Mordaunt Ballinger's luncheons at the Lawyers' Club, and his
introductions to various magnates of the money-market, had led to his
mind being tossed and buffeted on a sea of railroads, and mines, and
joint-stock companies, until it had settled--as much from exhaustion,
perhaps, as anything--on "real estate" in one of the rapidly rising
cities of the Far West. This seemed as safe an investment, to bring
in a large return for his money, as he could find. He felt sure Mrs.
Frampton would think so. Still, as his aunt, whose acuteness in money
matters he regarded with an almost superstitious trust, not wholly
unmixed with dread, was to join them in the course of a few weeks, the
young man resolved to defer the purchase of the shares offered him
until he could visit Pueblo, and investigate on the spot the condition
and prospects of the estate in question.
He came into his sister's room, a morning or two after the Van Winkle
dinner, holding an open letter in his hand.
"I've heard from Aunt Su. She has got my letter, and seems in an awful
stew about my investing money here. Well, I wrote yesterday to tell her
I should do nothing till she came. She thinks she can sail the middle
of February, and join us in Boston. By the bye, have you written to
Mrs. Courtly?"
"No. I was waiting for you to tell me what time to propose to go to
her. I suppose we shall only be there a few days before we go to
Boston?"
"Well, that depends. I believe the Planters are going to her next week.
We may as well offer ourselves at the same time."
Grace smiled.
"Certainly." Then, with a malicious glance into her brother's face,
"Perhaps Mrs. Courtly would invite Miss Hurlstone, too, if I mentioned
her. They are friends, I know."
"Well, don't mention her, then. She is a very nice girl, and all that,
but--I'd rather she didn't come."
He stood near the table where his sister was writing as he said this.
Then he took up a pen, and flung it down, fidgeted first on one leg,
then on the other, finally walked to the window, still with Mrs.
Frampton's letter in his hand, and remained there silent, with his
back to Grace, for several minutes. She knew him too well not to see
there was something on his mind--something which he desired to say to
her, and yet found it difficult to express. She thought, not without
a twinge of apprehension, of the various ladies to whom he had paid
attention here. Could it be that he had entangled himself, more or
less, with one of these? Her mind so little anticipated what was coming
that she started and flushed when he said,
"There's something else in Aunt Su's letter which I think you ought to
know, Grace. In fact, she says I'm to tell you. Because you're sure
to hear of it sooner or later. People are full of it. There's fresh
evidence against Lawrence."
Her face hardened. She closed her lips tight for a moment, and in her
clear blue eyes there was a momentary flash, as she said, quickly,
"What is it?"
"They've found the draft of another will, dated some years back, by
which his uncle left the bulk of his fortune to his other nephew, Giles
Tracy, and only ten thousand pounds to Ivor Lawrence."
"You call that evidence against him? What does that prove?" she asked,
hotly.
"It only proves that before Ivor got the influence over his uncle which
he exercised latterly, the old chap meant to leave his estates not to
his sister's son, but to his brother's son, as was natural, and as it
was understood he would do."
"Understood by whom? By Mr. Giles Tracy, I suppose, who took to
gambling on the strength of this prospective fortune! And why was it
'natural,' pray, that a man who had made--not inherited--his large
fortune, like old Mr. Tracy, should leave it to a spendthrift, a
_vautrien_, instead of to a clever rising barrister like his other
nephew, whose character was universally respected?"
"Well, it isn't universally respected now, Grace."
"The more shame for those who are ready to believe any foul accusation
on such evidence!" Her cheeks were aflame, and her voice shook as she
spoke. "Evidence? It is too childish to call this evidence. According
to your own showing, all it proves is that the old man once--before he
knew how young Tracy would turn out--meant to make him his heir. He
discovered in time the comparative worth of both his nephews."
"You forget there is a lot of cumulative evidence against Ivor before:
his bringing a lawyer, who happens to have died since, to his uncle's
bedside when he was dying--young Tracy's being refused admittance to
his uncle--"
"Because the old man could not endure the sight of him latterly. Every
one knows that he refused repeatedly to see him; and those who had
heard him speak of his nephew during the last year or two were amazed
to find that he had left him even so much as twenty thousand pounds."
