At this precise moment there pushed through the entrance-fla_An Idyll of All Fools' Day

An Idyll of All Fools' Day

By Josephine Daskam Bacon

Author of "Memoirs of a Baby," "The Madness of Philip," etc.

_With numerous illustrations_

By R. M. Crosby

New York

Dodd, Mead and Company 1908

_Published, October, 1908_

To A. A. B.

this bit of busy nonsense

is dedicated.

J. D. B.

ILLUSTRATIONS

"Only her shriek of terror saved them from the stone wall" (p, 47)

Frontispiece

Facing page "'Here we are at last, Nette dear, dressed in our best

for you!'"

"'On the right,' he began didactically"

"The red-headed boy bounded beside them, whooping madly"

"At the risk of losing his straight course he stole a rapid glance

at her"

"'Jump! Jump!' he cried hoarsely"

"'Well, here we are!' he said tentatively"

"Nette, wringing her hair and murmuring incoherent abnegations"

"'Mademoiselle,' he began, 'you are--you are--' he paused, for

genuine lack of words"

"'This gentleman here will take you down directly'"

THE ESCAPE

'TWAS a bloomy morning, all crocuses and tree buds, and Antony

sniffed it into his nostrils thankfully, even while he scowled.

"Come, come!" said his Uncle Julius, a wealthy old gentleman

buttoned firmly into a white vest, "what a face! It is nothing so

terrible that I ask of you! One would think it a hanging matter, to

beau a pretty young girl about the place!"

"You know that I do not care for schoolgirls, Uncle Julius," said

Antony severely.

"Fiddlestick!" his Uncle Julius cried, "and what are you sir, but a

school boy, I should like to know? What shall we hear next, I

wonder?"

Antony put on some fresh grey gloves with a sigh.

"Schoolgirl! Schoolgirl!" his uncle repeated mimickingly, "she

will not be reciting her lessons, I suppose!"

Antony buttoned his gloves.

"Or if she does, it will be your fault, sir," pursued his uncle.

Antony selected a slender walking stick from a rack of many, and

reviewed his collar with a critical hand.

"The young lady's topics of conversation will be a matter of

indifference to me, Uncle Julius," said he, "I assure you."

"And I assure _you_," cried Uncle Julius, "that if we were not on

this open porch, I should be strongly tempted to apply that stick

of yours where, as we used to say, it would do the most good!"

Antony adjusted his coat trimly and started down the steps.

"But since we are upon this open porch, let us, Uncle Julius,"

said he, "go where duty calls us. _En avant!_"

He strode along the flagged walk with Uncle Julius puffing behind

him, loquaciously indignant.

"Look at your mates, sir, as we pass them, and notice how enviously

they smile," he urged the youth, who replied shortly that he

observed them.

"In my time, I can tell you," said Uncle Julius, "there was no

shilly shallying in these matters. We had more blood. Let any

college lad be given a free day--and a fine day, too--and one of

the prettiest girls that ever wore a petticoat to enjoy It with

him, and he was the envy of all his fellows. And I believe," he

ended with a fine optimism, "that it is so now! Not one of these

lads but would change places with you at a nod."

"But you will not

nod, my dear Uncle Julius," Antony responded

calmly, "and so these lads--as you so felicitously call them--will

never lose the opportunity I would cheerfully relin----"

"Hush! there she is!" his uncle whispered, and Antony at once

removed his hat with a lordly and accomplished gesture, which Uncle

Julius noted with unwilling admiration.

"Well, here we are!" he said, with an attempt at prankish levity in

which he received no assistance from Antony. "Here we are at last,

Nette dear, dressed in our best for you!"

"So I see. And this is, I suppose, your young nephew, Mr. Julius?"

said the person at whose face Antony had not yet looked.

If she had intended to remedy this omission she could not have

devised a more efficacious means. Not only did Antony look at her:

he stared. From the topmost strand of her braided chestnut hair to

the lowest dimple In her olive cheek--for she was of that

irritatingly attractive class of females that combines deep-set

violet eyes with a gipsy colouring--every curve of her audacious

body spelled youth, unmitigated youth, and her tone was

correspondingly insulting.

"I am truly pleased to meet you," he said with the air of one to

whom experience has lent tolerance.

"I should truly never have guessed it," she returned promptly with

an amused smile.

Antony flushed. An impudent chit, this. A girl to be taught her

place, and that right early.

"I am to have, I believe," he said, with a fine air of disregard

for any previous conversation, "the honour of escort--of show--of,

er, of entertaining you for the day."

"That distinction is indeed yours," she replied gravely, "I have no

doubt that I shall be escort--show--er, entertained most

agreeably."

With this insulting remark she but half concealed a yawn and

Antony's blood boiled within him.

"Come," chirped Uncle Julius with a fatuous chuckle, "we are

getting along famously! What did I tell you? Yes, indeed!"

To this idiotic speech neither his nephew nor that nephew's new

acquaintance made any further reply than two eloquent but totally

ineffective glances. They were ineffective because the glance

as a medium of expression had not been included in Uncle Julius's

aesthetic training.

"And what are you going to do first, hey? Where does the great day

begin--see the town sights, I suppose?" this Imbecile old relative

maundered on.

