Chapter 33

"LOVE ALONE WILL STAY"

"It never ought to rain in June," said Sylvia.

She had just alighted from the train, and was in Thinkright's arms as she said it.

"I had set my heart on just such a drive with you as we had the first time I came."

"This will be far better than that was, Sylvia." He held her off at arm's length, and viewed her deliberately. "We had the sunshine outside that day. This time it's inside."

He could see it while he spoke, shining out through blue eyes and smiling lips, as the girl looked long into his face.

"It seems to me you are a rather elegant person to be clinging to an old farmer like me," he went on.

"Have I changed, Thinkright? You haven't. Oh, I'm so glad!"

"Yes, you have changed, little one. I'm looking at you, trying to find out how."

"I'm awfully well dressed, for one thing," whispered Sylvia, laughing. "Edna would have it. She's made Uncle Calvin pay bills that I'm sure must have shocked him. Yes, I know my things look simple, but they're right; and oh, how you do have to pay for millinery rightness, _à la_ Edna!"

"Well, I think the loafers have stared at you enough," said Thinkright. "Let's get into the wagon. I've brought a rubber coat for you, but very likely it'll be clear before we get home. Why," with sudden perception, "I know what has happened; your curls are gone."

"No, no, not gone, only promoted. I'm going to say good-by to this very proper hat for three months, and I think I'll begin now. It would be a tragedy if it should get wet."

While they still stood under the roof of the station platform, Sylvia took out her hat pins, and Thinkright unrolled and opened her neat umbrella.

"I've brought the umbrella, too," he said, with a humorous appreciation of the difference between that ample cotton shelter and the dainty silk affair he held in his hand.

"So," regarding the uncovered coiffure which had won John Dunham's approval, "so that is what has become of the wreath of curls. H'm. It makes you look--look very grown up, Sylvia."

"It's about time," returned the girl. "Wasn't I twenty last February?"

They went to the wagon, where the baggage had been placed, and Sylvia put on the rubber coat and jumped in. A sudden peal of thunder rolled.

"A salute in your honor, my dear," said Thinkright, climbing in beside her.

"I'm delighted," she answered, as the horses started, "for it means showers instead of a three days' rain. Here, let's take the calico tent," she added, "then we can both get under it."

She put her little umbrella under the rubber laprobe, and, raising the weather-beaten canopy, slipped her arm through Thinkright's.

"I'm going to paint such a lovely picture of you this summer, dear," she said, studying his face fondly.

"Of me? Oh, no."

"Oh, yes. I won't admit that any one else can paint such a likeness of you as I can."

"I hear good reports of your work."

"My own reports?" she laughed.

"No. Calvin's, Edna's, Mr. Dunham's."

"John's, Mr. Dunham's?"

Thinkright's answer was rather slow in coming, she thought.

"Yes. We've had occasion for some correspondence on a matter of business, and he has mentioned your promise."

"My promise to what?" asked Sylvia, suddenly interested in the fastening of the umbrella.

"The promise shown in your work," replied her companion, looking steadily between the horse's ears.

"Oh, yes," returned Sylvia in a small voice.

"You were a little mistaken about that match you had fixed up," said Thinkright, "between Edna and Mr. Dunham, weren't you?"

"Yes; and she's going to marry such a fine man, so worthy of her in every way!" Sylvia spoke with enthusiasm.

"You're better pleased than if it had been Dunham?" asked Thinkright.

It was his companion's turn to hesitate. "Oh, she didn't ask my advice," she replied at last, with elaborate lightness.

"It's rather easy to make mistakes about those matters," observed Thinkright.

"Yes; and rather easy in avoiding Scylla to fall into Charybdis." She had spent her winter in endeavoring to avoid Charybdis. Just because it had not been Edna who was John's ideal was no sign that the Princess did not exist, either already selected, as Edna's lover had been, or else still to appear. An acquaintance with Boston, and the dozens of interesting people she had met, had cleared her provincial vision, until she was more than ever wary of believing that an interest in her personality and her work meant anything deeper. There were a number of men who had shown her more attention than had John Dunham, aside from those evenings he had spent with Edna and herself. She had kept her thought filled with healthful interest in her work, the effort to please her teachers, and to make the most of her uncle's generosity; and the winter had gone swiftly. She had spent Christmas with her aunt, and Judge Trent and Mr. Dunham had dined with them on the holiday. After dinner she had gone sleigh-riding with John, far into the frosty, sparkling country, despite Miss Lacey's protest that she couldn't see why they wouldn't rather stay by the fire. Miss Martha declared that for her part she would just as soon sit with her feet in a pail of ice water and ring a dinner-bell as to go sleighing. Upon which Judge Trent reminded her that she had not always felt so; a concession on his part to the past which furnished Miss Lacey with gratified sensations for some time to come; the more that, instead of making some excuse to leave, her old friend had taken with extraordinary grace to the rôle of fireside companion, and remained talking with her of Sylvia, and mutual acquaintances, until the young people's return.

