CHAPTER XVII
Ross took Arethusa out to the Country Club for a round of golf the next afternoon, and as it was the first and only time she had ever spied a golf club, it is not at all difficult to imagine what sort of game she played. It deserved a name all of its own; and her method of holding her club would have brought tears to the eyes of any true devotee of the sport. But from the standpoint of pure enjoyment for the two most intimately concerned, the occasion was a great success.
"I don't believe I care very much for golf," she remarked decidedly, after she had almost dug a trench around her ball on the second tee, "and I believe you move that ball, Father, when I'm not looking with my stick up over my head."
Ross protested his innocence, and insisted that she try once more. So she did. But when she missed it this time also, she was firm in her resolve to quit.
"You do move it, Father!" she repeated. "I just know you do! To tease me! Because, why shouldn't my stick come down in the right place when I know exactly where it is when I start to hit it, if you don't push it away?"
"Because of one of the cardinal rules of the game, my dear, 'Keep your eye on the ball.' You are demonstrating its truth of that aphorism every time you take your eye off."
"But how can I?" retorted Arethusa. "I've only got two eyes. How can I watch my ball and my stick and where I'm going to knock it, and everything, when they won't look but one way at once? I'm not cross-eyed!"
Ross gave it up as beyond his powers of reasoning.
So Arethusa put her driver back in the bag and announced that she would do the caddying. But as conversation is one of the things most unnecessary to a caddy, she could hardly be said to approach perfection in this rôle, either, though as Ross, very fortunately, did not take his golf with any too much seriousness, they got along in fine shape. Arethusa was outspoken in her loyal admiration of each one of his shots, and when he made one drive of two hundred yards and over, her proud delight was manifest all over the course.
She had not even begun to exhaust the dinner-dance and the Wonderful Mr. Bennet as congenial topics of conversation, although the breakfast-table and the luncheon-table had heard much of both, so she continued to find a great deal to say about them as they walked,—especially about Mr. Bennet, upon which subject she enlarged to Ross's amusement. But Arethusa did not consider that his replies to her raptures were suitably enthusiastic.
"Now don't you really think he's good-looking, Father?"
"Undoubtedly so, my dear."
"I think," Arethusa's expression was dreamy, and her eyes were far away, apparently on the hazy skyline, "I think that he looks just like a Prince!"
It spoiled Ross's drive from the seventh tee completely. He sliced far over into the tall grass, and as she had not been watching as a caddy should, they had to go on without ever finding the ball.
While they were on the fourteenth fairway it began to rain in hard pelting drops, a fulfillment of the morning's promise of a heavy gray sky. Arethusa was in her element then, and as there was no Miss Eliza to drag her in by the power of her will, to all of Ross's entreaties that they seek shelter with more haste, she turned a deaf and unheeding ear. He was far more of a hot-house plant than his daughter, so he caught a violent cold from his drenching in the chilly fall rain, which made itself promptly known with much sneezing before he had gone to bed that night.
Arethusa was thoroughly conscience-stricken when he was unable to get up the next morning. She felt personally responsible for his aches and pains and his fever. It was her duty, she decided, as the contributing cause of it all, to nurse and amuse him. She refused to budge from his side for the next several days, indefatigable in her attentions. She read aloud to him, jumping up from her chair with almost every turning of a page to plump up his pillows with zeal, and to demand if he wanted anything. Arethusa was hardly a gentle nurse, even if a conscientious one. She fetched him veritable gallons of ice-water, and carried up his meals with her own fair hands. And while he dozed, at intervals through the days, she stayed near him, dreaming of Mr. Bennet. Ross accepted all of this solicitude with a lazy nonchalance, not in the least averse to being fussed over.
All of Sunday afternoon, Arethusa watched anxiously for Mr. Bennet. Had he not said that he was coming to call?
But he did not come, although Mr. Harrison and Billy Watts and several other acquaintances made at the Party did. She denied herself to all of these visitors. How could she leave her sick father for such as they?
By Wednesday afternoon, however, Ross was undeniably better. Even Arethusa could see that he was, in spite of the fact that he continued to complain. But it was such complaining as only too plainly indicated that he was loth to relinquish any of this delightful attention he was receiving. So when George announced a caller who had asked for "Miss Worthington," Elinor, who had just that moment come back from down-town with those two new and widely advertised detective stories for Ross's amusement which he had earlier in the day expressed a desire to see, said that she would begin the reading aloud in Arethusa's place, and that Arethusa must receive the visitor.
"And you'll like Candace Warren, I think. She's rather a dear girl. I suppose she came to see you because I know her mother so well. It was very kind of her." To Elinor's rose-colored view of youth, all young girls were attractive because of what they were.
"I think it was perfectly lovely!" chanted Arethusa happily.
She would certainly see Miss Warren, come to call on a stranger in her city, just because of her mother's friendship for Elinor! There was a warm little glow in her heart at the thought of the kindness shown her by so many people for the sake of Ross and Elinor; the Chestnuts, and Mr. Watts, innumerable others at the dinner-dance, and now Miss Warren!
"I'll send George in with tea a little later on," said Elinor, "if you would like to have it."
Then Arethusa's face clouded somewhat, "But I wanted to have supper up here again!"
"Not supper, Arethusa, it's just afternoon tea. I thought perhaps it might help you to get acquainted."
That was very different. It might be great fun to have afternoon tea. She had read about it, and it had always sounded most delightful in the reading.
"But Aunt 'Liza says I can't pour anything," she added doubtfully. "She never lets me at home. She says my fingers are all thumbs."
George could pour it for her, if she wished.
And so with these trifling details arranged, and the tea a settled prospect, Arethusa went in search of Miss Warren.
She ran gaily down the wide front steps, humming a little tune, and skipped into the small reception room at the side of the hall, both hands cordially outstretched.
"I think it wasperfectly dearof you to come to see me!" she exclaimed.
Miss Warren rose politely from the spindle-legged sofa where she had been sitting, and touched one of the outstretched hands with rather extraordinary limpness. She murmured something altogether indistinguishable.
Arethusa's cordiality felt somewhat thrown back upon herself. She sat down abruptly in the nearest chair. Miss Warren resumed her place on the sofa. There was a long silence, while the visitor covertly studied her hostess, and the hostess openly observed the details of her visitor's appearance with the frankest interest.
Arethusa thought Miss Warren was very pretty. She had coal black hair, although very little of it showed from under her hat, bright black eyes, and a wonderfully white skin with a great deal of color in her lips and cheeks.
But it was her clothes that really most intensely interested the clothes-loving Arethusa.
For Miss Warren was exceedingly well-dressed in garments that could but excite admiration. She wore silky furs as black as her hair, soft and long and smoothly shining. Arethusa had a childish longing to stroke them. Miss Warren's suit was made of a marvelous sort of stuff unlike any material Arethusa had ever seen, dark wine in color, and it spelled "Paris" in every well-cut line. The blouse she wore was a superlative affair of lace and delicacy and tracings of fine embroidery. It could never have been called a "shirtwaist," as Arethusa's plain garments of the same shape with their simple rows of tucking were named. From one daintily gloved hand she dangled a gold purse, and several other small articles of the same metal of an unknown variety.
