CHAPTER XXX
WHAT THE FIDDLE TOLD THEODORE
Jinnie looked very sweet when she bade farewell to Peg and Lafe thenext morning. Mr. King's car was at the door, and the cobbler watchedhim as he stepped from it with a monosyllabic greeting to the girl andhelped her to the seat next to his. Peggy, too, was craning her neckfor a better view.
"They're thick as thieves," she said, with a dubious shake of herhead.
"I guess he likes 'er," chuckled Lafe. "To make a long story short,wife, a sight like that does my eyes good!"
Mrs. Grandoken shrugged her shoulders, growled deep in her throat, andopined they were all fools.
"An' quit doin' yourself proud, Lafe!" she grumbled. "You're grinnin'like a Cheshire cat. 'Tain't nothin' to your credit she's goin' tohave the time of her life."
"No, 'tain't to my credit, Peggy," retorted the cobbler, "but 'tis toyours, wife."
By the time Lafe finished this statement, Mr. King and JinnieGrandoken were bowling along a white road toward a hill bounding thewest side of the lake.
"See that basket down here?" said the man after a long silence.
"Yes."
"That's our picnic dinner! I brought everything I thought a littlegirl with a sweet tooth might like."
Jinnie had forgotten about food. Her mind had dwelt only upon the factshe was going to be with him all day, one of those long, beautifuldays taken from Heaven's cycle for dear friends. The country, too,stretched in majestic splendor miles ahead of them, trees rimming theroad on each side and making a thick woodland as far as one couldsee.
"I'm glad I brought my fiddle," Jinnie remarked presently.
"I am, too," said Theodore.
The place he chose for their outing was far back from the highway, andleaving the car at one side of the road, they threaded their waytogether to it. The sky above was very blue, the lake quietlyreflecting its sapphire shades. Off in the distance the high hillsgazed down upon the smaller ones, guarding them in quietude.
Theodore spread one of the auto robes on the ground, and shyly Jinnieaccepted his invitation to be seated.
"Oh, it's lovely," she said in soft monotone, glancing at the lake.
"Yes," replied Theodore dreamily.
His eyes were upon the placid water, his thoughts upon the girl at hisside. Jinnie was thinking of him, too, and there they both sat, withpassionate longing in their young hearts, watching nature's great lifego silently by.
"Play for me," Theodore said at length, without taking his eyes fromthe water. "Stand by that big tree so I can look at you."
Flushed, palpitating, and beautiful, Jinnie took the position hedirected. She had come to play for him, to mimic the natural world forhis pleasure.
"Shall I play about the fairies?" she asked bashfully.
"Yes," assented King.
As on that night in his home when first she came into his life infull sway, the man now imagined he saw creeping from under the flowerpetals and from behind the tall trees, the tiny inhabitants ofJinnie's fairyland. Then he turned his eyes toward her, and as hewatched the lithe young figure, the pensive face lost and rapt in thelullaby, Theodore came to the greatest decision of his life. Hecouldn't live without Jinnie Grandoken! No matter if she was the nieceof a cobbler, no matter who her antecedents were--she was born intothe world for him, and all that was delicate and womanly in her calledout to the manhood in him; and all that was strong, masterful, andaggressive in him clamored to protect and shield her, and in thatfleeting moment the brilliant young bachelor suddenly lost his hold onbachelordom, as a boy loses his hold on a kite. There are times inevery human life when such a decision as Theodore then made seemed thebeginning of everything. It was as if the past had wrapped him aroundlike the grey shell of a cocoon.
A loose lock of hair fell coquettishly from the girl's dark head lowupon the fiddle, and Theodore loved and wanted to kiss it, and whenthe instrument dropped from under the dimpled chin, he held out hishand.
"Come here, Jinnie," he said softly. "Come sit beside me."
She came directly, as she always did when he asked anything of her. Hedrew her down close to his side, and for a long time they remainedquiet. Jinnie was facing the acme of joy. The day had only begun, andshe was with the object of her dreams. Just as when she had lived inthe hills the fiddle had held the center of her soul, so now TheodoreKing occupied that sacred place. The morning light rose in her eyes,the blue fire transforming her face.
"PLAY FOR ME," THEODORE SAID. "STAND BY THAT BIG TREE SO ICAN LOOK AT YOU."]
Theodore turned, saw, and realized at that moment. He discovered inher what he had long desired. She loved him! All the old longing, allthe strength and passion within him broke loose at the nearness ofher. Suddenly he stretched out his arms and drew her still nearer.Jinnie felt every muscle of his strongly fibered body grow tense ather touch. She tried to draw away from his encircling arms, but therise and fall of her bosom, girlishly curved--the small-girl shynessthat caused her to endeavor to unloose his strong hands, only goadedhim to press her closer.
"Don't leave me, my dearest, my sweet," he breathed, kissing her lidsand hair. "I love you! I love you!"
