CHAPTER X. A JOB FOR PETE—AND FOR BERTRAM
The early days in December were busy ones, certainly, in the little house on Corey Hill. Marie was to be married the twelfth. It was to be a home wedding, and a very simple one—according to Billy, and according to what Marie had said it was to be. Billy still serenely spoke of it as a “simple affair,” but Marie was beginning to be fearful. As the days passed, bringing with them more and more frequent evidences either tangible or intangible of orders to stationers, caterers, and florists, her fears found voice in a protest.
“But Billy, it was to be a simple wedding,” she cried.
“And so it is.”
“But what is this I hear about a breakfast?”
Billy's chin assumed its most stubborn squareness.
“I don't know, I'm sure, what you did hear,” she retorted calmly.
“Billy!”
Billy laughed. The chin was just as stubborn, but the smiling lips above it graced it with an air of charming concession.
“There, there, dear,” coaxed the mistress of Hillside, “don't fret. Besides, I'm sure I should think you, of all people, would want your guests fed!”
“But this is so elaborate, from what I hear.”
“Nonsense! Not a bit of it.”
“Rosa says there'll be salads and cakes and ices—and I don't know what all.”
Billy looked concerned.
“Well, of course, Marie, if you'd rather have oatmeal and doughnuts,” she began with kind solicitude; but she got no farther.
“Billy!” besought the bride elect. “Won't you be serious? And there's the cake in wedding boxes, too.”
“I know, but boxes are so much easier and cleaner than—just fingers,” apologized an anxiously serious voice.
Marie answered with an indignant, grieved glance and hurried on.
“And the flowers—roses, dozens of them, in December! Billy, I can't let you do all this for me.”
“Nonsense, dear!” laughed Billy. “Why, I love to do it. Besides, when you're gone, just think how lonesome I'll be! I shall have to adopt somebody else then—now that Mary Jane has proved to be nothing but a disappointing man instead of a nice little girl like you,” she finished whimsically.
Marie did not smile. The frown still lay between her delicate brows.
“And for my trousseau—there were so many things that you simply would buy!”
“I didn't get one of the egg-beaters,” Billy reminded her anxiously.
Marie smiled now, but she shook her head, too.
“Billy, I cannot have you do all this for me.”
“Why not?”
At the unexpectedly direct question, Marie fell back a little.
“Why, because I—I can't,” she stammered. “I can't get them for myself, and—and—”
“Don't you love me?”
A pink flush stole to Marie's face.
“Indeed I do, dearly.”
“Don't I love you?”
The flush deepened.
“I—I hope so.”
“Then why won't you let me do what I want to, and be happy in it? Money, just money, isn't any good unless you can exchange it for something you want. And just now I want pink roses and ice cream and lace flounces for you. Marie,”—Billy's voice trembled a little—“I never had a sister till I had you, and I have had such a good time buying things that I thought you wanted! But, of course, if you don't want them—” The words ended in a choking sob, and down went Billy's head into her folded arms on the desk before her.
Marie sprang to her feet and cuddled the bowed head in a loving embrace.
“But I do want them, dear; I want them all—every single one,” she urged. “Now promise me—promise me that you'll do them all, just as you'd planned! You will, won't you?”
There was the briefest of hesitations, then came the muffled reply:
“Yes—if you really want them.”
“I do, dear—indeed I do. I love pretty weddings, and I—I always hoped that I could have one—if I ever married. So you must know, dear, how I really do want all those things,” declared Marie, fervently. “And now I must go. I promised to meet Cyril at Park Street at three o'clock.” And she hurried from the room—and not until she was half-way to her destination did it suddenly occur to her that she had been urging, actually urging Miss Billy Neilson to buy for her pink roses, ice cream, and lace flounces.
Her cheeks burned with shame then. But almost at once she smiled.
“Now wasn't that just like Billy?” she was saying to herself, with a tender glow in her eyes.
It was early in December that Pete came one day with a package for Marie from Cyril. Marie was not at home, and Billy herself went downstairs to take the package from the old man's hands.
“Mr. Cyril said to give it to Miss Hawthorn,” stammered the old servant, his face lighting up as Billy entered the room; “but I'm sure he wouldn't mind your taking it.”
“I'm afraid I'll have to take it, Pete, unless you want to carry it back with you,” she smiled. “I'll see that Miss Hawthorn has it the very first moment she comes in.”
“Thank you, Miss. It does my old eyes good to see your bright face.” He hesitated, then turned slowly. “Good day, Miss Billy.”
