Of course, she was aware of it; she was thinking of it at this moment, while the Massachusetts woman behind her unpacked her conscience on her nearest Indiana neighbor.
"And how does Indiana stand?" said the evangelist, finally.
"Well, if you askme," said the Indianian, wearily, "we have troubles of our own; and we are not thinking much about it!"
At this, her companion (also from Massachusetts, but with a sense of humor), giggled and essayed to cover her indecorum by asking Mrs. Hardy if she had attended the industrial sessions. "I have tried to go to them," she confessed, later, after they had become confidential. "My husband is a manufacturer, and I was anxious to see whether they would try to get light on the questions that they are tackling, or would simply form an opinion beforehand and talk about it."
"Well, how did they strike you?"
"They didn't strike me at all; I went to two of them; but the first one, two southern acquaintances of mine lured me out into a committee-room, to tell me the dreadful things Massachusetts was going to do about the color question—not one of which had entered our heads, by the way—and the other meeting, I sat back in the hall and couldn't hear anything, and a Massachusetts friend came in, very calm but deeply excited, and got me out in the hall to tell me the plots of the Georgia delegation. Between them, I didn't hear a word of the industrial question. I'm told Missouri has been studying preventive legislation in regard to woman and child labor for the last year; what did they decide to recommend?"
"Well," said Mrs. Hardy, drily, "you see they were studying for ayear; if they had taken the subject for a month or two, no doubt they would have had opinions; but as it was, they didn't recommend anything. But what you say about the sessions made me think. I find that there are two classes of delegates, those who are interested in the meetings and those who simply go to the meetings to get a better chance to pull wires. It makes me more at sea than ever about the object of the federation. What doyouthink it is?"
The Massachusetts woman meditated. She was a handsome woman, a woman with ancestors, it was evident, for the blue and gold of the Colonial Dames badge, and the enamel star and scarlet ribbon of the Order of Colonial Governors illuminated the white chiffon of her bodice; and there were five bars on the scarlet ribbon. "My idea of the object is simply that it is a clearing-house," said she; "and so far it is democratic, for it brings us all together; and I," said the descendant of governors and warriors, "I'mdemocratic. Look at us. It is not only that we represent so many different classes, we represent so many sections of the country. In fact, about this color question, I feel that it is more important for the north and the south to get acquainted and friendly, working together, than it is for us to give the opportunities of the federation to a few colored people."
"I don't look at it that way, it is a question of right and wrong"—thus the ardent soul from Massachusetts unfurled her banner to the breeze—"are you going to do what is right or what is expedient?" The smouldering fire which had made the deck hot walking all through the meetings, showed signs of breaking out of cover; everybody in hearing craned her neck; there were murmurs of approval and polite sniffings of dissent to the right and to the left. The Massachusetts woman said "Life is a compromise;" and shrugged her shoulders. Mrs. Hardy put up the white flag in a mild sentence: "Mrs. Lowe is calling us to order, I think."
The convention had passed safely to the ballot. The opposition had sprung its mines; and the regulars had discharged their heavy artillery behind the proper parliamentary subterfuges. The undecided voters had, as usual, asked to take back their ballots, and as usual had been refused. The excitement had risen until it showed in white or flushed faces and strained voices, in clapping, and hisses; but the chairman's inscrutable calm never changed, and through it all she held the convention perfectly in hand.
Two men had safely run the gauntlet of ticket takers, and were seated in the lower gallery. They were a middle-aged man, dark, portly, carefully dressed in silver-gray tweeds, with a silk shirt; and a young man, dark, slender, in a lighter suit, with a stiff white collar on his pink negligee shirt. There was an air of distinction about both men; they looked to be men of importance in their own locality, men accustomed to command and deference; but nothing of gentler modesty and meekness than their demeanor can be imagined. They shrank back in their seats and sat close to each other, as one will observe timid children sitting, who have wandered into a strange house.
"You—you don't suppose they will put us out? eh, Darrie?" said the elder, in a low voice, "notnow?"
"Of course not," responded Darrie, with simulated lightness; "look there to the left, there's Myrtie. That president is a good presiding officer; you would not guess all this row is over her, she's absolutely impartial—by Jove!"
"What's the matter? Do you see mother anywhere?"
"No, sir; did you catch that, the secretary's explanation of the parliamentary question? Pretty clear, I call it; but they're getting in all their points, I observe, working questions of privilege for all they are worth."
"Very clever, very clever," assented Darius; "there's Hester, mother isn't withher; you don't suppose mother would stay away, this afternoon?"
"Never; this is the election afternoon."
"Myrtie said mother was very much admired and sought after, lots of invitations; maybe she has gone out to some tea—"
"They wouldn't have anything this afternoon; don't you see how keyed up they all are?"
"I thought I was monstrous clever planning all this," pursued Darius, with a knitted brow; "your mother forgot this was our anniversary, but I didn't; I have her present in my pocket; and the dinner ordered; and I was expecting to surprise her; but if she isn't here—she couldn't have gonehome?"
"Of course not—there she is, don't you see her? looking fresh as paint!"
A lady had risen, her voice, mellow and clear, dove through the sonorous buzz of the hall.
"Why it'smother!" cried Darius, "and if she isn't taking an appeal from the chair; mother has her nerve with her, to-day."
Darrie grinned; but as he watched his father's face kindle, his own changed; he laid his hand on his father's, nodding, softly: "I tell you, mother'sgreat," said he.
"That little dark-eyed lady is speaking on mother's side"—Darius was leaning forward with excited interest—"isn't she a pretty creature, she's little—but, oh my! How clearly she puts it; these southerners have a natural gift of oratory. Don't think much of that woman who's trying to call mother down!"
He was as eager as a boy, the man whose cool head and hard sense had won him a great fortune; his eyes glistened, the color crept into his cheek; and he drew a long sigh when the appeal was withdrawn. "Very pretty, Darrie," he said, "appeal withdrawn, but they have got in their work on the voters; chairman had to decide against her own friends, and did it like a Roman soldier. The extraordinary thing to me, Darrie, is how well they are all keeping their temper. Darrie, didn't you think mother's voice was good when she spoke; how'd she learn to speak so well?"
