Chapter 3. Auf Das Wasser Zu Singen

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_ CHAPTER III. AUF DAS WASSER ZU SINGEN

"HARRY MONMOUTH!" said Colonel Ferrers. "This is pleasant. Merryweather, you are a lucky dog!" As he spoke, he looked around him, and repeated, "A lucky dog, sir!"

The horn had just blown for supper, three long blasts, and already the campers were in their places at the long table, with its shining white cover. Mr. and Mrs. Merryweather, their six children, Bell, Gertrude, and Kitty, Gerald, Philip, and Willy, the two Montforts, with the Colonel and his nephew, made a party of twelve, and filled the table comfortably, though there was still room for more. The room was a long one, with a vast open fireplace stretching half across one side. At one end were rows of book-shelves, filled to overflowing; at the other, the walls were adorned with models for boats, sketches in water-color and pen and ink, birds' nests, curious fungi, and all manner of odds and ends. It was certainly a cheerful room, and so Miles Merryweather thought, as his eyes followed the Colonel's.

"We like it!" he said, simply. "It suits us, the place and the life. It's good for young and old both, to get away from hurry and bustle, and live for a time the natural life."

"Nature, sir!" said the Colonel. "Nature! that's it; nothing like it! When I was a lad, young men were sent abroad, after their school or college course; the grand tour, Paris, Vienna, that sort of thing: very good thing in its way, too, monstrous good thing. But before he sees the world, sir, a lad should know how to live, as you say, the natural life. Ought to know what a tree is when he sees it; upon my soul, he ought. Now my milksop--best fellow in the world, I give you my word, except that little fellow at home there--well, sir! when he came to me, he didn't know the difference between an oak and an elm, give you my word he didn't. Remember one day--he heard me giving directions to Giuseppe about cutting some ashes--clump of them in the field below the house, needed thinning out--and he wanted to know how ashes could be cut; thought I meant those in the fireplace, sir. Monstrous! Well, I taught him a little, and you and your young folks have taught him a great deal. H'm! I don't know that he is now more disgracefully ignorant than nine-tenths of the young men of his age. Set of noodles! I'll tell you what, Merryweather! You ought to have a kind of summer school here: get other boys, a dozen, two dozen; teach 'em to see with their eyes, and all the rest of it. I knew a boy once who thought a bat was a bird, give you my word I did. And another who thought oysters grew on bushes. Get up a school, sir, and I'll come myself, and be a boy again."

"That is a great inducement," said Mr. Merryweather, laughing: "but, Colonel, I hope you have brought a boy's appetite with you, at least. Who are the cooks to-night, Miranda? Oh, I see; Bell and Jack. Well, that is all right, Colonel; they make one of our best combinations. What have you there, Jack?"

Jack, in a white cap, and an apron reaching not quite half-way to his knees, advanced bearing a mighty dish, from which rose fragrant steam.

"H'm! ha!" said the Colonel, sniffing. "Smells good! you had no hand in this, I'll be bound, sir!"

"Indeed, Colonel Ferrers," said Bell, who followed with the teapot and a plate piled high with feathery rolls, "it is all Jack's doing, every bit. It is his famous pilaff, that the old Greek professor taught him to make in Germany; and it is almost the best thing you ever tasted in your life."

"H'm!" said the Colonel, frowning heavily, and looking immensely pleased. "So this is what he was doing while he was supposed to be studying. I always knew the rascal was deceiving me. Ha! it _is_ good; it's uncommon good! So you did learn something besides fiddling, eh, Jack?"

"Cooking is a part of chemistry, Uncle," said Jack, soberly; "a very important part. This dish is chemically prepared, sir; please regard it as a demonstration!"

"And please try my fried potatoes as a further demonstration!" said Bell. "Margaret, you are not eating anything."

"She never does!" said Peggy.

"Oh!" cried Margaret, "but I never ate so much before. Oh, please not!" as Phil tried to heap her plate with potatoes. "They are delicious, but I really cannot!"

"I can!" said Gertrude, holding out her plate.

"I'll warrant you!" said Phil. "No one doubted that, sweet Chuck!"

