PRISCILLA HAS A SECRET
PEGGY was worried about Priscilla. For the first time in their years
of intimacy she could not understand her friend; and worst of all, it
seemed out of the question to discuss the situation and come to an
understanding.
"Do you think she can like him?" Peggy asked the other Friendly Terrace
girls despairingly. "Because he's always seemed to me almost a joke. I
don't know how I could bear to have Priscilla fall in love with a man I
wanted to laugh at."
Though both girls would have been glad to reassure her, an ominous
silence followed her outbreak. "There's no accounting for tastes," said
Ruth at length, a suggestion of superiority in her tone.
"Priscilla ought to have a good talking to," exclaimed Amy. "She's got
plenty of sense, and to think of her letting Horace Hitchcock hang
around! I'd like to tell her--"
"You mustn't, Amy," Peggy interrupted. "It would never do to let her
know how you feel about it. That's one of the things that make me so
anxious--she's so awfully touchy on the subject of Horace. She won't
have him criticized."
Peggy had valiantly done her best to cultivate a liking for Horace
Hitchcock. Since the fatal Field Day when he had acted as Priscilla's
escort, his attentions had been unremitting. He had called several
times a week. He had brought Priscilla flowers and boxes of candy, to
say nothing of books of poems, from which he had read aloud to her by
the hour. Peggy, assuming that since Priscilla was seeing so much of
Horace, he must be quite a different person from what she supposed, had
invited him to her home along with the others of her little circle,
only to find it would not do. Horace and the others would not mix any
more than oil and water.
"For Heaven's sake, don't ask that Hitchcock here again," Graham
implored Peggy, after an evening that had been a failure, socially
considered. "He puts on airs as if he were the Prince of Wales--no,
that's not fair to the prince. But Hitchcock is a snob and a sissy and
he makes me tired."
"But if Priscilla likes him, Graham--"
"She can't," Graham had argued, not unreasonably. "She must see through
him just as the rest of us do; and even while she's so pleasant to him,
she must be laughing in her sleeve."
But reasonable as Graham's stand had seemed, Priscilla was in no
mood to laugh at Horace Hitchcock. Indeed, she was deliberately
shutting her eyes to his weaknesses, and holding before herself such
an idealized likeness of the real Horace that no one but herself
would have recognized it. Horace's attentions flattered her vanity.
Every call helped to reassure her anxiety in the matter of her own
attractiveness. Moreover, Priscilla was a little dazzled by Horace's
seeming familiarity with the people whose names were chronicled in the
society columns of the daily paper. She had seen for herself that Mrs.
Sidney Vanderpool regarded him with favor, and Horace had been at
some pains to let her know that other ladies, some of them young and
beautiful, held him in equally high esteem. That he should leave girls,
who could not go to New York for a week without the fact brought to the
public attention in the daily papers, in order that he might spend his
evenings with her, gave Priscilla an intoxicating sense of power.
But foolish as this all was, worse was to come, and all because Amy
disregarded Peggy's prudent counsel. Peggy had discovered an undue
sensitiveness in Priscilla, where Horace was concerned, and had been
sensible enough to perceive that any criticism of her ardent admirer,
instead of prejudicing Priscilla against him, was likely to have the
opposite effect. It hardly need be said that Amy did not flout Peggy's
advice, but in the course of a conversation with Priscilla she lost her
temper and subsequently her head.
It began with a most amiable intention on Amy's part. "Is Horace coming
up to-night?" she asked Priscilla, as the two strolled along the
Terrace in the hazy hush of a summer afternoon.
"I--I shouldn't be surprised to see him," owned Priscilla, with a
becoming blush.
"Bob telephoned me this morning that he'd be up. If Horace comes, bring
him over and I'll try to get Peggy and Ruth--"
"Shall you ask Nelson Hallowell?" Priscilla inquired, a reservation in
her tone which Amy did not understand.
