"They've all gone out in Mr. Brown's cat-boat--so I came alone,"
observed Miss Trehearne, when the expressman had been interviewed.
"Who are 'all'?" asked Lawrence. "Just the three Miss Miners?"
"Yes. Just the three Miss Miners."
"I thought you might have somebody stopping with you."
"No. Nobody but you. Why do you say 'stopping' instead of
'staying'? I don't like it."
"Then I won't say it again," answered Lawrence, meekly. "Why do you
object to it, though?"
"You're not an Englishman, so there's no reason why you shouldn't
speak English. Here's the buckboard. Can you drive?"
"Oh--well--yes," replied the young man, rather doubtfully, and
looking at the smart little turn-out.
Fanny Trehearne fixed her cool grey eyes on his face with a critical
expression.
"Can you ride?" she asked, pursuing her examination.
"Oh, yes--that is--to some extent. I'm not exactly a circus-rider,
you know--but I can get on."
"Most people can do that. The important thing is not to come off.
What can you do--anyway? Are you a good man in a boat? You see I've
only met you in society. I've never seen you do anything."
"No," answered Lawrence. "I'm not a good man in a boat, as you call
it--except that I'm never sea-sick. I don't know anything about
boats, if you mean sail-boats. I can row a little--that's all."
"If you could 'row' as you call it, you'd say you could 'pull an
oar'--you wouldn't talk about 'rowing.' Well, get in, and I'll
drive."
There was not the least scorn in her manner, at his inability to do
all those things which are to be done at Bar Harbour if people do
anything at all. She had simply ascertained the fact as a measure of
safety. It was not easy to guess whether she despised him for his
lack of skill or not, but he was inclined to think that she did, and
he made up his mind that he would get up very early, and engage a
sailor to go out with him and teach him something about boats. The
resolution was half unconscious, for he was really thinking more of
her than of himself just then. To tell the truth, he did not attach
so much importance to any of the things she had mentioned as to feel
greatly humiliated by his own ignorance.
"After all," said Miss Trehearne, as Lawrence took his seat beside
her, "it doesn't matter. And it's far better to be frank, and say at
once that you don't know, than to pretend that you do, and then try
to steer and drown one, or to drive and then break my neck. Only one
rather wonders where you were brought up, you know."
"Oh--I was brought up somehow," answered Lawrence, vaguely. "I don't
exactly remember."
"It doesn't matter," returned his companion, in a reassuring tone.
"No. If you don't mind, I don't."
Fanny Trehearne laughed a little, without looking at him, for she was
intent upon what she was doing. It was a part of her nature to fix
her attention upon whatever she had in hand--a fact which must
account for a certain indifference in what she said. Just then, too,
she was crossing the main street of the village, and there were other
vehicles moving about hither and thither. More than once she nodded
to an acquaintance, whom Lawrence also recognized.
"It's much more civilized than it was when I was here last," observed
Lawrence. "There are lots of people one knows."
"Much too civilized," answered the young girl. "I'm beginning to
hate it."
"I thought you liked society--"
"I? What made you think so?"
This sort of question is often extremely embarrassing. Lawrence
looked at her thoughtfully, and wished that he had not made his
innocent remark, since he was called upon to explain it.
"I don't know," he replied at last. "Somehow, I always associate you
with society, and dancing, and that sort of thing."
"Do you? It's very unjust."
"Well--it's not exactly a crime to like society, is it? Why are you
so angry?"
"I wish you wouldn't exaggerate! It does not follow that I'm angry
because you're not fair to me."
"I didn't mean to be unfair. How you take one up!"
"Really, Mr. Lawrence--I think it's you who are doing that!"
Miss Trehearne, having a stretch of clear road before her, gave her
pair their heads for a moment, and the light buckboard dashed briskly
up the gentle ascent. Lawrence was watching her, though she did not
look at him, and he thought he saw the colour deepen in her sunburnt
cheek, although her grey eyes were as cool as ever. She was
certainly not pretty, according to the probable average judgment of
younger men. Lawrence, himself, who was an artist, wondered what he
saw in her face to attract him, since he could not deny the
attraction, and could not attribute it altogether to expression nor
to the indirect effect of her character acting upon his imagination.
