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LOVE IN A CLOUD
A Comedy in Filigree
by
ARLO BATES
Boston and New York
Houghton, Mifflin and Company
The Riverside Press, Cambridge
1900
Copyright, 1900, by Arlo Bates
All Rights Reserved
TO
MRS. E. L. HOMANS
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. THE MISCHIEF OF A MAID 1
II. THE MADNESS OF A MAN 11
III. THE BABBLE OF A TEA 19
IV. THE TICKLING OF AN AUTHOR 29
V. THE BLAZING OF RANK 43
VI. THE MISCHIEF OF A WIDOW 50
VII. THE COUNSEL OF A MOTHER 60
VIII. THE TEST OF LOVE 69
IX. THE MISCHIEF OF A GENTLEMAN 79
X. THE BUSINESS OF A CLUBMAN 89
XI. THE GAME OF CROSS-PURPOSES 98
XII. THE WASTING OF REQUESTS 108
XIII. THE WILE OF A WOMAN 119
XIV. THE CONCEALING OF SECRETS 130
XV. THE MISCHIEF OF A LETTER 138
XVI. THE DUTY OF A SON 150
XVII. THE BUSINESS OF A LOVER 166
XVIII. THE MISCHIEF OF MEN 180
XIX. THE CRUELTY OF LOVE 191
XX. THE FAITHFULNESS OF A FRIEND 198
XXI. THE MISCHIEF OF A FIANCÉ 206
XXII. THE COOING OF TURTLE-DOVES 220
XXIII. THE BUSINESS OF A MUSE 227
XXIV. THE MISCHIEF OF A CAD 241
XXV. THE WAKING OF A SPINSTER 254
XXVI. THE WOOING OF A WIDOW 266
XXVII. THE CLIMAX OF COMEDY 277
XXVIII. THE UNCLOUDING OF LOVE 288
LOVE IN A CLOUD
I
THE MISCHIEF OF A MAID
"No, my dear May, I positively will not hear another word about 'Love in
a Cloud.' I am tired to death of the very sound of its stupid name."
"Oh, Mrs. Harbinger," May Calthorpe responded, eagerly defensive, "it
isn't a stupid name."
Mrs. Harbinger settled herself back into the pile of gay cushions in the
corner of the sofa, and went on without heeding the interruption:--
"I have heard nothing but 'Love in a Cloud,' 'Love in a Cloud,' until it
gives me a feeling of nausea. Nobody talks of anything else."
May nodded her head triumphantly, a bright sparkle in her brown eyes.
"That only shows what a perfectly lovely book it is," she declared.
Mrs. Harbinger laughed, and bent forward to arrange a ribbon at May's
throat.
"I don't care if it is the loveliest book ever written," she responded;
"I won't have it stuffed down my throat morning, noon, and night. Why,
if you'll believe it, my husband, who never reads novels, not only read
it, but actually kept awake over it, and after that feat he'll talk of
it for months."
Pretty May Calthorpe leaned forward with more animation than the mere
discussion of an anonymous novel seemed to call for, and caught one of
her hostess's hands in both her own.
"Oh, did Mr. Harbinger like it?" she asked. "I am so interested to know
what he thinks of it."
"You never will know from me, my dear," was the cool response. "I've
forbidden him to speak of it. I tell you that I am bored to death with
the old thing."
May started up suddenly from the sofa where she had been sitting beside
Mrs. Harbinger. With rather an offended air she crossed to the
fireplace, and began to arrange her hat before the mirror over the
mantel. Mrs. Harbinger, smiling to herself, gave her attention to
setting in order the cups on the tea-table before her. The sun of the
April afternoon came in through the window, and from the polished floor
of the drawing-room was reflected in bright patches on the ceiling; the
brightness seemed to gather about the young, girlish face which looked
out from the glass, with red lips and willful brown hair in tendrils
over the white forehead. Yet as she faced her reflection, May pouted and
put on the look of one aggrieved.
"I am sorry I mentioned the book if you are so dreadfully against it,"
she observed stiffly. "I was only going to tell you a secret about the
author."
Mrs. Harbinger laughed lightly, flashing a comical grimace at her
visitor's back.
"There you go again, like everybody else! Do you suppose, May, that
there is anybody I know who hasn't told me a secret about the author?
Why, I'm in the confidence of at least six persons who cannot deny that
they wrote it."
May whirled around swiftly, leaving her reflection so suddenly that it,
offended, as quickly turned its back on her.
"Who are they?" she demanded.
"Well," the other answered quizzically, "Mrs. Croydon, for one."
"Mrs. Croydon! Why, nobody could dream that she wrote it!"
"But they do. It must have been written by some one that is inside the
social ring; and there is a good deal in the style that is like her
other books. I do wish," she went on, with a note of vexation in her
voice, "that Graham would ever forget to mix up my two tea-services. He
is a perfect genius for forgetting anything he ought to remember."
She walked, as she spoke, to the bell, and as she passed May the girl
sprang impulsively toward her, catching both her hands.
"Oh, Mrs. Harbinger!" she cried breathlessly. "I must tell you something
before anybody comes."
"Good gracious, May, what is it now? You are as impulsive as a pair of
bellows that could blow themselves."
The butler came ponderously in, in reply to her ring as she spoke, and
the two women for the moment suspended all sign of emotion.
"Graham," Mrs. Harbinger said, with the air of one long suffering and
well-nigh at the end of her patience, "you have mixed the teacups again.
Take out the tray, and bring in the cups with the broad gold band."
