Chapter 14

"Seventeen plates! You and I are to be waiters, Marjorie," said Morris.

"I'll be a waiter, too," said Hollis. "That will be best fun of all. I'm glad you didn't hire anybody, Marjorie."

"I wouldn't; I wanted to be primitive and do it all ourselves; I knew Morris would be grand help, but I was not so sure of you."

"Are you sure of me, now?" he laughed, like the old Hollis who used to go to school.

After that Marjorie would not have been surprised if he had called her "Mousie."

"Morris, what do you want to be a sailor for?" inquired Hollis, arranging the white rose in his button-hole anew.

"To sail," answered Morris seriously. "What do you want to be a salesman for?"

"To sell," said Hollis, as seriously, "Marjorie, what do you want to be yourself for?"

"To help you to be yourself," she answered promptly, and flew to the front door where there was a sound of shouting and laughter. They were all there, every one of the little home-made company; and the waiters ushered them into the kitchen, where the feast was spread, with great ceremony.

If Linnet had not been somebody's wife she would have danced around and clapped her hands with delight; as it was she nearly forgot her dignity, and exclaimed with surprise and pleasure sufficient to satisfy those who were in the secret of the feast.

Linnet was in her gray travelling suit, but the dash of crimson this time was in both cheeks; there was a haziness in her eyes that subdued the brightness of her face and touched them all. The bridegroom was handsome and proud, his own merry self, not a trifle abashed before them all on his wedding day, everything that he said seemed to be thought worth laughing at, and there was not a shadow on any face, except the flitting of a shadow ever and anon across Morris Kemlo's blue eyes.

The feast was ended, prayer offered by the pastor and the new home dedicated to him who is the Father in every home where his children dwell, and then kisses and congratulations and thanks mingled with the tears that the mothers must need shed out of their joy and natural regret. The mothers were both exultantly proud and sure that _her_ child would not be the one to make the other unhappy. The carriages rolled away, Will and Linnet to take the train to Portland, for if the wind were fair the _Linnet_ would sail the next day for New York and thence to Genoa. Linnet had promised to bring Marjorie some of the plastering of the chamber in which Christopher Columbus was born, and if they went down to Naples she would surely climb Mt. Vesuvius and bring her a branch of mulberry.

The mothers remained to wash the dishes and pack things away, to lock up the house, and brush the last flake of dust from any of Linnet's new possessions; Captain Rheid called to Hollis and asked him to walk over the farm with him and see where everything was planted. Hollis was to remain over night, but Morris was to take a late train to join the _Linnet's_ crew, it being his first voyage as second mate.

The mothers took off their kitchen aprons, washed their hands at Linnet's new sink, and gave Morris the key of the front door to hang up in an out-of-the-way corner of the wood shed.

"It may better be here," said Mrs. Rheid, "and then any of us can get in at any time to see how things are without troubling anybody to find the key. The captain will see that every door and window is safe and as we have the silver I don't believe anybody will think of troubling the house."

"Oh, dear no," replied Mrs. West. "I always leave my clothes out on the line and we never think of locking a door at night."

"Our kitchen windows look over this way and I shall always be looking over. Now come home with me and see that quilt I haven't got finished yet for them. I told your husband to come to our house for you, for you would surely be there. I suppose Marjorie and Morris will walk back; we wouldn't have minded it, either, on our eighteenth birthday."

"Come, Marjorie, come see where I hang the key," said Morris.

Marjorie followed him down the kitchen steps, across the shed to a corner at the farther end; he found a nail and slipped it on and then asked her to reach it.

Even standing on tip toe her upstretched hand could not touch it.

"See how I put the key of my heart out of your reach," he said, seriously.

"And see how I stretch after it," she returned, demurely.

"I will come with you and reach it for you."

"How can you when you are demolishing plaster in Christopher Columbus' house or falling into the crater of Mt. Vesuvius? I may want to come here that very day."

"True; I will put it lower for you. Shall I put it under this stone so that you will have to stoop for it?"