"It will give me great pleasure, if she wishes to see them," said

Antony coldly, "to point out the various objects of local interest

to Miss----"

"Good gracious!" Uncle Julius interrupted, "what's come over the

boy? 'Miss,' indeed! Didn't I tell you that this is my old

godmother's own daughter's stepdaughter? 'Miss!' Her name is

Nette."

"Ah," said Antony.

"And his," continued Uncle Julius, with a flip of his finger at his

nephew and a wink at the young lady, "is Tony. Let's have no

formality among chicks of your age. No, no; Tony's his name."

"Indeed!" the young lady observed, gazing critically at the

embarrassed possessor of the cognomen, "and a quaint little name, I

am sure."

She smiled with a perfunctory brightness and continued in some

inexplicable manner to look down at her escort--though had she been

presented with ten thousand dollars for every one of the inches

over five feet in her height she would not have appeared before the

world as any considerable heiress. The object of this remarkably

achieved envisagement writhed inwardly. Uncle Julius rubbed his

hands in maudlin delight at her appreciation of his nephew's

baptismal acquirements, and she continued, prettily stifling a

second yawn between her white little pointed teeth:

"Since our young friend naturally pants to show us the beauties of

his Alma Mater, let us by all means begin with them," _and get them

over_, said the strangled yawn.

Antony bit his tongue in his seething rage and the pain turned him

crimson and wet-eyed. This did not escape the intolerable chit and

her deep-set violet eyes twinkled maliciously.

"It will not be at all necessary to see"--he began, when Uncle

Julius's round, astonished eyes interrupted them.

"He is not going to show 'us' at all," explained this worthy

but misguided man, "he is going to show you, my dear. I knew all

these sights well forty years ago. Dear, dear! yes, indeed."

Antony could have choked him for the apprehension that passed over

his young charge's face.

"You will not desert me, Mr. Julius?" she cried with a melting

glance that visibly warmed the cockles of his infatuated old heart,

"you can't mean to leave me"--_to the awkward attentions of this

red faced boy!_ her eyebrows continued the appeal, intelligible

only to Antony.

"But that's just what I do mean, Miss Nette," he assured her,

winking incredibly, "I am this moment due at my trustees' meeting.

I'm off directly. You must"--and he flapped his hand with airy

abandon--"endure the time without me!"

Here he smiled with disgusting coquetry and pattered like a plump

white rabbit down the shady brick path. As they stared blankly

after him he turned and waved his stick at them.

"Oh, I'm no spoil-sport!" he crowed, and rounded his corner. They

were left alone.

"Silly old ass!" Antony muttered, and then glared angrily at

the spot the buxom gentleman had quitted.

"I beg your pardon?" said the young lady, "did you speak?"

"Not to you," he replied briefly. She shook out a fluffy white

parasol and under its becoming shadow looked curiously about her.

"Indeed--to whom, then," she inquired.

Antony was silent.

"Minx!" he thought.

"You are not at all like your uncle, are you?" she began, after a

moment of this pregnant silence. Then after another moment she

added absently, "he has such pleasant, easy manners!"

Antony settled his fleckless straw hat firmly upon his head and

tightened his grip on his stick.

"My uncle," he began with great control, "is an estimable man. His

intentions are of the best--that is to say, I have always believed

them to be--but like too many others he does not always carry out

his intentions. Take, for instance, this present situation. It was

evidently his intention to give you (and me) a pleasurable day. It

is quite obvious to me, at least, that he has failed in his

intention--to a certain extent," he added politely, for he had

by now talked himself into his usual superior calm. His eyes were

fixed upon the tip of the young lady's parasol, some distance below

him, as she sat on the brick steps of the old porch before which he

stood, her slender figure leaning against a white pillar.

"Now, I have a suggestion to make," he continued, quite pleasantly

by this time. "I can plainly see that my uncle's somewhat

Philistine scheme for my showing you about the place is likely to

bore you extremely. Let us, then, omit that part of the programme

altogether. We must try to think of something that will attract

you, however," Antony had by this time a fairly paternal interest

in the young lady, "and if you will help me out, no doubt we can.

Perhaps," he concluded tentatively, "you would really prefer to

remain by yourself, and not be entertained at all?"

He paused, and as no reply appeared to be forthcoming, slowly

lowered his eyes along the fluffy parasol till they reached the

level of those deep-set violet ones. He could not have recognised

them by their colour, however, for they were closed; the gentle

rise and fall of the young lady's breast, the placid and

uncharacteristic kindness of her half-smile made the reason

for this closing only too obvious. She was sleeping.

Antony swallowed hard. Sheer rage choked him and his collar became

intolerably tight. His fingers itched along the supple stick he

carried and a longing to employ it in an absolutely unheard of

manner nearly flooded him off his feet. "Where it would do the most

good"--the obnoxious phrase flashed luminously across his mind.

The sudden silence had its natural effect upon the young person on

the brick steps. Slowly, inquiringly, her eyelids lifted, and the

peculiar, rain-washed effect of those dark blue eyes, so startling

above her olive cheeks, was not lost upon Antony.

"Not entertained at all?" she repeated vaguely, diving under the

ruffles of the parasol to cover the positively unconcealable

paroxysm of the third yawn, "oh, on the contrary! Really. I am

delightfully entertained, Mr.--Mr. Tony!"

"So it appears," he returned acidly. A soft dark colour suffused

her gipsy cheeks, but she brazened it out. She seemed to possess no

sense of shame whatever.

