A summer in the Apple Tree inn

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I. The Fairy Godmother i

II. The Apple Tree Inn 18

Chapter I

I T’S raining cats and dogs/’ wailed Dorothy forlornly, pressing her face close to the window pane against which the driving rain dashed and trickled in headlong rivulets, “ and it’s our first day in the country, too.”

“ Dorothy ! ” exclaimed a reproachful voice from the depths of a four-poster bed, “ you promised to call me if you waked up first,” and the bedclothes heaved in restless billows until Mildred’s tousled head appeared above the white confusion.

“ You needn’t be so keen to get up,” snapped Dorothy crossly, “ we cannot go out, and it is as cold as anything. The fog is so thick X cannot even see the bay. So we won’t be able to watch the boats, and that would have been something to do at least.”

“ Oh,” groaned Mildred, jumping from the bed and running across to the window to see for herself the unkindness of the weather, “ we cannot go to the barn or play in the garden, and the brook will be too high to wade in.”

“ Of course,” wailed Dorothy, “ and I suppose we will have to play in that stuffy attic with the rusty sword and the old hoopskirts and the duds we left there last summer. And Aunt Margaret will say after breakfast, ‘ now run up to the playroom, kiddies, and “ make believe ” until I have time to frolic with you. We must have a merry day in spite of the rainy weather,’ ” she mimicked naughtily.

Mildred giggled, but she glanced uneasily toward the open door, for she thought she had heard a footstep in Aunt Margaret’s room beyond. Dorothy was always so funny when she was just cross enough to imitate people, and even father said she was clever at it sometimes.

“ Then grandma will tell us a story this evening about some remarkable children she used to know when she was young, and we’ll have to sit still and be respectful when all of our fingers and toes are just aching to wiggle. What is it, Dorothy, that always keeps going and screwing inside when we have to sit still in church and other places? It’s like — like ”

“ A motor carriage with the brake on,” suggested Dorothy, as she splashed into one of the shining little tubs which stood on either side of the toilet stand and which Harriet had filled with water the night before. “ It just shakes and chugs frantically, but the brake won’t let it move.”

“ Do we have a motor, too, Dorothy?” looking askance at the other tub into which she was also expected to plunge for her morning bath.

Dorothy looked superior. “ It’s not called motor in our physiology,” pronouncing it very carefully, “ but it means the same thing as circulation. That never stops even when we are asleep.”

“ Did you ever see one, Dorothy? ”

“See a circulation? You silly! No, I never did. Now, Mildred, get into that tub this minute. You’re just fooling round to gain time, and you’re hoping you’ll have to miss your bath; I know you.”

“ But it’s so cold,” whimpered the child, touching the water cautiously with her little pink toes, “ and father’s not here to ask if we had our bath.”

“ Coward ! ” taunted Dorothy contemptuously. “ ‘ ’Fraid of the dark, ’fraid of the wet, ’fraid the goblins will get you yet ! ’ You know well enough why father wants us to take our cold dip. It makes us tough and strong, and that’s why we never have things like other girls. Get in this minute! I’m not going to wait to curl your hair after I’m dressed, so you had better scuttle. I smell something good and brownish too, from the kitchen.”

“ Wish grandma would have hot cakes this cold morning,” sputtered Mildred.

“ By the way,” said Dorothy suddenly, “ what did you do with the chocolate father gave you to carry in the train yesterday ? Did you leave any of it ? I saw you and Bob snipping and tasting all the time and you never passed it to us, you were so mean.”

“ I was not,” contradicted Mildred shortly. “Ough, this water is so cold! We just tasted it first to see if it had vanilla in it, then Bob asked if I did not think it was a bit burnt, so we snipped a little more to see, but it wasn’t, so there! Please hand me that towel, Dorothy.”

“ Then- where is it, pray? ”

“ Why, that Chinaman took the bag and I sup- • pose he’s eaten the candy by this time. What makes Aunt Margaret have that heathen laundryman work for her?”

