Love stories; New England -- Social life and customs -- 20th century -- Fiction
"You've put in your time well, eh, Barrison?"
"What makes you think so?"
"My word! If Miss Wilbur ever turned those lamps on me with that look in
them, I'd fly right in and singe my wings for life."
"I don't intend to singe mine," said Philip quietly. "They think I've
been useful in this one-act play they've been staging and they are
grateful, that's all. The goddess is as transparent and honest as any
child that ever lived. She doesn't want to light any flame for the moth,
she has far too big a soul. Did you notice that the boy I took away
looked different from the one we brought back to-day?"
"It wasn't the same one, was it?"
"Yes, with a few renovations in mind and body. I'll tell you about it as
we go along."
When Mrs. Wilbur went out on the Inn piazza and was assailed with the
island sights and odors, the snowy daisy drifts, the dark evergreens,
the rock-lashed foam dragging at the pebbles and flinging them back with
a never-ceasing crescendo and diminuendo, the soaring, sweeping gulls
above and beneath the blue, she did not speak for a time, and it was a
place where her lorgnette failed.
Léonie, however, kept up a joyous undertone. "Mais, c'est comme chez
moi. C'est vraiment comme chez moi, et Mr. Beel, he will take me to see
ze poisson."
"Mr. Beel" kept his word, and not once, but many times, did Mrs. Wilbur
look about vainly for her maid in a place where there was no bell to
ring for her, and no clocks for her to see when she was without, and
Bill's motor was running up and down the road in such a convenient way
for him to stop and take on an eager passenger, for whom no fishing boat
was too dirty, and who could swim as well as any fish in the bay.
"Do let her go, Mamma," Diana said one morning when they were alone.
"She is having a real vacation. When you are once attired and your hair
is dressed, can I not perform any other office for you?"
"But I don't know which is the maid, Léonie or I," said Mrs. Wilbur.
"First she had to have a sweater and I sent for that. Then she wanted a
bathing-suit and I sent for that. Then she bought herself some fishing
tackle and, if she can't get out in a boat, she sits on the wharf with
her feet hanging over and fishes for those--those--"
"Cunners?" suggested Diana.
"Yes; and she knows every one of the island boys, and how does she know
when I need her? She doesn't think anything about it."
"That's it," returned Diana, nodding. "She has lost her head. That is
what we all do. You will, too, Mamma. I heard you laughing and laughing
with Mr. Kelly yesterday."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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