AS NIGHT APPROACHES
Neither spoke until the boat came to its slippery, uncertain
landing-place on the opposite side of the river. Then each breathed
easier, in a sigh that seemed to express both relief and dismay.
"It's a very ugly looking river," she murmured encouragingly. She was
afraid he might feel obliged, in honour, to offer an explanation for
his presence, perhaps attempt to convince her in some tangible way that
she was to expect nothing but slavish devotion from him in the future.
"I don't wonder that the bridge gave way," he replied politely. They
looked at each other involuntarily, and then instantly looked away.
"I'd give my head to know what she expects of me," thought Windomshire
miserably.
"How I despise that old woman!" welled up in Eleanor's bitter heart.
Everything was awry. Luckily for both of them a small boy slipped into
the river at that moment. He was rescued by the brakeman, but not until
the catastrophe had served its purpose as a godsend. The excitement
which attended the rescue saved the couple an uncomfortable ten
minutes. Eleanor went to the assistance of the distracted mother;
Windomshire, in his eagerness to do something, offered to exchange
clothes with the dripping trainman; the small boy howled as lustily as
his wheezy lungs would permit. Everybody shouted advice to the mother,
rebukes to the boy, and praise to the hero; altogether Providence was
acting most handsomely.
At last the final boatload of passengers crossed the river and drew up
at the landing; Eleanor, with her bewildered fiance, stepped into the
beaming presence of Mrs. Van Truder.
"Come with us," she said with a friendliness that shattered all hope.
"Mr. Van Truder has just arranged for breakfast at that farmhouse over
there. The relief train won't be here for half an hour or more and you
must be famished." Eleanor's flimsy excuses were unavailing; her
protestations that she could not eat a mouthful fell on obdurate ears.
Windomshire, catching sight of the forlorn Anne, was about to assert
himself vigorously in declining the invitation when a meaning look from
the governess caused him to refrain. The look very plainly told him to
accept.
The unhappy couple followed the Van Truders to the nearby farmhouse.
They left behind them on the edge of the crowd, seated side by side on
a pile of ties, two miserable partners in the fiasco. Gloomy, indeed,
was the outlook for Miss Courtenay and the despised Mr. Dauntless. They
were silent for many minutes after the departure, rage in their hearts.
Then Mr. Dauntless could hold his tongue no longer.
"Damn her!" he exploded so viciously that Anne jumped and cried out,--
"Mr. Dauntless!"
"Oh, you feel just as I do about it only you won't say it aloud," he
exclaimed. "I won't stand for it!"
"I--I am sure Miss Thursdale has done nothing to deserve your curses,"
she began diplomatically.
"Good Heavens, Miss Courtenay, you--Oh, I say, you know I didn't mean
Eleanor. The old pelican--that's the one. Old Mrs. Intruder," he grated.
"I am sure it is all quite regular," observed Anne, so seriously that
he looked at her in wonder. It began to creep into his head that his
speculations were wrong, after all. At any rate it seemed advisable to
put a sharp curb on his tongue.
"I'm sorry I spoke as I did about the old lady," he said, after a
moment's reflection. "I was thinking of the way in which she left you
out of her invitation to breakfast."
"And yourself, incidentally," she smiled.
"Miss Courtenay, I'm--I'm a confounded ass for not thinking of your
breakfast. It's not too late. We are both hungry. Won't you come with
me and have a bit of something to eat? We'll try that farmhouse
ourselves. Come, let us hurry or the crowd will get in ahead of us. Ham
and eggs and coffee! they always have that sort of breakfast in
farmhouses, I'm told. Come."
[Illustration: Seated side by side...two miserable partner in the
fiasco]
She sprang up cheerfully, and followed him across the meadow to the
farmhouse. The Van Truder party was entering the door, smoke pouring
forth suggestively from a chimney in the rear of the house. The sudden
desire for ham and eggs was overcoming, in a way, the pangs of outraged
love; there was solace in the new thought.
