“That’s fine!” cried Doris. “I knew you could manage it.”
“But tell me—just one thing,” begged Sally, “What made you first think that Miss Camilla had anything to do with this? You can tell me just that, can’t you?”
“It was the little Sèvres vase on the mantel,” explained Doris, “and the way she spoke of it, I know a little,—just a tiny bit about old china and porcelains, because my grandfather is awfully interested in them and has collected quite a lot. But it was the way she spoke of it that made me think.”
Not another word would she say on the subject. And though Sally racked her brains over the matter for the rest of the day, she could find no point where Miss Camilla and her remarks had the slightest bearing on that secret of theirs.
It was about two o’clock that afternoon, and the pavilion at the Landing was almost deserted. Later it would be peopled by a throng, young and old, hiring boats, crabbing from the long dock, drinking soda-water or merely watching the river life, idly. But, during the two or three hot hours directly after noon, it was deserted. On this occasion, however, not for long. Old Captain Carter, corn-cob pipe in mouth, and stumping loudly on his wooden leg, was approaching down the road from the village. At this hour he seldom failed to take his seat in a corner of the pavilion and wait patiently for the afternoon crowd to appear. His main diversion for the day consisted in his chats with the throngs who haunted the Landing.
He had not been settled in his corner three minutes, his wooden leg propped on another chair, when up the wide stairs from the beach appeared his two granddaughters, accompanied by another girl. Truth to tell, they had been waiting below exactly half an hour for this very event. Doris, who had met him before, went over and exchanged the greetings of the day, then casually settled herself in an adjacent chair, fanning herself frantically and exclaiming over the heat. Sally and Genevieve next strolled up and perched on a bench close by. For several minutes the two girls exchanged some rather desultory conversation. Then, what appeared to be a chance remark of Doris’s but was in reality carefully planned, drew the old sea-captain into their talk.
“I wonder why some people around here keep a part of their houses nicely fixed and live in that part and let the rest get all run down and go to waste?” she inquired with elaborate indifference. Captain Carter pricked up his ears.
“Who do that, I’d like to know?” he snorted. “I hain’t seen many of ’em!”
“Well, I passed a place this morning and it looked that way,” Doris went on. “I thought maybe it was customary in these parts.”
“Where was it?” demanded the Captain, on the defensive for his native region.