Chapter 30

THE LIGHT BREAKS

"Come here," said Edna, and moving aside she indicated the sketches. John drew near. "This is what was in that pillow slip yesterday."

Dunham regarded the rough work with large eyes. "By Jove!" he exclaimed. "She has it in her, hasn't she?"

"Just see the composition," returned Edna. "See the directness."

"What's it done with?" asked Dunham. "Not a brush."

"No, some sort of a stump; and it's such a queer color. I've been trying to make out--John Dunham!" Edna's tone suddenly changed. "This is that blueberry juice!"

Dunham's mouth fell open. The two stood staring at each other, and, as many perceptions and explanations flowed into their thought, they colored slowly, and as richly as sunburn would permit.

"That is the love philtre, John," said Edna, when they had been a long time silent, and she caught her lip between her teeth, for her own condemnation pressed upon her more heavily with each enlightening consideration.

Dunham's feelings were inexpressible, and his one devout thanksgiving was that Edna was ignorant of his own banality.

Suddenly she ran out of the room to the head of the stairs. "Miss Lacey," she called, "will you bring Judge Trent up here?"

The request startled Miss Martha into a sudden panic. "Dear me, Calvin, Edna wants us. I'm afraid Sylvia is ill. She looked it this noon. Oh, I assure you she never would have stayed upstairs from laziness, never in this world. She"--

But Judge Trent was already far in advance of the speaker, and Miss Lacey tripped upstairs after him, briskly.

"Come here, both of you, and I will make you proud," said Edna as they entered the room. "These sketches are your niece's work."

"Aren't they the queerest things you ever saw?" asked Miss Martha, adjusting her eyeglasses the better to peer at the brown sheets. "But there's the Ledges, and there's Beacon Island, and the West Shore, and our own swimming pool from over on the Point, and"--

"Judge Trent, do you know about such work?" asked Edna. "Do you care for this sort of thing?"

"Yes, in an ignorant sort of a way. Certainly I do."

"If you found Sylvia talented, you'd help her, I'm sure you would."

"Of course. Why? You appear excited."

Edna touched the lawyer's black sleeve as he stood in his customary attitude, his hands behind his back. As she went on it was evident that she fought with tears.

"Pardon me for asking if Sylvia has any money? Has any allowance been made her?"

"Not by me, and it's not likely by Thinkright."

"It must be so! She can't have any money." The girl paused to swallow. Judge Trent regarded her, the corners of his mouth drawn down, at a loss to understand her manner, and ready to defy whatever accusation she was about to bring against him.

Edna continued: "Sylvia went into the field, and spent hours selecting the largest, darkest berries she could find. She came home and stewed them into a substitute for paint. You remember, Miss Martha, the evening you thought she was cooking. Then she found this rough manila paper, and contrived a stump out of something. Think how she must have longed to paint, how she longed for materials"--

"Why didn't you tell me?" demanded Judge Trent brusquely. "How was I to know?"

"I didn't know myself," returned Edna. "None of us knew. She was too modest, too delicate, to tell. She went alone to do these things, to try her powers. She had come to the place where she meant to tell me. She said so to-day. Doubtless she believed in her ability at last." Edna again seized the pillow slip and shook out a number of bits of paper that had sunk to the bottom. There fell out with them various stained, tightly-rolled paper stumps, which had evidently been used in lieu of brushes.

The three heads gathered together to look at the sketches of themselves and the family at the Mill Farm.

"By Jove, she has got it in her," repeated Dunham, regarding a drawing of himself as he had appeared to be asleep in the boat.

Judge Trent was examining his own penciled face, frowning beneath the silk hat. He shrugged his shoulders and smiled. "I shall have to speak to Sylvia about this. Call her in, Edna."

It was the judge's last consecutive sentence for some time. All the company stared in equal amazement and apprehension, as Edna suddenly bowed her head on the lawyer's little broadcloth shoulder, and shook him with her sobs.

"Edna!" exclaimed Dunham, stepping forward, and he was unconscious of the severity of his voice. "Do you know you're frightening us? Where is Sylvia?"

"G-gone!"

"Where, for mercy's sake?" demanded Miss Martha tremulously.

"H-home, to the Tide Mill." Edna managed to jerk out the words. "W-wait a minute."

As soon as she could lift her head and wipe her eyes, a process which gave Judge Trent infinite relief, she saw John's face grown so white under its tan that it helped her to become steady.

"She's--safe, I'm sure," she said. "We had--a misunderstanding, and it was all my fault, and I suppose she left this noon as soon as she could get away from us. She left a note for me. I found it when I came up to knock on her door. She said she was homesick."

"I don't understand at all," said Judge Trent. "Sylvia gone back to the farm, without a by-your-leave to her hostess? Confoundedly bad manners I call it." The lawyer's thought was creaking through unaccustomed ruts. He had been cheated out of Sylvia's companionship, after all, and his favorite Edna was in tears. He could _not_ understand, and his frown was portentous.