“ He’s not a Chinaman or a laundryman- either. He’s a Japanese, and Aunty says he knows enough to stock a university. He came over here to learn English a long time ago, on grandfather’s ship, and he’s known our people ever since, and so this summer he asked Aunt Margaret to let him live here.

I know he wouldn’t eat the candy. He’s too polite to sneak. Why, he took off his hat even to me, last night at the station, and said in his queer, sharp kind of a voice, 4 Will the honourable Miss allow me to carry her luggage?’ And when he lifted Lydia into the carriage, he said, 4 Will the little lady permit Koto to place her in the carriage? ’ ”

44 What makes him so polite ? Did they begin with him when he was small, just as mother does with us ? ,f

“ No, indeed, they began with the very first one of them all, and there never was a rude Japanese born ; father said so.”

Mildred sighed. “ I wish I was one. It’s so hard to be made to be polite when you don’t want to be.”

“ It certainly is. Goodness, what a tangle ! What makes you have such curly hair, Mildred? The rest of us don’t. And Mildred, don’t gobble when you eat, for mother is not here to reprove you. And for mercy’s sake, don’t stare at Koto when he waits on the table, or he will think you are an aborigine.”

“ I don’t gobble,” grumbled Mildred. “ I saw you eat a banana in four bites, on the train yesterday, and then you hid the skin under the cushion and pretended you didn’t know it was there.”

“ You’d better hush,” warned Dorothy, tweaking the golden curls she was brushing vigorously ; “ I could tell tales, too.”

“ Yes, but you’re ten years old and I’m only seven. And mother says you ought to be an example in things, but you’re not.”

“ Because I’m ten years old then,” very loftily, “ I do not intend to explain my conduct to any child.”

“ You’d better take lessons from Koto, if he’s so polite, missy ! Oh, Dorothy, why didn’t he have his eye holes cut bigger ? ”

“ He didn’t have anything to do with it — he was born that way.”

“ That don’t make any difference. Puppies are born with ears and tails, and coachmen always cut them off in the stable to make them valuable. Bob said so.”

“ Koto couldn’t have his eyes cut. He’s like all his people. You couldn’t expect him to be like us.”

“ Why not? Didn’t God make all of us? ”

“Yes, but he has lots of patterns and he uses a different one for every country. Now, I absolutely refuse to answer another question.”

“ Good-morning, girls,” called a cheery voice from the doorway, and Aunt Margaret bustled in, fresh and rosy in her white morning gown. “ I’ll tie the hair ribbons in a jiffy. The bell is just ringing.” And the subdued tones of a bronze gong sounded softly through the quiet house.

“ Now, let , s button these dresses like Jack Robinson, for grandma is waiting for her coffee, and Harriet had the waffle irons smoking hot when I slipped into the kitchen just now. Bob and Lydia are down already, and I’m sure he has counted every white swallow on the blue syrup jug, for I saw him eyeing it on the table, and I have every reason to believe that he has had evidence of the genuineness of the syrup inside. There, we look as tidy as pins and as fresh as roses. Come, we can all go down together. The stairs are wide and lead to pleasant places.”

“Are you really a fairy godmother?” asked Mildred shyly, as they crowded down the stairway, three abreast, as Aunt Margaret had an arm about each little girl, “ and do you have a wand and things? Father said so.”

Aunt Margaret laughed. " Father didn’t mean a real fairy godmother, though I might make believe to be one for a little time. I have a place in my room where I sit and think out things for people and they work about like magic sometimes, but I won’t begin to make believe now, I’m too hungry to pretend anything.”

Bob and Lydia were waiting on the hearth in front of a cheery driftwood fire, as the May day was as chilly as fall, and outside the rain poured unceasingly. The blazing fire drove away the gloom from the dining-room, whose long windows reached down to the floor and overlooked the fog-covered bay.

Grandma’s gentle face beamed at the children over the coffee urn and her cheeks were as pink as the ribbons on her pretty cap.