"This sun makes one almost sleepy," she said calmly, "and I sat up

quite late last night, too--playing picquet with your uncle. He is

a poor sleeper."

"Indeed. I am not acquainted with his habits," Antony responded.

"We will look at the buildings now, I think, if you are

sufficiently rested." A fell purpose had suddenly found itself in

his humiliated breast. This insolent young puss should have cause

indeed for drowsiness.

She sprang instantly to her feet with a quick and pleasing muscular

co-ordination, which, again, was not lost upon Antony. She wore a

white flannel costume dotted with a dull blue--the blue of Canton

china. Of this colour, too, was the silk stocking that flashed down

the steps above her low-cut shoes. A ludicrous and daring colour

for a brunette--until you encountered her eyes.

"I am quite ready," she said demurely, and Antony started briskly

down the street.

"On the right," he began didactically, "you will see Wadsworth

Hall, the building of applied sciences. It was presented by the two

sons of Mr. Ezra Bement Wadsworth in memory of their father, a

prominent graduate. It cost three hundred thousand dollars and is

one of the most completely equipped buildings of its kind in the

country, I believe."

"How interesting!" she murmured.

"Yes," Antony agreed, "it _is_ interesting."

"To what are the sciences applied?" she inquired placidly.

"To--er, to--really, I have never gone into it so far as that,"

Antony returned, biting his lip, "I am not interested in science

myself. But that is what it is generally called: it is on a bronze

tablet on the corner. It is probably only an expression."

"Ah, yes, probably," she assented.

"Beyond it and a shade to the left you will see," he continued,

with a wave of his stick, "Mansfield Hall. It is a dormitory,

occupied by sophomores."

"And who presented that?" his companion inquired, gazing

respectfully at the end of his stick.

"I do not know," he informed her briefly.

"Oh, you do not know," she repeated in her low voice. Something in

the falling inflection caused her guide to wriggle uneasily.

"Nobody knows," he added, rashly. "I should think nobody would want

to, it is so hideous."

"To be sure," she said. "And sophomores live there. Are you perhaps

a sophomore, Mr. Tony?"

"I?" Antony exclaimed; then in level tones, "I am a senior."

"Really!" she murmured. "I suppose that means that you are one of

the older pupils, then? In the first class?"

"It does," he assented grimly, adding as a cutting afterthought, "a

sophomore, I suppose, would be beneath your notice?"

She smiled sweetly. "Oh, dear me, no!" she assurred him, "not in

the least--it is all the same to me, you see, Mr. Tony!"

Antony should have realised by this time the folly of any further

tilting, but he did not.

"Your interest naturally turns, then, to men of my uncle's age?" he

inquired caustically.

She considered this with a pretty seriousness.

"N-no, hardly that," she said at length. "It is only that I do not--

that I am not--somehow, young men (_and such very young men!_ her

eyes added) do not exactly . . ."

"You need not trouble to explain yourself any further," Antony

broke in coldly. "It is somewhat unfortunate," he continued,

enunciating carefully, with averted eyes, "that I, of all people,

should have been selected for your escort this morning."

He had never said anything so nearly rude to a woman; but then he

had never to his recollection been so thoroughly annoyed by one,

since the dimly distant days when a series of deprecating aunts and

spying nurses had darkened his youthful horizon.

"Indeed. And why is that?" she asked pleasantly. She had, when she

chose, an exceedingly pleasant manner.

"Because," he returned, astonished at himself, but firm

nevertheless, "I am not sufficiently accustomed to the society of

young ladies to be certain of my ability to entertain even the

ordinary variety--much less those who prefer the society of

eccentric old gentlemen." _Come_, he reflected, _that's not half

bad. Perhaps that will teach her a thing or two!_

It seemed to him that there was a flash of respect in her eyes, but

he could not be sure, it was so fleeting.

"I suppose your studies take up so much of your time that you have

no leisure for society," she said kindly, "but you must not let

yourself grow shy: ladies are not very difficult to entertain,

really!"

To this remark Antony made no reply, perhaps because he could not

think of one which combined the expression of his feelings with

anything remotely resembling propriety. They walked on, therefore,

in utter silence.

The village through which they took their way was but a tiny one, a

green and sheltered cradle for the warm brick walls and lichened

chapel of the old college; and soon the grass-grown flagged walk

gave way to one of trodden earth, the houses grew sparser and

smaller, the trees thicker and less carefully tended. They were in

the country. The season was well forward: though the calendar

marked April, the warm blue sky, the odorous earth, the fresh,

full grass, all smelled of May. The early flowers were out long

before their wonted times; the birds, misled by the generous sun,

were already nesting musically; shock-headed urchins, those most

delicate barometers of the real seasons, had bravely cast off their

shoes and stockings and renewed the year in the splashing puddles

of some recent rain. All the scene spoke peace and promise of

better to come--all, I say, but those two fractious young souls who

walked diverse among the lovely unity of the pleasant world about

them. Antony strode on, his eyes fixed on the winding road, though

it is to be doubted if he saw it. Who would have thought to find

him, Antony, in such a baited, hot-necked frame? The day had gone

hideously awry from the beginning, and it was all the fault of this

blue-eyed, brown-cheeked chit.

She, for her part, moved easily and it must be admitted,

gracefully, beside him. Her step shot out from the hip, elastic as

a boy's; only the faintest shade of red under her skin confessed to

the pace he drove her; she drew regular breaths, through her small

nostrils. Though she could not match his stride, she yet fell into

a sort of rythmical accompaniment to it; evidently she was an

accomplished and enduring dancer.

