THE BUD UNFOLDS
In a certain way it ages a girl to be left motherless as Dorothy Dale
had been. She had been obliged to “play mother” herself so early that
her maternal instincts were strongly and early developed.
Until the Dale family had come away from Dalton to live with Aunt
Winnie at The Cedars, Dorothy had exercised her motherly oversight in
the little family. Indeed, Roger scarcely knew any other mother than
Dorothy, and Joe had almost forgotten her who had passed away soon
after Roger was born.
As for the major, he had soon given all domestic matters over into the
small but capable hands of “the little captain” while they were still
struggling in poverty. After coming to The Cedars, Dorothy, of course,
had been relieved of the close oversight of domestic and family matters
that had previously been her portion. But its effect upon her character
was plain to all observing eyes. Nor had her so early developed
maternal characteristics failed to affect the other members of the
family.
Now that she was really grown up past the schoolgirl age and of a
serious and thoughtful demeanor, even Aunt Winnie looked upon her as
being much older than Tavia—and years older than the boys. That Ned and
Nat were both several years Dorothy’s senior made no difference.
“Boys are to a degree irresponsible—and always are, no matter how old
they become,” said Aunt Winnie. “But _Dorothy_——”
Her emphasis was approved by the major. “The little captain is some
girl,” he said, chuckling. “Beg pardon! woman grown, eh, Sister?”
Nor was his approval merely of Dorothy’s surface qualities. He knew
that his pretty daughter was a much deeper thinker than most girls
of her age, and he had seldom interfered in any way with Dorothy’s
personal decisions on any subject.
“Let her find out for herself. She won’t go far wrong,” had often been
his remark at first when his sister had worried over Dorothy in her
school days. And so the girl developed into something that not all
girls are—an original thinker.
Knowing her as the major did and trusting in her good sense so fully,
he was less startled, perhaps, than he would otherwise have been when
Dorothy took him into her confidence regarding Garry Knapp. Tavia had
refrained from joking about the Westerner from the first. Little
had been said before the family about their adventures in New York.
Therefore, the major was not prepared in the least for the introduction
of the subject.
Perhaps it would not have been introduced in quite the way it was
had it not grown out of another matter. It came the day after
Christmas—that day in which everybody is tired and rather depressed
because of the over-exertion of celebrating the feast of good Kris
Kringle. Dorothy was busy at the sewing basket beside her father’s
comfortable chair. She knew that Tavia was writing letters and just at
this moment Major Dale dropped his paper to peer out of the window.
“There goes Nat—off for a tramp, I’ll be bound. And he’s alone,” the
major said.
“Yes,” agreed Dorothy without looking up.
“And Ned and that Jennie girl are in the library, and you’re here,”
pursued the major, with raised eyebrows. “Where is Tavia?”
She told him; but she refrained again from looking up, and he finally
bent forward in his chair and thrust a forefinger under her chin,
raising it and making her look at him.
“Say! what is the matter with Tavia and Nat?” he asked.
“Are you sure there is anything the matter, Major?” Dorothy responded.
“Can’t fool me. They’re at outs. And you, Captain? Is that what makes
you so grave, my dear?”
“No, Daddy,” she said, putting down her work and looking into his
rugged face this time of her own volition.
“Something personal, my dear?”
“Very personal, Daddy,” calling him by the intimate name the children
used. “I—I think I—I am in love.”
He neither made a joke of it nor appeared astonished. He just eyed her
quietly and nodded. The flush mounted into her face and she glowed like
a red rose. After all, it is not the easiest thing in the world to turn
the heart out for others to look at, even the dearest of others.
“I think I am in love. And the young man is poor—and—and I am afraid
our money is going to stand between him and me.”
“My dear Dorothy,” said the major, “are you really in love with
somebody, or in love with love?”
“I know what you mean,” his daughter said, with a tremulous little
laugh and shaking her head. “Seeing so many about us falling into
the toils of Dan Cupid, you think I perhaps imagine I have fixed my
affections upon some particular object. Is that it, Major?”
He nodded, a quizzical little smile on his lips.
“No” she said. “It isn’t anywhere near as simple as that. I—I do
love him I believe. He is the only man I have ever really thought twice
about. He is the center of all my thoughts now, and has been for a long
time.”
“But—but who is he?” the major gasped.
“Garry Knapp.”
Her father repeated the name slowly and his expression of countenance
certainly displayed amazement. “Did I ever see the young man?”
“No.”
“Your aunt—one of your cousins’ friends?”
“Dear Daddy,” said Dorothy, frankly and smiling a little. “I have done
something not at all as you would expect cautious little me to do. I
have picked a man—and, oh, he is a man, Daddy!—right out of the great
mob of folks. Nobody introduced us. We just—well, _met_.”
“The young man has been spoken of by Tavia, I believe,” said Major
Dale, quite cheerfully. “I remember now. Mr. Knapp. You met him at the
hotel in New York?”
“Before we got to the hotel. In the train I noticed him—vaguely. On the
platform where we changed cars at that Manhattan Transfer place, I saw
him better. I—I never was so much interested in a man before.”
Major Dale looked at her rather solemnly for a moment. “Are you sure,
my dear, it is anything more than fancy?”
“Quite sure.”
“And—and—_he_——”
The man’s voice actually trembled. Dorothy looked at him again, dropped
the sewing from her lap and suddenly flung her arms about his neck.
“Oh, my dear!” she murmured, her face hidden. “I know he loves me, too.
I am sure of it! Let me tell you.”
Breathlessly, her voice quavering a little but full of an element
of happiness that fairly thrilled her listener, she related all the
incidents—even the petty details—of her acquaintance with Garford
Knapp, of Desert City. So clear was her picture of the young man that
the major saw him in his mind’s eye just as Garry appeared to Dorothy
Dale.
She went over every little thing that had happened in New York
in connection with the young Westerner. She told of her own mean
suspicions and how they had risen from a feeling of pique and jealousy
that never in her life had she experienced before.
“That was a rather small way for me to show real feeling for a person.
But it caught me unprepared,” said Dorothy, with a full-throated laugh
although her eyes were full of tears. “I do not believe I am naturally
of a jealous disposition; and I should never let such a feeling get the
better of me again. It has cost me too much.”
She went on and told the major of the incidents that followed and how
Garry Knapp had gone away so hastily without her speaking to him again.
But the major rather lost the thread of her story for a moment. He was
staring closely at her, shaking his shaggy head slowly.
“My dear! my dear!” he murmured, “you have grown up. The bud
has unfolded. Our demure little Dorothy is—and with shocking
abruptness—blown into full womanhood. My dear!” and he put his arms
about her again more tightly.