CHAPTER XI

IN THE GARDEN

Winter--long and cold; spring--late and slow; then, all at once, in

June, radiant summer and the little garden round the corner in Gay

Street was a place of richly bursting bloom--a riot of colours against

the leafy green background of its vine-hung walls.

Toward the end of June a week of almost tropical heat had made the

evenings outdoors, on the little porch, and in the garden itself, events

to be looked forward to throughout the day, Joseph Bell, Peter, Ross,

and Rufus, thought of them many times during the hottest day of

all--midsummer, the twenty-first of the month--and came home at night to

find the table laid for a cool-looking supper out under the shadow of

the maple, and Mrs. Bell, Jane, and Nancy, in thin summer frocks,

putting the finishing touches to the attractive meal about to be served

there.

Up in a window of the house next door, behind closed blinds, an elderly

neighbour had watched Jane wreathing a big glass bowl full of

strawberries with a crisp little green vine spray.

"The Bells certainly are the queerest people anybody ever lived

neighbour to," she said over her shoulder to her sister, a withered

little spinster, who, in this hot, small upstairs room, was sewing at

another window, which did not look out upon the garden, and therefore

could have its blinds open. "Anybody 'd think life was just one picnic

to them. Think of lugging all those dishes outdoors this hot night, and

then lugging 'em all in again--and they all dressed out in flowered

muslins!"

The sister came to the window and peered somewhat wistfully out through

the closed blinds. "It does look sort of pleasant out there," she said.

"And we certainly can't say they 're not good neighbours. Mrs. Bell

sent over a whole tin of those light rolls of hers this morning. They

'll come in handy for supper."

"There come the men." Mrs. Hunter brought her gaze to bear upon the

four who had stolen up to the gate, and who, as she spoke, burst out

suddenly with a crisp clapping of hands which brought the three in the

"flowered-muslins" to the right-about. If Mrs. Hunter and Miss Maria,

watching those four advance, could have heard what they were saying as

they caught sight of the flower-decked table, they might have had a new

light shed upon the question whether the trouble of bringing forth all

those dishes from the house had been worth while.

The neighbours saw the merry little meal eaten, and saw all hands clear

it away at the end, making short work of the many dishes. But afterward

twilight fell, and little could be discerned except the gleam of the

light dresses and the presence near of dark forms lying on the grass.

It was after the midsummer moon was lighting the garden into a small

fairy-land that Peter, springing up, exclaimed, "There's Olive and

Murray!" and ran to greet them.

There was a third person with them, and a moment later the others heard

Peter exclaim, in a tone of surprise:

"Well, well, well! You don't mean to say this is----Why, how are you?

How are you? I 'm tremendously glad to see you!"

"Thank you! I 'm a good deal gladder to be home than anybody possibly

can be to have me." And Jane, recognising first the peculiar quality of

the voice, cried out:

"Why, it's Forrest!" and led the others, as a general uprising took

place.

"Yes, it's Forrest," said the voice, and in the bright moonlight Jane

looked up into the face whose outlines in these two years of absence had

grown dim in her memory. It was the same face, but she thought it

looked older and thinner, and she realised then and there that Forrest

was not the same careless boy who had gone so lightly away to lead a

soldier's life.

When the greetings were over and the company had settled down again on

the turf under the maple, Jane found Forrest next to herself, and had

her first little insight into his thoughts.

"I feel like a stranger from a foreign country, I assure you," he was

saying to her, presently, as the talk and laughter of the others made a

bit of confidence possible. "And the strangest thing of all to me is

the sight of my brother grinding away down there in the office, looking

like the healthiest fellow in town. I can't understand it; it took me

off my feet!"

"We have grown so used to the change," said Jane, smiling to herself, in

the dim light, "that we don't think about it any more."

"You see," Forrest pursued, "I came home on the quiet--just wanting to

see, you know, how they would take it. I thought if they really still

cared, I should know it by the look on their faces----"

"Oh, how could you think----" Jane began, eagerly.

But he interrupted. "A fellow thinks a good many things when he 's on

the other side of the world, and I--well, I got to wanting to know some

things so badly, I was n't sorry when I had my fever. Yes--you did n't

know that, did you? Oh, I had it all right! And I wasn't sorry when

they sent me home with a lot of other convalescents. So I made for the

office the minute I had seen my mother and the girls, for they told me

that Murray was down there for good--a thing I had n't known. Maybe

they thought I 'd be jealous--and maybe I was--in a way, though I don't

want the job any more than I ever did.

"Father gave me a good warm greeting--I 'll say that. And Murray--well,

when he got up and came toward me with his hand out, looking like the

strongest kind of a young business man, I felt as if--But I can't tell

you about that now."

There was a general movement of the younger people of the party, in

response to a request from Ross, who was entertaining them with some new

tricks, at which he was an adept. During the confusion Murray came and

flung himself upon the grass beside Jane.

"Take me into the conference, will you?" he said. "I'm envious of

anybody my brother talks to, I 'm so glad to get him back."

Under cover of the subdued light, Jane found her hand, which had been

resting on the cool grass where she sat, taken into a warm, significant

grasp, as familiar now as it was dear. She gave back a little answering

pressure, without turning her head toward Murray, at whose close

presence she had grown instantly happier.

"Take you in?" Forrest answered slowly. "Well, if you--and all the

others--will only take me in, and never turn me out--or let me turn

myself out again--I 'll be--satisfied."

With one hand holding tight the small one buried in the grass, Murray's

other hand went out toward the fist clenched on Forrest's knee. "Old

fellow," he said, warmly, "if you 'll just stay where you can get over

often into this garden in Gay Street, you 'll find it will do as much

toward making life worth living as it has done for every other one of

the Townsend family."

"I believe you," answered Forrest, and gave the brotherly hand an

answering grip.

BOOK II

WORTHINGTON SQUARE

CHAPTER I

JANE WEARS PEARLS

A tap upon her door sent Mrs. Murray Townsend flying across the room to

answer it. She expected to find her husband there, awaiting her

permission to come in and see her in the cloud-like white gown which she

had worn but once before--two months ago. He had vowed since that he

had never seen that wedding-gown, being occupied wholly upon the

occasion on which it was worn in keeping his head, in order to play his

own part with dignity and self-command.

But to Jane's disappointment, she opened the door only to a maid with a

florist's box. The box, upon being examined, yielded up among a mass of

roses Murray's card, which bore this message:

Sorry to be delayed, dear, but father wanted to go over everything that

has happened at the office during my absence. Will be up in time for the

pow-wow. Wear one of these for

MURRAY.

Jane smiled regretfully. It had seemed a long day. Only that morning

she and Murray had returned, belated, from their wedding journey across

the continent, to find cards out for a reception in their honour to take

place that very evening.

"You knew the date," Mrs. Harrison Townsend had said to her elder son,

when, upon being told that his delay had caused much anxiety to the

givers of the affair, he turned to his bride with a soft whistle of

recollection and chagrin.

"I certainly did," he had owned. "I forgot, I 'm afraid, that there

were such things as after-wedding festivities due to society, and that

this was the date for the first of the series. I don't think Jane even

knew."

"I didn't," said Jane, looking regretfully at her mother-in-law's

handsome face, which betrayed a slight annoyance. It certainly had been

trying to receive daily telegrams from the travellers throughout the

past week, announcing delays at this place and that on the homeward way.

"Of course it's of no consequence now that you are safely here. I 'm

only sorry Jane will have no chance to rest and visit. The florist's

men will arrive within an hour, and the house will be generally upset."

"I 'll run away over to Gay Street, then," said Jane. "Murray 's going

down to the office, and mother and Nan will be looking for me."

"My dear, I 'm sorry, but Olive has asked a few friends informally for

luncheon, people from out of town who are coming for to-night. It would

hardly do for you not to meet them--since two are cousins."

So Jane had had to be content with one brief hour in the little home

round the corner in Gay Street, and then she had come back to the big

house in Worthington Square, there to begin to act the part expected of

her. Murray had been more than sorry to leave her on this first day,

but his father's affairs were pressing, the office work had suffered in

his absence, and he felt it a necessity to get back into the harness

without an hour's delay. He had expected to be early at home, but his

message showed Jane that even for her he did not mean to cut short the

work of taking up again the routine of business at the point where he

had left it two months ago.

Selecting half a dozen of the finest of her roses, Jane, with a long,

light coat slipped on over her finery, opened the door and peeped

cautiously out into the large, square gallery of the upper hall. Nobody

was in sight. The doors of Mrs. Townsend's and Olive's rooms were

closed, the ladies dressing for the affair of the evening. The door of a

guest-room, occupied by the two cousins from out of town, was slightly

ajar, and a maid was to be seen inside, offering a cup of tea on a tray.

One of the cousins had a headache, and was fortifying herself for a

fatiguing evening.

Jane slipped quietly by this door and round the gallery to the point

where a staircase led to the lower landing, a place just now embowered

in palms, which were to serve as a screen for the string orchestra. She

paused an instant on this landing, to look down upon the brilliant

picture presented by the entrance-hall and its opening rooms below. The

look of it reminded her of an evening long ago, the first upon which she

had set foot as a guest in the great unknown house in Worthington

Square, when Murray had taken charge of her and brought her up here on

the landing, to look down upon the scene in which neither of them had

much cared to take part.

"Can this really be my home?" thought Jane, feeling as if it could not

all be true, even yet. She ran quickly on downstairs and round the foot

of the staircase to a door beneath, which furnished an inconspicuous

exit from the big hall, and which opened upon a short passage and a side

entrance not much used by the family. This had long been a favourite

entrance for Murray himself, for it shortened the way to Gay Street.

A very short cut Jane made of it, for a flood of light from the long row

of windows in the dining-room fell across the path, and turned it into

one less obscure than she wished it to be just now. Holding her

delicate skirts well away from the dust of the road, she hurried across,

through the warm air of the May evening.

There was nobody to be seen downstairs in the old house, although lamps

were lighted and the small rooms wore their usual air of home-likeness

and order. Jane ran up the steep little staircase which led to the

sleeping-rooms above. She understood that, as at the big house, the

family were engaged in arraying themselves for the Townsend reception.

She paused at the top of the stairs to listen and observe, for the

various doors were all more or less ajar, and the usual atmosphere of

friendly family comradeship gave her a little pang of homesickness.

The first thing distinguishable was the fact that Peter seemed to be

having a bad time with his neck-gear, and that his cousin, Ross

McAndrew, was enjoying his perturbation of mind.

"Either my neck is bigger than it was, or this neckband has shrunk."

Peter's growl rolled out into the tiny hall, and brought a dimple into

Jane's cheek as she listened.

"Probably both catastrophes have happened." This was Ross's voice in

reply. "Anybody who has seen you stow away buckwheat cakes and

maple-syrup all winter could n't be surprised if your neck should take a

seventeen collar this spring."

"Seventeen nothing! Sixteen's my size, and when I wear a bigger it 'll

be because---- O jiminy, I 've burst that buttonhole! What on earth am

I to do now? I don't own but one dress shirt that 'll fit the barn-door

opening in my white waistcoat."

"Your mother 'll sew that up on your back. I 'll do it myself if you

won't howl at a prick or two."

"Much obliged, but I know the general style of your repairs in a case

like this. Nan 'll do it, if she's dressed," and Peter's door swung

open. Intent on reaching his younger sister, whose door was next beyond

his own, he did not observe the figure at the head of the stairs in the

shadow. He proceeded to perform a double tattoo upon Nancy's door.

"What's the matter, Petey?" sounded an amiable voice from within.

"Neckband of my shirt's a wreck. Want you to come and splice the main

brace."

