_ CHAPTER VIII
Arethusa sat on a big, smooth stone at the edge of the Branch, under the low-drooping willow tree that leaned far over those clear waters, and absent-mindedly flipped at the water with a long switch broken from the tree. Under the stone it was cool shadow and the rocks on the bottom of the Branch gleamed invitingly green. Something like a fresh-water seaweed moved slowly back and forth, as Arethusa stirred the water above it. But for all its inviting appearance, it was treacherously slimy. It would have been hard for even nimble-footed Arethusa to keep her balance on those rocks. A tiny snake darted out from under the big stone and shot across to the other side; Arethusa leaned far over to watch it.
"A baby snake," she exclaimed delightedly. "I wonder if there're any more!" Then she poked farther back under the stone, but no more appeared. It was probably the only child in its family, thought Arethusa. It was rather late for baby snakes.
She straightened up once more and resumed her absent-minded switching at the water. Farther out, where the shadow of the weeping willow did not reach, the sunlight shone with dazzling brightness on the water, and the hundreds of little drops that flew off the end of Arethusa's switch gleamed like tiny diamonds as they fell back into the Branch.
It was a terrifically hot day.
The September sun blazed away so fiercely that the whole landscape drooped under it. Even Arethusa, whose enthusiasm no amount of ordinary heat had the power to lessen, felt wilted.
But despite the heat, work on her outfit for the Visit did not slacken. Miss Letitia and Miss Eliza were sewing away for dear life. Even Arethusa herself had been pressed into service. Miss Eliza believed in being ready for your occasions; rather ready with a long waiting, than not be ready. She would have the simple wardrobe finished and all carefully packed days before it was time to leave so there would be no flurry at the last moment; Miss Eliza hated flurry.
But Arethusa did not sew with ease. What little she knew of that art had been acquired with painful effort. And with the heat and her uncontrollable excitement when she considered what this work was for, the sewing had stuck to her hands so badly this morning, and the thread had knotted with such diabolic persistency, that Miss Asenath had taken it all away from her and suggested that she run outside for awhile. She was, however, to remain within easy calling distance of the house, so she had come down here to the willow tree at the Branch.
It was just a little over a month now until Arethusa was actually to go. She had counted the days on the calendar until October twenty-fifth and then multiplied them by twenty-four. And every night, with puckered brow and moistened pencil and great care so that no smallest mistake should be made in so important a subtraction, she subtracted twenty-four more from those hours still remaining. The number of figures on the slip of yellow paper stuck in the mirror of her bureau had increased as the size of the remainder decreased with each passing day. This method of showing the flight of time appealed to her very strongly. It made it seem as if so much more had been covered every day when she subtracted twenty-four from the larger number of hours, than if she simply took one away from the number of days.
She lay back on the big stone and clasped her hands under her head, smiling up into the willow branches as if she saw something there which pleased her exceedingly. And so did any contemplation of the limitless possibilities for happiness before her in the Visit bring just such a smile to curve her lips. A few sweat-bees buzzed half-heartedly about her head, but Arethusa did not even trouble to brush them away. It was too hot for any more exertion than was absolutely necessary.
Miss Johnson, Arethusa's fox terrier, sat right beside her mistress, with her small red tongue hanging out at one side of her mouth, and panting as if her small heart would burst through her ribs.
Miss Johnson had been the gift of Timothy, who owned her mother. But it had needed all his blandishments to induce Miss Eliza to allow Arethusa to have the little dog, for Miss Eliza cared nothing whatever for dogs of any kind or size or degree, either far or near. And once Timothy's cajolements had carried his point, and Miss Johnson had taken up her abode at the Farm, she had been hedged about with restrictions. She was never permitted to set foot inside the sacred precincts of the house, or even on either porch, or to go near the flower garden; and she knew it quite as well as anybody. Experience still remains the best of teachers. When Miss Eliza appeared on her horizon, Miss Johnson would put what was left of her tail between her legs and scuttle for cover. She was a wise little dog, and did not have to be told who wielded brooms and slapped.
But out in the open, her disposition was much less humble. She and Arethusa were boon companions; her mistress had the whole of that small heart which thumped so violently. One of her paws rested on a dumpy, round stick which she had selected as a good plaything, and she gave a short, sharp bark of frantic appeal when she saw Arethusa lie down on the stone.
It was never too hot for Miss John to play at chasing sticks; her energy never flagged in the least, even though it might seem that she would pant herself to death the very next moment.
Arethusa raised her head to one elbow to look very reproachfully at Miss Johnson.
"I told you twice it was too hot, Miss Johnson."
Miss Johnson barked. There were almost words in that bark, it was so entreating.
