Stiff, bewildered, filled with ecstasy, they finally unloaded in front of a big white building that looked like a hotel. They tried to see into the deep, mysterious darkness across the road, where boomed a great voice that called them, and where dashing spray loomed high like a waving phantom hand to beckon them now and again, and far-moving lights told of ships and a world beyond the one they knew,—a wide, limitless thing like eternity, universe, chaos.
With half-reluctant feet they turned away from the mysterious unseen lure and let themselves be led across an unbelievably wide veranda into the bright light of a hall, where everything was clean and shining, and a great fireplace filled with friendly flames gave cheer and welcome. The children stood bewildered in the brightness while two strange serving-maids unfastened their wraps and dust-cloaks and helped them take off their hats. Then they all sat around the fire, for Graham had come in by this time, and the maids brought trays of some delicious drink with little cakes and crackers, and tinkling ice, and straws to drink with. Doris almost fell asleep again, and was carried up-stairs by Shirley and put to bed in a pretty white crib she was too sleepy to look at, while Carol, Elizabeth, George, and Harley went with Graham across the road to look at the black, yawning cavern they called ocean, and to have the shore light-houses pointed out to them and named one by one.
They were all asleep at last, a little before midnight, in spite of the excitement over the spacious rooms, and who should have which. Think of it! Thirty rooms in the house, and every one as pretty as every other one! What luxury! And nobody to occupy them but themselves! Carol could hardly get to sleep. She felt as if she had dropped into a novel and was living it.
When Graham came out of his room the next morning the salt breeze swept invitingly through the hall and showed him the big front door of the upper piazza open and some one standing in the sunlight, with light, glowing garments, gazing at the sea in rapt enjoyment. Coming out softly, he saw that it was Shirley dressed in white, with a ribbon of blue at her waist and a soft pink color in her cheeks, looking off to sea.
He stood for a moment to enjoy the picture, and said in his heart that sometime, if he got his wish, he would have her painted so by some great artist, with just that little simple white dress and blue ribbon, her round white arm lifted, her small hand shading her eyes, the sunlight burnishing her brown hair into gold. He could scarcely refrain from going to her and telling her how beautiful she was. But when he stepped quietly up beside her only his eyes spoke, and brought the color deeper into her cheeks; and so they stood for some minutes, looking together and drawing in the wonder of God's sea.
"This is the first time I've ever seen it, you know," spoke Shirley at last, "and I'm so glad it was on Sunday morning. It will always make the day seem more holy and the sea more wonderful to think about. I like best things to happen on Sunday, don't you, because that is the best day of all?"
Graham looked at the sparkling sea all azure and pearls, realized the Sabbath quiet, and marvelled at the beauty of the soul of the girl, even as her feeling about it all seemed to enter into and become a part of himself.
"Yes, I do," said he. "I never did before, but I do now,—and always shall," he added under his breath.
That was almost as wonderful a Sabbath as the one they had spent in the woods a couple of weeks before. They walked and talked by the sea, and they went to a little Episcopal chapel, where the windows stood open for the chanting of the waves and the salt of the breeze to come in freely, and then they went out and walked by the sea again. Wherever they went, whether resting in some of the many big rockers on the broad verandas or walking on the hard smooth sand, or sitting in some cozy nook by the waves, they felt the same deep sympathy, the same conviction that their thoughts were one, the same wonderful thrill of the day and each other's nearness.
Somehow in the new environment Shirley forgot for a little that this young man was not of her world, that he was probably going back soon to the city to enter into a whirl of the winter's season in society, that other girls would claim his smiles and attentions, and she would likely be forgotten. She lost the sense of it entirely and companioned with him as joyously as if there had never been anything to separate them. Her mother, looking on, sighed, feared, smiled, and sighed again.