DORIS said no more on the subject. She was too well-bred to persist in such a demand when it did not seem to be welcome. But though she promptly changed the subject and talked about other things, inwardly she had become transformed into a seething cauldron of curiosity.
Sally headed the boat for the draw in the bridge, and in another few moments they had passed from the quiet, well-kept, bungalow-strewn shores of the lower river, to the wild, tawny, uninhabited beauty of the upper. The change was very marked, and the wagon bridge seemed to be the dividing line.
“How different the river is up here,” remarked Doris. “Not a house or a bungalow, or even a fisherman’s shack in sight.”
“It is,” agreed Sally. And then, in an unusual burst of confidence, she added, “Do you know what I always think of when I pass through that bridge into this part of the river? It’s from the ‘Ancient Mariner’:
“ ‘We were the first that ever burst
Into that silent sea.’ ”
Doris stared at her companion in amazement. How came this barefooted child of thirteen or fourteen, in a little, out-of-the-way New Jersey coast village to be quoting poetry? Where had she learned it? Doris’s own father and mother were untiring readers of poetry and other literature, and they were bringing their daughter up in their footsteps. But surely, this village girl had never learned such things from her parents. Sally must have sensed the unspoken question.
“That’s a long poem in a big book we have,” she explained. “It has lovely pictures in it made by a man named Doré.” (She pronounced it “Door.”) “The book was one of my mother’s wedding presents. It always lies on our parlor table. I don’t believe any one else in our house has ever read it but Genevieve and me. I love it, and Genevieve likes to look at the pictures. Did you ever hear of that poem?”
“Oh, yes!” cried Doris. “My father has often read me to sleep with it, and we all love it. I’m so glad it is a favorite of yours. Do you like poetry?”
“That’s about the only poem I know,” acknowledged Sally, “ ’cept the ones in the school readers—and they don’t amount to much. That book’s about the only one we have ’cept a Bible and a couple of novels. But I’ve learned the poem all by heart.” She rowed on a way in silence, while Doris marvelled at the bookless condition of this lonely child and wondered how she could stand it. Not to have books and papers and magazines unnumbered was a state unheard of to the city child. She had brought half a trunkful with her, to help while away the time at Manituck. But before she could speak of it, Sally remarked:
“That’s Huckleberry Heights,—at least I’ve named it that, ’cause Genevieve and I have picked quarts and quarts of huckleberries there.” She pointed to a high, sandy bluff, overgrown at the top with scrub-oak, stunted pines and huckleberry bushes. “And that’s Cranberry Creek,” she went on, indicating a winding stream that emptied into the river nearby. “ ‘Way up that creek there’s an old, deserted mill that’s all falling to pieces. It’s kind of interesting. Want to go sometime?”