"I WANT TO ASK YOU A QUESTION."
She bent down over Lawrence, who opened his eyes and looked at her.
"Oh!" she said, in a whisper. The thought which sprang swiftly into
her mind was the thought of the last time she had seen this man. It
was the time when she had told him that she had changed her mind
about marrying him, and had decided to marry Lord Maxwell. But later,
Lord Maxwell, for financial reasons and under parental influence, had
also changed his mind, and had married somebody else. This was in
Prudence's thought as she said, "Oh!" in a whisper.
"You see I'm not dead," remarked Lawrence, "only devilishly unlucky."
Prudence stood up erect.
"It quite relieves me to hear you say devilishly," she responded;
"cheers my heart, indeed."
"But why?"
"Because men who are mortally hurt are more pious; if they wanted to
say a bad word they would not do it. Thank you."
Lawrence smiled.
"I could cheer your heart still more," he answered, "for there are a
lot of bad words just galloping to be said."
Prudence did not reply. She turned to Leander, and asked if Mr.
Lawrence had been conversing like this, and had he been shamming when
they had first found him.
At this Lawrence groaned. After a few moments the boy and woman
assisted him to rise. He leaned heavily on them, but seemed to
improve somewhat.
"I don't think you've done much more than break a few ribs and a
collar-bone or so," said the girl, cheerfully.
"And p'raps concussed your brain a bit," added Leander, whose spirits
were rising rapidly.
"There comes the cart," announced Prudence. "It hasn't any springs,
but I didn't know but you were past minding springs. I did insist on
a mattress being put in; only it isn't a mattress, but a feather bed."
Lawrence groaned again.
"That's right," she said; "don't suffer in silence."
It was not long now before the two men who came in the cart had
assisted Lawrence into it. At first he refused to sit down on the
feather bed. He caught a glimpse of Prudence's laughing face as she
said, "If you don't, I shall think you're ungrateful for all we've
done for you."
On this the young man sank down on the bed. "I've only been stunned,"
he said, morosely, "and you needn't make any more fuss about it."
"All right; have it your own way; but I insist on the ribs and the
collar-bones. Now I'll go on and prepare the minds of your friends."
Before anything more could be said, Miss Ffolliott pedalled away.
Leander lifted his machine into the cart, and then placed himself
between it and the feather bed. The horse started on his walk to
Savin Hill.
As he started, Lawrence raised his head and looked back to the spot
of ground where he had fallen. He saw something white lying there,
and he knew that it was Miss Ffolliott's glove.
Miss Ffolliott herself rode swiftly along the shady, solitary road.
She knew the way very well. She had ridden and driven here many times
with the man who was lying there in the farm cart. He had been in
love with her,--extravagantly, furiously, delightfully. She smiled
as she remembered. Some men could make love so much more agreeably
than others. She supposed that was a matter of temperament.
And he wasn't hurt very much, after all. And he and Caro were
"spoons" now. She smiled more broadly.
"I always suspected that Caro cared," she thought, "and I was right.
How funny it is! Well, I shall know precisely the state of the case
in three seconds after I've seen them together. And I've come now."
She seemed to slide without propulsion along the road. She whistled
two or three bars of a tune she had often whistled while she had sat
beside her mother when the latter lady had been up to her neck in
ground peat and sprudel water.
Sometimes the girl flung back her head and sniffed the air, much as a
young colt sniffs when it has just been let out into a field after a
long confinement.
But she did not relax her speed. It was not long before she turned
into a better kept road, and here she saw ahead of her, and walking
towards her, the figure of her cousin Carolyn, who began to hasten
directly.
They fell on each other's necks, after the manner of girls, and
kissed and hugged.
Then Prudence held her off, and examined her, smiling slightly all
the while.
"Lee told me you were no good any more," she said, at last.
Then Caro blushed and blushed.
"I suppose you're happy?"
"Yes."
