She did not waken until her landlady's tap called her to supper. Mr.

and Mrs. Gates, two quiet, elderly people, greeted her kindly, and set a Homeric feast before her: shortbread and honey, broiled squirrels and pigeon stew, persimmon jam and hot mince pie. She ate dutifully, then crept back to her little room, with its mournful hair wreaths and its yellowed engravings of "Night and Morning" and "The Death-bed of Washington," and fell asleep again.

The three days that followed were like a queer, tired dream. It rained night and day. The roads were mired hub deep. Roderick could not drive over to see her, but he telephoned to her daily. But his hasty messages were little satisfaction. The heavy rains had overflowed the big ditch, he told her. That meant extra work for everybody on the plant. Carlisle was wretchedly sick, so Rod and Burford were sharing their chief's watch in addition to their own duties. Worst, Marvin had quarrelled with the head runner of the big dredge, and "We're having to spend half our time in coddling them both for fear they'll walk off and leave us," as Rod put it. In short, Roderick had neither time nor thought for his sister. Marian realized that her brother was not inconsiderate. He was absorbed in his work and in its risks. Yet she keenly resented her loneliness.

"It isn't Rod's fault. But if I had dreamed that the West would be like this!"

But on the fourth day, while she sat at her window looking out at the endless rain, there came a surprising diversion.

"A gentleman to see you, Miss Hallowell. Will you come downstairs?"

"Why, Commodore McCloskey!" Marian hurried down, delighted. "How good of you to come!"

Commodore McCloskey, dripping from his sou'wester to his mired boots, beamed like a drenched but cheery Santa Claus.

"I've taken the liberty to bring a friend to call," he chuckled. "He's young an' green, an' 'tis few manners he owns, but he's good stock, an'--Here, ye rascal! Shame on ye, startin' a fight the minute ye enter the house!"

Marian gasped. Past her, with a wild miauw, shot a yellow streak. That streak was Empress. Straight after the streak flew a fat, brown, curly object, yapping at the top of its powerful lungs. Up the window-curtain scrambled Empress. With a frantic leap she landed on the frame of Grandpa Gates's large crayon portrait. Beneath the portrait her curly pursuer yelped and whined.

"Why, he's a collie puppy. Oh, what a beauty! What is his name?"

"Beauty he is. And his name is Finnegan, after the poem, 'Off again, on again, gone again, Finnegan.' Do ye remember? 'Tis him to the life.

He is a prisint to ye from Missis McCloskey and meself. An' our compliments an' good wishes go wid him!"

"How more than kind of you!" Marian, delighted, stooped to pat her new treasure. Finnegan promptly leaped on her and spattered her fresh dress with eager, muddy paws. He then caught the table-cover in his teeth. With one frisky bounce he brought a shower of books and magazines to the floor. Mr. McCloskey clutched for his collar. The puppy gayly eluded him and made a dash for the pantry. Marian caught him just as he was diving headlong into the open flour-barrel.

"I do thank you so much! He'll be such a pleasure; and such a protection," gasped Marian, s.n.a.t.c.hing Mrs. Gates's knitting work from the puppy's inquiring paws.

"'Tis hardly a protector I'd call him," Mr. McCloskey returned. "But he'll sure keep your mind employed some. Good-day to ye, ma'am. And good luck with Finnegan."

Poor Empress! In her delight with this new plaything, Marian quite forgot her elder companion. Moreover, as Mr. McCloskey had said, Finnegan could and did keep her mind employed, and her hands as well.

"That pup is energetic enough, but he don't appear to have much judgment," said Mrs. Gates, mildly. In two hours Finnegan had carried off the family supply of rubbers and hid them in the corn-crib; he had torn up one of Rod's blue-prints; he had terrorized the hen-yard; he had chased Empress from turret to foundation-stone. At length Empress had turned on him and cuffed him till he yelped and fled to the kitchen, where he upset a pan of bread sponge.

"Suppose you take him for a walk, down to the big ditch. Maybe the fresh air will calm him down."

Marian made a leash of clothes-line and marched Finnegan down the sodden woods toward the ditch. She was so busy laughing at his droll performances that she quite forgot the dull fields, the wet, gray prospect. Crimson-cheeked and breathless, she finally dragged him from the third alluring rabbit-hole, despite his pleading whines, and started back up the ca.n.a.l. As she pushed through a hedge of willows a sweet, high, laughing voice accosted her.

