"Then, if that's the case," said Mrs. Bell, "if that's really and truly the case, and no mistake about it, Matty must have some new frocks made up for her at once. I have no idea of a child of mine looking shabby or behind any one else, but you must tell me truly, Alice, if he really was attentive. Bless you, child, you know what I mean. Was there any hand-squeezing, and was he always and forever making an excuse to have a look at her. No one could have been more genteel than your father during courtship, but the way his eyes did follow me wherever I turned, over and over put me to the blush."
"Don't say anything to Matty," responded Alice Bell. "She'll be sure to giggle awfully when next they meet, if you do. She can't keep anything in, and she owned to Sophy and me that he had got her heart. Well, yes, I suppose he was particular with her. He danced with her, and he looked at her, only, I do think it was she squeezed his hand."
"Oh, fie, Alice, to say such things of your sister. Well, anyhow the town is full of it. When I went out yesterday Mrs. Morris asked me point-blank if I hadn't news for her, and Miss Peters has taken so frightfully to rolling her eyes whenever Matty and Captain Bertram are seen together, that I'm quite afraid she will contract a regular squint. How long was he with Matty on the green last night, Alice?"
"About half-an-hour, I should say," responded Alice. "They walked round the Green five times, with me and Sophy doing gooseberry behind. I don't think Matty stopped laughing for a single minute, and the captain he did quiz her frightfully."
"Poor man, he was trying to wheedle her heart out of her!" remarked the gratified mother. "And he has all my sympathies, and what's more, we must have him to supper, and lobsters and crabs, and anything else he fancies. It isn't for me to be hard-hearted, and not give the poor fellow his opportunities; and no doubt Matty will relent by-and-bye."
"Oh, dear me, mother, she has relented now. She's only waiting and dying for him to pop the question."
"If I were you, Alice, I wouldn't make so light of your own sister. Of course she is gratified by being spoken to and appreciated, but if you think a girl of mine is going to let herself down cheap—well, she'll be very different metal from her mother before her. Three times Bell had to go on his knees for me, and he thought all the more of me for having to do it. If I'm not mistaken, there are some in this town who are jealous of Matty. Who would have thought that handsome friend of yours, Bee Meadowsweet, would be looked over and made nothing of, and my girl be the favored one? Well, I must own I'm pleased, and so will her father be, too. It's a nice genteel connection, and they say there's lots of money somewhere in the background.—Oh, is that you, Matty?—Goodness, child, don't get your face so burnt,—you shouldn't go out without a veil in the sun. Now come here, pet, sit down and keep cool, and I'll bring in some buttermilk presently to bathe your neck and cheeks. There's nothing like buttermilk for burns. Well, well, what were we talking about, Alice, when Matty came in?"
"About the person we're always talking about," replied Alice, rather crossly. "About Captain Bertram. Good gracious, Matty, it isn't at all becoming to you to flame up in that sudden way. Lor' ma, look at her, she's the color of a peony."
[It may be remarked in passing that the Bells did not echo one another when at home.]
"Never mind, never mind," retorted Mrs. Bell, who, with true delicacy, would not look at her blushing daughter.
"I was thinking Matty, my love, that you wanted a new evening dress. I don't like you to be behind any one else, my dear, and that green skirt with the white jacket, though genteel enough, doesn't seem quite the thing. I can't tell what's the matter with it, for the mohair in the skirts cost nine-pence half-penny a yard, and the first day you wore those dresses, girls, they shone as if they were silk, and your father asked me why I was so extravagant, and said that though he would like it he hadn't money to dress you up in silk attire. Poor Bell has a turn for poetry, and if he had not lost his money through the badness of the coal trade, he'd make you look like three poems, that's what he said to me. Well, well, somehow the dresses are handsome, and yet I don't like them."
"They're hideous," said Matty, kicking out her foot with a petulant movement. "Somehow, those home-made dresses never look right. They don't sit properly. We weren't a bit like the other girls at Mrs. Meadowsweet's a fortnight ago."
"No," said Alice, "we weren't. The Bertrams had nothing but full skirts and baby bodies, and sashes round their waists, just like little girls. Mabel Bertram's dress was only down to her ankles—nothing could have been plainer—no style at all, and yet we didn't look like them."
"Well," said the mother, bristling and bridling, "handsome dresses or not, somebody admired somebody at that party, or I'm greatly mistaken. Well, Matty dear, what would you fancy for evening wear? If my purse will stand it you shall have it. I won't have you behind no one, my love."
It was at this critical moment, when Matty's giggles prevented her speaking, and Alice was casting some truly sarcastic and sisterly shafts at her, that Sophy burst open the door, and announced, in an excited voice, that Mrs. Middlemass, the pedler, had just stepped into the hall.
"She has got some lovely things to-day," exclaimed Sophy. "Shall we have her up, mamma? Have we anything to exchange?"
"It's only a week since she was here," replied Mrs. Bell. "And she pretty nearly cleared us out then. Still it would be a comfort if we could squeeze a frock for Matty out of her. I could buy the trimmings easy enough for you, Matty, at Perry's, if I hadn't to pay for the stuff. Dear, dear, now what can we exchange? Look here, Sophy, run, like a good child, to your father's wardrobe, and see if there are a couple of pairs of old trousers gone at the knees, and maybe that great-coat of his that had one of the flaps torn, and the patch on the left sleeve. It was warm, certainly, but it always was a show, that great-coat. Maybe he wouldn't miss it, or at any rate he'd give it up to help to settle Matty."
