BETSY’S APPEAL
TRUE to her promise, Betsy stayed but two days in Boston, and Mrs.
Bruce, having had a very good time in her absence, was graciously
pleased to let bygones be bygones when she returned.
“Was your shopping successful?” she asked.
“Yes, we did real well,” was the reply. “I didn’t know there was so
many good ready-made things folks could get.”
Mrs. Bruce smiled leniently.
“Rather awful things,” she said, “but I suppose they did very well for
your friend from the country.”
“Yes, she’ll look real good in ’em after she’s fitted to a few
alterations. Miss Maynard’s been gettin’ some ready-made ones.”
“She has?” ejaculated Mrs. Bruce with interest.
“Yes; they showed ’em to me, some of ’em, when I went to Mrs. Nixon’s;
and they’re elegant.”
“Oh, yes; with Miss Maynard’s pocket-book, one can find very good
things; and since they’re coming here for the rest of the season, she
doesn’t need much. You say Mrs. Nixon wired for the rooms?”
“Yes, right off; and they think they’ll get here Saturday.”
That evening Irving Bruce, descrying Betsy stooping over her sweet-pea
bed, joined her.
“How is Miss Vincent?” he inquired.
Betsy rose and regarded him.
“Set a spell,” he continued, drawing her down upon a garden-seat.
“I haven’t got anything to tell you, Mr. Irving.”
“Nonsense,” remarked the young man easily. “Don’t you suppose I know
that you went to town to get clothes for somebody? Mrs. Bruce told me
that. Of course it was Rosalie. Whose gift? Yours or Mr. Derwent’s?”
“Mr. Derwent’s,” responded Betsy after a reluctant pause.
“I hope they are proper for the seashore.”
“They’re real simple, and pretty, and good; just like her.”
“Tell me what you bought.”
Irving brought his sun-burned face close to Betsy’s and hung his hand
over the back of the seat close to her shoulder.
Betsy pressed her lips together.
“If you don’t I’ll hug you, and Mrs. Bruce is up there on the piazza,
looking.”
“Mr. Irving, behave yourself!”
Betsy essayed to rise, and was brought back swiftly by the strong hand.
“I can see her in everything if you’ll just describe it.”
“Well,” said Betsy reluctantly, casting a glance toward the piazza, “we
got her a black lace.”
“Too old, I should think.”
“No, no, ’tain’t,” Betsy forgot her reluctance in defense. “It’s sort
o’ half low neck and has fluffy things on it—real pretty.”
“What else?”
“A white lace one— Oh, she does look just like an angel in it, Mr.
Irving!”
The speaker suddenly remembered herself, and her lips snapped together.
Irving frowned slightly. “Well, Mr. Derwent is blowing himself.”
“He gave me five hundred dollars, Mr. Irving, and told me to fit
that child out!” Betsy could not resist imparting her joyous news.
“Oh,”—she heaved a long, eloquent sigh,—“I’ve had one good time, I
tell you! I wanted to stay longer, but I promised Mrs. Bruce; and the
everyday things she can get herself. She’s smart, and knows that the
plainest things look best on her; because the Creator’s made her so she
don’t need any trimmin’ up. I went to Mrs. Nixon’s house, and there
they were dressin’ Miss Maynard out of a bottomless purse; but I’ll
match my girl against her.”
Irving, attentive, watched the narrow face glow.
“And where did you say Rosalie is living?”
“I didn’t say,” replied Betsy with a return of caution.
“Not at Mrs. Nixon’s, I suppose.”
“Well, I guess not. While I was examinin’ Miss Maynard’s finery, I
was glad I didn’t have a pain in my head so that they could see my
thoughts. If they’d known Mr. Derwent’s money was buyin’ another girl’s
outfit they’d ’a’ needed a smellin’ bottle. You know, Mr. Irving, I
thought perhaps Miss Maynard comin’ into that fortune would ’a’ liked
to help Rosalie in some way. It really surprised me ’cause she didn’t.”
“Miss Maynard’s head is in the clouds for the present. Very likely when
she comes to earth she will be more interested in other people.”