That breakfast was one never to be forgotten by four persons; two
others remembered it to their last days on account of its amazing
excellence. A dozen persons were crowded into the little dining-room;
no one went forth upon his travels with an empty stomach. No such
profitable harvest had ever been reaped by the farmer. Dauntless and
Anne ate off of a sewing-table in the corner. Mrs. Van Truder
deliberately refused to hear Mr. Windomshire's timorous suggestion that
they "make room" for them at the select table. Silent anathemas
accompanied every mouthful of food that went down the despot's throat,
but she did not know it. Fortunately the lovers were healthy and hungry.
They fared forth after that memorable breakfast with lighter hearts,
though still misplaced by an unrelenting fate.
All the way to Omegon Anne sat in the seat with the seething Dauntless,
each nursing a pride that had received almost insupportable injuries
during the morning hours. Windomshire and Eleanor, under the espionage
of the "oldest friend of the family," moped and sighed with a frankness
that could not have escaped more discerning eyes. Mrs. Van Truder,
having established herself as the much needed chaperon, sat back
complacently and gave her charges every opportunity to hold private and
no doubt sacred communication in the double seat just across the aisle.
Eleanor pleaded fatigue, and forthwith closed her wistful eyes.
Windomshire, with fine consideration, sank into a rapt study of the
flitting farm lands. Having got but little sleep among the coals, he
finally dropped off into a peaceful cat nap.
Omegon was reached before Eleanor had the courage to awaken him. She
did so then only because it was impossible for her to crawl over his
knees without losing her dignity; they were planted sturdily against
the seat in front. She fled like a scared child to Joe's side, her mind
made up to cling to him now, no matter what manner of opposition
prevailed.
"I'll go with you, Joe," she whispered fiercely. "I don't care what any
one says or thinks. Your cousin WILL meet us with the carriage, won't
he?" she concluded piteously. Windomshire also had taken the bull by
the horns and was helping Miss Courtenay from the train with an
assiduity that brought down the wrath of obstructing passengers upon
his devoted head.
"He said he would," replied Dauntless, his spirits in the clouds. "We
must get away from these people, Nell. I'll go crazy in another minute.
There's Derby waiting for instructions. Dear old Darb--he's a brick. My
cousin Jim is a deacon or something in the village church, dear, and he
has promised to let us in. I suppose he has a key. He and his wife will
be the only witnesses. By George, nothing can stop us now, dear, if you
have the nerve to--Where the dickens is Jim? Confound him, I don't see
him on the platform."
He looked about the station platform--first anxiously, then
impatiently, then--with consternation! His cousin was nowhere in sight.
Cold with apprehensiveness, he dashed over to a citizen who wore a star
upon his coat, almost dragging Eleanor after him.
"Is Jim Carpenter here? Have you seen him? Do you know him?" he
demanded.
"He was here, mister. 'Bout two hours ago, I reckon. I guess you must
be the fellow he was to meet--"
"Yes, yes,--where is he now?"
"I don't know, mister. His wife's got pneumonia, an' he told me to tell
you he couldn't wait. He took the doctor right out to--"
"Good Lord!" exploded Joe. The citizen jumped a few inches into the
air. "He's gone?"
"Yep. But he told me to tell you to go over to the Somerset an' wait
till you hear from him."
"Wait--till--I hear--from--him?" groaned Dauntless, wild-eyed but
faint. He and Eleanor looked at each other in despair.
"Go--to--the--hotel?" she murmured, her heart in her boots. "I never
can do that," she continued. Her voice was full of tears.
Mrs. Van Truder bore down upon them like an angry vulture. They saw her
coming, but neither had the strength of purpose to move.
Before they really knew how it happened, she was leading Eleanor to the
hotel 'bus and he was limply following, lugging both bags with a
faithfulness that seemed pathetic. Two minutes later they were in the
'bus, touching knees with the equally dazed and discomfited English
people.
Back on the platform the elongated medical gentleman, Mr. Hooker, was
talking loudly, wrathfully to the station agent. His voice rang in
their ears long after the 'bus rolled away on its "trip" to the big
summer hotel.
"You say old man Grover ain't dead yet?" Mr. Hooker was growling
resentfully, even indignantly.
"He ain't expected to live till night, sir, poor old man," replied the
agent.