"Lor, ma, I really do think you are indelicate, when the man hasn't even proposed!" exclaimed Alice. "There's Matty, she's off giggling again. I do believe she'll soon laugh day and night without stopping."
"Are we to have Mrs. Middlemass up or not, mother?" exclaimed Sophy.
"Yes, child, yes. Bring her up by all means. We'll contrive to make some sort of a bargain with her."
Sophy disappeared, and a moment or two later she ushered Mrs. Middlemass into the bedroom where the above conversation had taken place.
The pedler was a very stout person, with a red face, and the bundle which she carried in front of her and propelled first into the room, was of enormous dimensions.
"Good-day, Mrs. Bell," she said. "Good-day, young ladies. And what may I have the pleasure of serving you with to-day, Mrs. Bell? I've got some elegant goods with me, just the style for your beautiful young ladies."
With this speech, which was uttered with great gravity, Mrs. Middlemass proceeded to open her bundle, and to exhibit the worst muslin, cashmere, French merino, and other fabrics, which she offered for the highest price.
"There," she said, "there's a cashmere for you! Feel it between your finger and thumb, Mrs. Bell, mum, there's substance, there's quality. It would make up lovely. Shall I cut a length a-piece for the three young ladies, ma'am?"
"No, no," said Mrs. Bell, "that cashmere is dark and heavy, and coarse, too. I don't expect it's all-wool. It's shoddy, that's what it is."
"Shoddy, ma'am! That a lady whom I've served faithful for years should accuse me of selling shoddy! No, Mrs. Bell, may Heaven forgive you for trying to run down a poor widow's goods. This is as pure all-wool cashmere as is to be found in the market, and dirt cheap at three and elevenpence a-yard. Have a length for yourself, ma'am; it would stylish you up wonderful."
"No," said Mrs. Bell, "I don't want a dress to-day, and that cashmere isn't worth more than one and six. What we are wishing for—though I don't know that we really want anything—do we, girls? But what we might buy, if you had it very cheap, is a bit of something light and airy that would make up very elegantly for the evening. Do you care to have another evening-dress, Matty? I know you have a good few in your wardrobe."
"I don't know," said Matty, "until I see what Mrs. Middlemass has. I don't want anything common. I can get common things at Perry's; and perhaps I had better send for my best dress to London, ma."
This remark of giggling Miss Matty's was really astute for she knew that Mrs. Middlemass held Perry, the draper, in the most sovereign contempt.
"Right you are, my dear," said the pedler, a smile of gratified vanity spreading over her face, "you can get your common things, and very common things they'll be, at Perry's. But maybe old Auntie Middlemass can give you something as genteel as the London shops. You look here, my pretty. Now, then."
Here Mrs. Middlemass went on her knees, and with slow and exasperating deliberation, unfastened a parcel carefully done up in white muslin. From the depths of this parcel she extracted a very thin and crackling silk of a shade between brick and terra-cotta, which was further shot here and there with little threads of pale blue and yellow. This texture she held up in many lights, not praising it by any words, for she guessed well the effect it would have on her company. She knew the Bells of old: they were proof against anything that wasn't silk, but at the glitter and sheen of real silk they gave way. They instantly, one and all, fell down and worshipped it.
"It is pretty," said Matty at last, with a little sigh, and she turned away as one who must not any longer contemplate so dazzling a temptation.
Mrs. Bell's heart quite ached for her eldest-born at this critical juncture. It was so natural for her to wish for silk attire when the hero was absolutely at the gates. And such a hero! So tall, so handsome, such an Adonis—so aristocratic! But, alas! silk could not be had for nothing. It would be an insult to offer Bell's old coat and the two pairs of trousers gone at the knees for this exquisite substance.
"Sixteen yards," solemnly pronounced Mrs. Middlemass, when the silence had been sufficiently long. "Sixteen yards for three pound ten. There! it's a present I'm making to you, Miss Matty."
"I like it very much," said Matty.
"Like it! I should think you do. It was the fellow of it I sold this morning to Lady Georgiana Higginbotham, of Castle Higgins. She who is to be married next month. 'Middlemass,' she said, when she saw it, 'I'm in love with it. It has a sheen about it, and a quality. Cut me twenty yards, Middlemass; I do declare I'll wear it for my travelling dress, and no other.' She'll do it, too, Miss Matty, you'll see. And beautiful she'll look."
The three girls sighed. They sighed in unison. As there was a lover in the question, the two younger were willing that Matty should have a new frock. But a silk! Each girl wanted the silk for herself.
"It is exquisite," said Matty.
"Exquisite," repeated Alice.
"Quisite," said Sophy.
"I'll put it away for you, miss," said the pedler, beginning to pack up her other things. "There, take it, miss," she said, flinging a long sweep of the glittering texture over Matty's arm. "Now, it does become you, my dear. Doesn't it, ma'am?" turning to the mother. "Well, now, I never noticed it before, but Miss Matty has a great look of Lady Georgiana. Remarkable likeness! You wouldn't be known from her, miss when you had that dress on. Their eyes! the complexion! the figure! all ditto, ditto, ditto."
The girls smiled; but what amount of flattery will not one accept when judiciously offered? They were all pleased to hear Mrs. Middlemass compare one of their number to Lady Georgiana, although they knew perfectly that the pedler had never in the whole course of her life even spoken to that young lady, who was a head and shoulders taller than Matty, and as unlike her in all particulars as a girl could be.
