SEVERAL weeks later Dorothy McClain and Victoria Drew were again in the kitchen adjoining the living-room of the House in the Woods.
Upon this afternoon their state of mind was altogether unlike their former one. This was apparent both in manner and expression.
Over their Girl Scout costumes they were wearing semiofficial nursing uniforms, white cotton dresses and caps of their own design.
At present Dorothy McClain was leaning anxiously over the kitchen stove stirring a kettle of simmering milk into which she had just measured a proper amount of cocoa. Her face was flushed and she was looking so pretty that Tory sat watching her with a smile of satisfaction. She herself was engaged in cutting thin slices of bread. Of late more than one cause had conspired to make Dorothy less happy than usual.
“I do hope the first visit from our entire Patrol of Girl Scouts will not be too tiring for40 Miss Frean,” Dorothy remarked, aware that the other girl’s eyes were upon her and desiring to change the current of her thought.
Tory paused reflectively.
“I do not think it will hurt her in the least,” she announced. “You seem to forget that your father gave his consent to our meeting here a week ago and that Miss Mason, our Scout Captain, insisted on the delay. If Memory has recovered sufficiently to give up her trained nurse and submit to our ministrations for the past ten days, she is well enough for our tea party. The Girl Scouts have haunted the place ever since her illness. I suppose in a way it was a relief when she and Dr. McClain agreed to allow us to do the nursing, provided only two of us at a time would take charge. I specially asked to have you with me, Dorothy, as we were together on the morning when we suffered such suspense.”
Dorothy McClain straightened up and glanced around, the color slowly ebbing from her face and her clear eyes becoming disturbed and wistful.
“I wish all suspense ended in so happy a fashion, Tory dear!”
In her white cap and gown, with her dark41 eyes, slender face and full red lips, Tory appeared especially attractive. Her reddish gold hair, worn short, could not be tucked out of sight, but made a bright effect of contrasting color.
She drew her brows together and frowned, not angrily but seriously.
“The other thing you are thinking of will turn out happily soon, Dorothy, I am sure. Lance is a dreamer and I suppose is selfish, but Christmas is nearly here and he cannot let the Christmas season go by without writing your father and you where he is and what he is doing. It would be too hateful and too ungrateful!”
The other girl shook her head.
“You don’t know Lance as I do, Tory, although you may believe you understand each other because you both possess the artistic temperament, or think you possess it. Lance will never willingly let us know what has become of him until he has accomplished at least a portion of what he hoped for. You need not think he does not suffer and long for father and Don and me. But he realized this before he went away and decided at last he could not endure to wait longer for a chance to study his beloved music. Lance42 used so often to tell me music was not like the other arts; unless one learned when one was young there was no opportunity afterwards.”
“Then you forgive Lance for all he has made you and your father and Don suffer? You do care for him more than your other brothers?”
The girl who had been questioned shook her head thoughtfully.
“I don’t know. I have not been able to make up my mind; perhaps I shall know some day. I only said I understood. If we could only be sure that Lance would send for some one or let us know if he were ill, father and I would be less miserable! We both realize that is just what Lance will never do. If he has made a mistake, he will feel he should pay for it. But please, Tory, let us talk of something else. I want to forget everything but our Scout meeting this afternoon. You have finished the bread and I’ll butter it. The chocolate will keep warm at the back of the stove. Suppose you see if Miss Frean wishes anything before the girls and Miss Mason arrive.”
Appreciating that Dorothy really wished to be alone for a few moments, Tory slipped away.
43 The only girl in a family of six brothers, Dorothy McClain held a peculiar affection for one of the brothers nearest her own age. Donald and Lance McClain were twins, and yet totally unlike in appearance and character. Donald was, like his sister, tall, with chestnut hair and blue eyes, and a love for athletic sports and the outdoors. Simple and normal in their habits and tastes, it had not always been easy for them to endure the vagaries of Lance, in spite of their devotion to him. The odd member of the family, Lance McClain had a passionate devotion for music with which no one of them could sympathize. He did not seem possessed of a remarkable genius; at least his father considered that he had only talent, and that music was no profession for a boy who was forced to earn his own living.
