CHAPTER IV

JANET'S KINGDOM

Janet did not have time to investigate further, for at that moment Martha beckoned her mysteriously into the house. It was plain to be seen that the old servant was greatly disturbed.

"What's the matter!" Janet inquired in a whisper, for she caught some of the suspense.

"Oh, Miss Janet, whatever shall we do?" Martha exclaimed. "Mrs. Todd walked into your grandmother's room, and they have been arguing ever since. Your grandmother will have a turn I know, and yet I don't dare to interrupt them. What shall I do?"

It was a proof of the Great Change to be consulted, and Janet smiled with something like pride.

"I shouldn't do anything if I were you," she replied quietly. "Perhaps they are not arguing any more. They may just be talking; they're old friends, you know."

Martha shot a quick glance toward the closed door. "Old friends," she said, and then, thinking better of it, she did not finish the sentence, but said instead, "Sit down to your luncheon, child, do; it's getting cold and there's no reason to wait."

Janet nodded and went into the dining-room. She took a long time over her chops and sweet potatoes, but she finished without hearing the door to her grandmother's room open.

Martha was almost in tears. "Your grandmother has had no luncheon," she protested. "Dearie me, what shall I do?"

"Take my advice and wait until she calls you," Janet advised. "You know she doesn't like to be disturbed. I'm going out," she added. "No, Boru, you can't come to-day; stay home, like a good dog."

Boru buried his head in his paws and with a very mournful expression watched her leave. He knew that there was one mysterious place to which he was never allowed to accompany his mistress, and he resented it. He was right in guessing that she was going there to-day.

Janet left the house by the door that led to the steps and down to the sea road. The water looked sparkling blue and inviting, and she hurried along until she came to a small dock, very much the worse for age. She untied a row boat and found two broken oars that were hidden in the tall grass beside the road. There was no one in sight as she pushed off, and only a few sails were visible flapping smartly out beyond the harbor.

Her cheeks were flushed as she sent the old boat skimming over the water, for she was on her way to her secret kingdom. Though she had sailed to it many times there was always the chance of discovery, and that added zest to the adventure.

The point of land toward which she was heading was quite a distance off, and looked to be rather a desolate island. It was, in reality, however, a part of the mainland, for the bay came in, and the land around it was shaped like a big hook. There were a few fishing huts along the shore, and farther inland low farms nestled into the hills.

Janet chose a certain cove to land in and pulled her boat safely up on shore, and then she started off at a brisk walk. At this particular point of the beach the sand dunes were very high, and she was screened from sight except from the water front. She walked for about a quarter of a mile and then began to climb. Up above her on a rising knoll of ground a little way beyond the sand dunes was an old gray house. It was large and very rambling, but it was tumbling down. The roof sagged at one end, and the two big chimneys were crumbling to ruin. There was not a sign of life anywhere about it or in the many ramshackled farm buildings that evidently belonged to it. All the windows were boarded up but one, a very small one that led into the cellar. Janet pushed it open gently and slid down as far as she could and then dropped. It was very dark and very musty. She groped her way to the rickety stairs as quickly as she could. The door at the top opened with a groan as she pushed, and she was in a long, low-ceilinged kitchen. Rain had come down through the leaky roof and rusted the stove, the furniture was covered with dust, and a forlorn china cup with its handle broken lay dejectedly on one corner of the table.

Janet glanced hurriedly about her, to make sure that no one had been in the room since she had, and then hurried into the front hall. Some heavy pieces of furniture were partly covered by torn and dirty sheets; they looked like ghosts in the dim light that filtered in through the boarded windows. Janet, in spite of the many times that she had passed them, could not repress a shiver, and she gave a sigh of relief as she closed the door of another room behind her. She was in her kingdom at last, and she surveyed it with sparkling eyes. It was a long room with a low ceiling that ran the length of the house. In the center along one side was a huge fireplace. Each one of the six windows had a broad window seat. There was very little furniture, and none of it was covered by dust sheets. In consequence, the stuffing was coming out of several of the chairs and a puddle of water had sopped into the big horsehair sofa. The only human looking thing in the room was a pair of gloves on one end of the table. They were badly mildewed and they looked very limp and lifeless, but they had belonged to some one of the mysterious owners of the house, and Janet always nodded to them with mock respect. It was the books that made the room a kingdom. Rows and rows of them lined the walls from floor to ceiling. Some of them were damp and moldy but they were all readable, and that was all that mattered to Janet, though she sometimes cried over a broken binding and patted it quite as she would have stroked a hurt puppy.

"Well, my darlings, I have come back to you," she said as she slipped to her knees before a corner bookcase, "and I want you to be very kind to me and take me far, far away to--" She let her hand wander over the backs of the books until it rested on one, "Greece," she finished, as she read the title.

