Sisters Read online

  Produced by Stephen Hutcheson, Rod Crawford, Dave Morganand the Online Distributed Proofreading Team athttps://www.pgdp.net

  "Will you do me the favor to stand in front of this long mirror with me?" (Page 305)

  SISTERS

  _By_ GRACE MAY NORTH

  THE SAALFIELD PUBLISHING COMPANY Akron, Ohio New York

  Copyright MCMXXVIII THE SAALFIELD PUBLISHING COMPANY _Made in the United States of America_

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER PAGE I. How It Began 3 II. Jenny 15 III. Forlorn Etta 21 IV. A Pitiful Plight 28 V. Friends in Need 39 VI. Wanted, a Waitress 45 VII. Jenny's Teacher 59 VIII. An Adventure Filled Day 75 IX. An Old Friend Appears 88 X. Brother and Sister 94 XI. Views and Reviews 99 XII. Plots and Plays 105 XIII. Ferns and Friends 108 XIV. Dearest Desires 116 XV. Peers or Pigs 125 XVI. Good News 133 XVII. Pride Meets Pride 138 XVIII. A New Experience 145 XIX. A Welcome Guest 151 XX. Ingratitude Personified 168 XXI. A Second Meeting 178 XXII. Revelations and Regrets 186 XXIII. Mother and Son 194 XXIV. Harold and Charles 201 XXV. A Jolly Plan 207 XXVI. A Rustic Cabin 217 XXVII. Fun as Farmers 222 XXVIII. A Difficult Promise 232 XXIX. The Haughty Gwynette 238 XXX. Gwyn's Awakening 249 XXXI. Conflicting Emotions 257 XXXII. Three Girls 266 XXXIII Gwynette's Choice 279 XXXIV An Agreeable Surprise 289 XXXV A Birthday Cake 293 XXXVI Sisters 302

  SISTERS

  CHAPTER I. HOW IT BEGAN

  Gold and blue were the colors that predominated on one glorious Aprilday. Gold were the fields of poppies that carpeted the foothillsstretching down to the very edge of Rocky Point, against which thejewel-blue Pacific lapped quietly. It was at that hour of the tides whenthe surf is stilled.

  A very old adobe house surrounded on three sides by wide verandas, thepillars of which were eucalyptus logs, stood about two hundred feet backfrom the point. Rose vines, clambering at will over the picturesque olddwelling, were a riot of colors. There was the exquisite pink CecilBrunner in delicate, long-stemmed clusters; Gold of Ophir blossoms in amass glowing in the sunshine, while intertwined were the vines of thestar-like white Cherokee and Romona, the red.

  Mingled with their fragrance was the breath of heliotrope which grew,bushwise, at one corner so luxuriantly that often it had to be cut awaylest it cover the gravel path which led around the house to the orchard.There, under fruit trees that were each a lovely bouquet of pearly bloom,stood row after row of square white hives, while bees, busy at honeygathering, buzzed everywhere.

  Now and then, clear and sweet, rose the joyous song of mating birds.

  A little old woman, seated in a rustic rocker on the western side porch,dropped her sewing on her lap and smiled on the scene with blissfulcontent. What a wonderful world it was and how happy she and Silas hadbeen since Jenny came. She glanced across the near gardens, aglow withearly bloom, to a patch of ploughed brown earth where an old man wascultivating between rows of green shoots, some of them destined toproduce field corn for the cow and chickens, and the rest sweet corn forthe sumptuous table of Mrs. Poindexter-Jones.

  Then the gaze of the little old woman continued a quarter of a mile alongthe rocky shore to a grove of sycamore trees, where stood the castle-likehome of the richest woman in Santa Barbara township. Only the topmostturrets could be seen above the towering treetops. The vast grounds weresurrounded by a high cypress hedge, and, not until he reached the wroughtiron gates could a passer-by obtain a view of the magnificence that laywithin. But the little old woman knew it all in detail, as she had beenhousekeeper there for many years, until, in middle-age, she had marriedSilas Warner, who managed the farm for Mrs. Algernon Poindexter-Jones.

  For the past fifteen years the happy couple had lived in the old adobehouse at Rocky Point, while at Poindexter Arms, as the beautiful estatewas named, there had been a succession of housekeepers and servants, fortheir mistress was domineering and hard to please.

  Of late years the grand dame had seldom been seen by the kindly oldfarmer, Si Warner and his wife, for Mrs. Poindexter-Jones had preferredto live in her equally palatial home in San Francisco overlooking theGolden Gate.

  She visited Santa Barabra periodically, merely to assure herself that herorders were being carried out by the servants left in charge ofPoindexter Arms and Rocky Point farm. Often Mrs. Si Warner did not catcha glimpse of their employer on these fleeting visits, and yet she wellknew that the imperious mistress of millions was linked more closely thanshe liked to remember to the old couple at Rocky Point.

  As she resumed her sewing, memory recalled to her that long ago incidentwhich, by the merest chance, had made the proud woman and the humble,sharers of a secret which neither had cared to divulge.

  It had been another spring day such as this, only they had all beenyounger by fourteen years.

