“You can steep your soul in the beauties of our art treasures while I go to hunt up Cousin Rindy,” she remarked with a twist of a smile as she left the room, wondering meanwhile just what had brought Mabel to Marshville, and why she was in such a hurry to see Miss Rindy.
She was not long left in ignorance, for, as soon as Miss Rindy had clumped into the room and the usual forms of introduction were over, Mabel plunged into her subject.
“Please, Miss Crump,” she began, “put your mind in a receptive attitude, for if you don’t fall in with my plan I shall faint on the spot. To begin away back at the beginning: my grandmother loves to plan things months ahead, and so she commenced as soon as Christmas was over to talk about her summer plans. Year after year she has gone to a very fashionable, but deadly stupid, watering place where she could sit on the porch of a big hotel all day, do fancy work, and gossip with the other guests while they all rocked placidly. Well, I have stood it just about as long as I can, and this year, being of age, I made up my mind to rebel. My grandmother is neither old nor decrepit, and doesn’t need me in the least, for she will have hosts of friends in the same house, so I want to go off where I can enjoy myself in my own way. Last year one of my great-aunts died and left me a little cottage on an island off the Maine coast, and that is where I am crazy to go. Now this is where you come in.”
“Where we come in?” exclaimed Ellen excitedly.
“Exactly. Just hold your horses till my tale is told. Of course Gran held up her hands in holy horror when I suggested such a thing. The simple life has no appeal for her, and you would suppose the fisherfolk on the island went around in goatskins and armed with spears. Well, when I found she was deaf to all my blandishments I posted off to New York to my aunt, Mrs. Everleigh, who has more influence over Granny than any one else. Like the dear thing that she is, she listened to my tale of woe and promised to stand by me, so we planned out a course of action which promises to be successful if you will cooperate.”
“I may be very stupid, but I still fail to see our part in it,” Miss Rindy spoke.
“You will see in a minute, dear lady. There were two or three points to be settled before we could approach Granny again. We must have counter-arguments to meet hers. First, there must be some one provided to take my place, and we decided that a pretty, beguiling, and foolish little cousin, a débutante of next winter’s vintage, would be just the one, and we knew she would jump at the chance. Next, it would never do for me to go off into forest jungles and deserts wild without a proper chaperon; a cave man might grab me up at any moment and make off with me in a birch-bark canoe. Granny is still so unmodern as to believe in chaperons, you see, and she is mighty particular as to their quality. Well, we were mulling over this question when we happened to go to Mr. Barstow’s studio one afternoon. I was so full of my subject that I was ready to talk about it to every one, and I told my troubles to dear Mr. Barstow.”
“Dear Don Pedro, he would be just the one you would tell them to,” commented Ellen. “I haven’t a doubt but he could point to some way out.”
“He certainly did, so now it is up to you two. Oh, won’t you go with me? We could have such heavenly times, Ellen, and I am sure that invigorating air would do you a world of good, Miss Crump, make you over in fact. Please, please, don’t turn me down. I don’t mean that you are to decide at once. I shall be here till to-morrow, and you can sleep on it.”
“Do tell me what Mr. Barstow said,” Ellen urged.