CHAPTER XX
ABOARD THE JOLLY ROGER
THE artist held outu 5aaz his hand gallantly and Harry stepped on to the Jolly Roger with all the impressiveness of a queen disembarking from a royal barge.
“This way, if you please,” said Mr. Cole, holding open the studio door. They all trooped in and Harry gave a little cry of surprise and delight. On the easel, with a broad shaft of sunlight across it, stood a small canvas. The others echoed Harry’s exclamation. For there were two Harrys present, one gazing with shining eyes at the canvas, and one gazing smilingly back at her. Mr. Cole had copied the head and shoulders from the sketch for which Harry had posed, and in the lower right-hand corner were painted the words “To Harriet Emery with the artist’s homage.” Then followed the date and the signature: “F. Cole,” and for once Harry didn’t mind being called Harriet.
“Oh, it’s—it’s lovely!” she sighed. “Do you—do you really mean that it’s for me?”
“I really do,” answered Mr. Cole. “But there’s a string to it.”
“Wh-what?” faltered Harry anxiously.
“You’ll have to leave it with me until to-morrow at least, for I only finished it an hour ago and the paint is still wet.”
“Oh, that’s nothing,” she answered vastly relieved. “And—and I can’t tell you how much I thank you.” Then, in spite of the fact that she had been sixteen for several hours, which, as every one knows, is quite grown up, she impulsively threw her arms about the artist and hugged him. And Mr. Cole stood it beautifully!
“And now,” cried Harry, blushing a little, “I’ve got something to show you all. Look! You take it, Roy.”
She held out the folded paper which she had kept tightly clutched in her hand and Roy took it. He looked it over.
“Shall I read it?” he asked.
Harry nodded vehemently. Roy unfolded it and began to read.
“Why, it’s a deed!” he exclaimed.
“Yes!”
“And—and—why, say, Harry, that’s great!”
“Oh, come,” said Chub impatiently. “Let us into it!”
“Papa has given me the island!” cried Harry.
“The isl—you mean this island, Fox Island?”
“Yes, he’s given it to me—forever—and my ‘heirs and signs—’”
“Assigns,” corrected Roy.
“And—and it’s all my owntiest own!” ended Harry happily.
“Well, that is great!” cried Chub.
“And some day I’m going to live on it,” declared Harry. “And I’ll invite you all to come and visit me.”
“And we all hereby accept,” laughed Mr. Cole. “Well, I suppose I shall have to begin and pay you wharfage after to-day.”
“And I guess we’ll have to pay you rent,” laughed Dick.
“No, you won’t,” answered Harry. “But isn’t it fine to have an island all of your own? Oh, I’ve always wanted to own an island.”
“So have I,” answered the artist, “but no one has ever insisted on giving me one, and I’ve never been able to make up my mind which particular island I wanted to buy. Well, and now how about supper, Mr. Dick?”
“Ready as soon as we finish setting the table.”
“Let me do it!” Harry begged.
“No, sir,” answered Dick. “You’re to stay out until it’s all ready.”
“Where are we going to eat?” asked Chub, looking anxiously about for the table which had disappeared.
“Forward, in the sitting-room,” answered Mr. Cole. “There’s more room there, and it’s pleasanter. You and I, Miss Emery, will take a stroll on deck until they’re ready for us.”
And so Harry and her host went up to the roof-deck and watched the sun setting behind the western hills, and Harry told about her birthday luncheon at the Cottage, and the big cake with its sixteen pink candles, and—
“Oh!” she cried, halting in the midst of her narrative, “I ought to have brought some of the cake for you!”
“Well, it’s just as well,” said Mr. Cole, “because—er—well, you see, there’s another cake! I believe it was to be a surprise, but I didn’t want you to feel bad about not bringing any of the other, you see. Perhaps you won’t mind just seeming a little surprised when you go in?”
“Oh, no” laughed Harry, “not a bit. That’ll be fun, won’t it? They won’t know that I knew anything about it!”
And they never did, for when, presently, they were summoned to supper, and Harry entered the sitting-room on Mr. Cole’s arm, she simulated astonishment so perfectly that the boys howled with glee.
“Why,” exclaimed Harry, “I was never so surprised—!”
The cake—it wasn’t a very big one, nor, as events proved, a very excellent one—sat in the center of the round table, the sixteen flames from the sixteen little pink candles making sixteen little points of rosy flame in the glow of the late sunlight. There were five places set and one of them, to which Harry was ceremoniously conducted, was piled with packages.
“Oh!” said Harry. And this time she was genuinely surprised, and her eyes grew large as she looked from the packages to the merry watching faces. Then the candle flames grew suddenly blurred for her and a tear stole down one side of her nose.
“And this time she was genuinely surprised”
“What’s the matter?” asked Chub in distress.
“Every one’s much too nice to me,” sniffed Harry, searching for her handkerchief. (Of course she didn’t have one and so had to borrow Roy’s.)
“Nonsense!” said Roy cheerfully. “Don’t cry, Harry.”
“I’m n-not cr-crying,” answered Harry from behind the folds of the handkerchief. “I’m ju-just blowing my n-nose!”
Every one laughed then and sat down with much scraping of chairs, and Harry, smiling apologetically, opened her packages. There was a pair of silver links for the cuffs of her shirt-waist from Roy, a little gold bar pin from Dick, a Ferry Hill pin from Chub (Harry had lost hers a month before), and a volume of Whittier’s poems from Billy Noon.
“Oh!” said Harry distressfully, when she reached the last present, “I’d forgotten him! Isn’t he coming?”
