The Little Colonel's Knight Comes Riding Read online

  CHAPTER VI

  "GARDEN FANCIES"

  "OH, where are you going, my pretty maid?" It was Alex Shelby who calledout the question, leaning forward from the doctor's buggy, to look downthe locust avenue. Lloyd was coming toward the gate, swinging a hunter'shorn back and forth by its green cord. She waved it gaily as she sang inresponse:

  "I'm going a posing, sir, she said."

  He turned the wheel and sprang out, asking eagerly, "Is it anywhere thatI can take you?"

  "No, you're going in exactly the opposite direction, for I'm bound forthe spring in the Lindsey woods. Miss Marks asked me to meet her thereat eleven o'clock, but her note didn't come until aftah mothah had goneout with the carriage."

  Alex glanced at his watch. "If you could wait till I take this case ofinstruments up to Uncle, I could drive you over as well as not. It woulddetain you ten minutes, but even then you'd get to the Spring muchsooner than if you were to walk."

  "I'll certainly accept yoah offah," exclaimed Lloyd gratefully, lookingdown the long hot way that lay between her and the Lindsey woods.

  "No, I'll not drive ovah to the doctah's with you, thanks. That is sucha hot, dusty stretch of road. I'll just sit heah in the shade and wait."Laying the hunter's horn on the stone bench near the gate, she sat downbeside it and began to fan herself with her hat.

  "What's going on at the spring?" he asked as he climbed back into thebuggy.

  "I can't tell you. All I know is that old Frazer came up with a noteasking me to pose as Olga, the Flax-spinnah's maiden. Miss Marks isalways illustrating some old fairy-tale. She wanted me to bringgrandfathah's hunting hawn for the prince. I've been wondering evahsince who she's found to take that paht."

  "Harcourt, I'll bet you anything!" was Alex's emphatic answer as hegathered up the reins. "I saw him over at Clovercroft yesterday morning,setting up a tripod in front of the bay window. Well, here goes. I'll beback in ten minutes."

  As Lloyd watched the cloud of dust whirling along behind the rapidlydisappearing buggy, the impulse seized her to call out after him that heneedn't come back to take her to the spring, for she was not going.Several times that morning the suspicion had crossed her mind that MissMarks's new model might prove to be Leland Harcourt, and Alex's emphaticanswer seemed to confirm her misgivings. If that were the case she feltthat she could not possibly go. He had made such a point of avoiding herthat night at the Cabin, that even Betty had noticed it, and she wasvery sure she didn't want to have her picture taken with a man who hadshowed his aversion to her so plainly as all that. It would be horriblyawkward, she thought, if Miss Marks had asked him to pose with her. Hewould have to stoop and drink out of her hands as the prince had doneout of Olga's. Of course he couldn't refuse, and it would bedisagreeable to him and embarrassing to her, knowing as she did how hefelt towards her.

  It was unlike Lloyd to be sensitive over little things, and to magnifytrifles, and she had been unhappy for several days because she had doneso in this instance. If she had met Leland Harcourt like any otherstranger, she would not have given his manner toward her a secondthought; but Gay's plea beforehand in his behalf made herself-conscious. Of course he couldn't possibly know that she had lainawake, looking at the stars, picturing herself as a sort of guardianangel, who should lead him to great heights of achievement (as Gay hadassured her she could do). But she felt that he must have divined herintentions toward him, and was secretly amused at her presumption. Herface burned every time she thought of the regal manner in which she hadswept into the room, trying to make her entrance impressive, and thenthe polite way in which he had handed her over to some one else as ifshe were a mere child to whom he must be civil, but whose school-girlprattle bored him.

  "I can't _beah_ him!" she said in a disgusted tone to a black ant, whichwas crawling along towards the stone bench where she sat. But the littleant, intent on its own affairs, hurried past her as unheedingly as ifshe had been part of the bench.

  "And I suppose my opinion is of no moah impawtance to him than it is toyou," she added, with a shrug of the shoulders. Then she laughed, forthe comparison suddenly seemed to put the affair in a different light.

  "I'm certainly glad you happened along this way, Mistah Ant," she said,bending over to stop him with a stick while she made her whimsicalspeech. "Because I'm going to profit by yoah example from now on. Heahme? I'm going to quit worrying over what people may think of me and goalong about my business just as you are doing. _You_ nevah think aboutyoahself, do you! You don't even know that you _have_ a self, so ofco'se you can't feel slighted and sensitive."