He did not like to believe, either, that the charm was fictitious,
and lay in a certain air of superior smartness, the result of good
taste and plenty of money. Anybody could wear serge, and a more or
less nautical hat and gloves, just in the fashionable degree of
looseness or tightness, as the case might be. Anybody who chose had
the right to turn up a veil over the brim of the aforesaid hat, and
anybody who did so stood a good chance of being sunburnt. Moreover,
as Lawrence well knew, there is a quality of healthy complexion which
tans to a golden brown, very becoming when the grey eyes have dark
lashes, but less so when, as in Fanny Trehearne's case, the lashes
and brows are much lighter than the hair--almost white, in fact. It
is not certain whether the majority of human noses turn up or down.
There was, however, no doubt but that Fanny's turned up. It was also
apparent that she had decidedly high cheek bones, a square jaw, and a
large mouth, with lips much too even and too little curved for
beauty. After all, her best points were perhaps her eyes, her
golden-brown complexion, and her crisp, reddish brown hair, which
twisted itself into sharp little curls wherever it was not long
enough to be smoothed. With a little more regularity of feature,
Fanny Trehearne might have been called a milkmaid beauty, so far as
her face was concerned. Fortunately for her, her looks were above or
below such faint praise. It was doubtful whether she would be said
to have charm, but she had individuality, since those terms are in
common use to express gifts which escape definition.
A short silence followed her somewhat indignant speech. Then, the
road being still clear before her, she turned and looked at Lawrence.
It was not a mere glance of enquiry, it was certainly not a tender
glance, but her eyes lingered with his for a moment.
"Look here--are we going to quarrel?" she asked.
"Is there any reason why we should?" Lawrence smiled.
"Not if we agree," answered the young girl, gravely, as she turned
her head from him again.
"That means that we shan't quarrel if I agree with you, I suppose,"
observed the young man.
"Well, why shouldn't you?" asked Fanny, frankly. "You may just as
well, you know. You will in the end."
"By Jove! You seem pretty sure of that!" Lawrence laughed.
Fanny said nothing in reply, but shortened the reins as the horses
reached the top of the hill. Lawrence looked down towards the sea.
The sun was very low, and the water was turning from sapphire to
amaranth, while the dark islands gathered gold into their green
depths.
"How beautiful it is!" exclaimed the artist, not exactly from
impulse, though in real enjoyment, while consciously hoping that his
companion would say something pleasant.
"Of course it's beautiful," she answered. "That's why I come here."
"I should put it in the opposite way," said Lawrence.
"How?"
"Why--it's beautiful because you come here."
"Oh--that's ingenious! You think it's my mission to beautify
landscapes."
"I thought that if I said something pretty in the way of a
compliment, we shouldn't go on quarrelling."
"Oh! Were we quarrelling? I hadn't noticed it."
"You said something about it a moment ago," observed Lawrence, mildly.
"Did I? You're an awfully literal person. By the bye, you know all
the Miss Miners, don't you? I've forgotten."
"I believe I do. There's Miss Miner the elder--to begin with--"
"The oldest--since there are three," said Fanny, correcting him.
"Yes--she's the one with the hair--and teeth."
"Yes, and Miss Elizabeth--isn't that her name? The plainest--"
"And the nicest. And Augusta--she's the third. Paints wild flowers
and plays the piano. She's about my age, I believe."
"Your age! Why, she must be over thirty!"
"No. She's nineteen, still. She's got an anchor out to
windward--against the storm of time, you know. She swings a little
with the tide, though."
"I don't understand," said Lawrence, to whom nautical language was
incomprehensible.
"Never mind. I only mean that she does not want to grow old. It's
always funny to see a person of nineteen who's really over thirty."
Lawrence laughed a little.
"You're fond of them all, aren't you?" he asked, presently.
"Of course! They're my relations--how could I help being fond of
them?"
"Oh--yes," answered Lawrence, vaguely. "But they really are very
nice--people."
"Why do you hesitate?"
"I don't know. I couldn't say 'very nice ladies,' could I? And I
shouldn't exactly say 'very nice women'--and 'very nice people'
sounds queer, somehow, doesn't it?"
"And you wouldn't say 'very nice old maids'--"
"Certainly not!"
"No. It wouldn't be civil to me, nor kind to them. The truth is
generally unkind and usually rude. Besides, they love you."
"Me?"
"Yes. They rave about you, and your looks, and your manners, and
your conversation, and your talents."
"The Dickens! I'm flattered! But it's always the wrong people who
like one."
"Why the wrong people?" asked Fanny Trehearne, not looking at him.