They swung around a sharp corner under a great sprawling oak and

fairly mowed down an unattractive red-headed boy, insufficiently

attired and freckled beyond belief, who was hurrying frantically in

a direction only too obviously opposed to their own. Conscious of a

distinct relief at the necessity for constructive action, Antony

stooped and raised the howling and resentful creature, who dug his

grimy knuckles into his eyes and yelled the louder at each polite

query as to his injuries. After a few minutes of this

fruitless performance, Antony, irritated at his failure to bring

even this sordid incident to a triumphant conclusion, was about to

produce a coin and leave his victim to the sovereign solace of

Time, that great healer, when his companion, who had stood,

hitherto, discreetly aside from the business, now stepped forward

and laid a small brown hand on the heaving shoulder of the injured

infant.

"Where were you going, Bubby?" she asked abruptly.

He looked up from his bent and screening arm, stared a moment, and

replied in a matter-of-fact tone, without a trace of the sobs that

still echoed about them:

"To see the big snake!"

"The snake?" She shuddered involuntarily. Had the child mentioned

Leviathan, the monster would not have seemed more exotic to this

rural and domestic spot. By judicious questioning they elicited

from the suddenly secretive imp the successive facts of the

spectacular and recent arrival of an enormous foreign reptile; its

display under a tent on the outskirts of the village, very near

their present station; the establishment of a tariff of

fifteen cents for one view, or two separate opportunities for

excitement at the comparatively small sum of a quarter of a dollar;

and lastly, the cruel certainty that the delay occasioned by this

unexpected and sudden meeting had undoubtedly cost their informant

his only possible view of the monster, since the price of his

admission, though offered voluntarily by his maternal uncle, was

contingent upon his arrival at the tent ahead of his cousin, who,

in case of a previous appearance, was to receive the prize.

Overcome afresh by the bitterness of his lot, the red-headed boy

would have renewed his unpleasant and gulping demonstrations, had

not Antony hastily produced a coin of sufficient size to insure two

periods of ecstasy and offered it in reparation for what he

handsomely described as his clumsiness. Staggered by this princely

generosity, the urchin balanced the silver piece doubtfully, then

with a shy and unlooked-for courtesy suggested that they should use

it together.

"And what should I do, then?" asked the young lady with a smile--I

have mentioned that she had, when she saw fit to employ it, an

exceedingly pleasant manner.

The boy hesitated.

"Girls don't like snakes," he finally mumbled; "you could wait

outside!"

"Where is that tent?" she demanded indignantly, and they hurried

on, one on each side of their unconscious guide. No kindly

premonition laid a thrilling chill along Antony's stiff spine; no

wholesome doubts as to the successful issue of that doomed

expedition slowed the springing step of his companion. They hurried

on, I say, each with a hand upon the earth-stained, ragged shoulder

of that freckled imp whom Fate had selected as the instrument of

their destiny, and in ironic rivalry they literally urged him on,

and shot him, panting, through the roped enclosure that protected

the elect possessors of the admission price from contact with the

envious herd.

With the curt direction to their guide to invite, if he pleased, a

friend to enter with him, Antony slapped down a coin on the

improvised counter, received two greasy green cardboard slips and

strode towards the canvas flap of the small tent. The mingled odour

of tobacco smoke, crushed grass, and tethered horses, the cheerful,

chattering crowd, the honk and blare of a great claret-coloured

motor-car, hurtling inquiringly up the slope, all imparted a festival

air, a holiday spirit; and it was with a mild excitement that Antony

pushed into the close tent, clearing the way punctiliously for his

companion.

In the middle, under the opening, was a standard painted a dull,

forbidding red, and on this, in a cage of twisted iron, lay a

monstrous, coiled thing, hideously and brilliantly mottled, his

blunt, flattened head lazily resting on his topmost ring, his

malignant, weary eyes fixed in a listless stare, that drooped over

the human mushrooms around him, over the seas he had travelled,

back to the old gods and the beginnings of things. The inked

diamonds along his great length gleamed in a dreadful, supple

pattern; the eye, entranced in a seductive terror, followed the

massive rounds of those murderous coils, longing, yet dreading, to

trace them to their horrid head: it seemed that a faint, uncanny

odour, a hint of dead spices, like the secret wrapping cloths of

old mummies, hung in the air. Now Antony knew, or supposed he knew,

that cobras exhale no such odour, and in a disgusted curiosity he

peered about for the source of it, but found nothing in the stained

and faded tent, nor any nook or cranny in the obvious bareness

where the source of it could lurk.

The scene was a strange one; no officious showman called attention,

in a raucous voice, to the ugly thing in the middle. There appeared

to be no director, no advertisement of any kind, no appeal to a

credulous or morbid crowd. The tent could contain but a score of

visitors simultaneously, and they pushed in, fairly quiet as soon

as they had entered, slowly encircled the scornful, wicked-eyed

heap on the standard, discussed it in low tones and went out

through another flap to make room for the next group. Indeed, the

accustomed ease with which they performed these evolutions awoke in

Antony the wonder whether they had not rehearsed them many times,

and he involuntarily mentioned this idea to the girl, who gazed, at

once fascinated and repelled, as Eve at the Seducer.

