CHAPTER XVII
WHEREIN MRS. COMSTOCK DANCES IN THE MOONLIGHT, AND ELNORA MAKES
A CONFESSION
Billy was swinging in the hammock, at peace with himself and all
the world, when he thought he heard something. He sat bolt upright,
his eyes staring. Once he opened his lips, then thought again and
closed them. The sound persisted. Billy vaulted the fence, and ran
down the road with his queer sidewise hop. When he neared the Comstock
cabin, he left the warm dust of the highway and stepped softly at
slower pace over the rank grasses of the roadside. He had heard
aright. The violin was in the grape arbour, singing a perfect jumble
of everything, poured out in an exultant tumult. The strings were
voicing the joy of a happy girl heart.
Billy climbed the fence enclosing the west woods and crept toward
the arbour. He was not a spy and not a sneak. He merely wanted to
satisfy his child-heart as to whether Mrs. Comstock was at home,
and Elnora at last playing her loved violin with her mother's consent.
One peep sufficed. Mrs. Comstock sat in the moonlight, her head
leaning against the arbour; on her face was a look of perfect peace
and contentment. As he stared at her the bow hesitated a second
and Mrs. Comstock spoke:
"That's all very melodious and sweet," she said, "but
I do wish you could play Money Musk and some of the tunes I danced
as a girl."
Elnora had been carefully avoiding every note that might be reminiscent
of her father. At the words she laughed softly and began "Turkey
in the Straw." An instant later Mrs. Comstock was dancing in
the moon light. Ammon sprang to her side, caught her in his arms,
while to Elnora's laughter and the violin's impetus they danced
until they dropped panting on the arbour bench.
Billy scarcely knew when he reached the road. His light feet barely
touched the soft way, so swiftly he flew. He vaulted the fence and
burst into the house.
"Aunt Margaret! Uncle Wesley!" he screamed. "Listen!
Listen! She's playing it! Elnora's playing her violin at home! And
Aunt Kate is dancing like anything before the arbour! I saw her
in the moonlight! I ran down! Oh, Aunt Margaret!"
Billy fled sobbing to Margaret's breast.
"Why Billy!" she chided. "Don't cry, you little dunce!
That's what we've all prayed for these many years; but you must
be mistaken about Kate. I can't believe it."
Billy lifted his head. "Well, you just have to!" he said.
"When I say I saw anything, Uncle Wesley knows I did. The city
man was dancing with her. They danced together and Elnora laughed.
But it didn't look funny to me; I was scared."
"Who was it said `wonders never cease,'" asked Wesley.
"You mark my word, once you get Kate Comstock started, you
can't stop her. There's a wagon load of penned-up force in her.
Dancing in the moonlight! Well, I'll be hanged!"
Billy was at his side instantly. "Whoever does it will have
to hang me, too," he cried.
Sinton threw his arm around Billy and drew him closely. "Tell
us all about it, son," he said. Billy told. "And when
Elnora just stopped a breath, `Can't you play some of the old things
I knew when I was a girl?' said her ma. Then Elnora began to do
a thing that made you want to whirl round and round, and quicker
'an scat there was her ma a-whirling. The city man, he ups and grabs
her and whirls, too, and back in the woods I was going just like
they did. Elnora begins to laugh, and I ran to tell you, cos I knew
you'd like to know. Now, all the world is right, ain't it?"
ended Billy in supreme satisfaction.
"You just bet it is!" said Wesley.
Billy looked steadily at Margaret. "Is it, Aunt Margaret?"
Margaret Sinton smiled at him bravely.
An hour later when Billy was ready to climb the stairs to his room,
he went to Margaret to say good night. He leaned against her an
instant, then brought his lips to her ear. "Wish I could get
your little girls back for you!" he whispered and dashed toward
the stairs.
Down at the Comstock cabin the violin played on until Elnora was
so tired she scarcely could lift the bow. Then Philip went home.
The women walked to the gate with him, and stood watching him from
sight.
"That's what I call one decent young man!" said Mrs. Comstock.
"To see him fit in with us, you'd think he'd been brought up
in a cabin; but it's likely he's always had the very cream o' the
pot."
"Yes, I think so," laughed Elnora, "but it hasn't
hurt him. I've never seen anything I could criticise. He's teaching
me so much, unconsciously. You know he graduated from Harvard, and
has several degrees in law. He's coming in the morning, and we are
going to put in a big day on Catocalae."
"Which is----?"