"Of course. Well, I've been to the mud baths of Carlsbad, and I'm
not particularly happy. However, I congratulate you; and I won't
be _de trop_ any more than is absolutely necessary for the sake of
appearances."
Prudence propelled her wheel with one hand; the other arm she put
about her companion's waist, and so the two went out.
"Mr. Lawrence has returned," presently said Prudence.
"How do you know?" the other asked, quickly.
"Because we met him, Leander and I, on the Pine-wood road. Now if
you scream I won't tell you anything more; and it really isn't
anything to speak of, only he is on his way here now, and on a
feather bed also, because they didn't have any mattresses. If it
isn't ribs it's collar-bone,--what was it the Physiology used to call
collar-bone?--and he's sane, and knew me, and wanted to swear, but
wouldn't, much. So you see you needn't be alarmed a particle."
Carolyn had detached herself from her companion, and was gazing at
her, her lips growing white, as she listened.
"His horse threw him," added Prudence, shortly.
"Threw him?"
"Yes," with still more impatience. "What else do you want me to say.
Didn't I tell you he was on his way home, and that it was a feather
bed only because I couldn't get a mattress? I did as well as I could."
Here Prudence gave a short laugh, and lightly kissed her companion's
cheek.
Carolyn tried to appear calm. Her imagination had leaped to every
dreadful thing. She wanted to turn her back on this girl, but,
instead of doing that, she looked at her intently, and asked,
steadily:
"Are you telling me the truth?"
"Absolutely. I don't think your precious young man is hurt much, only
shaken up a bit."
The two girls were silent for a few moments. Carolyn had turned, and
they were both walking back over the road, that they might the sooner
meet the cart that was bringing Lawrence to Savin Hill.
"Providence made a great mistake in sending me to find your lover,"
at last said Prudence. "If Providence had wished to do the perfectly
correct thing, you would have been on the Pine-wood road this
morning. But then, when does Providence act quite up to the mark? I
am tired of Providence myself."
Though Carolyn gazed at the speaker, she did not apparently hear her.
Her eyes wandered off down the road.
After another short silence, Prudence spoke again.
"I hope there are people coming to the house this summer. I should
go raving mad if I had only you and Rodney, and you two in love with
each other."
The girl shrugged her shoulders, and shuddered. As there was no
answer, she repeated:
"I suppose you are in love with each other, aren't you?"
"I suppose so," mechanically.
"That's what I thought. Are there people coming?"
"Oh, yes."
"Men?"
"A few."
"Ah, I revive! If you had had as much to do with sprudel water as I
have, you would be as thankful as I am at the prospect of seeing
some men who are not slyly feeling their pulse while they talk to
you. You needn't look so curiously at me. It is strictly proper for a
girl to like men, only it's very improper to acknowledge the liking.
And when they begin to get in love--Oh, isn't that the head of the
procession appearing? Yes. Now, Caro, run and throw yourself on your
betrothed, and sing in a high soprano how thankful you are to see him
yet again--again--a-g-a--in! You see, I've not forgotten my opera."
But Carolyn did not run. She walked slowly forward, her hands very
cold, hanging inertly down, her lips pressed tightly together.
Of one thing she was sure,--that she would not make a scene. Yes, she
would die rather than make a scene.
There was the bed, and there was Lawrence lounging upon it. Leander
was standing rigidly straight, grasping the stakes of the cart. He
shouted shrilly as he saw his sister. The old horse, which always
stopped on any pretext whatever, stopped now, and drooped, as if he
would lie down.
"I say, sis," said Leander, jumping from the tail of the cart, "don't
you go and begin to cry, and all that stuff."
"I don't think your sister will cry, Leander," remarked Lawrence,
with some dryness.
Carolyn came to the side of the cart. She said that she hoped Mr.
Lawrence was not much hurt, and Mr. Lawrence replied that he should
be all right in a few hours.
Then the horse was induced to start on. After a while they all
reached the house, and Lawrence was helped to his room, while Leander
volunteered to go on his wheel for the doctor.
In due time the doctor came, and pronounced that the young man would
be as well as usual again in a few days.