"I'll tell Ruth to bring him if he comes, and he's pretty sure to be on
hand," laughed Amy. "He's making up for the chances he missed when he
was in the service."
"Then I'm afraid we can't come," said Priscilla. "Horace thinks Bob
Carey is fine, and he rather likes Graham, but he draws the line at
Nelson."
Amy stopped short, her plump face crimson. "Please tell me what you
mean by his drawing the line?"
"Well, Amy, I've no doubt that Nelson is a very fine fellow, as far as
morals go, but his social position, you know--"
"What about it?" As the two girls were standing side by side, it was
quite unnecessary for Amy to speak so loudly. Her defiant tone seemed
to challenge the entire block.
"Hush, Amy. I'm not deaf. Of course Nelson comes from quite an ordinary
family, and he's only a clerk, and Horace really doesn't care to meet
him socially."
Amy burst into an angry laugh. "Horace Hitchcock said that. What a
joke!"
"I don't quite understand you, Amy." Priscilla spoke with extreme
frigidity.
"Why, there's enough in Nelson Hallowell's little finger to make
several Horaces. To think of that dandified little manikin's turning up
his nose at a fellow like Nelson."
"Amy Lassell, how dare you?"
"Oh, fudge, Priscilla, you know perfectly well what Horace Hitchcock
is, and you needn't pretend to admire him, for I know better."
"I won't listen to you any longer," cried Priscilla furiously,
"slandering my friends." She turned abruptly and crossed the street.
The two girls continued on their homeward way with the width of the
Terrace between them, each looking steadily ahead, ignoring the other's
presence.
Before Amy reached home she was sorry. She saw she had been wrong
as well as right. Her whole-hearted championship of Nelson had not
necessitated sneering at Horace. Amy realized that Priscilla had good
reason to be angry, and resolved on a whole-hearted apology next day.
It was a pity she had not followed up her feeling of penitence by
immediate action, for when Horace came that evening he found Priscilla
in an unwonted mood. She had dramatized the whole affair to herself.
Everyone was unjust to Horace. Even Peggy allowed her childish
prejudices to influence her unwarrantedly. But she herself was Horace's
friend and she would be loyal to that friendship, cost what it might.
A few minutes after his arrival Horace suggested a walk in the
neighboring park, which had been so little "improved" that walking
through it was almost like strolling along country lanes. Though the
night was warm, most of the populace preferred the movies, and Horace
and Priscilla had the park practically to themselves. The night wind
sighed languorously through the trees. The air was full of ineffable
fragrances.
"Oh, Priscilla," exclaimed Horace suddenly, and caught her hand. It
seemed to Priscilla that her heart stood still. There was a note in
Horace's voice she had never heard before. She was sure that something
wonderful was happening. And the irritating part was that she could not
do justice to it, for she kept thinking of something else. She should,
she was sure, be entirely absorbed in what Horace was going to say; and
right at that moment, she wondered if Ruth and Nelson were sitting on
Amy's porch.
"Oh, Priscilla," Horace was murmuring, "Do you not feel as I do, that
we have met and loved before? You were mine, Priscilla, when the
pyramids were building. You were mine in Babylon. Tell me that you have
not forgotten. Tell me that you love me."
It was only about half an hour from that impassioned speech before
they were walking home decorously along the lighted streets, but
Priscilla had a feeling as if she had been away for months and months.
An unbelievable thing had happened. She was engaged. It was understood
that the engagement was not to be mentioned at present, not even to
Priscilla's father and mother. Horace had said something to the effect
that to let outsiders into their secret would bruise the petals of
the flower of love, and she had agreed to the postponement of that
catastrophe, without asking herself why the flower of love should be so
fragile. But the fact remained that she was the second of the quartette
to become engaged, and she took a rather foolish satisfaction in the
realization. She made up her mind that her former qualms as to her
own unattractiveness were without foundation, for otherwise a social
favorite like Horace would never have asked her to marry him.
