“They’re all nailed fast,” Eve called after him. But he strode on.
We sat down on the edge of the fountain. The statue of Circe still lay where we had left it, reclining in the leaf strewn bowl. Hattie May began poking with a stick in the newly filled hole. Several minutes went by and Michael did not return. “He must have got in after all,” Eve said, glancing a little apprehensively I thought, toward the thick growth of bushes that obscured our view of the rear of the house.
As she spoke our attention was caught by the sound of a car coming up the hill. Automobiles passed that way so seldom that we all jumped up instinctively. To our surprise it appeared to be slowing down in front of the house. Then suddenly I recognized Miss Blossom’s little coupe and saw that lady’s ample bulk at the wheel. A woman beside her was leaning over and peering out.
I groaned as I looked. “Aunt Cal! If that isn’t just our luck!”
Hattie May giggled. “Look, the fat lady is waving!”
“Come on,” Eve started for the wall. “I’ll explain everything satisfactorily to Aunt Cal.”
We climbed back over the wall. Miss Blossom beamed upon us. “We’re out joy riding,” she explained. “I told Cal she needed a little relaxation from her responsibilities. We’ve been doing forty miles an hour before we struck the hill!”
“We thought,” Aunt Cal remarked pointedly, “that we might meet you coming home!”
“Oh,” I said confusedly, “we are—I mean we’re going on directly—we’re just waiting for Michael.”
But Aunt Cal did not seem to be listening to my halting excuses. Instead, I saw that her eyes—and her thoughts with them, I guessed—had strayed beyond me toward the house dreaming there in the soft sunset light.