"'—'Bout Giunts, an' Griffuns, an' Elves,An' the Squidgicum-Squees 'at swallers therselves!'"
Rosalind quoted. "I hope you have been enjoying yourself."
"After a dull fashion, yes."
"I should like to tell her that! We saw you through the window. She struck us as very pretty, didn't she, Reggie?"
"I didn't notice her," Gillespie replied with so little interest that we both laughed.
"It's too bad," remarked Rosalind, "that Aunt Pat couldn't have come with us. It would have been a relief for her to get away from that dreary school-house."
"I might go and fetch her," I suggested.
"If you do," said Gillespie, grinning, "you will not find us here when you get back."
Rosalind sighed, as though at the remembrance of her aunt's forlorn exile; then the music broke out in a two-step.
"Come! We must have this dance!" she exclaimed, and Gillespie rose obediently. I followed, exchanging chaff with Rosalind until we came to the door, where she threw off her cloak for the first time.
"Lord and Protector, will you do me the honor?"
It all happened in a moment. I tossed the cloak across my arm carelessly and she turned to Gillespie without looking at me. He hesitated—some word faltered on his lips. I think it must have been the quick transition of her appearance effected by the change from the rich color of the cloak to the white of her dress that startled him. She realized the danger of the moment, and put her arm on his arm.
"We mustn't miss a note of it! Good-by,"—and with a nod to me I next saw her far away amid the throng of dancers.
As I caught up the cloak under my arm something crackled under my fingers, and hurrying to a dark corner of the veranda I found the pocket and drew forth an envelope. My conscience, I confess, was agreeably quiescent. You may, if you wish, pronounce my conduct at several points of this narrative wholly indefensible; but I was engaged in a sincere effort to straighten out the Holbrook tangle, and Helen had openly challenged me. If I could carry this deception through successfully I believed that within a few hours I might bring Henry Holbrook to terms. As for Gillespie he was far safer with Rosalind than with Helen. I thrust the envelope into my breast pocket and settled myself by the veranda rail, where I could look out upon the lake, and at the same time keep an eye on the ball-room. And, to be frank about it, I felt rather pleased with myself! It would do Helen no great harm to wait for Gillespie on St. Agatha's pier: the discipline of disappointment would be good for her. Vigorous hand-clapping demanded a repetition of the popular two-step of the hour, and I saw Rosalind and Gillespie swing into the dance as the music struck up again.
Somewhere beneath I heard the rumble and bang of a bowling-alley above the music. Then my eyes, roaming the lake, fell upon the casino pier below. Some one was coming toward me—a girl wrapped in a long cloak who had apparently just landed from a boat. She moved swiftly toward the casino. I saw her and lost her again as she passed in and out of the light of the pier lamps. A dozen times the shadows caught her away; a dozen times the pier lights flashed upon her; and at last I was aware that it was Helen Holbrook, walking swiftly, as though upon an urgent errand. I ran down the steps and met her luckily on a deserted stretch of board walk. I was prepared for an angry outburst, but hardly for the sword-like glitter of her first words.
"This is infamous! It is outrageous! I did not believe that even you would be guilty of this!"
The two-step was swinging on to its conclusion, and I knew that the casino entrance was not the place for a scene with an angry girl.
"I am anything you like; but please come to a place where we can talk quietly."
"I will not! I will not be tricked by you again."
"You will come along with me, at once and quietly," I said; and to my surprise she walked up the steps beside me. As we passed the ball-room door the music climbed to its climax and ended.
"Come, let us go to the farther end of the veranda."
When we had reached a quiet corner she broke out upon me again.
"If you have done what I think you have done, what I might have known you would do, I shall punish you terribly—you and her!"
"You may punish me all you like, but you shall not punish her!" I said with her own emphasis.
"Reginald promised me some papers to-night—my father had asked me to get them for him. She does not know, this cousin of mine, what they are, what her father is! It is left for you to bring the shame upon her."
"It had better be I than you, in your present frame of mind!"—and the pity welled in my heart. I must save her from the heartache that lay in the truth. If I failed in this I should fail indeed.
"Do you want her to know that her father is a forger—a felon? That is what you are telling her, if you trick Reginald into giving her those papers he was to give me for my father!"
"She hasn't those papers. I have them. They are in my pocket, quite safe from all of you. You are altogether too vindictive, you Holbrooks! I have no intention of trusting you with such high explosives."
"Reginald shall take them away from you. He is not a child to be played with—duped in this fashion."
"Reginald is a good fellow. He will always love me for this—"
"For cheating him? Don't you suppose he will resent it? Don't you think he knows me from every other girl in the world?"
"No, I do not. In fact I have proved that he doesn't. You see, Miss Holbrook, he gave her the documents in the case without a question."
"And she dutifully passed them on to you!"
"Nothing of the kind, my dear Miss Holbrook! I took them out of her cloak pocket."
"That is quite in keeping!"
"I'm not done yet! Pardon me, but I want you to exchange cloaks with me. You shall have Reginald in a moment, and we will make sure that he is deceived by letting him take you home. You are as like as two peas—in everything except temper, humor and such trifles; but your cloaks are quite different. Please!"
"I will not!"
"Please!"
"You are despicable, despicable!"
"I am really the best friend you have in the world. Again, will you kindly exchange cloaks with me? Yours is blue, isn't it? I think Reginald knows blue from red. Ah, thank you! Now, I want you to promise to say nothing as he takes you home about papers, your father, your uncle or your aunt. You will talk to him of times when you were children at Stamford, and things like that, in a dreamy reminiscential key. If he speaks of things that you don't exactly understand, refers to what he has said to your cousin here to-night, you need only fend him off; tell him the incident is closed. When I bring him to you in ten minutes it will be with the understanding that he is to take you back to St. Agatha's at once. He has his launch at the casino pier; you needn't say anything to him when you land, only that you must get home quietly, so Miss Pat shan't know you have been out. Your exits and your entrances are your own affair. Now I hope you see the wisdom of obeying me, absolutely."
