CHAPTER IX.A STRANGE ENCOUNTER.
Several days went by, and Geoffrey heard nothing more either of or from the sophomores who had attempted to haze him.
Neither did he happen to meet any of them on his way to or from his recitations, and he hoped that the occurrence would gradually be forgotten and occasion no more trouble.
He did not mention it to any one, and he bore none of the actors any ill-will, for he well knew that hazing had been an established custom in many colleges, and that every freshman was liable to be subjected to the ordeal.
But the affair was destined to be more serious, eventually, than he imagined an occurrence of that kind could ever become.
Young Mapleson realized, as soon as his passion began to cool somewhat, that he should be obliged to relinquish all thoughts of retaliation for a season, for none of hiscomrades would bear him out in any plan for revenge; but he vowed in his heart that there should yet come a day of reckoning between himself and Huntress for the indignity to which he had been subjected before his companions.
He was furious with them for not having come to his release, and he raved over the affair all the way back to his room after leaving Geoffrey’s.
But they made light of it, and tried to pass the whole thing off as a joke. This only enraged him the more, although he began to see the wisdom of keeping still about it, since he could get no sympathy from them.
There is no telling what rash act he might not have committed if he had been allowed to go and come as usual while this fierce mood lasted. But he had wrought himself into an excessive perspiration, and then going out into the chill night air afterward, he had taken a violent cold, and for three weeks he was confined to his room with a threatened fever.
At the end of that time, although his anger had not abated one whit toward Geoffrey, and he was no less determined to have his revenge, he had come to see the wisdom of refraining from all rashness which might rebound injuriously upon himself, and he resolved to conceal his purpose in his own breast and watch his opportunity to strike his foe down at some time in the future, when the blow would be felt with bitter force.
So, upon recovering his usual health, he resumed his studies and his intercourse with his fellow-students as if nothing had occurred to ruffle him, and those who had participated in the hazing of Geoffrey Huntress imagined that the unpleasant affair had blown safely over and become a thing of the past.
Thus the fall and winter passed.
Meantime Gladys was winning golden opinions for herself at Vassar.
Study was a perfect delight to her, consequently excellence in every department was but a natural result.
The name of Gladys Huntress became the synonym for all that was learned and brilliant in her class, and there was not one who did not predict that the first honor should be conferred upon her at the end of the course.
No one appeared to be jealous of her, either, on account of it, for she was a general favorite with both teachers and scholars, always having a pleasant word and a kind smile for everybody.
During the recess, which occurred between the winter and spring terms of her second year at Vassar, she was in New York city for a few days with her chosen friend and roommate, Addie Loring.
There was considerable shopping to be done to prepare for the warm weather, dress-making to attend to, besides a gay round of social duties, and the two girls were all the time in a delightful flutter of business and pleasure.
One morning, after a long siege of shopping, feeling both weary and hungry, they entered an up-town cafe to obtain a lunch and rest a little before going home.
At the cashier’s desk near the door, as they stepped inside, there stood a tall, handsome young man in the act of paying for his dinner.
Gladys caught sight of him in an instant, and she started and flushed a vivid crimson.
Then a smile of joy illumined her whole face as she sprang forward, and, laying her hand lightly on the young man’s arm, exclaimed in delighted tones:
“Why, Geoffrey, where did you drop from? I imagined you a solitary recluse at Yale, and hard at work over Latin and Greek, ‘to gain time’ as you wrote in your last letter.”
The young man turned quickly as the sweet, lady-like voice fell upon his ear, his whole body thrilling at that light touch upon his arm, and found himself face to face with the most beautiful girl he had ever seen.
A tall, slender, perfect form, clad in a bewitching suit of modest gray, stood before him. Her small head was proudly poised on a pair of graceful shoulders, and crowned with a jaunty turban of gray velvet in which there gleamed a scarlet feather. The face was delicate in outline, with lovely features and a complexion of pure white and rose. Her eyes of dark blue were lighted with surprise and gladness, her lips wreathed with a tender smile of welcome which parted them just enough to reveal the small, milk-white teeth between.
A look of admiration shot into the young man’s eyes, and then they began to gleam with amusement.
He raised his hat with all the gallantry of which he was master, and bowed low, as he replied:
“You have made a slight mistake, lady. I do not answer to the name by which you have addressed me, although I might be tempted to do so, perhaps, if I could thereby secure the pleasure of your acquaintance. Allowme,” he concluded, drawing a card from his pocket-book, and respectfully presenting it to her.
At the first sound of his voice Gladys was conscious that she had made a dreadful blunder, and she was instantly covered with confusion.
She knew at once that this man could not be Geoffrey, and yet who was he? So like him in face and form, with his very eyes and hair, and that familiar way of throwing up his head when suddenly addressed!