Graham took up the tray and departed, his back radiating protest until
the portière dropped behind him. When he was gone Mrs. Harbinger drew
May down to a seat on the sofa, and looked at her steadily.
"You evidently have really something to tell," she said; "and I have an
idea that it's mischief. Out with it."
May drew back with heightened color.
"Oh, I don't dare to tell you!" she exclaimed.
"Is it so bad as that?"
"Oh, it isn't bad, only--Oh, I don't know what in the world you will
think!"
"No matter what I think. I shan't tell you, my dear. No woman ever does
that."
May regarded her with a mixture of curiosity and wistfulness in her
look.
"You are talking that way just to give me courage," she said.
"Well, then," the other returned, laughing, "take courage, and tell me.
What have you been doing?"
"Only writing letters."
"Only! Good gracious, May! writing letters may be worse than firing
dynamite bombs. Women's letters are apt to be double-back-action
infernal-machines; and girls' letters are a hundred times worse. Whom
did you write to?"
"To the author of 'Love in a Cloud.'"
"To the author of 'Love in a Cloud'? How did you know him?"
Miss Calthorpe cast down her eyes, swallowed as if she were choking, and
then murmured faintly: "I don't know him."
"What? Don't know him?" her friend demanded explosively.
"Only the name he puts on his book: Christopher Calumus."
"Which of course isn't his name at all. How in the world came you to
write to him?"
The air of Mrs. Harbinger became each moment more judicially moral,
while that of May was correspondingly humble and deprecatory. In the
interval during which the forgetful Graham returned with the teacups
they sat silent. The culprit was twisting nervously a fold of her frock,
creasing it in a manner which would have broken the heart of the tailor
who made it. The judge regarded her with a look which was half
impatient, but full, too, of disapproving sternness.
"How could you write to a man you don't know," insisted Mrs.
Harbinger,--"a man of whom you don't even know the name? How could you
do such a thing?"
"Why, you see," stammered May, "I thought--that is--Well, I read the
book, and--Oh, you know, Mrs. Harbinger, the book is so perfectly
lovely, and I was just wild over it, and I--I--"
"You thought that being wild over it wasn't enough," interpolated the
hostess in a pause; "but you must make a fool of yourself over it."
"Why, the book was so evidently written by a gentleman, and a man that
had fine feelings," the other responded, apparently plucking up courage,
"that I--You see, I wanted to know some things that the book didn't
tell, and I--"
"You wrote to ask!" her friend concluded, jumping up, and standing
before her companion. "Oh, for sheer infernal mischief commend me to one
of you demure girls that look as if butter wouldn't melt in your mouths!
If your father had known enough to have you educated at home instead of
abroad, you'd have more sense."
"Oh, a girl abroad never would dare to do such a thing," May put in
naïvely.
"But you thought that in America a girl might do what she pleases. Why,
do you mean to tell me that you didn't understand perfectly well that
you had no business to write to a man that you don't know? I don't
believe any such nonsense."
May blushed very much, and hung her head.
"But I wanted so much to know him," she murmured almost inaudibly.
Mrs. Harbinger regarded her a moment with the expression of a mother who
has reached that stage of exasperation which is next halting-place
before castigation. Then she turned and walked vehemently up the
drawing-room and back, a quick sprint which seemed to have very little
effect in cooling her indignation.
"How long has this nonsense been going on?" she demanded, with a new
sternness in her voice.
"For--for six weeks," answered May tearfully. Then she lifted her
swimming eyes in pitiful appeal, and proffered a plea for mercy. "Of
course I didn't use my own name."
"Five or six weeks!" cried Mrs. Harbinger, throwing up her hands.
"But at first we didn't write more than once or twice a week."
The other stared as if May were exploding a succession of torpedoes
under her very nose.
"But--but," she stammered, apparently fairly out of breath with
amazement, "how often do you write now?"
May sprang up in her turn. She faced her mentor with the truly virtuous
indignation of a girl who has been proved to be in the wrong.
"I shan't tell you another word!" she declared.
Mrs. Harbinger seized her by the shoulders, and fairly pounced upon her
in the swoop of her words.
"How often do you write now?" she repeated. "Tell me before I shake
you!"
The brief defiance of May vanished like the flare of a match in a
wind-storm.
"Every day," she answered in a voice hardly audible.
"Every day!" echoed the other in a tone of horror.
Her look expressed that utter consternation which is beyond any
recognition of sin, but is aroused only by the most flagrant breach of
social propriety. Again the culprit put in what was evidently a prayer
for pity, couched in a form suggested by instinctive feminine cunning.
"Oh, Mrs. Harbinger, if you only knew what beautiful letters he writes!"
"What do I care for his beautiful letters? What did you want to drag me
into this mess for? Now I shall have to do something."
"Oh, no, no, Mrs. Harbinger!" cried May, clasping her hands. "Don't do
anything. You won't have to do anything. I had to tell you when he is
coming here."
Mrs. Harbinger stared at the girl with the mien of one who is convinced
that somebody's wits are hopelessly gone, and is uncertain whether they
are those of herself or of her friend.
"Coming here?" she repeated helplessly. "When?"
"This afternoon. I am really going to meet him!" May ran on, flashing
instantly from depression into smiles and animation. "Oh, I am so
excited!"
Mrs. Harbinger seized the girl again by the shoulder, and this time with
an indignation evidently personal as well as moral.
"Have you dared to ask a strange man to meet you at my house, May
Calthorpe?"
The other cringed, and writhed her shoulder out of the clutch of her
hostess.
