So this was the garden where that strange flower of girlhood had budded and blossomed. All at once Barrie, in her quaintness, became a readable riddle to Somerled.
The two gates in the high wall were kept bolted, but there was a jangling bell for each, the gate for visitors (it was almost supererogatory), and the gate for tradesmen and servants. An elderly and sullenly astonished woman opened the visitors' gate for Somerled, and made of her lean form a barrier lest he should try to pass. But she being narrowly built, on somewhat Gothic lines, and the gateway being broad, Somerled saw past the flying buttresses of her skirts into the background. And it was this background that explained in a flash why the girl knew less of life than a bird which has learned to use its wings; also the reason why she could never return to waste her young years behind the garden wall of Hillard House. The thought came into Somerled's mind that it would be interesting to show her the world she had never seen, not only between Carlisle and Edinburgh, but over the hills and far away, as far as the purple island of Dhrum, set in its sunset frame of ocean gold—or even farther. That could not be, of course, but the picture was pleasant.
He had prepared himself to be ingratiating; but he realized that ingratiation was not a successful line to pursue with dragons. Instead of inquiring politely if Mrs. MacDonald were at home, he said bluntly, "I wish to see Mrs. MacDonald; I have business with her—not my business, but hers. And you may tell her I am not The MacDonald of Dhrum, butaMacDonald from Dhrum, a very different thing."
He knew well that the name of Somerled would be no "Open Sesame" to this door, and he rather enjoyed the knowledge. It was clear at once that he had used the right key. Perhaps no other would have served a stranger. Anna Case was not a Scotswoman, but the name of MacDonald was respected within these gates, no matter who bore it, and this dark man, with the blue eyes that went through you like bright steel blades, didn't look like one who would claim what he had no right to claim. She bade him follow her into the house, which he did; into the hall; and so to a drearier drawing-room than he had ever entered. There had perhaps been some as gray and grim on his island of Dhrum; but in those days he had known nothing of drawing-rooms.
This was not even early Victorian. It was mid-Victorian, and rubbing and brushing had given the ugly furniture no time to mellow. He sat down on a horsehair-covered sofa which had two worked worsted cushions, each stiffly upright in its corner. One represented a dog's head, the other a bunch of white and yellow flowers with a cold background of steel beads. On the walls hung a few steel engravings; a meeting of Covenanters; portraits of unco' guid worthies with sidewhiskers or beards; and some tortured stags pursued or caught by hounds.
"Terrible!" he groaned in spirit. "Who'd suppose that such things existed nowadays?"
He might appropriately have made much the same criticism of the old woman who at that instant opened the door and came in, sturdily, in spite of her limp and the stout stick grasped in a knuckly hand. But as their eyes met—hers like thick glass panes behind which a burning fire could be dimly seen—something in her grim spirit spoke to something as grim and uncompromising far down his nature. To his own surprise he felt awaking in himself a queer impulse of sympathy for the redoubtable Grandma. Perhaps, reluctantly, she felt the same for him. But she looked him in the face, keenly and unblinkingly. "Well, sir," she said, in a deep voice almost like a man's, and amazingly young and vital, "well, sir, I do not recognize you, though you have gained entrance to my house by claiming the name of MacDonald."
"That is true," replied Ian, who had risen at her coming. "It's the first time I've claimed the name for many years, though it is mine and was my father's before me."
"Who was your father?" the old woman catechized him. "What kin to Duncan, my dead husband's half-brother?"
"No kin except by clan ties. You wouldn't have heard of us. My father was a crofter. His name was David."
"I well remember that man," said Mrs. MacDonald, "and his wife too when I lived with my husband on the island in my youth. Let me see—Mary her name was. They were God-fearing folk, and didn't wear any such grand clothes as you do, not even for their Sunday best."
"I paint people's portraits, you see, and have to live in cities," explained Ian calmly, though he had grown lazy as he grew rich and had not painted. "My clothes suit my trade and way of life better than my father's would, I think; though, as for my brains, my father's hat would have been too big for them."
"I dare say you are right about the brains. You are that youth who went off to America under the name of Somerled," Mrs. MacDonald severely remarked. "I have read of you in the newspapers; but I never approved of you, sir. It's not man's work, to my mind, smearing canvas with paint, and encouraging silly women to be vain of their faces."
"My portraits aren't considered to have that effect," returned Somerled; "rather the contrary, in some cases. And I'm sorry you don't approve of me, because that makes a bad opening for what I've come to say. However, it can't be helped. I know Mrs. Ballantree MacDonald slightly; met her in America——"
"If you think an acquaintance with that woman will recommend you to me, sir, you are mightily mistaken," was the answer he got.
"I mention it to make you understand why, when I met her daughter last night, I felt it my duty to do what I could, being of the same name and not quite a stranger to the family."
"Oh, you felt it your duty! Then you're the person mentioned in a letter I received from a certain Mrs. West, according to herself a writer of books. I do not read her sort of books, and never heard of her. 'Motor novels' indeed! What worse than nonsense! Little enough sense fools must have to buy them! If you have come from this Mrs. West, you can tell her from me, as she has made her bed she may lie in it. She has not taken under her roof my granddaughter, but the daughter of Mrs. Ballantree MacDonald, the play actress. I did my best for the girl, striving to bring her up to be a good and modest woman, despite the bad blood of the mother who broke my son's heart and killed him, who did what she could, and has been doing what she could in the years since, to disgrace our house. I might have known I should strive in vain, and I did know at heart. Vanity and extravagance and fondness of pleasure were Barbara Ballantree's undoing. I preserved her daughter from those dangers, and gave her a religious education. Levity was sternly rebuked in her. She had no young acquaintances to teach her foolishness, or tell her of her mother's sin. She was allowed no money to fritter away on vanities, no silly novels to read, such as those your friends write, no frivolous pursuits which could distract her mind from duty—yet she is her mother over again, and, like her mother, runs away from my house by stealth, in the dead of night."
"It wasn't ten o'clock when I met her in the railway station," Somerled defended the absent. "She was then not very stealthily seeking a train for London, where she expected to find her mother. Mrs. West has written you, I know, and told you everything that happened. For my part, I've called to speak of a plan I have in mind for your granddaughter. The telegram you sent Mrs. West seemed——"
"The telegram I sent Mrs. West? I've sent no telegram to her nor any one. I don't send telegrams."
"Indeed?" stammered Somerled, taken aback. "I understood—Mrs. West believed the telegram to be from you——"
"Nothing of the kind. She couldn't have believed it," Mrs. MacDonald shut him up mercilessly. "She must have been 'romancing,' as I suppose she would call it. I should call it lying."
Remembering Aline's words, Somerled also was frankly inclined to call it lying—on the part of the young woman or the old. He would gladly have blamed the elder, but reason rebelled. Whatever Mrs. MacDonald's faults might be, she did not seem to be one who would deliberately tell a lie.
