University of Virginia Library

17. CHAPTER XVII.

So thoroughly deceived was Mrs. Chester
by Major Lawson's inventions, that she resolved
to come to an explanation with Frank
McAlister, and give him to understand that
his fears of wearying her with his society
were groundless.

We will not detail the conversation that
resulted; we will draw a partial veil over
this awkward exposure of an unbalanced
mind; we will skip at once to the finale of
the discordant duo. Imagine the confusion
and distress of our modest and kind-hearted
Titan when Mrs. Chester, after many insinuating
preambles, took his hand, pressed
it tenderly, and said, “Let us be friends.
Will you always be my friend? My best
friend?”

What made his situation more pitiable
was that her agitation (a mixture of anxiety,
of womanly shame, and of affection) was so
great as to be unconcealable.

“I have no intention of being other than
your friend, madam,” replied the unfortunately
honest youth.

This answer, and especially this “madam,”
stunned her. She inferred that he would be
no more than a friend, and that he looked
upon her as an elderly lady. Had he slapped
her in the face, he could hardly have stung
her more keenly or repulsed her more
completely than he did by that title of respect,
“madam.” Dropping his hand as if
it were a hot iron, she recoiled from him a
little and walked on in silence, her breast
heaving and her lips very near to quivering.

“I hope certainly that we shall always be
friends,” hastily added Frank, perceiving
that he had pained her, and deeply regretting
it.

“Certainly,” mechanically responded Mrs.
Chester, for the moment pathetic and almost
tragic. In the next breath she grew angry
and continued, with a touch of hysterical
irony, “O, certainly, sir! We understand
each other, I believe! Well, I must go in!
I am afraid of this damp air. Excuse me,
sir.”

And before Frank could say anything to
the purpose, she had forced herself from
him and was in the house.

“Upon my honor I don't understand it,”
muttered the stupefied chemist and mineralogist.
“Is it possible that she really wants
me to really flirt with her?”

Such a respect had he for womankind
that he impatiently dismissed this supposition,
as he had often dismissed it before.
Because of his born chivalrousness, and still
more because of his worship of Kate, he
canonized the whole sex.

He was surprised out of his reflections
by the apparition of Nellie Armitage from a
small, thickly trellised grape-arbor close at
his elbow. It was like the dash of a partridge
from a thicket at one's feet; or rather
it was more like the spring of a tiger from
a jungle; at all events, she startled him
roundly. He suspected at once that she
had overheard his final words with Mrs.
Chester, and he grew almost certain of it
when he came to notice her manner. Nodding
without speaking, she took his arm and
walked on rapidly, her nostrils dilated and
her quick breath audible. It was evident
that she was in a good old-fashioned Beaumont
fit of anger.

“Mrs. Armitage,” he said, thinking it
best to be at least partially frank, “I fear
that I have vexed your aunt by an awkward
speech of mine.”

“I wish you had boxed her ears,” broke
out Nellie. “I wanted to.”

He was enlightened: so Mrs. Chester was
really making love to him; at least Mrs.
Armitage believed it. He did not know
what more to say, and the awkward promenade
continued speechlessly.

“I was not in ambush,” the lady at last
observed. “I was dozing there — no sleep
last night — hateful letters. Your talking
waked me, and I heard — Well, let us say
no more about it. It is abominable. It is
disgraceful. So ridiculous! Oh!!”

“I beg your pardon?” queried the anxious
Frank. “I must ask one word more.
You are not blaming me?”

“You are only too patient, Mr. McAlister.
You are a gentleman. Let us say no
more about it.”

Emerging presently from an alley lined
with neglected shrubbery so overgrown that
a camel would have been troubled to look
over it, they came upon a little stretch of
flower-beds and discovered Kate gathering
materials for her mantel bouquets, while
Bent Armitage stood at her elbow with a
basket. Of the four persons who thus met,
every one colored more or less with disagreeable
surprise.

“I took the liberty of forcing my guardianship
on Miss Beaumont,” said Bent,
looking apologetically at his sister-in-law.
“The roses might have wanted to keep her,
you know.”

Mrs. Armitage gave Frank a glance which
said as plainly as eyes could speak, “I confide
in your promise.”

Then, turning to Bent, she ordained:
“You must leave your basket to Mr. McAlister.
I want to see you about things at
home.”

Surrendering his pleasant charge to his
rival, the young man followed Nellie, his
lamed foot slapping the ground in its usual
nonchalant style, and his singular, mechanical
smile curling up into his dark red check,
but his heart very ill at case.

“Bent,” commenced Nellie when they
were alone, “I have nothing to say to you
about your brother. There is enough to
tell, but it is the same old story, and there
is no use in telling it. The home that I
want to talk to you about is my home here.
What business have you strolling off alone
with my sister? I told you not to do it.”

