FOUND!
THE other----
Ah, yes! At last, at last! After all my anxiety and worry and fretting
and search! There she was! I could have kissed the small, animated
grey-eyed face of the girl who was sitting next to the Honourable Jim at
the table. However she'd come there, I had at least found her.
My long-lost mistress; Miss Million herself!
"Oh, it's her!" cried Miss Million's shrill Cockney voice in a sudden
cessation of the parrot-like shrieks of talk and laughter as I ran round
the table. "Oh, it's my Miss--it's my Miss Smith!"
She clapped her hands with impatience, jumping up in her chair.
"Have you brought them, Smith?" she demanded eagerly. "Have you got my
clothes----"
"Oh, 'ark at her!" shrieked some one on the right of the table. "It's
all her clothes! Hasn't thought of anything else since she came
down----"
"Better late than never----" The babble went on all around me, while I
strove to make myself heard.
"Now we shall see a bit o' style----"
"Don't see anything wrong with the blouse the girl's got on, myself----"
"Fits where it touches, doesn't it----"
Indeed, the garment in which my young mistress's small form was
enfolded appeared to be the sort of wrap which a hairdresser's assistant
tucks about one when one is going to have a shampoo!
"Looks like a purser's jacket on a marling-spike!" sang out some one
else; and then more laughter.
Well, if they were lunatics, they were at least the cheerful variety!
I went up to Miss Million's chair, ignoring the blue glance of the man
beside her, and said in my "professional," respectful murmur: "I have
brought your dressing-bag and a suit-case, Miss----"
"Why ever didn't you bring them down yesterday?" demanded Million, all
eyes and shrill Cockney accent.
"I didn't know, Miss, where I was to bring them," I replied, feeling the
amused gaze of the Honourable Jim upon me as I said it.
"But, bless me! I gave the full address," vociferated Miss Million, "in
that telegram!"
All the lunatics (or whatever they were) were also listening with
manifest enjoyment.
"There was no address, Miss," I said, as I handed her the wire, which I
still kept in my hand.
"Yes! But this was the second one I sent!" protested my mistress loudly.
"This was when I was at my wit's end and couldn't think why you didn't
come! I sent off that first one first thing in the morning; you ought to
have got it!"
"I never did, Miss," I began.
Then a robust, rollicking voice that I confusedly remembered broke in on
the discussion.
"There you are, you see! What do I always say? Never trust anything
except your lookin'-glass, and not that except it's in a cross light,"
cried the voice gaily. "Certainly don't trust anything with trousers on!
Not even if they are ragged ones and tied up with lumps of string! Not
even if they do pitch you a tale about having served in the Boer War!"
Still feeling as if I were in a weird dream, I turned towards the
direction of the voice that enunciated these puzzling sentiments.
It proceeded from----
Ah! I knew her, too!
I knew the brass-bright hair and the plump white-clad, sulphur-crested,
cockatoo-like form across the table.
"London's Love," again! Miss Vi Vassity herself! I'd seen her last where
I last saw Million--at that supper-table.... Now what in the world was
England's premier comedienne doing in this asylum--if an asylum it were?
She went on in her high swift voice. "You won't catch me giving
half-crowns to any more tramps to hand in a wire at the next
post-office! No! Not if they can sport a row of medals on their chests
from here to East Grinstead! I knew how it would be," declared Miss Vi
Vassity. "My kind heart's my downfall, but I'm going to sign the pledge
to reform that. And you, my dear----"--to me--
"You sit down and have a bite of something to eat with us. Your mistress
don't mind. You don't mind, Nellie, do you?"--this to Miss Million.
"We all mess together in this place. I couldn't be worried with a
servant's hall. Make room for her there, Irene, will you? The girl looks
scared to death; it's all right, Miss--Smith, aren't you? Sit down,
child, sit down----"
Before I could say another word I found that a wooden chair had been
pushed squeakingly under me by some one. Knives and forks had been
clattered down in front of me by some one else. And there was I, sitting
almost in the lap of a very tiny, dark-eyed, gipsy-looking girl, in a
blouse without a collar and a pink linen sun hat pulled well down over
her small face.
