“Please could I say one word?” was the question three times repeated
before a rough head bobbed out from the grotto of books in which Mac
usually sat when he studied.
“Did anyone speak?” he asked, blinking in the flood of sunshine that
entered with Rose.
“Only three times, thank you. Don't disturb yourself, I beg, for I
merely want to say a word,” answered Rose as she prevented him from
offering the easy chair in which he sat.
“I was rather deep in a compound fracture and didn't hear. What can I do
for you, Cousin?” And Mac shoved a stack of pamphlets off the chair near
him with a hospitable wave of the hand that sent his papers flying in
all directions.
Rose sat down, but did not seem to find her “word” an easy one to
utter, for she twisted her handkerchief about her fingers in embarrassed
silence till Mac put on his glasses and, after a keen look, asked
soberly: “Is it a splinter, a cut, or a whitlow, ma'am?”
“It is neither. Do forget your tiresome surgery for a minute and be the
kindest cousin that ever was,” answered Rose, beginning rather sharply
and ending with her most engaging smile.
“Can't promise in the dark,” said the wary youth.
“It is a favor, a great favor, and one I don't choose to ask any of the
other boys,” answered the artful damsel.
Mac looked pleased and leaned forward, saying more affably, “Name it,
and be sure I'll grant it if I can.”
“Go with me to Mrs. Hope's party tomorrow night.”
“What!” And Mac recoiled as if she had put a pistol to his head.
“I've left you in peace a long time, but it is your turn now, so do your
duty like a man and a cousin.”
“But I never go to parties!” cried the unhappy victim in great dismay.
“High time you began, sir.”
“But I don't dance fit to be seen.”
“I'll teach you.”
“My dress coat isn't decent, I know.”
“Archie will lend you one he isn't going.”
“I'm afraid there's a lecture that I ought not to cut.”
“No, there isn't I asked Uncle.”
“I'm always so tired and dull in the evening.”
“This sort of thing is just what you want to rest and freshen up your
spirits.”
Mac gave a groan and fell back vanquished, for it was evident that
escape was impossible.
“What put such a perfectly wild idea into your head?” he demanded,
rather roughly, for hitherto he had been left in peace and this sudden
attack decidedly amazed him.
“Sheer necessity, but don't do it if it is so very dreadful to you. I
must go to several more parties, because they are made for me, but after
that I'll refuse, and then no one need be troubled with me.”
Something in Rose's voice made Mac answer penitently, even while he knit
his brows in perplexity. “I don't mean to be rude, and of course I'll go
anywhere if I'm really needed. But I don't understand where the sudden
necessity is, with three other fellows at command, all better dancers
and beaus than I am.”
“I don't want them, and I do want you, for I haven't the heart to drag
Uncle out anymore, and you know I never go with any gentleman but those
of my own family.”
“Now look here, Rose if Steve has been doing anything to tease you,
just mention it and I'll attend to him,” cried Mac, plainly seeing that
something was amiss and fancying that Dandy was at the bottom of it, as
he had done escort duty several times lately.
“No, Steve has been very good, but I know he had rather be with Kitty
Van, so of course I feel like a marplot, though he is too polite to hint
it.”
“What a noodle that boy is! But there's Archie he's steady as a church
and has no sweetheart to interfere,” continued Mac, bound to get at the
truth and half suspecting what it was.
“He is on his feet all day, and Aunt Jessie wants him in the evening.
He does not care for dancing as he used, and I suppose he really does
prefer to rest and read.” Rose might have added, “And hear Phebe sing,”
for Phebe did not go out as much as Rose did, and Aunt Jessie often came
to sit with the old lady when the young folks were away and, of course,
dutiful Archie came with her, so willingly of late!
“What's amiss with Charlie? I thought he was the prince of cavaliers.
Annabel says he dances 'like an angel,' and I know a dozen mothers
couldn't keep him at home of an evening. Have you had a tiff with Adonis
and so fall back on poor me?” asked Mac, coming last to the person of
whom he thought first but did not mention, feeling shy about alluding to
a subject often discussed behind her back.
“Yes, I have, and I don't intend to go with him any more for some time.
