“well,” said fanny, “i saw you having a talk with granny in here this morning. i suppose she has promised i shall go to london and live like other girls. that would be so like her,—such a sweet creature?—”
“sh—sh—”
“oh, why not say what you think? i’d like to hear your real opinion of her—after all these years.”
“she is my mother; and she was angelic to me this morning.”
fanny stared, then burst into laughter. “angelic! how i should like to have seen granny do it. did you ask her if i could go to the party at bath house?”
“she is opposed to it,” said julia, evasively, “but i think i can talk her over. one would never expect to get the best of mother in the first round. i must tell you, however, that i shall not go to bath house myself?—”
“oh, that mr. tay! only it is romantic, and he is handsome, and quite nice. do tell me, julia,” she asked eagerly, “what is it like to be in love with a real man?”
“put such thoughts out of your head for the present.”
“did he ever kiss you?”
“have you looked over my evening gowns? collins is quite excited at the prospect of fussing with them.”
“how heavenly! i’ll go this minute! what on earth is the matter with denny? he looks as if he’d just heard the guns at the fort announcing a hurricane.”
the old man almost staggered in. his expression was quite wild.
“lor’s sake, missy,” he gasped. “a visitor! a man!”
fanny snatched the card.
“julia!” she cried, more excited than denny. “it’s he! it’s mr. tay!”
julia turned her face away and walked with great dignity to the opposite door. “tell him that he must excuse me,” she said over her shoulder.
“he ask for mis’ winstone, mis’ julia.”
“for whom?”
“he say she ask him for tea.”
“she must be quite mad. well, go and find her.” and she hastened to her room, determined to punish tay for coming, but not so sure she should not waylay him in the garden when he left.
“denny,” said fanny, “ask him to come in here. and you need not disturb my aunt at present. she is taking her nap.”
“yes, missy.” and denny went off, shaking his head.
fanny ran over to a glass and smoothed her hair, put a flower in it, and made an attempt to stiffen her figure until it looked as if incased in stays. but when tay entered she immediately became as natural as the young female ever is in the presence of the young and marriageable male. tay did not look in the best of tempers, but she thought him quite handsome enough to be the hero of a romance.
“do sit down,” she said hospitably. “aunt maria will be in presently. oh, do tell me how you got in. i mean, what can aunt maria have told granny— or hasn’t she told her? perhaps i’d better take you out for a walk. granny might be too horrid.”
“i fancy mrs. winstone has told your grandmother that she asked me for tea,” said tay, with a slight access of color.
“but what?”
“oh— are not you too afraid of this—of your formidable grandmother?”
“not a bit. i only pretend to be for the sake of peace. but, oh, do tell me how aunt maria had the courage to ask you here! i’m simply mad with curiosity. a young man in this house!”
tay drew a long breath. this was an explanation he had not bargained for, and those immense eyes were disconcertingly young, and very handsome. “well, you see—this is how it is: i came here, neglected business and a good many other things, to see julia france, and i have no idea of wasting my time. i don’t like underhand methods. i’d rather fight in the open any time, but with women you almost never can. so let us call this strategy?—”
“yes! yes!” cried fanny. “but for heaven’s sake, what is it?”
“we had a conference last night at the hotel.” tay got up and walked about the room.
“oh, do go on.”
“well, briefly, we hatched a plot. mrs. winstone was to be induced to tell your grandmother that she and i are engaged?—”
“what?”
“ah—yes.”
“you and aunt maria!” she succeeded in taking it in, then went off into shrieks of laughter. tay swore under his breath, and looked out of the window.
“you and aunt maria! i never heard of anything so funny in all my life. why on earth didn’t you pretend to have fallen in love with me? that would have fooled everybody, and i should have loved to take you out for long walks—and turn you over to julia!”
“you forget that a man doesn’t care to place a girl in a false position?—”
“but aunt maria never can have made granny believe?—”
“why not? half the women in london have admirers young enough to be their sons, and sometimes they marry them. your aunt could have one of those brats dangling if she chose. it’s not my r?le, but i can play it at a pinch.” he returned to his chair. “do you think i can see julia to-day?”
“she ran away when she heard you were here.”
“oh, did she?”
“i don’t think she means to see you. that would be horrid of her. but you come here every day—to see aunt maria!—and i’ll manage it. and if you always come when granny’s asleep, you can talk to me.”
“that would be ample compensation,” said tay, mechanically. he was feeling very cross, and it was long since callow girlhood had appealed to him. still, this child was beautiful, and beauty exacts tribute at any age. he told himself that he was a surly brute, and exerted himself to be agreeable.
