Rose Galbraith (28 page)

“I think it was hers,” said Gordon. “She just went home, disappeared as soon as school was over, and nobody seemed to notice. I think it must have been on account of her mother being sick. She hurried away as if she had urgent business.”

“Was it only girls who held aloof? Was she a girl who was popular with the boys?”

“No, Mother, she never seemed to look at the boys particularly. She was just a part of school, a lovely part, that we took for granted and thought little about. We were a selfish lot, and there were plenty of girls who hung around and got your attention whenever they could. Besides, I wasn't hunting for girlfriends at that stage, I tell you. There's only one thing I remember about her, and that was at commencement. She was dressed in white, and her hair was fixed somehow different. She has brown curly hair, and it was all loose and fluffy, and she looked beautiful. I remember being surprised by her looks. She seemed almost like an angel. I suppose it was the clothes, perhaps, that got me, seeing her in white, when I had been used to seeing her in plain dark cottons. But she was lovely, and she made a beautiful appearance when she gave her commencement orations. She was the only girl who spoke at commencement. Maybe you remember her?”

“Was she small and slight?” His mother caught her breath with eagerness.

“Yes, that's the one.”

“Name Rose Galbraith?” asked the father, looking up casually, with no hint in his face that he had gone and looked up that old high school commencement program from among his archives that first night when Gordon had suggested another girl whom he had known in school. He had treasured the name in his heart during the months of suspense.

“Yes, Dad. How did you remember that? She's the girl whose speech you spoke of as being the best. Do you remember saying that?”

“Why, I remember thinking she was the best of the bunch or something like that,” said the father dryly. “Nice girl. Nice voice. Nice name, Gordon. Galbraith. There used to be a man named Galbraith, wrote some pretty fine articles in the magazines. Gilbert Galbraith, I think. I suppose he's no relation of hers, though.”

“Yes,” said Gordon, beaming. “That was her father. He died when she was only a little girl, and she and her mother had a right hard time getting along, I gather. Of course, I haven't discussed things like that with her much yet.”

“Well, but Gordon, I don't understand,” said his mother with a worried glance. “How did you get to know her if you didn't know her any better than that in school? It's a long time since you graduated. Was she in New York? Have you been meeting her there?”

Gordon laughed.

“Yes, she was in New York, and I met her there, once, but only a very few minutes. That was all!”

“A few minutes!” his mother was appalled.

“Yes, just a few minutes. She was on shipboard, just starting over to Scotland to visit some relatives. She was all alone. Her mother had just died. They had planned to go over together, but her mother died a week before they were to sail. She was pretty well broken up, I think, but of course I didn't know it. I had been sent down to give some papers to a man who was sailing on the same ship, and as I came down the deck toward the companionway, I saw somebody standing by the rail watching the people, and her back looked sort of familiar. I stopped an instant to identify her, and sure enough, it was Rose Galbraith. I just impulsively stepped up and said, ‘Why, if this isn't Rose Galbraith!' or something like that. And she turned around and recognized me, and her face lit up. She seemed so glad to see somebody she knew. She said she was just thinking how she was leaving her native land, and there wasn't even an acquaintance down in that throng to say good-bye to, and everybody else seemed to have friends. She said she was glad I had spoken to her. She was looking very sweet and pretty. Had something blue on and a blue hat that matched her eyes. I never saw her look so nice and like other girls before, and she seemed so pleased to see me that I lingered a minute or two. I asked her who she was going with and her eyes filled up with quick tears, though she smiled through them and said she was going alone, that her mother and she had been going together, but instead she'd had to leave her mother in the Shandon Cemetery. Well, gosh, that kind of got me, Mother. I felt awfully sorry for her, and I stood there a minute or two more talking, asked her where she was going and all that, you know, and then I realized—well, that isn't so, I did realize but I did what we usually do when someone we know well is going across the sea or off anywhere for a long time, I just stooped over and kissed her! There, Mother! That's the story! I suppose you and Dad won't understand what I mean, but I tell you truly I can't get away from the memory of her lips, the look in her eyes, her little hand in mine! And it wasn't any mush-mush stuff, either! It's real. I've been testing it out ever since. I did my best coming home and trying to get interested in that ‘Miss know-it-all' that you had here for me, but it didn't work. I even tried her out again, just last night, for she turned up on the train when I was on my way down to Silver Beach where Fran Tallant had coerced me into going to fill in for her brother Ed. I stuck it out till mid evening and then I decided I was done and the time had come to do something decisive. So I called you up, took a taxi to a poky old train, and came home. And here I am! Now, what have you got to say?”