"It is my fault," repeated Edna. "Spare me from explaining, because in the morning I shall go over to the farm myself and make things right."

"Just like that erratic father of hers. No manners," declared the lawyer.

"Calvin Trent!" Miss Martha's eyes sparkled through her excited tears. "I'll thank you to be careful how you insult my dead brother in my presence. Your own manners in doing so are worse than anything Sam was ever guilty of!"

"Right you are, Martha," returned the startled lawyer with prompt meekness.

"Moreover," added Edna, indicating the sketches, "see Sylvia's inheritance from that father. You've nothing to blame her for, Judge Trent, in the manner of her leaving. I understand it perfectly. Please fix your mind only on her talent. Come with me to-morrow, and make her happy by the assurance of your interest and assistance."

Judge Trent as he left the room muttered something to the effect that things had come to a pretty pass when he was forced at his age to spend his time on the water, tagging back and forth after a chit of a girl who didn't know her own mind. At the same time he recalled that Sylvia had returned to Hawk Island with reluctance, and that Edna Derwent was not the girl to shake him with her sobs for nothing; so he set himself to the task of being civil to Miss Lacey for the following half-hour, with intent to make amends for his offense to her.

Dunham, left alone with Edna, asked the question which was consuming him. Edna was placing the sketches in one of the empty drawers of the chiffonier.

"You must have had some talk with Sylvia this noon after I came upstairs for the book," he began.

She lifted her shoulder and shook her head with a gesture of repugnance. "Oh, yes. Don't remind me."

Dunham feared the worst. If Edna had accused Sylvia of giving him that potion, he would forswear the Mill Farm forever.

He continued: "Sylvia had already felt that you were offended with her. She mentioned it in the boat yesterday. Did your interview to-day go into detail? Did,"--John cleared his throat,--"did you tell her what her offense was?"

"No,"--Edna shook her head,--"and don't ask me what it was, John. I told her we would talk later; but I hurt her. I hurt her, because I didn't know." She paused, and her next words caused further relief to overspread Dunham's countenance. "I'm glad that you understand nothing about it, John."

"So am I," he returned cheerfully. "I know you'll fix things up all right. I think I'll just wander down the island now, and find Benny Merritt and see if he was her boatman. Cheer up, Edna. I know you can get whatever you want out of Judge Trent, and by this time to-morrow night everything will be going as merry as a marriage bell."

A shrewd guess helped Dunham to find the object of his search at the post office, where Benny was seated on a barrel, pensively kicking his heels. Dissembling his eagerness, John nodded a greeting in his direction, and, passing over to the corner of the grocery sacred to the Government pigeonholes, asked for the Derwent mail.

The portly wife of the postmaster replied that the evening boat was late and that they were waiting for the mail.

John accepted this information with proper surprise, and, turning away, looked through the window at the lights on a swordfisher standing in the cove. He thought he would first give Benny the chance to volunteer information.

He had already found that moments spent in the island grocery yielded rich returns in diversion. It was, in the first place, cause for rejoicing that the amiable but chronically weary proprietor of the island emporium, and his too substantial spouse, should be named Frisk.

While John stood there a girl came in and stumbled toward the post office window. "Have ye shet up the mail bag yet, Mis' Frisk? I want to git this package in if I possibly can. How much goes on it?"

"I'll have to see," returned the portly one, waddling out to where the grocery scales stood on the counter. By the light of the kerosene lamp she leaned over and examined the figures.

"'M. Weighs jest two pounds," she announced.

The girl looked bewildered. "Why, they ain't but two handkerchiefs in there, Mis' Frisk. I don't see how it could"--

"Hey?" deliberately. "Two handkerchiefs? Let's see." Another examination. "Oh, ye-us," wearily. "My stomach was on the scales."

Dunham had scarcely recovered from this when another girl, a smart summer boarder who favored him with a stare of interest as she entered, approached the proprietor.

Mr. Frisk in his shirt sleeves was viewing a too precipitate world from behind his counter. "I'd like some marshmallows, please," said the girl.

"Ain't got any," was the response, given with entire amiability.

"Why," disappointedly, "you did have them last week."

"Ye-us, I know. I tried carryin' ma'shmallers quite a spell: but't wan't no use. Seems if everybody wanted 'em. I couldn't keep 'em in stock any time at all, so I give it up."

"Well, I do declare!" exclaimed the young woman. "And, Mr. Frisk, my mother is distressed because that cable message doesn't come from father. If it comes to-night"--

"Oh, that's so, there wus a telegram this noon. Ye-us, that's so. I remember now. 'Twus from yer pa."

"Where is it? Why didn't you send it up, then?" John could hear the vexation fairly crackling in the speaker's voice.

"Why, I see he got thar all right, so I didn't know as thar wus any drive."

Some supporting sense of humor seemed to come to the girl, for John could hear her desperate chuckle as she went out with the cablegram.

