as they entered the carriage, and on the way home, hugh waited for some further personal remarks from his companion, but none came regarding themselves. miss frink declared herself in favor of pushing through the plans for mrs. lumbard’s recital.
“i should like to get it over with for many reasons. one is that i feel like a bull in a china shop when it comes to entertaining. i know no more about it, nor half so much as my cook. i rely on you to be host, hugh.”
“i’ll do the best a clumsy doughboy can; but there is mr. ogden. he knows the ropes about everything.”
“yes, he does. i admit that.” miss frink nodded in a way which again made hugh feel that the day of reckoning was upon him. “he’s a smooth rascal!”
hugh felt profoundly uncomfortable. he yearned to loose that damocles weapon himself. he couldn’t break his promise to ogden, but he could relieve himself in an honest remark, something that would lend some respectability to the situation.
[198]
“are you going to let me have that job in the store that i came for, miss frink?” he asked.
she smiled vaguely at the roadside. “of course. let us see. you want to begin at the sub-basement, and learn how department stores are constructed.”
hugh blushed furiously. “don’t make fun of me, please. i was packing boxes in a basement when mr. ogden looked me up, for my family’s sake.”
“yes. he says he used to be in love with your sister,” returned miss frink composedly; “but he says so many things besides his prayers.”
“i guess there’s no doubt about that,” returned the boy, miserably embarrassed. “it took some pretty strong impulse to make anybody take any interest in such a shuffling proposition as i was.—it seems a year ago, that day he found me. my hand against every man, and every man’s hand against me.”
“and he dressed you up in nice clean clothes, and laid out your programme, and sent you on your way.”
“why—he did—but did he tell you so this morning when you were hobnobbing so long?”
[199]
had ogden laid down the cards without telling him?
“no,” replied miss frink equably. “i just x-rayed him a little. he was taking all the credit of your saving my life. i believe he allowed providence a small part.”
“oh, do let us forget that, miss frink!” ejaculated the boy. “i’m a chap that’s come to you for a job, and you are kind enough to give it to me. i do want to learn the business.”
“and perhaps you will,” was the quiet reply; “but we’ll wait a bit yet till you can walk a mile or so and stand up under it. i do like those duanes. that little millicent—i can’t help calling her little, though she’s as tall as i am. what a refreshment it is in these days to find a girl a lady.”
“i’m sorry you don’t like ally,” said hugh.
“i don’t like liars,” returned miss frink calmly.
the boy’s ears grew crimson.
“i suppose i ought to have been a man,” she added. “i seem to be out of sympathy with most things feminine. mr. ogden gave me information concerning mrs. lumbard this morning which lifted a big irritation. it makes whatever i do for her now a favor instead[200] of a duty. once, hugh, i had an honest friend—just one. there never has been another. we loved each other. mrs. lumbard came here representing herself as this woman’s granddaughter, and she called me aunt susanna on the strength of it. mr. ogden unconsciously spoiled her game this morning. i never had trusted her, and had rebuked myself for it; but i’m usually right—that x-ray, you know.”
hugh, rolling along beside her in the charming little carriage, wondered wretchedly if she trusted him, or if the x-ray was working.
“i’m sorry for ally,” he said gravely.
“so am i,” responded miss frink promptly. “i hope she will develop some day into a worthy woman. i regret that it has to be in farrandale, but we can’t have all things to please us.”
“some day,” thought hugh, “she will want me to be a worthy man, anywhere but in farrandale.”
he was in his room dressing for dinner when ogden came in.
“well, admitted to the bar yet?” demanded the latter gayly.
“look here, ogden”—hugh advanced and seized his friend. “when you were spilling[201] ally’s beans this morning, did you spill mine, too, and never told me?”
“not so, dear one. will you kindly not pull the button off my coat?”
“she acts as if she knew. we were all on the duanes’ porch and she asked me to show my mother’s picture to miss duane. how did she suddenly know it was my mother?”
“whew!” whistled ogden, surprised. “search me. i never gave her a clue; but she seemed to have it in for me for some reason this morning. oh,” after a thoughtful moment, “she doesn’t know! she’s the yea-yea, and nay-nay, kind. if she knew you were hugh sinclair, she would either say, ‘bless you, my child,’ or tell you to get off the earth. i know her.”