“ Isn’t it nice to have them here, Margaret? And it’s the baby’s first visit too, alone,” nodding to Lydia, who had been too small to leave her mother last summer. But the other children had visited Beach Farm many times and knew every nook and cranny within it as well as every dell and cove without.

To Lydia everything was new and strange, and the children smiled at her awe of the silver coffee urn and her amazement at grandma’s portrait brooch, to say nothing of the quivering ribbons on her cap. They all stared equally at the slender Koto, who seemed to serve everybody at once and to know each time when another waffle would be acceptable.

io The Fairy Godmother

Of course, the waffles were brown and delicious. Harriet intended them to be, and the maple syrup was the nicest that ever flowed from trees. The little blue jug was passed around and around without a reprimand from grandma, who never once suggested that maple syrup was bad at times for the digestion. Bob had his milk cup filled four times unrebuked, for there was a lovely Jersey cow in the barn and no milkman tO' send in a bill for extras.

Aunt Margaret’s tabby cat sat on the back of her chair and glared uncompromisingly with her yellow eyes at the children and the Japanese alike. It had been hard enough to import the almond-eyed Asiatic, but to add four children at one time was more than her equanimity could stand. Thank goodness, she had the barn as a place of refuge, and she knew of hiding places that even four pairs of shining eyes could not ferret out.

“ Let me see,” grandma chatted on. “ Bob is twelve, Dorothy ten, Mildred seven and Lydia five, all a year older than last year and knowing a year more of everything. Well, dears, you will find a welcome in every part of the farm, and some stir-

The Fairy Godmother n

prises too, which I hope will please you. Koto here, will spend his spare time playing with you and he has already devised many new games in his wise young head.”

Koto smiled delightedly and bowed respectfully to grandma, while his sparkling eyes spoke unutterable things to the children. Mildred suddenly displayed such an agonised expression on her little face that Aunt Margaret asked anxiously if anything was wrong.

“ I’m just trying to make believe that I’m used to seeing a Japanese in the dining-room. But Aunt Margaret, why didn’t God make him out of a different pattern ? ”

Aunt Margaret spoke quickly to Koto, who left the room on some errand, and she flashed a glance at grandma, who was very busy with the coffee urn, and whose ribbons quivered above it with some agitation.

“ I think, Mildred,” said Aunt Margaret quietly, “ that you will soon be accustomed to him, and I assure you he will be the merriest playfellow in the world. You must remember that he comes of a very good family and is not an ordinary person at all. I trust none of you will fail to be courteous to

“ And now/’ went on Aunt Margaret, when the last drop of milk had been swallowed and the last sticky crumb of waffle had been munched, “ I’m going to begin to be the fairy godmother and each of you may have one wish which we will try to fulfil in some way. I think Lydia had better begin, as she believes most in fairies.”

Lydia blushed and hid her eyes behind a long beribboned curl, which she pulled over her face.

“ Come, Lydia, don’t be shy. You needn’t put on before us,” and Bob prodded her under the table with his foot. Lydia suddenly smiled like a sunbeam behind her fluffy hair. “ I wish,” she said softly, “ that we had a real fairy to play with. I thought,” she whispered, pointing to the bunch of flowers in the centre of the table, “ I saw something move in there, with shining wings, and I hoped it was a fairy.”

The children laughed merrily at Lydia’s imaginary fairy, but Aunt Margaret rose from her chair and leaned across to look more closely at the flowers, and when she touched them, lo, something moved and fluttered.

It was a butterfly, a huge black and yellow fellow, and he floated leisurely across, the room to the window sill where some potted plants were blooming gaily. Lydia was so startled that she ran and hid her face against grandma’s shoulder, while Bob exclaimed excitedly that the cocoon must be hidden somewhere.

“ He’s just hatched, Aunt Margaret, for there is still some powdery down on his wings.”

