Old Salt Adams took this all in, his amusement giving way to curiosity and then to wonder. Who was this person, who looked like a young, very young girl, yet who had all the mental powers of an experienced woman? What was she and what her calling?
The other boarders appeared, those nearest Anita were introduced, and most of them considered her merely a pretty, new guest. Her manners were irreproachable, her demeanor quiet and graceful, yet as Adams covertly watched her, he felt as if he were watching an inactive volcano.
The meal over, he detained her a moment in the dining-room.
“Why are you here, Miss Austin?” he said, courteously; “what is your errand in Corinth?”
“I am an artist,” she said, looking at him with her mysterious intent gaze. “Or, perhaps I should say an art student. I’ve been told that there are beautiful bits of winter scenery available for subjects here, and I want to sketch. Please, Mr. Adams, let me stay here until Letty comes.”
A sudden twinkle in her eye startled the old man, and he said quickly, “How do you know she isn’t coming?”
That, in turn, surprised Anita, but she only smiled, and replied, “I saw a telegram handed to Mrs. Adams at breakfast—and then she looked thoughtfully at me, and—oh, well, I just sort of knew it was to say Letty couldn’t come.”
“You witch! You uncanny thing! If I should take you over to Salem, they’d burn you!”
“I’ll ride over on a broomstick some day, and see if they will,” she returned, gleefully.
And then along came Nemesis, in the person of the landlady.
“I’m sorry, Miss Austin,” she began, but the girl interrupted her.
“Please, Mrs. Adams,” she said, pleadingly, “don’t say any thing to make me sorry, too! Now, you want to say you haven’t any room for me—but that isn’t true; so you don’t know what to say to get rid of me. But—why do you want to get rid of me?”
Esther Adams looked at the girl and that look was her undoing.
Such a pathetic face, such pleading eyes, such a wistful curved mouth, the landlady couldn’t resist, and against her will, against her better judgment, she said, “Well, then, stay, you poor little thing. But you must tell me more about yourself. I don’t know who you are.”
“I don’t know, myself,” the strange girl returned. “Do we, any of us know who we are? We go through this world, strangers to each other—don’t we? And also, strangers to ourselves.” Her eyes took on a faraway, mystical look. “If I find out who I am, I’ll let you know.”
Then a dazzling smile broke over her face, they heard a musical ripple of laughter, and she was gone.
They heard her steps, as she ran upstairs to her room, and the two Adamses looked at each other.
“Daffy,” said Mrs. Adams. “A little touched, poor child. I believe she has run away from home or from her keepers. We’ll hear the truth soon. They’ll be looking for her.”
“Perhaps,” said her husband, doubtfully. “But that isn’t the way I size her up. She’s nobody’s fool, that girl. Wish you’d seen her give Bob Tyler his comeuppance!”
“What’d she say?”
“’Twasn’t what she said, so much as the look she gave him! He almost went through the floor. Well, she says she’s a painter of scenery and landscapes. Let her stay a few days, till I size her up.”
“You size her up!” returned his wife, with good-natured contempt. “If she smiles on you or gives you a bit of taffy-talk, you’ll size her up for an angel! I’m not so sure she isn’t quite the opposite!”
Meanwhile the subject of their discussion was arraying herself for a walk. Equipped with storm boots and fur coat, she set out to inspect Corinth. A jaunty fur cap, with one long, red quill feather gave her still more the appearance of an elf or gnome, and many of the Adams house boarders watched the little figure as she set forth to brave the icy streets.
Apparently she had no fixed plan of procedure, for at each corner, she looked about, and chose her course at random. The snow had ceased during the night, and it was very cold, with a clear sunshiny frostiness in the air that made the olive cheeks red and glowing.
Reaching a bridge, she paused and stood looking over the slight railing into the frozen ravine below.
Long she stood, until passers-by began to stare at her. She was unaware of this, absorbed in her thoughts and oblivious to all about her.
Pinckney Payne, coming along, saw her, and, as he would have expressed it, fell for her at once.