"Well, I'll be damned!" roared Mr. Hooker. "I don't see any sense in a
man of his age hanging on like this. He's eighty-three. My time is
valuable"--looking at his big silver watch--"and I can't afford to hang
around here if he's going to act like this." The agent stared after him
as if he were looking at a maniac. Mr. Hooker set off in the direction
of old Mr. Grover's house, which had been pointed out to him by a
gaping small boy. "I'll go up and see about it," he remarked, as he
stepped across a wide rivulet in the middle of the main street. The
Somerset Hotel was situated on the most beautiful point of land
touching that trim little lake which attracted hundreds of city people
annually by its summer wiles. It was too sedate and quiet to be
fashionable; the select few who went there sought rest from the
frivolities of the world. Eleanor Thursdale had spent one tiresome but
proper season there immediately after the death of her father. She
hated everything in connection with the place except the little
old-fashioned church at the extreme end of the village street, fully
half a mile from the hotel. She had chosen it, after romantic
reflection, as the sanctuary in which she should become the wife of the
man she loved, spurning the great church in town and one of its
loveless matches.
The forenoon is left to the imagination of the reader,--with all of its
unsettled plans, its doubts and misgivings, its despairs and its
failures, its subterfuges and its strategies, its aggravations and
complaints. Bell-boys carried surreptitious notes from room to room;
assurances, hopes, and reassurances passed one another in systematic
confusion. Love was trying to find its way out of the maze.
Immediately after luncheon Dauntless set out to discover his faithless
cousin. Eleanor kept close to her room, in readiness for instant
flight. The necessary Mr. Derby had his instructions to remain where he
could be found without trouble. Mrs. Van Truder, taking up Eleanor's
battles, busied herself and every one else in the impossible task of
locating the young woman's trunks, which, according to uncertain
reports, had gone mysteriously astray. Moreover, she had prepared a
telegram to the young lady's mother, assuring her that she was quite
safe; but Mr. Dauntless boldly intercepted Mr. Van Truder on his way to
the desk.
"Allow me," he remarked, deliberately taking the despatch from the old
gentleman. "I'll send it from the station. Don't bother about it, Mr.
Van Truder." He drove through the village, but did not stop at the
station; his instructions to the driver did not include a pause
anywhere. It is not necessary to relate what took place when he
descended upon the unfortunate Jim; it is sufficient to say that he
dragged him from his sick wife's bedside and berated him soundly for
his treachery. Then it was all rearranged,--the hapless Jim being swept
into promises which he could not break, even with death staring his
wife in the face. The agitated Mr. Dauntless drove back to the hotel
with a new set of details perfected. This time nothing should go wrong.
His first action was to acquaint Derby with the plans, and then to send
a note of instructions to Eleanor, guarding against any chance that
they might not be able to communicate with each other in person.
"It's all fixed," he announced to Derby, in a secluded corner of the
grounds. "To-night at nine we are to be at the church down the road
there--see it? Nobody is on to us, and Jim has a key. He will meet you
there at a quarter of nine. But, hang it all, his wife can't act as a
witness. We've got to provide one. He suggested the postmaster, but I
don't like the idea; it looks too much like a cheap elopement. I'd just
as soon have the cook or the housemaid. I'll get Eleanor there if I
have to kill that Van Truder woman. Now, whom shall we have as the
second witness?"
"Windomshire, I'm afraid," lamented Derby. "You won't be able to get
rid of him."
"Hang him!" groaned Dauntless, his spirits falling, but instantly
reviving. "But he's dead in love with Miss Courtenay. It's pitiful, old
man. He feels that he's got to marry Nell, but it's not in his heart to
do it. Now if we could only shunt him off on to Miss Courtenay this
evening! Her train leaves at nine, they say. He might be forced to take
her to the station if you will only get busy and make him jealous."
"Jealous? I?"
"Certainly. It won't be much of an effort for you, and it will help me
immensely. Make love to her this afternoon, and when you suggest taking
her to the station this evening he'll be so wrought up that he won't
stand for it. See what I mean?"