"I suppose," she returned musingly, "they keep coming to see if it

will by any chance bite some one."

At this precise moment there pushed through the entrance-flap one

who by his distinctive dress showed himself the mechanician of the

claret-coloured motorcar. He was as obviously a foreigner, and

among the simple rural types that filled the tent his mustachioed

personality stood out as startlingly as the great cobra's. Elbowing

his way through the little crowd he made himself a place directly

beside Antony and the freckled boy, who had attached himself

definitely to his patron, and smiled at the young man in easy

cosmopolitan contempt of the rustics, conveying at the same time,

In a graphic Continental hint of respectful salutation, his

duty to the young lady. Antony accepted the smile with a lordly

nod, expressive of his familiarity with mechanicians as a class and

his appreciation of their place in the general scheme of things,

and the two men surveyed the reptile in silence.

"I know heem well," volunteered the big fellow in the leather suit,

at last.

"_C'est Monsieur le Cobra_, zat one. We have take ze car all

s'rough 'is country. Wait--I will amuse Mademoiselle. Watch heem!"

Lowering his head till the great goggles on his cap fronted the

slitted eyes in the cage he emitted a long, piercing hiss, a nerve

racking, whistling call. Everyone in the tent jumped backward

spasmodically; Antony threw out his arm and pushed the girl behind

him before he realised that there was no danger.

Upon the great snake the effect of the sudden noise was even

more appalling. His ugly flat head appeared suddenly high above

his writhing folds; no one saw the movement, for it was too

lightning-quick for sight, but it was undoubtedly the fact that

his head was no longer pillowed. The symmetrical turban on his

forehead puffed and quivered, his cold eye caught every eye

in the tent with a swift, horrible glance; and every eye shrank,

terrified, from his.

"A very unpleasant old party, that snake," Anthony remarked, "I

trust our friend won't think it advisable to repeat----"

In the middle of his sentence the Frenchman hissed again. The

cobra, irritated beyond further endurance, threw its massive weight

against the side of the cylindrical cage, which swayed slightly and

then dropped forward into the panic-stricken crowd.

Antony felt a soft, sighing breath on his neck and caught his

companion as she fell; he heard the ribs of her fluffy parasol

crack under somebody's stamping feet and braced himself to meet the

crushing, struggling rush of the frightened crowd. Through the

oaths and shrieks of the nightmare moment piped shrill the voice of

the red-headed boy.

"Mister, the cover's on! The cover's on tight."

Between the grovelling legs of two infuriated men, fighting

like demons for leeway from the horrid cage, Antony caught a

glimpse of it and realised that it was, indeed, completely

fastened. Though it rolled and bounded under the lashings of its

excited occupant, it was securely padlocked, and another moment of

frenzied struggle for the door-flaps emptied the tent sufficiently

to give passage to two angry men who threw a heavy canvas over the

cage and righted it, breathing hard.

One of these as he rose to his feet met Antony's eyes, shifted his

gaze to the fainting girl on his arm, and thrust his hand into the

capacious pocket of his flapping linen coat.

"Try her with this," he said shortly, "I've got the crowd to

settle. Then we'll kill the Frenchy, and then we'll leave!"

Antony forced the offered flask into the girl's mouth and

dragged her backward through the open flap. As the air reached her

she gasped and choked, gulping down the strong spirit nervously,

then stiffening herself in his arm and adjusting her hat.

"Your town is not dull, at any rate, Mr. Tony!" she observed, and

the observation, though a little breathless, was almost perfectly

under her control.

Antony felt his admiration rise into his eyes, nor did he seek to

conceal it.

"You are a brave, sensible--for heaven's sake, what's the matter

now?" he cried anxiously, staring at a point behind her.

Involuntarily she turned and looked in the same direction.

The greater part of the crowd had scattered and fled far down the

long hill; only a few groups of the most hardy and venturesome

among the villagers remained at varying distances from the deserted

tent. The most important of these groups now fell apart slightly,

disclosing as its centre a large and writhing human figure, prone

on the grass. The light box coat, the great goggles, proclaimed

this figure the ill-fated mechanician. Even as he sprawled and

twisted, the men who surrounded him turned and looked at

Antony and his companion, and there was an unpleasant fixity, an

unmistakable threatening, in their regard that chilled the young

gentleman slightly, though he was utterly at a loss as to its

import. Presently one of the men caught his eye and beckoned

commandingly.

"They seem to want me over there," he said to the girl, with an

attempt at unconcern, "perhaps I'd better step over a moment--I'll

return immediately. You don't object?"

She looked at him with a curious vague smile, then shook her head

slowly. This he took for acquiescence to his request, and as she

said nothing, he left her and joined the group about the prostrate

foreigner. She stared idly at him, but appeared little

impressed by his irritated and repeated pantomimic denials of what

was, to judge from the faces of the men, a grave charge of some

sort. Even when he threw off a hand on his arm and hastened angrily

back to her, his countenance dark with angry concern, she did not

alter that vague smile, and this vexed him still further, as he

began to explain their situation.

"I am very, very sorry Miss--Miss Nette," he began, his voice

fairly trembling with irritation, "but a most absurd and disgusting

complication has arisen. This French fellow swears he has been

bitten, and they think he is accusing you of hissing at the snake.