"We do not look for the Camp Appetite till after twenty-four hours," said Mrs. Merryweather. "Give Margaret time! in two days she will eat twice as much as she does now."

"Harry Monmouth!" exclaimed the Colonel. "At that rate, it is fortunate for you all that I do not outstay my two days. Twice as much as I am eating now would clear your larder, dear madam. Yes, thanks, Merryweather, a little more!"

"Oh, Colonel Ferrers!"

"Oh, Uncle Tom! you are not going away in two days? We counted on a week at least!" cried all in chorus.

"Impossible, dear people, impossible! Like nothing better; enchanted to stay all summer; delightful place. But--Elizabeth Beadle's condition, you understand; and the boy--I must get back. He is too young to have the responsibility. Most amazing boy in the world; I haven't the slightest doubt that he is doing her more good than all the doctors in the world--parcel of fools, mostly--but still he is too young; I must get back."

"Let me go, Uncle!" said Jack.

"Or me, Colonel Ferrers!" cried Gertrude. "Any one of us would love to go!"

The Colonel beamed on them with his kindliest smile, but shook his head resolutely. "Thanks! thanks!" he said, heartily. "Good children! kind and thoughtful children! but I must go. Couldn't be easy, you understand."

"The fact is," said Jack, "Uncle Tom cannot be comfortable for more than twenty-four hours away from Hugh. After that length of time he becomes restive, and symptoms develop which--"

"Hold your tongue, sir!" cried the Colonel. "Nothing of the sort, sir! Mrs. Merryweather, I hoped you were teaching this fellow better manners. Symptoms, indeed! You have seen no symptoms in me, of anything except pure pleasure--pleasure in everything except the gabbling of a goose!"

"Surely not, dear friend!" said Mrs. Merryweather, laughing. "But all the same, I think I should not try to detain you when once you had made up your mind that Hugh needed you."

"All against me!" cried the Colonel. "'The little dogs and all'--I beg ten thousand pardons, my dear madam; you know the quotation! Well," he added, his face changing suddenly as he turned to Mrs. Merryweather and spoke in a lower tone, "fortunate old fellow, eh? to have one young face--two, perhaps, for my Giraffe loves me too--brighten when one comes. Ah! you, with all your wealth--richest woman of my acquaintance, give you my honor!--cannot tell what these boys mean to me. Hilda, too: most astonishing how I miss that child! but all your young people are so good to me--"

"Colonel!" cried Gertrude from the other end of the table. "Will you come with me in my canoe after tea?"

"Will I?" cried the Colonel. "Won't I? Lead the way, my dear!"

* * * * *

The young moon shone bright; the lake lay a broad sheet of luminous black, with a silver path stretching across it. Four canoes lay beside the wharf, and the campers were taking their places. In the birch canoe, the original _Cheemaun_, Mrs. Merryweather was going as passenger, with her husband and Phil at bow and stern; in the _Nahma_ was Colonel Ferrers, with Gertrude and Peggy; Kitty and Willy in the _Rob Roy_, Gerald and Margaret in the _Wenonah_.

"All ready?" asked the chief. "Where shall we go? Where are Jack and Bell?"

"Oh, they started ahead," said Phil. "They had some stunt on hand, and we are to meet them over by the Black Shore."

"Ready--give way all!"

The paddles dipped, the canoes shot out along the silver path, gliding swift and silent as spirits. For a time no one spoke. The _Cheemaun_, with the powerful arms at either end, took the lead and kept it easily: next came the _Nahma_ and the _Rob_, nearly abreast, and vying with each other; but the _Wenonah_ lagged behind, and seemed in no special hurry.

"Like it?" asked Gerald, presently.

"Oh!" said Margaret, softly.

Gerald gave a little grunt of content, and was silent again. The paddle dipped noiseless in the liquid silver, the dark prow crept noiseless along the shining way.

"It is another world!" said Margaret presently, still speaking under her breath. "I never dreamed of anything like it. A silver world! Oh!"

"What is it?"

"Nothing--I was only thinking--one ought to be very good, to live in a world so beautiful as this, Gerald!"