The two girls were standing on the piazza, when this decision was
announced to them by Mrs. Ffolliott.
Carolyn walked quickly to the nearest chair, and sat down. She fixed
her eyes on that line of dazzling brightness which was the sea.
But she saw nothing. Prudence sauntered to the railing, and leaned
against it.
Presently Mrs. Ffolliott returned to the house, and the two were
alone.
Prudence walked to a long chair near her cousin, and placed herself
luxuriously in it. She still wore her bicycle suit. She crossed her
legs, and, leaning forward, embraced her knees with her clasped
hands.
"Got a smoke about you, Caro?" she asked.
"No. And I didn't know you had taken up smoking."
"No more I have. But my attitude, and the piazza, and a certain
natural depravity in my own breast suggested the question. I think
I shall try cigarettes. And one can have a truly divine thing in
cigarette-cases now. And a woman's hand is peculiarly fitted to show
jewels when holding a weed out--thus."
The speaker extended her left hand, while she seemed to puff smoke
from her lips as she did so.
Carolyn smiled slightly, as she said:
"You are just the same, aren't you?"
"Of course. You didn't think I had met with a change, did you?"
"Hardly."
Carolyn clasped her hands, and gazed down at them. A cloud was on her
face.
"You are not worrying about that great strapping fellow up-stairs,
are you?" Prudence asked the question sharply.
"No."
"You didn't seem to feel much when you met him just now," remarked
Prudence.
"I didn't want to make a scene," was the reply.
Prudence contemplated her companion for a moment in silence. Then she
said that she had a bit of advice to offer; advice was easily given,
and it never hurt any one, because no one ever followed it.
"What is it?"
"Don't be quite so self-controlled, or Rodney will begin to think you
seem indifferent because you feel so. You know men are creatures who
have no intuition, and who can't see the fraction of an inch below
the surface. And though they say they don't like scenes, they do,
when it's love for them that makes the scene. I don't charge you a
cent for this information. I do wish I had a cigarette; I'd try it
this very minute.
"''Twas off the blue Canary Isle
I smoked my last cigar!'"
Prudence sang in a deep bass that threatened to choke her. She grew
red in the face, and did not try to go on any further with the song.
Carolyn glanced at her and laughed.
"Somehow," she said, "I believe I thought Carlsbad would make you
over."
"You see I think I might have been made over if I had taken mud
baths myself," was the reply; "but only seeing mamma take them didn't
seem to have much effect,--only to bore me almost to death. Did you
ever notice that, after you have been bored to extinction, and have
escaped, you are liable to commit very nearly anything? You are so
exhilarated, you know. Now I'm going to do something startling. I
don't know yet whether I shall steal the Ffolliott silver, or--" here
the girl paused to laugh--"or Carolyn Ffolliott's lover. For the
first I might be put in jail; for the latter there's no punishment
that I know."
Prudence leaned back now and clasped her hands over the top of her
head.
"I do wish you wouldn't talk so!" Carolyn exclaimed.
"Why? It's fun to take out the stopper and let yourself bubble over."
"Prudence--"
"Ma'am?"
"I want to ask you something."
"Go right ahead. Questions cheerfully answered; estimates given upon
application."
But Carolyn hesitated. Then she said that she wished her cousin would
be serious.
"Serious! You don't call me gay, do you? Why, the solemnity that
dribbled over me from mamma isn't washed off yet. It will take a
whole summer, and several men in love with me at once, and fighting
about me, to take away the melancholy that I acquired at Carlsbad."
As she finished speaking, Prudence rose, and stepped out on to the
lawn. She ran across it and leaned on the wall at the end of it.
Beyond lay the bay, flashing brightly in the sunlight; but her strong
eyes did not blench as she gazed.
"Is that the _Vireo_ in the sandy cove?" she asked.
"Yes."
"It's a little thing, isn't it?"
"Yes."
"I believe I could almost manage that myself."
"Yes."
