CHAPTER THIRTEEN
THE TWO DRYADS
It was ten o’clock when Eva and Adele went to their room that night.
“Think of it!” Eva declared with shining eyes. “The orphans at the Home have been in their beds and sound asleep for two long hours. I feel as though I were a grown-up young lady, don’t you, Adele?”
“I do, indeed,” Adele replied, “but to-morrow morning we may sleep as late as we wish.”
“Oh, what a treat that will be!” Eva said, as she nestled down in the soft bed. “In the Home we have to be up at six.”
But, for all their resolution to sleep late, both of the girls were wide awake with the robins who lived in the apple-tree nearest the window. Eva sat up and exclaimed, “Oh, Adele, wouldn’t it be lovely on the top of Lookout Hill so early in the morning! I’ve often wanted to climb up there.”
“Let’s go!” Adele replied.
An hour later, the two girls, having breakfasted in the kitchen, even Kate, the cook, being still asleep, started out on the highway.
“I left a note at mother’s place on the table,” Adele said, “and I told her that we might be gone all the morning.”
Hand in hand the two girls skipped along the deserted road, through the village and out into the country.
There the dwellers in tree and grass were awake; no laggards were they.
“Good morning to you, little squirrel,” Eva called gayly, as a little red creature darted by. Adele noted with pleasure her friend’s shining face.
“Good-morning, meadow-lark,” she called to a bird which was perched on a fence-post, warbling its cheeriest song. Then, single file, they tripped over the little brown path which led across the Buttercup Meadows and on up the hill.
“Look at yonder gnarled oak-tree,” Adele exclaimed. “If we rapped upon it, do you suppose a door would open and a girl dryad would appear?”
“Oh!” Eva cried, as she stretched her arms out toward the glistening fields which lay below them. “I almost wish that I was a dryad and that I could live forever in the wonderful green out-of-doors.”
“Let’s play that we are dryads,” suggested Adele, who had not outgrown her delight in making-believe.
“Very well,” Eva gayly replied, as she began to unbraid her thick golden hair. “We’ll weave garlands of oak leaves and then we’ll dance on the hill-top.”
“Oh, Eva!” Adele cried admiringly. “You have the prettiest hair that I ever saw. You are like a fairytale princess, whose golden tresses hung like a mantle over her shoulders.”
“I’m glad,” Eva said simply. “I want to look nice to you. Now shake down your locks, my nut-brown maid, and I’ll crown you with these oak leaves.”
“We ought to have different names,” Adele declared. “You be Dryad Fern and I’ll be Dryad Oakleaf.” Then, taking Eva by the hand, she called merrily, “Come, Dryad Fern, let’s sing and dance, where the wild birds wing and the sunbeams glance.”
Away they went, skipping and singing, as graceful and lovely as two dryads could be. On the hill-top, just for the joy of it, Eva whirled about alone, and Adele, breaking a hollow reed, pretended to play upon it, when suddenly a strange voice called, “Lovely! Lovely! How lucky I am to meet two dryads!”
The girls turned and beheld a young woman who was seated in front of an easel. “Good morning, little dryads,” she said, with a pleasant smile. “You see I am painting that oak-tree on the hill-top. I was wishing for a dryad to appear, and lo, there you were! Now, here you go upon the canvas!”
“Oh, how beautiful!” Eva exclaimed, as she looked at the picture of the hill-top and the gnarled oak and the wide, sunny skies. “If I could paint like that I should be so happy.”
The artist looked at the girl with a bright smile. “Perhaps you could if you tried,” she said. “Have you done any sketching?”
“No,” Eva replied. “I have not had any chance.”
“I believe that you might have talent,” the artist said pleasantly. “I am Madge Peterson, from the city. My young brother and I are spending a fortnight at Little Bear Lake, and if you two dryads will go down to the inn with me, I’ll get my things and we’ll go sketching. How would you like that?”
“We’d love it!” Adele exclaimed, glad to have pleasant things happening, for she did so want this to be the happiest weekend of Eva’s whole life.
Soon the easel and paints were packed and Madge Peterson, who was little more than a girl herself, having just had her eighteenth birthday, beamed on her two new friends as she said, “Come now, little dryads; we will start on our downward way.”
“Oh,” exclaimed Adele, “I forgot something!”
“What?” asked Madge, looking up brightly.
“My manners,” Adele laughingly replied. “Miss Peterson, I never thought to tell you what our names are.”
“Why, yes you did,” Madge replied gayly. “You are Dryad Oakleaf and your friend is Dryad Fern.”
“Oh, but we change back to girls when we leave the oak-trees,” Adele said, as she began to braid her wavy brown hair, while Eva did the same to her golden locks.