"Those gray moths with wings that fold back like big flies,
and they appear as if they had been carved from old wood. Then,
when they fly, the lower wings flash out and they are red and black,
or gold and black, or pink and black, or dozens of bright, beautiful
colours combined with black. No one ever has classified all of them
and written their complete history, unless the Bird Woman is doing
it now. She wants everything she can get about them."
"I remember," said Mrs. Comstock. "They are mighty
pretty things. I've started up slews of them from the vines covering
the logs, all my life. I must be cautious and catch them after this,
but they seem powerful spry. I might get hold of something rare."
She thought intently and added, "And wouldn't know it if I
did. It would just be my luck. I've had the rarest thing on earth
in reach this many a day and only had the wit to cinch it just as
it was going. I'll bet I don't let anything else escape me."
Next morning Philip came early, and he and Elnora went at once to
the fields and woods. Mrs. Comstock had come to believe so implicitly
in him that she now stayed at home to complete the work before she
joined them, and when she did she often sat sewing, leaving them
wandering hours at a time. It was noon before she finished, and
then she packed a basket of lunch. She found Elnora and Philip near
the violet patch, which was still in its prime. They all lunched
together in the shade of a wild crab thicket, with flowers spread
at their feet, and the gold orioles streaking the air with flashes
of light and trailing ecstasy behind them, while the red- wings,
as always, asked the most impertinent questions. Then Mrs. Comstock
carried the basket back to the cabin, and Philip and Elnora sat
on a log, resting a few minutes. They had unexpected luck, and both
were eager to continue the search.
"Do you remember your promise about these violets?" asked
he. "To-morrow is Edith's birthday, and if I'd put them special
delivery on the morning train, she'd get them in the late afternoon.
They ought to keep that long. She leaves for the North next day."
"Of course, you may have them," said Elnora. "We
will quit long enough before supper to gather a large bunch. They
can be packed so they will carry all right. They should be perfectly
fresh, especially if we gather them this evening and let them drink
all night."
Then they went back to hunt Catocalae. It was a long and a happy
search. It led them into new, unexplored nooks of the woods, past
a red-poll nest, and where goldfinches prospected for thistledown
for the cradles they would line a little later. It led them into
real forest, where deep, dark pools lay, where the hermit thrush
and the wood robin extracted the essence from all other bird melody,
and poured it out in their pure bell-tone notes. It seemed as if
every old gray tree-trunk, slab of loose bark, and prostrate log
yielded the flashing gray treasures; while of all others they seemed
to take alarm most easily, and be most difficult to capture.
Philip came to Elnora at dusk, daintily holding one by the body,
its dark wings showing and its long slender legs trying to clasp
his fingers and creep from his hold.
"Oh for mercy's sake!" cried Elnora, staring at him.
"I half believe it!" exulted Ammon.
"Did you ever see one?"
"Only in collections, and very seldom there."
Elnora studied the black wings intently. "I surely believe
that's Sappho," she marvelled. "The Bird Woman will be
overjoyed."
"We must get the cyanide jar quickly," said Philip.
"I wouldn't lose her for anything. Such a chase as she led
me!"
Elnora brought the jar and began gathering up paraphernalia.
"When you make a find like that," she said, "it's
the right time to quit and feel glorious all the rest of that day.
I tell you I'm proud! We will go now. We have barely time to carry
out our plans before supper. Won't mother be pleased to see that
we have a rare one?"
"I'd like to see any one more pleased than I am!" said
Philip Ammon. "I feel as if I'd earned my supper to-night.
Let's go."
He took the greater part of the load and stepped aside for Elnora
to precede him. She followed the path, broken by the grazing cattle,
toward the cabin and nearest the violet patch she stopped, laid
down her net, and the things she carried. Philip passed her and
hurried straight toward the back gate.
"Aren't you going to----?" began Elnora.
"I'm going to get this moth home in a hurry," he said.
"This cyanide has lost its strength, and it's not working well.
We need some fresh in the jar."
He had forgotten the violets! Elnora stood looking after him, a
curious expression on her face. One second so--then she picked up
the net and followed. At the blue-bordered pool she paused and half
turned back, then she closed her lips firmly and went on. It was
nine o'clock when Philip said good-bye, and started to town. His
gay whistle floated to them from the farthest corner of the Limberlost.