"Mrs. Rheid said hang it over the window, that has been its place for generations. They lived here when they were first married, before they built their own house; the house doesn't look like it, does it? It is all made over new. I am glad he gave it to Will."

"He can build a house for Hollis," said he, watching her as he spoke.

"Let me see you put the key there," she returned, unconcernedly.

He hung the key on the nail over the small window and inquired if it were done to her satisfaction.

"Yes," she said. "I wonder how Linnet feels about going away from us all so far."

"She is with her husband," answered Morris. "Aren't you woman enough to understand that?"

"Possibly I am as much of a woman as you are."

"You are years ahead of me; a girl at eighteen is a woman; but a boy at eighteen is a boy. Will you tell me something out here among the wood? This wood pile that the old captain sawed and split ten years ago shall be our witness. Why do you suppose he gets up in winter before daylight and splits wood--when he has a pile that was piled up twenty years ago?"

"That is a question worthy the time and place and the wood pile shall be our witness."

"Oh, that isn't the question," he returned with some embarrassment, stooping to pick up a chip and toss it from him as he lifted himself. "Marjorie, _do_ you like Hollis better than you like me?"

"You are only a boy, you know," she answered, roguishly.

"I know it; but do you like me better than Hollis?"

His eyes were on the chips at his feet, Marjorie's serious eyes were upon him.

"It doesn't matter; suppose I don't know; as the question never occurred to me before I shall have to consider."

"Marjorie, you are cruel," he exclaimed raising his eyes with a flash in them; he was "only a boy" but his lips were as white as a man's would have been.

"I am sorry; I didn't know you were in such earnest," she said, penitently. "I like Hollis, of course, I cannot remember when I did not like him, but I am not acquainted with him."

"Are you acquainted with me?" he asked in a tone that held a shade of relief.

"Oh, you!" she laughed lightly, "I know what you think before you can speak your thought."

"Then you know what I am thinking now."

"Not all of it," she returned, but she colored, notwithstanding, and stepped backward toward the kitchen.

"Marjorie," he caught her hand and held it, "I am going away and I want to tell you something. I am going far away this time, and I must tell you. Do you remember the day I came? You were such a little thing, you stood at the kitchen sink washing dishes, with your sleeves rolled back and a big apron up to your neck, and you stopped in your work and looked at me and your eyes were so soft and sorry. And I have loved you better than anybody every day since. Every day I have thought: 'I will study like Marjorie. I will be good like Marjorie. I will help everybody like Marjorie.'"

She looked up into his eyes, her own filled with tears.

"I am so glad I have helped you so."

"And will you help me further by saying that you like me better than Hollis."

"Oh, I do, you know I do," she cried, impulsively. "I am not acquainted with him, and I know every thought you think."

"Now I am satisfied," he cried, exultantly, taking both her hands in his and kissing her lips. "I am not afraid to go away now."

"Marjorie,"--the kitchen door was opened suddenly,--"I'm going to take your mother home with me. Is the key in the right place."

"Everything is all right, Mrs. Rheid," replied Morris. "You bolt that door and we will go out this way."

The door was closed as suddenly and the boy and girl stood silent, looking at each other.

"Your Morris Kemlo is a fine young man," observed Mrs. Rheid as she pushed the bolt into its place.

"He is a heartease to his mother," replied Mrs. West, who was sometimes poetical.

"Does Marjorie like him pretty well?"

"Why, yes, we all do. He is like our own flesh and blood. But why did you ask?"

"Oh, nothing. I just thought of it."

"I thought you meant something, but you couldn't when you know how Hollis has been writing to her these four years."

"Oh!" ejaculated Hollis' mother.

She did not make plans for her children as the other mother did.

The two old ladies crossed the field toward the substantial white farmhouse that overlooked the little cottage, and the children, whose birthday it was, walked hand in hand through the yard to the footpath along the road.

"Must you keep on writing to Hollis?" he asked.

"I suppose so. Why not? It is my turn to write now."

"That's all nonsense."

"What is? Writing in one's turn?"

"I don't see why you need write at all."

"Don't you remember I promised before you came?"