In the midst of the excitement, old tabby sneaked from under the table, and watching her chance, sprang after the beautiful floating bit of colour. But it quickly soared so high that she could only snap her teeth and blink her eyes in disappointment. She was quickly banished from the room, and Bob watched carefully to keep the butterfly away from the draft in the chimney place.

“ It’s my fairy,” suddenly piped Lydia. “ I had my wish come true in one minute.” And as the child spoke, the butterfly fluttered over to her and lit on the ruffle of her apron. With mingled fear and delight Lydia looked with dilated eyes at the exquisite stranger sitting so confidingly on her shoulder.

“ I suppose/’ said grandma softly to Aunt Margaret, “ that Koto could account for it.”

“ A beautiful beginning, mother. I hope the other surprises will be as successful. Come, let us go on with the wishes while we are watching Lydia and her fairy. Mildred may have her turn now.”

“ Oh,” laughed the child, shutting her eyes tight together, “ I wish I could have my pocket full of candy, and be able to eat it all without having to take medicine after it.”

“ Pig, pig ! ” teased Dorothy, “ what a wish to tell anybody.”

“ I don’t care, the wish was right in my heart and I told it.”

“ Of course,” said Aunt Margaret, “ she may have her wish, but I’m not so sure about the medicine. Your father sent me a little box of sugar pills with specific directions, but as long as they are sweet you won’t care whether they are candy or medicine.

You know that even fairy godmothers have to be sensible and not give people wishes that would be harmful to them.

“ Now, Dprothy, it is your turn.”

“ I wish,” said Dorothy quickly, “ that I could have all the books I wanted to read, and that I could just play a while and have a good time without having to be an example to the children. It’s a strain sometimes,” and she sighed like a little old woman. “ I can never even be myself because I have to remember that the children might be looking or copying.”

Aunt Margaret looked curiously into Dorothy’s frank brown eyes, and her face was very grave as she encouraged her to go on with her wish.

“ Then I would like to have a place where I can make believe cook and mix and mess things to my heart’s content. Mother won’t allow it at home because it worries Janet, and then she says it makes me untidy, but I like to be untidy and make things with my own hands.”

“ Oh,” and Aunt Margaret smiled so suddenly that it seemed like a rift of sunshine across her face,

“ I know all about it, Dorothy, and we’ll talk it over some other time. Now let Bob tell what a real boy wishes for.”

“ Of course,” said Bob, “ I could wish for things to eat like Mildred, and for books like Dorothy, but my very heart’s wish is for a box of paints and some brushes, and a chance to use them. And then I wish I could do something — something to please father this summer. He says he’ll give me up pretty soon

if it doesn’t come, but — but ,” and Bob looked

so uncomfortable that Aunt Margaret laughed merrily.

“ Never mind, Bob, if it is too painful a subject to tell your fairy godmother. At any rate the paints are already waiting for you ; and as for that ‘ something,’ we’ll contrive it in some way.”

“ Now run and get on your cloaks and rubbers, girls, while Bob and I hunt for umbrellas. We are all going out, as your grandfather would have said, ‘ on a voyage of discovery,’ but it’s only to the orchard and not on the sea. It’s no wonder,” she said to Bob, “ that we all adore the sight and smell of the sea when our very bones and marrow are filled with the love of it. Are you going to be a sailor too, Bob? ”

“ Yes, if I cannot be a painter. But father says he won't allow any idle artists in his family."

“ Now what is that dreadful ‘ something,' Bob," she coaxed softly.

“ It’s because I’m a coward, Aunt Margaret, and father can't thrash it out of me." Bob’s face grew very red, and his lips quivered, as Aunt Margaret suddenly put her arm around him and gave him a good squeeze.

“ Never mind, old chap. I know a road to it that your father doesn’t dream of. No, I won’t tell anybody, but I’m glad to know what it is. Ready, girls ? Now, off we go to the orchard."

Away they went under the dripping trees still covered with apple blossoms, while the grass beneath was strewn with the pink-tipped petals.

