won’t feel like staying alone,” she said.
Thyra looked up steadily.
“No. But I want you to send for Damaris Garland.”
“Damaris Garland!” Cynthia repeated the name as if disbelieving her own ears. There was never any knowing what whim Thyra might take, but Cynthia had not expected this.
“Yes. Tell her I want her — tell her she must come. She must hate me bitterly; but I am punished enough to satisfy even her hate. Tell her to come to me for Chester’s sake.”
Cynthia did as she was bid, she sent her daughter, Jeanette, for Damaris. Then she waited. No matter what duties were calling for her at home she must see the interview between Thyra and Damaris. Her curiosity would be the last thing to fail Cynthia White. She had done very well all day; but it would be asking too much of her to expect that she would consider the meeting of these two women sacred from her eyes.
She half believed that Damaris would refuse to come. But Damaris came. Jeanette brought her in amid the fiery glow of a November sunset. Thyra stood up, and for a moment they looked at each other.
The insolence of Damaris’ beauty was gone. Her eyes were dull and heavy with weeping, her lips were pale, and her face had lost its laughter and dimples. Only her hair, escaping from the shawl she had cast around it, gushed forth in warm splendor in the sunset light, and framed her wan face like the aureole of a Madonna. Thyra looked upon her with a shock of remorse. This was not the radiant creature she had met on the bridge that summer afternoon. This — this — was HER work. She held out her arms.
“Oh, Damaris, forgive me. We both loved him — that must be a bond between us for life.”
Damaris came forward and threw her arms about the older woman, lifting her face. As their lips met even Cynthia White realized that she had no business there. She vented the irritation of her embarrassment on the innocent Jeanette.
“Come away,” she whispered crossly. “Can’t you see we’re not wanted here?”
She drew Jeanette out, leaving Thyra rocking Damaris in her arms, and crooning over her like a mother over her child.
When December had grown old Damaris was still with Thyra. It was understood that she was to remain there for the winter, at least. Thyra could not bear her to be out of her sight. They talked constantly about Chester; Thyra confessed all her anger and hatred. Damaris had forgiven her; but Thyra could never forgive herself. She was greatly changed, and had grown very gentle and tender. She even sent for August Vorst and begged him to pardon her for the way she had spoken to him.
Winter came late that year, and the season was a very open one. There was no snow on the ground and, a month after Joe Raymond’s boat had been cast up on the Blue Point sand shore, Thyra, wandering about in her garden, found some pansies blooming under their tangled leaves. She was picking them for Damaris when she heard a buggy rumble over the bridge and drive up the White lane, hidden from her sight by the alders and firs. A few minutes later Carl and Cynthia came hastily across their yard under the huge balm-of-gileads. Carl’s face was flushed, and his big body quivered with excitement. Cynthia ran behind him, with tears rolling down her face.
Thyra felt herself growing sick with fear. Had anything happened to Damaris? A glimpse of the girl, sewing by an upper window of the house, reassured her.
“Oh, Thyra, Thyra!” gasped Cynthia.
“Can you stand some good news, Thyra?” asked Carl, in a trembling voice. “Very, very good news!”
Thyra looked wildly from one to the other.
“There’s but one thing you would dare to call good news to me,” she cried. “Is it about — about—”
“Chester! Yes, it’s about Chester! Thyra, he is alive — he’s safe — he and Joe, both of them, thank God! Cynthia, catch her!”
“No, I am not going to faint,” said Thyra, steadying herself by Cynthia’s shoulder. “My son alive! How did you hear? How did it happen? Where has he been?”
“I heard it down at the harbor, Thyra. Mike McCready’s vessel, the Nora Lee, was just in from the Magdalens. Ches and Joe got capsized the night of the storm, but they hung on to their boat somehow, and at daybreak they were picked up by the Nora Lee, bound for Quebec. But she was damaged by the storm and blown clear out of her course. Had to put into the Magdalens for repairs, and has been there ever since. The cable to the islands was out of order, and no vessels call there this time of year for mails. If it hadn’t been an extra open season the Nora Lee wouldn’t have got away, but would have had to stay there till spring. You never saw such rejoicing as there was this morning at the harbor, when the Nora Lee came in, flying flags at the mast head.”
“And Chester — where is he?” demanded Thyra.
Carl and Cynthia looked at each other.
“Well, Thyra,” said the latter, “the fact is, he’s over there in our yard this blessed minute. Carl brought him home from the harbor, but I wouldn’t let him come over until we had prepared you for it. He’s waiting for you there.”
Thyra made a quick step in the direction of the gate. Then she turned, with a little of the glow dying out of her face.
“No, there’s one has a better right to go to him first. I can atone to him — thank God, I can atone to him!”
She went into the house and called Damaris. As the girl came down the stairs Thyra held out her hands with a wonderful light of joy and renunciation on her face.
“Damaris,” she said, “Chester has come back to us — the sea has given him back to us. He is over at Carl White’s house. Go to him, my daughter, and bring him to me!”
THE EDUCATION OF BETTY
When Sara Currie married Jack Churchill I was brokenhearted…or believed myself to be so, which, in a boy of twenty-two, amounts to pretty much the same thing. Not that I took the world into my confidence; that was never the Douglas way, and I held myself in honor bound to live up to the family traditions. I thought, then, that nobody but Sara knew; but I dare say, now, that Jack knew it also, for I don’t think Sara could have helped telling him. If he did know, however, he did not let me see that he did, and never insulted me by any implied sympathy; on the contrary, he asked me to be his best man. Jack was always a thoroughbred.
I was best man. Jack and I had always been bosom friends, and, although I had lost my sweetheart, I did not intend to lose my friend into the bargain. Sara had made a wise choice, for Jack was twice the man I was; he had had to work for his living, which perhaps accounts for it.
So I danced at Sara’s wedding as if my heart were as light as my heels; but, after she and Jack had settled down at Glenby I closed The Maples and went abroad…being, as I have hinted, one of those unfortunate mortals who need consult nothing but their own whims in the matter of time and money. I stayed away for ten years, during which The Maples was given over to moths and rust, while I enjoyed life elsewhere. I did enjoy it hugely, but always under protest, for I felt that a brokenhearted man ought not