"All right--if you 'll button me up the back. I can't reach below the

fourth button, and mother's busy dressing, too. It's so inconvenient

having Janey married."

"Give and take's fair play," agreed Peter, as a charming young figure in

pink-flowered muslin backed out of the door, both bare arms strenuously

demonstrating that they could not reach below the fourth button. "Stand

still now--no fidgeting. What on earth a girl wants her rigging

fastened behind for is beyond me! If it must be, why not use buttons

big enough to get hold of?"

"Look out, don't treat my buttonholes as you did your own, or I 'll have

to be sewed up, too."

"All right--you're done. Turn round and let's see how you look in

front. Good work! You 're a stunner, and tremendously grown up, too,

with your hair that way. Put it up the day you were eighteen, did n't

you?"

"Of course," admitted Nancy, with her comely head held high. Then, as

Jane's white skirts in the shadow caught her eye, "Why, there 's Janey!

You dear! Oh, how good it looks to see you standing there!"

At the cry three doors flew wide open, and Mr. Bell, Ross, and Rufus

appeared simultaneously upon their respective thresholds, while a voice

from within called, "Is Jane there? Come here, dear!"

"O mother, let me do your hair, will you?" offered Jane, eagerly, when

she had succeeded in making her way past the embraces of her delighted

family.

"Not in that dress, child! Mercy, remember it's your wedding-gown, and

don't whisk round so! Sit down there and let me look at you while I put

my hair up; it won't take but a minute, and then you shall help me into

my dress."

"If you won't let me do your hair, I 'll go sew up Pete's buttonhole. I

must do something for somebody. It seems so funny to have got dressed

over in the big house. I just had to come over here and see the rest of

you getting ready and consulting each other on details as usual. Where's

your work-basket, mother dear? Nan," running to the door--"don't you

_dare_ to mend Peter's shirt! I want to do it myself."

"All right, Mrs. Townsend, nothing will suit me better," declared Peter,

with satisfaction, kneeling in front of his sister with his back to her,

while she sat on the edge of his splint-bottomed armchair and threaded

her needle. "What does Murray think, by the way, of having his bride

rush over here to assist her family, and leave him to shift for himself?

Why are n't you putting in his studs and things, like a dutiful wife?"

"He could n't get home from the office till the last minute.

Mr.--Father Townsend wanted to consult him on so much that's happened

while we 've been gone. Of course I 'm going back before he comes,"

responded Jane. "Dear me--wreck is certainly the word for this

buttonhole. Did you try to put your thumb through it?"

"Tried to climb through it myself bodily at the last. Anything better

calculated to put a fellow into a lovely frame of mind for an affair

where's he's expected to make himself agreeable I don't know. Wrestling

to get an iron collar on a steel neckband is--well--it's a trifle

upsetting to the nerves. Be sure you get that buttonhole the right

size. Better try the collar-button in it before you make fast."

"When you 're done with him you can tie my tie for me, if you 're

looking for work," announced Rufus, appearing in the doorway. "I can't

seem to get the right curve on the thing."

"Janey, would you wear this bracelet Shirley gave me last Christmas, or

would n't you?" Nancy looked in over Rufus's shoulder. At eighteen she

was tall for her years; at twenty-one Rufus, although sturdily built,

had no advantage of her in inches. It was Peter, with his six feet of

brawn, who was the family pride in the matter of size.

Jane snipped off her thread and turned to look at her younger sister.

"Do as you like, Nan, of course," said she, "but--if you want to look

quite perfect in my eyes you 'll leave it off."

"Good for you!" Peter observed Nancy's simple frock and fair neck with

approval. "Lots of time for the gewgaws when they 're needed to cover

up the hollows."

"Now I 'll go help mother," said Jane, having adjusted Rufus's cravat to

his satisfaction, mended a tiny rip in Ross's glove, and given her

father a hug, since his dressing was completed, and there seemed to be

nothing else she could do for him. He had held her fast, regardless of

her bridal attire, for he had missed her sorely during her two months'

absence, and the thought that, however often she might seek it, his roof

was no longer hers, was one not easily assimilated.

"I should really not have felt properly dressed," averred Mrs. Bell, as

Jane hovered about her, performing all sorts of small offices, "if you

had not been here to assure me that I was quite right in all points."

As Jane smiled, first at her mother, then at her father, wondering how

she had ever been able, even for Murray's sake, to leave two people so

dear, a low call, apparently proceeding from downstairs, reached her

ear, and she turned quickly to listen.

"Jane?" came the voice again, interrogatively. "Gentle Jane, you 're not

lost to me for good and all?"

Jane ran to the head of the small stairway and looked down. In the

light from a bracket lamp at the foot, her husband's face smiled up at

her. A bright, strong face it was, ruddy with health, and alert with

interest in that which he beheld at the top of the stairs. Murray was

in evening dress, and as Jane observed the fact she cried softly and

regretfully:

"Why, it must be later than I thought! I did n't mean to be away when

you came--I 'm so sorry! It doesn't seem as if I 'd been here five

minutes."

"No excuses necessary, dear," he answered. "When I sent you word, I did

n't expect to be able to get away till the last minute, but a telegram

from a man who had an appointment with father let us out, and I followed

my message home. I came after you because mother is getting a bit

uneasy. She wants to be sure the bride is at her elbow, ready for the

fray, though not a soul will show up, of course, till long after the

hour on the cards."

"I 'll come this minute," and Jane caught up her long coat, threw a kiss

at her family, and hurried down. "You 'll all come right away, won't

you?" she called back, and let Murray walk off with her.

At the curb she paused. "I meant to have borrowed Nan's rubbers," she

said, looking down at her white-shod feet. "I forgot when I came over."

"That's easy," and Murray had her across the street before she could

protest that she was too heavy for him.

"You could n't have done that when I first knew you, could you?" laughed

Jane, with pride in his strength of arm.

"Not much. What a slim and sickly whiffet I was! I wonder you ever

looked twice at me, with Pete at hand as a contrast."

"I liked muscle, but I like brains too," explained Jane, as if this were

the first time the matter had been made clear.

"Thank you. I 'm afraid I had none too many of those, either. The

house looks festive, does n't it? Have you seen the dining-room? Mother

seemed to be particularly pleased with the decorations there."

"I 'm afraid I ran away in too much of a hurry to notice."

Murray gave his young wife an amused look as they stood together on the

steps of the small side entrance by which Jane had come out an hour

before.

"Do you know where you are to stand in the receiving line?" he inquired.

Jane shook her head.

"Do you know whether you are to shake hands with the guests or merely

bow?"

"No. You 'll tell me, won't you?"

"Do you know whether I 'm to present people you don't know to you, or

whether you 're to depend on mother for that?"

"I suppose I'll find that out when the time comes."

"Do you know whether you ought to look beamingly happy or coolly

composed?"

"Which do you prefer?"

Murray laughed. "A judicious mixture of both, I should say. Well, my

small bride, ignorant as you profess to be of your part, I 'm not

worried about you. Just the same, I expect we 'd better hunt up mother

and be coached as to the precise line of conduct she expects of us. I

've never played the leading man's part in a bridal 'At Home' myself,

and mother's something of a stickler for doing things according to the

latest revision of the code. Well, well," he added in surprise,

glancing at his watch as they entered the hall, "it's later than I

thought. Do you need to go upstairs?"

"Just a minute--to smooth my unruly hair," and Jane ran away, leaving

him gazing after her.

"Murray!" His mother came toward him from the library, a striking, even

imposing, figure in black and white lace and amethysts. "Between you

and Jane, I was getting anxious. I have n't seen the child since I went

to her room, at least two hours ago."

"She is all ready--dressed early so she might run home, since I sent her

word I should be late."

"But where is she now?"

"Ran upstairs to see if her hair was right. Is n't that the invariable

custom at the last minute?"

"She is wearing her wedding-gown, of course?"

"She surely is."

"No ornaments?"

"I sent her some roses. She 'll carry them, or wear one, or something,

I suppose."

"But no jewels?"

"I think she 's wearing the pearl pin I gave her."

"Murray! You are quite as bad as Jane! To be sure, her girlish way of

dressing has been very pretty and appropriate in view of her father's

lack of means. But her position now, as your wife, is different. Olive

insists that Jane does not care for ornaments of any sort, but I am sure

she would not object, Murray, to wearing that beautiful pearl necklace

of Grandmother Townsend's--if you explain to her that it's an heirloom

and that it will give me great pleasure to have her wear it? Pearls are

not becoming to Olive," added Mrs. Townsend, and her son smiled.

"If you want Jane to wear that, mother, you will have to ask her

yourself. She 's coming now, I think. Yes"--as Jane looked over the

gallery rail and nodded down at him--"here she is. Do you really think

she needs 'ornaments'? They strike me as superfluous."

Mother and son were watching Jane as she came down the staircase, her

white figure outlined against the dark green of the palms and foliage.

Her bronze-tinted hair shone like a crown under the radiance of the

lights, and her softly blooming face made one forget the simplicity of

her attire. At least, it made Murray forget it. But Mrs. Harrison

Townsend saw in the white neck and arms a background for her pearls.

She picked up a case from the table where she had laid it.

"My dear," she said, "you are very sweet, and I shall be very proud to

present you as my daughter. And you won't mind wearing, to please me,

these pearls of Murray's great-grandmother's, will you? They are just

what you need to set off your colouring."

Jane's face grew warm as her eyes fell upon the pearls, lying in a worn

old case lined with faded green velvet. She looked from them to

Murray--an appealing little glance and a questioning one. He nodded

ever so slightly in return, smiling at her.

"You are very kind," said Jane, simply, to her mother-in-law. "I will

wear them--if you wish."

She let Mrs. Townsend clasp the necklace, received that lady's kiss and

approving comment on the difference it made in her appearance, and

allowed herself to be led to a mirror to see the effect. As she stood

before it, her lashes falling after one glance of a pair of unwilling

eyes, somebody called Murray's mother away. Jane looked at her husband

again.

"Yes, I know you hate it, little modesty," said he. "And I own I like

to see you without any jewels. Yet there can be no doubt you become

those pearls. You set them off, not they you. And seeing they 're not

diamonds----"

Jane's eyes flashed. "Not even for you----"

His eyes responded with an answering brilliance, as he shook his head,

laughing. "Not even for me! Are you sure? But you need n't fear.

Diamonds, little Jane Townsend, were not made for you. Let those

sparkle who want to. I prefer a steady glow!"

An hour later Ross McAndrew and Peter Bell, making their entrance to the

long drawing-room together, and waiting their turn to advance toward the

receiving party, exchanged a series of low-voiced comments, under cover

of the general hum of talk.

"My word, Pete! Can that be our small girl, standing up there like a

young queen? Watch her! I say, watch her!"

"I am watching her," said Peter, with great satisfaction. "If you see

my eyes drop out, pick 'em up, will you?"

"Not that we might n't have expected it of her. I knew well enough she

'd be sweet and charming--but that little gracious manner--that

self-possession--jolly, she's great!"

"Look at Murray! Is he proud of her, or is n't he?"

"Proud as Lucifer. And has a right to be. His mother looks pretty

complacent herself. And Olive--she's stunning, as usual. But our

Jane--"

The time to go forward had arrived. With head up and shoulders squared

Peter led the way. As he passed his host and hostess he was a model of

well-trained propriety, but when he reached Jane and Murray his formal

manner relaxed, and he grasped each hand with a hearty grip.

"You're a delightful pair," he murmured, "and the sight of you takes me

off my feet."

"You look perfectly composed, even bored," retorted Murray, laughing,

glad to greet a brother who could be relied upon not to say the usual

thing.

But Jane whispered as she smiled up at him, "I 'm dreadfully frightened,

Petey, and I can't do it well at all."