On the other side of me, a big, lazy-looking blonde in a sky-blue sports
coat rocked her own chair a little away from mine, and said, in a
drowsy, friendly sort of voice: "Drop of ale, dear? Or d'you take a
glasser stout?"
Then the flood tide of talk and laughter seemed to flow on over my head
so fast that I literally could not make myself heard. I expostulated
that I had already had lunch, and that I didn't want anything to drink,
thanks, and that a gentleman was waiting outside on the step--but it
passed unheeded until my hostess caught my eye.
"What's that, what's that?" ejaculated Miss Vi Vassity, preening her
white-linen-bedecked bust across the table, as she saw me trying vainly
to say something against the uproar. "What's all that disturbance in the
dress circle, Bella?" The honey-blonde whom she called Bella turned to
me and said: "Speak up, dear; no one can hear your lines!" Then she made
a trumpet of her plump white hands and bellowed across to Miss Vi
Vassity:
"Says she's got her best boy with her, and that he is having to wait
outside on the steps!"
Here there was another general gale of laughter, in which my
crimson-cheeked explanations were quite lost! In the middle of it all I
saw the Honourable Jim rise from his seat, and stride into the hall and
bring in Mr. Jessop. He appeared to be introducing him to London's Love.
Miss Vi Vassity immediately made the new-comer sit down also, close to
her at the top of the table.
I have said it was a rather strange lunch that we had had earlier in the
morning at the little honeysuckle-covered inn, where we three had taken
cider and bread and cheese together. But it was nothing to the
extraordinary unexpectedness, yes, the weirdness in every way of this
second lunch, at the long table lined with all those strange types.
Already, as I sat down, I had given up the idea that it was a female
lunatic asylum and rest cure combined. But what was it, this "Refuge"?
I simply couldn't think! And I did not find out until quite a long time
afterwards. After dinner was finished, when Million, I knew, was fuming
for her boxes, she beckoned me to follow her away from the noisy crowd
of girls, up the shallow, broad, old-fashioned staircase. There was one
door on the landing which she tiptoed past, putting her finger on her
lips.
More mystery!
I could hardly wait with my questions until the door was shut of the
little, slanting-ceiling room with the snow-white, dimity-covered bed
that represented Miss Million's new quarters.
There were straw mats on the bare boards. On the little chest of drawers
there was a Jubilee mug full of the homeliest cottage flowers. This was
a far cry from London and the Hotel Cecil!
I turned with eagerness to my mistress. She had flung herself upon the
suit-case that had now been brought up to her room. She had forgotten to
wait until I should unpack for her, and, having snatched the keys from
me, she began fishing out her blouses and other possessions with "Ah's"
of delight and recognition.
"What on earth is this place, and what's the meaning of it all?" I
began. But Miss Million laughed gleefully, evidently taking no small
delight in my mystification. "Lively, isn't it?" she said. "Talk about
the old orphanage! Well, us girls used to enjoy life there, but it was a
fool to this. I fair revel in it, I can tell you, Smith, and be bothered
to the old Cecil. I don't see why we shouldn't stop on here. Middle-day
dinner and all. That's just my mark, and we can wire to that other
place. Here's plenty good enough for me, for the present----"
"But, look here," I began. "I want to know----" My mistress took me up
quickly. I hadn't seen her in such bubbling high spirits since some of
the old kitchen-days at Putney. "It's me that 'wants to know,' and I'm
just going to begin asking questions about it," she declared, as she
jumped up to allow me to fasten her into the skirt of the
tobacco-brown taffeta.