"Of course not," she responded, taking in her turn with instant
readiness the tone of just resentment. "He wrote me that he would be
here."
The other regarded May in silence a moment, apparently studying her in
the light of these new revelations of character. Then she turned and
walked thoughtfully to a chair, leaving May to sit down again on the
sofa by which they had been standing. Mrs. Harbinger was evidently going
over in her mind the list of possible authors who might be at her
afternoon tea that day.
"Then 'Love in a Cloud' was written by some one we know," she observed
reflectively. "When did you write to him last?"
"When I was here yesterday, waiting for you to go to the matinée."
"Do you expect to recognize this unknown paragon?" asked Mrs. Harbinger
with an air perhaps a thought too dispassionate.
A charming blush came over May's face, but she answered with perfect
readiness:--
"He asked me to give him a sign."
"What kind of a sign?"
"He said he would wear any flower I named if I would--"
"Would wear one, too, you minx! That's why you have a red carnation at
your throat, is it? Oh, you ought to be shut up on bread and water for a
month!"
May showed signs of relapsing again into tears.
"I declare, I think you are just as horrid as you can be," she
protested. "I wish I hadn't told you a word. I'm sure there was no need
that I should. I--"
The lordly form of Graham the butler appeared at the drawing-room door.
"Mrs. Croydon," he announced.
II
THE MADNESS OF A MAN
While Mrs. Harbinger was receiving from May Calthorpe the disjointed
confession of that young woman's rashness, her husband, Tom Harbinger,
was having a rather confused interview with a client in his down-town
office. The client was a middle-aged man, with bushy, sandy hair, and an
expression of invincible simplicity not unmixed with obstinacy. Tom was
evidently puzzled how to take his client or what to do with him. He had,
as they talked, the air of being uncertain whether Mr. Barnstable was in
earnest, and of not knowing how far to treat him seriously.
"But why do you come to me?" he asked at length, looking at his client
as one regards a prize rebus. "Of course 'Love in a Cloud,' like any
other book, has a publisher. Why don't you go there to find out who
wrote it?"
The other shook his head wearily. He was a chunky man, seeming to be
made largely of oleaginous material, and appearing to be always
over-worn with the effort of doing anything with muscles and
determination hopelessly flabby despite his continual persistence.
"I've been to them," he returned; "but they won't tell."
"Then why not let the matter pass? It seems to me--"
The other set his square jaw the more firmly amid its abundant folds of
flabby flesh.
"Let it pass?" he interrupted with heavy excitement. "If something isn't
done to stop the infernal impudence of these literary scribblers there
will be no peace in life. There is nothing sacred! They ought to be
punished, and I'll follow this rascal if it costs me every dollar I'm
worth. I came to you because I thought you'd sympathize with me."
Mr. Harbinger moved uneasily in his chair like a worm on a hook.
"Why, really, Barnstable," he said, "I feel as you do about the
impudence of writers nowadays, and I'd like to help you if I could;
but--"
The other broke in with a solemn doggedness which might well discourage
any hope of his being turned from his purpose by argument.
"I mean to bring suit for libel, and that's the whole of it."
"Perhaps then," the lawyer responded with ill concealed irritation, "you
will be good enough to tell me whom the suit is to be against."
"Who should it be against? The author of 'Love in a Cloud,' of course."
"But we don't know who the author of that cursed book is."
"I know we don't know; but, damme, we must find out. Get detectives;
use decoy advertisements; do anything you like. I'll pay for it."
Mr. Harbinger shrugged his shoulders, and regarded his client with an
expression of entire hopelessness.
"But I'm not in the detective business."
The other gave no evidence of being in the least affected by the
statement.
"Of course a lawyer expects to find out whatever is necessary in
conducting his clients' business," he remarked, with the air of having
disposed of that point. "There must be a hundred ways of finding out who
wrote the book. An author ought not to be harder to catch than a
horse-thief, and they get those every day. When you've caught him, you
just have him punished to the extent of the law."
Harbinger rose from his chair and began to walk up and down with his
hands in his pockets. The other watched him in silence, and for some
moments nothing was said. At length the lawyer stopped before his
client, and evidently collected himself for a final effort.
"But consider," he said, "what your case is."
"My case is a good case if there is any justice in the country. The man
that wrote that book has insulted my wife. He has told her story in his
confounded novel, and everybody is laughing over her divorce. It is
infamous, Harbinger, infamous!"
He so glowed and smouldered with inner wrath that the folds of his fat
neck seemed to soften and to be in danger of melting together. His
little eyes glowed, and his bushy hair bristled with indignation. He
doubled his fist, and shook it at Harbinger as if he saw before him the
novelist who had intruded upon his private affairs, and he meant to
settle scores with him on the spot.
"But nobody knew that you had a wife," Harbinger said. "You came here
from Chicago without one, and we all thought that you were a bachelor."
"I haven't a wife; that's just the trouble. She left me four years ago;
but I don't see that that makes any difference. I'm fond of her just the
same; and I won't have her put into an anonymous book."
Harbinger sat down again, and drew his chair closer to that in which the
other seethed, molten with impotent wrath.
"Just because there's a divorced woman in 'Love in a Cloud,'" he said,
"you propose to bring a suit for libel against the author. If you will
pardon me, it strikes me as uncommon nonsense."
Barnstable boiled up as a caldron of mush breaks into thick, spluttering
bubbles.
"Oh, it strikes you as uncommon nonsense, does it? Damme, if it was your
wife you'd look at it differently. Isn't it your business to do what
your clients want done?"