"I didn't know that I could hate you so much!" she said quietly. "But I shall not forget this. I shall let you see before I am a day older that you are not quite the master you think you are: suppose I tell him how you have played with him."
"Then before you are three hours older I shall precipitate a crisis that you will not like, Miss Holbrook. I advise you, as your best friend, to do what I ask."
She shrugged her shoulders, drew the scarlet cloak more closely about her, and I left her gazing off into the strip of wood that lay close upon the inland side of the club-house. I was by no means sure of her, but there was no time for further parley. I dropped the blue cloak on a chair in a corner and hurried round to the door of the ball-room, meeting Rosalind and Gillespie coming out flushed with their dance.
"The hour of enchantment is almost past. I must have one turn before the princess goes back to her castle!"—and Rosalind took my arm.
"Meet me at the landing in two minutes, Gillespie! As a special favor—as a particular kindness—I shall allow you to take the princess home!" And I hurried Rosalind away, regained the blue cloak, and flung it about her.
"Well," she said, drawing the hood over her head, "who am I, anyhow!"
"Don't ask me such questions! I'm afraid to say."
"I like your air of business. You are undoubtedly a man of action!"
"I thank you for the word. I'm breathing hard. I have seen ghosts and communed with dragons. She's here! youralter egois on this very veranda more angry than it is well for a woman to be."
"Oh," she faltered, "she found out and followed?"
"She did; she undoubtedly did!"
As we paused under one of the veranda lamps she looked down at the cloak and laughed.
"So this is hers! I thought it didn't feel quite right. But that pair of gloves!"
"It's in my pocket. I have stolen it!" I led the way to the lower veranda of the casino, which was now de-a sorted. "Stay right here and appear deeply interested in the heavens above and the waters under the earth until I get back."
I ran up the stairs again and found Helen where I had left her.
"And now," I said, giving her my arm, "you will not forget the rules of the game! Your fortunes, and your father's are brighter to-night than they have ever been. You hate me to the point of desperation, but remember I am your friend after all."
She stopped abruptly, hesitating. I felt indecision in the lessening touch upon my arm, and I saw it in her eyes as the light from the ball-room door flooded us.
"You have taken everything away from me! You are playing Reginald against me."
"Possibly—who knows! I supposed you had more faith in your powers than that!"
"I have no faith in anything," she said dejectedly.
"Oh, yes, you have! You have an immense amount of faith in yourself. And you know you care nothing at all about Reginald Gillespie; he's a nice boy, but that's all."
"You are contemptible and wicked!" she flared. "Let us go."
Gillespie's launch was ready when we reached the pier, and after he had handed her into it he plucked my sleeve, and held me for an instant.
"Don't you see how wrong you are! She is superb! She is not only the most beautiful girl in the world, but the dearest, the sweetest, the kindest and best. You have served me better than you know, old man, and I'm grateful!"
In a moment they were well under way and I ran back to the club-house and found Rosalind where I had left her.
"We must go at once," she said. "Father will be very anxious to know how it all came out."
"But what did you think of Buttons?"
"He's very nice," she said.
"Is that all? It doesn't seem conclusive, some way!"
"Oh, he's very kind and gentle, and anxious to please. But I felt like a criminal all the time."
"You seemed to be a very cheerful criminal. I suppose it was only the excitement that kept you going."
"Of course that was it! I was wondering what to call it. I'm afraid the Sisters at the convent would have a less pleasant word for it."
"Well, you are not in school now; and I think we have done a good night's work for everybody concerned. But tell me, did he make love acceptably?"
"I suppose that was what he was doing, sir," she replied demurely, averting her head.
"Suppose?" I laughed.
"Yes; you see, it was my first experience. And he is really very nice, and so honest and kind and gentle that I felt sorry for him."
"Ah! You were sorry for him! Then it's all over, I'm clear out of it. When a woman is sorry for a man—tchk! But tell me, how did his advances compare with mine on those occasions when we met over there by St. Agatha's? I did my best to be entertaining."
"Oh, he is much more earnest than you ever could be. I never had any illusions about you, Mr. Donovan. You just amuse yourself with the nearest girl, and, besides, for a long time you thought I was Helen. Mr. Gillespie is terribly in earnest. When he was talking to me back there in the corner I didn't remember at all that it was he who drove a goat-team in Central Park to rebuke the policeman!"
"No; I suppose with the stage properly set,—with the music and the stars and the water,—one might forget Mr. Gillespie's mild idiosyncrasies."
"But you haven't told me about Helen. Of course she saw through the trick at once."
"She did," I answered, in a tone that caused Rosalind to laugh.
"Well, you wouldn't hurt poor little me if she scolded you!"
We were on the pier, and I whistled to Ijima to bring up the launch. In a moment we were skimming over the lake toward the Tippecanoe.
Arthur Holbrook was waiting for us in the creek.
"It is all right," I said. "I shall keep the papers for the present, if you don't mind, but your troubles are nearly over." And I left Rosalind laughingly explaining to her father how it came about that she had gone to the casino in a scarlet cloak but had returned in a blue one.
Patience or Prudence,—what you will,Some prefix faintly fragrant stillAs those old musky scents that fillOur grandmas' pillows;And for her youthful portrait takeSome long-waist child of Hudson's make,Stiffly at ease beside a lakeWith swans and willows.—Austin Dobson.
