Arethusa was going shopping, and going shopping for the very first time
in her life, alone.
And thereby hangs a tale.
Wednesday coming was Miss Asenath's birthday, and Arethusa had
completely lost track of that important fact to forget it until this
Monday morning. She, who had given Miss Asenath something, if only a
tight bouquet of flowers from the plants brought into the house for the
winter, every birthday anniversary since she was old enough to lisp
"birfday" and comprehend its significance, had forgotten that this
event was so near. She could have made her a gift as she generally did
had there been time to finish it and send it so it would reach the Farm
on the twentieth; but it would not be a birthday gift if Miss Asenath
did not get it on her birthday (this was logic to Arethusa); so in her
distress she had appealed to Elinor.
And Elinor, after asking if Miss Asenath ever wore shawls and learning
that she did all the winter through, suggested that Arethusa purchase
her a rose-colored shoulder shawl of silk and several yards of
rose-colored ribbon to match for the locket. If it was started today,
it would reach there in time.
Charming Idea!
So Arethusa was to take the automobile, as Elinor had a Board meeting
of importance this morning and could not go with her; seek the
magnificent establishment where she had accompanied her mother so many
times to shop; inquire of a floor-walker the location of the department
of shawls; purchase one of the same, and charge it to Elinor's name and
address; and return home in the machine. Such were the directions given
by Elinor.
They seemed to cover every detail for the buying of Miss Asenath's
birthday gift; and, moreover, sounded very simple. As viewed by
Arethusa, although Miss Eliza would have been horrified at the bare
suggestion, she could surely buy one rose-colored silk shawl without
assistance.
She loved her reflection in the mirror when she was dressed for this
adventure; a jaunty new hat with a flyaway feather, a new suit, and
even gloves and shoes as slim as Miss Warren's. And besides, pride of
her heart, her costume was enhanced with furs of rich, dark brown, as
silky smooth in appearance as those she had envied that visitor who had
been so trying a visitor. There was also, a half-formed Hope within
that when she looked so well as she did this morning she would meet the
Wonderful Mr. Bennet somewhere downtown that made her eyes shine, which
added to the attractiveness of the reflection.
She left the car in front of the big shop and bade Clay wait for her
with an air of dignity that was an almost ludicrous imitation of
Elinor's manner of uttering the same words. Clay smiled broadly as he
touched his cap, recognizing her model.
Arethusa tripped gayly into the store and a polite and obsequious
gentleman escorted her to that counter where she might find shawls, and
directed that she be waited upon, immediately.
The very prettiest girl among those in this department stepped forward.
She was the one which Arethusa might have chosen to wait upon her, had
she been choosing. But she was a dreadfully tired-looking girl, even
more tired looking than pretty, Arethusa noticed when she was closer.
She had great dark circles under her eyes and a pathetic sort of droop
to the corners of her mouth. Her black dress made her look still more
forlorn, for she was very pale and it accentuated the pallor.
But the girl smiled at Arethusa; she could not help it, tired as she
looked and really was, for Arethusa's eagerness to purchase was so
amusingly apparent.
"I want to see silk shawls," announced Arethusa, "rose-colored silk
shawls."
A bewildering variety of shawls was immediately spread before her, in
every conceivable shade of the color she had requested. How Miss
Asenath would have loved that heap of gayety! Arethusa found it
terribly difficult to make a choice. She picked out three as the
prettiest of the collection, after much deliberation and selection and
rejection; but each one was so lovely that she wanted every one of them
for Miss Asenath. Then she made an appeal to the girl.
"Which of these do _you_ think is the very prettiest? It's for an old
lady; the dearest old lady!"
The girl bent her dark head over the shawls Arethusa was holding.
"Is it for your grandmother?"
"No," replied Arethusa. "It's for my Aunt 'Senath. She's an invalid."
Then, of necessity almost, she must tell Miss Asenath's interesting
story, beginning way back at the very beginning, with the Romance
before the Fall. Her sympathetic telling of her Tale, her gestures and
her earnest voice, attracted every other girl at that counter, for it
was not a very busy morning, so that long before she had finished, four
or five other heads were bent in solemn consultation above the three
shawls from which final choice was to be made. They could not all agree
as to the one most desirable; tastes were different as to which shade
of rose would really be most becoming and best for Miss Asenath.
