higher nature.
Bobby, with her head on one side, considered the matter. "Well," she
said, "you did something I didn't like, and I did something you didn't
like. Strikes me the drinks are on us both."
"The--" Percival's horrified look caused her to exclaim contritely:
"Excuse me, I'll do better next time. Come on, let's make up. Put it
there and call it square!"
It was impossible to refuse the small hand that had been the cause of
the trouble, but even as Percival thrilled to its clasp he realized his
danger. During the course of his twenty-eight years he had always been
able to prescribe a certain course for himself and follow it with
reasonable certainty. Exciting moments were now occurring when he was
unable to tell what his next word or move was going to be. It is quite
certain that he never intended to take her hand in both of his and look
at her in the way he was doing now.
"What a bunch of letters!" she said, getting possession of her hand.
"You see, I have some, too. I'll read you some of mine if you'll read me
some of yours. Will you?"
"Which will you have?"
"May I choose? What fun! Read me the one with the sunburst on it."
He obediently adjusted his monocle, broke the seal, and began:
_"'My Dear Son:_
"'I cannot, I fear, make my letter so long or so interesting as I could
desire, owing to the fact that I am afflicted with a slight lumbago, but
I will proceed without further preliminary to set down the few incidents
of interest that have occurred since my last writing. Your brother is
sorely harassed by affairs in the city, and when here he is in constant
altercation with the grooms about exercising your horses. I fear you
will find them sadly out of condition upon your return.'"
"I call that a darn shame!" said Bobby, sympathetically, then her hand
flew to her mouth as she saw Percival's raised eyebrows.
"There I go again! You see, I've been running around with Andy Black,
and nobody ever puts on airs with Andy."
Percival gave a sigh of discouragement, then resumed his reading:
"'We have had few guests at the hall since your departure until
yesterday, when who should call but the Duchess of Dare!'" Percival
paused, and glanced hurriedly down the page.
"Go on!" commanded Bobby.
"It won't interest you in the slightest."
"But it _does_. Unless there's something you don't want me to
hear."
"Not at all. Where was I? Oh, yes, 'call but the Duchess of Dare! She
has let her house to some friends, and has come away from London for a
fortnight's rest. It was rather queer of her calling, wasn't it? She was
less embarrassed than you would imagine and actually had the effrontery
to mention Hortense.'"
"Who is Hortense?" asked Bobby, all curiosity.
"Her daughter."
"Well, why shouldn't her mother mention her?"
"Oh, I don't know," said Percival, in deep water; "rather bad form,
perhaps."
"For a mother to mention her own child?" Then the light dawned. "Perhaps
she is the one you were telling me about."
Percival hastily folded the letter and slipped it into its emblazoned
envelop.
"Is she?" persisted Bobby.
"Is she what?"
"The girl you let down easy?"
"Well, really, Miss Boynton--"
"Roberta," corrected Bobby.
"Very well, Roberta. It's your time to read to me. May I choose a
letter?"
"No, I'll choose one myself."
"But that isn't fair. I let you select any one you liked."
She thought it over, then somewhat reluctantly held out three envelops.
It was so evident that she was trying to keep back the bulky one with
the bold address that Percival instantly selected it.
"Some of it's secrets," she warned him, "and you mustn't peep."
"Of course not. But who is it from?"
"That wasn't in the game. I didn't ask you."
"You didn't need to; but go ahead."
"It's all about the ranch," said Bobby, looking over the pages
and smiling to herself. "They've had an awful row with the new
broncho-buster, and Hal had to punch his head for being cruel to the
horses. I knew that fellow wasn't any good." She read on for a while
to herself. "Says the shooting promises to be great this year. My! but
I hate to miss it!"
"Whatever do you find to shoot?"
"A little of everything from teal duck to Canada goose."
"Really!" exclaimed Percival, with interest. "And do you shoot?"
"Oh, yes, some. I'm not as good as the boys. You see, I have to use Pa
Joe's old No. 10 choke-bore shot-gun, when I really ought to have a
16-bore fowling-piece."
Here was a new and wholly unsuspected bond of sympathy between them.
Percival would have plunged at once into a dissertation on a subject
upon which he considered himself an authority had not the fluttering
sheets of the letter stirred vague misgivings in his bosom.