Prudence turned towards her cousin, flung her head back, and laughed.
A young man lying impatiently on a bed in a room on the second floor
heard that laugh, and tossed his head on the pillow as he heard.
He inwardly compared the sound with Carolyn's musical gurgle when
she was amused, and then said aloud that it was amazing that he had
ever fancied that he had cared for Prudence Ffolliott. She must be
out there by the wall. He raised himself on his elbow, but, though he
could look through the window, he could see only the ocean and the
sails on it, and the long trails of smoke from two steamers that were
gliding away towards "the utmost purple rim."
That phrase came into his mind, and with it the memory of one
evening, down on the beach, when Prudence had quoted that verse, and
how her voice had sunk and thrilled as it pronounced the words and
she had glanced up at him.
What an ass he had been! Well, he was thankful that was all over. It
was incredible that he had been moved so by that woman. He was beyond
all that now; and he was in love with the dearest girl in the world.
Prudence laughed again, and again Lawrence raised himself on his
elbow, and once more saw nothing but the ocean and the sails. Then he
turned with his back to the window, groaned by reason of his hurts,
muttered something that sounded like "Damn it," and in a few moments
fell asleep.
Prudence still remained by the wall, her arms upon it and her
brilliant face towards the sea. And Carolyn still sat in her chair
on the veranda. She was not looking at Massachusetts Bay, but at
her cousin. She was wondering about her with an intensity that was
almost painful. Among other things, she was trying to determine
what it was in Prudence Ffolliott's face that made it interesting,
and that gave it something very much more effective than beauty of
feature. It was a mocking, flashing, melting, fiery, tender face; a
face full of daring, of possibilities, and suggestions, and shadows,
and brightnesses; and it was unscrupulous, and passionate, and cruel,
and selfish, and--
Having thought of all these adjectives, Carolyn roused herself and
smiled at her own folly, and told herself it was an impossible thing
that any human countenance should be so contradictory. She recalled
the story her own mirror told her. As for beauty, she possessed a
share of that.
This thought strengthened and comforted her. She left her chair and
joined her cousin by the wall. Prudence put her arm about Carolyn,
and the two stood in silence a few moments. The water before them was
vivid, shining green and blue and purple; and it was just ruffled by
a gentle east wind that made the whole world seem a bright, joyous
place to live in.
"How many times I've thought of just this place on the Savin Hill
lawn, and just this outlook over the bay!"
Prudence spoke very gently, and sighed slightly as she spoke.
"Have you?"
"Indeed I have. What did you imagine I thought of in that dreadful
hotel with mamma and the maid and the nurse and the peat and the
water? I had to think of something. And I wondered if I should ever
sail in the _Vireo_. And now I mean to sail in her the very first
minute I can manage it. I got me the loveliest sailor hat in Paris,
and a ribbon with 'Vireo' on it, and a yachting suit that looks as if
it were made in Paradise. Yes, I sail the _Vireo_ the salt seas over."
"I didn't know you went to Paris."
"I did. I wanted some clothing fit for mamma's daughter and your
cousin to wear. And I've got it. You just wait and see. That's why
I was a little late in coming across. Oh, how divine that color is
beyond Long Ledge! Life is worth the living, isn't it, Caro dear?
Yes, it is certainly a blessed thing to be alive. This world is a
beautiful place. Yes, I must go out in the _Vireo_ this very day,
even if the wind isn't right for much of a sail."
Prudence leaned her head lightly on her companion's shoulder
while she recited in a half-voice and with exquisite penetrating
intonation:
"The day, so mild,
Is Heaven's own child,
With earth and ocean reconciled.
The airs I feel
Around me steal
Are murmuring to the murmuring keel.
"Over the rail
My hand I trail
Within the shadow of the sail;
A joy intense,
The cooling sense
Glides down my drowsy indolence.
"With dreamful eyes
My spirit lies
Where Summer sings and never dies.
O'erveiled with vines,
She glows and shines
Among her future oil and wines."
