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Cinder Pond, The

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<h3>CHAPTER II</h3> <h4>PART OF THE TRUTH</h4> Roger, with his rather long hair carefully brushed, sauntered downstairs to the nicely furnished dining-room, where his mother was eating breakfast. Mrs. Fairchild was a most attractive little woman. Like Roger, she was blue-eyed and fair. She was taller, however, than Roger and not nearly so wide. "Good morning," said she, with a very pleasant smile. "I guess we're both late this morning. Your father's been gone for twenty minutes." "Good morning," shivered Roger. "Dear me!" said Mrs. Fairchild, catching sight of her son's remarkably sleek head. "I do wish you wouldn't put so much water on your hair when you comb it. It isn't at all necessary and it looks horrid—particularly when it's so long. Do be more careful next time." "I will," promised Roger, helping himself to an orange. "It must have taken you a great while to dress. I thought I heard you stirring about hours ago." "Yes'm," returned Roger, looking anywhere except at his pretty mother. "I'm glad you remembered to put on your old clothes, since it's Saturday. But—why, Roger! What is that?" "That" was a thin, brownish stream, scarcely more than an elongated drop—trickling down the boy's wrist to the back of his plump hand. Roger looked at it with horror. His drenched, fleece-lined underwear was betraying him. Mrs. Fairchild pushed up his coat sleeve, turned back the damp cuff of his blue cotton shirt, and disclosed three inches of wet, close-fitting sleeve. She poked an investigating finger up her son's arm. Then her suspicious eye caught a curious change of color in the bosom of his blue shirt. It had darkened mysteriously in patches. She touched one of them. Then she reached up under his coat and felt his moist back. "Roger, how in the world did your shirt get so wet? Surely you didn't do all that washing yourself?" "No'm." "Have you been outdoors?" "Yes'm." "Watering the grass?" "No'm." "Hum—Katie says somebody dug a hole in my pansy bed last night. It's a splendid place for worms. Have you, by any chance, been trying your new pole?" Silence. "Have you, Roger?" "Ye—es'm," gulped Roger. "Did you fall in?" "Ye—es'm." "How did you get out?" "Jus—just climbed out." "Roger Fairchild! You're shivering! And that window wide open behind you! Come upstairs with me this instant and I'll put you to bed between hot blankets. It's a mercy I discovered those wet clothes. I'll have Katie bring you some hot broth the moment you're in bed." Roger, under a mountain of covers, was thankful that he hadn't had to divulge the important part Jeanne Duval had played in his rescue. All that morning, when his mother asked troublesome questions, he shivered so industriously that the anxious little woman fled for more hot blankets or more hot broth. The blankets were tiresome and he already held almost a whole boyful of broth; but anything, he thought, was better than telling that he had been pulled out of the lake in a smelly old fish net; and by a girl! A small girl at that. But, in spite of his care, the truth, or at least part of it, was to come out. The very next day, a small red-headed, barefooted, and very ragged boy appeared at the Fairchilds' back door. He carried a fish-pole in one hand, a navy-blue cap in the other. Inside the cap, neatly printed in indelible ink, were Roger's name and address; for Roger, like many another careless boy, frequently lost his belongings. "My sister," said Michael Duval, handing the cap and the pole to the cook, "sent these here. She pulled 'em out of the lake—same as she did the fat boy what lives here." "How was that, now?" asked Katie, with interest. "Wiv a fish net. It was awful deep where he fell in—way over your head." "Wait here, sonny. I'll tell the missus about it." But when Katie returned after telling "Missus," she found no small red-headed boy outside the door. Michael had turned shy, as small boys will, and had fled. Neither Katie nor Mrs. Fairchild, gazing down the street, could catch a glimpse of him. But Mrs. Fairchild managed to extract a little more information from Roger, now fully recovered from his unlucky bath. Yes, the water was deep—ten miles deep, he guessed—because it took an awful while to come up. Yes, he had been pulled out by somebody. Perhaps it might have been a girl. A big girl. A perfectly tremendous girl. A regular giantess, in fact. She had reached down with a long, long arm, and helped him up. A fishnet? Oh—yes (casually), he believed there was a fish net there. "Where," asked Mrs. Fairchild, "was that dock?" "Oh, I dunno—just around anywhere. There's a lot of docks in Bancroft—a fellow doesn't look to see which one he's on." "But, Roger, where does the girl live? We ought to do something for her. I'm very grateful to her. You ought to be too. Can't you tell me where she lives?" "Didn't ask her," mumbled Roger. "I just hiked for home." "And you don't know her name?" "No," said Roger, truthfully. "I didn't ask her that, either. I'm glad I got my pole back, anyhow." "Roger," said his mother, earnestly, "hereafter, when you go fishing, I shall go with you and sit beside you on the dock and hold on to you. Another time there might not be a great big, strong girl on hand to pull you out. We must thank that girl." "I hate girls," said Roger, who had finally escaped from his persistent mother. "And small ones—Yah!" The girl that he thought he hated most was eleven years of age, and small at that. Yet, because of her carefree, outdoor life, she was wiry and strong; as active, too, as a squirrel. Also, she did a great deal of thinking. Little Jeanne Duval loved the old wharf because it was all so beautiful. She liked the soft blackness of the cindery soil that covered the most sheltered portions of the worn-out dock. She liked the little sloping grass-grown banks that had formed at the inner sides of the dock, where it touched the Cinder Pond. She liked to lie flat, near the steep, straight outer edge of the dock, to look into the green, mysterious depths below. Anything might be down there, in that deep, deep water. The Cinder Pond was different. It was shallow. The water was warmer than that in the lake and very much quieter. There were small fish in it and a great many minnows. And in one sunny corner there were pollywogs and lively crawfish. Also bloodsuckers that were not so pleasant and a great many interesting water-bugs. Then there were flowers. Wherever there was a handful of soil, seeds had sprouted. Each spring brought new treasures to the old dock; each year the soil crept further lakeward; though the planking was still visible at the Duval corner of the wharf. The flowers near the shore were wonderful. Pink and white clover, with roses, bluebells, ox-eyed daisies, black-eyed Susans, wild forgetmenots, violets. And sometimes, seeds from the distant gardens on the high bluff back of the lake were carried down by the north wind; for, one summer, she had found a great, scarlet poppy; another time a sturdy flame-colored marigold. What she liked best, perhaps, was a picture that was visible from a certain point on Lake Street. That portion of the so-called street, for as far as the eye could reach, was road—a poor road at that. There were no houses; and the road was seldom used. From it, however, one saw the tall old smoke-stack, outlined against the sky, the long, low dock with its fringe of green shrubbery reflected in the quiet waters of the Cinder Pond; and beyond, the big lake, now blue, now green, or perhaps beaten to a froth by storm. Jeanne loved that lake. Seen from that distance, even the rambling shack that her father had built was beautiful, because its sagging, irregular roof made it picturesque. Jeanne couldn't have told you why this quiet spot was beautiful, but that was the reason. On the portion of the dock that ran eastward from the Duval house, there were a number of the big reels on which fishermen wind their nets. These, seen from the proper angle, made another picture. They were used by her father, Barney Turcott, and Captain Blossom. Barney and "Old Captain," as everybody called Captain Blossom, were her father's partners in the fishing business. Two of them went out daily to the nets, anchored several miles below the town of Bancroft. The third partner stayed on or near the wharf to sell fish to the chance customers who came (rather rarely indeed) on foot; in a creaking, leisurely wagon; or perhaps in a small boat from one of the big steamers docked across the Bay. Jeanne's playfellows were her half-brothers Michael, aged eight, Sammy, aged five, and Patsy, who was not quite two. Also her half-sister Annie, whose years were three and a half. Jeanne and her father were French, her stepgrandmother said. Her stepmother, Mollie, and all her children were mostly Irish. "But," said Jeanne, a wise little person for her years, "I love those children just as much as if we were all one kind." <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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