CHAPTER XIADRIAN DREDMOND
The day of sailing came at last.
A good deal of confusion prevailed in getting the family, with their endless supply of luggage, from the Coolidge mansion to the steamer; and in the midst of it all, Wilbur managed several times to escape the Argus eyes of his watchful mother and jealous sister, and get a word with Brownie.
Every hour in her presence only served to enthrall him more hopelessly. He never wearied of looking upon herbright face, nor of listening to the sweet tones of her voice. She wove a sweet spell about him.
Miss Douglas, however, responded very quietly, and with some dignity, whenever he addressed her.
She was observing enough to perceive that his attentions to her were anything but acceptable to the Coolidge family; so, without appearing to do so, she avoided him, and devoted herself to her young charges, Viola and Alma.
But a little incident occurred, just as they were going aboard the steamer, which was to influence the young girl’s whole after life.
Brownie was the last to step aboard, excepting Wilbur, and not paying strict heed to her steps, she caught her foot in a coil of rope, stumbled, and would have fallen had she not been quickly caught and upheld by a strong arm. The shock was so severe that, overcome with dizziness, she lay almost unconscious for a moment in the stranger’s clasp.
“Has she fainted?” asked Wilbur Coolidge, in anxious tones, as he sprang forward, too late to render service.
“I think not. It was only the shock; she will rally in a moment,” were the words which Brownie, on coming to herself, heard in such deep, rich tones, that she was conscious of a sudden thrill running through her whole frame.
She opened her eyes, and found herself looking up into a face that was strange, yet familiar.
For one instant her eyes met his, and their souls met through that glance. Then, with a vivid blush of shame staining her fair cheek, as she realized she was being held in the arms of a stranger, Brownie gently disengaged herself, and tried to stand alone.
“Brownie Douglas!” the stranger murmured, in wondering surprise, and as if the words were forced from him by some previous memory.
As she caught them, the color again flew to her face, and he, seeing her embarrassment, hastened to say:
“I beg your pardon, but my surprise made me forget myself. Will you take my arm and allow me to conduct you below? I fear you are not quite strong yet.”
“Thank you,” Brownie began, when Wilbur Coolidge suddenly interfered.
“I will attend to the lady, sir, thanking you kindly for the service you have already rendered her,” he said, somewhat haughtily, and offering Miss Douglas his own arm.
She took it, and with a grateful little bow to the strange gentleman, and one more rapid glance into his fine eyes, she allowed Mr. Coolidge to lead her away.
“Who was that gentleman, Miss Douglas?” Wilbur Coolidge demanded, with a grave face, when they had left him, and he was carefully conducting her down the companionway.
“I do not know; I have never met him before, and yet——” was Brownie’s hesitating reply, while her face wore a puzzled look.
“And yet what?” asked the young man, trying to speak carelessly, yet with the vestige of a frown.
“It seems to me as if I have seen his face at some time, but where, I do not remember.” And the perplexed look still remained upon her countenance.
“He seemed to know you. He called you ‘Brownie Douglas.’ Is that your name?”
The color flamed again into her cheeks at the question. She had noticed the stranger’s involuntary utterance of her pet name, and had been strangely moved by it.
“It used to be when I had dear friends.”
She grew sad and pale again at the memories which came thronging upon her at the sound of the dear old name.
“I cannot understand, though, how he should come to know it,” she added, after a moment.
“Brownie—Brownie—it just suits you, Miss Douglas,” said Mr. Coolidge, taking in at one admiring glance the shining coils of brown hair, the liquid chestnut eyes, and the long, dark lashes which just now half concealed them.
“My name is Mehetabel Douglas, Mr. Coolidge,” Brownie said, coldly, and with dignity, not relishing his familiarity, nor the tender cadence which his voice had assumed.
He laughed aloud.
“Pardon me,” he said, “but such a name for you is an abomination. Don’t you ever shorten it?”
“I do not think it is very euphonious myself, Mr. Coolidge, and therefore, when I write it, I shorten it into Meta,” she explained, smiling at his indignation, and disarmed by his frankness.
“That is quite respectable. But what is the matter? I fear you have not recovered from your fall yet. Are you sure you are not injured by it?” he asked, anxiously, seeing she had grown very white again.
“No; but it gave me quite a shock, and I think the motion of the boat prolongs the dizziness. But I shall do very well if I can only sit down.”
“If this gentle swaying affects you so, I do not know what you will do when we come to move,” he replied, as he hastened toward the saloon with her.
Here they found the rest of the family, quite anxious at their non-appearance; and his mother and Isabel were not in the best frame of mind in the world when they saw the governess come in, leaning upon the arm of Wilbur.
“Miss Douglas has had a fall, mother, and is faint; please let her have your vinaigrette,” he explained, as he carefully seated her upon a sofa.
“Thanks, but I have one,” Brownie said, and straightway produced one from her little traveling-bag, which caused Miss Isabel’s pale eyes to expand with wonder.
