CHAPTER X
MONA HUTTON
Mona Hutton was, as Winn instinctively felt that Sunday when he firstglanced into her well-like eyes, a girl but little akin to hersurroundings--a child of the island, full of strange moods and fancies,sombre as the thickets of spruce that grew dense and dark between theledges of granite, and solemn as the unceasing boom of ocean billowsbelow its cliffs. Even as a barefoot schoolgirl she had found the sea anenticing playmate, and to watch its white-crested waves lifting therockweed and brown kelpie, as they swept over the rocks and into thegorges and fissures, was of more interest than her schoolmates. Shewould hide between the ledges and watch the sea-gulls sailing over themfor hours, build playhouses in out-of-the-way spots with lonecontentment, filling them with shells, starfish, and crabs, dig wells inthe sandy margin of the harbor, and catch minnows to put in them. Sheloved to watch the fishing boats sailing away, the coasters pass theisland, the current sweeping in and out beneath the old tide mill, andas she grew up and gained in courage roamed over the entire island atwill. The Devil's Oven, out of sight and sound of everybody, became acharming spot for her; and here she would sit for hours watching thewaves leap into the gorge and wondering why they never sounded twicealike. And so on, as she developed, she absorbed the mood of the ocean,its grandeur shaped her thoughts, its mystery tinged her emotion, andits solemnity, like the voice of eternity, gave expression to her eyes.
Companions of her own age she had none, leaving them to play as theychose while she sought solitude, and found contentment on the lonelyshores. Uncle Jess only was akin to her, and if she could lead him awayas playmate, then was she happy.
And so she grew up.
With only a limited education, such as the island schools afforded, ascant knowledge of books, since but few ever reached Rockhaven, a loveof music that amounted to a passion, no knowledge of the world exceptthat gleaned from Uncle Jess, a deep religious feeling, partially shapedby the "Hardshell" Baptist teachings of the Rev. Jason Bush, and more bythe ocean billows that forever thundered against the island shores, shewas at twenty a girl to be pitied by those capable of understanding hernature or realizing how incompatible to it was her environment. Of musicshe knew but little, and that taught her by the genial old soul who,since her babyhood, had been father, uncle, and companion. His constantassistance had been hers through her pinafore days at school; his genialphilosophy and keen insight into human impulse had done more to developher mind afterward than the three R's she mastered there. His gentlehand had taught her the scales on his old brown fiddle, and now that shehad reached that mystic line where girlhood ends and womanhood begins,her future was of more concern to him than all else in his life. Thatshe must and would, in the course of human nature, love and marry, hefully expected; that it was like to be a mateship with some of thesimple and hard-working fishermen's sons, he expected; and yet, withdread for her far more than any one else, even her mother, he realizedthat such an alliance would be but a lifelong slavery for Mona. To matea poetic soul like hers, that heard the voice of eternity in thewhite-crested billows, the footsteps of angels in the music he drew fromhis violin, and the whisper of God in the sea winds that murmuredthrough the spruce thickets they visited, as he knew she did, seemed asunnatural as confining one of the white gulls that circled about theisland in a coop with the barnyard fowls.
To Mona herself no thought of this had come. Though the young men withwhom as schoolmates she had studied, and who now as fishermen, withill-smelling garb and sea-tanned hands and faces, often sought her, tonone did she give encouragement, and with none found agreeablecompanionship. What her future might be, and with whom spent, gave herno concern. Each day she lived as it came, helping her mother in thesimple home life and the making of their raiment, stealing awayoccasionally to spend a few hours with Uncle Jess, or in summer to hideherself in the Devil's Oven, and play on the violin he had given her, orpractise with him as a teacher. This violin and its playing, it must bestated, had been and was the only bone of contention between Mona andher mother, and just why that mother found it hard to explain, exceptthat it was a man's instrument and not a woman's. Their humble parlorboasted a small cottage organ. "Let Mona learn to play on that," she hadsaid when Jess first began to teach Mona the art of the bowstrings,"it's more graceful for a girl to do that than sawing across a fiddlestuck under her chin." And this matter of grace, so vital to thatmother's peace of mind, was the only point of dispute between them. ButUncle Jess sided with Mona, and the mother gave in, for with her, formany potent reasons, the will and wishes of Uncle Jess must not bethwarted, even if wrong. However, the dispute drove Mona and the fiddleout of the house, and when she had finally mastered it (at least in ameasure), it stayed out.