Finally, Arethusa and Jessie (for so the first girl's name had been
discovered to be) decided that majority must rule as always, and
selected as Miss Asenath's birthday gift what they themselves and two
of the other girls liked best, the one that was in between in tone.
"I can get ribbon just this color, can't I?" asked the shopper
anxiously, once her choice was actually made.
"For the locket?" inquired Jessie.
"Yes."
"Sure you can. Suppose you just take this over to the ribbon counter
and match it right now, it's just in the next aisle, and then you can
bring it back to me."
Arethusa went away joyfully, bearing the shawl.
"Ain't you afraid, Jess, to let her go off like that?" asked one of
Jessie's contemporaries, of a more distrustful turn of mind. "'Sposin'
she don't come back with it? It ain't paid for, and she never told you
who she was."
"Oh, she'll come back," replied Jessie, confidently, "She'll come back,
all right. I ain't the least bit afraid. 'Specially when she looks as
much like an angel as she talks! I wish there was more like her to wait
on, and then it wouldn't be so hard to be standing here all day long.
Yes, ma'am, these shawls are all silk," to a personage who had paused
to examine the wares which Jessie had not yet put away.
It would be impossible to mention her in any way save as a "personage."
She exuded superiority and a consciousness of a high station in life
from every aristocratic pore.
"I doubt it. They look rather cheap." She tossed the whole heap aside,
contemptuously. "Have you nothing any better?"
"No, ma'am, these are the best."
"That's old Mrs. Bixby," whispered one of the clerks in a tone of
heartfelt awe to the girl next her, as the lady seated herself before
the counter. "And she is some swell, too, believe me, Molly Davis!
Money! Just buckets of it!"
Mrs. Bixby seemed rather disdainful of what Jessie had to offer her in
the way of shawls. She continued to toss them to right and left,
scattering them so carelessly about that one or two fell to the floor
of the aisle and were retrieved by a near-by floor-walker, who glanced
at poor Jessie, as much as to say, "Don't you let that happen again!"
"I see nothing here I'd really have," remarked Mrs. Bixby, at last.
Then as she turned, she caught sight of an acquaintance across the
aisle, who had loitered there hoping for the sun of her smile, to whom
she beckoned imperiously; and who came swiftly for whatever was desired
of her, at this nod, much as a menial runs in answer to the nod of a
master.
"I've got it!"
Arethusa came back with the shawl and several yards of rose-colored
ribbon that matched it as perfectly as if woven especially to be worn
with it to hold the Locket.
Jessie's face broke into welcoming smiles. Most of the other clerks
smiled also. Arethusa's honest joy in her purchases was truly
refreshing after Mrs. Bixby.
"Isn't that a perfectly beautiful match?" Arethusa asked of them all
impartially, with enthusiasm. "And yet Aunt 'Liza always says I have no
sort of taste! Can't you just see darling Aunt 'Senath in all her white
clothes with this lovely rose color next to her?"
It was not at all hard for Jessie to imagine the picture after the
vivid description she had received of Miss Asenath. "I'll bet she'll
look just lovely," she declared warmly, "and it certainly is a splendid
match! No one could have matched it better!"
The other girls made a smiling affirmation to this verdict.
Mrs. Bixby turned around from her own conversation at the sudden sound
of these animated voices so close to her and lifted her gold lorgnette
to examine Arethusa.
"This girl was waiting on me, I believe," she said, indicating Jessie
with a wave of her aristocratic hand, and speaking in a pleasantly acid
tone that was intended to consign Arethusa to nothingness forever.
But Arethusa gave no smallest sign of doing so.
"She was waiting on me, long before you ever saw her!"
That lorgnette could but irritate Arethusa.
Mrs. Bixby glanced up and down, and then through her.
"Indeed! I think you're mistaken!" Then to Jessie. "I wasn't through,
girl."
"But you said...." began poor Jessie.
She was torn between her desire to serve Arethusa, whom, girl-like, she
had voted a darling, and her great fear of offending one so powerful as
Mrs. Bixby. The floor-walker suddenly turned his attention in their
direction, which added to her agitation. But she need not have worried
quite so much; her first customer made a sturdy champion of any cause,
and she was still most undaunted, lorgnette or no lorgnette.
"There's a whole stack of girls here," declared Arethusa hotly, "and
just because you can't help being disagreeable, you want the same one I
have! Jessie sold me this shawl before you ever came, and she let me
take it over to match it in ribbon!"
