CHAPTER THREE
I
Sunday evening the Freemans were called unexpectedly into town and Bruce and Henderson were left to amuse themselves. Henderson immediately lost himself in a book and Bruce, a little homesick for the old freedom of the road, set out for a walk. A footpath that followed the river invited him and he lounged along, his spirit responding to the beauty of the night, his mind intent upon the future. The cordiality of the Freemans and their circle had impressed him with the friendliness of the community. It would take time to establish himself in his profession, but he had confidence in his power to achieve; the lust for work was already strong in him. He was satisfied that he had done wisely in obeying his mother’s mandate; he would never have been happy if he had ignored it.
His meeting with Shepherd Mills had roused no resentment, revived no such morbid thoughts as had troubled him on the night of his arrival in town. Shepherd Mills was his half-brother; this, to be sure, was rather staggering; but his reaction to the meeting was void of bitterness. He speculated a good deal about young Mills. The gentleness and forbearance with which he suffered the raillery of his intimates, his anxiety to be accounted a good fellow, his serious interest in matters of real importance—in all these things there was something touching and appealing. It was difficult to correlate Shepherd with his wife, but perhaps their dissimilarities were only superficial. Bruce appraised Connie Mills as rather shallow, fond of admiration, given to harmless poses in which her friends evidently encouraged and indulged her. She practiced her little coquetries with an openness that was in itself a safeguard. As they left the Freemans, Shepherd and his wife had repeated their hope of seeing him again. It was bewildering, but it had come about so naturally that there seemed nothing extraordinary in the fact that he was already acquainted with members of Franklin Mills’s family....
Bruce paused now and then where the path drew in close to the river to look down at the moonlit water through the fringe of trees and shrubbery. A boy and girl floated by in a canoe, the girl singing as she thrummed a ukulele, and his eyes followed them a little wistfully. Farther on the dull put-put-put of a motor-boat broke the silence. The sound ceased abruptly, followed instantly by a colloquy between the occupants.
“Damn this fool thing!” ejaculated a feminine voice. “We’re stuck!”
“I had noticed it!” said another girl’s voice good naturedly. “But such is the life of the sailor. I wouldn’t just choose this for an all-night camp!”
“Don’t be so sweet about it, Millicent! I’d like to sink this boat.”
“It isn’t Polly’s fault. She’s already half-buried in the sand,” laughed the other.
Bruce scrambled down to the water’s edge and peered out upon the river. A small power boat had grounded on a sandbar in the middle of the stream. Its occupants were two young women in bathing suits. But for their voices he would have taken them for boys. One was tinkering with the engine while the other was trying to push off the boat with an oar which sank ineffectually in the sand. In their attempts to float their craft the young women had not seen Bruce, who, satisfied that they were in no danger, was rather amused by their plight. They were presumably from one of the near-by villas and their bathing suits implied familiarity with the water. The girl at the engine talked excitedly with an occasional profane outburst; her companion was disposed to accept the situation philosophically.