CHAPTER III
HER FATHER’S DAUGHTER
In a house that hid behind friendly old trees cuddled in trumpet vines and tender, little trailing things, Barbara Hale and her father, Dr. Winthrop Hale, lived. It was just off the road that stretched into the newly settled summer place called by the land developers Sea Cosset. A fanciful name indeed, and its choice had caused much discussion, for as every one with access to a dictionary soon discovered, cosset means pet and is usually applied to a little lamb.
“Sea Lamb,” scoffed the old sailors who brought their nets in from the ocean at the road’s turn.
“Why didn’t they call it ‘the kid,’ and be done with it,” Thom Merrill wanted to know. Thom had sold all his land to the enterprising development company, and now he had nothing else to do but criticize their choice of name for the new colony.
“But you’re all wrong,” declared Mary-Louise Trainor, who was the “bookiest” woman in the county. “We chose the name because it literally means that the sea fondles, loves, yes if you like——” she flung this defiantly into Thom Merrill’s red face—“the sea pets the land at this pretty little point, and Sea Cosset is a perfectly ideal name.”
“Sure is,” agreed Thom, chuckling so audibly that Mary-Louise turned away in evident disgust at that memorable meeting held three years ago last spring. Then Sea Cosset was cut away from the surrounding territory by its fancy name, a number of pretty bungalows, the land agents’ promise to build more “of any design desired as fast as they would be applied for,” not to mention all the other well-advertised improvements of a new summer place as compared with its well-seasoned, comfortable old town of Landing.
Strange that all of this would have anything to do with Cara Burke’s house party. But it had, for Barbara Hale and her beloved “Dads,” the doctor, were this very day admitting they should have sold their land, or some of it, to that company that developed Sea Cosset.
“Then, my dear Babs,” said father, regretfully, “you might have afforded proper things for your party.”
“But I don’t need them, really, Dads; I’ve got lots of clothes,” protested the daughter. “It’s just that these different affairs require different things.”
Which explanation meant not a thing, in the way of an explanation, for it plainly stated that Barbara Hale did not have things ready for a house party.
On the floor of her quaintly old-fashioned bedroom, Barbara was now packing her suit-case. And only the suit-case that lay there helplessly could have seen or understood the expression on her face, for the bag had more than once witnessed that same look as Barbara leaned over, putting things in and taking them out, anxiously.
“She’s worried but she’s brave,” would have been the verdict could the leather case have spoken.
“But she’s plucky and she’ll never never give in to silly little clothes,” the comb and brush might easily have confided to each other.
“And you don’t know, Dads, what a perfectly stunning pair of pajamas I have,” the girl leaning over the bag spoke up finally. “You know, dear old Mrs. Seaman sent them to me for Christmas; wasn’t that lucky?”
“It was,” replied the tall, thin man sullenly. “And if it hadn’t been for dear old Mrs. Seaman,” he was adding irony to every word, “I suppose you wouldn’t have that perfectly stunning pair of slippers, either.” More irony, more sarcasm, and teams of bitterness sharpened Dr. Hale’s words. He was blaming himself, only, and was therefore free to be as cruel as he wished about it.
“Dads,” coaxed Barbara, jumping up from her packing and confronting the ogre, “you’re being mean.” She was standing there before him in her big white bungalow apron—this was her idea of a practical bathrobe—and her eyes, always the deepest blue, were now so truly violet that their shadows were almost purple.
Certainly Barbara had a remarkable face—every feature matched up so perfectly—but the two most striking were her pallor, for one of her type, which she left untinted; and the deep violet of her eyes. She looked foreign or rather classic, with a firmness about her expression hardly fair to her youth. Her nose was very straight with that sculptured curve at her nostrils that made one think of a Greek statue—or a young colt, depending entirely upon Barbara’s mood.
Just now she was being the colt, and Dr. Hale, her indulgent father, was well aware of that mood.
“We should have sold off some of our land, Babs,” he repeated, coming back to her door and intoning the words like a verdict for some one doomed.
“We should not, Dads,” she contradicted. “Just because I haven’t a few brand new rags for a silly little party, you stand there bewailing our misery.” Her words were serious enough but her tone was bantering. Barbara was determined to cheer up the gloomy man before her.
“Well, all right,” he conceded, tapping his fingers impatiently on her door jamb and thereby drawing one’s attention to its shabby paint. “But I’m glad you’re going. Do you good,” he pronounced, again in that judicial tone.
“Maybe,” scoffed Barbara. “But I wouldn’t have gone a single step if it hadn’t been for that Cara Burke.” Barbara ignored her packing completely now. “She’s the nicest girl, Dads, really a thoroughbred. I just couldn’t refuse her.” The inference was plainly that she preferred to have refused even Cara.
“And why should you refuse?” demanded Dr. Hale. “Look here, Babs,” he spoke a little sharply. “Do you know this won’t do? I won’t have folks talking about you as if I—as if I were depriving you of—of everything.”
“Dadykins!” Barbara burst out, and all the pallor of her face was now dyed with an angry flush. “Who has said that? Whose business is it what we do or how we live? Just because I want to keep to myself more than other girls do, they think I’m being deprived of—of what?” she ended bitterly, and it was easy to see now that she was very much her father’s daughter.
“There now, don’t get excited,” placated the doctor. “I’m sure no one was talking about us, dear. Do hurry your packing,” he urged anxiously. “Dora has lunch ready and we must not get her wrought up,” he ended wearily. “Dora’s our stand-by,” he pointed out emphatically.