It was a costly little trifle of solid gold, and its stopple was curiously formed and set with pearls.
She prized it, and loved to use it, because it has been one of the things which had been used last by Miss Mehetabel.
“Do look, mamma! Wherever did she get it?” whispered Isabel.
“I’m sure I don’t know, child; evidently, she belonged to a different sphere in life before she came to us. I only wish your grandfather had been at the poles that night she went to the library to beguile him with her pretty face,” returned the maternal Coolidge, impatiently.
“Oh, you begin to think she is pretty, do you?” sneered her dutiful daughter.
“Wilbur evidently thinks so, if I do not,” was the moody reply.
Brownie’s quick ears had caught every word, and she very coldly refused the glass of ice water which the young man in question at that moment brought her.
She then settled herself upon the couch and closed her eyes, thus intimating her desire to be left alone.
Upon the deck above them there paced a young man, with bent head and thoughtful brow.
He was tall and exceedingly well-formed, his broad, full chest and square shoulders giving one the impression of great strength and powers of endurance.
He looked the Englishman every inch, and a very noble one withal.
He was not handsome, like Wilbur Coolidge, but he possessed a face of decision and truth.
He had deep, thoughtful gray eyes, a good mouth with kindly lines about it, and an expression of great firmness and character withal. It was a true, good face—a face to be trusted under any circumstances.
“How does she happen to be here, I wonder?” he muttered, with a far-away look out over the waters. “I know she left Philadelphia soon after her aunt’s death,” he continued, “and though Gordon tried hard to find where she had gone, he could not. She faded out of the fashionable world in which she used to move as completely and suddenly as a fallen star drops out of existence. I’m glad now I did not leave the button with him, as he wished me to do; no, I’ll give it to her with my own hands, or I will keep it forever!”
He walked absently to the side of the steamer, and stood looking into the turbid waters beneath; and not long after two ladies drew near, and he overheard the following conversation:
“Mamma, I tell you we shall have trouble with that governess as sure as the world.”
“I hope not,” replied the elder lady, with a troubled look.
“Wilbur is over head and ears in love with her already, and it will be just like her to lead him on for the sake of gaining a good position in the world,” and the young lady’s tone was exceedingly disagreeable.
“Well, it cannot be helped now; you must make yourselfso interesting and agreeable that he will prefer your society to that of any one’s else; you must monopolize him during the voyage, and when we are once settled, I will see that she does not have any spare time to flirt.”
“Talk about her having a fall,” continued Isabel Coolidge, indignantly. “Alma saw the whole proceeding, and says it was nothing but a stumble. She said a gentleman caught her, and saved her from going to the floor, and she lay back in his arms as helplessly and gracefully as any heroine in a novel.”
“I have not much doubt that she is artful, and would not scruple to take advantage of Wilbur’s weakness for pretty faces, notwithstanding she appears so meek and demure.”
“Meek and demure, mamma! Why, she is anything but that. She has the manners and bearing of a little queen!” interrupted Miss Coolidge.
“Well, but she is very quiet, and does not appear to be seeking his attentions; but, as I said before, we cannot help it now; all we can do is to watch them closely.”
“Never fear but that we can do that with our sharp eyes; and with you and I both on the lookout, I reckon we can manage them,” laughed the young lady.
“Yes; and if we find any indications of anything serious upon Wilbur’s part, I will find some excuse for shipping her off our hands as soon as we land. I will not have my son’s prospects ruined by a poverty-stricken governess,” replied the haughty woman, sternly.
They moved away from the place where they had been standing, and the young Englishman resumed his pacings, a smile of ineffable scorn curling his fine lips.
“A poverty-stricken governess, indeed!” he muttered between his teeth; “and I would not have her prospects for future happiness ruined by the son of such a woman! Poor child!” and his face softened into tenderness; “then she has been reduced to that cruel necessity, and she will have a hard time of it if left to the tender mercies of those two. At all events,” he continued, “I will manage some way to get acquainted with her before the voyage is ended, and return her cuff button. I shall miss it, too,for it has lain so long in its place that it seems like a precious talisman.”
He took it from the pocket of his vest as he spoke—that beautiful little trifle of black enamel and gold, with its sparkling initial in the center, inclosed in its brilliant circle.
He turned it over, and read the tiny letters engraved on the back.
“Brownie!” he murmured. “I could not help speaking her name as I held her in my arms; and how beautiful she looked when the lovely color leaped into her face as she heard it. Never mind, when I put this into her own little hands, I will explain it all.”
He replaced the button in his pocket, with a deep sigh, and then turned his attention to the steamer, as she cast off her moorings and began to move out into the mighty deep.
The reader has doubtless recognized in the stranger the person of Adrian Dredmond, one of the young men who stood in the vestibule of the Art Gallery at Philadelphia, on the day when Miss Huntington met with such a series of accidents to her elaborate toilet.
He had come from the old country to attend the world’s wonderful exposition, and was now returning—but more of him hereafter.