"Let's call it our pilot house. We may need piloting before we get through," said Helen, sitting down on the broad front steps, her chin on her palms, listening to the music of falling water in the distance and the wind overhead in the great, slumbrous pines. There were four of these, two on each side of the long terrace, with rock maples down near the rock wall, and several pear and cherry trees. Along the terrace were old-time flower beds, three on each one, outlined with clam shells.
"Miss Trowbridge used to have gladiolus set out in those beds, with pansies and sweet alyssum set 'round the edges, and outside again, old-hen-and-her-chickens. They looked real sightly."
"Who was Miss Trowbridge, Cousin Roxy?" asked Mrs. Robbins. She sat beside Jean, her hands clasped lightly in her lap, her hat lying beside her. There was a look of concent on her face that had been a stranger there for many months. Doris dropped a spray of half blossomed cherry twigs in her lap, and ran away again.
"She was own sister to the Trowbridge that owned the mills. She married some man out in Canada, lived a while out there, then gave up and died. She never did have much backbone that I could see, but she loved flowers. Did you notice a big glass bay window off the dining-room? She called that her conservatory. I remember asking her if it was her 'conversationary,' and how she did laugh at me! Well, everyone can't be expected to know everything. It's all I can do to keep up with Gilead Center these days. Her name was Francelia and she married a McRae."
"But who had the place after she and her brother died?"
Cousin Roxana never believed in directness when it came to genealogies. She delighted in them, and would slip her glasses down to the middle of her long nose, elevate her chin, and go after a family tree like a government arborist.
"Well, according to my way of thinking, it should belong to Piney Hancock and her brother Honey. His name's Seth, but they call him Honey. Their mother was Luella Trowbridge, own sister to Francelia and Tom who owned the mills, but she married Clint Hancock against everybody's word, and her father cut her off in his will, and never saw her from the day she was married. Tom did the same, but Francelia used to go over and see her after Piney and Honey were born. They live down near Nantic. You must have passed the house, little bit of a gray one with rambler roses all over it, and a well sweep at one side. The property went to Francelia after Tom died, and she had one boy. He's out in Northwest Canada now and don't give a snap of his finger for this place, when there's Piney and Honey loving it to death and can't hardly walk on the grass. Still, I suppose if they went to law, they'd get nothing out of it after all the lawyers had been satisfied."
Kit and Helen listened open-eyed.
"My goodness, Cousin Roxy," exclaimed Kit, "how on earth do you ever manage to keep track of all of them?"
"Keep track of them? Land, child, that ain't anything after you've been to school with them and lived neighbors all your life. You children will like Piney and her brother, and maybe you can help put a little happiness into their lives, poor youngsters."