  Lifting the stick so that the little creature might go on its eager wayagain, she watched it disappear, and then began idly tracing figures inthe dust at her feet.

  "I wish I had an enchanted necklace like Olga's," she mused, recallingthe old fairy-tale for which she was soon to pose. "Not one that couldgive me gorgeous dresses whenevah I repeated the charm, but one thatwould sawt of clothe my mind--put me into such a beautifully serenemental state that I wouldn't mind slights, and would be as unconsciousof self as that little old ant."

  Then a surprised, pleased expression lighted her face, as a suddenrecollection seemed to illuminate the old fairy-tale, and give it a newmeaning.

  "Why, it's like that lovely verse in the Psalms that Miss Allison readto the King's Daughters, the first time I went to a meeting of theCircle. '_The King's Daughter is all glorious within. Her clothing isof wrought gold._'" Sentences from Miss Allison's earnest little talk oflong ago began coming back to Lloyd like fragments of forgotten music.Something about being anointed with the "oil of gladness" and wearinggarments that smelled of myrrh and aloes and cassia "out of the ivorypalaces whereby they have made thee glad."

  Now in the story when Olga would change her gown of tow to one befittingher royal station, she had only to clasp a bead of her magic rosary andwhisper:

  "For love's sweet sake, in my hour of need, Blossom and deck me, little seed,"

  and straightway she would be clad in a garment, fine and fair as theshimmer of moonbeams. And Lloyd, casting about in her mind for a likecharm that would make her "all glorious within" as Olga's made herglorious without, suddenly bethought herself of her little necklace ofRoman pearls. She had not taken it back to school with her in her Senioryear, for she felt that she had outgrown its childish symbolism. Shecould "keep tryst" with life's obligations now without the visiblereminder of a little white bead, slipped daily over a silken cord.Still, it had helped her to remember, so many times in the past, thatshe was strongly tempted to try the efficacy of her little talisman justonce more. Glancing at her watch, she saw that Alex had been gone onlyfive minutes. Then dropping the stick with which she had been writing inthe dust, she ran lightly up the avenue, into the house and up to herroom.

  "Maybe it is sawt of childish," she thought as she opened thesandal-wood box and clasped the rosary around her neck. "But I don'tcare, if it will only help me to remembah not to be snippy and sensitiveand to go about my business like that little black ant. It's funny howsuch a little thing started me on the right path."

  When Alex came back she met him with such a shining face that he glancedat her curiously. "You look as if you had heard good news," he said ashe helped her into the buggy. "What's happened?"

  "Oh, nothing," she laughed. "I've just been practising my paht while Iwaited for you. I'm the Princess Olga, and I've gotten rid of my gown oftow, and I'm so relieved to find the real King's-daughtah attire, thatI'm as happy as a June-bug."

  He did not understand her allusion, but it would have made no differenceif she had talked to him in Greek, with that charming dimple coming andgoing as she laughed. It was a pleasure just to sit and watch her, whileshe rattled on in her inimitable way about June-bugs, wondering howhappy they were anyhow, and why people chose them as the unit ofmeasurement when they were measuring joy.

  * * * * *

  Over at the spring while they waited for Lloyd to come, Miss Marks
andLeland Harcourt experimented at picture-making with Gay for a victim.Stretched out on the rocks of the creek bank, with her hands lying inthe shallow water and her hair streaming over her shoulders, she wasobligingly trying to obey instructions to "look as wet and dead aspossible."

  Lloyd and Alex, coming on her unexpectedly as they picked their way upthe ravine, having tied the horse where the woodland road ended, werehorrified to find her lying there so limp and still. But the nextinstant Leland's voice sounded somewhere up among the bushes: "That'sgreat, Pug. Try to keep the pose a little longer till we get one moreplate. With a sea-gull and some rolling waves painted in in thebackground, it will be a perfect copy of that painting I saw inBrittany."

  "Well, hurry, please!" called Gay plaintively. "I can't stand it muchlonger. The sun on my wet face is burning it to a blister, and the rocksare cutting my elbow, and I know it's a spider that's crawling over theback of my neck."

  Lloyd gave a toot of the hunter's horn to warn them of their approachand the extra plate was never made. For with a little shriek the"Drowned Fishermaiden" scrambled up from the rocks in embarrassed haste,and when she caught sight of Alex, fled away into the bushes to gatherup her dishevelled hair and otherwise put herself to rights. She was tooagitated to notice Lloyd's meeting with Leland, but while she madeherself presentable the sound of laughter floated in among the bushes toher most reassuringly.