"Now see here, Joe, I'm willing to do a great deal for you, but this is
too much. You forget that I am a minister of the gospel. It's--"
"I know, old man, but you might do a little thing like this for--By
Jove, I've got it! Why not have old Mr. Van Truder for the other
witness?"
Mr. Van Truder was crossing the lawn, picking his way carefully.
"Good afternoon," greeted Dauntless.
"Afternoon," responded Mr. Van Truder. "Is this the hotel?"
"No, sir; the hotel is about ten feet to your left. By the way, Mr. Van
Truder, would you mind doing me a favour this evening?"
"Gladly. Who are you?"
"Joe Dauntless."
"Anything, my dear Joe."
"Well, it's a dead secret."
"A secret? Trust me," cried the old man, joyfully.
"First, let me introduce my friend, the Rev. Mr. Derby. He's in the
secret. It will go no farther, I trust, Mr. Van Truder."
"My wife says I can't keep a secret, but I'll show her that I can.
Trust me, my boy."
"I'll bet you a hundred dollars you can't keep this one," said Joe,
inspired.
"Done!"
"Well," bravely but cautiously, "I'm going to be married to-night. Be
careful now! Look out! Don't explode! Remember the bet!" The old
gentleman repressed his feelings.
"Beautiful!" he exclaimed. "Congratulations, my boy."
"Now for the favour. I want you to act as a witness. It's to be a very
quiet affair." Dauntless explained as much of the situation to him as
he thought necessary, omitting the lady's name. Mr. Van Truder bubbled
over with joy and eagerness. He promised faithfully to accompany Mr.
Derby, pooh-hooing the suggestion that he could not slip away from the
hotel without his wife being aware of the fact.
"Trust me, my boy. Don't worry. I'm always Johnny-on-the-spot. Where
did you say the hotel was? I'll go up and get ready. Oh, by the way,
who is the young lady?"
"She's a friend of Mr. Dauntless's," said Mr. Derby.
"To be sure; I might have known. Silly question."
The young men watched him enter the hotel, but they did not see him
fall into the clutches of his wife just inside the door.
"Where have you been?" demanded Mrs. Van Truder.
"I've been looking everywhere for you, my dear," he said, almost
whimpering. "I've got a grand secret, but I can't tell you. Don't ask
me!"
"Is it a wedding?" she demanded sternly.
"Dear me! Do you know it too?" he cried, bewildered. "But that's not
the real secret; it's only part of it. Joe is going to marry some
friend of his to-night--but that's as far as I'll go. I'll NOT betray
the secret." He hurried away to avoid questions, muttering to himself
as he went: "She's dying to know. But a secret's a secret. She sha'n't
know that I am to be a witness."
Mrs. Van Truder pondered long and deeply, but she was not well enough
acquainted with all of the facts to hazard a guess as to who the girl
might be. It came to her memory that Dauntless had been with Miss
Courtenay all morning, however, and she wondered not a little.
Windomshire was approaching in search of Anne, who was to have met him
as if by accident in a corner of the reading-room.
"Oh, Mr. Windomshire," exclaimed Mrs. Van Truder, darting toward him.
"How do, Mrs. Van Truder? How are you to-day?" he asked, scarcely able
to hide his annoyance.
"That is the tenth time you've asked me that question. I must repeat: I
am quite well."
"Oh, pardon my inquisitiveness. It has been a very long day, you know."
"I want you and Miss Thursdale to dine with me at eight this evening. I
think I'll have a little surprise for you," she said mysteriously.
Windomshire glared, and then managed to give a provisional acceptance.
It all depended on the hour for leaving for the train. As he hurried
off to find Anne he was groaning to himself: "How the deuce can I go to
a dinner and run off again with Anne? I've got everything arranged. I
can't let a beastly dinner interfere. I won't go, hang me if I do." He
came upon Anne in the corner of the library--the most unfrequented
corner.
"Well?" she questioned eagerly. He clasped her hands, beaming once more.
"I've seen him, dear. It's all right. My word, I've had no end of a
busy day. The confounded fellow was out making calls on the
congregation, as they say, and I had to pursue him from house to house,
always missing him, by Jove."
