They were three very happy people, all of them greatly interested in the progress of scientific investigation."
"And not one of them deserved to be happy," said the Daughter of the House.
"But you must remember, miss, this is a story about realities," said the gardener.
She sighed a little sigh; she knew that where realities are concerned this sort of thing generally happens.
"That is a very good story, John," said the Mistress of the House, rising from her seat; "but it seems to me that while you were talking you sometimes thought of yourself as Jaqui."
"There is something in that, madam," answered the gardener; "it may have been that during the story I sometimes did think that I myself might have been Jaqui."
"Mamma," said the Daughter of the House, as the two walked out of the garden, "don"t you think that John Gayther is very intelligent?"
"I have always thought him remarkably intelligent," her mother replied.
"I have noticed that gardeners generally are a thoughtful, intelligent race of men."
"I don"t think it is so much the garden as because he has travelled so much," said the young lady, "and I have a strange feeling that he has a story of his own in the past. I wonder if he will ever tell it to me."
"If he has such a story," said the elder lady, "he will never tell it to you."
THIS STORY IS TOLD BY
THE MISTRESS OF THE HOUSE
AND IS CALLED
THE COT AND THE RILL
IV
THE COT AND THE RILL
A week or so later the Daughter of the House came skipping down one of the broad paths. John Gayther stood still and looked at her, glad to see her coming, as he always was, no matter on what errand she came.
"John," she cried, before she reached him, "you are to stop work!" Then, as she came up to him, she continued: "Yes; there is to be story-telling this morning. We have told papa about it, and he is coming to what he calls the story-telling place with us, and mamma feels inspired to tell the story. So you may take that troubled look out of your face. Please put the big easy garden-chair in the shade of the summer-house. Papa does so like to be comfortable. And the view from there is so fine, you know--a beautiful land view. Papa must be tired of sea views and sh.o.r.e views, and here he will enjoy the mountains!"
Having delivered all this very volubly, the Daughter of the House skipped away. And as John Gayther busied himself in making the "story-telling place" attractive he felt glad that there were others besides himself who liked to tell stories. There was such a thing as overworking a mine. He was that rare thing, a story-teller who is also a good listener. Moreover, John felt very diffident about telling one of his stories before the Master of the House, who was a man p.r.o.ne to speak his mind. Not that John disliked the Master of the House. Far from it.
He, with the family, was pleased when the Master of the House returned from a long cruise and proceeded immediately to make himself very much at home. For the Master of the House was a captain in the navy, and as hearty, bluff, and good-natured as a captain should be.
The captain had been at home some days, and had been in the garden several times, and now John Gayther was filled with admiration as he saw this fine, st.u.r.dy figure, clad all in white, approach the summer-house.
With an air of supreme content this figure partly stretched itself in the big garden-chair, while the two ladies seated themselves on the bench. John Gayther stood respectfully until the Master of the House motioned to him to sit on his stool.
"Good morning, John," he cried heartily. "We"ve piped all hands to yarns. I have heard what you can do in this line, and we shall call upon you before long. This time you are privileged to listen. You can let somebody else cut your asparagus and dig your potatoes this morning."
"Papa," said his daughter, "it is too late for asparagus and too early for potatoes. I am afraid you forget about these things when you are at sea."
"Not at all," said her father. "On shipboard we cut our asparagus at any time of the year. The steward does it with a big knife, which he jabs through the covers of the tin cans. As for potatoes, they are always with us."
The Mistress of the House was now prepared to tell her story.
"I am going to tell my story in the first person," she began.
"There is no better person," interrupted the Master of the House.
"I do not intend to describe my hero who is to tell the story,"
continued his wife. "I will only say that he is moderately young and moderately handsome. Various other things about him you will find out as the story goes on. Now, then, he begins thus: I was driving my wife in a buggy in a mountainous region, and when we reached the top of a little rise in the road, Anita put her hand on my arm. "Stop," she said; "look down there! That is what I like! It is a cot and a rill. You see that cot--not much of a house, to be sure, but it would do. And there, just near enough for the water to tumble over rocks and gurgle over stones to soothe one to sleep on summer nights, is the rill--not much of a rill, perhaps, but I think it could be arranged with a shovel. And then, all the rest is enchanting. I had been looking at it for some time before I spoke. There is a smooth meadow stretching away to a forest, and behind that there are hills, and in the distance you can just see the mountains. Now this is the place where I should like to live. Isn"t there any way of making those horses stand still for a minute?"
"I tried my persuasive powers on the animals, and succeeded moderately.
"To live?" I asked. "And for how long?"
""Until about the 3d of August," she replied. "That will be about three weeks."
""You mean," I said in surprise, "something like this."
""I do not," answered Anita. "I mean this very spot. To find something like it would require months. What I want, as I have told you over and over again, is a real cot with a real rill, to which we can go now and live for a little while that unsophisticated life for which my soul is longing."
"Anita and I were taking a summer outing together, and were trying to get into free nature, away from people we knew, and had been several days at a mountain hotel, and were driving about the country. My black cobs now declined to stand any longer.
""Drive them down into the valley. There must be a road to that house,"
said Anita.
"I drove on for a short distance, and soon came to a wagon-track which descended to the little house. "Anita," said I, "I cannot go down that road; it is too rough and rocky, and we should break something. But why do you want to go down there, anyhow? You are not in earnest about living in such a place as that?"
""But I am in earnest," she answered sweetly but decisively. "I want to stay in this region and explore it. We both of us hate hotels, and I could be very happy in a cot like that (a little arranged, perhaps) until the 3d of August, when we have to go North. But I won"t ask you to go down that road, of course. Suppose we come again to-morrow with some quieter horses."
""I am sorry," said I, "but I cannot do that. Mr. Baxter comes to-morrow. You know it was planned that he should always come Tuesdays."
"She sighed. "I suppose everything must give way to business," she said, "and I shall have to wait until Wednesday. But one thing must certainly be agreed upon: when we get to that cot there must be no more Mr. Baxter; you can certainly plan for that, can"t you?"
"I made no immediate reply, because I was busy turning the horses in rather an awkward place; but when we were on the smooth highway and were trotting gayly back to the hotel, I discussed the matter more fully with Anita, and I found that what she had been talking about was not a mere fancy. Before coming to this picturesque mountain region she had set her heart upon some sort of camping out in the midst of real nature, and this cot-and-rill business seemed to suit her exactly.
""I want to go there and live," she said; "but I do not mean any Marie Antoinette business, with milk-pails decked with ribbons, and dainty little straw hats. I want to live in a cot like a cotter--that is, for us to live like two cotters. As for myself, I need it; my moral and physical natures demand it. I must have a change, an absolute change, and this is just what I want. I would shut out entirely the world I live in, and it is only in a real and true cot that this can be done as I want to do it."
"She talked a great deal more on the same subject, and then I told her that if it suited her it suited me, and that on the day after to-morrow we would drive out again and examine the cot. For the rest of the day and the greater part of the evening Anita talked of nothing but her projected life in the valley; and before I went to sleep I was quite as much in love with it as she was. The next day it rained, but Mr. Baxter came all the same; weather never interfered with him."
"Who in the name of common sense is Mr. Baxter?" asked the Master of the House. "I like to know who people are when I am being told what they do."
"I had hoped," said the Mistress of the House, "that I should be able to tell my story so you would find out for yourselves all about the characters, just as in real life if you see a man working in a garden you know he is a gardener."
"But he may not be," said her husband; "he may be a coachman pulling carrots for his horses."
"But, as you wish it," continued the Mistress of the House, "I do not mind telling you that Mr. Baxter was my hero"s right-hand man and business manager. And now he will go on: