Produced by Stephen Hutcheson and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net

       [Illustration: _Was it Kate Marshall? She scarcely knew._]

                        YOUNG MODERNS BOOKSHELF

                                  THE
                           VANISHING COMRADE
                      _A Mystery Story for Girls_

                                   BY
                            ETHEL COOK ELIOT

                [Illustration: Young Moderns Book Shelf]

 An unusual mystery about a strange orchard house with a brave girl who
                     finally straightens things out

                        The Sun Dial Press, Inc.
                                NEW YORK

                                  1937
                        THE SUN DIAL PRESS, INC.
                                   CL

                          COPYRIGHT, 1924, BY
                       DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY
                          ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

                      PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES
                                   AT
               THE COUNTRY LIFE PRESS, GARDEN CITY, N.Y.

                        AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED
                                   TO
                            MY SISTER HELEN

                                CONTENTS

  CHAPTER                                                           PAGE
  I. Great Aunt Katherine Commands                                     1
  II. The Boy in the Flowery, Dragony Picture Frame                   19
  III. The Comrade Does Not Appear                                    30
  IV. Little Orchard House, Beware!                                   44
  V. Kate Makes Up a Face                                             59
  VI. “I Will Pay for It”                                             69
  VII. “Even So——”                                                    86
  VIII. Kate Meets a Detective                                        92
  IX. Something of Fairy in It                                       106
  X. In the Mirror                                                   116
  XI. Kate Takes the Helm                                            135
  XII. The Special Delivery                                          149
  XIII. “You Thief!”                                                 160
  XIV. The Stranger in the Garden                                    174
  XV. Kate on Guard                                                  194
  XVI. One End of the String                                         204
  XVII. Into the Orchard House                                       219
  XVIII. The Last Room                                               236
  XIX. Elsie Confides                                                249
  XX. A Farewell in the Dark                                         261
  XXI. Like the Stars                                                269

                                  THE
                           VANISHING COMRADE

  [Illustration: “_Orchard house, beware! Aunt Katherine’s nieces are
                                here._”]

                         The Vanishing Comrade

                               CHAPTER I
                     GREAT AUNT KATHERINE COMMANDS

Two boys and a girl climbed down out of the bus from Middletown when it
made its final stop in front of the summer hotel at the head of Broad
Street. The boys, between them, were carrying the girl’s books and a
goodly number of their own, for they were returning from the last
session of the school year. To-morrow summer holidays would begin. They
nodded a friendly good-bye to the driver and started off up the steep
little elm-roofed street that sloped directly up to Ashland College, an
institution for girls, perched on the highest plateau of this hill town.
The boys’ father was a professor in that college and the girl’s mother
an instructor. But in spite of their privilege of living in the lap of
learning these young people had to take a daily nine-mile bus ride down
into the bigger village of Middletown if they themselves were to get
college preparation.

The boys were twins. They were tall and spare, even for boys of sixteen,
and seemed all angles. They had thick thatches of auburn hair, whimsical
faces, and generous, clear-cut mouths. The girl was sturdy, slightly
square in build, with brown, straight bobbed hair. The bobbed hair was
parted at the side and brushed away in a wing from her forehead, and
this gave her a boyish, ready look. Her eyes were hazel and very clear
and confident in their level glance, but when she smiled, as she did
often, they crinkled up into mere slits of eyes, because they were
slightly narrow to begin with, and then she seemed oddly Puckish. Her
mouth was wide and her lips rather full, but for all of that, because of
its uptilted corners, it was really a very nice mouth. She trudged along
now between her two friends, the corners of her mouth more uptilted than
usual.

“Oh, I’m so glad it’s vacation! At last!” she was saying. “Mother and I
are going to have just the nicest summer. We’re going to take long walks
we never took, make a new vegetable garden, and eat almost every one of
our meals out-of-doors when it isn’t raining. We may even if it does
rain! When will your tennis court be done?”

“We’re going to get right at it to-morrow morning,” Sam Hart, the twin
on her left, answered. “It ought to be finished by the middle of July or
sooner if they’ll let us borrow the roller from the Hotel. Then if your
mother is as patient as usual with us, we may be champions ourselves
before the summer’s over.”

“She’s crazy to play,” Kate assured them. “But she says we must remember
she hasn’t touched a racket in years and that you have to keep in
practice to be any good at tennis. It was seventeen years ago she won
that cup at the Oakdale Country Club.”

“She must have begun playing when she was in creepers,” Sam exclaimed.
“I thought it was a regular cup, a real and regular tournament affair.”

“It was, of course. And she was nineteen, foolish.”

“She’s thirty-six now then.” Lee did the arithmetic. “It’s funny that,
being so old as all that, she has always seemed just one of us. Where
did you ever get such a mother, Kate?”

“Oh, I took my time about choosing,” Kate answered, apparently
seriously. “I didn’t snatch at the first thing offered. I said ‘better
not have any mother at all than one who isn’t magnificent.’ So I kept my
head and refused to consider anything commonplace. You know the result,
gentlemen.”

The boys did not bother to respond even with a laugh. They were used to
Kate’s nonsense.

But now in their climb up the steep elm-shaded street they had reached
the college campus on the “Heights” and Professor Hart’s house set into
its corner.

“I’ll take my books,” Kate said. “Thanks for carrying ’em. If I do a lot
of weeding in the court, perhaps it’ll pay you a little for having been
such good pack-horses for me all this year.”

But Sam shook his head at the outstretched hands. “I’m coming on with
you,” he declared. “How about you, Lee?”

“Me, too,” Lee responded. “Wait a second till I pitch these things on to
the piazza.”

But Kate protested. “No, don’t. It’s almost supper time. The bus was
late. We’ll be busy, Mother and I. Come after supper, instead, and help
us decide where the new garden is to be. Perhaps mother will play Mah
Jong with us.”

There was nothing to do but agree when Kate took a dictatorial tone. The
boys meekly gave a pile of books into her arms and turned in at their
own walk.

Kate’s mouth kept its uptilted corners as she went on alone, humming to
herself and thinking pleasant thoughts. She skirted the forsaken campus
a little way and then took a short-cut across its lawns. She knew that
the last student had left to-day, and there would be no “grass police”
to shoo her back to the paths.

“It’s great having all the girls gone,” she mused. “Now I shall have a
little of Mother to myself again.”

Kate was justified in her pleasure in the girls’ departure, for those
older girls did take an unconscionable amount of Katherine Marshall’s
time and thought. Of course, Katherine had to teach them, Kate
realized—that was how she earned their living. But she did not
understand why, outside of classroom hours, they need be always
underfoot. Kate was proud of her mother’s popularity, but often
exasperated by it, too; for those older girls never by any chance paid
any attention to Kate herself. They were polite, of course, but most
perfunctorily; it was her mother they came to see and on her least word
and motion they hung almost with bated breath. The truth was that these
indifferent, superior girls, always present and never of any use to her,
turned the college year for Katherine into a loneliness that even her
mother scarcely realized.

There were the Hart boys, of course, always. But boys cannot take the
place of a girl comrade. Kate’s mother was all the girl comrade she had.
That was why she had not let the boys come with her now. For once, she
would be sure to find her mother alone, and the hour would take on, for
Kate, something of the nature of a reunion.

The house she now approached, across the street from the campus to which
it turned its low and vine-hung back, had formerly been a barn. The
college had made it over for Kate’s mother into a charming cottage which
despite its turned back was still part of the college property. Kate
found her mother sitting on the little garden bench at the side of the
big double doors that had once been the carriage entrance and now stood
open all spring and summer facing the hazy valley. Her cheek was resting
on her hand and the expression in her eyes was a very far-away one, a
farther away than the valley one. But she became very present when she
heard Kate’s step.

“Oh, Kate, I thought you would never come!” she exclaimed. “Read this
letter.” She picked it up from the bench beside her and handed it to
Kate. “It’s from your Great Aunt Katherine!”

“What! Again?”

Why Kate exclaimed “Again” would be hard to say, for within her memory
Great Aunt Katherine had only written her mother once before, and that
was all of two years ago! That letter had been to tell of the sudden
death of a semi-relative, a woman of whom, until that time, Kate had
never heard. Would this have news of another death? It must be something
of importance that had wrung a second letter from Great Aunt Katherine.

Flinging her books on the grass, and following them herself to sit at
her mother’s feet, Kate opened the smooth, thick, creamy sheet and read:

  My dear Katherine:

  I am asking you to send your daughter Katherine to spend the month of
  July with me here in my Oakdale house. Unexpected business in Boston
  is keeping me from my usual trip abroad this summer. I do not know
  whether I told you when acquainting you with Gloria’s tragic death
  that her daughter was left without home or protection of any sort and
  that I proposed to take her in. But such was the case. Naturally, ever
  since, the child has been peculiarly lonely here in Oakdale. And now
  that she no longer has her day school in Boston to occupy her, the
  situation is a really trying one. It has occurred to me that Elsie and
  your Katherine are very nearly of an age, both fifteen, and that they
  might find themselves companionable. So I am asking you to forget old
  grievances, as I shall, and send your daughter to me for a month’s
  visit. I shall plan parties and theatres and good times for them, and
  promise you that it will be every bit as gay as it was when you were a
  young girl here, and not too independent then to let your aunt give
  herself pleasure by planning for yours. I have looked up trains and
  find that by leaving Middletown at one o’clock, Katherine, with only
  one change, will arrive in the South Station in Boston at six-fifteen.
  I shall expect her on that train Saturday of this week, and Bertha,
  Elsie’s maid, will meet her and bring her out here in time for dinner.
  If for any reason that is not a convenient train for Katherine to
  take, will you please wire me what time she _will_ arrive?
                                 Sincerely,
                                                         Aunt Katherine.

Kate looked up at her mother, dazed. “Just like that!” she exclaimed.
“Does Great Aunt Katherine expect us to obey her just like that?”

Katherine was grave. “Yes, she has always done things like this. That’s
been the trouble. And when things don’t go exactly as she has commanded
that they should, she is at first unbelieving and then furious.”

“Hm. And who is Elsie?”

“Elsie is Nick’s little girl, and a sort of foster-niece to Aunt
Katherine now, I suppose.”

“It was Nick’s wife who was killed in the automobile accident in France,
wasn’t it? But why haven’t you told me about her, about this Elsie? I’ve
always wanted a cousin so, Mother!”

“Well, she isn’t exactly a cousin, you know. But even so, if Nick and I
hadn’t quarrelled, if we had stayed as we were, in the course of things
you would have known each other and perhaps have been very dear friends.
It would have been natural.”

“Oh, Mother—quarrels! When you are so lovely, how have people quarrelled
with you so? It’s a—_paradox_. Now don’t say I’ve used the wrong
word!—But here’s more, more to the letter!”

Kate had turned the letter over and discovered a postscript on the back.
Katherine, who had missed it, bent down, and they read it cheek to
cheek.

  P.S. I will add, for this will perhaps make your acceptance the
  quicker to come to, that Nicholas’s name is never mentioned here,
  either by me or the servants, or even Elsie herself. So that end of
  things need cause you no anxiety. Elsie is a charming, well-mannered
  child.

That paragraph had not been intended for Kate’s eyes. Katherine
understood that at once, but it was all that she did understand about
it. She frowned, puzzled.

“Notice how she says ‘Make your acceptance quicker to come to’,” Kate
pointed out sharply. “She takes it for granted you’ll come to it,
apparently. If there is any question, it’s only one of time. But why
isn’t Nick’s name mentioned?”

Katherine shrugged. “I am afraid she must have quarrelled with him, too,
just as she did with your father and me. But if that’s so it must be
terrible for both of them, since he owes her so much and she counted on
him so to make up for Father and me and later you, Kate, and everything!
How could he quarrel with her? Why, he should have put up with
anything!”

Katherine’s cheek was again on her hand. Her face was all puzzle. “And
why should Elsie be lonely in Oakdale?” she went on aloud, but almost to
herself now. “Oakdale is quite a gay little place, and I know very well
there are plenty of young people there. Some of them are children of
friends of mine, friends I haven’t seen since I was married. Why, there
are even the Denton children, just next door to Aunt Katherine’s! It’s
all very mysterious, Elsie’s being lonely.”

But mystery where Great Aunt Katherine was concerned was no new thing to
Kate. Whenever she thought about Aunt Katherine at all it was always to
wonder. Why should her mother be estranged so entirely from her only
living relative, this aunt for whom she had been named, and who had been
a second mother to her after her own mother had died, when she was a
very little girl? Kate could never understand that situation. Katherine
was so peculiarly gentle and forgiving and lovable! How could any one
stay angry with her?

Last year, when Kate was fourteen, Katherine had tried to explain things
to her a little. She had said then that Great Aunt Katherine’s money was
the cause of the feud. Only it was not the usual trouble that money
makes in families. It was not that Aunt Katherine was selfish or proud.
It was—oh, absurdity—that she was over-generous! She expected to force
her generosity on her family whether they wanted it or not. It had begun
with Kate’s Grandfather Frazier. He and Great Aunt Katherine were
half-brother and sister. When Katherine was about Kate’s age now,
Grandfather Frazier had failed in business and the very same month Great
Aunt Katherine had inherited a fortune from an uncle on her mother’s
side. Until that turn of fortune’s wheel Aunt Katherine had been a
school teacher living with her half-brother and giving her spare time to
mothering her namesake niece. When she woke up one morning to find
herself a wealthy—a very wealthy—woman, she immediately decreed that her
brother should share the good fortune with her just as she had for so
long shared his home with him and his child. But Grandfather Frazier’s
pride forbade him to acquiesce in that. The uncle was not his uncle, and
it was not only his pride but his sense of propriety that influenced him
in his firm decision not to accept one cent from Aunt Katherine. All
that he would allow her to do to help his financial situation was to buy
the house from him in which they were living so that with the money he
might pay his debts. Thereafter he insisted that she was his landlady
and he made a fetish until the month of his death of being on time with
the absurdly small rent.

Aunt Katherine had built herself a large and mansionlike house on part
of the land that went with her brother’s little house. And since he
distinctly limited her in the things she might do for his daughter, she
adopted, suddenly and to every one’s amazement, a poor young boy, with
no background whatever, who had been brought up in a “Home,” and who at
the time of her discovering him was working in a factory. She prepared
him herself for college, sent him to Harvard, and thrust him, almost
head first, into the “younger set” in Oakdale. He had married Gloria, a
beautiful young Bostonian but with no especial “connections.” That was
all that Kate knew of him, except for this late knowledge that he had a
daughter.

Kate could understand her grandfather’s pride, dimly. But her mother’s
case was not so clear to her, not quite. Her mother had married a rising
young diplomat, a man of supposedly some wealth and assuredly fine
ancestry. But on his death, not long after Kate’s birth, it was
discovered that there was not a cent to which the young widowed mother
could lay claim. Katherine had never explained to Kate how this had
happened. She hardly knew herself perhaps, because the processes of Wall
Street were a maze to her. Almost gleefully, Aunt Katherine had seized
upon this opportunity to offer her niece a home with her and a
substantial allowance so that she might feel independent in that home.
Katherine had refused point blank. And Aunt Katherine, now very
sensitive on the subject of rejected generosities, had made a clean
break with her namesake, washed her hands, and dropped her out of her
life, much as one might drop a thistle that had pricked too
unreasonably.

Katherine, determined to earn her own and her little daughter’s way, had
obtained an instructorship here at Ashland College, worked hard and
happily ever since, and gloried in her independence.

The whole reason for this choice of poverty and hard work Katherine had
not told Kate. But she had hinted that there was a very deep reason and
one that justified her. Sometime, perhaps, she would disclose it.
Meanwhile, Kate gave all this little thought, and was only brooding over
it now because of the letter in her hand.

After a minute she said firmly, “If Great Aunt Katherine thinks I’m
going to leave you here alone on this deserted hill-top for a whole
month of our precious vacation, she has a surprise in store. Shall we
write or wire our regrets, Mother?”

“We’d better write,” Katherine answered, getting up suddenly and
beginning in an unusually energetic way to pull up weeds from the
lily-of-the-valley bed under the window. “I shall write that Saturday is
too soon, for there must be some preparation on our part for such a
visit. By next Tuesday, though, I should think you could be ready.”

Kate turned her head to follow her mother with amazed eyes. “You don’t
mean I’m to go, Mother?”

“Yes, I want you to go. I want you very much to go. Aunt Katherine
apparently needs you. I think, though, she must be drawing on her
imagination a bit as to the loneliness of Oakdale for Elsie, especially
since she herself says there will be parties and good times for you. You
can’t have parties without young people! Even so, her saying she needs
you makes our acceptance not only dignified but imperative.”

“But to leave you here alone! How could I ever do that? What are you
thinking of?”

Katherine laughed at her daughter then. She was extraordinarily pretty
when she laughed, startlingly pretty. But when she sobered, as she was
bound to do too quickly, she was quite different, still lovely but not
startling. Her face, sober, was intensely earnest. She had a rather
square and strong chin but with wide, melting gray eyes to offset it.
Her dark curly hair, which when undone came just to her shoulders, could
be held in place at her neck with only a shell pin or two, it was so
amenable in its curly crispness. Her cheeks and little slim hands were
tanned, but with healthy colour showing through, making her, Kate often
said, exactly the colour of a golden peach. She was slim and very
graceful and not tall.

But in spite of all Katherine’s loveliness and feminine charm, the
impression one gained from her was one of over-earnestness, a fire of
intense purpose steadily, even fiercely burning under the outwardly gay
and light manner.

Now she was laughing. “Why shouldn’t you leave me alone?” she asked.
“And I won’t be so alone, either. The Harts are staying. The boys will
be my protectors and my playfellows both. I’ve been a fortunate woman
all these years to have two such boys as well as my girl! And three
mornings a week, you know, I shall be busy helping Mr. Hart with his
cataloguing.... Now we shall have to collect all our wits and think
about suitable clothes for you.”

Kate’s heart began to beat. When she had read the letter she had not let
herself even contemplate what going would mean, not for an instant; for
she had not dreamed her mother would so fall in with Aunt Katherine’s
plan. But since she had fallen in with it, since she wanted her to
go—well, it was very exciting! For the first time she might have for a
comrade a girl, a girl of her own age, a chum! For if Elsie, that
stranger unheard of until a few minutes ago, was lonely, What was she,
Kate Marshall? Oh, she would surely be gladder of Elsie than Elsie could
possibly be of her!

She went to the border of the lily-of-the-valley bed and began weeding
beside her mother.

“I don’t see what we’ll do about clothes,” she said a little
tremulously, not yet really believing in this new vista that seemed
opening before her, like the valley there, at her very feet. “If I do
go, I suppose Aunt Katherine will expect me to dress for breakfast and
dinner and supper and in between times in that splendid house of hers.”

“No, not quite so bad as that; but she certainly will want you to
have—let’s see—two ordinary gingham dresses, a little dinner frock, a
party frock, a white dress for church, a sport coat and hat, a garden
hat, a street hat, a street suit, a——”

But Kate interrupted this list with a quick laugh. “She’ll want in vain,
then. Let’s get down to business and just discuss the must-be’s, if I
_am_ to be a pig and go and leave you here alone for July with a
vacation on your hands.”

Katherine straightened up, brushing the soil from her fingers. Her quick
ear had caught a joyous lilt in the voice and laugh that to an ordinary
ear would have sounded merely dry. Her own heart leapt in sympathy with
Kate’s.

“Fortunately there’s my pink organdie. That must do for dinners,” the
mother began, counting on her earth-stained fingers.

“Pardon, Mother darling, _my_ pink organdie. It’s been mine for over a
year. Why will you go on calling things yours for years and years and
years after they have descended? There’s _my_ pink organdie then. It’ll
have to do for church and for parties and for summer best just as it
would if I were here. Two gingham dresses almost new. The blue
flannel—but that will be too warm and scratchy for July, I’m afraid. Oh,
Mother, that’s just all. I simply can’t go to Great Aunt Katherine’s,
and I’ll never know Elsie!”

“Of course you can. Haven’t we always found a way to do the things we
really wanted? Wait a minute. There’s my new white linen. I shall fix
that for you. But your gingham dresses will never do, not for Oakdale.
Never!”

“You’re not to give your white linen to me. It’s the prettiest thing
you’ve got.”

“Hush! It will make a charming street suit. It will need a black silk
tie and a patent-leather belt. I can _see_ you in it.”

“You can, but you won’t!” But when Kate saw her mother’s dazed, puzzled
little frown that invariably met her rare impertinences, she relented.
“Oh, Mother,” she cried, “if I’m to have your very best things added to
mine, of course I shall be perfectly fixed. It will be a regular
trousseau.”

“I don’t need anything but these old smocks, staying here,” Katherine
insisted. “And that’s exactly what I shall do, give you everything of
mine that can possibly be of any use. For once in your life you are
going to have just an ordinary young girl good time. And if you and
Elsie do hit it off, perhaps Aunt Katherine will consent to her coming
back with you for the rest of the vacation. Come, let’s spread all our
possibilities out on the beds and see what there is!”

“Yes, after we’ve pared the potatoes for supper,” Kate agreed, trying
desperately to hold on to her last shreds of casualness and poise. “We
had better have supper to-night, I suppose, whether I go to Great Aunt
Katherine’s or not. It must be six o’clock now.”

Katherine threw an arm across Kate’s shoulder as they went through the
big door. “How fortunate it is,” she said, not for the first time, “that
I have such a steady, common-sensible little girl!”

But Kate would not abide her own hypocrisy.

“Oh, Mother, don’t make me feel cheap!” she exclaimed. “You know
perfectly well that I’m just bursting with excitement, only I’m ashamed
to show it, for it’s you who are going to be left at home doing just the
same old things and seeing just the same old people and everything.”

“But I’m happy doing just that,” Katherine hurried to assure her. “Why,
you yourself, Kate, have been looking forward to your vacation here and
planning it with such pleasure!”

“Ye—es. But that was before this came. Now I don’t see how I could bear
the thought of just staying here! Now that I’m going to have pretty
clothes and go to parties and meet some boys and girls, and have a girl
chum of my own—why, what I was so looking forward to doesn’t seem
anything at all. I’ve suddenly waked up, and there’s a big door open
right in front of me, bigger than our funny old front door! I’m going
through it, right into such fun! Only I’m leaving you behind. That isn’t
fair.”

Katherine was quick to understand. Kate’s whole mood was as real to her
as though it were her own. She said, “But don’t you see, dear, I _had_
all that fun a thousand times over when I was a girl. Aunt Katherine
gave me parties galore and took me to the theatre as often as Father
would let her and there was anything worth seeing. And now that you are
to have some of that life for a month, I am delighted. I only wish Aunt
Katherine had asked you sooner. I have truly always hoped she would.
Only, I suppose, she thought I was like Father and wouldn’t accept
things for you any more than for myself. And oh, Katie dear, do try to
be patient with Aunt Katherine, no matter what she does or says! Perhaps
you will make up a little to her for what I have taken away.”

They stood now in the kitchen, facing each other. Suddenly Kate laughed,
her nicest laugh that screwed up her eyes into slits and turned her into
a Puck. “Let’s put off supper then,” she cried. “Stodgy old suppers we
can have any night. Let’s get out all the clothes we’ve got and just
plan. I’m not going to let you touch any of your good ones for me. I’m
truly not. But there may be some old things we’ve forgotten.”

“Now you’re really common-sensible, my dear,” Katherine affirmed.
“Before it was only pretend common-sensibleness.”

And arm-in-arm, without one look at the kitchen clock which now was
pointing to all of quarter past six, they went through the funny, merry
little barn house toward the bedrooms.

                               CHAPTER II
             THE BOY IN THE FLOWERY, DRAGONY PICTURE FRAME

During the next few days of hurried preparation for the visit the Hart
boys found themselves almost entirely left out of the life in the little
barn house, the house that ordinarily served as a second home for them.

“No time for boys to-day,” Kate would call out crisply when they
appeared at windows or door. “Woman’s business is afoot. We’re too busy
even to look at you.”

And Katherine, who was usually so much more easily beguiled and quick to
see their side in any argument, for once echoed Kate and upheld her in
her determination to stick to the tasks they had set themselves.

In spite of all Kate’s protests, Katherine’s new white linen was ripped
to pieces and remade for the traveller into a jaunty street suit. With a
black tie and narrow black patent-leather belt, when it was finished it
looked as though it might have come from some fashionable shop in New
York. Kate could not help being delighted. The pink organdie, which had
done Kate duty for best all last summer, and Katherine for best for
several summers before that, was now freshened with new lace and
decorated with narrow black velvet ribbon. It was not only becoming, but
quite up-to-date, and when it was finished and Kate surveyed herself in
it in the glass, standing on a chair to see it all, they both decided
that Kate would be able to put clothes definitely out of her mind when
she was wearing it, for it was quite appropriate for all the occasions
it was destined to grace.

And finally, Katherine’s pretty bedroom was robbed of its month-old
chintz curtains which, under her magic, in the space of two days only,
became two simple but unique and pretty morning dresses for Kate. Now
all that remained to be thought of in the way of clothes was the
travelling suit.

“My navy blue silk will do perfectly,” Kate said. “If I’m a little
careful, it won’t hurt it any, and next winter it will be as good as
ever for your teas and things, Mother, unless I’ve quite grown out of
it. Anyway, travelling won’t spoil it.”

When that was agreed upon it naturally followed that Katherine’s new
spring hat must go with it; for it was a little navy blue silk hat,
light and small and quite fascinating.

“What you’ll ever do for a hat I don’t see,” Kate worried.

“Never mind about me,” Katherine told her nonchalantly. “Here on this
hill-top anything does so long as it gives a shade. And if ever I go
down to Middletown I can wear your black tam.”

In the silk dress and hat and with her last spring’s blue cape with its
orange silk lining Kate felt prepared to meet the eyes of even Elsie’s
maid with equanimity. But imagine a girl of fifteen having a lady’s
maid!

Katherine thought that was just a glorified title for nurse, probably.
But Kate protested that. A nurse for a girl of fifteen would be even
more absurd than a maid. Well, Katherine was sure Aunt Katherine herself
wouldn’t have a maid. She was a New Englander with all a true New
Englander’s scorn of self-indulgence. But she probably did need someone
to keep Elsie mended and possibly to be a sort of chaperon for her, too;
for Aunt Katherine, since her inheritance, had interested herself in
social and charitable work and was a very busy and even an important
woman.

The two had endless conversations about Aunt Katherine and the
adventures awaiting Kate. And Katherine talked more than she had ever
talked before about her own girlhood in Oakdale and the little orchard
house where she had always lived and where she had been so happy.

“If it isn’t rented you must go into it,” she told Kate. And then she
described the rooms for her and all the important events that had
happened in them. Aunt Katherine’s big newer house she hardly spoke of
at all, for Kate herself was so soon to see it and know all its corners.

All the planning and sewing and the long intimate conversations about
Katherine’s girlhood and bits of family history that Kate had never
heard before, kept her right up to the eve of departure occupied and
excited. But as bedtime approached that night she began to be shaken by
unexpected qualms. She had never before been away from her mother for
even one night and they had always _shared_ adventure. That now she was
actually to go off by herself into an adventure of her own seemed
unnatural and almost impossible.

They were sitting on the bench out beside the big front doors, breathing
in all the cool night air they could after the last hot and rather
hurried day. Their faces were only palely visible to each other in the
starlight. They had been silent for many minutes when Kate said
suddenly, and a little huskily, “Mother, may I take the picture of the
boy in the silver, flowery, dragony picture frame along to Oakdale with
me to-morrow? He’s a sort of talisman of mine.”

Katherine was used to Kate’s abruptnesses and seldom showed surprise at
anything anyway. But now she did show surprise, and the voice that
answered Kate quivered with more than surprise.

“The silvery, flowery, dragony picture frame? And the boy? What do you
know of him, Kate?”

“Why, he’s always been in the little top drawer of your desk. He’s
_always_ been there. I’ve never told you how much he meant to me. I’ve
made it a secret. But I’ve known him just about as long as I can
remember. I was an awfully little girl and had to climb on to a chair at
first to see him. But I didn’t climb to look often. I saved it
for—magic. When something dreadful happened, when I was punished or
lessons were just too hateful, or you were late coming home, then I’d
climb up and look at that boy in the frame for comfort. I think it would
be very comfortable to have it with me along with your picture, Mother.”

Katherine did not answer this for some time. She stayed as still as a
graven image in the starlight. Finally, without moving at all, and in a
voice as cool as starlight, she asked, “But why did you make it a
secret? I don’t understand a bit. I didn’t know you even knew there was
a little upper drawer. It’s almost hidden, and there is a secret about
the catch. You have to work it just so.”

“Yes, I know. And I can’t remember how or exactly when I discovered how
to work it. At first, I do remember, it was just the frame I loved. It
is a little wonder of a frame! The silver was so shining, and then the
flowers and the fruit _and_ the dragons are all so enchanting. I traced
the dragons with my finger over and over and played they were alive. I
thought it was too mysterious and lovely, all of it! It fascinated me in
a way I could never tell you.”

Katherine remained silent and Kate went on: “It was only when I was
older I began to look at the picture and feel about that so strangely. I
discovered what a wonderful face that boy has. I pretended he was the
Sandman, the one who gave me my dreams at night. I always had such
wonderful dreams, Mother! Remember?”

Katherine did not answer, and Kate felt somehow impelled to go on. She
was surprising herself in this account of past childish imaginings. She
had never thought about it in words like this before.

“He’d be just the person to have made those dreams for me. His face said
he knew them all and thousands and thousands more! Then, when I got
older I forgot about his being the Sandman, and anyway, my dreams
stopped being wonderful and were just silly. Then I called him the
‘Understander.’ When I especially wanted an understander I’d open the
secret drawer—I could do it without climbing on a chair by then—and
there he was, looking up at me out of the dragons and the fruit and the
flowers with _understanding_.

“It was all just a notion, of course. Oh, am I talking nonsense, Mother?
And was it nonsense to keep it so secret and all, always?”

Katherine answered emphatically, “No. Not nonsense a bit. Only
surprisingly—intuitive. For, Kate, he is just the sort of person who
_could_ have made up those wonderful dreams you used to have. And he
was—and is still, I suppose—just a perfect understander. That is his
quality. And it is startling to me, all you have said, for he has been a
sort of a talisman to me, too, all these years. I’ve looked at him, at
the picture, when _I_ needed understanding. And that is surprising in
itself, for once, when he was just the age he is in that picture, the
very week the picture was taken, I did him a wrong, a great wrong. We
quarrelled. Since then I have never seen or heard from him.”

Kate turned upon her mother with real exasperation at this disclosure.
“Oh, Mother! How could you! Another quarrel!”

Katherine said nothing, and Kate instantly softened. She felt that she
had wounded her mother; and that was a dreadful thing to have happened
on this their last night! It was in an apologizing tone and humbly that
she asked then, “And may I take him with me to-morrow?”

“No, I think you’d better not. Let him stay just where he is, in the
secret drawer. I may need his magic more than you while you are away.”

So her mother wasn’t really hurt at all, or cross. She had spoken
lightly, even airily. Kate sighed her relief. “I’m not asking you who
the boy is, notice?” she spoke as lightly as her mother. “It might spoil
the magic if I knew a human name for him. And I don’t believe you ever
did him a wrong, either. For one thing, I don’t believe any one could do
him a wrong. And you never did any one a wrong, anyway. I know it.
You’re too dear and kind.— Look at those fireflies out there. Watch me
catch one!”

Kate suddenly jumped up and ran away into the summer evening. Katherine
stayed still on the bench, watching her quick motions, her leaps and
runs and turns. “It’s very like a dance,” she thought. “Only there
should be music.” And she began humming softly.

                            * * * * * * * *

Kate slept that night with the twinges of premature homesickness dulled
by fatigue. And when morning came with the last bustle and scurry, any
doubts that still lingered back in her mind were lost in the glamour of
the adventure whose day had at last arrived.

“I’m going to take ‘The King of the Fairies’ with me to read on the
train, Mother,” she called from her bedroom where she was putting the
very last things into her bag.

Katherine came to stand in the doorway, a partly spread piece of bread
for a sandwich for Kate’s luncheon in her hand. “But you know ‘The King
of the Fairies’ by heart,” she said. “Why not take the mystery story Sam
and Lee gave you?”

“I’ve packed that. I believe you want ‘The King of the Fairies’
yourself, just as you want the picture!” Kate said, teasingly.

“Perhaps I do. It’s without exception the nicest thing that has happened
to us this year, I think. Bring it back safely, for I shall certainly
read it again before the summer’s through. Suppose we had been so
foolish as to decide we couldn’t afford it that day we stumbled on it in
the bookshop and were lost at the first paragraph!”

Kate gasped at such a supposing. “I simply can’t imagine having missed
it, never read it, can you? If that had happened, well, everything would
be different. It has made so many things different, hasn’t it—reading
it?”

“Yes, for us both, I think. That’s why I am sure it is a great book,
because it does make such a difference to you, having read it or not.
And I understand your wanting it with you to-day. Try to get Aunt
Katherine to read it, if you can. She has enough literary appreciation
to realize its beauty, and the rest of it, what it does to you—well, it
wouldn’t hurt to have it do a little of that to her, too!”

At that minute Sam and Lee whistled from the road, out at the back of
the house, and in a second they were around and in at the big front door
calling for Kate’s bag and anything that was to be carried. Katherine
hurried to finish the sandwiches and tie up the lunch, Kate gave her
hair a last boyish, brisk brushing, put on her hat, took her cape on her
arm, and they were off, hurrying down to Broad Street and the bus there
waiting the minute of starting in front of the Hotel.

“Don’t let your father work Mother too hard on that old catalogue,” Kate
besought the boys. “And do write me sometimes about everything, the
tennis court and all.”

Sam and Lee promised that they would take turns writing, much as they
disliked it, and Kate should not lack for news. “And bring Elsie back
with you to repay us,” they commanded. “The Hotel has let us borrow the
roller, and the court will be in fine shape. We’ll be all practised up,
too. You’d better do some practising yourself while you’re there. Elsie
is probably a shark, anyway.”

They reached the bus in good time and stood chattering a few minutes
before the bus driver facetiously sang out, “All aboard!” Kate was the
only passenger that morning. One quick hug and kiss passed between
mother and daughter while Sam put in the suitcase and Lee dropped “The
King of the Fairies” and the box of lunch in at the window. The busman
himself had climbed into his seat and was sitting with his back to them.
The Hotel piazza was deserted for the minute. There was no one besides
themselves on the street. Sam kissed Kate on one cheek, and Lee kissed
her on the other, quick, sound, affectionate, brotherly kisses. The
driver blew his horn twice just to make sure no traveller was belated in
the Hotel, started his engine, and the adventurer was off.

Kate stood in the little vestibule, hanging to the door and looking back
as long as she could see the three people she was leaving. Katherine was
between the boys, hatless, in a blue smocked dress; she was waving and
blowing kisses. She looked like a sister to the boys, and not even an
older sister from the distance of the speeding bus. Then the vehicle
jerked around a corner and Kate sat down, faced about the way they were
going, and contemplated her own immediate future.

In school she had often sat watching the big clock over the blackboard
in the front of the room; just before the minute hand reached the hour
it had a way of suddenly jerking itself ahead with a little click. That
was what had happened on the instant of parting from her mother—time,
somehow, or at least her place in time, had jerked suddenly and
unexpectedly ahead. Now the hour must be striking, she reflected
whimsically, and she was at the beginning of a new one. So much the
better. She expected it to be a wholly fascinating hour, and Elsie the
unknown comrade was waiting in it.

                      THE COMRADE DOES NOT APPEAR

Although Kate kept her book “The King of the Fairies” on her lap in bus
and trains, she did not look into its pages at all. Still it had its
meaning and its use on the journey. It was something well known and
dearly loved going with her into strangeness and uncertainty. Its purple
cloth binding spoke to her through the tail of her eye even when she was
most busy taking in the fleeting landscape. One would have thought her a
seasoned traveller and a very well-poised person if he had seen her
sitting so still, her hands lightly touching the closed book, her gaze
missing little of interest in country and town as the train rushed
along. But in reality her mind was as busy as the spinning wheels, and
her thoughts ranged everywhere from the commonplace to the inspired; and
as for her emotions, they were in a whir.

But the thought that recurred over and over and from which she never
entirely escaped during the whole five hours of travel was this: was any
one else in the world so happy and elated as she? People she saw looking
from windows, people working in factories, people working in meadows,
people walking on streets—how dull and uneventful their present hour was
compared to her present hour! And the Hart boys back at home! How could
they bear the commonplaceness of going on in the same spot all summer,
doing the same things, and seeing the same people! And only one week ago
she herself had been more than contented, happily expectant even, when
she was facing just such a summer!

Of course, she wondered about Elsie a lot. In fact, she scarcely thought
of Great Aunt Katherine at all. Would Elsie meet her at the South
Station in Boston? Great Aunt Katherine’s letter had said Elsie’s maid
would meet her. But surely Elsie herself would be there, too. Kate, for
a minute, imagined herself in Elsie’s place, eagerly waiting among the
crowds at the great terminal for the appearance of the new friend,
wondering and speculating about her, just as Kate herself was wondering
and speculating about Elsie.

The journey seemed very short. Kate could not believe they were actually
in Boston until the conductor coming through assured her that in less
than two minutes they would be in. But for Kate the next two minutes
seemed longer than all the rest of the journey put together. She sat on
the edge of the seat, one hand grasping the handle of her suitcase, the
other clutching “The King of the Fairies.” And even in her tense
excitement the long-drawn-outness of those two minutes made her think
about the King of the Fairies and what he had taught, or rather shown,
the girl and boy in the book about _time_—what a mysterious thing it
was, quite man-made and not real. She could well believe it now.
However, even that two minutes came to an end, as such eternities will.

At the train steps there were “red caps” galore clamouring for baggage
to carry, and a pushing crowd of passengers who had poured down from the
long line of coaches. Kate shook her head as a matter of course to the
porters, and marched along, her rather heavy leather bag, marked with
the initials K. M. in white chalk, in one hand, the book and her
purse—not a very good balance—in the other. No one could come out into
the train shed to meet you, Kate remembered now from the two or three
times she had been in that station with her mother. Well, Elsie would be
up at the entrance, standing on tiptoes, looking off over heads until
their eyes met. How should they know each other? No special arrangement
had been made to insure Kate’s being recognized. But Katherine had said,
“Don’t worry. Aunt Katherine’s not one to bungle anything. She or Elsie
or the maid, probably all three, will spot you at once. And if they
don’t, all you have to do is to find a telephone booth and call up the
Oakdale house.” And now, coming up through the shed, straining her eyes
toward the gate, Kate had not the slightest doubt that the minute her
eyes met Elsie’s eyes they would know each other. She had lived in
anticipation of this minute now so steadily for so long that she would
feel confident of picking Elsie out in a crowd of a thousand girls all
of the same age.

But she was getting near the gate and still she had seen no one that
might be Elsie. Then, walking on tiptoes for a second, a difficult feat
when you are as loaded down as she was, she did see a girl standing a
little way back from the gate and watching the passengers with impatient
eagerness as they came through. For an instant the eyes of the two girls
met. Kate went suddenly, unexpectedly shy at that encounter. But
instantly an inner Kate squared her shoulders, in a way the inner Kate
had, and forbade the outer Kate to tremble. And when Kate, in a flash,
had restored herself to herself, she knew that the girl waiting there
was certainly not Elsie; she was too utterly different from anything she
had imagined about her. There! She was right. The girl had greeted the
woman just ahead of Kate and they hurried off together talking volubly.
Kate drew a relieved sigh. She never could have liked that overdressed
girl as well as she knew she was going to like Elsie. They would never
have become chums and comrades.

But now she herself was outside the gate. She suddenly realized that her
suitcase was very heavy and put it down. Simultaneously she looked
around confidently for a friendly, welcoming face, for the eyes of the
new comrade. There was no such face, no such eyes. But she did become
aware of a youngish woman, in a very smart gray tailored suit and
Parisian looking black hat with a gray wing, bearing directly down upon
her. She was certainly too young to be Great Aunt Katherine; but it was
hard to believe that such smartness and apparent distinction could
belong to a maid.

“Miss Marshall?”

“Yes, I’m Kate Marshall. And you?”

“Bertha, Miss Elsie’s maid.” She turned toward a middle-aged round
little Irishman in brown livery. “Timothy,” she said, “it’s her.” Alas,
for the distinction of the black toque!

Timothy stepped briskly forward and picked up Kate’s suitcase, touching
his cap, but giving her a quick, keenly interested glance at the same
time. “Your trunk checks, if you please, Miss?” he said, holding out his
free hand for them.

“Why, there isn’t a trunk. The suitcase is all.”

“Didn’t the trunk catch this train?” Bertha asked, and added in a
commiserating tone, “Service is wretched—Miss Frazier says so.”

“I didn’t have any trunk at all. The suitcase holds everything.”

Bertha’s ejaculation of surprise was suddenly turned into a flow of
tactful words. “All the better, all the better. That makes things very
simple, very simple. We’ve only to go out to the automobile then, and
we’ll be in Oakdale in no time.”

Little round Timothy led the way with the bag and book, Kate followed
him, and Bertha came behind her. She was not used to walking in
processions like this, and she felt distinctly strange and lonely. But
the thought that Elsie might be waiting in the car braced her up. Even
so she couldn’t imagine why Elsie hadn’t come in and been the first to
greet her at the gate. If she were Elsie she would never sit calmly
waiting out in the car.

But the car was empty. It was a very handsome, big, luxurious affair,
painted a light glossy brown, the very shade of Timothy’s uniform. It
had a long, low body, much shining nickel plate, windshields before the
back seat as well as the front, and Great Aunt Katherine Frazier’s
monogram in silver on the door.

Timothy held back the monogrammed door while Kate stepped in. Then he
slid into the driver’s seat, leaving Bertha to follow him. So there was
Kate bobbing around on the wide back seat that was richly though
slipperily upholstered in smooth leather. Her baggage was in front with
the servants. She had not even the cherished book to sustain her. She
wondered, a little whimsically, that they had let her carry her purse.

Where was Elsie? Kate gave herself up to speculation as they crawled
through the crowded city streets. They crawled, but it was smooth and
beautiful crawling, for Timothy was an artist among chauffeurs. Kate
looked all around her interestedly and happily in spite of the sharpness
of her disappointment at Elsie’s absence. But although it was exciting
and stimulating to her to be moving through the streets of the big city
she realized the heat uncomfortably and, used to her high hill air, was
over-conscious of the unsavoury odours that met her on every side. She
unbuttoned and threw back her cape and resisted just in time an impulse
to lift her hat from her head by the crown, the way a boy does, and toss
it into a corner of the seat so that her head might be a little cooler.
But another inclination she did not resist in time. She leaned forward
and spoke to Bertha over the windshield: “Elsie, Miss Elsie, couldn’t
she come? Is she well?” she asked.

What an idiotic question! Why was she always saying things so abruptly,
things she hardly meant to say! Bertha turned her smooth,
distinguished-looking profile. “She is very well. She will be at
dinner.”

Now they were out of the city and they gained speed; but they gained
almost without Kate’s noticing, for the car was so luxurious and Timothy
was such an artist. But when she observed how the trees and fences and
houses were beginning to rush by she braced her feet against the nickel
footrail and laid her arm along the padded armrest. She leaned back,
relaxed. She began to feel that she quite belonged in the car, as though
such conveniences had always been at her service, almost as though
private chauffeurs and ladies’ maids were an everyday matter. Or was she
dramatizing herself? Anyway, it was fun and very, very new. She hoped
there would be time to write her mother all about it to-night. She
profoundly wished the Hart boys could see her!

But Bertha had turned her smooth profile again. “We are just entering
Oakdale,” she informed her, speaking impersonally, so decorously that it
might have been to the air. And instantly Kate’s composure and assurance
were shivered, her relaxed muscles tensed themselves, her mind became
just one big question mark.

Oakdale was a charming suburb. Most of the houses seemed to have lawns
and gardens that justified the name of “grounds,” and wealth spoke on
every side, but in a tone of good taste and often even beauty. Elms and
maples lined the street down which the adventurer’s chariot was bowling.

Oh, which house, which house was Great Aunt Katherine’s? Would Elsie be
standing in the doorway? Would Kate know the house by that? Or would she
be at a window, or keeping a watch for them on some garden wall?

They suddenly swerved from the main residential street and rolled down a
delightful lane bordered by older, more mellowed houses. At the very end
of the lane, before a large white house with green blinds, the car came
to a stop. What a gracious, dignified house it was, and every bit as
imposing and mansionlike as Kate’s mother had described it. There were
balconies gay with plants and hanging vines, tall windows, and an
absence of anything ambiguous or superfluous. The wide front door, with
its shining brass knocker and rows of potted plants at either side, was
approached by a dozen or so wide, shallow stone stairs bordered by tall
blue larkspur and a golden bell-shaped flower for which Kate did not
know the name. The steps were almost upon the lane, but Kate knew that
there were extensive “grounds” at the back, and somewhere there the
little orchard house.

No Elsie stood at the top of those stone steps or came running around
the house from the gardens at the sound of the stopping car. Not even
Aunt Katherine made an appearance. Timothy held open the automobile
door, Bertha took the suitcase and book, and Kate, with a “Thank you,”
to Timothy, started off on the last stage of her journey, that of the
climb of the stone steps to her aunt’s front door. Bertha followed close
behind. Kate wondered whether she should ring the bell, or wait and let
Bertha ring it for her. Or would Bertha open the door and they go in
without ringing? Oh, dear! Why hadn’t she asked her mother more
explicitly about correct usage when there is a lady’s maid at your
heels? But then, perhaps Mother couldn’t have helped her much, for
certainly Mother had never been so attended. And then the inner Kate
asserted herself. “Don’t be a silly,” it said. “How can it matter which
of you rings the doorbell?—and certainly you’re not going to go in
without ringing. Bertha’s hands are too full either to ring the bell or
open the door. Ring.”

But before her finger had time to reach the button, the door swung open
before her as though by magic and Kate stepped in. A maid had opened the
door and now stood half-concealed behind it with her face properly
vacant. Kate, when she discovered her, gave her a nod and a faint “Thank
you.” Then she stood still in the hall, looking about for her aunt. She
had almost given up Elsie for the present; but surely her aunt would
come now from some part of the house hurrying to greet her with
hospitality and show her her room.

But Bertha had no such idea. _She_ did not look about as though
expecting any one. “I will lead the way,” she offered, “if you please.
There are a good many turns.” And still carrying Kate’s suitcase she
walked off up the narrow strip of thick gray velvety material that
carpeted the polished stairs. Kate followed. It was a very complicated
house, she decided, as they went through doors, down unexpected
passages, up steps, and finally around a sharp turn, around two turns,
up two steps, and Bertha threw open a door. There Bertha stood back for
Kate to pass in ahead of her.

The bedroom that had been assigned to her was exquisitely lovely. It was
a little room of beautiful proportions facing the “grounds.” So much
care had been spent on its decorations and furnishings that one never
thought of all the money that had been spent _with_ the care. Its three
long windows, their sills almost on the floor, opened out on to a
flowery balcony hung above the garden. The windows were wide open now
because of the heat and stood back against the walls like doors. The
finest of spiderweb lace was gathered against the panes, and at their
sides hung opal-coloured curtains of very soft silk. The same colour, in
heavier silk, was used in the spread for the narrow ivory bed, with its
painted crimson ramblers at footboard and top. There was a low reading
table by the bed and in the centre of it a little crystal lamp with an
opal shade. Across from the bed and table stood an ivory dressing table
reflecting the balcony’s brilliant plants in its three hinged mirrors.
An ivory-coloured chair with a low back and three legs was placed before
the dressing table. On one creamy wall hung LePage’s “Joan of Arc,” and
on the opposite wall a painting of a little girl with streaming hair
leaping across a bright flower bed. Through a door with long crystal
mirrors panelled into either side Kate glimpsed a white bathroom with a
huge porcelain tub with shining taps and a rack hung thick with wide,
creamy towels.

“What a heavenly room!” she exclaimed, enraptured. “Is it mine?”

“Yes, this is your bedroom.” Bertha spoke almost deprecatingly of it.
“But there is a sitting-room just across the hall. It is Miss Elsie’s,
but while you are here Miss Frazier says you are to share it. That is
much more comfortable.”

Kate went directly to a window, hoping to find the orchard house in its
view. She was not disappointed. Beyond lawns and flower gardens there
was the old orchard with its gnarled, twisted trees, and back among the
trees the outlines of a little gray house. Kate was quite moved by this
her first glimpse of her mother’s home.

Bertha came up behind, and now was engaged in unbuttoning her cape for
her and taking off her hat. But Kate was almost unconscious of these
ministrations. She was unconscious, too, when Bertha turned to unpacking
her bag.

“There won’t be time for you to change to-night, Miss Frazier said,”
Bertha was informing her. “So we’ll just wash you up a bit and brush
your hair. Miss Frazier said you were to go down directly, and there’s
the first gong anyway.”

A musical note was sounding through the house.

Reluctantly, Kate turned from the window. Bertha followed her into the
bathroom, filled the bowl for her with water, and then stood at hand
with soap and a towel. For one wild instant Kate wondered whether Bertha
meant to wash her face for her! She had a definite feeling of relief
when she put the soap and the towel down at the side of the bowl and
left her alone. Quickly and efficiently Kate removed the grime of
travel. When she went back into her room Bertha was standing by the
dressing table, brush in hand.

Kate sat down on the three-legged chair. She thought she had never
looked into clearer mirrors than the three hinged ones before her.
“Please, I can brush my own hair, it’s so short. I would rather.” Just a
few quick strokes, a poke or two, and the bobbed hair with the wing
brushed across the forehead was perfectly tidy and crisp.

“I’ll take you to the top of the stairs,” Bertha offered. “You mayn’t
have noticed the way very carefully as we came along.”

“No, I am not sure I could find it. But tell me first, where does that
door, the other door, in the bathroom go?”

“Oh, that’s Miss Elsie’s door.”

“Miss Elsie’s room! So near! Oh, do you suppose she’s in there?”

“Why, I don’t know. I dressed her for dinner before starting to town for
you. She’s more probably downstairs. Dinner is served three minutes
after that first gong.”

Kate gave one more glance toward the door that now had become of so much
interest to her, before following Bertha. She was glad that she and
Elsie were to sleep so near each other. Why, it was a suite of rooms
they had. There was something splendid about occupying a suite of rooms.
And there was even a sitting-room for them across the hall. How jolly it
was and how independent! But where was Elsie?

Kate thanked Bertha when she had been guided to the top of the
staircase. “Am I just to go down?” she asked, a little timidly.

“Why, yes. Miss Frazier will be in the drawing-room. It’s at the left.
You can’t miss it.”

Bertha faded discreetly back as she spoke, into the shadows of the upper
hall, leaving Kate suddenly to her own resources. But after an instant’s
hesitation, during which the inner indomitable Kate was summoned up, she
passed quietly and with dignity down the gray velvet stair carpet.

                               CHAPTER IV
                     LITTLE ORCHARD HOUSE, BEWARE!

The drawing-room extended for almost half the length of the big house.
It was the largest room that Kate had ever seen or imagined outside of a
castle. Just at first she could not discover her aunt in it. But soon
her glance found her sitting down at the farthest end near one of the
French doors that stood wide open into the garden. Her head was turned
away, but the shape and pose of that head and the way she sat in her
chair, with a book but not reading, reminded Kate sharply and poignantly
of her mother. Why hadn’t Katherine warned her that they were so much
alike?

She went toward her softly because of her shyness, her feet hardly
making a sound on the Persian rugs, past the tables and divans and
lamps. It was seven o’clock of a July evening now, and the shadows lent
a lovely charm to the big room that was peculiarly charming even in
broadest daylight. Kate felt as she went toward her aunt that she was
walking in a dream. And it was a very nice dream, too, for that glimpse
of the likeness of her aunt to her mother had reassured her completely.
All her previous ideas of her aunt were swept away, and the
anticipations of this visit, which for a little had been dampened, now
returned with fresh life.

Miss Frazier turned as Kate came near. Hastily she put her book, still
open as Kate’s mother would have, on a table at her hand and rose. She
kissed Kate with warmth and dignity and then held her off, the tips of
her fingers on her shoulders.

“You’re not one bit like your mother,” she affirmed. “Not one least
bit.”

“Don’t accuse me,” Kate said, laughing. “I would have been if I could,
of course. But wouldn’t it have been rather confusing to have had three
of us so much alike? The names are confusing enough.”

If someone could have told Kate an hour—no, two minutes—ago that on
first meeting her aunt she would speak so easily, so without
self-consciousness, she would not have believed. She had expected to be
constrained, awkward. But then she had never expected Aunt Katherine to
be so agreeable as she apparently was.

Aunt Katherine was smiling quite brilliantly. Kate had instantly touched
and pleased her. “Does it really seem to you that I am anything like
your mother?”

Kate nodded. But even as she nodded, she saw the difference suddenly.
Aunt Katherine was taller, of course; but that was not it. Her firm,
squarish chin was not neutralized by melting gray eyes as Katherine’s
was. Aunt Katherine’s eyes were dark and their expression echoed the
strong chin; it was a sure expression, penetrating and above all
intellectual. And the lines about the mouth and eyes were lines that
Katherine would never have at any age. They were lines of loneliness and
trouble.

Even as Kate was thinking all this—lightning-quick thinking it was, of
course—she saw the lines deepen and the mouth and eyes harden
perceptibly. “It is past dinner time. Didn’t Elsie come down with you?”
The hardening was not for Kate’s tardiness; it was for Elsie’s.

“I haven’t seen her. I don’t believe she was in her room or she would
have heard me.”

“Haven’t seen Elsie? That is strange! She must be in the orchard or
somewhere, and not realize the time.”

Aunt Katherine moved to the garden door, her hand still on Kate’s
shoulder. “There she comes now, from the orchard.”

They stepped over the sill and waited for Elsie on the stone flags
outside. She was floating through the gardens directly from the orchard.
Floating is a better word for it than hurrying because she was such a
light and airy creature and above all so graceful. Her approach was
almost in the nature of a dance. She was dressed in white, a narrow belt
of periwinkle blue at the low waistline.

It was evident when she came nearer that she had not seen the two
waiting for her. Her eyes were dropped a little and she was smiling!
There was a radiance of happiness about her. At first, in this
impression of her, happiness was even more obvious than prettiness. But
she was pretty, too, quite enchantingly pretty. Kate, who was not pretty
herself, loved it all the more in others. Her appreciation always leapt
to meet it.

Elsie was slim, with a fairy grace of face and figure. Her hair, a net
of sunlight even now in the growing dusk, was tied at her neck, and its
curls straying on her shoulders and at her cheeks shone like fairy gold.
Her face was delicately moulded and faintly tinted. It was her chin that
struck Kate most. It was an elfin, whimsically pointed chin. In fact,
she was such an exquisite creature that Kate, standing there waiting for
the instant when she should look up and their eyes meet, felt as though
her own sturdy young body belonged to another world.

But Elsie was so absorbed in her happiness that she did not raise her
eyes until she was almost upon them. It was Aunt Katherine’s voice that
recalled her, and she stopped short a few feet from where they were
standing. “Well, Elsie?”

Then at last the eyes of the destined comrades met! Kate was smiling,
the corners of her mouth uptilted little wings. Her whole face spoke her
delight in Elsie’s extraordinary prettiness and her own expectation of
comradeship. No one could have missed what her look meant. But Elsie’s
response was a strange one. Instantly the elfin smile vanished, the
elfin chin became set, the pretty face and violet eyes hardened. But she
took the few remaining steps forward and gave Kate her hand. In a
correctly polite but delicately cool way she said, “How do you do?”

Aunt Katherine showed some chagrin at that tone. “This is your cousin,
Elsie,” she said. “You are not going to stand on any formality with a
cousin who has come for the express purpose of being cousinly. Dinner
was announced some minutes ago. Let us go in.”

But what had happened to Kate? She hardly knew herself. She had turned
sick, physically sick and faint, when Elsie had looked at her so coolly
and indifferently. No one had ever treated her so in all her life
before. She had had spats, of course, with her contemporaries, now and
then. There had been days when either Sam or Lee or some girl in school
refused to speak to her. There had been angry glances, sharp words. But
she had never been treated like this. Nothing before had ever turned her
_sick_.

As they moved down the long drawing-room and across the hall to the
dining-room Kate asked herself desperately whether she had imagined it
all. Could she have heard Elsie’s voice aright? Was the cool, hard
glance from Elsie’s eyes insultingly indifferent? How could it be? Why
should it be? What had she done? She had done just nothing at all. There
was no reason in the world for Elsie to hate or despise her. And so,
fortified by her reason and by the wise inner Kate that never wholly
forsook her, Kate decided before they reached the dining-room that it
_had_ been imagination—partly, anyway. Elsie might not have liked her
looks at first, but she had no reason to hate her.

Even so, she did not have the courage to look directly at Elsie when
they were finally seated at the table. They were in high-backed carved
Italian chairs at a narrow, long, black, much-oiled table. In the centre
of the table two marvellously beautiful water lilies floated in an
enormous shallow jade bowl. The napkin that Kate half unfolded in her
lap was monogrammed damask and very luxurious to her fingers’ touch. The
dinner was simple, as simple as the dinners to which Kate was accustomed
at home, but it was served with such dignity by a lacy-capped and
aproned waitress that before they were finished with the prune-whip
dessert Kate felt they had banqueted.

Very early in the meal Kate learned that she need not avoid looking
directly at Elsie, for Elsie’s own eyes were averted. Apparently she was
languidly interested in the portraits on the opposite wall. At any rate,
her gaze was always just a little above Kate’s head or to the right or
left of her shoulder. When Aunt Katherine spoke to her she looked at her
as she replied. But aside from those polite and clearly spoken answers,
she contributed nothing to the conversation.

In contrast to Elsie Aunt Katherine was giving her whole mind to being
entertaining and making Kate feel at home. She drew her out about the
life in Ashland, the barn that had so ingeniously been turned into a
house, Kate’s school in Middletown, the Hart boys, their mother and
father, the life at Ashland College, everything that concerned Katherine
and Kate. Although Kate hardly realized it, during the course of that
first meal she had given her aunt a pretty complete picture of her
background, and incidentally of herself.

Just as the finger bowls were brought in Aunt Katherine said, “The
little orchard house beyond the garden was your Grandfather Frazier’s,
you know, Kate. You will want to explore it, I imagine. To-morrow at
breakfast I shall give you the key.”

Kate was delighted. “Oh, may I go into it? Mother wasn’t at all sure it
wouldn’t be rented. She wanted me to see it if I possibly could, and
tell her all about it.”

“Of course it’s not rented. It is too much part of my grounds,
altogether too connected with everything here. A family there would be
intolerable. And besides, I consider that the house belongs to your
mother. It is only waiting for her.”

But now the eyes of the two girls did meet for the second time. Kate
gasped. Fear and anger spoke in Elsie’s direct stare. And Kate was sure
she was not imagining now—all the delicate tint had been swept from
Elsie’s face. She was pale.

They got up at that minute and followed Aunt Katherine from the
dining-room. Elsie turned her head away as they walked. But Kate was too
curious now to be definitely unhappy. She wanted only to know the reason
of Elsie’s behaviour. And she surprised herself more than a little by
finding herself drawn to the sulky, ungracious, frightened girl. Nothing
was at all the way she had dreamed it and expected it, it is true. But
in some ways it was better. Elsie was more of a _person_ than her dreams
had made her, and friendship with her, if only they ever did become
friends, might be quite wonderful. Kate did not think this out. It was
just her feeling.

In the drawing-room Aunt Katherine sat down at her reading table and
picked up her book. “It is after eight,” she told the girls, “and I’m
sure Kate should go to bed early. But you may walk in the garden
together a little first.”

Now Kate glimpsed the Aunt Katherine of tradition. Neither she nor Elsie
had any thought but to obey the command. They went out together to walk
in the garden. “Just like that,” Kate said to herself, inwardly smiling.
But there was no rebellion in her thought. She distinctly liked Aunt
Katherine and was ready to take commands from her. And this command was
particularly welcome. Now Elsie _must_ unbend! Now they must find each
other.

For a minute they walked in silence and then Kate said, “Let’s go into
the apple orchard. I want to see my mother’s house nearer. Do you know I
can hardly wait until morning when I shall see it inside, too. Mother
has told me so much about it!”

“It isn’t your mother’s house,” Elsie answered quite unexpectedly. “It’s
Aunt Katherine’s. And there’s nothing to see in the dark. Just a little
old gray house with weeds in the front walk. Even the road to it is all
grown over with grass now, for no one goes there ever.”

“I want to see it all the same. It’s where my mother and my grandmother
and my grandfather lived. I’m going whether you come or not.”

“Oh, all right,” Elsie acquiesced, sulkily. “But a lot you’ll see in the
dark.”

It was just as Elsie had said. It was a little old gray house set down
in the centre of the apple orchard with no road leading to it. And weeds
stood high in the gravel front walk.

“Why, it’s a fairy house by starlight!” Kate exclaimed, quite forgetting
Elsie’s mood in her own.

Elsie spoke in a rather high voice then, a voice that carried all
through the orchard: “If it is a fairy house,” she called, “Fairies,
beware! Orchard house, beware! If there are fairies in the house put out
all lights, hurry away. Aunt Katherine’s nieces are here and Aunt
Katherine doesn’t want the house occupied.”

Kate was surprised but quickly pleased, too. Elsie had entered into a
game whole-heartedly. Perhaps she was just an ordinary girl, after all!
Perhaps she had been imagining absurd things about her. This Elsie
calling out into the starry dimness, warning the little house of their
approach, was Elsie as she should be, with her fairy-gold curls and
elfin chin.

Kate involuntarily drew nearer to her. And then she raised her voice and
called in her turn to the little orchard house. “But Aunt Katherine’s
not here,” she called. “She is deep in a deep book. So light all your
lights, if you wish, look out of your windows, open your doors. Little
enchanted house, wake up!”

She was laughing as she finished and holding Elsie’s hand, for she was
quite carried away by her own fancy. This was the kind of nonsense she
loved, and the little house did seem alive and awake. She _felt_ it
responding there in its dim starlight!

Elsie allowed her hand to be held. But she cried, softly, but still in a
carrying voice, “No, no, no. Don’t look out! Don’t wake up. There are
two of us here. Two. Not one!”

And then the girls stood silent. The game had become so real that Kate
would not have been at all astonished to see fairy lights at the
windows, to hear windows opening and fairy laughter. But she heard
nothing except the crickets in the uncut grass and Elsie’s hurried
breathing.

“Come,” she whispered. “Let’s go all around the house”—and off she
started, still holding Elsie’s hand. Elsie could only go, too. And at
the back of the house, the side that was in view only of the orchard and
vacant fields beyond, Kate noticed two windows wide open in the second
story.

“Does Aunt Katherine let those windows stay open like that?” she asked,
curiously. “Those are the windows in the study. I know from Mother’s
telling. Suppose it should rain to-night? It must be an oversight. Let’s
go back and get the key from Aunt Katherine now to-night and close them
for her. Won’t it be fun to go in by starlight, just we two alone!”

Elsie shook her head violently and pulled her hand away at the same
time. There was a break in her voice almost as though she were in danger
of bursting into tears.

“You needn’t go being a busybody the very first hour you are here,” she
exclaimed. “I guess Aunt doesn’t need your advice about such things.
Come away. Come out of the orchard.”

Kate followed her, nonplussed, at sea. “What is the matter?” she
demanded. “What are you afraid of, Elsie Frazier?” Then, stopping
suddenly, “What was that? Listen!” Surely a door had closed softly up
there in the room with the windows open!

“What was what?”

“Didn’t you hear?”

“No, of course I didn’t hear anything.”

“A door closed up there.”

“Nonsense! How could a door close up there?”

“Well, it did. I heard it just as plain. But perhaps it was a breeze
that closed it. Only I don’t feel any breeze.”

“It must have been a breeze.”

“Well, it was a _careful_ breeze. It shut the door ever so gently. Quite
as though a door knob was turned. Oh, Elsie, do you suppose it is
fairies—or something weird?”

“I don’t suppose anything. And Aunt Katherine will be expecting us in.
Come.”

As they went Kate turned to look back several times at the orchard
house. But no fairy lights twinkled for her in the windows, no doors or
windows opened, no fairy stood on the doorstone beckoning her back. It
was just a little old gray house in an orchard. But even so Kate felt it
_alive_, awake somehow. Elsie could not spoil her feeling about it.

Just outside the lighted drawing-room Elsie turned about and faced Kate.
She was not quite so tall and she was slighter. But her whole body was
drawn up with extraordinary force and her face, in spite of its delicate
elfin quality, was determined.

“Kate Marshall,” she said in a quiet tone, “you’re not to say one word
to Aunt Katherine about those windows. Not one single word! And what’s
more, you’re not to use the key that she will give you to-morrow. It’s
not your mother’s house any more. You’ll only be disappointed. There’s
nothing of her in there at all. I shall hate you and hate you and HATE
you if you use that key. You’ve got to promise me.”

Kate did not flinch before this unexpected attack. But she was amazed.
“Of course I sha’n’t promise you,” she contradicted. “You’re a silly to
think you can make me. What’s the matter with you, anyway?”

Elsie still looked at her, but her firmness, her determination melted.
Her lips trembled. Unshed tears glistened in her eyes. When she spoke
her tone was changed completely. “Please, please,” she besought Kate.
“You are just a girl even if you are—well, even if you are Kate
Marshall. Please promise me that you’ll wait a week before exploring the
orchard house. After that I won’t care. Go and live in it, if you like.
But just for a week, promise me.”

“No, I won’t promise.” But Kate was softening. “I won’t promise. But
perhaps, since you care so much, I won’t go in to-morrow or the next
day. Perhaps I’ll stay away a week. Only I think you’ll have to tell me
_why_.”

But Elsie shook her head. “I can’t tell you why. You’ll know for
yourself within a few days. You’ve promised?”

“I have not promised. And I think you ought to explain to me. Are you
sure you won’t? I’m a pretty good person at keeping a secret. If I knew,
I _might_ promise.”

Elsie shook her head. Kate saw the tears still glistening in her eyes.
She felt brutal to have made a fairy cry!

“Don’t, don’t cry,” she begged softly. “I won’t use the key to-morrow,
anyway. I promise you that. And I’ll tell you before I do use it. I
don’t see why I shouldn’t put it off for a week if you care so much. I’m
not a pig.”

“And you won’t even prowl around the orchard house during that week?”

Kate, instantly forgetting her momentary pity, grew hot. “I never prowl.
What a nasty word!”

“You prowled to-night.”

“I didn’t. We were playing a game with the house. I’m going in.”

With high-held head, flaming cheeks, and bright eyes Kate stepped into
the drawing-room. Elsie was at her side, cool, calm, no trace of recent
tears. In spite of Kate’s flash of real anger Elsie was well satisfied
with the outcome of their “walk in the garden.” For she felt that Kate
would be one to keep her word. Elsie might breathe freely, for a day
more at any rate, and not live in hourly terror of the discovery of her
secret, and the secret of the orchard house.

Aunt Katherine had been watching them through the glass of the long
door. She smiled, apparently well pleased, as they came in now. She
said, “I am glad that you are getting acquainted. You should have a very
nice month together, you two. Kate must be tired, and I advise you both
to go right to bed. Breakfast is at quarter to eight.”

“She was watching us while we talked at the door,” Elsie whispered as
they went up the stairs. “She thought we couldn’t leave off talking. She
imagines we’re bosom friends already.”

But Kate walked on up with a set face. She did not trouble to answer.

                               CHAPTER V
                          KATE MAKES UP A FACE

As they neared their doors Elsie said, “Please tell Bertha if she’s in
your room that I shall be in the sitting-room when she’s through helping
you. I’m going right to bed then.”

She stopped with her hand on the knob. “Wouldn’t you like to see the
sitting-room? It’s yours, too, now.”

Kate looked in as Elsie opened the door and stood back. Now she knew why
Bertha had said that room was more “comfortable” than her bedroom. In
contrast to it her bedroom was almost nun-like. There were deep chairs
upholstered in gay cretonne, cretonne with parrots and poppies and birds
of paradise glowing against its yellow background. There was even a
little lounge, heaped with yellow pillows, drawn up under the windows.
In the centre of the room stood a square cherry-wood reading table, and
the walls were almost lined with bookshelves already about one third
filled with books. On the table stood a glass bowl filled with red
roses. A Japanese floor lamp cast a mellow light over everything. In one
corner a practical old Governor Winthrop desk with many drawers and a
wide writing leaf drew Kate’s eyes. Imagine having a desk like that just
for one’s own!

But she did not show her appreciation of the room. She simply glanced
about it, as Elsie seemed to expect her to, and then muttering a crusty
“good-night” crossed the hall to her own room.

Bertha was waiting for her there. Evidently Aunt Katherine had
instructed her that Kate would retire early. The opal lamp by the bed
was shedding its delicate radiance through the room, the bed was turned
down, Kate’s dressing gown and nightgown were spread across its foot,
and her bedroom slippers stood near at hand. Her bag had long since been
unpacked and put away. The “King of the Fairies” and the mystery
story—Sam and Lee’s gift—lay on the bed table under the lamp.

Kate was very glad of her own cool, clear little room. She liked it
better than all that colour and ease across the hall. And in any case
she would never be able to share that other room with Elsie. She
determined not to go into it at all—no, not even to look over the books!

“Miss Elsie is in the sitting-room,” she told Bertha. “She said to tell
you that when you were ready she would go to bed. I don’t need any help,
truly.”

“Sha’n’t I even brush your hair, Miss Kate? That is so restful.”

“You’ve unpacked for me. Thank you very much. My short hair doesn’t need
much brushing.”

So, reluctantly, for Miss Frazier had requested her to attend to both
girls equally, Bertha took her dismissal. In a minute Kate heard voices
on the other side of Elsie’s door. Then Elsie opened the door and looked
in through the bathroom.

“Aunt Katherine says we’re to leave these doors open,” she informed
Kate, calmly. “That is so you won’t be lonely.”

Kate nodded an “all right.” But to herself she said, “I’d be a heap less
lonely if you’d close the door and I’d never see your face again.”

She undressed well out of sight of Elsie’s room. When she was in
nightgown, dressing robe, and slippers, she sat down on the three-legged
ivory stool, before the hinged mirrors, brush in hand. She was surprised
by the expression of her own face as it looked back at her grimly out of
the glass. All its humour, its _charm_, was gone. She was just a rather
plain young girl. And as she looked at this disenchanted reflection it
suddenly went misty and blurred. She saw tears rising in its eyes.

With an angry hand she dashed them away and stuck out her tongue at the
blurred face in the mirror. Then came her own laugh, the eyes crinkling
to slits, the mouth freed from its set lines and lifting wings in a
smile.

“Idiot,” she whispered. “To cry about her! She’s a stuck-up little pig,
but you needn’t become a grouchy glum just for that. Be yourself in
spite of her.”

But as she went toward the windows to push them a little farther back,
for the night was a warm and beautiful one, she turned her head and
looked through the open doors into Elsie’s room. Elsie was sitting
before her own dressing table, a replica of Kate’s. She was in an
exquisitely soft-looking pink dressing gown edged about the neck and the
long flowing sleeves with swansdown. Bertha stood behind her, brushing
her curls with long, even strokes. The eyes of the two girls met in
Elsie’s glass. Flashingly, Kate was glad she had made up a face and got
it over with; otherwise she would certainly have made up just the same
face now, at Elsie, before thinking.

The pairs of eyes held each other in the glass for an instant. It must
have been something deceiving in the twin lights glowing at either side
of Elsie’s mirror, or in the glass itself, Kate decided afterward, but
for that instant it seemed that a _comrade_ had looked questioningly out
of the mirror at her! But the hidden comrade, if such it was, vanished
even before Kate had time to turn away.

What a delicious bed Aunt Katherine had given her! She delighted in its
scented linen and light covers. She punched the fluffy pillows up into a
bolster, slipped out of her dressing gown and in between the smooth,
lavender-scented sheets. Sitting there against the pillows she took “The
King of the Fairies” on to her knee. She couldn’t sleep quite yet, she
knew. Why, at home she seldom went to bed before her mother, and now it
was not yet nine. The very sight, even the feeling of this book in her
hands filled her with a happy stir deep in the far wells of imagination.
She opened it casually. Any place would do since she already knew it
practically by heart. The very sight of the smooth, clearly printed
pages with their wide margins freed her. She was ready for space now and
clear, disentangled adventurings into light.

Although the book was titled “The King of the Fairies” it was not at all
a fairy story for children. Kate had only just reached the age when it
could be cared about. It began with a girl and a boy quarrelling on a
fence in a meadow. It was a real quarrel, a horrid quarrel with hot and
sharp and bitter words. But it is interrupted by a tramp happening by.
He asks them a direction and they stop their recriminations for the time
to point him his way scornfully. Accepting their directions he still
tarries a while to ask them if they themselves don’t want some pointing.
Then the story, the marvellous story begins. He points to an elder bush
and asks them what it is. They tell him glibly. Then he gets on to the
fence between them and with his eyes level with theirs asks them to look
again. Everything is changed for the girl and boy in that instant. They
begin seeing as the tramp sees. They are in Paradise or Fairyland: the
author himself makes no clear distinction. But the elder bush is now
much more than an elder bush. And the meadow is full of a life the girl
and boy had never suspected. There are other beings moving in it, fairy
beings, perhaps. Not only is the invisible made visible to the girl and
boy seeing as the tramp sees, but the, until then at least, partly
visible—the brook, the trees, the very stones and the elder bush—are
seen to have more _life_ than could be suspected. And all colours are
changed, too. The boy and girl are seeing things in a new spectrum.

Finally the three get down from the fence and wander about in this
Fairyland that has always been here truly but is only now seen. The book
is their day in the meadow. And when you have turned the last page you
do not remember it as a _book_. You remember it as a day in Fairyland or
Paradise—or as a day on which you saw things clear. And you never doubt
for a minute that the author himself is one who has certainly seen like
that. Perhaps he only saw it in a flash, but he did see for himself and
with his own eyes.

In the end the boy and girl return to the fence and the tramp departs on
the way they had pointed out to him. But as he goes, he turns about when
he gets to the elder bush and they realize in that last glance from his
eyes that he is the King of the Fairies. Then as he turns again and
walks on, as long as he is in their sight, he is simply a common tramp.

But their quarrel has dropped for ever dead between them. A boy and a
girl who have actually walked in Fairyland together and seen things
clear have nothing to quarrel about, and so long as they both shall live
can have nothing to quarrel about again.

And though they had surely seen things clear for a whole day in the
meadow—the sun had risen to the meridian and gone down into the west
while they wandered—now when they look at each other there is no
indication that a minute has passed. The sun is where it was at the
height of their quarrel! And so it appears that the tramp’s arrival and
stay and departure and their whole day in the meadow was squeezed into
perhaps one straight meeting of their eyes as they quarrelled.

But they do not spend themselves in wonder. This boy and girl are
Wisdom’s own children, in spite of the momentary silliness that had
plunged them head-first into the darkness of an enmity; they accept the
gods’ gifts. And for a boy and a girl who have spent a day in Fairyland
together, or for that matter only spent a minute there together, the
gods’ gift is marriage.

Katherine, when she had finished the book, had said that it was the most
perfect love story she had ever read; she wished she were rich enough to
give it to all the lovers she knew. And she said, too, that the author
must be a very wonderful person, a great man in some field of life.
Perhaps that was why he had not signed his name to the work.

As Kate read now, the conversation between Elsie and Bertha in the next
room was a humming undertone to her thoughts. She could not have caught
their words if she had listened. But she had no inclination to listen.
She was moving in a world where quarrels and bitter feelings were an
impossibility. She was seeing things through the eyes of the King of the
Fairies. She was in the meadows that she knew at home, feeling the
larger life there that the King of the Fairies had made known to her.
She was standing, tall, in the body of an elm tree, spreading with its
leaves to the sun, feeling with its roots into the vibrating ground.

Suddenly a voice came to her. It was a long way she rushed back to find
the voice. Bertha was standing beside her bed.

“Shall I turn out your light, Miss Kate? Or do you wish to read?”

Kate did not know that Bertha had come into the room at all. Elsie’s
light was out, and if the doors through must be left open, Kate’s light
would disturb her. Of course she must put out her light and try to
sleep. She was on the verge of saying, “I will put out my own light,
thanks,” but the meadow from which she had rushed back had, oddly enough
as some might think, put her into more perfect harmony with her own
restricted four walls. So she said, “You may put the light out, thank
you.” And she did not even smile to herself when Bertha bent over the
table and pulled at the little chain that was much nearer Kate’s reach
than hers. She accepted the service naturally, since such acceptance was
Aunt Katherine’s wish and the purpose of Bertha’s presence here.

“Good-night,” Bertha spoke out of the sudden darkness.

“Good-night,” Kate answered. Then soft footfalls, and she was alone in
the room.

But though “The King of the Fairies” had done a good deal for Kate it
had not had time to do enough to make her call a “good-night” to Elsie.
Suppose Aunt Katherine knew the two girls were going to sleep without a
word to each other!

From her bed, now that the room was dark, Kate could see the dim apple
orchard under starlight. She rose on her elbow and strained her eyes for
the outlines of the little orchard house. She found it by hard looking.
How mysterious, how lonely, still how alive out there it stood. And she
_had_ heard a door close softly, just as though a door knob had turned
as they stood below those open back windows. And why were those windows
open? Elsie knew, Kate was sure. The little orchard house harboured some
secret of Elsie’s.

But what was that! Kate sat up in bed and bent toward the window, her
eyes straining. A light, flickering, was moving down through the house!
Kate watched it as it went by several windows, breathless. Soon it
disappeared altogether, and a second after Kate thought she heard the
front door of the little orchard house softly closing, or opening; but
that must have been fancy, for the orchard house was much too far away
for a sound of that quality to carry to her.

As she curled down into bed again her eyes crinkled with her smile in
the darkness. Well, here was mystery. She would write Sam and Lee that
she would save their mystery story for duller times. Now she was living
in one!

                               CHAPTER VI
                          “I WILL PAY FOR IT”

Kate was waked next morning by Elsie moving about in her room. She
opened her eyes quickly and sat up. To her surprise Elsie was dressed
and ready for the day. She looked as fresh as the July morning in a blue
and white gingham, white sport shoes and stockings. Her hair was pinned
up at her ears, and that made her look older but not less pretty than
last night.

Kate was not a girl to wake up with a grudge on a morning like this, or
on any morning, in fact. So she sang out now, “Hello!”

But Elsie, apparently, had not been mellowed by sleep. She responded to
the “hello” with a nod. Then, much to Kate’s surprise, she came directly
to the bed and picked up “The King of the Fairies” from the table there.

“Bertha told me you had borrowed my book,” she said. “I don’t mind your
borrowing books. But I think you ought to ask. And Aunt Katherine didn’t
give me this one. I’m going to read outdoors before breakfast, and I
want ‘The King of the Fairies,’ if you don’t mind.”

Kate laughed. “It’s my copy, not yours,” she said. “Mother and I gave it
to each other last Easter. It’s a perfectly great book, Mother thinks,
and I brought it with me here because I love it so.”

Elsie was standing directly in the gilded morning sunlight. Kate had
just waked up and her eyes were still a little dazed from sleep. That
may account for her seeing again, flashingly, the comrade she had
surprised in the mirror last night. Surely Elsie’s whole being in that
flash radiated comradeship. And there was something more. Kate could not
remember, but sometime in her life—it felt a long time ago—she had
exchanged glances with that golden comrade! Or had it been just a vivid
dream she had had, or perhaps only the ideal she had set up in her mind
of the perfect comrade?

But Elsie almost instantly moved out of the sunlight nearer the bed, and
everything was as before.

“Please pardon me,” she said coldly. “I don’t know why it never entered
my head that you might have a copy of your own. That was stupid of me.
I’ll see you at breakfast.”

“So it is still on,” Kate told herself, as Elsie left the room. “She
hates me. She hates me just awfully. And that was awfully rude about the
book, even if it had been hers! How _could_ she be so rude—to a _guest?_
She is afraid of me, too. She is afraid I will discover the secret of
the orchard house. Why, perhaps she doesn’t hate me, personally at all.
Mayn’t it be just fear that makes her like that? For she has no reason
to hate me, and of course if she has some secret in the orchard house
she has every reason to think I may discover it. For I do mean to
explore it thoroughly when I get around to it.”