His ways do not suit me, and mine do not suit him, so I want to be
quite independent, and you can help me if you will,” said Rose, rather
nervously spinning the big globe close by.
Mac gave a low whistle, looking wide awake all in a minute as he said
with a gesture, as if he brushed a cobweb off his face: “Now, see here,
Cousin, I'm not good at mysteries and shall only blunder if you put me
blindfold into any nice maneuver. Just tell me straight out what you
want and I'll do it if I can. Play I'm Uncle and free your mind come
now.”
He spoke so kindly, and the honest eyes were so full of merry goodwill,
that Rose thought she might confide in him and answered as frankly as
he could desire: “You are right, Mac, and I don't mind talking to you
almost as freely as to Uncle, because you are such a reliable fellow
and won't think me silly for trying to do what I believe to be right.
Charlie does, and so makes it hard for me to hold to my resolutions. I
want to keep early hours, dress simply, and behave properly no matter
what fashionable people do. You will agree to that, I'm sure, and stand
by me through thick and thin for principle's sake.”
“I will, and begin by showing you that I understand the case. I don't
wonder you are not pleased, for Charlie is too presuming, and you do
need someone to help you head him off a bit. Hey, Cousin?”
“What a way to put it!” And Rose laughed in spite of herself, adding
with an air of relief, “That is it, and I do want someone to help me
make him understand that I don't choose to be taken possession of in
that lordly way, as if I belonged to him more than to the rest of the
family. I don't like it, for people begin to talk, and Charlie won't see
how disagreeable it is to me.”
“Tell him so,” was Mac's blunt advice.
“I have, but he only laughs and promises to behave, and then he does
it again when I am so placed that I can't say anything. You will never
understand, and I cannot explain, for it is only a look, or a word, or
some little thing but I won't have it, and the best way to cure him is
to put it out of his power to annoy me so.”
“He is a great flirt and wants to teach you how, I suppose. I'll speak
to him if you like and tell him you don't want to learn. Shall I?” asked
Mac, finding the case rather an interesting one.
“No, thank you that would only make trouble. If you will kindly play
escort a few times, it will show Charlie that I am in earnest without
more words and put a stop to the gossip,” said Rose, coloring like a
poppy at the recollection of what she heard one young man whisper to
another as Charlie led her through a crowded supper room with his most
devoted air, “Lucky dog! He is sure to get the heiress, and we are
nowhere.”
“There's no danger of people gossiping about us, is there?” And Mac
looked up with the oddest of all his odd expressions.
“Of course not you're only a boy.”
“I'm twenty-one, thank you, and Prince is but a couple of years older,”
said Mac, promptly resenting the slight put upon his manhood.
“Yes, but he is like other young men, while you are a dear old bookworm.
No one would ever mind what you did, so you may go to parties with me
every night and not a word would be said or, if there was, I shouldn't
mind since it is 'only Mac,'” answered Rose, smiling as she quoted a
household phrase often used to excuse his vagaries.
“Then I am nobody?” he said, lifting his brows as if the discovery
surprised and rather nettled him.
“Nobody in society as yet, but my very best cousin in private, and I've
just proved my regard by making you my confidant and choosing you for my
knight,” said Rose, hastening to soothe the feelings her careless words
seemed to have ruffled slightly.
“Much good that is likely to do me,” grumbled Mac.
“You ungrateful boy, not to appreciate the honor I've conferred upon
you! I know a dozen who would be proud of the place, but you only care
for compound fractures, so I won't detain you any longer, except to ask
if I may consider myself provided with an escort for tomorrow night?”
said Rose, a trifle hurt at his indifference, for she was not used to
refusals.
“If I may hope for the honor.” And, rising, he made her a bow which was
such a capital imitation of Charlie's grand manner that she forgave him
at once, exclaiming with amused surprise: “Why, Mac! I didn't know you
could be so elegant!”
“A fellow can be almost anything he likes if he tries hard enough,” he
answered, standing very straight and looking so tall and dignified
that Rose was quite impressed, and with a stately courtesy she retired,
saying graciously: “I accept with thanks. Good morning, Dr. Alexander
Mackenzie Campbell.”
