“But, Rosa,” she argued, quite helplessly, for Nancy had no illusion about her own weaknesses, “don’t you think, maybe, you just imagine a lot of things?”
“Don’t you?” fired back Rosa.
“No, not that way,” replied Nancy. “What’s the use of making worries? If you had a brother like our Ted1—”
“Or a sister like Ted has,” put in Rosa good-humoredly. “I know you hate silly stuff, Nancy. You wouldn’t let me say that you’ve done me a lot of good already; but you have.”
“How? Why, Rosa, we hardly know each other, and I really couldn’t do you good, for112 I’m rather—rather queer, you know. I just couldn’t—” Nancy stumbled and paused.
“Pretend,” finished Rosa. “That’s it, Nancy, you’re just being queer, is the reason. There’s a name for it but don’t let’s bother about that. Shall we row out?”
“I love to row,” declared Nancy again, taking her place at the oars2.
“And I hate to,” admitted Rosa, settling back in the cushions.
“Rowing ought to be good for you,” suggested Nancy. “Isn’t it queer how we skinnies always do the things that make us thinner?”
“And we fatties—” But Rosa’s remark was cut short by a call; it seemed to come from the island.
“What’s that!” both girls exclaimed.
They listened.
“It’s coming from No Man’s Land and it’s a woman’s voice,” declared Rosa.
“Can we row over there?” asked Nancy. “She’s in distress3, surely.”
“Maybe you could, but I can’t row worth a113 cent,” confessed Rosa. “I’ll answer her.”
She again cupped her hands to her mouth and called the megaphone call.
“Whoo-hoo! Where are—you!”
“Here! Here!” came a shrill4 reply. “On the island! Come—get—me!”
“Guess we’ll have to try,” sighed Rosa. “I suppose it’s some one marooned5 out there and naturally afraid of night coming. It might storm to-night, too.”
Without further ado Nancy turned the boat and headed for the island. The dot of land was not more than a dark speck6 on the sunset-lighted waters, for although it was late evening, the glow of a parting day was still gloriously strewn over the great, broad lake and mountains, flanking every side of the basin and adding to its depths. The usual craft were rather scarce just now, social dinner-times absorbing the lure7 of the great Out Doors.
Valiantly8 Nancy tugged9 at her oars, while Rosa directed verbally and steered10 at the helm. The distance was much longer than it114 had appeared to be, but after safely passing Dead Rock and Eagles’ Lair11, the little boat was now bravely skirting the island.
“Here! Here!” called a woman’s voice shrilly12. “Thank the mercies you’ve come! I thought I was here for the night and I’ve got to—”
“Oh, hello, Mrs. Pixley!” exclaimed Rosa. “So it’s you! However did you get caught over here?”
“I didn’t—didn’t get caught at all. It was that brazen13 girl—”
“Orilla?” asked Rosa.
“No one else. Just Orilla. The sassy little thing—”
Nancy was just pulling in to land when it seemed to her that the voice sounded oddly familiar. Then she caught sight of the excited woman’s face.
“Oh, hello!” she too exclaimed. “You’re the lady with the grape juice bottle—the one that exploded in the train!” Nancy declared in astonishment14.
“Of all things! I want to know! And115 you’re the little girl who tried to help me! Rosalind Fernell, is this girl visiting you?” demanded she whom Rosa had called Mrs. Pixley.
“Why, of course. She’s my cousin, Nancy Brandon from out Boston way. How did you know her?”
A rather sketchy15 account of the train incident was then furnished in a dialogue between Nancy and Mrs. Pixley, the latter at the same time gathering16 up pails and baskets and preparing to get into the boat.
“I came over here for berries,” she explained. “I’ve a sick lady who would have blueberries, and I knew I’d get them here. Orilla had the launch—Mr. Cowan’s, you know, Rosa, and she ran me over here like a streak17. Promised to be back by five but here it is—What time is it, anyway?”
“Nearly nine,” replied Rosa. “What do you suppose happened to Orilla?”
“Nothing. Nothing could happen to her. I often tell her mother I don’t see what’s going to become of that girl. Shall I get in the116 front? I don’t want to spill them blueberries. There’s hardly any ripe yet, but Miss Sandford has been pestering18 me for some. There, now I’m all right. Want me to row? It’s such a mercy you came. No boats came past the island—hardly any, and I’m hoarse19 from shoutin’. Here, young lady, give me them oars. You’re tuckered out,” and still talking Mrs. Pixley took Nancy’s place, not against Nancy’s will, either.
“But Orilla,” Rosa said again. “I haven’t seen Cowan’s launch out this afternoon. And she always comes by our dock when she has that out.”
“Don’t you bother with that girl, Rosalind,” cautioned Mrs. Pixley. “She’s flighty. Never no telling what she’s going to do next—”
“But she’s awfully20 smart,” interrupted Rosa.
“In some ways, but that don’t make her wise.” Mrs. Pixley was an expert at the oars as well as being a fluent talker. Nancy watched and listened, with admiration21 and with interest.
“I’ll go in at your place, Rosalind,” continued117 the woman, “and get a ride down the road. Lots of cars running down the hill at this time of night. And if you see Orilla Rigney you can tell her for me, she’ll not get another drop of milk at my place. To play me such a trick!” Mrs. Pixley’s indignation almost interfered22 with her talking, but not quite.
“Just imagine you knowing Mrs. Pixley, Nancy,” Rosalind managed to remark as they pulled in.
“Yes, just imagine!” repeated the woman before Nancy could speak. “Well, if you ever saw that grape juice fly, Rosalind, you’d understand how well I got acquainted on that car!”
“How funny!” persisted Rosa. “Did it hurt anyone?”
“Not exactly anyone, but a lot of things,” laughed the woman. “I’ll never forget that fat man’s shirt front! Looked like my log-cabin quilt. And the lady with the yellow hair—remember her, Nancy? How it turned lavender?”
118 “Indeed I do; she looked like someone made up for a masquerade—”
“I wish I’d been there!” sighed Rose, interrupting Nancy. “But I never happen to be around when that sort of lark23 is on. Well, here we are. All ashore24 who’s going ashore!” she chanted. “And Mrs. Pixley, you can row almost as well as Nancy.”
This compliment was accepted with another flood of words from Mrs. Pixley. When all were again safely landed at the Fernell dock, the queer woman took herself off without any unnecessary delay. She had talked of her experiences on the train when Nancy had witnessed the grape juice explosion, she had talked of and against Orilla Rigney, she had talked of the unreasonable25 “lady customer” who had insisted upon early blueberries, and Nancy wondered, as she listened to her repeat her thanks and her goodnights, if Mrs. Pixley really ever stopped talking.
But this was not the most interesting point in the little adventure. Nancy’s wonderment centered more about the connection of119 Orilla with the affair. Mrs. Pixley seemed one more person who disliked that girl, and Nancy said so to Rosa.
“Wasn’t it dreadful of Orilla not to go back for her?” she said, when she and Rosa tied up the boat.
“It wouldn’t have killed old Pixley to stay on the island all night,” defended Rosa. “Maybe it would have cooled off her gabbing26.”
Nancy had no desire to start a fresh argument. So she did not press the subject further, but she wondered when this person of mystery would make her appearance in Rosa’s home. That the passage for Europe of Mr. and Mrs. Fernell, now only a few hours off, would precipitate27 the invasion of Orilla, seemed rather too sure a guess for Nancy, for she dreaded28 its realization29. She didn’t want anything to do with the Rigney girl, and she hoped Rosa would not now find her companionship desirable.
For in Nancy’s mind was stored the vivid remembrance of Rosa’s accident in the woods.120 This she could not help attributing to Orilla’s queer influence, and she hoped that the painful affair had been a good lesson to Rosa.
“Afraid of the dark?” Rosa asked, as the last rays of light were caught up in the receding30 sky.
“No, not of the dark,” replied Nancy, trying again the knot with which she fastened the boat. “But it certainly is lonely out here, with all that water to run into if anyone chases us,” she added, jokingly.
“You bet!” agreed Rosa. “That’s one thing we must never try to do; we must not try to run across that lake, for it’s awfully wet.”
“Is that a boat I hear? Maybe it’s Orilla,” suggested Nancy, listening to the distant purr of a motor boat.
“No, I don’t believe it is,” replied Rosa. “You see, she keeps awfully busy, and I suppose it didn’t worry her any to leave poor Pixley to swim ashore.”
“What a very odd girl she must be,” continued Nancy, almost against her will.
121 “Perhaps she is, but then—oh, well, don’t let’s bother about her. Dad is sure to be watching the moon rise from the East porch,” said Rosa, as they started back toward the house. “Let’s go talk to him.”
