Part 18 (1/2)
planning the future and gazing into the clear obscure of the darkening sky.
”'Star light, star bright, first star I've seen tonight!
I wish I may, I wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight,'”
sang Dum, and sure enough there was a star.
”Look here, girls, it's getting late! I hate to awaken you from this dream of eternal bliss, but we've got to go in,” and Dee turned over on her face to swim in, thereby causing some commotion in the hearts of the two swimmers newly initiated in the art.
”Don't leave me!” gasped Annie.
”Didn't your faithful Mary swear to take you safe to sh.o.r.e? Just lie still and I'll tow you in;” and in they came, Mary steaming away like a tug boat and Annie floating like an ocean liner, until her shoulders grated on the sand and then and only then was she convinced that she could touch bottom.
We raced back to the cottage, hungry and happy, the fifteen minutes that we had meant to stay having turned into an hour in the twinkling of an eye. From afar we espied Blanche on the porch, shooing us back with one hand and beckoning with the other. We obeyed the beckoning one and eagerly demanded what was the matter. Her face was so pale that the name of Blanche was almost appropriate.
”What is it, Blanche? What has happened?” we cried.
But she was speechless except for gasping: ”Oh, the disgrace, the disgrace!”
We followed her trembling form into the living room, wet suits and all, feeling that the exigency of the case was sufficient cause for suspension of rules and for once we would bring dripping bathing suits into the house. The cause of Blanche's perturbation of mind was easily understood when we beheld the portly figure of Cousin Park Garnett stiffly seated in a dusty chair (on Dum's Panama hat it was discovered later). She was indignantly waving her turkey-tail fan, and such an expression of disgust I have never seen on a human countenance.
The room looked no better than when we had left it and even a little worse, as the pickup supper we were to have had been dumped on the table in great confusion and not at all in Blanche's usual careful style. We had told her not to set the table and she had taken us at our word. The odour of sardines left in the opened boxes mingled with that of the bananas, still in the bursting bag. The bread was cut in thick, uneven slices. A gla.s.s jar of pickle and one of olives added to the sketchiness of the table. It was ”confusion worse confounded.”
”Oh!” I gasped, on viewing my indignant relative, ”I thought you had gone!”
”No, I have not yet departed,” stiffly from Cousin Park. ”This is rather an unusual time for bathing, is it not?”
”Yes'm, but----” and I began to stammer out something, fully aware of the dismal figure I cut, standing limply in front of that august presence, my wet clothes sending forth streams of water that settled in little puddles on the floor. I was well aware of the fact that Cousin Park had never approved of my friends.h.i.+p with the Tuckers, and now, coming on us in this far from commendable state, she would have what she would consider a handle for her hitherto unfounded objections.
But Dee, who by some power that she possessed in common with her father, the power by a certain tact to become master of any situation, no matter how embarra.s.sing, came forward and with all the manners of one much older and clothed in suitable garments, so that you lost sight of her scant and dripping bathing suit, she said:
”We are very glad to see you, Mrs. Garnett, and are extremely sorry to have missed any of your visit. You have found us in some disarray from the fact that we are preparing to move and at the same time have just been engaged in having a wedding in the family.”
”A wedding! Whose wedding?” The wily Dee had taken her mind off of the disorder in the room and now she felt she could soon win her over to complacency at least. The wetting paled to insignificance beside the wedding.
”Why, our dear friend and chaperone, Miss c.o.x.”
”Your chaperone! Goodness gracious, child! Did she marry your father?”
”Heavens, no!” laughed Dee. ”Mr. Bob Gordon is the happy man!”
”Miss Binks did not tell me a word of it,” said Mrs. Garnett rather suspiciously.
”No, she did not know about it.” ”Not know about it? That is strange!
Was there any reason for keeping it secret?”
”No especial reason for keeping it secret except that it was to be a very quiet affair and the invited guests included only the most intimate friends. Mabel Binks has a way of getting herself invited by hook or crook, and we just decided not to tell her about the matter.”
”How long were they engaged? It seems strange behaviour in a chaperone.”