The Pines of Lory

by John Ames Mitchell

“No, sir. There’s another one farther in, but the tide isn’t right for it.”

67Just off the pier stood their trunks, and beside them two boxes and a barrel. Of the three passengers, the gladdest to get ashore, if one could judge by outward manifestations, was Solomon. He ran and barked and wheeled about, jumping against his master as if to impart some of his own enthusiasm. His joy, while less contagious than he himself desired, produced one good result in causing the lady to unbend a little. At first she merely watched him with amusement, then talked and played with him, but not freely and with abandon, only so far as was proper with a dog whose master had become a suspicious character. As the life-boat disappeared toward the invisible steamer, Pats turned to his companion.

“Welcome to this island, Miss Marshall. I am now the host–and your humble and obedient vassal. Shall I hurry on ahead and send down for the baggage? Or shall we go on together and surprise the family?”

Her lips parted to say: “Let us go on together,” but she remembered Father Burke and his warning. So she answered, with a glance at the trunks, “Perhaps you should go first. The sooner the baggage is removed the better.”

68With a little bow of acquiescence Pats turned and climbed the rocky path. She followed, but at a distance, and slowly, that there might be no confusion in his mind as to her desire to walk alone. To make doubly sure she paused about half-way up and listened for a moment to the tumbling of the waves upon the little beach below.

Reaching the top of this path she found herself at the edge of a forest. It was more like a grove,–a vast grove of primeval pines. Into the shadow of this wood she entered, then stopped, and gazed about. Such trees she had never seen,–an endless vista of gigantic trunks, like the columns of a mighty cathedral, all towering to a vault of green, far above her head. And this effect of an interior–of some boundless temple–was augmented by the smooth, brown floor,–a carpet of pine-needles. With upturned face and half-closed eyes the girl drew a long deep breath. The fragrance of the pines, the sighing of the wind through the canopy above, all were soothing to the senses; and yet, in a dreamy way, they stirred the imagination. This was fairy land–the enchanted forest–the land of poetry and peace–of calm content, far away from common things. And that unending 69lullaby from above! What music could be sweeter?

From this revery–of longer duration than she realized–she was awakened by a distant voice of a person shouting. She could see Pats off at the end of the point waving his handkerchief and trying to attract the attention of somebody on the water. Perhaps the gardener, or some fisherman.

Walking farther on, into the wood, she became more and more impressed by the solemn beauty of this paradise. And the carpet of pine-needles seemed placed there with kind intent as if to insure a deeper silence. She resolved to spend much of her time in these woods, and, even now, she found herself almost regretting the proximity of her friends.

In the distance, between the trunks of the trees, came glimpses, first of Solomon, then of his master, moving hastily about as if on urgent business. She smiled, a superior, tolerant smile at the inconsistency–and the sacrilege–of haste or of any kind of business in the sacred twilight of this grove, this realm of peace. And so, she strolled about, resting at intervals, inhaling the odors of the pines, and dreaming dreams.

70In these reveries came no thoughts of time until she saw the enemy–Pats–approaching. His silent footsteps on the smooth, brown carpet made him seem but a spirit of the wood,–some unsubstantial denizen of this enchanted region. But in his face and manner there was something that dispelled all dreams. He stopped before her, out of breath. “There is no house here!”