"Keep on being frightened, then," advised her brother. "The result's

perfectly satisfactory, is n't it, Murray?"

"You're not really frightened?" whispered her husband, taking advantage

of a slight lull in his duties to detain Peter. "She does n't look it,

does she?"

"Not a bit."

"You 've only to look at mother," was Murray's comforting assurance, "to

know that she's entirely satisfied. If she were not--well--she'd look

different, that 's all!"

CHAPTER II

SHIRLEY HAS GROWN UP

As Peter Bell abruptly rounded the corner from Gay Street into

Worthington Square he saw coming toward him an attractive young figure

in a white frock. He glanced at it and away again; then back, as he

came nearer; once more away; then returned to look steadily, positive

that his second impression had been the right one, after all. It must

be that he knew this girl. If he did, he must give her a chance to

recognise him.

She not only recognised him, she smiled outright, and stopping short

held out her hand. The eyes which were laughing at him were eyes he had

surely seen before.

Peter's hat had come off promptly; when she stopped, he stopped. When

she held out her hand he took it, and stood staring down into the merry

eyes with puzzled interest.

"O Mr. Peter Bell!" she jeered softly. "To be so slow to recognise an

old friend--a connection of your own family. Dear, dear, you should go

to an oculist! Has it been coming on long? Can you still distinguish

trees and houses?"

The voice told him who its owner was, though it was a degree richer in

quality than when he had heard it last, two years before. "Shirley

Townsend!" he cried. "Miss Shirley, I mean, of course. Well, well! No

wonder I---- When did you come? And you've grown up!"

"Of course I have. Has n't Nancy grown up? I 'm a year older than she,

too. And I came last night--a whole month before they expected me. I

was supposed to be going to stop in New York with Aunt Isabel for a

month--after two long years away off in England at school! But Marian

Hille's mother met her at the ship--she 's the girl who went with me,

you know--and they came right along home. I could n't stand it to stop

in New York, and I came with them. And you don't mean 'Miss Shirley' at

all, of course--with Jane married to Murray!"

"Then you don't mean 'Mr. Peter Bell.'"

"You look terribly elderly yourself. But I knew you! The mere fact

that you are not wearing the same clothes you were when I went away----"

"It was n't your clothes--except the extension on the length of them.

It was--it was----"

"I understand. My hair is up. I no longer wear two big black bows

behind my ears."

"Your cheeks," protested Peter. "You--the English air, I suppose----"

"No, I 'm not a pale little, frail little girl any more, thanks to miles

and miles of walking. You don't look very frail, either. Are n't we

delightfully frank--after staring each other out of countenance? Is

Nancy at home, and Mrs. Bell?"

"They 'll be delighted to see you."

"They 'll _know_ me, too," laughed Shirley.

"She certainly has grown up," thought Peter, when Shirley had walked

away from him toward Gay Street. He rather wished he had not been so

obviously rushing away from home when he met this new-old acquaintance.

The little Shirley had always been a good friend of his; the older

Shirley looked distinctly better worth knowing. But Peter's days were

busy ones; he had few moments for lingering by the side of pretty girls;

nor was he wont to spend much time lamenting his deprivations.

Shirley Townsend's appearance at the door of the Bell house caused a

flurry of welcoming. Nancy, after two minutes of shyness at the sight of

her former chum looking so like and so unlike herself, discovered that

the unlikeness was going to make no difference. It was a great relief,

for somebody who had seen Marian Hille at the end of one year at the

English school had declared her grown insufferably consequential, and

had prophesied that Shirley Townsend would come home "spoiled."

But almost the first remark Shirley made was, "Isn't Jane the dearest

thing you ever saw? And are n't we just the luckiest people to get her

into the family?" So then Nancy knew it was precisely the same Shirley,

and was glad.

"I don't suppose she's really as good-looking as Olive," commented

Rufus, when he, too, had seen his old-time partner at tennis, and had

had a game with her, "but she 's a lot more alive, and jollier, ten

times over. And her playing form 's improved; she can serve a ball that

keeps you up and doing for fair. She knows cricket too; she 's going to

teach us. I 'm glad she 's got home. It 'll be a good deal pleasanter

for Jane over there. Shirley won't go in for society, like Olive and

Mrs. Harrison."

Rufus's prophecy proved a true one. Upon the second day after Shirley's

return, Mrs. Townsend, Senior, announced--with some languor, as if she

herself found summer affairs wearisomer after a winter which had been

unusually full--that a garden-party and _musicale_ would that afternoon

claim all four feminine members of the household. "Our men ought to go,

too," she added, "but your father simply will go to nothing that takes

him away from his business, and Murray seems to be lapsing into the same

attitude. Forrest, when he is at home, is my only standby, but this

freak of his to spend his time travelling makes him seldom to be counted

on. Shirley, I hope you have something suitable to wear. It was a

strange idea for you to come home, after being two years within an hour

of London, with nothing but tennis suits and cricketing shoes. If you

had stopped in New York, as I expected, your Aunt Isabel would have

remedied all deficiencies in your wardrobe. But as it is----"

"As it is, I 've nothing suitable, mother mine. So you won't ask me to

go, will you?"

"You must have something that will do. The Hildreths will expect you,

now that every one knows you are at home. Marian Hille will be sure to

be there, and you ought to be, quite as much."

"I 've had two years of Marie Anne--as she wishes to be called now. I

can do without her very comfortably for a day or two," objected Shirley,

smiling at Jane.

Jane was indeed rejoicing in her new young sister's return. The

relations between herself and Olive, although cordial and affectionate,

were not based on so strong a congeniality of tastes as existed between

Jane and Shirley. The girl, before she went away, had shown decided

promise of originality and force of character. Looking at her now, as

she stood before them in short tennis dress and fly-away hat, with

vivacious, wide-awake face full of clear colour, it needed small

discernment to make sure of the fact that here was a girl out of the

common, and quite irresistibly out of the common, too.

"I don't like to insist, Shirley, and I would not, if you were showing

the slightest fatigue after your journey. But since all the apology I

could make for you would be that you preferred to play tennis in the sun

with Nancy Bell----"

"I see. It's evident I must face the music--Miss Antoinette Southwode's

searching soprano, and Mr. Clifford Burnham-Brisbane's wabbly tenor--and

tea and little cakes. Since it's my duty I 'll do it. But, mother

dear, please don't make many engagements for me. Give it out that I 'm

eccentric--that Miss Cockburn told me positively, before I came away

from Helmswood, that after a severe course of study under her

unexceptionable tutelage I must have absolute relaxation. Say that I

have no fine clothes, no floppy hats covered with roses, suitable for

lawn-parties. Say anything, but after to-day don't make me go--unless I

most awfully want to. Promise--_please_!"

Two firm tanned hands clasped themselves behind Mrs. Townsend's neck,

two importunate black-lashed blue eyes looked at her beseechingly. The

mother sighed.

"Child, what shall I do, with two of you? Here is Jane, accepting her

invitations under protest, and now you are going to be still more

unreasonable."

"Is Jane another? Then why not just make a simple division of labour?

You and Olive play the society parts, and give Jane and me the domestic

ones."

"My dear, nothing can be so unfortunate for a girl, or for a young

married woman, as to become known as peculiar. Of course you are not

serious--no girl of your age is ever serious in declaring that she wants

nothing to do with society--but it distresses me to have you even talk

as you are doing. Go and dress, and look your best, dear, and don't

worry me with this sort of thing. I am quite worn out already. Doctor

Warrener advises a course of baths at a rest-cure, and I think I shall

have to follow his advice."

"I'm sorry," and Shirley kissed her mother, with a pat upon the smooth

white cheek, where faint lines were beginning to show. Then she went

away to dress, discarding the short skirt and canvas shoes with a

smothered breath of regret, but appearing, in due course of time, in a

costume eminently suitable for a garden-party, at least from her own

point of view. Her mother did not see her until the carriage was at the

door, and then it was too late for her to do more than to murmur:

"My dear, if that is the best you can do, I must take you to a

dressmaker at once. White linen is well enough for some occasions, and

that hat----Did you tell me that Miss Cockburn advised it, and you got

it in Bond Street? But the effect is decidedly more girlish than is

necessary."

"I should think you would want me as infantile as possible, with Olive

to do the dressy young lady. You and Jane and Olive, with your

'Ribbons and laces,

And sweet, pretty faces,'

need a plain little schoolgirl to set you off. And I shall not be 'out'

until next winter. I 'm all right, mother dear. Miss Cockburn was

always delighted with white linen, and discouraged fussy frocks. I 'm

really beautifully 'English,' and you should be satisfied. Girls are

n't allowed to grow up half so fast over there as here, and I think it

is a sensible thing."

Mrs. Townsend said no more until, crossing the Hildreth lawn an hour

later, she caught sight of Marian Hille. At the first opportunity

thereafter, she said in Shirley's ear, "Miss Cockburn certainly did not

advise Marian to cling to the schoolgirl style of dressing. If that is

not a French frock she is wearing, my eyes deceive me. She is charming

in it, too, and not at all overdressed. That rose-covered hat is

exquisite, and quite girlish enough."

Shirley smiled, a protesting little smile, but she did not argue the

question further. To her mind, "Marie Anne" looked like a Parisian

fashion-plate, and her manner was certainly that of a young person of

considerable social experience. Shirley did not like it. Her eye went

from Miss Marian Hille to Mrs. Murray Townsend, and rejoiced at the

contrast. The two were close together, taking their seats for the

outdoor _musicale_, which was about to begin. No fault could possibly be

found with Jane's attire, but in it she looked, beside Marian, like a

dainty gray pigeon beside a golden pheasant.

"I beg your pardon, but may I ask what you are staring at so intently?"

said a voice beside her, and Shirley turned to confront the interested

gaze of Brant Hille, Marian's elder brother. "I 've been standing beside

you here all of three minutes, waiting for you to come back to earth and

recognise me. Do you realise we have n't met since you and Marian came

back? And won't you let me find you a chair over on the edge of the

crowd, where we can talk?"

This suited Shirley, and she let him establish her in a corner where a

clump of shrubbery screened the two from a part of the audience. Until

the music began, young Hille plied her with questions about her

experiences at Miss Cockburn's school, evidently enjoying the fact that

her point of view seemed decidedly to differ from that of his sister.

"I should n't know you had been at the same place," was his whispered

comment, as the first notes of the initial number on the programme smote

the summer air and caused a partial hush to fall upon the assemblage.

He had been noting, with interest, the change in her. He had known

Shirley since their earliest days, but beyond the friendly liking she

had always inspired in him, as in everybody, by her girlish good humour

and love of sport, he had not thought her especially attractive. Now,

however, as Peter Bell had done, he found himself discovering in her

qualities distinctly noteworthy.

"So they took you to a lot of old churches and cathedrals," he began

suddenly to Shirley, after an interval during which they had listened

politely to Miss Antoinette Southwode's truly "searching" soprano and

Mr. Burnham-Brisbane's astonishingly "wabbly" tenor, intermingled in an

elaborate Italian duet. "Did n't you find that sort of thing deadly

dull?"

"Not a bit," denied Shirley, promptly. "It was such fun to hear the

dear old vergers proudly recite the histories of the antiquities. And

the antiquities themselves! In one very, very old church there was a

tablet of a man and his six wives, all kneeling before a shrine. He

knelt first and they came after, all in profile. The poor dears were

all dressed alike--they must have worn the same dress, handed down.

One's head was gone--that made her more touching than the others. You

could n't help feeling that her husband had been harder on her than on

the rest. He looked that sort, you see."

"No doubt he was," agreed Hille, laughing. "Did you see anything else

equal to that?"