Priscilla's father and mother were on the porch when the young people
reached home, and, as it was much too warm to stay indoors, the evening
which had contained so thrilling an episode ended rather tamely. Mr.
Combs and Horace exchanged ideas on local politics, and Mrs. Combs and
Horace expressed themselves on the subject of the weather. Priscilla
had nothing to say on either interesting topic. She was trying to
realize that some day, instead of saying "Mr. Combs" and "Mrs. Combs,"
Horace would be addressing her parents as "father" and "mother." This
seemed so extraordinary that she was almost inclined to believe that
she had dreamed the whole thing, though the significantly tender
pressure of Horace's fingers, as he said good-night, assured her to the
contrary.
Priscilla slept very poorly that night. Her dreams were troubled. And
each time she woke, which was on the average of once an hour, she
had a dreadful sense of impending disaster. On each occasion it took
her several minutes to convince herself that nothing was wrong, that
instead she was a very fortunate and happy girl, singled out of the
world of girls by a most unusual young man. And thus reassured, she
would drop off to sleep, to start again with troubled dreams, and to go
again through the whole program.
Owing to her restless night, Priscilla overslept and had to dress in
a hurry to avoid being late to breakfast. By expedition she reached
the dining room just after her mother had seated herself. Her father
followed a half minute later, and leaning over her mother's chair
kissed her cheek. "Know what day it is?"
"Of course, silly," laughed Mrs. Combs. "But I'm astonished to hear
that you do."
Smiling broadly, Mr. Combs went around the table and took his seat. "We
should have planned a celebration," he remarked.
"What, and advertise our advanced age!" exclaimed his wife in mock
consternation.
"That's so," owned Mr. Combs with a chuckle. "I remember when a silver
wedding seemed to me significant of extreme age. What do you think,
daughter, of having parents old enough to have been married twenty-five
years?"
Then Priscilla knew what was the matter with her. She thought of
sitting opposite Horace Hitchcock twice a day, year in and year out,
for a quarter of a century, and her heart turned sick within her.
All at once she knew how his affections of manner would grate on one
who watched them for twenty-five years. He had a way of raising his
eye-brows and pursing his mouth which, she was convinced, would drive
her frantic in course of time. And then her relentless common-sense,
awake at last, went on to assure her that the Horace Hitchcock who had
made love to her in the park the previous evening was in all essentials
the smug, vain little boy nobody liked. She watched her father and
mother exchanging smiles and knew that such good comradeship between
Horace and herself was unthinkable. She doubted if there would be a
smile left in her after twenty-five years of his society.
"You look tired this morning, Priscilla," said Mr. Combs. "And I can't
say I wonder. That admirer of yours makes me rather--"
"He's a very pleasant boy, I'm sure," interrupted Mrs. Combs hastily,
"though I wish his manners were just a little simpler. But he always
looks so neat that it's refreshing to the eye. And by the way, dear,
I think you had better see your tailor and get samples for your fall
suit. You've got to the point where you must have something."
Priscilla did not notice her mother's dextrous changing of the subject.
She was too absorbed in looking ahead twenty-five weary years. Of
course, in view of her discovery, the only sensible thing to do was
to get in touch with Horace, and tell him that the lady with whom he
had been on such friendly terms in Babylon was an entirely different
person. But that sane and simple way of escape never occurred to
Priscilla. She had given her word. She must stand by it, no matter what
it cost.
Amy came over about eleven o'clock, looking very penitent. "Priscilla,"
she said, "I don't blame you a bit for getting angry yesterday. I'm
ashamed of what I said. Of course," added Amy, her natural candor
getting the better of her, "Horace Hitchcock doesn't appeal to me, but
that doesn't excuse me for calling him a manikin, and you have a right
to choose your friends to please yourself."
Priscilla's acceptance of this apology took Amy by surprise. She
dropped her head on her visitor's shoulder--as Priscilla was tall and
Amy was short, this was a feat requiring considerable dexterity--and
burst into tears.