"Oh, she took lessons," returned Darrie, easily; "Hester got her into them; Hester and mother are great pals."
"I know; Hester's a remarkable girl, Darrie; she has always appreciated your mother. Begun again, have they? Started something else while the ballots are counted. Like a continuous show, isn't it?"
He listened with a slackened zest while the questions of reorganization and details of the duties of chairmen pattered through the hour, the rain after the thunder-storm. Then, unexpectedly, Mrs. Hardy made her little speech. It was an excellent little speech, good-natured, full of sense, and with a dash of humor. At first, she was a little nervous, but she was too interested in her subject to be nervous more than an instant. Had she known of the presence of two auditors in the gallery, perhaps her composure had wavered. There could be no doubt regarding their agitation. They turned pale and clutched each other; then, first on Darrie's, next on his father's features, dawned and spread a light of exceeding confidence; with shameless effrontery—considering their relationship—they stimulated the applause; they beamed over the hits; and at the close they were radiant. Without a word Darius held out his hand to his son, who wrung it. Then, they both took a long, long breath of relief and satisfaction. Darius was the first to speak: "My son," said he, "I have known your mother for forty years and have been her husband for thirty-three, but she can surprise me still!"
"Mother certainlyisgreat," assented Darrie, solemnly; he added his own little feather of marital triumph: "Hetty always told me so," said he.
"Look at those women all around her," said Darius, "patting her on the shoulder and whispering;theyknow. Darrie, I'll bet you anything, there hasn't been another speech in this convention that has put things as clearly as mother's."
Myrtle started when she saw her husband and son smiling in the doorway. Her daughter-in-law was on one side, her daughter on the other, half a dozen of her delegation radiated complacency in her wake. "Hasn't she covered us with glory?" one of the followers called, gleefully to another. And a little din of compliments fell upon Darius' ears. It is pleasant to reflect that all over the hall similar groups were exulting unselfishly over their own prowess and their own heroines. Little did Darius Hardy concern himself with them. He took his wife under his arm with a proud and blissful smile. He waved a direction at Darrie: "You take the girls, Darrie, you'll find a cab, somewhere; I want your mother to myself. Now, Myrtle, if sated vanity can demand any more, I'll give it to you in the carriage!"
A few minutes later, she was gazing, through a happy mist, at the gems on her heart-shaped locket, murmuring: "And I thought you had forgotten the day. And you planning this lovely, lovely surprise for me. Oh, I am so glad, Dar, I didn't know you were there, I couldn't have said aword! Did I—were you—was itpassable?"
"You're fishing!" chuckled he; and he kissed her hand. But he whispered in her ear; and she blushed like a young girl.
Presently he laughed. "By the way, Myrtle, you haven't told me! Have you discovered what is the object of the federation?"
"Certainly," said she, "I don't know what it is for others, but in my case it is to help me find myself—and my husband!"
The golf links were picturesque; spreading along the shore or climbing through the heart of the island set in the great river; here and there a vista of the huge bulk of the arsenal-shops; walled over the river by the hills behind opulent, bustling little cities, the fair greens jeweled by the sun and dappled with shadow from trees older than the Louisiana Purchase. A breeze shifted the shadows. Willy Butler felt its touch on his wet forehead.
He half turned to take out his handkerchief. In the act he saw her. It was the same girl who had followed the course yesterday. She was alone, just as she had been alone yesterday.
The gallery was bobbing like the crest of a wave over the brow of the hill; the carriages and machines glittered in slow pomp after the rope, while the favorites and their caddies marched over the slope toward the bunkers. But Willy and Dickson had only this one follower, a little lonely figure, slim and straight and nimble, in white linen, whose brown arms and brown face against her dazzling gown made the effect of a Russian eikon minus the gold-incrusted robe. She halted when Willy halted. With impersonal interest she watched Dickson make a strike. At the clean, beautiful drive she nodded approval. Then her black brows met in a slightly worried frown. Willy, club in hand, was aware of the frown. He was aware—in a sort of subconscious way—that she wanted him to play well; and he was acutely aware that he had not played well this afternoon. Even his direction, which had always been his best ally, had not kept its form. Twice had he gone into the rough, losing a shot each time, despite his really hair-raising recoveries. Now the other man was two up, with only four more holes to play. At best Willy could but halve this hole, at best, with a perfect approach and a long putt. "A duffer at golf, like everything else!" ran his own bitter comment to himself. He didn't know why he looked up; swinging his club for a trial stroke on a leaf. Look he did, however, to catch the dark eyes of the little lonely girl intently watching him. If she had called to him aloud "Brace up!" he couldn't have heard the words more distinctly. He almost thought he did hear them, and gave the child an involuntary, half-starved smile.
With the same smile on his lips he sent a faultless approach into easy putting distance, and he felt absurdly pleased because she clapped her hands. They halved the hole. Dickson, the Harvard champion, looked bored as he sank on the bench by the red water-cooler. He had been Willy's classmate a year ago at college, knowing him as the man who makes all the best societies and "leads the life" may know the recluse who makes none; he was conscious of a certain irritation peppering his cool superiority. To think of the millions that shuffling, cowed-looking, insignificant chap would have, while he, Dickson, had to slave on a salary. A duffer who couldn't even win a golf game that belonged to him, because he was rattled! Dickson felt that the ways of Fate were scandalous.
Willy had limped up. The day before he had blistered his heel somehow, and every step cost a pang. He eased the lame foot by resting his weight on the other. His gray-blue eyes, which only his dead mother had ever found handsome, scanned with a certain wistfulness Dickson's graceful, athletic figure and clean, dark profile. His own profile was irregular and his figure was awkward, with arms too long and shoulders too square for harmony; he stooped in an ungainly fashion, as if he had the habit of musing as he walked; his plain face was deeply freckled. Yet as there was a suggestion of strength in the figure, so there was the same suggestion in the young mouth and chin, and something clear and strangely innocent, for a young man, looked out of his eyes. As he stood, every muscle seemed to sag; he appeared utterly spent; but the instant Dickson had driven he stepped alertly into his place and sent a drive like a bird sailing far beyond Dickson's dot of white on the green. Somehow a new uplift of energy and hope had come to him; bless that kid, he would show her that he could still do something with the sticks! He heard her whispered, unconscious "Beauty!" This time he kept his head straight, but when the hole was won, he met her smile frankly with another. The next hole was easy. He had steadied; he had his nerve back; every calculation worked; and when Dickson stymied, it was a simple trick (the like of which he had practiced often) to hop over the ball and roll into the hole, to the artless joy of his caddy. "You're going to be the champeen," this worthy told Willy when they trudged on; "guess that young lady's a mascot."
