And, having thus weakly rid myself of care and responsibility, I began to enjoy that life. To enjoy the freedom of it, and the novelty of the surroundings, and the friendship of the good people who were our neighbors. Yes, and to enjoy the home life, the afternoons on the tennis court or the golf course, the evenings in the drawing-room, the "teas"

on the lawn--either our lawn or someone else's--the chats together across the dinner-table; to enjoy it all; and, more astonishing still, to accept the companionship of the young person who was responsible for our living in that way as a regular and understood part of that life.

Not that I understood the young person herself; no Bayport quahaug, who had shunned female companionship as I had for so long, could be expected to understand the whims and changing moods of a girl like Frances Morley. At times she charmed and attracted me, at others she tormented and irritated me. She argued with me one moment and disagreed the next.

She laughed at Hephzy's and my American accent and idioms, but when Bayliss, Junior, or one of the curates ventured to criticize an "Americanism" she was quite as likely to declare that she thought it "jolly" and "so expressive." Against my will I was obliged to join in conversations, to take sides in arguments, to be present when callers came, to make calls. I, who had avoided the society of young people because, being no longer young, I felt out of place among them, was now dragged into such society every day and almost every evening. I did not want to be, but Little Frank seemed to find mischievous pleasure in keeping me there.

"It is good for you," she said, on one occasion, when I had sneaked off to my room and the company of the "British Poets." "Auntie says you started on your travels in order to find something new to write about.

You'll never find it in those musty books; every poem in them is at least seventy years old. If you are going to write of England and my people you must know something about those that are alive."

"But, my dear young lady," I said, "I have no intention of writing of your people, as you call them."

"You write of knights and lords and ladies and queens. You do--or you did--and you certainly know nothing about THEM."

I was quite a bit ruffled. "Indeed!" said I. "You are quite sure of that, are you?"

"I am," decidedly. "I have read 'The Queen's Amulet' and no queen on earth--in England, surely--ever acted or spoke like that one. An American queen might, if there was such a thing."

She laughed and, provoked as I was, I could not help laughing with her.

She had a most infectious laugh.

"My dear young lady--" I began again, but she interrupted me.

"Don't call me that," she protested. "You're not the Archbishop of Canterbury visiting a girl's school and making a speech. You asked me not to call you 'Uncle Hosea.' If you say 'dear young lady' to me again I shall address you publicly as 'dear old Nunky.' Don't be silly."

I laughed again. "But you ARE young," I said.

"Well, what of it. Perhaps neither of us likes to be reminded of our age. I'm sure you don't; I never saw anyone more sensitive on the subject. There! there! put away those silly old books and come down to the drawing-room. I'm going to sing. Mr. Worcester has brought in a lot of new music."

Reluctantly I closed the volume I had in my hand.

"Very well," I said; "I'll come if you wish. But I shall only be in the way, as I always am. Mr. Worcester didn't plead for my company, did he?

Do you know I think he will bear up manfully if I don't appear."

She regarded me with disapproval.

"Don't be childish in your old age," she snapped, "Are you coming?"

I went, of course, and--it may have been by way of reward--she sang several old-fashioned, simple ballads which I had found in a dog's-eared portfolio in the music cabinet and which I liked because my mother used to sing them when I was a little chap. I had asked for them before and she had ignored the request.

This time she sang them and Hephzy, sitting beside me in the darkest corner reached over and laid a hand on mine.

"Her mother all over again," she whispered. "Ardelia used to sing those."

Next day, on the tennis court, she played with Herbert Bayliss against Worcester and me, and seemed to enjoy beating us six to one. The only regret she expressed was that she and her partner had not made it a "love set."

Altogether she was a decidedly vitalizing influence, an influence that was, I began to admit to myself, a good one for me. I needed to be kept alive and active, and here, in this wide-awake household, I couldn't be anything else. The future did not look as dull and hopeless as it had when I left Bayport. I even began to consider the possibilities of another novel, to hope that I might write one. Jim Campbell's "prescription," although working in quite a different way from that which he and I had planned, was working nevertheless.

Matthews, at the Camford Street office, was forwarding my letters and honoring my drafts with promptness. I received a note each week from Campbell. I had written him all particulars concerning Little Frank and our move to the rectory, and he professed to see in it only a huge joke.

"Tell your Miss Cahoon," he wrote, "that I am going to turn Spiritualist right away. I believe in dreams now, and presentiments and all sorts of things. I am trying to dream out a plot for a novel by you. Had a roof-garden supper the other night and that gave me a fine start, but I'll have to tackle another one before I get sufficient thrills to furnish forth one of your gems. Seriously though, old man, this whole thing will do you a world of good. Nothing short of an earthquake would have shaken you out of your Cape Cod dumps and it looks to me as if you and--what's her name--Hephzibah, had had the quake. What are you going to do with the Little Frank person in the end? Can't you marry her off to a wealthy Englishman? Or, if not that, why not marry her yourself?

She'd turn a dead quahaug into a live lobster, I should imagine, if anyone could. Great idea! What?"

His "great idea" was received with the contempt it deserved. I tore up the letter and threw it into the waste basket.

But Hephzy herself spoke of matrimony and Little Frank soon after this. We were alone together; Frances had gone on a horseback ride with Herbert Bayliss and a female cousin who was spending the day at "Jasmine Gables."

"Hosy," said Hephzy, "do you realize the summer is half over? It's the middle of July now."

So it was, although it seemed scarcely possible.

"Yes," she went on. "Our lease of this place is up the first of October.

We shall be startin' for home then, I presume likely, sha'n't we."

"I suppose so. We can't stay over here indefinitely. Life isn't all skittles and--and tea."

"That's so. I don't know what skittles are, but I know what tea is. Land sakes! I should say I did. They tell me the English national flower is a rose. It ought to be a tea-plant blossom, if there is such a thing.

Hosy," with a sudden return to seriousness, "what are we goin' to do with--with HER when the time comes for us to go?"

"I don't know," I answered.

"Are you going to take her to America with us?"

"I don't know."

"Humph! Well, we'll have to know then."

"I suppose we shall; but," defiantly, "I'm not going to worry about it till the time comes."

"Humph! Well, you've changed, that's all I've got to say. 'Twan't so long ago that you did nothin' BUT worry. I never saw anybody change the way you have anyway."

"In what way?"

"In every way. You aren't like the same person you used to be. Why, through that last year of ours in Bayport I used to think sometimes you were older than I was--older in the way you thought and acted, I mean.

Now you act as if you were twenty-one. Cavortin' around, playin' tennis and golf and everything! What has got into you?"

"I don't know. Jim Campbell's prescription is taking effect, I guess.

He said the change of air and environment would do me good. I tell you, Hephzy, I have made up my mind to enjoy life while I can. I realize as well as you do that the trouble is bound to come, but I'm not going to let it trouble me beforehand. And I advise you to do the same."

"Well, I've been tryin' to, but sometimes I can't help wonderin' and dreadin'. Perhaps I'm havin' my dread for nothin'. It may be that, by the time we're ready to start for Bayport, Little Frank will be provided for."

"Provided for? What do you mean?"

"I mean provided for by somebody else. There's at least two candidates for the job: Don't you think so?"

"You mean--"

"I mean Mr. Worcester and Herbert Bayliss. That Worcester man is a gone case, or I'm no judge. He's keepin' company with Frances, or would, if she'd let him. 'Twould be funny if she married a curate, wouldn't it."

"Not very," I answered. "Married life on a curate's salary is not my idea of humor."