Jane balanced her spoon on the brim of the shell-like cup and smiled at
Mr. Scott.
“Yesterday, Billie, I received another of those Willoughby
epistles--about my extravagance, you know.”
“The idea of anybody thinking you extravagant,” murmured Mr. Scott,
with an adoring glance.
“Oh, as to that,” observed Jane, airily, “I admit I’m extravagant, but
I’m purposely so. Listen, my child, and I’ll tell you the story of my
life. But first let me put a drop more rum in your tea.” Mr. Scott held
out his cup.
“It does taste of tea,” he admitted. “And you know I’ve always cracked
up the flavor of your--er--tea, Jane.” She dropped the rum out of a
silver filigree bottle with an amethyst in the stopper.
“You see,” she continued, thoughtfully, “before my eyes were opened or
my teeth cut, those Willoughby relations of mine married me to De Mille
because he had money. He was--oh, well, Billie, he was the biggest
bore I ever met. However, I saw as little of him as possible, but
you can imagine that I did my best to make life miserable for those
Willoughbys who blighted my youth. What _are_ you laughing at, Billie?
Well, De Mille got into financial difficulties, and selfishly took
to his bed. I got the best nurse in town, and went to see him every
day. Yes, I did. It was good for me, of course!”--Jane’s conversation
usually took the form of a monologue. “Finally, he had the good taste
to die. When one of the Willoughbys, who came up to town to help me
bear my grief, came in and told me that he had passed to a better land,
I said: ‘Well, God knows best.’” Mr. Scott tittered. “Aunt Susan--that
was the Willoughby--assured the family that I was showing a beautiful
spirit. As a matter of fact, I really could have danced up and down,
I was so relieved. You see, Billie, if the man had ever pretended to
love me, I should not have been such a wretch. But he just wanted a
good-looking woman to preside over his house, and he wanted to marry
into the Willoughby family, and the Willoughby family wanted to get
me married to money and off their hands, so it was just a disgraceful
bargain, about which your humble servant had no more to say than the
dress goods on a bargain counter. When it was discovered that De Mille
had left me nothing but debts, I refused to worry, and informed my
beloved relations that my support was their business. Otherwise, the
stage for Jane, and the Willoughbys’ view of the stage is very similar
to the devil’s view of holy water.”
“Well, they’ve got plenty of this world’s goods,” commented Mr.
Scott, who was quite content to have Jane do most of the talking, an
arrangement that suited her to perfection.
“They’re rolling in wealth!” she exclaimed, filling her own cup. “But
they’re as close as bark on a tree, and how to bring them to time after
De Mille’s death kept me awake nights. I made up my mind to get even
with them for marrying me off like a slave, and the first thing I did
was to order the most expensive mourning New York affords. I still
cling to it, for black is _so_ becoming to me.”
“I should think it was,” said Mr. Scott, fervently. “You are simply
ravishing in that cap.”
“The cap was my own idea,” observed Jane, sweetly. “The real lace ones
are so stunning and so--er--expensive. But where was I? Oh, yes. The
Willoughbys held a mass meeting, or convocation, or something, to talk
me over. Finally it was decided that they would pay my bills among
them--if I was not too extravagant--and that I should spend my time
with each of them in turn, handed around from house to house like a
poor relation. But it was at that point in their proceedings that Jane
rose and gave them an ultimatum.”
“I put my money on Jane,” spoke up Mr. Scott, promptly.
“You won’t lose,” answered that young woman. “I rose, wiped my
eyes with a handkerchief--black border, two inches; price, three
dollars--and spoke my mind. I said that I had married to suit them,
and that henceforth I would live to suit myself; that I was perfectly
willing they should pay my bills, but that I intended to take an
apartment in town and go on living as before. I said it was not my
fault that my poor, dear husband--I shed a tear or two--had met with
financial reverses and was not able to leave me anything. I said,
further, that I would not be dictated to about the size of my bills,
that everyone knew I was not extravagant--yes, Billie, I said that with
a straight face--and that I was in deep grief, and could not bear any
more discussion of my affairs, and so I would just take my leave and
send in the bills.”
“Bet they were paralyzed,” observed Billie.