  While ploughing in the lot nearest the highway, Farmer Si had noticed astrange equipage drawn to one side of the road. He thought little of itat first, believing it to be a traveling tinsmith, as the canopied wagonwas evidently furnished with household utensils, but, when an hour later,he again reached that side of the field and saw the patient horse stillstanding there with drooping head and no one in sight, his curiosity wasaroused, and, leaping over the rail fence, he went to investigate.

  Under that weather-stained canopy a sad tragedy had been enacted. On thedriver's seat a young man, clothed in a garb of a clergyman, seemed to besleeping, but a closer scrutiny revealed to the farmer that the Angel ofDeath had visited the little home on wheels. For a home it evidently hadbeen. In the roomier part of the wagon a beautiful little girl of threesat on a stack of folded bedding, while in a crude box-like crib a sicklylooking infant lay sleeping.

  Whenever Mrs. Silas Warner recalled that long ago day, she againexperienced the varying emotions which had come to her following eachother in rapid succession. She had been ironing when she had seen a queercanopied equipage coming up the lane which led from the highway.Believing it to be a peddlar, who now and then visited their farm, shehad gone
to the side porch, there to have her curiosity greatly arousedby the fact that it was her husband Si who was on the seat of the driver.Then her surprise had been changed to alarm when she learned of the threewho were under the canopy. Awe, because she was in the presence of death,and tender sympathy for the little ones, who had evidently been orphaned,mingled in the heart of the woman as she held the scrawny, crying infantthat her husband had given to her. Even with all these crowding emotionsthere had yet been room for admiration, when the little three-year-oldgirl was lifted down. The child stood apart, quiet and aloof. She hadheard them say that her father was dead. She was too young to understandand so she just waited. A rarely beautiful child, with a tangled mass oflight brown, sun-glinted hair hanging far below her shoulders, and wide,wondering brown eyes that were shaded with long curling lashes.

  But still another emotion had been stirred in the heart of Susan Warner,for a most unexpected and unusual visitor had at that moment arrived. Acoach, bearing the Poindexter Arms, turned into the lane, and when theliveried footman threw open the door, there sat no less a personage thanthe grand dame, Mrs. Algernon Poindexter-Jones, on one of her veryinfrequent visits to the farm which belonged to her estate. She had beencharmed with the little girl, and after having heard the story, sheannounced that she would keep the child until relatives were found. Thenshe was driven away, without having stated her errand, and accompanyingher, still quietly aloof, rode the three-year-old girl. A doctor andcoroner soon arrived, having been summoned by Mrs. Poindexter-Jones. Thelatter had searched the effects of the dead man and had found anunfinished letter addressed to a bishop in the Middle West. In it the manhad told of his wife's death, and that he was endeavoring to keep on withhis traveling missionary work in outlying mountain districts, but thathis heart attacks were becoming threateningly more frequent. "There is norelative in all the world with whom to leave Gwynette, who is now three,and little Jeanette, who is completing her first year." No more had beenwritten.

  After the funeral Mrs. Poindexter-Jones had announced that she wouldadopt the older child and that, if they wished, the farmer and his wifemight keep the scrawny baby on one condition, and that was that the girlsshould never be told that they were sisters. To this the childless couplehad rejoicingly agreed. The doctor and coroner had also been sworn tosecrecy. The dead man's effects were stored in the garret above the oldadobe and the incident was closed.

  Mrs. Poindexter-Jones left almost at once for Europe, where she hadremained for several years.

  Tenderly loved, and nourished with the best that the farm could produce,the scrawny, ill-looking infant had gradually changed to a veritablefairy of sunshine. "Jenny," as they called her, feeling that Jeanette wasa bit too grand, walked with a little skipping step from the time thatshe was first sure that she would not tumble, and looked up, withlaughter in her lovely eyes, that were the same liquid brown as were hersister's, and tossed back her long curls that were also light brown withthreads of sunlight in them. And ever after, there were little skippingsteps to her walk, and, when she talked, it seemed as though at anymoment she might break into song.

  Jenny had never questioned her origin. She had always been with GrannySue and Granddad Si, and so, of course, that proved that she belonged tothem. She was too happy, just being alive, to create problems for herselfto solve, and too busy.

  There had been too few children on the neighboring ranches to maintain acountry school, and Jenny had been too young to send on a bus to SantaBarbara each day, but her education had not been neglected, for acharming and cultured young woman living not far away had taught herthrough the years, and she had learned much that other girls of her agedid not know.

  When the weather was pleasant Jenny, her school books under her arm,walked to the hill-top home of her teacher, Miss Dearborn, but during therainy season her grandfather hitched their faithful Dobbin to theold-fashioned, topped buggy and drove her to her destination in themorning, calling for her in the late afternoon.

  But on one wild March day when Jenny had been thirteen, an unexpectedstorm had overtaken her as she was walking home along the coast highway.

  Luckily she had worn her mackintosh, but as she was passing between wide,treeless meadows that reached to the sea on one side and a briary hill onthe other, there had been no shelter in sight.