"But why should Mrs. West?" Somerled asked himself, calling up the pretty smile, the soft blue eyes of his friend. He had been inclined to believe her true. He had liked her very much, more than he liked most women, and had wondered if he might not learn to like her still better in time. The women he saw oftenest were mostly nervous, exacting, self-centred creatures, craving constant flattery. Aline was none of these things. She had many charms, and he had seen few defects; but a motive for falseness in the matter of the telegram would suggest itself to his intelligence. He tried to shut the door in its insinuating, conceited grin.
"There must be a mistake—somewhere," he mumbled.
"Not here, anyhow," retorted the old lady.
"After all, it's apart from the question in hand. But perhaps my plans for your granddaughter don't interest you?"
"Not particularly. Still, you may as well tell them. I see you want to."
"And I see"—Somerled squandered a smile, but only because it came spontaneously—"I see that you want to hear them, because," he dared to go on with a flash of his keen eyes into hers, "youdocare what becomes of Miss MacDonald. If you had not got Mrs. West's letter, you would have had no sleep last night. As it is, knowing your granddaughter has fallen into safe hands, you can comfortably disclaim anxiety."
"You seem to fancy yourself a mind-reader, my good sir," returned Mrs. MacDonald at her haughtiest, or what Barrie would have called her "snortiest." "Think what you like. It is nothing to me, and thinking costs naught. As for the hands she has fallen into, what do I know of them? They may be black with sin for all I can tell. No doubt Barbara Ballantree's daughter would be just as ready to accept help from such hands."
"As a painter, I try to keep mine clean," said Somerled. "I tell you that in earnest, not in joke, because for the present I've constituted myself your granddaughter's guardian. My plan is to take her in my motor-car to Edinburgh, where I shall deliver her safely to Mrs. Bal—Mrs. Ballantree MacDonald. In the car will be Mrs. West and her brother, Basil Norman. Have you anything to say against the plan? If you have, kindly speak now."
"If I did speak, would it prevent your doing what you've made up your mind to do?"
"Perhaps not, unless your reasons appealed to my judgment," Somerled admitted.
"You're no prevaricator, anyhow."
"I don't come of prevaricating stock."
"You don't, if you're David MacDonald's son. He was a humble, God-respecting man. But you have no humble air. You hold your crest high."
Somerled was minded to be impudent and say that in that case he must get his hair cut; but he refrained. "The atmosphere of this house does not conduce to humility, madam," he answered instead—and always as they talked the two looked one another straight and full in the face.
"H'm!" the old woman grunted. Yet there was something vaguely resembling a twinkle in the glass-gray eyes, a gleam which Barrie and few others now living had ever seen; for not more than one or two of her fellow-beings had ever had the slightest idea how to manage Mrs. MacDonald,néeAnn (scorning an "e") Hillard.
"Go on your motor trip, then, so far as I care," said she, a permission which from her was well-nigh a blessing. "It will probably end in a smash-up before Edinburgh."
"I think not," said Somerled. "I drive myself, and I know how to drive rather well."
"I was not referring to physical results."
"So I presumed. Nor was I," he retorted.
If she found the reply enigmatical she did not say so.
They had not sat down during the conversation. Now, Somerled took a step toward the door. "I'm obliged to you for receiving me, madam," he said as a prelude to departure.
"I received you on the strength of your name," she reminded him.
"Which I don't intend to disgrace in your eyes."
"Why in my eyes? They will not long be looking your way."
"I think they will, as long as I'm in charge of your granddaughter. That's what I mean."
"I do not thank you for the assurance. Except that when she's twenty-one I shall make over certain money of my son's to her, I have washed my hands of the girl."
"I haven't. That's not the kind of washing to make them clean."
"You reproach me, sir!" She glared at him.
"Not at all, madam. Even if I would venture, there's no need, for I think your bark is worse than your bite."
Again she almost twinkled at the wretch's daring. There was excitement in it, which she had not experienced since early married days. Then she had had to do with another MacDonald, and even a Hillard could without disgrace afford to be mastered by a MacDonald of Dhrum.
"When I've put your granddaughter into more suitable guardianship than mine," Somerled went on quickly, "I'll write and tell you."
"Suitable guardianship! It will be some time before I get that letter."
"I thank you for the compliment."
"It was not one."
"You're not to blame if I choose to take it as such."
"I am not to blame in any way in this matter."
"There I'm no judge. It's my own actions I must look after." And again he smiled.
"I advise you to be careful, sir, between Barbara Ballantree and Barribel MacDonald. I wish you joy of them both."
"And what of Aline West?" The question whispered itself in Somerled's ears.
But Mrs. MacDonald knew nothing of Aline West. And Somerled was beginning to think that, for all the boasted sagacity of experience, he knew not much more.
"Thank you for your kind wishes," he said non-committally. "And now I will wish you a good day."
He put out his hand, and, to her own intense surprise when she thought of it afterward, Mrs. MacDonald gave hers. Over the prominent knuckles the old skin lay soft and loose. The grim woman was vaguely pathetic to Somerled in his youth and strength and full tide of success. The touch of the would-be iron hand in the velvet glove of faded age made him conscious of his vast advantage over her. He went away filled with hope, and a curious new joy of life, which was partly the excitement of battle.
"Theheather moon!" he found himself saying, as he passed out of the ill-kept, once lovely garden where Barrie had often dreamed. Perhaps the thought came then because here and there a patch of heather glorified the weeds, or perhaps because Barrie's dreams still empurpled their birthplace.
When luncheon-time drew near and Somerled was absent, Aline's heart misgave her. It was useless to argue that he must have lingered in talk with his chauffeur, with whom he had early gone to confer. Reason offered this explanation, which was plausible, and altogether more likely than any other; but instinct was deaf to it. Aline wandered nervously about the house and garden, unable to settle anywhere, and it was an added vexation to her disturbed spirit that Basil should be giving himself heart and soul to the entertainment of that dreadful girl in the summer-house. It was well enough that he should entertain her, and keep her passive, but Aline would have liked him to be a martyr, sacrificing his own inclination for his sister's good. She did not wish to think that there was something about this young, crude creature which attracted men to her, and caused them to find pleasure in her society. Aline's head ached, and she could not think consecutively. Again and again she asked herself, "What shall I do if he has been to see that old woman and found out about the telegram?" but no clear answer would come. She could only repeat the would-be consoling words, "But hehasn'tbeen there. It's silly to think of such a thing. He's not that sort of man."
She was in the summer-house with her brother and Barrie MacDonald when at last Somerled did come. She called to him gayly as he appeared round the corner of an immense architectural rose-bush, and he answered pleasantly. He even met her smile with a smile as friendly to the eye, and there was no definable change in his look or manner, yet—Aline was filled with a cold fear which chilled the perfumed August noon. Her perception of the invisible was as sensitive as the needle of a compass to the thrill of the magnetic north. Her brain suddenly buzzed as if a hive of bees had been let loose in her head. A voice seemed to be yelling in her ears accusations: "What a fool you have been—what a fool you have been. It's all your fault if he has found out. You needn't have done the thing. It wasn't necessary."