"No end of things. Of course there was ever so much that was dignified

and beautiful, but one could n't help being glad to find something funny

now and then. One tablet in another ancient chapel showed three men,

one above another on their painted wooden tombs, all lying sidewise and

half rising on their elbows, and staring right down at you with their

eyes wide open. They had pink cheeks and black hair. They were father,

son, and grandson, and the father looked the youngest. Their wives were

all lying quietly asleep at one side. It did n't seem fair for the men

to be so wide awake, while the poor wives had to slumber and see

nothing.--Oh, there goes Mr. Brisbane again! Why _does_ his voice shake

so much harder than when I heard him last?"

"He 's that much more celebrated," said Hille. "See here, are n't you

and Marian about the same age."

Shirley shook her head. But when the song was over he asked the

question again.

"I 'm three months older," admitted Shirley.

"She looks three years older. Why is it?"

Shirley shook her head again. It was one thing to air her views to her

family, quite another to tell Brant that Marian was leaping into young

ladyhood and its signs too fast. But Brant studied his sister. Her

blond head, the hair elaborately waved, could be seen between the heads

and shoulders in front, the striking rose-crowned hat conspicuous among

other elaborate hats of all patterns.

"She looks twenty-five, at least," he commented, approvingly. "She

looks older than your sister Olive. And she seems to have that cad

Maltbie glued to her for the afternoon. If that 's the best she can do,

she 'd better take me. But she 's no use for brothers. Look here, when

's Forrest coming home?"

"I 've no idea. He was leaving Ecuador before the hot season began, and

was intending to stay at Jamaica as long as it was comfortable. He

wrote he might be off for the South Sea Islands soon. He 's had a

tempting invitation."

"He 's a rover. His taste of army life gave him the fever. I wish he

'd get enough of it and come back. Things always 'go' while Forrest's

home."

Altogether, between Brant Hille and two or three other young people,

Shirley found the garden-party endurable. But its cakes and ices

spoiled her appetite for dinner, and the moment that meal was over, she

was off to the tennis-court. Here she and Rufus played several sets in

so spirited a fashion that Murray and Jane, strolling over the lawn to

watch them, were moved to comment upon Shirley's vigour.

"I 'm just working off the garden-party," declared the girl, when her

brother asked the cause of so much energy upon so warm an evening.

"You should have put on your tennis skirt, dear," said Jane, as Shirley

came up to her, racquet in hand.

"So I ought, but I was afraid mother would be made ill by the sight of

me, if I did, after dinner. Oh, how good it is to be at home! Let's

camp down here on the grass and send for the rest of the clan. Run

over, Rufie, will you, and get all the Bells that will come?"

As she spoke, Shirley dropped upon the smooth turf close by the big

wicker chair that Murray had just drawn up for Jane, on the terrace at

the edge of the court. Her cheeks were flushed by the lively exercise

she had been taking, her hair curled moistly about her forehead. Jane

looked at her with a touch of envy in her affectionate glance. Being

Mrs. Murray Townsend, she supposed it became her to sit demurely in a

chair, instead of putting herself, as she longed to do, beside Shirley,

on the grass. But Murray, with no such restraining thought in his head,

cast himself upon the turf beside his sister, at his wife's feet.

Presently Rufus returned, bringing Nancy and Ross McAndrew. Olive,

spying the group upon the lawn, came trailing out in all her pretty

finery of the afternoon. Two or three young neighbours appeared. By

and by Peter Bell, just home from the paper-factory, looked across from

the Gay Street porch and descried the distant group. Somebody had

brought a banjo, and somebody else was essaying to sing a boating-song

to the accompaniment.

"Shall I go over?" thought Peter, when he had had his bath and his

supper, and had come out upon the porch again.

He was quite alone, for his mother, after serving his supper, had

hurried out to see a neighbour who had been long ill, and who depended

upon Mrs. Bell for her daily cheer. Mr. Bell had driven out to

Grandfather Bell's farm. The little house seemed strangely silent, and

the porch, in the early summer twilight, more companionable. A hammock

swung behind the vines, and after a moment's indecision, Peter stretched

his long form in it, clasping his hands under his head. He was

unusually weary, for the day had been very hot. He lay quietly

listening to the distant 'plunkings' of the banjo and to the faint

sounds of talk and laughter which floated across the space to him. So,

after a little, he fell asleep.

He was awakened by the sound of voices on the step. The Bell porch,

unlike that of the Townsends, possessed no electric lamps, and the

nearest illumination to-night came from an arc-light on the corner.

Peter, in his hammock, lay shrouded wholly in darkness. He could see a

gleam of white between the vines which sheltered him, and the voices

were those of his sister Nancy and Shirley Townsend.

"It's such a relief," Shirley was saying, "to get away from that banjo.

I seem to have been listening all day to the sorts of music I like

least. Rodman Fielding and his banjo are the last straw. Nan, what do

you suppose is the matter with me that I don't seem to care for the

things most girls do--clothes and boys and--banjos. I detest banjos!"

"What do you care for?" Nancy asked. "Tennis, anyhow. And you like

Rufus and Ross and Peter, don't you? As for banjos--I don 't think

anybody thinks they 're very musical. They just like the funny songs

that go with them."

"Rufus is like a brother, and Ross like an uncle--a young one. As for

Peter--I don't seem to know Peter. He 's changed. What 's he been

doing to make him look so old and sober? I almost thought I saw a gray

hair--and he 's no older than Murray."

"Peter old and sober?"--Peter himself was growing fairly awake, although

not fully enough roused to the situation to realise that he was playing

eavesdropper.--"What an idea! He has n't changed a particle. Gray

hair! It could n't be. Why, Peter 's stronger than all the rest of us

put together!"

"He's been taxing his strength, then. He looks as if he had been

carrying loads of responsibility--solving problems--worrying over some

he could n't solve. He's working too hard."

Nancy laughed incredulously, and said that Peter's work was quite the

same as it had been, and that her friend's absence had made her see

things unnaturally. But Peter's eyes, in the darkness, opened wide.

Here was extraordinary discernment for a nineteen-year-old girl, who had

met him only once since her return, casually upon the street, during

which time she had merely laughed at him for not knowing her

immediately, and then had walked on. Was it possible that she had seen

that which he had been carefully guarding from the eyes of his family

for a long, long time, and at which even his mother did not guess?

But here was Shirley again, speaking low and thoughtfully: "I seem to

see everybody, since I came home, as if I had never seen them before. I

see father looking as if he thought it did n't pay to have made so much

money, after all; and mother looking worn-out playing the grand lady;

Olive following after, and not finding much in it. Murray and Jane

absorbed in each other, but Jane wishing--no, I 'll not say what I think

Jane is wishing. She would n't admit it, I know. Ross and Rufus and

you, busy and happy. Your father and mother contented as ever. But

Peter----"

It would not do. He was fully awake now. If she was going on to talk

about him again he must let her know he was there. Besides, if she

really divined something of the truth, he must not let her make Nancy

anxious.

Shirley had paused with his name upon her lips, as if soberly thinking.

Peter sat up. But at the fortunate instant a figure dashed across Gay

Street.

"You runaways!" Rufus called, reproachfully. "A fine hostess you are,

Shirley Townsend! They 're asking for you. You 'll have to come back."

So they went away and Peter was left alone upon the porch. There was a

queer feeling tugging at his heart. Nobody else had seen, nobody else

had even noticed the slightest change in him. Of course it was not

possible that Shirley could know the least thing about his situation,

but it was something that she appreciated one fact--that he was working

to the limit of his capacity, and that, although he was not yet

overdone, the strain was beginning to tell. Not the strain of work, but

the greater and more exhausting drain of anxiety.

CHAPTER III

LUNCHEON FOR TWELVE

"Mrs. Murray, Mrs. Townsend would like you to come to her room, if you

please."

"Yes, Sophy, certainly. Is Mrs. Townsend's headache better this

morning?"

"It's very bad, Mrs. Murray. And she's that upset about the luncheon

she's giving. Cook's taken sick, too--the bad luck!"

"Since breakfast, Sophy?"

"'T was Norah and Mary served breakfast. Cook but got out of bed and

went back. Mr. Townsend bade me send for the doctor. He says she 'll

not leave her bed again the day. And Mrs. Townsend says the luncheon

must go on, and not a bit of outside help to be had at this short

notice."

Jane hurried down the hall, Sophy's laments in her ears. She found

Olive sitting on the foot of her mother's bed talking perturbedly with

the elder woman, in the effort to dissuade her from the purpose of

attempting to entertain any guests whatever in the circumstances. But

it became evident to Jane at once that Mrs. Townsend was not to be

dissuaded.

"There must be somebody to be had," she asserted, as Jane drew up a

chair, after laying a cool hand on the aching forehead and expressing

her sympathy with the headache. "It can't be possible that Lemare could

n't send me somebody if he understood the necessity--or Perceval. We

don't need much done. Cook had all the preliminary baking done

yesterday. It's only to get everything together."

"But that's the whole of it, mother," Olive urged. "You may say it's

only a simple luncheon, but Norah and Mary are certainly not equal to

it. Is n't it excuse enough to send those women word that you 're ill?

I 'll telephone--or write notes, if you prefer."

She rose as she spoke, but Mrs. Townsend waved an agitated hand, and

shook her head violently. "You don't understand," she moaned, pressing

her hand to her head and falling back among the pillows. "There are

reasons why I can't have this thing fail. Mrs. Arlo Stevenson is a most

difficult person to get for any affair whatever--and this is

particularly in her honour. I could have had a caterer, of course, but I

consider it not good form to put small entertaining into any hands but

one's cook's. I am indebted to Mrs. Wister very deeply, and she is

bringing a guest whom she is very anxious to have meet Mrs. Stevenson.

There are other reasons----"

"But, mother"--Olive's tone was growing impatient--"what can't be, can't

be. We can't get any one."

"Perhaps I could do it," Jane began, with some hesitation. "If it's

really a simple luncheon----"

"It is!" Mrs. Townsend spoke with eagerness.

"I might not be able to manage the most elaborate dishes----"

"Cook can't be too ill to tell you what is necessary."

"But, mother," Olive protested, "Jane must be at the table. She can't

be in the kitchen, sending in courses."

"That's of no consequence," declared Jane, quickly. "I don't mind

missing the luncheon in the least."

"They are all older women," murmured Mrs. Townsend, closing her eyes

wearily. When Olive took things in hand, it was always difficult to

oppose her.

"Yes, but Jane is our bride. And you expect me to be there. If Jane

stays in the kitchen, so shall I."

"I don't know what to do," and the poor lady on the bed, among her

pillows, looked as if she were indeed suffering.

There was a minute's silence. Then Jane spoke with gentle decision.

"Olive, dear, that is very nice of you, but I truly don't mind in the

least. It is n't as if you had n't already introduced me everywhere,

and I had n't been entertained over and over. If mother's guests are

older ladies, my absence surely won't be noticed. And I 'd love to try

what I can do. You know I 've had years of training at cookery, and if I

can't manage all of Cook's dishes, perhaps I can substitute others that

are n't at all common. I can promise at least that nothing will be

burned."

"You are a dear child," said Mrs. Townsend fervently. She wiped away a

nervous tear or two.

Olive followed Jane to her room to watch her new sister exchange her

morning dress for one more suitable for the affairs she meant to take in

hand.

"This is going to be fun," said Jane gaily.

"I don't see how you can think so. It's certainly very foolish of

mother to persist against all odds. One would think her life depended

on that luncheon."

"It does--in a way. Her poor nerves are quite worn out. I 've seen it

for a long time. Having things go wrong just now is the last straw."