Billy laid the package on the table. Her eyes were thoughtful as she looked after the old man, who was now almost to the door. Something in his bowed form appealed to her strangely. She took a quick step toward him.
“You'll miss Mr. Cyril, Pete,” she said pleasantly.
The old man stopped at once and turned. He lifted his head a little proudly.
“Yes, Miss. I—I was there when he was born. Mr. Cyril's a fine man.”
“Indeed he is. Perhaps it's your good care that's helped, some—to make him so,” smiled the girl, vaguely wishing that she could say something that would drive the wistful look from the dim old eyes before her.
For a moment Billy thought she had succeeded. The old servant drew himself stiffly erect. In his eyes shone the loyal pride of more than fifty years' honest service. Almost at once, however, the pride died away, and the wistfulness returned.
“Thank ye, Miss; but I don't lay no claim to that, of course,” he said. “Mr. Cyril's a fine man, and we shall miss him; but—I cal'late changes must come—to all of us.”
Billy's brown eyes grew a little misty.
“I suppose they must,” she admitted.
The old man hesitated; then, as if impelled by some hidden force, he plunged on:
“Yes; and they'll be comin' to you one of these days, Miss, and that's what I was wantin' to speak to ye about. I understand, of course, that when you get there you'll be wantin' younger blood to serve ye. My feet ain't so spry as they once was, and my old hands blunder sometimes, in spite of what my head bids 'em do. So I wanted to tell ye—that of course I shouldn't expect to stay. I'd go.”
As he said the words, Pete stood with head and shoulders erect, his eyes looking straight forward but not at Billy.
“Don't you want to stay?” The girlish voice was a little reproachful.
Pete's head drooped.
“Not if—I'm not wanted,” came the husky reply.
With an impulsive movement Billy came straight to the old man's side and held out her hand.
“Pete!”
Amazement, incredulity, and a look that was almost terror crossed the old man's face; then a flood of dull red blotted them all out and left only worshipful rapture. With a choking cry he took the slim little hand in both his rough and twisted ones much as if he were possessing himself of a treasured bit of eggshell china.
“Miss Billy!”
“Pete, there aren't a pair of feet in Boston, nor a pair of hands, either, that I'd rather have serve me than yours, no matter if they stumble and blunder all day! I shall love stumbles and blunders—if you make them. Now run home, and don't ever let me hear another syllable about your leaving!”
They were not the words Billy had intended to say. She had meant to speak of his long, faithful service, and of how much they appreciated it; but, to her surprise, Billy found her own eyes wet and her own voice trembling, and the words that she would have said she found fast shut in her throat. So there was nothing to do but to stammer out something—anything, that would help to keep her from yielding to that absurd and awful desire to fall on the old servant's neck and cry.
“Not another syllable!” she repeated sternly.
“Miss Billy!” choked Pete again. Then he turned and fled with anything but his usual dignity.
Bertram called that evening. When Billy came to him in the living-room, her slender self was almost hidden behind the swirls of damask linen in her arms.
Bertram's eyes grew mutinous.
“Do you expect me to hug all that?” he demanded.
Billy flashed him a mischievous glance.
“Of course not! You don't have to hug anything, you know.”
For answer he impetuously swept the offending linen into the nearest chair and drew the girl into his arms.
“Oh! And see how you've crushed poor Marie's table-cloth!” she cried, with reproachful eyes.
Bertram sniffed imperturbably.
“I'm not sure but I'd like to crush Marie,” he alleged.
“Bertram!”
“I can't help it. See here, Billy.” He loosened his clasp and held the girl off at arm's length, regarding her with stormy eyes. “It's Marie, Marie, Marie—always. If I telephone in the morning, you've gone shopping with Marie. If I want you in the afternoon for something, you're at the dressmaker's with Marie. If I call in the evening—”
“I'm here,” interrupted Billy, with decision.
“Oh, yes, you're here,” admitted Bertram, aggrievedly, “and so are dozens of napkins, miles of table-cloths, and yards upon yards of lace and flummydiddles you call 'doilies.' They all belong to Marie, and they fill your arms and your thoughts full, until there isn't an inch of room for me. Billy, when is this thing going to end?”
Billy laughed softly. Her eyes danced.
“The twelfth;—that is, there'll be a—pause, then.”
“Well, I'm thankful if—eh?” broke off the man, with a sudden change of manner. “What do you mean by 'a pause'?”
Billy cast down her eyes demurely.
“Well, of course this ends the twelfth with Marie's wedding; but I've sort of regarded it as an—understudy for one that's coming next October, you see.”