Arethusa's glance traveled downward, still admiring, and there it paused. For it was hard in the first glimpse to determine just where Miss Warren's feet could be, in those long narrow shoes, with the ends just like pointed pencils. It did not seem possible that human toes, of the number of five, could fit into one of those shoes. Arethusa looked suddenly at her own feet, and as Miss Warren's eyes were at that moment upon them also, they seemed to Arethusa to appear very large, and very awkward to have as feet, in her comfortable house slippers with the broad, round toes. She tucked them as far under her chair as she could, and felt a little hot. Miss Eliza had selected those slippers, as a special privilege of an extra pair of shoes for the Visit. But they were a half-size larger than Arethusa ordinarily wore, because they had been the only pair obtainable at Tobin's, in Blue Spring. She had never minded this fact before, but by contrast with Miss Warren's so slim foot-covering they looked really dreadful.
Arethusa found it quite impossible to admire Miss Warren's hat, although liking everything else she wore so much. It was much too small to conform to Arethusa's ideas of beauty in a hat, and it came so close down over the visitor's delicate eyebrows, that it seemed impossible that she could have much of that black hair tucked underneath it. Arethusa began to feel a trifle better, minding the difference in feet and the house-slippers a little less, as she remembered her own glorious mop of redness; which, although so undesirable in color, could never have been squeezed into so small a space as that hat represented.
"I think it was perfectly dear of you to come to see me," said Arethusa for the second time.
But the words elicited very little more response than they had when first spoken.
Miss Warren seemed to be glad that Arethusa should feel as she did about her coming to call, but there was no real animation in her gladness.
The hostess cast around for sentiments, which if uttered, might loosen her visitor's tongue, but the visitor fortunately loosened it of her own accord.
"Do you like Lewisburg, Miss Worthington? Is this your first visit here?"
"Yes, and I just love it!" declared Arethusa, "Everybody is perfectly darling to me! I went to a dinner-dance the other night and had the Most Heavenly Time! Mrs. Chestnut's it was, at the Hotel. Were you there?"
Miss Warren had not been invited, she was sorry to say. She volunteered the information that she was a second-year girl, and that she believed that very few of them had been asked.
While her information as to the cause of it shed very little light, Arethusa was exceedingly regretful that her visitor had missed such a Wonderful Party. She described it in detail for the one so unfortunately deprived of first-hand enjoyment of the Heavenly Affair, bringing Mr. Bennet into the narrative.
Did Miss Warren, by any chance, know Mr. Bennet?
Miss Warren did.
Arethusa waxed more eloquent upon so moving a theme.
But Miss Warren had not added that Mr. Bennet had recently been devoting quite a little of his valuable time and attention to herself, and that there was very little of Mr. Bennet's charm that Arethusa could mention which she did not already know. One of the reasons she had called so promptly when her mother suggested a visit to Mr. Worthington's daughter was because she had been informed that Mr. Bennet had "rushed" the visiting lady at the Chestnut's dinner-dance, and so a very natural curiosity as to the personality of the visiting lady craved gratification as soon as possible.
Mr. Bennet as a subject was exhausted before very long, for Miss Warren was so very unresponsive that it was hard to continue the discussion of him in just the way it had started. Arethusa felt a shyness descending upon her at the cold reception of her enthusiasm for the Wonderful Being who had so recently come into her life. Rhapsodies are well-nigh impossible unless the mood of the listener answers in some small degree.
So the conversation languished once more.
Miss Warren languidly dangled her gold purse and stared through the lace curtains of the window nearest her. It was gloriously autumnal as to weather this afternoon, and the world was gay to the vision. The trees were bright with their rapidly turning Joseph's coat of foliage, and the sunlight streamed like liquid gold. Overhead, the sky was the very clearest of bright blues. Lenox Avenue was unusually full of those who had been tempted out to revel in it; babies and nurses strolled past on the sidewalk, and loaded automobiles sped by in a sort of procession in the street.
Arethusa's regard was largely for the outside also. It was such a day as she adored. Then, feeling it was quite beyond her power to sit so unsociably so close to anyone in the same room, when it was so glorious a world they were both viewing, she turned back to Miss Warren with a friendly little smile.
"It's a perfectly beautiful day, isn't it?"
Miss Warren seemed to thaw a trifle. "It's just gorgeous outside!"
"I like fall better than spring, always," replied Arethusa, "and especially when it's like this."
"Yes," agreed Miss Warren.
The silence descended once more, to be first broken by Miss Warren with the polite inquiry, "Do you play bridge, Miss Worthington?"
Arethusa's surprised gray eyes were removed from the window to which they had returned with the silence, to be fixed on Miss Warren.
"Do I what?" she exclaimed.
"Play bridge."
Miss Warren made this contribution to conversation for no other reason than that it had a strong personal appeal. And from her point of view, it had more possibilities as a theme for development than had the weather; the silence had grown almost oppressive.
Arethusa laughed gaily. She had played a game called "London Bridge" when she was quite small, she and Timothy and the little darkies from the washer-woman's cabin, and they had all liked it very much as a game; but they had never thought of calling it just "bridge."
"I used to play London Bridge when I was little, but of course I don't now."
"I meant cards," explained the visitor with a well-bred smile. "I'm perfectly mad about it. Though some people do like auction better, I never have."
Her smile had nettled her hostess. It had a calm superiority about it that was rather trying. "No," she replied, shortly. "No, I don't know anything about it, or that other thing either. Aunt 'Liza says playing cards are wicked."
The delicate black eyebrows of the visitor lifted a little.
"It's too bad if you don't play. There're so many bridge parties given here. And," she added, "Mr. Bennet plays a beautiful game."
Arethusa decided that Miss Warren was not nearly so pretty as she had at first considered her.
At this critical juncture, George made his entrance with the tea-tray. Arethusa remembered she was a hostess and had a guest. She enquired if the guest would care for some tea.
The guest would be delighted to have some tea. She was famished, she added.
But Arethusa made no reply to this sally. She had not yet forgiven that last remark about Mr. Bennet's ability as a bridge-player.
While the tea and its attendant sandwiches were consumed almost in silence, Arethusa did some thinking. When in Rome do as the Romans do is an excellent old saw, and although Miss Eliza's views on the subject of games played with a deck of cards were firm and had been expressed so as not to be mistaken, Arethusa was meditating open defiance. If the Wonderful Mr. Bennet played bridge, then she, Arethusa, would learn the game, Miss Eliza or no Miss Eliza.
Over her last sandwich, she eyed Miss Warren.
"Is it very hard to learn?"
"What?"
"That.... That card game you called 'bridge'?"
Miss Warren laughed with softness. Arethusa was really rather amusing.
"Why, not at all, I think, for some people. Would you care to learn? I'd be delighted to teach you myself, sometime. Mr. Bennet says I play a very good game."