She feared to meet Somerled's eyes and read condemnation, yet her very dread forced her to seek them, and learn at once the best or worst, since suspense was unbearable. It seemed to her that he avoided her look; that he too was nervous and uncomfortable, while trying to appear at ease.
For a moment or two he talked of the car, which he had been to see, and of a sight-seeing expedition round Carlisle which Basil had proposed for the afternoon. Then he turned suddenly to Barrie: "I've been thinking over what we can do for you, Miss MacDonald," he said. "We don't know where your mother is now, but we do know that she'll be in Edinburgh the first of next week. Perhaps we might be able to find out her whereabouts meanwhile, but there'd be delay before we could expect answers to inquiries, if she's playing small towns in order to knock her new play into shape. You don't want to go back to your grandmother's. We're starting off in my car to-morrow. I've undertaken the responsibility of you, so I'm your guardianpro tem. I couldn't allow you to hang about alone anywhere. The alternative is, taking you with us in the car. What do you say?"
"Me in a motor-car!" exclaimed Barrie, rapturous. "It can't be true."
"It will be true if you say 'yes.'" Somerled spoke coolly, but it seemed to Aline that his eyes were alight. They were fixed on the girl, noting how she paled and flushed. Her face, seen in the golden lights and green shadows of the summer-house, had the texture of flowers. Aline had not known it was in her to hate any one so bleakly as she hated Barrie MacDonald at this moment; and she hated Somerled too, more than she had hated him last night. She ached to make him suffer as he was making her suffer. If only she could—if she but had the power!
This was the blow she had known would fall: the invitation to Barrie. Now the worst had happened despite the risk she had run for its prevention. And Somerled would not meet her eyes. Did this mean that he not only made light of her arguments, but had found out the falsehood on which they were based?
"Of course I say 'yes!'" Barrie was gayly answering. "It seems more than ever as if I were in a fairy story. Travelling for five days, in a real, live motor-car, to see my real live mother! Oh, ifGrandmaknew!"
"She does know," said Somerled. The words spoke themselves. For once unable to decide quickly and definitely, he had come back from Hillard House to Moorhill Farm without making up his mind whether or no to tell how he had spent most of his morning. He had left chance to settle the question; and now it was settled. Still he did not look at Mrs. West. He spoke in a commonplace tone, as if Mrs. MacDonald's knowledge of his plan included no secret knowledge on his part.
"How do you know she knows?" asked Barrie eagerly, leaning toward him with elbows on knees, chin in hand, long red plait failing over shoulder. "You—you haven'tseenher?"
"I have."
"You met her looking for me!"
"No, not that."
"Then you must have been to Hillard House."
"Yes. I went there to talk with Mrs. MacDonald about you."
To save her life, Aline could not have kept down her agonizing blush. Tears started to her eyes. Though she had been half prepared for this blow, it fell upon her with an almost mortal shock. Ostentatiously, Somerled was keeping his eyes off her face; and that was worse than if he had stared straight into her eyes. Her terrible blush must have touched the consciousness of a blind man. It called Basil's fascinated attention from the girl; and so stricken did his sister look that he would have cried out to ask what was the matter had she not sealed his lips with a glance of desperate command.
There was no longer a gram of doubt. Somerled knew that Mrs. West had lied about the telegram, and everything was changed between them forever. For a moment Aline told herself that there was no hope, there could not possibly be any; and yet, if he cared for her, would he not forgive? Was there no way of saving the situation, and turning the inevitable change into gain instead of loss? She took a quick and courageous resolution, as a timid woman may when told that her life depends upon a dangerous operation, to be performed instantly or not at all.
"Mr. Somerled," she said, "can I speak to you—just you and me alone for a few minutes?" As she made her plea, she rose from the rustic seat where she had been sitting by her brother's side and opposite Barrie.
"Of course, with pleasure." Somerled rose too, stiff and alert as a soldier on duty. She hated this stiffness, this alertness. It showed her that he was sensitively dreading the scene to come, and hiding reluctance behind a hard, bright shield.
"Mrs. West," Barrie spoke out impulsively, "if you don't want me to go in the car, I won't."
"Of course I want you to go, silly child." Aline tried to withdraw sharpness from her voice, but it was there, like the sting of a wasp in a wound. "Even if I didn't think it wise for some reasons, it isn't my car, you know, but Mr. Somerled's, and he has a perfect right to invite any guests he likes. Don't imagine that I'm going to talk to him aboutyou. It's something quite different I have to say."
Barrie was snubbed into instant silence; but as Aline and Somerled walked away together they heard her appeal confidentially to Basil, in a tone of passionate interest: "Whatshall Ido about clothes? I can't go off in a motor-car with——" The rest was lost in distance.
The two walked without speaking as far as the big, spouting rose-bush and the junction where two paths met. Then, choosing the path which avoided the house, Aline took her life in her hands.
"You mentioned that telegram to Mrs. MacDonald?"
"Yes," confessed Somerled. "The subject came up—accidentally."
"What did she say? I want you to tell me. Afterward I'll explain—why."
"She said that she hadn't sent any telegram; and I saw at once that you must have made a mistake."
"You needn't put it that way to save my feelings!" Aline caught him up, panting a little, not trying to calm herself. "You knew that I had—told you a fib. Be honest with me. You must. And I'll be honest with you."
"I'm glad you're talking to me like this," said Somerled simply, "because I was puzzled, I admit. I couldn't bear to think——"
"I know exactly what you couldn't bear to think," she cut in, letting herself break into a sob. "You thought: 'Mrs. West has told me a deliberate lie because she's jealous of that child, and doesn't want me to take her in the car.' Oh, don't deny it. Iknow. And it's true. Iwasjealous, I don't dislike the poor little thing. Why should I? She's too insignificant, too much a child in intellect as well as years. But—I wanted you to ourselves. It was horrid of me. Only you can't imagine how I've looked forward to this trip, ever since the day you asked us to take it with you. Before that I was bored with the idea of writing the book we've promised our publishers. Our going with you made all the difference to me. You see, we got to be such friends on shipboard—that last night. Iama jealous friend. I admit it. And it was such a blow to have a stranger thrust upon us—to haveyouthrust her upon us—when you might have guessed how I felt, if we're friends. The telegram this morning was from Sir George. It told me that Mrs. Bal was coming to Edinburgh. Instantly Iknewyou'd ask that girl to go with us there in the car—oh, simply in your kindness of heart to a waif. But I couldn't bear it. I saw everything spoiled—for us all, even you. I was like a disappointed child. I had to dosomething—and on the impulse I made up that fib. I'm not sorry even now—I think. Yet I did mean to tell you, sooner or later, the truth. Honestly, I shouldn't have kept silence long if you hadn't found out. I'm not a coward when it's necessary to be brave."