I don't think he is really such a cad as all that, but he is

practically hysterical, and now I don't believe he knows what he is

saying. There is certainly some mark on his wrist and one of the

men says that he saw the snake's head touch him, and they have

filled him so thoroughly with whisky that he really is not

responsible for what he says. I think,"--he marvelled at her lack

of fright or emotion of any kind--"indeed, I am sure, that they have

merely misunderstood his broken French, but these people are so

idiotically obstinate, you know. They've sent for a doctor,

and they insist that they hold--me responsible, and that if we

don't stay here quietly they'll--in short, I don't see what to do.

I'm dreadfully sorry."

He paused, ready for reproaches, for tears, for rebellion. But none

of these was apparent.

"How silly!" said Nette carelessly, glancing a moment at the group

of men.

Antony felt slightly relieved, but only slightly.

"I'm afraid that it can be made quite disagreeable, however," he

explained gently, "though it is silly. The fellow deserved to be

bitten--if he is, which I'm not at all certain of," he interjected

hastily, "and it's none of our business and all his fault; but I've

tried everything--bribing and bullying--and we seem to be caught

here. I regret it so much--as soon as we can get to my uncle, it

will be all right, of course, but nobody here will take a message

for me and--and I think perhaps it will make less publicity and

fuss, you know, if we go quietly with--with whoever they ask us to

and . . ."

He ground his teeth--if only he had been alone! He saw himself the

butt of the whole college, nick-named for eternity, blamed by his

uncle, that bulwark of convention, self-disgraced by reason of

utter, crude failure in this, the greatest social crisis of his

life. It was maddening, humiliating--and this thick-skinned,

feather-headed girl by his side seemed absolutely indifferent to

her (to say the least) embarrassing situation. Stealing a glance at

her he perceived that she was still smiling. Nay, more, she now

directed the smile straight at him, and though its warm brightness

cheered him irrationally for a moment, it was for a moment only,

and the gloom of their plight shut round him again as he caught the

eye of the leader of the hostile group beyond.

Suddenly he felt a tug at his coat, turned to see the gleaming red

head of the author of all his woes, and seized him by the arm with

a confused idea of vengeance.

"The doctor's coming, mister, he's nearly got here!" panted this

unconscious instrument of Fate, "and I'll bet that foreign man

dies! I'll bet he does! He got a terrible bite! Did you see it?"

Antony throttled the boy hastily and looked apprehensively at his

companion; he had hoped to spare her this. To his surprise she

turned to the child and laughed lightly.

"Oh, dear, no!" she said, "he won't die, little boy. Chauffeurs

don't die--they explode!"

Antony had a sense of moral shock. This passed frivolity. Really,

the girl was scarcely human; sympathy was wasted on her.

"Did you know the sheriff was coming?" the freckled-faced imp

pursued, after a mildly contemptuous stare at his patron's

incomprehensible friend. "I wouldn't go with him, if I was you. My

uncle says he's got no right to make you."

"Of course he's got no right," Antony exclaimed angrily, "but what

can I do about it? I can't fight eight or ten men, can I? I'd

rather go than be carried."

"Why don't you jump into that automobile?" the boy asked abruptly.

"I would. She goes easy--I saw him start her up before. She'll

whizz off, I'll bet you!"

The girl turned abruptly. "That's it!" she cried; "let's do that,

Mr. Tony!"

In a flash he caught the practical possibility of the scheme. Once

at his uncle's and the affair was finished. But common sense gave

pause.

"I can't run the thing," he admitted with vexation, "I don't know

the first thing about them."

"Oh, that's nothing--they run themselves!" she said competently,

"I'm used to them. Hurry--here comes a man, now!"

It was indeed the fact that a burly, self-satisfied creature was

advancing towards them, and Antony's blood boiled at the pompous

rustic's meaning glance.

"Come, come, Mr. Tony!" she urged excitedly.

"Can you run?" he muttered desperately, "it's no good if you can't,

you know."

"Of course I can," she replied, and he noted how different the

tones of her voice had grown, how much richer and more alluring. "I

can beat you to the car! Come!"

The freckled boy plucked at his coat urgingly, and in a moment, as

one flees in dreams, he was dashing down the slight slope that led

to the little tableland at the head of the steeper hill where the

huge car stood, pointed towards freedom.

A hoarse, suety cry issued from the constable, answered by the

farther group; a number of men rushed hastily in their direction,

but no one seemed to realise the object of their flight and the way

was left clear. The red-headed boy bounded beside them,

whooping madly; Nette's pale skirt flashed valiantly a trifle ahead

of them; the loose stones rolled under their flying feet.

With a light bound the girl dropped on the wide leather seat, and

Antony tumbled in after her, an agile village boy almost at his

heels. Even as it was, this boy would have seized him had not the

freckled arbiter of their destinies dexterously tripped him,

grinning derisively at his downfall as he dashed to the side of the

car and panted:

"Let her go, mister, let her go!"

Mechanically Antony grasped the steering wheel as he had seen

others grasp it and turned to his companion. But she had toppled

breathless against his shoulder and huddled there motionless. He

stared helplessly at the approaching pursuit--his head whirled.

"Here, I'll pull it!" cried the red-headed urchin and fumbled

mysteriously at Antony's feet. A low, raucous buzzing began

forthwith, and as three men dashed up to them triumphantly, the

great car shuddered a moment and lurched down the hill, gathering

speed with every quarter-second.