"There!" said the pedler. "Three pound ten! Dirt-cheap. Going, you may say, for nothing, and because it's the last piece I have of it. Lady Georgiana paid me seven pounds for the length I cut her this morning. I'd like to see you in this dress, Miss Matty, and, maybe, if all reports is true, you'll want me to sell you something different, and more—more—well, more, perhaps, bridal-like, by-and-bye, my pretty young lady."
This last speech finished the fate of the silk. If rumor had reached down to the strata of pedlers, etc., it simply could not be disregarded. Mrs. Bell bargained and haggled for the best part of an hour. She stripped herself of many necessary garments, and even ransacked her very meagre little collection of jewelry. Finally the purchase was completed with the sale of the ring which Bell had given her on the day when he had gone down on his knees for the third and successful time. That ring, of a showy style, but made of real gold and real gems, was beloved by Mrs. Bell above all her worldly goods. Nevertheless, she parted with it to make up the necessary price for the shot silk; for, what will not a mother do for her child?
"I wish you wouldn't worry me so, miss."
"Well, answer my question. Has Mr. Hart come back?"
"Yes—no—I'm sure I can't say. Maybe he's in his room, maybe he's not. You do look dirty, miss, and tired—my word, awful tired. Now, where have you been, Miss Josephine, since early yesterday morning? After no good, I'll be bound. Oh, dear me, yes, after no good! You're a wild one, and you're a daring one; and you'll come to a bad end, for all your eyes are so bright, if you don't mind."
Josephine's queer, restless eyes flashed with an angry gleam.
"Do you know what this is?" she said, doubling up her small hand, and thrusting the hard-looking fist within an inch or two of her irate landlady's nose. "I knocked a man down before now with this, and I have no respect for women. You'd better not anger me, Mrs. Timms."
"Oh, dear no, miss, I'm sure I meant no disrespect!"
"That's right. Don't say what you don't mean in future."
"I won't, Miss Josephine. Now I come to think of it, I expect Hart was at home; I heard him shuffling about overhead last night."
"I'll go up and see," said Josephine.
She nodded to Mrs. Timms, and walked slowly, as though she were dead tired, and every step was an effort to her, up the stairs. They were rickety stairs, very dirty and dark, and unkept. Josephine went on and on, until her upward ascent ended under a sloping attic roof. Here she knocked at a closed door.
"Come in," said a voice.
She entered a long, low room, which did service as a sitting-room, kitchen and studio, all combined. A little, old man with a long, white beard and a bald head was bending over a stove, frying eggs.
"Is that you, Nina?" he said, without looking round. "If it is, you may as well fry these eggs while I lay the cloth for supper."
"No, you can finish them yourself," replied Josephine. "I'm dead tired. I'd rather eat no supper than cook it."
She flung herself into a long, low wicker-work chair, folded her hands and closed her eyes. The old man turned the tail of one eye to glance at her. Then he resumed his cooking, attending to it very carefully, removing each egg, as it was browned, to a hot and clean dish which stood in readiness.
"There," he said, at last, "supper's ready. Here's the vinegar, here's the pepper, here's the salt, here's the pewter jug with the beer, here's the bread and butter, and last, but not least, here's your tea, Josephine. You're nowhere without your tea, are you, child?"
"Pour it out for me," said Josephine. "Put an egg on a plate and give it to me. I'll be better when I've eaten. I can't talk until I have eaten. I was taken this way last night—I'll be better presently."
The old man gave her a long, curious glance; then he fetched a tray, piled it with refreshments, and brought it to her side. She ate and drank ravenously. The food acted on her like magic; she sat upright—her eyes sparkled, her pallor left her, and the slight shade of petulance and ill-humor which had characterized her when she entered the room gave place to a sunshiny and radiant smile.
"Well, Daddy," she said, getting up, going to the old man and giving him a kiss. "So you have come back at last. I was pretty sick of being a whole fortnight by myself, with no one but that interesting Mrs. Timms for company. You never wrote to me, and however careful I was, that five shillings wouldn't go far. What did you do in London? And why didn't you write?"
"One question at a time, Nina. Don't strangle me, child. Sit down quietly, and I'll tell you my news. I'm a good grandfather to you, Josephine. I'm a very good and faithful grandfather to you."
"So you tell me every day of my life. I'll retort back now—I'm a good grandchild to you—the best in the world."
"Bless me, what have you ever done, chit, but eat my bread and drink my water? However, I have news at last. Now, how eager you look! You would like to be a fine lady and forget your old granddad."
"I'd like to be a fine lady, certainly," responded Josephine.
She said nothing further, but sitting still, with her small hands crossed in her lap, she absolutely devoured the old man's face with her eyes.
He was accustomed to her gaze, which glittered and shone, and never wavered, and was by some people thought uncanny. He finished his supper slowly and methodically, and until he had eaten the last mouthful, and drained off the last drop of beer in the pewter mug, he didn't speak.
Then with a sharp glance at the girl he said, suddenly:
"So you wanted to take me unawares?"
"What do you mean, Grandfather?"
"You know what I mean well enough. However, I'll tell you, you have been on the tramp; you have no money; but you thought your legs would carry you where your heart wanted to be. Shall I go on?"