“Billy, you darling!” breathed a supremely happy voice in a shell-like ear—Billy was not at arm's length now.
Billy smiled, but she drew away with gentle firmness.
“And now I must go back to my sewing,” she said.
Bertram's arms did not loosen. His eyes had grown mutinous again.
“That is,” she amended, “I must be practising my part of—the understudy, you know.”
“You darling!” breathed Bertram again; this time, however, he let her go.
“But, honestly, is it all necessary?” he sighed despairingly, as she seated herself and gathered the table-cloth into her lap. “Do you have to do so much of it all?”
“I do,” smiled Billy, “unless you want your brother to run the risk of leading his bride to the altar and finding her robed in a kitchen apron with an egg-beater in her hand for a bouquet.”
Bertram laughed.
“Is it so bad as that?”
“No, of course not—quite. But never have I seen a bride so utterly oblivious to clothes as Marie was till one day in despair I told her that Cyril never could bear a dowdy woman.”
“As if Cyril, in the old days, ever could bear any sort of woman!” scoffed Bertram, merrily.
“I know; but I didn't mention that part,” smiled Billy. “I just singled out the dowdy one.”
“Did it work?”
Billy made a gesture of despair.
“Did it work! It worked too well. Marie gave me one horrified look, then at once and immediately she became possessed with the idea that she was a dowdy woman. And from that day to this she has pursued every lurking wrinkle and every fold awry, until her dressmaker's life isn't worth the living; and I'm beginning to think mine isn't, either, for I have to assure her at least four times every day now that she is not a dowdy woman.”
“You poor dear,” laughed Bertram. “No wonder you don't have time to give to me!”
A peculiar expression crossed Billy's face.
“Oh, but I'm not the only one who, at times, is otherwise engaged, sir,” she reminded him.
“What do you mean?”
“There was yesterday, and last Monday, and last week Wednesday, and—”
“Oh, but you let me off, then,” argued Bertram, anxiously. “And you said—”
“That I didn't wish to interfere with your work—which was quite true,” interrupted Billy in her turn, smoothly. “By the way,”—Billy was examining her stitches very closely now—“how is Miss Winthrop's portrait coming on?”
“Splendidly!—that is, it was, until she began to put off the sittings for her pink teas and folderols. She's going to Washington next week, too, to be gone nearly a fortnight,” finished Bertram, gloomily.
“Aren't you putting more work than usual into this one—and more sittings?”
“Well, yes,” laughed Bertram, a little shortly. “You see, she's changed the pose twice already.”
“Changed it!”
“Yes. Wasn't satisfied. Fancied she wanted it different.”
“But can't you—don't you have something to say about it?”
“Oh, yes, of course; and she claims she'll yield to my judgment, anyhow. But what's the use? She's been a spoiled darling all her life, and in the habit of having her own way about everything. Naturally, under those circumstances, I can't expect to get a satisfactory portrait, if she's out of tune with the pose. Besides, I will own, so far her suggestions have made for improvement—probably because she's been happy in making them, so her expression has been good.”
Billy wet her lips.
“I saw her the other night,” she said lightly. (If the lightness was a little artificial Bertram did not seem to notice it.) “She is certainly—very beautiful.”
“Yes.” Bertram got to his feet and began to walk up and down the little room. His eyes were alight. On his face the “painting look” was king. “It's going to mean a lot to me—this picture, Billy. In the first place I'm just at the point in my career where a big success would mean a lot—and where a big failure would mean more. And this portrait is bound to be one or the other from the very nature of the thing.”
“I-is it?” Billy's voice was a little faint.
“Yes. First, because of who the sitter is, and secondly because of what she is. She is, of course, the most famous subject I've had, and half the artistic world knows by this time that Marguerite Winthrop is being done by Henshaw. You can see what it'll be—if I fail.”
“But you won't fail, Bertram!”
The artist lifted his chin and threw back his shoulders.
“No, of course not; but—” He hesitated, frowned, and dropped himself into a chair. His eyes studied the fire moodily. “You see,” he resumed, after a moment, “there's a peculiar, elusive something about her expression—” (Billy stirred restlessly and gave her thread so savage a jerk that it broke)”—a something that isn't easily caught by the brush. Anderson and Fullam—big fellows, both of them—didn't catch it. At least, I've understood that neither her family nor her friends are satisfied with their portraits. And to succeed where Anderson and Fullam failed—Jove! Billy, a chance like that doesn't come to a fellow twice in a lifetime!” Bertram was out of his chair, again, tramping up and down the little room.
