She had studied "some" already. She was taking lessons over at Point Concepcion, where her aunt had friends, and she went three times a week. The gentleman who taught her was not a Catholic, and, of course, he knew she was a Protestant. She would have preferred to live there, but her mother and father were both dead, and had left her with her aunt. She liked it better because it was sunnier and brighter there. She loved the sun and warmth. She had listened to what he had said about the dampness and gloom of the chapel. It was true. The dampness was that dreadful sometimes it just ruined her clothes, and even made her hoarse. Did he think they would really take his advice and clear out the woods round the chapel?
"Would you like it?" he asked pleasantly.
"Yes."
"And you think you wouldn't pine so much for the sunshine and warmth of the Mission?
"I'm not pining," said Cissy with a toss of her curls, "for anything or anybody; but I think the woods ought to be cleared out.
It's just as it was when the runaways hid there.""When the RUNAWAYS HID THERE!" said Brother Seabright quickly.
"What runaways?"
"Why, the boat's crew," said Cissy.
"Why do you call them runaways?"
"I don't know. Didn't YOU?" said Cissy simply. "Didn't you say they never came back to Horse Shoe Bay. Perhaps I had it from aunty. But I know it's damp and creepy; and when I was littler Iused to be frightened to be alone there practicing.""Why?" said the preacher quickly.
"Oh, I don't know," hurried on Cissy, with a vague impression that she had said too much. "Only my fancy, I guess.""Well," said Brother Seabright after a pause; "we'll see what can be done to make a clearing there. Birds sing best in the sunshine, and YOU ought to have some say about it."Cissy's dimples and blushes came together this time. "That's our house," she said suddenly, with a slight accent of relief, pointing to a weather-beaten farmhouse on the edge of the gorge. "I turn off here, but you keep straight on for the Mills; they're back in the woods a piece. But," she stammered with a sudden sense of shame of forgotten hospitality, "won't you come in and see aunty?""No, thank you, not now." He stopped, turning his gaze from the house to her. "How old is your house? Was it there at the time of the wreck?""Yes," said Cissy.
"It's odd that the crew did not come there for help, eh?""Maybe they overlooked it in the darkness and the storm," said Cissy simply. "Good-by, sir."The preacher held her hand for an instant in his powerful, but gently graduated grasp. "Good-by until evening service.""Yes, sir," said Cissy.
The young girl tripped on towards her house a little agitated and conscious, and yet a little proud as she saw the faces of her aunt, her uncle, her two cousins, and even her discarded escort, Jo Adams, at the windows, watching her.
"So," said her aunt, as she entered breathlessly, "ye walked home with the preacher! It was a speshal providence and manifestation for ye, Cissy. I hope ye was mannerly and humble--and profited by the words of grace.""I don't know," said Cissy, putting aside her hat and cloak listlessly. "He didn't talk much of anything--but the old wreck of the Tamalpais.""What?" said her aunt quickly.
"The wreck of the Tamalpais, and the boat's crew that came up the gorge," repeated the young girl.
"And what did HE know about the boat's crew?" said her aunt hurriedly, fixing her black eyes on Cissy.
"Nothing except what I told him."
"What YOU told him!" echoed her aunt, with an ominous color filling the sallow hollows of her cheek.
"Yes! He has been a sailor, you know--and I thought it would interest him; and it did! He thought it strange.""Cecilia Jane Appleby," said her aunt shrilly, "do you mean to say that you threw away your chances of salvation and saving grace just to tell gossiping tales that you knew was lies, and evil report, and false witnesses!""I only talked of what I'd heard, aunt Vashti," said Cecilia indignantly. "And he afterwards talked of--of--my voice, and said I had a heavenly gift," she added, with a slight quiver of her lip.
Aunt Vashti regarded the girl sharply.
"And you may thank the Lord for that heavenly gift," she said, in a slightly lowered voice; "for ef ye hadn't to use it tonight, I'd shut ye up in your room, to make it pay for yer foolish gaddin'
TONGUE! And I reckon I'll escort ye to chapel tonight myself, miss, and get shut o' some of this foolishness."II.
The broad plaza of the Mission de la Concepcion had been baking in the day-long sunlight. Shining drifts from the outlying sand dunes, blown across the ill-paved roadway, radiated the heat in the faces of the few loungers like the pricking of liliputian arrows, and invaded even the cactus hedges. The hot air visibly quivered over the dark red tiles of the tienda roof as if they were undergoing a second burning. The black shadow of a chimney on the whitewashed adobe wall was like a door or cavernous opening in the wall itself; the tops of the olive and pear trees seen above it were russet and sere already in the fierce light. Even the moist breath of the sea beyond had quite evaporated before it crossed the plaza, and now rustled the leaves in the Mission garden with a dry, crepitant sound.