Rebecca's Promise

  CHAPTER IX

  "I'm hungry!"

  Joan's plaintive wail woke Rebecca Mary, and she opened her eyes andthen sat up very straight.

  "Why--why----" she stammered, rubbing her sleepy eyes to make sure thatthey were telling her the truth. "Where are we?"

  For they were no longer under a star-studded moon-illumined sky. Theywere in a rough shed with a roof so close to Rebecca Mary's head thatshe could have touched it if she had stretched up her arm. She looked athungry Joan and then at Granny, who was rubbing her eyes, too, andfeeling for the glasses which should hang around her neck.

  "This isn't Seven Pines!" Granny declared crossly, as one occasionallyspeaks when roused from sound slumber. "Where have you brought us,Rebecca Mary?"

  Rebecca Mary's bewildered face turned a lovely pink and the corners ofher red mouth tilted up. "Then it wasn't a dream," she said softly. "Itwasn't a dream!" she told Granny triumphantly.

  "What wasn't a dream?" Granny's voice still had a bit of an edge to it."Don't ask conundrums the first thing in the morning, Rebecca Mary. Whatwasn't a dream?"

  "Well," began Rebecca Mary, and her voice sounded as if she wasn't quitesure of her story herself. "You know you went to sleep in the car lastnight, and when we came to a cross road I didn't know which way to turn.I hated to waken you, so I ate a couple of sandwiches while I waited foryou to waken yourself. Suddenly I heard some one laugh and say: 'Hello,I thought I knew this old boat. Where do you think you are going?' Andthere was Mr. Simmons----"

  "Not old Peter Simmons?" exclaimed Granny excitedly. "It couldn't be! Hewas to be in Waloo at eleven-fifty-five. He couldn't have been at thecross roads!"

  "It was young Mr. Simmons," Rebecca Mary hastened to explain. "He was ina roadster with another man. I told him we were going to Seven Pines,and he wanted to know why we were going at night, why we didn't wait formorning. And I said it would be so warm in the morning. I didn't knowwhether you wanted him to know----"

  "Indeed he may know. I don't care who knows," declared Grannygenerously.

  "And he said he knew the way to Seven Pines, and he got in our car andtook the wheel, and we started again. But the road was so long and sowhite and the car ran so smoothly and we didn't talk much of any, and Iwas so glad to have him drive that I must have dozed off, too. Anyway, Ijust remember that we turned in at a big gate where Peter talked to aman. I thought of course that it was Seven Pines. And then we went alittle further, I suppose into this shed, and Peter got out and said hewould see about something and--That's all I remember," she finishedabruptly.

  "But that's perfect nonsense," insisted Granny. "What would Peter bedoing at the cross roads at that time of night? You must have beendreaming, Rebecca Mary. And I wasn't asleep all the time. I was awakeoff and on, and I remember now, that at one time I thought I heard youtalking to some one. But it couldn't have been to Peter. You must havebeen dreaming, Rebecca Mary!"

  She was so very positive that she made Rebecca Mary wonder if she couldhave gone to sleep at her post. It didn't seem possible that she wouldhave closed her eyes when she had the responsibility of Granny and Joanon her hands but sleep can sometimes be a wily enemy. It isn't always ahelpful friend. But if slumber had stolen insidiously over her how hadthey reached the old shed? Her story furnished the only possibleexplanation, and yet Granny frowned and said that her story wasnonsense.

  "Are you afraid?" whimpered Joan, suddenly clutching her arm. "Shall Ibe afraid, Granny? Are you afraid, Miss Wyman?"

  "I'm scared to death!" But Rebecca Mary laughed softly, and she put herarm around Joan. "But it is because I went to sleep on guard. Grannysaid I did. I should have stayed awake to watch. But you needn't befrightened, Joan. There is nothing to be afraid of, is there, Granny?"

  "Nothing at all." Granny made the endorsement strong and prompt. "But wemight as well look around and make sure."

  But when she stepped from the car she had to catch hold of the door orshe would have fallen for her limbs were cramped and stiff from spendingthe night in the tonneau.

  "If you live to be sixty-eight, Joan," she explained a littleimpatiently as she straightened herself, "you will have learned thatthere is nothing in the world to be afraid of. Come and let us see ifwe can find some breakfast. I don't suppose whoever brought us hereplans to starve us to death."

  They presented rather a disheveled and crumpled appearance as they stoodin the open doorway of the shed and looked across the green grass whichran without stopping to the green hedge a half of a mile away. What wason the other side of the hedge was kept a secret by the arbor vitae. Nearthe shed the grass was marked by many wheel tracks. There was no one tobe seen, and Granny went bravely forth with Rebecca Mary on her rightand Joan clinging to her left hand.

  "The grass is wet." Granny looked down at her shoe. "Was there any rainin your dream?" And she laughed at Rebecca Mary's puzzled face.