“A fellow does n't want to have the air
of a boor,” he muttered sullenly. “Just
look at it now. A lady goes by with a basket
to pick flowers. Can't a man offer to
hold her basket? Is n't he obliged to do
it? Would you have him tilt back his chair
and go on smoking?”

“O, it 's easy explaining,” returned Nellie.
“But I am not to be trifled with, Bent.
You sha' n't court her. If you do, I 'll tell
my whole story to my father and brothers.
Then we 'll see if ever an Armitage enters
this house again.”

Bent was cowed at once and completely;
the threat was clearly a terrible one to him.

“Before God, I don't take Randolph's
part,” he said. “I know you have cause
of complaint enough. I wish to God he
was — ”

He stopped with a groan. His brother,
as he comprehended the matter now in hand,
was his evil genius, standing between him
and Kate Beaumont. In his grief and anger
he had come very near to wishing that
that brother was dead.

“I don't sustain him,” he resumed. “Besides,
Randolph is not a bad fellow at heart.
He is naturally a good fellow. You know
what it is that makes him raise the devil.”

“You are taking the same road,” was
Nellie's judgment. “You will be just like
him.”

“Never!” declared Bent. “You shall
see.”

She marched on with an unbelieving, unpitying
face, and he followed her with the
air of a criminal who asks for a remission
of sentence, and believes that he asks in
vain.

“Well, I must go, I suppose,” he said,
turning towards his horse as they neared
the house. “If you see old Miriam, tell her

to pray for me,” he added with a smile of
bitter humor. “What I want most is to
break my neck.”

“I am sorry, Bent,” replied Nellie, just
a little softened. “But depend upon it that
I am doing what is best. Just look at it
yourself. What sort of a state were you in
yesterday? You were — ”

She was interrupted by Mrs. Chester
calling from her window to Armitage that
she wanted to see Mrs. Devine, and would
ride home with him.

“Delighted,” grinned Bent. “I shall
have somebody to cheer me. Misery loves
company.”

Just as Kate and Frank returned chattering
and laughing to the house, the two
people who adored them cantered hastily
away, not sending a look backward.

Whether we want to or not, and whether
we find it pleasant or not, we must go back
to Mrs. Chester's heart-affairs, trusting soon
to come to an end of them. We will not,
however, try to analyze her present feelings;
the matter is altogether too complicated
and indiscriminate. As we value a
clear head we must confine ourselves to her
intentions, which were lucidly spiteful, mischievous,
and full of the devil. It was not
Mrs. Devine whom see wanted to see, but
that lady's dangerous flirt of a daughter,
Jenny; and before the day was out the old
coquette and the young one were closeted
in camarilla over Kate Beaumont's matrimonial
chances.

“You ought to help your cousin,” was
Mrs. Chester's adroit recommendation.

“Can't he do his own courtship?” sneered
Jenny. “You 'll be asking me next to fight
his duels for him.”

“I want him to get her,” pursued Mrs.
Chester, too much engaged in her own train
of thought to notice the sarcasm on her
protégé. “It would be very pleasant for us
all to have her married in the family, as it
were. We should n't lose the dear child,
you see.”

Jenny stared and nearly laughed, for this
phrase, “the dear child,” struck her as both
surprising and humorous, as she knew that
Aunt Marian was not given to the family
affections, nor even to counterfeiting them.

“Besides, it is so desirable to keep the
Kershaw estate in the relationship,” continued
the eager and absorbed Mrs. Chester.
“I must say that I wish poor Bent
may succeed.”

“And you want me to try to run off with
Frank McAlister,” laughed Jenny. “That 's
what you want, is it?”

The elder lady's eyes flashed; she was
far enough from wanting that.

“I won't do it,” added Jenny. “I believe
Kate likes him.”

“She does n't,” affirmed Mrs. Chester.

“Oh!” scoffed Jenny, incredulously.

“I tell you she does n't. Besides, she
ought not to. It would be the worst thing
in the world for her.”

And here came a long argument against
a match with a McAlister, going to show that
it would surely end in severing Kate from
her family, that it would make her miserable
for life, etc.

“There is something in that,” admitted
Jenny. “Yes, you are right; no doubt
about it. Well, take me over there and
give me a chance. I don't mind trying to
help Bent a little.”

“O, do say a word or two for the poor
fellow. As for Mr. McAlister, you need n't
mind him much. Just talk to him now and
then a moment, to keep him from getting
in Bent's way. Not that he means to get
in his way.”

“Yes,” answered Jenny, absent-mindedly.
She was in a revery about this Mr.
McAlister. Suppose he should fall in love
with her? Suppose she should fall in love
with him? Would it be very bad? Would
it be very nice? O dear!

