NIGHT-SCENES.
Miss Sturtevant's summer visit to Montfield usually ended with
September, but this year she had remained for the theatricals. That she
did not carry Tom Putnam's heart as a trophy of her summer's campaign
was certainly no fault of hers. As she walked home from the exhibition,
leaning upon his arm, she taxed him with his want of attention.
"I have scarcely seen you for the summer," she said. "You have been
very sparing of your calls."
"I confess my remissness, but I have so little time."
"You might at least," Flora said, "have come to thank me for my hint
about the Samoset and Brookfield. Almost everybody else sold out."
"To your gain," he returned. He had little respect for the woman beside
him, and was annoyed at her intrusion.
"I thought I answered your note," he continued. "I certainly intended
doing so."
"Oh, you did!" Miss Sturtevant said, leaning upon his arm more heavily.
"But a note is a poor substitute for a call from one to whom one is
attached."
"I hope," the lawyer observed briskly, determined not to be drawn into
a scene, "that you have sold out. I see by the morning paper that the
vote has been reconsidered, and the Branch is not to be bought, after
all: I suspected it would be so, all the time. The whole thing was only
the work of speculators, and I hope you were as lucky as I in getting
rid of your paper at the flood."
"What!" cried his companion,--"reconsidered? You do not mean that the
Branch isn't to be bought? Uncle Jacob promised"--
"The Branch certainly is not to be bought," Putnam repeated. "The
corporation has no use for it, and never had. You haven't held your
stock?"
"I have," she answered, pressing her thin lips together. "I am
completely beggared. Good-night. I must have time to think."
"I wish I had known," Tom said, standing upon the step below her; for
they had reached the Browns' door. "I supposed you knew all about the
stock."
"I thought I did," she answered in a strained, thin voice. "It seems I
was mistaken. Good-night."
She went in, and the door closed behind her. Tom walked home, kicking
his boot-toes out against every pebble, divided between disapproval and
pity.
Twenty-four hours later Miss Sturtevant was confronted with Mr. Jacob
Wentworth in the library of his Beacon-street residence. The lawyer sat
by a grate in which had been kindled a fire as a precaution against
the autumnal chill in the air. On a small table at his hand lay the
last number of "Punch," between a decanter of choice sherry and a
well-furnished cigar-stand. Mr. Wentworth's family being out for the
evening, he was enjoying himself in almost bachelor comfort, only the
contrasting background of bachelor loneliness being needed to make his
happiness complete. He was not well pleased at this late call from
Flora, of whom he had never been fond, and who now came to mar the
delightful ease of his evening with complaints of the inevitable. She
looked worn and old and eager. She had been travelling a large part of
the day, and the anxiety which Putnam's news had brought to her had
told severely.
"I knew you would reproach me," Mr. Wentworth was saying. "But, when I
found that you had deceived me, I felt under no further obligations to
you."
"But I did not deceive you. Peter Mixon has the papers."
"I took the trouble to go to Montfield myself," the other answered
judicially, "to prevent the possibility of a mistake; for the Mullen
property is a large one, and my client's interests are my own. I saw
the man personally, and he assured me that he had no papers whatever."
"So he did me," Flora burst out; "but I was not such a fool as to
believe him."
The lawyer gave a sweeping wave of the hand as if to thrust completely
aside the implication.
"You are imaginative," he said coolly.
"I had proof of it," she returned,--"proof, I tell you; and you have
lied to me about the Branch, and ruined me."
She was ashy pale, and even Mrs. Gilfether would have found no lack of
expression in her blue eyes now.
"The turning of the road the other way," Wentworth said unmoved, "was
for my interest; and, when Miss Mullen assured me that Frank Breck had
the papers, I hardly felt under obligation to communicate further with
you."
"Frank Breck?"
"Yes. He is the son of an old friend of the Clemens woman."
"Uncle Jacob," Miss Sturtevant said in her harshest voice, rising from
her seat as she spoke, "you are a fool. I shall be even with you yet.
Good-night."
* * * * *
When, on the night of the theatricals, Patty saw Tom Putnam give
his arm to Miss Sturtevant, she accepted at once the proffered
escort of Clarence Toxteth. To Toxteth's remarks she replied in
monosyllables, pleading that she was very tired. She dismissed him at
the piazza-steps, and, passing into the shadow, gave him the impression
that she had entered the house. As a matter of fact she discovered her
door-key to be missing; and, not caring to disturb any one, she sat
down to wait for Will. He was long in coming, for he and Ease loitered
that night.
But steps approached; and, to her surprise, Patty saw in the moonlight
Bathalina and her quondam husband coming up the walk. They parted
midway between the gate and house, Mrs. Mixon advancing alone.
"I thought, Bathalina," Patty said, "that you had given that man up."
"Law, Miss Patty, how you started me! I thought you would have been a
ghost."
"Nonsense! Where have you been all this time?"
"Traipsin' up and down, up and down, like the Devil, seeking of
somebody to devour. I'm worn almost out of my shoes, but Peter would
argufy it out. So we've been traipsin' up and down; and this shawl's so
thick, and the weather so warm, let alone it's bein' October and ought
to be cool, that I am about melted to death."
"What makes you wear your shawl, then?"
"I'm not a young girl, miss, that I should walk in my figger. I won't
go through the streets with my figger showin', if it kills me."
"What are you walking with Peter Mixon for, anyway? I thought you were
done with him."
"Well, miss," the servant answered with a great appearance of candor,
"Amanda West wouldn't have him, seein' as he was sort of married to me;
and I've been thinking very likely it was all my sinful pride refusing
to live with him after the Lord had kind o' jined us."
"The Lord kind o' joined you, I should think!" Patty retorted
contemptuously. "The Old Evil One had more to do with it."