February came The operetta, for which Billy was working so hard, was
to be given the twentieth. The Art Exhibition, for which Bertram was
preparing his four pictures, was to open the sixteenth, with a private
view for specially invited friends the evening before.
On the eleventh day of February Mrs. Greggory and her daughter arrived
at Hillside for a ten-days' visit. Not until after a great deal of
pleading and argument, however, had Billy been able to bring this about.
“But, my dears, both of you,” Billy had at last said to them; “just
listen. We shall have numberless rehearsals during those last ten
days before the thing comes off. They will be at all hours, and of all
lengths. You, Miss Greggory, will have to be on hand for them all, of
course, and will have to stay all night several times, probably. You,
Mrs. Greggory, ought not to be alone down here. There is no sensible,
valid reason why you should not both come out to the house for those ten
days; and I shall feel seriously hurt and offended if you do not consent
to do it.”
“But--my pupils,” Alice Greggory had demurred.
“You can go in town from my home at any time to give your lessons, and
a little shifting about and arranging for those ten days will enable you
to set the hours conveniently one after another, I am sure, so you can
attend to several on one trip. Meanwhile your mother will be having a
lovely time teaching Aunt Hannah how to knit a new shawl; so you won't
have to be worrying about her.”
After all, it had been the great good and pleasure which the visit would
bring to Mrs. Greggory that had been the final straw to tip the scales.
On the eleventh of February, therefore, in the company of the once
scorned “Peggy and Mary Jane,” Alice Greggory and her mother had arrived
at Hillside.
Ever since the first meeting of Alice Greggory and Arkwright, Billy had
been sorely troubled by the conduct of the two young people. She had,
as she mournfully told herself, been able to make nothing of it. The two
were civility itself to each other, but very plainly they were not at
ease in each other's company; and Billy, much to her surprise, had to
admit that Arkwright did not appear to appreciate the “circumstances”
now that he had them. The pair called each other, ceremoniously, “Mr.
Arkwright,” and “Miss Greggory”--but then, that, of course, did not
“signify,” Billy declared to herself.
“I suppose you don't ever call him 'Mary Jane,'” she said to the girl, a
little mischievously, one day.
“'Mary Jane'? Mr. Arkwright? No, I don't,” rejoined Miss Greggory, with
an odd smile. Then, after a moment, she added: “I believe his brothers
and sisters used to, however.”
“Yes, I know,” laughed Billy. “We thought he was a real Mary Jane,
once.” And she told the story of his arrival. “So you see,” she
finished, when Alice Greggory had done laughing over the tale, “he
always will be 'Mary Jane' to us. By the way, what is his name?”
Miss Greggory looked up in surprise.
“Why, it's--” She stopped short, her eyes questioning. “Why, hasn't he
ever told you?” she queried.
Billy lifted her chin.
“No. He told us to guess it, and we have guessed everything we can think
of, even up to 'Methuselah John'; but he says we haven't hit it yet.”
“'Methuselah John,' indeed!” laughed the other, merrily.
“Well, I'm sure that's a nice, solid name,” defended Billy, her chin
still at a challenging tilt. “If it isn't 'Methuselah John,' what is it,
then?”
But Alice Greggory shook her head. She, too, it seemed, could be firm,
on occasion. And though she smiled brightly, all she would say, was:
“If he hasn't told you, I sha'n't. You'll have to go to him.”
“Oh, well, I can still call him 'Mary Jane,'” retorted Billy, with airy
disdain.
All this, however, so far as Billy could see, was not in the least
helping along the cause that had become so dear to her--the reuniting of
a pair of lovers. It occurred to her then, one day, that perhaps, after
all, they were not lovers, and did not wish to be reunited. At
this disquieting thought Billy decided, suddenly, to go almost to
headquarters. She would speak to Mrs. Greggory if ever the opportunity
offered. Great was her joy, therefore, when, a day or two after the
Greggorys arrived at the house, Mrs. Greggory's chance reference to
Arkwright and her daughter gave Billy the opportunity she sought.
“They used to know each other long ago, Mr. Arkwright tells me,” Billy
began warily.
“Yes.”
The quietly polite monosyllable was not very encouraging, to be sure;
but Billy, secure in her conviction that her cause was a righteous one,
refused to be daunted.
“I think it was so romantic--their running across each other like this,
Mrs. Greggory,” she murmured. “And there _was_ a romance, wasn't there?
I have just felt in my bones that there was--a romance!”
Billy held her breath. It was what she had meant to say, but now that
she had said it, the words seemed very fearsome indeed--to say to Mrs.
Greggory. Then Billy remembered her Cause, and took heart--Billy was
spelling it now with a capital C.
For a long minute Mrs. Greggory did not answer--for so long a minute
that Billy's breath dropped into a fluttering sigh, and her Cause became
suddenly “IMPERTINENCE” spelled in black capitals. Then Mrs. Greggory
spoke slowly, a little sadly.