Elnora complained of being tired, so she went to her room and to
bed. But sleep would not come. Thought was racing in her brain and
the longer she lay the wider awake she grew. At last she softly
slipped from bed, lighted her lamp and began opening boxes. Then
she went to work. Two hours later a beautiful birch bark basket,
strongly and artistically made, stood on her table. She set a tiny
alarm clock at three, returned to bed and fell asleep instantly
with a smile on her lips.
She was on the floor with the first tinkle of the alarm, and hastily
dressing, she picked up the basket and a box to fit it, crept down
the stairs, and out to the violet patch. She was unafraid as it
was growing light, and lining the basket with damp mosses she swiftly
began picking, with practised hands, the best of the flowers. She
scarcely could tell which were freshest at times, but day soon came
creeping over the Limberlost and peeped at her. The robins awoke
all their neighbours, and a babel of bird notes filled the air.
The dew was dripping, while the first strong rays of light fell
on a world in which Elnora worshipped. When the basket was filled
to overflowing, she set it in the stout pasteboard box, packed it
solid with mosses, tied it firmly and slipped under the cord a note
she had written the previous night.
Then she took a short cut across the woods and walked swiftly to
Onabasha. It was after six o'clock, but all of the city she wished
to avoid were asleep. She had no trouble in finding a small boy
out, and she stood at a distance waiting while he rang Dr. Ammon's
bell and delivered the package for Philip to a maid, with the note
which was to be given him at once.
On the way home through the woods passing some baited trees she
collected the captive moths. She entered the kitchen with them so
naturally that Mrs. Comstock made no comment. After breakfast Elnora
went to her room, cleared away all trace of the night's work and
was out in the arbour mounting moths when Philip came down the road.
"I am tired sitting," she said to her mother. "I
think I will walk a few rods and meet him."
"Who's a trump?" he called from afar.
"Not you!" retorted Elnora. "Confess that you forgot!"
"Completely!" said Philip. "But luckily it would
not have been fatal. I wrote Polly last week to send Edith something
appropriate to-day, with my card. But that touch from the woods
will be very effective. Thank you more than I can say. Aunt Anna
and I unpacked it to see the basket, and it was a beauty. She says
you are always doing such things."
"Well, I hope not!" laughed Elnora. "If you'd seen
me sneaking out before dawn, not to awaken mother and coming in
with moths to make her think I'd been to the trees, you'd know it
was a most especial occasion."
"Then Philip understood two things: Elnora's mother did not
know of the early morning trip to the city, and the girl had come
to meet him to tell him so.
"You were a brick to do it!" he whispered as he closed
the gate behind them. "I'll never forget you for it. Thank
you ever so much."
"I did not do that for you," said Elnora tersely. "I
did it mostly to preserve my own self-respect. I saw you were forgetting.
If I did it for anything besides that, I did it for her."
"Just look what I've brought!" said Philip, entering the
arbour and greeting Mrs. Comstock. "Borrowed it of the Bird
Woman. And it isn't hers. A rare edition of Catocalae with coloured
plates. I told her the best I could, and she said to try for Sappho
here. I suspect the Bird Woman will be out presently. She was all
excitement."
Then they bent over the book together and with the mounted moth
before them determined her family. The Bird Woman did come later,
and carried the moth away, to put into a book and Elnora and Philip
were freshly filled with enthusiasm.
So these days were the beginning of the weeks that followed. Six
of them flying on Time's wings, each filled to the brim with interest.
After June, the moth hunts grew less frequent; the fields and woods
were searched for material for Elnora's grade work. The most absorbing
occupation they found was in carrying out Mrs. Comstock's suggestion
to learn the vital thing for which each month was distinctive, and
make that the key to the nature work. They wrote out a list of the
months, opposite each the things all of them could suggest which
seemed to pertain to that month alone, and then tried to sift until
they found something typical. Mrs. Comstock was a great help. Her
mother had been Dutch and had brought from Holland numerous quaint
sayings and superstitions easily traceable to Pliny's Natural History;
and in Mrs. Comstock's early years in Ohio she had heard much Indian
talk among her elders, so she knew the signs of each season, and
sometimes they helped. Always her practical thought and sterling
common sense were useful. When they were afield until exhausted
they came back to the cabin for food, to prepare specimens and classify
them, and to talk over the day. Sometimes Philip brought books and
read while Elnora and her mother worked, and every night Mrs. Comstock
asked for the violin. Her perfect hunger for music was sufficient
evidence of how she had suffered without it. So the days crept by,
golden, filled with useful work and pure pleasure.