“i’m growing to know her,” said hugh, going on with his toilet, “and i’ll say she’s a trump. i don’t like to look forward to being despised by her.”
“hugh, my son, don’t make me laugh. you’ve got the woman. i don’t know whether it’s the shape of your nose or your general air of having the world by the tail, but the deed’s done.”
hugh regarded him gloomily. “all to be knocked over by a simple twist of the wrist when she learns that i’m the thing she despises[202] most—a liar. she says she has had only one honest friend. i’d tell her the truth to-night if it weren’t for ally’s recital. i don’t want anything to disturb that, poor girl.”
under ogden’s guidance, the invitations to mrs. lumbard’s recital were sent out promptly, and farrandale society rose to its first opportunity to be entertained in the frink mansion. not a regret was received by miss frink’s social secretary pro tem. adèle, as the star of the occasion, took an oddly small part in the preparations. she did some practicing on her programme, apologizing to hugh for its more weighty numbers.
leonard grimshaw observed her infatuation for the young man, and it added to the score against him which began on the day hugh was carried into the house. was he in love with adèle himself? he sometimes asked himself the question. she had sparkled into such life and vivacity in these last days that any man would have felt her attraction.
one day he found himself alone with her on the veranda. “do you realize all miss frink is doing for you in giving this affair?” he asked.
“no. is it such a great indulgence?” she returned lightly.
[203]
“positively. it is breaking her habits of years, and it will be a great expense. she is making lavish preparations,” declared grimshaw severely.
“well, don’t blame me for it, leonard,” said the young woman, reverting to the appealing manner. “it was hughie’s idea.”
“for pity’s sake don’t call him ‘hughie’!” exclaimed the other irritably. “it makes me sick. you’re so crazy about him, anyway.”
adèle smiled up at her companion. “how delightful! i do believe you’re jealous, leonard. i’m complimented to death.”
“you have far more reason to be jealous,” he retorted. “anybody with half an eye can see that stanwood is fascinated with millicent’s demure ways. ‘in the spring a young man’s fancy,’ etc., you know, and these walks with her every day—”
“he has to go to her grandfather,” broke in adèle, a frown gathering and quenching the light in her eyes. “he cares nothing for that stupid creature except to tease her.”
“and you should care nothing for him, adèle,” said grimshaw quickly. “he is a crude boy without a cent, just beginning life. why waste your time? you are meat for his masters.”
[204]
she lifted her head coquettishly, the frown disappearing. “are you his master?”
“perhaps,” said grimshaw.
his regard for adèle had been deepened by the fact that miss frink was giving this affair for her. it seemed to prove that she was more and more a person to be reckoned with, and likely to share with himself in all his employer’s favors. moreover, the young woman’s attraction to and for hugh stanwood had seemed to create a new eagerness for her in himself which at moments threatened to overcome his caution. if adèle were really to be one of miss frink’s heirs, there was no need for caution. what worried him was that he feared that some time he might commit himself on an uncertainty. adèle in her present mood was a menace to clear thinking.
the day of the recital arrived. john ogden was here, there, and everywhere. the piano was freshly tuned. he supervised the removal of the drawing-room furniture and the placing of the crowd of camp-chairs. miss frink, feeling invertebrate for the first time in her life, forgot that he was a smooth rascal, and followed his suggestions implicitly as to dressing-rooms and the servants’ duties. leonard grimshaw’s nostrils dilated when his employer informed[205] him that mr. ogden had given instructions to the caterer and that he, grim, need feel no care.
“i think you would find, miss frink, that we could manage this affair if mr. ogden were still in new york,” he said.
“thank heaven he isn’t,” returned that lady devoutly.
millicent found it not such an easy matter to put her employer to sleep to-day. she was reading the book of an arctic explorer; and miss frink was learning more about the astonishing flora of those regions than she had ever expected to know as the pleasant voice read on, with an intelligence born of long assistance to her grandfather’s failing eyes.
at last miss frink flung off the white silk handkerchief. “it’s no use, millicent,” she said. “you know how it is when a young débutante is taking her first plunge into society. it’s exciting. i never gave a party before.”