Betsy looked at the speaker affectionately. “You always was a generous
boy,” she said. “Never could be hired to knock anybody.”
“I’m going to knock you, right off this seat, if you don’t tell me
without any beating about the bush, where Rosalie Vincent is. I expect
to go to Boston in a few days. I might help her choose her hats.”
Betsy’s eyes met his earnestly. “Now, look here. You’ve been as good as
gold ever since we left the lake. You haven’t asked me a question.”
“That’s why you ought to answer me now, instantly.”
“I’m not goin’ to tell you.” Betsy spoke deliberately. “Rosalie’s
got to make her own way in the world. Mr. Derwent knows that outside
appearances count for a lot in her line o’ business, and he’s givin’
her this outfit, just as he’d give a boy a little capital to start him.
She’s goin’ to try an experiment, and I ain’t goin’ to say anything
about it. It’s an idea o’ my own, and if it turns out all right, I’ll
believe my good angel put it into my head; but if folks like you—young
men—play the fool, it won’t turn out well; and then I’ll know it was
a caper o’ my bad angel. You needn’t scowl and look as if you’d eat
up any other man who looks at her. You’re the one o’ the lot I’m most
afraid of, and you’re very likely to see her.”
Irving sprang to his feet as if he had been shot.
“Betsy, have you—is it possible—” he nearly choked in his
excitement—“have you found her some place on the stage—vaudeville?”
Miss Foster, after her first jump, swallowed, and looked at him in
exasperation.
“Will you sit down and not scare a body into a fit?”
“Have you, I say!” he demanded fiercely. “I’ll see Derwent to-night if
he’s had anything to do with this.”
“For the land’s sake, Irving Bruce, you’re actin’ like a natural-born
fool—but I love you for it!” The gray eyes sparkled. “Sit down on this
bench.”
He obeyed, but his eyes still devoured her.
“I can’t leave Mrs. Bruce, can I? If Rosalie went on the stage I’d
have to go with her, wouldn’t I? Do act as if you had some common
sense.”
“You frightened me,” said Irving.
“Well, you nearly gave _me_ heart disease.”
Irving did not smile. His expression made it difficult for his
companion to proceed; but there was no time like the present. She
seldom had opportunity to talk with the young man alone, and Robert was
amusing his hostess on the porch.
“As I said a minute ago, Mr. Irving, you’re a generous boy, and always
were. You’re likely to see Rosalie Vincent sooner or later, and you’ll
be put to the test. You know in your inmost heart that you don’t care a
thing about her except the way you would a pretty picture, or statue,
that you’d come across. You don’t know her at all in the first place,
so any attention you pay her would be just for your own selfish fun,
and you’ve said so much to me about her, that I’m afraid you _will_
seek her if you get the chance—just for her beauty, poor child.”
Irving’s thoughts had flown back to the canyon, and a train of memories
stirred him.
“She will attract a great many besides me,” he said. “If there’s ever
any need of shielding her, I sha’n’t stand aside, you may be sure.”
“You’re the only one she needs shielding _from_, Mr. Irving.” Betsy
spoke with slow, gentle emphasis. “I tell Rosalie to be mejum, but she
don’t know _how_. It isn’t in her. I’d feel meaner’n pusley to say this
to you, if ’twan’t meaner not to. She’s set you up, the way a girl
will, in a special niche of her heart. How she come to I can’t see,
’cause she never talked with you more’n once or twice. She don’t know
that I notice this, but she’s shown it a number o’ times the last two
days. Now she hasn’t had a chance yet to know men worth knowin’; and if
you happen to meet her anywhere, and just treat her pleasant but real
formal, she’ll get over this fancy—it’s all just a part of her poetry
and the notions she lives among all the time, in her own thoughts. It
don’t amount to anything, now; but it could if you acted selfish. I
told you before that I love her, Mr. Irving. She hasn’t got a person to
take care of her but me. I’m glad she’s a girl all out o’ the question
for you, because Mrs. Bruce would never think she was good enough, and
would make her unhappy; and as long as she _is_ out o’ the question I
ain’t afraid to ask the son o’ your father and mother, the two finest
people I ever knew in my life, to keep away from her; not flatter her;
not show her any attention. She’s as modest as a daisy, and got no more
worldly experience than one. Lots o’ men admire that kind a little
while, and then tread on it without even noticin’ that they have.”