"You aren't playing fair!" he cried. "You are telling me what is in your
letter without reading it to me."
"So I am!" She looked over page after page. "Here, this will do. It
says: 'I wish you could have been along last night when I hit the trail
for the Lower Ranch. You know what that old road looks like in the
moonlight, all deep black in the gorges, and white on the cliffs, and
not a dog-gone sound but the hoof-beats of your horse and the clank of
the bridle-chains. Why, when you come out in the open and the wind gets
to ripping 'cross the grass-fields, and the moon gets busy with every
little old blade, and there's miles of beauty stretched out far as your
eye can reach, I'd back it against any sight in the world. Only last
night I wasn't thinking much about the scenery. I was thinking--'"
Bobby stopped short, declaring that she had a cinder in her eye.
"Can't be a cinder, out here in the bay," protested Percival.
"Well, it's whatever they have out here."
"And sha'n't I ever know what your friend was thinking?"
"He was probably thinking of his dinner," said Bobby, gazing at him
reassuringly with her free eye.
After she had departed to make sure that the steamer got properly under
way, he tortured himself with suspicions. What possible secrets could
she have with this unknown friend, who waxed sentimental over moonlit
trails and wind-swept grassfields? Had not some one told him of an
unhappy love-affair? He searched his memory. Suddenly there came to him
the disturbing figure of a stalwart young man on a broncho, with leather
overalls, jingling spurs, a silk handkerchief knotted about his throat,
and a pair of keen, humorous eyes lighting up a sun-bronzed face.
Then he smiled at his quick alarm. Hadn't she told him it was one of her
foster-brothers, one of those lads whom he persisted in regarding as
children? It was the most natural thing in the world that an impulsive,
big-hearted creature like Bobby would be on terms of affectionate
intimacy with those boys with whom she had been brought up.
He did not feel fully reassured, however, until he put the question to
her flatly:
"That letter you were reading me," he said at his first opportunity--"you
won't mind telling me if it is from that chap I saw at the station?"
"I don't mind telling you. But you mustn't tell the captain."
"The captain? Oh, to be sure. Doesn't fancy your friends, the Fords. I
remember."
From that time on he boldly and openly entered the lists for Bobby's
favor. The ten days he had allowed himself to drift with the tide of his
inclination were passing with incredible swiftness, and he resorted to
every means, from the subtlest strategy to the most domineering
insolence, to monopolize every waking moment of her time.
She responded to all his suggestions with flattering promptness until
preparations were set on foot to hold a huge gymkhana, in which
everybody on board should take part. The enterprise fired her enthusiasm
instantly. She was a born organizer, and the prospect of a whole day
devoted to sports captivated her. The project served as a peg on which
she and Percival hung their first quarrel.
"Of course I'm going into it," she exclaimed hotly, "and so are you."
"The idea!" said Percival. "I shouldn't think of it for a moment. Fancy
me chasing an egg around the deck in a teaspoon, and all that sort of
thing!"
"But there are lots of other contests. There's the long jump, and the
tug-of-war--"
"And pinning tails on donkeys," added Percival, bitterly. "Dare say
you'd like to see me doing that."
"I'd like to see you doing anything that would make you more sociable,"
flashed Bobby.
For the rest of the day Percival sulked in the smoking-room, raging at
the time that was stolen from him, and given to the making of silly
rules and the buying of trifling prizes.
On the morning of the sports he arrayed himself in one of the white
creations of G. Lung Fat's, giving special attention to the accessories
of his toilet. Then, with marked indifference to the games, which were
the all-absorbing topic of the day, he had his chair moved to the far
side of the deck, and sat there in superior isolation during the whole
morning.
But even there he could not avoid hearing what was taking place; shouts
of laughter, groans, and jeers over a failure, and frantic applause over
a victory, were wafted to him constantly. Now and then some one hurried
by with the information that Andy Black had won the quoits prize or that
Andy Black had won the bottle-race. His lip curled contemptuously at
sports that required a mere trickster's turn of the wrist or an animal's
sense of direction. He would like to see Andy attempt a long jump or a
mile race. Imagine the fat pink-and-white youth on a polo pony!
At luncheon Andy's praises were passed from lip to lip. The affair
had assumed an international significance. A Scotchman, a German, a
Japanese, and an American were striving for first place. The captain's
patriotism ran so high that he offered to set up the handsomest dinner
the Astor Hotel in Shanghai could afford if Andy came out victorious.
