The Slipper Point Mystery | Page 7

she hesitated. "I - perhaps - sometime I 'll tell you more, but - the secret - Genevieve's and mine - is up on Slipper Point!"
And before Doris could reply, she was gone, racing away along the darkening sand.

CHAPTER III
SALLY CAPITULATES
IT was the beginning of a close friendship. For more than a week thereafter, the girls were constantly together. They met every morning by appointment at the hotel dock, where Sally always rowed up in "45," and Genevieve never failed to be the third member of the party. The canoe was quite neglected, except occasionally, in the evening, when Doris and Sally alone paddled about in her for a short time before sunset, or just after. Sally introduced Doris to every spot on the river, every shady bay and inlet or creek that was of the slightest interest. They explored the deserted mill, gathered immense quantities of water-lilies in Cranberry Creek, penetrated for several miles up the windings of the larger creek that was the source of the river, camped and picnicked for the day on the island, and paddled barefooted all one afternoon in the rippling water across its golden bar.
Beside that, they deserted the boat one day and walked to the ocean and back, through the scented aisles of an interminable pine forest. On the ocean beach they explored the wreck of a schooner cast up on the sand in the storm of a past winter, and played hide-and-seek with Genevieve among the billowy dunes. But in all this time neither had once mentioned the subject of the secret on Slipper Point. Doris, though consumed with impatient curiosity, was politely waiting for Sally to make any further disclosures she might choose, and Sally was waiting for - she knew not quite what! But had she realized it, she would have known she was waiting for some final proof that her confidence in her new friend was not misplaced.
Not even yet was she absolutely certain that Doris was as utterly friendly as she seemed. Though she scarcely acknowledged it to herself, she was dreading and fearing that this new, absorbing friendship could not last. When the summer had advanced and there were more companions of Doris's own kind in Manituck, it would all come to an end. She would be forgotten or neglected, or, perhaps even snubbed for more suitable acquaintances. How could it be otherwise? And how could she disclose her most precious secret to one who might later forsake her and even impart it to some one else? No, she would wait.
In the meantime, while Doris was growing rosy and brown in the healthful outdoor life she was leading with Sally, Sally herself was imbibing new ideas and thoughts and interests in long, ecstatic draughts. Chief among all these were the books - the wonderful books and magazines that Doris had brought with her in a seemingly endless amount. Sometimes Doris could scarcely extract a word from Sally during a whole long morning or afternoon, so deeply absorbed was she in some volume loaned her by her obliging friend. And Doris also knew that Sally sat up many a night, devouring by candle-light the book she wanted to return next day - so that she might promptly replace it by another!
One thing puzzled Doris, - the curious choice of books that seemed to appeal to Sally. She read them all with equal avidity and appeared to enjoy them all at the time, but some she returned to for a second reading, and one in particular she demanded again and again. Doris's own choice lay in the direction of Miss Alcott's works and "Little Lord Fauntleroy" and her favorites among Dickens. Sally took these all in with the rest, but she borrowed a second time the books of a more adventurous type, and to Doris's constant wonder, declared Stevenson's "Treasure Island" to be her favorite among them all. So frequently did she borrow this, that Doris finally gave her the book for her own, much to Sally's amazement and delight.
"Why do you like 'Treasure Island' best?" Doris asked her point-blank, one day. Sally's manner immediately grew a trifle reserved.
"Because - because," she stammered, "it is like - like something - oh! I can't just tell you right now, Doris. Perhaps I will some day." And Doris said no more, but put the curious remark away in her mind to wonder over.
"It's something connected with her secret - that I'm sure!" thought Doris. "I do wish she felt like telling me, but until she does, I 'll try not even to think about it."
But, all unknown to Doris, the time of her final testing, in Sally's eyes, was rapidly approaching. Sally herself, however, had known of it and thought over it for a week or more. About the middle