FRIENDS.
Several days later, as Mr. Halloway was leaving the rectory one
afternoon, he saw Phebe standing in her door-way, and crossed to
speak to her.
"Alone?" he asked, smiling. "I supposed that now you would never be
without a shadow."
"Gerald is up-stairs dressing. She is going to ride with Mr. De Forest.
He has been to see her twice already, and you have not called yet." There
was the faintest possible reproach in her voice and in her eyes.
"I have been really busy the last few days, Miss Phebe. You may know
there is always some desperate reason when I am long absent. But here I
am now. Shall I send in my card for Miss Vernor? Must I do it up in New
York or Joppa style?"
Phebe laughed. "Never mind the card, Gerald will be down soon. It is
nearly time, and she is always so punctual. What is it, Olly, dear?"
An ugly little boy, with a pale, pinched face and impish eyes, was
pulling smartly at her dress.
"I say, Pheeb, can I have a cookie?"
"Does Gerald let you have cookies between meals, Olly?"
"Yes," answered Olly, unhesitatingly. "Always."
"What's that?" broke in an unexpected voice behind,--a clear,
ringing, decided voice. "I will not have you tell such lies, Olly!
Why will you do it!"
"I'll have the cookie anyhow," said Olly, starting on a run. "Pheeb said
I could, and this is Pheeb's house, and I will."
"And you won't," said the voice, sharply. There was a scuffle, a rush,
the sound of a smart box on the ear, a sudden childish howl, and Olly
fled back to Phebe and buried his face in her dress. Phebe folded her
arms protectingly around him, and looked up appealingly at the tall,
slender figure approaching.
"Oh, Gerald, must you?"
"Phebe, I can't have you spoil that boy so. I won't have him a liar and a
gourmand; he's bad enough without that. Olly, stop bawling this moment."
"I won't," screamed Olly. "You hurt me, you did, and if I can't have a
cookie I'll cry just as loud as ever I can; so there!"
"Then you'll cry in the house and not on the front steps. I won't have
it. Come in immediately."
And holding up her habit with one hand, the young lady reached out with
the other,--a very small and white but determined-looking little hand
Denham noticed (from where he stood he could not see her face)--and
wrenching the child by no means gently away from Phebe, she dragged him
with her toward the parlor.
"I hate you! I hate you! I hate you!" cried Olly, vociferously, doing
battle valiantly with hands and feet as he went. "I hate you every day
worse than ever!"
"Hate me all you like," said Gerald, with utmost coolness and disdain. "I
leave you perfectly free in that direction, but you shan't tell lies or
disobey me. Now stay in there and be still."
And closing the door on the sobbing culprit, she came slowly back to
Phebe, still scowling and pressing her lips firmly together as she drew
on her gauntlets. "Little wretch!" she muttered.
"Gerald, please," said Phebe, flushing scarlet with mortification, "here
is Mr. Halloway. I want to introduce him to you."
Gerald stopped abruptly and looked up. She had not seen him before. A
fleet, faint color tinged her clear cheeks an instant, but there was no
other sign of embarrassment or annoyance as her dark blue eyes met his
with the singularly penetrating gaze with which they looked out on all
the world. There was no denying it. With her clear-cut, aristocratic
face, and her slim, straight figure, stately perhaps rather than
graceful, and a trifle haughty in its unbending erectness, Gerald Vernor
was very, very handsome.
"I am happy to meet you at last, Miss Vernor," said Denham, with his
pleasant smile. "But you are no stranger to me, I assure you. Miss Phebe
made us all friends of yours long since."
Gerald's brows contracted. "Phebe is very kind," she said, with quite
the opposite from gratitude in her voice, "but I hate to be talked about
beforehand. One starts on a false basis from the first. Besides, it gives
every one else the advantage over one."
"To be sure," replied Denham, "we cannot expect you to know us as
well from hearsay. It would be too much to hope that Miss Phebe
should have had as much to say for any of the rest of us." He turned
laughingly to Phebe as he spoke, and she looked at him with eyes full
of implicit faith.
"No," she said, simply; "I haven't told Gerald any thing about you, only
your name. She will find it all out for herself so much better than I can
tell her."
"I am afraid I am not very good at finding people out," remarked Gerald,
bluntly, "unless I am extraordinarily interested in them--"
"Which I imagine you generally are not," interrupted Denham.
"True," she answered, smiling a little, "which I generally am not; I am
content with a very superficial knowledge. The world is crowded so full,
where could one stop who set out to know thoroughly all he met?"
"It is a bitter thought that you will never know more of me than just the
color of my beard," said Denham, reflectively, "but if such is your habit
I suppose I must resign myself to it. Now, I am exactly the reverse from
you; I am always extraordinarily interested in everybody."
"Ah, because as a clergyman you must be."
"No; simply because it happens to be my nature. One has one's individual
characteristics, you know, quite independently of one's profession."
"Yes, in other professions; but in yours--"
"But we are men first, Miss Vernor, afterward clergymen. Why may we not
keep our distinct idiosyncrasies, even in our clerical uniform?"
