I had never been a model for anything.  Now I was used as such by my companion indiscriminately, in the background, in the foreground and once as a grayhaired witch.  I was commanded to sit still, to not wink an eyelash, though the mosquitoes feasted and the hornets buzzed.

Fortunately the summer holiday gave me some leisure.  I absorbed every moment seeking comprehension of youthful ways of looking at things, and in Zura’s effort to reduce her wild gallop to a sober pace, the way was as rough for the girl, as the climb up the mountain side was for me.  Often she stumbled and was bruised in the fall.  Brushing aside the tears of discouragement she pluckily faced about and tried again.

There were many battles of tongue and spirit but when the smoke had been swept away, the vision was clearer, the purpose firmer.

That monotony might not work disaster or routine grow irksome our workdays were interspersed with picnics, journeys to famous spots and, for the nights, moonlight sails on the Inland Sea.

Page Hanaford was our frequent guest.  To Jane and me his attitude was one of kindly deference and attention.  Towards Zura it was the mighty call of youth to youth.  She answered with ready friendship.  It was easy to see that the boy was buoyant by nature, but the moods that sometimes overtook him were strange.  Often at a moment when the merriment was at its height, the hand of some invisible enemy seemed to reach out and clutch him in a dumb horror, confused the frankness of his eyes, left him with bloodless lips.  From light-hearted happiness he plunged to silent gloom.

Twice it had occurred when the day was heavy with moisture, thick and superheated by the summer’s sun.  The last time it happened, to the heat was added the excitement of a police launch stopping our little pleasure craft and demanding our names and business.  When it left Page grew silent and, until we landed, lay in the prow his face hidden by his hat.  Mental or physical I could not say.  I wished I knew for it subtracted the joy from the day as surely as dampness takes the kink out of unnatural curls.

When I mentioned the incident to Jane, she only looked wise and smiled.  I could almost believe she was glad, for it gave her unlimited opportunity for coddling.  Zura made no comment.  So great was the rebound partial freedom induced, her spirits refused to descend from the exhilarating heights of “having a good time and doing things.”  She blandly ignored any suggestion of hidden trouble, or the possibility of it daring to come in the future.  Untiring in her preparations for our festivities, the hour of their happening found her so gracious a hostess, naturally she was the pivot around which the other three of us swung.

I wondered if, in our many festivities we were not forming habits of useless dissipation.  Jane said our parties were much livelier than church socials at home.  Our experienced leader assured me, however, these picnics were as slow as a gathering of turtles in a coral cave, but they continued, ceasing only when the nights grew too chill for comfort.  Our pleasures were then transferred to the homeyness of the little living-room in “The House of the Misty Star.”