Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905

Mrs. Star received her nephew’s announcement with suitable effusion, and with an undercurrent of genuine feeling. After kissing Deena, she made a confidence that had a spice of kindly malice.

“My dear child,” she said, “I knew so well what was about to happen, that I came all the way from New York in order to welcome you into the family, and I think I showed great self-restraint not to tell you so in the carriage when you put that very direct question as to what brought me.”

Concerning the Heart’s Deep Pages

By Sewell Ford

Author of “Horses Nine,” Etc

When Dickie’s mother put him in my charge for the summer she said: “Keep him out of as much mischief as you can.” This seemed unnecessary, for, really, Dickie was a well-mannered, good-looking young fellow, with broad shoulders, a clear skin and a clean heart. I said as much.

“Oh, you old bachelors!” laughed Dickie’s mother, and sailed away to spend her second season of widowhood abroad.

Dickie and I were just taking a look at the country surrounding our summer headquarters when we found Rosie. Balancing herself on a gatepost and eating cherries was Rosie. It must be admitted that she did both of these things with a certain grace, also that the picture she made had its charm. For she was probably sixteen, with all that the age implies.

Of course, one could not expect Dickie to be at all impressed. Certainly I did not.

“Girls!” Here followed an ominous inbreathing, ending in an explosive “Huh!” This was Dickie’s expressed attitude toward the sex. For Dickie was nineteen, which is the scornful age, you know. What are girls when a fellow is going to be a soph. in the fall, with the prospect of playing quarterback on the ’varsity eleven?

As we neared the girl on the gatepost Dickie gave her a careless glance. She certainly deserved better. There was the sifting sunshine in her hair and there were her white, rounded arms reaching up to pull down a fruit-laden branch. Perhaps the girl on the gatepost felt the slight of Dickie’s unappreciative glance, perhaps not. At any rate, she was unstirred.

“Want one?” she asked, saucily dangling a cherry at us.

Red as the cherry went Dickie’s face, and he marched stiffly past without reply. Once we were out of earshot, he remarked, with deep disgust: “What a freshy!”

“Yes, but rather pretty,” said I.

“Think so? Now, I don’t.” This with the air of a connoisseur. “But she did have good eyes.”

“Yes,” I agreed. “I like brown ones myself.”

“Brown?” protested Dickie. “They were blue, dark blue and big – the deep kind.”

“Oh, were they?” In my tone must have been that which caused Dickie to suspect that I was teasing him.

“You bet she knows it, too,” he added, vindictively. “Conceited beggars, these girls.”

“Awfully,” I assented. Then, after a pause: “But I thought you were fond of cherries?”

“So I am. If she’d been a boy, I would have tried to buy a quart.”

“She seemed to want you to have some,” I suggested. “Perhaps she would sell you a few.”

Dickie glanced at me suspiciously. “Think so? I’ve a mind to go back and try. Will you wait?”

I said I would; in fact, it was the only thing to be done, for he was off. So I sat down and watched the scorner of girls disappear eagerly around a bend in the road. At the end of a half hour of waiting I began to speculate. Had Dickie’s courage failed him, had he taken to the woods, or was he upbraiding her of the gatepost for the sin of conceit? I would go and see for myself.

All unheeding the rest of the world, they were sitting at the foot of the cherry tree. The “conceited beggar” of the deep blue eyes was trying to toss cherries into Dickie’s open mouth. When she missed it became Dickie’s turn to toss cherries. The game was a spirited one. Dickie appeared to be well entertained.

“I thought you had forgotten me,” said I, mildly. Dickie’s laugh broke square in the middle, and he smoothed his face into a bored expression.

“Her name is Rosie,” this was the substance of the stammered introduction.

“Indeed!” I replied. “And you were right about her eyes; they are blue.”

Dickie flushed guiltily and hastily got on his feet.

“Come on,” he said; “I guess we’d better be going.”

Very frankly Rosie looked her opinion of me as we left. It was interesting to note the elaborate strategy used by Dickie to conceal the fact that he waved his handkerchief to her. There ensued a long silence between us, but of this Dickie seemed unconscious. He broke it by whistling “Bedelia” two notes off the key.

“It’s too bad, Dickie,” I said, finally, “that you dislike girls so much.”

“They’re a silly lot,” said Dickie, with a brave effort at a tired drawl.

“But Rosie, now – ”

“Oh, she’s not like the rest of them. She’s rather jolly.”

“Conceited little beggar, though, I suppose?”

“No, sir; not a bit. She’s just the right kind.” Then Dickie flushed and the conversation lapsed suddenly.

We were to go sailing on the river next morning, but when the time came Dickie pleaded delay. He had “promised to take a book to a friend.” He would be back in a few minutes. Two hours did Dickie take for that errand, and I began to think that perhaps my joking had been unwise.

Dickie now entered upon a chronic state of being “togged up.” He treasured faded flowers, raising hue and cry because the maid threw out a wilted peony which he had enshrined in a vase on his chiffonier. Once he almost fell into the river rescuing an envelope which had slipped from his pocket. The treasure it contained seemed to be a lock of dark hair. His spending money went for fancy chocolates, which I did not see him eat.

Such were the beginnings of this tremendous affair.

Very gentle and serious Dickie became in these days, moods new to him. Also he took to reading poetry. Scott’s “Marmion,” about the only piece of verse with which he had been on speaking acquaintance, he abandoned for fragments of “Locksley Hall” and “Lucille.” His musical taste underwent like change. The rollicking college airs he was accustomed to whistle with more vigor than accuracy gave place to “Tell Me, Pretty Maiden,” and “Annie Laurie.” These he executed quite as inaccurately, but – and this was some relief – in minor key.

Sitting in the sacred hush of the moonlight, we had long talks on sober subjects not at all related to “revolving wedges” and “guards back formation,” on which he had been wont to discourse. With uneasy conscience I meditated on the amazing alchemy, potent in young and tender passion.

One morning a grinning youngster with big blue eyes, like Rosie’s, handed me a note. It was rather sticky to the touch, by reason of the candy with which the messenger had been paid. It bore no address. “Darlingest Dearest – ” Thus far I read, then folded it promptly and put it in my pocket.

The note was still there the next afternoon when, jibing our sail, we came abruptly on an unexpected scene. In a smart cedar rowboat, such as they have for hire at the summer hotel, an athletic youth wielded a pair of long, spruce oars. Facing him, with her back toward us and leaning comfortably against the chair seat in the stern, was a pretty girl in white.

“Why,” said I, with perhaps a suspicion of relief, “I believe that is Rosie.”

Dickie, gripping the tiller hard, was staring as one in a trance. My words roused him.

“Rosie? What Rosie?” said he.

“Why, the one who gave you the cherries.”

“Is it?” asked Dickie, stoically. Then, with studied carelessness and devilish abandon: “I say, old man, toss me a cigar, will you? I feel like having a smoke.”

After dinner I found Dickie in his room. There was a scent of burned paper in the air and fresh ashes were in the grate. The mercury was close to ninety.