Nobody

"Some folks doos," returned Mr. Sears. "These here folks knows what'sgood. Wait till you see. I tell you! long clams, fresh digged, andb'iled as soon as they're fetched in, is somethin' you never see beat."

"Long clams," repeated the lady. "Are they not the usual sort?"

"Depends on what you're used to. These is usual here, and I'm gladon't. Round clams ain't nowheres alongside o' 'em."

He went off to fill the kettle, and the lady returned slowly round thehouse to the steps and the door, which were on the sea side. Mr. Lenoxhad gone in and was talking to Mrs. Armadale; Mrs. Barclay was in herold position on the steps, looking out to sea. There was a wonderfullight of westering rays on land and water; a rich gleam from brown rockand green seaweed; a glitter and fresh sparkle on the waves of theincoming tide; an indescribable freshness and life in the air and inthe light; a delicious invigoration in the salt breath of the ocean.Mrs. Barclay sat drinking it all in, like one who had been longathirst. Mrs. Lenox stood looking, half cognizant of what was beforeher, more than half impatient and scornful of it; yet even on her thewitchery of the place and the scene was not without its effect.

"Do you come here often?" she asked Mrs. Barclay.

"Never so often as I would like."

"I should think you would be tired to death!"

Then, as Mrs. Barclay made no answer, she looked at her watch.

"Our train is not till ten o'clock," she remarked.

"Plenty of time," said the other. And then there was silence; and thesun's light grew more westering, and the sparkle on earth and watermore fresh, and the air only more and more sweet; till two figures werediscerned approaching the bathing-house, carrying hoes slung over theirshoulders, and baskets, evidently filled, in their hands. They wentround the house towards the cook-house; and Mrs. Barclay came down fromher seat and went to meet them there, Mrs. Lenox following.

Two such figures! Sun-bonnets shading merry faces, flushed withbusiness; blue flannel bathing-suits draping very unpicturesquely thepersons, bare feet stained with mud, – baskets full of the delicate fishthey had been catching.

"What a quantity!" exclaimed Mrs. Barclay.

"Yes, because I had aunt Anne to help. We cannot boil them all at once, but that is all the better. They will come hot and hot."

"You don't mean that you are going to cook all those?" said Mrs. Lenoxincredulously.

"There will not be one too many," said Lois. "You do not know longclams yet."

"They are ugly things!" said the other, with a look of great disgustinto the basket. "I don't think I could touch them."

"There's no obligation," responded here Mrs. Marx. She had thrown onebasketful into a huge pan, and was washing them free from the mud andsand of their original sphere. "It's a free country. But looks don'tprove much – neither at the shore nor anywhere else. An ugly shell oftencovers a good fish. So I find it; and t'other way."

"How do you get them?" inquired Mr. Lenox, who also came now to thedoor of the cook-house. Lois made her escape. "I see you make use ofhoes."

"Yes," said Mrs. Marx, throwing her clams about in the water with greatenergy; "we dig for 'em. See where the clam lives, and then drive athim, and don't be slow about it; and then when the clam spits at you, you know you're on his heels – or on his track, I should say; and youtake care of your eyes and go ahead, till you catch up with him; andthen you've got him. And every one you throw into your basket you feelgladder and gladder; in fact, as the basket grows heavy, your heartgrows light. And that's diggin' for long clams."

"The best part of it is the hunt, isn't it?"

"I'll take your opinion on that after supper."

Mr. Lenox laughed, and he and his wife sauntered round to the frontagain. The freshness, the sweetness, the bright rich colouring of skyand water and land, the stillness, the strangeness, the novelty, allmoved Mr. Lenox to say,

"I would not have missed this for a hundred dollars!"

"Missed what?" asked his wife.

"This whole afternoon."

"It's one way that people live, I suppose."

"Yes, for they really do live; there is no stagnation; that is onething that strikes me."

"Don't you want to buy a farm here, and settle down?" asked Mrs. Lenoxscornfully. "Live on hymns and long clams?"