"Good-morning, my haughty lady! Won't you stop and talk with us a while?"

Startled, Marian turned toward the call. Across the ditch, high on the opposite bank, stood the quaintest, prettiest group that her eyes had ever beheld. A tall, fair-haired girl of her own age, dressed in a bewitching short-waisted gown of scarlet and a frilly scarlet bonnet, stood in the leafless willows, a tiny white-clad child in her arms.

Behind her a stout beaming negress in bandanna turban and gay plaid calico was lifting another baby high on her ample shoulder.

Marian stared, astonished. The whole group might well have stepped straight out of some captivating old engraving of the days before the war.

"Haven't you time to pa.s.s the time o' day?" the sweet, mischievous voice entreated. "You are Miss Hallowell, I know. I'm Sarah Louisiana Burford, and I am just perishin' to meet you. There is a board bridge just a rod or so up the ca.n.a.l. We'll meet you there. Do please come, and bring your delightful dog. March right along now!"

And Marian, laughing with amus.e.m.e.nt and delight, marched obediently along.

CHAPTER IV

THE MARTIN-BOX NEIGHBORS

Marian picked her way up the sh.o.r.e to the board bridge, with Finnegan prancing behind her. She felt a little abashed as she remembered her rather tart indifference to young Burford's cordial invitation of the week before. But all her embarra.s.sment melted away as she crossed the little bridge and met Sally Lou's welcoming face, her warm clasping hands.

"You don't know how hungry I have been to see you," vowed Sally Lou, her brown eyes kindling under the scarlet bonnet.

"We've been counting the hours till we should dare to go to call on Miss Northerner, haven't we, kiddies? This is my son, Edward Fairfax Burford, Junior, Miss Hallowell. Three years old, three feet square, and weighs forty-one pounds. Isn't he rather gorgeous--if he does belong to me! And this is Thomas Tucker Burford. Eighteen months old, twenty-six pounds, and the disposition of an angel, as long as he gets his own way. And this is Mammy Easter, who came all the way from Norfolk with me, to take care of the babies, so that I could live here on the contract with Ned. Wasn't she brave to come out to this cold, lonesome country all for me? And this martin-box is my house, and it is anxious to meet you, too, so come right in!"

[Ill.u.s.tration: ON THE EDGE OF THE OPPOSITE BANK STOOD THE QUAINTEST, PRETTIEST GROUP THAT HER EYES HAD EVER BEHELD.]

Marian climbed the high, narrow outside steps that led to the tiny play-house on stilts, and entered the low, red doorway, feeling as if she had climbed Jack's bean-stalk into fairyland. Inside, the martin-box was even more fascinating. It boasted just three rooms. The largest room, gay with Mother Goose wall-paper and rosy chintz, was obviously the realm of Edward, Junior, and Thomas Tucker. The next room, with its cunning miniature fireplace, its shelves of books, its pictures and photographs, and its broad high-piled desk, was their parents' abode; while the third room boasted fascinating white-painted cupboards and sink, a tiny alcohol stove, and a wee table daintily set.

"Aren't you shocked at folks that eat in their kitchen?" drawled Sally Lou, observing Marian with dancing eyes. "But all our baking and heavy cooking is done for us, over on the quarter-boat. I brought the stove to heat the babies' milk; and, too, I like to fuss up goodies for Ned when he is tired or worried. Poor boys! They're having such an exasperating time with the contract this week! Everything seems possessed to go awry. We'll have to see to it that they get a lot of coddling so's to keep them cheered up, won't we?"

"Why, I--I suppose so. But how did you dare to bring your little children down here? They say that this is the most malarial district in the State."

"I know. But they can't catch malaria until May, when the mosquitoes come. Then I shall send them to a farm, back in the higher land. Mammy will take care of them; and I'll stay down here with Ned during the day and go to the babies at night. They're pretty st.u.r.dy little tads.

They are not likely to catch anything unless their mother is careless with them. And she isn't careless, really. Is she, Tom Tucker?" She s.n.a.t.c.hed up her youngest son, with a hug that made his fat ribs creak. "Come, now! Let's brew some stylish afternoon tea for the lady.

