"And I'm Suzanne Kirk. Really Suzanne. Christened so. Not Susan putting on frills. Now we know each other ... or rather we've known each other for hundreds of years. I recognised you as soon as I saw you. Come and squat with us."
Pat, still a little stiff, let herself be pulled over to the fire. She wanted to be friendly ... and yet she didn't.
"This is my brother, David, Miss Gardiner."
David Kirk got up and put out a long lean brown hand. He was quite old ... forty, if a day, Pat thought mercilessly ... and there were grey dabs in the dark hair over his ears. He was not handsome, yet he was certainly what Judy would have called "a bit distinguished-like." There was a good deal of his sister's charm in his face and though his eyes were grey-blue instead of grey- green, there was the same tilt to his mouth ... perhaps a little more decided ... a little cynical. And when he spoke, although he said only, "I am glad to meet you, Miss Gardiner," there was something in his voice that made everything he said seem significant.
"And this is Ichabod," said Suzanne, waving her hand to the dog, who thumped his tail ingratiatingly. "Of course it's an absurd name for a lordly creature like him but David wanted to give him a name no dog had ever had before. I'm SURE no dog was ever called Ichabod before, aren't you?"
"I never heard of one." Pat felt that she was yielding in spite of herself. It DID seem as if she had known them before.
"Our cat is called Alphonso-of-the-emerald-eyes. Alphonso, meet Miss Gardiner."
Alphonso did not wave his tail. He merely blinked a disdainful eye and went on being Alphonso-of-the-emerald-eyes. Suzanne whispered to Pat,
"He is a haughty cat of ancient lineage but he likes being tickled under the ear just as well as if he were a cat who didn't know who his grandfather was. He understands every word we say but he never gossips. Pick out a soft spot of ground, Miss Gardiner, and we'll have a nice do-nothing time."
For a moment Pat hesitated. Then she curled up beside Alphonso.
"I suppose I've been trespassing," she said, "but I didn't know you'd come yet. So I wanted to come up and say good-bye to the Long House. I ... I used to come here a great deal. I have very dear memories of it."
"But you are not going to say good-bye to it ... and you are going to come here a great deal again. I know we are going to be good friends," said Suzanne. "David and I want neighbours ... want them terribly. And we're not really moved in yet ... we're going to sleep in the hay-loft to-night ... but our furniture is all in there higgledy-piggledy. The only thing in place is that old iron lantern over the front door. I HAD to hang that up and put a candle in it. It's our beacon star ... we'll light it every night. Isn't it lovely? We picked it up one time we were over in France ... in an old château some king had built for his beloved. David went for his paper and I mortgaged my future for years and went with him. I've never regretted it. It's funny ... but all the things I do regret were prudent things ... or what seemed so at the time. David and I have just been prowling about this evening. We arrived two hours ago in a terrible old rattling, banging, squeaking car ... a second-hand which we bought last week. It took all our spare cash to buy the house but we don't grudge it. The minute we saw that house I knew we must have it. It is a house of delightful personality, don't you think?"
"I've always loved it," said Pat softly.
"Oh, I knew it had been loved the moment I saw it. I think you can always tell when a house has been loved. But it's been asleep for so long. And lonely. It always hurts me to see a house lonely. I felt that I must bring it back to life and chum with it. I KNOW it feels happy because we are going to fix it up."
Pat felt the cockles of her heart warming. Houses meant to this girl what they meant to herself ... creatures, not things.
"We found this pile of apple boughs here and couldn't resist the temptation to light it. There is no wood makes such a lovely fire as applewood. And we're so happy tonight. We've just been hungry for a home ... with trees and flowers and a cat or two to do our purring for us. We haven't had a home since we were children ... not even when David was married. He and his wife lived in a little apartment for the short time the poor darling did live. We're short on relations so we'll have to depend on neighbours. It doesn't take much to make us laugh and although we're quite clever we're not so clever that anybody need be scared of us. We can't be very wild ... David here was shell-shocked somewhere in France when he was twenty and has to live quietly ... but we do mean to be good friends with life."
"I was bad friends with it when I came up here," said Pat frankly, letting herself thaw a little more. "You see, I really did resent you ... anybody ... coming in here. It seemed to belong to a dear friend of mine who used to live here ... and died six years ago."
"But you don't resent us any longer, do you? Because now you know we love this place, too. We'll be good to your ghosts and your memories, Miss Gardiner."
"I'm just Pat," ... letting herself go completely.
"Just as I'm Suzanne."
Suddenly they all felt comfortable and congenial. Ichabod lay down ... Alphonso really went to sleep. The applewood fire crackled and sputtered companionably. About them was the velvet and shadow of the oncoming night with dreaming moonlit trees beyond. In the spruces little winds were gossiping and far below the river gleamed like a blue ribbon tied around its green hill.
"I'm so glad the view goes with the house," said Suzanne. "You don't know how rich it makes me feel just to look at it. And that old garden is one I've always dreamed. I knew I had to have wistaria and larkspur and fox-gloves and canterbury-bells and hollyhocks and here they all are. It's uncanny. We're going to build a stone fireplace here in this crescent of trees. It just wants it."
"Bets ... my friend ... planted those trees. They're hers ... really ... but she won't mind lending them to you."
Suzanne reached across Alphonso and squeezed Pat's hand.
"It's nice of you to say that. No, she won't mind, because we love them. You never mind letting people have things when you know they love them. And she won't mind our making an iris glade in the spruce bush. That is another thing I've always dreamed of ... hundreds of iris with spruce trees around them ... all around them, so the glade will never be seen save by those you want to see it. And we can go there when we want to be alone. One needs a little solitude in life."
They sat and talked for what might have been an hour or a century. The talk had colour ... Pat recognised that fact instantly. Everything they talked of was interesting the moment they touched it. Occasionally there was a flavour of mockery in David Kirk's laughter and a somewhat mordant edge to his wit. Pat thought he was a little bitter but there was something stimulating and pungent about his bitterness and she found herself liking that lean, dark face of his, with its quick smiles. He had a way of saying things that gave them poignancy and Pat loved the fashion in which he and Suzanne could toss a ball of conversation back and forth, always keeping it in the air.
"The moon is going behind a cloud ... a silvery white cloud," said Suzanne. "I love a cloud like that."
"There are so many things of that sort to give pleasure," said Pat dreamily. "Such LITTLE things ... and yet so much pleasure."
"I know ... like the heart of an unblown rose," murmured Suzanne.
"Or the tang of a fir wood," said David.
"Let's each give a list of loveliest things," said Suzanne. "The things that please us most, just as they come into our heads, no matter what they are. I love the strange deep shadows that come just before sunset ... June bugs thudding against the windows ... a bite of home-made bread ... a hot water bottle on a cold winter night ... wet mossy stones in a brook ... the song of wind in the top of an old pine. Now, Pat?"