Part 13

"Now, Arthur," cried the princess, "tell me everything at once!"

"Gay," said Arthur, "is in love with a young Englishman, and knows that she is. He had to go home to be made an earl; but I think she is expecting him back in a few days, because she is beginning to take an interest in the things she really likes. Mary is in love with Sam Langham, and he with her. They, however, don't know this. Phyllis has forsaken her garden and become a dead-game sport. This she has done for the sake of a red-headed Bostonian named Herring. Lee and a young fellow named Renier are neglecting other people for each other. And our sedate Maud, formerly very much in the company of two fiery Southerners, is now very much in the company of one of them, Colonel Meredith, of South Carolina. The other Carolinian, Mr. Bob Jonstone, sprained his wrist the other day, and it seems that sister Eve was intended by an all-wise Providence to be a trained nurse. But in the case of those last mentioned there are certain mysteries to be solved."

At this moment Andrea appeared at the tent opening and announced in his piping child voice: "The canoe is overboard, papa."

XXX

Andrea stuck to his big brother like a leech, and insisted upon crossing to The Camp in the same canoe with him and Cecily. To Andrea the possibility of newly engaged persons wishing to be by themselves was negligible. Princess Oducalchi, an old hand on inland waters, took charge of the other canoe, and, like Arthur, in spite of a look of resigned horror on her husband's face, paddled standing up.

Arthur, too happy to make speed, was rapidly distanced by his mother, whose long, graceful figure and charming little, round head he regarded from time to time with great admiration.

"She might be one of my sisters!" he exclaimed to Cecily.

"If she only was," said Cecily, "and the others were only exactly like her, then I shouldn't be a bit frightened."

"Frightened?"

"Wouldn't you be frightened if I had six great angry brothers and you were just going to meet them for the first time?"

Arthur smiled steadily and shook his head.

"I'm too happy to be afraid of anything."

"I'm not. The happier I feel the more frightened I feel. And I can feel your sisters picking me all to pieces, and saying what a horrid little thing I am!"

"Little? Haven't I told you that you are exactly the right size?"

"No, you haven't."

"Then I tell you now. I leave it to Andrea. Isn't she exactly the right size, Andrea?"

"Then mamma is too tall."

"No, mamma is exactly the right size for a mamma. In fact, Andrea," exulted Arthur, "on this particular morning of this particular year of grace everything in the world is exactly the right size, except me. I'm not half big enough to contain my feelings. So here goes!"

And the sedate Arthur put back his head, which resembled that of the young Galahad, and opened his mouth, and let forth the most blood-curdling war-whoop that has been sounded during the Christian era.

Cecily clapped her hands to her ears, and Andrea gazed upon his big brother with redoubled admiration.

"Is that like Indians do?" he asked.

"Not at all," said Arthur; "that's what studious and domesticated young men do when they've overslept, and wake up to find the sky blue and the forest green." And once more he whooped terrifically. And Wow, the dog, heard him, and thought he had gone mad; and Uncas, the chipmunk, ran to the top of a tall tree at full speed, down it even faster, and into a deep and safe hole among the roots.

Gay alone was at the float to receive the Oducalchis; but now word of their coming had gone about The Camp, and the remaining Darlings could be seen hurrying up from various directions.

From embracing her mother, Gay turned with characteristic swiftness and sweetness to Cecily, who had just stepped from Arthur's canoe to the float, flung her arms around her, and kissed her.

"I'm not quite sure of your name," she said; "but I love you very much, and you're prettier than all outdoors."

Then Maud came, followed by Eve and Mary, with Lee next and Phyllis last, and they all talked at once, and made much of their mother and Cecily and little Andrea. And they all teased Arthur at once, and showered Oducalchi with polite and hospitable speeches. And he was greatly moved, because he knew very well that these beautiful maidens had loved their own brilliant scapegrace father to distraction, and that it was hard for them to look with kindness upon his successor.

Never, I think, did a mere float, an affair of planks supported by the displacing power of empty casks, have gathered upon it at one time so much beauty, so many delighted and delightful faces.

