AN ALARMING SUGGESTION
The quotation Uncle Robert made, and which was overheard by Philip in
the garden, was a wind-up to a conversation relative to Phyllis and
Captain Arbuthnot.
Colonel Lane had been confiding in Mr. Burns, and perhaps it would be
as well to give the gist of their conversation, as it bears upon the
disclosures of the foregoing chapter.
As soon as Philip, refusing wine, had sallied forth to smoke in the
garden, Colonel Lane began to open his heart--part of it, at least;
there was another part where a very tender secret lay hidden--to his
friend.
“You have heard, of course, Burns, that Arbuthnot has been ordered to
India? It is a mighty relief to me, for my little girl was clamoring to
become engaged to him. That is saved, at any rate.”
“But, surely, Colonel, you can’t object to Arbuthnot!” exclaimed Uncle
Robert; “a gentleman and a fine soldier.”
“That is just it,” rejoined the Colonel. “Arbuthnot is all that, and I
have a deep regard for him. But Phyllis has had many fancies before,
and will have many to come. She is a darling girl, but I fear she is
very changeable. She thinks herself greatly in love with Arbuthnot
to-day. To-morrow, more likely than not, she will think herself equally
in love with someone else. She is not exactly a coquette, but she
imagines herself to feel deeply, when she gets a surface impression.
I want her to become more stable before she unites herself to a man
with the chance of spoiling both their lives. It is very hard, Burns,
to have to be both father and mother to a wilful girl! However, this
particular situation is saved for the moment. Arbuthnot will be away
for some time, and Phyllis may, in the meantime, grow older, and get to
know her own mind, I hope.”
Glancing through the window at this point, the Colonel caught sight of
a white figure crossing the lawn, and smiled a little grimly.
“Women are strange creatures, Burns,” he said; “I can’t understand
them! A battalion of men is more easily managed than one woman!”
“Opinions differ, however,” said Uncle Robert. “Chaucer says, ‘Ther can
no man in humblesse him acquite as woman can, ne can be half so trewe
as woman ben,’ while Robert Burns calls her ‘dear, deluding woman.’”
“You, of course, take _Burns’s_ view,” said the Colonel laughing.
Robert Burns the second did not see the joke. He answered quite
seriously.
“No, I don’t take Burns’s view,” he said seriously. “I have a sister
who is above rubies--a woman who is a sweetener of life.”
The Colonel grew serious. “By Gad! you are right, Burns! Mrs. Barrimore
keeps my faith in woman from crumbling to dust. How sweet and girlish
she looked at dinner to-night! It seems absurd that she should be
Philip’s mother. Philip looks the older of the two. I think, between
you and me, that it is a little too bad of Philip to go away to that
bungalow. Mrs. Barrimore feels it, I could see, even while she tried to
show interest in it to-night.”
“You will scarcely believe it, Colonel,” broke out Uncle Robert, “but
Philip says my quotations have driven him away.”
“You do quote a lot, you know,” the Colonel told him laughing; “and
authors are proverbially irritable.”
“‘They damn those authors whom they never read,’” said Uncle Robert.
“That is from Churchill, and is to be found in ‘The Candidate.’ I told
Philip so this morning; I had quoted Chaucer, and Philip had said, with
more vigor than politeness, ‘Damn Chaucer!’ Now Philip never reads
Chaucer--never has, I should say. In my young days young men read
standard works, and digested them. Nowadays they read fiction.”
Colonel Lane stifled a yawn, and once more looked through the window at
his daughter, now in earnest conversation with Philip Barrimore.
Uncle Robert’s eyes followed his friend’s.
“Doesn’t your little Phyllis appear to be on very confidential terms
with our boy to-night?” he observed.
“Yes, she does,” answered the Colonel brusquely. “She will be in love
with him next--to his undoing!”
Then had followed the quotation overheard by young Barrimore.
“_Oh, Love! thou bane of the most generous souls,
Thou doubtful pleasure, and thou certain pain._”
Phyllis Lane was a good actress--what woman is not? To judge from her
gay attitude as she entered Mrs. Barrimore’s drawing-room, one would
never have imagined that she was a bride of a few hours, with her
bridegroom speeding away to India.
The pink lamp-shade shed a warm glow over the pretty low-ceilinged
room which was heavy with the scent of pink carnations--Mrs.
Barrimore’s favorite flower. Mrs. Barrimore wore some of them pinned
into the lace of her pearl-grey evening dress, and the color was
faintly repeated in her cheeks. She had the complexion of a girl in
her teens, and her slightly waving nut-brown hair was without a silver
streak.
Her figure was softly rounded and slim as it had been at twenty. As
Colonel Lane had said, she looked a girl, despite her over forty years.
She was sitting among the amber cushions on her favorite Chesterfield,
where Colonel Lane joined her.