"I guess she is," said Willy. He was sure of it when at the home hole, guarded by a high hedge, Dickson's ball was sliced into the stubborn net of osage-orange roots. When his own ball sailed cleanly over the wall he made an excuse of tying his shoe in order to get another view of "that kid's" brilliant smile. The girl herself went on to the bench in sight of the blackboard. Here she found herself beside an elderly man with a great head of thick gray hair. He was clapping so vigorously that she took him to be Willy's father, and sent him a glance of sympathy. "You been all 'round with him?" said he. "What sort of a game is he playing?"
"Pretty bad until the fifteenth, and then a wonder," she returned calmly.
"Rattled!" he snorted in disgust, as he chewed his cigar out of shape. "First match game. How are the others? What's his chance?"
"He can beat them all if he will only think so," she returned in the same even tone. Her voice was fuller, with a different and more melodious intonation than those about him; he looked up at her quickly, as if from a passing sense of the difference.
"Yes, he's rattled!" grunted the elderly gentleman. "Gone stale, practicing every minute. Too anxious. Wants to please his father by getting a little silverware."
"Aren't you his father?"
"Me?No. His father could buy me up out of his pocket-money. His father is Hiram G. Butler. I'm only his boss. He's learning the steel business with me. I wish Iwashis father; he's a genius in his way."
"I suppose his father is awfully proud of him."
"Proud nothing!" exploded the stout gentleman. "His father has bought and sold and fought inventors so long that when he discovered that his son was hatching formulas for open-hearth steel he was disgusted. Then at college Will took honors in chemistry and was a grind; and when his father wanted to load him with money, and told him to go ahead and make all the societies, he sent the money back and said he didn't know any boys in societies; the boys who ran after him were only after his money and the other boys didn't want him. The trouble simply is he is too all-fired shy and modest. Takes his father's word he is a failure because he couldn't make their fool societies. How should a fellow who has spent his life in English schools and traveling about with a tutor, and then is dumped into Harvard, be expected to make a splash among those snippy young swells? Harvard's no violet cold-frame! The other boys did, but they were chips of the old block, hard as nails and hustlers from 'way back. And since his mother died this poor chap has had nobody to chirk him up. Father didn't mind until the other boys died. All three in one year; pretty tough on their father. Pretty tough. Ever lose—ur-r!—any one in your family? Then you know. Now Willy's the only child, and his father wants to make him over in his brothers' image. Wants to give him a wife to help! And Willy so scared of a petticoat he walked two hours up and down before the Somerset Hotel at his first college dance trying to screw up courage to go in—and couldn't. Hiram never will get over that. But Willy, though he won't marry to please his father, is fond of the old dictator just the same. And mighty proud. That's why he has worked so at golf. Trying to show he can do some things like other boys, you see. Well, I see that Harvard dude has got his ball on the green at last. Now it's up to Willy—Didn't I tell you? In all right! Shall—Oh!" It was a singularly small, soft "Oh!" which the elderly man uttered, and it slipped out of his rugged lips when he caught the shy flash from Willy's eyes at the girl. He studied her an infinitesimal space before he spoke, and he turned a chuckle into a cough as he said, "Aren't you Lady Jean Bruce-Hadden and aren't you visiting the Brookes?"
She said that she was, rather indifferently, her gaze still following Willy, who was accepting Dickson's congratulations less awkwardly than was his wont.
"I guess Major Brooke has told you about me, Jabez Rivers—"
But ere he could finish the name, she had held out her hand with a kindling face, crying, "Oh, indeed, yes. I'm ever so glad to meet you, Mr. Rivers."
After this it was only natural to present Willy; but it was a bit of a surprise to have Willy, when presented, say, "This is my mascot, sir. I lost the game and she made me win it."
Willy was astonished at his own fluency; but then he had thought Lady Jean a very young girl, not quite the "kid" that he had styled her, but still hardly a young lady. Then, anyhow, she was different. Oh,verydifferent!
His friend was eying him critically, with queer little grunts, according to his fashion. "You're not fit to walk," he grumbled. "Whywillyoung folks wear shoes that don't fit! Say, you take Lady Jean home while I go over to the club-house with the major. And keep the car if you don't find me. I'll go back with Standish. And—I don't know but you better take her 'round the head of the island and show her that motor mowing-machine—lawn-mower, you know; I want her to see it."
He grinned as the young people obeyed him with grateful docility, speeding away in his electric runabout; and bestowed a look of orphic sagacity upon the officer in white undress uniform who had joined him. The officer was younger than Rivers, although not young.
"That is one of the very finest little ladies in the world," he remarked.
To which Rivers returned dryly, "So you've told me. And that's one of the finest, decentest, cleanest fellows in the world with her."
"As you've toldme."
Rivers grunted. "Go over that lingo you told me about the girl again—or I'll repeat to see if I've got it straight. She's the fifth daughter of the Earl of Paisley, Scotch earl, and poor as even a Scotch earl can be. He has no sons. Distant cousin heir to title. Countess dead. Oldest daughter married to Baron Fairley; second, widow of a bishop; third, wife of army officer. Bishopess manages family. She has brought Lady Moira and the earl over here to give American millionaires a chance with Lady Moira, who is the family beauty; and little Jean, who is good as gold, and has sense, but isn't showy, was just thrown in because an old-maid aunt offered to pay her expenses. Your wife, who knew them in Scotland, asked her to come here while the Bishopess, in New York, picks out the most eligible of the millionaire admirers. So?"