"Why, Jane, what's going to happen?" called Shirley, five minutes later,

encountering Jane on the stairs which led to the servants' rooms on the

third floor. Shirley had been up to see Cook, who adored her.

"Is Bridget able to see me?" asked Jane.

"She 'll be much flattered. It's sciatica, and it lays her low, but she

can converse with intelligence, even with brilliancy. She 's in a

terrible state over not being able to get up that luncheon."

"I 'm going to hold a council of war with her," and Jane disappeared

into Cook's room.

Half an hour later she came out again, her eyes dancing with

anticipation, pencil and paper in hand. As she ran downstairs, Sophy

came up with a tray, and caught the overflow of Bridget's emotions.

"The cleverness of her!" exclaimed the invalid. "To take the menyou

into her own pretty hands and think she can see to it all! She can, too,

or I 'm deceived. Consultin' with me and gettin' my directions, and

tellin' me where she makes bold to follow, and where she 's not quite

sure. It's a pity she 's not mistress of the house in Mrs. Townsend's

place--and her so wore out she ought to be at a sanitarium this minute.

Look to it, Sophy, that Norah and Mary does their duty by Mrs. Murray

this day, If they 're inclined to be triflin', bid them come up to me.

I 'll soon put them in mind of what Mr. Murray says to me when he

brought home his wife. 'Whatever you do to please her will be

appreciated,' he says, 'by me.' And it's nothing I would n't do for Mr.

Murray and Miss Shirley, these seven years I 've lived here. And now I

'm feelin' the same way toward Mrs. Murray."

Whether it was the potency of the message which reached scullery maid

and waitress by way of Sophy, or whether it was Jane's own engaging

manner, together with the respect she soon inspired by the assured and

competent way in which she "took hold," there could be no question that

by the end of the first hour not only Norah and Mary, but also Ellen,

the laundress, were flying about as they had rarely done before, even

for Bridget, who certainly knew how to get out of them work enough and

to spare.

At a moment when they chanced to be all together, Jane had said to them,

as with deft fingers she mixed a bowlful of ingredients, that if with

their help she could only bring about the serving of a luncheon which

the guests would like to eat, she should be happier than over any

entertainment she herself had ever been offered. And she had been able

to tell from their smiling interested faces that she was to have from

that moment the best service they could give her.

Shirley, when affairs were well under way, had gone to the telephone and

called up Murray's office.

"I want you to come home for a few minutes at two o'clock!" she said,

imperatively.

"What for? Anything the matter?" asked her brother.

"Not a thing," said Shirley, reassuringly "But there 's something

happening up here at the house that you must see."

"I 'm pretty busy."

"You 'll never forgive yourself, when you hear about it, if you don't

see with your own eyes."

"All right, I 'll try to make it. Anything connected with Jane?"

"Of course. Do you suppose I 'd ask you if it was n't?"

"I'll be there."

"I thought you would," and Shirley laughed as she hung up the receiver.

No doubt Murray was a happy man.

"Do you suppose Jane is going to be able to do it?" queried Mrs.

Townsend, dressing with the help of Shirley and Sophy. As the hour for

the arrival of her guests approached, doubts were beginning to assail

her. Jane was no doubt an extremely capable young matron, but the

preparing of such a luncheon as Bridget had planned meant not only

accomplished cookery, but much skill and care in the details of serving.

Had Jane's eyes been open during the brief period of her entertainment

at various fine tables! It was too late to do anything but hope so.

"Don't worry, mother," Shirley had urged. "Jane's doing wonders. If she

can keep it up she 'll surprise you."

"I had a bit sip of the booly-on just now when I was down in the

kitchen," offered Sophy, "and it was elegant. And you know yourself 'm,

Bridget says that's one of the most trying things of all to get tasty."

Mrs. Townsend went wanly down into her rooms, to find flowers all about,

distributed by Olive's skilful fingers. She looked into the

dining-room. Her table was faultlessly laid, to the last detail, and a

charming arrangement of lilies was mirrored in the polished mahogany.

"Now come and rest until the last minute," urged Shirley. "And don't

worry. Mrs. Arlo Stevenson won't have a thing to criticise--except the

conversation."

An hour afterward, Murray, letting himself in with his latch-key, found

Shirley awaiting him inside the door. "Don't say a word," she

whispered. "Just walk straight past the dining-room without looking in.

Mother 's entertaining Mrs. Stevenson at luncheon, you know, and it's a

very solemn occasion."

Wondering, Murray, hat in hand, followed his sister as she walked

demurely by the wide entrance to the dining-room, from within which he

could hear a subdued murmur of voices. But once past, she hurried him,

by a circuitous route, to a narrow hallway at the back of the house,

which led to the kitchen. Here she stationed him, and bade him push the

door open a cautious crack and peep within. He obeyed her. Shirley

stood behind him, alive with anticipation, while she watched her

brother's shoulders.

Shirley could not see his face, but she heard his subdued exclamation as

he gazed at the scene within. She knew what it was. The luncheon had

reached the salad course. Jane was arranging plates picturesque with an

enticing combination of ingredients, parti-coloured, crisp and cool. Her

fair arms were bared to the elbow, her cheeks were flushed. At her

right hand Mary was ready with assistance, her eyes respectfully

studying the arrangement--not of the salad, but of her young mistress's

hair, which was certainly worth studying for its effective simplicity.

The maid could never hope to match that daintiness of arrangement with

her own ash-coloured locks, but she meant to try.

Murray turned about at last. "Well, by Jove!" he exploded, softly.

"How does this come about?"

Shirley noiselessly closed the door and explained in a whisper.

Murray's eyes grew eloquent as he listened. "The little trump!" was his

comment. "I wish I could stay till she's finished. I suppose it would

n't do to call her out now?"

"Mercy, no! You might upset her. So far I don't think the least thing

has gone wrong."

"What possessed mother to put the thing through, anyhow? Jane ought to

be in there with the others."

"It was something about entertaining Mrs. Arlo Stevenson. Mother felt

it must be done, though the heavens fell. They nearly did fall, till

Jane came under and held them up. As for Jane's being at the table--she

did n't want to be there. And Olive would n't be, without her, so

there's nothing noticeable. They 're all women of mother 's age--on

some special board of charities, or something like that, that makes them

congenial."

"Its making them congenial does n't necessarily follow, unfortunately.

So Olive stayed out, did she? That's one count for Olive. Why is n't

she helping Jane, though?"

"Jane would n't have either of us in the kitchen. Olive did the flowers,

and Norah and I the table. I got in an English fashion or two that will

either drive mother to distraction or fill her with pride. I forgot to

tell her," and Shirley began to laugh. She led Murray away to safer

regions, but he looked at his watch and said he must be off.

"Wasn't it worth coming up for?" she demanded.

"No question of that. Much obliged for letting me know. I 'll settle

with Jane later. Take her out for a drive, or something, to cool her

off, will you? Good bye!" And Murray vanished, smiling to himself.

"That ought to make her pretty solid with mother," he reflected, as he

raced to his car.

But when the last guest had rustled away, Mrs. Townsend was in no

condition to fall upon Jane's neck and overwhelm her with thanks.

Instead she had to be carried to her room by Phelps, the

coachman--summoned in haste from the stable--and put to bed by her

daughters. Her physician arrived in short order, and his edict, when he

had telephoned for a nurse, was stern.

"When you society women stop putting yourselves through a grind that no

strong man could stand up under, you will get a grip upon your nerves,"

said he. "Mrs. Townsend was at the end of her forces two months ago,

and I told her so. She has simply been keeping up on will--with the

inevitable result. The moment she is fit to travel she must get off to

the quietest place on my list--and stay there. Home would be a better

place for her, if she would obey the rules; but she won 't, so that

settles it. And you, Miss Olive"--he turned abruptly to the elder

daughter of the house--"would do well to go with her. It's evident you

've been travelling along the same road."

"O Doctor Warrener, how absurd you are! I 'm perfectly well. And I 've

half a dozen invitations to lovely places. They 'll do me far more good

than going to some invalid resort and taking baths."

He shook his head. "You're all alike," said he. "I may talk till I 'm

dumb--you 'll pay the price. And when you 've paid it, you 'll

remember."

"There are two," said Olive, indicating Jane and Shirley, "who will

never have nervous prostration on account of overdoing society."

Doctor Warrener surveyed them, and the grimness of his face relaxed.

"I'll acquit them on their faces," said he. "Tell your husband, Mrs.

Murray, to shut you up in a bandbox--or, better, take you off West to

that place where he got back his health--before he lets you drift into

the swirl. As for Shirley,"--he laid his hand upon her shoulder--"if

I'm any reader of destiny--and I ought to be--she 's going to swing that

tennis racquet for several years yet before she gives up and settles

down."

All this had happened before Mr. Townsend and Murray came home. Mrs.

Townsend's breakdowns after fatigue in fulfilling her engagements, and

the summoning of the doctor, had become too frequent occurrences to

imply the sending for her husband. The orders away, for rest and

recuperation, were also, within the last few years, of semi-annual

recurrence.

"It simply means," said Murray, pacing with Jane up and down the long

flower-bordered walk between the house and the tennis-court, "it simply

means six weeks or two months for you to try your hand at being mistress

of the establishment. And judging by what I saw that hand do

to-day----"

Jane looked quickly up at him.

"I should say that it was competent to run anything. That salad was

a--what do women say?--a symphony--a star. Not that I care much for

salads myself, but to see you putting it together----"

"Murray--you didn 't!"

"Didn't I? You had on a pink-and-white checked apron that came up over

your shoulders. Your sleeves were short, and your hair curled round your

ears, the way it does on damp days. You----"

"Where were you? How did you know! Who----"

"I was on the other side of the door, which you forgot to lock. Never

in my life was I so bowled over by the sight of a girl in a kitchen."

"If I had known you were looking----"

"Precisely. That was why Shirley wouldn't let me call you out. Of

course I should have kissed you--I never felt more like it--and that

might have endangered the composition of the salad."

"I 'm afraid it would," laughed Jane. "As it was, I made the one real

mistake of the luncheon--I sent that salad in on the game plates! The

girls were in such a flurry they did n't notice till the plates began to

come out again. I hope mother did n't mind very much."

"I 'll warrant nobody else did. Mrs. Arlo Stevenson is as short-sighted

as an owl in the day-time, and as I understand it, Mrs. Stevenson was

the guest who counted--goodness knows why! I think she's insufferable.

I 'm glad mother 's got her off her mind, for the time being. It will

give her a chance to recuperate. Poor mother! She misses a lot of fun,

does n't she?"

"She thinks it's we who miss it."

"Perhaps we can show her better some day--when we 've been very good and

earned that house by ourselves. Hi! What?" exclaimed Murray. "How you

jumped! Did you think that house by ourselves was n't really to

materialise some day?"

"I--wasn't sure." Jane's voice was low. She did not mean to show how

much she cared, or how she longed to believe definitely in a prospect

which, as yet, had not been in so many words held out to her.

"Why, it's a certainty! Have n't I made that clear, little girl? You

know, when I told you how anxious father was to have us live with them,

I said it would n't be for all time. Don't you remember that?"

"I know. But I thought----"

"You thought, I see, it meant while he needed me, which would be as long

as he lived. No, he does n't insist on that. It was to be only while

he stayed an active partner in the business. He wanted me at his elbow,

and I did n't feel like refusing him. He means to retire within five

years--or sooner, if his health shows signs of breaking. Then he

understands that I 'm to have a home by myself--build one, you know.

Well, well, what a squeeze my arm is getting! Are you so glad?"

"I'm pretty glad. It's not that--that this place is n't pleasant, and

everybody more than kind, but----"

"You needn't be afraid to tell me--in fact, you don't need to tell me.