In this connection, it may be said, there was also a difference inopinion between Mrs. Hutton and Jess regarding the future of Mona, andthough never discussed before her, for obvious reasons, it existed. WithMrs. Hutton the measure of her own life, or what it had been, as well asthat of her neighbors, was broad enough for Mona.
"It's going to spoil her," she asserted on one of these occasions, "thisgetting the idea into her head that those she has been brought up withare not good enough for her. They may not be, but we are here and likelyto stay here, and once a girl gets her head full o' high notions andthat she's better than the rest, it's all day with her."
"Thar ain't no use interferin'," Jess responded, "whatever notionsMona's got, she's got, an' ye can't change 'em. If she likes the smello' wild roses better'n fishin' togs, she does; and if she turns up hernose at them as don't think 'nough o' pleasin' her ter change togs whenthey come round, I 'gree with her. Wimmin, an' young wimmin 'specially,air notional, an' though most on 'em 'round here has ter work purtyhard, it ain't no sign their notions shouldn't be considered. I'vestayed in houses whar wimmin wa'n't 'lowed to lift a finger an' hadsarvants ter fan 'em when 'twas hot, an' though that ain't no signMona'll git it done for her, I hope I'll never live ter see her drudgin'like some on 'em here."
"If you'd had the bringing o' Mona up," Mrs. Hutton had responded rathersharply, "you would a-made a doll baby out o' her, an' only fit to haveservants to fan her." At which parting shot, Jess had usually taken tohis heels, muttering, "It's a waste o' time argufyin' with a woman."
But Mrs. Hutton was far from being as "sot" in her way as might beinferred, as she always had, and still desired, to rear her only childin the way she considered best, and in accordance with her surroundings.To be a fine lady on Rockhaven, as Mrs. Hutton would put it, wasimpossible; and unless Mona was likely to be transplanted to anotherworld, as it were, it seemed wisest to keep her from exalted ideas andhigh-bred tastes. But back of that, and deep in the mother's love, laythe hope of better things for her child than she had known, though howthey were to come, and in what way, she could not see.
Mere pebbles of chance shape our destiny, and so it was in the life ofWinn Hardy, and the trifle, light as air, that turned his footsteps, wasthe sound of church bells that Sunday morning in Rockhaven.
Had they not recalled his boyhood, he would have spent the day inroaming over the island as he had planned, instead of accepting Mrs.Moore's invitation to accompany her to church, with the sequence ofevents that followed. And the one most potent was the accent ofcordiality in Mrs. Hutton's neighborly invitation to call. It may besupposed, and naturally, that the expressive eyes of her daughter werethe real magnets; but in this case they were not. Instead it was themother with whom he desired to visit, and when he called that firstevening it was with her he held most converse. Out of the medley ofsubjects they chatted about, and what was said by either, so little ispertinent to this narrative, it need not be quoted. Winn gave a briefaccount of his early life and more of the latter part, since he had beena resident of the city, together with a full explanation of how theRockhaven Granite Company was likely to affect the island, and hismission there. This latter recital, he felt, would be a wise stroke ofpolicy, as apt to be repeated by Mrs. Hutton, as in truth it was, la
teron. While she was not inquisitive, he found she was keenly interested inthe new industry he had established there, and discerning enough to seethat, if successful, it would be a great benefit to the island. Winndiscovered also that in addition to being a most excellent and devotedmother, she was fairly well posted in current events, had visitedrelatives on the mainland many times, and in the city once, and was farfrom being narrow-minded. With Mona, who sat a quiet listener, heexchanged but a few words, and those in connection with the church andsocial life of the village. In truth, he found her disinclined to saymuch and apparently afraid of him. His call was brief and notparticularly interesting, except that it made him feel a little more athome on the island, and when he rose to go, he received the expectedinvitation to call again; and when he had reached his room, the onlyfeatures of the call that remained in his mind were that Mrs. Huttonseemed interested in his mission there, and her daughter had eyes thathaunted him.
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