In vain Percival sought to hold Bobby's attention. The tapers in her
eyes were lighted for Andy, and he was obliged to undergo the new and
intolerable sensation of sitting in a darkened niche and watching the
candles burn at an adjoining shrine.
The slightest hint of deflection in one upon whom he had bestowed his
favor maddened him. He had showered upon this ungrateful girl attentions
the very husks of which would have sustained several English girls he
knew through a lifetime of patient waiting. He recalled their unswerving
loyalty with a glow at his heart.
Ah, he thought, one must look to England for ideal womanhood. Where else
was to be found that beautiful deference, that blind reliance, that
unswerving loyalty--At the word "loyalty" a stabbing memory of Lady
Hortense punctured his eloquence.
During the afternoon he found it impossible to escape the games. The
potato and three-legged races brought the contestants to his side of the
deck, and his reading was constantly interrupted by an avalanche of
noisy spectators who rushed through the cross passages from one side of
the boat to the other, exhibiting a perfectly ridiculous amount of
excitement.
Andy, it seemed, had only one more entry to win before claiming the
day's championship.
"He'll get it!" Percival overheard the captain saying gleefully to Mrs.
Weston. "None of 'em are in it with America when it comes to sports."
Percival flicked the ashes from his cigar, and, carefully adjusting his
tie, rose, and made his way to the judges' table.
"How many more events are there?" he asked in a superior tone.
"One," was the answer.
"How many entries?"
"Two. Mr. Black and the Scotch gentleman."
"Make it three," said Percival, as if he were ordering cocktails.
In the confusion of preparing for the last and most elaborate feature of
the day, Percival's enlistment was not discovered. It was not until the
contestants ranged themselves in front of the judges' table that a buzz
of fresh interest and amazement swept the deck. First came the Scot,
lean, wiry, and deadly determined; then came Andy, plump and pink, with
his fair hair ruffled, and a laughing retort on his lips for every sally
that was sent in his direction. Last came the Honorable Percival, a
distinguished figure in immaculate array, wearing upon his aristocratic
features a look of contemptuous superiority.
"What are the rules of the game?" he inquired, looking into space.
"There's just one rule," called Captain Boynton from the
background--"Get there."
"The American motto, I believe," said Percival, quietly, and the crowd
laughed.
The Scot was the first to start, and Percival watched anxiously to see
the nature of the race he had entered. He saw his adversary dash forward
as the signal sounded, climb over a pile of upturned chairs, scramble
under a table, scale a high net fence, then disappear around the deck,
only to emerge later from the mouth of a funnel-shaped tunnel, through
which his contortions had been followed by shrieks of merriment.
Percival realized too late what he had let himself in for. Not for
worlds would he have subjected himself to such buffoonery had he known.
It was not the sport of a gentleman; it was the play of a circus clown!
He watched with horrified disgust as the Scot's grimy face and tousled
head emerged from the canvas cavern.
"Four minutes and five seconds," called the umpire.
Andy Black stepped confidently forward amid a burst of applause.
"The champion Roly-Poly of the Pacific," some one called.
"The _Saluria's_ Little Sunbeam," suggested another.
Andy smiled blandly, and kissed his fingertips. The signal sounded, and
he bounded off, bouncing from one obstacle to another like a rubber
ball. It was only in the twenty-yard dash from the net fence to the
canvas tunnel that he lost ground.
"Four minutes, two seconds," announced the umpire as Andy scrambled out
on all fours.
At that moment Percival would willingly have exchanged places with the
grimiest stoker in the hold. Was it possible that he had, of his own
accord, placed himself in this absurd and undignified position for the
sole purpose of defeating a common, commercial traveler who had dared to
deflect the natural course of a certain damsel's smiles! He writhed
under the ignominy of it. What if he were defeated? What if--
The signal sounded, and instinctively he hurled himself forward. As he
scrambled over the upturned chairs he heard a sound that struck terror
to his soul: it was the unmistakable hiss of tearing linen. The hastily
made garments of G. Lung Fat had proved unequal to the strain put upon
them. Percival lost his head completely when he realized that his
waistcoat was split up the back from hem to collar, and that he had
become an object of the wildest hilarity.