"Oh, yes; but it's also my business to tell them when what they want is
folly."
"Then it's folly for a man to resent an insult to his wife, is it? The
divorce court didn't make a Pawnee Indian of me. My temper may be
incompatible, but, damme, Harbinger, I'm human."
Harbinger began a laugh, but choked the bright little bantling as soon
as it saw the light. He leaned forward, and laid his hand on the other's
knee.
"I understand your feelings, Barnstable," he said, "and I honor you for
them; but do consider a little. In the first place, there is no
probability that you could make a jury believe that the novelist meant
you and your wife at all. Think how many divorce suits there are, and
how well that story would fit half of them. What you would do would
be to drag to light all the old story, and give your wife the
unpleasantness of having everything talked over again. You would injure
yourself, and you could hardly fail to give very serious pain to her."
Barnstable stared at him with eyes which were full of confusion and of
helplessness.
"I don't want to hurt her," he stammered.
"What do you want to do?"
The client cast down his eyes, and into his sallow cheeks came a dull
flush.
"I wanted to protect her," he answered slowly; "and I wanted--I wanted
to prove to her that--that I'd do what I could for her, if we were
divorced."
The face of the other man softened; he took the limp hand of his
companion and shook it warmly.
"There are better ways of doing it than dragging her name before the
court," he said. "I tell you fairly that the suit you propose would be
ridiculous. It would make you both a laughing-stock, and in the end come
to nothing."
The square jaw was still firmly set, but the small eyes were more
wistful than ever.
"But I must do something," Barnstable said. "I can't stand it not to do
anything."
Harbinger rose with the air of a man who considers the interview ended.
"There is nothing that you can do now," he replied. "Just be quiet, and
wait. Things will come round all right if you have patience; but don't
be foolish. A lawyer learns pretty early in his professional life that
there are a good many things that must be left to right themselves."
Barnstable rose in turn. He seemed to be trying hard to adjust his mind
to a new view of the situation, but it was evident enough that his brain
was not of the sort to yield readily to fresh ideas of any kind. He
examined his hat carefully, passing his thumb and forefinger round the
rim as if to assure himself that it was all there; then he cleared his
throat, and regarded the lawyer wistfully.
"But I must do something," he repeated, with an air half apologetic. "I
can't just let the thing go, can I?"
"You can't do anything but let it go," was the answer. "Some time you
will be glad that you did let it be. Take my word for it."
Barnstable shook his head mournfully.
"Then you take away my chance," he began, "of doing something--"
He paused in evident confusion.
"Of doing something?" repeated Harbinger.
"Why, something, you know, to please--"
"Oh, to please your wife? Well, just wait. Something will turn up sooner
or later. Speaking of wives, I promised Mrs. Harbinger to come home to a
tea or some sort of a powwow. What time is it?"
"Yes, a small tea," Barnstable repeated with a queer look. "Pardon me,
but is it too intrusive in me to ask if I may go home with you?"
Harbinger regarded him in undisguised amazement; and quivers of
embarrassment spread over Barnstable's wavelike folds of throat and
chin.
"Of course it seems to you very strange," the client went on huskily;
"and I suppose it is etiquettsionally all wrong. Do you think your wife
would mind much?"
"Mrs. Harbinger," the lawyer responded, his voice much cooler than
before, "will not object to anybody I bring home."
The acquaintance of the two men was no more than that which comes from
casual meetings at the same club. The club was, however, a good one, and
membership was at least a guarantee of a man's respectability.
"I happen to know," Barnstable proceeded, getting so embarrassed that
there was reason to fear that in another moment his tongue would cleave
to the roof of his mouth and his husky voice become extinct altogether,
"that a person that I want very much to see will be there; and I will
take it as very kind--if you think it don't matter,--that is, if your
wife--"
"Oh, Mrs. Harbinger won't mind. Come along. Wait till I get my hat and
my bag. A lawyer's green bag is in Boston as much a part of his dress as
his coat is."
The lawyer stuffed some papers into his green bag, rolled down the top
of his desk, and took up his hat. The visitor had in the meantime been
picking from his coat imaginary specks of lint and smoothing his
unsmoothable hair.
"I hope I look all right," Barnstable said nervously. "I--I dressed
before I came here. I thought perhaps you would be willing--"
"Oh, ho," interrupted Harbinger. "Then this whole thing is a ruse, is
it? You never really meant to bring a suit for libel?"
The face of the other hardened again.
"Yes, I did," was his answer; "and I'm by no means sure that I've given
it up yet."
III
THE BABBLE OF A TEA
The entrance of Mrs. Croydon into Mrs. Harbinger's drawing-room was
accompanied by a rustling of stuffs, a fluttering of ribbons, and a
nodding of plumes most wonderful to ear and eye. The lady was of a
complexion so striking that the redness of her cheeks first impressed
the beholder, even amid all the surrounding luxuriance of her toilet.
Her eyes were large and round, and of a very light blue, offering to
friend or foe the opportunity of comparing them to turquoise or blue
china, and so prominent as to exercise on the sensitive stranger the
fascination of a deformity from which it seems impossible to keep the
glance. Mrs. Croydon was rather short, rather broad, extremely
consequential, and evidently making always a supreme effort not to be
overpowered by her overwhelming clothes. She came in now like a yacht
decorated for a naval parade, and moving before a slow breeze.
Mrs. Harbinger advanced a step to meet her guest, greeting the new-comer
in words somewhat warmer than the tone in which they were spoken.
"How do you do, Mrs. Croydon. Delighted to see you."