"Yes, 'tis. There's nothing you can say will make me think it isn't, and it's very bad for you to run in the heat."
Another bark.
"No, I'm not going to throw it for you. I've told you so over and over. Besides, you ought not to want to run with an old stick when I'm going away so soon. You ought to be glad to sit with me while you can."
But Miss Johnson believed in snatching at the pleasures of the present rather than in preparation for the sorrows of the future. She sat up quite straight and begged beseechingly. Her tiny fore-paws were so irresistible in their appealing waving that Arethusa relented.
"But just this once, only," she warned, as she sat up and reached for the stick.
Miss Johnson jumped about, with excitement at the highest tension; and her mistress lifted that round bit of wood high above her head and threw it with a swing which had far more grace than aim, and all the force she could muster.
And it hit Timothy, stealing up quietly to surprise her, square between the eyes.
"Suffering cats, Arethusa!"
Timothy grabbed Miss Johnson's plaything and continued its flight so very far away that the poor little dog could not find it at all, although she searched most diligently for it for a long, long time.
Arethusa almost jumped off the big stone into the Branch.
"Why don't you look where you're throwing things occasionally! You nearly put my eyes out!" There was a fast growing red spot on his nose; Timothy rubbed it ruefully.
"Served you quite right if I had! How could I know you were sneaking there!" Then Arethusa turned her back to Timothy, and she turned it with a movement of the greatest dignity. "I thought I told you last night," she added, "not to come to see me any more, ever."
Timothy was silent for a moment.... "I didn't think you really meant it," he said, miserably.
"Well, I did."
Arethusa's back looked decidedly inhospitable; there was an uncompromising rigidity about the way she stared straight before her. Even the long rope of red hair seemed to have become suddenly as stiff as the rest of her. It was not an attitude in a hostess conductive to easy conversation, or to make one's thoughts flow smoothly.
Miss Johnson flew about, hunting for her stick, every now and then coming back to Timothy with frantic little questioning yelps; but Timothy, ordinarily such a friend of hers, paid no sort of attention. He had eyes only for Arethusa. It was hard for Miss Johnson to understand.
Finally, Timothy flung himself down on the ground at the side of the big stone. "Do you mind if I stay, Arethusa?"
"Suit yourself," she replied, indifferently. "It's not on my land. But it seems to me you have an awful lot of time to loaf around for anybody who calls himself a farmer." There was scorn in Arethusa's tone.
"I came over here just especially to tell you I was sorry. I saw you from the hemp-field and came."
"You better go on back to the hemp-field then," said Arethusa, "now that you've said it."
Timothy gathered a handful of small stones lying near him and began to idly skip them one by one across the Branch. It was an accomplishment which Arethusa deeply envied him: her stones invariably fell in without skipping. Yet she made no move to show him that she saw how beautifully every single stone that Timothy skipped sped across the top of the water to the other side. Miss Johnson came and sat down between them, worn out in her vain search for her stick, and she panted and gazed inquiringly from one to the other of her playmates, so unusually silent.
"I don't see why," said Timothy suddenly, "that you want to act this way, Arethusa. I've said I was sorry. That ought to be quite enough; and ... and.... Anyway, I don't see why one kiss should make you so mad."
"Oh, you don't?" replied Arethusa, very sarcastically.
Life had seemed a gloomy affair to Timothy since the day he had realized that Arethusa was actually going on this Visit. He did not want her to go, to put it very plainly. Not that he thought she would not have a good time; he thought she would have a good time; in fact, he thought she would have far too good a time, his verbal expression to Arethusa of the contrary idea, notwithstanding. Timothy had made more than one visit to Lewisburg; he was well acquainted with the variety of its attractions. He could not help but vision the oceans of beings of the opposite sex it was inevitable she should meet, and he saw in these meetings his own eclipse as a suitor.
Timothy's Ardent Wish for Arethusa and himself was identical with Miss Asenath's Secret Hope and Miss Eliza's Openly Expressed Desire. And Arethusa had not exaggerated in the least, to Miss Eliza, the number of his proposals. He had been proposing to her every summer with worthy persistence since he was nine or ten, childish though those first proposals may have been; and sometimes twice a summer.