When Friday evening came and word was sent up that her escort had
arrived, Rose ran down, devoutly hoping that he had not come in a
velveteen jacket, top-boots, black gloves, or made any trifling mistake
of that sort. A young gentleman was standing before the long mirror,
apparently intent upon the arrangement of his hair, and Rose paused
suddenly as her eye went from the glossy broadcloth to the white-gloved
hands, busy with an unruly lock that would not stay in place.
“Why, Charlie, I thought--” she began with an accent of surprise in her
voice, but got no further, for the gentleman turned and she beheld Mac
in immaculate evening costume, with his hair parted sweetly on his brow,
a superior posy at his buttonhole, and the expression of a martyr on his
face.
“Ah, don't you wish it was? No one but yourself to thank that it isn't
he. Am I right? Dandy got me up, and he ought to know what is what,”
demanded Mac, folding his hands and standing as stiff as a ramrod.
“You are so regularly splendid that I don't know you.”
“Neither do I.”
“I really had no idea you could look so like a gentleman,” added Rose,
surveying him with great approval.
“Nor that I could feel so like a fool.”
“Poor boy! He does look rather miserable. What can I do to cheer him up
in return for the sacrifice he is making?”
“Stop calling me a boy. It will soothe my agony immensely and give me
courage to appear in a low-necked coat and curl on my forehead, for I'm
not used to such elegancies and I find them no end of a trial.”
Mac spoke in such a pathetic tone, and gave such a gloomy glare at the
aforesaid curl, that Rose laughed in his face and added to his woe
by handing him her cloak. He surveyed it gravely for a minute, then
carefully put it on wrong side out and gave the swan's-down hood a good
pull over the head, to the utter destruction of all smoothness to the
curls inside.
Rose uttered a cry and cast off the cloak, bidding him learn to do it
properly, which he meekly did and then led her down the hall without
walking on her skirts more than three times on the way. But at the door
she discovered that she had forgotten her furred overshoes and bade Mac
get them.
“Never mind it's not wet,” he said, pulling his cap over his eyes and
plunging into his coat, regardless of the “elegancies” that afflicted
him.
“But I can't walk on cold stones with thin slippers, can I?” began Rose,
showing him a little white foot.
“You needn't, for there you are, my lady.” And, unceremoniously picking
her up, Mac landed her in the carriage before she could say a word.
“What an escort!” she exclaimed in comic dismay, as she rescued her
delicate dress from a rug in which he was about to tuck her up like a
mummy.
“It's 'only Mac,' so don't mind,” and he cast himself into an
opposite corner with the air of a man who had nerved himself to the
accomplishment of many painful duties and was bound to do them or die.
“But gentlemen don't catch up ladies like bags of meal and poke them
into carriages in this way. It is evident that you need looking after,
and it is high time I undertook your society manners. Now, do mind what
you are about and don't get yourself or me into a scrape if you can help
it,” besought Rose, feeling that on many accounts she had gone further
and fared worse.
“I'll behave like a Turveydrop see if I don't.”
Mac's idea of the immortal Turveydrop's behavior seemed to be a peculiar
one; for, after dancing once with his cousin, he left her to her own
devices and soon forgot all about her in a long conversation with
Professor Stumph, the learned geologist. Rose did not care, for one
dance proved to her that that branch of Mac's education had been sadly
neglected, and she was glad to glide smoothly about with Steve, though
he was only an inch or two taller than herself. She had plenty of
partners, however, and plenty of chaperons, for all the young men were
her most devoted, and all the matrons beamed upon her with maternal
benignity.
Charlie was not there, for when he found that Rose stood firm, and had
moreover engaged Mac as a permanency, he would not go at all and retired
in high dudgeon to console himself with more dangerous pastimes. Rose
feared it would be so, and even in the midst of the gaiety about her an
anxious mood came over her now and then and made her thoughtful for a
moment. She felt her power and wanted to use it wisely, but did not know
how to be kind to Charlie without being untrue to herself and giving him
false hopes.
