As soon as politeness permitted, they excused themselves, and it was a happy moment for them when they tumbled onto the high feather bed and lay there in delicious drowsiness listening to the call of the whippoorwills. They could hear Miss Zillah softly moving around, and now and then through half-closed lids they saw her conscientiously brushing her hair—counting the strokes as she did so—reading her Bible and saying her prayers. But at last preparations for the night were finished and all sank to sleep.
“Why call this Sunset Gap?” asked Carin the next morning. “Wouldn’t Sunrise Gap do as well?”
The sun was streaming gorgeously through the open casement full upon the bed where the girls lay. Azalea sat up with a start, wondering for a moment where she was, and how it came that Carin’s voice was in her ears. Then she saw Miss Zillah’s curls upon the pillow of the adjoining bed, recognized the triple row of bottles on the mantel shelf, and remembered that she was now a responsible person. She was a teacher, a kind of missionary, a somebody with a purpose! It was both amusing and alarming.
“Oh, Carin,” she said with a little nervous laugh, “why ever did we come? Do you suppose we can do anything worth doing? I’m frightened, honestly I am.”
Carin sat up in bed too, and Azalea watched her hair turn into shining gold where the sun played upon it.
“Honey-bird, what’s the matter with you?” Carin demanded. “I thought people were always brave in the morning and downhearted at night. You were braver than I was last night coming up that dreadful road in the dark, and now here you are, getting fussy in broad daylight.”
“Well,” said Azalea, a little ashamed, “we’ve simply got to make a success, haven’t we? I don’t know as I ever before simply had to make a success.”
“Take it easy, the way Mr. McEvoy does the snakes,” laughed Carin. “If you get to feeling so dreadfully wise and responsible you won’t be able to do a thing.”
“That’s right,” said Miss Zillah from her bed. “I myself have always been too anxious. It runs in the Pace blood to be serious and care-taking. But now that I’m middle-aged and have taken time for thought I see that owls have never been as much liked as larks. So you be a lark, Azalea. That’s what you naturally are, anyway.”
Azalea gave a little chuckle. She liked Miss Zillah’s way of putting things; moreover, these particular words stuck in her memory. She contrived to “be a lark” at breakfast, and she insisted on helping Mis’ Cassie McEvoy with the dishes and on entering with vivacity into the discussion of whether medicine that was good for rheumatism would cure heartburn. Two bottles of patent medicine which were enjoying the most favor just at that time, stood on a tiny shelf above the kitchen table. One was very fat and contained a dark liquid, and this Azalea secretly named “Bluebeard.” The other was slender, tall and filled with a pinkish stuff, and this she called “The Princess Madeline.” She told Carin, and they amused themselves by watching to see which was most in favor. As nearly as they could make out, Mis’ Cassie favored Bluebeard of mornings and so probably turned to Princess Madeline along toward night.