Mordaunt shrugged his shoulders.
"The signature of the will is disputed, as you know."
An ejaculation indicative of intense scorn burst from his sister's lips.
"So he is to be accused of forgery. I wonder they don't add murder to
the charge! Has the trial begun?"
"No, it has been again deferred."
She was silent for a moment, leaning her head upon her left hand, while
with a pen in the right she traced some scrolls upon the note-paper
before her.
"Poor Mr. Lawrence!" she said, at last. "I have a great mind to write
to him."
"Good God! You wouldn't dream of doing anything so undignified, so
outrageous, after his behavior to you, Grace? A fellow who runs after
you for months so that half the world believes you are engaged to him,
and that he is only waiting till he is rich enough to marry, and who,
when he inherits this big fortune, turns his back and never comes near
you again--and you would actually demean yourself to write to him?"
Strange to say, now that the discussion had entered upon personal
grounds, the young lady had comparatively regained her composure.
Still, it was not without an effort that she said,
"Mr. Lawrence and I are very good friends, and I hope we shall always
remain so. We never have been, and, of course, never shall be, anything
more. I see no reason why I should not write and assure him that
there is one person who believes in him if all the verdicts in the
world went against him; if the whole of London cut him dead, it would
make no difference to me. I know him to be a perfectly honorable,
truthful, noble character. He is peculiar; there are some very rugged
knots in him which you and Aunt Su, particularly Aunt Su, could never
understand. And you don't understand him now. You think, supposing that
he cared for me, which of course he never did, that he should have
proposed when he found himself with ten thousand pounds a year. That is
the last thing he would do with this accusation, this cloud over his
head. He might have done so as a poor barrister, but never as one whose
good name was tainted. I don't say he is right in avoiding us as he has
done; I think, on the contrary, he is quite wrong. But I should not be
afraid of his misunderstanding me if I wrote to him. I think he would
do justice to my motives, and thank me."
"All the same, Grace, I do hope to goodness you won't. Men of the world
are not used to such high-flown sentiments. And it's so very like
throwing yourself at the head of a cad, who--"
"None of that, Mordy, please, or I must ask you to leave the room." She
spoke now with more excitement. "We have gone through all the string of
opprobrious epithets at your command before, you know. They produce no
effect on me--yes, they do. They make me feel very irritable with you.
So, like a dear, drop it, please, and if you mention Mr. Lawrence--I
have no objection whatever to your mentioning him--do so respectfully,
as my friend."
He felt there was nothing more to be said. He had expended all his
ammunition--retreat alone remained for him. But when the door was
closed behind her brother, the girl's fortitude and pride broke down.
She laid her head between her hands, and the hot tears of wounded love
and disappointment coursed down her cheeks and fell on the note-paper
upon which her pen had traced a confusion of curves and circles. Why
had he not spoken to her when he was a struggling barrister? Was it
because of her aunt, her brother? Was it by reason of false pride?
That he had pride, of an unreasoning, indomitable kind, allied to the
obstinacy which was so marked a feature of his character, she knew
well. But this should not have been enough to have kept him silent if
he cared for her. And unless she was utterly blinded by vanity, by a
fatuous misapprehension of looks she had now and again found fastened
upon her, of casual words and actions escaping from a reticent man, he
had cared for her at that time. She would sooner have died than admit
to her brother that she believed this. To him, as to her aunt, while
hotly defending Ivor Lawrence, whenever a discussion concerning him
arose, she always declared that, as "there had been nothing between
them," her only feeling as to his now holding aloof from them was
grief at the alienation of the most trusted friend she had ever had.
Of course, Mrs. Frampton was much too acute to be deceived by these
protestations. When the accusations against Lawrence were made public,
Grace's health and spirits were so visibly affected for a time that
those who loved her most could not but see how strong a hold this man
had taken on her heart. Nearly eight months had passed since then, and
to all outward seeming she had recovered her buoyant tone, her healthy
interest and capacity of deriving pleasure from things around her.
