Part 6 (2/2)

”No; I've always made some excuse to her for not having them meet. I didn't want to hear her make disparaging remarks about him, and she is such a flirt, she'd try to draw him out and he would shut up like a clam.”

”Well, I think,” decided Silvia, ”that the best way out of it is to write Rob to postpone his visit and I will write Beth to come direct to Hope Haven.”

”Yes,” I agreed, ”that will be fine. She shall have charge of dear little Di and study the evolutions of the Polydores later.”

I approved this plan. So we wrote our letters and stealthily, but joyously, prepared for our getaway, leaving the house like thieves in the night and bearing the sleeping cherub, Diogenes.

Silvia sighed in relief when we were aboard the train.

”I feel quite chesty,” she declared, ”at being smart enough to outwit Ptolemy, the wizard.”

”I have the feeling,” I observed forebodingly, ”that they may be on the train or underneath it.”

The next morning we reached Windy Creek, the station nearest our destination, and continued our journey by stage.

”People will think you have consoled yourself very speedily for the death of your first husband,” I observed, as we were en route.

”Why, what do you mean, Lucien?”

”You know Diogenes addresses me as stepdaddy. It is the only word he speaks plainly.”

”Oh!” she exclaimed in perturbation, ”I never thought of that! Well, we can explain to everyone, or I'll teach them to leave off the 'step.'”

”Not on your life!” I demurred.

”He had better call you Lucien, then. Emerald calls his father 'Felix.'”

She at once began her tutelage of the bewildered Diogenes. After several stabs at p.r.o.nouncing Lucien he managed to evolve ”Ocean” to which he sometimes affixed ”step” so that people to whom he was not explained doubtless thought me the latest thing in dances.

Hope Haven was like most resorts--a place safe to shun. There was a low, flat stretch of woods in which a clearing had been made for a barn-like structure called a hotel, with rooms rough and not always ready. The beautiful recreation grounds mentioned in the advertising matter consisted of a plowed field worked over into a s.p.a.ce designated as a tennis court and a gra.s.s-grown croquet ground.

”Anyway,” claimed Silvia hopefully, ”it's a treat to see woods, water, and sky unconfined.”

She devoted the remainder of the morning to unpacking and after luncheon set off to explore the woods, borrowing from the landlady a little cart for Diogenes to ride in. My plan to go in swimming was delayed by my garrulous landlord.

I was just starting for the lake when I heard sounds from the woods that alarmed the landlord but which I instantly recognized as the Polydore yell. A moment later I saw Silvia emerging at full speed into the open, drawing the cart in which Diogenes was doubled up like a jackknife. I hastened to meet them.

”Oh, Lucien,” exclaimed my wife tearfully, ”we are bitten to bits!

Just look at poor little Di!”

I lifted the howling child from the cart. His face, neck, and hands were stringy and purplish--a cross between an eggplant and a round steak.

”Mosquitoes!” explained Silvia. ”They came in flocks and they advertised particularly 'no mosquitoes.'”

A dour-faced guest paused in pa.s.sing.

”There aren't--many,” she declared. ”Very few, in fact, compared to the number of black flies, sand fleas, and jiggers. However, you'll find more discomfort from the poison ivy, I imagine.”

”Lucien,” began Silvia in lament.

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