“It’s a pity,” said Madge, who thought that she had never before met two lovelier girls.
“There!” Adele exclaimed when their hats were on. “Now, Miss Madge Peterson, from the city, permit me to introduce to you my friend, Eva Dearman, and myself, Adele Doring, from Sunnyside.”
“I am delighted to meet you,” Madge laughingly declared.
The path they were following was rounding the hill, and suddenly Eva stood still with an exclamation of joy.
“Adele,” she cried, “I didn’t know that there was such a lovely little lake on the other side of Lookout Hill. I have never been in this direction since I came to the Home.”
Poor Eva, suddenly realizing what she had said, blushed crimson, and then she hurriedly explained. “Oh, Miss Peterson, I’m just a girl from an Orphans’ Home, whom Adele is befriending, out of pity, I guess.”
“How can you say such a thing, Eva Dearman!” Adele exclaimed, with flashing eyes, as she put her arm around her friend. “I love you just as much as I do any of the Sunny Six, and my mother says that it doesn’t matter what clothes we wear or what house we live in; it’s what we are that counts.”
“That is indeed true,” Madge Peterson said kindly. “You are a princess among girls, Eva, and a princess is no less royal because, for a time, she is kept in a dungeon.” Then, to change their thought, Madge exclaimed: “See that sail-boat rounding Pine Island! There’s a merry breeze down there; you can tell by the ripple on the water. Why, whatever has happened? The sail-boat has tipped over. Come, let us hasten down to the shore and see if we can help.”
Hurriedly they scrambled through the berry-bushes to the edge of the lake. The up-turned sail-boat was drifting toward them, and a good-looking lad dressed in white was calmly sitting on the side of it.
“I declare if that isn’t my brother, Everett,” laughed Madge. Then, making a funnel of her hands, she called, “Ship ahoy!”
The lad, looking toward them, recognized his sister with a joyous shout, and, leaping into the water, he swam ashore and soon stood before them, dripping wet.
“Miss Doring and Miss Dearman,” exclaimed Madge mischievously, “may I present to you my young brother, Everett? If I had not claimed him, you might have mistaken him for a white water-rat, if such a creature exists.”
Everett made a deep bow as he gayly cried, “Young ladies, may I take you for a sail? My boat will be in directly.”
“You may row us out to Pine Island in about half an hour,” Madge declared, “and now we’ll leave you to your fate.”
“My brother is just learning to sail a boat,” she explained, as she led the girls toward Little Bear Inn.
“What pretty gardens!” Eva said. “And, oh, what a picturesque, rambling old house!”
The inn was built of rough logs, and all about it stood great old pine-trees, through which the breeze was murmuring.
“I do love pine-trees,” Adele exclaimed. “There’s something so restful about them.”
“I like them, too,” Madge said, as she led the girls across the wide veranda, on which were rustic chairs and tables and green bowls filled with ferns and wild flowers.
Eva thought that she had never seen anything more attractive than the big cool room which they next entered. There were heavy beams overhead, and the furniture was green willow, comfortably upholstered in dark red. There were antlers on the wall, and pictures of deer drinking at the edge of the lake.
“Do look!” Eva exclaimed. “Here is a picture of the darlingest little bear. Oh, Miss Peterson, was the lake named after him, do you suppose?”
“So they say,” Madge replied. “There is a story about it, which as yet I have not heard.”
Madge excused herself and went to her own room to put away her easel and paints and to get her sketching materials. A moment later she returned with shining eyes. “Little dryads,” she said, “I have a beautiful plan. You don’t have to hurry back, do you?”
“Not if I can let mother know where we are,” Adele replied. “She will be expecting us home about noon, and I do not want her to be worried. We left so early that I haven’t seen her to-day.”
Madge Peterson pointed toward a table in the far corner of the room as she laughingly declared, “Yonder is the modern Mercury, who will gladly carry a message to your mother.”
“Good!” exclaimed Adele when she saw the telephone. “But, Miss Peterson, you have not told me what I am to say to my mother.”
“Ask her if you may stay to lunch with me and spend the afternoon,” Madge replied.
“Oh, how nice that will be,” Adele said. “And I am sure that Adorable Mumsie will say Yes.”
She was quite right. Mrs. Doring, knowing that she could rely upon Adele’s good judgment, readily granted the permission desired.
“I’m so glad,” Madge Peterson said gayly. “Now I’ll hie me kitchenward and have a basket filled with good things to eat. Then we’ll hunt up brother Everett, who is a much better oarsman than sailor, and he will row us out to that lovely Pine Island. It’s just an enchanting place for a picnic-lunch, and there are such pretty things to sketch.”
The two girls were delighted with this plan, and they little dreamed of the exciting adventures they were to have before they returned.