"I see you're not," said Ian. "You—have paid me a great compliment, and I thank you."
"You thank me for what—precisely? For telling a fib because I wanted to keep my friend to myself—if I could?"
"For liking me well to enough tell it."
"For liking you well enough! Yet now I've shown my liking—and my courage, you like me less."
"No."
"You do!"
"No."
"Prove that."
"How do you want me to prove it?"
Aline's voice was thick. She felt broken, but not beaten yet. "Prove it," she almost whispered, "by sacrificing that girl to—ourfriendship. When we go back to the summer-house, tell her you've changed your mind; that you'll find out at what place her mother is playing now; and that after all you think it best to send her there at once. Youcouldfind out easily, you know! And I'd take the child myself if you liked. I'd do that for you, if you'd do what I ask for me."
"You're only trying me, Mrs. West," said Somerled. "You don't really wish me to fail the girl."
"Fail her! What an exaggeration. Shewantsto go to her mother."
"At present she wants to go to her mother by motor-car."
Anger at his obstinacy and her own failure lost Aline her self-control. "You mean you want the girl in your motor-car!" Her manner made the words an accusation. But he took the challenge in silence, walking at her side, his head slightly bent, his hands in his pockets. Aline darted a glance at his profile. His jaw looked set, and he had the expression of a man who would give anything to be smoking a cigarette.
It was too late to grope her way back to the path of tactfulness, and the hot blood in her temples made her indifferent to his opinion, to the future, to everything except her own anger and the need to vent it.
"Silence gives consent," she said bitterly, seeing her hopes lie broken at her feet, but not caring much yet. Only, she knew dully that she would care by and by, care to the sharpest point of agony. "Well, so much for our friendship! I'm sorry. I would have done a good deal for my part of it, but there's a limit, isn't there? And friendship can't be all on one side. I'm afraid, if you want Miss MacDonald in your car, you'll have to get her another chaperon. I don't engage in that capacity."
Now there was just one last loophole open for Somerled. He could protest that Aline had misunderstood him; that he cared not a hang or anything of that kind whether Miss Barrie MacDonald went to Edinburgh or Jericho; that the only thing which mattered was Mrs. West's friendship. If he said this quickly, she would hold out both hands to him and cry a little, and beg his pardon for being cross. Then they would forgive each other and everything would be as before, or better. But Aline waited breathlessly for an instant, and several more instants: and Somerled said nothing at all. He would have continued to walk slowly on if she had not stopped suddenly in the middle of the path, and brought him up short. Already she was beginning to feel the pain of loss and the weighty irrevocability of everything. "What are we going to do?" she panted, her breast rising and falling alluringly. Her cheeks were bright pink, and her eyes brilliant. Never had she been so near to beauty; but Somerled faced her with a calm very like sullenness.
"What areyougoing to do?" he answered her with a question.
"What do you want me to do?"
"I want you and Norman to go motoring with me through Scotland, of course."
"Thank you. But I've made my point, and I must stick to it. Basil and I won't go with you if this girl goes."
"We've quarrelled, then, have we?" he asked. His eyes were blue as the ice of glaciers in his brown face. His mouth and chin looked hard as iron; and never had Aline liked him half as well.
"Yes, we've quarrelled—if you insist," she said.
"Then I must no longer intrude on you as your guest."
"You'll go——"
"Naturally I'll go. I can't stay in your house—it's the same as your house—when you think I no longer deserve your friendship. On my side, I think you're unreasonable; but I may be wrong. Perhaps it's I who am unreasonable, and can't see it. Anyhow, I shall have to go."
"I won't have Miss MacDonald in the house a minute after you leave," Aline said, almost threateningly.
"Why should you? Her packing won't take long, poor child."
"You'll have to send her back to her grandmother now," Aline warned him, in a brief flame of defiance.
"That's impossible. I wouldn't break my promise, even if Mrs. MacDonald didn't forbid her the house."
"She can't very well go alone with you to Edinburgh in your car, I suppose?"
"She is going to Edinburgh in my car, but not alone with me. Won't you go too, Mrs. West, and let us forget all this nonsense?"
"You call it nonsense? That shows how little you understand me, how willing you are to spoil everything for the sake of this wretched girl! Basil and I will simply go back to our original plan, and travel through Scotland together in a hired car."
"Luncheon is served, madam," Moore announced, at the turn of the path.
Luncheon—and the world in ruin!
"Mr. Somerled and Miss MacDonald will not be lunching," said Aline icily.
Moore hid surprise by retiring in decorous haste.
"Good-bye, Mrs. West," said Somerled.
He held out his hand, looking at her steadily, but she turned and rushed away from him, crying.
When the Great Surprise happened, Mr. Norman and I had just been having a very nice talk. I'd never expected to know a real author, and of course I wanted to talk about him, but he would talk about me instead. He asked me questions in quite a different way from his sister's, though I can't put the difference into words. I can only feel it. I know his way made me want to answer him, and hers made me want to slap her. That is queer, because she was not rude, but soft and gentle.
Among other things that Mr. Norman teased me to tell, was about the silly stories which I've always been scribbling secretly ever since the time when I had to print because I hadn't learned to write. He said that he would like to see them, but I told him they were torn up, even the last one, which I stuffed into the chimney in my room before I ran away from Grandma's. Then he said I must write another, and he would help me. Iwasexcited when he went on to say that people who took to writing like ducks to water when they were almost babies, without any one advising them, generally had real talent. This made me wild to begin writing again at once, and I envied him because he and Mrs. West had planned out a story all about their motor trip in Scotland. I thought it would be the greatest fun to write of things that were actually happening; but he explained that he wasn't going to bring in the real people or what they did or said, only the scenery and perhaps a few of the adventures, glorified a little. I told him that I should enjoy even more writing things exactly as they were in life; then he argued that if one did it in that way it wouldn't be a story, but a kind of diary.
Perhaps thisisa kind of diary, but I feel as if I must write it, especially as, because of what happened while we were talking, Mr. Norman's story can't be written after all. At least it can't be written about this trip and this beautiful car.
That prim maid Moore, who looks as if she'd had a rush of teeth to the head, minced to the door of the summer-house where we were sitting, and called us to luncheon. Of course that interrupted our conversation, but Mr. Norman said it must be "continued in our next," like a serial story and we'd make the most of our time between Carlisle and Edinburgh. "You'll let me help you all I can, won't you, Miss MacDonald?" he asked. I said "Yes," and thanked him; and then he exclaimed, "Let's shake hands on the compact."
I didn't know precisely what a compact was, but I shook hands, because most things which begin with "com" are pleasant. Just as we were giving the last shake, Mr. Somerled appeared, and I felt myself getting red, because his eyes looked so blue and fierce, as if he were vexed about something.
"We're striking a bargain," Mr. Norman explained. "Miss MacDonald has promised to let me help her up the ladder of fame as an author. How many days are you going to give us together in your motor-car?"