Somehow the conviction she had come to, that fear rather than personal
dislike was ruling Elsie’s conduct, comforted her. Moreover, it was a
perfect morning—sunshine, a light breeze at the curtains, birds
carolling (how had she ever slept through the noise those birds were
making?) and the room pervaded by flower scents from balcony and
gardens. It was with a light heart, then, that Kate allowed Bertha to
run her bath, lay out her clothes, and finally even brush the bobbed
hair. Such unneeded service seemed absurd to Kate, but it was in the
order of this household, and some fresh sweetness she had brought from
sleep made her eager to harmonize herself as much as possible with the
world she had come back to. But even so, in a minute when Bertha’s back
was turned, Kate grabbed the brush from the dressing table and gave a
quick, surreptitious stroke that turned the bang Bertha had created into
a wing across her brows; for Bertha, experienced lady’s maid as she was,
had not caught the knack of _that_ so quickly.

It was with a heart as bright as the morning that Kate finally went down
the long stairs just as the soft-toned gong was sounding. There was no
sign of breakfast being laid in the dining-room, so she wandered about
the house, in and out of the rooms she had only glimpsed through open
doors last night.

Everything was quite beautiful. Kate knew that Aunt Katherine had once
been determined to “go in for art seriously.” But at that time money had
been lacking for such a design, and she had with keen disappointment
submitted to fate and become a school teacher. When wealth had suddenly
come to her everyone thought she would, of course, take up study with
some great master and become an artist. But this never came about.
Perhaps the first disappointment had been too keen; perhaps in giving up
her hope so definitely she had made it impossible for herself ever to
renew it under any conditions. But now, wandering about these rooms that
Aunt Katherine had made, Kate realized that she had turned artist in a
way. Instead of painting on canvas she had created beauty in her
environment. For her home was like a warmly painted picture with
beautiful lights and shadows. And Kate soon felt as though she were
walking around in a picture. The morning sunshine outside was its great
gilded frame. That was how the utter silence and absence of human beings
in these big downstairs rooms explained itself to her fancy; somehow she
had walked into a picture painted by her great aunt, a picture hung up
somewhere in an enormous gilded frame. This fancy stirred her
imagination and she pretended so hard to herself that it became quite
real.

That is why she almost started when she finally did hear voices and the
clink of china. Coming out of the picture into everyday life, suddenly
like that, was something of a jar. And she was probably late for
breakfast wherever it was being served. She hurried her steps and found
Aunt Katherine and Elsie already at the meal. They were sitting at a
little table under a peach tree growing up between the flags of a
terrace just outside a sunny breakfast-room. How delightful! Kate was
glad now to step down out of the picture.

Aunt Katherine greeted her with a welcoming smile. And having just
stepped down out of Aunt Katherine’s picture Kate felt that she
understood her, that they were very close to each other really. How
different, and how pleasantly different, Great Aunt Katherine was
proving herself from Kate’s preconceived ideas of her.

Kate took the little garden chair waiting for her and unfolded her
napkin. Coffee was percolating visibly in two large glass globes set one
on top of the other before Aunt Katherine. The silver sugar bowl and
cream pitcher turned all the sunlight that found them into a million
diamond sparkles. A half grapefruit with ice snuggled about it was at
Kate’s place. Kate lifted the slender pointed spoon made just for
grapefruit, and gratefully tasted the tart pulp and juice.

“Elsie might have shown you the way,” Aunt Katherine was saying. “I
thought of course you would come down together.”

“I am sorry I was late. But it was fun wandering around in the house
trying to find you.” And then Kate told them all about how she had felt
herself in a picture.

Aunt Katherine was pleased. “Was it really like that to you, my house?”
she asked.

“Oh, yes! and more so than I know how to say. Most of the windows and
doors open, the glimpses of tree branches and flowers and sky, the light
and shade in the rooms, all the flowers in vases in surprising places,
the colours of everything, the hangings——”

Kate stopped, embarrassed by her own enthusiasm, or perhaps discomfited
by Elsie’s cool gaze. But she had said more than enough to give Aunt
Katherine very real and deep pleasure.

“Then I see,” she told Kate, “why you did not mind wandering about alone
or our seeming inhospitality. And I think your dress, my dear, fitted
into the picture. It is a very poetic dress.”

Kate flushed with pleasure. “Mother would love to hear you say that,”
she said. “We made it out of the new chintz curtains in her bedroom. You
see I had to have some dresses, and there were the curtains. Mother
thought——”

But at mention of her mother Kate saw in morning light what she had
failed to see last night in lamplight: the deepening of pain lines
around Aunt Katherine’s eyes and mouth, a cloud of pain somehow in her
face. So she broke off her account of Katherine’s ingenuity.

“I’m glad you like it,” she finished lamely.

“I have brought you the key to the orchard house,” Aunt Katherine said,
as though it were a matter she would like to be done with quickly.
“Elsie will show you all over it and around it. Then I have an errand at
the post office I wish you girls would do for me. I have a very busy
morning ahead. The car is at your disposal this morning, and I should
think you would take a good long ride. It is really too warm to do
anything more energetic. At least, it promises to be a very warm day.”

Kate looked at the key which Aunt Katherine had handed her. It was an
old-fashioned brass key, clumsy and heavy but not too big to go into her
pocket. When she had tucked it away there she raised defiant eyes to
Elsie. But her defiance suddenly turned to pity. Elsie looked so
troubled!

Aunt Katherine with a word of apology to the girls picked up the mail
now lying at her place and began reading the one or two personal letters
she found among the circulars, pleas for charity, and advertisements.
Kate leaned toward Elsie and said quickly and softly, “Don’t worry.
You’re safe to-day and to-morrow, too, and for as long as you mind, I
guess. If I see the little house sometime, what does it matter when?”

Elsie nodded to signify that she had caught the very low words, and her
face cleared.

“Ungrateful thing! She might at least have thanked me,” Kate reflected.

But very soon she learned that Elsie was thanking her for that impulsive
gesture of generosity in her own way. When they joined each other in the
big car that was waiting for them at the door, half an hour later, Elsie
was plainly trying to force herself to be friendly and natural. But
since this friendliness was forced, Kate’s response to it was of
necessity forced, too. Oh, how different everything was turning out
between these two girls from the way Kate had dreamed it!

“Don’t you think Oakdale is pretty?” Elsie asked. “People care so much
about their gardens. And then the streets are all so wide and shady, and
where they aren’t wide they are just little lanes like ours that end
perhaps in a gate or an open meadow. Those endings of streets seem
romantic to me always.”

“Yes, I think they are romantic,” Kate agreed. “And when your lane
turned all the away around and ended in the orchard, that must have been
awfully romantic. I wonder why Aunt Katherine ever let the grass grow
over it so that it got lost, the end of the lane!”

Something in Elsie’s restrained silence at this remark made Kate realize
that she had blundered. Oh, dear! She hadn’t meant to. Truly! She tried
to explain.

“You see it was my mother’s house, Elsie. You can’t know what fun it is
to imagine your mother a little girl, to see for the first time the
house where she was born and the places where she played. Everything
about your mother’s childhood—well, there’s a kind of mystery about it.”

Elsie deliberately turned away her face. “Oh, I’m sorry. What an idiot I
am! I had forgotten about your mother! How could I be such a—brute!”

Elsie looked at Timothy’s back steadily. “Don’t be so sorry as all
that,” she replied coolly and without any apparent emotion in her voice.
“My mother was killed in an automobile accident in France two years ago.
But I never knew her, anyway. When I was at home she was usually
somewhere else, at house-parties or sanitariums, or abroad. And I was
only home for holidays. She sent me off to boarding school when I was
eight. Her being dead hasn’t made much difference to me. I was terribly
sorry for her when they told me, that was all. She was so pretty, and
too young-seeming to be a mother. And she would have hated dying!
Sometimes I _ache_ for her when I think of that. But that’s all.”

“Oh, how can you! How can you speak about a dead mother like that!”
Kate’s heart was crying. But she only said, after a second: “There are
lots of jolly-looking girls and boys in this town. Do you know them all?
They keep looking at us, but you never speak. Don’t you _see_ people?
Mother’s like that. She’s so absent minded.”

But even this was an unfortunate subject. Unlucky Kate!

“I know who most of them are but of course I don’t know them socially.”

This was amazing. “Why not?”

But here all Elsie’s attempt at friendliness broke down. She turned on
Kate a tigerish face. “Yes, why not?” she almost hissed. “You know very
well, Kate Marshall, why not. Here’s the post office.”

Kate was shocked. “Well, I certainly _don’t_ know ‘why not’,” she
contradicted. “I haven’t the least idea—unless you treat them in the
rude, horrid way you treat me.”

The car had drawn up to the curb and come to a stand-still before the
pride of Oakdale’s civic life, its white marble post office built on the
lines of a Greek temple. Elsie’s only answer to Kate’s denial was a
shrug.

“Have you letters? And are there any errands?”

Timothy stood on the sidewalk asking for orders.

Elsie stood up quickly. “I’ll post the letters myself,” she answered
him. Kate noticed for the first time a package that Elsie was carrying.
Across the top the word “Manuscript” was written in a round hand, and
the address was that of a publishing house and caught Kate’s attention
because it was the same publishing house that had brought out “The King
of the Fairies.” Kate read the large round black handwriting quite
mechanically and without any motive of curiosity as Elsie stepped past
her out of the car.

When Elsie was halfway up the post-office steps she turned and ran back
to the curb. “Tell me,” she said, “didn’t Aunt Katherine ask us to do
something for her? I’ve quite forgotten what it was.”

“Yes. A dollar book of stamps and ten special deliveries. She gave you
the money.”

“Oh, thanks. Good for your memory.”

“What is she sending to those publishers?” Kate found herself wondering
when the spinning glass doors had closed on her “cousin.” “There was a
special delivery stamp on it, too. And it filled her mind so full that
she quite forgot Aunt’s errands. Can Elsie be trying to _write_? Oh,
wouldn’t that be exciting!”

“Now Holt and Holt’s,” Elsie ordered Timothy when she returned to the
car.

“Holt and Holt’s is a grocery store. I noticed it as we came by,” Kate
said. “I didn’t hear Aunt Katherine say anything about groceries.”

“Of course not. Julia, the cook, attends to all that over the telephone.
This is my errand. Do you mind?”

Kate refused to rise to the sarcasm in Elsie’s “Do you mind?”

But at the grocers’ she said, “I think I’ll come, too, and stretch my
legs.”

“All right.” But Kate distinctly felt that Elsie did not at all like the
idea of having her companionship in the store. However, her pride would
not let her turn back now, of course.

Elsie’s order was given briskly: “A head of crisp Iceland lettuce,” she
said, “a small bottle of salad oil, genuine Italian, half a pound of
almonds, half a dozen eggs, and the smallest loaf of bread you have. Oh,
yes, and a pound of flour, if you sell so little.”

“Thanks,” said the young clerk who had written the order down in his
book.

But Elsie waited. He looked at her inquiringly. “Anything more?”

“No. But I want what I ordered.”

“I thought we’d send it, of course. It will be quite a load.”

“No. Please do the things up and put them into my car for me. How much
is it all?”

“Oh, that’s all right. You’re Miss Frazier, aren’t you? You folks have a
charge account here.”

“However, I want to pay for these things myself. Do not by any means put
them on Miss Frazier’s account.” Elsie spoke primly but with flushed
cheeks that contradicted her outward composure.

“Thought I’d just tell you. Yesterday when you came in and paid for
things Mr. Holt said there must be some mistake.”

“There is no mistake. And will you please put the box of eggs in a bag?
Not just tie them with a string like that!”

“We’re going up your way, miss, in about ten minutes. Why don’t we take
’em?”

But Elsie shook her head, biting her lips with annoyance at the young
man’s persistence. She commanded him to put the things into the car.

“To the Bookshop now,” she ordered Timothy as they started again.

At the Bookshop Kate did not speak of getting out, though it certainly
attracted her more than the grocery store. But Elsie herself turned at
the door. “Don’t you want to come, too, Kate?” she called. “It’s an
awfully cunning little place.”

Kate and her mother were always drawn by bookshops wherever they found
them, and they spent in them during the course of a year a sum that it
would have taken no budget expert to see was all out of proportion to
their income. But then, Katherine always said when the subject of
“budgeting” came up that it was as foolish to make rules about the
spending of money as it would be to make rules about the spending of
time. It was a matter for the individual, strictly. Kate followed Elsie
eagerly, now.

It was such a little shop that Kate, although she immediately gravitated
toward a table of books that interested her particularly, could not
avoid hearing Elsie’s conversation with the Bookshop woman.

“Have you Havelock Ellis’s ‘Dance of Life’?” she asked.

“Yes, a new order has just come in. I knew Miss Frazier wanted it and I
was sending it up first thing this afternoon. Would you like to take
it?”

“Yes, I’ll take one for my aunt, if she ordered it. I’ll take two. One
is for myself, and I will pay for it.”

“Your aunt always charges. Sha’n’t I charge them both?”

“No, I will pay for it. How much is it?”

“Four dollars.”

“Four dollars! Oh, dear! So much?”

The woman was very obliging. “Why not charge it?” she suggested again,
for Elsie was looking woefully into her purse.

“No. Let me think a minute. Well, I won’t buy it to-day.”

Elsie’s face had so fallen, she was so obviously disappointed, that Kate
went over to her. “I have money,” she offered. “Five dollars. You can
borrow from me.”

But as she spoke her glance quite unconsciously fell upon the purse
opened in Elsie’s hand. A little roll of crisp bills lay there for any
one to see, amounting surely to more than four dollars.

“No, thanks.” Elsie replied, snapping the purse shut. “Let’s go home.”

Kate turned it over quickly as they went back to the car. Why had Elsie
acted, as she certainly had acted, as though she did not have four
dollars in her purse when it was perfectly plain that she had more? And
why did she want the book, anyway? Katherine had bought that book less
than a week ago, and Kate had had an opportunity to look into it to find
what of interest there might be for herself. She had found nothing. It
was decidedly a book for adults, a rather deep book, and, to Kate’s
mind, a dull book. But perhaps Elsie only wanted it to give away.
Anyway, she would ask no questions. It was none of her business.