He might have fled the scene then and there, leaving Andy to enjoy
his laurels undisturbed, had he not caught sight of Bobby frantically
motioning him to go on. Setting his teeth grimly, he went down on all
fours and scrambled under the table, then resolutely tackled that
swaying, sagging network of ropes that barred his progress. Again and
again he got nearly to the top, only to have his foot go through the
wide bars and leave him hanging there in the most awkward and ungainly
position. It seemed to him an eternity that he hung ignominiously, like
a fly in a spider's web, while the crowd went wild with merriment.
Then suddenly all his fighting blood rose, and forgetting the
spectators, and even forgetting Bobby, he doggedly grappled with those
yielding ropes until he got a foothold, swung himself over the top,
cleared the entanglement below, and made a flying dash for the yawning
mouth of canvas at the far end of the deck. It was incredibly hot and
suffocating inside, but he wriggled frantically forward, clawing and
kicking like a crab. At last a dim light ahead spurred him to one final
gallant effort.
"Four minutes!" called the umpire as the Honorable Percival Hascombe
emerged, blinking and breathless, and staggered to his feet. His clothes
were soiled and torn, his hair was on end, there was dust in his eyes,
and dirt in his mouth.
The fickle audience went wild. The dark horse had won, and public favor
immediately swung in his direction. But it was not the favor of the
public that Percival sought; it was the homage of a certain rebellious
maiden, who must be taught that he was the master of any situation in
which he found himself.
Bobby was not slow to proffer her congratulations. She gave them with
both hands, to say nothing of her eyes and her dimple.
"I pulled for you!" she whispered eagerly. "I almost prayed for you. I
wouldn't have seen you beaten for the world."
As Percival, elated by her enthusiasm, stood shaking hands right and
left, he felt a curious and unfamiliar warmth stealing over him. All
these people whom he had looked upon until to-day as so many figureheads
stalking about suddenly became human beings. He found, to his surprise,
that he knew their names and they knew his. He sat on a table, swinging
his feet in unison with a lot of other young feet, while he sipped
lemonade from the same glass as Bobby Boynton.
[Illustration: He sat on a table swinging his feet in unison with a lot
of other young feet, while he sipped lemonade from the same glass as
Bobby Boynton.]
As a matter of fact, the Honorable Percival Hascombe was experiencing a
novel sensation. He was enjoying a sense of fellowship, to which all his
life he had been a stranger.
XII
THE SONG OF THE SIREN
By the time the _Saluria_ anchored off Shanghai, the fires in
Percival's bosom had assumed the proportions of a conflagration. No
sooner were they seemingly conquered by the cold stream of reason that
was poured upon them than they broke forth again with fresh and alarming
violence.
On the launch coming up the Hwang-pu River he took the precaution of
engaging Bobby Boynton's company not only for the day on shore, but for
the evening as well. With hardened effrontery he bore the young lady
away in exactly the high-handed manner so bitterly condemned in Andy
Black at Yokohama.
The day on shore was one he was destined never to forget. The glamour of
it suffused even material old China with a roseate hue. With gracious
condescension he visited gaily decked temples and many-storied pagodas,
he loitered in silk and porcelain shops, and wound in and out of narrow,
ill-smelling streets, even allowing Bobby to conduct him through that
amazing quarter known as Pig Alley. He not only submitted to all these
diversions; he demanded more. He seemed to have developed an ambition to
leave no place of interest in or about Shanghai unvisited.
Tiffin-time found them at a well-known tea-house in Nanking Road--a
tea-house with golden dragons climbing over its walls and long wooden
signs bearing cabalistic figures swinging in the wind like so many
banners. Percival secured a table on the upper balcony, where they could
look down on the passing throng, and here in the intimate solitude of a
foreign crowd they had their lunch.
Bobby was too excited to eat; she hung over the balcony, exclaiming at
every new sight and sound, and appealing to Percival constantly for
enlightenment. Fortunately he had spent part of the previous day poring
over a Shanghai guide-book, so he was able to meet her inquiries with
the most amazing satisfaction.
"I don't see how any one human being can know as much as you do!" she
exclaimed, with a look that Buddha might have envied.
"Even I make mistakes occasionally," said Percival, modestly. "Can't
always be right, you know."
"But you are," she persisted; "you are always abominably right, and I am
always wrong."
