CHAPTER XXIV. A TANTALIZING REVELATION
"I shall have something to tell you in the orchard this evening," saidthe Story Girl at breakfast one morning. Her eyes were very bright andexcited. She looked as if she had not slept a great deal. She had spentthe previous evening with Miss Reade and had not returned until the restof us were in bed. Miss Reade had finished giving music lessons and wasgoing home in a few days. Cecily and Felicity were in despair over thisand mourned as those without comfort. But the Story Girl, who had beeneven more devoted to Miss Reade than either of them, had not, as Inoticed, expressed any regret and seemed to be very cheerful over thewhole matter.
"Why can't you tell it now?" asked Felicity.
"Because the evening is the nicest time to tell things in. I onlymentioned it now so that you would have something interesting to lookforward to all day."
"Is it about Miss Reade?" asked Cecily.
"Never mind."
"I'll bet she's going to be married," I exclaimed, remembering the ring.
"Is she?" cried Felicity and Cecily together.
The Story Girl threw an annoyed glance at me. She did not like to haveher dramatic announcements forestalled.
"I don't say that it is about Miss Reade or that it isn't. You must justwait till the evening."
"I wonder what it is," speculated Cecily, as the Story Girl left theroom.
"I don't believe it's much of anything," said Felicity, beginning toclear away the breakfast dishes. "The Story Girl always likes to make somuch out of so little. Anyhow, I don't believe Miss Reade is going to bemarried. She hasn't any beaus around here and Mrs. Armstrong saysshe's sure she doesn't correspond with anybody. Besides, if she was shewouldn't be likely to tell the Story Girl."
"Oh, she might. They're such friends, you know," said Cecily.
"Miss Reade is no better friends with her than she is with me and you,"retorted Felicity.
"No, but sometimes it seems to me that she's a different kind of friendwith the Story Girl than she is with me and you," reflected Cecily. "Ican't just explain what I mean."
"No wonder. Such nonsense," sniffed Felicity. "It's only some girl'ssecret, anyway," said Dan, loftily. "I don't feel much interest in it."
But he was on hand with the rest of us that evening, interest or nointerest, in Uncle Stephen's Walk, where the ripening apples werebeginning to glow like jewels among the boughs.
"Now, are you going to tell us your news?" asked Felicity impatiently.
"Miss Reade IS going to be married," said the Story Girl. "She told meso last night. She is going to be married in a fortnight's time."
"Who to?" exclaimed the girls.
"To"--the Story Girl threw a defiant glance at me as if to say, "Youcan't spoil the surprise of THIS, anyway,"--"to--the Awkward Man."
For a few moments amazement literally held us dumb.
"You're not in earnest, Sara Stanley?" gasped Felicity at last.
"Indeed I am. I thought you'd be astonished. But I wasn't. I'vesuspected it all summer, from little things I've noticed. Don't youremember that evening last spring when I went a piece with Miss Readeand told you when I came back that a story was growing? I guessed itfrom the way the Awkward Man looked at her when I stopped to speak tohim over his garden fence."
"But--the Awkward Man!" said Felicity helplessly. "It doesn't seempossible. Did Miss Reade tell you HERSELF?"
"Yes."
"I suppose it must be true then. But how did it ever come about? He'sSO shy and awkward. How did he ever manage to get up enough spunk to askher to marry him?"
"Maybe she asked him," suggested Dan.
The Story Girl looked as if she might tell if she would.
"I believe that WAS the way of it," I said, to draw her on.
"Not exactly," she said reluctantly. "I know all about it but I can'ttell you. I guessed part from things I've seen--and Miss Reade told me agood deal--and the Awkward Man himself told me his side of it as we camehome last night. I met him just as I left Mr. Armstrong's and we weretogether as far as his house. It was dark and he just talked on as if hewere talking to himself--I think he forgot I was there at all, oncehe got started. He has never been shy or awkward with me, but he nevertalked as he did last night."
"You might tell us what he said," urged Cecily. "We'd never tell."
The Story Girl shook her head.
"No, I can't. You wouldn't understand. Besides, I couldn't tell it justright. It's one of the things that are hardest to tell. I'd spoil it ifI told it--now. Perhaps some day I'll be able to tell it properly. It'svery beautiful--but it might sound very ridiculous if it wasn't toldjust exactly the right way."
"I don't know what you mean, and I don't believe you know yourself,"said Felicity pettishly. "All that I can make out is that Miss Reade isgoing to marry Jasper Dale, and I don't like the idea one bit. She isso beautiful and sweet. I thought she'd marry some dashing young man.Jasper Dale must be nearly twenty years older than her--and he's soqueer and shy--and such a hermit."
"Miss Reade is perfectly happy," said the Story Girl. "She thinks theAwkward Man is lovely--and so he is. You don't know him, but I do."
"Well, you needn't put on such airs about it," sniffed Felicity.
"I am not putting on any airs. But it's true. Miss Reade and I are theonly people in Carlisle who really know the Awkward Man. Nobody elseever got behind his shyness to find out just what sort of a man he is."
"When are they to be married?" asked Felicity.
"In a fortnight's time. And then they are coming right back to live atGolden Milestone. Won't it be lovely to have Miss Reade always so nearus?"
"I wonder what she'll think about the mystery of Golden Milestone,"remarked Felicity.