Arethusa choked on her sandwich.
"I don't think I shall botheryou," she said, pointedly; "Mr. Bennet would show me, if I asked him, I reckon."
Once more Miss Warren's well-bred and superior smile shone forth to arouse resentment. "I think if I were you, Miss Worthington, that I would ask some one else first, because," very kindly, "Gridley Bennet is a perfect old maid about his game. It bores him almost to tears to play with a poor player or a beginner. I've heard him say so more than once. And men just simply hate that sort of thing when they do hate it, you know."
The air with which Miss Warren called the Wonderful Mr. Bennet by his Christian name was galling. It bespoke a degree of intimacy with his charming self from which Arethusa felt herself far removed. And her manner of stating his likes and dislikes was that of one who knew. Arethusa boiled over.
"I didn't ask your advice!" she exploded. "And when I want any of it, I'll let you know!"
Miss Warren looked surprised.
"Why, I...." she began, and then she decided that it was time to leave. She could not quarrel with Arethusa, and Arethusa looked very ready to quarrel.
As Miss Warren made her way gracefully homeward along the avenue, she decided that she really had nothing to fear from Mr. Bennet's casual attentions to the visiting lady at parties. She was countrified and queer, and her clothes were awful. Miss Warren knew Mr. Bennet to be a gentleman of taste. Yet she was glad she had made the call, for she had rather enjoyed it. It would be fun to tell Gladys, friend nearest her heart, all about it.
Arethusa went up the stairs about three at a time, and burst into Ross's room like a small whirlwind, cheeks glowing and hands still clenched in righteous anger at Miss Warren.
"Well, well," exclaimed Ross, "what has happened? Did not the fair Candace come up to expectations?"
"I thought you said she was a dear girl!" Arethusa looked accusingly at Elinor.
"And isn't she?" asked Ross mischievously.
"She's ... she's a cat!" said Arethusa with emphasis. "She said perfectly awful things to me, and she was as nasty as could be to me about Mr. Bennet!"
"So that is where the shoe pinches! Elinor, dearest, methinks there is one of your friends' daughters who has no sort of attraction for our daughter. But Arethusa, my child, I told you, when you first mentioned his name, that he was in a class apart. I told you that he was no lonely floweret wasting his sweetness on the desert air, and that the competition where you would compete was keen. I told you...."
"Ross, for heaven's sake!" laughed Elinor.
"Arethusa is only finding out the truth of my words," replied Ross seriously. "She will learn to depend on her father with one or two more experiences of this kind."
Arethusa perched herself on the arm of Ross's big chair, and Ross tweaked at her ear affectionately. "Is that not so, mine own daughter?"
Arethusa disregarded this question, and asked one of her own.
"Could I learn bridge, do you reckon?"
Ross jumped. "Shades of Miss Eliza!"
"But could I?" recklessly; "Miss Warren said Mr. Bennet played a beautiful game and she said it was cards and that he was fond of it."
"I see. I've heard that he did. Well, something will have to be done about this. Myself, being the sort of player from whom the bridge world runs as one man cannot help you much. But Elinor might. She is said to be somewhat proficient at it. We'll give Arethusa a bridge-party, how about it, Belovedest?"
Elinor agreed, and so Ross suggested a lesson right away.
And Arethusa was just starting off to fetch some cards and have George bring what Elinor spoke of a "card-table," when George himself knocked at the door to announce that Miss Arethusa was wanted on the telephone.
"Mr. Bennet wishes to speak to her."
Bridge lessons were forgotten as if they had never been heard of. Every vestige of color left Arethusa's face. Her hands clasped tightly over her suddenly tumultuous heart.
"To.... To me, George? To me," she stammered; "are you real sure he said tome?"
George nodded, smiling. "He said, 'MissWorthington,' very plain, Miss Arethusa."
Then the deepest of red flamed back into her checks and she scuttled off down the hall so fast that she upset every single rug in her path.
Mr. Bennett was Waiting at the telephone!
CHAPTER XVIII
Arethusa's trembling fingers could hardly find the telephone receiver at first, and even when once located, they could scarcely keep it to her ear.
"Hello!" her greeting was soft and almost breathless.
"Hello!" And she recognized the deep drawl immediately. "Is this Miss Worthington at the 'phone?"
"Yes, it's me, all right!" Arethusa was too excited to be quite grammatical. "But I've been running to get here, and I've lost my breath!"
At the other end of the line, Mr. Bennet smiled rather broadly, and his stenographer, just then depositing a pile of letters to be signed on his desk, could not help wondering what the young lady had said that was so funny. Mr. Bennet did not often smile so into a mere telephone.
"Well, this is Gridley Bennet talking."
"I knew it was!" happily.
"And I should like to know if you have any engagement for to-morrow night?"
"Oh, Mr. Bennet!"
"Have you?"
"Of course, I haven't!" Arethusa considered it a foregone conclusion that if he wanted her for anything, she was free.
"Then will you go to see the 'Earl and His Girl' with me?"
"What is that?"
"A musical comedy, and quite a good one, I've heard them say."
"Is.... Is it the Theater?"
"Why.... Yes! Certainly!" This surprised him just a bit.
"Oh, Mr. Bennet!" exclaimed Arethusa once more.
"I take it, then, you'll go with me?"
"You just bet! I should just love it! Why, I've never been to the Theater in all my life! Not even to the Opera House in Hawesville!" Hawesville was the county-seat.
Mr. Bennet laughed outright then. He had been smiling right straight through this conversation, to the deep interest of his blonde stenographer, who smiled herself in sympathy for the laugh. She took a frank pride in Mr. Bennet's popularity, his many invitations and his telephone calls. It was something to be stenographer to the very handsomest man in the fourteen-story building without his being one of the very nicest to work for, as well.
"That surely makes it all the better," said Mr. Bennet, "and I'll call for you about eight." Then he added, being what he was, "I was rather afraid I wasn't going to be allowed this great pleasure; I was sure one of those many youths that surrounded you the other evening had been before me."
"Well, they haven't. And I'm awfully glad they weren't, because I would so much rather go with you."
It was only the truth which Arethusa spoke, just as she had been taught it was best to do on every occasion.
Mr. Bennet was still smiling when he hung up the receiver and turned to the blonde stenographer. "Please get me two seats for to-morrow night at the Masonic, Miss Ford. You'd better telephone first to see what they have, and then you can go after them." He looked up at the tall clock between the office windows. "And you needn't come back any more to-night, unless you yourself have something to do," he added kindly, "because these letters were all, and I can mail them. Just bring the tickets with you to-morrow."
Miss Ford, with a beaming face, sat down to telephone for the seats which were to introduce Arethusa to the world of the theater, while Mr. Bennet busied himself with the signing of his letters.