“No,” answered the artist. “He begged me to make his excuses and tell you that he was very sorry he couldn’t be present. He has a rather important piece of business on hand for this evening, I believe.”
Chub looked triumphantly at Roy and Dick with an “I-told-you-so” expression. But it was quite lost, for they were watching Harry’s face as she read the lines which the Licensed Poet had written on the fly-leaf of the book.
“Aren’t they beautiful?” she sighed finally, looking about the table.
“We don’t know,” laughed Roy. “Suppose you read them to us?”
But Harry shyly pushed the book to Mr. Cole.
“You do it, please,” she said.
“Very well,” answered the artist. “Here they are”:
TO MISS EMERY
ON HER SIXTEENTH BIRTHDAY
Accept, I pray, this little book,
For in it, if you will but look,
You’ll find lines sweet enough, ’tis true,
To have been written just for you.
Were I a poet I would write
Words fair enough to meet your sight;
But as it is, ’twill have to suit
To make this book my substitute
In hope that, as you read, it may
Arrange its lines in magic way
Until you find before your sight
The Birthday Poem I’d fain write!
Sincerely yours,
William Noon.
“Oh, but I think that’s just too sweet for anything,” cried Harry. “It’s—it’s perfectly dandy! And I think it’s too bad he can’t be here.” The others echoed both sentiments. Then Harry deposited her presents in a place of safety and the feast began, much to Chub’s satisfaction, for that youth declared that he was rapidly starving to death. I’m not going to even attempt to do justice to that banquet, but you may rest assured that the five persons around the table did. The sun sank lower and lower, and the golden glow faded from the quiet surface of the river. Lamps were lighted and the shades pulled across the little windows. The cake was cut, Harry declaring that never had she dreamed of having two birthday cakes in one day, and Chub convulsed the table by surreptitiously concealing a pink candle in Roy’s slice and causing his chum to leave the room precipitately.
“Aren’t mad, are you?” asked Chub when Roy returned.
“Not if I get another piece of cake without any filling,” was the answer.
“I was afraid you’d wax wroth,” said Chub. For that he was captured by Roy and Dick and made to apologize to the assemblage, Mr. Cole encouraging them to administer any punishment they saw fit. The dessert finished—there was ice-cream in two flavors, cake, fruit, and candy—the table was hurriedly cleared and moved back to the studio and Mr. Cole started the talking-machine. The first selection was, as Mr. Cole announced, Handel’s “Sweet Bird,” sung by Madame Melba. The audience listened very closely and politely, the artist watching them with twinkling eyes. When it was finished he asked them how they liked it. Harry was quite enthusiastic, Roy said it was splendid, Dick said it was very pretty, and Chub merely strove to look appreciative and didn’t succeed.
“Well,” said Mr. Cole, “since you like classic music we’ll have some more. I was afraid you wouldn’t care for it.”
Chub winked soberly at Roy, their host having turned his back to select a new record, and Dick fidgeted in his chair.
“I think you’ll like this one immensely,” said Mr. Cole, clasping his hands on his breast and looking dreamily at the ceiling. The machine began to play and suddenly some one with an inimitable negro pronunciation launched forth into “Bill Simmons.” The surprise depicted on the faces of his audience was too much for Mr. Cole’s gravity and he laid his head back and for a moment drowned the music with his mellow laughter. There was no more classic music that evening; in fact, the cabinet seemed to be devoted principally to the other sort; for almost an hour the machine poured forth songs and instrumental selections that wrought the audience to the wildest enthusiasm. When they knew a song they joined in and helped the talking-machine, Mr. Cole almost raising the roof when he let himself out. Then Chub had a brilliant idea, the rug was taken up, the furniture moved out and they had a dance. Of course Harry was in great demand and she went from Roy to Chub and from Chub to Dick and from Dick to Mr. Cole with scarcely a pause. But even without Harry for a partner it was still possible to dance and the evolutions of Mr. Cole and Chub, clasped in each other’s arms was well worth a long journey to witness.
Perhaps that is what Billy Noon thought when at about half-past nine he peeked through one of the windows after having made fast his boat, for he smiled broadly as he looked. Then he went to the door and knocked. Dick, who was nearest, threw it open and Billy walked in.
“Hello, Noon!” cried Mr. Cole, pausing in the dance. “Is that you? What luck?”
“Good,” answered Billy smilingly as he laid down his hat and seated himself beside it on the window-seat.
“Then you got them?”
“All three.”
“Good for you!” said the artist heartily. “Where are they?”
“Silver Cove. Brady has them. We’re going down on the midnight. I brought your boat back and thought I’d stop a minute and say good-by.”
“Are you going away?” cried Harry.
“Yes, I must go now,” was the answer.
“I’m so sorry,” said Harry. “And I want to thank you a thousand times for your present and the poem you wrote for me. I think it’s perfectly beautiful, Mr. Noon.”
“I’m glad you liked it,” answered Billy, looking pleased.
“Are you going away to-night?” asked Chub.
“Yes, we’re taking the midnight train for New York.”
“Oh, there’s some one with you?”
“Yes,” answered Billy, with a slight smile, “I have four others with me now.” Chub frowned, while Dick and Roy and Harry looked perplexed. The atmosphere of mystery grew heavier every moment.
“Are they all—book agents?” faltered Harry. Mr. Cole broke into a laugh.
“You’d better let me show you up in your true colors, Noon,” he said. Billy smiled.
“Well, I guess there’s no harm in it now,” he answered.
Mr. Cole struck an attitude.
“Miss Emery and gentlemen,” he said, “allow me the honor of introducing to you Mr. William Noon of the United States Secret Service!”