Irving during this speech had sunk his hands in his pockets, and his
eyes were fixed on his outstretched pumps. Betsy regarded him anxiously
through a moment of silence.
“Do you ever wish we were back in the canyon?” he asked. “I do.”
“Mr. Irving!” she ejaculated. “I don’t believe you’ve heard a word I’ve
been saying.”
“I have; but I doubt most of it. You’re in love with me yourself,
Betsy. That’s what’s the matter with you.”
“H’m. Perhaps I might be if I could forget how cross you were when
you were teethin’ and how you tore your clothes, and got all stuck up
with jam. Your mother trusted me perfectly. Whenever I carried you to
her and said, ‘Please spank him, ma’am,’ she always did it without a
question.” Betsy’s tone was vainglorious.
Irving threw back his head, and his ringing laugh caused Mrs. Bruce to
look wonderingly down the garden.
“An absolute monarchy, eh?” he responded. “And you have the habit so,
you want to tyrannize over me still?”
“Don’t leave me with the feelin’ that you want to shirk out of it by
foolin’,” pursued Betsy, refusing to smile, and rising, conscious of
Mrs. Bruce’s gaze.
Irving rose also and threw his arm tenderly around her thin shoulders
as they moved toward the house.
She tried to escape, but the gentle vise held.
“You’ve made me feel very sentimental, referring as you have to
our past, Betsy,” he said emotionally. “Know’st thou these verses,
beginning—
“‘There is no friend like the old friend, who has shared our
morning days’ (and teething nights!)”
“Please, Mr. Irving!”
With a desperate wriggle, Betsy escaped, and moved swiftly around
toward the back door of the cottage.
“Did she refuse you?” called Nixie, as his friend stretched
portentously, and then came on up the steps.
“Absolutely.”
“It must be a habit of hers,” remarked Mrs. Bruce. “Captain Salter has
been returning to the charge for years, so I’ve heard lately.”
“Great work!” declared Nixie with zest. “He looks like a sea-dog that
can hold on. I must have some fun with the great and only Betsy.”
“If you do,” remarked Irving lazily, “I’ll have some fun with you that
will make you an interesting invalid for the rest of the summer.”
“Highty-tighty!” exclaimed Nixie. “I believe sonny is in earnest, Mrs.
Bruce.”
“Doubtless,” she returned, with some bitterness. “Betsy has a true
knight.”
“I _am_ in earnest,” said Irving quietly. “Betsy’s private affairs are
as much to be respected as your mother’s. Hands off.”
“I spoke to her about the captain once,” said Mrs. Bruce. “He’d been as
much as making love to her under my very eyes, and I put some innocent
question, but—” the speaker shrugged her shoulders—“she snubbed me.”
“Quite right,” said Irving promptly.
“The man’s crazy,” declared Mrs. Bruce, “if he thinks Betsy could be
persuaded to leave us, and go and drudge for him. Of course that’s all
he wants her for; and she _is_ clever. She knows it.”
“I don’t agree with you,” said Irving mildly. “Old Hiram’s in love with
her. To his eyes she looks just the same as she did when they went to
school together.”
“He shall have her then!” ejaculated Nixie enthusiastically. “I shall
make it my pleasure, in slight, unostentatious ways, to throw them
together.”
“Wretch!” exclaimed Mrs. Bruce. “Destroyer of homes! Do you want to
give me nervous prostration?”
“Did you ever try to throw Betsy anywhere she didn’t want to go?”
inquired Irving.
“That’s my comfort,” groaned Mrs. Bruce. “She looked at Captain Salter
as if she could eat him when he told us what he had named the boat.”
Nixie laughed. “She’s a character, isn’t she? I’m not far from in love
with her myself.”