“you must find this a lonely life,” he observed. “what do you do with yourself? read novels? go over to parties on st. kitts?”
“novels! parties! i’ve read about ten, and i’ve never been to a party in my life. you are the first young man i’ve ever talked to.”
“really?” tay was mildly interested. “what a life for a young girl. i’ve never seen any one look less like a hermit. what do you do with yourself?”
“oh, granny put me in charge of the estate a year ago. she’s too old to go out much, and she drilled me until i thought i’d go off my head. but now i rather like it. there’s something to do, anyhow, riding over the estate every morning, keeping the mill overseer from cheating, and getting work out of lazy blacks. i can do that, and in a way it’s like having a little kingdom all your own. i’ve made them all afraid of me.”
“have you? by george, you are some girl! i thought you were merely out for fun. i’d be put to it to find another girl of your age—and—and—general style—who was running an estate. it seems to be a remarkable family, altogether.”
fanny saw that she had now really caught his attention, and found him more attractive every moment. the subject of her prosaic duties had never entered her imaginary conversations with young men, but this one was quite different himself from any of her dreams; and she suddenly found reality far more attractive than romance. she was also quick to take a cue, and was about to launch upon a description of plantation life in the west indies, when denny came running in, this time looking fairly distracted.
“lots of visitors, missy!”
“i should have told you that mrs. winstone asked the rest of our party,” said tay.
fanny forgot him in her fright, as mrs. macmanus, mr. pirie, and the morisons entered. but her instincts asserted themselves, and she went through the ordeal very creditably.
“why, how do you do?” she said hospitably. “i’m so glad to see you all in our house. please sit down. denny, go and tell mrs. winstone. ah—won’t you take off your hats?”
“no, thank you, dear,” said mrs. morison, whose eyes were brimming with mischief. “mine is so becoming. besides, a lot of hair would come off, too.”
“i will,” said mrs. macmanus, “and thank you for asking me. reminds me of my youth.” and she removed her bonnet and rolled up the strings. “even one’s hair is too warm for the tropics. pirie, you might take off your toupee. i’ve seen you do it twice when you thought no one was looking!”
“really, hannah!” pirie almost exploded. what an assault in the presence of glorious eighteen!
but fanny was paying no attention to pirie. she was gazing in rapt admiration at mrs. morison’s airy toilette of daffodil yellow, with a large chiffon hat of the same shade, covered with more little soft feathers than she had ever seen before, and a perfectly useless, but all the more enviable, sunshade of chiffon and lace.
mrs. morison saw the admiration in the girl’s eyes, and no admiration was thrown away on her. she smiled brilliantly.
“how simply enchanting to see the inside of an old west indian home,” she exclaimed. “i never had any old-fashioned things in my life. grandpa emigrated to california in the fifties, and every house he built burned down whenever the city did. so when i came along and pa was making his pile, there wasn’t so much as a daguerrotype in the family. we were just upholstered from new york and dressed from paris. how’s that for family history, miss edis?”
“oh,” said fanny, through her teeth, “how i should like to live in a country where there were no ancestors. there’s nothing else here.”
morison was also beaming upon her. “you must come and visit us in new york,” he said. “we’re imitating england and becoming too democratic to talk about ancestors, even when we’ve got ’em, and we usually haven’t.”
“why, nolly,” cried emily, who was californian when she wanted to be audacious, but valued her new york to its ultimate vanishing drop of azure blood, “you know your mother was a?—”
“pauper. she hooked my father, which is more to the point, and i’m in the race for millionaire street, which is the whole point.”
“oh, you little bleating wall street calf! such a little one, too, miss edis.”
“i might be a bigger one if you spent less. what are we here for, anyhow?” he asked, as fanny, apprehending a domestic scene, moved away. “dan can take care of his own affairs, and i feel as if i were on a ship in midocean with the wireless out of order.”
“what man ever could manage his own affairs? it would have been cruel to let dan come alone, and i know i can help him out. we mustn’t scrap and frighten mrs. france, or she’ll think the temper is in the tay family, whereas it’s always your fault?—”
but she laughed good-naturedly, extracting the sting, and morison, who never quite understood her, was mollified and shrugged his shoulders. “well, i’m going to flirt with that little west indian girl who doesn’t know the first thing about life and wants to know it all in five minutes. great fun. serve you right, too, for bringing me here.”