Golden Milestone was the beautiful name the Awkward Man had given hishome; and there was a mystery about it, as readers of the first volumeof these chronicles will recall.
"She knows all about the mystery and thinks it perfectly lovely--and sodo I," said the Story Girl.
"Do YOU know the secret of the locked room?" cried Cecily.
"Yes, the Awkward Man told me all about it last night. I told you I'dfind out the mystery some time."
"And what is it?"
"I can't tell you that either."
"I think you're hateful and mean," exclaimed Felicity. "It hasn'tanything to do with Miss Reade, so I think you might tell us."
"It has something to do with Miss Reade. It's all about her."
"Well, I don't see how that can be when the Awkward Man never saw orheard of Miss Reade until she came to Carlisle in the spring," saidFelicity incredulously, "and he's had that locked room for years."
"I can't explain it to you--but it's just as I've said," responded theStory Girl.
"Well, it's a very queer thing," retorted Felicity.
"The name in the books in the room was Alice--and Miss Reade's name isAlice," marvelled Cecily. "Did he know her before she came here?"
"Mrs. Griggs says that room has been locked for ten years. Ten years agoMiss Reade was just a little girl of ten. SHE couldn't be the Alice ofthe books," argued Felicity.
"I wonder if she'll wear the blue silk dress," said Sara Ray.
"And what will she do about the picture, if it isn't hers?" addedCecily.
"The picture couldn't be hers, or Mrs. Griggs would have known her forthe same when she came to Carlisle," said Felix.
"I'm going to stop wondering about it," exclaimed Felicity crossly,aggravated by the amused smile with which the Story Girl was listeningto the various speculations. "I think Sara is just as mean as mean whenshe won't tell us."
"I can't," repeated the Story Girl patiently.
"You said one time you had an idea who 'Alice' was," I said. "Was youridea anything like the truth?"
"Yes, I guessed pretty nearly right."
"Do you suppose they'll keep the room locked after they are married?"asked Cecily.
"Oh, no. I can tell you that much. It is to be Miss Reade's ownparticular sittin
g room."
"Why, then, perhaps we'll see it some time ourselves, when we go to seeMiss Reade," cried Cecily.
"I'd be frightened to go into it," confessed Sara Ray. "I hate thingswith mysteries. They always make me nervous."
"I love them. They're so exciting," said the Story Girl.
"Just think, this will be the second wedding of people we know,"reflected Cecily. "Isn't that interesting?"
"I only hope the next thing won't be a funeral," remarked Sara Raygloomily. "There were three lighted lamps on our kitchen table lastnight, and Judy Pineau says that's a sure sign of a funeral."
"Well, there are funerals going on all the time," said Dan.
"But it means the funeral of somebody you know. I don't believe init--MUCH--but Judy says she's seen it come true time and again. I hopeif it does it won't be anybody we know very well. But I hope it'll besomebody I know a LITTLE, because then I might get to the funeral. I'djust love to go to a funeral."
"That's a dreadful thing to say," commented Felicity in a shocked tone.
Sara Ray looked bewildered.
"I don't see what is dreadful in it," she protested.
"People don't go to funerals for the fun of it," said Felicity severely."And you just as good as said you hoped somebody you knew would die soyou'd get to the funeral."
"No, no, I didn't. I didn't mean that AT ALL, Felicity. I don't wantanybody to die; but what I meant was, if anybody I knew HAD to die theremight be a chance to go to the funeral. I've never been to a singlefuneral yet, and it must be so interesting."
"Well, don't mix up talk about funerals with talk about weddings," saidFelicity. "It isn't lucky. I think Miss Reade is simply throwing herselfaway, but I hope she'll be happy. And I hope the Awkward Man will manageto get married without making some awful blunder, but it's more than Iexpect."
"The ceremony is to be very private," said the Story Girl.
"I'd like to see them the day they appear out in church," chuckled Dan."How'll he ever manage to bring her in and show her into the pew? I'llbet he'll go in first--or tramp on her dress--or fall over his feet."
"Maybe he won't go to church at all the first Sunday and she'll have togo alone," said Peter. "That happened in Markdale. A man was too bashfulto go to church the first time after getting married, and his wife wentalone till he got used to the idea."
"They may do things like that in Markdale but that is not the way peoplebehave in Carlisle," said Felicity loftily.
Seeing the Story Girl slipping away with a disapproving face I joinedher.
"What is the matter, Sara?" I asked.
"I hate to hear them talking like that about Miss Reade and Mr. Dale,"she answered vehemently. "It's really all so beautiful--but they make itseem silly and absurd, somehow."
"You might tell me all about it, Sara," I insinuated. "I wouldn'ttell--and I'd understand."
"Yes, I think you would," she said thoughtfully. "But I can't tell iteven to you because I can't tell it well enough yet. I've a feeling thatthere's only one way to tell it--and I don't know the way yet. Some dayI'll know it--and then I'll tell you, Bev."
Long, long after she kept her word. Forty years later I wrote to her,across the leagues of land and sea that divided us, and told her thatJasper Dale was dead; and I reminded her of her old promise and askedits fulfilment. In reply she sent me the written love story of JasperDale and Alice Reade. Now, when Alice sleeps under the whispering elmsof the old Carlisle churchyard, beside the husband of her youth, thatstory may be given, in all its old-time sweetness, to the world.