"Yes. Well?"
"Come on over to the club-house; and while we rest a bit, you telephone over to Mrs. Brooke, who only needs a tip to go straight, tomakeWilly Butler stay to dinner—"
"Oh, I say—" began the major.
"No, you don't say anything. You don't ask questions. You have confidence in your Uncle Jabez and do what he asks.Not?"
"I will," said the major, and he went away smiling.
How astonishing to be taking a girl about alone and not be in torments of embarrassment! But this girl was so nice and simple and boyish; not the least like those snippy Boston buds! And she knew golf to the ground; it seemed the most natural thing in the world to ask her if she was going to watch Cleaves play to-morrow.
"I thought I'd follow you," she said quietly. "Do you want to—fire—isn't that what you call it?—your mascot?"
"Will you? Will you really?" he stammered in his pleasure. "I had a sneaking hope, but I didn't d-dare—I feel if you d-do, I'll beat my man; they say he is easy, and then I'll be Cleaves' runner-up and get a cup."
"Why not beat Cleaves and get the big cup?" said she in the same cool tone. "You can if you will. You know perfectly well you can. Promise me you will."
"Here and now?" said Willy, smiling faintly, but the light in her eyes struck a glint in his own. "Done," he added, holding out his hand. Her clasp was cool and soft, but as firm and frank as a boy's.
"And now," said she, "where's your lawn-mower?"
They had reached the head of the island, where there was a beautifully shaven sweep of lawn, but no vestige of mower; Willy's pulses beat a thought faster, and he felt himself a master of stratagem when he suggested their searching for it in an impossible locality at the farther end if the island. He found that she could talk as well about other things as golf. There was no froth in her talk, but she was very witty; Willy, who passed for an abnormally serious young fellow, laughed several times. He confessed to her that it was more like talking to a boy than to a girl to talk to her. "I've always wanted to be a boy," she laughed. "You can play I am one, if you like."
"But I'm afraid you would miss the pretty speeches, and all that."
"I never had any," she answered, with her flashing smile. "Maybe when I'm presented I shall have if we have enough money next year to have me come out. But I don't believe I shall. If you had four sisters all raving beauties and tremendously fetching, and you couldn't even sing a song, do nothing but ride and play tennis—well, you wouldn't expect pretty speeches!"
"Why not? You are pretty, too. You—"
She stopped him with a raised finger and a shrug of her shoulders. He wondered why he had never noticed before what lovely lines pertain to girls' shoulders and how daintily their little heads are set on their smooth olive throats. "Plain truth, you know," said she; "we're playing being two boys."
To save the situation he went on precipitately, "I dare say I know, though. I never was lucky enough to have a sister, but as I had three brothers who did everything I can't do, I know how it feels to—to be out of it."
"But you understand my sisters are splendid and no end nice to me."
"So were my brothers," said Willy loyally.
She looked at him with a quick sympathy. "I know," she murmured. "Mr. Rivers told me. And all in one year. It must have been dreadful."
"Yes, it was. But it was worse when my mother died."
"Oh, yes. I was sixteen when my mother died. And I miss her so now. Don't you?"
"Yes. I was fifteen."
They were both silent. The weight of their piteous memories was on both young hearts, and yet in each was a sense of companionship, of the sympathy of a common pain. The tears gathered slowly in the girl's eyes; she put her hand up her sleeve, but withdrew it empty, and the young man, taking out his own handkerchief, which had surely seen hard usage, looked disconsolately on it before tendering the freshest corner. "It's pretty mussy, but I lost the others," he apologized.
"And you have pockets, too! I lose handkerchiefs to an appalling extent."
"So do I." It was wonderful how many things they had in common—thoughts, opinions, most delightfully human of all, faults. He felt emboldened to say that it must be a great comfort to have a sister; he had always wanted one.
"They're a good deal of a nuisance, most boys think," said she, "but I don't know why. I know I shouldn't have been a nuisance to my brothers and I should rather like to have had one. We might have been pals."
His eyes sparkled; he felt that he was about to make a proposal as daring as it was original; but he made it, clutching the lever under his hand more firmly in his agitation, yet not hesitating. "If we are going to play things, why not play you are my sister? It would be easier than being two boys. You see I should all the time be afraid of forgetting somehow and saying something unbecoming, or too rough, if we played you were a boy."
She had more sense of humor than he, although she was scarcely less innocent; she laughed, saying, "Most boys are rough enough to their sisters. Besides, I don't know you well enough."
"You know me better than any one in the world does," he answered gravely. Their young eyes met and darted away. He thought how lovely her eyes were. Not so much in color or form, perhaps, but in expression. He wished that he could see them that way again. But she had turned away. He was worried lest he might unwittingly have offended her. He knew (for his French tutor had told him) how easy it is for a man to blunder clumsily into a woman's fine reserves and sensitive modesty; it was a great relief to have her turn swiftly toward him again and smile as she said, "Butyoudon't knowme!"
"Maybe not; I'm asking you to give me the chance."
"Oh! Is that why? Just to amuse you."
"You know better," said he, "for at least you knowme."
"That was disagreeable of me," she admitted penitently. "I do know better. Please forgive me!"
"Then you will play it?" he said eagerly. "You know I did what you wanted. I promised to win the cup."
His first gleam of masterful daring did not displease the girl; possibly, it obscurely gratified her. "But you must be good and win," she said, conceding the point in the immemorial feminine fashion which would always march out of a surrendered keep with flags flying.
"I will be good and win," repeated Willy obediently.
There fell a little silence, during which they had glimpses of soft green woods, of distant harvest-fields and of the shimmer of sunlit waves. Vagrant odors of new-mown hay were wafted to them when the breeze stirred. An oriole's note rose out of the dim forest paths, poignantly sweet. Presently the lad spoke, not so much frightened at his own audacity as amazed at his lack of fear. "Since you are playing my sister, do you mind telling me your name? Did he say Buchanan?"
"No; Bruce-Hadden."
His face lighted as he exclaimed boyishly, "IknewI had known you! And I have—at least, I've seen your picture. You are Oswald Graham's cousin Jean."