It was a kindly Providence that spared Arethusa the loss of life or limb on her way back to impart this Marvelous piece of news, for such a plunge across slippery floors was never made before. Ross and Elinor seemed quite as excited over it as she could have wished, and had a very proper appreciation of the Signal Honor paid their daughter by the Princely-looking Mr. Bennet, although Ross was rather regretful that he had not realized before that she had never attended the theater. He would have taken her himself.
Elinor's most immediate concern was for the costume, and after due deliberation of Arethusa's slender wardrobe, it was decided a purchase must be made for this Occasion.
The next day was the longest that Arethusa had ever spent, in spite of all that had to be done toward getting ready for the theater expedition. The hands of the little silver clock on her mantel seemed to Arethusa to be afflicted with a sort of palsy, during the last hours of that day. She consulted them with frequency, but they never seemed to move forward enough to be noticeable. And deeming something to have happened to the clock, for surely time could not creep so slowly by, she was ready and waiting for Mr. Bennet long before the stroke of eight.
On this visit to Miss Rosa, she had produced a Dress of the soft colors of the tinted autumn leaves, shading into almost the color of the bronzy hair of the girl who was to wear it. It was made with soft skirt on top of soft skirt, in these tones, of shimmering chiffon. It was as Wonderful a Frock in its way as the Green Frock itself. Arethusa fairly held her breath with delight when she saw it. And as it was such a very Momentous Occasion, far too momentous for anything borrowed to be worn, Elinor purchased her daughter, to wear with this dress, a cloak of soft velvet in deep olive green with a collar of fluffy brown fur that framed her glowing face in the most fascinating way possible.
So Mr. Bennet could not help but approve her appearance as he handed her into the automobile. He liked those ladies he escorted to festivities to do him credit. He was as much addicted to a liking for feminine loveliness as was ever Mr. Harrison. For Mr. Bennet had looked in the mirror often, and being a person of discernment, had liked what he had seen there; and he had a deep and abiding sense of the fitness of things. Had the gods been less kind to Arethusa in the matter of looks, undoubtedly her adoration of Mr. Bennet must have remained of a distance. But even a more carping critic than her escort could have found no fault with her this evening; from the crown of her ruddy head to the soles of her satin slippered feet, she was joy to the eye.
The theater lobby was full when they arrived, of a good-natured crowd that laughed and chatted and greeted its acquaintances gayly as it moved slowly toward the inside entrance; where the women whose bare necks gleamed white in their settings of silks and velvets and furs, with their dress-suited men folks, were separated, like the sheep from the goats, for the downstairs of the theater, from the more plainly attired who climbed balconyward. Mr. Bennet and his lady belonged unmistakably with the sheep.
It would be a good house, judging from this number waiting to get inside. It was the first night of a much heralded show, "with the original New York company," its advance notices had said; and it had called forth what the morning newspapers of Lewisburg delighted to call a "representative audience."
Arethusa recognized, among the many, one or two faces she had seen to know at the dinner-dance, and so she could nod and smile a greeting or so, as she and Mr. Bennet pushed forward, with the rest of that crowd. But the people around her pressed against her so closely, that all unknown to Mr. Bennet, she timidly grasped the skirt of his overcoat and gripped it tightly for an anchor should they be forced apart. It was a fearful thought. What on earthwouldshe do, if she lost him in that swarm of folks?
But once in the more open space inside, she breathed more easily, and could lose her hold, for separation was no longer to be really feared.
She looked about her then, as Mr. Bennet divested himself of that anchoring overcoat, and they waited for an usher, and, Arethusa-like, was deeply impressed with all that her eyes rested upon; the glittering crystal chandeliers that gleamed like hundreds of diamonds high above her, the distorted pair of cupids, unnaturally fat, who swayed from garlands of stiff flowers over the proscenium arch, the badly anatomized ladies on the ceiling, riding impossible blue clouds; the gorgeousness of many gilded columns, and even the bright red plush of the seats. Arethusa's tastes were ever slightly rococo.
They were barely seated when the curtain rose, to a fanfare of sound more deafening than musical, and she gave a long drawn out and delighted, "O ...Oh!" for a really pleasing riot of color was before her.
The advertising of this musical show had not so very far falsified its attractions. There was plenty of action in the piece, much trotting on and off the stage; a great many songs with an exceedingly active chorus doing its best, and the dancing was unusually good. It had a big company of principals, well costumed; and such music as was offered was almost music.
But Mr. Bennet gave up all pretense of watching the performance after a little while and devoted his attention entirely to Arethusa, for he had never seen anyone before who so personified enjoyment. Her eyes, great, deep pools of darkness, were glued immovably to the scene before her. A soft flush came and went in her cheeks. She clutched the programme that had been given her at the door tightly in one hand. She had made no move to open it. She had no time to waste on programmes. Once, at a very exciting moment, when the villain was eavesdropping within a hand's distance of the handsome Earl of the piece, she grabbed Mr. Bennet's arm and squeezed it painfully, almost totally unaware whose arm it was.
Then the curtain went down with a grand flourish to a long roll from the snare drum. It went up again, an encore to much applause, then down; then up and down swiftly several times. Arethusa clapped a great split right through the middle of her brand new gloves. The curtain descended once more, and this time.... It stayed. The lights in the theater flashed on.
It had seemed all too short a period of pleasure. Arethusa sighed as she rose and reached behind her for her Green Cloak.
"I wish," she said, regretfully, "I wish it had lasted longer!"
"Lasted longer!" exclaimed Mr. Bennet, "Why!..."
"Isn't it over?" she almost shrieked.
"Over! Good gracious, child! That was only the first act! I believe there are two more, before it's over."
"Two more! Oh! Goody!" Arethusa plumped herself down again with such solid decision to stay where she was, that had her seat not been strongly made, she might have gone clear through it. "But I saw men going out! And I thought of course that was all! It did seem awfully short, though!"
That there should be two whole more acts; such richness of prospect!
The curtain rose for the second act, and Arethusa's smile began to widen in glad anticipation. Then it faded, and her expression changed to that of one rather bewildered. She looked all about her, but no one else seemed at all affected as she was herself. Everybody in the audience was gazing intently, and with pleasure, at the stage.
"What's the matter?" inquired Mr. Bennet.
Arethusa nodded towards the frolicking chorus girls who were just immediately back of the foot-lights, all with arms out-stretched to their responsive audience, singing vociferously of unintelligible words.
"It's.... It's the girls."
"Yes...."
"They.... They have on pa ... pajamas." She stumbled a little over the word.
"Yes...." encouraged Mr. Bennet once more.
"They must have been resting," replied Arethusa.
"Resting?"
"Pa ... pajamas are bedclothes," she explained, blushing just a bit.
"Yes, I know," said Mr. Bennet kindly, "but I don't just see...." He glanced back at the stage.
"I reckon they put them on to rest between the acts," continued Arethusa, "because they must have been tired, after dancing so hard, and the curtain must have gone up so quick they didn't have time to change. They must be awfully embarrassed to come out before us like that. I think it's mean to laugh at them. I wouldn't laugh for anything myself."