In my own room I drew the blinds for greater security, lighted the desk-lamp and sat down before the packet Gillespie had given Rosalind. It was a brown commercial envelope, thrice sealed, and addressed, "R. Gillespie: Personal." In a corner was written "Holbrook Papers." I turned the packet over and over in my hands, reflecting upon my responsibility and duty in regard to it. Henry Holbrook, in his anxiety to secure the notes, had taken advantage of Gillespie's infatuation for Helen to make her his agent for procuring them, and now it was for me to use the forged notes as a means of restoring Arthur Holbrook to his sister's confidence. The way seemed clear enough, and I went to bed resolving that in the morning I should go to Henry Holbrook, tell him that I had the evidence of his guilt in my possession and threaten him with exposure if he did not cease his mad efforts to blackmail his sister.
I rose early and perfected my plans for the day as I breakfasted. A storm had passed round us in the night and it was bright and cool, with a sharp wind beating the lake into tiny whitecaps. It was not yet eight o'clock when I left the house for my journey in search of Henry Holbrook. The envelope containing the forged notes was safely locked in the vault in which the Glenarm silver was stored. As I stepped down into the park I caught sight of Miss Pat walking in the garden beyond the wall, and as I lifted my cap she came toward the iron gate. She was rarely abroad so early and I imagined that she had been waiting for me.
The chill of the air was unseasonable, and in her long coat her slight figure seemed smaller than ever. She smiled her grave smile, but there was, I thought, an unusual twinkle in her gentle eyes. She wore for the first time a lace cap that gave a new delicacy to her face.
"You are abroad early, my lord," she said, with the delicious quaint mockery with which she sometimes flattered me. And she repeated the lines:
"Hast thou seen ghosts? Hast thou at midnight heardIn the wind's talking an articulate word?Or art thou in the secret of the sea,And have the twilight woods confessed to thee?"
"No such pleasant things have happened to me, Miss Holbrook."
"This is my birthday. I have crowned myself—observe the cap!"
"We must celebrate! I crave the privilege of dining you to-night."
"You were starting for somewhere with an air of determination. Don't let me interfere with your plans."
"I was going to the boat-house," I answered truthfully.
"Let me come along. I am turned sixty-five, and I think I am entitled to do as I please; don't you?"
"I do, indeed, but that is no reason. You are no more sixty-five than I am. The cap, if you will pardon me, only proclaims your immunity from the blasts of Time."
"I wish I had known you at twenty," she said brightly, as we went on together.
"My subjection could not have been more complete."
"Do you make speeches like that to Helen?"
"If I do it is with less inspiration!"
"You must stop chaffing me. I am not sixty-five for nothing and I don't think you are naturally disrespectful."
When we reached the boat-house she took a chair on the little veranda and smiled as though something greatly amused her.
"Mr. Donovan—I am sixty-five, as I have said before—may I call you—"
"Larry! and gladden me forever!"
"Then, Larry, what a lot of frauds we all are!"
"I suppose we are," I admitted doubtfully, not sure where the joke lay.
"You have been trying to be very kind to me, haven't you?"
"I have accomplished nothing."
"You have tried to make my way easy here; and you have had no end of trouble. I am not as dull as I look, Larry."
"If I have deceived you it has been with an honest purpose."
"I don't question that. But Helen has been giving you a great deal of trouble, hasn't she? You don't quite make her out; isn't that true?"
"I understand her perfectly," I averred recklessly.
"You are a daring young man, Larry, to make that statement of any woman. Helen has not always dealt honestly with you—or me!"
"She is the noblest girl in the world; she is splendid beyond any words of mine. I don't understand what you mean, Miss Holbrook."
"Larry, you dear boy, I am no more blind or deaf than I am dumb! Helen has been seeing her father and Reginald Gillespie. She has run off at night, thinking I wouldn't know it. She is an extremely clever young woman, but when she has made a feint of retiring early, only to creep out and drop down from the dining-room balcony and dodge your guards, I have known it. She was away last night and came creeping in like a thief. It has amused me, Larry; it has furnished me real diversion. The only thing that puzzles me is that I don't quite see where you stand."
"I haven't always been sure myself, to be frank about it!"
"Why not tell me just how it is: whether Helen has been amusing herself with you, or you with Helen."
"Oh!" I laughed. "When you came here you told me she was the finest girl in the world, and I accepted your word for it. I have every confidence in your judgment, and you have known your niece for a long time."
"I have indeed."
"And I'm sure you wouldn't have deceived me!"
"But I did! I wanted to interest you in her. Something in your eye told me that you might do great things for her."
"Thank you!"
"But instead of that you have played into her hands. Why did you let her steal out at night to meet her father, when you knew that could only do her and me a grave injury? And you have aided her in seeing Gillespie, when I particularly warned you that he was most repugnant to me."
I laughed in spite of myself as I remembered the night's adventure; and Miss Pat stopped short in the path and faced me with the least glint of anger in her eyes.
"I really didn't think you capable of it! She will marry him for his money!"
"Take my word for it, she will do nothing of the kind."
"You are under her spell, and you don't know her! I think—sometimes—I think the girl has no soul!" she said at last.
The dear voice faltered, and the tears flashed into Miss Pat's eyes as she confronted, me in the woodland path.
"Oh, no! It's not so bad as that!" I pleaded.
"I tell you she has no soul! You will find it out to your cost. She is made for nothing but mischief in this world!"
"I am your humble servant, Miss Holbrook."
"Then," she began doubtfully, and meeting my eyes with careful scrutiny, "I am going to ask you to do one thing more for me, that we may settle all this disagreeable affair. I am going to pay Henry his money; but before I do so I must find my brother Arthur, if he is still alive. That may have some difficulties."
