THE HAPPY VENTURE

BY

EDITH BALLINGER PRICE

AUTHOR OF "BLUE MAGIC,"
"US AND THE BOTTLEMAN,"
"SILVER SHOAL LIGHT," ETC.

ILLUSTRATED BY
THE AUTHOR

Published in 1920, 1921, by The Century Co.

CONTENTS

I TALES IN THE RAIN

II HAVOC

III UP STAKES

IV THE FINE OLD FARMHOUSE

V THE WHEELS BEGIN TO TURN

VI THE OTHER SIDE OF THE HEDGE

VII A-MAYING

VIII WORK

IX FAME COMES COURTING

X VENTURES AND ADVENTURES

XI THE NINE GIFTS

XII "ROSES IN THE MOONLIGHT"

XIII "THE SEA IS A TYRANT"

XIV THE CELESTINE PLAYS HER PART

XV MARTIN!

XVI ANOTHER HOME-COMING

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

"Now can you see it? Now?"

The Maestro sat down beside Kirk

The slack length of it flew suddenly aboard

"Phil--Phil!" Kirk was saying then

THE HAPPY VENTURE

CHAPTER I

TALES IN THE RAIN

"How should I your true love know,
   From another one?
By his cockle hat and staff,
   And his sandal shoon..."

It was the fourth time that Felicia, at the piano, had begun the old song. Kenelm uncurled his long legs, and sat up straight on the window-seat.

"Why on earth so everlasting gloomy, Phil?" he said. "Isn't the rain bad enough, without that dirge?"

"The sky's 'be-weeping' him, just the way it says," said Felicia. She made one complete revolution on the piano-stool, and brought her strong fingers down on the opening notes of another verse.

"He is dead and gone, ladie,
     He is dead and--"

Kenelm sat down again in the window-seat. He knew that Felicia was anxious about their mother, and he himself shared her anxiety. The queer code of fraternal secrecy made him refrain from showing any sign of this to his sister, however. He yawned a little, and said, rather brusquely:

"This rain's messing up the frost pretty well. There shouldn't be much left of it by now."

"Crocuses soon ..." Felicia murmured. She began humming to an almost inaudible accompaniment on the piano:

"Ring, ting, it is the merrie springtime...."

The rain rolled dully down the clouded window-panes and spattered off the English-ivy leaves below the sill. They quivered up and down on pale stems--bright, waxed leaves, as shining as though they had been varnished.

Kirk drifted in and made his way to Felicia.

"She's better," he observed. "She said she was glad we were having fun." He frowned a little as he ran his finger reflectively down Felicia's sleeve. "But she's bothered. She has think-lines in her forehead. I felt 'em."

"You have a think-line in your own forehead," said Felicia, promptly kissing it away. "Don't you bother."

"Where's Ken?" Kirk demanded.

"In the window-seat."

Thither Kirk went, a tumble of expectancy, one hand before him and his head back. He leaped squarely upon Ken, and made known his wishes at once. They were very much what Kenelm expected.

"See me a story--a long one!"

"Oh, law!" Kenelm sighed; "you must think I'm made of 'em. Don't crawl all over me; let me ponder for two halves of a shake."

Kirk subsided against his brother's arm, and a "think-line" now became manifest on Kenelm's brow.

"See me a story"--Kirk's own queer phrase--had been the demand during most of his eight years. It seemed as though he could never have enough of this detail of a world visible to every one but himself. He must know how everything looked--even the wind, which could certainly be felt, and the rain, and the heat of the fire. From the descriptions he had amassed through his unwearied questioning, he had pieced out for himself a quaint little world of color and light,--how like or unlike the actuality no one could possibly tell.

"Blue is a cool thing, like water, or ice clinking in your glass," he would say, "and red's hot and sizzly, like the fire."

"Very true," his informants would agree; but for all that, they could not be sure what his conception might be of the colors.

Things were so confusing! There, for instance, were tomatoes. They were certainly very cool things, if you ate them sliced (when you were allowed), yet you were told that they were as red as red could be! And nothing could have been hotter than the blue tea-pot, when he picked it up by its spout; but that, to be sure, was caused by the tea. Yet the hot wasn't any color; oh, dear!

Ken had not practised the art of seeing stories for nothing. He plunged in with little hesitation, and with a grand flourish.

"My tale is of kings, it is," he said; "ancient kings--Babylonian kings, if you must know. It was thousands and thousands of years ago they lived, and you'd never be able to imagine the wonderful cities they built. They had hanging gardens that were----" Felicia interrupted.

"It's easy to tell where you got this story. I happen to know where your marker is in the Ancient History."

"Never you mind where I got it," Ken said. "I'm trying to describe a hanging garden, which is more than you could do. As I was about to say, the hanging gardens were built one above the other; they didn't really hang at all. They sat on big stone arches, and the topmost one was so high that it stuck up over the city walls, which were quite high enough to begin with. The tallest kinds of trees grew in the gardens; not just flowers, but big palm-trees and oleanders and citron-trees, and pomegranates hung off the branches all ready to be picked,--dark greeny, purpley pomegranates all bursting open so that their bright red seeds showed like live coals (do you think I'm getting this out of the history book, Phil?), and they were this-shaped--" he drew a pomegranate on the back of Kirk's hand--"with a sprout of leaves at the top. And there were citrons--like those you chop up in fruit-cake--and grapes and roses. The queen could sit in the bottomest garden, or walk up to the toppest one by a lot of stone steps. She had a