“I don't mind saying to you that I did hope, once, that there would be a
romance there. They were the best of friends, and they were well-suited
to each other in tastes and temperament. I think, indeed, that the
romance was well under way (though there was never an engagement)
when--” Mrs. Greggory paused and wet her lips. Her voice, when she
resumed, carried the stern note so familiar to Billy in her first
acquaintance with this woman and her daughter. “As I presume
Mr. Arkwright has told you, we have met with many changes in our
life--changes which necessitated a new home and a new mode of
living. Naturally, under those circumstances, old friends--and old
romances--must change, too.”
“But, Mrs. Greggory,” stammered Billy, “I'm sure Mr. Arkwright would
want--” An up-lifted hand silenced her peremptorily.
“Mr. Arkwright was very kind, and a gentleman, always,” interposed the
lady, coldly; “but Judge Greggory's daughter would not allow herself
to be placed where apologies for her father would be necessary--_ever!_
There, please, dear Miss Neilson, let us not talk of it any more,”
begged Mrs. Greggory, brokenly.
“No, indeed, of course not!” cried Billy; but her heart rejoiced.
She understood it all now. Arkwright and Alice Greggory had been almost
lovers when the charges against the Judge's honor had plunged the family
into despairing humiliation. Then had come the time when, according
to Arkwright's own story, the two women had shut themselves indoors,
refused to see their friends, and left town as soon as possible. Thus
had come the breaking of whatever tie there was between Alice Greggory
and Arkwright. Not to have broken it would have meant, for Alice, the
placing of herself in a position where, sometime, apologies must be made
for her father. This was what Mrs. Greggory had meant--and again, as
Billy thought of it, Billy's heart rejoiced.
Was not her way clear now before her? Did she not have it in her power,
possibly--even probably--to bring happiness where only sadness was
before? As if it would not be a simple thing to rekindle the old
flame--to make these two estranged hearts beat as one again!
Not now was the Cause an IMPERTINENCE in tall black letters. It was,
instead, a shining beacon in letters of flame guiding straight to
victory.
Billy went to sleep that night making plans for Alice Greggory and
Arkwright to be thrown together naturally--“just as a matter of course,
you know,” she said drowsily to herself, all in the dark.
Some three or four miles away down Beacon Street at that moment Bertram
Henshaw, in the Strata, was, as it happened, not falling asleep. He was
lying broadly and unhappily awake Bertram very frequently lay broadly
and unhappily awake these days--or rather nights. He told himself, on
these occasions, that it was perfectly natural--indeed it was!--that
Billy should be with Arkwright and his friends, the Greggorys, so much.
There were the new songs, and the operetta with its rehearsals as a
cause for it all. At the same time, deep within his fearful soul was the
consciousness that Arkwright, the Greggorys, and the operetta were but
Music--Music, the spectre that from the first had dogged his footsteps.
With Billy's behavior toward himself, Bertram could find no fault. She
was always her sweet, loyal, lovable self, eager to hear of his work,
earnestly solicitous that it should be a success. She even--as he
sometimes half-irritably remembered--had once told him that she realized
he belonged to Art before he did to himself; and when he had indignantly
denied this, she had only laughed and thrown a kiss at him, with the
remark that he ought to hear his sister Kate's opinion of that matter.
As if he wanted Kate's opinion on that or anything else that concerned
him and Billy!
Once, torn by jealousy, and exasperated at the frequent interruptions of
their quiet hours together, he had complained openly.
“Actually, Billy, it's worse than Marie's wedding,” he declared, “_Then_
it was tablecloths and napkins that could be dumped in a chair. _Now_
it's a girl who wants to rehearse, or a woman that wants a different
wig, or a telephone message that the sopranos have quarrelled again. I
loathe that operetta!”
Billy laughed, but she frowned, too.
“I know, dear; I don't like that part. I wish they _would_ let me alone
when I'm with you! But as for the operetta, it is really a good thing,
dear, and you'll say so when you see it. It's going to be a great
success--I can say that because my part is only a small one, you know.
We shall make lots of money for the Home, too, I'm sure.”
“But you're wearing yourself all out with it, dear,” scowled Bertram.
“Nonsense! I like it; besides, when I'm doing this I'm not telephoning
you to come and amuse me. Just think what a lot of extra time you have
for your work!”
“Don't want it,” avowed Bertram.
“But the _work_ may,” retorted Billy, showing all her dimples. “Never
mind, though; it'll all be over after the twentieth. _This_ isn't an
understudy like Marie's wedding, you know,” she finished demurely.
“Thank heaven for that!” Bertram had breathed fervently. But even as he
said the words he grew sick with fear. What if, after all, this _were_
an understudy to what was to come later when Music, his rival, had
really conquered?
Bertram knew that however secure might seem Billy's affection for
himself, there was still in his own mind a horrid fear lest underneath
that security were an unconscious, growing fondness for something he
could not give, for some one that he was not--a fondness that would one
day cause Billy to awake. As Bertram, in his morbid fancy pictured it,
he realized only too well what that awakening would mean to himself.