"Oh, yes, you may say anything you fancy. Stay, I'll say it for you. Yesterday I walked to Northbury. Northbury is over twenty miles from here. I walked every step of the way. In the evening I got there—I was footsore and weary. I had one and sixpence in my purse, no more for food, no more for bribes, no more for anything. I went to Northbury to see the Bertrams—to see that fine lady, that beloved friend of mine, Mrs. Bertram. She was from home. You probably know where she really was. I bribed the gatekeeper, and got into the grounds of Rosendale Manor. I frightened a chit of a schoolgirl, a plain, little, unformed, timorous creature. She was a Bertram, coming home from a late dissipation. She spoke of her fright, and gave her sister the cue. About midnight Catherine Bertram came out to seek me. What's the matter, Grand-dad?"
"Good heavens! Nina, that glib tongue of yours has not been blabbing. Catherine! What is Miss Bertram's Christian name to you?"
"Never mind. Her Christian name, and she herself also, are a good deal to me. As to blabbing, I never blab; I saw her, she spoke to me; I slept at the lodge; I returned home to-day."
"You walked home?"
"Yes, and I am dead tired; I want to go to bed now."
"You can't for a few minutes. I have a few words to say first. Josephine, I have always been a good grandfather to you."
"Perhaps you have done your best, Grand-dad, but your best has not been much. I am clothed after a fashion, and fed after a style, and educated!" she filliped her slender fingers scornfully; "educated! I belong to the self-taught. Still, after your lights, you have been a good Grand-dad. Now, what is all this preamble about? I can scarcely keep my eyes open. If you are not quick your words will soon fall unregarded, for I shall be in the arms of that god of delight, Morpheus."
"I have something very important to say, child. I want to lay a command upon you."
"What is that?"
"You are not to act the spy on the Bertrams again."
"The spy? What do you mean?"
"What I say. You are not to do it. I have made arrangements, and the Bertrams are to be unmolested. I have given my oath, and you must abide by it."
"What if I refuse?"
"Then we part company. You go one way, I another. You are truly a beggar, and can take up no other position without my aid. You have a story to tell which no one will believe, for I alone hold the proofs. Talk much about your fine secret, and what will be the result? People will think you off your head. Be guided by me, and all comes right in the end and in the meantime we share the spoils."
"The spoils," said Josephine, "what do you mean?
"I can give you a practical answer, Nina. I have made a good bargain, a splendid bargain; seeing that I have only put on the first screw, my success has largely anticipated my wildest hopes. Josephine, my poor girl, you need no longer suffer the pangs of hunger and neglect. You and I are no longer penniless. What do you say to an income? What do you say to four hundred a year?"
Josephine put up her thin, white hand to her forehead.
"Four hundred a year?" she repeated, vaguely. "I don't quite know what it means. What have we now?"
"Anything or nothing. Sometimes a pound a week, sometimes two pounds, sometimes five shillings."
"And we have in the future?"
"Didn't I tell you, child? Four hundred a year. One hundred pounds paid regularly every quarter. Got without earning, got without toiling for. Ours whether we are sick or well; ours under any circumstances from this day forward; ours just for keeping a little bit of a secret to ourselves."
"A secret which keeps me out of my own."
"We have no money to prove it, child, at present. In the meantime, this is a certainty. Whenever we get our proofs complete we can cease to take this annuity."
"This bribe, you mean. I scorn it. I hate it. I won't touch it."
Josephine's eyes again gleamed with anger.
"I hate bribes," she repeated.
"All right, child. You can go on starving. You can go your own way, I mine. For myself, at least, I have accepted the annuity; and if you anger me any more, I'll burn the documents tonight, which give you the shadow of a claim."
Josephine turned pale. There were moments when, fearless as she was, she feared this queer old man. The present was one of them. She sat quite still for a moment or two, during which she thought deeply. Then she spoke in an altered tone.
"Grandfather, if I consent to make no fuss, to say nothing, to reveal nothing by word or action, will you give me half your annuity?"
"Why so, Nina? Had we not better live together? When all is said and done, I'd miss you, Grandchild, if you left me."
"You'd get over that, Grand-dad. These are not the days when people are especially affectionate. Will you give me two hundred a year, and let me live away from you?"
The old man looked down at the floor, and up at the ceiling; then furtively into his granddaughter's face, then away from her.
"It's late now, we'll talk of it to-morrow," he said.
"No, I am not sleepy any longer. Two hundred a year is worth staying awake for. Will you give it to me? You can promise to-night as well as tomorrow."
"This is an important thing. I can't make up my mind all in a minute. I've got to think."
"You can think now. I'll give you half-an-hour. I'll shut my tired eyes, and you can think hard for half-an-hour."
"Nina, you are so persistent."
"Exactly, I am so persistent. Now my eyes are shut. Please begin to think."
About a fortnight after the events mentioned in the last chapter, the landlady of the Blue Lion, the little slatternly village inn where Mr. Hart and his granddaughter had their quarters, was somewhat disappointed, somewhat puzzled, and certainly possessed by the demon of curiosity when Hart told her that he and his granddaughter intended to take their departure that evening. Hart often went away; Mrs. Timms was quite accustomed to his sudden exits, but his granddaughter was always left as a hostage behind. Hart with his queer ways, his erratic payments, was perhaps not the most inviting lodger for an honest landlady to count upon, but Mrs. Timms had grown accustomed to him. She scolded him, and grumbled at him, but on the whole she made a good thing out of him, for no one could be more generous than old Hart when he was at all flush of cash.
He came down, however, this morning, and told her he was going.
"For a fortnight or so?" responded Mrs. Timms. "You'll leave Miss Josephine behind as usual? I'll take good care of her."
"No, Miss Josephine is also going. Make out our bills, my good Timms, I can pay you in full."