Mrs. Bixby displayed an interest. She raised the lorgnette once more.
"Indeed! And had you paid for it?"
"It's none of your business whether I had or not! It's not your store,
is it? But I hadn't, so there, if you really want to know!"
"I shall report you immediately," said Mrs. Bixby, majestically to
Jessie, "for allowing goods to be taken away from your counter without
being paid for, and for not waiting on your customers properly. You
were very impudent. And...."
"Why, you're a horrible old woman!" interrupted Arethusa, as if the
discovery was most surprising. "A perfectly horrible old woman! But go
right ahead and report, if you want to! I reckon it won't hurt anything
very much, because I brought the shawl back and I'm going to charge it
right now, this very minute!"
"And _you_," continued Mrs. Bixby, once more consigning the tempestuously
excited Arethusa to nothingness with her glance, "are the most decidedly
ill-bred young person I ever saw!"
She sailed away and sought the floor-walker.
His glance, after a brief conversation with her, was sternly directed
in the direction of the shawl department. He nodded several times in
answer to what she said to him, and finally bowed her deferentially
towards the outer door.
Arethusa turned to Jessie, whose rather frail hands were trembling in
their effort to fold her shawls, and her sympathetic heart ached for
this evident distress.
"I wouldn't mind, Jessie. That old beast can't really do anything that
would hurt you, can she?"
"I don't know," miserably.
"Was it very wrong to let me take the shawl to have it matched before I
had paid for it?"
"It's against the rules. People could steal things that way. But I knew
you'd bring it right back."
"That nasty old thing!" Arethusa leaned earnestly across the
counter-top. "I'll buy two or three shawls. Would it be all right
then?"
Jessie was forced to a smile at this suggested method of straightening
out the affair.
"That wouldn't make very much difference about this, I'm afraid. And
besides, I don't suppose your mother would like your doing it, very
much!"
"She wouldn't care," affirmed the daughter, stoutly. "She wouldn't care
the least bit. She's the loveliest person in the world!" Suddenly, an
altogether new idea seized her. "They won't discharge you, will they?"
It was a horrible thought!
"Oh, no! That is, I don't suppose so. It depends on what she said,
mostly. If she told the truth, I might just get reprimanded. They'll
dock me probably, though; but that's almost as bad to me right now, as
being discharged," bitterly; "I need every single cent of my money."
"Oh, well," Arethusa patted Jessie consolingly on the arm, "Don't you
worry! I'll get Father to fix it up for you. He knows Mr. Redmond
awfully well. He plays golf with him, and he told me Mr. Redmond owned
this store, even if his name isn't on the sign. So he'll fix it!"
She departed, serenity restored all around; for Ross would surely
manage it so that Jessie should not suffer for being kind.
But before she was out of the establishment, she unfortunately
encountered Mrs. Bixby near the door, who raised her lorgnette and
surveyed the "Ill-bred young person" through it again. She so aroused
Arethusa's ire that she rushed furiously out of the shop and went
headlong on up the street. She had gone quite a block, when she
ran ... bang! into a man person, who in her excitement she had not
noticed as approaching.
"You seem to be in a very great hurry this fine morning," said a
familiar voice, and she looked up.
There was Mr. Bennet smiling at her; standing in the middle of the
sidewalk, irreproachably groomed as always, very much Mr. Bennet, and
evidently glad to see her.
Arethusa was glad to see him also. She clasped her hands, parcel and
all, and dimpled charmingly.
"I'm just as mad as I can be! That nasty old beast of a woman!"
"What old beast of a woman?"
Arethusa launched into explanation.
And as the narrative progressed, Mr. Bennet's inward amusement grew.
Arethusa was primed with names, and so he recognised Mrs. Bixby for his
aunt, the mentor of their rather extensive family connection. He would
have given anything to have seen the encounter! And he would have
backed Arethusa for winner without any hesitancy, as well as he knew
his dictatorial relative.
"And will you, Mr. Bennet," finished Jessie's champion imploringly,
"will you go back and see that man with me and fix it so they won't do
anything to Jessie?"
It might be better to fix things up now with Mr. Bennet's able
assistance, than to wait until later on to speak to Ross.
"Certainly," said Mr. Bennet, kindly, "I'll be very glad to; if you
think I can do any good."
Arethusa was absolutely sure of this. Was he not Mr. Bennet?
