"Let's land there," Madeline exclaimed suddenly. "It looks like a jolly

place."

She pointed toward a stretch of beach caught between the arms of trees

that came to the very water's edge, and enshrined in a great wild

grape-vine that had climbed from branch to branch until it made a

tangled canopy.

Dick turned sharply inward and ran their prow into the twittering sand.

"Thou speakest and it is thy servant's place to obey," he said.

"How does it feel to keep slaves? I've often wondered," Ellery said as

he jumped ashore and Dick began tossing him rugs and cushions.

"Very comfy, thank you, and not at all un-Christian," she answered

saucily. "Dick, don't throw the supper basket, under penalty of

liquidating the sandwiches. I think there's a freezer of ice-cream under

the deck, if you'll pull it out. Now, are you ready for me?"

She stepped lightly forward under Dick's guidance, took Ellery's

outstretched hands and sprang to the shore, where a kind of throne was

built for her against a prostrate log,--all this help not because it was

necessary, but as the appropriate pomp of royalty.

"I suspect," said Dick, looking about him with great satisfaction, "that

this was a favorite picnic place for Gitche Manito and Hiawatha, in the

morning of days."

"That shows how nature can forget," Madeline retorted. "Surely you know

the real story, Dick."

"I don't," said Ellery. "Tell it to me."

She snuggled comfortably down into her rugs.

"In early days, which is the western equivalent for 'once upon a time,'

a furious storm raged down the lake and tore the water into long

ribbons of purple and green. A beautiful girl stood, perhaps on this

very spot, with a savage who had rescued her from a sinking canoe and

brought her here, dripping but safe. Over there on the mainland her

father came running out of the woods in an agony of fear. He saw her

here, saw her signals, but the shriek of the storm and the roar of the

waters drowned out the words that she frantically screamed toward him.

He saw her point to the Indian, who was always feared, always counted

treacherous, and his dread of the hurricane changed to terror of the

savage. He raised his rifle and the girl's deliverer dropped dead at her

feet."

"Then fifty years went by, and this became a bower for the eating of

sandwiches," added Dick.

Norris was lying on his back and staring through the tangle of grape and

maple leaves at the flecks of blue beyond.

"That's a noble story," he said. "I didn't suppose this new land had any

legends. It all gives me the impression of being just old enough to be

big."

"Isn't that the conceit of the Anglo-Saxon? He calls this a new land

because he's lived here only about a half-century. Things did happen

before you were born, my dear boy," said Dick.




readonlinefreebook.com Copyright 2016 - 2024