Gordon Keith Part 29

exclaimed the other lady, as she slowly descended.

"Why, it is not any bigger than yours," protested Mrs. Wentworth.

"It's twice as large, and, besides, I was born in that and learned all its ups and downs and pa.s.sages and corners when I was a child, just as I learned the alphabet. But this house! It is as full of devious ways and pitfalls as the way in 'Pilgrim's Progress,' and I would never learn it any more than I could the multiplication table. Why, that second-floor suite you have given me is just like six-times-nine. When you first put me in there I walked around to learn my way, and, on my word, I thought I should never get back to my own room. I thought I should have to sleep in a bath-tub. I escaped from the bath-room only to land in the linen-closet. That was rather interesting. Then when I had calculated all your sheets and pillow-cases, I got out of that to what I recognized as my own room. No! it was the broom-closet--eight-times-seven! That was the only familiar thing I saw. I could have hugged those brooms. But, my dear, I never saw so many brooms in my life! No wonder you have to have all those servants. I suppose some of them are to sweep the other servants up. But you really must shut off those apartments and just give me one little room to myself; or, now that I have escaped from the labyrinth, I shall put on my bonnet and go straight home."

All this was delivered from the bottom step with a most amusing gravity.

"Well, now that you have escaped, come in here," said Mrs. Wentworth, laughing. "I want a friend of mine to know you--a young man--"

"A gentleman!"

"Yes; a young gentleman from--"

"My dear!" exclaimed the other lady. "I am not fit to see a young gentleman--I haven't on my new cap. I really could not."

"Oh, yes, you can. Come in. I want you to know him, too. He is--m--m--m--"

This was too low for Keith to hear. The next second Mrs. Wentworth turned and reentered the room, holding by the hand Keith's old lady of the train.

As she laid her eyes on Keith, she stopped with a little shriek, shut both eyes tight, and clutched Mrs. Wentworth's arm.

"My dear, it's my robber!"

"It's what?"

"My robber! He's the young man I told you of who was so suspiciously civil to me on the train. I can never look him in the face--never!"

Saying which, she opened her bright eyes and walked straight up to Keith, holding out her hand. "Confess that you are a robber and save me."

Keith laughed and took her hand.

"I know you took me for one." He turned to Mrs. Wentworth and described her making him count her bundles.

"You will admit that gentlemen were much rarer on that train than ruffians or those who looked like ruffians?" insisted the old lady, gayly. "I came through the car, and not one soul offered me a seat. You deserve all the abuse you got for being so hopelessly unfas.h.i.+onable as to offer any civility to a poor, lonely, ugly old woman."

"Abby, Mr. Keith does not yet know who you are. Mr. Keith, this is my cousin, Miss Brooke."

"Miss Abigail Brooke, spinster," dropping him a quaint little curtsy.

So this was little Lois's old aunt, Dr. Balsam's sweetheart--the girl who had made him a wanderer; and she was possibly the St. Abigail of whom Alice Yorke used to speak!

The old lady turned to Mrs. Wentworth.

"He is losing his manners; see how he is staring. What did I tell you?

One week in New York is warranted to break any gentleman of good manners."

"Oh, not so bad as that," said Mrs. Wentworth. "Now you sit down there and get acquainted with each other."

So Keith sat down by Miss Brooke, and she was soon telling him of her niece, who, she said, was always talking of him and his father.

"Is she as pretty as she was as a child?" Keith asked.

"Yes--much too pretty; and she knows it, too," smiled the old lady. "I have to hold her in with a strong hand, I tell you. She has got her head full of boys already."