"Because all the liking in the world from people one doesn't care for
can't make up for the not liking of the one person one does care for."
"Oh--in that way. It's rash to care for only one person. It's
putting all one's eggs into one basket."
"What an extraordinary sentiment!"
"I didn't mean it for sentiment."
"No--I should think not! Quite the contrary, I should say."
"Quite," affirmed Fanny, gravely.
"Quite?"
"Yes--almost quite."
"Oh--'almost' quite?"
"It's the same thing."
"Not to me."
The young girl would not turn her attention from her horses, though
in Lawrence's inexpert opinion she could have done so with perfect
safety just then, and without impropriety. The most natural and
innocent curiosity should have prompted her to look into his eyes for
a moment, if only to see whether he were in earnest or not. He would
certainly not have thought her a flirt if she had glanced kindly at
him. But she looked resolutely at the horses' heads.
"Here we are!" she exclaimed suddenly.
With a sharp turn to the left the buckboard swept through the open
gate, the off horse breaking into a canter which Fanny instantly
checked. The near wheels passed within a foot of the gatepost.
"Wasn't that rather close?" asked Lawrence.
"Why? There was lots of room. Are you nervous?"
"I suppose I am, since you say so."
"I didn't say so. I asked."
"And I answered," said Lawrence, tartly.
"How sensitive you are! You act as though I had called you a coward."
"I thought you meant to. It sounded rather like it."
"You have no right to think that I mean things which I haven't said,"
answered the young girl.
"Oh, very well. I apologize for thinking that what you said meant
anything."
"Don't lose your temper--don't be a spoilt baby!"
Lawrence said nothing, and they reached the house in silence. Fanny
was not mistaken in calling him sensitive, though he was by no means
so nervous, perhaps, as she seemed ready to believe. She had a harsh
way of saying things which, spoken with a smile, could not have given
offence, and Lawrence was apt to attach real importance to her
careless speeches. He felt himself out of his element from the
first, in a place where he might be expected to do things in which he
could not but show an awkward inexperience, and he was ready to
resent anything like the suggestion that timidity was at the root of
his ignorance, or was even its natural result.
His face was unnecessarily grave as he held out his hand to help
Fanny down from the buckboard, and she neither touched it nor looked
at him as she sprang to the ground.
"Go into the library, and we'll have tea," she said, without turning
her head, as she entered the house before him. "I'll be down in a
moment."
She pointed carelessly to the open door and went through the hall in
the direction of the staircase. Lawrence entered the room alone.
The house was very large; for the Trehearnes were rich people, and
liked to have their friends with them in considerable numbers.
Moreover, they had bought land in Bar Harbour in days when it had
been cheap, and had built their dwelling commodiously, in the midst
of a big lot which ran down from the road to the sea. With the
instinct of a man who has been obliged to live in New York, squeezed
in, as it were, between tall houses on each side, Mr. Trehearne had
given himself the luxury, in Bar Harbour, of a house as wide and as
deep as he could possibly desire, and only two stories high.
The library was in the southwest corner of the house, opening on the
south side upon a deep verandah from which wooden steps descended to
the shrubbery, and having windows to the west, which overlooked the
broad lawn. The latter was enclosed by tall trees. The winding
avenue led in a northerly direction to the main road. At the east
end of the house, the offices ran out towards the boundary of the
Trehearnes' land, and beyond them, among the trees, there was a small
yard enclosed by a lattice of wood eight or ten feet high.
The library was the principal room on the ground floor, and was
really larger than the drawing-room which followed it along the line
of the south verandah, though it seemed smaller from being more
crowded with furniture. As generally happens in the country, it had
become a sort of common room in which everybody preferred to sit.
The drawing-room had been almost abandoned of late, the three Miss
Miners being sociable beings, unaccustomed to magnificence in their
own homes, and averse to being alone with it anywhere. They felt
that the drawing-room was too fine for them, and by tacit consent
they chose the library for their general trysting-place and tea camp
when they were indoors. Mrs. Trehearne, who was, perhaps, a little
too fond of splendour, would have smiled at the idea as she thought
of her gorgeously brocaded reception rooms in New York; but Fanny had
simple tastes, like her father, and agreed with her old-maid cousins
in preferring the plain, dark woodwork, the comfortable leathern
chairs, and the backs of the books, to the dreary wilderness of
expensive rugs and unnecessary gilding which lay beyond. For the
sake of coolness, the doors were usually opened between the rooms.