Stella Rosevelt

“What are we going to do next?” Mr. Rosevelt repeated. “Why, enjoy it all, to be sure. I have waited a good while for this good time, and now I am going to make the most of it. First, Miss Gladstone must attend to that very important item, Miss Gladstone’s wardrobe, which must be suitable for her position; and Star, I shall be quite particular upon that point; let it be both rich and elegant. Then, as the hot weather comes on, there will be a trip to Newport and the White Mountains, or some other place equally pleasant, and after that—well, something else, I suppose,” he concluded, with a smile.

Star heaved a sigh of delight.

It was nice, after all, to be surrounded by all this beauty and elegance, and to have everything heart could wish.

She had applied for a position as a teacher, and had hoped also to do something toward writing another book during the coming year; but now, of course, she could not teach, and there was no actual need that she should use her pen, although the enticing finger of fame seemed beckoning to her, urging her to try for even greater literary honors.

Her wardrobe!

Of what should it consist, to be suitable for her position as the heiress of a millionaire?

It was rather a difficult question to decide, when, during the last two years, her means had been too limited to allow of her gratifying her naturally exquisite taste, and all she had possessed in the way of dresses had been scarce half a dozen, and those of the commonest material.

The next fortnight was a busy one with dressmakers, milliners, and seamstresses; for Mr. Rosevelt said he wished to go to Newport by the middle or last of July, if possible.

Mrs. Blunt was jubilant over the change in “Miss Star’s fortunes.”

“Just to think of it!” she would exclaim every little while. “Who would have dreamed of it two years ago, when you were at Madam Richards’, and she trying to make a drudge of you. Don’t I wish I might be on hand when you and Miss Josephine meet, if you ever do, and she hears that Mr. Rosevelt was only playing poverty all the time, just to try his proud relations! I tell you there’ll be music by the full band.”

The young girl flushed.

Josephine had, indeed, been very unkind to her, and it had been hard not to resent the theft of her beautiful little cameo but she was not one to treasure ill-will. Her little heart was full of “Christian charity,” and full of gratitude for the blessings which were surrounding her, and she was ready to forgive all past injuries.

“I should at least try to remember,” she returned, quietly, in reply to the housekeeper’s somewhat vindictive speech, “that I wish to be a lady in the truest sense of the term, and treat her accordingly. But,” she continued, wishing to change the subject, “you have never told me yet how you happened to come to keep house for us. I think it was one of the nicest arrangements that was ever made.”

“Thank you, Miss Star,” the woman answered, with a beaming face; “and you’d better believe it was a chance that I jumped at. I suppose I should have been slaving it for that ungrateful set now if I hadn’t come over to New York one day about three months ago, and met Mr. Rosevelt on Broadway, all by chance. He seemed glad to see me, and asked how I was getting on; and I was that discouraged with the way things were being managed, the cross words, complaints, and everything, that I told him I was sick and tired of it all, and meant to find another place just as soon as ever I could, though goodness knows I hadn’t an idea where that would be. Upon that he looked thoughtful, and, after a moment, said ‘he didn’t believe in hiring people away from their employers, but if I really meant to go away, he thought he knew of some one who would like just such a person for a housekeeper.’ I tell you I jumped at the chance, for ever since that young lord took himself off so quick, the madam has been so irritable that nothing would please her; and Mr. Rosevelt said when I had worked out my notice to come to him, and I’d find him any day at home at ten o’clock. I suppose he set that hour because he didn’t want you to know what was going on. I gave my notice the next day, worked out my two weeks, and came over to New York lighter of heart than I’d been for years.

“When Mr. Rosevelt told me about what he’d been doing, and what he was going to do, and said he wanted me for his own housekeeper, my eyes stuck out so that I thought they’d never feel natural again; but if ever an old woman was happy, I was, to think I was going to serve you; and here I’ve been ever since, helping him fix up for you.

“It’s like a beautiful story, Miss Star,” continued Mrs. Blunt, waxing sentimental, “to see you here among all these elegant things, for which you were just made, or I’m much mistaken; and when I see you coming out in all of these lovely clothes, nobody’ll be prouder than I.”

“You are very good, Mrs. Blunt, to be so interested for me,” Star said, with a smile; “and if what you want is to see me ‘come out in these fine things,’ you will have your wish, for we shall have to take you to Newport with us, as I must have some one to attend me, and I cannot consent to take a stranger.”

“That will be almost as good as to come out myself,” the woman said, with a chuckle of delight.

Star’s wardrobe and pretty things were all ready at last, and Mr. Rosevelt, who had taken a strange interest in it, for a bachelor, was perfectly satisfied.

He had made her elegant presents in the way of jewelry and laces, until she felt almost overwhelmed.

“Diamonds!” she had exclaimed, her face flushing all over with delight, when, the day before they were to leave, he came into her sitting-room and laid a case in her lap, telling her to open it. He had already purchased her several other sets, but this was the crowning gift of all.

She had thought when he had given her some beautiful point-laces, that if she only had some diamonds to go with them she should like it; they were the two things for which she had an especial passion—rich laces and those pellucid stones, like drops of dew which send back the light in gorgeous tints. She would have been content with just a pair of ear-pendants and a solitaire ring—she was content, indeed, without them, but she thought how nicely they would go with her laces; but there, dazzling her eyes upon their velvet bed, were ear-pendants, a cross attached to a beautiful chain, a solitaire ring, and a star for her hair.