That evening there arrived at Northbury by the seven o'clock train a single first-class passenger—a girl dressed in a long gray cloak, and a big, picturesque shady hat stepped on to the platform. She was the only passenger to alight at Northbury, and the one or two sleepy porters regarded her with interest and admiration. She was very graceful, and her light-colored eyes had a peculiar quick expression which made people turn to watch her again.
The strange girl had scarcely any luggage—only a small portmanteau covered with a neat case of brown holland, and a little trunk to match.
She asked one of the porters to call a cab, did not disdain the shaky and ghastly-looking conveyance which Loftus Bertram had been too proud to use; sprang lightly into it, desired the porter to put her luggage on the roof, and gave the address of Rosendale Manor.
"Oh, that accounts for it," said the man to his mate. "She's one of them proud Bertram folk. I thought by the looks of her as she didn't belong to none of the Northbury people."
The other laughed.
"She have got an eye," he said. "My word, don't it shine? Seems to scorch one up."
"There's the 7.12 luggage train signalled, Jim!" exclaimed the other.
The men forgot the strange girl and returned to their duties.
Meanwhile, she sat back in her cab, and gazed complacently about her. She knew the scene through which she was passing—she had looked on it before. Very travel-stained and weary she had been then; very fresh and keen, and all alive she felt now.
She threw open the windows of the close cab, and took a long breath of the delicious sea air. It was a hot evening towards the middle of July, but a slight breeze rippled the little waves in the harbor, and then travelled up and up until it reached the girl in the dusty cab.
The Northburians were most of them out on the water. No one who knew anything of the ways of Northbury expected to see the good folk in the streets on an evening like this. No, the water was their highway, the water was their pleasure-scene. Each house owned a boat, each garden ended in steps against which the said boat was moored. It was the tiniest walk from the supper room or the high tea-table to the little green-painted boat, and then away to float over the limpid waves.
All the girls in Northbury could row, steer—in short, manage a boat as well as their brothers.
There was a view of the straggling, steep little High Street from the water; and the Bells now, in a large white boat with four oars, and occupied at the present moment by Mrs. Bell, fat and comfortable in the stern, Alice and Sophy each propelling a couple of oars, and the blushing, conscious Matty in the bow, where Captain Bertram bore her company, all saw the old cab, as it toiled up the hill in the direction of Rosendale Manor.
"Do look at Davis's cab!" exclaimed Matty. "Look, Captain Bertram, it's going in your direction. I wonder now, if any one has come by the train. It's certainly going to the Manor. There are no other houses out in that direction. Do look, Captain Bertram."
"Lor, Matty, you are so curious!" exclaimed her sister Sophy, who overheard these remarks from her position as bow oar. "As if Captain Bertram cared! You always do so fuss over little things, Matty. Even if there are visitors coming to the Manor, I'm sure the captain doesn't care. He is not like us who never see anybody. Are you, Captain Bertram?"
"I beg your pardon," said the captain, waking put of a reverie into which he had sunk. "Did you speak, Miss Bell?" he continued, turning with a little courteous movement, which vastly became him, towards the enamored Matty.
"I said a cab was going up the hill," said Matty.
"Oh, really! A cab is an interesting sight, particularly a Northbury cab. Shall I make a riddle for you on the spot, Miss Bell? What is the sole surviving curiosity still to be found out of Noah's ark?"
Matty went off into her usual half-hysterical laughter.
"Oh! I do declare, Captain Bertram, you are too killingly clever for anything," she responded. "Oh, my poor side—I'll die if I laugh any more. Oh, do have mercy on me! To compare that poor cab to Noah's ark!"
"I didn't; it isn't the least like the ark, only I think it must once have found a shelter within that place of refuge."
"Oh! oh! oh! I am taken with such a stitch when I laugh. You are too witty, Captain Bertram. Sophy, you must hear what the captain has said. Oh, you killing, funny man—you must repeat that lovely joke to Sophy."
"Excuse me, it was only meant for Miss Matty's ears."
Matty stopped laughing, to blush all over her face, and Sophy thought it more decorous to turn her back on the pair.
"Does not that green boat belong to Miss Meadowsweet?" interrupted Bertram. "Look, Miss Bell, I am sure that is Miss Meadowsweet's boat."
(He had seen it for the last ten minutes, and had been secretly hoping that Mrs. Bell would unconsciously steer in that direction; she was going the other way, however, and he was obliged to speak.)
"Yes, that's Beatrice," said Matty, in an indifferent tone. "She generally goes for a row in the evening."
"All alone like that?"
"Yes, Mrs. Meadowsweet is such a coward. She is afraid of the water."
"Poor Miss Meadowsweet, how sad for her to be by herself!"
Matty gave a furtive and not too well-pleased glance at her captain.
"Bee likes to be alone," she said.
"I should never have thought it. She seems a sociable, bright sort of girl. Don't you want to talk to her? I know you do. I see it in your face. You think it will be irksome for me, but, never mind, we need not stay long. I must not be selfish nor indulge in the wish to keep you all to myself. I know you want to talk to Miss Meadowsweet, and so you shall,—I won't have you balked."
Here he raised his voice.
"Mrs. Bell, will you steer over to Miss Meadowsweet's boat? Miss Matty, here, has something to say to her."
Not an earthly thing had Matty to communicate to her friend, but the captain had managed to put the matter in such a light that she could only try to look pleased, and pretend to acquiesce.
"Oh, yes, she had always lots to say to her darling Bee," she murmured. And then, somehow, her poor little silly spirits went down, and she had a sensation of feeling rather flat.
