“Yes, but don’t count me in, please,” exclaimed Lucy with a merry laugh as she arose from her seat.  “I don’t know a thing about it.  I’ve just told the dear captain so.  I’m going upstairs this very moment to write some letters.  Bonjour, Monsieur le Docteur; bonjour, Monsieur le Capitaine and Madame Dellenbaugh,” and with a wave of her hand and a little dip of her head to each of the guests, she courtesied out of the room.

When the door was closed behind her she stopped in the hall, threw a glance at her face in the old-fashioned mirror, satisfied herself of her skill in preserving its beautiful rabbit’s-foot bloom and freshness, gave her blonde hair one or two pats to keep it in place, rearranged the film of white lace about her shapely throat, and gathering up the mass of ruffled skirts that hid her pretty feet, slowly ascended the staircase.

Once inside her room and while the vote was being taken downstairs that decided Archie’s fate she locked her door, dropped into a chair by the fire, took the unopened letter from her pocket, and broke the seal.

“Don’t scold, little woman,” it read.  “I would have written before, but I’ve been awfully busy getting my place in order.  It’s all arranged now, however, for the summer.  The hotel will be opened in June, and I have the best rooms in the house, the three on the corner overlooking the sea.  Sue says she will, perhaps, stay part of the summer with me.  Try and come up next week for the night.  If not I’ll bring Sue with me and come to you for the day.

“Your own Max.”

For some minutes she sat gazing into the fire, the letter in her hand.

“It’s about time, Mr. Max Feilding,” she said at last with a sigh of relief as she rose from her seat and tucked the letter into her desk.  “You’ve had string enough, my fine fellow; now it’s my turn.  If I had known you would have stayed behind in Paris all these months and kept me waiting here I’d have seen you safe aboard the steamer.  The hotel opens in June, does it?  Well, I can just about stand it here until then; after that I’d go mad.  This place bores me to death.”

CHAPTER XVI

THE BEGINING OF THE EBB

Spring has come and gone.  The lilacs and crocuses, the tulips and buttercups, have bloomed and faded; the lawn has had its sprinkling of dandelions, and the duff of their blossoms has drifted past the hemlocks and over the tree-tops.  The grass has had its first cutting; the roses have burst their buds and hang in clusters over the arbors; warm winds blow in from the sea laden with perfumes from beach and salt-marsh; the skies are steely blue and the cloud puffs drift lazily.  It is summer-time—­the season of joy and gladness, the season of out-of-doors.

All the windows at Yardley are open; the porch has donned an awning—­its first—­colored white and green, shading big rocking-chairs and straw tables resting on Turkish rugs.  Lucy had wondered why in all the years that Jane had lived alone at Yardley she had never once thought of the possibilities of this porch.  Jane had agreed with her, and so, under Lucy’s direction, the awnings had been put up and the other comforts inaugurated.  Beneath its shade Lucy sits and reads or embroiders or answers her constantly increasing correspondence.