Meanwhile the interior of the bathing-house was changing its aspect.Part of the partition of boards had been removed and a long tableimprovised, running the length of the house, and made of planks laid ontrestles. White cloths hid the rudeness of this board, and dishes andcups and viands were giving it a most hospitable look. A whiff ofcoffee aroma came now and then through the door at the back of thehouse, which opened near the place of cookery; piles of white bread andbrown gingerbread, and golden butter and rosy ham and new cheese, madea most abundant and inviting display; and, after the guests wereseated, Mr. Sears came in bearing a great dish of the clams, smokinghot.

Well, Mrs. Lenox was hungry, through the combined effects of salt airand an early dinner; she found bread and butter and coffee and ham mostexcellent, but looked askance at the dish of clams; which, however, shesaw emptied with astonishing rapidity. Noticing at last a striking heapof shells beside her husband's plate, the lady's fastidiousness gaveway to curiosity; and after that, – it was well that another big dishfulwas coming, or somebody would have been obliged to go short.

At ten o'clock that evening Mr. and Mrs. Lenox took the night train to

Boston.

"I never passed a pleasanter afternoon in my life," was the gentleman'scomment as the train started.

"Pretty faces go a great way always with you men!" answered his wife.

"There is something more than a pretty face there. And she isimproved – changed, somehow – since a year ago. What do you think now ofyour brother's choice, Julia?"

"It would have been his ruin!" said the lady violently.

"I declare I doubt it. I am afraid he'll never find a better. I amafraid you have done him mistaken service."

"George, this girl is nobody."

"She is a lady. And she is intelligent, and she is cultivated, and shehas excellent manners. I see no fault at all to be found. Tom does notneed money."

"She is nobody, nevertheless, George! It would have been miserable forTom to lose all the advantage he is going to have with his wife, and tomarry this girl whom no one knows, and who knows nobody."

"I am sorry for poor Tom!"

"George, you are very provoking. Tom will live to thank mamma and meall his life."

"Do you know, I don't believe it. I am glad to see she's all right, anyhow. I was afraid at the Isles she might have been bitten."

"You don't know anything about it," returned his wife sharply. "Womendon't show. I think she was taken with Tom."

"I hope not!" said the gentleman; "that's all I have to say."

CHAPTER XXXII

A VISITOR

After that summer day, the time sped on smoothly at Shampuashuh; untilthe autumn coolness had replaced the heat of the dog days, and hayharvest and grain harvest were long over, and there began to be asuspicion of frost in the air. Lois had gathered in her pears, and wasgarnering her apples. There were two or three famous apple trees in theLothrop old garden, the fruit of which kept sound and sweet all throughthe winter, and was very good to eat.

One fair day in October, Mrs. Barclay, wanting to speak with Lois, wasdirected to the garden and sought her there. The day was as mild assummer, without summer's passion, and without spring's impulses of hopeand action. A quiet day; the air was still; the light was mellow, notbrilliant; the sky was clear, but no longer of an intense blue; thelittle racks of cloud were lying supine on its calm depths, apparentlyhaving nowhere to go and nothing to do. The driving, sweeping, changingforms of vapour, which in spring had come with rain and in summer hadcome with thunder, had all disappeared; and these little delicate linesof cloud lay purposeless and at rest on the blue. Nature had done herwork for the year; she had grown the grass and ripened the grain, andmanufactured the wonderful juices in the tissues of the fruit, and laida new growth of woody fibre round the heart of the trees. She wasresting now, as it were, content with her work. And so seemed Lois tobe doing, at the moment Mrs. Barclay entered the garden. It was unusualto find her so. I suppose the witching beauty of the day beguiled her.But it was of another beauty Mrs. Barclay thought, as she drew near thegirl.

A short ladder stood under one of the apple trees, upon which Lois hadbeen mounting to pluck her fruit. On the ground below stood two largebaskets, full now of the ruddy apples, shining and beautiful. Besidethem, on the dry turf, sat Lois with her hands in her lap; and Mrs.Barclay wondered at her as she drew near.