THE MISTRESS OF THE LAWNS
Strange to say, the episode in which Keith had figured as the reliever
of Norman Wentworth's embarrassment had a very different effect upon
those among whom he had moved, from what he had expected. Keith's part
in the transaction was well known.
His part, too, in the Wickersham matter was understood by his
acquaintances. Wickersham had as good as absconded, some said; and there
were many to tell how long they had prophesied this very thing, and how
well they had known his villany. Mrs. Nailor was particularly
vindictive. She had recently put some money in his mining scheme, and
she could have hanged him. She did the next thing: she damned him. She
even extended her rage to old Mrs. Wickersham, who, poor lady, had lost
her home and everything she had in the world through Ferdy.
The Norman-Wentworths, who had moved out of the splendid residence that
Mrs. Norman's extravagance had formerly demanded, into the old house on
Washington Square, which was still occupied by old Mrs. Wentworth, were,
if anything, drawn closer than ever to their real friends; but they were
distinctly deposed from the position which Mrs. Wentworth had formerly
occupied in the gay set, who to her had hitherto been New York. They
were far happier than they had ever been. A new light had come into
Norman's face, and a softness began to dawn in hers which Keith had
never seen there before. Around them, too, began to gather friends whom
Keith had never known of, who had the charm that breeding and kindness
give, and opened his eyes to a life there of which he had hitherto
hardly dreamed. Keith, however, to his surprise, when he was in New
York, found himself more sought after by his former acquaintances than
ever before. The cause was a simple one. He was believed to be very
rich. He must have made a large fortune. The mystery in which it was
involved but added to its magnitude. No man but one of immense wealth
could have done what Keith did the day he stopped the run on Wentworth &
Son. Any other supposition was incredible. Moreover, it was now plain
that in a little while he would marry Mrs. Lancaster, and then he would
be one of the wealthiest men in New York. He was undoubtedly a coming
man. Men who, a short time ago, would not have wasted a moment's thought
on him, now greeted him with cordiality and spoke of him with respect;
women who, a year or two before, would not have seen him in a ball-room,
now smiled to him on the street, invited him among their "best
companies," and treated him with distinguished favor. Mrs. Nailor
actually pursued him. Even Mr. Kestrel, pale, thin-lipped, and frosty as
ever in appearance, thawed into something like cordiality when he met
him, and held out an icy hand as with a wintry smile he congratulated
him on his success.
"Well, we Yankees used to think we had the monopoly of business ability,
but we shall have to admit that some of you young fellows at the South
know your business. You have done what cost the Wickershams some
millions. If you want any help at any time, come in and talk to me. We
had a little difference once; but I don't let a little thing like that
stand in the way with a friend."
Keith felt his jaws lock as he thought of the same man on the other side
of a long table sneering at him.
"Thank you," said he. "My success has been greatly exaggerated. You'd
better not count too much on it."
Keith knew that he was considered rich, and it disturbed him. For the
first time in his life he felt that he was sailing under false colors.
Often the fair face, handsome figure, and cordial, friendly air of Alice
Lancaster came to him; not so often, it is true, as another, a younger
and gentler face, but still often enough. He admired her greatly. He
trusted her. Why should he not try his fortune there, and be happy?
Alice Lancaster was good enough for him. Yes, that was the trouble. She
was far too good for him if he addressed her without loving her utterly.
Other reasons, too, suggested themselves. He began to find himself
fitting more and more into the city life. He had the chance possibly to
become rich, richer than ever, and with it to secure a charming
companion. Why should he not avail himself of it? Amid the glitter and
gayety of his surroundings in the city, this temptation grew stronger
and stronger. Miss Abby's sharp speech recurred to him. He was becoming
"a fair counterfeit" of the men he had once despised. Then came a new
form of temptation. What power this wealth would give him! How much good
he could accomplish with it!
When the temptation grew too overpowering he left his office and went
down into the country. It always did him good to go there. To be there
was like a plunge in a cool, limpid pool. He had been so long in the
turmoil and strife of the struggle for success--for wealth; had been so
wholly surrounded by those who strove as he strove, tearing and
trampling and rending those who were in their way, that he had almost
lost sight of the life that lay outside of the dust and din of that
arena. He had almost forgotten that life held other rewards than riches.