Chapter II

B OB was the first to discover it, as he had hurried on ahead along the gravel path, and when he suddenly came upon the odd-looking building, nestled among the apple trees, he gave a long whistle of astonishment.

“ What is it, Aunt Margaret ? ” he called back. “ This was not here last year.”

“ No,” she answered, smiling, “ this is one of the surprises.” And when they all stood in front of the door, she called their attention to the swinging painted sign above it. One side was printed in bright red letters, “ The Apple Tree Inn,” and on the other was a wonderful sketch of an apple tree whose fruit was as scarlet as cherries in August and about as large.

On either side of the door were two small windows draped with muslin curtains, and the polished 18 glass glistened like two shining eyes beneath the overhanging eaves. The house was brown and one story high with a curious sloping roof, and the short chimney was painted red and capped with a pompous weather vane.

“ Why it’s like a bird house, only prettier and bigger,” exclaimed the children. “ But why did somebody want an inn in your orchard, Aunt Margaret ? ”

But Aunt Margaret had opened the door without first, knocking with the cute brass knocker and the children crowded eagerly after her. Then she rapidly explained that the building had formerly done service as a granary, and with the help of Koto and a clever carpenter it had been moved and transformed into a habitable little dwelling.

“ Of course, you know now that it is a playhouse for you children, and each of you will find in it just what belongs to you. There are three rooms and a tiny kitchen beyond for Dorothy, who will be housekeeper and will see that it is kept orderly and properly. Here are the keys of the cabinets and closets, and you could not have a better day to become acquainted with the treasures waiting for you in them. Now, I will leave you, but shall expect you to return to the house in time for dinner. And,” she nodded archly, “ grandma and I will be so happy to receive invitations to afternoon tea, if Dorothy could manage to serve it about four o’clock.”

And away she went out in the rain again, leaving the children breathless with delight, and positive that there never had been such a playhouse in all the world, nor a more delightful fairy godmother.

They wandered about the quaintly ’furnished rooms and tested the comfort of all the inviting little rocking chairs which stood in every corner. They peeped into the pretty baskets on the tables and admired the strange designs on the matting which covered the floor of every room. Queer Japanese kites and fans decorated the walls, and in one room a huge umbrella had been opened and fastened to a beam so that it spread its flowered cover as if to protect the occupants of the room from possible summer showers. From the very centre of it hung a brilliant butterfly whose paper wings fluttered with every breath of air. In another room behind a wonderful screen with shelves, Bob found a miniature studio with an easel, and paints and brushes enough to have stocked a shop. Then there was a cabinet too, all of his very own, with tiny drawers and cupboards enough to satisfy the most curious of boys. In the same room was a case of books beneath a cosy window seat, covered with cushions of such gay colours that they resembled stuffed rainbows sewed together. And on the cushions were verses painted and one of them ran like this :

“Rest a while and lean on me,

I’m full of comfort as can be.”

In fact there were jingles sprinkled everywhere throughout the little house. Above the doors were rhymes of welcome and hospitality. On the chairs were invitations to sit and stay a while. In the kitchen, on the dishes and even the tiny tea kettle sang a funny line :

“A cup of tea for thee and me,

I’ll boil and sing quite merrily.”

On the bookshelf was printed a warning that the children said was for Dorothy :

“ Read not only with your eyes,

Nor when your duty elsewhere lies.”

In the smallest room, which flaunted a paper covered with gorgeous roses climbing over a trellis, ran a picture moulding about as high as Lydia’s head, and on it had been placed a row of real Japanese dolls dressed as daintily as possible. And there were a whole family of dolls sitting demurely in one corner on the floor, and they all smiled in such a friendly way that Lydia’s heart was captivated immediately. And the funny part of it was that on the mother doll’s breast was pinned a paper on which was written this strange communication :

“We’ve come to spend the summer,

In the Inn of Apple Trees,

And we’ll try in every manner,

Our hostesses to please.”