As she finished the lines Prudence lifted her head and smiled at her
companion.
That smile somehow made Carolyn's heart sick, it was so softly
brilliant. She had a wild notion, for the instant, that a woman who
could smile like that, and whose eyes melted like that, was a woman
to fly from across the whole world.
"Prudence--" began Carolyn, as she had once before begun.
This time Prudence did not say, "Ma'am." She responded, "Yes," in a
half whisper.
Carolyn stood up a little more erectly; she felt her hands growing
cold. She went on:
"I've often wondered how you happened to engage yourself to Rodney
Lawrence."
"I shouldn't think you'd wonder about that, when you've just been and
done the same thing yourself," was the response.
"Now don't be flippant."
"No, I won't be. Go on."
"Well," Carolyn began again, "perhaps I ought to say that I wonder
how, having engaged yourself to Rodney, you could jilt him for
anybody else in the world."
"Not for Lord Maxwell?"
"Not for a thousand Lord Maxwells."
"One is quite enough, thank you. Well, if I did wrong, I was speedily
punished. I jilted Mr. Lawrence for his lordship; his lordship jilted
me for the brewer's daughter. I notice that brewers' daughters over
in England get much more than their share of the male nobility."
"You said you wouldn't be flippant."
"So I did. Have you any more remarks to make?"
"Yes. I remark that I thought you were in love with Rodney."
There was now a short silence. Prudence was standing with her hands
clasped among the vines on top of the wall in front of her.
"Did I seem so?" she asked.
"Yes."
Prudence turned still farther away as she answered:
"I was in love with him."
"Oh, Prudence, you are certainly unaccountable!" burst out Carolyn.
"That's just what I think myself."
As she spoke, the girl turned back towards her companion and laughed.
"Oh, yes, I was certainly in love with him. The sun rose and set in
his eyes for me; I thought of him by day and dreamed of him by night;
when he looked at me I felt my heart give one delightful throb and
then go on as if it were beating to delicious music. He was never
absent from me really; he--"
"That's quite enough," interrupted Carolyn, harshly; and she added,
after a moment:
"I don't believe one word you have said."
"Why not?" Prudence lifted her eyebrows.
"Because if you had loved him like that you would not have thought of
any one else."
"Pshaw! While the fever was on, you mean."
"Prudence, why won't you be serious?"
"Because you are serious enough for two,--yes, for a dozen."
Carolyn's face had been gradually growing white. She now walked away,
following the wall and staring out towards the ocean.
Prudence leaned forward on the wall, her arms extended over the thick
green of the creeper that covered the stones. There was some new
light in her eyes, but it was not easy to tell what that light meant.
When Carolyn returned she met her gaze with frankness, and said:
"Caro, what is it you want to say to me? You haven't said it yet."
"No, I haven't. I'm trying to ask you a question."
"Go on."
But the other girl still seemed to find extreme difficulty in saying
what was in her mind. Finally she asked:
"Are you going to try to win Rodney back to you?"
There was something deeply piteous in Carolyn's lovely face as she
spoke; a pain, a hope and doubt which made the tears rise to the eyes
of her companion.
"You dear little thing!" cried Prudence. "How ridiculous you are! I
couldn't do it if I tried."
"Oh, I don't know," was the response. "I wish you hadn't come now.
Mamma dreamed that you were drowned, and that I was glad of it. That
was horrible. It frightened me. I remember how Rodney felt about you.
It's useless to pretend that I don't remember, or that he is in love
with me in that kind of a way. You'd find out all about it, and I may
just as well tell you. I've loved him ever since I can remember; I
suffered when you and he were engaged; but I meant to be reconciled
to anything that would make him happy. You see, I want him to be
happy, whatever happens--"
"You foolish thing!" here Prudence murmured. But the other did not
seem to hear this exclamation. She went on:
"And if I didn't think he'd be happy with me I never would have said
yes to him,--no, not for anything in the world. I know he has a
strong affection for me, and I--" The tender voice faltered for an
instant, then went on. "I love him beyond anything I can imagine in
this world or the next. I suppose I am wicked, and an idolater, and
all that, but it's the truth, and I can't help it. Now are you going
to--are you going to be very, very kind to him? You know you almost
broke his heart once, and now I think you might let him alone. Will
you?"