She made herself as comfortable as possible in one of the window seats, and for an hour she was so engrossed in the old fables and the stirring tales of the gods that she forgot the time. It was only when the light through the chink of the boarding grew too dim to see that she realized with a start that it was getting late.

"And I never looked up about Roy's paw in that animal book!" she exclaimed. Had Mrs. Page heard her, she might have understood where she had learned so much about the care of dogs.

Janet hurriedly put her book back and went to the bookcase across the room to find what she wanted.

"That's funny," she said. "I thought I left it--why, I did; here's the place where it belongs." An empty hole on the bottom shelf confronted her, and looked as if the smiling row had lost a tooth.

Without exactly knowing why, Janet was frightened. She had looked upon this room as so particularly hers for so long that there was something uncanny in the thought that some one else had dared to trespass.

"Perhaps I put it back somewhere else." She tried to comfort herself with this thought, but she could not get rid of the queer feeling that some other hands were touching her loves, and that other eyes were seeing into her enchanted pages.

She puzzled over it as she rowed home, but it was impossible to come to any conclusion.

Martha was waiting for her in the hall; her face was even whiter than it had been earlier in the day.

"Miss Janet, you're back, thank goodness; your grandmother has been calling for you all afternoon."

"When did Mrs. Todd leave!" Janet enquired.

"She hasn't left at all," Martha gasped. "She's sat in there the whole blessed day. Only an hour ago she came into my kitchen as smiling as you please, and said she and Mrs. Page would have a cup of tea and some toast and jam. I took it in, and, well, Miss Janet, it's beyond me; indeed it is!"

"But, Martha, why shouldn't they have tea? Grandmother always has it for her guests." Janet laughed.

Martha sighed profoundly.

"If you knew all that I know of those two and then to see them smiling and laughing together," Martha shook her head, unable to give vent to her feelings in mere words.

Janet raced upstairs and changed her dress, and in a very few minutes she was knocking at her grandmother's door.

"Oh, it's you, is it, dear child!" Mrs. Todd called as she entered. "I was hoping you would get back in time to drive me home."

"Ann, don't presume too far," Mrs. Page said tartly. "Janet, where have you been?"

Janet decided that the change in her grandmother was not as great as Martha had led her to suppose, so she answered as she always did.

"I have been out most of the time."

"To whom are you speaking!" Mrs. Page inquired.

Janet sighed and blushed a little; it was not like her grandmother to find fault before people.

"I'm sorry, 'I have been out most of the time, grandmother,'" she corrected, but a second later she almost laughed aloud for she was sure she had heard Mrs. Todd say "fiddlesticks" under her breath.

"I wanted you all afternoon," Mrs. Page went on. "However, we will let that pass. Mrs. Todd wishes you to help this year at the church fair and I have given my consent under one condition--that you are home here by nine o'clock."

"Ten," corrected Mrs. Todd crisply.

"What did you say, Ann?" Mrs. Page's eyes flashed.

"I said ten," Mrs. Todd repeated. "Ten was the hour we agreed on. And now I must be going, as my eyes are not what they used to be and these new roads puzzle me. I must ask you to let Janet drive me home."

For a long minute there was silence, and then Mrs. Page did something she was rarely ever seen to do; she smiled.

[Illustration: For a long minute there was silence, and then Mrs. Page did sometning she was rarely ever seen to do; she smiled.]

"You are a very smart woman, Ann Todd, and I'm a very old one. Have your own way, but remember your promise," she said.

The drive through the twilight was wonderful, for Mrs. Todd let Janet do the driving while she sat back and talked.

"You're a funny youngster," she said when they were half way to the village. "You haven't asked me a single question."

"About grandmother, do you mean?" Janet laughed. "I didn't have to. You see, you made her let me go and that's all that matters."

"Aren't aren't you curious to know how?"

Janet shook her head.

"Well, I'll tell you. I bullied her.

"Your grandmother is a very remarkable woman," she added after a silence that lasted until they were turning into the driveway of the rectory grounds.

"I think she is too," Janet said loyally, "and every one is sure to like her when they know and understand her."

Mrs. Todd got out at the carriage block. "Bless the child," she said almost tenderly, but a second later, as she was going up the steps, she said in her usual brisk manner, "Come 'round to-morrow and see me; we'll have a chat."

Janet gave the horse over to the hired man and walked slowly home. She was so absorbed in her thoughts that she reached the end of the garden wall before she knew it.

The sound of an automobile made her hurry to the side of the road. Motors were not very common in Old Chester, for it was away from the beaten track and the roads were very bad. Janet was a little ashamed of her interest in them, but she could never resist staring at them. The one that was approaching now had powerful searchlights, and she watched them, fascinated. It looked as though they were sweeping right on to her very feet. Suddenly they fell across the corner of the garden wall. It was only for a minute, but it was long enough to illuminate a patch of ground and to bring out into sharp relief a torn straw hat and a thick book bound in dull blue, embossed with a gold dog.