How the lad wanted to laugh. Just before he had left the city his sister Helen had dragged him to an afternoon tea (or was it a bazaar?) and there some prettily dressed girls had surrounded him, offering him dainty porcelain cups half filled with fragrant orange pekoe. He was expected to purchase one of them for the sake of the cause. Not wishing to offend any of the fair friends of Helen Beavers, he had purchased them all, and then, when unobserved, he had slipped away to freedom.
Again a maiden—a storm maiden, at that—was offering him tea. The cup wasn’t porcelain and the girl was not effusively gracious to him as those others, who all greatly admired him, had been. This wild island girl was merely trying to warm him up that he need not freeze from his unexpected plunge into the icy surf. There was another point of difference between the two tea parties, Gene thought as he drank the hot, and almost bitter, beverage. His one desire at the other had been to escape, but at this tea party he found himself more interested than he had been in a long time.
Gene had several moments alone in which to meditate, for Rilla, having glanced at the sun, had suddenly scrambled up the rocks, and, shading her eyes, had looked long toward the town. Being satisfied that her grand-dad had not left Tunkett, she returned and lighted the dry wood, which soon snapped and crackled. Then, rising, she put her hands on her hips and unsmilingly gazed at the boy with dark, expressive eyes. After a moment’s solemn scrutiny she inquired: “How come yo’ to be cruisin’ ’round in that ol’ leaky hulk? Even a water rat’d had better sense.”
There seemed to the lad to be a note of scorn in the girl’s voice, and yet she had brought him tea.
Gene lowered the cup and smiled at her. Usually his smile was contagious, it was so genuinely good natured. “I don’t blame you in the least for calling me names,” he told her. “I just landed in Tunkett yesterday, and not knowing how to pass the time away, I went down to the wharf and asked a small freckle-faced boy if I could hire a boat. He said I could have my pick for a dollar an hour. He was going with me to where his boats were tied, I suppose, but just then some woman in the store called and away he ran. So I took the first boat I came to. I didn’t notice that it leaked until I was rounding the island.”
“That was little Sol—Mis’ Dexter’s boy—he rents boats to summer folks. He asks a tarnal whoppin’ price for ’em, ’pears like.”
“Well, his sail will cost me more than one dollar,” the lad told her, his eyes twinkling, “for I’ll have to pay for the wreck, I suppose.” Then he added: “Miss Storm Maiden, why don’t you smile? I’ve been here an hour, I do believe, and although you have looked at me angrily and scornfully and solemnly, you have not as yet smiled at me.
“I can’t be smilin’ when I know I’m doin’ what’s agin my grand-dad’s orders, but I tried to mind him. I tried to ship yo’ off’n Windy Island. I sure did.” The lad was puzzled. “I’ll testify that you tried hard enough, but why did you, Storm Maiden? Surely you weren’t afraid of me. I don’t understand.”
Then, in a few words, the girl told of her grand-dad’s dislike for “city folks,” though she did not tell him what caused that dislike.
“Am I the very first boy you have ever talked with?” the lad asked in amazement.