As will be seen by the foregoing remarks, Captain Bertram had a rare gift for making killing and funny speeches.
Matty had over and over pronounced him to be the most brilliantly witty person she had ever in the whole course of her life encountered. But his talent as a supposed wit was nothing at all to the cleverness with which he now managed to keep the large white boat by the side of the small green one for the remainder of the evening. It was entirely managed by the superior will of one person, for certainly none of the Bells wished for this propinquity.
Mrs. Bell, who like a watchful hen-mother was apparently seeing nothing, and yet all the time was tenderly brooding over the little chick whom she hoped was soon about to take flight from the parent nest, saw at a glance that her chick looked nothing at all beside that superior chicken of Mrs. Meadowsweet's. For Matty's little nose was sadly burnt, and one lock of her thin limp hair was flying not too picturesquely in the breeze. And her home-cut jacket was by no means remarkably becoming, and one of her small, uncovered hands—why would Matty take her gloves off?—was burnt red, not brown by the sun. Beatrice, on the contrary, looked as she always did, trim and neat, and bright and gracious. She had on the gray cashmere dress which she had worn when Captain Bertram first began to lose his heart to her, and over this, tonight, she had twisted a long bright crimson scarf. Into her white hat, too, she had pinned a great bunch of crimson roses, so that, altogether, Beatrice in her pretty green boat made a beautiful picture. She would have made this in any case, for her pose was so good, and her figure fine, but when, in addition, there was a sweet intelligent face without one scrap of self-consciousness about it, and two gray eyes full of a tender and sympathetic light, and when the rosy lips only opened to make the pleasantest and most appropriate speeches, and only to give utterance to words of tact and kindness, Mrs. Bell was not very far wrong when she felt a sense of uneasiness for her own poor chick.
Shuffle, however, as she would up in the stern, viciously pull the rudder string so as to incline the boat away from Beatrice, the captain's will still kept the green boat and the white together. Was he likely to give in or to succumb to a woman like Mrs. Bell? Had he not planned this meeting in his own mind from an early hour that morning? For had he not met Beatrice and incidentally gathered that she would be sure to be on the water that night? And after receiving this information, had he not carefully made his plans, wandering about on the quay just when the Bells were getting into their boat, accepting the invitation eagerly given that he should go on the water with them, and afterwards come home to supper.
"Sophy," Mrs. Bell had gasped, at that critical and triumphant moment in a whisper, pulling her youngest daughter aside, "fly up to Gibb's at the corner, and order in two lobsters for supper. The captain loves lobsters with the coral in them. Be sure you see that they have the coral in them, Sophy. Fly, child. We'll wait for you here."
And Captain Bertram had overheard this whisper, and mentally determined that Beatrice Meadowsweet should also eat lobster with coral in it for supper. Was it likely, therefore, that he would now yield to that impatient tug of Mrs. Bell's rudder? On the contrary, he put out his hand in apparently the most unconscious way, and held the little green boat to the side of the white. In his way he was a diplomat, and even Matty did not suspect that he wanted to do anything but show her a kindness by keeping her in such close conversation with her friend.
"It's getting quite chill," suddenly exclaimed Mrs. Bell. "Girls, it's time for us to be getting home. Your father likes his supper punctually. Well, Bee, my dear, there's no use in asking you to supper, I suppose? Of course, more than welcome you'd be if you would come, lovey, but you're such a daughter—one in a thousand. I assure you, Captain Bertram, I can hardly ever get that girl to leave her mother alone in the evening."
Beatrice laughed.
"It so happens," she said, "that my mother is having tea and supper to-night at Mrs. Butler's. So if you really care to have me, Mrs. Bell, I shall be delighted to come."
Beatrice, the popular, the beloved of all in the town, never knew, never to her dying day, that on a certain memorable occasion, good-humored, fat, pompous Mrs. Bell would have given half a sovereign to box her ears. The astute captain, however, guessed her feelings, and chuckled inwardly. He had also found out during his brief morning's conversation that Mrs. Meadowsweet was going to sup from home.
"How delightful you look, Miss Bell!" he said, suddenly, fixing his dark eyes on Matty.
Their glance caused her to start and blush.
"Mrs. Bell," he said, raising his voice again, "Miss Matty has been so anxious to have Miss Meadowsweet's company this evening. And now we are all happy," he added, gayly. "Shall I give you another riddle, Miss Matty?"
Mrs. Bell's anxious brows relaxed, and she smiled inwardly.
"Poor man! He is over head and ears in love," she murmured. "I suppose he thinks Beatrice will play gooseberry with the other girls, and leave him more chance to be alone with little Matty. She does not look her best, that I will say for her; but, poor fellow, he sees no faults, that's evident. How beautiful the love-light in his eyes is—ah, dear me, it reminds me of the time when I was young, and Bell used to go on his knees to me—Bell hadn't eyes like Captain Bertram though. Dear, dear, he is attentive, poor man, and how close he bends over Matty. I'll help him, so I will. I'll take Beatrice and the other girls away when once we get out of the boat. We four will walk up to the house together, and let Captain Bertram and his little girl follow. Why, of course, she's his little girl; bless her, the dear child! Then when we get in, I'll get Bee and Alice and Sophy to come upstairs by way of consulting how Matty's new dress is to be made, so the two poor things can have the drawing-room to themselves. I shouldn't be a bit surprised if he popped there and then. Well, I am gratified. Bertram is a pretty name—Matilda Bertram! She won't like to be known as Matty, then. 'Mrs. Captain Bertram'—it sounds very stylish. I wonder how much money pa will allow for the trousseau. And how am I to manage about the breakfast? None of our rooms are big, and all the town's people will want to be asked. It isn't for me to turn my back on old friends; but I doubt if the Bertrams will like to meet every one, of course, they are the first to be considered. Lor, Sophy, how you startled me; what's the matter, child?"