Billy tossed her work aside and sprang to her feet. Her eyes, too, were alight, now.
“But you aren't going to fail, dear,” she cried, holding out both her hands. “You're going to succeed!”
Bertram caught the hands and kissed first one then the other of their soft little palms.
“Of course I am,” he agreed passionately, leading her to the sofa, and seating himself at her side.
“Yes, but you must really feel it,” she urged; “feel the 'sure' in yourself. You have to!—to doing things. That's what I told Mary Jane yesterday, when he was running on about what he wanted to do—in his singing, you know.”
Bertram stiffened a little. A quick frown came to his face.
“Mary Jane, indeed! Of all the absurd names to give a full-grown, six-foot man! Billy, do, for pity's sake, call him by his name—if he's got one.”
Billy broke into a rippling laugh.
“I wish I could, dear,” she sighed ingenuously.
“Honestly, it bothers me because I can't think of him as anything but 'Mary Jane.' It seems so silly!”
“It certainly does—when one remembers his beard.”
“Oh, he's shaved that off now. He looks rather better, too.”
Bertram turned a little sharply.
“Do you see the fellow—often?”
Billy laughed merrily.
“No. He's about as disgruntled as you are over the way the wedding monopolizes everything. He's been up once or twice to see Aunt Hannah and to get acquainted, as he expresses it, and once he brought up some music and we sang; but he declares the wedding hasn't given him half a show.”
“Indeed! Well, that's a pity, I'm sure,” rejoined Bertram, icily.
Billy turned in slight surprise.
“Why, Bertram, don't you like Mary Jane?”
“Billy, for heaven's sake! Hasn't he got any name but that?”
Billy clapped her hands together suddenly.
“There, that makes me think. He told Aunt Hannah and me to guess what his name was, and we never hit it once. What do you think it is? The initials are M. J.”
“I couldn't say, I'm sure. What is it?”
“Oh, he didn't tell us. You see he left us to guess it.”
“Did he?”
“Yes,” mused Billy, abstractedly, her eyes on the dancing fire. The next minute she stirred and settled herself more comfortably in the curve of her lover's arm. “But there! who cares what his name is? I'm sure I don't.”
“Nor I,” echoed Bertram in a voice that he tried to make not too fervent. He had not forgotten Billy's surprised: “Why, Bertram, don't you like Mary Jane?” and he did not like to call forth a repetition of it. Abruptly, therefore, he changed the subject. “By the way, what did you do to Pete to-day?” he asked laughingly. “He came home in a seventh heaven of happiness babbling of what an angel straight from the sky Miss Billy was. Naturally I agreed with him on that point. But what did you do to him?”
Billy smiled.
“Nothing—only engaged him for our butler—for life.”
“Oh, I see. That was dear of you, Billy.”
“As if I'd do anything else! And now for Dong Ling, I suppose, some day.”
Bertram chuckled.
“Well, maybe I can help you there,” he hinted. “You see, his Celestial Majesty came to me himself the other day, and said, after sundry and various preliminaries, that he should be 'velly much glad' when the 'Little Missee' came to live with me, for then he could go back to China with a heart at rest, as he had money 'velly much plenty' and didn't wish to be 'Melican man' any longer.”
“Dear me,” smiled Billy, “what a happy state of affairs—for him. But for you—do you realize, young man, what that means for you? A new wife and a new cook all at once? And you know I'm not Marie!”
“Ho! I'm not worrying,” retorted Bertram with a contented smile; “besides, as perhaps you noticed, it wasn't Marie that I asked—to marry me!”
CHAPTER XI. A CLOCK AND AUNT HANNAH
Mrs. Kate Hartwell, the Henshaw brothers' sister from the West, was expected on the tenth. Her husband could not come, she had written, but she would bring with her, little Kate, the youngest child. The boys, Paul and Egbert, would stay with their father.
Billy received the news of little Kate's coming with outspoken delight.
“The very thing!” she cried. “We'll have her for a flower girl. She was a dear little creature, as I remember her.”
Aunt Hannah gave a sudden low laugh.
“Yes, I remember,” she observed. “Kate told me, after you spent the first day with her, that you graciously informed her that little Kate was almost as nice as Spunk. Kate did not fully appreciate the compliment, I fear.”
Billy made a wry face.
“Did I say that? Dear me! I was a terror in those days, wasn't I? But then,” and she laughed softly, “really, Aunt Hannah, that was the prettiest thing I knew how to say, for I considered Spunk the top-notch of desirability.”