There flashed before Antony's eyes a quick panorama of the extended

Frenchman, the kneeling doctor, the threatening men; his ears

resounded with the gleeful cackle of that freckled Fate who had

launched them, and then he faced an empty country road, silent but

for the whirring of their chariot. He turned his face to the girl,

unconsciously moving the simple steering apparatus so as to keep

the car in the middle of the road, while he spoke.

"May I trouble you to take this now?" he said politely. "Your

knowledge of this business has undoubtedly saved you a great deal

of mortifying bother and delay."

She stiffened sensibly beside him, and in her voice he caught no

hint of the momentary rich abandon that he had noticed at the

beginning of their flight, for she spoke with the cool and airy

dryness of their first meeting.

"My knowledge?" she repeated, with an obviously sincere surprise,

"my knowledge? What do you mean? Why should I take it? I never

handled a car in my life!"

Antony's fingers stiffened and grew damp against the wheel. For a

few sick seconds he sat utterly silent, stunned and incredulous,

not knowing what he did, while his hands, with a strange muscular

memory all their own of the days when he had propelled a

little mechanical velocipede steered by a wheel, kept the whirring

vehicle in the centre of the long, empty road.

"Good heavens!" he muttered at last, "I thought you told me--you

certainly said--I understood you--oh, the devil!"

"Put your foot on something!" Nette cried feverishly; "that's the

way they do! It can't be hard to stop it for just a moment. Put

your foot----"

With that she stamped her little white shoe on a round metal disc

projecting like a toadstool from the floor in front of her, and

immediately, whether from that cause alone, or because Antony

unwittingly complicated the manoeuvre by some untoward pressure of

knee or wrist, the car, with a tremendous jerk, began to revolve

backward upon itself in a dizzy swoop. A moment more had seen them

in the deep ditch beside the road, had not Antony dislodged her

foot with an ungraceful but timely kick and allowed the mechanism

to right itself and lumber into its course again.

"For God's sake, sit still!" he shouted hoarsely. "Is it possible

you do not understand you are in danger? Do you wish to kill or

maim us both before it is necessary? I order you to sit perfectly

quiet until I tell you to jump!"

"Very well," she replied meekly, with a short, frightened intake of

the breath, and they sped along.

THE FLIGHT

II.

THE FLIGHT

ANTONY had now--so wonderfully resilient is youth--won sufficient

confidence in himself to realise that there was yet a chance of

bringing this dangerous expedition to some sort of successful

issue, if fate should prosper them with a straight and empty road.

They were not, fortunately, travelling at any tremendous rate of

speed; though jumping from the car would have been extremely

unwise, it remained a possibility, at least, and if, as was fairly

probable, the car had already travelled a considerable distance,

its motive power would become exhausted sooner or later and they

could dismount safely. In a few curt sentences he explained the

situation, as it appeared to him, to his companion.

"I must beg you to believe," he concluded, "that I somehow got a

distinct impression of your telling me that you were used to

managing these things--I cannot understand how I could have

made such a mistake. I am particular in repeating this, because in

case of accident--and it would be the merest idiocy to deny that a

very grave accident is quite likely to happen at any moment--I do

not want you to think too hardly of me. But of course your realise

that unless I had been quite certain of your ability I should never

have attempted such a foolhardy thing."

She made no answer, and at the risk of losing his straight course

he stole a rapid glance at her.

To his surprise she was crimson with what was obvious, even to his

fleeting view, as embarrassment. Her fingers twisted nervously; the

tears that suffused her eyes were certainly not tears of grief or

fright. She bit furiously at her under lip, and began more than one

sentence that faltered away into confusion. Indeed, they had

triumphantly climbed and descended a hill that sent Antony's heart

into his throat before she succeeded in the task she evidently

loathed but had as evidently determined to fulfil.

"Mr.--Mr. Tony," she began suddenly, alarmed in her turn at their

increased speed as they went down the hill, "in case, as you say,

anything should happen, I must tell you something. When I said

that about--about my running the car perfectly well----"

"You didn't, of course, put it in that way," he interjected, as she

seemed unable to go on.

"Oh, didn't I?" she asked. "I thought you said I did."

"You said that they ran themselves, you remember, and that you were

used to them," he reminded her, "and I took that to mean----"

"Oh, that's what I said," she repeated, thoughtfully.

"Don't you know what you said?" he demanded, a spasm of terror

catching him and quickening his heart-beat as a great waggon loomed

into sight horribly near them. Despairingly he glanced at the

shining metal paraphernalia that encompassed him--his eye fell upon

an unmistakable brass horn at his right, terminating in a rubber

bulb. This could be but one thing, and cautiously loosening one

clammy hand from the wheel, he pressed the bulb nervously. A loud,

harsh cry from its brazen throat relieved him inexpressibly and

sent a glow of confidence through him. He repeated the pressure,

the driver of the cart looked leisurely around, and with a

scowl drew off to one side of the road. Antony's blood resumed its

normal pace, and as the course was now clear for a moment, anyway,

he repeated his question:

"Don't you know what you said?"

The trees, the full brooks, the grazing cattle, unrolled behind

them like a painted ribbon for several seconds before she answered.

At length his ear caught a faint, short murmur.

"N--no."

"Why not?" he demanded briefly.

"I would rather not tell you," she replied with a return of her old

spirit.

"You must tell me," he said angrily. "Here come two carriages--oh,

why did I never notice how they stopped these things? Reach under

my arms and squeeze that horn--quick!"

