Billie Bradley on Lighthouse Island Part 19

The ocean was calm, for there was almost no wind. The water gleamed and sparkled in the brilliant suns.h.i.+ne, and the beach was almost too dazzlingly white to look upon.

In the distance rose the irregular outline of the mainland, but on all other sides there was nothing but an illimitable stretch of long, graceful, rolling combers.

As the girls came out upon the Point, there, before them, rose the lighthouse tower, robbed of the mystery it had worn the night before, yet wearing a quaint, romantic dignity all its own.

"Connie," said Billie happily, "I'm sure this is the most wonderful place in the world."

CHAPTER XVIII

UNCLE TOM

Uncle Tom was undeniably glad to see them. He was sitting in the little room at the base of the tower which was his living room, smoking a great corn-cob pipe and idly turning over the pages of a book.

But as Connie entered and ran to him with a joyful cry, he put the pipe down carefully, flung the book on the floor and caught the girl in a bear's hug.

"Well, well!" he cried, his great voice filling the room like thunder, "here's my little girl come back to me again. I was beginning to think you'd deserted your uncle in his old age, Connie, la.s.s. When did you get back? And who are these other very pretty young ladies you have with you?"

"They are my chums and the nicest girls in all the world," said Connie, turning to them gayly. "You must have known they were coming, Uncle Tom.

Mother said she told you."

"Yes, yes, so she did," said Uncle Tom in the same hearty tones that seemed to fill the little room and--the girls could almost have sworn to it--make it tremble. "But my memory is getting worse and worse, Connie, la.s.s," he added, with a doleful shake of the head that was belied by the merry twinkle in his eyes. "Let me see now, what was it their names were?"

Then laughingly Connie introduced the girls and Uncle Tom had some funny personal little thing to say to each one of them so that by the time the introductions were over they were all laughing merrily and feeling very well acquainted.

"I suppose you will be wanting to see the tower," said Uncle Tom, after he had shown them all around the quaint little room and introduced them to some of his treasures--queer racks and sh.e.l.ls and pebbles that he had picked up in his wanderings. "Everybody always wants to climb the tower, and it's mighty hard on a poor old fellow with a weak back, let me tell you." And again the doleful shake of the head was belied by the twinkle in his eyes.

"Oh, we're in no hurry, please," put in Billie, turning from one of the small-paned, outward-opening windows that looked straight out upon the ocean. "I think this is the darlingest room I ever saw. I could spend days and days just looking around here."

Connie's Uncle Tom stood six feet two in his stocking feet and was broad in proportion. He had a shock of reddish brown hair that was becoming slightly streaked with gray, but his face was clean shaven. His features were rugged, rather than handsome, but his eyes were large and red-brown to match his hair and with an everlasting humor in them that made everybody love him who knew him.

And now he stood looking down at Billie's pretty, eager face, and, though his face was grave, his eyes were laughing as usual.

"I'm glad you like it," he said. "I do. But then, I have to."

"I should think you'd want to," Billie shot back. "Why, I am sure I would just love to live here myself----"

"No, you wouldn't," Uncle Tom interrupted, taking up his pipe and puffing at it thoughtfully. "It's mighty nice in the day time, I'll admit. Then it's a mighty pretty, homey place. But at night, especially on a stormy night, it's different. The wind wails round here like a tortured ghost, the waves beat upon the rock foundation of the tower like savage beasts trying to tear it apart, and the tower itself seems to quiver and tremble. And you start to wonder--" the girls had gathered closer to him, for his voice was grave and his eyes had stopped laughing--"about the s.h.i.+ps away out there in the fury of the storm, some of them crippled, distressed, sinking perhaps. And you get to thinking about the men and women, and little children maybe, on board and wondering how many will be alive when the storm dies down. I tell you it grips you by the throat, it makes your eyes ache with pity, and you curse the storm that's bringing disaster along with it."

His hands were clenched, his face was hard and stern, and the girls felt thrilled, stirred, as they had never been before. But suddenly he jumped to his feet, went over to the window and stood there looking out for a moment. And when he came back he was smiling so naturally that the girls caught themselves wondering if they had not dreamed what had gone before.