"My dear chap, I'm sorry to tell you that Mrs. West and I have just had a row," said Mr. Somerled, "and she's backed out of the trip."
I've always laughed when I've heard or read the expression, "his face fell"; but faces do fall. Mr. Norman's chin seemed suddenly to grow inches longer. "Backed out of the trip!" he echoed, as if he couldn't believe his ears.
"Yes. I asked her to reconsider, but made a mess of it. I fear there's no hope that she'll change her mind. She says you and she will take your trip alone."
I quite wished that he'd invite Mr. Norman to break off from his sister, but he didn't. Perhaps that would not have been etiquette. I don't know anything about such things. The etiquette book Heppie lent me to read once was too uninteresting, worse than Hannah More.
Mr. Norman's face went on falling. His sister would not have been complimented if she had seen it.
"In fact," Mr. Somerled added, "I'm afraid this is good-bye. Mrs. West doesn't expect"—he stopped and laughed a little—"doesn't expect Miss MacDonald and me to stay to luncheon."
I see now that it was horrid of me, but I clapped my hands, and cried out, "How thrilling!" Mr. Norman turned red. I hope he didn't think I was ungrateful. It wasn't that at all which made me clap my hands. It was being coupled with Mr. Somerled in the row, and wondering what was going to become of us both.
"It's like Adam and Eve being turned out of Paradise, by the Angel with the Flaming Sword," I said, to make things better; and perhaps it did, for they both laughed this time, but it was very queer laughter. If Heppie had heardmelaugh like that, she would have accused me of hysterics. But it was good for Mr. Norman, and stopped his face from falling. He stammered regrets and apologies and suggestions, and Mr. Somerled seemed upset, too, though not excited, like Mr. Norman and me. He went into the house to collect our belongings, and Iwasthankful not to meet Mrs. West. She kept out of our way, but one of the servants helped Mr. Somerled, who has no man to look after him, and another, not that horrid Moore, offered to help me, but I said, "No, thank you." I knew she would make fun of my bundle to the others afterward. All the maids have stick-out teeth in this house, as if they'd been engaged on purpose, and somehow it makes them seem formidable, like having ogresses to do your packing.
Fancy Mr. Somerled, in the midst of his worry, remembering that I might want to give money to Mrs. West's servants! He doesn't seem the sort of man who would think of little things like that, but I begin to see already that it isn't easy to guess what he is like really, unless he chooses to let one do so. As we were on the way to the house, he said to me in a low tone, "Here's an installment of what I owe you for your brooch," and quickly he slipped a lot of gold and silver into my hand, making my fingers shut round the coins.
"But you haven't got the brooch yet," I whispered back.
"I'll trust you," he said, in an absent-minded way, as already his thoughts had rushed off to something else. And no wonder!
I gave a ten-shilling piece to the maid, with a grand air which must have impressed her, because she treated me almost respectfully after that, and secretly smuggled down my ugly bundle to the front gate, where, in a few minutes more, Mr. Somerled's big car came to fetch us away. Some one must have been sent to fetch it, and there were a few crumbs on the chauffeur's coat, which made me fancy he'd been called away in the midst of his luncheon, poor man. He must have been surprised, but he had that ineffable marble-statue look which I've noticed on the faces of grand coachmen driving high-nosed old ladies in glittering carriages through the streets of Carlisle. Heppie says that the true test of a well-trained servant is to show no emotion in any circumstances whatever; so I suppose this big chauffeur, whose name is Vedder, must be very well trained indeed. He is a strange looking man, but very smart, and, being a Cockney, carefully puts all his "h's" in the wrong place. If he forgets to do this, he goes back and pronounces the word over again. He travelled to America from London to be Mr. Somerled's coachman years ago, and then he learned how to drive a motor-car and be a mechanic, because he couldn't bear to have his master tearing over the earth with any one else. Mr. Somerled told me all this, coming from the railway station, when he was bringing me to Moorhill Farm.
Mr. Norman saw us off, and was very cast down as Mr. Somerled's luggage was put on the car, but he was so loyal to his sister, that he would not say much except, "I'm sorry!" over and over again.
I was afraid that Mr. Somerled would drive (as he told me the night before he liked driving his own car) and leave me sitting alone in the immense gray automobile, which has a glass front and a top you can put up or down. But to my joy he got in beside me, and let Vedder take the wheel in those large, well-made hands which carry out the marble-statue idea. I had no notion where we were going; and Vedder drove so slowly that I guessed he was expecting further instructions.
As soon as we were safely away from the gate I asked the question burning on my tongue: "Youwon'ttake me to Grandma?"
"I thought you trusted me as I trusted you," was the only answer Mr. Somerled condescended to make.
Suddenly I saw myself a selfish pig. "I do trust you," I insisted. "But Ioughtto want to go back of my own accord, rather than let you give up—things—for me. I'm nothing to you——"
"You're Mrs. Ballantree MacDonald's daughter, and—er—a fellow-being."
"If it comes to that, I suppose a worm's a fellow-being. But this worm has turned, and would as soon cross the path of a perfectly ravenous early bird as go to its grandmother. So I won't do that, even for your sake, though you've been so kind; but I wish you'd drop me at the station where you found me, and let me travel to Edinburgh by train. I can wait there for mother——"
"Nonsense!" he broke in; a word he seems devoted to, as he has already used it several times to pound down some suggestion of mine as if he were breaking it with a hammer. He has the air of a man used to getting his own way with the world, anyhow with women, and I can't think it good for him; though Mrs. West's one idea apparently is to do what will please him, not fussily, but gently and sweetly; so that must be what men like. I should pity him if he lived with Grandma! I suppose it is my living with her for so long which makes me feel like going against strong, dictatorial people, just to see what they will do. With him, that plan would be exciting. It is ungrateful of me, but I long to contradict him about something, it doesn't matter what, and try my naughty little strength against his, like a headstrong, conceited mouse pitting itself against a lion.
I had no inclination to contradict or fight with Mr. Norman. But he has pathetic, wistful eyes, asking for kindness, whereas Mr. Somerled's look bored with things, as if he needed waking up.
I thought these thoughts while he went on to remind me more gently, that he'd promised to motor me to Edinburgh, and that he had quite a strong weakness for not breaking promises.
"But I give you back this one unbroken, not even cracked," said I. "So that's different."
"I don't choose to take it back," said he. "You'll humiliate me if you refuse to go to Edinburgh in my car—with a competent chaperon, of course."
"A chaperon! My gracious!" I couldn't help laughing. "Aren't you chaperon enough—a great big, grown-up man?"
"I suppose you think me very old," said he; "and so I am, compared to you; but I'm afraid—no, I'mnotafraid—to tell you the truth, I'm extremely glad that I haven't come yet to the chaperon age."
"What is the chaperon age for a man?" I inquired.
"Seventy."
"And you won't be that for a long time," I added dreamily, wondering how old he really was.