  "They're laughing at me," she thought, "but I don't care how ridiculousI looked. _Anything to_ break the ice between them and put them on afriendly footing."

  At the sight of Leland's dark face with its cynical, slightly amusedexpression, Lloyd's resentment returned, but the touch of the littlenecklace recalled her resolve. "I'll _not_ be snippy and sensitive," sherepeated to herself, clasping one of the beads in her fingers as if itreally held some potent charm to help her change her mental attitude.

  So when Gay joined them she found that Lloyd had dropped her distant,disdainful manner of the day before and was her own sweet, winsome self.It was with a sigh of relief that Gay left them to the discussion ofposes and costumes, and turned to Alex, who was about to take hisdeparture. The one word, picnic, was enough to stop him. It was what hehad been hoping for ever since the Harcourts had taken the Cabin. Gay'sappeal for help set him to work with the zest of a truant school-boy.

  While he made a fire and carried water from the spring, Gay emptied thebaskets they had brought, and spread the contents out on a great flatrock. Then while the water boiled for the coffee, and the potatoes wereroasting in the ashes, she sent him to look for a wild grape-vine.

  "I want a lot of grape-leaves to make into little baskets to serve theberries in," she told him. "And bring them up here where I can keep aneye on what is going on at the spring. There seems to be a hitch in theperformance somewhere."

  The difficulty was with the prince's costume. Nothing they had broughtgave quite the effect they wanted, so finally Leland proposed bringingthe story down to date.

  "The modern Princess is the Summer Girl," he said. "So take MissSherman just as she is, and I'll go back to the Cabin and put on abicycle suit."

  "MAKING A CUP OF HER WHITE HANDS."]

  "They are getting on famously," thought Gay as she listened to Lloyd'smerry response to something he called back, as he went crashing awaythrough the bushes. The last little basket was made and filled withberries before Leland came back, dragging his wheel up the ravine. Gayand Alex, having finished their preparations, climbed up the bank towatch the pretty tableau, Lloyd making a cup of her white hands andcatching the water in them, that the prince might stoop and drink.

  "Let's try it again, Miss Marks," cried Leland enthusiastically. "How isthis pose?" He dropped gracefully to one knee, baring his head as hebowed it over Lloyd's hands.

  "Is the change in him or is it in me?" thought Lloyd as the dark eagerface smiled up at her, with its quick flashing smile that she found sopeculiarly attractive. "He certainly is the most entahtaining man I evahtalked to."

  "The show is over," called Gay as Miss Marks began to put up her camera."If your royal highnesses will deign to descend, dinner will be servedimmediately." It was an attractive table she led them to, the redberries shining in luscious heaps in their little green baskets,mounds of fresh watercress beside every plate, and a big bouquet ofwildflowers in the centre of the rock table.

  "What is the peculiar charm of a picnic?" queried Alex as he fished anant out of the sugar and opened a half-cooked potato.

  "At home one would send such a dish back to the kitchen in red-hotwrath. Here one eats it in a sort of solemn joy."

  "It's the spell of the June woods," suggested Miss Marks.

  "No, it's youth in the blood," said Leland. "All the Junes in the worldand all outdoors wouldn't make a half-baked potato fit for the godsunless one has 'the sun and the wind in his pulses.'"

  "No," insisted Gay. "It can't be that, for Jameson isn't much older thanyou, and he despises prowling around in the woods, as he calls it. Hemade so much fun of it that Lucy went driving with him instead of comingwith us, and she adores such outings, just as much now as she did beforeshe was married."

  "Maybe no one feels the charm unless the gods have given him a sort ofMidas touch that will turn everything disagreeable, like ants andunderdone potatoes, into golden experiences," said Alex. "The Midasimagination let us call it. And the way to keep it in good working orderis to give it constant practice. Let's have a picnic every day."

  "To-morrow," announced Leland, "I'll take you all over to that oldEnglish garden that I discovered, to take that Garden fancy ofBrowning's we were discussing."

  Gay looked up quickly. It had been understood only yesterday that theywere to wait for Kitty's return for that picture. His taking it forgranted that Lloyd would assume the part augured well for her hopes.

  "You know that poem of Browning's, don't you, Miss Sherman?" he asked,smiling across at her.