“Don’t do it, sister!” he said, pausing beside her. “Don’t end your young life on this glorious day! Suicide is a mess, at best. Take my advice and cut it out!”
She turned, ready to freeze him with a glance more icy even than the landscape, but his frank, roguish smile disarmed her.
“Freshman?” she said, patronizingly, but it didn’t abash him.
“Yep. Pinckney Payne, if you must know. Commonly called Pinky.”
“I don’t wonder,” and she noticed his red cheeks. “Well, now that you’re properly introduced, tell me some of the buildings. What’s that one?”
“Dormitories. And that,” pointing, “is the church.”
“Really! And that beautiful colonnade one?”
“That’s Doctor Waring’s home. Him as is going to be next Prexy.”
“And that? And that?”
He replied to all her questions, and kept his eyes fastened on her bewitching face. Never had Pinky seen a girl just like this. She looked so young, so merry, and yet her restless, roving eyes seemed full of hidden fire and tempestuous excitement.
“Where you from?” he said, abruptly. “Where you staying?”
“At Mrs. Adams,” she returned, “is it a good house?”
“Best in town. Awful hard to get into. Always full up. Relative of hers?”
“No, just a boarder. I chanced to get a room some one else engaged and couldn’t use.”
“You’re lucky. Met Bob Tyler?”
“Yes.”
“You don’t like him! I see that. Met Gordon Lockwood?”
“No; who’s he?”
“He’s Doctor Waring’s secretary, but he’s mighty worthwhile on his own account. I say, may I come to see you?”
“Thank you, no. I’m not receiving callers—yet.”
“Well, you will be soon—because I’m coming. I say my aunt lives next door to Adams’. May I bring her to call on you?”
“Not yet, please. I’m not settled.”
“Soon’s you say the word, then. My aunt is Mrs. Bates, and she’s a love. She’s going to marry Doctor Waring—so you see we’re the right sort of people.”
“There are no right sort of people,” said the girl, and, turning, she walked away.
Apparently Miss Austin’s statement that there were no right sort of people was her own belief, for she made no friends at the Adams house. Nor was this the fault of her fellow-boarders. They were more than willing to be friendly, but their overtures were invariably ignored.
Not rudely, for Miss Austin seemed to be a girl of culture and her manners were correct, but, as one persistent matron expressed it, “you can’t get anywhere with her.”
She talked to no one at the table, merely answering a direct question if put to her. She retained the seat next Old Salt, seeming to rely on him to protect her from the advances of the others. Not that she needed protection, exactly, for Miss Anita Austin was evidently quite able to take care of herself.
But she was a mystery—and mysteries provoke inquiry.
The house was not a large one, and the two-score boarders, though they would have denied an imputation of curiosity, were exceedingly interested in learning the facts about Miss Mystery, as they had come to call her.
Mrs. Adams was one of the most eager of all to know the truth, but, as he did on rare occasions, Old Salt Adams had set down his foot that the girl was not to be annoyed.
“I don’t know who she is or where she hails from,” he told his wife, “but as long as she stays here, she’s not to be pestered by a lot of gossiping old hens. When she does anything you don’t like, send her away; but so long’s she’s under my roof, she’s got to be let alone.”
And let alone she was—not so much because of Adams’ dictum as because “pestering” did little good.
The girl had a disconcerting way of looking an inquisitor straight in the eyes, and then, with a monosyllabic reply, turning and walking off as if the other did not exist.
“Why,” said Miss Bascom, aggrievedly relating her experience, “I just said, politely, ‘Are you from New York or where, Miss Austin?’ and she turned those big, black eyes on me, and said, ‘Where.’ Then she turned her back and looked out of the window, as if she had wiped me off the face of the earth!”
“She’s too young to act like that,” opined Mrs. Welby.
“Oh, she isn’t so terribly young,” Miss Bascom returned. “She’s too experienced to be so very young.”
“How do you know she’s experienced? What makes you say that?”
“Why,” Miss Bascom hesitated for words, “she’s—sort of sophisticated—you can see that from her looks. I mean when anything is discussed at the table, she doesn’t say a word, but you can tell from her face that she knows all about it—I mean a matter of general interest, don’t you know. I don’t mean local matters.”