“But, Gordon,” said his father, taking a sudden hand, “do I understand that that scene on the boat is the last? You haven't seen her or had any contact with her since?”

“Not on your life!” said Gordon. “I've been in touch with her right along. I stopped at the flower shop as I went down and ordered a lot of flowers sent up to her cabin before I got off. Then two or three days later I sent her a radio message on shipboard. And ever since we've been corresponding. I've got her last letter right here in my breast pocket and you can read it, both of you, if you like. It's a pippin! Of course it's not a love letter. We haven't got that far yet. I mean, I have, but I don't know where she stands as to that. We've just been corresponding as friends, so far.”

“Oh-oh!” said Father McCarroll. “So that's the way it is! Well, Son, I should say you had shown pretty good judgment as to how to go about things. Almost as good work as we got away with, isn't it, Mother?” And he came over and sat down on the arm of her chair and put a loving arm around his wife. “How about it, little mother, are you going to wish your boy godspeed?”

“Of course!” said Gordon's mother, wiping away the tears and lighting up her own mother smile.

“But Gordon,” she said a moment later, with a little puzzled look on her brow that almost verged on anxiety, “what are you going to do next? Don't you think it is time you began to inquire a little more about her? You know you scarcely know her at all.”

“Not on your life, Mother. I know all I need to know. Whatever else I find out I'll find out from her own lips. The next thing I'm going to do is go over to Scotland and find out if she feels the same way I do. That's the most important thing, and I'm not going to wait any longer.”

“You mean you are going to give up your job, or have they fired you?” asked his father.

“No, neither,” laughed Gordon. “But I get two weeks vacation anyway, and I am reasonably sure I can coax my superior into giving me another week or two to do some business for the firm. The man who was going broke his leg last week, and I heard last night that he isn't getting on as fast as they hoped he would. I happen to know they are mighty anxious to have somebody from the company over there on the spot. I'm going up to New York tomorrow morning and see what I can do with them, and if all goes well I'll sail on the first ship leaving New York tomorrow. Will you wish me well or not, Mother? Father?”

“Sure!” said the father happily.

“Why, of course, Gordon,” said the mother in a small tight voice, “but don't you think you are being a bit hasty? You know marriage lasts a long time. If it's all right—”

“It's all right, Mother! Read that letter and see if you don't think so! She's a Christian girl, Mother, and a darned sight better Christian than I've ever been with all my wonderful upbringing. And if she's willing to tie up to me, I'll have to go some to keep step.”

So Mother McCarroll read Rose's letter, and Father McCarroll sat and beamed on his son happily.

And when his mother had read the letter, she passed it over to her husband.

“Yes, that's a lovely letter,” she said and got out her handkerchief and wiped her eyes. She was deeply touched. “Yes, she must be a lovely girl!”

So then Gordon started in to tell her all about the other letters he had under lock and key in New York, and Father McCarroll amid it all, trying to read the letter and yet attend to what was being said, nearly lost his mind. He wanted to listen and smile, and he wanted to read, but he managed somehow to do both.

Gordon described the castle and the thatched cottage and the grandmother and the evening and morning worship, and all the sweet Scotch habits and customs he was beginning to love. The parents listened eagerly, thoughtfully, and reflected that much as they had wanted to teach their boy to be a warm, sincere Christian, they had failed to establish a family altar in their home. It had been a long time since they had even thought about such a custom, though it had been a habit in both the homes in which they themselves had been brought up.