He had forgotten the calm and tranquil region that stretched beyond the
moil and anguish of the strife for gain.
Here his father walked with him again, calm, serene, and elevated, his
thoughts high above all commercial matters, ranging the fields of lofty
speculation with statesmen, philosophers, and poets, holding up to his
gaze again lofty ideals; practising, without a thought of reward, the
very gospel of universal gentleness and kindness.
There his mother, too, moved in spirit once more beside him with her
angelic smile, breathing the purity of heaven. How far away it seemed
from that world in which he had been living!--as far as they were from
the worldlings who made it.
Curiously, when he was in New York he found himself under the allurement
of Alice Lancaster. When he was in the country he found that he was in
love with Lois Huntington.
It was this that mystified him and worried him. He believed--that is, he
almost believed--that Alice Lancaster would marry him. His friends
thought that she would. Several of them had told him so. Many of them
acted on this belief. And this had something to do with his retirement.
As much as he liked Alice Lancaster, as clearly as he felt how but for
one fact it would have suited that they should marry, one fact changed
everything: he was not in love with her.
He was in love with a young girl who had never given him a thought
except as a sort of hereditary friend. Turning from one door at which
the light of happiness had shone, he had found himself caught at another
from which a radiance shone that dimmed all other lights. Yet it was
fast shut. At length he determined to cut the knot. He would put his
fate to the test.
Two days after he formed this resolve he walked into the hotel at
Brookford and registered. As he turned, he stood face to face with Mrs.
Nailor. Mrs. Nailor of late had been all cordiality to him.
"Why, you dear boy, where did you come from?" she asked him in pleased
surprise. "I thought you were stretched at Mrs. Wentworth's feet in
the--Where has she been this summer?"
Keith's brow clouded. He remembered when Wickersham was her "dear boy."
"It is a position I am not in the habit of occupying--at least, toward
ladies who have husbands to occupy it. You are thinking of some one
else," he added coldly, wishing devoutly that Mrs. Nailor were
in Halifax.
"Well, I am glad you have come here. You remember, our friendship began
in the country? Yes? My husband had to go and get sick, and I got really
frightened about him, and so we determined to come here, where we should
be perfectly quiet. We got here last Saturday. There is not a man here."
"Isn't there?" asked Keith, wishing there were not a woman either. "How
long are you going to stay?" he asked absently.
"Oh, perhaps a month. How long shall you be here?"
"Not very long," said Keith.
"I tell you who is here; that little governess of Mrs. Wentworth's she
was so disagreeable to last winter. She has been very ill. I think it
was the way she was treated in New York. She was in love with Ferdy
Wickersham, you know? She lives here, in a lovely old place just outside
of town, with her old aunt or cousin. I had no idea she had such a nice
old home. We saw her yesterday. We met her on the street."
"I remember her; I shall go and see her," said Keith, recalling Mrs.
Nailor's speech at Mrs. Wickersham's dinner, and Lois's revenge.
"I tell you what we will do. She invited us to call, and we will go
together," said Mrs. Nailor.
Keith paused a moment in reflection, and then said casually:
"When are you going?"
"Oh, this afternoon."
"Very well; I will go."
Mrs. Nailor drove Keith out to The Lawns that afternoon.
In a little while Miss Huntington came in. Keith observed that she was
dressed as she had been that evening at dinner, in white, but he did
not dream that it was the result of thought. He did not know with what
care every touch had been made to reproduce just what he had praised, or
with what sparkling eyes she had surveyed the slim, dainty figure in the
old cheval-glass. She greeted Mrs. Nailor civilly and Keith warmly.
"I am very glad to see you. What in the world brought you here to this
out-of-the-way place?" she said, turning to the latter and giving him
her cool, soft hand, and looking up at him with unfeigned pleasure, a
softer and deeper glow coming into her cheek as she gazed into his eyes.
"A sudden fit of insanity," said Keith, taking in the sweet, girlish
figure in his glance. "I wanted to see some roses that I knew bloomed in
an old garden about here."
"He, perhaps, thought that, as Brookford is growing so fashionable now,
he might find a mutual friend of ours here?" Mrs. Nailor said.
"As whom, for instance?" queried Keith, unwilling to commit himself.