"You're in a brown study, ma. How much longer are you going to stay in the boat? We have all landed."
"Good gracious! mercy mother! Help me out quick, Sophy, quick! Bee, Beatrice, come and lend me your hand. You are bigger than my girls, and my legs are always a little unsteady in a boat. Oh, not you, Captain Bertram, I beg, I pray. You just go on with Matty to the house, and we'll follow presently. Go on like a good man, and don't bother yourself."
Here she winked broadly at Beatrice, who started and colored.
"I don't want to keep him back," she said, in a broad whisper to the young lady, who was helping her to alight on the steps. "He's over head and ears, and I thought we would give them their chance. You stay close to me, lovey. What a fine strong arm you have! There! Alice hasn't a bit of gumption—as if Matty wanted Alice to walk with her! Alice, come back and help your mother. I'm quite giddy from the motion of the water. Come back, child, I say!"
But it was not Alice who turned. Captain Bertram, with the most gracious gallantry, proffered his arm to the fat old lady, and while he helped her to the house looked again and again at Beatrice.
Mr. Bell was as thin as his wife was fat, and as quiet and unassuming as she was bumptious and talkative. On the occasion of this memorable supper he very nearly drove his better half into fits by his utter want of observation.
"It's that that worries me in Bell," the good woman was often heard to say. "When a thing is as plain as the nose on his face he won't see it. And not all my hints will make him see it. Hints!—You might hint forever to Bell, and he wouldn't know what you were driving at."
These remarks Mrs. Bell had made, times without number, concerning her spouse, but never had ehe more cause to give utterance to them than on the present occasion. For just when the whole party were seated at supper, and she by the boldest manoeuvres had placed Captain Bertram next to herself by the coffee-tray, and had planted Matty at his other side, so that he was in a measure hemmed in, and if he did not talk to Matty had no one to fall back on but herself, who, of course, would quickly, using the metaphor of battledore and shuttlecock, toss him back to her daughter—having arranged all this, what should Bell do but put his foot in it?
"Captain Bertram," he called in his thin voice across the table, "I hope you enjoyed your row, and I'm proud to see you at my humble board. But come up here, my good young sir; you're quite smothered by the missis and the teacups. We have fine room at this end, haven't we, Beatrice? You come away up here, Captain Bertram, where you'll have room to use your elbows; the missis mustn't keep you to herself altogether, that ain't fair play."
"Oh, we're as comfortable as possible, Peter," almost screamed Mrs. Bell.
But in vain. The captain was too acute a person not to seize this opportunity. He said a courteous word or two to Mrs. Bell, apologized for having already crowded her, smiled at Matty, and then with a light heart seated himself beside Beatrice.
After this, matters seemed to go wrong as far as the Bells were concerned. It is true that after supper Beatrice called Matty to her side, and looked over a photographic album with her, and tried hard to draw her into the gay conversation and to get her to reply to the light repartee which Captain Bertram so deftly employed. But, alas for poor Matty she had no conversational powers; she was only great at interjections, at ceaseless giggling, and at violent and uncontrollable fits of blushing. Even Beatrice felt a sense of repulsion at the very open way in which Matty played her innocent cards. Matty was in love, and she showed it by voice, look and gesture. Beatrice tried to shield her, she was mortified for her, and felt a burning sense of resentment against the captain.
In spite, however, of the resentment of the one girl, and the too manifest admiration of the other, this hero managed to have pretty much his own way. Beatrice had to reply to his sallies, she was forced to meet his eyes; now and then even he drew a smile from her.
When the time came for Miss Meadowsweet to go home, Albert Bell was eagerly summoned to accompany her.
"This is unnecessary," said the captain; "I will see Miss Meadowsweet back to the Gray House."
"Oh, now, Captain! Bee, don't you think it's really too much for him?"
"Of course I don't, dear Mrs. Bell," said Beatrice, stopping the good lady's lips with a kiss; "but Albert shall come too, so that I shall be doubly escorted."
She nodded and smiled to her hostess, and Mrs. Bell felt a frantic desire to send Matty with her brother, but some slight sense of decorum prevented her making so bare-faced a suggestion.
Albert Bell was very proud to walk with Beatrice, and Captain Bertram felt proportionately sulky. To Albert's delight, who wanted to confide his own love affairs to Bee, the captain said good-night at the top of the High Street.
"As you have an escort I won't come any further," he said. "When are we to see you again? Will you come to the Manor to-morrow?"
"I don't know," said Beatrice, "I've made no plans for to-morrow."
"Then come to us; Catherine told me to ask you. Our tennis court is in prime order. Do come; will you promise?"
"I won't quite promise, but I'll come if I can."
"Thanks; we shall look out for you."
He shook hands, gave her an earnest glance, nodded to Bell and turned away. His evening had been a partial success, but not a whole one. He left Beatrice, as he almost always did, with a sense of irritation. It was her frank and open indifference that impelled him to her side. Indifference when Captain Bertram chose to woo was an altogether novel experience to so fascinating an individual. Hitherto it had been all the other way. He had flirted many times, and with success. Once even he had fallen in love; he owned to himself that he had been badly hit, but there had been no doubt at all about his love being returned, it had been given back to him in full and abundant measure. He sighed to-night as he thought of that passionate episode. He remembered ardent words, and saw again a face which had once been all the world to him. Separation had come, however; his was not a stable nature, and the old love, the first love, had given place to many minor flirtations.