For an instant his eyes waked up thoroughly, and he looked as if he were in a fury; then he burst out laughing. But his brown face was rather red when he asked if I would mind mentioning my honest impression of his age.
I thought a minute, and then said that perhaps he might be—well, nearly thirty. He laughed again, and seemed relieved, but wanted to know if thirty struck me as old or young. I didn't know what to answer, not to be impolite, so I said presently that I had always thought of thirty as being the year when you were not middle-aged yet, though anything that happened to youafteryour thirtieth birthday couldn't matter. "Still," I went on, "you look young. Only, there's something important and decided about you, as if you must have been grown up for a long time."
"Not to deceive you, I'm thirty-four," he said. "Now, no doubt, you'll consider me a sort of Ancient Mariner. Perhaps that's all the better."
"Looking at you, I can't, even if it would be better," I had to confess. "You're so alive—so strong, so—almost violent. I can't somehow imagine that you've ever been younger, or that you can ever grow older."
Just then, when we'd forgotten the chaperon part of our conversation, the car slowed down and Vedder made a kind of signal of distress. Mr. Somerled put his head out through the open window, whereupon I think Vedder must have reminded him that we were coming into town, wanting to know what he was to do next. In came Mr. Somerled's smooth black head again, and he glared at me in a kind of amused desperation. "You must know some one who would act as your chaperon for a few days, at a good salary—sent home by train when we'd done with her. That ex-governess or nurse of yours, you told me about."
"Oh, Heppie wouldn't be founddeadleaving Grandma," said I. "Not that she loves her. Neither does a mouse love a cat, when it won't try to escape. It keeps running back and being polite with its eyes bulging out."
"There must be somebody else. Think. Has your grandmother any friends?"
"Dear me, no. She'd scorn it. Only a few acquaintances and a relation or two, whom she snubs when they come to see her and scolds if they don't. They wouldn't—but, oh, perhaps Mrs. Jamesmight. I wonder?"
"Where does Mrs. James live?"
I told him quickly that it was in a little sort of cul-de-sac street called Flemish Passage, not far from English Street, where Heppie and I sometimes look at the shops; and I was going on to say more about it and about Mrs. James, but before I'd time to draw another breath, Mr. Somerled grabbed up a speaking tube and was talking through it. "Find Flemish Passage near English Street, and I'll tell you where to stop," he addressed the back of Vedder's massive head.
"It's an old curiosity shop, and she keeps it," I hurried to explain, but that didn't seem to matter to Mr. Somerled.
"I hope you like the lady's society," was all he said.
"I love her, and she's an angel, but a very peculiar angel; and Grandma doesn't call her a lady, so perhaps you won't," I broke the news to him.
"I daresay your grandmother wouldn't have called my mother a lady," he replied coolly. "She was an angel, and the cleverest, most gracious woman I ever knew or expect to know." I did like him for saying this. And something told me that, in spite of his domineering way with me, he wouldn't be one to put on high and mighty airs with Mrs. James, as Grandma does.
English Street, of course, is the main street of Carlisle and runs north to William Rufus's Castle that stands looking over the moors toward the border, eight miles away. Grandma never would let Heppie take me into the Castle, because it's turned into barracks now, and swarming with soldiers. She said that her father called soldiers Men of Blood, and seemed to think that ought to put me off from wishing to go in, but it didn't a bit, rather the other way round. I love soldiers in books, and should like to meet some.
It was near the old Citadel of Henry VIII, where the towers have been turned into court-houses, that we had to turn off, and it is there that English Street really begins. It didn't take Vedder long to find Flemish Passage—which Mrs. James says is named after the Flemish masons William Rufus brought over to make the Castle, men who settled down afterward to live in Carlisle. Maybe there were Flemish houses on the spot in those days—who knows? I love to think there were; and though there isn't a trace of anything half so ancient as William, Flemish Passage can't have changed much from what it must have been in the Middle Ages. Even the people who live there are mostly old, and as the big gray car turned into the small, quiet cul-de-sac, elderly heads appeared at antique windows of all the medieval houses. I should think nothing so exciting had happened in Flemish Passage at all events since Carlisle surrendered to Prince Charlie. The car looked enormous, as if it were a dragon swelling to twice its size in rage because it knew there would be no room for it to turn round when it wanted to get out.
Mrs. James house used to be like the others till she had the two front windows thrown into one, and took to keeping a shop. The way she happened to do that was just as it was with Miss Mattie in that darling "Cranford" I found with father's name in it; only Mrs. James, of course, was married and Miss Mattie wasn't. I wanted to tell Mr. Somerled about her, and how her husband, a distant cousin of Grandma's, was the doctor that couldn't cure my father. Mrs. James herself wasn't a cousin, and wasn't even of the north, so Grandma never thought of her, as she has no opinion of southern people. Mrs. James was Devonshire, and (in Grandma's eyes) amésalliancefor Richard James. He lodged with the Devonshire girl's mother when he was a medical student in London, Heppie told me once; and even Heppie puts on superior airs with Mrs. James, whom she considers a feckless creature. I have an idea Heppie knew the doctor before he met his wife, and he was her One Romance; so naturally she thinks the "James Mystery" wouldn't have happened if he had married her instead. Of course, though, it could never have occurred toany oneto marry Heppie, whereas Mrs. James must always have been a darling and very pretty in her fluffy way. Grandma says the "James Mystery" (as it seemed it was called in the newspapers at the time, when I was very small) never was a mystery except for "fools or sensation-mongers." I heard her speak those very words to poor Mrs. James, who has always called on Grandma once a month, ever since I can remember, though Grandma does nothing but make herself disagreeable and say things to hurt Mrs. James feelings, knowing that her one dream of happiness is in believing her husband still lives.
Nobody else believes this, Heppie has told me; because Doctor James had a motive for not wishing to live, "apart from any disappointment in his home life." After he didn't cure my father there was another case which he was supposed not to have understood. I don't know exactly what happened, for my questions weren't encouraged; but he operated on the person when he ought not, or else didn't operate when he ought; anyhow the person was a high personage, so there was trouble, and then might have been a legal inquiry if Doctor James hadn't gone one day to Seascale, and from there disappeared. His hat was found on the beach, and a coat, and though his body was never recovered, all the world except his wife felt sure he had drowned himself on purpose. As for her, she is perfectly certain that he is alive, and she hopes to this day that some time he will come to her, or else send for her to go to him.
He disappeared or died, or whatever it was, seventeen years ago when I was almost a baby; and he and Mrs. James weren't so very young even then: but because he admired what he called her "baby face," she has always tried desperately to keep her looks that he mayn't find her changed when (she doesn't say "if") they meet again. It is the most pathetic thing I ever heard of, because in spite of all the troubles she has had, enough to make her old twice over, she has never lost gayety or courage. Grandma and Heppie think it wicked and frivolous of her not to "bow to God's will," but I think she is a marvel, and I love every little funny way and trick she has.