Get down the caravan tea that father sent us, Mammy, and the preserved ginger, and my Georgian spoons. And fix some chicken bones on the stoop for Miss Northerner's puppy. This is going to be a banquet, and a right frabjous one, too!"

It was a banquet, and a frabjous one, Marian agreed. Sally Lou's tea and Mammy's nut-cakes were delicious beyond words. The bright little house, the dainty service, Sally Lou's charming gay talk, the babies, clinging wide-eyed and adorable to her knee, all warmed and heartened Marian's listless soul. She was ravished with everything. She looked in wonder and delight at the high sleeping-porch, with its double mosquito bars and its duck screening and its cosey hammock-beds. ("Ned sleeps so much better here, where it is quiet, than on that noisy boat," Sally Lou explained.) She gazed with deep respect at the tiny pantry, built of soap-boxes, lined with snowy oil-cloth. She marvelled at the exquisite old silver, the fine embroidered table-linen, the delicate china. And she caught her breath when her eyes lighted upon the beautiful painting in oils that hung above young Burford's desk.

It was a magical bit of color: a dreamy Italian garden, walled in ancient carved and mellowed stone, its slopes and borders a glory of roses, flaunting in splendid bloom; and past its flowery gates, a glimpse of blue, calm sea. She could hardly turn her eyes away from the lovely vista. It was as restful as an April breeze. And across the lower corner she read the clear tracing of the signature, a world-famous name.

Sally Lou followed her glance.

"You surely think I'm a goose, don't you, to bring my gold teaspoons, and my wedding linen, and my finest tea-set down to a wilderness like this? Well, perhaps I am. And yet the very best treasures that we own are none too good for our home, you know. And this _is_ home. Any place is home when Ned and the babies and I are together. Besides, the very fact that this place is so queer and ugly and dismal is the best of reasons why we need all our prettiest things, and need to use them every day, don't you see? So I picked out my sacredest treasures to bring along. And that painting--yes, it was running a risk to bring so valuable a canvas down here. But doesn't it just rest your heart to look at it? That is why I wanted it with us every minute. You can look at that blue sleepy sky, and those roses climbing the garden wall, and the sea below, and forget all about the noisy, grimy boats, and the mud, and sleet, and malaria, and the cross laborers, and the broken machinery, and everything else; and just look, and look, and dream.

That is why I carted it along. Especially on Ned's account, don't you see?"

"Y-yes." At last Marian took her wistful eyes from the picture. "I wish that I had thought to bring some good photographs to hang in Rod's state-room. I never thought. But there is no room to pin up even a picture post-card in his cubby-hole on the boat. I must go on now. I have had a beautiful time."

"There goes your brother this minute! In that little red launch, see?

He is going up the ditch. Ring the dinner-bell, Mammy, that will stop him. He can take you and your dog up to Gates's Landing and save you half an hour's muddy walk."

Mammy's dinner-bell pealed loud alarm. Roderick heard and swung the boat right-about. His sober, anxious face lighted as Marian and Sally Lou gayly hailed him.

"I'm glad that you've met Mrs. Burford," he said, as he helped Marian aboard and hoisted Finnegan astern with some difficulty and many yelps; for Finnegan left his chicken-bones only under forcible urging.

"She is just about the best ever, and I hope you two will be regular chums."

"I love her this minute," declared Marian, with enthusiasm. "Where are you bound, Rod? Mayn't Finnegan and I tag along?"

Rod's face grew worried.

"I'm bound upon a mighty ticklish cruise, Sis. It is a ridiculous cruise, too. Do you remember what I told you last week about the law that governs the taxing of the land-owners for the making of these ditches?"

"Yes. You said that when the majority of the land-owners had agreed on doing the drainage work, then the law made every owner pay his tax, in proportion to the acreage of his land which would be drained by the ditches, whether he himself wanted the drainage done or not. And you said that some of the farmers did not want the ditches dug, and that they were holding back their payments and making trouble for the contractors; while others were making still more trouble by blocking the right of way and refusing to let the dredges cut through their land. But how can they hold you back, Rod? The law says that all the district people must share in the drainage expenses, whether they like to or not, because the majority of their neighbors have agreed upon it."