The picture conjured up by this speech of Arethusa's, of the chorus girls changing wildly to pajamas and reclining after the arduous labors of the first act, tickled Mr. Bennet more than anything that had happened on the stage, even the best efforts of the expensive comedian. And the effect upon him of the idea was the very same effect that the idea of moths and butterflies as a Topic of Conversation for Parties had had upon Mr. Watts, when Arethusa had presented it to him at the dinner-dance.
Mr. Bennet laughed.
His laughter was much more refined and less boisterous than that of Mr. William Watts, but Arethusa realized, nevertheless, that he was laughing at her. He was not laughing at the chorus girls who had been caught unawares by a rising curtain, in garments in which they had not intended that they should be seen; but he was laughing at her, Arethusa. Whatever it was she had said this time that was wrong, she had made herself ridiculous enough for the Wonderful Mr. Bennet to laugh at her!
Her throat filled suddenly with a perfectly solid lump. Something back of her eyes began to smart unbearably, and they filled also, filled quickly with tears that so blinded her that she could not see even her own shimmering lap. Her hands trembled unmanageably, until the programme dropped from their uncertain grasp, and she fumbled about to find that handkerchief which was so badly needed. She dabbed at her eyes with it, and winked back those tears as best she could, biting her lips fiercely to keep from sobbing outright. But there were so many tears and they came so fast that they brimmed clear over, and some fell, great shining drops, on the yellow chiffon of her dress. Her tiny handkerchief was all unavailing to quench this flow, and in a very short while it was only a small lump of wet. Her head drooped lower and lower.
It was absolute and overwhelming humiliation.
Mr. Bennet heard a queer little sound at his side, a little sound that she was quite unable to control, and he turned to see this weeping Arethusa.
"Why, my dear little girl!" he exclaimed, bending over. "What on earth!"
She managed to swallow a small portion of the lump that filled her throat. "You.... You laughed at me!" she said brokenly. "You laughed at me!"
So he had. But Mr. Bennet was very sure that this was not the time to acknowledge it.
He was genuinely distressed to see her cry, but his interest was more acute that something be done to stop it before too much attention was accorded them. Mr. Bennet disliked very much to be made at all conspicuous.
He slid one arm gently along the back of her seat. Arethusa was conscious of this movement through her unhappiness, and she could not help being thrilled at the thought of that Wonderful Arm being where it was. Mr. Bennet, however, knew very well just how far it might go. Miss Eliza herself thought no more of the proprieties than did Mr. Bennet. Then he leaned protectingly close. Arethusa thrilled some more.
"Did you imagine for a moment that I was laughing at you!" And his rich drawling voice was so convincing that she believed him immediately. "Indeed, I was not! There was something very funny just then that you missed.Why, I wouldn't laugh atyoufor all the world!"
Arethusa smiled through her tears at him like a veritable bit of April.
"I didn't like to think you would. But.... But.... It seemed just exactly like you were!"
"You misjudged me dreadfully!"
And this time he sounded so reproachful that she was just as ashamed of herself for so misjudging him, as she had been humiliated the moment before because she had thought herself the object of his mirth.
"I ... I'm sorry," she faltered. Would Mr. Bennet ever be able to forgive such a misinterpretation of his charming laugh?
But Mr. Bennet was a truly magnanimous soul, and it seemed that he would.
So an atmosphere of enjoyment once more restored, Arethusa turned her attention back to the chorus ladies, who had in the meantime clothed themselves in garments belonging less to the hours of rest and more to those of activity, and responded to their antics to amuse as she had before that most unfortunate episode.
She sighed a gusty sigh of real forlornness when the curtain had descended in such a way that it could not possibly be construed by even inexperienced theatergoers to mean anything but that it was all over.
"It doesn't last near long enough, not near!" she said, regretfully, as she was being helped into the Green Cloak.
Mr. Bennet produced his watch. "I don't know just how long you expected it to last," he replied, "but right this moment it happens to be ten minutes past eleven; which means that we have been here almost three hours!"
Arethusa regarded him open-eyed and open-mouthed.
"Honest!"
"Honest."
"Why, it hasn't seemed like any time at all!"
"Well, it seems to me that if you enjoyed it so much, we'll have to come again some time very soon. Shall we?"
Arethusa accepted this invitation with undoubted pleasure.
"I'll be a little more careful, though, in my selection of our next play, so there will be nothing in it you could misunderstand that might possibly spoil a few moments for us. I don't want any spoiled moments with you," tenderly.
Arethusa blushed deeply and her head drooped.
Shehad spoiled it, all by herself; those moments of unhappiness had been all her own fault, because she was such a goose. This play had been as near perfection as a play could be, thought she, who knew so little of plays. At the next one, she herself would see that nothing of the kind occurred. She had learned her lesson, and there would be no more misinterpretation of Mr. Bennet's charming little ways.
Mr. Bennet was just a bit conscience-stricken in the morning by the way he had turned that episode, when reviewing it at his office. She was a dear child. The Worthington interest was a solid one. There were dollars galore that stood to that name in various financial institutions, and when one is a dealer in the commodities known as stocks and bonds, one must not let the smallest chance slip by to cement a friendship outside which might prove to extend itself into the business world. There was no telling how quickly bread cast upon the waters might return. At least, it could do no sort of harm. She was a dear child!
Which explains why Arethusa received a long green box, brought to her by George as she ate her luncheon. It was a box of American Beauties with stems a yard long, roses that were far too beautiful as roses to be real, and that seemed to Arethusa to have gathered all the perfume of heaven within their deep, red centers. She sniffed and smelled them in ecstasy; and stroked the glossy green leaves that spread out from their stems, so marvelous as leaves. She could hardly part with them that they might be put in the tallest vase on the library table, which would display their beauty to the greatest advantage.
Inside the box was a tiny note....
"Would Miss Worthington do Mr. Bennet the honor of reserving the date of the January Cotillion for him?"
"Would Miss Worthington do Mr. Bennet the honor of reserving the date of the January Cotillion for him?"
"But that's so awfully far off," objected Arethusa, as she read this communication aloud to her interested parents. "It's only the first of November right now!"
It was entirely too lovely of Mr. Bennet to send her roses; it heaped coals of fire with effective vengeance. She was almost ashamed to accept them. But she did wish that he had made that engagement for something a trifle closer at hand.
"You little goose!" exclaimed Ross. "Why, that istheevent of the whole Lewisburg season! And not one debutante in ten out of a winter ever gets to go! As superlative as I'll have to admit Mr. Bennet's taste in flowers, I believe most girls would care far more about that invitation than they would about the roses!"
"Really!" Arethusa brightened up considerably.
"I'd let a man laugh at me every day from now till Christmas if he'd ask me to go to the January Cotillion with him," continued Ross, "that is, if I was a young lady with any hope of being a social success."
"But he wasn't laughing at me," protested his daughter. She had narrated the affair in detail. "I told you that, Father. He said very positively he wasn't laughing at me!"