And now came guides, servants, and camp helpers, to whom Princess Oducalchi had been a kind and understanding mistress in the old days, and then, shyly and hanging back, hoping they were wanted and not sure, Sam Langham, Renier, Herring, the Carolinians, and others, until the float began to sink and there was a laughter panic and a general rush up the gangway to the shore. Here Wow, the dog, did a great deal of swift wagging and loud barking, and Uncas, the chipmunk, from the top of a tree said: "I'm not really angry, but I'm scolding because I'm afraid to come down, and nobody loves me or makes much of me--ever!"

To Arthur, standing a little aside, beaming with pride and happiness, and recording in his heart every pleasant thing which his sisters said to Cecily and every pleasant look they gave her, came Gay presently, and slipped an arm through his.

"I'm so glad," she said.

But there was something in her voice that was not glad, and with one swift glance he read her wistful heart. He pressed her arm, and said:

"I know one poor little kid that's left out in the cold for the moment; one little lion that feels as if it wasn't going to get any martyr; one little sister that a big brother loves and understands a little bit better than any of the others-- So there! At the moment every _chacune_ has her _chacun_, except one. Moments are fleeting, my dear, and other moments are ahead. I, too, have lived bad, empty, unhappy moments."

"But you always knew that she cared."

"And don't you know about him?"

"I only know that I've seen so many people appear to be idiotically happy at the same time, and it makes me want to cry."

"And for that very reason," said Arthur, "the moments that are ahead will be the happier."

"I wonder," said Gay, and, "I know," said Arthur.

XXXI

The fact of Arthur's sudden blossoming into a full-fledged and emphatic figure of romance had an unsettling effect upon many of the peacefully disposed minds in The Camp. It is always so when friends, especially in youth, come to partings of ways. Clement, who takes the Low road, cannot but be disturbed at the thought of those possible adventures which lie in wait for Covington, who has fared forth by the High. There was the feeling among many of the young people in the camp that, if they didn't hurry, they might be left behind. Nobody expressed this feeling or acknowledged it or recognized in it anything more than a feeling of unrest; but it existed, nevertheless, and had its effect upon actions and affections.

Renier had been leading a life of almost perfect happiness. For the things that made him happy were the same sort of things that make boys happy. No school; no parental obstructions or admonitions; green-and-blue days filled from end to end with fishing, sailing, making fires, shooting at marks, and perfecting himself in physical attainments. Add to these things the digestion and the faculties of a healthy boy interested neither in drink, tobacco, nor in any book which failed to contain exciting and chivalrous adventures, and, above all, a companion whose tastes and sympathies were such that she might just as well have been a boy as not.

They were chums rather than sweethearts. It needed a sense of old times coming to an end and new times beginning to make them realize the full depth and significance of their attachment for each other.

There were four of us once "in a kingdom by the sea," and I shall not forget the awful sense of partings and finality, and calamity, for that matter, furnished by a sudden sight of the first flaming maple of autumn.

"I think your mother's a perfect brick," said Renier. "She makes you feel as if she'd known you all your life, and was kind of grateful to you for living."

"I'm rather crazy about the prince," said Lee. "Of course, I oughtn't to be. But I can't help it, and after all he's been awfully good to mamma. Do you believe in divorce?"

"I never did until I saw your mother. She wouldn't ask for anything that she didn't really deserve."

"But it's funny, isn't it," said Lee, "that so many people get on famously together until they are actually married, and then they begin to fight like cats? I knew a girl who was engaged to a man for five years. You'd think they'd get to know each other pretty well in that time, wouldn't you? But they didn't. They hadn't been married six months before they hated each other."

"And that proves," said Renier, "that long engagements are a mistake."

"Smarty!" exclaimed Lee.

"I suppose your brother'll be getting married right away, won't he? Haven't they liked each other for ever so long?"

"M'm!" Lee nodded. "But Arthur never does anything right away. He does too much mooning and wool-gathering. If a united family can get him to the altar in less than a year they'll have accomplished wonders. There's one thing, though--when we do get him married good and proper, he'll stay married. He's like that at all games. It comes natural to him to keep his eyes in the boat. He's got the finest and sweetest nature of any man in this world, _I_ think."

"Of course, you except present company?"

"Heavens, yes!" cried Lee, and they both laughed.

