The Gay Cockade Part 29

The Admiral, taking up cudgels for his niece, answered, "If she had been on the other side, she would have taken life as she takes it now--like a gentleman and a soldier," and he smiled at Petronella.

Hare had a baffled sense that the Admiral was right--that Petronella's fineness and delicacy would never go down in defeat or despair. She would hold her head high though the heavens fell. But could any man make such demands upon her? For himself, he would not.

So he answered, doggedly, "We shall hope she need never be tested." And Petronella's heart sank like lead.

But presently she began to talk about the little tree. "We have always had it in uncle's lookout tower. That was another of dear Aunt Pet's thoughts for the sailors. On clear nights they looked through their gla.s.ses for the little colored lights, and on stormy nights they knew that back of all the snow was the Christmas brightness."

"I never had a tree," said Justin. "When I was a kiddie we had pretty hard times, and the best Christmas I remember was one when mother made us boys put up a shelf for our books, and she started our collection with 'Treasure Island' and 'Huckleberry Finn.'"

In the adjoining room, volumes reached from floor to ceiling, from end to end. Petronella had a vision of this vivid young giant gloating over his two books on a rude shelf. And all her life she had had the things she wanted! Somehow the thought took the bitterness out of her att.i.tude toward him. How strong he must be to deny himself now the one great thing that he craved when his life had held so little.

"How lovely to begin with just those two books," she said, softly, and the radiance of her smile was dazzling.

When she showed him her presents she was still radiant. There was a queer opera-bag of Chinese needlework, with handles of jade, a Damascus bowl of pierced bra.s.s, a tea-caddy in quaint Dutch _repousse_; there was a silver-embroidered altar-cloth for a cus.h.i.+on, a bit of Copenhagen faience, all the sophisticated artistry which is sent to those who have no need for the commonplace. There were jewels, too: a bracelet of topazes surrounded by brilliants, a pair of slipper buckles of turquoises set in silver, a sapphire circlet for her little finger, a pendant of seed pearls.

As she opened the parcels and displayed her riches Justin felt bewildered. His gifts to his mother had included usually gloves and a generous check; if he had ventured to choose anything for Petronella he would not have dared go beyond a box of candy or a book; he had given his nurses pocketbooks and handkerchiefs. And the men of Petronella's world bestowed on her bra.s.s bowls and tea-caddies!

Miss Danvers vanished up-stairs. The Admiral, having admired, slipped away to the library, encouraged by Petronella's whispered: "Oh, uncle dear, leave us alone for just a little minute. I've found a way!"

Then Petronella, with that radiance still upon her, sat down on her little stool in front of the fire, and looked at Justin on the other side of the hearth.

"You haven't given me anything," she began, reproachfully.

"What could I give that would compare with these?" His hand swept toward the exquisite display. "What could I give--"

"There's one thing," softly.

"What?"

"That copy of 'Treasure Island' that your mother gave you long ago."

Dead silence. Then, unsteadily: "Why should you want that?"

"Because your mother--loved you."

Again dead silence. Hare did not look at her. His hand clenched the arm of his chair. His face was white. Then, very low, "Why do you--make it hard for me?"

"Because I want--the book"; she was smiling at him with her eyes like stars. "I want to read it with the eyes of the little boy--with the eyes of the little boy who looked into the future and saw life as a great adventure; who looked into the future--and dreamed."

He had a vision, too, of that little boy, reading, in the old house in the Maine woods, by the light of an oil-lamp, on Christmas Eve, with the snow blowing outside as it blew to-night.

"And your mother loved you because she loved your father," the girl's voice went on, "and you were all very happy up there in the forest. Do you remember that you told me about it on the s.h.i.+p?--you were happy, although you were poor, and hadn't any books but 'Treasure Island' and 'Huckleberry Finn.' But your mother was happy--because she--loved your father."

As she repeated it, she leaned forward. "Could you think of your mother as having been happy with any one else but your father?" she asked.

"Could you think of her as having never married him, of having gone through the rest of her days a half-woman, because he would not--take her--into his life? Can you think that all the money in the world--all the money in the whole world--would--would have made up--"

The room seemed to darken. Hare was conscious that her face was hidden in her hands, that he stumbled toward her, that he knelt beside her--that she was in his arms.

"Hush," he was saying in that beating darkness of emotion. "Hush, don't cry--I--I will never let you go--"

When the storm had spent itself and when at last she met his long gaze, he whispered, "I'm not sure now that it is right--"

"You will be sure as the years go on," she whispered back; then, tremulously: "but I--I could never have--talked that way if I had thought of you as the man. I had to think of you as the little boy--who dreamed."

THE CANOPY BED

"My great-grandfather slept in it," Van Alen told the caretaker, as she ushered him into the big stuffy bedroom.

The old woman set her candlestick down on the quaint dresser. "He must have been a little man," she said; "none of my sons could sleep in it.

Their feet would hang over."

Van Alen eyed the big bed curiously. All his life he had heard of it, and now he had traveled far to see it. It was a lumbering structure of great width and of strangely disproportionate length. And the coverlet and the canopy were of rose-colored chintz.

"I think I shall fit it," he said slowly.

Mrs. Brand's critical glance weighed his smallness, his immaculateness, his difference from her own great sons.

"Yes," she said, with the open rudeness of the country-bred; "yes, you ain't very big."

Van Alen winced. Even from the lips of this uncouth woman the truth struck hard. But he carried the topic forward with the light ease of a man of the world.

"My grandfather had the bed sawed to his own length," he explained; "did you ever hear the story?"

"No," she said; "I ain't been here long. They kept the house shut up till this year."

"Well, I'll tell you when I come down," and Van Alen opened his bag with a finality that sent the old woman to the door.

"Supper's ready," she told him, "whenever you are."

At the supper table the four big sons towered above Van Alen. They ate with appet.i.tes like giants, and they had big ways and hearty laughs that seemed to dwarf their guest into insignificance.

But the insignificance was that of body only, for Van Alen, fresh from the outside world and a good talker at all times, dominated the table conversationally.

To what he had to say the men listened eagerly, and the girl who waited on the table listened.

She was a vivid personality, with burnished hair, flaming cheeks, eyes like the sea. Her hands, as she pa.s.sed the biscuits, were white, and the fingers went down delicately to little points. Van Alen, noting these things keenly, knew that she was out of her place, and wondered how she came there.

At the end of the meal he told the story of the Canopy Bed.

"My great-grandfather was a little man, and very sensitive about his height. In the days of his early manhood he spent much time in devising ways to deceive people into thinking him taller. He surrounded himself with big things, had a big bed made, wore high-heeled boots, and the crown of his hat was so tall that he was almost overbalanced.

"But for all that, he was a little man among the st.u.r.dy men of his generation, and if it had not been for the Revolution I think he would have died railing at fate. But the war brought him opportunity. My little great-grandfather fought in it, and won great honors, and straight back home he came and had the bed sawed off! He wanted future generations to see what a little man could do, and his will provided that this house should not be sold, and that, when his sons and grandsons had proved themselves worthy of it by some achievement, they should come here and sleep. I think he swaggered a little when he wrote that will, and he has put his descendants in an embarra.s.sing position.

We can never sleep in the canopy bed without taking more upon ourselves than modesty permits!"

He laughed, and instinctively his eyes sought those of the girl who waited on the table. Somehow he felt that she was the only one who could understand.