“i’m sure it is going to be a wonderful one,” replied the girl, closing the book on her finger. “every one is so pleased to be coming.”
she spoke perfunctorily. adèle had been steadying a ladder for hugh as she crossed the veranda coming in, and the look on the former’s[206] face as she gazed up, and he laughed down, had infuriated her by the sudden heat it brought on at the back of her own neck.
“how-do, millicent,” hugh had cried; “you’ll have to go home alone to-day. don’t you cry!”
she had bowed to adèle, ignoring his chaff, and said something pleasant about anticipating the evening.
“you would think,” she said now, “that mrs. lumbard would be the excited one. how coolly she takes it.”
miss frink shook her pillowed head. “i think it is nothing in her life to play to a lot of rubes,” she remarked.
“they won’t care to be taught by her if she feels that way,” said millicent stiffly.
miss frink laughed. she had learned to laugh in the last month. “i shouldn’t have said that. don’t repeat it and ruin business. i’m just guessing; but i don’t believe any kind of an audience would disconcert her. have you heard her play?”
“no.”
“well, you have a treat in store. as hugh says, nobody can hit the box like ally.”
“why does he call her ally?”
“because of her white hair. when she was[207] working among the doughboys they called her an albino.”
“is she one?” millicent looked preternaturally serious.
“search me,” returned the débutante carelessly. “now, look here, milly, i have another job for you. i want you to receive with me to-night.”
“what, miss frink?”
“mr. ogden says i’ve got to stand up there by the portières like a black satin post, and receive the guests as they come in. i thought i should like to have you and hugh stand by me in the ordeal.”
it entertained miss frink to see millicent blush, and she watched the color come now, and the startled look in the girl’s eyes, like that of a bird ready to fly.
“you see,” went on miss frink, “somebody will have to nudge me when i say, ‘good-evening, mr. griscom; i see you put that deal over for the woman’s club building!’ ‘good-evening, mr. bacon; so that rise in real estate across the river is upon us. congratulations!’ etc., etc.”
“but i wouldn’t be any good, miss frink, and i—and i couldn’t—it would—for you to honor hugh and me together like that—”
[208]
miss frink sighed. “i suppose i should have to call another town meeting to tell them again that there was nothing in it. i was saying what i would like to have; but, as a matter of fact, mr. grimshaw would be very justly hurt if i planned on hugh’s supporting me.”
millicent looked relieved. “mr. grimshaw is just the right one,” she said.
“and you would have no objection to standing up with him?” miss frink’s quizzical smile was playing about her lips.
the young girl shook her head.
“then you put on your prettiest frock and come and stand beside the old lady, and burst out with something about the weather if you hear me mention stocks, bonds, or real estate.”
millicent went home and told her grandfather of the high honor thrust upon her. the responsibility, with that of netting damaris’s hair into a demure coiffure for the occasion, made her all aquiver with excitement.
as soon as she had left miss frink that day, adèle knocked on her hostess’s door.
“i heard you and miss duane talking, so i knew you were not asleep, aunt susanna,” she said. “i wanted you to see if i look all right for to-night.”
miss frink drew herself up to a sitting[209] posture and regarded her visitor. adèle looked like a french marquise, with her snowy hair, excited color, and eyes sparkling like brown diamonds. her white crêpe gown clung to her.
miss frink adjusted her glasses and nodded. “very picturesque,” she said. “sit down a minute, adèle.”
the latter’s eyes scintillated with swift apprehension. there was no warmth in her hostess’s approval.
“what do you wish to say, aunt susanna? is it about my hair? i’ll tell you.”
“no, no,” said miss frink. “we are way past that.”
adèle liked the atmosphere less and less.
“please wait, then,” she said impulsively. “i don’t want to be thrown off my balance for to-night.”
miss frink shrugged her shoulders. “i don’t know much about temperamental people,” she said. “go on, then. you look very handsome, adèle.”
the young woman vanished quickly. even miss frink said she looked very handsome. she exulted as she thought of hugh. his image constantly filled her thought, and a thousand imaginings of the future went careering through her brain.