"Of course; and you—you are his Yankee friend at Eton, the one who fought him because he said things about America!"
"And jolly well licked I was, too," said Willy gaily. "I didn't even know how to put up my hands; he made a gorgeous mess of me. And then he hunted me up and took it all back. Of course we were chums after that. I was going to visit him in the holidays, but—"
"But he was drowned, trying to save a child."
"He did save her. He always did what he set out to do. And if I had only been there—"
"I understand. He said you could swim like a duck."
"It's the only sport I'm not a muff at," said Willy dismally. "It's just my long arms. But he,hecould do anything. I don't suppose I'll ever stop missing him. He was the only boy friend I ever had."
"But you have men friends now," she said gently.
"Yes." He sat up more erect in his seat. "You saw Mr. Rivers. He's the best ever."
"I've heard about how good he is and how gruff. That's the kind I like; no nonsense about them. I hate sissy men, don't you?"
Willy assented, but without animation; he was diffidently searching his inner consciousness as to whether he himself had not been accused of being a sissy. "Sometimes a fellow seems a sissy when he isn't," he offered.
"Oh,often," she agreed heartily; "but the man they want Moira to marry is a genuine muff, a horrid, languid-affected New Yorker who talks like a guardsman and makes fun of his own country. Moira can't endure him; but he offers to settle half a million on her, and we let Effie marry a captain of the line who had only a thousand a year—"
"That wasyou," interrupted Willy fervently. "You did that. Oswald told me—"
"No, it was dad; he couldn't bear to have Effie so unhappy when I told him how she might go into a decline, she felt so wretched. But you see, having let Effie do that and helping her out, we couldn't afford any more detrimentals, although Jimmy's got his colonelcy and the cross and they are ever so happy. But we can't afford another love match. The bishop is dead and Ellen hasn't very much; and Lord Fairley has a big family; he was a widower with five when Ellen married him, and they have two; andweare so deadly poor. It is really necessary, but it's awful. And I am sure she cares a lot for Reggy Sackville, a kind of cousin of ours who is a barrister, and she is sure he will be a judge, he is so clever; but he couldn't support a wife for years and years. Don't you think it's really and truly awful to have to marryanybody?"
"Awful—intolerable," agreed Willy. "I simply will not."
"Andyourfather wants you—" She looked so sympathetic that Willy broke right in:
"Yes. I never seem able to do anything my father wants. I can't manage men and make friends and run the business as my brothers did. Now he wants me to marry a girl he has picked out for me; and I've got to disappoint him again. I wrote him I'd try to meet his wishes every other way—I'd accept dinner invitations; I'd learn the steel business; I could ride and run an automobile, and I had been up in an airship, and I'd try to win a golf cup; and I'm taking bridge lessons, but—the hand of Douglas was his own, you know."
"I think that's splendid!" cried the girl heartily. "Idon't want to; but maybe I shall have to, to save Moira."
"Don't you do it!" he exclaimed. "It makes me sick to think of their trying to force you into such a thing." He did look moved.
"Don't get into such a wax. They can't force me—do I look like a person to be forced?—and poor old daddy of all people in the world! If you just knew him; we're the greatest pals in the world. But there's Moira. If I were to marry some one with a lot of money, she could marry poor Reggy; and Moira couldn't stand being unhappy near so well as I can."
"Who's the man?" growled Willy in a tone of mingled gloom and fury.
"I don't know his name," replied the girl sadly. "It was like this: Dad met his father, and they became very chummy, and they got to talking. He talked about his son, who is a 'nice fellow' with elegant tastes and doesn't like business. Oh, I know, a perfectly odious person."
"Odious," Willy agreed morosely; "a downrightsissy! You'd bewatched!"
"Yes," sighed Lady Jean; "but Moira would be wretcheder because she would always be thinking of Reggy. And besides"—she grew more cheerful—"men never fancy me; no doubt he'll think I'm too ugly and dowdy, and I'm so shy I shall be hideously awkward."
"You're nothing of the kind!" Willy interrupted; "it—it's the most abominable cold-blooded bargain-and-sale business! And your father told you—"
"Oh, no, he didn't tell me. It was Ellen. She was so pleased; she never had any hopes ofme, don't you know; and now she says they won't need to sacrifice Moira. But if the young man doesn't want me,Ishan't be to blame. Now tell me about your girl!"
"There's nothing to tell. I never saw her. I don't know her name, even. Only she's got a title; and she is very brilliant and charming and modest, and I'll be lucky. It's another case of parents butting in. All he wants, he says, is for me toseeher; I told him I should run away if I knew I were in the same town! But never mind me. Don't worry, little girl.I'llthink up a way to save you all right, all right."
His face, as he spoke, was stern and dark. She was sure that he must have great latent strength of character.
Abruptly she changed the subject recalling the elusive mowing-machine and the approach of the Brookes' dinner-hour. Willy was sure that Mr. Rivers would want her to see the mower, it was—was—so typically American; and if he would take her directly and swiftly home, wouldn't she go on another search to-morrow?
"If you win," said she; she felt that she must hesitate at nothing which would give him that cup. "Another thing, don't you give another thought to me; you think every minute of your game. If you distract your mind it may get onto your game."
"I won't let it hurt my game, don't you worry," returned Willy confidently.
Mrs. Brooke had none of the difficulty which she had anticipated in persuading Willy to dine with them; and she wondered what suffering friends of hers who had had his reluctant presence at social functions, meant by their stories. To be sure, he didn't talk much, but he was a most intelligent listener; and he was visibly having a good time.
The next day it was bruited about (no one but Jabez Rivers, who had walked the links with a reporter, could have quite told how) that young Butler was playing a wonderful game. A dozen of the golf lovers deserted the great man and his only less great opponent and saw Willy limp over eleven links, as he beat his man with leisurely ease.
That afternoon, while again searching for the mowing-machine which that unsuspected but efficient emissary of the Blind God, Jabez Rivers, had advised them to be sure to find—after with his own eyes he had seen it trundling into the garage—Willy submitted his plan of rescue. They were rolling noislessly along a wide avenue, above which the great elm boughs made a vaulted arch like the groined vault of a cathedral. Through the arches filtered the sunset rose. Willy suddenly stopped the machine. He did not look at her. He clutched the handle of the lever very hard; and she was positive he was pale, a pallor which threw his freckles into high relief. But she was thinking of anything else than freckles.
