16. Visiting Celebrities
The first campers were due to arrive the second week in June, but everything was in complete readiness long before that time. The girls never wearied of making their tours of inspection to be sure nothing had been overlooked, and each time it seemed as if they added a few more finishing touches.
Becky declared it was all so inviting that she felt like closing up the big house and coaxing the Judge to camp out with her.
Kit and Doris were in one of the cabins that was on a little jutting point of land near the Peckham mill. Here, the river swept out in a wide U-shaped curve that was crowned with gray rocks and pines. The music of the falls reached it, and the road was only about a quarter of a mile across the fields to the north, but apparently it was completely isolated.
All at once Tommy came tearing around the rock path, his eyes wide with excitement, his whole manner full of mystery.
“There’s a car just stopped in the road,” he exclaimed, “and the man in it asked me who lived in the cabin over here.”
“I never supposed anyone could see that cabin from the road.” Kit’s tone held a distinct note of disappointment. “What did he want to sell us, Tommy, lightning rods or sewing machines?”
“Aw, Kit, quit it,” pleaded Tommy. “He’s really in earnest, and he’s coming over here right now. I told him all about everything, and he thinks he might want to rent one.”
Kit’s face brightened up at this. “Lead me, Tommy, to this first paying guest. Doris, don’t you dare to say anything to spoil the inviting picture which I shall give him. I don’t see what more he could want.” She hesitated a moment, surveying the river, almost directly below the sloping rock. “Why, he could almost sit up in bed in the morning and haul in his fishing line from that river with a fine catch for breakfast on it.”
“Oh, hurry, Kit, and stop wasting time,” Tommy begged. “He’s really awfully nice, and he’s in earnest, I know he is.”
So Kit followed Tommy across the fields to the road where the automobile was waiting. The man must have been about forty years old, but with his closely cut dark hair and alert smile he appeared much younger. He wore no hat, and was deeply tanned. It seemed to Kit at first glance as though she had never seen eyes so full of keen curiosity and genial friendliness.
“Hello,” he called as soon as she came within hearing distance. “Are you the young lady in charge of renting these cabins which I see?”
Kit admitted that she was. He nodded his head approvingly and smiled, a broad pleasant smile which seemed to include the entire landscape.
“I like it here,” he announced with emphasis. “It is sequestered and silent. I have not met a single car on the road for miles.”
“Oh, that happens often,” said Kit eagerly. “There are days when nobody passes at all except the mailman.”
“It suits me,” he exclaimed buoyantly. “I must have quiet and perfect relaxation. I will rent one of your cabins and occupy it at once. I have been touring this part of the country looking for a spot which appealed to me.”
“We have one on the hill over there,” Kit suggested. He seemed rather peculiar, and perhaps it would be just as well to have him as far off as possible. “It is right on the edge of the pines, and faces the west. The sunsets are beautiful from there.”
“No, no,” he repeated. “I like the sound of water. I hear falls below here. I will take that cabin I see over there.”
So the first cabin dweller came to Woodhow. Kit had still been in doubt, and taking no chances on strangers within the gates, she had guided Mr. Ormond up to her father to make the closing arrangements on renting the waterfall cabin. The most amazing part was that he left a check that first day for full rental for ten weeks.
“I must not be interrupted or bothered by little things,” he told Mr. Craig. “I must have perfect isolation or I cannot do my work.”
He arrived promptly the following day and arranged to put up the car in their garage. Tommy and Jack helped him move his things into the cabin.
“Gosh, we’ve lugged down all his belongings to the cabin,” Jack said when they were finished, “and I can’t find out what in the heck his business is. He had a lot of heavy bundles, and we asked him a few questions about them, but he didn’t seem to take kindly to it, so we let him alone.”
“Lucy says he’s made arrangements to buy eggs and chickens from them,” said Kit, “so I see where our paying guests are going to scatter prosperity around the neighborhood.”
Ralph McRae arrived the seventeenth of June and took the Turtle Cove Cabin. The Craigs saw quite a good deal of him, for he was always dropping in on them. Doris suspected a budding romance, but she contented herself with watching Jean and investing her with the glamor of all her favorite heroines.
The first fruits of Jean’s efforts to colonize the cabins came with a letter from Peg Moffat.
“You’re going to have four of the girls through July anyway, and August if they like it. I’ve told them the scenery is perfectly gorgeous and they can draw wherever they like, so be sure and give them the cabins with the best view.”
The next surprise was a letter from Billie. He could not reach home before the middle of July, as he was going on another trip with Frank, but there were five of the boys from his class who wanted to come up and camp.