"How d' y' do?" responded the flutterer, an arch air of youthfulness
struggling vainly with the unwilling confession of her face that she was
no longer on the sunny side of forty. "How d' y' do, Miss Calthorpe?
Delighted to find you here. You can tell me all about your cousin
Alice's engagement."
Miss Calthorpe regarded the new-comer with a look certainly devoid of
enthusiasm, and replied in a tone not without a suggestion of
frostiness:--
"On the contrary I did not know that she was engaged."
"Oh, she is; to Count Shimbowski."
"Count Shimbowski and Alice Endicott?" put in Mrs. Harbinger. "Is that
the latest? Sit down, Mrs. Croydon. Really, it doesn't seem to me that
it is likely that such a thing could be true, and the relatives not be
notified."
She reseated herself as she spoke, and busied herself with the
tea-equipage. May rather threw herself down than resumed her seat.
"Certainly it can't be true," the latter protested. "The idea of Alice's
being engaged and we not know it!"
"But it's true; I have it direct," insisted Mrs. Croydon; "Miss
Wentstile told Mr. Bradish, and he told me."
May sniffed rather inelegantly.
"Oh, Miss Wentstile! She thinks because Alice is her niece she can do
what she likes with her. It's all nonsense. Alice has always been fond
of Jack Neligage. Everybody knows that."
Mrs. Croydon managed somehow to communicate to her innumerable streamers
and pennants a flutter which seemed to be meant to indicate violent
inward laughter.
"Oh, what a child you are, Miss Calthorpe! I declare, I really must put
you into my next novel. I really must!"
"May is still so young as to be romantic, of course," Mrs. Harbinger
remarked, flashing at her young friend a quick sidewise glance. "Besides
which she has been educated in a convent; and in a convent a girl must
be either imaginative or a fool, or she'll die of ennui."
"I suppose you never were romantic yourself," put in May defensively.
"Oh, yes, my dear; I had my time of being a fool. Why, once I even fell
violently in love with a man I had never seen."
The swift rush of color into the face of Miss Calthorpe might have
arrested the attention of Mrs. Croydon, but at that moment the voice of
Graham interrupted, announcing:--
"Mr. Bradish; Mr. Neligage."
The two men who entered were widely different in appearance.
That Mr. Bradish was considerably the elder was evident from his
appearance, yet he came forward with an eager air which secured for him
the first attention. He was lantern-jawed, and sanguine in color.
Near-sight glasses unhappily gave to his eyes an appearance of having
been boiled, and distorted his glance into an absurd likeness to a
leer. A shadow of melancholy, vague yet palpable, softened his face, and
was increased by the droop of his Don Quixote like yellow mustaches. The
bald spot on his head and the stoop in his shoulders betrayed cruelly
the fact that Harry Bradish was no longer young; and no less plainly
upon everything about him was stamped the mark of a gentleman.
Jack Neligage, on the other hand, came in with a face of irresistible
good nature. There was a twinkle in his brown eyes, a spark of humor and
kindliness which could evidently not be quenched even should there
descend upon him serious misfortune. His face was still young enough
hardly to show the marks of dissipation which yet were not entirely
invisible to the searching eye; his hair was crisp and abundant; his
features regular and well formed. He was a young fellow so evidently
intended by nature for pleasure that to expect him to take life
seriously would have seemed a sort of impropriety. An air of youth, and
of jocund life, of zest and of mirthfulness came in with Jack,
inevitably calling up smiles to meet him. Even disapproval smiled on
Jack; and it was therefore not surprising if he evaded most of the
reproofs which are apt to be the portion of an idle pleasure-seeker. He
moved with a certain languid alertness that was never hurried and yet
never too late. This served him well on the polo-field, where he was
deliberately swift and swiftly deliberate in most effective fashion. He
came into the drawing-room now with the easy mien of a favorite, yet
with an indifference which seemed so natural as to save him from all
appearance of conceit. He had the demeanor of the conscious but not
quite spoiled darling of fortune.
"You are just in time for the first brewing of tea," Mrs. Harbinger
said, when greetings had been exchanged. "This tea was sent me by a
Russian countess who charged me to let nobody drink it who takes cream.
It is really very good if you get it fresh."
"To have the tea and the hostess both fresh," Mr. Bradish responded,
"will, I fear, be too intoxicating."
"Never mind the tea," broke in Mrs. Croydon. "I am much more interested
in what we were talking about. Mr. Bradish, you can tell us about Count
Shimbowski and Alice Endicott."
Jack Neligage turned about with a quickness unusual in him.
"The Count and Miss Endicott?" he demanded. "What about them? Who's had
the impertinence to couple their names?"
Mrs. Croydon put up her hands in pretended terror, a hundred tags of
ribbon fluttering as she did so.
"Oh, don't blame me," she said. "I didn't do it. They're engaged."
Neligage regarded her with a glance of vexed and startled disfavor. Then
he gave a short, scornful laugh.
"What nonsense!" he said. "Nobody could believe that."
"But it's true," put in Bradish. "Miss Wentstile herself told me that
she had arranged the match, and that I might mention it."
Neligage looked at the speaker an instant with a disbelieving smile on
his lip; and tossing his head went to lean his elbow on the mantel.
"Arranged!" he echoed. "Good heavens! Is this a transaction in real
estate?"
"Marriage so often is, Mr. Neligage," observed Mrs. Harbinger, with a
smile.
