“No longer’n three years is gen’rally” grumbled Caleb; and the subject dropped.
They were on their way to the pretty waterside building that served the quadruple purpose of casino, store, post-office and boathouse, for the Antlers. The arrival of the evening mail was one of the day’s two great events; the other being the morning mail’s advent. The night had a sting to its air; and the mail-time gathering was held in the lamplit store instead of on the porch or dock. A tall clerk was busy sorting letters and packages to eager groups of sweater-clad girls and to men in cold-weather outing garb. Conover and Desirée, awaiting their turn, leaned against the glass cases opposite the post-office counter and watched the laughing, excited guests.
“What I can’t see” commented Caleb, “is why ev’rybody’s always in such a sweat about their mail. What is there in it for anyone? To ev’ry env’lope that’s got a check in it there’s three that has bills; an’ a dozen with adv’tisements. To ev’ry letter that’s worth readin’ there’s ten that’s stoopid or grouchy or makin’ a hard-luck touch. An’ as for soov’nir postals—the only folks they int’rest is those that sends ’em. People come up here to get away from the world they’ve been livin’ in. Yet they scramble for noospapers an’ letters from that same world, like they was stranded on a desert island.—Here’s our chance.”
The crowd had thinned. Caleb and Desirée went forward to the mail counter. For Conover there were a sheaf of letters in business envelopes. He thrust them without a glance into the pocket of his tweed coat. Desirée’s sole mail consisted of a long pasteboard box thickly strewn with vari-colored stamps and bearing the gold-lettered legend of a New York florist.
In a second her quick fingers had torn away the wrappings. As the box was lifted, a whiff of warm fragrance rushed out; filling the room.
“Oh!” gasped Desirée, burying her face rapturously in a crimson nest of American Beauty roses.
Then, her cheeks aglow and her eyes shining, she lifted her head and faced Conover.
“Thank you! Thank you so much!” she exclaimed. “It was perfectly darling of you to remember my birthday so beautifully. And I love American Beauties so. I might have known you would think of that. It’s just like you. Smell them! What a dear, thoughtful blesséd old—”
She checked herself at sight of Conover’s blank expression. If her own face had borrowed the flush of her armful of roses, Caleb had exacted similar tribute from a whole wagonload of imaginary peonies.
“I’m—I’m sorry, Dey,” he blurted out at last, “But they ain’t from me. I—, well, they must be from somebody who’s got more sense. I didn’t think to get you anything at all. I didn’t ever know folks gave reg’lar presents on birthdays.”