“She’s an intelligent girl, I know, but that doesn’t make her out old. I don’t believe she’s twenty.”
“Oh, she is! Why, she’s twenty-five or twenty-seven!”
“Never in the world! I’m going to ask her.”
“Ask her!” Miss Bascom laughed. “You’ll get well snubbed if you do.”
But this prophecy only served to egg Mrs. Welby on, and she took the first occasion to carry out her promise.
She met Anita in the hall, as the girl was about to go out, and smilingly detained her.
“Why so aloof, my dear,” she said, playfully. “You rarely give us a chance to entertain you.”
As Mrs. Welby was between Anita and the door, the girl was forced to pause. She looked the older woman over, with an appraising glance that was not rude, but merely disinterested.
“No?” she said, with a curious rising inflection, that somehow seemed meant to close the incident.
But Mrs. Welby was not so easily baffled.
“No,” she repeated, smilingly. “And we want to know you better. You’re too young and too pretty not to be a general favorite amongst us. How old are you, my dear child?”
“Just a hundred,” and Miss Austin’s dark eyes were so grave, and seemed to hold such a world of wisdom and experience that Mrs. Welby almost jumped.
Too amazed to reply, she even let the girl get past her, and out of the street door, before she recovered her poise.
“She’s uncanny,” Mrs. Welby declared, when telling Miss Bascom of the interview. “I give you my word, when she said that, she looked a hundred!”
“Looked a hundred! What do you mean?”
“Just that. Her eyes seemed to hold all there is of knowledge, yes—and of evil—”
“Evil! My goodness!” Miss Bascom rolled this suggestion like a sweet morsel under her tongue.
“Oh—I don’t say there’s anything wrong about the girl—”
“Well! If her eyes showed depths of evil, I should say therewassomething wrong!”
The episode was repeated from one to another of the exclusiveclienteleof the Adams house, until, by exaggeration and imagination it grew into quite a respectable arraignment of Miss Mystery, and branded her as a doubtful character if not a dangerous one.
Before Miss Austin had been in the house a week, she had definitely settled her status from her own point of view.
Uniformly correct and courteous of manner, she rarely spoke, save when necessary. It was as if she had declared, “I will not talk. If this be mystery, make the most of it.”
Old Salt, apparently, backed her up in this determination, and allowed her to sit next him at table, without addressing her at all.
More, he often took it upon himself to answer a remark or question meant for her and for this he sometimes received a fleeting glance, or a ghost of a smile of approval and appreciation.
But all this was superficial. The Adamses, between themselves, decided that Miss Austin was more deeply mysterious than was shown by her disinclination to make friends. They concluded she was transacting important business of some sort, and that her sketching of the winter scenery, which she did every clear day, was merely a blind.
Though Mrs. Adams resented this, and urged her husband to send the girl packing, Old Salt demurred.
“She’s done no harm as yet,” he said. “She’s a mystery, but not a wrong one, ’s far’s I can make out. Let her alone, mother. I’ve got my eye on her.”
“I’ve got my two eyes on her, and I can see more’n you can. Why, Salt, that girl don’t hardly sleep at all. Night after night, she sits up looking out of the window, over toward the college buildings—”
“How do you know?”
“I go and listen at her door,” Mrs. Adams admitted, without embarrassment. “I want to know what she’s up to.”
“You can’t see her.”
“No, but I hear her moving around restlessly, and putting the window up and down—and Miss Bascom—her room’s cornerways on the ell, she says she sees her looking out the window late at night ’most every night.”
“Miss Bascom’s a meddling old maid, and I’d put her out of this house before I would the little girl.”
“Of courseyouwould! You’re all set up because she makes so much of you—”
“Oh, come now, Esther, you can’t say that child makes much of me! I wish she would. I’ve taken a fancy to her.”
“Yes, because she’s pretty—in a gipsy, witch-like fashion. What men see in a pair of big black eyes, and a dark, sallow face, I don’t know!”
