"If you could possibly come with us to the landing we might make some excuse for picking you up, and Jennie could go home with you. We might all go. I'll tell you!" a sudden inspiration breaking in on the difficult situation. "Jump in. We will row back as quickly as we can and send the boys over to Bailey's for a big car. Then we will all drive up the mountain with you. We will have the man for protection, and if your old Reda is not good-natured we will not let you stay there to-night. Would your grandfather care? Might he allow you to spend a night with us?"
All the hidden and suppressed hopes in that strangely veiled countenance seemed to burst through now, and Mary's expression, from one of almost impenetrable gloom, assumed a strange light—perhaps borrowed from the sunset.
"Oh, it is too good to be true!" she sighed. "Someone at last is not afraid to help me!"
CHAPTER IX
THE SECRET SPRING
That settled it. Before Mary realized her position she was sitting securely in the broad seat at the stern of the gliding boat, with Madaline's arm around her, while her delighted fingers trailed through the water, and her almost frightened gaze was fastened on Jennie's face.
"You are a real woman," she surprised her friends by declaring. "Do you know I have not seen anyone like you to talk to since Loved One went away. She was my mother," the child said solemnly.
"When did she die?" Jennie ventured.
"When I was eleven. I am thirteen now."
"And where did you live then?" pressed Cleo, feeling the time was opportune for obtaining something of Mary's history.