Other callers began to appear just then. It was Mrs. Wentworth's day, and to call on Mrs. Wentworth was in some sort the cachet of good society. Many, it was true, called there who were not in "society" at all,--serene and self-contained old residents, who held themselves above the newly-rich who were beginning to crowd "the avenues" and force their way with a golden wedge,--and many who lived in splendid houses on the avenue had never been admitted within that dignified portal. They now began to drop in, elegantly dressed women and handsomely appointed girls. Mrs. Wentworth received them all with that graciousness that was her native manner. Miss Brooke, having secured her "new cap," was seated at her side, her faded face tinged with rising color, her keen eyes taking in the scene with quite as much avidity as Gordon's. Gordon had fallen back quite to the edge of the group that encircled the hostess, and was watching with eager eyes in the hope that, among the visitors who came in in little parties of twos and threes, he might find the face for which he had been looking. The name Wickersham presently fell on his ear.

"She is to marry Ferdy Wickersham," said a lady near him to another.

They were looking at a handsome, statuesque girl, with a proud face, who had just entered the room with her mother, a tall lady in black with strong features and a refined voice, and who were making their way through the other guests toward the hostess. Mrs. Wentworth greeted them cordially, and signed to the elder lady to take a seat beside her.

"Oh, no; she is flying for higher game than that." They both put up their lorgnons and gave her a swift glance.

"You mean--" She nodded over toward Mrs. Wentworth.

"Yes."

"Why, she would not allow him to. She has not a cent in the world. Her mother has spent every dollar her husband left her, trying to get her off."

"Yes; but she has spent it to good purpose. They are old friends. Mrs.

Wentworth does not care for money. She has all she needs. She has never forgotten that her grandfather was a general in the Revolution, and Mrs.

Caldwell's grandfather was one also, I believe. She looks down on the upper end of Fifth Avenue--the Wickershams and such. Don't you know what Mrs. Wentworth's cousin said when she heard that the Wickershams had a coat-of-arms? She said, 'Her father must have made it.'"

Something about the placid voice and air of the lady, and the knowledge she displayed of the affairs of others, awoke old a.s.sociations in Keith, and turning to take a good look at her, he recognized Mrs. Nailor, the inquiring lady with the feline manner and bell-like voice, who used to mouse around the verandah at Gates's during Alice Yorke's convalescence.

He went up to her and recalled himself. She apparently had some difficulty in remembering him, for at first she gave not the slightest evidence of recognition; but after the other lady had moved away she was more fortunate in placing him.

"You have known the Wentworths for some time?"

Keith did not know whether this was a statement or an inquiry. She had a way of giving a tone of interrogation to her statements. He explained that he and Norman Wentworth had been friends as boys.

"A dear fellow, Norman?" smiled Mrs. Nailor. "Quite one of our rising young men? He wanted, you know, to give up the most brilliant prospects to help his father, who had been failing for some time. Not failing financially?" she explained with the interrogation-point again.

"Of course, I don't believe those rumors; I mean in health?"

Keith had so understood her.

"Yes, he has quite gone. Completely shattered?" She sighed deeply. "But Norman is said to be wonderfully clever, and has gone in with his father into the bank?" she pursued. "The girl over there is to marry him--if her mother can arrange it? That tall, stuck-up woman." She indicated Mrs. Caldwell, who was sitting near Mrs. Wentworth. "Do you think her handsome?"

Keith said he did. He thought she referred to the girl, who looked wonderfully handsome in a tailor-made gown under a big white hat.

"Romance is almost dying out?" she sighed. "It is so beautiful to find it? Yes?"

Keith agreed with her about its charm, but hoped it was not dying out.

He thought of one romance he knew.

"You used to be very romantic? Yes?"

Keith could not help blus.h.i.+ng.

"Have you seen the Yorkes lately?" she continued. Keith had explained that he had just arrived. "You know Alice is a great belle? And so pretty, only she knows it too well; but what pretty girl does not? The town is divided now as to whether she is going to marry Ferdy Wickersham or Mr. Lancaster of Lancaster & Company. He is one of our leading men, considerably older than herself, but immensely wealthy and of a distinguished family. Ferdy Wickersham was really in love with"--she lowered her voice--"that girl over there by Mrs. Wentworth; but she preferred Norman Wentworth; at least, her mother did, so Ferdy has gone back to Alice? You say you have not been to see her? No? You are going, of course? Mrs. Yorke was so fond of you?"