“But it does make me so mad, Dad,” Barbara echoed. “To have folks always slurring——”
“But they were not, dear.” He raised his voice irritably. “I merely guessed that they might.”
Still in her bungalow apron and with her arms bare, Barbara answered Dora’s call to lunch. She was excited. Not on account of her father’s words, which really had amounted to nothing unusual, but because she had to go to that party. And she hadn’t the right things to wear.
The little meal was not, apparently, being much appreciated, for both Barbara and her father were entirely preoccupied, as Dora passed from one to the other the slighted food.
Suddenly the jangling telephone startled them.
“I’ll go,” offered Barbara. “Take your tea, Dads.”
It was Cara Burke calling.
“Yes, yes,” Barbara answered. “That’s awfully good of you, Cara, but I am honestly on the point of sending my very late regrets. I really should not have accepted.”
“Why Barbara!” almost shrieked Cara at the other end of the wire but the telephone voice was of course, pouring into Barbara’s ear, “I just couldn’t have the party without you. You’ve got to come. Don’t mind about the little dance,” went on distracted Cara. “I shouldn’t have told you only I thought you would want to know.”
“I do, Cara. And it’s lovely of you to call me up.” Barbara hesitated. Cara had just called her to say there would be a little dance and she might want to fetch something different for it. And that had added to Barbara’s misery, for what had she different to take?
Long and ardent pleas and protestations were coming over the wire, for Cara had counted much upon the presence of Barbara at her party, but now, at the last moment, the much-desired one was hesitating.
There was no questioning the sincerity of Cara Burke. Unspoiled by all her advantages, she was so worth-while a girl that Barbara found it very difficult indeed to ignore her advances.
“It’s so good of you,” Barbara repeated. “But you see, I——” she paused, and instantly Cara filled the gap.
“You know, my brother Dudley thinks you and your friend Glenn are just about right,” Cara chuckled, “and he promised to get Glenn to come to our little dance if I could get you to come to the party.”
“Really!” laughed Barbara. “Glenn’s an awful stick—I mean he’s what we call a real stude, student you know,” Barbara explained. “But is he going?”
“Dud says he is, and that’s why you really couldn’t disappoint me; now could you, Barbara?”
“After all that? It would be ungrateful I know, Cara. But clothes—”
“I understand perfectly, Babs,” Cara was saying, using the endearing name with telling effect. “You don’t pay much attention to clothes. Couldn’t I lend you a little dress? You are just about my size and I’ve so many useless frocks that mother loves to buy. Wouldn’t you wear one just out of charity? It would really be a blessing to air the stuff.”
What could Barbara say to such an impulsive, generous girl? Well, that was just what she did say, and when she finally left the phone and returned to the table, her face had lost its look of perplexity.
“Well, Dads,” she exclaimed, beaming so merrily that her dark eyes threatened to ignite, “I guess I’m in for it now. Cara is bound to play me up, although why she’s so keen I can’t see.”
“I can,” replied her father grimly. “And look here, Barbara Hale,” he continued, using her name to emphasize his seriousness, “I’m glad you’re going. It’s highly important that you should go. It’s all very well to be a high-brow——”
“High-brow! Me, a high-brow?”
“Exactly. What do you think a good student ever becomes if not intelligent?”
“But I want to know—just certain things——”
“Exactly again. That’s just how one becomes a high-brow. If you had scattered interests, Babs dear, it would be different. But when one concentrates one achieves.”
“Daddy, don’t you want me to study?” Barbara’s voice was pleading, her eyes misty.
“Yes, daughter, of course I do,” replied the father, himself softening his tone until it matched Barbara’s. “But this summer I want you to go out with your friends. In fact, I want you to promise me that you will set aside everything in the way of study for this summer.” He went over to where she stood and put his hands upon her shoulders so that his look completely encompassed her. “You are so like your mother now, my dear——”
“And mother loved the same things I do,” quickly defended Barbara, in turn putting her hands on his shoulders.
“Yes, but not at your age,” he argued.
A silence fell between them. The man whose shoulders were straight as a soldier’s, in spite of his bending over with constant research work, was now thinking of Barbara’s mother. She was gone. Her devotion to nursing during the war had cost her her life with the deadly influenza then ravaging the camps among America’s flower of youth. She had been a nurse, just as Barbara was now determined to be, and the research work in bacteriology, which was Dr. Hale’s chosen field, had been as fascinating to her as it now threatened to become to Barbara.
“Do you mean, Dads, that we shouldn’t do any more experiments this summer?” his daughter asked gently.
“I do, dear. This must be your play season. I’ve got plenty to do single-handed. I’ll miss your help, of course——” he hurried to interject, “but you must promise me, right this minute, to fall in line with the girls and boys——”
“And fall out of line—with you!” Barbara’s arms went quickly about his neck and so the promise was given.
“And this is splendid, this affair today,” her father continued, when he recovered his composure. “I only wish you had a lot of pretty things——”
“I have, slathers of them,” she fibbed bravely. But no mention was made of Cara’s offer of the extra party dress.
Nor did she bother to tell her dad that Glenn Gaynor was expected to be at the party. Glenn was the attractive youth who figured so prominently in Barbara’s appearance on the beach, when Cara and her girl friends stood at a safe distance, thrilled in admiration.
One hour more—and then she must be at Billows.