"You know, Alice Lancaster has been talking of coming here? Now, don't
pretend that you don't know. Whom does every one say you are--all in
pursuit of?"
"I am sure I do not know," said Keith, calmly. "I suppose that you are
referring to Mrs. Lancaster, but I happened to know that she was not
here. No; I came to see Miss Huntington." His face wore an expression of
amusement.
Mrs. Nailor made some smiling reply. She did not see the expression in
Keith's eyes as they, for a second, caught Lois's glance.
Just then Miss Abigail came in. She had grown whiter since Keith had
seen her last, and looked older. She greeted Mrs. Nailor graciously, and
Keith cordially. Miss Lois, for some reason of her own, was plying Mrs.
Nailor with questions, and Keith fell to talking with Miss Abigail,
though his eyes were on Lois most of the time.
The old lady was watching her too, and the girl, under the influence of
the earnest gaze, glanced around and, catching her aunt's eye upon her,
flashed her a little answering smile full of affection and tenderness,
and then went on listening intently to Mrs. Nailor; though, had Keith
read aright the color rising in her cheeks, he might have guessed that
she was giving at least half her attention to his side of the room,
where Miss Abigail was talking of her. Keith, however, was just then
much interested in Miss Abigail's account of Dr. Locaman, who, it
seemed, was more attentive to Lois than ever.
"I don't know what she will do," she said. "I suppose she will decide
soon. It is an affair of long standing."
Keith's throat had grown dry.
"I had hoped that my cousin Norman might prove a protector for her; but
his wife is not a good person. I was mad to let her go there. But she
would go. She thought she could be of some service. But that woman is
such a fool!"
"Oh, she is not a bad woman," interrupted Keith.
"I do not know how bad she is," said Miss Abigail. "She is a fool. No
good woman would ever have allowed such an intimacy as she allowed to
come between her and her husband; and none but a fool would have
permitted a man to make her his dupe. She did not even have the excuse
of a temptation; for she is as cold as a tombstone."
"I assure you that you are mistaken," defended Keith. "I know her, and I
believe that she has far more depth than you give her credit for--"
"I give her credit for none," said Miss Abigail, decisively. "You men
are all alike. You think a woman with a pretty face who does not talk
much is deep, when she is only dull. On my word, I think it is almost
worse to bring about such a scandal without cause than to give a real
cause for it. In the latter case there is at least the time-worn excuse
of woman's frailty."
Keith laughed.
"They are all so stupid," asserted Miss Abigail, fiercely. "They are
giving up their privileges to be--what? I blushed for my sex when I was
there. They are beginning to mistake civility for servility. I found a
plenty of old ladies tottering on the edge of the grave, like myself,
and I found a number of ladies in the shops and in the churches; but in
that set that you go with--! They all want to be 'women'; next thing
they'll want to be like men. I sha'n't be surprised to see them come to
wearing men's clothes and drinking whiskey and smoking tobacco--the
little fools! As if they thought that a woman who has to curl her hair
and spend a half-hour over her dress to look decent could ever be on a
level with a man who can handle a trunk or drive a wagon or add up a
column of figures, and can wash his face and hands and put on a clean
collar and look like--a gentleman!"
"Oh, not so bad as that," said Keith.
"Yes; there is no limit to their folly. I know them. I am one myself."
"But you do not want to be a man?"
"No, not now. I am too old and dependent. But I'll let you into a
secret. I am secretly envious of them. I'd like to be able to put them
down under my heel and make them--squeal."
Mrs. Nailor turned and spoke to the old lady. She was evidently about to
take her leave. Keith moved over, and for the first time addressed Miss
Huntington.
"I want you to show me about these grounds," he said, speaking so that
both ladies could hear him. He rose, and both walked out of the parlor.
When Mrs. Nailor came out, Keith and his guide were nowhere to be found,
so she had to wait; but a half-hour afterwards he and Miss Huntington
came back from the stables.
As they drove out of the grounds they passed a good-looking young fellow
just going in. Keith recognized Dr. Locaman.
"That is the young man who is so attentive to your young friend," said
Mrs. Nailor; "Dr. Locaman. He saved her life and now is going to
marry her."
It gave Keith a pang.
"I know him. He did not save her life. If anybody did that, it was an
old country doctor, Dr. Balsam."