Sylvia brought her reminiscent thought back to the present.

"How are the Fosters?" she asked.

"Well."

"And my boat?"

"Fine. Waiting for you. Minty wanted to come over with me to get you; but I decided to be selfish." Sylvia squeezed his arm.

When they reached the height to-day, the wide view was sullen; the waves lashing, and gnawing with white teeth at the leaden rocks under a leaden sky. The dripping firs were dark blots on the vague islands.

Sylvia recklessly let go the old umbrella, which fell backward as she stood up in the rain and looked off, affectionately. The damp rings of hair blew about her forehead on the wind-swept height, and she reached out her arms toward the grand, forbidding prospect.

"You can't frighten me, dearest, _dearest_!" she said exultantly. "Rumble and roar as much as you like. I know what is behind the mask."

She sat down and righted the umbrella, and while the horses descended the hill she looked and looked, feasting her eyes on every well-remembered landmark.

The Tide Mill loomed out of the mist.

"Poor dear!" she said, apostrophizing it. "Are things just as desperate as ever?"

Tears were glistening on the closed shutters, and running down the weather-beaten sides.

"I think when the mill is crying like that, it always seems as if it were softening a little, Thinkright. Don't you? As if there were greater chance of its opening its eyes and taking notice once more."

Thinkright gave a low laugh. "Your miracle hasn't come to pass yet, has it?"

"No, but I'm going to hope, still."

"That's right. If those shutters ever open I think you'll have to be the prime mover. No one else seems to care."

"_You_ care, Thinkright," replied the girl wistfully. "There shouldn't be anything sad or hopeless around the Mill Farm, least of all that dear old neglected thing that named it."

"You're a very fanciful little girl," was the reply; but there was nothing disapproving in the glance her companion bent upon her.

As they drove up to the farmhouse, the living-room door flew open, and Minty was disclosed, prevented by her mother from going out into the rain, and expending pent-up energy by hopping up and down with irrepressible eagerness.

Mrs. Lem appeared behind her, wreathed in smiles, and coiffured and arrayed in her company best.

"It's so good to be home again," cried Sylvia, "so good, so good!" and she jumped out of the wagon and seized Minty's hands and danced around the living-room in the rubber coat until the child's laughter rang out gleefully.

"And how have you been, Mrs. Lem?" she asked when their breath was gone.

"Smart," replied that lady, regarding the girl admiringly, and wondering whether by patience and perseverance she might force her own hair to go into the shape of Sylvia's.

"I do hope you've brought us a change in the weather," went on Mrs. Lem. "When it hain't ben actually rainin' the past two weeks, there's ben so much timidity in the atmosphere that I've got hoarse as a crow, and we'll all be webfooted pretty soon if it don't clear up."

"You shall have sunshine to-morrow," declared Sylvia.

"I hain't touched the Rosy Cloud yet," said Minty, "even though you wrote I could. Thinkright said I might let her git stove on a rock, and he'd druther I'd wait."

"Very well, Minty, to-morrow we shall begin making up for lost time. Let them watch us."

Cap'n Lem soon appeared, and the five made a happy supper party. During the meal the clouds lightened and the rain abated. Mrs. Lem would not hear to Sylvia's assisting in clearing away, but sent her upstairs to unpack her trunk. She was at work at it when the western sun suddenly shone out.

"The rainbow, the rainbow!" shouted Minty at the foot of the stairs.

"Where?" cried Sylvia.

"Over the mill."

Sylvia ran into Thinkright's room, which was on the eastern side of the house, and, throwing open a window, fell on her knees before it. In a protecting, splendid arch a perfect rainbow spanned the cloud above the