She looked at me as though for approval; then went on.
"I have been thinking of all these matters carefully since I came here. Henry has forfeited his right to further inheritance by his contemptible, cowardly treatment of me; but I am willing to forgive all that he has done. He was greatly provoked; it would not be fair for me to hold those things against him. As between him and Arthur; as between him and Arthur—"
Her gaze lay across the twinkling lake, and her voice was tremulous. She spoke softly as though to herself, and I caught phrases of the paragraph of her father's will that Gillespie had read to me: "Dishonor as it is known, accounted and reckoned among men;"—and she bowed her head on the veranda rail a moment; then she rose suddenly and smiled bravely through her tears.
"Why can't you find Arthur for me? Ah, it you could only find him there might be peace between us all; for I am very old, Larry. Age without peace is like life without hope. I can not believe that Arthur is dead. I must see him again. Larry, if he is alive find him and tell him to come to me."
"Yes," I said; "I know where he is!"
She started in amazement and coming close, her hands closed upon my arm eagerly.
"It can't be possible! You know where he is and you will bring him to me?"
She was pitifully eager and the tears were bright in her eyes.
"Be assured of it. Miss Holbrook. He is near by and well; but you must not trouble about him or about anything. And now I am going to take you home. Come! There is much to do, and I must be off. But you will keep a good heart; you are near the end of your difficulties."
She was quite herself again when we reached St. Agatha's, but at the door she detained me a moment.
"I like you, Larry!" she said, taking my hand; and my own mother had not given me sweeter benediction. "I never intended that Helen should play with you. She may serve me as she likes, but I don't want her to singe your wings, Larry."
"I have been shot at in three languages, and half drowned in others, and rewards have been offered for me. Do you think I'm going down before a mere matter ofbeaux yeux! Think better of me than that!"
"But she is treacherous; she will deliver you to the Philistines without losing a heart-beat."
"She could, Miss Patricia, but she won't!"
"She has every intention of marrying Gillespie; he's the richest man she knows!"
"I swear to you that she shall not marry Gillespie!"
"She would do it to annoy me if for nothing else."
I took both her hands—they were like rose-leaves, those dear slightly tremulous hands!
"Now, Miss Pat—I'm going to call you Miss Pat because we're such old friends, and we're just contemporaries, anyhow—now, Miss Pat, Helen is not half so wicked as she thinks she is. Gillespie and I are on the best of terms. He's a thoroughly good fellow and not half the fool he looks. And he will never marry Helen!"
"I should like to know what's going to prevent her from marrying him!" she demanded as I stepped back and turned to go.
"Oh, I am, if you must know! I have every intention of marrying her myself!"
I ran away from the protest that was faltering upon her lips, and strode through the garden. I had just reached Glenarm gate on my way back to the boat-house when a woman's voice called softly and Sister Margaret hurried round a turn of the garden path.
"Mr. Donovan!"
There was anxiety in the voice, and more anxious still was Sister Margaret's face as she came toward me in her brown habit, her hands clasped tensely before her. She had evidently been watching for me, and drew back from the gate into a quiet recess of the garden. Her usual repose was gone and her face, under its white coif, showed plainly her distress.
"I have bad news—Miss Helen has gone! I'm afraid something has happened to her."
"She can't have gone far, Sister Margaret. When did you miss her?" I asked quietly; but I confess that I was badly shaken. My confident talk about the girl with Miss Pat but a moment before echoed ironically in my memory.
"She did not come down for breakfast with her aunt or me, but I thought nothing of it, as I have urged both of them to breakfast up-stairs. Miss Patricia went out for a walk. An hour ago I tried Helen's door and found it unlocked and her room empty. When or how she left I don't know. She seems to have taken nothing with her."
"Can you tell a lie, Sister Margaret?"
She stared at me with so shocked an air that I laughed. "A lie in a good cause, I mean? Miss Pat must not know that her niece has gone—if she has gone! She has probably taken one of the canoes for a morning paddle; or, we will assume that she has borrowed one of the Glenarm horses, as she has every right to do, for a morning gallop, and that she has lost her way or gone farther than she intended. There are a thousand explanations!"
"But they hardly touch the fact that she was gone all night; or that a strange man brought a note addressed in Helen's handwriting to her aunt only an hour ago."
"Kidnapped!"—and I laughed aloud as the meaning of her disappearance flashed upon me!
"I don't like your way of treating this matter!" said Sister Margaret icily. "The girl may die before she can be brought back."
"No, she won't—my word for it, Sister Margaret. Please give me the letter!"
"But it is not for you!"
"Oh, yes, it is! You wouldn't have Miss Pat subjected to the shock of a demand for ransom. Worse than that, Miss Pat has little enough faith in Helen as it is; and such a move as this would be final. This kidnapping is partly designed as a punishment for me, and I propose to take care of it without letting Miss Pat know. She shall never know!"
Sister Margaret, only half convinced, drew an envelope from her girdle and gave it to me doubtfully. I glanced at the superscription and then tore it across, repeating the process until it was a mass of tiny particles, which I poured into Sister Margaret's hands.
"Burn them! Now Miss Pat will undoubtedly ask for her niece at once. I suggest that you take care that she is not distressed by Helen's absence. If it is necessary to reward your house-maid for her discretion—" I said with hesitation.
"Oh, I disarranged Helen's bed so that the maid wouldn't know!"—and Sister Margaret blushed.
