with us, when there was the sharp, piercing whistle of the eleven o"clock train as it sped close by our secluded little nook and drew up pantingly a few moments afterward at the village station.
"Doesn"t that whistle sound _close_ on these clear, still mornings?"
Jean remarked with a little start, as she looked up from her magazine and watched the column of smoke mount into the sunny, blue sky.
"Close, and decidedly cheerful, I always think," I answered, allowing my eyes also to wander after the smoke up into the dizzy heights. "You city people can"t realize what the coming of the trains mean to us who are tucked away in the little country towns. Our first thought always is, "Is there a letter on that train for me?" Or, rather, that is my first thought always. It"s a pity we"re dressed this way or we might walk down to the post-office and see. The whistle sounded so unusually musical this morning that there may be a very important one. The last one I had was from Liverpool--there ought to be one very soon from New York!"
"But the old well!" Jean cried in sudden alarm, for she is a sadly sentimental creature and would not have missed the little superst.i.tious performance this morning for several letters--bearing _my_ name and address. "We are not going to give that up now."
"Well, we would better be moving upon the field of operation then," I suggested, closing my book and starting to my feet. "That train wanders into the village at any hour which suits it best, so there"s no telling just what time of the beautiful May morning it is. Let"s hurry on down to the lot so that we shall be on the spot when the first twelve o"clock whistle blows."
We hurried back in the direction of home, taking a short cut which led us through one end of the orchard and soon landed us beside the clump of ancient lilac bushes which form a kind of hedge along the barbed wire fence of the disused horse lot. In the center of this is the well, the uncovered frame top of which affords an excellent opportunity for this old-fashioned May-day indulgence.
We rested a bit in the shade of the tall lilac hedge, but the noon-day whistles soon sounded and we scampered over to the well and laughingly peered in. There was nothing to be seen in its gloomy depths, but the day was so beautiful and we were so absurdly lighthearted over the divine order of all things in nature that we refrained from making any sarcastic remarks on our grown-up sophistication.
"I don"t see Guilford"s face down there, but I"m glad we came out to look for it; for the walk has made me ravenously hungry," Jean said, as we straightened up and pushed our white bonnets back from over our eyes.
"Then let"s hurry on to the house, for I am starving, too--and I know that there are delicious things for dinner. Mammy Lou made me promise to get back in time to make the salad. There are tomatoes for it and the loveliest young lettuce you ever saw, with tiny, slender onions--not a bit bigger than my little finger. I can"t bear them when they grow bigger--"
"Ann, hush! Let"s don"t waste time talking."
We hurried up through the side yard, and as we approached the house there were signs of an unwonted stirring in the vicinity of the dining-room and kitchen. My spirits fell at the sight and I intentionally slackened my steps.
"Unexpected company to dinner," I announced dismally to Jean, as I saw mother flutter excitedly across the back porch, followed by Dilsey bearing a big bowl of strawberries to set in the refrigerator. Just then mother caught sight of us coming leisurely up the walk and she made a spasmodic motion for us to hurry.
"Go on up-stairs and dress," she said in a stagy voice when we had come within earshot. "Dress _beautifully_."
"Why, what on earth--" I started to ask, when I saw the transfigured face of Mammy Lou at the kitchen door. "Some august company to dinner?"
""Tain"t dinner! It"s luncheon," she replied grandly, "in _courses_.
And the chil"ren o" Israel lookin" into Canaan and seein" the bunch o"
grapes that it took two men to carry ain"t saw nothin" compared with what I"ve saw this day."
"Good gracious! Who _is_ here?" I demanded, much more impressed by her calling the meal "luncheon" than by the weightiness of her Biblical allusion.
"Is there but _one_ man on earth I"d turn the name o" my vittles up-side-down"ards for?" she questioned meaningly, gazing upon me with a beatific glow. "--And he"s the grandest that the Lord ever made and put on earth to be pestered with poll-taxes."
"_Alfred!_" I cried, a sudden burst of understanding and joy sweeping over me; and leaving me very weak-feeling and happy. "Alfred is coming!"
"Not coming, but already here," I heard his voice saying close behind me. His voice! It seemed a thousand years since I heard it last; and I knew in that moment that I could listen to it for a thousand years without ever once growing tired.--But as I turned and faced the big, bearded man coming through the hall doorway, the quick color flew to my face and I felt suddenly very small and insignificant. For it seemed in that instant that Alfred had grown into a giant, a great, bearded giant, over seas--and I have always had such an admiration for giants.
"Well, have I stayed away long enough?" he demanded, as he came on the porch and took my hand. Mother and Jean had fled, but Mammy Lou steadfastly held her ground. "Are you glad to see me, Ann?"
"Yes--yes," I stammered in a mighty confusion.
"How glad? How glad, _darling_?" His brown eyes were deep and grave.--But the afternoon wore away and the spring twilight had fallen before I answered that question.