Timothy showed distinct surprise at Elsie’s nonchalant “Home, Timothy.”
And Kate understood his surprise. Aunt Katherine had given them the car
for the morning and Timothy was all prepared to start off on a long
drive. But Elsie had apparently forgotten about this in her worry over
the book. And Kate had no impulse to remind her. If things were only as
one might expect them to be, not all so strangely mysterious and
unpleasant, a car at her disposal and a comrade on a beautiful summer
morning like this would have seemed the height of pleasure. But such a
ride with Elsie would certainly be no fun, and she did not think until
it was too late that she alone with Timothy might start off on an
exploring adventure.

When they got out of the car in front of their own door, Timothy, as a
matter of course, expected to take the packages from the grocery store
around to the servants’ entrance. But Elsie held out her hands for them.
He relinquished them to her, plainly puzzled. Surely they were
groceries!

When the two girls stood together in the big front hall Kate said
briefly: “Good-bye. I’m going out into the garden.”

“Wait on the terrace outside the drawing-room and I’ll come with you,”
Elsie responded, very unexpectedly. “First I’ll just run up to my room
with these bundles. I know a lot about the kinds of flowers and things
in the garden. Let me show it all to you.”

Kate was almost dazed by this suggestion. She had certainly been made to
feel that Elsie was only too eager to get rid of her company. She stood
where she had been left, wondering.

Why had Elsie taken lettuce and oil and bread and eggs and flour and
nuts up to her room? What could she ever do with them up there?

“I’ll not ask her about it,” she promised herself, “just not a thing.
But I shall write to Mother and the boys this morning. I won’t tell
Mother how horrid Elsie is being, though. She would be too disappointed
for me. And I’m really not having such a bad time as it might sound. But
I’ll tell the boys just everything. They will be as mystified as I am.
And to think I was dissatisfied with them for chums and wanted a _girl_!
I’ll appreciate them when I get back, that’s certain. Oh, of course! Why
didn’t I think at first! Elsie doesn’t trust me in the garden alone!
That’s why she wants to come with me. She is afraid I won’t keep my
promise. She’s afraid I will go ‘prowling’ around the orchard house. I
just wish I hadn’t promised not to use the key. It would be something to
do with this morning she’s spoiled. And something to write Mother about.
And it might explain some of the mystery. There _was_ a light last
night. I saw it plain enough. The boys will be interested in all that.
How soon can I expect letters from home, I wonder?”

With these thoughts Kate went out through the cool, shady drawing-room
and on to the terrace. There in the shade of some trellised wisteria she
sat down on a garden bench to wait for Elsie.

                              CHAPTER VII
                              “EVEN SO——”

Elsie was a very long time in coming. As the minutes dragged themselves
along Kate’s cheeks began to get hot even before she realized that she
was angry. But after she had waited so long that she was convinced Elsie
was not coming at all she got up with a shrug. Any one who knew Kate
would have seen at once that she was in no ordinary mood; for shrugs or
any such Latin methods of self-expression were quite foreign to this
girl, New England bred.

She went up to her room for paper. Now was the time to write to her
mother and Sam and Lee. Certainly she had enough to tell them!

The door to the sitting-room across the hall was standing open and a
glance assured Kate that it was empty. And while she did not actually
look into Elsie’s room she heard no sound and felt that Elsie was not
there. But she had no idea where Bertha had put the writing paper when
she unpacked the suitcase and the envelopes and stamps. She searched
through the drawers of the dressing table. But there were only her
ribbons, her handkerchiefs, her underclothes arranged artistically. No
sign of paper or fountain pen. So, although she had meant never to go
into the sitting-room, she was forced to now. Her writing materials must
be in the desk there.

She found them at once. And now being in the room, she took the occasion
to look all about. It was the jolliest place imaginable for a girl to
call her own! And since the morning had grown rather oppressively hot it
was a refuge, too; for there was a breeze on this side of the house and
it was the coolest spot Kate had found herself in that morning. Tree
shadows stood on the walls, and leaf shadows shook in a green, cool
light. It would be very nice to sit here and write. But Kate could not
bring herself to do it. She reminded herself that this was Elsie’s desk
and room, and therefore hateful.

Picking up her own property she hurried out and down the stairs. Once in
the garden she made directly for the apple orchard. She would allow
herself to walk along the edge viewing the orchard house from that
angle. If Elsie called that prowling, let her! As she walked she felt
the brass key in her pocket. But though now her whole mind was on the
house and her desire to go into it, it never entered her head to break
her promise. Elsie certainly deserved her anger, but revengeful thinking
was quite outside of Kate’s mentality.

When she had walked the whole length of the orchard she came to a low,
broad hedge that marked the termination of Aunt Katherine’s grounds.
Near it she sat down, not in the orchard but in its shade, and placing
her block of paper on her knee began to write.

“Dearest Mother”:—And then so suddenly that it startled her, tears
blotted the two words. At the same minute she heard running feet. Kate
winked fast and furiously and looked up. Elsie was standing over her.
She was flushed from running in the heat and her eyes were very bright
and soft. Again she was radiating happiness as on Kate’s first glimpse
of her. On her arm swung a straw basket and one hand held a pair of
shining shears. Kate felt that she would rather die on the spot than let
Elsie guess that she was crying. But if Elsie saw the tears she showed
no sign.

“I’m sorry I didn’t get here sooner, and that I asked you to wait.” She
spoke in a conciliatory tone. “Truly I’m not so rude as I seemed. But I
had an unexpected opportunity to attend to something that needed
attention and there wasn’t time to run down and tell you. It had to be
done quickly. But now I’m ready. I thought as we walked around I’d cut
some flowers for our rooms. Aunt Katherine likes me to keep my vases
filled.”

Now it was Kate who was cold and distant. Her shame in her tears made
that necessary. “I’m writing to my mother,” she answered. “And I don’t
need to be entertained a bit. Some other time I’ll help you with the
flowers.”

Elsie’s glow flickered and went out. “Very well,” she said, and turned
away sharply to cut some nasturtiums growing around the foot of an apple
tree.

But just as she turned there came a shout from over the hedge. A boy
older than themselves, in fact a young man of seventeen probably, had
come to the tennis court, only a few paces beyond the hedge, with a
racket and balls in his hand. He was calling to a girl on the steps of
the piazza of the house next door. “Hurry up,” he shouted. “Come on.”

“Yes. Just a minute.” The girl was bending over on the steps, tying her
shoe perhaps. In a minute she had come bounding down the long slope of
the lawn and joined her brother.

Kate looked at them interestedly. “Who are they?” she asked of Elsie.
Elsie gave her the information without turning. “That’s Rose Denton and
her brother Jack. And they’d ask you to play, probably, if they saw you,
and I weren’t here. They just barely speak to me.”

“Barely speak to you? And they live right next door?”

“Yes, queer, isn’t it!” The voice above the nasturtiums was sarcastic.
“Only get yourself noticed and you’ll soon know them. Hope you have a
good time.”

Elsie straightened up, adjusted her basket on her arm, and moved away.
But Kate called after her, her voice shaking with anger, “I don’t know
why you are so queer, Elsie Frazier, or why you haven’t friends. But
while I’m visiting you it isn’t likely I’d play with people who won’t
play with you, no matter how much they asked me. That’s that.”

Elsie turned and walked backward now. “Well, Kate Marshall, I’m afraid
you’ll have just a horrid month then,” she prophesied. And with a
strange, almost strangled little laugh she whirled about and was really
off with her basket and shears.

Kate watched her as she went, floating toward the gardens across the
smooth lawn. “She walks like a dryad,” she thought, “and she looks like
a Dorothy Lathrop fairy.” Then she smiled a little woefully at her own
fancy. “She may look like a fairy but she’s a horrid, stuck-up thing
just the same,” she reminded herself.

But she found relief for her overcharged emotions when she came to the
compositions of her letter to the Hart boys. There she described Elsie
just as she was and had behaved. Not one unpleasant thing that Elsie had
done was forgotten. Perhaps it was rather horrid of Kate to complain so
unrestrainedly and set down so much criticism. But she did not give that
a thought—not then. When the letter was finished and in its envelope she
pulled it out again to add a postscript.

  P. S. It’s all true what I have told you about Elsie Frazier, every
  bit. But _even so_, I don’t hate her and now that I’ve written about
  her I’m not even angry any more. She’s hardly said a friendly word or
  acted a bit as you would expect her to to a guest, but even so if she
  only were nice to me I’d be quite crazy about her. That isn’t just
  because she’s so pretty, either. I don’t know why I feel that way, but
  I do. She’s exactly the sort of chum I’ve always imagined having some
  day. And there’s one thing good I can tell you about her. She likes
  “The King of the Fairies,” I think. Anyway, she owns it. So what do
  you make of it all? And what about the light in the orchard house? And
  why do you suppose Elsie is so set against my using the key? And why
  did she buy those groceries and take them up to her room? Don’t tell
  Mother a word I’ve told you about how mean Elsie is. _She_ must think
  I’m having a _lovely_ time—at least, until I know whether I can stick
  it out or not. K.M.

                              CHAPTER VIII
                         KATE MEETS A DETECTIVE

When Kate came to luncheon that day she was surprised to see a letter
lying at her place. So soon? Why, she had not been here a day yet!

“It’s not your mother’s handwriting,” Aunt Katherine said, a little
curiously.

“No, it’s from the boys. Oh, I’m so glad!”

“The boys?”

“Yes, I told you about them last night, you know. The twins. The Harts.
How jolly of them to write me so soon!”

“But what can they have to tell you since yesterday?”

“It will be all about Mother, and much better than a letter from her
herself because she doesn’t know how to tell about herself, you know.
She’s always so silent on that subject. Do you mind, Aunt, if I just
open it and peek?”

“Of course, my dear, read it. Elsie and I will excuse you.”

But there was almost no letter inside. There was one paragraph in the
exact centre of a big square sheet of yellow notepaper, written in a
script so small and round and legible that it was almost print like. But
the very wide margins were bordered with a series of pen sketches that
told a story in its progressive action something in the way a moving
picture does. It was the story of a picnic the Harts had arranged for
yesterday afternoon with Katherine the guest of honour. Professor Hart,
in an endeavour to rescue the lunch basket which had fallen into a
brook, had evidently fallen in after it. That perhaps was the high mark
in the artist’s work. But the picnic had been chock full of adventure
one could see at a glance; and Lee’s quick humour and real art had
turned even the worst mishaps into fun.

The paragraph was in Sam’s hand, and began: “Dear Kate, if you are well
it is well. We also are well.” Apparently he had nothing whatsoever to
say, but he said it cheerfully.

Kate crinkled up her eyes and laughed so wholeheartedly over the
nonsense that she felt herself rude. She passed the paper to Aunt
Katherine. “You will see that I can’t help it,” she explained.

And Aunt Katherine, after she had studied the pictures a few seconds and
skimmed the paragraph, laughed, too, a light, genuinely amused laugh.
“It’s not only funny, though,” she insisted, “it’s artistic. Which boy
drew these pictures?”

“Lee. He’s always sketching. He means to be a real artist.”

“I think he is that already. All he needs now is study. I would say he
has a future if he has the will to stick to it.”

Aunt Katherine now handed the letter to Elsie and turned back to Kate to
remark: “Your mother, on accepting my invitation for you, mentioned the
fact that you were lonely, in need of friends as much as Elsie. But I
don’t see how any one could be more companionable or amusing than these
boys, from your descriptions and this letter.”

Kate glowed at Aunt Katherine’s appreciation of Sam and Lee. “Oh, Mother
meant _girl_ friends. There just doesn’t happen to be any one near my
age in Ashland. And while boys are all right, they aren’t exactly the
same.”

Elsie had lost some of her indifference and coldness over the letter.
She was almost smiling, in fact. Now she was actually smiling. Kate
beamed. This was certainly the most natural minute and the happiest
since her arrival. She blessed the Hart boys for having created it.

But Aunt Katherine was surprised when it developed that the girls had
not been exploring the countryside in the car that morning.

“Didn’t you use Timothy at all?” she asked.

“Just for errands in the town. Kate wrote letters and I picked and
arranged flowers, and read ‘The King of the Fairies.’”

“One would think, Elsie, you possessed only one book. When are you going
to finish with ‘The King of the Fairies’?”

“Oh, I don’t know.” Elsie’s tone had fallen suddenly into sulkiness.

But though Aunt Katherine did not seem to notice the sudden chilling of
the atmosphere, Kate did and spoke quickly, a trifle nervously.

“Haven’t you read ‘The King of the Fairies,’ Aunt Katherine?”

“Why, no. It’s a fairy story, a child’s book. It surprises me that
Elsie, a big girl of fifteen, finds it so fascinating.”

“Mother finds it fascinating, too,” Kate hurried to assure her. “And I
know it just about by heart. Mother keeps saying it’s the most beautiful
love story she ever read. And even the boys like it. They felt just the
way you do about its title. But once they got into it they couldn’t
stop. If you read it yourself you’d see why.”

Kate was fairly radiant with her enthusiasm about this book. Her aunt
smiled into her eager eyes. “I shall certainly look it over, then,” she
promised. “It must be an unusual book to inspire such loyalty.”

“I’ll bring my copy down and put it on your reading table right after
luncheon.”

“You have a copy with you! It _must_ be a favourite! Thank you, Kate.”

But Elsie did not offer a word to this topic. She sat, colder than ever,
looking at the wall to the right of Kate’s shoulder.

“As Timothy hasn’t been working this morning, I think I shall have him
take me in to Boston this afternoon,” Aunt Katherine said, as she helped
the girls to lemon ice which had just been set before her in a frosted