"Splendid! I can teach you nothing, Sister Margaret! Please help me this much further: get one of Miss Helen's dresses—that blue one she plays tennis in, perhaps—and put it in a bag of some kind and give it to my Jap when he calls for it in ten minutes. Now listen to me carefully, Sister Margaret: I shall meet you here at twelve o'clock with a girl who shall be, to all intents and purposes, Helen Holbrook. In fact, she will be some one else. Now I expect you to carry off the situation through luncheon and until nightfall, when I expect to bring Helen—the real Helen—back here. Meanwhile, tell Miss Pat anything you like, quoting me! Good-by!"
I left her abruptly and was running toward Glenarm House to rouse Ijima, when I bumped into Gillespie, who had been told at the house that I was somewhere in the grounds.
"What's doing, Irishman?" he demanded.
"Nothing, Buttons; I'm just exercising."
His white flannels were as fresh as the morning, and he wore a little blue cap perched saucily on the side of his head.
"I was pondering," he began, "the futility of man's effort to be helpful toward his fellows."
He leaned upon his stick and eyed me with solemn vacuity.
"I suppose I'll have to hear it; go on."
"I was always told in my youth that when an opportunity to do good offered one should seize upon it at once. No hesitation, no trifling! Only a few years ago I wandered into a little church in a hill town of Massachusetts where I waited for the Boston Express. It was a beautiful Sunday evening—I shall never forget it!" he sighed. "I am uncertain whether I was led thither by good impulse, or only because the pews were more comfortable than the benches at the railway station. I arrived early and an usher seated me up front near a window and gave me an armful of books and a pamphlet on foreign missions. Other people began to come in pretty soon; and then I heard a lot of giggling and a couple of church pillars began chasing a stray dog up and down the aisles. I was placing my money on the taller pillar; he had the best reach of leg, and, besides, the other chap had side whiskers, which are not good for sprinting,—they offer just so much more resistance to the wind. The unseemliness of the thing offended my sense of propriety. The sound of the chase broke in harshly upon my study of Congo missions. After much pursuing the dog sought refuge between my legs. I picked him up tenderly in my arms and dropped him gently, Donovan, gently, from the window. Now wasn't that seizing an opportunity when you found it, so to speak, underfoot?"
"No doubt of it at all. Hurry with the rest of it, Buttons!"
"Well, that pup fell with a sickening yelp through a skylight into the basement where the choir was vesting itself, and hit a bishop—actually struck a young and promising bishop who had never done anything to me. They got the constable and made a horrible row, and besides paying for the skylight I had to give the church a new organ to square myself with the bishop, who was a friend of a friend of mine in Kentucky who once gave me a tip on the Derby. Since then the very thought of foreign missions makes me ill, I always hear that dog—it was the usual village mongrel of evil ancestry—crashing through the skylight. What's doing this morning, Irishman?"
I linked my arm in his and led the way toward Glenarm House. There was much to be done before I could bring together the warring members of the house of Holbrook, and Gillespie could, I felt, be relied on in emergencies. He broke forth at once.
"I want to see her—I've got to see her!"
"Who—Helen? Then you'll have to wait a while, for she's gone for a paddle or a gallop, I'm not sure which, and won't be back for a couple of hours. But you have grown too daring. Miss Pat is still here, and you can't expect me to arrange meetings for you every day in the year."
"I've got to see her," he repeated, and his tone was utterly joyless. "I don't understand her, Donovan."
"Man is not expected to understand woman, my dear Buttons. At the casino last night everything was as gay as an octogenarian's birthday cake."
He stopped in the shadow of the house and seized my arm.
"You told her something about me last night. She was all right until you took her away and talked with her at the casino. On the way home she was moody and queer—a different girl altogether. You are not on the square; you are playing on too many sides of this game."
"You're in love, that's all. These suspicions and apprehensions are leading symptoms. Up there at the casino, with the water washing beneath and the stars overhead and the band playing waltzes, a spell was upon you both. Even a hardened old sinner like me could feel it. I've had palpitations all day! Cheer up! In your own happy phrase, everything points to plus."
"I tell you she turned on me, and that you are responsible for it!"—and he glared at me angrily.
"Now, Buttons! You're not going to take that attitude toward me, after all I have done for you! I really took some trouble to arrange that little meeting last night; and here you come with sad eye and mournful voice and rebuke me!"
"I tell you she was different. She had never been so kind to me as she was there at the casino; but as we came back she changed, and was ready to fling me aside. I asked her to leave this place and marry me to-day, and she only laughed at me!"
"Now, Buttons, you are letting your imagination get the better of your common sense. If you're going to take your lady's moods so hard you'd better give up trying to understand the ways of woman. It's wholly possible that Helen was tired and didn't want to be made love to. It seems to me that you are singularly lacking in consideration. But I can't talk to you all morning; I have other things to do; but if you will find a cool corner of the house and look at picture-books until I'm free I'll promise to be best man for you when you're married; and I predict your marriage before Christmas—a happy union of the ancient houses of Holbrook and Gillespie. Run along like a good boy and don't let Miss Pat catch sight of you."
"Do you keep a goat, a donkey or a mule—any of the more ruminative animals?" he asked with his saddest intonation.
"The cook keeps a parrot, and there's a donkey in one of the pastures."
"Good. Are his powers of vocalization unimpaired?"
"First rate. I occasionally hear his vesper hymn. He's in good voice."
"Then I may speak to him, soul to soul, if I find that I bore myself."
We climbed the steps to the cool shadows of the terrace. As we stood a moment looking out on the lake we saw, far away toward the northern shore, theStiletto, that seemed just to have slipped out from the lower lake. The humor of the situation pleased me; Helen was off there in the sloop playing at being kidnapped to harass her aunt into coming to terms with Henry Holbrook, and she was doubtless rejoicing in the fact that she had effected a combination of events that would make her father's case irresistible.
