Anne's House of Dreams
thirty years. Yet they bloom on every summer. Look at those red
roses, Leslie--how they queen it over everything else!”
“I love the red roses,” said Leslie. “Anne likes the pink ones best,
and Gilbert likes the white. But I want the crimson ones. They
satisfy some craving in me as no other flower does.”
“These roses are very late--they bloom after all the others have
gone--and they hold all the warmth and soul of the summer come to
fruition,” said Owen, plucking some of the glowing, half-opened buds.
“The rose is the flower of love--the world has acclaimed it so for
centuries. The pink roses are love hopeful and expectant--the white
roses are love dead or forsaken--but the red roses--ah, Leslie, what
are the red roses?”
“Love triumphant,” said Leslie in a low voice.
“Yes--love triumphant and perfect. Leslie, you know--you understand.
I have loved you from the first. And I KNOW you love me--I don’t need
to ask you. But I want to hear you say it--my darling--my darling!”
Leslie said something in a very low and tremulous voice. Their hands
and lips met; it was life’s supreme moment for them and as they stood
there in the old garden, with its many years of love and delight and
sorrow and glory, he crowned her shining hair with the red, red rose of
a love triumphant.
Anne and Gilbert returned presently, accompanied by Captain Jim. Anne
lighted a few sticks of driftwood in the fireplace, for love of the
pixy flames, and they sat around it for an hour of good fellowship.
“When I sit looking at a driftwood fire it’s easy to believe I’m young
again,” said Captain Jim.
“Can you read futures in the fire, Captain Jim?” asked Owen.
Captain Jim looked at them all affectionately and then back again at
Leslie’s vivid face and glowing eyes.
“I don’t need the fire to read your futures,” he said. “I see
happiness for all of you--all of you--for Leslie and Mr. Ford--and the
doctor here and Mistress Blythe--and Little Jem--and children that
ain’t born yet but will be. Happiness for you all--though, mind you, I
reckon you’ll have your troubles and worries and sorrows, too. They’re
bound to come--and no house, whether it’s a palace or a little house of
dreams, can bar ’em out. But they won’t get the better of you if you
face ’em TOGETHER with love and trust. You can weather any storm with
them two for compass and pilot.”
The old man rose suddenly and placed one hand on Leslie’s head and one
on Anne’s.
“Two good, sweet women,” he said. “True and faithful and to be
depended on. Your husbands will have honor in the gates because of
you--your children will rise up and call you blessed in the years to
come.”
There was a strange solemnity about the little scene. Anne and Leslie
bowed as those receiving a benediction. Gilbert suddenly brushed his
hand over his eyes; Owen Ford was rapt as one who can see visions. All
were silent for a space. The little house of dreams added another
poignant and unforgettable moment to its store of memories.
“I must be going now,” said Captain Jim slowly at last. He took up his
hat and looked lingeringly about the room.
“Good night, all of you,” he said, as he went out.
Anne, pierced by the unusual wistfulness of his farewell, ran to the
door after him.
“Come back soon, Captain Jim,” she called, as he passed through the
little gate hung between the firs.
“Ay, ay,” he called cheerily back to her. But Captain Jim had sat by
the old fireside of the house of dreams for the last time.
Anne went slowly back to the others.
“It’s so--so pitiful to think of him going all alone down to that
lonely Point,” she said. “And there is no one to welcome him there.”
“Captain Jim is such good company for others that one can’t imagine him
being anything but good company for himself,” said Owen. “But he must
often be lonely. There was a touch of the seer about him tonight--he
spoke as one to whom it had been given to speak. Well, I must be
going, too.”
Anne and Gilbert discreetly melted away; but when Owen had gone Anne
returned, to find Leslie standing by the hearth.
“Oh, Leslie--I know--and I’m so glad, dear,” she said, putting her arms
about her.
“Anne, my happiness frightens me,” whispered Leslie. “It seems too
great to be real--I’m afraid to speak of it--to think of it. It seems
to me that it must just be another dream of this house of dreams and it
will vanish when I leave here.”
“Well, you are not going to leave here--until Owen takes you. You are
going to stay with me until that time comes. Do you think I’d let you
go over to that lonely, sad place again?”
“Thank you, dear. I meant to ask you if I might stay with you. I
didn’t want to go back there--it would seem like going back into the
chill and dreariness of the old life again. Anne, Anne, what a friend
you’ve been to me--‘a good, sweet woman--true and faithful and to be
depended on’--Captain Jim summed you up.”
“He said ‘women,’ not ‘woman,’” smiled Anne. “Perhaps Captain Jim sees
us both through the rose-colored spectacles of his love for us. But we
can try to live up to his belief in us, at least.”
“Do you remember, Anne,” said Leslie slowly, “that I once said--that
night we met on the shore--that I hated my good looks? I did--then.
It always seemed to me that if I had been homely Dick would never have
thought of me. I hated my beauty because it had attracted him, but
now--oh, I’m glad that I have it. It’s all I have to offer Owen,--his
artist soul delights in it. I feel as if I do not come to him quite
empty-handed.”
“Owen loves your beauty, Leslie. Who would not? But it’s foolish of
you to say or think that that is all you bring him. HE will tell you
that--I needn’t. And now I must lock up. I expected Susan back
tonight, but she has not come.”