The hospitality of the Beaumont house
was illimitable, and nobody was put out
when Mrs. Chester brought Jenny Devine
to stay a fortnight. On the contrary, the
little jilt was heartily welcomed, for she was
a favorite with the young men of the family,
while Peyton Beaumont still retained his
archi-patriarchal fancy for pretty women.
As, moreover, Wallace McAlister soon discovered
her whereabouts, and two or three
other stricken deer came daily to have their
wounds enlarged, Jenny had more than
beaux enough. But busy as she was with
her own affairs, she found time to keep her
promise to Mrs. Chester, and even to outrun
it. On the very evening of her arrival she
held a prolonged bedchamber conference
about love matters with Kate Beaumont.

“And so there is going to be no wedding
right away?” said Jenny, after some preliminary
catechizing.

“No, indeed,” replied Kate, with an ostentation
of calmness.

“I think he is splendid,” continued Jenny,
trusting that her friend would be thrown
off her guard and answer, “Is n't he!”

Getting no response, she added, pettingly,
“So tall! Such a beautiful complexion!
Come now, don't you like him? Don't you
like him just a little teenty-taunty bit?”

“I like everybody as much as that,” answered
Kate, hurrying to a closet on pretence
of hanging up a dress.

“Here, come to the light where I can see
you,” said Jenny, seizing her friend's bare
arms and drawing her towards the kerosene
lamp which was the Beaumont substitute
for gas. “O, how you blush!”

“Anybody would blush, pulled about and

catechized in this way,” protested Kate.
“How awfully strong you are! and impudent!
Real impudent!”

“O, tell me a little bit about it,” persevered
Jenny. “Could you refuse him?
If he should come and get on his knees,
and make himself only five feet high, and
say his little pitty-patty prayer to you, could
you refuse him?”

“Yes, I could,” declared Kate, amused
and perplexed and annoyed all at once.

“O, yes. But would you?”

“I would,” was the answer, uttered in a
changed tone, somewhat solemnizing.

Jenny let go of Kate's hands, studied her
suddenly sobered face for an instant, and
believed her.

“Well, Kitty, it 's awful,” she said at last,
with a mock-serious twist of her pretty
mouth. “Somebody must console the poor
man. I 'll do it.”

After a minute of meditation she added,
“And there 's my poor cousin cracked after
you. Will you take him?”

Kate, who at the moment was ready to
cry under such teasing, found a relief in
answering this question with something like
temper, “No!”

Jenny was so amused by this explosion
from her usually quiet friend, that she burst
into a shriek of laughter.

“Poor Bent!” she gasped. “Coffin
number two. Will they drown themselves,
I wonder, or take a cup of cold pizen together?
Pizen, I guess. Mr. McAlister
could n't drown himself without going to
the seaside. Just imagine them sitting down
to arsenic tea and quarrelling for the first
drawing.”

“Jenny, what does all this mean?” demanded
Kate, seriously. “Have you been
sent here to pump me?”

“No, no, no, no, no!” chattered Jenny,
“Why, wha-t an idea!”

“Excuse me,” said Kate. “I must go
now. Good night.”

And, with an exchange of kisses which
strikes us as sweetness wasted, the two girls
parted and went to bed, the one to laugh
herself to sleep over the interview, and the
other to — well, she did not laugh.

The next day, believing that Kate cared
little or nothing for Frank McAlister, and
believing also that it would be well if she
should never learn to care for him, Jenny
watched eagerly for the appearance of that
giant gentleman, and when he came, set her
nets for him. She was fearfully and wonderfully
successful; she got him away from
her friend and got him away from Mrs.
Chester; she made him take her to walk
and made him take her to ride. She played
backgammon with him, and euchre and high-low-jack,
crowing over him defiantly when
she beat him, and making pretty mouths at
him when he beat her. It seemed for two
or three days as if she only stayed at the
Beaumonts' to receive his visits, and as if
he only came there to see her. Something
of a romp and a good deal of a chatterer, she
had a thousand tricks for occupying and
amusing men, and killed time for them without
their being aware of it. The field was
the more easily her own for two reasons:
first, because Kate, mindful of her promise
to her sister, had lately taken to holding
the McAlister at a distance; and, second,
because that young chieftain, discouraged
at being treated with reserve and continually
hampered by either Mrs. Armitage or
Mrs. Chester, had come to a stand in his
courtship.