You 're too much of a born Jenny Wren not to want to feather your own

nest. And I want to see you do it. We 'll begin to look over plans.

We can talk about it and think about it----"

"No, we can't, Murray."

"Why not? Isn't anticipation----"

"Yes, but it would make it harder to wait. Now I know it's sure, I

can----"

"Be good?" said her husband. "You are being good--heavenly. What you

did to-day--well, if you could have known what I thought about you when

I saw you out there putting those pretty shoulders to the domestic

wheel--proud is n't the name for it. And let me tell you, Janey

Townsend, it is n't every girl who could take command of the forces and

have them working for you at the top of their ability, like that. Norah

has n't a nose and chin of that perky shape for nothing; and Mary can

soldier for fair when she chooses. As for Sophy--but you had Sophy for

your own from the start. And it 's not been done with tips, either, has

it? Honestly, now, have you ever given Sophy a tip since you came to the

house?"

"A tip?" said Jane. "Money, you mean? Why, no. Should I? I never

thought of it. Does she expect it?"

"She probably doesn't now--from you--or want it, as long as you reward

her with your smiles and ask about her invalid brother, the way I

overheard you doing the other day. She'd probably rather have your

friendly interest than all Olive's dollar bills. Oh, there are several

ways of winning people's loyalty, dear--and yours is the best. Only

everybody can't do it. Do you know, gentle Jane, I 'm a good deal

interested in seeing you in the role of mistress of this house for a

while?"

"Murray, I 'm so doubtful about it!"

"You need n't be. The commanding officer who has proved to his regiment

that in an emergency he can work with them, shoulder to shoulder--and

work better than they can--need have no fears. It 'll just be a case of

'Bridget, Norah, Sophy, Mary, Ellen--fall in! Shoulder arms! March!'

And off the regiment will go, heads up, chests out, eyes to the front."

CHAPTER IV

POT-HOOKS

"I want to have a talk with you, Murray."

"All right, sister, I 'm at your service."

"Please come over to the seat beyond the shrubbery, where nobody will

see or hear. It's not a very suitable place, but it's better than the

house this hot night."

"Not a suitable place?" queried Murray, as he followed Shirley across

the lawn. "Not so fast, child. It is a hot night, and I 've only just

cooled off since dinner. It was insufferable in the office to-day--or

would have been if anybody had had time to stop and think about it. Why

is n't that romantic seat beyond the shrubbery just the place to talk?"

"Because the talk has no romance about it. The office would be the place

for it, only you 've no time to give me if I should come there."

"You excite my curiosity." Murray disposed himself comfortably upon the

wide rustic seat, screened from all beholders without and within the

grounds, not only by shrubbery and hedges, but by the fast deepening

July twilight. "Fire away. Anything gone wrong?"

"Nothing--except me."

"You alarm me."

"Don't joke. I 'm serious."

"I see you are. And that's what alarms me. Seriousness, at

eighteen----"

"I 'm nineteen--nearly twenty. And I 'm not only serious--I 'm cross.

Murray, I want something to do."

"Haven't you plenty? Jane tells me she could n't get on without you."

"Jane is a dear. And I love to help her. But I want to be doing

something--else. I want to amount to something. I want to learn

something."

"Miss Cockburn's finishing-school didn't finish then? Is college the

bee you have in your bonnet?"

"No, I 'm afraid I 'm too unsettled for that now--I don't know why.

Once I spent a whole week trying to convince mother I must go to college

instead of to school in England. But I don't want that any more. I

want--Murray, please don't laugh when I tell you!"

"Why should I laugh? It's plain you mean business of some sort, and I

'm honoured by your confidence. Go ahead, little girl, and don't be

afraid of your big brother."

"Well, then, I want to learn stenography and typewriting." It came with

a rush, and after it Shirley sat still, one hand holding the other

tightly while she waited for the explosion she expected.

It did not come. Murray turned his head until she could feel that he

was looking directly at her through the dim light. He sat up slightly,

and thrust his hands deeper down into his pockets--a masculine action

which usually indicates concentration of attention. He was silent for a

full minute before he spoke. When he did speak, it was in the tone that

one man uses to another when the basis of their intercourse is that of

mutual respect.

"Would you mind giving me your idea? It's plain you have thought

something out to the end. I need to know it from the beginning, if you

want any advice worth while."

"I can, now I know that you're not going to knock me down with arguments

against it before you know mine for it."

"That would be poor policy. That's the boomerang sort of argument--the

one that comes back at one's self. Besides, I've too much confidence in

my sister's good judgment to believe that she would fire a proposition

like that at me without a reason back of it."

"The reason is easy. I'm restless for something to do. I don't want to

be a next season's debutante, and go through a winter like the five

Olive has spent. I want to work. I want to fit myself to be

independent. If anything should happen to father's money, I don't want

to be like the Desmond girls after their father's failure, as helpless

as baby birds pushed out of the nest. Olive could n't do a thing.

Forrest is just an idler. You have Jane to take care of. But I--I

could be learning to support myself."

"The business is in fine condition. We never were so substantial a firm

as now. There's very little danger of our going to pot."

"That may be," said Shirley, "though things do happen, Murray, out of a

clear sky. But that's not my real reason. My real reason is a genuine,

great big longing to amount to something. I never come down to the

office without envying the girls I see there. I envy them because they

have to do it--because they 're supporting themselves and somebody else

by it."

"Do you mean that you would like a position in our office?"

"Oh, would n't I! If I could study and study, and practise and

practise, and then some day take a dictation from you or father and

bring you a perfect copy, I believe I 'd be--Murray, I 'd be the

happiest girl that ever lived!"

"You mean that, do you?"

"I do."

"Have you thought that if you took a position in our office, or in any

other, you 'd be shutting out some poor girl who really needs the

salary?"

"Yes, I've thought of it. I know that's an argument against it. But,

Murray, don't you think the rich men's daughters need employment

sometimes quite as much as the poor ones do? Why, I 'm telling you I

envy the poor ones!"

"I know; but the fact remains that they need the money, and you don't."

"Are n't you keeping some poor man out of the salary you get by taking

the place of father's right hand man?"

Murray laughed. "There's a back-hander for me! But I 'm practically a

partner, you know, and a firm can't do without its heads, no matter how

many poor fellows would like the job."

"And you have the right to make something of yourself. But I have n't

because I should be taking work away from some girl who needs it. I

don't want to do that. I 'd work for nothing, or give my salary away."

"Ah, but that wouldn't solve the problem. The girl whose job you took

from her would n't accept your salary from you."

"Then, just because a girl's father can support her, must she give up

learning how to support herself? And the fun of doing it?"

"What do you expect the family to say about it?"

"Of course they won't like it. Except father. I think he will."

"Possibly, after you have wheedled him and hung round his neck. Well,

do you feel you have a right to disappoint mother and Olive, as you will

do, if you so much as begin on this course, to say nothing of sticking

to it?"

Shirley was silent for a moment. Then she answered, very gently, "I

should be sorry for that, of course, but I think I have the right.

Devoting one's self to society can't be a duty one owes to one's family,

if one does n't feel satisfied with that life. And my learning to earn

my own living won't disgrace my family--not in these days of millionaire

milliners and violet raisers."

"No, it won't disgrace your family. Instead, it makes one member of it

sit up and look at his small sister with a good deal of respect. If you

take hold of the thing, you 'll go through with it. I 've not the least

doubt of that, for you 're no quitter."

"Thank you. Then will you go with me to talk with father about it?"

"When?"

"Now. He 's in the library."

Murray got up. "You are in earnest," he remarked. "Yes, I 'll go with

you. But you 'll find the question will have to be pretty thoroughly

threshed out with him before he agrees. He employs none but experts;

you 'll have to win your spurs before you can wear them. And good

stenographers are born, not made. If you 've got it in you, you 'll

succeed; if you have n't, you won't, no matter how hard you try."

He could not see his sister's eyes, but he could read the determination

in her voice as she answered that it was the expectation of winning

those spurs that made her heart jump just to think about it.

It was a fortnight after this talk, and the longer and more earnest one

which succeeded it, that, coming away from the factory one warm July

afternoon at an earlier hour than usual, Peter Bell happened upon his

young neighbour in a most unexpected place. Far downtown, blocks below

the usual shopping district, he saw Shirley Townsend come out of a

doorway and start rapidly up the street. She had not seen him, and he

was too far away to call to her, so he was forced to quicken his pace

almost to a run to overtake her at the next corner before she signalled

her car.

She had walked so fast that the best he could do was to run and swing

himself aboard the same car just as it got under way. The car was full,

and Shirley herself was obliged to stand, clinging to a strap. Peter

secured a strap beside her. There was little chance for conversation

during the long ride uptown, but Peter's eyes were observant, and he

noticed a peculiarity in Shirley's attire.

At an hour in the afternoon when the girls of her sort would all be

wearing light frocks and ribbons, Shirley was dressed like the girls in

the office he had just left. With a difference--which Peter's eyes also

discerned, although he could not have told just where the difference

lay. Shirley's white blouse, her blue serge skirt, her sailor hat, her

trim shoes, all bore about them the stamp of quality, indefinable, yet

not to be denied.

As for her face, Peter thought he had never seen it so alight with life.

The smile she had flashed at him was brilliant. He was glad he had

caught the car. It was a decided enlivenment of the long ride,

monotonous with daily repetition, just to stand beside the trim, swaying

figure, and occasionally exchange a word with its possessor. Besides,

he was feeling not a little curiosity as to the errand which had taken

her to a place where hung the sign of a well-known commercial college.

"It is a hot day, isn't it?" observed Shirley, when he had handed her

off the car, and they were walking up Gay Street toward Worthington

Square. "Just the day to get into the country. I 'd like a gallop over

about ten miles of good roads--just to feel the wind in my face."

"It would be great, would n't it?" agreed Peter.

She looked up at him. "You and Olive don't ride as much as you used

to."

"She has n't seemed to care for it for the last year or so."

"Hasn't she asked you to ride Grayback whenever you wanted?"

"She 's been very kind about offering him. But I don't like to go over

and order him out myself."

"He 's pining for exercise. So is Pretty Polly, though I had one short

canter on her before breakfast. You 've never been out with me on

horseback. Perhaps you don't know I can ride."

"I have my eyesight. And as for inviting you to go with me--how can I,

when you have the horses? If you 're asking me to go with you--there 's

nothing on earth I 'd rather do just now."

"I believe that," thought Shirley, as she ran into the house to change

her clothes. "If ever a man looked as if he 'd like to drop his cares

and get off on a horse's back, Peter does to-day."

In a few minutes she was crossing the lawn, in her riding habit, crop in

hand. Peter met her, himself in riding trim. His face showed his

pleasure in the prospect, as he put her up and swung into his own

saddle.

"'If wishes were horses,'" he quoted, as they turned toward the

Northboro road. "And sometimes they are. An hour ago I was looking out

of the office window at the factory, and wishing for this very sort of

thing. I ought to see Grandfather Bell. Do you mind if we go that

way?"

"I 'm fond of that way. It will give us a good gallop down the old

turnpike, and a cool walk through the woods to freshen the horses."

Once out of the city they were off at a brisk trot, talking a little now

and then, but mostly busy with thoughts. They had seen so little of

each other since Shirley's return that a sense of having begun a new

acquaintanceship hampered them both. They had not yet found common

ground.

"Now for the gallop," said Shirley, as they rounded a turn and came out

upon a long, level stretch of road, with few vehicles in sight.

