""This is my kingdom," he answered. "These are the tombs of the kings I have conquered. Behold me, beautiful princess. I am Death!"
"He lifted his visor. All saw his awful face. The proud princess shrieked.
""Come to my arms, my bride," he cried. "I have won you fairly. I am the king who conquers all kings!"
"He clasped her fainting form to his breast and spurred his white horse to the tombs. A tempest of rain broke over the valley and blotted them from sight. Very sadly the old king and courtiers rode home, and never, never again did human eye behold the proud princess. But when those long, white clouds sweep across the sky, the country people in the land where she lived say, "Look you, there is the Wedding Veil of the Proud Princess.""
The weird spell of the tale rested on us for some moments after the Story Girl had finished. We had walked with her in the place of death and grown cold with the horror that chilled the heart of the poor princess. Dan presently broke the spell.
"You see it doesn"t do to be too proud, Felicity," he remarked, giving her a poke. "You"d better not say too much about Peter"s patches."
CHAPTER V. PETER GOES TO CHURCH
There was no Sunday School the next afternoon, as superintendent and teachers wished to attend a communion service at Markdale. The Carlisle service was in the evening, and at sunset we were waiting at Uncle Alec"s front door for Peter and the Story Girl.
None of the grown-ups were going to church. Aunt Olivia had a sick headache and Uncle Roger stayed home with her. Aunt Janet and Uncle Alec had gone to the Markdale service and had not yet returned.
Felicity and Cecily were wearing their new summer muslins for the first time--and were acutely conscious of the fact. Felicity, her pink and white face shadowed by her drooping, forget-me-not-wreathed, leghorn hat, was as beautiful as usual; but Cecily, having tortured her hair with curl papers all night, had a rampant bush of curls all about her head which quite destroyed the sweet, nun-like expression of her little features. Cecily cherished a grudge against fate because she had not been given naturally curly hair as had the other two girls. But she attained the desire of her heart on Sundays at least, and was quite well satisfied. It was impossible to convince her that the satin smooth l.u.s.tre of her week-day tresses was much more becoming to her.
Presently Peter and the Story Girl appeared, and we were all more or less relieved to see that Peter looked quite respectable, despite the indisputable patch on his trousers. His face was rosy, his thick black curls were smoothly combed, and his tie was neatly bowed; but it was his legs which we scrutinized most anxiously. At first glance they seemed well enough; but closer inspection revealed something not altogether customary.
"What is the matter with your stockings, Peter?" asked Dan bluntly.
"Oh, I hadn"t a pair without holes in the legs," answered Peter easily, "because ma hadn"t time to darn them this week. So I put on two pairs.
The holes don"t come in the same places, and you"d never notice them unless you looked right close."
"Have you got a cent for collection?" demanded Felicity.
"I"ve got a Yankee cent. I s"pose it will do, won"t it?"
Felicity shook her head vehemently.
"Oh, no, no. It may be all right to pa.s.s a Yankee cent on a store keeper or an egg peddler, but it would never do for church."
"I"ll have to go without any, then," said Peter. "I haven"t another cent. I only get fifty cents a week and I give it all to ma last night."
But Peter must have a cent. Felicity would have given him one herself--and she was none too lavish of her coppers--rather than have him go without one. Dan, however, lent him one, on the distinct understanding that it was to be repaid the next week.
Uncle Roger wandered by at this moment and, beholding Peter, said,
""Is Saul also among the prophets?" What can have induced you to turn church-goer, Peter, when all Olivia"s gentle persuasions were of no avail? The old, old argument I suppose--"beauty draws us with a single hair.""
Uncle Roger looked quizzically at Felicity. We did not know what his quotations meant, but we understood he thought Peter was going to church because of Felicity. Felicity tossed her head.
"It isn"t my fault that he"s going to church," she said snappishly.
"It"s the Story Girl"s doings."
Uncle Roger sat down on the doorstep, and gave himself over to one of the silent, inward paroxysms of laughter we all found so very aggravating. He shook his big, blond head, shut his eyes, and murmured,
"Not her fault! Oh, Felicity, Felicity, you"ll be the death of your dear Uncle yet if you don"t watch out."
Felicity started off indignantly, and we followed, picking up Sara Ray at the foot of the hill.