"Well," replied Ross, "it makes no difference what caused his mirth, it seems to me that I'd assuredly welcome it, with such effect!"
CHAPTER XIX
Arethusa was going shopping, and going shopping for the very first time in her life, alone.
And thereby hangs a tale.
Wednesday coming was Miss Asenath's birthday, and Arethusa had completely lost track of that important fact to forget it until this Monday morning. She, who had given Miss Asenath something, if only a tight bouquet of flowers from the plants brought into the house for the winter, every birthday anniversary since she was old enough to lisp "birfday" and comprehend its significance, had forgotten that this event was so near. She could have made her a gift as she generally did had there been time to finish it and send it so it would reach the Farm on the twentieth; but it would not be a birthday gift if Miss Asenath did not get it on her birthday (this was logic to Arethusa); so in her distress she had appealed to Elinor.
And Elinor, after asking if Miss Asenath ever wore shawls and learning that she did all the winter through, suggested that Arethusa purchase her a rose-colored shoulder shawl of silk and several yards of rose-colored ribbon to match for the locket. If it was started today, it would reach there in time.
Charming Idea!
So Arethusa was to take the automobile, as Elinor had a Board meeting of importance this morning and could not go with her; seek the magnificent establishment where she had accompanied her mother so many times to shop; inquire of a floor-walker the location of the department of shawls; purchase one of the same, and charge it to Elinor's name and address; and return home in the machine. Such were the directions given by Elinor.
They seemed to cover every detail for the buying of Miss Asenath's birthday gift; and, moreover, sounded very simple. As viewed by Arethusa, although Miss Eliza would have been horrified at the bare suggestion, she could surely buy one rose-colored silk shawl without assistance.
She loved her reflection in the mirror when she was dressed for this adventure; a jaunty new hat with a flyaway feather, a new suit, and even gloves and shoes as slim as Miss Warren's. And besides, pride of her heart, her costume was enhanced with furs of rich, dark brown, as silky smooth in appearance as those she had envied that visitor who had been so trying a visitor. There was also, a half-formed Hope within that when she looked so well as she did this morning she would meet the Wonderful Mr. Bennet somewhere downtown that made her eyes shine, which added to the attractiveness of the reflection.
She left the car in front of the big shop and bade Clay wait for her with an air of dignity that was an almost ludicrous imitation of Elinor's manner of uttering the same words. Clay smiled broadly as he touched his cap, recognizing her model.
Arethusa tripped gayly into the store and a polite and obsequious gentleman escorted her to that counter where she might find shawls, and directed that she be waited upon, immediately.
The very prettiest girl among those in this department stepped forward. She was the one which Arethusa might have chosen to wait upon her, had she been choosing. But she was a dreadfully tired-looking girl, even more tired looking than pretty, Arethusa noticed when she was closer. She had great dark circles under her eyes and a pathetic sort of droop to the corners of her mouth. Her black dress made her look still more forlorn, for she was very pale and it accentuated the pallor.
But the girl smiled at Arethusa; she could not help it, tired as she looked and really was, for Arethusa's eagerness to purchase was so amusingly apparent.
"I want to see silk shawls," announced Arethusa, "rose-colored silk shawls."
A bewildering variety of shawls was immediately spread before her, in every conceivable shade of the color she had requested. How Miss Asenath would have loved that heap of gayety! Arethusa found it terribly difficult to make a choice. She picked out three as the prettiest of the collection, after much deliberation and selection and rejection; but each one was so lovely that she wanted every one of them for Miss Asenath. Then she made an appeal to the girl.
"Which of these doyouthink is the very prettiest? It's for an old lady; the dearest old lady!"
The girl bent her dark head over the shawls Arethusa was holding.
"Is it for your grandmother?"
"No," replied Arethusa. "It's for my Aunt 'Senath. She's an invalid."
Then, of necessity almost, she must tell Miss Asenath's interesting story, beginning way back at the very beginning, with the Romance before the Fall. Her sympathetic telling of her Tale, her gestures and her earnest voice, attracted every other girl at that counter, for it was not a very busy morning, so that long before she had finished, four or five other heads were bent in solemn consultation above the three shawls from which final choice was to be made. They could not all agree as to the one most desirable; tastes were different as to which shade of rose would really be most becoming and best for Miss Asenath. Finally, Arethusa and Jessie (for so the first girl's name had been discovered to be) decided that majority must rule as always, and selected as Miss Asenath's birthday gift what they themselves and two of the other girls liked best, the one that was in between in tone.
"I can get ribbon just this color, can't I?" asked the shopper anxiously, once her choice was actually made.
"For the locket?" inquired Jessie.
"Yes."
"Sure you can. Suppose you just take this over to the ribbon counter and match it right now, it's just in the next aisle, and then you can bring it back to me."
Arethusa went away joyfully, bearing the shawl.
"Ain't you afraid, Jess, to let her go off like that?" asked one of Jessie's contemporaries, of a more distrustful turn of mind. "'Sposin' she don't come back with it? It ain't paid for, and she never told you who she was."
"Oh, she'll come back," replied Jessie, confidently, "She'll come back, all right. I ain't the least bit afraid. 'Specially when she looks as much like an angel as she talks! I wish there was more like her to wait on, and then it wouldn't be so hard to be standing here all day long. Yes, ma'am, these shawls are all silk," to a personage who had paused to examine the wares which Jessie had not yet put away.
It would be impossible to mention her in any way save as a "personage." She exuded superiority and a consciousness of a high station in life from every aristocratic pore.
"I doubt it. They look rather cheap." She tossed the whole heap aside, contemptuously. "Have you nothing any better?"
"No, ma'am, these are the best."
"That's old Mrs. Bixby," whispered one of the clerks in a tone of heartfelt awe to the girl next her, as the lady seated herself before the counter. "And she is some swell, too, believe me, Molly Davis! Money! Just buckets of it!"
Mrs. Bixby seemed rather disdainful of what Jessie had to offer her in the way of shawls. She continued to toss them to right and left, scattering them so carelessly about that one or two fell to the floor of the aisle and were retrieved by a near-by floor-walker, who glanced at poor Jessie, as much as to say, "Don't you let that happen again!"
"I see nothing here I'd really have," remarked Mrs. Bixby, at last.
Then as she turned, she caught sight of an acquaintance across the aisle, who had loitered there hoping for the sun of her smile, to whom she beckoned imperiously; and who came swiftly for whatever was desired of her, at this nod, much as a menial runs in answer to the nod of a master.
"I've got it!"
Arethusa came back with the shawl and several yards of rose-colored ribbon that matched it as perfectly as if woven especially to be worn with it to hold the Locket.
Jessie's face broke into welcoming smiles. Most of the other clerks smiled also. Arethusa's honest joy in her purchases was truly refreshing after Mrs. Bixby.
"Isn't that a perfectly beautiful match?" Arethusa asked of them all impartially, with enthusiasm. "And yet Aunt 'Liza always says I have no sort of taste! Can't you just see darling Aunt 'Senath in all her white clothes with this lovely rose color next to her?"