But there was no time to lose. I made Gillespie comfortable indoors and sent Ijima to get the bag I had asked for; and a few minutes later the launch was skimming over the water toward the canoe-maker's house at Red Gate.
Blow up the trumpet in the new moon.—The Psalter.
Rosalind was cutting sweet peas in the garden where they climbed high upon a filmy net, humming softly to herself. She was culling out white ones, which somehow suggested her own white butterflies—a proper business for any girl on a sunny morning, with the dew still bright where the shadows lay, with bird-wings flashing about her, and the kindliest of airs blowing her hair.
"A penny for your thoughts!" I challenged.
She snipped an imaginary flower from the air in my direction.
"Keep your money! I was not thinking of you! You wear, sir, an intent commercial air; have you thread and needles in your pack?"
"It is ordained that we continue the game of last night. To-day you are to invade the very citadel and deceive your aunt. Your cousin has left without notice and the situation demands prompt action."
I was already carrying the suit-case toward the house, explaining as we walked along together.
"But was I so successful last night? Was he really deceived, or did he just play that he was?"
"He's madly in love with you. You stole away all his senses. But he thought you changed toward him unaccountably on the way home."
"But why didn't she tell him?—she must have told him."
"Oh, I took care of that! I rather warned her against betraying us. And now she's trying to punish me by being kidnapped!"
Rosalind paused at the threshold, gathering the stems of the sweet peas in her hands.
"Do you think," she began, "do you think he really liked me—I mean the real me?"
"Like you! That is not the right word for it. He's gloomily dreaming of you—the real you—at this very moment over at Glenarm. But do hasten into these things that Sister Margaret picked out for you. I must see your father before I carry you off. We've no time to waste, I can tell you!"
The canoe-maker heard my story in silence and shook his head.
"It is impossible; we should only get into deeper trouble. I have no great faith in this resemblance. It may have worked once on young Gillespie, but women have sharper eyes."
"But it must be tried!" I pleaded. "We are approaching the end of these troubles, and nothing must be allowed to interfere. Your sister wishes to see you; this is her birthday."
"So it is! So it is!" exclaimed the canoe-maker with feeling.
"Helen must be saved from her own folly. Her aunt must not know of this latest exploit; it would ruin everything."
As we debated Rosalind joined her persuasions to mine.
"Aunt Pat must not know what Helen has done if we can help it," she said.
While she changed her clothes I talked on at the house-boat with her father.
"My sister has asked for me?"
"Yes; your sister is ready to settle with Henry; but she wishes to see you first. She has begged me to find you; but Helen must go back to her aunt. This fraudulent kidnapping must never be known to Miss Pat. And on the other hand, I hope it may not be necessary for Helen to know the truth about her father."
"I dare say she would sacrifice my own daughter quickly enough," he said.
"No; you are wrong; I do not believe it! She is making no war on you, or on her aunt! It's against me! She enjoys a contest; she's trying to beat me."
"She believes that I forged the Gillespie notes and ruined her father. Henry has undoubtedly told her so."
"Yes; and he has used her to get them away from young Gillespie. There's no question about that. But I have the notes, and I propose holding them for your protection. But I don't want to use them if I can help it."
"I appreciate what you are doing for me," he said quietly, but his eyes were still troubled and I saw that he had little faith in the outcome.
"Your sister is disposed to deal generously with Henry. She does not know where the dishonor lies."
"'We are all honorable men,'" he replied bitterly, slowly pacing the floor. His sleeves were rolled away from his sun-browned arms, his shirt was open at the throat, and though he wore the rough clothes of a mechanic he looked more the artist at work in a rural studio than the canoe-maker of the Tippecanoe. He walked to a window and looked down for a moment upon the singing creek, then came back to me and spoke in a different tone.
"I have given these years of my life to protecting my brother, and they must not be wasted. I have nothing to say against him; I shall keep silent."
"He has forfeited every right. Now is your time to punish him," I said; but Arthur Holbrook only looked at me pityingly.
"I don't want revenge, Mr. Donovan, but I am almost in a mood for justice," he said with a rueful smile; and just then Rosalind entered the shop.
"Is my fate decided?" she demanded.
The sight of her seemed to renew the canoe-maker's distress, and I led the way at once to the door. I think that in spite of my efforts to be gay and to carry the affair off lightly, we all felt that the day was momentous.
"When shall I expect you back?" asked Holbrook, when we had reached the launch.
"Early to-night," I answered.
"But if anything should happen here?" The tears flashed in Rosalind's eyes, and she clung a moment to his hand.
"He will hardly be troubled by daylight, and this evening he can send up a rocket if any one molests him. Go ahead, Ijima!"
As we cleared Battle Orchard and sped on toward Glenarm there was a sting in the wind, and Lake Annandale had fretted itself into foam. We saw theStilettorunning prettily before the wind along the Glenarm shore, and I stopped the engine before crossing her wake and let the launch jump the waves. Helen would not, I hoped, believe me capable of attempting to palm off Rosalind on Miss Pat; and I had no wish to undeceive her. My passenger had wrapped herself in my mackintosh and taken my cap, so that at the distance at which we passed she was not recognizable.
Sister Margaret was waiting for us at the Glenarm pier. I had been a little afraid of Sister Margaret. It was presuming a good deal to take her into the conspiracy, and I stood by in apprehension while she scrutinized Rosalind. She was clearly bewildered and drew close to the girl, as Rosalind threw off the wet mackintosh and flung down the dripping cap.
"Will she do, Sister Margaret?"
"I believe she will; I really believe she will!" And the Sister's face brightened with relief. She had a color in her face that I had not seen before, as the joy of the situation took hold of her. She was, I realized, a woman after all, and a young woman at that, with a heart not hardened against life's daily adventures.