“I think I should have liked to know Spunk,” smiled Marie from the other side of the sewing table.
“He was a dear,” declared Billy. “I had another 'most as good when I first came to Hillside, but he got lost. For a time it seemed as if I never wanted another, but I've about come to the conclusion now that I do, and I've told Bertram to find one for me if he can. You see I shall be lonesome after you're gone, Marie, and I'll have to have something,” she finished mischievously.
“Oh, I don't mind the inference—as long as I know your admiration of cats,” laughed Marie.
“Let me see; Kate writes she is coming the tenth,” murmured Aunt Hannah, going back to the letter in her hand.
“Good!” nodded Billy. “That will give time to put little Kate through her paces as flower girl.”
“Yes, and it will give Big Kate time to try to make your breakfast a supper, and your roses pinks—or sunflowers,” cut in a new voice, dryly.
“Cyril!” chorussed the three ladies in horror, adoration, and amusement—according to whether the voice belonged to Aunt Hannah, Marie, or Billy.
Cyril shrugged his shoulders and smiled.
“I beg your pardon,” he apologized; “but Rosa said you were in here sewing, and I told her not to bother. I'd announce myself. Just as I got to the door I chanced to hear Billy's speech, and I couldn't resist making the amendment. Maybe you've forgotten Kate's love of managing—but I haven't,” he finished, as he sauntered over to the chair nearest Marie.
“No, I haven't—forgotten,” observed Billy, meaningly.
“Nor I—nor anybody else,” declared a severe voice—both the words and the severity being most extraordinary as coming from the usually gentle Aunt Hannah.
“Oh, well, never mind,” spoke up Billy, quickly. “Everything's all right now, so let's forget it. She always meant it for kindness, I'm sure.”
“Even when she told you in the first place what a—er—torment you were to us?” quizzed Cyril.
“Yes,” flashed Billy. “She was being kind to you, then.”
“Humph!” vouchsafed Cyril.
For a moment no one spoke. Cyril's eyes were on Marie, who was nervously trying to smooth back a few fluffy wisps of hair that had escaped from restraining combs and pins.
“What's the matter with the hair, little girl?” asked Cyril in a voice that was caressingly irritable. “You've been fussing with that long-suffering curl for the last five minutes!”
Marie's delicate face flushed painfully.
“It's got loose—my hair,” she stammered, “and it looks so dowdy that way!”
Billy dropped her thread suddenly. She sprang for it at once, before Cyril could make a move to get it. She had to dive far under a chair to capture it—which may explain why her face was so very red when she finally reached her seat again.
On the morning of the tenth, Billy, Marie, and Aunt Hannah were once more sewing together, this time in the little sitting-room at the end of the hall up-stairs.
Billy's fingers, in particular, were flying very fast.
“I told John to have Peggy at the door at eleven,” she said, after a time; “but I think I can finish running in this ribbon before then. I haven't much to do to get ready to go.”
“I hope Kate's train won't be late,” worried Aunt Hannah.
“I hope not,” replied Billy; “but I told Rosa to delay luncheon, anyway, till we get here. I—” She stopped abruptly and turned a listening ear toward the door of Aunt Hannah's room, which was open. A clock was striking. “Mercy! that can't be eleven now,” she cried. “But it must be—it was ten before I came up-stairs.” She got to her feet hurriedly.
Aunt Hannah put out a restraining hand.
“No, no, dear, that's half-past ten.”
“But it struck eleven.”
“Yes, I know. It does—at half-past ten.”
“Why, the little wretch,” laughed Billy, dropping back into her chair and picking up her work again. “The idea of its telling fibs like that and frightening people half out of their lives! I'll have it fixed right away. Maybe John can do it—he's always so handy about such things.”
“But I don't want it fixed,” demurred Aunt Hannah.
Billy stared a little.
“You don't want it fixed! Maybe you like to have it strike eleven when it's half-past ten!” Billy's voice was merrily sarcastic.
“Y-yes, I do,” stammered the lady, apologetically. “You see, I—I worked very hard to fix it so it would strike that way.”
“Aunt Hannah!”
“Well, I did,” retorted the lady, with unexpected spirit. “I wanted to know what time it was in the night—I'm awake such a lot.”
“But I don't see.” Billy's eyes were perplexed. “Why must you make it tell fibs in order to—to find out the truth?” she laughed.
Aunt Hannah elevated her chin a little.
“Because that clock was always striking one.”
“One!”
“Yes—half-past, you know; and I never knew which half-past it was.”
“But it must strike half-past now, just the same!”