"This is the spot where your sister lost most of her hairpins, when she

took her first ride with me," said Peter, indicating to Grayback that a

change of pace was in order. "I don't think she 'd ever had such a

dashing get-away before. Off, are you? Well, well, you do mean

business, don't you? All right, I 'm with you. But don't expect me to

recover the hairpins!" he called, as Grayback picked up the pace Pretty

Polly had set.

But both Pretty Polly and her rider were evidently on their mettle, and

Grayback, bigger and longer of stride though he was, had to look to his

heels to keep up with the little brown mare.

Shirley proved a daring rider, and before she finally pulled Polly down

to a canter she certainly had felt the wind in her face with a rush.

When she looked round at Peter, as they entered the mile-long course of

wood-shaded road which succeeded the turnpike, she met a brighter smile

than she had seen on his face since she came home, two months before.

Once more, for the moment, he looked the care-free boy again.

"You may be a pupil of the riding-schools, but you 've taken plenty of

road-training since," was his comment. "And not a hairpin loose, so far

as I can see."

"That's because I always tie my mop with a ribbon for riding, like any

schoolgirl. It's childish, but comfortable. Is n't this deliciously

cool in here? And I 've forgotten all about the pothooks already." But

having said this, Shirley bit her lip. She had not meant to tell yet.

"Pothooks?" repeated Peter, curiously. "Have you been bothered by

pothooks lately?"

"A trifle." She turned away her head, and pointed out a fine clump of

ferns, growing on a bank by the roadside.

"Do you want them?" he asked.

"No, no, not enough to get down for. I--said something I did n't mean

to, and the ferns offered a way of escape."

Peter was silent, wondering what she could mean.

Then Shirley said, frankly:

"That sounds rude, and I 'm going to tell you."

"Not because something slipped out. I won't even guess at it, unless

you want me to."

"I do--now. I think I 'd like to tell you, though not even Nancy knows

yet. My family do--but I don't think even they quite realise what it

means to me. Perhaps you would."

"I 'd like to try."

"I--have begun to study stenography," said Shirley. "When I've learned

it--and typewriting--thoroughly, I 'm to have a place in Murray's

office."

She said it with her eyes looking straight between her horse's ears; and

she did not see the quick, astonished glance which fell upon her.

Peter made no answer for so long that she turned, wondering and a little

resentful.

"I beg your pardon," said Peter. "I believe I forgot to answer. But

that was n't from lack of interest. You took my breath away. When I

got it back I fell to thinking that I might have expected it of you."

"You might? Why?"

"I 'm not good at telling my thoughts. But I knew you had a mind of

your own from the day you first gave Nancy Bell of Gay Street the

preference over the little Hille girl of Worthington Square."

"Gay Street was sixteen times more interesting than Worthington Square,

always," declared Shirley, frankly.

"How do you like the pothooks?"

"I 'm going to like them, whether they 're likable or not. Just now I

'm in a sort of delirium ever them. Little black quirls and dots and

dashes walk through my dreams. I 've just one week of it now, and I 'm

fascinated. The only trouble is, I want to get hold of everything at

once."

"Hold steady and make sure as you go. Slow accuracy at first is much

better than a fast jumble that you can't read yourself. If you like it,

and are getting hold of it already, that shows you are going to win out.

It's easy to tell, from the start, who 'll make a stenographer in the

end and who won't."

"That's what Murray says, and it encourages me. You 've studied it

yourself, then?"

"Taught myself in odd hours; thought it might be useful some time, and

it has been, many times. I can show you a lot of technical short cuts

that will be of use to you, when you 're familiar with the regular

method.'

"Oh, thank you--I'll be grateful. Come Polly--you 've cooled off--try a

smooth little canter for a while."

At Grandfather Bell's Peter took Shirley down and sent her to roam about

the great orchard, while he hunted up the old gentleman and had a talk

with him. This consumed nearly an hour, and when they were off upon the

road once more, Shirley discovered that the care-free look had vanished

from her companion's face, and that his mouth had taken again the grave

expression it had acquired after she went away to school.

She let him ride to the edge of the woods, four miles toward home, in

the abstracted silence which had fallen upon him; but as they came under

the first cool shadows, she brought Pretty Polly down to a walk, and

began to talk lightly about Murray and Jane, and the successful way in

which Jane had taken up the cares of managing the big house and its

affairs. Peter obediently followed her lead, but after a short time she

discovered that he gave her his attention only by an effort.

She longed to know what was the matter, for that something had gone

wrong with him she was more than ever sure. Two years ago she would

have demanded, with the familiarity of long acquaintance, an explanation

of any cloud upon his brow, for she and Peter had been as good friends

as seventeen and twenty-six may be, when the families of both are united

by certain common interests. But somehow nineteen and twenty-eight had

not yet recovered quite the old ground of mutual frankness, and

Shirley's anxious questions halted upon her lips.

They had another gallop when they came to the smooth stretch, but this

time, although Peter said, "That was a good one, was n't it?" his face

did not clear.

Just before they reached home, however, he appeared to realise all at

once that he must have been poor company, and said so, with a word of

regret.

"I don't mind a bit," said Shirley. "One does n't always feel like

talking. And I know in your position, you must have a good many cares."

"A few. I 'm afraid I 'm not good at carrying them, since I let myself

keep them on my own shoulders, even on horseback. They fell off on the

way out, but at the farm they climbed up Grayback's tail again. I 'm

sorry, for you 've been jolly company, and I 've honestly enjoyed the

ride more than anything that has happened in a year."

"We 'll go again, then, on another half-holiday, and next time we 'll

leave Black Care behind altogether. Or, if you will take him along you

shall introduce me. Will you?"

Her look was so girlishly sympathetic and inviting, Peter could hardly

be blamed for finding a ray of comfort in it, although he only said

stoutly:

"That would n't be fair."

"Indeed it would. What are one's friends for? And Black Care does n't

like the society of two."

"That's true. But he's not a desirable acquaintance, and I don't mean

to introduce him to you. Remember the pothooks--they 'll keep you

busy."

He smiled as he said it, but Shirley persisted, more boldly, for she

thought she detected the fact that it would be a relief to Peter to tell

somebody his troubles, if his conscience would let him.

"I 've seen, ever since I came home, that something was worrying you.

It's made me feel badly. Perhaps just telling would make it easier."

"I should imagine it might. I 'll think about it. Meanwhile, thank you

for two fine hours. We 're back just in time for your dinner--and my

supper. Will you go to the house door, or dismount here at the stable?"

"Here, please. And next Saturday we'll go again, if you really care

to."

"I shall think about it through the week. Here you are--you don't half

let me help you. Success to the pothooks! Good-bye!"

CHAPTER V

BLACK CARE

On the following Saturday it rained all day, and no horseback-riding or

excursions of any sort were possible. Before another half-holiday had

come round, an unusual and severe pressure of work had overtaken Peter,

which shut him off from any leisure whatever for many successive weeks.

Night after night, all through July and August, he came home late in the

evening, too weary for anything but supper and bed. During all this

time he saw little of the people in Worthington Square.

As for Shirley, although she thought often of Peter, and was sorry that

no chance seemed to favour her getting at the secret of his burdens,

whatever they might be, her own work absorbed her. She was proving a

ready pupil, keen of intellect and quick of eye and hand. As she

advanced in the mastery of stenography, she became more and more

fascinated by its details, and spent more and more of her spare hours in

practice. The typewriting she acquired in an unexpectedly short space

of time, but her chief ambition was to achieve the ability to take

dictation rapidly and accurately, and to this end she laboured with much

zeal.

Nancy Bell was taken into confidence, and became an active and

interested partner. Many were the hours she spent with Shirley, reading

aloud to her from all sorts of books and papers, with a view to

accustoming her to any kind of composition.

"You certainly can do anything now," Nancy said, one day in late

September, when she had given Shirley an unusually trying test at top

speed, and the worker had typewritten it without an error worth

mentioning.

"I 'm not so sure." Shirley studied her paper. "I 'm used to you, and

you don't flurry me much. But if I should go to father and offer myself

for a trial, I 'm afraid I should bungle it."

"But you can't get office practice without office practice. Nothing can

take its place or give you confidence, I should think. Why don't you

let Murray try you? If he dictates as fast as he talks when he 's

discussing business with Peter, he must be hard enough for anybody."

That evening, as Murray and Jane, in the library, were discussing

certain household matters, Shirley, sitting at the big table with her

notebook, turned a leaf and began to take down the conversation.

"Did I say that?" Murray asked, toward the close of the conference. "I

thought I put it quite differently."

"You said, dear," said Jane, "that it ought to cost that, not that it

did."

"Are you sure?"

"Quite sure."

"I must have been wandering in my mind. I seem to hear myself saying in

a tone of great assurance that it actually did cost seventeen dollars.

I could n't have said anything else, knowing the facts."

Jane merely smiled, sure of her ground, but not liking to dispute it

further. Murray took a turn up and down the room, whistling softly. He

himself would not insist upon the thing he was sure he had said, but he

was none the less confident. It seemed to bring the discussion to a

standstill, as such small differences of statement sometimes will.

Shirley began to read aloud from her note-book a reproduction of the

conversation which had just taken place. Listening incredulously,

Murray heard himself quoted as saying precisely that which Jane had

asserted.

"Look here," said he, coming over to the table and seizing upon the

note-book. "Are you sure you have that straight--that you 're not

saying it from memory of what Jane said I said?"

"I did n't get every word you said, but I did get that sentence. You

brought out the 'ought' so strenuously I put the exact sign down."

"I 'll give in, of course, but I 'll have to be careful of what I say in

your hearing after this. You must be pretty good at it, if you caught

all that off our tongues. We were talking fairly fast, if I remember."

"You were very nearly too fast for me--in spots. Conversation 's harder

to take than anything else. Do you want to try me on a business

letter?"

"With pleasure," and Murray promptly pulled a letter out of his pocket,

glanced it over, and began to dictate a reply.

Before she had done two lines, Shirley realised that the actual

receiving of dictation from a man of business, who was seriously putting

her to a test, was quite different from any amount of practice with

Nancy Bell. Murray's keen eyes were upon her, he was watching her

fingers as they flew, he was using business terms with which she was not

familiar. These technicalities she was forced to omit, but after a

little she steadied under the consciousness that he was speaking not too

rapidly, and that he paused now and then between sentences, as if

studying the letter he was answering.

At the end she said, "I 'll make you a copy," and flew out of the room.

Murray smiled at Jane, who had been an interested witness of the scene.

"I can't get used to the idea that the child is serious in all this,"

said he. "I know she's been working at it all summer, but I 've seen so

little of it, and she 's been so quiet about it, I forget that she means

business. If mother and Olive had been at home all this time I should

have heard of little else."

"There 's no doubt of her being in earnest. She and Nan have practised

by the hour," answered Jane. "I think you'll find her copy pretty

correct."

"I doubt it. She certainly caught the gist of our conversation, but

that 's comparatively easy, for her memory would help out on the sort of

thing we were saying. But when it comes to getting it word for word, as

a business letter must, she 'll find that 's another thing."

Shirley came back presently and handed her brother the letter. He read

it through carefully. "By Jove!" he ejaculated, and looked at his

sister.

"I had to leave spaces for the words you used that I had never heard,"

said she. "I did n't think of it before, but there must be a lot of

such words in your correspondence. Would you mind making me out a list

of them, or giving me a catalogue? Next time I 'll know them."

"I'll warrant you will. Except for them, you 've practically every word

just as I gave it to you. See here, when have you done it? You have n't

had time to accomplish so much. It takes at least six months to make a

respectable stenographer. You 've been at it but four. Come here and

let me look at you. By rights you ought to have grown thin. No, I

can't see that you have."

"Of course I have n't. I 've never been so happy in my life."

"Miss Henley, who is in the office, is going to be married in October."