The other children beamed with delight as their belongings were revealed to them, but Mildred could not find anything suitable to her taste until she discovered in one of the little closets a china Mandarin whose head nodded approvingly every minute. A single touch removed his cap and lo, he was filled with candy, the very kind she enjoyed most. But around the cap was written the strangest rhyme of all:

“To those who seek my sweets for self,

And share not every candy small,

Will find it only bitter pelf,

They’d better touch me not at all.”

“I don’t care what it says,” said Mildred stubbornly, “ as long as I can have the candy that is in it.”

But the kitchen ! Dorothy screamed with delight when she spied the tiny stove, in which a wood fire was burning briskly. The children immediately expressed desires for everything they loved to eat, until Dorothy compromised by promising to make some fudge that very minute. Then she stood and gazed at the prim array of shining tins upon the shelves, and the brown, blue and yellow dishes in the glass cupboard, and her bright eyes discovered many devices which would have pleased a much older and more experienced cook. A recipe book bound in scarlet lay on the well-scrubbed table, above which hung a tiny mirror on which was painted in white letters:

“ A cook whose face is fair with smiles,

Will never spoil her cake,

So all through your kitchen trials,

Pray watch the smiles, no chances take.”

On one side of the kitchen a deep closet with shelves covered with fancy paper revealed groceries and goodies to be cooked when the fancy pleased the young maid. And in the midst of it all stood a chocolate cake on a pretty plate all ready for the afternoon tea. Now they really could invite grandma and Aunt Margaret, and the girls hurried to the umbrella room where they had found a wicker table and a tea-set all ready for a feast. There were dainty paper napkins and a fringed cloth with a border of bright flowers, and when the table was ready, with the caddy filled and all, Dorothy clasped her hands and gloated over it with every housewifely instinct in her little being wide awake.

“ It’s a perfect dream,” she sighed, “ and I shall never want to leave it. I can learn everything now, and may be sometime, if father should grow very poor, the family will appreciate my love of cooking, for I could help economise. ,,

Out in the kitchen with a blue checked apron tied around her chubby neck, Lydia grated chocolate for the fudge, in the making of which each child was to have a share.

“ I guess I’m going to love to cook too,” she dimpled, “ but I’ll have fairies help me bake my cakes 1 , and they’ll never burn or sink in the middle like Janet’s do. And I’ll take home some of this fudge for that dear beautiful butterfly who’s waiting to tell me something the fairies said. But I believe I know what it came for, Dorothy,” running to the door, “ I know what the butterfly came for.”

“ What? ” asked all the children at once.

“To tell us what to say to Aunt Margaret for making this happy place.”

“ But what ? Of course, we know we must say something.”

“ Why, tell her we won’t frown in it or be cross in it or be sneaky or tell tales all summer. Because if we did it might all fly away and even our fairy godmother couldn’t bring it back.”

“ Oh, foolish Lydia, it couldn’t fly away. The house is fastened down tight, and even the wind couldn’t blow it away.”

But Lydia shook her head and pointed a prophesying finger at Mildred.

“ I believe,” she said solemnly, “ that if we are very bad in this house or fractious, that all these nice things would be taken away because we didn’t —

didn’t ” she hesitated, blushing, because she

could not remember the long word.

“ Appreciate,” finished Bob.

“ Now, Lydia, stop playing witch and go on grating chocolate. You can do that better than you can talk, and we are all aching for some of Dor’s fudge.”

And Bob slipped away to his studio to arrange his paints and brushes. He carefully examined the studies in water colour he found in the cabinet drawers, and he outlined one of them rather skilfully for a boy. He stuck at his work, dreaming dreams of the great picture he would paint some day of a knight clad in white garments, whose “ bravery had won renown in the great world around.” Then presently a whiff of boiling chocolate disturbed his vision of Sir Launfal, and with that reminder of another pleasure still in store for him, he slipped into the kitchen, leaving on his easel his first attempt at art.

With cheeks ablaze and face radiant with content, Dorothy was bending over the stove stirring vigorously a dark savoury mixture in an enamel saucepan.