A band struck up a gay waltz in Alexandra Park. Mrs. Barrimore’s grey
eyes brightened. “I love a band,” she said. “There is a _fête_ in the
park to-night, I can see the illuminations through the trees. How that
music makes one wish to dance! Do you know, Colonel, I can’t help
forgetting that I am middle-aged. Philip is sometimes a little shocked,
I think. _He_ thinks me quite old, and only to-day said, ‘Mother, don’t
you think you ought to wear a _bonnet_?’ I began to think that perhaps
I ought. It had never occurred to me before.”
“Bonnet!” exclaimed the Colonel. “It would be ridiculous. You would
look really odd in one, with your face and figure. Philip has some very
foolish ideas. That bungalow, for instance. I understand that he is
going to live there with a manservant.”
Mrs. Barrimore’s pink deepened to carnation in her cheeks.
“Oh, you don’t understand,” she said, up in arms at once in defence of
her boy. “Philip wants solitude--he needs it to write his books. He
can’t get it here. Dear Robert won’t leave him alone. Young people,
even the best, find it difficult to put up with the peculiarities of
older folk. It is later on that the once young look back, and love
these same older folk for these same peculiarities. It is all the same
annoyance with old folks and infants, and I remember myself how angry
it used to make me when Philip--he was little Philly then--left his
sticky finger-prints on the window-glass--and now that my baby is a
man, I would give--oh, what would I not give!--to see those sticky
finger-prints again!”
Colonel Lane saw the tender eyes grow bright with unshed tears.
He cleared his throat.
“I think I know what you mean,” he said; “the man just arrived at
maturity neither makes allowances for those older or younger than
himself. It is the conceit that covers the just-grown-up as with a
garment. But it is a garment which soon grows too small for a man with
a fine nature--luckily. Philip is centered in his work at present,
and all outside it is of but little importance. He is made of such
good stuff, however, that it will not take long for him to look with
different eyes on things outside himself.”
“We must remember, too, that Philip has had a great sorrow,” Mrs.
Barrimore reminded the Colonel.
“Yes, I know,” answered her companion. “An inward pain such as his
can’t fail to make him exaggerate annoyances. Do you think he is
getting over it, dear Mrs. Barrimore?”
“I fear not,” she answered; “but it all happened only a year ago, you
see. Philip wants to find out Eweretta’s half-sister, and help her.”
“Half-sister?” repeated the Colonel. “Had Miss Alvin a half-sister,
then?”
“Yes, it is a very sad story. Aimée Le Breton was not legitimate. She
was the living image of Eweretta, and both girls were the image of
their father, and nearly the same age. The poor girl was weak-minded,
so it was said, and lived with her mother at Qu’Appelle, in Canada.
They have gone away no one seems to know where. Mr. Alvin left
everything to Eweretta, and not a penny to Aimée or her mother.
Eweretta died suddenly at Mrs. Le Breton’s house. She had gone over to
Qu’Appelle to tell Aimée she should share with her--and she died of
heart disease, so it was said. She was buried before Philip heard a
word.”
“And what became of the money?” demanded the Colonel rather sharply.
“John Alvin’s brother Thomas came into it. It was willed so. If
Eweretta died unmarried, Thomas was to take all.”
“My dear Mrs. Barrimore,” said the Colonel, “this is the first I have
heard of this amazing story. Up to now I have only heard that Miss
Alvin died. What kind of a man was Thomas Alvin?”
“He had always been unlucky, I know that,” replied Mrs. Barrimore. “He
was a thirteenth son, and the only one who survived John. He failed in
everything he touched, and was known as ‘The Thirteenth Man.’ I have
heard that men sometimes refused to work with him for fear he should
bring them ill-luck. And now you know all I know.”
The Colonel looked steadily out of the window at the lights in
Alexandra Park that twinkled through the trees for some moments in
silence. Then he brought his eyes back to his companion’s face.
“So Eweretta’s death was worth thirty thousand pounds to this unlucky
thirteenth man!”
Mrs. Barrimore’s eyes took a look of horror.
“Colonel! you don’t mean--you can’t mean that Thomas Alvin--oh! for
God’s sake don’t say a word to Philip. It would drive him mad!”
Phyllis had struck a few chords on the piano. Philip was standing near
the instrument ready to turn the pages of a song she was about to sing.
Uncle Robert had impolitely dropped off to sleep.
“Forgive me!” whispered the Colonel. “It was a foolish remark of mine.
Of course, I shall say nothing to Philip. You look quite pale! I shall
never forgive myself for expressing that thought aloud. Won’t you come
out on the terrace? The cool air will do you good. Oh, what a blunderer
I am!”
Mrs. Barrimore smiled bravely and rose. “Yes, I should like to get into
the air,” she said.