"But I've come now," he replied in a tone intended to be very convincing.

"His mother would miss it, if I didn't write; she thinks she can't write letters. And I like his letters," she added frankly.

"I suppose you do. I suppose you like them better than mine," with an assertion hardly a question in his voice.

"They are so different. His life is so different from yours. But he is shy, as shy as a girl, and does not tell me all the things you do. Your letters are more interesting, but _he_ is more interesting--as a study. You are a lesson that I have learned, but I have scarcely begun to learn him."

"That is very cold blooded when you are talking about human beings."

"My brain was talking then."

"Suppose you let your heart speak."

"My heart hasn't anything to say; it is not developed yet."

"I don't believe it," he answered angrily.

"Then you must find it out for yourself. Morris, I don't want to be _in love_ with anybody, if that's what you mean. I love you dearly, but I am not in love with you or with anybody."

"You don't know the difference," he said quickly.

"How do you know the difference? Did you learn it before I was born?"

"I love my mother, but I am in love with you; that's the difference."

"Then I don't know the difference--and I do. I love my dear father and Mr. Holmes and you,--not all alike, but I need you all at different times--"

"And Hollis," he persisted.

"I do not know him," she insisted. "I have nothing to say about that. Morris, I want to go with Miss Prudence and study; I don't want to be a housekeeper and have a husband, like Linnet! I have so much to learn; I am eager for everything. You see you _are_ older than I am."

"Yes," he said, disappointedly, "you are only a little girl yet. Or you are growing up to be a Woman's Rights Woman, and to think a 'career' is better than a home and a man who is no better than other men to love you and protect you and provide for you."

"You know that is not true," she answered quietly; "but I have been looking forward so long to going to school."

"And living with Miss Prudence and becoming like her!"

"Don't you want me to be like her?"

"No," he burst out. "I want you to be like Linnet, and to think that little house and house-keeping, and a good husband, good enough for you. What is the good of studying if it doesn't make you more a perfect woman? What is the good of anything a girl does if it doesn't help her to be a woman?"

"Miss Prudence is a perfect woman."

Marjorie's tone was quiet and reasonable, but there was a fire in her eyes that shone only when she was angry.

"She would be more perfect if she stayed at home in Maple Street and made a home for somebody than she is now, going hither and thither finding people to be kind to and to help. She is too restless and she is not satisfied. Look at Linnet; she is happier to-day with her husband that reads only the newspapers, the nautical books, and his Bible, than Miss Prudence with all her lectures and concerts and buying books and knowing literary people! She couldn't make a Miss Prudence out of Linnet, but she will make a Miss Prudence twice over out of you."

"Linnet is happy because she loves Will, and she doesn't care for books and people, as we do; but we haven't any Will, poor Miss Prudence and poor Marjorie, we have to substitute people and books."

"You might have, both of you!" he went on, excitedly; "but you want something better, both of you,--_higher_, I suppose you think! There's Mr. Holmes eating his heart out with being only a friend to Miss Prudence, and you want me to go poking along and spoiling my life as he does, because you like books and study better!"

Marjorie laughed; the fire in Morris' blue eyes was something to see, and the tears in his voice would have overcome her had she not laughed instead. And he was going far away, too.

"Morris, I didn't know you were quite such a volcano. I don't believe Mr. Holmes stays here and _pokes_ because of Miss Prudence. I know he is melancholy, sometimes, but he writes so much and thinks so much he can't be light-hearted like young things like us. And who does as much good as Miss Prudence? Isn't she another mother to Linnet and me? And if she doesn't find somebody to love as Linnet does Will, I don't see how she can help it."

"It isn't in her heart or she would have found somebody; it is what is in peoples' hearts that makes the difference! But when they keep the brain at work and forget they have any heart, as you two do--"

"It isn't Miss Prudence's brain that does her beautiful work. You ought to read some of the letters that she lets me read, and then you would see how much heart she has!"

"And you want to be just like her," he sighed, but the sigh was almost a groan.

Certainly, in some experiences he had outstripped Marjorie.