Bradish began to explain with the solemn air which he had. He was often
as obtuse and matter-of-fact as an Englishman, and now took up the
establishment of the truth of his news with as much gravity as if he
were setting forth a point of moral doctrine. He seemed eager to prove
that he had at least been entirely innocent of any deception, and that
whatever he had said must be blamelessly credible.
"Of course it's extraordinary, and I said so to Miss Wentstile. She said
that as the Count is a foreigner, it was very natural for him to follow
foreign fashions in arranging the marriage with her instead of with
Alice."
"And she added, I've no doubt," interpolated Mrs. Harbinger, "that she
entirely approved of the foreign fashion."
"She did say something of that sort," admitted Bradish, with entire
gravity.
Mrs. Harbinger burst into a laugh, and trimmed the wick of her tea-lamp.
Neligage grinned, but his pleasant face darkened instantly.
"Miss Wentstile is an old idiot!" said he emphatically.
"Oh, come, Mr. Neligage," remonstrated his hostess, "that is too strong
language. We must observe the proprieties of abuse."
"And say simply that she is Miss Wentstile," suggested Mrs. Croydon
sweetly.
The company smiled, with the exception of May, whose face had been
growing longer and longer.
"I don't care what she says," the girl burst out indignantly; "I don't
believe Alice will listen to such a thing for one minute."
"Perhaps she won't," Bradish rejoined doubtfully, "but Miss Wentstile is
famous for having her own way. I'm sure I shouldn't feel safe if she
undertook to marry me off."
"She might take you for herself if she knew her power, Mr. Bradish,"
responded Mrs. Croydon. "No more tea, my dear, thank you."
"For Heaven's sake don't mention it then," he answered. "It's enough to
have Jack here upset. The news is evidently too much for him."
"What news has upset my son, Mr. Bradish?" demanded a crisp voice from
the doorway. "I shall disown him if he can't hide his feelings."
Past Graham, who was prepared to announce her, came a little woman,
bright, vivacious, sparkling; with clear complexion and mischievous
dimples. A woman trimly dressed, and in appearance hardly older than the
son she lightly talked of disowning. The youthfulness of Mrs. Neligage
was a constant source of irritation to her enemies, and with her
tripping tongue and defiant independence she made enemies in plenty. Her
gypsyish beauty and clear skin were offenses serious enough; but for a
woman with a son of five and twenty to look no more than that age
herself was a vexation which was not to be forgiven. Some had been
spiteful enough to declare that she preserved her youth by being
entirely free from feeling; but since in the same breath they were ready
to charge the charming widow with having been by her emotions carried
into all sorts of improprieties, the accusation was certainly to be
received with some reservations. Certainly she was the fortunate
possessor of unfailing spirits, of constant cleverness, and delightful
originality. She had the courage, moreover, of daring to do what she
wished with the smallest possible regard for conventions; and it has
never been clearly shown how much independence of conventionality and
freedom of life may effect toward the preservation of a woman's youth.
She evidently understood the art of entering a room well. She came
forward swiftly, yet without ungraceful hurry. She nodded brightly to
the ladies, gave Bradish the momentary pleasure of brushing her
finger-tips with his own as she passed him, then went forward to shake
hands with Mrs. Harbinger. Without having done anything in particular
she was evidently entire mistress of the situation, and the rest of the
company became instantly her subordinates. Mrs. Croydon, almost twice
her size and so elaborately overdressed, appeared suddenly to have
become dowdy and ill at ease; yet nothing could have been more
unconscious or friendly than the air with which the new-comer turned
from the hostess to greet the other lady. There are women to whom
superiority so evidently belongs by nature that they are not even at the
trouble of asserting it.
"Oh, Mrs. Neligage," Mrs. Croydon said, as she grasped at the little
glove which glanced over hers as a bird dips above the water, "you have
lived so much abroad that you should be an authority on foreign
marriages."
"Just as you, having lived in Chicago, should be an authority on
un-marriages, I suppose. Well, I've had the fun of disturbing a lot of
foreign marriages in my day. What marriage is this?"
"We were speaking of Miss Wentstile's proposing to marry Alice to Count
Shimbowski," explained Mrs. Harbinger.
"Then," returned Mrs. Neligage lightly, "you had better speak of
something else as quickly as possible, for Alice and her aunt are just
behind me. Let us talk of Mrs. Croydon's anonymous novel that's made
such a stir while I've been in Washington. What is it? 'Cloudy Love'!
That sounds tremendously improper. My dear, if you don't wish to see me
fall in a dead faint at your feet, do give me some tea. I'm positively
worn out."
She seated herself near Mrs. Croydon, over whose face during her remarks
had flitted several expressions, none of them over-amiable, and watched
the hostess fill her cup.
"Come, Mrs. Neligage," protested Bradish with an air of mild
solicitation. "You are really too bad, you know. It isn't 'Cloudy Love,'
but 'Love in a Cloud.' I didn't know that you confessed to writing it,
Mrs. Croydon."
"Oh, I don't. I only refuse to deny it."
"Oh, well, now; not to deny is equivalent to a confession," he returned.
"Not in the least," Mrs. Neligage struck in. "When you are dealing with
a woman, Mr. Bradish, it isn't safe even to take things by contraries."
IV
THE TICKLING OF AN AUTHOR
The entrance of Miss Wentstile and her niece Alice Endicott made the
company so numerous that it naturally broke up into groups, and the
general conversation was suspended.