Mr. Platt, the floor-walker to whom Mrs. Bixby had complained of
Jessie, was also an assistant manager, and he was very glad to have the
facts in this particular case, he said, when Arethusa and Mr. Bennet
had hunted him up; Arethusa to do most of the talking, and Mr. Bennet
to smile and look on, and impress the one who had Jessie's sentence
within his power to make either good or bad, by just the fact of his
appearance and his air of being someone of importance, which was so
decidedly Mr. Bennet's air. The other lady, added Mr. Platt to his
speech apologetically, had slightly misrepresented things. She had
accused the girl of impudence and inattention, which had sounded bad.
And in a store of this size.... But when a customer got excited, she
was not always just accurate, yet they could not tell....
Mr. Bennet was most amused by this little dig at his aunt. Arethusa was
vigorous in her defense of Jessie, and her denial that Jessie had been
at all impudent. And her indignation had made her so pretty, with her
flushed cheeks, that Mr. Platt smiled paternally and told her that it
would be all right. Probably she herself might like to stop by and tell
Jessie so? Nothing suited Arethusa better; so with Mr. Bennet in tow,
this pleasant duty was performed, and then once more she sought the
outside.
"Now come go to lunch with me," said Mr. Bennet, as they paused under
the iron and glass porte-cochere for a moment. "It's lunch time," he
added, "and maybe considerably after. I was on my way when I met you."
Arethusa's eyes sparkled at the thought. "But do girls go to lunch
down-town with gentlemen?"
He assured her that they often did, and as Arethusa had no further
scruples of any sort to add, he led the way across the street to the
big Patterson Hotel; the shop where shawls and excitement had been
found was exactly opposite.
Arethusa followed him on into the dining-room, her heart beating such
an excited tattoo against her chest she was very glad that the band on
the little balcony at one end of the room was playing so loudly just
then, else she was quite certain that Mr. Bennet, and even the tall and
imposing head waiter who was so courteously showing them to a table,
would have heard that pounding heart.
It was certainly a Real Adventure.
They were piloted to a spot which Mr. Bennet, from the door-way when
they had first stepped inside, had selected for its attractions, a
little table for two far over in the corner, just enough removed from
the band for the music to be a pleasant accompaniment to the business
of luncheon, instead of an interruption, as it often was when closer to
it. The table held a lighted candle lamp shaded with a soft
rose-colored shade of fluted silk (and not all of the tables boasted
little lamps) which seemed to add most delightfully to the intimacy of
the occasion.
Arethusa leaned her elbows on the table, and looked happily at Mr.
Bennet, sitting so close to her on the other side of the white cloth,
ordering a lunch for her to eat. There was a charming intimacy about
the situation which could not help but appeal.
"Isn't this fun!" she exclaimed. "Just us!"
Mr. Bennet thought it was, indeed.
And he added instructions to the waiter, about the food which was to be
prepared for Arethusa to eat, which further added to the Charm of
things. The waiter hurried off with their order, as if he himself
deemed it no ordinary order.
Then, while they waited, Arethusa unrolled her parcel and showed Mr.
Bennet the shawl and told him all about Miss Asenath.
"It would be wonderful to be loved the way your aunt has loved that man
all these years," he said softly, when the Tale was ended, for Arethusa
had crowded every single bit of Romance connected with it into her
telling.
Her long eyelashes drooped suddenly over her eyes, and the little flush
which always came so quickly spread over her face and neck. Her unruly
heart beat even faster.
There was a soft, long silence, and Mr. Bennet, admiring the light of
the candle lamp on Arethusa's ruddy hair, smiled to himself as he
watched her. He had an idea that he knew just about what she was
thinking.
Arethusa was thinking that Mr. Bennet was undoubtedly the sort of man
that one would be sure to love just that way.
Now Mr. Bennet knew very well how Arethusa felt about him, and this
without any real conceit on his part. Arethusa was a woefully
transparent young person; she had never learned there are times when it
might seem best to dissemble a little. Mr. Bennet knew, perhaps, better
than she did herself, the exact state of her Feeling in regard to him.
There were some essential points on which they would not have agreed at
all; but still.... His main idea as to just how Arethusa felt was
pretty clear.