Instead of replying immediately, Prudence hurriedly passed her hand
over her eyes; then she said, lightly:
"I don't think you have any idea how much breaking a man's heart will
bear, and 'brokenly live on.'"
She smiled as she made the quotation.
"You needn't answer me like that," said Carolyn. "I suppose men's
hearts are something like the hearts of women, after all. But we
won't discuss that. I want you to reply to me. I've talked so frankly
to you because I thought on the whole I would do so. I was determined
that there should be no misunderstanding. Now, what are you going to
do?"
"Nothing."
"Do you mean it?" she asked, eagerly.
"Absolutely nothing,--save to look on, when I can't help it, at this
beautiful drama of love--"
"And you are not going to flirt with Rodney?" Carolyn interrupted.
"No," the other said, firmly.
Carolyn drew a deep breath; then she laughed. "I know I've been
talking in the most ridiculous way possible," she said; "but no
matter. I had a desire to have you give me your promise, and you
have. But you needn't think I don't know exactly how foolish I've
been; because I do."
As Carolyn finished speaking she came to her cousin's side and took
her hand for an instant. To her surprise, she found it as cold as her
own, though the sun was shining hotly down upon the two.
"If I were a man," began Prudence, "and saw two girls like you and
me, I shouldn't look at me, I should just go and fall in love with
you."
"No; you wouldn't do any such thing; you'd think--oh, I know what
you'd think. Oh, dear!" she partially turned towards the house,
"is that Leander's voice? There's no one in the universe but a boy
who can be in all places at once. I thought he had gone fishing.
Leander," turning and speaking with some asperity, "I thought you had
gone codding."
"You must be a fool, then," promptly replied Leander, coming forward
with his hands in his pockets. "I ain't goin' coddin' with the sun
like this, 'n' the tide like this, 'n' late as this, I tell you.
What you two been talkin' about?" He scanned the faces before him,
squinting his eyes almost shut as he did so. "I declare, you look
exactly as if you'd been tellin' secrets. Have ye?"
"Yes, we have," answered Prudence.
Leander came yet nearer. He reached out one grimy hand and took hold
of his sister's skirt and pulled it.
"Tell me," he said. "It's such good fun to have a secret. I know two
of the cook's and one of that new chambermaid's."
"Then you know enough."
"No, I don't, either. I never tell on one if I promise, you know; but
I scare 'em half to death sayin' I will tell if they don't do so and
so, you know. There's the cook, now. She's got so she makes my kind
of choc'late cake 'bout every day 'cause she thinks if she don't I'll
tell marmer something she did one time when you were all gone."
Here the boy laughed, and danced a short shuffle on the close-cut
grass.
"You're a low-bred little cad, then," said Carolyn, so sharply that
she rather wondered at herself.
Leander stopped dancing. His face grew very red.
"You dasn't say that again!" he shouted. "I guess you wouldn't say
such rotten, nasty things if Rodney was here. You're as sweet as
California honey when he's round. And I ain't a cad. 'N' if I am,
who's a better right? 'N' you're a cad's sister, then,--that's what
you are!"
"Welcome diversion!" cried Prudence. "We were getting very tired of
telling secrets. Where's that tame crow? I haven't seen him yet."
But the boy could not answer. His face seemed swelling, his sharp
eyes were filling.
"Leander, I beg your pardon," hastily said his sister.
"I ain't a cad!" said the boy, in a shrill quaver. "Rodney told me I
was real gentlemanly 'bout that reward." Then, with a sudden fury, "I
hate you, Carolyn Ffolliott, 'n' you needn't beg my pardon."
Leander spun around, and hurried away. As he did so, a black speck
appeared over the savin-trees.