"Yes, I want to be like her," she answered deliberately.

"And study and go around and do good and never be married?" he questioned.

"I don't see the need of deciding that question to-day."

"I suppose not. You will when Hollis Rheid asks you to."

"Morris, you are not like yourself to-day, you are quarrelling with me, and we never quarrelled before."

"Because you are so unreasonable; you will not answer me anything."

"I have answered you truly; I have no other answer to give."

"Will you think and answer me when I come home?"

"I have answered you now."

"Perhaps you will have another answer then."

"Well, if I have I will give it to you. Are you satisfied?"

"No," he said; but he turned her face up to his and looked down into her innocent earnest eyes.

"You are a goosie, as Linnet says; you will never grow up, little Marjorie."

"Then, if I am only eight, you must not talk to me as if I were eighty."

"Or eighteen," he said. "How far on the voyage of life do you suppose Linnet and Captain Will are."

"Not far enough on to quarrel, I hope."

"They will never be far enough for that, Will is too generous and Linnet will never find anything to differ about; do you know, Marjorie, that girl has no idea how Will loves her?"

Marjorie stopped and faced him with the utmost gravity.

"Do you know, Morris, that man has no idea how Linnet loves him?"

And then the two burst into a laugh that restored them both to the perfect understanding of themselves and each other and all the world. And after an early supper he shook hands with them all--excepting "Mother West," whom he kissed, and Marjorie, whom he asked to walk as far as "Linnet's" with him on his way to the train--and before ten o'clock was on board the _Linnet_, and congratulating again the bridegroom, who was still radiant, and the bride, who was not looking in the least bit homesick.

"Will," said Linnet with the weight of tone of one giving announcement to a mighty truth, "I wouldn't be any one beside myself for _anything_."

"And I wouldn't have you any one beside yourself for _anything_," he laughed, in the big, explosive voice that charmed Linnet every time afresh.

XIV.

A TALK AND ANOTHER TALK.

"Life's great results are something slow."--Howells.

Morris had said good-bye with a look that brought sorrow enough in Marjorie's eyes to satisfy him--almost, and had walked rapidly on, not once turning to discover if Marjorie were standing still or moving toward home; Mr. Holmes and Miss Prudence had promised to start out to meet her, so that her walk homeward in the starlight would not be lonely.

But they were not in sight yet to Marjorie's vision, and she stood leaning over the gate looking at the windows with their white shades dropped and already feeling that the little, new home was solitary. She did not turn until a footstep paused behind her; she was so lost in dreams of Linnet and Morris that she had not noticed the brisk, hurried tread. The white rose had fallen from her hair and the one at her throat had lost several petals; in her hand was a bunch of daisies that Morris had picked along the way and laughingly asked her to try the childish trick of finding out if he loved her, and she had said she was afraid the daisies were too wise and would not ask them.

"Haven't you been home all this time?" asked Hollis, startling her out of her dream.

"Oh, yes, and come back again."

"Do you find the cottage so charming?"

"I find it charming, but I could have waited another day to come and see it. I came to walk part of the way with Morris."

She colored, because when she was embarrassed she colored at everything, and could not think of another word to say.

Among those who understood him, rather, among those he understood, Hollis was a ready talker; but, seemingly, he too could not think of another word to say.

Marjorie picked her daisies to pieces and they went on in the narrow foot path, as she and Morris had done in the afternoon; Hollis walking on the grass and giving her the path as her other companion had done. She could think of everything to say to Morris, and Morris could think of everything to say to her; but Morris was only a boy, and this tall stranger was a gentleman, a gentleman whom she had never seen before.

"If it were good sleighing I might take you on my sled," he remarked, when all the daisies were pulled to pieces.

"Is Flyaway in existence still?" she asked brightly, relieved that she might speak at last.

"'Stowed away,' as father says, in the barn, somewhere. Mr. Holmes is not as strict as he used to be, is he?"

"No, he never was after that. I think he needed to give a lesson to himself."

"He looks haggard and old."

"I suppose he is old; I don't know how old he is, over forty."

