The Captain's Toll-Gate Part 14

Mrs. Easterfield knew exactly where the book was, but she preferred to allow Olive to occupy herself in looking for it, while she kept her eyes on the hall.

"Wait a moment, Olive," said she; "a visitor has just arrived, and I want to make him acquainted with you."

Olive rose with a book in her hand, and Mrs. Easterfield presented Mr.

Hemphill to Miss Asher. As she did so, Mrs. Easterfield kept her eyes steadily fixed upon the young lady's face. With a pleasant smile Olive returned Mr. Hemphill's bow. She was generally glad to make new acquaintances.

"Mr. Hemphill is one of my husband's business a.s.sociates," said Mrs.

Easterfield, still with her eyes on Olive. "He has just come from him."

"Did he send us this fine day by you?" said Olive. "If so, we are greatly obliged to him."

The young man answered that, although he had not brought the day, he was delighted that he had come in company with it.

"What atrocious commonplaces!" thought Mrs. Easterfield. "The girl does not know him from Adam!"

Here was a disappointment; the thrill, the pallor, the involuntary start, were totally absent; and the first act of the little play was a failure. But Mrs. Easterfield hoped for better things when the curtain rose again. She conducted Mr. Hemphill to the Foxes and let Olive go away with her book; and, as soon as she had the opportunity, she read the letter from her husband.

"With this I send you Mr. Hemphill," he wrote. "I don't know what you want to do with him, but you must take good care of him. He is a most valuable secretary, and an estimable young man. As soon as you have done with him please send him back."

"I am glad he is estimable," said Mrs. Easterfield to herself. "That will make the matter more satisfactory to Tom when I explain it to him."

When d.i.c.k Lancaster, properly booted and wearing a felt hat, returned the borrowed horse, he was met by Mr. Locker, who had been wandering about the front of the house, and when he had dismounted d.i.c.k was somewhat surprised by the hearty handshake he received.

"I am sorry to have to tell you," said the poet, "that there is another one."

"Another what?" asked d.i.c.k.

"Another unnecessary victim," replied Locker. And with this he returned to the front of the house.

At last Olive came down the stairs, and she was alone. Locker stepped quickly up to her.

"If I should marry," he said, "would I be expected to entertain that Austrian?"

She stopped, and gave the question her serious consideration. "I should think," she said, "that that would depend a good deal upon whom you should marry."

"How can you talk in that way?" he exclaimed. "As if there were anything to depend upon!"

"Nothing to depend upon," said Olive, slightly raising her eyebrows.

"That is bad." And she went into the dining-room.

The afternoon was an exceptionally fine one, but the party at Broadstone did not take advantage of it; there seemed to be a spirit of unrest pervading the premises, and when the carriage started on a drive along the river only Mr. and Mrs. Fox were in it. Mrs. Easterfield would not leave Olive and Mr. Hemphill, and she did not encourage them to go.

Consequently there were three young men who did not wish to go.

"It seems to me," said Mr. Fox, as they rolled away, "that a young woman, such as Miss Asher, has it in her power to interfere very much with the social feeling which should pervade a household like this. If she were to satisfy herself with attracting one person, all the rest of us might be content to make ourselves happy in such fas.h.i.+ons as might present themselves."

"The rest of us!" exclaimed Mrs. Fox.

"Yes," replied her husband. "I mean you, and Mrs. Easterfield, and myself, and the rest. That young woman's indeterminate methods of fascination interfere with all of us."

"I don't exactly see how they interfere with me," said Mrs. Fox rather stiffly.

"If the carriage had been filled, as was expected," said her husband, "I might have had the pleasure of driving you in a buggy."

She turned to him with a smile. "Immediately after I spoke," she said, "I imagined you might be thinking of something of that kind."

Mrs. Easterfield was not a woman to wait for things to happen in their own good time. If possible, she liked to hurry them up. In this Olive and Hemphill affair there was really nothing to wait for; if she left them to themselves there would be no happenings. As soon as was possible, she took Olive into her own little room, where she kept her writing-table, and into whose sacred precincts her secretary was not allowed to penetrate.

"Now, then," said she, "what do you think of Mr. Hemphill?"

"I don't think of him at all," said Olive, a little surprised. "Is there anything about him to think of?"

"He sat by you at luncheon," said Mrs. Easterfield.

"I know that," said Olive, "and he was better than an empty chair. I hate sitting by empty chairs."

"Olive," exclaimed Mrs. Easterfield with vivacity, "you ought to remember that young man!"

"Remember him?" the girl e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed.

"Certainly," said Mrs. Easterfield. "After what you told me about him, I expected you would recognize him the moment you saw him. But you did not know him; you did not do anything I expected you to do; and I was very much disappointed."

"What are you talking about?" asked Olive.

"I am talking about Mr. Hemphill; Mr. Rupert Hemphill; who, about seven years ago, was engaged in the Philadelphia Navy-Yard, and who came to your house on business with your father. From what you told me of him I conjectured that he might now be my husband's Philadelphia secretary, for his name is Rupert, and I had reason to believe that he was once engaged in the navy-yard. When I found out I was entirely correct in my supposition I had him sent here, and I looked forward with the most joyous antic.i.p.ations to being present when you first saw him. But it was all a fiasco! I suppose some people might think I was unwarrantably meddling in the affairs of others, but as it was in my power to create a most charming romance, I could not let the opportunity pa.s.s."

Olive did not hear a word of Mrs. Easterfield's latest remarks; her round, full eyes were fixed upon the wall in front of her, but they saw nothing. Her mind had gone back seven years.

"Is it possible," she exclaimed presently, "that that is my Rupert, my beautiful Rupert of the roseate cheeks, the Rupert of my heart, my only love! The Endymion-like youth I watched for every day; on whom I gazed and gazed and wors.h.i.+ped and longed for when he had gone; of whom I dreamed; to whom my soul went out in poetry; whose miniature I would have painted on the finest ivory if I had known how to paint; and whose image thus created I would have worn next my heart to look at every instant I found myself alone, if it had not been that my dresses were all fastened down the back! I am going to him this instant! I must see him again! My Rupert, my only love!" And with this she started to the door.

"Olive," cried Mrs. Easterfield, springing from her chair, "stop, don't you do that! Come back. You must not--"

But the girl had flown down the stairs, and was gone.

_CHAPTER XIII_

_Mr. Lancaster's Backers._

Olive found Mr. Hemphill under a tree upon the lawn. He was sitting on a low bench with one little girl upon each knee. He was not a stranger to the children, for they had frequently met him during their winter residences in cities. He was telling them a story when Olive approached.

He made an attempt to rise, but the little girls would not let him put them down.

"Don't move, Mr. Hemphill," said Olive; "I am going to sit down myself."

And as she spoke she drew forward a low bench. "I am so glad to see you are fond of children, Mr. Hemphill," she continued; "you must have changed very much."

"Changed!" he exclaimed. "I have always been fond of them."