“I wish we were all children again, with no hearts to perplex us and no
great temptations to try us,” she said to herself as she rested a minute
in a quiet nook while her partner went to get a glass of water. Right
in the midst of this half-sad, half-sentimental reverie, she heard
a familiar voice behind her say earnestly: “And allophite is the new
hydrous silicate of alumina and magnesia, much resembling pseudophite,
which Websky found in Silesia.”
“What is Mac talking about!” she thought, and, peeping behind a great
azalea in full bloom, she saw her cousin in deep conversation with the
professor, evidently having a capital time, for his face had lost its
melancholy expression and was all alive with interest, while the elder
man was listening as if his remarks were both intelligent and agreeable.
“What is it?” asked Steve, coming up with the water and seeing a smile
on Rose's face.
She pointed out the scientific tete-a-tete going on behind the azalea,
and Steve grinned as he peeped, then grew sober and said in a tone
of despair: “If you had seen the pains I took with that fellow, the
patience with which I brushed his wig, the time I spent trying to
convince him that he must wear thin boots, and the fight I had to get
him into that coat, you'd understand my feelings when I see him now.”
“Why, what's the matter with him?” asked Rose.
“Will you take a look and see what a spectacle he has made of himself.
He'd better be sent home at once or he will disgrace the family by
looking as if he'd been in a row.”
Steve spoke in such a tragic tone that Rose took another peep and did
sympathize with Dandy, for Mac's elegance was quite gone. His tie was
under one ear, his posy hung upside down, his gloves were rolled into a
ball, which he absently squeezed and pounded as he talked, and his hair
looked as if a whirlwind had passed over it, for his ten fingers set
it on end now and then, as they had a habit of doing when he studied or
talked earnestly. But he looked so happy and wide awake, in spite of his
dishevelment, that Rose gave an approving nod and said behind her fan:
“It is a trying spectacle, Steve yet, on the whole, I think his own odd
ways suit him best and I fancy we shall be proud of him, for he knows
more than all the rest of us put together. Hear that now.” And Rose
paused that they might listen to the following burst of eloquence from
Mac's lips: “You know Frenzal has shown that the globular forms of
silicate of bismuth at Schneeburg and Johanngeorgenstadt are not
isometric, but monoclinic in crystalline form, and consequently he
separates them from the old eulytite and gives them the new name
Agricolite.”
“Isn't it awful? Let us get out of this before there's another avalanche
or we shall be globular silicates and isometric crystals in spite of
ourselves,” whispered Steve with a panic-stricken air, and they fled
from the hailstorm of hard words that rattled about their ears, leaving
Mac to enjoy himself in his own way.
But when Rose was ready to go home and looked about for her escort, he
was nowhere to be seen, for the professor had departed, and Mac with
him, so absorbed in some new topic that he entirely forgot his cousin
and went placidly home, still pondering on the charms of geology. When
this pleasing fact dawned upon Rose her feelings may be imagined. She
was both angry and amused it was so like Mac to go mooning off and leave
her to her fate. Not a hard one, however; for, though Steve was gone
with Kitty before her plight was discovered, Mrs. Bliss was only too
glad to take the deserted damsel under her wing and bear her safely
home.
Rose was warming her feet and sipping the chocolate which Phebe always
had ready for her, as she never ate supper, when a hurried tap came
at the long window whence the light streamed and Mac's voice was heard
softly asking to be let in “just for one minute.”
Curious to know what had befallen him, Rose bade Phebe obey his call
and the delinquent cavalier appeared, breathless, anxious, and more
dilapidated than ever, for he had forgotten his overcoat; his tie was at
the back of his neck now; and his hair as rampantly erect as if all the
winds of heaven had been blowing freely through it, as they had, for
he had been tearing to and fro the last half hour, trying to undo the
dreadful deed he had so innocently committed.
“Don't take any notice of me, for I don't deserve it. I only came to see
that you were safe, Cousin, and then go hang myself, as Steve advised,”
he began in a remorseful tone that would have been very effective if
he had not been obliged to catch his breath with a comical gasp now and
then.