It was not at all hard for Jessie to imagine the picture after the vivid description she had received of Miss Asenath. "I'll bet she'll look just lovely," she declared warmly, "and it certainly is a splendid match! No one could have matched it better!"
The other girls made a smiling affirmation to this verdict.
Mrs. Bixby turned around from her own conversation at the sudden sound of these animated voices so close to her and lifted her gold lorgnette to examine Arethusa.
"This girl was waiting on me, I believe," she said, indicating Jessie with a wave of her aristocratic hand, and speaking in a pleasantly acid tone that was intended to consign Arethusa to nothingness forever.
But Arethusa gave no smallest sign of doing so.
"She was waiting on me, long before you ever saw her!"
That lorgnette could but irritate Arethusa.
Mrs. Bixby glanced up and down, and then through her.
"Indeed! I think you're mistaken!" Then to Jessie. "I wasn't through, girl."
"But you said...." began poor Jessie.
She was torn between her desire to serve Arethusa, whom, girl-like, she had voted a darling, and her great fear of offending one so powerful as Mrs. Bixby. The floor-walker suddenly turned his attention in their direction, which added to her agitation. But she need not have worried quite so much; her first customer made a sturdy champion of any cause, and she was still most undaunted, lorgnette or no lorgnette.
"There's a whole stack of girls here," declared Arethusa hotly, "and just because you can't help being disagreeable, you want the same one I have! Jessie sold me this shawl before you ever came, and she let me take it over to match it in ribbon!"
Mrs. Bixby displayed an interest. She raised the lorgnette once more.
"Indeed! And had you paid for it?"
"It's none of your business whether I had or not! It's not your store, is it? But I hadn't, so there, if you really want to know!"
"I shall report you immediately," said Mrs. Bixby, majestically to Jessie, "for allowing goods to be taken away from your counter without being paid for, and for not waiting on your customers properly. You were very impudent. And...."
"Why, you're a horrible old woman!" interrupted Arethusa, as if the discovery was most surprising. "A perfectly horrible old woman! But go right ahead and report, if you want to! I reckon it won't hurt anything very much, because I brought the shawl back and I'm going to charge it right now, this very minute!"
"Andyou," continued Mrs. Bixby, once more consigning the tempestuously excited Arethusa to nothingness with her glance, "are the most decidedly ill-bred young person I ever saw!"
She sailed away and sought the floor-walker.
His glance, after a brief conversation with her, was sternly directed in the direction of the shawl department. He nodded several times in answer to what she said to him, and finally bowed her deferentially towards the outer door.
Arethusa turned to Jessie, whose rather frail hands were trembling in their effort to fold her shawls, and her sympathetic heart ached for this evident distress.
"I wouldn't mind, Jessie. That old beast can't really do anything that would hurt you, can she?"
"I don't know," miserably.
"Was it very wrong to let me take the shawl to have it matched before I had paid for it?"
"It's against the rules. People could steal things that way. But I knew you'd bring it right back."
"That nasty old thing!" Arethusa leaned earnestly across the counter-top. "I'll buy two or three shawls. Would it be all right then?"
Jessie was forced to a smile at this suggested method of straightening out the affair.
"That wouldn't make very much difference about this, I'm afraid. And besides, I don't suppose your mother would like your doing it, very much!"
"She wouldn't care," affirmed the daughter, stoutly. "She wouldn't care the least bit. She's the loveliest person in the world!" Suddenly, an altogether new idea seized her. "They won't discharge you, will they?" It was a horrible thought!
"Oh, no! That is, I don't suppose so. It depends on what she said, mostly. If she told the truth, I might just get reprimanded. They'll dock me probably, though; but that's almost as bad to me right now, as being discharged," bitterly; "I need every single cent of my money."
"Oh, well," Arethusa patted Jessie consolingly on the arm, "Don't you worry! I'll get Father to fix it up for you. He knows Mr. Redmond awfully well. He plays golf with him, and he told me Mr. Redmond owned this store, even if his name isn't on the sign. So he'll fix it!"
She departed, serenity restored all around; for Ross would surely manage it so that Jessie should not suffer for being kind.
But before she was out of the establishment, she unfortunately encountered Mrs. Bixby near the door, who raised her lorgnette and surveyed the "Ill-bred young person" through it again. She so aroused Arethusa's ire that she rushed furiously out of the shop and went headlong on up the street. She had gone quite a block, when she ran ... bang! into a man person, who in her excitement she had not noticed as approaching.
"You seem to be in a very great hurry this fine morning," said a familiar voice, and she looked up.
There was Mr. Bennet smiling at her; standing in the middle of the sidewalk, irreproachably groomed as always, very much Mr. Bennet, and evidently glad to see her.
Arethusa was glad to see him also. She clasped her hands, parcel and all, and dimpled charmingly.
"I'm just as mad as I can be! That nasty old beast of a woman!"
"What old beast of a woman?"
Arethusa launched into explanation.
And as the narrative progressed, Mr. Bennet's inward amusement grew. Arethusa was primed with names, and so he recognised Mrs. Bixby for his aunt, the mentor of their rather extensive family connection. He would have given anything to have seen the encounter! And he would have backed Arethusa for winner without any hesitancy, as well as he knew his dictatorial relative.
"And will you, Mr. Bennet," finished Jessie's champion imploringly, "will you go back and see that man with me and fix it so they won't do anything to Jessie?"
It might be better to fix things up now with Mr. Bennet's able assistance, than to wait until later on to speak to Ross.
"Certainly," said Mr. Bennet, kindly, "I'll be very glad to; if you think I can do any good."
Arethusa was absolutely sure of this. Was he not Mr. Bennet?
Mr. Platt, the floor-walker to whom Mrs. Bixby had complained of Jessie, was also an assistant manager, and he was very glad to have the facts in this particular case, he said, when Arethusa and Mr. Bennet had hunted him up; Arethusa to do most of the talking, and Mr. Bennet to smile and look on, and impress the one who had Jessie's sentence within his power to make either good or bad, by just the fact of his appearance and his air of being someone of importance, which was so decidedly Mr. Bennet's air. The other lady, added Mr. Platt to his speech apologetically, had slightly misrepresented things. She had accused the girl of impudence and inattention, which had sounded bad. And in a store of this size.... But when a customer got excited, she was not always just accurate, yet they could not tell....
Mr. Bennet was most amused by this little dig at his aunt. Arethusa was vigorous in her defense of Jessie, and her denial that Jessie had been at all impudent. And her indignation had made her so pretty, with her flushed cheeks, that Mr. Platt smiled paternally and told her that it would be all right. Probably she herself might like to stop by and tell Jessie so? Nothing suited Arethusa better; so with Mr. Bennet in tow, this pleasant duty was performed, and then once more she sought the outside.
"Now come go to lunch with me," said Mr. Bennet, as they paused under the iron and glass porte-cochere for a moment. "It's lunch time," he added, "and maybe considerably after. I was on my way when I met you."