With six sons and a daughter, Dr. McClain, a village physician, did not see how it would be possible to give the delicate, erratic boy the musical education he would require. A few weeks before Lance had disappeared from his home in the small town of Westhaven, and so far no word had come from him. Remembering that he had threatened to spend the winter in New York, there could be but little doubt that he was in hiding there.
44 To-day the living-room of the House in the Woods was more than ordinarily lovely. Its simplicity, which approached austerity, was relieved by half a dozen vases and bowls of flowers. The eye fell at once upon a bouquet of red roses and violets in the center of a table near a big chair where a woman was half seated and half reclining. An open book was in her hands.
Tory looked from one to the other.
She was aware that the older woman had become handsomer since her illness. The heavy dark hair was more carefully arranged, since Tory herself was responsible for it. The weeks of rest and, had the girl known it, companionship, as well as other things, had softened and made more gentle the strong face with the blue, serious eyes.
“You appear to have grown into a very popular person in Westhaven, Memory,” Tory said irrelevantly, “and yet I recall that at our first meeting I was made to believe by you that you possessed only a few friends in the village. I wonder why you thought this? Please put down what you are reading and tell me.”
Miss Frean closed her book.
“Do you know, Tory, that since I have been45 nursed by seven of the eight girls of your Eagle’s Wing Patrol and the one Girl Guide who is a guest of honor, I have reached this conclusion: You are the most autocratic of the group, even if your manner now and then conceals the fact. Still, you saved my life, didn’t you, dear? I consider you saved it, spending the night here and coming to search for me, and the first aid you gave me before any one else was here to help. So I presume I owe you thanks.”
The girl shook her head.
“I have explained to you half a dozen times, Memory, that it was Uncle Richard who saved you, not I. I had made up my mind I did not dare face the storm alone, when he made his unexpected appearance at your door. It is not like you to seem so unwilling to be grateful to him. I told him that you said he was not to send you flowers every day. As he made no answer, I don’t think he intends to obey. Still, you have not answered my question.”
“Oh, yes, I have, Tory. I was unpopular in the village before we made friends and I became a member of your Girl Scout Council. Don’t you hear the others coming? I am as excited as a girl having a first party.”
46 Miss Frean crossed the room toward the window. She wore a dress of heavy blue silk, made simply, with a cord as a girdle. Tory had insisted upon her buying the dress, as she owned no proper costume in which to be a convalescent. As a matter of fact, Tory had made the discovery that the older woman was not so poor as the simplicity of her living made one believe. She was possessed of only a small income, but had written several books upon birds and flowers under an assumed name which increased the amount. This she did not care to have people know. She preferred bestowing the money upon persons who were in need without allowing them to guess the source.
“You are a beauty, Memory Frean! I did not think so when I first knew you,” Tory remarked, following her friend to the window and drawing her back toward the warmer shelter of the room.
“Remember, please, Dr. McClain says you are not yet to expose yourself to the cold. It was dreadfully stupid of any one who knows as much as you do of the outdoors to have attempted to reach home in such a storm as you dared. Henceforth in spite of your nature lore you will have sometimes to do what you are told.”
47 Leaning over, the older woman gave Tory a sudden, unexpected embrace. Demonstration was unusual with her.
“You flatter and scold in the same breath, Tory. I am glad you think I am prettier. No woman ever grows too old or too sensible not to wish to hear this compliment.
“Now I am convinced I hear our visitors; please open the front door, if I am not to be allowed to do it.”
An hour later eight girls, their hostess and Sheila Mason, the Scout Captain, were seated close together, facing the log fire.
“I think you might tell your dream now, Tory,” Miss Frean suggested, half amused and half serious.
“My dream?” Tory answered, bright spots of color showing in her ordinarily pale cheeks. “I studied the background of my dream on the long winter night when I stayed here alone awaiting Memory Frean’s return.”