He studied her face keenly.

She looked at him with eager eyes. He laughed.

"If you were a pauper with a family to support, you could n't look more

appealing," he said. "Well, keep pegging away, and I 'll recommend you

to father."

Mrs. Harrison Townsend did not come home at all that autumn. Instead,

she sailed for Italy, taking Olive with her. From Europe Mrs. Townsend

wrote Murray a letter which he showed to no one, but which gave him no

little discomfort of mind.

"I am much better away," she wrote, "where I shall not be in the throes

of the revolution which has overtaken my household. With Jane refusing

many of her most important invitations, Forrest away, and Shirley

casting herself into the business world, like any poor man's daughter, I

should be too distressed to be able to play my own part with composure.

I hear that Jane is not keeping up her calling list as conscientiously

as she should do. Please try to impress her with her duty to our

friends, even if she does not care to make them hers. When I return, I

shall wish to take up my social life where I left it, and if I should

find my friends alienated by the eccentricity of my daughter-in-law, I

should feel that a wrong had been done which it would be difficult to

overlook."

"About the hardest thing in the world," thought Murray, as he pondered

these lines, "seems to be for one woman to get another's point of view.

Here 's Jane, staying at home all summer to keep me company, when she

might have gone off to the seaside or the mountains with Olive. She 's

tackling big problems every day in the management of the house, to say

nothing of looking after all mother's social correspondence. She 's

entertained relatives of ours from in town and from out of town, to say

nothing of making father's evenings pleasant and seeing to her own

family. Yet because some woman on mother's list writes her that Jane has

failed to pay a call within the required limit of time, the poor girl is

'eccentric.' Well, she shall not be taxed with it, if I can help it."

Feeling that Jane, although unconscious of the elder woman's

dissatisfaction with her endeavours, should have amends made her after

some fashion, Murray arranged to take her with him upon a week's

business trip, a flying journey half-way across the continent and back.

In the absence of Mrs. Townsend and Olive, this left Shirley and her

father quite alone for a week.

One of the evenings of that week Mr. Townsend spent with Joseph Bell--as

was now his frequent custom. On this evening Shirley settled down with

a book before the library fire. She had been working harder and harder

to perfect herself for the position which she had been assured should be

hers upon the resignation of Miss Henley, a fortnight hence. And she

had at last arrived at that state of confidence in her own powers which

permitted an occasional indulgence in an idle evening without a twinge

of conscience.

The book proved so entertaining that an hour passed, during which she

took no note of time. She could not have told whether it was late or

early, when a slight stir in the hall brought her attention to the fact

that somebody was there, awaiting her recognition. She looked up to see

Peter Bell standing in the doorway, his face so grave and worn that she

gave a little cry of amazement.

"Why, Peter!" she said, and came forward to give him her hand. He

looked down at her almost as if he did not see her. His hand was cold.

"You 've been out in the wet--you 're chilled," she said, eagerly

drawing him toward the fire. "Why, you 're very wet! You did n't have

an umbrella."

"I believe I did n't," Peter answered, glancing at his coat-sleeve,

which was, indeed, almost dripping with dampness. "I 've been walking a

long way--I don't know how far."

He took the big armchair which she offered him, but she stood regarding

his moist condition with concern. His visits were too few to make her

willing to run the risk of losing this one by suggesting that he ought

not to sit down in his wet coat; and after a moment she ran away and

came back with a house coat of Murray's.

"Please put this on," she said.

Peter protested that he had no need of taking such precautions, but

Shirley persisted until he obeyed her and donned the coat, throwing his

own upon a chair, whence she rescued it and hung it where it might have

a chance to dry.

"Now rest and be comfortable," said she, drawing her own small chair

into a friendly nearness to the big one, "and tell me what's wrong. It

needs to be told at once, I know--or I 'd try to talk about something

else first."

"I'm afraid I couldn't talk about anything else first," said Peter.

"Yet I don't know that I can talk about this. But--I had to come. There

was no one else I could go to. I 've stood all the rest by myself, but

this----"

He stopped short, as if he could not go on. Something about his

appearance made Shirley's heart begin to beat fast with apprehension.

It must be a very bad trouble indeed which could make Peter act so

unlike himself, Peter the strong, the self-reliant.

Her mind went back in a flash to the day, weeks before, when he had half

promised to give her his confidence in regard to matters which it was

evident were bothering him. But he had not looked then in the least

like this. It had been merely business care which was heavy on his

shoulders at that time. This was trouble, or she did not know the

signs. His set face, upon which her welcome had brought no hint of an

answering smile, the lines about his mouth, the suggestion of pallor

which was already succeeding to the colour which had been the result of

the tramp in the rain, all made her sure of her conclusions.

"I want to hear," began Shirley, very gently, controlling the anxiety in

her voice. Then, suddenly, as a startling thought occurred to her,

"Peter, it's not--Murray--or Jane?--or mother?"

"No, no," said Peter, quickly, turning to her. "No, it's not your

trouble, it's mine--ours. Only the others don't know it yet. They must

n't know it till it--comes. That's why I came here. It' s not right to

burden you with it, I 'm afraid. But, somehow I----"

Shirley impulsively put out her hand, as if to touch his. He did not

see it, and she withdrew it again. She longed to give him comfort in

some way. Yet, until the story was told, she could not tell what to do.

If only he would tell it quickly. But, plainly, it was hard to tell.

He drew a deep breath; then sat up straight, staring into the fire.

"There has been a long succession of misfortunes," he began, slowly. "I

don't need to go into those, though I thought them bad enough--until

now. Now--if it were nothing worse than those things, if I could just

go back to them, I 'd shoulder them all gladly, and not mind. It was

property business, all of it--foreclosure of a heavy mortgage

threatening Grandfather Bell's farm, loss of the little money father had

got together and put into stocks that have gone to pieces--that sort of

thing. It was up to me to straighten it all out--and not much to do it

with. And father--he seemed not very well--had two or three queer

attacks of illness at the factory during the hot weather. I felt I could

n't worry him with it. He seemed to be getting old--all at once.

Finally, yesterday----"

Peter paused; then he went on in a lower voice:

"Yesterday he had another of those attacks--much worse than before. A

man near him sent for me, and I sent for a doctor. The doctor brought

him round, but it took some time. To-day I made him go to another

doctor--a specialist. He examined father, and told me what it was."

Shirley, in a breathless silence, waited.

"Any over-exertion, excitement, worry--anything--may end it at any time.

If he would give up and stay quietly at home, he might last a good

while. But that's what he won't do. He knows it all--took it as coolly

as if it were nothing at all, but won't give up. And he won't have

anybody told. Says they 'd never know another happy moment--and that's

true enough. He 'll just take his chances. It's brave of him, and I can

understand how he feels, but the hard thing for me is--I 've got to keep

still, and stand by, and--see it come."

With the last word Peter's voice almost broke. He turned his head away.

Shirley got up and went to him. She laid one hand on his shoulder,

standing still beside him, her heart aching with sympathy, but finding

not a word to say. In all his unhappiness, Peter recognised the light

touch, and putting up his cold hand grasped the warm one. He held it

tight for a minute, for the sense of comradeship and comprehension it

brought him gave him courage to go on.

Shirley understood the warm and close relations which had always existed

between Peter and his father. And she realised, with a pang, that which

Peter had not mentioned, but which must add its share to the poignancy

of his apprehension--the fact that with the loss of the head of the

family, the burden of the support of that family must fall upon the

son's shoulders. Money problems were not to be mentioned in the same

breath with the threatened loss of a dear parent, but the anxiety they

were bound to cause would make Peter's trouble immeasurably more

serious.

When Peter spoke his voice was steady again.

"Of course I 'm facing nothing harder than other people have to face

every day, in one way or another. I mean to stand up to it, like a man,

if I can--it would n't be worthy of a chap with a father like mine to be

bowled over by what he bears with such courage. But it seemed to me I

must tell somebody, and you--something you said weeks ago, when we went

riding together, made me sure you would care."

"I do care, very, very much," Shirley answered. "I 've wished ever so

many times since then that I knew what was the matter. If you had told

me that, it would have been easier for you to come to me with this, I

think. I 'm so glad you did. I only wish--oh, how I wish--there were

something I could do!"

"You can. You 're doing it now. Just knowing you know makes it easier.

If there were anything I could do myself I could bear it better."

She slipped out of the room. In a few minutes she came back, bearing a

tray, upon which was a cup of chocolate with a little mound of whipped

cream on top, and beside it a plate of sandwiches. She set her tray at

Peter's elbow.

"Father is so fond of this, late in the evening, that Cook keeps a

double boiler ready on the back of the range, and the rest of us make

use of it," she explained. "You may not be hungry, but it will be good

for you. Tell me, did you have your supper?"

"No, I haven't been home," he owned. "If a fellow could eat at all, he

ought to be able to eat this."

To Shirley's satisfaction Peter consumed every one of the six thin

sandwiches, and when she suggested a second cup of chocolate, he

gratefully accepted it. He had been famishing, though he had not known

it. The interview with the specialist had taken place before lunch

time, and Peter had not remembered lunch at all.

Being human, and very weary, creature comforts did their part in

strengthening him, in mind as well as body. When he had finished, and

had spent another half-hour listening to Shirley's account of news from

Forrest, who was in the West Indies now, he rose, a very different young

man from the one who had come in out of the rain an hour before.

When he had exchanged the velvet house-coat for the rough tweed one, now

dried by the fire, he stood before her, hat in hand. He looked down

into her friendly uplifted face and something very appreciative showed

in his own. He could summon only the suggestion of a smile, but his

eyes were less heavy, his colour had come back, and resolution was once

more in his bearing.

"You would put heart into a craven," he said, shaking hands.

"You 're no craven," answered Shirley, returning the look steadily with

her frank eyes, "but one of the stoutest-hearted I ever knew. I know

lots more about you than you think, and I know what you have been facing

all these years in the way of sticking to work you did n't like."

"That's nothing. Everybody does that, if he amounts to any thing."

"Everybody doesn't. But it's made you strong and brave. You 're brave

now--and you 're going to be braver yet."

He studied her a moment in silence. Then the smile she had missed shone

briefly out upon her as Peter said fervently: "If I am, it will be

thanks to you, my friend. Good night!"

CHAPTER VI

A BREAKDOWN

"Now make her come!" commanded Marian Hille, as her brother Brant

brought his big green motor-car to a stand in front of the great

building belonging to Townsend & Company. "Don't let her refuse. How

she can spend her days down here, drudging away, I don't see! Brant,

tell her I shall simply never forgive her if she does n't shut up that

typewriter at once and come along."

"I 'll say what seems to me to suit the situation," declared her

brother, sliding out of his seat and divesting himself of his motoring

coat. "Whether it will make any impression I 'm not so sure."

He walked leisurely off, but when he was inside the building he made a

short trip of it to the fifth floor and the offices. He was quite as

anxious as his sister for the success of his errand.

Murray himself welcomed young Hille cordially, and when Brant asked for

Shirley, he led his visitor into an inner office. Here Brant stood

still, gazing with interest. He had not yet seen his old acquaintance

at her new tasks.

Shirley sat before a typewriting machine, her fingers playing as lightly

and swiftly over the keys, for all Brant could see, as those of any

veteran at the business. The girl did not look up. Plainly she was much

absorbed in her work, a little flush on her cheek, her eyes devouring

the "copy" before her in the shape of her note-book, held open by a

device above her machine.

Brant turned to look at Murray, and Murray smiled.

"She looks as if she enjoyed it!" Brant exclaimed, under his breath.

"She does. No question of that."

"It 'll wear off, don't you think?"

"I doubt it."