“Oh, yes, here I am, Mrs. Doctor, dear,” said Susan, entering
unexpectedly from the kitchen, “and puffing like a hen drawing rails at
that! It’s quite a walk from the Glen down here.”
“I’m glad to see you back, Susan. How is your sister?”
“She is able to sit up, but of course she cannot walk yet. However,
she is very well able to get on without me now, for her daughter has
come home for her vacation. And I am thankful to be back, Mrs. Doctor,
dear. Matilda’s leg was broken and no mistake, but her tongue was not.
She would talk the legs off an iron pot, that she would, Mrs. Doctor,
dear, though I grieve to say it of my own sister. She was always a
great talker and yet she was the first of our family to get married.
She really did not care much about marrying James Clow, but she could
not bear to disoblige him. Not but what James is a good man--the only
fault I have to find with him is that he always starts in to say grace
with such an unearthly groan, Mrs. Doctor, dear. It always frightens
my appetite clear away. And speaking of getting married, Mrs. Doctor,
dear, is it true that Cornelia Bryant is going to be married to
Marshall Elliott?”
“Yes, quite true, Susan.”
“Well, Mrs. Doctor, dear, it does NOT seem to me fair. Here is me, who
never said a word against the men, and I cannot get married nohow. And
there is Cornelia Bryant, who is never done abusing them, and all she
has to do is to reach out her hand and pick one up, as it were. It is
a very strange world, Mrs. Doctor, dear.”
“There’s another world, you know, Susan.”
“Yes,” said Susan with a heavy sigh, “but, Mrs. Doctor, dear, there is
neither marrying nor giving in marriage there.”
CHAPTER 39
CAPTAIN JIM CROSSES THE BAR
One day in late September Owen Ford’s book came at last. Captain Jim
had gone faithfully to the Glen post office every day for a month,
expecting it. This day he had not gone, and Leslie brought his copy
home with hers and Anne’s.
“We’ll take it down to him this evening,” said Anne, excited as a
schoolgirl.
The long walk to the Point on that clear, beguiling evening along the
red harbor road was very pleasant. Then the sun dropped down behind
the western hills into some valley that must have been full of lost
sunsets, and at the same instant the big light flashed out on the white
tower of the point.
“Captain Jim is never late by the fraction of a second,” said Leslie.
Neither Anne nor Leslie ever forgot Captain Jim’s face when they gave
him the book--HIS book, transfigured and glorified. The cheeks that
had been blanched of late suddenly flamed with the color of boyhood;
his eyes glowed with all the fire of youth; but his hands trembled as
he opened it.
It was called simply The Life-Book of Captain Jim, and on the title
page the names of Owen Ford and James Boyd were printed as
collaborators. The frontispiece was a photograph of Captain Jim
himself, standing at the door of the lighthouse, looking across the
gulf. Owen Ford had “snapped” him one day while the book was being
written. Captain Jim had known this, but he had not known that the
picture was to be in the book.
“Just think of it,” he said, “the old sailor right there in a real
printed book. This is the proudest day of my life. I’m like to bust,
girls. There’ll be no sleep for me tonight. I’ll read my book clean
through before sun-up.”
“We’ll go right away and leave you free to begin it,” said Anne.
Captain Jim had been handling the book in a kind of reverent rapture.
Now he decidedly closed it and laid it aside.
“No, no, you’re not going away before you take a cup of tea with the
old man,” he protested. “I couldn’t hear to that--could you, Matey?
The life-book will keep, I reckon. I’ve waited for it this many a
year. I can wait a little longer while I’m enjoying my friends.”
Captain Jim moved about getting his kettle on to boil, and setting out
his bread and butter. Despite his excitement he did not move with his
old briskness. His movements were slow and halting. But the girls did
not offer to help him. They knew it would hurt his feelings.
“You just picked the right evening to visit me,” he said, producing a
cake from his cupboard. “Leetle Joe’s mother sent me down a big basket
full of cakes and pies today. A blessing on all good cooks, says I.
Look at this purty cake, all frosting and nuts. ’Tain’t often I can
entertain in such style. Set in, girls, set in! We’ll ‘tak a cup o’
kindness yet for auld lang syne.’”
The girls “set in” right merrily. The tea was up to Captain Jim’s best
brewing. Little Joe’s mother’s cake was the last word in cakes;
Captain Jim was the prince of gracious hosts, never even permitting his
eyes to wander to the corner where the life-book lay, in all its
bravery of green and gold. But when his door finally closed behind
Anne and Leslie they knew that he went straight to it, and as they
walked home they pictured the delight of the old man poring over the
printed pages wherein his own life was portrayed with all the charm and
color of reality itself.
“I wonder how he will like the ending--the ending I suggested,” said
Leslie.
She was never to know. Early the next morning Anne awakened to find
Gilbert bending over her, fully dressed, and with an expression of
anxiety on his face.
“Are you called out?” she asked drowsily.
“No. Anne, I’m afraid there’s something wrong at the Point. It’s an
hour after sunrise now, and the light is still burning. You know it
has always been a matter of pride with Captain Jim to start the light
the moment the sun sets, and put it out the moment it rises.”
Anne sat up in dismay. Through her window she saw the light blinking
palely against the blue skies of dawn.
“Perhaps he has fallen asleep over his life-book,” she said anxiously,
“or become so absorbed in it that he has forgotten the light.”
Gilbert shook his head.
“That wouldn’t be like Captain Jim. Anyway, I’m going down to see.”