  "I don't know." Rebecca Mary's voice was as puzzled as her face.

  They passed a huge stone barn and several small sheds but there was noone about them. From somewhere they could hear the sound of a gasolineengine. Puff--puff it said, but the silly words conveyed absolutely noinformation to Rebecca Mary.

  When they rounded the corner of the barn they faced a great stone housewhich might have begun its existence as a giant's bandbox, it was sovery big and square. But some one had added wings on either side sothat now it looked like a home and sprawled so hospitably among theshrubbery that it seemed to call: "Come in, come in."

  Granny gave a funny little exclamation when she saw it, and she hurriedaround to the front, where she stood and stared at the house and then atthe formal garden with its pool and borders and its pergola, which ranall the way from the west wing to the river bank. The barn and shedswere on the other side of the house and, at some distance. In front thetrimly shaven lawn was broken by a driveway which slipped in from thehigh road half a mile away to encircle and say "howdydo" to a hugeflower bed which flaunted its red cannas before the wide front terrace.There were two tennis courts on one side of the driveway, down near thesecretive hedge.

  "God bless my soul!" gasped Granny, as she looked around her. The windblew her gray hair about her face, which looked a bit pinched in thestrong morning light. "Whose place do you think this is?"

  "The beautiful princess's!" Joan jumped up and down in delight. "It'stoo pretty to belong to an ogre."

  "It's Riverside, Rebecca Mary!" But as that name conveyed nothing toRebecca Mary, Granny gave her more information. "Joshua Cabot'sgrandfather's old home. Did you ever! It must have been Joshua insteadof Peter who came along and found us. But we certainly haven't anythingto be afraid of now. We'll go right in and ask Joshua for breakfast, andthen we'll scold him for bringing us out of our way, and then we'll goon to Seven Pines."

  Rebecca Mary did not think that she could have confused young PeterSimmons and Joshua Cabot, but she did not say so as she followed Grannyand Joan up the steps and in through the open door. There was no one inthe broad hall but Joshua Cabot's great grandfather and grandmother andthey hung quietly on the wall in old gilt frames. No one was in the bigdining room to which Granny turned, but some one had been there for thetable was laid for breakfast. Covers were placed for three. Granny drewa chair from the table and sat down before a plate of temptingstrawberries.

  "I'm old enough to take privileges," she said. "I hope there are morestrawberries, but if Joshua Cabot has been playing a practical joke onan old lady he should pay for it. Come, children, and eat yourbreakfast."

  Joan obeyed with hungry alacrity, but Rebecca Mary hesitated, wonderingif she dared. But the strawberries looked so delicious, Granny and Joanenjoyed them so heartily that Rebecca Mary found that she did dare. In avery few minutes there was not a strawberry left on that table. ThenGranny rang the bell for what was to follow, but no one answered it. Sherang again, and when again there was no response Joan jumped up and raninto the kitchen. She came back in a minute, big-eyed and important, toreport that there was no one,
no one at all, in the kitchen. Grannypushed back her chair.

  "The maid has probably gone out for the eggs," she said with unruffledserenity. "I expect Joshua insists that they shall be perfectly fresh.While we are waiting, Rebecca Mary, come into the parlor. I want to showyou a portrait of Joshua Cabot's great-grandmother. She was RichardCabot's great-grandmother, too, you know."

  Rebecca Mary rose obediently and followed Granny and Joan across thehall and into the parlor, which ran the full length of the house andwhose many French windows opened on the formal garden and furnished manycharming pictures of the river and the low hills beyond. And thesweet-faced young girl in a gauzy white frock and with a pink rose inher long slender fingers was Richard Cabot's great-grandmother. RebeccaMary quite forgot that the sweet-faced girl was also Joshua Cabot'sgreat-grandmother as she gazed at her. There were several other picturesto which Granny called Rebecca Mary's attention, but always RebeccaMary's eyes strayed back to the portrait. It seemed to call to her insome strange fashion. Suddenly they heard a clatter, and a door slammed.

  "There are the eggs!" exclaimed Granny with a sigh of relief. "I supposethey will be ready in three minutes. Dear, dear, it is very plain thatSallie isn't here. She would never put up with such careless service,not for a minute."

  She was interrupted by a roar, a very bellow, which made them draw closetogether.

  "Here!" cried a harsh voice which sounded for all the world like thevoice of the Big Bear. "Who has been eating my strawberries?"

  The words rang through the hall and came into the big parlor withinhospitable roughness. There was a startled, an awed silence.

  "That," whispered Rebecca Mary, as Joan huddled against her, "doesn'tsound a bit like Mr. Cabot."

  "It sounds like an ogre," Joan was sadly disappointed because it hadn'tsounded like a prince. "It sounds exactly like an ogre!"