"I'll be shot!" ejaculated Captain Lancaster, in a voice of the
liveliest exasperation.
"Oh, no; what have you done?" exclaimed his chum, lifting his handsome
head from his lounge amid a cloud of curling, blue cigar-smoke.
"Nothing; I never did anything in my life," in an injured tone, "and I
am fain to ask why I am so bitterly persecuted."
"Persecuted?" inquired De Vere, languidly.
"Oh, yes, you can afford to be cool. You are the legal heir to ten
thousand a year. You are not at the beck and call of a relative who
gives you the most troublesome commissions to execute without so much
as saying 'by your leave,'" growled Lancaster.
The young lieutenant laughed lazily.
"You have had a letter from my lady?" he said.
"Yes. Look here, De Vere, I wonder if she thinks I belong to her
wholly? Must one be a white slave for the sake of coming into twenty
thousand a year?"
"It is worth lots of toadying," declared De Vere, emphatically.
"I used to like Aunt Lydia--rather--before my uncle died," said
Lancaster, reflectively. "She was always tart and waspish. I didn't
care for it when I didn't have to bear the brunt of it. She rather
amused me then, but now I get out of patience with her whims and
exactions."
"What is it she wants now?" asked Harry De Vere, lazily.
"It is something I have to carry home to her from New York. By Jove!
I have a great mind to refuse. Anything in reason I would willingly
undertake; but, ah, really, this is too bad!" groaned the victim,
dropping his head back among the cushions of his chair.
It was a handsome head, crowned with short, crisp masses of fair hair,
and he was a blue-eyed young giant with the perfect features of an
Antinous, and a smile that dazzled one when it played around the full
red lips half veiled by the drooping ends of the long, fair mustache.
He had an indolent air that was not unbecoming to him, but rather
taking than otherwise. He did not look like a man who would overexert
himself for anything, and yet the air might have been cultivated and
not natural.
"I did not know that there was anything on this side of the
'herring-pond' her ladyship would deign to accept," said De Vere.
"There isn't. She has a horror of everything American."
"Then why--what?" inquired the other, perplexedly, and Captain
Lancaster's moody brow cleared a moment, and he laughed merrily at his
friend's amazed air.
"Give it up, Harry. You couldn't guess in a month," he said.
"I give it up," resignedly.
"It's a female," said Lancaster, lifting his head to note the effect on
his inferior officer.
It was startling. The hands that were clasped behind the lieutenant's
head relaxed suddenly, and he sat bolt upright on his sofa, his brown
eyes distended to their greatest size, his whole air indicative of the
greatest astonishment.
"By George! You don't say so?" he ejaculated.
Lancaster relaxed from his perturbation to laugh at his startled
hearer. "It's astonishing what an effect the mere mention of the female
sex has upon you, De Vere," he observed.
"Well, you did take my breath away. I confess myself astonished. Who is
the female, Lancaster? Not," catching his breath excitedly, "the chosen
fair?--the fatal she who is to out-captain the captain himself, and
lead him captive to the hymeneal altar?"
"Pshaw!" disgustedly, "how you run on! Of course it is nothing of the
sort. Could one come out of New York that would please my august aunt?"
"'Can any good come out of Nazareth?'" quoted the lieutenant, lightly.
"But I say, Lancaster, you have excited my curiosity to the highest
pitch. Who is the female? Am I to be associated with you in the care of
her?"
"I will hand over to you the whole charge, if you wish," said the
captain, with the same disgusted air.
"_Cela dépend._ Is she young and fair? I have found New York girls
rather fascinating, usually," said De Vere, recalling sundry
flirtations by the light of a chandelier, with nobody very near.
"Young? yes--very young, I should say," growled the captain,
sardonically. "But not to keep you any longer in suspense, listen to
this portion of my dear aunt's epistle:
"'There is a small commission I wish you to execute for me, Clive.
My housekeeper's brother has died in New York and left her a little
girl to take care of. I can not spare Mrs. West long enough for her
to go after the child; and, in fact, I don't think it would be safe
for her to go, anyhow. She is so simple, poor woman, she would be
quite lost in the wilderness of New York, and might be devoured by
the bulls and bears that I hear infest the place. So I want you to
bring the child to England with you. I dare say she will not be much
trouble. I inclose a card with her name and New York address. You are
to go there and get little Leo and bring her to her aunt. Now, do not
upon any account forget the child, Clive, for West would be ready to
die of chagrin if you did not bring the little brat to her the first
of June.'"
He paused and looked at his friend in comical anger.
"Did you ever hear of anything so deucedly cool in your life?" he said.
"No, I never did. It is most outrageous. What shall you do?"
"Advise me, please. Shall I rebel against my tormentor's mandate and
refuse point-blank?"
"No, never. Rather meet the peril boldly and vanquish it. Walk boldly
up to the cannon's mouth. In other words, accept the small commission."
"Small commission, indeed!" groaned the wretched victim. "What shall I
do with a child--a girl-child, too--perhaps a baby?"
"That would be the best of all. You need have no trouble then. Only
provide a nurse, a sucking-bottle, and some cans of condensed milk, put
them aboard with the baby, and all your trouble is over," suggested
the lieutenant.
"Is it so easy as that? Well, perhaps it is a baby. She calls it a
girl, a little child. Yes, I have no doubt it is a baby. Well, when we
leave Boston we will go over to New York and see about the nurse and
the bottles," sighed Lancaster.