“It does.” There was the triumphant ring of the conqueror in Aunt Hannah's voice. “But now it strikes half-past on the hour, and the clock in the hall tells me then what time it is, so I don't care.”
For one more brief minute Billy stared, before a sudden light of understanding illumined her face. Then her laugh rang out gleefully.
“Oh, Aunt Hannah, Aunt Hannah,” she gurgled. “If Bertram wouldn't call you the limit—making a clock strike eleven so you'll know it's half-past ten!”
Aunt Hannah colored a little, but she stood her ground.
“Well, there's only half an hour, anyway, now, that I don't know what time it is,” she maintained, “for one or the other of those clocks strikes the hour every thirty minutes. Even during those never-ending three ones that strike one after the other in the middle of the night, I can tell now, for the hall clock has a different sound for the half-hours, you know, so I can tell whether it's one or a half-past.”
“Of course,” chuckled Billy.
“I'm sure I think it's a splendid idea,” chimed in Marie, valiantly; “and I'm going to write it to mother's Cousin Jane right away. She's an invalid, and she's always lying awake nights wondering what time it is. The doctor says actually he believes she'd get well if he could find some way of letting her know the time at night, so she'd get some sleep; for she simply can't go to sleep till she knows. She can't bear a light in the room, and it wakes her all up to turn an electric switch, or anything of that kind.”
“Why doesn't she have one of those phosphorous things?” questioned Billy.
Marie laughed quietly.
“She did. I sent her one,—and she stood it just one night.”
“Stood it!”
“Yes. She declared it gave her the creeps, and that she wouldn't have the spooky thing staring at her all night like that. So it's got to be something she can hear, and I'm going to tell her Mrs. Stetson's plan right away.”
“Well, I'm sure I wish you would,” cried that lady, with prompt interest; “and she'll like it, I'm sure. And tell her if she can hear a town clock strike, it's just the same, and even better; for there aren't any half-hours at all to think of there.”
“I will—and I think it's lovely,” declared Marie.
“Of course it's lovely,” smiled Billy, rising; “but I fancy I'd better go and get ready to meet Mrs. Hartwell, or the 'lovely' thing will be telling me that it's half-past eleven!” And she tripped laughingly from the room.
Promptly at the appointed time John with Peggy drew up before the door, and Billy, muffled in furs, stepped into the car, which, with its protecting top and sides and glass wind-shield, was in its winter dress.
“Yes'm, 'tis a little chilly, Miss,” said John, in answer to her greeting, as he tucked the heavy robes about her.
“Oh, well, I shall be very comfortable, I'm sure,” smiled Billy. “Just don't drive too rapidly, specially coming home. I shall have to get a limousine, I think, when my ship comes in, John.”
John's grizzled old face twitched. So evident were the words that were not spoken that Billy asked laughingly:
“Well, John, what is it?”
John reddened furiously.
“Nothing, Miss. I was only thinkin' that if you didn't 'tend ter haulin' in so many other folks's ships, yours might get in sooner.”
“Why, John! Nonsense! I—I love to haul in other folks's ships,” laughed the girl, embarrassedly.
“Yes, Miss; I know you do,” grunted John.
Billy colored.
“No, no—that is, I mean—I don't do it—very much,” she stammered.
John did not answer apparently; but Billy was sure she caught a low-muttered, indignant “much!” as he snapped the door shut and took his place at the wheel.
To herself she laughed softly. She thought she possessed the secret now of some of John's disapproving glances toward her humble guests of the summer before.
CHAPTER XII. SISTER KATE
At the station Mrs. Hartwell's train was found to be gratifyingly on time; and in due course Billy was extending a cordial welcome to a tall, handsome woman who carried herself with an unmistakable air of assured competence. Accompanying her was a little girl with big blue eyes and yellow curls.
“I am very glad to see you both,” smiled Billy, holding out a friendly hand to Mrs. Hartwell, and stooping to kiss the round cheek of the little girl.
“Thank you, you are very kind,” murmured the lady; “but—are you alone, Billy? Where are the boys?”
“Uncle William is out of town, and Cyril is rushed to death and sent his excuses. Bertram did mean to come, but he telephoned this morning that he couldn't, after all. I'm sorry, but I'm afraid you'll have to make the best of just me,” condoled Billy. “They'll be out to the house this evening, of course—all but Uncle William. He doesn't return until to-morrow.”
“Oh, doesn't he?” murmured the lady, reaching for her daughter's hand.
Billy looked down with a smile.