Then, suddenly, Lee looked him in the eyes quite solemnly.

"I wasn't fooling," she said, "not entirely. I _do_ think you're fine and sweet. I didn't always, but I do now."

There was levity in Renier's words but not in his voice.

"This," he said, "so far has been a perfectly good Tuesday."

"Whatever we do together," said Lee, "you always give me the best of it. It's been a good summer."

"Do you feel as if summer was over, too?"

She nodded.

"That's funny, isn't it? Because it's nowhere near over, is it? Maybe it's the excitement of the Oducalchis' arrival and your brother's engagement. It makes you sort of feel as if there wasn't time to settle back into the regular life and get things going again before the leaves fall."

He spoke. And from the fine striped maple under which they sat there fell, and fluttered slowly into Lee's lap, a great yellowing leaf ribbed with incipient scarlet.

"That only means," said Renier--but there was a kind of awe in his voice--"that this particular tree has indigestion."

And they sat for a time in silence and looked at the leaf. And lo! Arthur came upon them, smiling.

"I was looking for you two," he said. "I thought maybe you'd do me a great favor. I've got to play host, and----"

"Nobody would miss us!" exclaimed Lee.

"They wouldn't?" said Arthur. "I'll bet you anything you like that, during your absence, you will both be mentioned among the missing, by name, at least five times."

"What'll you bet?" asked Lee eagerly. "Nobody ever thinks of _us_. Nobody ever mentions _us_. Nobody even loves _us_. What'll you bet?"

"Anything you like," said Arthur, "and if necessary I will take charge of the five personal mentionings and make them myself!"

Lee shook her head sadly, and said: "Once an accepted lover, always a sure thing, man. Oh, Arthur, how low you have fallen! You used to engineer bets with me for the sheer joy of seeing me win them. But now you are on the make, and it looks as if there was no justice under heaven-- Where do you want us to go and what do you want us to do when we get there? Of course, we'll go; we always do. Everybody sends us on errands, and we always go. The longer the errands the oftener we go. But nobody seems to realize that we might enjoy spending one single solitary afternoon sitting under a striped maple and watching the green leaves turn yellow. Nobody even loves us! But when we are dead there will be the most frightful remorse and sorrow."

Arthur leaned heavily against the stem of the striped maple.

"Your sad case," he said, "certainly cries aloud for justice and redress----"

"'Kid us along, Bo,'" said Lee; "we love it!"

"I want two people," said Arthur, "for whom I have affection and in whom I have confidence, to go at once to Carrytown in the _Streak_ and consult a lawyer upon a matter of paramount importance and delicacy--" He hesitated, and Lee said:

"I pray you, without further ado, continue your piquant narrative."

Then Arthur, in a tone of solemn, confidential eagerness:

"Look here, you two, go to Carrytown, will you, and find out how quickly two people can get married in the State of New York, and what they have to do about licenses and things? Will you? I'll be eternally obliged."

"Of course, we will," exclaimed Lee in sudden excitement. "Are you game?"

"You bet your sweet life I'm game!" cried the vulgar Renier. And a few minutes later the two inseparable school-boyesque chums, whom nobody mentioned, whom everybody sent on errands, and whom nobody even loved, were streaking across the lake in the _Streak_.

There was but the one lawyer in Carrytown and the one stenographer. Their shingles hang one above the other on the face of the one brick building.

At the door of this building Lee suddenly drew back.

"Look here!" she said. "Won't it look rather funny if we march in hand in hand and say: 'Beg pardon, sir, but how do you get married in the State of New York?'"

"It _would_ look funny," said Renier, "and I shouldn't wonder if it made us feel funny. But the joke would really be on the lawyer. We could say '_Honi soit qui mal y pense_' to him. Of course, if it would really embarrass you----"

"It wouldn't," said Lee, "_really_."

So they went up a narrow flight of stairs and knocked on the door of room Number Five. There was no answer. So they pushed open the door and entered a square room bound in sheepskin with red-and-black labels. There was nobody in the room, and Lee exclaimed:

"Nobody even loves us."

"He'll be in the back room," said Renier. "I know. Once I swiped a muskmelon from a lawyer's melon-patch, and had to see him about it. _He_ was in the back room----"

"'Counting out his money'?"

"No; he was drinking whiskey with a judge and a livery-stable keeper, and they were all spitting on a red-hot stove."

"What did he do about the melon?"

"He told me to can the melon and have a drink. I had already canned the melon as well as I could (I wasn't educated along scientific lines) and my grandmother had promised me any watch I wanted if I didn't drink till I was twenty-one."

"Did you?"

"I did not."

"Did you get the watch?"

"I did not."

"Why not?"

"Grandma reneged. She said she didn't remember making any such promise."

They pushed open a swinging door and entered the back room.

Here, in a revolving chair, sat a stout young man with a red face. Upon his knees sat a stout young woman with a red face. And with something of the consistency with which a stamp adheres to an envelope so the one red face appeared glued to the other red face.

The red face of the stout young man had one free eye which detected the presence of intruders. And the stout young man said:

"Caught with the goods! Jump up, Minnie, and behave yourself!"

Minnie's upspring was almost a record-breaker.

Renier began to stammer:

"I b-b-beg your pardon," he said, "but I thought you might b-b-be able to tell me how to g-g-get married in New York State."

The stout young man rose from his revolving chair; he was embarrassed almost to the point of paralysis, but his mind and mouth continued to work.

"You've come to just the right man," he said, "at just the right time, for information of that sort. First, you hire a stenographer; then you get a mash on her. Then she sits in your lap--she _will_ do it--and then you kiss her. And then you get a license, and then you curse laws and red tape for a while, and then you wed. Now, what you want is a license?"

"Exactly," said Renier. "It--it's for another fellow."

"Friend of yours?" queried the stout young man.

"Yes."

"And you want a license for him, not for yourself?"

Renier nodded.

"At this moment," said the stout young man, "there are assembled on the long wharf, chewin' tobacco and cursin', some twenty-five or thirty marines. Would you mind just stepping down and telling that to them?"

"I am quite serious," said Renier. "It is my friend who wants to get married."

"And _you_ don't?"

Renier stammered ineffectually.

"Then," said the stout young man, with a glance at Lee (of the highest admiration), "you're a gol-darn fool."

And forthwith he was so vulgar as to burst into a sudden snatch of song:

"Old man Rule was a gol-darn fool, For he couldn't see the water in the gol-darn pool!"

At the finish of this improvisation the dreadfully confused Minnie went, "Tee-hee!"

And, horror of horrors, that charming boylike companion, Lee Darling, behind whom were well-bred generations, also went suddenly, "Tee-hee."

"Licenses," said the stout young man, "are applied for in room Five. After you, sir; after you, miss."

And, with a waggish expression, he turned to Minnie.

"Be back in five minutes," he said; "try not to forget me, my flighty one."

When they were in the front room, he said:

"Before a license is issued, the licensor must be satisfied as to the preliminaries. Now, then, what can you tell me as to lap sitting and kissings?"

"You," cried Lee, in a sudden blaze of indignation, "are the freshest, most objectionable American I ever set eyes on."

The stout young man turned appealingly to Renier.

"You wouldn't say that," he said; "you'd say I was just typical, wouldn't you, now? And I wish you would tell her that, though in these backwoods I have been obliged to eschew my Chesterfield, I've got a great big heart in me and mean well."

During the last words of this speech he became appealingly wistful.

"Why," said he to Lee, "just because Minnie and me is stout, don't you think we know heaven when we see it--the empyrean! Yesterday she threw me down, and I says to her: 'Since all my life seems meant for "fails"--since this was written and needs must be--my whole soul rises up to bless your name in pride and thankfulness. Who knows but the world may end to-night?' To-day she sits in my lap and we see which can hug the hardest. Ever try that?"

And suddenly the creature's voice melted and shook. He was a genuine orator, as we Americans understand it, having that within his powers of voice that defies logic and melts the heart.

"Wouldn't you," he said, "even _like_ to sit in his lap? Wouldn't you _love_ to sit in his lap and be hugged?"