“Not sallow,” Old Salt said, reflectively; “olive, rather—but not sallow.”
“Oh you!” exclaimed Mrs. Adams, and with that cryptic remark the subject was dropped.
Gordon Lockwood, secretary of John Waring, had a room at the Adams house. But as he took no meals there save his breakfasts, and as he ate those early, he had not yet met Anita Austin.
But one Saturday morning, he chanced to be late, and the two sat at table together.
An astute reader of humanity, Lockwood at once became interested in the girl, and realized that to win her attention he must not be eager or insistent.
He spoke only one or two of the merest commonplaces, until almost at the close of the meal, he said:
“Can I do anything for you, Miss Austin? If you would care to hear any of the College lectures, I can arrange it.”
“Who are the speakers?”
She turned her eyes fully upon him, and Gordon Lockwood marveled at their depth and beauty.
“Tonight,” he replied, “Doctor Waring is to lecture on Egyptian Archaeology. Are you interested in that?”
“Yes,” she said, “very much so. I’d like to go.”
“You certainly may, then. Just use this card.”
He took a card from his pocket, scribbled a line across it, and gave it to her. Without another word, he finished his breakfast, and with a mere courteous bow, he left the room.
Miss Austin’s face took on a more scrutable look than ever.
The card still in her hand, she went up to her room. Unheeding the maid, who was at her duties there, the girl threw herself into a big chair and sat staring at the card.
“The Egyptian Temples,” she said to herself, “Doctor John Waring.”
The maid looked at her curiously as she murmured the words half aloud, but Miss Austin paid no heed.
“Go on with your work, Nora, don’t mind me,” she said, at last, as the chambermaid paused inquiringly in front of her. “I don’t mind your being here until you finish what you have to do. And I wish you’d bring me a Corinth paper, please?’ There is one, isn’t there?”
“Oh, yes, ma’am. Twice a week.”
Nora disappeared and returned with a paper.
“Mr. Adams says you may have this to keep. It’s the newest one.”
The girl took it and turned to find the College announcements. The Egyptian Lecture was mentioned, and in another column was a short article regarding Doctor Waring and a picture of him.
Long the girl looked at the picture, and when the maid, her tasks completed, left the room, she noticed Miss Austin still staring at the fine face of the President-elect of the University of Corinth.
After a time, she reached for a pair of scissors, and cut out the portrait and the article which it illustrated.
She put the clipping in a portfolio, which she then locked in her trunk, and the picture she placed on her dresser.
That night she went to the lecture. She went alone, for Gordon Lockwood did not reappear and no one else knew of her going.
“Shall I have a key, or will you be up?” she asked of Mrs. Adams, as she left the house.
“Oh, we’ll be up.” The round, shrewd eyes looked at her kindly. “You’re lucky to get a ticket. Doctor Waring’s lectures are crowded.”
“Good night,” said Miss Austin, and went away.
The lecture room was partly filled when she arrived, and her ticket entitled her to a seat near the front.
Being seated, she fell into a brown study, or, at least, sat motionless and apparently in deep thought.
Gordon Lockwood, already there, saw her come in, and after she was in her place, he quietly arose and went across the room, taking a seat directly behind her.
Of this she was quite unaware, and the student of human nature gave himself up to a scrutiny of the stranger.
He saw a little head, its mass of dark, almost black hair surmounted by a small turban shaped hat, of taupe colored velvet, with a curly ostrich tip nestling over one ear.
Not that her ears were visible, for Miss Austin was smartly groomed and her whole effect modish.
She had removed her coat, which she held in her lap. Her frock was taupe colored, of a soft woolen material, ornamented with many small buttons. These tiny buttons formed two rows down her back, from either shoulder to the waist line, and they also formed a border round the sailor collar.
They were, perhaps, Lockwood decided, little balls, rather than buttons, and he idly counted them as he sat watching her.
He hoped she would turn her head a trifle, but she sat as motionless as a human being may.
He marveled at her stillness, and impatiently waited for the lecture to begin that he might note her interest.