The grosbeak had led the family in the maple abroad and a second
brood, in a wild grape vine clambering over the well, was almost
ready for flight. The dust lay thick on the country roads, the days
grew warmer; summer was just poising to slip into fall, and Philip
remained, coming each day as if he had belonged there always.
One warm August afternoon Mrs. Comstock looked up from the ruffle
on which she was engaged to see a blue-coated messenger enter the
gate.
"Is Philip Ammon here?" asked the boy.
"He is," said Mrs. Comstock.
"I have a message for him."
"He is in the woods back of the cabin. I will ring the bell.
Do you know if it is important?"
"Urgent," said the boy; "I rode hard."
Mrs. Comstock stepped to the back door and clanged the dinner bell
sharply, paused a second, and rang again. In a short time Philip
and Elnora ran down the path.
"Are you ill, mother?" cried Elnora.
Mrs. Comstock indicated the boy. "There is an important message
for Philip," she said.
He muttered an excuse and tore open the telegram. His colour faded
slightly. "I have to take the first train," he said. "My
father is ill and I am needed."
He handed the sheet to Elnora. "I have about two hours, as
I remember the trains north, but my things are all over Uncle Doc's
house, so I must go at once."
"Certainly," said Elnora, giving back the message. "Is
there anything I can do to help? Mother, bring Philip a glass of
buttermilk to start on. I will gather what you have here."
"Never mind. There is nothing of importance. I don't want to
be hampered. I'll send for it if I miss anything I need."
Philip drank the milk, said good-bye to Mrs. Comstock; thanked her
for all her kindness, and turned to Elnora.
"Will you walk to the edge of the Limberlost with me?"
he asked. Elnora assented. Mrs. Comstock followed to the gate, urged
him to come again soon, and repeated her good-bye. Then she went
back to the arbour to await Elnora's return. As she watched down
the road she smiled softly.
"I had an idea he would speak to me first," she thought,
"but this may change things some. He hasn't time. Elnora will
come back a happy girl, and she has good reason. He is a model young
man. Her lot will be very different from mine."
She picked up her embroidery and began setting dainty precise little
stitches, possible only to certain women.
On the road Elnora spoke first. "I do hope it is nothing serious,"
she said. "Is he usually strong?"
"Quite strong," said Philip. "I am not at all alarmed
but I am very much ashamed. I have been well enough for the past
month to have gone home and helped him with some critical cases
that were keeping him at work in this heat. I was enjoying myself
so I wouldn't offer to go, and he would not ask me to come, so long
as he could help it. I have allowed him to overtax himself until
he is down, and mother and Polly are north at our cottage. He's
never been sick before, and it's probable I am to blame that he
is now."
"He intended you to stay this long when you came," urged
Elnora.
"Yes, but it's hot in Chicago. I should have remembered him.
He is always thinking of me. Possibly he has needed me for days.
I am ashamed to go to him in splendid condition and admit that I
was having such a fine time I forgot to come home."
"You have had a fine time, then?" asked Elnora.
They had reached the fence. Philip vaulted over to take a short
cut across the fields. He turned and looked at her.
"The best, the sweetest, and most wholesome time any man ever
had in this world," he said. "Elnora, if I talked hours
I couldn't make you understand what a girl I think you are. I never
in all my life hated anything as I hate leaving you. It seems to
me that I have not strength to do it."
"If you have learned anything worth while from me," said
Elnora, "that should be it. Just to have strength to go to
your duty, and to go quickly."
He caught the hand she held out to him in both his. "Elnora,
these days we have had together, have they been sweet to you?"
"Beautiful days!" said Elnora. "Each like a perfect
dream to be thought over and over all my life. Oh, they have been
the only really happy days I've ever known; these days rich with
mother's love, and doing useful work with your help. Good-bye! You
must hurry!"
Philip gazed at her. He tried to drop her hand, only clutched it
closer. Suddenly he drew her toward him. "Elnora," he
whispered, "will you kiss me good-bye?"
Elnora drew back and stared at him with wide eyes. "I'd strike
you sooner!" she said. "Have I ever said or done anything
in your presence that made you feel free to ask that, Philip Ammon?"
"No!" panted Philip. "No! I think so much of you
I wanted to touch your lips once before I left you. You know, Elnora----"
"Don't distress yourself," said Elnora calmly. "I
am broad enough to judge you sanely. I know what you mean. It would
be no harm to you. It would not matter to me, but here we will think
of some one else. Edith Carr would not want your lips to-morrow
if she knew they had touched mine to-day. I was wise to say: `Go
quickly!'"