“Oh, Uncle Jacob,” she faltered, “I am afraid you are spending too much money for me.”

“Don’t you like them?” he questioned, although her glowing face should have told him all he wished to know.

“Like them? They are perfectly lovely; and I do particularly love diamonds.”

“Then don’t trouble your pretty head about the money. You know I have been denied all my life the pleasure of spending it for either wife or child, and now that I have found some one who appreciates and is worthy of it, let me get all the comfort I can in this way. You forget,” he continued, with a smile, “that there are two years’ income to be disposed of in some way, and I am only making up lost time. I like to go about the world, and I like to go in style, as I told you once before, and so my heiress must help me keep up appearances.”

“Are you sure you are doing just right, Uncle Jacob, in giving me all your money?” Star asked, hesitatingly, after a few minutes of thoughtful silence, while she watched the sunlight play among her new treasures.

“To whom should I give it, I should like to know?” he questioned, bluntly.

“But I have no legal claim upon you, and you have relatives. I’m afraid it will make trouble——”

“No, it won’t; I’ve taken care of that, I can assure you,” he interrupted. “My will is made, signed, and sealed, and in the hands of one of the best lawyers in the city. You are to have the whole of my fortune, excepting what the law demands for blood. I’ve given a dollar to each of them, just to clear myself and keep them from breaking my will; and they’ll never get another red cent,” he concluded, with more asperity than she had ever seen him betray before.

“I’m afraid you are piling a mountain upon my small shoulders,” Star said, with a little laugh.

“It is a mountain which I shall take care won’t crush you; and, besides, I hope to help you bear it for a good many years to come, if my health keeps on improving as it has done during the last few months; and then, I reckon, it will not be very difficult to find some one else who would be willing to take a share of the burden,” Mr. Rosevelt concluded, slyly.

Star flushed, and then her face grew sad.

She knew that he meant she would find suitors for her hand; but she could not forget her first love, and she knew that she should never meet another who would win the place in her heart which she had given to Archibald Sherbrooke, unworthy as she believed him to be of it.

That evening Miss Meredith and her brother called.

“How fortunate that you came to-night,” Star said to the young lady during their conversation. “You would have missed us if you had waited longer, for to-morrow we go to Newport for a few weeks.”

“Do you? That is delightful, for we have our rooms engaged there also for next week, and intend to remain a month,” Miss Meredith returned, with evident pleasure, while Mr. Ralph Meredith, who was conversing with Mr. Rosevelt, but with one ear open toward the young ladies, felt a sudden heart-throb at the intelligence.

“Newport is very gay this summer, I am told,” Miss Meredith continued. “‘Everybody,’ so to speak, is there, and it is one of the most charming places in the world to visit. Have you ever been there, Miss Gladstone?”

“No,” Star answered. “I have been so busy with my studies ever since I came to this country, that I have not been anywhere.”

“Since you came to this country!” Grace Meredith repeated. “Are you not an American?”

“No; I am an English girl, and it will be two years in November since I left merrie England.”

“Are you some lady of high degree, come here to get your education? I am almost inclined to think so,” laughed her friend, bending an admiring glance upon Star’s beautiful face.

“No, indeed. Don’t go to weaving any romances about me,” she answered, flushing slightly, “for I am only plain Star Gladstone.”

“But ‘plain Star Gladstone’ belongs to a very good family, nevertheless,” interrupted Mr. Rosevelt, who had overheard the latter part of their conversation, and would not allow Star to depreciate herself; whereupon Miss Meredith did feel at liberty to “romance” a little on her own account.

Star was asked for some music, and delighted her listeners with her exquisite playing. Miss Meredith and her brother sang a charming duet, and after an hour spent in the most social manner, they took their departure, having formed numerous plans to be carried into execution when they should meet a week later at Newport.

“Miss Gladstone is the loveliest girl I have ever met, and you wouldn’t let me get a word in edgewise with her, Grace,” Ralph Meredith said, in a grieved tone, after they left the house.

“Are you ‘star’-struck so soon, brother mine? You’ll have opportunities enough to ‘get your words in’ widthways during the next few weeks, and you can comfort yourself for your disappointment to-night with the thought that I was paving the way to glory for you,” laughed his sister.

“Were you not surprised to learn that she is English?” she asked, thoughtfully.

“Yes, rather; for I have been told that English girls are not very pretty; but she is wonderfully beautiful.”

“What will you wager that she does not turn out to be some lady of high degree?”

“Pshaw! Grace, you are always imagining some unlikely story or other. You should not read so many novels. Don’t put her entirely beyond our reach, if you please. It is quite enough for the present to know that she is Mr. Rosevelt’s heiress and the author of that charming little book, without being some princess in disguise,” returned the young man, somewhat impatiently.

“I think I shall like Miss Meredith,” Star said, musingly, to Mr. Rosevelt, when their visitors were gone.

“She appears to be a very agreeable young lady. I should like you to form some pleasant friendship,” the old gentleman returned; then, with a keen glance, he asked: “How are you pleased with her brother?”

“He is quite entertaining.”

“Very fine-looking young man; don’t you think so?”

“Is he?—yes—rather,” was the absent reply; for speaking of England had sent Star’s thoughts across the ocean again, where she saw in imagination a noble, patrician face, with dark, fathomless eyes, and curling chestnut hair; for Archibald Sherbrooke—she could never think of him in any other character—was her ideal of all that was manly and grand.