Miss Wentstile was a lady of commanding presence, whose youth was with
the snows of yester year. She had the eye of a hawk and the jaw of a
bulldog; nor was the effect of these rather formidable features softened
by the strong aquiline nose. Her hair was touched with gray, but her
color was still fresh and too clear not to be natural. She was richly
dressed in dark green and fur, her complexion making the color possible
in spite of her years. She was a woman to arouse attention, and one,
too, who was evidently accustomed to dominate. She cast a keen glance
about her as she crossed the room to her hostess, sweeping her niece
along with her not without a suggestion that she dragged the girl as a
captive at her chariot-wheel.
Jack Neligage stepped forward as she passed him, evidently with the
intention of intercepting the pair, or perhaps of gaining a word with
Alice Endicott.
"How do you do, Miss Wentstile," he said. "I am happy to see you looking
so well."
"There is no reason why I should not look well, Mr. Neligage," she
responded severely. "I never sit up all night to smoke and drink and
play cards."
Neligage smiled his brightest, and made her a bow of mock deference.
"Indeed, Miss Wentstile," he responded, "I am delighted to know that
your habits have become so correct."
She retorted with a contemptuous sniff, and by so effectually
interposing between him and her niece that Miss Endicott could only nod
to him over her aunt's shoulder. Jack made a grimace more impertinent
than courtly, and for the time turned away, while the two ladies went on
to Mrs. Harbinger.
"Well, Alice," Mrs. Harbinger said, "I am glad you have come at last. I
began to think that I must appoint a substitute to pour in your place."
"I am sorry to be so late," Miss Endicott responded, as she and her
hostess exchanged places. "I was detained unexpectedly."
"I kept her," Miss Wentstile announced with grim suddenness. "I have
been talking to her about--"
"Aunt Sarah," interposed Alice hurriedly, "may I give you some tea?"
"Don't interrupt me, Alice. I was talking to her about--"
Mrs. Harbinger looked at the crimsoning cheeks of Alice, and meeting
the girl's imploring glance, gave her a slight but reassuring nod.
"My dear Miss Wentstile," she said, "I know you will excuse me; but here
are more people coming."
Miss Wentstile could hardly finish her remarks to the air, and as Mrs.
Harbinger left her to greet a new arrival the spinster turned sharply to
May Calthorpe, who had snuggled up to Alice in true school-girl fashion.
"Ah, May," Miss Wentstile observed, "what do you settle down there for?
Don't you know that now you have been brought out in society you are
expected to make your market?"
"No, Miss Wentstile," May responded; "if my market can't make itself,
then it may go unmade."
The elder turned away with another characteristic sniff, and Alice and
May were left to themselves. People were never tired of condemning Miss
Wentstile for her brusque and naked remarks; but after all society is
always secretly grateful for any mortal who has the courage to be
individual. The lady was often frank to the verge of rudeness; she was
so accustomed to having her own way that one felt sure she would insist
upon it at the very Judgment Seat; she said what she pleased, and
exacted a deference to her opinions and to her wishes such as could
hardly under existing human conditions be accorded to any mortal. Miss
Wentstile must have been too shrewd not to estimate reasonably well the
effect of her peculiarities, and no human being can be persistently
eccentric without being theatrical. It was evident enough that she
played in some degree to the gallery; and undoubtedly from this it is to
be argued that she was not without some petty enjoyment in the notoriety
which her manners produced. Should mankind be destroyed, the last thing
to disappear would probably be human vanity, which, like the grin of the
Cheshire cat in "Alice," would linger after the race was gone. Vanity in
the individual is nourished by the notice of others; and if Miss
Wentstile became more and more confirmed in her impertinences, it is
hardly to be doubted that increase of vanity was the cause most active.
She outwardly resented the implication that she was eccentric; but as
she contrived continually and even complacently to become steadily more
so, society might be excused for not thinking her resentment
particularly deep. Dislike for notoriety perhaps never cured any woman
of a fault; and certainly in the case of Miss Wentstile it was not in
the least corrective.
The relations between Miss Wentstile and Alice Endicott were well known.
Alice was the doubly orphaned daughter of a gallant young officer killed
in a plucky skirmish against superior force in the Indian troubles, and
of the wife whose heart broke at his loss. At six Alice was left, except
for a small pension, practically penniless, and with no nearer relative
than Miss Wentstile. That lady had undertaken the support of the child,
but had kept her much at school until the girl was sixteen. Then the
niece became an inmate of her aunt's house, and outwardly, at least,
the mere slave of the older lady's caprices. Miss Wentstile was kind in
her fashion. In all that money bought she was generous. Alice was richly
dressed, she might have what masters she wished, be surrounded by
whatever luxuries she chose. As if the return for these benefits was to
be implicit obedience, Miss Wentstile was impatient of any show toward
herself of independence. If Alice could be imagined as bearing herself
coldly and haughtily toward the world in general,--a possibility hardly
to be conceived of,--Miss Wentstile might be pictured glorying in such a
display of proper spirit; but toward her aunt the girl was expected to
be all humility and concession. As neither was without the pride which
belonged to the Wentstile blood, it is easy to see that perfect harmony
was not to be looked for between the pair. Alice had all the folly of
girlhood, which is so quick to refuse to be bullied into affection;
which is so blind as not to perceive that an elder who insists upon its
having no will of its own is providing excellent lessons in the high
graces of humility and meekness. Clever observers--and society remains
vital chiefly in virtue of its clever observers--detected that Miss
Wentstile chafed with an inward consciousness that the deference of her
niece was accorded as a courtesy and not as a right. The spinster had
not the tact to avoid betraying her perception that the submission of
Alice was rather outward than inward, and the public sense of justice
was somewhat appeased in its resentment at her domineering treatment by
its enjoyment of her powerlessness either to break the girl's spirit or
force her into rebellion.