"Adorably wrong," amended Percival, assisting with the tea-things.
"Two, three, four?" she asked, holding up the sugar-tongs.
"Doesn't matter so long as I have you to look at."
Now, when an Englishman ceases to be particular about the amount of
sugar in his tea, you may know he is very far gone indeed. By the time
he had drained three cups of the jasmine-scented beverage and basked in
the brilliance of Bobby's smiles through the smoking of two cigars, he
was feeling decidedly heady.
"If we are going to the races, we really _must_ start," declared
Bobby when she found the situation getting difficult.
"What's the use of going anywhere?" asked Percival, blowing one ring of
smoke through another.
"Why, we are seeing the sights of Shanghai. You said you were crazy
about China."
"So I am. You are quite determined on the races?"
"Quite," said Bobby.
Their way to the track lay along the famous Bubbling Well Road, and as
they bowled along in a somewhat imposing victoria, with a couple of
liveried Chinamen on the box, Bobby sat bolt upright, her cheeks
flushed, and her eager eyes drinking in the sights.
It was a scene sufficiently gay to hold the interest of a much more
sophisticated person than the untraveled young lady from Wyoming. The
whole of society, it appeared, was on route to the races. The road was
thronged with smart traps full of brilliantly dressed people of every
nationality. There were gay parties from the various legations, French,
Russian, Japanese, German, English, American. In and out among the
whirling wheels of the foreigners poured the unending procession of
native life, unperturbed, unconcerned. A Chinese lady in black satin
trousers and gorgeous embroidered coat, wearing a magnificent head-dress
of jade and pearls, rode side by side with a coolie who trundled a
wheelbarrow which carried his wife on one side and his week's provisions
on the other. Water-carriers, street vendors, jinrikisha-runners, women
with bound feet, children on foot, and children strapped on the backs of
their mothers, crossed and recrossed, surged in and out.
But the Honorable Percival concerned himself little with these petty
details. To him China was only a pleasing background for Miss Roberta
Boynton; he saw no further than her eager, smiling eyes, and heard
nothing more distant than the ripple of her laughter.
At the races they found an absorbing bond of interest. The love of
horse-flesh was ingrained in both, and the merits of the various ponies
provoked endless discussion. Lights were beginning to twinkle on the
bund when they drove back to the hotel.
"Where shall we go to-night!" asked Percival, as eager at the end of
this eight hours' tête-à-tête as he had been at the start.
"To the ball, of course," said Bobby. "The hotel is giving it in honor
of the _Saluria_."
"Heavens! what a bore! Can't we dodge it?"
"You can if you want to. Andy'll take me. He's just waiting to see if
you renig."
"Renig?" repeated Percival.
"Yes," said Bobby--"fluke, back out; you know what I mean."
That settled it with Percival. Five minutes before the hour appointed he
was waiting impatiently in one of the small reception-rooms to conduct
Miss Boynton to that most abhorred of all functions, a public ball. What
possible pleasure he was going to get out of standing against the wall
and watching her dance with other men he could not conceive. He assured
himself that he was acting like a fool, and that if he kept on at the
pace he was going, Heaven only knew what folly he might commit in the
four days that must pass before he reached Hong-Kong.
Hong-Kong! The word had but one association for him. It was the home of
his eldest and most conservative sister, a lady of uncompromising social
standards, who recognized only two circles of society, the one over
which her mother presided in London, and the smaller one over which she
reigned as the wife of the British diplomatic official in the land of
her adoption.
At the mere thought of presenting Bobby to this paragon of social
perfection, Percival shuddered. He could imagine Sister Cordelia's
pitiless survey of the girl through her lorgnette, the lifting of her
brows over some mortal sin against taste or some deadly transgression in
her manner of speech. Of course, he assured himself it would never do;
the idea of bringing them together was wholly preposterous. And yet--
A Chinese youth, with a handful of trinkets, slipped into the room, and
furtively proffered his wares.
"Very good, number-one jade-stone. Make missy velly plitty. Can buy?"
Percival motioned him away, only to have him return.
"Jade-stone velly nice! Plitty young missy wanchee jade-stone."
"Did she say she wanted it?" demanded Percival, with sudden interest.
The boy grinned. "Oh, yes. Wanchee heap! No have got fifty dollar'.
Master have got. Wanchee buy?"