Gerald slashed her dress gently with her riding whip. "It seems to me as
if you should all be clergymen first and men afterward, fitting
yourselves to the profession rather than the profession to you; and so by
all confessedly following one pattern, you would be necessarily drawn
into a greater similitude with each other than any other class of men.
Ah, here is Mr. De Forest at last."
"At last?" repeated that gentleman as he joined the group, or rather
paused just beyond it, surveying Gerald with a critical glance which
seemed to take in accurately at one swift sweep every least detail of her
dress. "My watch stands at the minute, Miss Vernor."
"And here come the horses," added Phebe.
"Not much to boast of," said De Forest, turning the severe criticism of
his look upon the animals as the boy brought them up. "I wouldn't let you
be seen in Central Park with them. However, they are the best Joppa can
do for us. They are not very good-natured brutes either, but I believe
you look to a horse's hoofs rather than his head."
"I do, decidedly," laughed Gerald, as De Forest raised her deftly to the
saddle and arranged bridle and girths to her liking, turning to tighten
his own before mounting, and kicking away a small dog that had run up to
sniff at his heels.
"What did you bring along this ugly little beast of yours for, Jim? I
abhor curs."
"Tain't none of mine, Mister," said the stable-boy, grinning. "It's
one of them street dogs that ain't nobody's." And he in his turn gave
a push to the puppy, while Gerald leaned down and hit at it lightly
with her whip.
"Get away, my friend. There isn't room both for you and for us here," she
said, turning her horse toward it playfully as the little creature slunk
aside. In another instant her horse kicked violently, there was a single
sharp yelp, and the dog lay motionless in the road.
"Hi!" exclaimed Jim, quite in accents of admiration, as he ran up and
bent over the poor thing. "That was a good un! Right on the head! He
won't trouble any other genelman again, I'm thinking."
"What!" cried Gerald, sharply. "You don't mean the dog is dead?"
"Don't I?" said the boy, moving a little aside so that she should see.
"That was a neat un and no mistake."
Gerald looked down with a cry of horror; then suddenly sprang from her
horse and caught up the poor little limp animal in her arms.
"Take away the horse," she said to the boy, imperiously. "I shall not
ride to-day."
"But, Miss Vernor!" expostulated De Forest, "for heaven's sake don't
take it so to heart. It's unfortunate, of course, but no one is to blame.
Do put the thing down. It's dead. You can't do any thing more for it."
"I know it," said Gerald. "I did all I could; I killed him. But you'll
have to excuse me, Mr. De Forest, I can't ride."
De Forest caught her by the arm impatiently, as she turned from him.
"What nonsense, Miss Vernor! What _is_ the good of playing tragedy queen
over a dead dog? I'll have him buried in a silver coffin if you like and
raise a memorial to his inestimable virtues, but in the name of all that
is sensible, do get on the horse again and let us have our ride."
"Not to-day," replied Gerald. "I could not. It is impossible." She
looked up at him, holding the little victim pressed close in her arms,
utterly regardless of its rough and grimy coat. Her eyes were swimming
with tears.
"As you decide, of course," said De Forest, sulkily, releasing her, and
tossing his bridle to the boy. "Here you, Sim, or Tim, or Jim, or
whatever you are, take away the horses, and as you value your tip, mind
you don't have any more dogs around the next time I want you."
Gerald turned away without another word, gathering up her dress as she
best could, and went into the house. Olly, who had witnessed the whole
proceeding enchantedly from the window, ran to meet her. "I say, let's
see him. My, ain't he dirty! Is he dead? just as dead as he can be?"
"Yes," answered his sister, very gently; "the poor thing is quite dead.
Come and help me bury him decently somewhere. No, Phebe, stay there. I
wish it. Don't let us have any more fuss about it, please."
De Forest lifted his hat and turned to leave as Gerald disappeared. "Pray
don't let me detain you from the interesting ceremony, Miss Lane," he
said, with his most cynical and mocking voice; "Miss Vernor as
high-priestess will be worth a full audience. Good-morning."
"Gerald wouldn't like it if I went to her when she said not; I must
stay here," said Phebe turning her distressed face to Halloway, who had
stood a silent spectator of it all. "Oh, I'm so sorry it happened!
Isn't it too bad?"
"It certainly is,--for the dog."
"She won't get over it for ever so long, and it wasn't really her fault.
She was only in fun when she turned her horse that way. Gerald is very
tender-hearted."
"I see she is,--toward dogs."
"Mr. Halloway, you don't like her!"
"Miss Phebe, I am madly in love with her."
"Don't laugh at me, please. Isn't she handsome?"
"Well, I couldn't judge of the length of her hair."
"Nonsense, tell me what you really think of her."
Denham pondered a moment. "I think all sorts of things," he answered
presently, with an amused laugh. "She is so contradictory she'll fit
almost any opinion, and the worst I can say of her is that she'll never
concern herself in the least to find out what my opinion may be."
"Ah," said Phebe, softly, "just wait. You don't either of you know each
other yet!"