"It is time for luncheon. Miss Pat expects you, too."
"Then I must leave you to instruct Miss Holbrook and carry off the first meeting. Miss Holbrook has been—"
"—For a long walk"—the Sister supplied—"and will enter St. Agatha's parlor a little tired from her tramp. She shall go at once to her room—with me. I have put out a white gown for her; and at luncheon we will talk only of safe things."
"And I shall have this bouquet of sweet peas," added Rosalind, "that I brought from a farmer's garden near by, as an offering for Aunt Pat's birthday. And you will both be there to keep me from making mistakes."
"Then after luncheon we shall drive until Miss Pat's birthday dinner; and the dinner shall be on the terrace at Glenarm, which is even now being decorated for a fête occasion. And before the night is old Helen shall be back. Good luck attend us all!" I said; and we parted in the best of spirits.
I had forgotten Gillespie, and was surprised to find him at the table in my room, absorbed in business papers.
"'Button, button, who's got the button!'" he chanted as he looked me over. "You appear to have been swimming in your clothes. I had my mail sent out here. I've got to shut down the factory at Ponsocket. The thought of it bores me extravagantly. What time's luncheon?"
"Whenever you ring three times. I'm lunching out."
"Ladies?" he asked, raising his brows. "You appear to be a little social favorite; couldn't you get me in on something? How about dinner?"
"I am myself entertaining at dinner; and your name isn't on the list, I'm sorry to say, Buttons. But to-morrow! Everything will be possible to-morrow. I expect Miss Pat and Helen here to-night. It's Miss Pat's birthday, and I want to make it a happy day for her. She's going to settle with Henry as soon as some preliminaries are arranged, so the war's nearly over."
"She can't settle with him until something definite is known about Arthur. If he's really dead—"
"I've promised to settle that; but I must hurry now. Will you meet me at the Glenarm boat-house at eight? If I'm not there; wait. I shall have something for you to do."
"Meanwhile I'm turned out of your house, am I? But I positively decline to go until I'm fed."
As I got into a fresh coat he played a lively tune on the electric bell, and I left him giving his orders to the butler.
I was reassured by the sound of voices as I passed under the windows of St. Agatha's, and Sister Margaret met me in the hall with a smiling face.
"Luncheon waits. We will go out at once. Everything has passed off smoothly, perfectly."
I did not dare look at Rosalind until we were seated in the dining-room. Her sweet peas graced the center of the round table, and Sister Margaret had placed them in a tall vase so that Rosalind was well screened from her aunt's direct gaze. The Sister had managed admirably. Rosalind's hair was swept up in exactly Helen's pompadour; and in one of Helen's white gowns, with Helen's own particular shade of scarlet ribbon at her throat and waist, the resemblance was even more complete than I had thought it before. But we were cast at once upon deep waters.
"Helen, where did you find that article on Charles Lamb you read the other evening? I have looked for it everywhere."
Rosalind took rather more time than was necessary to help herself to the asparagus, and my heart sank; but Sister Margaret promptly saved the day.
"It was in theRound World. That article we were reading on The Authorship of the Collects is in the same number."
"Yes; of course," said Rosalind, turning to me.
Art seemed a safe topic; and I steered for the open, and spoke in a large way, out of my ignorance, of Michelangelo's influence, winding up presently with a suggestion that Miss Pat should have her portrait painted. This was a successful stroke, for we all fell into a discussion of contemporaneous portrait painters about whom Sister Margaret fortunately knew something; but a cold chill went down my back a moment later when Miss Pat turned upon Rosalind and asked her a direct question:
"Helen, what was the name of the artist who did that miniature of your mother?"
Sister Margaret swallowed a glass of water, and I stooped to pick up my napkin.
"Van Arsdel, wasn't it?" asked Rosalind instantly.
"Yes; so it was," replied Miss Pat. Luck was favoring us, and Rosalind was rising to the emergency splendidly. It appeared afterward that her own mother had been painted by the same artist, and she had boldly risked the guess. Sister Margaret and I were frightened into a discussion of the possibilities of aërial navigation, with a vague notion, I think, of keeping the talk in the air, and it sufficed until we had concluded the simple luncheon. I walked beside Miss Pat to the parlor. The sky had cleared, and I broached a drive at once. I had read in the newspapers that a considerable body of regular troops was passing near Annandale on a practice march from Fort Sheridan to a rendezvous somewhere to the south of us.
"Let us go and see the soldiers," I suggested.
"Very well, Larry," she said. "We can make believe they are sent out to do honor to my birthday. You are a thoughtful boy. I can never thank you for all your consideration and kindness. And you will not fail to find Arthur,—I am asking you no questions; I'd rather not know where he is. I'm afraid of truth!" She turned her head away quickly—we were seated by ourselves in a corner of the room. "I am afraid, I am afraid to ask!"
"He is well; quite well. I shall have news of him, to-night."
She glanced across the room to where Rosalind and Sister Margaret talked quietly together. I felt Miss Pat's hand touch mine, and suddenly there were tears in her eyes.
"I was wrong! I was most unjust in what I said to you of her. She was all tenderness, all gentleness when she came in this morning." She fumbled at her belt and held up a small cluster of the sweet peas that Rosalind had brought from Red Gate.
"I told you so!" I said, trying to laugh off her contrition. "What you said to me is forgotten, Miss Pat."
"And now when everything is settled, if she wants to marry Gillespie, let her do it."
"But she won't! Haven't I told you that Helen shall never marry him?"
I had ordered a buckboard, and it was now announced.
