of Mr. Winters’s gift to keep still.
Fidgetting from side to side of the carriage seat, where she had been left to wait, the impatient girl felt that Aunt Betty’s errands were endless. Even the fat horses, used to standing quietly on the street, grew restless during a long delay at the law offices of Kidder and Kidder, Mrs. Calvert’s men of business. This, the lady had said, would be the last stop by the way; and when she at length emerged from the building, she moved as if but half conscious of what she was doing. Her face was troubled and looked far older than when she had left the carriage; and, with sudden sympathy and pity, Dorothy’s mood changed.
“Aunt Betty, aren’t you well? Let’s go straight home, then, and not bother about that boat.”
Mrs. Calvert smiled and bravely put her own worries behind her.
“Thank you, dear, for your consideration, but ‘the last’s the best of all the game,’ as you children say. I’ve begun to believe that this boat errand of ours may prove so. Ephraim, drive to Halcyon Point.”
If his mistress had bidden him drive straight into the Chesapeake, the old coachman would have attempted to obey; but he could not refrain from one glance of dismay as he received this order. He wouldn’t have risked his own respectability by a visit to such a “low down, ornery” resort, alone; but if Miss Betty chose to go there it was all right. Her wish was “sutney cur’us” but being hers not to be denied.
And now, indeed, did Dorothy find the city with its heat a “smelly” place, but a most interesting one as well. The route lay through the narrowest of streets, where tumble-down old houses swarmed with strange looking people. To her it all seemed like some foreign country, with its Hebrew signs on the walls, its bearded men of many nations, and its untidy women leaning from the narrow windows, scolding the dirty children in the gutters beneath.
But after a time, the lane-like streets gave place to wider ones, the air grew purer, and soon a breath from the salt water beyond refreshed them all. Almost at once, it seemed, they had arrived; and Dorothy eagerly sought to tell which of the various craft clustered about the Point was her coveted house-boat.
The carriage drew up beside a little office on the pier and a man came out. He courteously assisted Aunt Betty to descend, while he promptly pointed out a rather squat, but pretty, boat which he informed her was the “Water Lily,” lately the property of Mr. Blank, but now consigned to one Mr. Seth Winters, of New York, to be held at the commands of Miss Dorothy Calvert.
“A friend of yours, Madam?” he inquired, concluding that this stately old lady could not be the “Miss” in question and wholly forgetting that the little maid beside her might possibly be such.
Aunt Betty laid her hand on Dolly’s shoulder and answered:
“This is Miss Dorothy Calvert and the ‘Water Lily’ is a gift from Mr. Winters to her. Can we go on board and inspect?”
The gentleman pursed his lips to whistle, he was so surprised, but instead exclaimed:
“What a lucky girl! The ‘Water Lily’ is the most complete craft of its kind I ever saw. Mr. Blank spared no trouble nor expense in fitting her up for a summer home for his family. She is yacht-shaped and smooth-motioned; and even her tender is better than most house-boats in this country. Blank must be a fanciful man, for he named the tender ‘The Pad,’ meaning leaf, I suppose, and the row-boat belonging is ‘The Stem.’ Odd, isn’t it, Madam?”
“Rather; but will just suit this romantic girl, here,” she replied; almost as keen pleasure now lighting her face as was shining from Dorothy’s. At her aunt’s words she caught the lady’s hand and kissed it rapturously, exclaiming:
“Then you do mean to let me accept it, you precious, darling dear! You do, you do!”
They all laughed, even Ephraim, who was close at his lady’s heels, acting the stout body-guard who would permit nothing to harm her in this strange place.
The Water Lily lay lower in the water than the dock and Mrs. Calvert was carefully helped down the gang plank to its deck. Another plank rested upon the top of the cabin, or main room of the house-boat, and Dorothy sped across this and hurried down the steep little winding stair, leading from it to the lower deck, to join in her aunt’s inspection of the novel “ship.”
Delighted astonishment hushed for the time her nimble tongue. Then her exclamations burst forth:
“It’s so big!”
“About one hundred feet long, all told, and eighteen wide;” the wharf master explained.
“It’s all furnished, just like a really, truly house!”
“Indeed, yes; with every needful comfort but not one superfluous article. See this, please. The way the ‘bedrooms’ are shut off;” continued the gentleman, showing how the three feet wide window-seats were converted into sleeping quarters. Heavy sail cloth had been shaped into partitions, and these fastened to ceiling and side wall separated the cots into cosy little staterooms. Extra seats, pulled from under the first ones, furnished additional cots, if needed.
The walls of the saloon had been sunk below the deck line, giving ample head room, and the forward part was of solid glass, while numerous side-windows afforded fine views in every direction. The roof of this large room could be covered by awnings and became a charming promenade deck.
Even Aunt Betty became speechless with pleasure as she wandered over the beautiful boat, examining every detail, from the steam-heating arrangements to the tiny “kitchen,” which was upon the “tender” behind.
“I thought the tug, or towing boat was always in front,” she remarked at length.
“Mr. Blank found this the best arrangement. The ‘Pad’ has a steam engine and its prow fastened to the stern of the Lily propels it ahead. None of the smoke comes into the Lily and that, too, was why the galley, or kitchen, was built on the smaller boat. A little bridge is slung between the two for foot passage and – Well, Madam, I can’t stop admiring the whole affair. It shows what a man’s brain can do in the way of invention, when his heart is in it, too. I fancy that parting with his Water Lily was about the hardest trial poor old Blank had to bear.”
Silence fell on them all and Dorothy’s face grew very sober. It was a wonderful thing that this great gift should come to her but it grieved her to know it had so come by means of another’s misfortune. Aunt Betty, too, grew more serious and she asked the practical question:
“Is it a very expensive thing to run? Say for about three months?”
The official shrugged his shoulders, replying:
“That depends on what one considers expensive. It would smash my pocket-book to flinders. The greatest cost would be the engineer’s salary. One might take the job for three dollars a day and keep. He might – I don’t know. Then the coal, the power for the electric lights – the lots of little things that crop up to eat up cash as if it were good bread and butter. Ah! yes. It’s a lovely toy – for those who can afford it. I only wish I could!”
The man’s remarks ended in a sigh and he looked at Dorothy as if he envied her. His expression hurt her, somehow, and she turned away her eyes, asking a practical question of her own:
“Would three hundred dollars do it?”
“Yes – for a time, at least. But – ”
He broke off abruptly and helped Aunt Betty to ascend the plank