“Everet Mapleson, Richmond, Virginia,” she read upon the card that he had given her, and instantly the startled thought shot through her mind: “Can it be possible that he and Geoffrey are related?”
“I beg your pardon, Mr. Mapleson,” she said, recovering herself somewhat, while she searched his face for something by which she could distinguish him from Geoffrey. “I perceive that I have made a mistake, but you so strangely resemble my—Mr. Geoffrey Huntress that I mistook you for him.”
She had been about to say “my brother,” but suddenly checked herself, for, since Geoffrey had shown so much of his heart to her and she had begun to analyze her own feelings toward him, she had been very shy about calling him brother.
“Ah! Mr. Geoffrey Huntress,” repeated Everet Mapleson, with a quick flash from his eyes, while his keen mind at once made a shrewd guess, and argued therefrom that this beautiful girl must be either the sister or the cousin of his enemy. “I have met that gentleman, for I also am a student at Yale,” he continued, “and—pardon my boldness—I presume I now have the pleasure of meeting his sister, Miss Huntress.”
“No, I am not his sister, Mr. Mapleson,” Gladys replied, her color coming and going in soft, little sunrise flushes, “but we are members of the same family, and I am Miss Huntress.”
“Ah, yes—excuse me—you are cousins, I presume. Huntress once told me that he was reared by an uncle. I am sorry, upon my word,” he went on, with an appealing look, “if our singular resemblance has caused you any annoyance to-day; pray think no more of it since it was a very natural mistake. We are often addressed by each other’s name—indeed, we are known at Yale as ‘the mysterious double.’”
All the time the young man was speaking he was closely observing the young girl.
He had noticed her fluctuating color when she spoke of Geoffrey; he remarked the tender inflection of her voice as she uttered his name, and how eager she had been to correct his mistake in supposing them to be brother and sister.
“They are cousins—perhaps not first cousins, either, and the girl loves him,” he said to himself. “Of course he returns her affection—no fellow in his senses could help it. I wonder how it would work if I should try my own luck in this direction. I have never paid off that old grudge against him, and this would be a fine way to settle it.”
But Gladys, all unconscious of this secret plotting against her own and Geoffrey’s happiness, looked up with a merry smile at his words to her, and remarked:
“The resemblance is surely very striking, although your voices are unlike. I knew the moment you spoke that I had made a mistake, and my apparent rudeness must have been quite startling to you,” she concluded, coloring again as she remembered how eagerly she had approached him and laid her hand upon his arm.
“No, indeed; you are very hard upon yourself, Miss Huntress. Believe me I shall consider the incident a most fortunate circumstance if I may be allowed to consider it as a formal introduction to you, and thus secure the pleasure of your acquaintance.”
He was so gentlemanly and affable, so refined in his language and manner, that Gladys thought him very agreeable, and, since he claimed to know Geoffrey, she thought there could be no possible harm in receiving him as an acquaintance.
Still she was not quite sure that it would be proper, and this made her a little guarded in her reply.
“I am always glad to meet any of Geoffrey’s friends,” she said, with one of her charming smiles; but if she could have known how he cringed under her words, and what venomous hatred was rankling in his heart against him who was her ideal of all manly excellence, she would have fled from him in dismay.
But nothing of this nor of the miserable plot which was rapidly taking form in his mind appeared on the surface, while before he could frame a suitable reply Gladys turned quickly and drew Addie Loring to her side, saying:
“Allow me to introduce my friend—Miss Loring, Mr. Mapleson.”
He lifted his hat in acknowledgment of the presentation while he was still inwardly chafing over that last guarded speech of hers.
“She wouldn’t look at me if she knew the truth,” he thought, “and that clever cousin will be letting it all out when he learns that we have met. Never mind. I’ll make hay while the sun shines, and do my best to ingratiate myself with her before he finds it out; she’s dusedly pretty and it would suit me finely if I could cut him out.”
He detained the young ladies for a few moments longer—for he had the power of making himself very agreeable when he chose—then Addie Loring pulled forth a little gem of a watch and remarked, with a look of surprise:
“Gladys, dear, we promised mamma to be at home by four, and it is nearly three now, while we have flowers yet to get for Mrs. Brevort’s reception.”
Everet Mapleson’s heart gave a great bound at these last words, for the friends at whose house he was visiting also had cards for Mrs. Brevort’s reception, and he mentally resolved that he would grace that lady’s elegant drawing-room with his presence that evening, although he and Al Vanderwater had previously planned for something entirely different.
He took pretty Miss Loring’s hint, however, begged pardon for having detained them so long, then made his adieus and passed out of the cafe, while the young girls moved forward to an empty table, where they chatted over the strange encounter as they ate their cream and cake.