"I've thought it all out," said Willy very firmly, "and I wouldn't bother you the least little bit, not the least. And we think alike about so many things. I believe I could make it all right with your people. I can do anything, whenyouare backing me. It would ease my mind awfully; I should be sure to win the cup. I know that would please my father, and he'd help us, maybe. Besides, I've a fortune of my own; I'd settle it all on you—"
"Whatdoyou mean?" cried Lady Jean.
"You wouldn't need to marry anybody else if you marriedme," said Willy.
"My word!" gasped Lady Jean. "But you told me you didn't want to marryanybody."
"I shouldn't mindyouso much," said he.
She was thoughtful, her own mind a chaos to herself. She stole a furtive glance at his miserable face; something tender and compassionate and strange made her lips quiver, but she set them closely.
"You would be making an awful sacrifice for me?"
He did not deny it.
"It would be an awful sacrifice for me, too."
"I know," he acquiesced sadly.
"Still—I suppose you ought to have your mind settled before to-morrow or it will get on your game."
"Yes, that's just it! I'd be awfully grateful—"
Without any warning she began to laugh. "I think you are the funniest boy in the world! I don't want to marry anybody. I want to live with daddy and take care of him and be like Aunt Jean, but if Ihaveto marry anybody, I'd rather marry you. Shall we let it go at that for the present?"
"You are awfully good," cried the boy. He wondered at the extraordinary calm, almost elation, of his mood. That he should be engaged to be married and not be revolving suicide! He had read of the exaltation of self-sacrifice—maybe this was it. But how hard it must be for her.
"I'll make it just as easy for you as I can—dear." He added the last word very softly. Probably she didn't hear it, for she answered in her ordinary tone, not in the least offended, that she knew he would, then immediately demanded a sight of the mowing-machine; since it wasn't there, he would better take her home.
"Don't you begin to love this island?" he said, as he obeyed her.
"It is lovely," she said: "I never thought I could really like any place without mountains, but I do."
"I love mountains," said Willy.
"They were again surprised at their similarity of taste. Motor-cars and carriages passed them continually; luxurious open vehicles, victorias and golf-carts and automobiles with their hoods lowered, disclosing billows of diaphanous feminine finery and pretty, uncovered girlish heads. Willy marveled over his own ease as he returned greetings punctiliously. A week ago he would have raced his horse into the darkest woodland road to escape a passing salute, the hazard of a little casual badinage.
"How pretty American girls are," said Lady Jean a little wistfully; "such lovely wavy hair."
Willy's glance furtively took note of her sleek brown head and the heavy braid between her slim shoulders, which had caused him to think her a child.
"I don't much like this corrugated hair," said he carelessly; "it looks so machine-made."
Lady Jean declined all proffers of seats, even Rivers' invitation to a place by him in his runabout. She was going to walk; one could see better walking. Which was entirely correct, but was not her most intimate reason; in truth she could not endure to be sitting at her ease while Willy, footsore and weary, would be doggedly tramping after his ball. He presented rather a grotesque figure, did Willy, that eventful morning, being shod as to his sound foot with one of his own neat golf shoes, but as to his left (thanks to the ministrations of Rivers), with one of the latter's ample slippers over swathings of bandage soaked in healing-lotion. Every caddy on the ground (except Willy's) was in secret ecstasies over his appearance. "We ain't out for a beauty prize, but the champeen golf cup," says the faithful Tommy haughtily. "Yes, that's a bottle of liniment. I wet him up with it between whiles. He's in terrible agony. But he don't mind long's he can keep limber. And say, jest git onto our game, will you? Two up, and first round over."
Tommy and Jean were waiting when the first round ended, Rivers having taken the Brookes to the luncheon-tent to secure seats for them all. The game that morning had surprised all but the newspaper men and the few who had followed Willy the day before. The only hope of the friends of the champion lay in the possible exhaustion of the lame wonder whose unerring approaches were even more dangerous than his drives and his putts. "If his foot holds out," Rivers said to Brooke, "he's got the cup."
And at this very moment, as if fate conspired against Willy's chances, a frightful commotion arose. Willy, talking to Jean a moment about the game, could see the gay groups outside the white tent scatter in violent agitation with waving hands; could hear an uproar of shouts and screams. There came a quick change in Lady Jean's face, in every face near—the caddy's, the young red-jacketed officer's at the blackboard, the women's faces in a passing carriage. At first no intelligible sound penetrated the din; but in a thought's time a blood-curdling cry tore out of a score of throats, "Mad dog! Mad dog!" as men with golf-irons and pistols, raced toward the little group on the links, after a foam-flecked, glaring-eyed, panting little beast. The creature made straight for Tommy, who fled like a deer; but his foot hit the marker, and he stumbled and fell. It seemed in the same eyeblink that the dog was on the child and Willy Butler was on the dog, his bare hands twisting its collar into a tourniquet.
With one impulse Lady Jean and the young officer each snatched a golf-club and sprang to help him. "Keep off!" he cried. "I can hold him. Get a strap; we have to keep him alive to find out—Jean!For God's sake—"
His heart seemed to stand still. Lady Jean had dropped on her knees by the dog, shielding him from the young officer's club. "Don't," she said; "he'snot mad! It's Mrs. Brooke's dog—Why can't yousee? The poor brute'swagging his tail!"
"He is," said Willy; "hold up, boys! A mad dog doesn't wag his tail." He released the tourniquet sufficiently to free a piteous whimper. A second later he lifted his hand off the dog, which wriggled into Lady Jean's compassionate arms as a voice announced, "That's not the dog!"
The real mad dog—if mad he were—had been despatched by a single shot from a soldier's gun, rods away; but a panic-stricken crowd had used the customary judgment of panic, and pursued the wrong dog.