Only at rare moments, and when alone, as now, did the flood-gates of a
grief, the well-springs of which lay so far below the surface, rise up
and overflow.
Nevertheless, after a while her brave spirit rose. She must not succumb
to her trouble. For the sake of others she must put it away from her.
She rose and bathed her eyes. She had an engagement to a "ladies'
luncheon" party, convened at the house of an agreeable woman, almost
a stranger to Grace, who, after securing her, had invited seventeen
others "to meet Miss Ballinger." The luncheon was exquisite and
well-served; the conversation general and very pleasant.
"I had no idea it could have been so pleasant," she said, afterwards.
"I really think eighteen Englishwomen would have been very dull, all
the waves floundering together without a male rock to dash themselves
against. But these waves had so much salt in them! I felt myself quite
invigorated by plunging among them."
The truth was these waves were rather stronger than those which
played, as a rule, upon the fine shores of fashionable New York life.
The women here met were almost all interested and active in better
things than gossip, parties, dress. Their fields and their aims were
diverse; some of them were young and active, some past middle age,
but with keen intelligence undimmed, sympathies warm as in girlhood,
and a playful humor--a humor altogether national, conveyed sometimes
in a word, the turn of a phrase, lighting with the illusive flame of
a will-o'-the-wisp swamps into which an interchange of talk so often
flounders. They were not pretentious, though many of them did adventure
upon subjects that demand more time, thought, and preparation than
most Englishwomen conceive it fitting to give to any study. One girl
had been through a course of anatomy; not, as it appeared, with any
ulterior object, but in order to master the wonderful mechanism of the
human frame, "which," as she said, with a hard directness which sounded
odd in one so young, "being a fact always present, should interest us
more than it does. We can learn, and we ought to know all about it;
for this is a thing which affects our whole being here, our present and
our future; whereas the soul, which people trouble themselves so much
about, is only a matter of speculation. It seems a pity to waste time
on a subject we know so little of."
Grace was too wise to enter into a discussion with the youthful
philosopher. This was a phase which would probably pass away in a few
years, when, if the girl fell under right influence, she might learn
that there were higher truths than those which can be tangibly felt.
In the meantime, the uncompromising antagonism to all conventional
acceptances and polite euphemisms, the resolve to seize the truth to
her hand and probe it thoroughly, interested Grace. This was a type of
American character she had not yet met.
But among the middle-aged women was one whose studies and experience
were far more curious. She had large means, which she had partly
expended among the fast-diminishing tribe of Zuni Indians in Arizona,
whose language she had rescued from oblivion by means of the
phonograph. The music of their hymns and chants and invocations for
rain had also thus been noted down, and several unique objects--notably
a jewelled toad, supposed to be a god--secured by her excavations. The
ruined city, made of adobe, in which this tribe dwelt, had been saved
from total destruction through this lady's exertions, who induced the
government to aid her in protecting them from the attacks of other and
more powerful tribes. So interested had she become in this people,
that she had bidden some of their high-priests to journey to the
East, and visit her--which they did. She described most graphically
their dignity, their admirable breeding, the eloquence of their
gestures, expressing their meaning so clearly as scarcely to need the
interpreter's verbal translation of their speech. They went thrice a
day down to the sea-shore--the house stood on a cliff--to make their
prayers and libations. "You are not as religious as we are," they said,
"but we suppose you are as religious as you have time to be."
Some day a learned monograph will be published of this people, their
language, their faith, their customs; and the philologists will fight
over their origin, and the plough of civilization will pass over
their poor, mud-built city; but Grace was interested in meeting the
enthusiast through whose courage, energy, and devotion so much had been
rescued as a text-book for historical research. It was a fine, sonorous
note in the diapason of American character, and the young Englishwoman
heard it with pleasure.
That evening she and her brother dined with Mrs. Caldwell. It was not a
large party; and the guests, with the exception of Mrs. Flynn and her
cousin, were all men--mostly men distinguished in some way other than
that of having amassed large fortunes.