"Handsome evenin', Mr. Dunham," remarked the unmoved postmaster. "Bo't's late, ain't it?"

John assented, and a wizened old man passed him and approached the counter.

"Howdy, Frisk," he mumbled. "Got to have some more terbacca. Gimme a package o' Peace and Good Will, will ye?"

The proprietor beamed sympathetically. "Ye'll have to try somethin' else this time, Uncle Ben," he drawled pleasantly. "I'm sorry, but the fact is my Peace and Good Will's mouldy."

Dunham smiled, and looked over his shoulder at Benny. He was still cracking his heels gently against the flour barrel. The evening boat must be in soon, and then the boy would be out on the dock, lost in the excitement of its arrival. Dunham strolled up to him. "Good-evening, Benny."

He was surprised at the unresponsive air with which the boy nodded. John was aware of having recently completed the capture of Benny's heart by replying to questions concerning the gold football on his fob; but to-night there was no lighting of the young sailor's face.

"Come outside, will you, Benny? I want to speak to you."

To John's further amazement, Benny, instead of bounding off the barrel, complied with reluctance; but they were finally out of doors in the velvet darkness that preceded the moonrise.

"I want to know where you left Miss Sylvia," said John Dunham imperiously.

The boy hesitated a minute, then spoke grudgingly. "At the Tide Mill."

"How was she?"

"Able to walk up to the house," responded the boy irritatingly.

"Look here,"--Dunham laid a heavy hand on the other's shoulder, and Benny struggled vainly to shake it off. "What's the matter with you? Was Miss Sylvia ill? I didn't see her before she went."

Benny ceased his futile writhing. "Oh, you kin hold on to me, I s'pose," he said sullenly; "but I don't care if you have got a muscle, and kin stay under water, and play football. Gosh durn you fer makin' her cry, I say."

The vim with which Benny exploded his accusation silenced Dunham for a moment, but he did not relax his grasp. "I didn't make her cry," he answered then. "Give you my word, Benny. Can't you have any sympathy for a fellow? I didn't know she was going, and I'm all broken up."

Benny lifted his eyes, half relenting.

"What did she cry for? What did she say? Tell me, and I'll give you the best fishing outfit you can buy in Portland."

"Didn't say nothin' much. She come to me all white around the gills, and asked if I'd sail her home right away quick. She had her bag, and I see she didn't cal'late to come back. She kep' a-hurryin' me up, and after we got out o' the cove she give me a smile and thanked me for bein' so quick, and then she said, 'If you don't mind, Benny, I'm goin' to sleep. I'm jest as tired as I can be.'"

"Well, where does my making her cry come in?" In his impatience John gave an unconscious shake to his captive.

"You leggo my collar," said Benny, with a threatened return of the sulks.

"Certainly. Excuse me." Dunham instantly dropped his hand. "You said she went to sleep?"

"Yes, went to sleep!" repeated the boy contemptuously. "Do folks go to sleep with their eyes wide open? I see she didn't want me to talk to her, but I watched her mighty close, 'cause I knew right off you was at the bottom of it."

"I? What possible idea"--

"Git out. Ain't I seen you not noticin' Miss Edna any? Ain't I seen you not sail the boat when you had the chance? Ain't I seen her eyin' you when she thought you wan't lookin'?"

Dunham groaned. "Benny, you're horribly precocious."

The boy glowered suspiciously.

"I don't know whether I be or not. I know I've got eyes."

"And what did you see to-day?"

"Tears. Hundreds of 'em. That's what I see. If she'd a-busted out cryin' 't wouldn't 'a' ben so bad. I could 'a' said, 'Oh, you're young yet, you don't know how many wuss things is goin' to happen to you, and I've known fellers could stay under longer'n he kin;' but I couldn't say a thing to comfort her when she kep' a-wip-in' away one tear at a time from her cheek, secret like. I knew she'd ben scrappin' with you, or else that you'd turned around and ben sweet on Miss Edna."

"Nothing of the sort, Benny. You're all off in both guesses. Miss Sylvia just went home a little sooner than she expected, and Miss Derwent is going over to-morrow to spend the day with her. You're going to take her over yourself."

"See anythin' green in my eyes?" drawled Benny. "I'll bet you ain't goin' over, then," he added cynically.

"Of course I wouldn't butt in on the young ladies' day together," returned John. Benny's recital had touched him, but he could not forbear a smile at the youngster's courage of conviction. "I tell you, I'm the aggrieved party in this matter," he added.

"Oh, git out," returned the boy. "Butt in, nawthin'. You go over there and fix it up with her. Say," hopefully, "I'll sail ye over to-night if ye want to. Plenty o' moon."

"You're awfully good, Benny, but you can take it from me, I shouldn't be welcome."

The boy looked staggered for the first time.

"Has she turned you down?" he asked in a low tone. "That's so, she'd a cried jest the same if she had. Say, has she?"

Dunham made a significant gesture.

"Next time don't you be so sure you know it all, Benny," he replied.