"Look here, for a start! Who's that nice-lookin' young fellow you came
down with? I never! Motorin' all over the country with strange young
gentlemen. My word! there's behaviour!" giggled Million, evidently with
the delightful consciousness that her own behaviour was far more
reprehensible than mine could ever be. "Bringin' him in, as bold as
brass; whatever do you think your Auntie'd say to that, Miss--there! I
nearly called you Miss Beatrice again. After all this time! Thinkin' of
your Aunt Nasturtium, I suppose? But straight ... Smith! Where did you
pick up that young man?"
"Pick him up? I didn't," I began, feeling that a long explanation was
ahead of me. "As a matter of fact, he picked me up----"
"Oh, shockin'," said Million, giggling more than before. "Whoever said I
was going to allow you to have followers?"
This annoyed me.
"Followers!" I exclaimed quite violently.
It really was exasperating. First the Honourable Jim! Then the girl
called "Bella"! Then my mistress! They were all taking it for granted!
They were all foisting him upon me, this young American with the sleek,
mouse-coloured hair and the upholstered shoulders! Upon me!
"His name is Mr. Hiram P. Jessop----"
"'Tain't pretty, but what's in a name?" said Million, as she held out
her wrist for me to insert the microscopic pearl buttons into the
fairy-silk loops that fastened her cuffs. "Who is he?"
"He's your cousin," I told her.
And, of course, as I expected, it was some time before I was able to get
my young mistress to believe this.
"You're sure," she said at last, "that he's not having us on?"
"I don't think so," I said rather sadly, for I thought again of what
that cousinship might mean--the loss of all Miss Million's fortune!
However, I'd leave that aspect of it for the present. Let him explain
that. They hadn't been introduced yet.
I said: "He's extremely anxious to meet you, let me tell you. He thought
of nothing else all the time that he was talking to me. Be as nice to
him as you can, won't you?"
"Well, I don't see why I should go out of my way," demurred Million
exasperatingly. I had hoped that she might appeal to the chivalrous side
of the young American's nature; appeal to it so that he might give up
his idea of fighting for his rights--if they are his rights! But if
Million is going to put her back up and become independent--well,
they'll fight. And there'll be a catastrophe, and the downfall of
Million's prosperity, and general wretchedness for Miss Million and her
maid--oh, dear, what a prospect!
I began to coax her.
"Oh, yes, be nice. He's rather a dear, this cousin of yours. And he was
so absurdly pleased, do you know, to hear that you had black hair. He
admires brunettes."
"Very kind of him," said Million quite flippantly. "You told him, I
suppose, about me bein' dark."
"He asked so many questions!" I said. "He really takes such an interest.
You ought to be flattered, Miss Million."
"I don't know that having interest taken in me by young gentlemen is any
such a rarity, just now!"
Here she reddened rather prettily.
I fastened the other cuff. Million went on, in a gush of artless
confidence: "To tell you the truth, Smith, I haven't half been getting
off lately. The other night, at the Thousand and One Club, who d'you
suppose was making a fuss of me? A lord, my girl!"
This she said, little dreaming that her maid had watched the whole of
this scene.
"And then, there's something else that's getting a bit more serious,"
said Million, bridling. "Turning up to-day, just because he'd guessed
where I'd got to, and all!"
"He? Which he?" I asked, with a quick feeling of dismay.
"It's what I call pointed," said Million, "the way he's been going on
ever since he's met me. Even if he is uncle's old friend, it's not all
on account of uncle that he makes hisself so agreeable. Oh, no! Marked,
that's what I call it. You know who I mean."
She nodded her dark head. She smiled as she spoke the name with a
shyness that suited her rather well.
"The Honourable Mr. Burke!"
"Million!" I said anxiously, as I folded the borrowed blouse I'd taken
off her, "Miss Million, do you like him?"
Miss Million's grey eyes sparkled. She said: "Who wouldn't like him?"
A pang seized me. A pang of the old apprehension that my little heiress
of a mistress might lose her heart to a graceless fortune-hunter!
I said, with real anxiety in my tone: "Oh, my dear, you don't think you
are going to fall in love with this Mr. Burke, do you?"