“I never thought you would be the one to desert me,” said Rose with a
reproachful look, thinking it best not to relent too soon, though she
was quite ready to do it when she saw how sincerely distressed he was.
“It was that confounded man! He was a regular walking encyclopedia,
and, finding I could get a good deal out of him, I went in for general
information, as the time was short. You know I always forget everything
else when I get hold of such a fellow.”
“That is evident. I wonder how you came to remember me at all,” answered
Rose, on the brink of a laugh it was so absurd.
“I didn't till Steve said something that reminded me then it burst upon
me, in one awful shock, that I'd gone and left you, and you might have
knocked me down with a feather,” said honest Mac, hiding none of his
iniquity.
“What did you do then?”
“Do! I went off like a shot and never stopped till I reached the Hopes'”
“You didn't walk all the way?” cried Rose.
“Bless you, no I ran. But you were gone with Mrs. Bliss, so I pelted
back again to see with my own eyes that you were safe at home,” answered
Mac with a sigh of relief, wiping his hot forehead.
“But it is three miles at least each way, and twelve o'clock, and dark
and cold. Oh, Mac! How could you!” exclaimed Rose, suddenly realizing
what he had done as she heard his labored breathing, saw the state of
the thin boots, and detected the absence of an overcoat.
“Couldn't do less, could I?” asked Mac, leaning up against the door and
trying not to pant.
“There was no need of half killing yourself for such a trifle. You might
have known I could take care of myself for once, at least, with so many
friends about. Sit down this minute. Bring another cup, please, Phebe
this boy isn't going home till he is rested and refreshed after such a
run as that,” commanded Rose.
“Don't be good to me I'd rather take a scolding than a chair, and drink
hemlock instead of chocolate if you happen to have any ready,” answered
Mac with a pathetic puff as he subsided onto the sofa and meekly took
the draft Phebe brought him.
“If you had anything the matter with your heart, sir, a race of this
sort might be the death of you so never do it again,” said Rose,
offering her fan to cool his heated countenance.
“Haven't got any heart.”
“Yes, you have, for I hear it beating like a trip-hammer, and it is
my fault I ought to have stopped as we went by and told you I was all
right.”
“It's the mortification, not the miles, that upsets me. I often take
that run for exercise and think nothing of it but tonight I was so mad
I made extra-good time, I fancy. Now don't you worry, but compose
your mind and 'sip your dish of tea,' as Evelina says,” answered Mac,
artfully turning the conversation from himself.
“What do you know about Evelina?” asked Rose in great surprise.
“All about her. Do you suppose I never read a novel?”
“I thought you read nothing but Greek and Latin, with an
occasional glance at Websky's pseudophites and the monoclinics of
Johanngeorgenstadt.”
Mac opened his eyes wide at this reply, then seemed to see the joke and
joined in the laugh with such heartiness that Aunt Plenty's voice was
heard demanding from above with sleepy anxiety: “Is the house afire?”
“No, ma'am, everything is safe, and I'm only saying good night,”
answered Mac, diving for his cap.
“Then go at once and let that child have her sleep,” added the old lady,
retiring to her bed.
Rose ran into the hall, and catching up her uncle's fur coat, met Mac as
he came out of the study, absently looking about for his own.
“You haven't any, you benighted boy! So take this, and have your wits
about you next time or I won't let you off so easily,” she said, holding
up the heavy garment and peeping over it, with no sign of displeasure in
her laughing eyes.
“Next time! Then you do forgive me? You will try me again, and give me a
chance to prove that I'm not a fool?” cried Mac, embracing the big coat
with emotion.
“Of course I will, and, so far from thinking you a fool, I was much
impressed with your learning tonight and told Steve that we ought to be
proud of our philosopher.”
“Learning be hanged! I'll show you that I'm not a bookworm but as much
a man as any of them, and then you may be proud or not, as you like!”
cried Mac with a defiant nod that caused the glasses to leap wildly off
his nose as he caught up his hat and departed as he came.
A day or two later Rose went to call upon Aunt Jane, as she dutifully
did once or twice a week. On her way upstairs she heard a singular sound
in the drawing room and involuntarily stopped to listen.