The carriages separated and he went, quaking, between them.

"Now, go on--this luck can hardly last," he warned her. "I intend

to know for how much of this nightmare I am responsible."

"You are responsible for all of it, then," she cried recklessly.

"You had not the slightest excuse for making me drink all that

nasty, burning stuff!"

Regardless of his wheel, Antony turned and stared at her, and only

her shriek of terror saved them from the stone wall that bordered a

curve in the road.

"You mean you were----"

"If you dare to say it I shall jump!" she interrupted, plucking

nervously at her skirt, and he saw that she was quite capable of

carrying out the threat.

"But--but you drank it yourself--I thought you knew----" he

stammered.

"It was down in my throat--I couldn't help it--I pushed it away as

soon as I could--I never tasted anything but champagne and sherry

and I thought they were all the same, those things. . ."

She was on the point of tears now, and even in his keen sense of

danger Antony was conscious of a gratified consciousness of that

calm masculine superiority so long denied him.

"I see, I see," he said hastily. "I am very sorry. I did the best I

could at the time: I am not accustomed to resuscitating fainting

young ladies and I rather lost my head. I assure you that I assume

all the blame."

"I think you had better," she replied vindictively, and Antony's

conscious magnanimity collapsed instantly into an intense

irritation.

"I must beg you to observe," he said, somewhat jerkily, as they

bounced up and down the irregularities of a rough country road,

"that I am hardly responsible, even with the best will in the

world, for your inability to consume five or six swallows of bad

whisky without--without----" in a panic of terror as her hands flew

to her skirts and her knees stiffened, he concluded

impotently, "oh, have it any way you like! It's all my fault. Now,

for heaven's sake, sit still and listen to me. Do you or do you not

know anything whatever about motor cars? I ask because it is

absolutely necessary," he added hastily.

"I know nothing whatever about them," she returned with an icy

finality, an air of uninterested irresponsibility, that maddened

even while it appalled him.

"Very good; neither do I," he said. "We are, as you see, on a long,

empty, practically uninhabited country road. This is extremely

fortunate for us, but it will not last much longer, for we are

coming into Huntersville, which was, on the occasion when I last

went through it in one of these ungodly machines, full of babies,

chickens, unhitched horses, and large, disagreeable dogs. Rather

than go through Huntersville I would run this thing at a tree, now.

If I could estimate the force of the shock, I'd do it anyway. But I

cannot estimate it, and I do not want to frighten you to death.

Besides, it might send the thing backward. The same reasoning

applies to a steep bank. Now, as I remember it, there is a wild

sort of road that turns off to the left very soon and goes up

a long hill somewhere or other. I haven't the least idea where, but

it must lead to something. My idea would be to go up that road and

try to wear the machinery out on it. If it runs into a field, it

can't be helped. At any rate, I think there is less risk. Are you

willing to try it?"

His sincere and serious manner had its effect and she answered

simply, "Anything that you think is best, of course. But could we

not experiment a little, and try to stop it? It cannot be anything

very complicated, since it has to be done so often."

"No, no, no!" Antony cried nervously, "not while I'm in my right

mind! It may seem foolish to you," he continued more stiffly, "but

I have reached my limit of experiment. I--I know nothing of any

kind of machinery--I loathe it. As soon as I began anything of that

sort, my nerve would go. You remember the result when you stamped

on that brass knob? Well, I admit that I am not equal to a

repetition, to be quite frank."

"I thought men always understood machinery," she murmured

impatiently. "All the men I know are quite clever at it."

Now, curiously enough, this pettish and really inexcusable

fling did not produce its presumable effect upon Antony. Whether he

felt that it was partly justified and that he was really in some

sort unworthy of his sex, or whether the actuality of their

pressing danger rendered him immune as regards such flighty stabs,

is not known, but it remains a fact that he merely pursed his lips

indulgently and spoke as follows:

"You are indeed fortunate in your acquaintance. I regret that

practice in steering horses, sail boats, bob sleds and to a certain

small extent, dirigible balloons, has left me little leisure--and

less inclination--for these evil-smelling devil-waggons. Neither

the steamfitter nor the engineer has ever appealed to me----"

He ceased abruptly, and as his voice died out she looked

questioningly at him, for even her slight acquaintance with the

young gentleman had taught her that he was not one to leave a

well-planned sentence incomplete from choice.

"What is it?" she asked breathlessly.

"That wild road is on the other side of Huntersville!" he said,

with an utter absence of comment that impressed her more deeply

than any of his previous conversational embroideries.

Indeed, the pointed spire of the Huntersville church rose white

before them and scattered houses even now lined the road.

"I wish we were going uphill now," Antony began, "and I should

advise you to jump. I don't believe you'd make such a mess of it as

a great many girls would be likely to. Of course, you might have on

the last hill, but I hated the idea of it. It may be steering will

do. But if it's a question of running someone down, you'll have to,

of course, and I'll turn sharp about and take my chance. Or aim at

tree. Now, blow the horn hard, please, and when I say jump, go the

way the car is going, and clear it well. You may sprain your ankle

or get a bruise or two, but that won't kill you. It's a small sort

of place, and we might get through. Don't stop the horn a moment.

What's that idiot doing?"

On the side of the road an overgrown boy of eighteen hopped wildly

on one foot, the other stretched at right angles in front of him,

while his lank red wrists beat the air like the arms of a windmill.