Philip still clung to her. "Will you write me?" he begged.
"No," said Elnora. "There is nothing to say, save
good-bye. We can do that now."
He held on. "Promise that you will write me only one letter,"
he urged. "I want just one message from you to lock in my desk,
and keep always. Promise you will write once, Elnora."
She looked into his eyes, and smiled serenely. "If the talking
trees tell me this winter, the secret of how a man may grow perfect,
I will write you what it is, Philip. In all the time I have known
you, I never have liked you so little. Good-bye."
She drew away her hand and swiftly turned back to the road. Philip
Ammon, wordless, started toward Onabasha on a run.
Elnora crossed the road, climbed the fence and sought the shelter
of their own woods. She chose a diagonal course and followed it
until she came to the path leading past the violet patch. She went
down this hurriedly. Her hands were clenched at her side, her eyes
dry and bright, her cheeks red-flushed, and her breath coming fast.
When she reached the patch she turned into it and stood looking
around her.
The mosses were dry, the flowers gone, weeds a foot high covered
it. She turned away and went on down the path until she was almost
in sight of the cabin.
Mrs. Comstock smiled and waited in the arbour until it occurred
to her that Elnora was a long time coming, so she went to the gate.
The road stretched away toward the Limberlost empty and lonely.
Then she knew that Elnora had gone into their own woods and would
come in the back way. She could not understand why the girl did
not hurry to her with what she would have to tell. She went out
and wandered around the garden. Then she stepped into the path and
started along the way leading to the woods, past the pool now framed
in a thick setting of yellow lilies. Then she saw, and stopped,
gasping for breath. Her hands flew up and her lined face grew ghastly.
She stared at the sky and then at the prostrate girl figure. Over
and over she tried to speak, but only a dry breath came. She turned
and fled back to the garden.
In the familiar enclosure she gazed around her like a caged animal
seeking escape. The sun beat down on her bare head mercilessly,
and mechanically she moved to the shade of a half-grown hickory
tree that voluntarily had sprouted beside the milk house. At her
feet lay an axe with which she made kindlings for fires. She stooped
and picked it up. The memory of that prone figure sobbing in the
grass caught her with a renewed spasm. She shut her eyes as if to
close it out. That made hearing so acute she felt certain she heard
Elnora moaning beside the path. The eyes flew open. They looked
straight at a few spindling tomato plants set too near the tree
and stunted by its shade. Mrs. Comstock whirled on the hickory and
swung the axe. Her hair shook down, her clothing became disarranged,
in the heat the perspiration streamed, but stroke fell on stroke
until the tree crashed over, grazing a corner of the milk house
and smashing the garden fence on the east.
At the sound Elnora sprang to her feet and came running down the
garden walk. "Mother!" she cried. "Mother! What in
the world are you doing?"
Mrs. Comstock wiped her ghastly face on her apron. "I've laid
out to cut that tree for years," she said. "It shades
the beets in the morning, and the tomatoes in the afternoon!"
Elnora uttered one wild little cry and fled into her mother's arms.
"Oh mother!" she sobbed. "Will you ever forgive me?"
Mrs. Comstock's arms swept together in a tight grip around Elnora.
"There isn't a thing on God's footstool from a to izzard I
won't forgive you, my precious girl!" she said. "Tell
mother what it is!"
Elnora lifted her wet face. "He told me," she panted,
"just as soon as he decently could--that second day he told
me. Almost all his life he's been engaged to a girl at home. He
never cared anything about me. He was only interested in the moths
and growing strong."
Mrs. Comstock's arms tightened. With a shaking hand she stroked
the bright hair.
"Tell me, honey," she said. "Is he to blame for a
single one of these tears?"
"Not one!" sobbed Elnora. "Oh mother, I won't forgive
you if you don't believe that. Not one! He never said, or looked,
or did anything all the world might not have known. He likes me
very much as a friend. He hated to go dreadfully!"
"Elnora!" the mother's head bent until the white hair
mingled with the brown. "Elnora, why didn't you tell me at
first?"
Elnora caught her breath in a sharp snatch. "I know I should!"
she sobbed. "I will bear any punishment for not, but I didn't
feel as if I possibly could. I was afraid."
"Afraid of what?" the shaking hand was on the hair again.
"Afraid you wouldn't let him come!" panted Elnora. "And
oh, mother, I wanted him so!"