“run along,” said his wife, indulgently, and he joined fanny, who was talking to tay, and told her that the st. kitts girls were coming to the party on thursday night. but fanny had lost all interest in the married man now that a single one had appeared, and gave him her shoulder with a young girl’s brutality. a moment later, when mrs. winstone entered, she deliberately drew tay into the embrasure of one of the windows. she had curled her lip at her grandaunt’s appearance, but the rest applauded, and mrs. winstone was secretly delighted with herself. she had abandoned her usual discretion and got herself up like a woman of thirty. there was rouge on her cheeks, a flower in her youthfully dressed hair, and a pink chiffon scarf floated over her white gown.
“good! good!” cried mrs. macmanus. “how does it work?”
“oh, quite all right. only i was made to feel as if i had escaped from the mummy room in the british museum and stolen my grandniece’s clothes.”
“upon my word, maria,” said pirie, gallantly, “i didn’t know you could do it. ten to one tay does fall in love with you. why not? julia’s got a bee in her bonnet. we men don’t like bees as domestic pets. they sting.”
“curious that even the young men are as old-fashioned as ever, while the women go marching on,” said mrs. macmanus, unrolling her knitting. “what will you all do for partners, by and by?”
“oh, we’ll still marry them,” said mrs. morison, patronizingly. “they give us our little romance, and it’s no part of our policy to let the race die out.”
“hear! hear!” cried mrs. macmanus, looking over her eye-glasses. “so you, too, are a suffragette. you never gave us a hint.”
“i forgot about it down here. but last winter in new york, everybody who was anybody, or wanted to be, went in for it. two or three of the rich and fashionable women whose names are regular electric signs—designed by the press—great gilt way—took it up, and all the rank outsiders fairly fell over themselves to get into the new suffrage societies, and shake hands with those brunhildes come down off their fire-girt perch. makes me sick. i believe in it because i know it’s coming.”
“ha! ha!” cried pirie. “a good patriot always loves the top.”
“don’t be cynical, pirie,” said mrs. macmanus, who had not failed to note the longing glances cast in fanny’s direction. “it can’t be laid to extreme youth in your case.”
“now, why is a man always called cynical when he tells the truth? no limelight, no martyrs.”
“oh, what a sophisticated old lot we are,” said mrs. macmanus, with a sigh. “i wish i knew as little as that charming fanny. she is youth—innocent barbarous youth—personified. look at her flirting with her aunt’s lover. i always said that honor was an acquired virtue.”
“sh—sh—” whispered mrs. winstone, and she sprang to her feet.
mrs. edis stood in the terrace doorway leaning on her stick. she looked like an allegory of the past, the uncompromising disillusioned past, which has come in contact with none of the bridges that connect with the present. her keen contemptuous gaze had just lit upon fanny and tay, when the company, made aware of her presence, rose precipitately, and were presented by mrs. winstone.
“i bid you all welcome to my house,” said mrs. edis, formally.
fanny had hastily marshalled tay into the circle. mrs. edis favored him with a piercing look which gave him a sensation of acute discomfort.
“good lord!” he thought. “here’s an enemy worthy of any man’s mettle. what a family!”
mrs. winstone almost laughed aloud as she met her sister’s glance of disgust. it was long since she had enjoyed herself so thoroughly. to outwit jane and embroil everybody else was better for the nerves than mere vegetating.
mrs. edis turned to fanny.
“where is julia?”
“i don’t know, grandmother.”
“go and find her. she must not appear to want in hospitality.”
“yes, grandmother.”
“sit down, all of you.”
the company did as commanded, tay in ostentatious proximity to mrs. winstone. there was a moment’s profound silence, mrs. edis, like george washington, having the rare gift of immersing any company in an ice bath. mrs. macmanus would never have dreamed of making conversation unless she had something to say; pirie and morison, snubbed by fanny, were both sulky; mrs. winstone was flirting with tay under the eagle eye of her sister, who poured out the tea. finally, mrs. morison, with the american woman’s sense of conversational responsibility, rushed into the breach, after peremptorily motioning to her husband to sit beside her on the little sofa: here was an opportunity for a parade of domestic american bliss.
“oh, mrs. edis!” she cried. “we were just talking when you came in— aren’t you quite too frightfully proud of mrs. france?”
“frightfully?”
“our dreadful slang. i mean—well, aren’t you too proud of her for words?”
“and pray why should i be unable to express myself? julia was always a good child.”
“oh, of course—but it isn’t often that any one is as good as mrs. france, and so tremendously clever.”