Arethusa's eyes sparkled at the thought. "But do girls go to lunch down-town with gentlemen?"
He assured her that they often did, and as Arethusa had no further scruples of any sort to add, he led the way across the street to the big Patterson Hotel; the shop where shawls and excitement had been found was exactly opposite.
Arethusa followed him on into the dining-room, her heart beating such an excited tattoo against her chest she was very glad that the band on the little balcony at one end of the room was playing so loudly just then, else she was quite certain that Mr. Bennet, and even the tall and imposing head waiter who was so courteously showing them to a table, would have heard that pounding heart.
It was certainly a Real Adventure.
They were piloted to a spot which Mr. Bennet, from the door-way when they had first stepped inside, had selected for its attractions, a little table for two far over in the corner, just enough removed from the band for the music to be a pleasant accompaniment to the business of luncheon, instead of an interruption, as it often was when closer to it. The table held a lighted candle lamp shaded with a soft rose-colored shade of fluted silk (and not all of the tables boasted little lamps) which seemed to add most delightfully to the intimacy of the occasion.
Arethusa leaned her elbows on the table, and looked happily at Mr. Bennet, sitting so close to her on the other side of the white cloth, ordering a lunch for her to eat. There was a charming intimacy about the situation which could not help but appeal.
"Isn't this fun!" she exclaimed. "Just us!"
Mr. Bennet thought it was, indeed.
And he added instructions to the waiter, about the food which was to be prepared for Arethusa to eat, which further added to the Charm of things. The waiter hurried off with their order, as if he himself deemed it no ordinary order.
Then, while they waited, Arethusa unrolled her parcel and showed Mr. Bennet the shawl and told him all about Miss Asenath.
"It would be wonderful to be loved the way your aunt has loved that man all these years," he said softly, when the Tale was ended, for Arethusa had crowded every single bit of Romance connected with it into her telling.
Her long eyelashes drooped suddenly over her eyes, and the little flush which always came so quickly spread over her face and neck. Her unruly heart beat even faster.
There was a soft, long silence, and Mr. Bennet, admiring the light of the candle lamp on Arethusa's ruddy hair, smiled to himself as he watched her. He had an idea that he knew just about what she was thinking.
Arethusa was thinking that Mr. Bennet was undoubtedly the sort of man that one would be sure to love just that way.
Now Mr. Bennet knew very well how Arethusa felt about him, and this without any real conceit on his part. Arethusa was a woefully transparent young person; she had never learned there are times when it might seem best to dissemble a little. Mr. Bennet knew, perhaps, better than she did herself, the exact state of her Feeling in regard to him. There were some essential points on which they would not have agreed at all; but still.... His main idea as to just how Arethusa felt was pretty clear.
He leaned back in his chair, and continued to watch her. He could almost have laughed aloud at her pretty confusion. Arethusa's nervous fingers crumbled up a perfectly good slice of bread until it could be of no use of any kind to anybody, her head still bent. If the Situation had such charm, it had not lost altogether the power to embarrass, when Words that could cause such Thoughts were softly spoken by a rich and drawling Voice.
The waiter helped matters considerably by bringing in the soup.
Soup has never been regarded as much in the way of a reliever of embarrassment, but it proved to be something of the kind in this particular case. Arethusa's tongue was loosened again, and she chattered of inconsequential topics of variety, but none of them brought such moments as the one just past. There was much to be said to Mr. Bennet, for they had grown to be great friends in the last few weeks and had many interests in common.
It was an unusually nice little luncheon that Mr. Bennet had ordered; and it was perfect eaten so, just the two of them, thought Arethusa. It was prolonged quite beyond the time generally allotted for luncheons, for it was almost half-past three when they emerged from the Hotel.
"Well, what shall we do now?" asked Mr. Bennet. He glanced at his watch and then shut it with a snap. "I don't believe I'll go back to the office again this afternoon; that is.... How about you? Are you free? What do you say to a moving-picture show?"
Arethusa was delighted. She had nothing whatever to do, and she adored the movies. She had seen a few with Ross and Elinor.
So Mr. Bennet stepped back into the Hotel to telephone Miss Ford that he would not be back that afternoon; and then they strolled side by side up the street, he and Arethusa, hunting for the picture show which seemed to have the most to offer.
The one they finally chose to attend proved to be so exciting that Arethusa scarcely breathed a word to him until it was all over, and the film had gone around and started to go around again, so that she could be perfectly sure she had seen every bit of it. There was a great deal of honest realism about the acting done on the screen for Arethusa, photography though it might be. A smothered scream had attested to Mr. Bennet the genuineness of her fear for her own safety during a portion of this picture's running, and her sudden jump when the evil-looking Indian had shot the handsome cowboy, and the little sound of distress she had made, told him that although movie guns were said to fire blank cartridges, they inflicted actual damage for Arethusa.
It was dark when they left the moving-picture theatre, and well after five. Winter days seem woefully short.
"Well, what shall we do now?" asked Mr. Bennet, for the second time. "I suppose, though, it will be home. It's so late."
Arethusa stopped short in the middle of the crowded sidewalk, full of folks who were plainly impatient to get somewhere, and very probably it was home, flowing past her on either side, all unregarded. She grabbed Mr. Bennet frantically by one arm.
"Oh, Mr. Bennet!"
"What's the matter? Did you leave something in the theater?"
"No! But I've left Clay waiting in the machine for me all this time in front of that store, and I never thought of him once until you said, 'home!'"
The last part of this information was wafted on the breeze to Mr. Bennet, for Arethusa had started off down the street with the swiftness of the wind itself. He followed her immediately, but considerably more slowly as to locomotion (he was no sprinter and Mr. Bennet rarely forgot his dignity) and with the parcel containing Miss Asenath's birthday gift in one hand. Arethusa had dropped it directly at his feet in her excitement. When he caught up with her, she was standing in front of the shop gazing wildly up and down the street, for no Clay and no automobile were to be discovered anywhere.
The door attendant, when questioned by Mr. Bennet, said that he remembered the chauffeur referred to very well. He had seemed to be very worried about the young lady, and had left his car several times to ask him if he had seen her come out. But he had driven off some time ago, about three hours ago, the door attendant thought it was, to be as exact as he could.
Mr. Bennet took Arethusa home in a taxicab to an excited and distraught household.
When Clay had come back without her, with his strange story of having waited for her, and that she had never returned to the machine, Ross had been perfectly sure that she had been kidnapped, and he had gone impetuously to the police station to start an immediate search. Elinor was prostrate in her room, visioning all sorts of dreadful things that might have happened to an Arethusa always too prone to make chance acquaintances, when Arethusa herself, as repentant and contrite a cause of it all as it was possible for her to be, walked in.
Elinor would not allow Ross to scold her after she heard Arethusa's sobbing explanation, that she was having such a good time she forgot everything else; for she said that he was really more to blame for that than anyone concerned.
Which rather cryptic statement, if Arethusa failed of comprehension, seemed to be quite clear to her father.