“But perhaps he and—”
“Oh, Betty will be bossing the packing,” interrupted Rosa, anticipating the words of Nancy’s objections. “Come on. I’m going to miss dad and I want to be with him all I can—now.”
“Then you go talk to him, Rosa,” urged Nancy, considerately. “I’ve got some things to do. You won’t mind. You see, I must write mother at once, so that she’ll get it almost as soon as she reaches London.”
“Give her my love,” said Rosa, as the cousins parted on the porch.
On the little table in her room Nancy found a gift from Betty, a beautiful rainbow chiffon scarf, and also a big box of candy from her Uncle Frederic. She loved the scarf; it was beautiful, and would blend with any and every costume. The candy, of course, was equally122 welcome, for she had no doubt that her uncle himself had thought of it.
Standing31 before the broad mirror of her dresser she tried on the scarf. Her simple powder-blue dress was made much more attractive beneath its colorful folds, and it delighted Nancy to vision its possibilities as an adjunct to her limited outfit32. It would be lovely over her apple green—the black shadows in it would be wonderful over green, she reflected, and her gray dress—the one she wanted so much and her mother objected to because of its somberness—that would be perfect with the rainbow scarf.
Throwing the filmy ends first over one shoulder and then over the other, stepping this way and that to suit the pose and get just the correct lighting33 on the scarf, Nancy was quite unconscious of a light step approaching her open door.
Then, as she turned once more to try just one more swing of the silken tie, she found herself facing the smiling Lady Betty.
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收听单词发音
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1
ted
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| vt.翻晒，撒，撒开 | |
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oars
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| n.桨，橹( oar的名词复数 )；划手v.划（行）( oar的第三人称单数 ) | |
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distress
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| n.苦恼，痛苦，不舒适；不幸；vt.使悲痛 | |
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4
shrill
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| adj.尖声的；刺耳的；v尖叫 | |
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marooned
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| adj.被围困的；孤立无援的；无法脱身的 | |
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speck
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| n.微粒，小污点，小斑点 | |
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7
lure
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| n.吸引人的东西，诱惑物；vt.引诱，吸引 | |
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8
valiantly
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| adv.勇敢地，英勇地；雄赳赳 | |
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tugged
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| v.用力拉，使劲拉，猛扯( tug的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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steered
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| v.驾驶( steer的过去式和过去分词 )；操纵；控制；引导 | |
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11
lair
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| n.野兽的巢穴；躲藏处 | |
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12
shrilly
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| 尖声的； 光亮的，耀眼的 | |
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13
brazen
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| adj.厚脸皮的，无耻的，坚硬的 | |
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14
astonishment
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| n.惊奇，惊异 | |
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15
sketchy
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| adj.写生的，写生风格的，概略的 | |
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16
gathering
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| n.集会，聚会，聚集 | |
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17
streak
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| n.条理，斑纹，倾向，少许，痕迹；v.加条纹，变成条纹，奔驰，快速移动 | |
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18
pestering
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| 使烦恼，纠缠( pester的现在分词 ) | |
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19
hoarse
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| adj.嘶哑的，沙哑的 | |
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20
awfully
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| adv.可怕地，非常地，极端地 | |
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21
admiration
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| n.钦佩，赞美，羡慕 | |
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22
interfered
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| v.干预( interfere的过去式和过去分词 )；调停；妨碍；干涉 | |
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lark
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| n.云雀，百灵鸟；n.嬉戏，玩笑；vi.嬉戏 | |
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24
ashore
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| adv.在(向)岸上，上岸 | |
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25
unreasonable
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| adj.不讲道理的，不合情理的，过度的 | |
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26
gabbing
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| v.空谈，唠叨，瞎扯( gab的现在分词 ) | |
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27
precipitate
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| adj.突如其来的；vt.使突然发生；n.沉淀物 | |
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28
dreaded
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| adj.令人畏惧的；害怕的v.害怕，恐惧，担心( dread的过去式和过去分词) | |
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29
realization
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| n.实现；认识到，深刻了解 | |
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30
receding
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| v.逐渐远离( recede的现在分词 )；向后倾斜；自原处后退或避开别人的注视；尤指问题 | |
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31
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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32
outfit
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| n.（为特殊用途的）全套装备，全套服装 | |
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33
lighting
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| n.照明，光线的明暗，舞台灯光 | |
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