“I’ve told them the fishing is swell around there, and they’re going to make the trip from here in Jeff Saunders’s car. Jeff’s from Georgia, and most of the guys have never been north. We’re going to join them later on, so if you’ve got a bunch of cabins together, you better save us three.”
“We’ll put them all over in the glen, where they can do just as they please,” Kit decided. “They won’t interfere with high art or our mysterious stranger.”
Lucy opened her general store the first of June. It stood exactly at the crossroads, beside Woodhow. Her brothers had erected a little slab shack, and Lucy had planted wild cucumber and morning glory vines thickly around the outside, the last week in April, so that by June they had climbed halfway up.
Inside the store there were two counters, one on either side as you entered, and these had been Mr. Peckham’s contribution to the good cause. At first the stocking up of the store had been a problem, but Becky helped out with the business plan, and by this time nearly everyone in Elmhurst was taking a keen, personal interest in the venture.
It was Ma Parmalee who first suggested that Lucy sell on the commission plan. “I’ve got thirty-five jars of the best kind of preserves and canned goods in Elmhurst,” she announced one day, when she had stopped on her way by the crossroads to look over the new establishment. “Most of them are pints, and besides I’ve got—land, I don’t know how many glasses of jelly and jam. I’d be willing to give you a good share of whatever you could make on them, if you could sell them off for me down here.”
Lucy agreed gladly, and the fruit made a splendid showing along the upper shelves behind the counters. Not only that, but it began to sell at once. Mr. Ormond bought up all of the canned peaches after sampling one jar, and Ralph said he was willing to become responsible for some of the strawberry jam and spiced pears. Before long, Lucy was looking around for more supplies.
One morning, just after Tommy had gone whistling out to the barn, Doris spied a familiar figure coming along the drive toward the house, and leaned out of the dining room window, calling with all her heart, “Hi, Billie!”
Billie waved back and came up to the back steps where he found the other girls. “The camp’s immense,” he said. “We got in late last night and I knew the way down, so we didn’t disturb anybody. Even found the old boat in the same place, Doris.”
“Well, you wouldn’t have if I hadn’t hauled it there, where I knew you could lay your hands on it.”
Billie laughed. He knew from past experience that Doris’s scoldings didn’t amount to much. He and Frank had brought up a load of supplies with them but huckleberry pancakes with honey lured them both up for breakfast that first morning. And even Kit was silent as Frank related all of his adventures during the year. It seemed to her that she had never really looked at him before, that is, to get the best impression, without prejudice. Now, she realized he was quite good-looking and she noted for the first time his curly yellow hair, and long, half-closed blue eyes, that always seemed to be laughing at you. He had dimples, too, and these Kit resented.
“I can’t abide dimples in a boy’s face,” she declared privately to Jean, when the latter was dwelling on Frank’s good looks.
“But, Kit, Buzzy has dimples, and you always thought he was such a swell guy.”
“Well, he’s different,” Kit said lamely. “I don’t think I like blond, curly hair, either.”
They had walked down to the Peckham mill after supper to get some supplies that Danny Peckham had promised to bring up from Nantic. Just as they came to the turn of the road there came a strange sound from the direction of the waterfall cabin, deep, rich strains of music, almost as low-pitched and thrilling as the sound of the water itself. Both girls stood still listening, until Jean whispered, “It must be Mr. Ormond. He’s playing on a cello, isn’t he?”
“Then, that’s what he does,” Kit’s tone held a touch of admiring awe as she listened. “And we thought he might be anything from a counterfeiter to an escaped convict hiding away up here. Oh, Jeannie, why do you suppose he keeps away from everyone?”
“Probably got a hidden sorrow,” Jean answered. “Still he’s got a terrific appetite. Mrs. Gorham says she doesn’t see how he ever puts away the amount of food he does. He buys whole roast chickens and eats them all himself.”
Just then the music ceased suddenly. The door opened and Mr. Ormond spoke into the twilight gloom.
“Is that you, Tommy?”
“No, it’s just us girls,” answered Kit. “We’re going down to the mill.”
“Would you mind so very much asking if anyone has telephoned a telegram up for me from the station? I’m expecting one.”
“There, you see,” Jean said, dubiously, as they went on down the road. “We just get rid of one mystery, and he hands us another to solve. Who would he be getting a telegram from?”
Kit laughed and said, “You’re getting just as bad as everyone else in Elmhurst, Jean. I thought only Mr. Ricketts took an interest in telegrams and post cards.”
Nevertheless, when Lucy told them that there had been a message phoned up from Nantic, even Kit showed quick interest.
It was signed “Concetta,” and the message read, “Arrive Nantic, ten-two. Contract signed. All love and tenderness.”