“Yes,” said Father McCarroll. “That's a good thing, family worship. That's the way I was brought up. And you too, Mother,” nodding toward his wife.

She bowed her head in assent.

“Well, go on, Son! When you get over there what are you going to do next? Get a job and stay there and go courting her?”

“Oh, no,” said Gordon with a grin. “I'll do that the first few minutes, and then we're going to get married, if she'll have me, and I really think she cares. Believe me, Dad, we're not going to let that sea separate us anymore.”

“Oh!” said the father. “And I suppose your mother and I can stay at home and suck our thumbs. You aren't even thinking of inviting us to the wedding, are you?”

Gordon's face lit gorgeously.

“Sure thing, Dad. Would you come? Do you mean you'd leave business and everything and bring Mother over to the wedding?”

“Why of course, if we were invited,” said his parent with a grin.

“Well, you're invited. We'll cable an invitation the minute we get the day settled. Say, Dad and Mother, you're both peaches! Of course I knew you would be, but somehow it's better than I had even wished!”

And then suddenly the dinner bell rang, and with their arms about one another as they used to walk when Gordon was a little boy, they all three went abreast into the dining room.

S
o there was Gordon McCarroll standing at the door of the thatched cottage in Kilcreggan, and Rose, opening the door, all unaware!

“Gordon!” she cried, a great light coming into her eyes.

He put out his hands and took both of hers in his own, and then with a kind of glory in his face he bent and kissed her. Then suddenly his arms went around her and he drew her close, his lips on hers.

“Rose! My little love!” he whispered softly, as she suddenly nestled closer to him and put her rosy face down on his shoulder. “Rose, I love you! Don't you know it? Look up, dear. Let me see what your eyes say.”

For answer she lifted smiling eyes, and he laid his lips again on hers. “Oh!” she said softly. “Is this real, or is it just a dream?”

“It is real, little Rose,” he said softly and held her close.

Then they heard footsteps coming toward the kitchen door, and Gordon quickly released her, and stood looking at her, his face shining.

The door opened, and there was Aunt Jessie with a wondering look on her sweet face. Rose, all shining-faced and happy, took Gordon by the hand shyly and led him over to her aunt.

“Aunt Jessie, this is my friend Gordon McCarroll, from home.”

Aunt Jessie turned a sudden quick look on the young man, and then apparently satisfied, beamed upon him.

“Yir verra welcome,” she said extending her hand in greeting. “A' doot it's a glad day for oor little lassie tae see a frien' frae hame. Tak his hat, Rosie, an' gie him a chair. Air ye juist frae the ship, or came ye by Liverpool?”

“Yes, I came by Liverpool,” said Gordon. “I landed two days ago. Had to stop in London on business for the company that demanded haste, and then I came right on here by train. I am so very glad to find Rose here. I was afraid she might have gone to the castle in Edinburgh, but I decided to try here first.”

A quick look passed between Rose and her aunt.

“But I almost did,” said Rose, with a motion of her hand to her heart. “I was just saying this minute that I thought I ought to go at once, and Aunt Jessie was saying she wouldn't let me go alone, that I would have to wait till my cousins came back. It wasn't safe.”

“Safe?” said Gordon with quick alarm in his eyes. “Why wouldn't it be safe?”

“Mayhap a' shudna hae mentioned it,” said Aunt Jessie penitently. “I thocht ye micht know a' aboot it.”

“Not quite all,” said Rose with flaming cheeks, “but it's all right, Aunt Jessie. I'll tell him about it at once. I'm sure he'll understand.”

“Well, sit ye doon in the shade in the yaird whiles an' talk, an' a'll get a bit meal on the table. Then when the lads come ye can eat an' go if gang ye must.”

Hand in hand they went out in the yard to the rustic bench under the big tree and sat down, and Gordon put his arm about her and drew her closer to him.

“Darling!” he said, looking deep into her eyes. “Do you really love me?”

It was several minutes before they could tear their thoughts away from their delight in each other