"Some of us are, Margaret!"

Silence again.

"I'm awfully glad you like it!" said Gerald. "I hoped you would. I've--I've been looking forward all summer to your coming."

"I was very glad to come," said Margaret, simply. "I was afraid, but I was glad, too."

"Afraid? I should like to know what you were afraid of!"

"Oh--I don't know! I have never been with many people, you know. I have never seen a large family together before. How happy you all are!"

"That's what we are!" said Gerald. "Especially now! I say, Margaret! the child Toots has fallen a victim."

"Fallen a--what do you mean, Gerald? not into the water?"

"Charms!" said Gerald. "Yours. Bowled her over completely. Nice child, the child Toots. Think so?"

"I think she looks as good as she is beautiful," said Margaret. "Does she really like me? I am very glad, for I know I shall love her."

"Don't you think she is the image of me?" asked Gerald, plaintively.

"No, I never thought of it!" said downright Margaret. "Oh! hark, Gerald; what is that? I hear music."

They listened. Directly in front of them lay a deep black shadow, and forth from this shadow stole notes of music, low, sweet, almost unearthly in their purity and clearness.

"Evidently the stunt of Tintinnabula and the Camelopard!" said Gerald. "That is the Black Shore yonder, and the noise is that of the Tree-browser's fiddle, in sooth a goodly noise. Approach we along the moonglade! that is what we call the wake here. Pretty?"

"Lovely!" murmured Margaret. "Oh! but hush, and listen!"

The other canoes had slackened their speed, and now all four crept on abreast over the luminous water. From the black shadow ahead forms began to detach themselves, black rocks, dark trees stooping to the water's edge, fir and pine, with here and there a white birch glimmering ghostlike; and still the music rose, ever clearer and sweeter, thrilling on the silent air. It seemed no voice of anything made by man; it was as if the trees spoke, the rocks, the water, the very silence itself. But now--now another tone was heard; a human voice this time, a full, rich contralto, blending with the aerial notes of the violin.

"Over all the mountains is peace;
Among the tree-tops
Hardly a breath is stirring;
The birds are silent,
Silent in the woodland;
Only wait! only wait!
Soon thou too shalt rest."

"Harry Monmouth!" murmured the Colonel under his breath. "Am I alive, or is this the gate of Heaven?"

"Oh! who is it?" whispered Margaret.

"Tintinnabula! rather a neat thing in voices, the Tintinnabula's. Nor does the song altogether excite to strenutation. Ah! but that is the best yet!"

The notes changed. It was Schubert's Serenade now that rose from voice and violin together. No one stirred. The canoes were now close inshore, and the long, soft fingers of fir and cedar brushed Margaret's cheek as she sat motionless, spellbound. It was a world of soft darkness, black upon black: the silver world they had just left seemed almost garish as she looked back on it. Here in the cool shadow, the voices of the night pouring forth their wonderful melody--"Oh!" she thought; "if this might last forever!"

But it was over. Floating round a great rock that stretched far out from the shore, they came upon the musicians, their canoe drawn up close to the rock.

"Here they are!" cried Willy. "It's Bell and Jack, Kitty; I knew it was. You are such a silly!"

"I don't care!" pouted Kitty. "It did sound like nymphs; I am sure that is just the way they sound."

"You are quite right, Kitty," said her mother. "Children, you have given us a great treat. May we not have some more?"

"Oh, we were only waiting for you," said Bell; "now we must have choruses, many of them!"

And lying close together, the paddles stretched across from one canoe to another, the Merryweathers sang, to Jack's accompaniment, song after song in chorus: German student songs, with merry refrain of "_vivallera la_" and "_juch heira sa sa!_" Scottish ballads and quaint old Highland boat-songs; till Mr. Merryweather declared that it was time to go home.

So home they went, down the moonglade once more, across the glimmering floor of the lake, singing as they went; till, twinkling through the fringe of trees, they saw the lights of the Camp, and the long outline of the float, and the boats swinging at their moorings. _

Read next: Chapter 4. After The Picnic

Read previous: Chapter 2. The Camp

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