The result of this seeming flirtation between
the bothered Frank and the feather-headed
Jenny was a sentimental muddle.
Although Kate kept up a smiling face, she
did not at heart like the way things were
going, and she grew more reserved than
ever towards her admirer. Mrs. Chester
very rapidly became as jealous of Miss
Devine as she had been of Miss Beaumont.
Wallace detected the girl whom he loved
best in making eyes at his handsome brother,
and fell into a state of mind which was
likely to rob him of what hair he had left.
Nellie Armitage, now that she saw a chance
of loosing Frank as a brother-in-law, inclined
to think that her sister might go
farther and fare worse. From all that she
could learn of him, she had come to admit
that he was morally one of the finest young
fellows in the district. He scarcely drank
at all; he had never been known to gamble;
he had never been engaged in a squabble.
There were others, to be sure, as worthy as
he; there were Pickens Pendleton and the
Rev. Arthur Gilyard and Dr. Mattieson;
but Kate could not be got to care about
any of them. What if the child should
throw Frank McAlister away, only to pick
up Bent Armitage? In short, Nellie began
to lose distinct recollection of the feud with
the McAlisters, and to feel a little anxious,
if not a little pettish, over this flirtation of
Jenny Devine.

An explosion came; but of course it was
neither Kate nor Nellie who brought it
about; and equally, of course, it was Mrs.
Chester. That sensitive young thing (only
forty-five summers, please to remember) let
her heart go fully back to Frank as soon as
she saw him entangled with Jenny, and
lived a year or so of torture in three or four
days. It is perhaps impossible to write into
credibility the almost insane jealousy with
which she watched this girl of nineteen
coquetting with this youth of twenty-four.
But if you could have beheld the spasm
which pinched her lips and the snaky sparkle
which shot from her eyes when she discovered

them together, you would have believed
in the reality of her passion. Her emotions
were so strong that her reasoning powers,
never of any great value, were now not
worth a straw to her. She forgot that she
had done much to start Jenny on her present
adventure, and thought of her as an
unbidden intruder, impudent, cunning, false,
and selfish. She secretly gnashed her teeth
at her, and lay in wait to expel her. After
a sufficiency of this firing up, she all at once
broke through the crust and uttered herself
like a volcano.

“I don't know what your mother would
say to all this,” she began abruptly. Not
that she meant to be abrupt; in her excitement
it seemed to her that much had been
said already; that Jenny and everybody
else must know what was upon her mind.

“All what?” demanded the young lady,
her eyes opening wide at this sound of coming
tempest. She knew, like all Hartland,
that Mrs. Chester was a tartar; but she was,
nevertheless, surprised by the lunge now
made at her; in fact, Mrs. Chester was
capable of surprising anybody.

“O, of course,” sneered the old coquette,
not to be foiled by the supposed arts of a
young coquette.

“I don't understand you, Mrs. Chester,”
declared Jenny, drawing herself up with
the hauteur of self-respect, and looking her
assailant firmly in the face.

“Then it 's my duty to make you understand,”
was the reply of a woman whose
reason was dragging at the heels of her
emotion. “I think that, considering you
are not at home, you are flirting pretty
smartly.”

“You must be joking!” said the astounded
girl. “Why, you brought me here to —
what do you mean?”

“I mean what I say,” returned Mrs. Chester,
perfectly ready to quarrel and fit to go
to a maison de santé. You are flirting scandalously.”

“Why, you old gossip!” exclaimed Jenny,
suddenly and furiously indignant.

“Old! — gossip!” gasped Mrs. Chester,
looking as if a strait-jacket would be a
blessing to her.

“Where is Mr. Beaumont?” demanded
Jenny, quite as angry and not a bit intimidated.
“I want to see Mr. Beaumont.”

Mrs. Chester quailed as a lunatic might
who should hear his keeper called for.

“He is not at home,” she asserted, which
happened to be the case, although she did
not know it.

Jenny marched away with the swing of
an insulted hoyden; called for her dressing-maid
and had her trunks packed; evaded
Kate's questions as to the cause of her departure;
begged the loan of the Beaumont
coach, and drove home. On the way she
cried a little, and clenched her small fist a
number of times, and laughed hysterically
more than once.

Thus ended Jenny's visit to the Beaumonts;
but short as it was, it had brought
about one important result; it had led
Kate's sister to see the value of Kate's lover.
That very afternoon, even while Jenny Devine
was having her wickedness borne in
upon her by Mrs. Chester, Nellie had said
to the young man, in her characteristically
frank way, “How much have you changed
in the last week?”

“Not one bit,” was the earnest and honest
reply.

“Then I withdraw my opposition,” declared
Nellie. “You may succeed, if you
can.”

“I shall speak to her now,” returned
Frank, his heart throbbing as if it were of
volcanic nature and communicated with the
internal earthquake forces.

“Oh!” gasped Mrs. Armitage, quailing a
little under the suddenness of the thing, and
wishing, as all women do, to prolong a spectacle
of courtship. “O, so quick? But
you must see my father first,” she added,
recollecting that obstacle, likely, as she knew,
to be no obstacle at all. “You surely will
see him first?” she begged, feeling that she
had no right to command a man who was
invested with the great authority of love.
“And he is not at home.”

“I shall wait for his return,” was the decision
of a true lover.