Gene had fallen into a light slumber, which had greatly refreshed him, and when he awakened he heard Muriel’s voice. “Top o’ the morning to you, Storm Maiden,” he called. “Do hurry! I’m eager to see if you look as I remember you.”
But she did not, for the Muriel with her long red-brown hair neatly tied back with a wide green ribbon, which Miss Brazilla had made for her into a truly beautiful butterfly bow, did not look quite like his memoried picture of that stormy girl who with long hair wind-blown about her shoulders, had ordered him to leave the Lighthouse Island or be devoured by her dog.
Almost shyly the girl, in her neat green gingham dress, paused in the open doorway, hardly knowing what to do. Gene held out a frail white hand. “Won’t you come and shake hands with me?” he asked. “I’m sorry that I can’t come to you, but I have had orders to lie here until mine host decrees otherwise.”
The girl, touched by the boy’s paleness, forgot her embarrassment and went toward him, placing her strong brown hand in the one he had stretched forth to greet her. Then, seating herself in the wicker chair nearest, she said: “I hope yo’re forgivin’ me, Mr. Beavers, for makin’ it so that yo’ had to swim.”
“It was I who used poor judgment,” the boy told her. “Don’t feel that you were in the least bit to blame.” Then, smiling up at her in his friendliest fashion, he added: “We are only in our teens, you and I, and that’s not so very grown up. Don’t you think you could call me Gene and permit me to call you Muriel? It’s a beautiful name.”
“’Twas my mother’s.” The boy thought he had never heard that word spoken with greater tenderness. Shyly, the girl was saying: “An’ I’d be that pleased if yo’ would call me the whole of it Thar’s no one as calls me Muriel. Folks here jest call me Rilly.”
“Then I will gladly. Now, Muriel,” the lad leaned on his elbow, “the best way for two people to become acquainted is by asking questions. Won’t you tell me how you pass your time, what books you read, and——”
Gene paused, almost startled by the sudden flush that had crimsoned the cheeks of his guest. When it was too late he tried to prevent her from having to make the admission, but falteringly she made it. “I can’t read books,” she said. Then the resolve of the day before gave her new courage, and lifting her head and looking directly into his eyes with an eager expression, she added: “But I’m goin’ to learn. I don’ know how, but I’m goin’ to.”
“Of course you are, Muriel,” was his hearty response. “And if I am laid up long in ‘dry dock for repairs,’ as Mr. Jabez Mullet calls my confinement, perhaps you will let me help you. I had to be helped, you know. We all do, just in the beginning.” The lad’s smile was winsome. Then he quickly added: “There are the noon bells from the church tower, and if I’m not mistaken, Miss Brazilla is coming to serve our lunch.”
Muriel sprang up when the housekeeper appeared. “Why, Miss Brazilla, me settin’ here and lettin’ yo’ wait on me! Mayn’t I help somehow? I’m real handy at it.”