"I didn't mean to give you a lecture," he told them gayly. And with strange reluctance they shook off the spell and smiled with him. "Come on, let's take a look at the tower, and then I'll give you some clam chowder. Would you like some clam chowder?"

They were too fresh from breakfast to be wildly enthusiastic even over clam chowder just then, but they knew the time would come soon when they would be hungry again, so they a.s.sented happily and followed the broad back of Uncle Tom up the winding tower steps.

They exclaimed over the tower room, and the wonderful revolving light, but the thing that charmed them most was the platform that completely encircled the tower.

They reached the platform through a small door, and as the girls stepped out upon it they felt almost as if they were stepping out into s.p.a.ce.

The water seemed unbelievably far away, farther a good deal than it actually was, and Billie did not dare look down very long for fear of becoming dizzy.

It was almost half an hour before Uncle Tom finally succeeded in luring them away from the platform, and then the whole crowd of girls went reluctantly.

They went downstairs with Uncle Tom and listened to his yarns, with Bruce curled happily up at his master's feet, until the thought of the clam chowder he had promised them became insistent and Connie asked him pointblank whether he had forgotten all about it.

Uncle Tom indignantly denied the latter imputation, and set about preparing the chowder immediately, the girls offering eager but inexperienced help. Bruce tried to help, too, but only succeeded, as usual, in getting himself in the way.

And after that came bliss! The girls succeeded in devouring a huge pot of delicious chowder--it was better than that they had had the night before, because it was freshly made--and it was after three o'clock before they finally tore themselves from the lighthouse and Uncle Tom and started for the Danvers' bungalow.

"Come again and come often," he called after them in his megaphone voice, one hand stroking Bruce's beautiful head as the big dog stood beside him.

"We will," they answered happily.

"Especially if you give us clam chowder every time," Billie laughed back at him over her shoulder. "Good-bye, Bruce." She turned once more before they lost sight of the lighthouse keeper, and there he was, towering in the doorway, his dog at his side, smoking his corn cob pipe and gazing thoughtfully out to sea.

"I don't wonder you love him, Connie," she said, shading her eyes with her hand, for the brilliant suns.h.i.+ne made her blink. "I think he's wonderful. He's like--like--somebody out of a book."

"Poor Teddy," said Laura, with a wicked side glance at her chum. "I guess he'd better hurry up, if he's coming."

Billie tried hard to think of something crus.h.i.+ng to say in reply, but before she could speak Connie gave an excited little skip that very nearly landed her in the sand a couple of feet below the boardwalk.

"Oh, when do you suppose the boys will get here?" she asked eagerly. "I'm just crazy to go out in that motor boat of Paul's."

"Yes, to have the boys come will be all we need to make us perfectly happy," declared Vi.

"Well, they ought to be along in a few days now," said Billie. Then she suddenly caught Connie's arm and pointed out toward the water's edge.

"Look!" she cried. "There are some people in swimming."

"Why, of course," said Connie. "We can go in swimming, too, to-morrow if we want to. Maybe Uncle Tom will come along. I always feel safer with him, he's such a wonderful swimmer."

"Oh, I hope so," said Vi, adding plaintively: "I only wish to-morrow wasn't such a long way off," and she sighed.

The girls walked along in silence for a few minutes. Then Billie spoke as if she were thinking aloud.

"I wonder," she said, "what your Uncle Tom----"

"You'd better call him your Uncle Tom," said Connie, with a laugh, "because he's already adopted you."

"All right," agreed Billie. "I wonder what made Uncle Tom speak the way he did about storms and wrecks and--and--things----"

"Why, since he's a sailor," said Laura, "I suppose he's been in all sorts of wrecks, and of course he thinks about them most in a storm."

"No," said Connie gravely. "No, that isn't it. You see," she lowered her voice a little and spoke slowly, "Uncle Tom lost somebody in a wreck once. She was a very lovely girl, it is said, and Uncle Tom was engaged to marry her."