"But you DID find him?" anxiously.
"Of course. He will be at the church at nine to-night--sharp. He
understands that no one is to know about it. His fee is ten
pounds--quite a bit for a chap like him. I found him calling upon a
fellow who is about to die--a Mr. Grover. He sent out word I'd have to
wait as the old gentleman was passing away. By Jove, do you know I was
that intense that I sent in word that the old gentleman would have to
wait a bit--I COULDN'T. The pastor came out and--well, it seems that
the fee for helping a chap to get married is more substantial than what
he gets for helping one to die. And, as luck would have it, I found a
fellow who will act as one of the witnesses to the ceremony at this
same house,--a Mr. Hooker, Anne. He came down on the train with us.
Tall, dark, professional looking man. He was sitting on Mr. Grover's
front steps when I got there. The other witness--must have two, you
know--is the head-waiter in the dining-room here--"
"The--head-waiter?" she gasped.
"He's a very decent sort of chap, my dear--and, besides, we can't be
choosers. Waiters are most discreet fellows, too. He's to get two
pounds for his trouble. By Jove, I think I've done rather well. I'm
sorry if you don't approve," he lamented.
"But I do approve, Harry," she cried bravely. "It's lovely!"
"Good! I knew you would. Now all we have to do is to slip away from
here this evening, and--Oh, I say, hang it all! Mrs. Van Truder has
asked me to dine with them this evening."
"Isn't she running you a bit?" cried Anne, indignantly. "She had you
for breakfast and luncheon and now it's dinner. I daresay she'll have
you for tea too."
"But I'm not going to her confounded dinner. That's settled. I can't do
it, you know, and be on time for the wedding. Deuce take it, what does
she take a fellow for? Hello, here comes the chap that Dauntless
introduced to us this morning." Derby was approaching with a warm and
ingratiating smile. "What's his name? Confound him."
"Mr. Derby, I think. Why can't they give us a moment's peace?" she
pouted. Derby came up to them, his eyes sparkling with a fire which
they could not and were not to understand. He had surveyed them from a
distance for some time before deciding to ruthlessly, cruelly break in
upon the tranquil situation.
"She's a pretty girl," he reflected, unconsciously going back to his
college days, and quite forgetting his cloth--which, by the way, was a
neat blue serge with a tender stripe. Consoling himself with the
thought that he was doing it to accommodate an old friend, the
good-looking Mr. Derby boldly entered the lists for the afternoon. He
felt, somehow, that he had it in his power to make Mr. Windomshire
quite jealous--and at the same time do nothing reprehensible. What he
did succeed in doing, alas, was to make two young people needlessly
miserable for a whole afternoon--bringing on grievous headaches and an
attack of suppressed melancholia that savoured somewhat of actual
madness.
[Illustration: Windomshire]
True to his project, he laboured hard and skilfully for hours.
Windomshire moved about in solitude, gnashing his teeth, while Derby
unceremoniously whisked the dazed Anne off for pleasant walks or held
her at bay in some secluded corner of the parlours. By dinner-time,
encouraged by Joe's wild but cautious applause, he had driven
Windomshire almost to distraction. A thing he did not know,
however,--else his pride might have cringed perceptibly,--was that Anne
Courtenay was growing to hate him as no one was ever hated before.
"Well," he said to the nervous Mr. Dauntless at seven o'clock that
evening, having arrived at what he called the conclusion of his day's
work, "I think I've done all that was expected, haven't I?"
"You've got him crazy, old boy. Look at him! It's the first minute he's
had since half-past two. Say, what do you think of this cursed weather?
It's raining again--and muddy! Great Scot, old man! it's knee deep, and
we don't dare take a carriage to the church. One can't sneak worth a
cent in a cab, you know. See you later! There's Eleanor waiting to
speak to me. By George, I'm nervous. You WON'T fail us, old man?"
"I'll do my part, Joe," said Derby, smiling.
"Well, so long, if I don't see you before nine. You look out for old
Mr. Van Truder, will you? See that he sneaks out properly. And--"
"Don't worry, old chap. Go to Miss Thursdale. She seems nervous."