The Carlisle church was a very old-fashioned one, with a square, ivy-hung tower. It was shaded by tall elms, and the graveyard surrounded it completely, many of the graves being directly under its windows. We always took the corner path through it, pa.s.sing the King plot where our kindred of four generations slept in a green solitude of wavering light and shadow.
There was Great-grandfather King"s flat tombstone of rough Island sandstone, so overgrown with ivy that we could hardly read its lengthy inscription, recording his whole history in brief, and finishing with eight lines of original verse composed by his widow. I do not think that poetry was Great-grandmother King"s strong point. When Felix read it, on our first Sunday in Carlisle, he remarked dubiously that it LOOKED like poetry but didn"t SOUND like it.
There, too, slept the Emily whose faithful spirit was supposed to haunt the orchard; but Edith who had kissed the poet lay not with her kindred.
She had died in a far, foreign land, and the murmur of an alien sea sounded about her grave.
White marble tablets, ornamented with weeping willow trees, marked where Grandfather and Grandmother King were buried, and a single shaft of red Scotch granite stood between the graves of Aunt Felicity and Uncle Felix. The Story Girl lingered to lay a bunch of wild violets, misty blue and faintly sweet, on her mother"s grave; and then she read aloud the verse on the stone.
""They were lovely and pleasant in their lives and in their death they were not divided.""
The tones of her voice brought out the poignant and immortal beauty and pathos of that wonderful old lament. The girls wiped their eyes; and we boys felt as if we might have done so, too, had n.o.body been looking.
What better epitaph could any one wish than to have it said that he was lovely and pleasant in his life? When I heard the Story Girl read it I made a secret compact with myself that I would try to deserve such an epitaph.
"I wish I had a family plot," said Peter, rather wistfully. "I haven"t ANYTHING you fellows have. The Craigs are just buried anywhere they happen to die."
"I"d like to be buried here when I die," said Felix. "But I hope it won"t be for a good while yet," he added in a livelier tone, as we moved onward to the church.
The interior of the church was as old-fashioned as its exterior. It was furnished with square box pews; the pulpit was a "wine-gla.s.s" one, and was reached by a steep, narrow flight of steps. Uncle Alec"s pew was at the top of the church, quite near the pulpit.
Peter"s appearance did not attract as much attention as we had fondly expected. Indeed, n.o.body seemed to notice him at all. The lamps were not yet lighted and the church was filled with a soft twilight and hush.
Outside, the sky was purple and gold and silvery green, with a delicate tangle of rosy cloud above the elms.
"Isn"t it awful nice and holy in here?" whispered Peter reverently. "I didn"t know church was like this. It"s nice."
Felicity frowned at him, and the Story Girl touched her with her slippered foot to remind him that he must not talk in church. Peter stiffened up and sat at attention during the service. n.o.body could have behaved better. But when the sermon was over and the collection was being taken up, he made the sensation which his entrance had not produced.
Elder Frewen, a tall, pale man, with long, sandy side-whiskers, appeared at the door of our pew with the collection plate. We knew Elder Frewen quite well and liked him; he was Aunt Janet"s cousin and often visited her. The contrast between his week-day jollity and the unearthly solemnity of his countenance on Sundays always struck us as very funny.
It seemed so to strike Peter; for as Peter dropped his cent into the plate he laughed aloud!
Everybody looked at our pew. I have always wondered why Felicity did not die of mortification on the spot. The Story Girl turned white, and Cecily turned red. As for that poor, unlucky Peter, the shame of his countenance was pitiful to behold. He never lifted his head for the remainder of the service; and he followed us down the aisle and across the graveyard like a beaten dog. None of us uttered a word until we reached the road, lying in the white moonshine of the May night. Then Felicity broke the tense silence by remarking to the Story Girl,
"I told you so!"
The Story Girl made no response. Peter sidled up to her.
"I"m awful sorry," he said contritely. "I never meant to laugh. It just happened before I could stop myself. It was this way--"
"Don"t you ever speak to me again," said the Story Girl, in a tone of cold concentrated fury. "Go and be a Methodist, or a Mohammedan, or ANYTHING! I don"t care what you are! You have HUMILIATED me!"
She marched off with Sara Ray, and Peter dropped back to us with a frightened face.
"What is it I"ve done to her?" he whispered. "What does that big word mean?"