It is true that Alan Brown, the young Anglomaniac--"and stupid at
that," as May Clayton said--was present, but as he sat next Doreen, to
whom he talked in a low tone, his insignificance was not offensive.
Brilliant Chudleigh, the advocate, whose scathing eloquence was a
proverb, jovial Dr. Parr, simmering with fun, ready to boil over at any
moment, wise and witty General Stout, famous in the war, and now in
peace time as great a favorite with women as with men, the poet Sloper,
so gently humorous, so blandly pungent, Mordaunt's shrewd friend Reid,
and two others, whom the Ballingers had not met before, threw their
separate contributions into the common pool, and produced that best of
round games--general conversation. No one monopolized the talk, but
the men had the best of it. May Clayton held her own, it is true; the
provocation of her nimble tongue stimulated the clever elders around;
her sallies elicited peals of laughter; and from time to time, when
there was a lull, she set the humming-top--as with a neat flick of the
whip--once more frantically spinning. But as dinner progressed, and the
conversation, leaving generalities, entered into the arena of personal
chaff, the spur of the girl's tongue was not needed. The combatants
were on their mettle, with a gallery to applaud their brilliant attacks
and retorts, their assaults, and reprises, and carrying of the war into
the enemy's country; each man had his bout, and the fooling, conducted
with perfect good humor, was delightful. Such a contest would not be
possible in England. In chaff, we hold that all is permissible but
the truth. But here to wound one of these dexterous knights, armed
cap-à-pie, seemed impossible. Chudleigh had tried for the Presidency
of the United States, and had failed. The mock commiseration he met
with at the hands of Parr, who deplored the waste of fine oratory
spilled upon that occasion, was countervailed by the satirical sympathy
Chudleigh affected in rounded periods at the charges of bribery and
corruption brought in the public prints against a well-known body,
of which the M.D. was a leading member. This spear-thrust might have
been expected to pierce his armor. Not at all; he rode on laughing,
and apparently untouched. Then it was proposed that government should
be memorialized to create the post of Laureate to the United States,
in order that the poet Sloper should be elected thereto. His verses
had failed to soften the hearts of his native town so far as to induce
them to send him as their representative to Congress, but this want of
appreciation, this deadness of heart--said General Stout, warming to
his subject--would, no doubt, disappear when Sloper's Sonnets received
the stamp of official recognition. As to the general himself, he
received thrusts on all sides, as to his campaigns in stage-land, his
conquests in the green-room, his capitulations under (scenic) canvas,
his ready response to the cry from oppressed damsels of "Stout to the
rescue!"
The Ballingers were both much amused. Mordaunt, between Mrs. Caldwell
and Mrs. Flynn, had two foot-notes, as it were, to the text of all
this personal raillery. Mrs. Flynn was the more ample and unrestrained
expositor of the two, Mrs. Caldwell not going beyond a hint, sometimes,
where the younger and livelier lady became exhaustive. Grace had Pierce
Caldwell beside her. He fully entered into the fun, and told her enough
to make her understand the point of each attack, the dexterity of each
defence, the imperturbable good temper with which all who mingled in
the fray bore the several blows.
"People say you Americans are thin-skinned," she said. "Perhaps
there is one side of you--that side which you turn to _us_--which
has a sensitive skin; but the other side, that which is presented to
yourselves, must be covered with a perfect hide! Englishmen could not
stand these blows below the belt, they would turn very nasty. I saw a
clever young man once in a country-house retire to bed because--we were
playing at 'Twenty-one Questions'--he was so offended at an impudent
bit of chaff. We had thought of the Duke of Wellington's monument in
St. Paul's, and when he could not guess it, and had to be told, he
declared indignantly he had never heard of it. 'Perhaps you never heard
of the Duke of Wellington,' said a pert prig, whereupon the discomfited
guesser went straight off to bed. Now, I see that no American could
possibly be so silly. You have your tempers so admirably in hand."
"Well, I don't know about that," said Pierce, dubiously. "It all
depends on whether we think a man means mischief or not. These fellows
here, you see, are all good friends. They enjoy sharpening their wits
on each other."