“i am glad to infer that you think well of julia.” mrs. edis, reflecting that society was even more silly than in her own day, wondered how long these people would stay. she observed that the company was looking amused, but before she had time to speculate upon the cause, she forgot the rest of them, in her keen observation of tay. he was ignoring mrs. winstone and frowning at his sister. but in another moment she forgot even him.
“oh, i don’t count,” cried the desperate mrs. morison. “i’m merely trying to make myself agreeable, in return for your gracious hospitality. it’s what the world thinks.”
“the world?”
“surely, you must feel proud that she’s quite the hope of the party, a flaming torch. if she remains in london, why, she’ll be its only leader—a regular queen.”
“queen?”
mrs. edis set the tea-pot violently down.
“prime minister, you know, or something like that,” said pirie. “strange things are happening.”
“are you making game of me?” cried mrs. edis, furiously.
“oh, pirie never makes game of anybody but himself,” said mrs. macmanus, soothingly.
“i beg your pardon, then, but it sounds pure gammon to me.”
“it does to many, dear madam.”
mrs. edis was staring straight before her, the company forgotten. “queen.” that still active brain, never rusty, nor clouded, had leaped back to the night when she and old m’sieu had pored over julia’s horoscope. “queen.” the word had almost been written. they had compromised on a mere peerage, as the times no longer permitted the marriage of a sovereign with a subject. but—times change—julia had unwittingly made her feel like an old crab—moreover, the twentieth century was to witness the birth of a new solar year, the year of man. might that be but a generic term? the woman’s movement had been abhorrent to her, shocking every aristocratic instinct, much as she despised men. but she had begun to realize that it was both portentous and imperishable. if julia was to lead it, if in it lay her child’s only chance to achieve a vast and splendid distinction—well, she was not too old to reconstruct her ideas, bury her inherited ideals, move, herself, with the times.
she became aware that a pall-like silence had descended upon her guests.
“pardon me,” she said more graciously. “i am an old woman and my mind wanders. what you said startled me. a great future was predicted for my child at birth—and the time came when i made sure that she was to be a duchess?—”
“duchess!” cried mrs. morison. “oh, dear me, a duchess isn’t in it these days with a great public leader. think of all the dukedoms that have been bought with brand new american dollars. it’s now quite a commonplace position.”
“is this true?”
“true as suffrage, dear madam,” said mrs. macmanus. “there are even english duchesses that are nobodies. this is the day of the individual.”
once more mrs. edis stared straight before her. “i see! i see!” she muttered.
tay sprang to his feet and bore down upon his sister.
“for god’s sake change the subject,” he said, in a tone of concentrated fury. “can’t you see what is going on in that old woman’s mind? i wish you had stayed in new york.”
“i kept getting in deeper and deeper,” said mrs. morison, apologetically, but enjoying herself, nevertheless. “that old woman would rattle anybody. here comes your julia.”
julia had hidden when she heard fanny’s voice, but on second thoughts had concluded not to arouse her mother’s suspicions. she had therefore hastily put herself into a soft white house frock with a floating green scarf, and looked little older than fanny.
she barely glanced at tay, but smiled brightly at the other guests. “good afternoon, everybody. how delightful to see the old house so gay. a very strong cup, please, mother.”
“oh, not so awfully gay,” cried mrs. morison. “we’ve been talking suffrage.”
“no more of that at present,” said mrs. edis, peremptorily. “fanny, stop trying to engage mr. tay’s attention. he came to nevis to see your grandaunt. go and talk to mrs. macmanus. young girls should always strive to make themselves agreeable to elderly ladies.”
fanny obeyed sulkily, and the company, now put completely at its ease, fell upon the tea and cakes, which mrs. edis finally remembered to order denny to pass. tay bent over mrs. winstone and shot a glance at julia. she was consumed with silent laughter. his eyes grew imploring, but he moved them with a sudden sense of discomfort. mrs. edis looked as if about to launch her cane at him.
mrs. macmanus, fearing they would all break into hysterical laughter, addressed herself to mrs. edis. “we have been admiring your wonderful old house. would it be asking too much to let us see more of it?”
“and the delicious grounds,” cried mrs. morison, determined to acquit herself and give dan his opportunity to talk to julia. “i’ve never seen anything like those terraces rising up the mountain.”
mrs. edis rose. “give me your arm, julia. i shall be happy to show our guests the house, and then you may take them up to the cone.”
“i’ll not go,” said tay to mrs. winstone. “i shall stay here. please get julia away from them and send her back.”
“very well,” said mrs. winstone, good-naturedly. “possess your soul in patience!”
“i’ve a small stock left!”