  Now Lloyd had never cared for Browning. In fact she frankly admittedthat she had never got far enough into many of his poems to know what hewas talking about. At Warwick Hall Miss Chilton had been such anenthusiastic interpreter of his that ten of the girls in Lloyd's classhad formed a Browning club. Although she declined their invitation tojoin them, she was more complimented by that invitation than any otherof that school term, and envied them their apparent enjoyment of what toher was a tangle of vague meanings. Now when, she saw Leland take a wellworn copy from his pocket and flip over the leaves to find the place,with an ease that showed long familiarity with it, she wished that shehad joined the club. It made her feel childish and immature to thinkthat she could not discuss this subject with him as any one of those tengirls could have done. But it was one of the simple poems to which thebook opened. From her seat opposite, Lloyd could see the marked marginsand underscored lines, as he read aloud:

  "'Here is the garden she walked across Arm in my arm such a short while since.

  * * * * *

  Down this side of the gravel walk She went, while her robe's edge brushed the box. And here she paused in her gracious talk To point me a moth on the milk-white phlox.'"

  "Oh, I can just _see_ that picture," cried Miss Marks enthusiastically."I wish we had time to take it to-day."

  "But wait, here's a better one," he added, turning the page.

  "'This flower she stopped at, finger on lip, Stooped over in doubt, as settling its claim, Till she gave me with pride to make no slip, Its soft, meandering Spanish name. What a name! Was it love or praise? Speech half-asleep or song half-awake? I must learn Spanish one of these days Only for that slow, sweet name's sake.'"

  Lloyd picked up the book open at the place where he laid it, facedownward, on the rock.

  "I wondah what flowah Browning meant," she said, "that had such a 'soft,meandering Spanish name. Speech half-asleep or song half-awake--' Itmust have been something exquisitely beautiful or he wouldn't have beenwilling to learn
a language just for the sake of knowing that one name."

  Farther down the page were other underscored lines. She read themsoftly, almost under her breath.

  "'Where I find her not, beauties vanish. Whither I follow her beauties flee. Is there no method to tell her in Spanish June is twice June since she's breathed it with me?'"

  "Isn't that sweet?" cried Gay. "Say it for us, Leland. Say it in Spanishso we can hear how it sounds."

  With an indulgent smile, as if amused at her childishness, he lazily didGay's bidding, then as she began exclaiming over the musical syllablesto Alex, he turned to Lloyd and repeated the line with an emphasis whichmade it altogether personal. Of course she could not understand it, butthe words were like bird-notes, and there was no mistaking the languageof those dark expressive eyes that held hers a moment in their admiringgaze. They said as plainly as if they had spoken aloud, "June is twiceJune, since _you've_ breathed it with me."

  Lloyd felt the colour surge up into her face, and to hide it, turnedquickly and began examining a grass stain on the hem of her skirt, withapparent concern. But an exultant little thrill flashed over her. Heliked her. She was sure of it, and it made her glad, so glad that itamazed her to think that only two hours before she had confidedemphatically to a little black ant crawling over her path, that shecouldn't bear him.

  When she had finished a critical examination of the grass stain sheglanced back again, hoping that Gay had not seen her embarrassment. Toher relief Gay's entire attention was absorbed in an argument with Alexas to the exact meaning of the quotation, whether twice June meant alengthening of the calendar or an intensifying of its pleasures. MissMarks, like a good chaperone, could not have noticed, for she was busygathering up the dishes, and Lloyd sprang up to help her.

  Presently, as they started away from the spring, Leland came around toLloyd's side. "You must let me teach you Spanish, Miss Sherman," he saidin his masterful way which seemed to leave her no choice in the matter."An hour a day wouldn't take much of your time, and would be enough togive you some idea of the charm of the language. Gay tells me you playthe harp. Some of the songs are exquisite."

  "Oh, I nevah in the world could learn it, I am suah!" she answeredlightly, with a shrug that seemed to indicate the uselessness ofundertaking such a task.

  "You don't know," he answered authoritatively. "You've never had me fora teacher."

  Again that flashing look that made his eyes deepen so wonderfully andcurved the cynical lips into an altogether gentle and winning smile. Itseemed to photograph itself on Lloyd's memory, recurring to her againand again in the most unexpected moments. She saw it on the way homewith Alex, all the time she was laughingly recounting some of herWarwick Hall escapades. It came between her and her book when she triedto read herself to sleep that afternoon, and the last thing that nightwhen her eyes were closed and the lights were out she saw again thatglance that said as plainly as the slow music of his Spanish words,"June is _twice_ June since _you've_ breathed it with me."