She gasped once, twice, and her head fell upon his breast, and for amoment she lay wrapped in her youthful modesty as in a mantle.
"Kiss me, Jinnie," Theodore murmured entreatingly.
She buried her head closer against him.
"Kiss me," he insisted, drawing her face upward. His lips fell uponhers, and Jinnie's eyes closed under the magic of her first kiss.
The master-passion of the man brought to sudden life correspondingemotions in the girl--emotions that hurt and frightened her. She puther hand to his face, and touched it. He drew back, looking into hereyes.
"Don't," she breathed. "Don't kiss me any more like--like that."
"But you love me, my girlie, sweet?" he murmured, his lips roving overher face in dear freedom. "You do!... You do!"
Jinnie's arms went about him, but her tongue refused to speak.
"Kiss me again!" Theodore insisted.
Oh, how she wanted to kiss him once more! How she gloried in thestrong arms, and the handsome face strung tense with his love for her!Then their lips met in the wonders of a second kiss. Jinnie hadthought the first one could never be equaled, but as she lay limply inhis arms, his lips upon hers, she lost count of everything.
It might have been the weird effect of the shadows, or the deep,sudden silence about them that drew the girl slowly from his arms.
"I want my fiddle," she whispered. "Let me go!"
Faint were the inflections of the words; insistent the drawing back ofthe dear warm body.
Theodore permitted her to get up, and with staggering step she tookher position at the tree trunk.
Then he sank down, hot blood coursing through his veins. Long ago hehad realized in Jinnie and the fiddle essentials--essentials to hisfuture and his happiness, and to-day her kisses and divine, womanlyyielding had only strengthened that realization. Nothing now was ofany importance to him save this vibrant, temperamental girl. There wassomething so delightfully young--so pricelessly dear in the way shehad surrendered herself to him. The outside world faded from hismemory as Jinnie closed her eyes, and with a very white face began toplay. For that day she had finished with the song of the fairies, thebabbling of the brook, and the nodding rhythm of the flowers in thesummer's breeze. All that she considered now was Theodore and hiskisses. The bow came down over a string with one long, vibrating,passionate call. It expressed the awakening of the girl'ssoul--awakened by the touch of a man's turbulent lips--Jinnie'sGod-given man. Her fiddle knew it--felt it--expressed it!
With that first seductive kiss the soul-stirring melody was full bornwithin her, as a world is called into the firmament by one spoken wordof God. And as she played, Theodore moved silently toward her, for thefiddle was flashing out the fervor of the kisses she had given him.
He was close at her feet before he spoke, and simultaneously the whi
telids opened in one blue, blue glance.
"Jinnie!" breathed Theodore, getting up and holding out his arms."Come to me! Come to me, my love! I can't live another moment withoutyou."
The bow and fiddle remained unnoticed for the next half hour, whilethe two, the new woman and the new man, were but conscious of oneanother, nothing else.
At length Theodore spoke.
"Jinnie, look up and say, 'Theodore, I love you'."
It was hard at first, because her mind had never reached the point ofspeaking aloud her passionate love for him, but Theodore heard thehalting words, and droned them over to himself, as a music loverdelights in his favorite strains.
"And you love me well enough to marry me some day?" he murmured.
Marry him! This, too, was a new thought. Jinnie's heart fluttered likea bird in her breast. To be with him always? To have him for her own?Of course, he was hers, and she was his! Then into her mind came thethought of Lafe, Peggy, and Bobbie, and the arms around him relaxed.
"I love you better'n anybody in the world," she told him,pathetically, "but I can't ever leave the cobbler.... They need methere."
"They can't keep you," he cried passionately. "I want you myself."
His vehemence subdued her utterly. She glanced into his face. In hisflashing eyes, Jinnie read a power inimitable and unsurpassed.
"I couldn't ever leave 'em," she repeated, quivering, "but couldn'tthey live----"
"We'd take the little blind boy," promised Theodore.
Jinnie remained pensive. To bring the shine in her eyes once more, hesaid:
"Wouldn't you like Bobbie to live with us?"
"Yes, of course; but I couldn't leave Lafe and Peg in Paradise Road."
Theodore surrounded the entreating, uplifted face with two stronghands.
"I know that. We'll take care of them all----"
Still Jinnie held back her full surrender.
"Can I take Happy Pete, too? And the cats? There's an awful lot of'em.... Milly Ann does have so many kitties," she ended naively.
Theodore laughed delightedly.
"Dearest little heart! Of course we'll take them all, every one youlove!"
"Will you tell Lafe about--about us?" Jinnie asked shyly, "I--I----"but she had no more time to finish.
"I'll tell him to-morrow, Jinnie!" exclaimed Theodore. "Are you happy,dearest?"
"So happy," she sighed, with loving assurance.
The rest of the day they were like two frolicking children, eatingtheir luncheon under the tall trees. When the shadows fell, they lefttheir trysting place, and with their arms about each other, wentslowly back to the automobile.