"Oh, Polly, you are so quixotic and so unpractical! Suppose you should fall ill again? But there, forgive me, I should not have spoken of such a possibility. When we are both old and you have grown tired of being famous and admired, will you come here and live with me at my ’House by the Blue Lagoon’?"
"Yes, Betty dear, I’ll hide somewhere in one of your secret passages, while you entertain house parties of distinguished persons from Washington, or elsewhere--Senators, Ambassadors, even Congressmen. With all my love for my work, it is you who are admired and who care for society. Small wonder Bettina was never able to keep up with you! Here comes Bettina with her shadows, Elce and the little girl she brought from the settlement. ’Ardelia in Arcady’! Do you recall the old story of the child who came from the city to the country and was expected to care for it and did not? It was very amusing. Bettina’s latest protégé is a pathetic little figure, with her crutch and her city pallor, but she feels dreadfully lost on your desert island amid all this beauty and romance. She is a little daughter of the tenement! I believe I can understand her better than you or Bettina."
"Princess, what are our visitors doing? Polly and I ran away for an hour’s quiet talk. She is to learn to love our place nearly as much as I do," Mrs. Graham exclaimed.
Bettina Graham came nearer. She looked grave and sweet, although a little smile showed at the corners of her lips.
"Oh, they are perfectly well entertained without us, dear, and I thought Maida and Elce needed my society for a little while.
"We have small hope of seeing much of you and Tante for a few days until you have grown accustomed to the wholly new experience of being with each other. You are worse than lovers.
"Actually, mother, your house party has accepted your suggestion and has set to work to make you a garden, a new garden where the old one has been this hundred or more years. It is a charming idea! We are to leave such shrubs and roses as will bloom. David Hale and Dan Webster have taken charge and say we are to work two hours every morning, before we are allowed to do anything else--boat, or bathe, or fish, or sail. It is to be a memory or a friendship garden, although we intend to find a prettier and more original title. Anyhow, the garden is to commemorate our first Camp Fire house party by the blue lagoon. Isn’t the place exquisite, Tante? Sitting here by the lagoon can one imagine the poverty and sorrow I see every day in my settlement work, or such an experience as Maida’s, whose father is responsible for her lameness? Forgive me, mother, I promised myself not to speak of these things, or even to think of them while I am on your enchanted island."