I don't know Mrs. James well enough to call her my friend, because I don't often see her, and we've never been left alone together when she's called on Grandma; Heppie took me to her house only once, just after she'd grown poor through the breaking of some savings-bank, and turned her little drawing-room into an antique shop. I fancy Heppie wanted to go simply to spy out the nakedness of the land and satisfy curiosity in Grandma. But I've never forgotten that day, and how brave and bright Mrs. James was, selling off the pretty old things which she had loved: heirlooms of her family and her husband's; old clocks, old vases, old ornaments, and jewels, old china and glass, old samplers and bits of embroidery or brocade, old furniture, old pictures and transparencies, and everything of value except old books, which she adored because his library had been her husband's life. It was clever of her, I think, to group the treasures together in the little drawing-room with its oak panelling and beams, its uneven, polished oak floor, and the two diamond-paned windows which she enlarged and threw into one. It is not like a shop, but just a charming room crowded full of lovely things, and every one of them for sale, even the chairs. She wrote cards of advertisement which the hotel people let her pin up in their halls or offices, because they respected her pluck, and had liked Doctor James. Americans and other travellers saw the advertisements, and went to her house; so by and by Mrs. James made a success with her experiment. When most of her own antiquites were sold, she could afford to buy others, just as good or better, to take their places. She never made big sums of money; but maybe that was because she had debts of her husband's to pay off, which she kept secret. Besides, she is so generous and kind that she would give good prices for things in buying, and ask small ones in selling.
"Mrs. James: Antiquities;" it says in gilt letters over the door on which you can still see the mark left by the professional name-plate of Doctor James. His wife had that taken off before she opened her shop, because she felt that her going into trade might seem to discredit "his honoured name."
That is her great watchword: "his honoured name." I've often heard her repeat it to Grandma, who invariably snorts and says something to dishearten or humiliate the poor humble darling who thinks so much of the Hillard and James families, and so little of herself.
Opening the door, which rings a bell of its own accord, you walk straight into the drawing-room, or hall. There's an oak screen which cuts off your view to the left, and gives an opportunity for surprises; and straight ahead at the back is a lovely old carved stairway, that goes up steeply, with two turns and two platforms, where stand tall, ancient clocks. Behind this hall or drawing-room, turned into a shop, is a tiny parlour, where Mrs. James spends her few free hours, eats her tiny, lonesome meals, and faithfully reads nearly every book in her husband's library, so that she may be an intelligent companion for him if he comes back. The walls of the parlour are covered with his books, on shelves reaching up nearly as high as the low-beamed ceiling. Behind the parlour is the kitchen, which looks into a tiny garden with one lovely apple tree in it; and a back stairway almost like a ladder leads to what used to be servants' rooms. Now Mrs. James sleeps in one; and next door is the young girl, rescued from something or other by the Salvation Army, who is her only servant. The front part of the "upstairs," which you reach by the lovely staircase in the shop, is occupied by a curate-lodger. Heppie says Mrs. James can afford to give up having a lodger now, and that she keeps him on only because she's stingy; or else because she thinks it "distinguished" to have some connection with "Church." But I'm sure it's really because she's so kind and good-natured, that she can't bear to turn the curate away from rooms which have been his only home for years.
Shewassurprised to see me get out of an automobile with a man! I know she did see me get out, because she opened the door herself, exclaiming in her soft Devonshire voice, which has never been hardened by the north, "Why, Barribel, mydearchild, can Ibelievemy eyes?"
She throws emphasis on a great many words when she talks, which Heppie says is gushing, and not reserved enough for a true lady; but I like it when Mrs. James does it, because it sounds cordial, and more interested in you than any other person's way of talking which I ever heard.
I introduced Mr. Somerled, and hurried in the next breath to explain that he was a MacDonald, because that made him seem like a relation, and she wouldn't think to begin with that I was with a perfect stranger. But as soon as I said "Somerled," she knew all about him, not only the history of the first Somerled, which, of course, shewouldknow, but that this one was a great celebrity.Ishouldn't have known that, if Mr. Norman hadn't mentioned it: and Moore with the teeth told me, too, that she'd heard Mrs. West say he was "a millionaire." I'm not sure if Mrs. James knew about the millions, and even if she did, they wouldn't seem half as important to her as his pictures, which she began to chat about. Of course they're not as important, because anybody can have millions by accident, but they can have genius only from what they are in themselves. I felt more than ever how wonderful it was that he should be so good to me; a person so flattered and run after; but all the same Icouldn'tmake myself feel in awe of him. He seemed to me just a Man: and I wanted as much as ever to see what he would do if I took my own way and went against him.
Mrs. James invited us into the house in her cordial, emphatic way, while our coming and our being together were still mysteries which must have puzzled her wildly. I saw by the blue flash in Mr. Somerled's eyes that the artist in him admired the shop-drawing-room, and I thought from his manner that he had taken a fancy to Mrs. James herself. I am so used to her looks, from seeing her once a month ever since I can remember, that I can hardly judge what she is like: and I suppose sheispeculiar. But why shouldn't she try to keep young for the sake of her dream? I think it's romantic and beautiful, and all one with her efforts to become the intellectual equal of her lost husband. Grandma and Heppie sneer after Mrs. James has been and gone, at the long words she uses, and condemn her for wanting to deceive people into thinking she's much younger than she is. But that is because they've no romance in them, and can't understand her true motive.
Her figure is like a young girl's, though perhaps a little stiffer and less rounded. She is short, and has the tiniest waist in the world, so tiny that it must hurt her to breathe, but that is her chief pride, because "the doctor" (as she always calls him) fell in love at first sight with her slender waist; and she has never let it measure an inch more than it did then. A big man could span it with his hands. Perhaps Doctor James could. She dresses her hair now as he liked best seventeen years ago, though the fringe looks old-fashioned and odd. Grandma says her hair is bleached, otherwise it couldn't have kept its yellow colour at her age, forty-five. But it shines and is a lovely golden. She takes the greatest pains in doing it, too, even when she's in a hurry on a cold winter's morning, because she's never sure "the doctor" mayn't appear that day, to give her a surprise. It would be too bad if, after all these years, he should walk in and find her not looking her best!
She has features like a doll's, with large dark blue eyes, and high arched eyebrows which give her an innocent, expectant expression. Heppie says she blacks them; but Heppie has no eyebrows at all, so it's difficult for her to believe in other people's.
When Mrs. James came to meet us at the door, she had a ladies' paper in her hand, open at a page where it told you in big letters, "How to be Beautiful Forever," so I suppose it's true, as Heppie says, that she's always looking for recipes to keep young. She had on a lavender muslin dress, very becoming to her fair complexion, which would be perfect if she hadn't a very few little veins showing in the pink of her cheeks, and some faint, smiling-lines round her eyes, which you see only if you stare rudely as Grandma does, to "take down Mrs. James's vanity." Lavender was the doctor's favourite colour, and she invariably wears one shade or another of it. She never would go into mourning for him, as people thought she ought to do when he disappeared.