The fondness of Alice for Jack Neligage was the one tangible thing with
which Miss Wentstile could find fault; and this was so intangible after
all that it was difficult to seize upon it. Nobody doubted that the two
were warmly attached. Jack had never made any effort to hide his
admiration; and while Alice had been more circumspect, the instinct of
society is seldom much at fault in a matter of this sort. For Miss
Wentstile to be sure that her niece favored the man of all others most
completely obnoxious, and to bring the offense home to the culprit were,
however, matters quite different. Now that Miss Wentstile had outdone
herself in eccentricity by boldly adopting the foreign fashion of a
_mariage de convenance_, there was every reason to believe that the real
power of the spinster would be brought to the test. Nobody doubted that
behind this absurd attempt to make a match between Alice and Count
Shimbowski lay the determination to separate the girl from Jack
Neligage; and it was inevitable that the struggle should be watched for
with eager interest.
The first instant that there was opportunity for a confidential word,
May Calthorpe rushed precipitately upon the subject of the reported
engagement.
"Oh, Alice," she said, in a hurried half-whisper, "do you know that Miss
Wentstile says she has arranged an engagement between you and that
horrid Hungarian Count."
Alice turned her long gray eyes quickly to meet those of her companion.
"Has she really told of it?" she demanded almost fiercely.
"They were all talking of it before you came in," May responded.
Her voice was deepened, apparently by a tragic sense of the gravity of
the subject under discussion; yet she was a bud in her first season, so
that it was impossible that there should not also be in her tone some
faint consciousness of the delightfully romantic nature of the
situation.
An angry flush came into the cheek of Miss Endicott. She was not a girl
of striking face, although she had beautiful eyes; but there was a
dignity in her carriage, an air of birth and breeding, which gave her
distinction anywhere. She possessed, moreover, a sweet sincerity of
character which made itself subtly felt in her every tone and movement.
Now she knit her forehead in evident perplexity and resentment.
"But did they believe it?" she asked.
"Oh, they would believe anything of Miss Wentstile, of course," May
replied. "We all know Aunt Sarah too well not to know that she is
capable of the craziest thing that could be thought of."
She picked out a fat bonbon as she spoke, and nibbled it comfortably, as
if thoroughly enjoying herself.
"But what can I do?" demanded Alice pathetically. "I can't stand up here
and say: 'Ladies and gentlemen, I really have no idea of marrying that
foreign thing Aunt Sarah wants to buy for me.'"
Whatever reply May might have made was interrupted by the arrival of a
gentleman with an empty teacup. The new-comer was Richard Fairfield, a
young man of not much money but of many friends, and of literary
aspirations. As he crossed the drawing-room Mrs. Neligage carelessly
held out to him her cup and saucer.
"As you are going that way, Richard," she said without preface of
salutation, "do you mind taking my cup to the table?"
"Delighted, of course," he answered, extending his hand for it.
"If Mrs. Neligage will permit me," broke in Mr. Bradish, darting
forward. "I beg ten thousand pardons for not perceiving--"
"But Mrs. Neligage will not permit you, Mr. Bradish," she responded
brightly. "I have already commissioned Richard."
Fairfield received the cup, and bore it away, while Bradish cast upon
the widow a glance of reproach and remonstrance.
"You women all pet a rising author," he said. "I suppose it's because
you all hope to be put in his books."
"Oh, no. On the contrary it is because we hope to be left out."
"I don't see," he went on with little apparent relevancy, "why you need
begrudge me the pleasure of doing you a small favor."
"I don't wish you to get too much into the habit of doing small favors,"
she responded over her shoulder, as she turned back to the group with
which she had been chatting. "I am afraid that if you do, you'll fail
when I ask a great one."
Fairfield made his way to the table where Alice was dispensing tea. He
was by her welcomed cordially, by May with a reserve which was evidently
absent-minded regret that he should break in upon her confidences with
her cousin. He exchanged with Alice the ordinary greetings, and then
made way for a fresh arrival who wished for tea. May responded rather
indifferently to his remarks as he took a chair at the end of the sofa
upon which she was seated, seeming so absorbed that in a moment he
laughed at some irrelevant reply which she gave.
"You did not understand what I said," he remarked. "I didn't mean--"
"I beg your pardon," she interrupted, turning toward him. "I was
thinking of something I was talking about with Alice, and I didn't mind
what you did say."
"I am sorry that I interrupted."
"Oh, everybody interrupts at an afternoon tea," she responded, smiling.
"That is what we are here for, I suppose. I was simply in a cloud--"
Fairfield returned her smile with interest.
"Is that an allusion?"
May flushed a little, and put her hand consciously to the carnation at
her throat.
"Oh, no," she answered, with a little too much eagerness. "I can talk of
something beside that book. Though of course," she added, "I do think
it is a perfectly wonderful story. There is so much heart in it. Why, I
have read it so much that I know parts of it almost word for word."
"Then you don't think it is cynical?"
"Oh, not the least in the world! How can anybody say that? I am ashamed
of you, Mr. Fairfield."
"I didn't mean that I thought it cynical; but lots of folk do, you
know."
May tossed her hands in a girlish gesture of disdain.
"I hate people that call everything cynical. It is a thing that they
just say to sound wise. 'Love in a Cloud' is to me one of the truest
books I ever read. Why, you take that scene where she tells him she
cares for him just the same in spite of his disgrace. It brings the
tears into my eyes every time I read it."