Lee looked to Renier for help, as he to her. And they took a step apiece directly toward each other, and another step. It was as if they had been hypnotized. Suddenly Renier caught Lee's hand in his, and after a moment of looking into his eyes she turned to the stout man, and sang in miraculous imitation of him:

"Young Miss Mule is a gol-darn fool, But you made her see the water in the gol-darn pool."

"I'll just get a license blank," said the stout young man. "They're in the back room."

"Thank you," said Renier--"if you will, Mr.----"

"Heartbeat!" flashed the stout young man, and left them. And he wasn't lying or making fun that time. For that was his really truly name. And in northern New York people are beginning to think that he is by way of being up to it.

Suddenly Lee quoted from a joke that she and Renier had in common. She said, as if surprised:

"'Why, there's a table over there!'"

And Renier, his voice suddenly breaking and melting, answered:

"'Why, so there is--and here's a chair!'"

And Mr. Heartbeat, making a supreme effort to live up to his name, did not return with the license blank for nearly eight minutes. During those minutes, Renier resolved that in every room in his home there should be at least one revolving chair. And they came out of Mr. Heartbeat's office no longer boyish companions but lovers, a little startled, engaged, and licensed to be married.

XXXII

"Lee, dear," said Renier, "you don't feel that that fellow buncoed you into this, do you? Please say you don't."

"Of course, I wasn't buncoed," she said, and with infinite confidence. "Why, I've seen the thing coming for months! Haven't you?"

"I've seen a certain girl begin by being very dear and grow dearer and dearer--I wish we could _walk_ back. I'm afraid of motor-boats, fresh water, and sudden storms on mountain lakes. And I hereby highly resolve that after this perilous trip I shall never again do anything dangerous, such as watching people going up in aeroplanes, such as sitting around with wet feet, such as eating green fruit, such as-- Oh, my own darling little kiddie," he whispered with sudden trembling emotion, "but this life is precious."

"George and Charley are looking at us," said Lee, "with funny looks. I wonder if they are _on_? I wonder if everybody will be _on_--just by looking at us. _Do_ I look foolish?"

"You do not, but I think you are foolish to take a feller like me, and that's why I'm going to dance down this gang-plank and snap my fingers and shock George and Charley out of their senses."

During this first part of the _Streak_'s swift rush from Carrytown to The Camp a tranquil silence came over them. Lee, I think, was searching her heart with questions. But she had no doubt of her love for Renier; she doubted only her capacity to be to him exactly the wife he needed. And I know that Renier just sat, brazening the critical glances of George and Charley, and adored her with his eyes.

And what were his thoughts? Would you give a penny for them? He leaned closer to her, and in a whisper that thrilled them both to the bone, he quoted from Poe:

"And neither the angels in heaven above, Nor the demons down under the sea, Can ever dissever my soul from the soul Of the beautiful Annabel Lee."

And a little later he said:

"I never knew till to-day what poetry is for. I thought people who wrote it were just a little simple and that people who read and quoted it were perfect jackasses."

"And what is poetry for?" asked Lee, smiling.

"Poetry," he said, "is for _you_."

As they neared the camp the sentiment in their hearts yielded a little to excitement.

"When we tell 'em," said Lee, "it's going to be just like a bomb going off. And everybody will be terribly envious."

"Nobody even loves us," laughed Renier, and he quoted:

"Among ten million, one was she, And surely all men hated me."

And like a flash Lee answered:

"Among ten million he was one, So all the ladies fought like fun."

"One thing is sure," sand Renier, "we've more than executed Brother Arthur's delicate and confidential commission. What we don't know about getting married in the State of New York simply doesn't exist."

Arthur, eager and impatient, was like a more famous person, watching and waiting.

"Well," he said, "thank you a thousand times. And what did you find out?"

"We've brought you a license blank," said Lee; "you simply fill it out with your names and ages and things--like this--" And she placed a second paper in her brother's hands.

And conspicuous on the paper he saw Lee's name and Renier's. His hands shook a little, and his face became very grave and tender.

"Say you're surprised!" exclaimed Lee; "say you were never so surprised in all your born days!"

"But I'm not surprised," said Arthur. "Come here to me!" He opened his arms to her and she flung herself into them. Over her shoulder and hiding head Arthur spoke to Renier.