“One, two, three, slide! One, two, three, turn! Now, then, come on!”
said one voice impatiently.
“It's very easy to say 'come on,' but what the dickens do I do with my
left leg while I'm turning and sliding with my right?” demanded another
voice in a breathless and mournful tone.
Then the whistling and thumping went on more vigorously than before,
and Rose, recognizing the voices, peeped through the half-open door to
behold a sight which made her shake with suppressed laughter. Steve,
with a red tablecloth tied around his waist, languished upon Mac's
shoulder, dancing in perfect time to the air he whistled, for Dandy was
proficient in the graceful art and plumed himself upon his skill. Mac,
with a flushed face and dizzy eye, clutched his brother by the small
of his back, vainly endeavoring to steer him down the long room without
entangling his own legs in the tablecloth, treading on his partner's
toes, or colliding with the furniture. It was very droll, and Rose
enjoyed the spectacle till Mac, in a frantic attempt to swing around,
dashed himself against the wall and landed Steve upon the floor. Then
it was impossible to restrain her laughter any longer and she walked in
upon them, saying merrily: “It was splendid! Do it again, and I'll play
for you.”
Steve sprang up and tore off the tablecloth in great confusion, while
Mac, still rubbing his head, dropped into a chair, trying to look quite
calm and cheerful as he gasped out: “How are you, Cousin? When did you
come? John should have told us.”
“I'm glad he didn't, for then I should have missed this touching tableau
of cousinly devotion and brotherly love. Getting ready for our next
party, I see.”
“Trying to, but there are so many things to remember all at once keep
time, steer straight, dodge the petticoats, and manage my confounded
legs that it isn't easy to get on at first,” answered Mac with a sigh of
exhaustion, wiping his hot forehead.
“Hardest job I ever undertook and, as I'm not a battering ram, I decline
to be knocked round any longer,” growled Steve, dusting his knees and
ruefully surveying the feet that had been trampled on till they tingled,
for his boots and broadcloth were dear to the heart of the dapper youth.
“Very good of you, and I'm much obliged. I've got the pace, I think,
and can practice with a chair to keep my hand in,” said Mac with such a
comic mixture of gratitude and resignation that Rose went off again so
irresistibly that her cousins joined her with a hearty roar.
“As you are making a martyr of yourself in my service, the least I
can do is lend a hand. Play for us, Steve, and I'll give Mac a lesson,
unless he prefers the chair.” And, throwing off her hat and cloak, Rose
beckoned so invitingly that the gravest philosopher would have yielded.
“A thousand thanks, but I'm afraid I shall hurt you,” began Mac, much
gratified, but mindful of past mishaps.
“I'm not. Steve didn't manage his train well, for good dancers always
loop theirs up. I have none at all, so that trouble is gone and the
music will make it much easier to keep step. Just do as I tell you, and
you'll go beautifully after a few turns.”
“I will, I will! Pipe up, Steve! Now, Rose!” And, brushing his hair out
of his eyes with an air of stern determination, Mac grasped Rose and
returned to the charge bent on distinguishing himself if he died in the
attempt.
The second lesson prospered, for Steve marked the time by a series of
emphatic bangs; Mac obeyed orders as promptly as if his life depended on
it; and, after several narrow escapes at exciting moments, Rose had the
satisfaction of being steered safely down the room and landed with a
grand pirouette at the bottom. Steve applauded, and Mac, much elated,
exclaimed with artless candor: “There really is a sort of inspiration
about you, Rose. I always detested dancing before, but now, do you know,
I rather like it.”
“I knew you would, only you mustn't stand with your arm round your
partner in this way when you are done. You must seat and fan her, if
she likes it,” said Rose, anxious to perfect a pupil who seemed so
lamentably in need of a teacher.
“Yes, of course, I know how they do it.” And, releasing his cousin, Mac
raised a small whirlwind around her with a folded newspaper, so full of
zeal that she had not the heart to chide him again.