"And now," wrathfully declared Jabez Rivers to his army cronies, "now that poor boy has probably put his wrist out of whack; and his father coming in on the two o'clock train to see him fight for the cup! And this old fool telegraphed for him to come."
Nevertheless he kept a semblance of confidence. And he has always liked Dickson because he was so sure Willy would win. He offered to caddy for Willy; but Willy gratefully declined, because it would break Tommy's heart; Tommy's mother was coming over to see the game. "He's a real dead-game sport," Dickson ended, "and a little thing like a spurious mad dog isn't going to put him out of the running."
Nor did it; Cleaves made up one of his missing holes, but he got no farther; and at the sixteenth hole Rivers and a small, keen-eyed, quiet-looking man stood up in a runabout and shouted while the great Cleaves, bewildered but invincibly courteous, shook hands with Willy Butler.
"You wait until he has cleaned up a bit" advised Rivers; "give the boy's girl a chance first—there they are; she's talking to him now."
Mr. Butler knew who she was; she had been pointed out to him before; possibly having watched her carefully through the progress of the game, he knew something else, being a man who came to conclusions quickly, on occasion. He looked at her now; he looked at Rivers; the only words that escaped his lips—in a very small, low voice—were, "Wouldn't that make a man believe in answers to prayers!"
"Willy's been going some," said Rivers. "I don't know who you've up your sleeve for him, but we've picked out a winner—a sweet, brave, true-hearted little lady. Don'tyoubutt in, Hiram."
"Well, hardly," said Hiram Butler, "since her father and I picked her out first. But, Jabez, blood will tell; I knew Willy had the makings. Now suppose you and I put the young folks into the machine. They can do their courting on the way."
It may be presumed that he knew, although they took their own original way to Arcadia. Fifteen minutes later, in the heart of the woods which they had sought because, although much longer to the club-house by that road, Willy needed its cool refreshment; fifteen minutes later the boy was saying, "I had to write the note because I didn't have a chance to see you. Have you read it?" He looked up tremulously. "I write an awfully blind handwriting always, and to-day, with playing golf and all, it's worse than ever."
"You could read it out to me, you know," said the girl; she pulled the score-card, on which Willy had scribbled, from her sleeve, and both the young heads bent over it. "'Dear Jean,'" read Willy; then he added, "I hope you don't think that presumptuous, but being engaged—"
"No, never mind that; you called me that to-day, already, at the top of your voice, too."
"You scared me stiff—Jean."
"You scared me first—before I knew it was Flukes. You are an awfully reckless boy."
"I will go on," said Willy; "it's short." He read:
"'Dear Jean, I forgot to say one thing yesterday when I asked you to marry me; I love and adore you. Yours very sincerely, William Godfrey Butler.'"
He said nothing more; neither did she say anything for a space. The squirrels watched them with their bright little eyes, and scampered fearlessly up the very tree under which their car had halted. All at once she began to laugh. "My word! but you look miserable, William Butler. I know it is a sacrifice; I made up my mind to release you; I only consented yesterday to make you easy in your mind for the game."
Then he surprised her. "That was yesterday," said he. "To-day I know why all the world has been different ever since I saw you; I knew everything I felt when you ran to that dog—"
"Then it will not be an awful sacrifice for you?"
He took her little cold brown hand; I had forgotten there was such a thing in the world as fear. "It will be heaven for me," he said. "But for you?"
She looked away at the squirrels; she tried in vain to speak in her gay, light tone. "I—I found out something this morning, too."
So Arcady lured two new explorers, who, going through its subtly winding paths, naturally took quite a little while to reach the club-house and the ovation waiting the champion. Just outside the portals Lady Jean uttered a little cry. "Why, I do believe! Why,Willy! There's the motor mower!"
There in the body, resting amid long lines of green stubble, there, indeed, stood the long-sought mower.
"I'm obliged to it," said Willy, "but I don't need it now."
The flies and the sun! The sun and the flies! The two tents of the division ward in the hospital had been pitched end to end, thus turning them into one. The sun filtered through the cracks of the canvas; it poured in a broad, dancing, shifting column of gold through the open tent flap. The air was hot, not an endurable, dry heat, but a moist, sticky heat which drew an intolerable mist from the water standing in pools beneath the plain flooring of the tents. The flies had no barrier and they entered in noisome companies, to swarm, heavily buzzing, about the medicine spoons and the tumblers and crawl over the nostrils and mouths of the typhoid patients, too weak and stupid to brush them away. The other sick men would lift their feeble skeletons of hands against them; and a tall soldier who walked between the cots and was the sole nurse on duty, waved his palm-leaf fan at them and swore softly under his breath.
There were ten serious cases in the ward. The soldier was a raw man detailed only the day before and not used to nursing, being a blacksmith in civil life. An overworked surgeon had instructed him in the use of a thermometer; but he was much more confident of the success of his lesson than the instructed one. There was one case in particular bothered the nurse; he returned to the cot where this case lay more than once and eyed the gaunt figure which lay so quietly under the sheet, with a dejected attention. Once he laid his hand shyly on the sick man's forehead, and when he took it away he strangled a desperate sort of sigh. Then he walked to the end of the tent and stared dismally down the camp street, flooded with sunshine. "Well, thank God, there's Spruce!" said he. A man in a khaki uniform, carrying a bale of mosquito netting, was walking smartly through the glare. He stopped at the tent. "How goes it?" said he, cheerfully but in the lowest of tones. He was a short man and thin, but with a good color under his tan, and teeth gleaming at his smile, white as milk.
"Why, I'm kinder worried about Maxwell—"
Before he could finish his sentence, Spruce was at Maxwell's cot. His face changed. "Git the hot-water bottle quick's you can!" he muttered, "and git the screen—the one I made!" As he spoke he was dropping brandy into the corners of Maxwell's mouth. The brandy trickled down the chin.
"He looks awful quiet, don't he?" whispered the nurse with an awestruck glance.
"You git them things!" said Spruce, and he sent a flash of his eyes after his words, whereat the soldier shuffled out of the tent, returning first with the screen and last with the bottles. Then he watched Spruce's rapid but silent movements. At last he ventured to breathe: "Say, he ain't—he ain't—he ain't—?"