Ever since that time when she had made the first appeal to his chivalry when he had met her, a chubby little scrap of only three scant summers, wandering off down the Pike, every little footfall taking her farther and farther away from the Farm, and she had raised her eyes, brimming over with tears in their wonderful tangle of black lashes, and said, with a tiny catch in her voice, "I'm losted. Tate me home, Boy!"; and he, with the superior knowledge of location which seven years gives over three, had led her safely back to Miss Eliza--ever since that long-past day, Arethusa had made up the most of Timothy's world. They had played together all through childhood and boyhood and girlhood, and quarreled violently and much over their play, and then made up with commendable immediacy; Timothy was the nearest approach to a brother Arethusa had ever known. But Timothy's feeling for Arethusa had ever been, and especially these last few years, more than a brother's love. It was the clean whole-hearted affection which a boy gives to the one girl in the world who seems to him superior to other girls. Even when Timothy had gone away to a neighboring town to college, his allegiance had never for a moment been shaken; in all those four long years he had never seen a single maiden, among the many he had met, who came anywhere near Arethusa in his estimation.
Timothy had had some dim idea that it might be quite wise to get her safely promised to himself before she went away. The last point-blank refusal she had made him, earlier in this summer, had not left him altogether disheartened. He knew Arethusa was given to moods. Then, too, persistence often wins the reluctant; dripping water wears away a stone. There are a great many aphorisms dealing directly with such a state of mind as Timothy's.
So the evening just before this hot September morning, he had dressed himself in his very best and strolled over to the Farm, fully determined on a definite course of action.
He had made his formal proposal for Arethusa's hand to Arethusa herself, as they sat side by side on the top step of the worn stone steps to the front porch. But she had laughed at him, so derisively, that Timothy, goaded into rashness by the laughter, had kissed her with a resounding smack. Then he had been slapped by the indignant Arethusa until his check stung with the pain, sent straight home and told never to come back again as long as he lived.
And he had wondered, as he cut across the fields, a chastened and a sadder Timothy under the friendly stars which winked so sympathetically, and rubbing his still stinging cheek as he walked, if there would ever be anybody who would understand Arethusa. He didn't. He could recall occasions when he had kissed her and had not been slapped.
Now Miss Eliza had unfortunately heard the conversation and the kiss and the slap and the dismissal of Timothy, from inside the sitting-room; and she had called Arethusa into her after the rejected suitor had fled and outdone even herself in the quality of her scolding. She had gone so far as to make a threat of such a truly horrible nature that it had turned Arethusa absolutely cold with the fear that she might really carry it out.
Arethusa had every right to be very angry with Timothy.
Timothy gathered him another little heap of stones, and one by one, with a perfect mastery of the art, skipped those all across the water. But he did it very gloomily, with no apparent pleasure, hardly as if conscious of what he were doing. And Arethusa continued to stare straight before her as if she had found new and unexpected beauties in a familiar landscape.
"I hate for us to be mad," said Timothy after awhile, making another attempt to break the hostile little silence.
"So do I," replied Arethusa non-committally.
Timothy brightened.
"But I expect to be mad at you as long as I live," she continued, and Timothy lapsed into gloom once more, "when you act the way you do. I don't see why you want to be always bothering me about marrying you; unless Aunt 'Liza puts you up to it. I don't want to marry you, Timothy; and I'll never change my mind about it. You needn't ask me again, ever. I want to be very good friends with you, because you're the very oldest friend I've got, but we can't be friends if you're going to be so silly and sentimental all the time. I hate sentimental people!"
Had Timothy's sense of humor not deserted him absolutely, he must have laughed at this; as it was, he took it very seriously.
Just then came a faint, "Ar----ee--thu----sa!" from the direction of the house, and Arethusa rose quickly to answer the call.
"Oh, I forgot," Timothy rolled over. "Miss 'Titia called to me from the house as I came by to tell you she was ready for you."
"Why didn't you tell me then, an hour ago? You've been here a half hour at least and haven't said a word about it!"
"I forgot," replied Timothy humbly, thoroughly ground to the earth by that speech of Arethusa's with its "I'll be a sister to you" tone.
"That's evident. She probably thinks I'm lost or something by this time. If you weren't so busy always seeing how you can annoy me, you might remember when people give you messages to deliver!" Arethusa swept majestically off, bending her head to escape the low-growing willow branches, and Timothy watched her miserably. But she had gone only about six or seven paces when she turned and came back to him, "And Timothy," she announced, as sternly as Miss Eliza herself might have spoken, "if you ever even try to kiss me again, like you did last night, I'll do something worse to you than just slap. I'll ... I'll ... It's ... I don't like to be kissed."
"But you used to kiss me," Timothy sat upright, here was his alibi and a chance to defend himself.
"I know I did, but we were babies. That was ages ago, and it's very, very different. Grown girls don't kiss grown men. It's not nice. It's.... It's just like poor white trash!"
And with last stroke of annihilation, Arethusa departed for the house and Miss Letitia and her fitting, with Miss Johnson trotting at her heels, leaving Timothy in abject abandonment to misery under the willow tree. _