"That _is_ antiquated. You will be forty yourself, if you live long enough."

"Twenty-two years," she answered seriously; "that is time enough to do a good many things in."

"I intend to do a good many things," he answered with a proud humility in his voice that struck Marjorie.

"What--for example?"

"Travel, for one thing, make money, for another."

"What do you want money for?" she questioned.

"What does any man want it for? I want it to give me influence, and I want a luxurious old age."

"That doesn't strike me as being the highest motives."

"Probably not, but perhaps the highest motives, as you call them, do not rule my life."

And she had been praying for him so long.

"Your mother seems to be a happy woman," was her reply, coming out of a thought that she did not speak.

"She is," he said, emphatically. "I wish poor old father were as happy."

"Do you find many happy people?" she asked.

"I find you and my mother," he returned smiling.

"And yourself?"

"Not always. I am happy enough today. Not as jubilant as old Will, though. Will has a prize."

"To be sure he has," said Marjorie.

"What are you going to do next?"

"Go to that pleasant home in Maple Street with Miss Prudence and go to school." She was jubilant, too, today, or she would have been if Morris had not gone away with such a look in his eyes.

"You ought to be graduated by this time, you are old enough. Helen was not as old as you."

"But I haven't been at school at all, yet," she hastened to say. "And Helen was so bright."

"Aren't you bright?" he asked, laughing.

"Mr. Holmes doesn't tell me that I am."

"What will your mother do?"

"Oh, dear," she sighed, "that is what I ask myself every day. But she insists that I shall go, Linnet has had her 'chance' she says, and now it is my turn. Miss Prudence is always finding somebody that needs a home, and she has found a girl to help mother, a girl about my age, that hasn't any friends, so it isn't the work that will trouble me; it is leaving mother without any daughter at all."

"She is willing to let Linnet go, she ought to be as willing to let you."

"Oh, she is, and father is, too. I know I don't deserve such good times, but I do want to go. I love Miss Prudence as much as I do mother, I believe, and I am only forty miles from home. Mr. Holmes is about leaving, too. How father will miss _him_! And Morris gone! Mother sighs over the changes and then says changes must needs come if boys and girls will grow up."

"Where is Mr. Holmes going?"

"To California. The doctor says he must go somewhere to cure his cough. And he says he will rest and write another book. Have you read his book?"

"No, it is too dry for me."

"We don't think it is dry; Morris and I know it by heart."

"That is because you know the author."

"Perhaps it is. The book is everything but a story book. Miss Prudence has a copy in Turkey morocco. Do you see many people that write books?"

"No," he said, smiling at her simplicity. "New York isn't full of them."

"Miss Prudence sees them," replied Marjorie with dignity.

"She is a bird of their feather. I do not fly, I walk on the ground--with my eyes on it, perhaps."

"Like the man with the muck rake," said Marjorie, quoting from her old love, _Pilgrims Progress_, "don't you know there was a crown held above his head, and his eyes were on the ground and he could not see it."

"No, I do not know it, but I perceive that you are talking an allegory at me."

"Not at you, _to_ you," she corrected.

"You write very short letters to me, nowadays."

"Your letters are not suggestive enough," she said, archly.

"Like my conversation. As poor a talker as I am, I am a better talker than writer. And you--you write a dozen times better than you talk."

"I'm sorry I'm so unentertaining to-night. When Linnet writes she says: "'I wish I could _talk_ to you,' and when I talk I think: 'I wish I could write it all to you.'"

"As some one said of some one who could write better than he talked, 'He has plenty of bank notes, but he carries no small change, in his pocket.'"

"It is so apt to be too small," she answered, somewhat severely.

"I see you are above talking the nonsense that some girls talk. What do you do to get rested from your thoughts?"

How Marjorie laughed!

"Hollis, do talk to me instead of writing. And I'll write to you instead of talking."

"That is, you wish me near to you and yourself far away from me. That is the only way that we can satisfy each other. Isn't that Miss Prudence coming?"

"And the master. They did not know I would have an escort home. But do come all the way, father will like to hear you talk about the places you have visited."