  However, a low gray car had soon appeared around a bend and the driver, ayouth whose face was hidden by cap, collar and goggles, had offered her aride. Gladly she had accepted and had been taken to her home, where, toher surprise, Grandmother Sue had welcomed the lad with sincerestpleasure. That had been the first time Jenny Warner had met Harold, theonly son of their employer, Mrs. Poindexter-Jones.

  His visit had brought consternation to the little family at Rocky Point,for, inadvertently, he had told the old man that his mother plannedselling the farm when she could find a suitable buyer.

  The old woman sitting on the side porch dropped her sewing to her lap asshe recalled that long-ago scene in the kitchen.

  The farmer had been for the moment almost stunned by the news, thenlooking up at the boy with a pitiful attempt at a smile, he had saidwaveringly:

  "I reckon you see how 'tis, Harry-boy. We've been livin' here at RockyPoint so long, it's sort o' got to feelin' like home to us, but you tellyour ma that the Warners'll be ready to move when she says the word."

  The boy had been much affected, and, after assuring them that perhaps abuyer would not be found, he had taken his departure.

  When he had gone, Jenny had cuddled in her grandfather's arms and he hadheld her close. Susan Warner remembered that the expression on his facehad been as though he were thanking God that they had their "gal". Withher irrepressible enthusiasm the girl had exclaimed:

  "I have the most wonderful plan! Let's buy Rocky Point Farm, and then itwill be all our very own."

  "Lawsy, child," Susan Warner had remonstrated, "it'd cost a power o'money, and it's but a few hundred that we've laid by."

  But Jenny had a notion that she wanted to try out. "Granny, granddad,"she turned from first one to the other and her voice was eager, earnest,pleading: "Every Christmas since I can remember you've given me afive-dollar gold piece to be saving for the time when I might be allalone in the world. I want to spend them now." Then she unfolded herplan. She wanted to buy hens and bees. "You were a wonderful beekeeperwhen you were a boy, granddad," she insisted. "You have told me so timeand again, and I just know that I can sell eggs and honey to the richpeople over on the foothill estates, and then, when we have saved moneyenough, we can buy the farm and have it for our very own home forever andever."

  The old couple knew that this would be impossible, but, since they hadnot the heart to disappoint their darling, the scheme had been tried.Every Saturday morning during the summer that she had been thirteen,Jenny, high on the buckboard seat, had driven old Dobbin up and down thelong winding tree-hung lanes in the aristocratic foothill suburb of SantaBarbara. At first her wares were only eggs from her flocks of whiteMinorka hens, but, when she was fourteen, jars of golden strained honeywere added, and gradually, among her customers, she came to be known as"The Honey Girl" from Rocky Point Farm. And now Jenny was fifteen.

  Susan Warner was startled from her day-dreams by the shrill whistle ofthe rural mail carrier. Neatly folding her sewing (and Granny Sue wouldneatly fold her sewing if she were running away from a fire), the oldwoman went to the side porch nearest the lane where the elderly Mr.Pickson was then stopping to leave the Rural Weekly for Mr. Silas Warnerand a note from Miss Isophene Granger for "The Honey Girl."

  "I reckon it's a fresh order for honey or eggs or such," the smiling oldwoman told him. The mail carrier agreed with her.

  "I reckon 'tis! There's a parcel o' new girls over to the seminary," washis comment as he turned his horse's head toward the gate, then with ashort nod he drove away.

  Susan Warner went back into the kitchen, and, feeling sure that the notewas not of a private nature, she unfolded the paper and read the message,which w
as couched in the formal language habitually used by the principalof the fashionable seminary.

  "Miss Isophene Granger desires six dozen eggs to be delivered thisafternoon not later than five."

  The old woman glanced at the clock. "Tut! Tut! And here it's close tothree. I reckon I'd better be gatherin' the eggs this once. Jenny saysit's her work, but it'll be all she can do to get there, with Dobbin tohitch and what not."

  Taking her sunbonnet from its hook by the kitchen door, the old womanwent out to the barnyard where, in neat, wired-in spaces, there wereseveral flocks of white Minorka hens. After filling the large basket thatshe carried with eggs, Susan Warner returned through the blossomingorchard, and although she was unconscious of it, she smiled and nodded atthe bees that were so busily gathering honey; then she thought of hergirl.

  "Dear lovin' child that she is!" The faded blue eyes of the old womanwere tender. "Si and me never lets on that her plan can't come tonothin'. 'Twould nigh break her heart. All told there's not more'n sevenhundred now in the bank, an' the farm, when they come to sell it, is liketo bring most that an acre, or leastwise so Pa reckons."

  But later, as Susan Warner was sorting the eggs and placing them in boxesholding a dozen each, she took a more optimistic view of the matter.

  "It's well to be workin' and savin', how-some-ever," she concluded. "Ourdarlin'll need it all an' more when her granddad an me are took." Then,before the old woman could wipe away the tears that always came when shethought of leaving Jenny, her eyes brightened, and, peering out of awindow near she exclaimed aloud (although there was only a canary tohear), "Wall now, here comes Jenny this minute, singin' and skippin' upthe lane, like the world couldn't hold a trouble. Bless the happy heartof her!"