“And this is little Kate, I suppose,” she said, “whom I haven't seen for such a long, long time. Let me see, you are how old now?”
“I'm eight. I've been eight six weeks.”
Billy's eyes twinkled.
“And you don't remember me, I suppose.”
The little girl shook her head.
“No; but I know who you are,” she added, with shy eagerness. “You're going to be my Aunt Billy, and you're going to marry my Uncle William—I mean, my Uncle Bertram.”
Billy's face changed color. Mrs. Hartwell gave a despairing gesture.
“Kate, my dear, I told you to be sure and remember that it was your Uncle Bertram now. You see,” she added in a discouraged aside to Billy, “she can't seem to forget the first one. But then, what can you expect?” laughed Mrs. Hartwell, a little disagreeably. “Such abrupt changes from one brother to another are somewhat disconcerting, you know.”
Billy bit her lip. For a moment she said nothing, then, a little constrainedly, she rejoined:
“Perhaps. Still—let us hope we have the right one, now.”
Mrs. Hartwell raised her eyebrows.
“Well, my dear, I'm not so confident of that. My choice has been and always will be—William.”
Billy bit her lip again. This time her brown eyes flashed a little.
“Is that so? But you see, after all, you aren't making the—the choice.” Billy spoke lightly, gayly; and she ended with a bright little laugh, as if to hide any intended impertinence.
It was Mrs. Hartwell's turn to bite her lip—and she did it.
“So it seems,” she rejoined frigidly, after the briefest of pauses.
It was not until they were on their way to Corey Hill some time later that Mrs. Hartwell turned with the question:
“Cyril is to be married in church, I suppose?”
“No. They both preferred a home wedding.”
“Oh, what a pity! Church weddings are so attractive!”
“To those who like them,” amended Billy in spite of herself.
“To every one, I think,” corrected Mrs. Hartwell, positively.
Billy laughed. She was beginning to discern that it did not do much harm—nor much good—to disagree with her guest.
“It's in the evening, then, of course?” pursued Mrs. Hartwell.
“No; at noon.”
“Oh, how could you let them?”
“But they preferred it, Mrs. Hartwell.”
“What if they did?” retorted the lady, sharply. “Can't you do as you please in your own home? Evening weddings are so much prettier! We can't change now, of course, with the guests all invited. That is, I suppose you do have guests!”
Mrs. Hartwell's voice was aggrievedly despairing.
“Oh, yes,” smiled Billy, demurely. “We have guests invited—and I'm afraid we can't change the time.”
“No, of course not; but it's too bad. I conclude there are announcements only, as I got no cards.
“Announcements only,” bowed Billy.
“I wish Cyril had consulted me, a little, about this affair.”
Billy did not answer. She could not trust herself to speak just then. Cyril's words of two days before were in her ears: “Yes, and it will give Big Kate time to try to make your breakfast supper, and your roses pinks—or sunflowers.”
In a moment Mrs. Hartwell spoke again.
“Of course a noon wedding is quite pretty if you darken the rooms and have lights—you're going to do that, I suppose?”
Billy shook her head slowly.
“I'm afraid not, Mrs. Hartwell. That isn't the plan, now.”
“Not darken the rooms!” exclaimed Mrs. Hartwell. “Why, it won't—” She stopped suddenly, and fell back in her seat. The look of annoyed disappointment gave way to one of confident relief. “But then, that can be changed,” she finished serenely.
Billy opened her lips, but she shut them without speaking. After a minute she opened them again.
“You might consult—Cyril—about that,” she said in a quiet voice.
“Yes, I will,” nodded Mrs. Hartwell, brightly. She was looking pleased and happy again. “I love weddings. Don't you? You can do so much with them!”
“Can you?” laughed Billy, irrepressibly.
“Yes. Cyril is happy, of course. Still, I can't imagine him in love with any woman.”
“I think Marie can.”
“I suppose so. I don't seem to remember her much; still, I think I saw her once or twice when I was on last June. Music teacher, wasn't she?”
“Yes. She is a very sweet girl.”
“Hm-m; I suppose so. Still, I think 'twould have been better if Cyril could have selected some one that wasn't musical—say a more domestic wife. He's so terribly unpractical himself about household matters.”
Billy gave a ringing laugh and stood up. The car had come to a stop before her own door.
“Do you? Just you wait till you see Marie's trousseau of—egg-beaters and cake tins,” she chuckled.
Mrs. Hartwell looked blank.
“Whatever in the world do you mean, Billy?” she demanded fretfully, as she followed her hostess from the car. “I declare! aren't you ever going to grow beyond making those absurd remarks of yours?”
“Maybe—sometime,” laughed Billy, as she took little Kate's hand and led the way up the steps.
Luncheon in the cozy dining-room at Hillside that day was not entirely a success. At least there were not present exactly the harmony and tranquillity that are conceded to be the best sauce for one's food. The wedding, of course, was the all-absorbing topic of conversation; and Billy, between Aunt Hannah's attempts to be polite, Marie's to be sweet-tempered, Mrs. Hartwell's to be dictatorial, and her own to be pacifying as well as firm, had a hard time of it. If it had not been for two or three diversions created by little Kate, the meal would have been, indeed, a dismal failure.
But little Kate—most of the time the personification of proper little-girlhood—had a disconcerting faculty of occasionally dropping a word here, or a question there, with startling effect. As, for instance, when she asked Billy “Who's going to boss your wedding?” and again when she calmly informed her mother that when she was married she was not going to have any wedding at all to bother with, anyhow. She was going to elope, and she should choose somebody's chauffeur, because he'd know how to go the farthest and fastest so her mother couldn't catch up with her and tell her how she ought to have done it.
After luncheon Aunt Hannah went up-stairs for rest and recuperation. Marie took little Kate and went for a brisk walk—for the same purpose. This left Billy alone with her guest.
“Perhaps you would like a nap, too, Mrs. Hartwell,” suggested Billy, as they passed into the living-room. There was a curious note of almost hopefulness in her voice.
Mrs. Hartwell scorned naps, and she said so very emphatically. She said something else, too.
“Billy, why do you always call me 'Mrs. Hartwell' in that stiff, formal fashion? You used to call me 'Aunt Kate.'”
“But I was very young then.” Billy's voice was troubled. Billy had been trying so hard for the last two hours to be the graciously cordial hostess to this woman—Bertram's sister.
“Very true. Then why not 'Kate' now?”
Billy hesitated. She was wondering why it seemed so hard to call Mrs. Hartwell “Kate.”
“Of course,” resumed the lady, “when you're Bertram's wife and my sister—”
“Why, of course,” cried Billy, in a sudden flood of understanding. Curiously enough, she had never before thought of Mrs. Hartwell as her sister. “I shall be glad to call you 'Kate'—if you like.”
“Thank you. I shall like it very much, Billy,” nodded the other cordially. “Indeed, my dear, I'm very fond of you, and I was delighted to hear you were to be my sister. If only—it could have stayed William instead of Bertram.”
“But it couldn't,” smiled Billy. “It wasn't William—that I loved.”
“But Bertram!—it's so absurd.”
“Absurd!” The smile was gone now.
“Yes. Forgive me, Billy, but I was about as much surprised to hear of Bertram's engagement as I was of Cyril's.”
Billy grew a little white.
“But Bertram was never an avowed—woman-hater, like Cyril, was he?”
“'Woman-hater'—dear me, no! He was a woman-lover, always. As if his eternal 'Face of a Girl' didn't prove that! Bertram has always loved women—to paint. But as for his ever taking them seriously—why, Billy, what's the matter?”
Billy had risen suddenly.
“If you'll excuse me, please, just a few minutes,” Billy said very quietly. “I want to speak to Rosa in the kitchen. I'll be back—soon.”
In the kitchen Billy spoke to Rosa—she wondered afterwards what she said. Certainly she did not stay in the kitchen long enough to say much. In her own room a minute later, with the door fast closed, she took from her table the photograph of Bertram and held it in her two hands, talking to it softly, but a little wildly.
“I didn't listen! I didn't stay! Do you hear? I came to you. She shall not say anything that will make trouble between you and me. I've suffered enough through her already! And she doesn't know—she didn't know before, and she doesn't now. She's only imagining. I will not not—not believe that you love me—just to paint. No matter what they say—all of them! I will not!”
Billy put the photograph back on the table then, and went down-stairs to her guest. She smiled brightly, though her face was a little pale.
“I wondered if perhaps you wouldn't like some music,” she said pleasantly, going straight to the piano.
“Indeed I would!” agreed Mrs. Hartwell.
Billy sat down then and played—played as Mrs. Hartwell had never heard her play before.
“Why, Billy, you amaze me,” she cried, when the pianist stopped and whirled about. “I had no idea you could play like that!”
Billy smiled enigmatically. Billy was thinking that Mrs. Hartwell would, indeed, have been surprised if she had known that in that playing were herself, the ride home, the luncheon, Bertram, and the girl—whom Bertram did not love only to paint!