a happier couple than fenie and harry could not be found in all new york. this must be true, for both of them said so one evening while they were the only occupants of trif's cozy parlor, while trif and her husband were out, making a short call.
harry had just told fenie that while he was very happy about his sister and jermyn, because he thought them specially suited to each other, he was also very sorry for them, for naturally love could not be so delightful to jermyn as to him, for was not the officer at least ten years the older. ten years, to harry, seemed time enough to transform a young man into a person of middle age.
fenie said she never would have mentioned such things if harry had not begun it, but she was dreadfully sorry for kate, for the dear girl, being much older than she—six or seven years older—could not know the bliss of youth that gives itself entirely to thoughts of love.
harry did not like to hear any allusions made to the age of his sister, for kate had always seemed to him, until he met fenie, the embodiment of everything girlishly delightful. was she not the merriest romp of the family? was it not she who always brought him out of his brown studies? did she not play with the younger children as if she herself was still in short dresses?
by a natural coincidence, jermyn and kate, only a few squares away, were congratulating themselves that they were not young things like harry and fenie. they had seen much of the world; they knew men and women well; they had gone through many illusions from start to finish, but now they had found each other, the world might move on in its orbit, or out of its orbit, with no end of trouble to all concerned—except them. they were one in soul and purpose for all time, and, they devoutly hoped, for all eternity.
about this time a bell rang somewhere in the house, but neither of them heeded it. why should they? were they not sitting and looking as if jermyn had merely dropped in for an evening call? kate was pretending to do some alleged "fancy work," and jermyn was admiring the movements of her pretty hands, and wishing that his pay or his prospects were so good that the aforesaid pretty hands might never have to do anything more exacting or less becoming, and thinking he had been a brute to propose to such a woman when he had only his pay, nearly two thousand a year, and a thousand or two dollars he had saved, when the current of his thoughts was disturbed by the appearance of trixy, who stood before him in a waterproof cloak and a face covered with tears.
"trixy!" exclaimed jermyn. "what has happened to you?"
"they're havin' an awful row," sobbed the child.
"they? not your father and mother?"
"no, indeed! they never fight—aren't you ashamed of yourself! it's the other two—aunt fee and harry. she says she never loved him much anyhow, and she didn't ask him to go down south and bother her, and he said he didn't believe she knew her own mind, and she said she wished he had any mind worth knowin', and she wished he was half as much of a man as lieutenant jermyn, that he'd been abusin'. she said you was a man, and he wasn't nothin' but a boy. and papa and mamma was gone out, and i was awful frightened, and i got the cook to bring me around here, so i could ask miss trewman if somethin' couldn't be done for 'em."
"why should he have abused me?" asked jermyn of no one in particular.
"why should she compare him with you?" asked kate. "jermyn," she exclaimed, "did you ever make love to fenie wardlow?"
"never! upon my honor, my dear."
"then i'm sure i don't know——"
"neither do i. suppose i go around with trixy and find out?"
"i shall go with you," said kate. there was something in her voice that jermyn had never heard before, and it distracted his thoughts about harry and fenie. nevertheless the two quickly left the house together, and jermyn [pg 182]talked to trixy rather than to kate, and kate was made so uncomfortable thereby that she talked incessantly to trixy, which mystified jermyn greatly, although kate's hand grasped his arm tightly all the while.
on their way they chanced to meet harry, to whom jermyn said quickly:
"well met, old chap! come along with us. we are going to make a call and would like to have you with us; we can promise that you shall have a pleasant time."
"i'd be glad if something pleasant would happen on this particular evening—confound it!" replied harry in the gruff tone which some very young men, despite good breeding and association, sometimes indulge in. when they reached the highwoods' house and started up the steps harry shrank backward and said:
"not there, thank you. not this evening."
he started quickly away, but jermyn, with kate still clinging to his arm, soon overtook him, grasped his shoulder as a policeman might seize a prisoner, and said, kindly enough:
"my dear fellow, i've seen a score of clever youngsters through lovers' quarrels, and i'm going to see you through one this evening—now, or i'm going to break your neck. which do you prefer?"
harry answered nothing, although he acted like a surly criminal led by a jailor. meanwhile kate was grasping jermyn's arm tightly and pressing close to his side. what had become of trixy no one knew or thought, yet no sooner did they ring the bell than the child stood in the open doorway.
kate hurried to fenie's room, where she found the occupant bathed in tears. at any other time such a spectacle would have moved kate to tenderness, but now she rudely shook the girl and asked:
"tryphena wardlow, were you ever in love with jermyn?"