Spruce nodded. The other turned a kind of groan into a cough and wiped his face. Awkwardly he helped Spruce wherever there was the chance for a hand; and in a little while his bungling agitation reached the worker, who straightened up and turned a grim face on him.
"Was it me?" he whispered then. "For God's sake, Spruce—I did everything the doctor told me, nigh's I could remember. I didn't disturb him, 'cause he 'peared to be asleep. I—I never saw a man die before!"
"It ain't no fault of yours," said Spruce in the same low whisper. "I'm sorry for you. Did you give him the ice I got?"
"Yes, I did, Sergeant."
"And was there enough for Green and Dick Danvers?"
"Yes, I kept it rolled up in flannel and newspapers. Say, I got a little more, Sergeant."
"How?"
"The doctors or some fellers had a tub of lemonade outside, a little bit further down. I chipped off a bit."
Spruce ground his teeth, but he made no comment. All he said was, "You go git Captain Hale and report. Tell the captain I got his folks' address. They'll want him sent home. They're rich folks and they were coming on; guess they're on the way now. Be quiet!"
The soldier was looking at the placid face. A sob choked him. "He said, 'Thank you,' every time I gave him anything," he gulped. "God! it's murder to put fools like me at nursing; and the country full of women that know how and want to come!"
"S-s-s! 'Tain't no good talking. You done your best. Go and report."
As the wretched soldier lumbered off, Spruce set his teeth on an ugly oath.
"I ought to have stayed, maybe," he thought, "but I've been doing with so little sleep, my head was feeling dirty queer; and the doctor sent me. Collapse, of course; temperature ran down to normal, and poor Tooley didn't notice, and him too weak to talk! Well, I hope I git the G boys through, that's all I ask!"
He went over to the next cot, where lay the nearest of the G boys, greeting him cheerily. "Hello, Dick?"
Dick was a handsome young specter, just beginning to turn the corner in a bad case of typhoid fever. His blue eyes lighted at Spruce's voice; and he sent a smile back at Spruce's smile. "Did you get some sleep?" said he. "What's that you have in your hand?"
"That's milk, real milk from a cow. Yes, lots of sleep; you drink that."
The sick man drank it with an expression of pleasure. "I don't believe any of the others get milk," he murmured; "save the rest for Edgar."
"Edgar don't need it, Dick," Spruce answered gently.
Dick drew a long, shivering sigh and his eyes wandered to the screen. "He was a soldier and he died for his country jest the same as if he were hit by a Mauser," said Spruce—he had taken the sick boy's long, thin hand and was smoothing his fingers.
"It's no more 'an what we all got to expect when we enlist."
"Of course," said Dick, smiling, "that's all right, for him or for me, but he—he was an awfully good fellow, Chris."
"Sure," said Spruce. "Now, you lie still; I got to look after the other boys."
"Come back when you have seen them, Chris."
"Sure."
Spruce made his rounds. He was the star nurse of the hospital. It was partly experience. Chris Spruce had been a soldier in the regulars and fought Indians and helped the regimental surgeon through a bad attack of typhoid. But it was as much a natural gift. Chris had a light foot, a quick eye, a soft voice; he was indomitably cheerful and consoled the most querulous patient in the ward by describing how much better was his lot with no worse than septic pneumonia, than that of a man whom he (Spruce) had known well who was scalped. Spruce had enlisted from a Western town where he had happened to be at the date of his last discharge. He had a great opinion of the town. And he never tired recalling the scene of their departure, amid tears and cheers and the throbbing music of a brass band, with their pockets full of cigars, and an extra car full of luncheon boxes, and a thousand dollars company spending money to their credit.
"A man he comes up to me," says Spruce, "big man in the town, rich and all that. He says, calling me by name—I don't know how he ever got my name, but he had it—he says, 'I'm told you've been with the regulars; look after the boys a little,' says he. 'That I will,' says I, 'I've been six years in the service and I know a few wrinkles.' I do, too. He gave me a five-dollar bill after he'd talked a while to me, and one of his own cigars. 'Remember the town's back of you!' says he. 'Tis, too. I'd a letter from the committee they got there, asking if we had everything; offering to pay for nurses if they'd be allowed. Oh, it's a bully town!"
Spruce himself had never known the sweets of local pride. He had drifted about in the world, until at twenty he drifted into the regular army. He had no kindred except a brother whose career was so little creditable that Spruce was relieved when it ended—were the truth known, in a penitentiary. He had an aunt of whom he often spoke and whom he esteemed a credit to the family. She was a widow woman in an Iowa village, who kept a boarding house for railway men, and had reared a large family, not one of whom (Spruce was accustomed to explain in moments of expansion, on pay-day, when his heart had been warmed with good red liquor) had ever been to jail. Spruce had never seen this estimable woman, but he felt on terms of intimacy with her because, occasionally, on these same pay-days, he would mail her a five-dollar bank-note, the receipt of which was always promptly acknowledged by a niece who could spell most of her words correctly and who always thanked him for his "kind and welcome gift," told him what they proposed to do with the money, and invited him to come to see them.
He always meant to go, although he never did go. It was his favorite air-castle, being able to go on furlough to the village where his aunt lived and show his medal. He had won the medal in an Indian fight where he had rescued his captain. The captain died of his wounds and Spruce never got drunk (which I regret to confess he did oftener than was good either for his soul or the service) that he didn't talk about his captain, who had been his hero; and cry over him. Spruce, who was a cheery creature in his normal state, always developed sentiment and pathos when he was revealed by liquor. Now he had another day-dream. It was to be greeted by the cheering crowds—again he would march down the sunny streets with the band playing, amid the faces and the shouts. And the men who had stood by the company so stanchly would be pointing him out and telling each other his mythical exploits—and adding the record of his Indian exploits—which Spruce felt that an inattentive country had not appreciated. A dozen times a day he pictured the scene, he mentally listened to the talk—he, walking with a rigid and unseeing military mien. He approximated the number of glasses a man could take without even grazing indecorum—for he was determined he would not be riotous in his joy—and he used to whistle the refrain of a convivial song: