Sargent," he read. "Why, it is one of Shakespeare"s plays," he said, in surprise. So this was the story Rosalind was talking about.
On the fly-leaf was some writing in small clear letters. "For Rosalind, with the wish that she may meet the hard things of life as bravely, and find as much happiness by the way, as did her namesake in the Forest of Arden. From her friend, Louis A. Sargent."
"Meet the hard things of life as bravely--" Maurice"s face grew hot. "You wouldn"t have thought there was any good in that." The touch of scorn in Rosalind"s tone stung as he recalled it. He turned the leaves and began to read.
It was a pleasure to look at the large clear type; he soon became interested.
Half an hour later Katherine"s voice broke in upon the Forest of Arden.
"Maurice, Maurice, what are you doing? Mother sent me to find you."
"I am reading. Don"t bother, please," was the reply, in a tone so far removed from melancholy that Katherine, rea.s.sured, obediently retired.
CHAPTER SIXTH.
PUZZLES.
"How weary are my spirits!"
Up to this time life had been a simple and joyous matter to Rosalind. She had known her own small trials and perplexities, but her father or Cousin Louis were always at hand to smooth out tangles and show her how to be merry over difficulties. Now all was different. There were puzzles on every side and no one to turn to.
The house behind the griffins was not exactly a cheerful place. Rosalind found herself stealing about on tiptoe lest she disturb the silence of the s.p.a.cious rooms. She hardly ventured to more than peep into the drawing-room, where Miss Herbert"s liking for twilight effects had full sway. There was a pier table here, supported by griffins, the counterpart in feature of those on the doorstep, which she longed to examine, but the shades were always drawn and the handsome draperies of damask and lace hung in such perfect folds she dared not disturb them.
Where was the charm of her father"s stories of Friendship? Was it because her grandfather was dead that everything had changed? This was why her grandmother wore black dresses and added that heavy veil when she went out. Rosalind once drew a corner of it over her own face and the gloom appalled her.
She ventured to say one day as they drove along a pleasant country road, "Grandmamma, you don"t know how bright the sunshine is," and Mrs.
Whittredge replied, "I do not wish to know, Rosalind; nothing can ever again be bright to me." Yet if she would only look, she must see that it was bright. This was one puzzle.
Aunt Genevieve"s manner was another. It was as if she scorned everything, and sometimes it made Rosalind almost angry.
On the day of her meeting with Maurice, she ate her lunch with a glance every few minutes at her great-uncle Allan on the opposite wall. A very black portrait, it seemed only a meaningless blur till in a certain light the strong face and stern eyes shone out of the surrounding gloom with startling effect. She sometimes wondered rather anxiously if the uncle to whose home-coming she looked forward, could by any possibility be like the person for whom he was named. It was not an agreeable face, yet it drew her gaze with an irresistible attraction. She was convinced that on occasion the heavy brows contracted and the eyes grew even sterner.
In the next panel hung Matilda, his wife, as the ma.s.sive marble in the cemetery said,--a youthful person with side curls and a comfortable smile.
Even with its southern windows the dining room was sombre in its ma.s.sive furnishings of Flemish oak. Very different from the one at home, with its sunshine and flowers, its overflow of books from the study, and the odds and ends of pottery picked up by father and Cousin Louis in their travels.
Rosalind was thinking that the plain little room of the magician was the pleasantest place she knew in Friendship, when Martin entered with something in his hand, announcing in his courtly way, "A book for Miss Rosalind." It seemed to her that Martin, with his grizzled head and dusky face, had the most beautiful manners ever seen.
"For me, Martin?" she exclaimed.
"The young gentleman from next door left it," said Martin.
"I did not know you knew any one next door, Rosalind," Mrs. Whittredge remarked questioningly.
"I am not very well acquainted, grandmamma," Rosalind answered, seeing suddenly in the handsome face a likeness to the dark portrait; "but I talked to Maurice through the hedge this morning. I remember now, I had my book. I must have left it on the gra.s.s."
"I believe Rosalind seldom loses an opportunity to speak to people. Miss Herbert says she is on quite intimate terms with Morgan," remarked Miss Genevieve.
"Father told me about Morgan," Rosalind began apologetically, adding more confidently, "I like to know people."
"Your father over again," Mrs. Whittredge said, smiling. "What is your book, dear?"
""As You Like It." Cousin Louis gave it to me." As she spoke Rosalind caught the glance exchanged by her grandmother and aunt.
"When I was a little girl Cousin Louis told me the story because it is about Rosalind, you know, and ever since I have called it my story, because I like it best of all."
No comment was made on this explanation, and it seemed to her the next time she looked in his direction, that Uncle Allan frowned.
When luncheon was over she went out to the garden seat under the birch, carrying with her an old green speller found in a bookcase upstairs. In the back of it she had discovered the deaf and dumb alphabet, so now she would not have to wait for Maurice to teach her; she could learn it by herself. It did not seem difficult. With the spelling book propped open in one corner of the bench she went carefully over it, and then tried to think of words she was most likely to want to use in talking with Morgan; but this was slower work, and the thought that for some unknown reason her grandmother was displeased with her kept claiming her attention.
When father was displeased with her--and this was not often--he always told her, and they talked it over frankly, but grandmamma and Aunt Genevieve only looked at each other and said nothing. It both puzzled her and hurt her dignity to be treated in this way.
Presently it occurred to her that her grandmother might have been vexed at her carelessness in leaving her book on the gra.s.s. It was careless; father would have said so. Well, she could let grandmamma know she was sorry, and feeling relieved at having found a possible solution of the problem, she closed the spelling book.
Mrs. Whittredge looked up in evident surprise when Rosalind entered the room and announced, "I am sorry I left my book on the gra.s.s, grandmamma."
"What do you mean, my dear?" she asked.
"I thought you didn"t like it because I was careless."
"I suppose it was careless, my pet, but I had not thought of it. But tell me what makes you care so much for that book. It seems to me there are many stories that would be more interesting to a little girl. Suppose you put it away and let me find you something else."
The color deepened in Rosalind"s face. "It is my own, own book," she cried, clasping it to her heart.
"Very well, you need not be tragic about it," Mrs. Whittredge said coldly, turning to her writing.
Again Rosalind knew she had offended, and this time her resentment was aroused. "I don"t like to be spoken to in that way," she told herself, as she walked from the room.
Before she had reached the head of the stairs her grandmother"s voice called her hack. Reluctantly she returned.
Mrs. Whittredge had risen and now came to meet her and put her arm around her, and her voice was soft and full of affection as she asked, "Do you want to go to the cemetery with me this afternoon, pet? Aunt Genevieve has the carriage, and I think a walk will do me good."
The walk along the shady street and through the gra.s.sy lane to the gate at the foot of the hill was as pleasant as a walk could be that summer day.
Rosalind kept sedately by her grandmother"s side, and the face under the drooping hat was grave. Behind them walked Martin with some garden tools and a watering-pot.
The serious eyes brightened, and the lips curved into a smile at sight of Maurice and Katherine playing dominos under the maple. How lovely it must be to have a brother or sister to play with and talk to!
The cemetery was not new to Rosalind, for Mrs. Whittredge on her daily drive usually stopped there, and its winding paths and green slopes, its drooping willows and graceful oaks, and the flowers that bloomed everywhere, around the stately shafts of marble and the low headstones, seemed to her very pleasant. Here, however, her grandmother"s sadness took on a deeper tinge as she moved among the mounds that lay in the shadow of the ma.s.sive granite monument with "Whittredge" in letters of bronze at its base.
As Martin went to work tr.i.m.m.i.n.g the ivy under his mistress"s direction, Rosalind wandered away by herself across the hill-top, pausing now and then to read an inscription and do a sum in subtraction, on the result of which her interest largely depended. "Lily, born 1878, died 1888," stirred her imagination, and she sat down to consider it at length. How old would Lily be now if she had lived? She tried to think how her own name would look on a stone. It was still and peaceful on that sunny hillside; it reminded her of "Sharon"s lovely rose." The idea of a grave here was not unattractive. She was considering it pensively when her eyes fell on a long-stemmed, creamy rose, lying not far from her on the ground. With instant pleasure in its beauty she took it up and held it against her cheek.
Where had it come from? Some one must have dropped it. She stood up and looked around, but there was no one in sight. On the other side of a holly bush, however, a number of just such roses lay on a grave. Rosalind walked over and stooped to read the name on the low headstone. "Robert Ellis Fair," she repeated half aloud as she laid her rose beside the others.
When she lifted her head she met the surprised gaze of a young lady, who came across the gra.s.s with a watering-pot in her hand. She was decidedly pretty to look at, and she smiled pleasantly as she began watering the flowers in an iron vase.
Rosalind felt she must explain, so she said, smiling in her turn, "I found a rose on the gra.s.s, and I thought it must belong here."