“That’s not the word for it. I left them gasping for breath. But they
hate gossip, and that’s where I had them. They hate to be called mean,
though being mean doesn’t worry them. That’s the way with some people,
you know. So I rented this apartment, moved my things in, drew a few
checks on uncle Jacob--the best of the lot, by the way--and here I have
lived in my deep grief.”
Jane smiled at Mr. Scott and leaned back in her chair.
“That’s the first chapter,” he said.
“Yes,” she answered, “and yesterday’s letter, which I’m coming to, is
the beginning of the second. This letter informed me that my bills were
becoming outrageously large, that I needed a chaperon--fancy a widow in
her first grief needing a chaperon, Billie--and the long and short of
it is that I must give up this apartment and go and live among them as
originally proposed.
“Well?” queried Mr. Scott.
“Well, what?” demanded Jane. “You certainly didn’t for a moment think I
would do it?”
“No,” he responded. “There’s a very simple way out, you know. Marry me
and let the Willoughbys go to----”
“Thunder,” finished Jane. “Oh, Billie, I do appreciate the fact that
you love me and want me. And if I loved you, I’d live in a cottage
with you--though I hate cottages--and work like a slave. But the awful
fact must be faced that I do not love you. I am horribly fond of you,
though, Billie, and I wish I could marry you, but I never could make
you understand how I hate being married. I was knocked down to the
highest bidder, and the experience was too disagreeable to permit me to
marry again or to fall in love with anyone.”
“But you’re flirting awfully with Kingston and Maitland--and there’s
Dick Thomas--oh, Jane, it’s pretty tough on me!” The boy--for Mr. Scott
wasn’t much more--looked as though he were going to cry.
“Fiddlesticks!” exclaimed Jane, contemptuously. “Nothing in the world
would induce me to marry one of those men--or any other. Freedom
is the breath of life to me, Billie, but I must have my little
recreations. You can’t understand--no man can--how flirting to a woman
is a justifiable evening up of the sufferings that some women have to
endure. Why, I’m leading Jack Maitland an awful existence because he
flirted desperately with Betty Lockwood, who loves him to distraction.
I’m doing it for Betty’s sake, and it’s good for him. Betty married
Maurice just out of pique.” Jane put down her cup. “I’m really trying
to do good, in my own way, Billie.”
“You should join the Humane Society,” observed Mr. Scott, sarcastically.
“The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children will rescue
you from my clutches if you persist in coming here all the time,” she
retorted, severely. “I’ll tell you what I am going to do”--changing the
subject, swiftly. “I’ll answer the Willoughby epistle in person. I’ll
go down to Rosemount to-morrow and tell them things that I hope will
do them good. I do not intend to reduce my bills, or live with them.
Whenever I get a letter from them like this last one, I go out and buy
something.”
“What did you buy yesterday?” queried Mr. Scott, with lively interest.
“A pair of high-boys--genuine colonials! I’ve no place for them here,
of course, but the Willoughbys needed them for a lesson.”
“Let me drive you down to Rosemount in my car,” said Mr. Scott, with
sudden inspiration.
“Um--I’d like the car and the chauffeur, but you, Billie, cannot come.
It might cause gossip.”
“Let ’em talk, who cares?” exclaimed Mr. Scott, defiantly.
“I do,” said Jane, decidedly. “No, you can’t come, Billie, but if
you’ll have the car here to-morrow, at ten, I’ll drive down in it, stay
all night, and come back the next day.”
“I’m afraid they’ll persuade you to live with them,” murmured Mr.
Scott, miserably.
“To think that you would say that to me,” said Jane, reproachfully. “I
intend to live alone from this time on. I hate living with anybody.”
“Wait until you’re in love!” warned Billie.
“Yes, I’ll wait,” responded his hostess, briskly. “A woman who has
had my luck would be an ungrateful wretch if she permitted herself to
become entangled again. Why, it isn’t one woman in ten who marries for
money whose husband dies in two years. No wonder I’ve clung to deep
mourning. It’s an expression of thankfulness--of the warmest gratitude
on my part. No one can say of me, Billie, that I do not realize my
blessings!”
Mr. Scott rose and tried to kiss Jane’s hand, but she put it
determinedly behind her.
“Respect my mourning, my child,” she said, rebukingly.
After Mr. Scott had taken his departure, she ordered two suit cases
packed, gave orders to her two servants about the care of the
apartment during her absence, and telegraphed a lengthy message to the
Willoughbys.