He leaned back in his chair, and continued to watch her. He could
almost have laughed aloud at her pretty confusion. Arethusa's nervous
fingers crumbled up a perfectly good slice of bread until it could be
of no use of any kind to anybody, her head still bent. If the Situation
had such charm, it had not lost altogether the power to embarrass, when
Words that could cause such Thoughts were softly spoken by a rich and
drawling Voice.
The waiter helped matters considerably by bringing in the soup.
Soup has never been regarded as much in the way of a reliever of
embarrassment, but it proved to be something of the kind in this
particular case. Arethusa's tongue was loosened again, and she
chattered of inconsequential topics of variety, but none of them
brought such moments as the one just past. There was much to be said to
Mr. Bennet, for they had grown to be great friends in the last few
weeks and had many interests in common.
It was an unusually nice little luncheon that Mr. Bennet had ordered;
and it was perfect eaten so, just the two of them, thought Arethusa. It
was prolonged quite beyond the time generally allotted for luncheons,
for it was almost half-past three when they emerged from the Hotel.
"Well, what shall we do now?" asked Mr. Bennet. He glanced at his watch
and then shut it with a snap. "I don't believe I'll go back to the
office again this afternoon; that is.... How about you? Are you free?
What do you say to a moving-picture show?"
Arethusa was delighted. She had nothing whatever to do, and she adored
the movies. She had seen a few with Ross and Elinor.
So Mr. Bennet stepped back into the Hotel to telephone Miss Ford that
he would not be back that afternoon; and then they strolled side by
side up the street, he and Arethusa, hunting for the picture show which
seemed to have the most to offer.
The one they finally chose to attend proved to be so exciting that
Arethusa scarcely breathed a word to him until it was all over, and the
film had gone around and started to go around again, so that she could
be perfectly sure she had seen every bit of it. There was a great deal
of honest realism about the acting done on the screen for Arethusa,
photography though it might be. A smothered scream had attested to Mr.
Bennet the genuineness of her fear for her own safety during a portion
of this picture's running, and her sudden jump when the evil-looking
Indian had shot the handsome cowboy, and the little sound of distress
she had made, told him that although movie guns were said to fire blank
cartridges, they inflicted actual damage for Arethusa.
It was dark when they left the moving-picture theatre, and well after
five. Winter days seem woefully short.
"Well, what shall we do now?" asked Mr. Bennet, for the second time. "I
suppose, though, it will be home. It's so late."
Arethusa stopped short in the middle of the crowded sidewalk, full of
folks who were plainly impatient to get somewhere, and very probably it
was home, flowing past her on either side, all unregarded. She grabbed
Mr. Bennet frantically by one arm.
"Oh, Mr. Bennet!"
"What's the matter? Did you leave something in the theater?"
"No! But I've left Clay waiting in the machine for me all this time in
front of that store, and I never thought of him once until you said,
'home!'"
The last part of this information was wafted on the breeze to Mr.
Bennet, for Arethusa had started off down the street with the swiftness
of the wind itself. He followed her immediately, but considerably more
slowly as to locomotion (he was no sprinter and Mr. Bennet rarely
forgot his dignity) and with the parcel containing Miss Asenath's
birthday gift in one hand. Arethusa had dropped it directly at his feet
in her excitement. When he caught up with her, she was standing in
front of the shop gazing wildly up and down the street, for no Clay and
no automobile were to be discovered anywhere.
The door attendant, when questioned by Mr. Bennet, said that he
remembered the chauffeur referred to very well. He had seemed to be
very worried about the young lady, and had left his car several times
to ask him if he had seen her come out. But he had driven off some time
ago, about three hours ago, the door attendant thought it was, to be as
exact as he could.
Mr. Bennet took Arethusa home in a taxicab to an excited and distraught
household.
When Clay had come back without her, with his strange story of having
waited for her, and that she had never returned to the machine, Ross
had been perfectly sure that she had been kidnapped, and he had gone
impetuously to the police station to start an immediate search. Elinor
was prostrate in her room, visioning all sorts of dreadful things that
might have happened to an Arethusa always too prone to make chance
acquaintances, when Arethusa herself, as repentant and contrite a cause
of it all as it was possible for her to be, walked in.
Elinor would not allow Ross to scold her after she heard Arethusa's
sobbing explanation, that she was having such a good time she forgot
everything else; for she said that he was really more to blame for that
than anyone concerned.
Which rather cryptic statement, if Arethusa failed of comprehension,
seemed to be quite clear to her father.