"Gentle Wind from the Isles of the Blest,
Breathe on my little chalet,
Fill it with music and laughter and rest;
Fill it with love and with dreams that are best;
Breathe on it softly, sweet Wind of the West,
Breathe on my little chalet."
There was certainly nothing very remarkable about the little song, and yet it had caught the eye of the real estate men as having a certain quality which would attract people to that sunny mountainside whereon were perched the quaint Swiss chalets they desired to sell. There was a subtle suggestion to the buyer that he might find rest and happiness in this peaceful home. The piney air, the flowers and the sunshine had all been poetically but quite truthfully described. With a picture of the "Chalet of the West Wind" on the opposite page, people of discerning tastes, looking for summer homes, would surely be attracted.
"How ever did you happen to write it, Molly?" they asked her after re-reading the poem and admiring it with friendly loyalty. "Have you ever been to the mountains?"
"No," she answered, "I actually never have. But something in me that wasn't me wrote the verses. They just seemed to come, first the meter and then, gradually, the lines. I can't explain it. I had some bad news and was afraid I would have to leave college and then the poem came. That was all. Two hundred dollars," she added, looking at the check. "It seems too good to be true. What must I do with it?"
"Put it in the Wellington Bank to-morrow morning," answered Margaret promptly.
Between them, Mrs. Markham and Mrs. O'Reilly prepared a very good dinner for the girls that night, and instead of being a funeral feast it was changed into a jolly banquet. The old Queen's dinner table was restored and there was as much gay, humorous conversation as there ever had been in the brown shingled house now reduced to a heap of ashes.
Paperhangers and painters did go into the new college house on the following Monday morning and in less than ten days the dingy rooms were transformed by white woodwork and light paper. If the Queen's girls felt a little out of it at first, not being on the campus, they were too proud to admit it, and nobody ever heard a complaint from them. They had a great many visitors at O'Reilly's. Crowds of their friends came down to drink tea or spend the evening. The President herself called one morning and had a look at the place.
In the meantime Molly had called at Miss Walker's office and informed her that she had come into a little money unexpectedly and, with the money she was earning, she would be able to pay her own board at O'Reilly's for the rest of the winter. It was only by chance that Miss Walker learned how Molly had earned this sum of money.
"Think of the child's modesty in keeping the secret from me," she said to Miss Pomeroy. "Have you seen the poem that won the prize, by the way?"
"Why, yes," answered that critical individual. "It's a sweet little thing and I suppose struck the exact note they wanted, but I assure you it's nothing wonderful."