"So it seems," said Grace, laughing.
Dr. Parr, on her other side, had been watching his opportunity to fire
sly shots obliquely across the table at Chudleigh, and had not heard
the foregoing. He now turned round and addressed the young Englishwoman
with the unmistakable air that says, "Enough of fooling. Let us be
serious," though there was still a sub-cutaneous twitch about his mouth.
"What do you think of us, Miss Ballinger? I am afraid you will go back
and say we are an _un_licensed set of victuallers, making a terrible
row, without any manners, any polish, eh?"
"I am so glad you put it that way, instead of asking me what I think
of America, which is so difficult to answer, and which I am asked,
upon an average, twelve times every day. It isn't at all difficult to
answer _you_. I should like to dine with such unlicensed victuallers
every day of my life."
"Great Scot! This is, indeed, an incentive to continue in our evil
ways," cried the doctor. "You cannot be English, Miss Ballinger, quite,
_quite_ English? A drop of Irish or foreign must be infused into your
blue blood, surely?"
"Why so? Are we not the most appreciative nation upon earth?"
"Critical--say critical--and I am with you. You measure everything
by one standard--your own. I don't say you are wrong, but it makes
English approval sometimes appear to be tinged with--what shall I
say? condescension? Do you know the story of the American who drew
the attention of a patriotic Briton to a gorgeous sunset here? The
Britisher replied,'Sunset? Ah! you should see one of Her Majesty's
sunsets!'"
Grace laughed heartily.
"That is very cruel of you, Dr. Parr. I wanted to say such a number of
nice things to you, and now I can't. I shall have to pour them all out
to Mr. Chudleigh, who won't call my appreciation 'condescension.'"
Here a name, bandied across the table, struck Grace's ear.
"Planter has cornered the market, they say."
"He has high Scriptural authority for doing so," said Chudleigh.
"Joseph cornered the market, and made a very good thing out of it."
"I suspect that is more than Planter will do," struck in the general.
"He will come to grief some day with his gigantic speculations."
"What!" cried May Clayton, with her chirruping little voice, "has he
bitten off more than he can chew?"
Ballinger laughed immoderately. Probably this turned Miss Clayton's
attention more directly to him.
"By the bye, Sir Mordaunt, is it true that you are going to give up
your baronetcy, and become an American citizen?"
"You have given me too little _encouragement_," he replied, promptly,
with a stage sigh.
"Well!" she said, "I don't know about encouragement. I should say
you have neglected your opportunities. But I believe you followed my
advice. Only take care you don't bark up the wrong tree."
"There's such a forest," he said. "It's awfully confusing."
Grace had some conversation with her hostess after dinner.
The Caldwells were to leave New York for their home in the Rocky
Mountains in the course of a week. It was arranged that Grace should
write to Mrs. Caldwell when she and her brother went westward, and Mrs.
Frampton was included in the cordial invitation to "Falcon's Nest"
offered to the English travellers.
"I like Mrs. Caldwell," said Mordaunt as they drove home. "She is a
good sort. The girl's dull."
"Not at all; she is young, and has not lost the sweet privileges of
youth for remaining in the background, as Miss Clayton has."
"Give me a girl who has lost the privilege, then. I can't stand a
bread-and-butter miss. I wish Mrs. Caldwell would ask Mrs. Flynn and
her cousin to Falcon's Nest when we are there; not that I shall be
there for more than a day or two, I fancy. I shall leave you and Aunt
Su, while I go off to Pueblo, and stay with Charington at his ranch."
"I should not much like to be shut up with Aunt Su and Miss Clayton,"
returned his sister, laughing. "It would be what you call 'rather
warm quarters.' I like the girl myself. I am sure there is no harm in
her--not half so much as there is in many very demure girls--but I
fancy I see Aunt Su's face at her way of going on. I shouldn't mind her
meeting Miss Planter, now," she added, glancing with a smile at him as
the lamp-light flashed upon his face. "Miss Planter would not offend
her taste."
He did not reply, and the rest of the drive home was performed in
silence.