I explained everything, talking so fast that I got out of breath, while Mr. Somerled walked round the room looking at the curiosities. I was glad no customers came in to interrupt; but luckily there wasn't much danger at that hour, as it wasn't yet half-past two, and people had scarcely finished their luncheons. As I talked, she gave little exclamations almost like the cooing of a dove; and the most desperate thing in our story seemed to be, in her opinion, the fact that we hadn't lunched.
She insisted on giving us eggs and apple-tart and coffee in her own dining-room, and she let us come into the kitchen and help cook. Mr. Somerled looked quite young and boyish. We all three laughed a good deal. Not a word did Mr. Somerled say about my going to Edinburgh or the chaperon business until we'd finished our picnic meal, and he had selected several of the best and most expensive things in the shop for himself. After that, how could Mrs. James refuse him what he called "a great favour" even if she'd wished to say no, which she didn't. On the contrary, she was enchanted. Everything had worked together to make her going possible. The curate had gone off for a holiday, giving her permission to use his two rooms if she liked. I could have them till we started; and she would ask a friend from next door to attend to the shop, a nice girl who often helped her, if she were ill or had to go away on a "curiosity quest." "Just think!" she exclaimed, "I've never been to Scotland, though it's only eight miles distant, and I've pined to go all my life. You'll find that I've a good book-knowledge of the country, if that's any use, for my dear husband's favourite pastime has been the study of history. Since he—left Carlisle, I've devoted much time to following his researches."
The long words do come so nicely from her pretty little mouth, and she shapes them with such care, that they seem to issue forth one by one like neatly formed birds being let out of a cage. She is making a speciality of pronunciation, and what she sometimes speaks of as "refined wording." She was a farmer's daughter in Devonshire.
It was arranged that the girl from next door should be called in at once, in order that Mrs. James and I might go and buy things. I was rich on the proceeds of the brooch; for Mr. Somerled counted out the rest of the money on the parlour table; and Mrs. James abetted him in saying that fifty pounds was not a penny too much to lend on such a treasure. But it does seem wonderful! Mrs. James herself must have felt flush after making such good sales, and her eyes lit at the thought of a motor hat and coat—they seemed exciting purchases. But when Mr. Somerled mentioned the fact that mother is one of the best-dressed women in the world, the little woman looked frightened. "I shan't dare take the responsibility of choosing an outfit for the child, then," said she nervously. (I do wish people wouldn't call me "child," though it's nicer from Mrs. James than Mrs. West!) "Supposing she shouldn't make the correct impression? Won't you be persuaded to help us, sir, with your advice about the most important articles?"
Somehow I feel that Mr. Somerled hates "sir" as much as I hate "child." I expected him to make an excuse, that he knew nothing about such things—or "articles," according to Mrs. James. But instead, he snapped at the suggestion and looked as pleased as Punch. I suppose he doesn't want me to be a fright and disgrace his car on the journey.
When Miss Hubbell had come in from the next house, smelling of some lovely sort of jam which she and her mother had been making, off we three went in the gray automobile, Mrs. James trying not to look self-conscious and proud, nor to give little jumps and gasps when she thought we were going to run over creatures.
It is many years since she has been to London. I think she was there on her wedding trip and never since: and besides that expedition, Exeter and Carlisle are her two largest cities: but, in order to impress the great artist, she patronized Carlisle, saying we "mustn't hope for London shops." I longed to catch his eye, because I'm sure he sees everything that is funny; but it would have been horrid to laugh at the kind darling, trying to be a woman of the world.
In the end, it was Mr. Somerled and I who chose everything, even Mrs. James's motor coat and hat, for she was too timid to decide; and if she had decided, it would have been to select all the wrong things. I had to get my dresses ready-made, because of starting for Scotland next morning, and it was funny to see how difficult Mr. Somerled was to please. One would have thought he took a real interest in my clothes; but of course it was owing to his artistic nature. We found a blue serge—I wouldn't have believed, after my deadly experience, that blue serge could be so pretty—and a coat and skirt of creamy cloth; and an evening frock of white chiffon, I think the girl called it. Actually it has short sleeves above my elbows, and quite a low neck, that shows where my collar-bone used to be when I was thinner than I am now. It seems an epoch to have a dress like that. It was Mr. Somerled who picked it out from among others, and insisted on my having it, though, simple as it looked, it was terribly expensive. Mrs. James thought I couldn't afford it, as I had so many things to do with my fifty pounds, but Mr. Somerled brushed aside her objections in that determined way he has even in little things. He said that it would be money in his pocket, as an artist, to paint me in this gown; and that I must sit for him in it. He would call his picture "The Girl in the White Dress"; and as he'd show it in London and New York and get a big price, of course he must be allowed to pay for the dress. Mrs. James seemed doubtful about the propriety, but he drew his black eyebrows together, and that made her instantly quite sure he must be right. When she'd agreed to my having the dress on those terms, she couldn't—as he said—stick at a mere hat, so he bought me a lovely one to wear with the creamy cloth. He suggested that I should keep it in the "tire box" while motoring—a huge round thing on the top of the car.
"It is just like having a kind uncle, isn't it, my dear?" asked Mrs. James. But I didn't feel that Mr. Somerled was the sort of man I couldeverthink of as a kind uncle, and I said so before I'd stopped to wonder if it sounded rude. Luckily he didn't seem offended.
I am writing this in the curate's sitting-room upstairs in Mrs. James's house. It is night, and we are to start to-morrow morning very early, because I happened to mention that I'd never seen the inside of Carlisle Castle, or put my nose into the Cathedral. Grandma does not approve of cathedrals, and their being historic makes no difference. Mr. Somerled said that we could visit both, and then "slip over the border." Oh, that border! How I have thought of it, as if it were the door of Romance; and so it is, because it is the door of Scotland. I am afraid it must be a dream that I shall cross at last, to see the glories on the other side, and find the lovely lady who to me is Queen of all Romance—my mother. Still, I've pinched myself several times, and instead of waking up in my old room at Hillard House each time I've found myself with my eyes staring wide open, in the curate's room, which has a lot of books in it and a smell of tobacco smoke, and on the mantelpiece Mrs. James's wedding wreath as an ornament under a glass case.
Mr. Somerled has gone to a hotel; but he stayed to supper with us, and Mrs. James brought out all her nicest things. It was much pleasanter than supper last night at Moorhill Farm, though Mrs. West had lovely things to eat. I am glad I shall never see Moore again! But I should like to see Mr. Norman. I could feel toward him as if he were a brother. But I don't know what to say about my feeling toward Mr. Somerled. I think of him as of a knight, come to the rescue of a forlorn damsel in an enchanted forest. After delivering the damsel from one dragon—Grandma—he is going to take her away with another quite different sort of a dragon; a well-trained, winged dragon, which people who don't know any better believe to be only a motor-car.