"I wonder where my old love is now," he thought, and then again he felt a sense of irritation as he remembered Beatrice. "She is quite the coolest girl I have ever met," he said to himself. "But I'll win her yet. Yes, I'm determined. Am I to eat the bread of humiliation in vain? Faugh! Am I to make love to a creature like Matty Bell in the vain hope of rousing the envy or the jealousy of that proud girl? I don't believe she has got either envy or jealousy. She seemed quite pleased when I spoke to that wretched little personage, although she had the grace to look a trifle ashamed for her sex when Miss Matty so openly made love to me. Well, this is a slow place, and yet, when I think of that haughty—no, though, she's not haughty—that imperturbable Beatrice Meadowsweet, it becomes positively interesting.
"Why has the girl these airs? And her father kept a shop, too! I found that fact out from Matty Bell to-day. What a spiteful, teasing little gnat that same Matty is, trying to sting her best friend. What a little mock ridiculous air she put on when she tried to explain to me the social status of a coal merchant (I presume Bell is a coal merchant) versus a draper."
As Bertram strolled along, avoiding the High Street, and choosing the coast line for his walk, he lazily smoked a pipe, and thought, in that idle indifferent way with which men of his stamp always do exercise their mental faculties, about his future. His past, his present, his possible future rose up before the young fellow. He was harassed by duns, he was, according to his own way of thinking, reduced to an almost degrading state of poverty. His mother had put her hand to a bill for a considerable amount to save him. He was morally certain that she would have to meet that bill, and when she met it that she would be half ruined. Nevertheless, he felt gay, and light at heart, for men of his class are seldom troubled with remorse.
Presently he reached the lodge gates. His mother's fad about having them locked was always religiously kept, and he grumbled now as he sought for a latch-key in his waistcoat-pocket.
He opened the side gate and let himself in; the gate had a spring, and was so constructed that it could shut and lock itself by the same act. Bertram was preparing to walk quickly up the avenue when he was startled by a sudden morement; a tall slim apparition in gray came slowly out of the darkness, caused by the shadow of the lodge, to meet him.
"Good God!" he said; and he stepped back, and his heart thumped hard against his breast.
"It's me, Loftus—I'm back again—I'm with you again," said a voice which thrilled him.
The girl in gray flung her arms around his neck, and laid her head of red gold on his breast.
"Good God! Nina! Josephine! Where have you come from? I was thinking of you only tonight. It's a year since we met. Where have you sprung from? Out of the sky, or the earth? Look at me, witch, look in my face!"
He put his hand under her chin, raised her very fair oval face; (the moonlight fell full on it—he could see it well); he looked long and hungrily into her eyes, then kissed her eagerly several times.
"Where have you come from?" he repeated. "My God! to think I was walking to meet you in such a calm fashion this evening."
"You never were very calm, Loftie, nor was I. Feel my heart—I am almost in a tempest of joy at meeting you again. I knew you'd be glad. You couldn't help yourself."
"I'm glad and I'm sorry. You know you intoxicate me, witch—I thought I had got over that old affair. What: don't flash your eyes at me. Oh, yes, Nina, I am glad, I am delighted to see you once again."
"And to kiss me, and love me again?"
"Yes, to kiss you and love you again."
"How soon will you marry me, Loftie?"
"We needn't talk about that to-night. Tell me why you have come, and how. Where is your grandfather? Do you still sing in the streets for a living?"
"Hush, you insult me. I am a rich girl now."
"You rich? What a joke!"
"No, it is a reality. Riches go by comparison, and Josephine Hart has an income—therefore she is rich compared to the Josephine who had none. When will you marry me, Loftie?"
"Little puss! We'll talk of that another day."
He stroked her cheek, put his arm around her waist and kissed her many times.
"You have not told me yet why you came here," he said.
She laughed.
"I came here because my own sweet will directed me. I have taken rooms here at this lodge. The man called Tester and his wife will attend on me."
"Good gracious! at my mother's very gates Is that wise, Nina."
"Wise or unwise I have done it."
"To be near me?"
"Partly."
"Nina, you half frighten me. You are not going to do me an injury? It will prejudice my mother seriously if she finds out my—my—"
"Your love for me," finished Josephine.
"Yes."
"Why will it prejudice her?"
"Need I—must I tell you? My mother is proud; she—she would almost disown me if I made a mésalliance."
Nina flung back her head.
"You talk like a boy," she said. "When you marry me you save, not degrade, yourself. Ah, I know a secret. Such a secret! Such a blessed, blessed, happy secret for me. It is turning me into a good girl. It causes my heart to sing. When I think of it I revel in delight; when I think of it I could dance: when I remember it I could shout with exultation."
"Nina, what do you mean?"
"Nothing that you must know. I rejoice in my secret because it brings me to you, and you to me. You degrade yourself by marrying me? You'll say something else some day. Now, goodnight. I'm going back to Tester. He's stone deaf, and he's waiting up for me. Good-night—good-night. No, Loftus, I won't injure you. I injure those I hate, not those I love."
She kissed her hand to him. He tried to catch the slim fingers to press them to his lips, but with a gay laugh she vanished, shutting the lodge door after her. Loftus Bertram walked up the avenue with the queerest sensation of terror and rejoicing.