"Don't trouble to go up-stairs, Aunt Pat; I will bring your things for you," said Rosalind; and Miss Pat turned upon me with an air of satisfaction and pride, as much as to say, "You see how devoted she is to me!"
I wish to acknowledge here my obligations to Sister Margaret for giving me the benefit of her care and resourcefulness on that difficult day. There was no nice detail that she overlooked, no danger that she did not anticipate. She sat by Miss Pat on the long drive, while Rosalind and I chattered nonsense behind them. We were so fortunate as to strike the first battalion, and saw it go into camp on a bit of open prairie to await the arrival of the artillery that followed. But at no time did I lose sight of the odd business that still lay ahead of me, nor did I remember with any satisfaction how Helen, somewhere across woodland and lake, chafed at the delayed climax of her plot. The girl at my side, lovely and gracious as she was, struck me increasingly as but a tame shadow of that other one, so like and so unlike! I marveled that Miss Pat had not seen it; and in a period of silence on the drive home I think Rosalind must have guessed my thought; for I caught her regarding me with a mischievous smile and she said, as Miss Pat and Sister Margaret rather too generously sought to ignore us:
"You can see now how different I am—how very different!"
When I left them at St. Agatha's with an hour to spare before dinner, Sister Margaret assured me with her eyes that there was nothing to fear.
I was nervously pacing the long terrace when I saw my guests approaching. I told the butler to order dinner at once and went down to meet them. Miss Pat declared that she never felt better; and under the excitement of the hour Sister Margaret's eyes glowed brightly.
"Sister Margaret is wonderful!" whispered Rosalind. "Aren't my clothes becoming? She found them and got me into them; and she has kept me away from Aunt Pat and taken me over the hard places wonderfully. I really don't know who I am," she laughed; "but it's quite clear that you have seen the difference. I must play up now and try to be brilliant—like Helen!" she said. "I can tell by the things in Helen's room, that I'm much less sophisticated. I found his photograph, by the way!"
"What!" I cried so abruptly that the others turned and looked at us. Rosalind laughed in honest glee.
"Mr. Gillespie's photograph. I think I shall keep it. It was upside down in a trunk where Sister Margaret told me I should find these pretty slippers. Do you know, this playing at being somebody else is positively uncanny. But this gown—isn't it fetching?"
"It's pink, isn't it? You said that photograph was face down, didn't you?"
"It was! And at the very bottom under a pair of overshoes."
"Well, I hopeyouwill be good to him," I observed.
"Mr. Donovan," she said, in a mocking tone that was so like Helen's that I stared stupidly, "Mr. Donovan, you are a person of amazing penetration!"
As we sat down in the screened corner of the broad terrace, with the first grave approach of twilight in the sky, and the curved trumpet of the young moon hanging in the west, it might have seemed to an onlooker that the gods of chance had oddly ordered our little company. Miss Patricia in white was a picture of serenity, with the smile constant about her lips, happy in her hope for the future. Rosalind, fresh to these surroundings, showed clearly her pleasure in the pretty setting of the scene, and read into it, in bright phrases, the delight of a story-book incident.
"Let me see," she said reflectively, "just who we are: we are the lady of the castle perilous diningal fresco, with the abbess, who is also a noble lady, come across the fields to sit at meat with her. And you, sir, are a knight full orgulous, feared in many lands, and sworn to the defense of these ladies."
"And you,"—and Miss Pat's eyes were beautifully kind and gentle, as she took the cue and turned to Rosalind, "you are the well-loved daughter of my house, faithful in all service, in all ways self-forgetful and kind, our hope, our joy and our pride."
It may have been the spirit of the evening that touched us, or only the light of her countenance and the deep sincerity of her voice; but I knew that tears were bright in all our eyes for a moment. And then Rosalind glanced at the western heavens through the foliage.
"There are the stars, Aunt Pat—brighter than ever to-night for your birthday."
Presently, as the dark gathered about us, the candles were lighted, and their glow shut out the world. To my relief the three women carried the talk alone, leaving me to my own thoughts of Helen and my plans for restoring her to her aunt with no break in the new confidence that Rosalind had inspired. I had so completely yielded myself to this undercurrent of reflection that I was startled to find Miss Pat with the coffee service before her.
"Larry, you are dreaming. How can I remember whether you take sugar?"
Sister Margaret's eyes were upon me reproachfully for my inattention, and my heart-beats quickened as eight strokes of the chapel chime stole lingeringly through the quiet air. I had half-raised my cup when I was startled by a question from Miss Pat—a request innocent enough and spoken, it seemed, utterly without intention.
"Let me see your ring a moment, Helen."
Sister Margaret flashed a glance of inquiry at me, but Rosalind met the situation instantly.
"Certainly, Aunt Pat,"—and she slipped the ring from her finger, passed it across the table, and folded her hands quietly upon the white cloth. She did not look at me, but I saw her breath come and go quickly. If the rings were not the same them we were undone. This thought gripped the three of us, and I heard my cup beating a tattoo on the edge of my saucer in the tense silence, while Miss Pat bent close to the candle before her and studied the ring, turning it over slowly. Rosalind half opened her lips to speak, but Sister Margaret's snowy hand clasped the girl's fingers. The little circlet of gold with its beautiful green stone had been to me one of the convincing items of the remarkable resemblance between the cousins; but if there should be some differentiating mark Miss Pat was not so stupid as to overlook it.
Miss Pat put down the ring abruptly, and looked at Rosalind and then smiled quizzically at me.
"You are a clever boy, Larry."
Then, turning to Rosalind, Miss Pat remarked, with the most casual air imaginable:
"Helen pronounces either with the longe. I noticed at luncheon that you say eyether. Where's your father, Rosalind?"