"That old man! I thought he was dead years ago."
"Well, he is not. He is very much alive."
A few evenings later Keith found Mrs. Lancaster in the hotel. He had
just arrived from The Lawns when Mrs. Lancaster came down to dinner. Her
greeting was perfect. Even Mrs. Nailor was mystified. She had never
looked handsomer. Her black gown fitted perfectly her trim figure, and a
single red rose, half-blown, caught in her bodice was her only ornament.
She possessed the gift of simplicity. She was a beautiful walker, and as
she moved slowly down the long dining-room as smoothly as a piece of
perfect machinery, every eye was upon her. She knew that she was being
generally observed, and the color deepened in her cheeks and added the
charm of freshness to her beauty.
"By Jove! what a stunning woman!" exclaimed a man at a table near by to
his wife.
"It is not difficult to be 'a stunning woman' in a Worth gown, my dear,"
she said sweetly. "May I trouble you for the Worcestershire?"
Keith's attitude toward Mrs. Lancaster puzzled even so old a veteran as
Mrs. Nailor.
Mrs. Nailor was an adept in the art of inquisition. To know about her
friends' affairs was one of the objects of her life, and it was not only
the general facts that she insisted on knowing: she proposed to be
acquainted with their deepest secrets and the smallest particulars. She
knew Alice Lancaster's views, or believed she did; but she had never
ventured to speak on the subject to Gordon Keith. In fact, she stood in
awe of Keith, and now he had mystified her by his action. Finally, she
could stand it no longer, and so next evening she opened fire on Keith.
Having screwed her courage to the sticking-point, she attacked boldly.
She caught him on the verandah, smoking alone, and watching him closely
to catch the effect of her attack, said suddenly:
"I want to ask you a question: are you in love with Alice Lancaster?"
Keith turned slowly and looked at her, looked at her so long that she
began to blush.
"Don't you think, if I am, I had better inform her first?" he said
quietly.
Mrs. Nailor was staggered; but she was in for it, and she had to fight
her way through. "I was scared to death, my dear," she said when she
repeated this part of the conversation, "for I never know just how he is
going to take anything; but he was so quiet, I went on."
"Well, yes, I think you had," she said; "Alice can take care of herself;
but I tell you that you have no right to be carrying on with that sweet,
innocent young girl here. You know what people say of you?"
"No; I do not," said Keith. "I was not aware that I was of sufficient
importance here for people to say anything, except perhaps a few persons
who know me."
"They say you have come here to see Miss Huntington?"
"Do they?" asked Keith, so carelessly that Mrs. Nailor was just thinking
that she must be mistaken, when he added: "Well, will you ask people if
they ever heard what Andrew Jackson said to Mr. Buchanan once when he
told him it was time to go and dress to receive Lady Wellesley?"
"What did he say?" asked Mrs. Nailor.
"He said he knew a man in Tennessee who had made a fortune by attending
to his own business."
Having failed with Keith, Mrs. Nailor, the next afternoon, called on
Miss Huntington. Lois was in, and her aunt was not well; so Mrs. Nailor
had a fair field for her research. She decided to test the young girl,
and she selected the only mode which could have been successful with
herself. She proposed a surprise. She spoke of Keith and noticed the
increased interest with which the girl listened. This was promising.
"By the way," she said, "you know the report is that Mr. Keith has at
last really surrendered?"
"Has he? I am so glad. If ever a man deserved happiness it is he. Who is
it?"
The entire absence of self-consciousness in Lois's expression and voice
surprised Mrs. Nailor.
"Mrs. Lancaster," she said, watching for the effect of her answer. "Of
course, you know he has always been in love with her?"
The girl's expression of unfeigned admiration of Mrs. Lancaster gave
Mrs. Nailor another surprise. She decided that she had been mistaken in
suspecting her of caring for Keith.
"He has evidently not proposed yet. If she were a little older I should
be certain of it," she said to herself as she drove away; "but these
girls are so secretive one can never tell about them. Even I could not
look as innocent as that to save my life if I were interested."