“Well done, old fellow. I begin to have hopes of you and will order
you a new dress coat at once, since you are really going in for
the proprieties of life,” said Steve from the music stool, with the
approving nod of one who was a judge of said proprieties. “Now, Rose,
if you will just coach him a little in his small talk, he won't make
a laughingstock of himself as he did the other night,” added Steve. “I
don't mean his geological gabble that was bad enough, but his chat with
Emma Curtis was much worse. Tell her, Mac, and see if she doesn't think
poor Emma had a right to think you a first-class bore.”
“I don't see why, when I merely tried to have a little sensible
conversation,” began Mac with reluctance, for he had been unmercifully
chaffed by his cousins, to whom his brother had betrayed him.
“What did you say? I won't laugh if I can help it,” said Rose, curious
to hear, for Steve's eyes were twinkling with fun.
“Well, I knew she was fond of theaters, so I tried that first and got
on pretty well till I began to tell her how they managed those things in
Greece. Most interesting subject, you know?”
“Very. Did you give her one of the choruses or a bit of Agamemnon, as
you did when you described it to me?” asked Rose, keeping sober with
difficulty as she recalled that serio-comic scene.
“Of course not, but I was advising her to read Prometheus when she gaped
behind her fan and began to talk about Phebe. What a 'nice creature' she
was, 'kept her place,' dressed according to her station, and that sort
of twaddle. I suppose it was rather rude, but being pulled up so short
confused me a bit, and I said the first thing that came into my head,
which was that I thought Phebe the best-dressed woman in the room
because she wasn't all fuss and feathers like most of the girls.”
“Oh, Mac! That to Emma, who makes it the labor of her life to be always
in the height of fashion and was particularly splendid that night. What
did she say?” cried Rose, full of sympathy for both parties.
“She bridled and looked daggers at me.”
“And what did you do?”
“I bit my tongue and tumbled out of one scrape into another. Following
her example, I changed the subject by talking about the charity concert
for the orphans, and when she gushed about the 'little darlings,' I
advised her to adopt one and wondered why young ladies didn't do that
sort of thing, instead of cuddling cats and lapdogs.”
“Unhappy boy! Her pug is the idol of her life, and she hates babies,”
said Rose.
“More fool she! Well, she got my opinion on the subject, anyway, and
she's very welcome, for I went on to say that I thought it would not
only be a lovely charity, but excellent training for the time when they
had little darlings of their own. No end of poor things die through the
ignorance of mothers, you know,” added Mac, so seriously that Rose dared
not smile at what went before.
“Imagine Emma trotting round with a pauper baby under her arm instead of
her cherished Toto,” said Steve with an ecstatic twirl on the stool.
“Did she seem to like your advice, Monsieur Malapropos?” asked Rose,
wishing she had been there.
“No, she gave a little shriek and said, 'Good gracious, Mr. Campbell,
how droll you are! Take me to Mama, please,' which I did with a thankful
heart. Catch me setting her pug's leg again,” ended Mac with a grim
shake of the head.
“Never mind. You were unfortunate in your listener that time. Don't
think all girls are so foolish. I can show you a dozen sensible ones who
would discuss dress reform and charity with you and enjoy Greek
tragedy if you did the chorus for them as you did for me,” said Rose
consolingly, for Steve would only jeer.
“Give me a list of them, please, and I'll cultivate their acquaintance.
A fellow must have some reward for making a teetotum of himself.”
“I will with pleasure; and if you dance well they will make it very
pleasant for you, and you'll enjoy parties in spite of yourself.”
“I cannot be a 'glass of fashion and a mold of form' like Dandy here,
but I'll do my best: only, if I had my choice, I'd much rather go round
the streets with an organ and a monkey,” answered Mac despondently.
“Thank you kindly for the compliment,” and Rose made him a low courtesy,
while Steve cried, “Now you have done it!” in a tone of reproach which
reminded the culprit, all too late, that he was Rose's chosen escort.
“By the gods, so I have!” And casting away the newspaper with a gesture
of comic despair, Mac strode from the room, chanting tragically the
words of Cassandra, “'Woe! woe! O Earth! O Apollo! I will dare to die; I
will accost the gates of Hades, and make my prayer that I may receive a
mortal blow!'”