The Open Question Part 59

Mrs. Gano sank her voice, although the heavy parlor-door was shut.

"Emmie has just told me that Ethan has some plan of giving you children a dog-cart. Now, I can't have that."

"I thought you would object. I said so."

"You were perfectly right. Of course Ethan doesn't realize; he offers these things out of sheer amiability and carelessness. It's a bagatelle to him. To us"--she laid her hand on Val's arm--"it is a question of the principle. We must guard against nothing so carefully as a habit of accepting things from a rich relation. It is a situation full of peril to personal dignity, to continuance of esteem."

Thank Heaven, thought Val, that shameless letter asking for money had the sense to go and lose itself! What a disgrace to have brought upon her family! She felt a spasm of nervous relief go down her spine at the thought of that guilty secret having escaped detection.

Mrs. Gano had gone and opened the front door.

"Make haste, and you won't be so very late."

Val went with lagging steps to the parlor, and came hurrying out with her things. Ethan had not even looked round. He was laughing at something Emmie was saying.

"We haven't seen Harry Wilbur lately; ask him if he can't come in to-night," said Mrs. Gano, as she saw Val off.

Oh yes, a great deal of water had flowed under the bridge since her own daughter was young.

It was plain that Ethan was a great success in New Plymouth. Not that any of the neighbors knew him as yet, not that he had gone anywhere except to St. Thomas's that first Sunday; but such glimpses as the inhabitants had of him, whether at his rather absent-minded devotions or driving about with Mrs. Gano, had roused a fever of interest. The fact of his great wealth, combined with his somewhat glowering good looks, his slow transforming smile, ran away with hearts by the score, and made the tumble-down Fort a centre of seething gossip and excitement. Harry Wilbur was known to look upon the new-comer with open suspicion.

"Can't say I've much use for an American who _isn't_ an American," said the florid Westerner to Julia Otway at the Hornsey "tea-fight."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, look at him."

"Where--where?"

Her unblus.h.i.+ng excitement seemed further to annoy the usually equable Wilbur.

"I don't mean he's here. But you've seen him, haven't you?"

"Oh yes, but only at a distance. Have you?"

"Quite near enough. He's like a Spaniard, or some kind of foreigner, and goes about looking as if he owned the earth."

"Well, he does own a good slice of it, and as to his looks, he's very much like all the rest of the Ganos except Val."

Julia had put great pressure upon herself not to rush over at once and make the new-comer's acquaintance. But there was a general feeling that, however much one naturally yearned to meet the attractive stranger, Mrs.

Gano's house was not the place that one could run in and out of without invitation. Julia's patience was rewarded by the bidding to supper, to which she had responded by the suggestion of tennis.

Her presence made a great difference in the family evening at the Fort.

John Gano's form of contribution to the entertainment of his guest was to play chess with him after supper, or else engage him in conversation on the subject of State Rights _versus_ Centralization. Several nights of such frivolity had satisfied Ethan.

"I hear that you play," he said to Julia Otway, as they came out from supper.

She, nothing loath, and seeming magnetized into forgetfulness of her usual restraint in Mrs. Gano's presence, followed him to the piano.

"Locked. Where's the key?" Ethan asked.

"In my dressing-case," said Mrs. Gano, nodding to Val.

As the girl came back into the parlor with the key, she caught sight of the expression of demure coquetry with which Julia, seated on the piano-stool, was looking up into Ethan's face. He was leaning against the piano, talking and laughing. Why, he hadn't looked as amused as that since he came! What _could_ Julia have said? With a sudden chill upon her spirit Val came forward and handed Ethan the key.

"Ah, here we are!"

He opened the piano, and Julia began to play. Ethan went over to the window and watched her.

Val sat by her father. Julia was distressingly pretty; there was no disguising the fact. Evidently cousin Ethan thought so. How absorbed he was! He was quite angry at the clatter some one was making at the front door. He knitted his dark brows impatiently. The interrupter must be Harry Wilbur; n.o.body else approached door-knockers in so athletic a spirit. Yes, it was Harry.

"How do you do? I'm _so_ glad to see you," said Val, with an overflowing cordiality that surprised her visitor quite as much as it gratified him.

He went and spoke in an undertone to Mrs. Gano, and then came back and sat on the other side of Val.

"You haven't told me yet why you were so late at the Hornseys to-day,"

he whispered.

"It just happened; everybody's late sometimes."

"Why didn't you come to the archery party yesterday?"

"Had something else to do."

"Had to go driving with cousin Croesus, eh?"

"If you saw me, why didn't you bow?"

"Why have you got your hair up? In honor of cousin Croesus? Don't look at me like that or I shall cry." His frank face wore a broad smile. "I _like_ your hair up; you look scrumptious."

"Hus.h.!.+ and listen to the exquisite playing."

"I ain't musical like cousin Croesus. _Your_ singing's the only music I care about."

"You don't care about it; you only pretend."

"I a.s.sure you, on my honor--"

"s.h.!.+ cousin Ethan's looking at us."

"What if he is? Great Caesar's ghost! Not that I blame him for looking at _you_. Specially lately, you--"

"Hus.h.!.+ and don't talk nonsense."

But cousin Ethan had lifted his head impatiently, and was making her a little sign for silence.

She shrank together as if at a blow. Ethan went back to the piano when Julia finished, and bent over her, speaking thanks and praises. He was asking for something of Brahms'. Julia began again. This was another success. Cousin Ethan was really impressed; no doubt about it. Emmie went over to the piano in the midst of the general conversation, and said in her clear treble: