Part 7 (1/2)
The others, however, revealed no difference in their appearance, and the girls restored her candle to Genevieve at the table, and stood gazing at each other in disconcerted silence.
”But, after all,” suggested Doris shortly, ”would you expect to see any real sign of the boards being movable or having been moved at some time?
That would only give their secret away, when you come to think of it.
No, if there _is_ some way of opening one of those corners, it's pretty carefully concealed, and I don't see anything for it but for us to bring some tools up here,--a hammer and saw and chisel, perhaps,--and go to work prying those boards up.” The plan appealed to Sally.
”I'll get some of Dad's,” she declared. ”He's got a lot of tools in the boathouse, and he'd never miss a few of the older ones. We'll bring them up tomorrow and begin. And I think your first idea about the corner was the best. We'll start over there.”
”I's cold,” Genevieve began to whimper, at this point. ”I don't _like_ it in here. I want to go out.”
The two girls laughed. ”She isn't much of a treasure-hunter, is she!”
said Doris. ”Bless her heart. We'll go out right away and sit down under the pine trees.”
They emerged into the sunlight, and Sally carefully closed and concealed the entrance to their secret lair. After the chill of the underground, the warm sunlight was very welcome and they lay lazily basking in its heat and inhaling the odor of the pine-needles. Far above their heads the fish-hawks swooped with their high-pitched piping cry, and two wrens scolded each other in the branches above their heads. Sally sat tailor-fas.h.i.+on, her chin cupped in her two hands, thinking in silence, while Doris, propped against a tree, was explaining the pictures in her new book to Genevieve. In the intervals, while Genevieve stared absorbedly at one of them, Doris would look about her curiously and speculatively. Suddenly she thrust the book aside and sprang to her feet.
”Do you realize, Sally,” she exclaimed, ”that I've never yet explored a bit of this region _above ground_ with you? I've never seen a thing except this bit right about the cave. Why not take me all round here for a way. It might be quite interesting.”
Sally looked both surprised and scornful. ”There's nothing at all to see around here that's a bit interesting,” she declared. ”There's just this pine grove and the underbrush, and back there,--quite a way back, is an old country road. It isn't even worth getting all hot and tired going to see.”
”Well, I don't care, I want to see it!” insisted Doris. ”I somehow have a feeling that it would be worth while. And if you are too tired to come with me, I'll go by myself. You and Genevieve can rest here.”
”No, I want to go wis Dowis!” declared Genevieve, scrambling to her feet as she scented a new diversion.
”Well, I'll go too,” laughed Sally. ”I'm not as lazy as all that, but I warn you, you won't find anything worth the trouble.”
They set off together, scrambling through the scrub-oak and bay-bushes, stopping now and then to pick and devour wild strawberries, or gather a great handful of sa.s.safras to chew. All the while Doris gazed about her curiously, asking every now and then a seemingly irrelevant question of Sally.
Presently they emerged from the pine woods and crossed a field covered only with wild blackberry vines still bearing their white blossoms. At the farther edge of this field they came upon a sandy road. It wound away in a hot ribbon till a turn hid it from sight, and the heat of the morning tempted them no further to explore it.
”This is the road I told you of,” explained Sally with an ”I-told-you-so” expression. ”You see it isn't anything at all, only an old back road leading to Manituck. n.o.body much comes this way if they can help it,--it's so sandy.”
”But what's that old house there?” demanded Doris, pointing to an ancient, tumble-down structure not far away. ”And isn't it the queerest-looking place, one part so gone to pieces and unkempt, and that other little wing all nicely fixed up and neat and comfortable!”
It was indeed an odd combination. The structure was a large old-fas.h.i.+oned farmhouse, evidently of a period dating well back in the nineteenth century. The main part had fallen into disuse, as was quite evident from the closed and shuttered windows, the peeling, blistered paint, the unkempt air of being not inhabited. But a tiny ”L” at one side bore an aspect as different from the main building as could well be imagined. It had lately received a coat of fresh white paint. Its windows were wide open and daintily curtained with some pretty but inexpensive material. The little patch of flower-garden in front was as trim and orderly.
”I don't understand it,” went on Doris. ”What place is it?”
”Oh, that's only Roundtree's,” answered Sally indifferently. ”That's old Miss Roundtree now, coming from the back. She lives there all alone.”
As she was speaking, the person in question came into view from around the back of the house, a basket of vegetables in her hand. Plainly she had just been picking them in the vegetable-garden, a portion of which was visible at the side of the house. She sat down presently on her tiny front porch, removed her large sun-bonnet and began to sort them over.
From their vantage-point behind some tall bushes at the roadside, the girls could watch her un.o.bserved.
”I like her looks,” whispered Doris after a moment. ”Who is she and why does she live in this queer little place?”
”I told you her name was Roundtree,--Miss Camilla Roundtree,” replied Sally. ”Most folks call her 'old Miss Camilla' around here. She's awfully poor, though they say her folks were quite rich at one time, and she's quite deaf too. That big old place was her father's, and I s'pose is hers now, but she can't afford to keep it up, she has so little money. So she just lives in that small part, and she knits for a living,--caps and sweaters and things like that. She does knit beautifully and gets quite a good many orders, especially in summer, but even so it hardly brings her in enough to live on. She's kind of queer too, folks think. But I don't see why you're so interested in her.”
”I like her looks,” answered Doris. ”She has a fine face. Somehow she seems to me like a lady,--a _real_ lady!”