"no," replied the girl with a wondering blush. "that is——"
"did he ever make love to you? tell me—this instant!"
"no. that is——"
"did he ever kiss you?"
"no, no, no—a thousand times no! aren't you ashamed of yourself, to have asked such a question?"
"yes—i am!" said kate, "and i sincerely beg your pardon, but—here, dear, let me dry your eyes. you poor little darling, has harry been a brute? oh, won't i make life miserable for him when i get him alone, at home? there, dear! if your own sister isn't here to comfort you, you shan't lack another. come down stairs with me; jermyn is here, and i want you to look your prettiest."
"it isn't necessary," said fenie, trying to clear her face of the traces of sorrow and anger. "he's no eyes for any one else when you're present."
"you darling girl! say that again—and again!"
"old chap," jermyn was saying to harry, "i don't know what has been the trouble, but i know the nature of it, for i've seen signs of it in [pg 184]many other men who have been in love. take all the blame to yourself—do! 'tis the privilege of men to relieve women of all of that sort of thing they can."
"'tis very well for you to talk," grumbled harry. "'they jest at scars that never felt a wound.' but——"
"but, you blessed idiot, do you know what you are in danger of losing? fenie is one of the sweetest little women on the face of the earth."
"how do you know?" asked harry defiantly. "were you ever in love with her? from something she said this evening i am half inclined to——"
"i was in love with her sister, many years ago," said jermyn softly; "so i know the family quality."
"i beg your pardon," said harry, humbly, and trying hard to be once more a gentleman. "but she said——"
"'tis no matter what she said. be a man; be a lover; be a gentleman. sh—h—h-!—they're coming."
kate entered with fenie, who greeted jermyn effusively, while harry chatted with his sister, there being no one else for him to speak to, for trixy had disappeared. kate and jermyn soon succeeded in making the conversation general, and in compelling harry and fenie to talk to each other. then jermyn and kate began to admire some of the highwoods' pictures so intently that harry and fenie could talk only to each other; they dropped their voices, but the [pg 185]tones were audible and promised well. finally, as the others turned they saw something which caused them to say:
"we beg a thousand pardons."
"you needn't," replied fenie bravely. "we've made up, and i don't care if all the world knows it, for it was all my fault from the first."
"what a fib!" exclaimed harry.
"it isn't! but how—" here fenie turned to kate, "did you chance to come to the rescue? my heart was almost broken."
"and mine," added harry.
"and mine," said kate tragically.
"mine is of no particular consequence," drawled jermyn, with a reproachful look at kate, "still, it got a frightful stab."
"you poor fallow!" exclaimed kate, making amends in the most delightful manner appropriate to the occasion. this demonstration incited harry and fenie to be very tender to each other, and there was an instant of delicious silence, too soon broken by a pitiful wail which seemed to come from a portière.
"i s'pose it don't matter about my poor little bit of a heart, but it was broke most to pieces."
"did that child overhear the quarrel?" whispered fenie.
"'twas she who brought us word about it," kate replied.
then harry and fenie kissed trixy, and jermyn took her into his arms, and the child, relieved of her load of responsibility, fell asleep, and jermyn held her so tenderly and looked at her so fondly and thoughtfully that kate looked upon him with a new and tender expression in her eyes, although she wouldn't for the world have had him see it. finally kate herself took the child, so softly that she did not waken it, and carried it to and fro a moment or two, and finally laid it upon a sofa, and jermyn looked at kate every moment, and thought, and thought, and thought. at last he ventured to remark:
"all the artists and poets have been wrong. they should have made cupid a little girl."
the four sat and talked until trif and phil returned, and then they continued to talk, yet the astute heads of the family did not hear or see anything that could make them imagine that there had been any trouble. indeed, trif told her husband that it seemed strange that jermyn and kate should have spared time for a call on that particular evening, when jermyn's time was so short, and he must soon be away for no one knew how long.