The girls returned after delivering the message, brimful of the news, but Mr. Craig laughed at them.
“Why, my goodness,” he said, “I could have told you long ago all about Bryan Ormond. He’s one of the greatest cellists we have, and is married to Madame Concetta Doria, the opera singer. He told me when he first took the cabin for the summer, but as he was composing a new opera, he wanted absolute solitude up here and asked me not to let anyone know who he was.”
“Talk about entertaining an angel unawares,” Jean exclaimed. “Now, Doris, you’ll have your chance, if you can only get acquainted with her. I can see you perched on their threshold drinking in trills and quavers the rest of the summer.”
Doris only smiled happily. It was she who had begged the hardest to bring the piano with them when they moved to Elmhurst. She really played quite well and had a pleasing voice.
“Have you ever heard her sing, Mother?” she asked.
“Yes, many times. She has a lovely voice and you will like her.”
“And just to think of her coming to live in a cabin at Woodhow,” Doris said, almost in a whisper. “It seems as if we ought to offer them the best room in the house.”
“If you did, they would run away. That’s just what they have come here to escape from, all the fuss and publicity.”
Jean, too, was eagerly expecting Madame Ormond. While not one of the girls could have explained just exactly how they thought she would look, still they held a blurred picture of someone unusual, who would probably dress more or less eccentrically.
Kit was in the kitchen making sandwiches for lunch, when a shadow fell across the doorway. Jean sat on the edge of the table by the window picking over blackberries, and the two stared at the intruder. She was about the same age as Mr. Ormond, a large buoyant type of woman with a mass of curly ash-blonde hair, sparkling black eyes, and a wonderful complexion. Perhaps it was her smile that charmed the girls most, though, at that first glance. It was such a radiant smile of good fellowship when she peered into the shadowy interior of the kitchen.
“Good morning. I have come for butter and eggs and milk.” She spied the two-quart pail of berries on the table, and gave a little cry of interest. “Where do you find those, my dear?”
Jean told her politely that they came from the rock pasture on the hill behind the house.
“Will you come down to the cabin this afternoon and take me there? My husband is very, very busy working on his new opera, and I must be away and let him write in peace, so you and I will have to explore the woods together, yes?” She smiled down into Jean’s face, and just at that moment there came from the living room, where Doris was dusting, a clear, sweet soprano voice.
Madame Ormond laid her finger on her lips and listened, her eyes bright with attention and interest. “It is still another one of you?” she asked softly, when the song died away. “You shall bring her down to the cabin to me and let my husband try her voice with the cello. It is his big baby, that cello, but it is very wise, it never gives the wrong decision on a voice, and she has a very beautiful one.”
“Well,” Kit declared with a deep sigh, after Madame Ormond had gone on down toward the road with her butter, eggs, and milk, “we’ve always believed we were an exceptional family. We’ll have to begin our song of triumph pretty soon. I’ll bet she’ll go up there in the pasture every day and do her vocal practicing out of hearing of the cello, and Doris will sit on the nearest rock and play echo.”
Jean was telling Ralph about it that evening while they were sitting in the cool high air on the front porch as they did almost every evening. Although the others, with the exception of her mother and father, didn’t know it yet, Jean was going to be engaged that summer.
Not long after Ralph had come in June he had asked Jean if she had reached a decision on her art career. “Are you going to go ahead and get a job in that field and make it your career?” He asked a little anxiously, after Jean had finished an enthusiastic description of her previous year’s work in New York.
“I’ve pretty much decided against it, Ralph. I know you’ll be pleased because you never really wanted me to go through with it, I realize now. I realize something else, too, and that is how much I really love the country. How I missed it last winter. The noise of the city got on my nerves so, that I could hardly wait to get on the train when I was coming home weekends. Although I never told Mother, I almost dreaded having to go back when Sunday came.”
“Then you mean you wouldn’t mind living on the Canadian prairie?” Ralph asked, eagerly. “Are you quite sure that is what you really want?”
“Oh, of course, I’ll want to visit the city once in a while. I don’t want to forego the opportunities of city life altogether—the plays and concerts and exhibitions, I mean. As far as my career is concerned, art is only a hobby, I think, and I’d like my real career to be with you.”
Ralph kissed her tenderly, and together the next day they told Mr. and Mrs. Craig of their plans.
Jean’s mother and father were very pleased at the news, but were rather relieved to know that the two did not plan to be married until Jean was older.
“It will take me quite a long time to get used to the idea of being parted from my oldest daughter,” remarked Mrs. Craig. “I’m glad you’re being sensible about it and are going to wait. You’re not completely grown up yet, Jeannie.”