That evening Keith called at The Lawns. He did not take with him a
placid spirit. Mrs. Nailor's shaft had gone home, and it rankled. He
tried to assure himself that what people were thinking had nothing to do
with him. But suppose Miss Abigail took this view of the matter? He
determined to ascertain. One solution of the difficulty lay plain before
him: he could go away. Another presented itself, but it was
preposterous. Of all the women he knew Lois Huntington was the least
affected by him in the way that flatters a man. She liked him, he knew;
but if he could read women at all, and he thought he could, she liked
him only as a friend, and had not a particle of sentiment about him. He
was easy, then, as to the point Mrs. Nailor had raised; but had he the
right to subject Lois to gossip? This was the main thing that troubled
him. He was half angry with himself that it kept rising in his mind. He
determined to find out what her aunt thought of it, and decided that he
could let that direct his course. This salved his conscience. Once or
twice the question dimly presented itself whether it were possible that
Lois could care for him. He banished it resolutely.
When he reached The Lawns, he found that Miss Abigail was sick, so the
virtuous plan he had formed fell through. He was trying to fancy himself
sorry; but when Lois came out on the verandah in dainty blue gown which
fell softly about her girlish figure, and seated herself with
unconscious grace in the easy-chair he pushed up for her, he knew that
he was glad to have her all to himself. They fell to talking about
her aunt.
"I am dreadfully uneasy about her," the girl said. "Once or twice of
late she has had something like fainting spells, and the last one was
very alarming. You don't know what she has been to me." She looked up at
him with a silent appeal for sympathy which made his heart beat. "She is
the only mother I ever knew, and she is all I have in the world." Her
voice faltered, and she turned away her head. A tear stole down her
cheek and dropped in her lap. "I am so glad you like each other. I hear
you are engaged," she said suddenly.
He was startled; it chimed in so with the thought in his mind at the
moment.
"No, I am not; but I would like to be."
He came near saying a great deal more; but the girl's eyes were fixed on
him so innocently that he for a moment hesitated. He felt it would be
folly, if not sacrilege, to go further.
Just then there was a step on the walk, and the young man Keith had
seen, Dr. Locaman, came up the steps. He was a handsome man, stout, well
dressed, and well satisfied.
Keith could have consigned him and all his class to a distant and torrid
clime.
He came up the steps cheerily and began talking at once. He was so glad
to see Keith, and had he heard lately from Dr. Balsam?--"such a fine
type of the old country doctor," etc.
No, Keith said; he had not heard lately. His manner had stiffened at
the young man's condescension, and he rose to go.
He said casually to Lois, as he shook hands, "How did you hear the piece
of news you mentioned?"
"Mrs. Nailor told me. You must tell me all about it."
"I will sometime."
"I hope you will be very happy," she said earnestly; "you deserve to
be." Her eyes were very soft.
"No, I do not," said Keith, almost angrily. "I am not at all what you
suppose me to be."
"I will not allow you to say such things of yourself," she said,
smiling. "I will not stand my friends being abused even by themselves."
Keith felt his courage waning. Her beauty, her sincerity, her
tenderness, her innocence, her sweetness thrilled him. He turned back to
her abruptly.
"I hope you will always think that of me," he said earnestly. "I promise
to try to deserve it. Good-by."
"Good-by. Don't forget me." She held out her hand.
Keith took it and held it for a second.
"Never," he said, looking her straight in the eyes. "Good-by"; and with
a muttered good-by to Dr. Locaman, who stood with wide-open eyes gazing
at him, he turned and went down the steps.
"I don't like that man," said the young Doctor. This speech sealed his
fate.
"Don't you? I do," said Lois, half dreamily. Her thoughts were far from
the young physician at that moment; and when they returned to him, she
knew that she would never marry him. A half-hour later, he knew it.
The next morning Lois received a note from Keith, saying he had left for
his home.
When he bade Mrs. Lancaster good-by that evening, she looked as if she
were really sorry that he was going. She walked with him down the
verandah toward where his carriage awaited him, and Keith thought she
had never looked sweeter.
He had never had a confidante,--at least, since he was a college
boy,--and a little of the old feeling came to him. He lingered a little;
but just then Mrs. Nailor came out of the door near him. For a moment
Keith could almost have fancied he was back on the verandah at Gates's.
Her mousing around had turned back the dial a dozen years.
Just what brought it about, perhaps, no one of the participants in the
little drama could have told; but from this time the relations between
the two ladies whom Keith left at the hotel that Summer night somehow
changed. Not outwardly, for they still sat and talked together; but they
were both conscious of a difference. They rather fenced with each other
after that. Mrs. Nailor set it down to a simple cause. Mrs. Lancaster
was in love with Gordon Keith, and he had not addressed her. Of this she
was satisfied. Yet she was a little mystified. Mrs. Lancaster hardly
defined the reason to herself. She simply shut up on the side toward
Mrs. Nailor, and barred her out. A strange thing was that she and Miss
Huntington became great friends. They took to riding together, walking
together, and seeing a great deal of each other, the elder lady spending
much of her time up at Miss Huntington's home, among the shrubbery and
flowers of the old place. It was a mystification to Mrs. Nailor, who
frankly confessed that she could only account for it on the ground that
Mrs. Lancaster wanted to find out how far matters had gone between Keith
and Miss Huntington. "That girl is a sly minx," she said. "These
governesses learn to be deceptive. I would not have her in my house."
If there was a more dissatisfied mortal in the world than Gordon Keith
that Autumn Keith did not know him. He worked hard, but it did not ease
his mind. He tried retiring to his old home, as he had done in the
Summer; but it was even worse than it had been then. Rumor came to him
that Lois Huntington was engaged. It came through Mrs. Nailor, and he
could not verify it; but, at least, she was lost to him. He cursed
himself for a fool.
The picture of Mrs. Lancaster began to come to him oftener and oftener
as she had appeared to him that night on the verandah--handsome,
dignified, serene, sympathetic. Why should he not seek release by this
way? He had always admired, liked her. He felt her sympathy; he
recognized her charm; he appreciated her--yes, her advantage. Curse it!
that was the trouble. If he were only in love with her! If she were not
so manifestly advantageous, then he might think his feeling was more
than friendship; for she was everything that he admired.
He was just in this frame of mind when a letter came from Rhodes, who
had come home soon after Keith's visit to him. He had not been very
well, and they had decided to take a yacht-cruise in Southern waters,
and would he not come along? He could join them at either Hampton Roads
or Savannah, and they were going to run over to the Bermudas.
Keith telegraphed that he would join them, and two days later turned his
face to the South. Twenty-four hours afterwards he was stepping up the
gangway and being welcomed by as gay a group as ever fluttered
handkerchiefs to cheer a friend. Among them the first object that had
caught his eye as he rowed out was the straight, lithe figure of Mrs.
Lancaster. A man is always ready to think Providence interferes
specially in his, case, provided the interpretation accords with his own
views, and this looked to Keith very much as if it were Providence. For
one thing, it saved him the trouble of thinking further of a matter
which, the more he thought of it, the more he was perplexed. She came
forward with the others, and welcomed him with her old frank, cordial
grasp of the hand and gracious air. When he was comfortably settled, he
felt a distinct self-content that he had decided to come.
A yacht-cruise is dependent on three things: the yacht itself, the
company on board, and the weather. Keith had no cause to complain of
any of these.
The "Virginia Dare" was a beautiful boat, and the weather was
perfect--just the weather for a cruise in Southern waters. The company
were all friends of Keith; and Keith found himself sailing in Summer
seas, with Summer airs breathing about him. Keith was at his best. He
was richly tanned by exposure, and as hard as a nail from work in the
open air. Command of men had given him that calm assurance which is the
mark of the captain. Ambition--ambition to be, not merely to
possess--was once more calling to him with her inspiring voice, and as
he hearkened his face grew more and more distinguished. Providence,
indeed, or Grinnell Rhodes was working his way, and it seemed to him--he
admitted it with a pang of contempt for himself at the admission--that
Mrs. Lancaster was at least acquiescent in their hands. Morning after
morning they sat together in the shadow of the sail, and evening after
evening together watched the moon with an ever-rounder golden circle
steal up the cloudless sky. Keith was pleased to find how much
interested he was becoming. Each day he admired her more and more; and
each day he found her sweeter than she had been before. Once or twice
she spoke to him of Lois Huntington, but each time she mentioned her,
Keith turned the subject. She said that they had expected to have her
join them; but she could not leave her aunt.
"I hear she is engaged," said Keith.
"Yes, I heard that. I do not believe it. Whom did you hear it from?"
"Mrs. Nailor."
"So did I."