At last Doctor Waring appeared on the platform, and as the applause resounded all over the room, Lockwood was almost startled to observe Miss Austin’s actions.
She clasped her hands together as if she had received a sudden shock. She—if it hadn’t seemed too absurd,—he would have said that she trembled. At any rate she was a little agitated, and it was with an effort that she preserved her calm. No one else noticed her, and Lockwood would not have done so, save for his close watching.
Throughout the lecture, Miss Austin’s gaze seemed never to leave the face of the speaker, and Lockwood marveled that Waring himself was not drawn to notice her.
But Waring’s calm gaze, though it traveled over the audience, never rested definitely on any one face, and Lockwood concluded he recognized nobody.
“Miss Mystery!” Gordon Lockwood said to himself. “I wonder who and what you are. Probably a complex nature, psychic and imaginative. You think it interesting to come up here and pretend to be a mystery. But you’re too young and too innocent to be—I’m not so sure of the innocent, though,—and as to youth,—well, I don’t believe you’re much older than you look any way. And you’re confoundedly pretty—beautiful, rather. You’ve too much in your face to call it merely pretty. I’ve never seen such possibilities of character. You’re either a deep one or your looks belie you.”
Lockwood heard no word of the lecture, nor did he wish to; he had helped in the writing of it, and almost knew it by heart anyway. But he was really intrigued by this mysterious girl, and he determined to get to know her.
He had been told, of course, of the futile attempts of the other boarders to make friends with her, but he had faith in his own attractiveness and in his methods of procedure.
Pinky Payne, too, had told of the interview he had on the bridge. His account of the girl’s beauty and charm had first roused Lockwood’s interest, and now he was making a study of the whole situation.
Idly he counted the buttons again. There were thirteen across the collar. The vertical rows he could not be sure of as the back of the seat cut off their view.
“Thirteen,” he mused; “an unlucky number. And the poor child looks unlucky. There’s a sadness in her eyes that must mean something. Yet there’s more than sadness,—there’s a hint of cruelty,—a possibility of desperate deeds.”
And then Lockwood laughed at himself. To romance thus about a girl to whom he had not said half a dozen sentences in his life! Yet he knew he was not mistaken. All that he had read in Anita Austin’s face, he was sure was there. He knew physiognomy, and rarely, if ever, was mistaken in his reading thereof.
After the lecture was over, Miss Austin went home as quickly as possible.
Lockwood would have liked to escort her, but he had to remain to report to Doctor Waring, who might have some orders for him.
There were none, however, and after a short interview with his employer, Gordon Lockwood went home.
As he went softly upstairs to his room in the Adams house, he passed the door of what he knew to be Miss Austin’s room. He fancied he heard a stifled sob come from behind that closed door, and instinctively paused to listen a moment.
Yes, he was not mistaken. Another sob followed, quickly suppressed, but he could have no doubt the girl was crying.
For a moment Lockwood was tempted to go back and ask Mrs. Adams to come and tap at the girl’s door.
Then he realized that it was not his affair. If the girl was in sorrow or if she wanted to cry for any reason, it was not his place to send someone to intrude upon her. He went on to his own room, but he sat up for a long time thinking over the strange young woman in the house.
He remembered that she had paid undeviating attention to the lecture, quite evidently following the speaker with attention and interest. He remembered every detail of her appearance, her pretty dark hair showing beneath her little velvet toque,—the absurd buttons on the back of her frock.
“That will do, Gordon, old man,” he told himself at last. Better let her alone. She’s a siren all right, but you know nothing about her, and you’ve no reason to try to learn more.
And then he heard voices in the hall. Low of tone, but angry of inflection.
“She threw it away!” Miss Austin was saying; “I tell you she threw it away!”
“There, there,” came Mrs. Adams’ placating voice, “what if she did? It was only a newspaper scrap. She didn’t know it was of any value.”
“But I want it! Nora has no business to throw away my things! She had no reason to touch it; it was on the dresser—standing up against the mirror frame. What do you suppose she did with it?”
“Never mind it tonight. Tomorrow we will ask her. She’s gone to bed.”
“But I’m afraid she destroyed it!”
“Probably she did. Don’t take on so. What paper was it?”
“The Corinth Gazette.”
“The new one?”
“I don’t know. The one she brought me this afternoon.”
“Well, if she has thrown it away, you can get another copy. What was in it that you want so much?”
“Oh,—nothing special.”
“Yes, it was.” Mrs. Adams’ curiosity was aroused now. “Come, tell me what it was.”
“Well, it was only a picture of Doctor Waring, the man who lectured tonight.”
“Such a fuss about that! My goodness! Why, you can get a picture of him anywhere.”
“But I want it now.”
An obstinate note rang in the young voice. Perhaps Miss Austin spoke louder than she meant to, but at any rate, Lockwood heard most of the conversation, and he now opened his door, and said:
“May I offer a photograph? Would you care to have this, Miss Austin?”
The girl looked at him with a white, angry face.
“How dare you!” she cried; “how dare you eavesdrop and listen to a conversation not meant for your ears? Don’t speak to me!”
She drew up her slender figure and looked like a wrathful pixie defying a giant. For Lockwood was a big man, and loomed far above the slight, dainty figure of Miss Mystery.
He smiled good-naturedly as he said, “Now don’t get wrathy. I don’t mean any harm. But you wanted a picture of Doctor Waring, and I’ve several of them. You see, I’m his secretary.”
“Oh,—are you! His private secretary?”
“Yes—his confidential one,—though he has few confidences. He’s a public man and his life is an open book.”
“Oh, it is!” The girl had recovered her poise, and with it her ability to be sarcastic. “Known to all men, I suppose?”
“Known to all men,” repeated Lockwood, thinking far more of the girl he was speaking to than of what he was saying.
For, again he had fallen under the spell of her strange personality. He watched her, fascinated, as she reached out for the picture and almost snatched at it in her eagerness.
Mrs. Adams yawned behind her plump hand.
“Now you’ve got your picture, go to bed, child,” she said with a kind, motherly smile. “I’ll come in and unhook you, shall I?”
Obediently, and without a word of good night to Lockwood, Anita turned and went into her room, followed by Mrs. Adams. The good lady offered no disinterested service. She wanted to know why Miss Austin wanted that picture so much. But she didn’t find out. After being of such help as she could, the landlady found herself pleasantly but definitely dismissed. Outside the door, however, she turned and reopened it. Miss Mystery, unnoticing the intruder, was covering the photograph with many and passionate kisses.
“I’ll tell her you’re here, but I’m noways sure she’ll see you.”
Mrs. Adams stood, her hand on the doorknob, as she looked doubtfully at Emily Bates and her nephew.
“Why not?” asked Mrs. Bates, in astonishment, and Pinky echoed, “Why not, Mrs. Adams?”
“She’s queer.” Mrs. Adams came back into the room, closed the door, and spoke softly. “That’s what she is, Mrs. Bates, queer. I can’t make her out. She’s been here more’n a week now, and I do say she gets queerer every day. Won’t make friends with anybody,—won’t speak at all at the table,—never comes and sits with us of an afternoon or evening,—just keeps to herself. Now, that ain’t natural for a young girl.”
“How old is she?”
“Nobody knows. She looks like nineteen or twenty, but she has the ways of a woman of forty,—as far’s having her own way’s concerned. Then again, she’ll pet the cat or smile up at Mr. Adams like a child. I can’t make her out at all. The boarders are all fearfully curious—that’s one reason I take her part. They’re a snoopy lot, and I make them let her alone.”
“You like her, then?”
“You can’t help liking her,—yet she is exasperating. You ask her a question, and she stares at you and walks off. Not really rude,—but just as if you weren’t there! Well, I’ll tell her you’re here, anyway.”
It was only by his extraordinary powers of persuasion that Pinky Payne had won his aunt’s consent to make this call, and, being Sunday afternoon, the recognized at-home day in Corinth, they had gone to the Adams house unannounced, and asked for Miss Austin.
Upstairs, Mrs. Adams tapped at the girl’s door.
It was opened slowly,—it would seem, grudgingly,—and Anita looked out inquiringly.
“Callers for you, Miss Austin,” the landlady said, cheerily.
“For me? I know no one.”
“Oh, now, you come on down. It’s Mrs. Bates, and her nephew, Pinky Payne. They’re our best people—”
“What makes you think I want to see your best people?”
“I don’t say you do, but they want to see you,—and—oh, pshaw, now, be a little sociable. It won’t hurt you.”
“Please say to Mrs. Bates that I have no desire to form new acquaintances, and I beg to be excused from appearing.”
“But do you know who she is? She’s the lady that’s going to marry Doctor Waring, the new President. And Pinckney Payne, her cousin, is a mighty nice boy.”
Mrs. Adams thought she detected an expression of wavering on the girl’s face, and she followed up her advantage.
“Yes, he’s an awfully nice chap and just about your age, I should judge.”
“I’ll go down,” said Miss Austin, briefly, and Mrs. Adams indulged in a sly smile of satisfaction.
“It’s Pinky that fetched her,” she thought to herself. “Young folks are young folks, the world over.”
Triumphantly, Mrs. Adams ushered Anita into the small parlor.
“Mrs. Bates,” she said, “and Mr. Payne,—Miss Austin.”
Then she left them, for Esther Adams had strict notions of her duties as a boarding-house landlady.
“Mrs. Bates?” Anita said, going to her and taking her hand.
“Yes, Miss Austin,—I am very glad to know you.”
But the words ceased suddenly as Emily Bates looked into the girl’s eyes. Such a depth of sorrow was there, such unmistakable tragedy and a hint of fear. What could it all mean? Surely this was a strange girl.
“We have never met before, have we?” Mrs. Bates said,—almost involuntarily, for the girl’s gaze was too intent to be given to a stranger.
“No,” Anita said, recovering her poise steadily but slowly,—“not that I remember.”
“We have,” burst forth the irrepressible Pinky. “I say, Miss Austin, please realize that I’m here as well as my more celebrated aunt! Don’t you remember the morning I met you on the bridge,—and you were just about to throw yourself over the parapet?”
“Oh, no, I wasn’t,” and a delightful smile lighted the dark little face. The lips were very scarlet, but it was unmistakably Nature’s own red, and as they parted over even and pearly teeth, the smile transformed Miss Austin into a real beauty.
It disappeared quickly, however, and Pinky Payne thenceforward made it his earnest endeavor to bring it back as often as possible.
“Of course you weren’t,” agreed Mrs. Bates, “don’t pay any attention to that foolish boy.”
“I’m a very nice boy, if I am foolish,” Pinky declared, but Miss Austin vaguely ignored him, and kept her intent gaze fixed on Emily Bates.
“We thought perhaps you would go with us over to Doctor Waring’s for tea,” Mrs. Bates said, after an interval of aimless chat. “It would, I am sure be a pleasant experience for you. Wouldn’t you like it?”
“Doctor Waring’s?” repeated Anita, her voice low and tense, as if the idea was of more importance than it seemed.
“Yes; I may take you, for the Doctor is my fiance,—we are to be married next month.”
“No!” cried the girl, with such a sharp intonation that Mrs. Bates was startled.
“Sure they are,” put in Pinky, anxious to cover up any eccentricity on the part of this girl in whom he took an increasing interest. “They’re as blissful as two young turtle-doves. Come on, Miss Austin, let’s go over there. It’s a duck of a house to go to, and jolly good people there. The view from the study window is worth going miles to see. You’re an artist,—yes?”
“I sketch some,” was the brief reply.
“All right; if you can find a prettier spot to sketch on this terrestrial globe than the picture by the Waring study window, I’ll buy it for you! Toddle up and get your hat.”
His gay good nature was infectious and Anita smiled again as she went for her hat and coat.
The walk was but a short one, and when they entered the Waring home they found a cheery group having tea in the pleasant living room.
Doctor Waring was not present and Mrs. Peyton was pouring tea, while Helen and Robert Tyler served it. The capable Ito had always Sunday afternoon for his holiday, and while Nogi, the Japanese second man, was willing enough, his training was incomplete, and his blunders frequent. He was a new servant, and though old Ito had hopes of educating him, Mrs. Peyton was doubtful about it. However, she thought, soon the responsibilities of the Waring menage would be hers no longer, and she resolved to get along with the inexperienced Nogi while she remained.
Mrs. Peyton was very regretful at the coming change of affairs.
She had looked upon John Waring as a confirmed bachelor, and had not expected he would ever marry. Now, she declared, he was marrying only because he thought it wiser for a College President to have a wife as a part of his domestic outfit.
Helen disagreed with her mother about this. She said Doctor Waring had begun to take a personal interest in the attractive Mrs. Bates before he had any idea of becoming President of the University.
But it didn’t matter. The wedding was imminent, and Mrs. Peyton had received due notice that her services would be no longer needed.
It was a blow to her, and it had made her depressed and disconsolate. Also, a little resentful, even spiteful toward Emily Bates.
The housekeeper greeted Miss Austin with a cold smile, and then disregarded her utterly.
Helen was frankly curious, and met the newcomer with full intention of finding out all about her.
For Helen Peyton had heard of Miss Mystery from her friend and admirer, Robert Tyler, who, however, did not report that the girl had snubbed him more than once.
One or two other guests were present and, having been told of Mrs. Bates’ arrival Doctor Waring and his secretary came from the study and joined the others at tea.
With a welcoming smile, John Waring greeted his fiancee, and then Mrs. Bates turned to the girl she had brought.
“Miss Austin,” she said, “let me present Doctor Waring. John,—Miss Anita Austin.”
At that very moment Helen Peyton offered Waring a cup of tea, and he was in the act of taking it from her hand when Mrs. Bates made the introduction.
The cup and saucer fell to the floor with a crash, and those nearest saw the Doctor’s face blanch suddenly white, and his hand clench on a nearby chair.
But with a sudden, desperate effort he pulled himself together, and gave a little laugh, as he directed Nogi to remove the wrecked teacup.
“Pick up the four corners, and carry it all off at once,” he ordered, pointing to the small rug on which the cup had fallen, and Nogi, a little clumsily, obeyed.
“Pardon the awkwardness, Miss Austin,” he said, turning to smile at the girl, but even as he did so, his voice trembled, and he turned hastily away.
“What is it, John?” asked Emily Bates, going to his side. “Are you ill?”
“No,—no, dear; it’s—it’s all right. That foolish teacup upset my nerves. I’ll go off by myself for a few moments.”
Somewhat abruptly, he left the room and went back to his study.
Listening intently, Mrs. Bates heard him lock the door on the inside.
“I’m sorry,” she said, turning to Anita, “but I know you’ll forgive Doctor Waring. He is under so much strain at present, and a foolish accident, like the broken teacup, is enough to give him a nervous shock.”
“I know,” said the girl, sympathetically. “He must be very busy and absorbed.”
She spoke, as she often did, in a perfunctory way, as if not interested in what she was saying. Her glance wandered and she bit her red lower lip, as if nervous herself. Yet she was exceedingly quiet and calm of demeanor, and her graceful attitudes betokened only a courteous if disinterested guest.
Gordon Lockwood immediately followed his chief and tapped at the locked study door.
“All right, Lockwood,” Waring recognized the knock. “I don’t want you now. I’ll reappear shortly. Go back to the tea room.”
Willingly, Lockwood went back, hoping to have a chance for conversation with Miss Mystery.
She was chatting gayly with Helen Peyton, Pinky and Mrs. Tyler.
To Lockwood’s surprise, Miss Austin was really gay and merry and quite held her own in the chaff and repartee.
Yet as Lockwood noted her more closely, his quick perception told him her gayety was forced.
The secretary’s ability to read human nature was almost uncanny, and he truly believed the girl was making merry only by reason of her firm determination to do so.
Why? He wondered.