Kitabı oku: «The Squirrel Inn», sayfa 4
X
ROSE VERSUS MAYBERRY
Miss Calthea Rose was a person of good height, originally slender, but gathering an appreciable plumpness as the years went on, and with good taste in dress when she chose to exert it, which on the present occasion she did. She possessed acute perceptions and a decided method of action. But whether or not the relation of her perceptions to her actions was always influenced by good judgment was a question with her neighbors. It never was, however, a question with herself.
When everybody but Mr. Tippengray had finished dinner, and he had desired the others not to wait for him as he would probably be occupied some time longer, the host and hostess went out to greet the visitor, followed by Mrs. Cristie and Lodloe. When Miss Calthea Rose turned to greet the latter lady her expression was cold, not to say hard; but when her eyes fell upon the gentleman by the side of the young widow, a softening warmth spread over her face, and she came forward with outstretched hands.
"Did you see that?" said Mrs. Petter, aside to her husband. "Jealous as she can be of Mrs. Cristie till she sees that she's got a young man of her own; then as sweet as sugar."
When Miss Calthea Rose set about to be as sweet as sugar, it was very good sugar that she took for her model. She liked to talk, but was not a mistress of words, and although her remarks were not always to the point, they were generally pointed. At last Mr. Tippengray came out on the piazza. He walked slowly, and he did not wear his usual ease of demeanor; but nothing could have been more cordial and reassuring than the greeting given him by Miss Calthea. If this were intended in any way to inspirit him, it failed of its effect. The Greek scholar stood apart, and did not look like a man who had made up his mind as to what he was going to do next; but Miss Calthea took no notice of his unusual demeanor. She talked with great graciousness to the company in general, and frequently directed remarks to Mr. Tippengray which indicated a high degree of good comradeship.
Under this general warmth Mr. Tippengray was forced to melt a little, and in a manner to accept the position thus publicly tendered him; but suddenly the maid Ida popped up the steps of the piazza. She had an open book in her hand, and she went directly and quickly to Mr. Tippengray. She held the book up towards him, and put her finger on a page.
"You were just here," she said, "when you had to go to your dinner. Now if you will finish the explanation I can go on nicely. You don't know how you help me. Every word you say seems to take root"; and she looked up into his face with sparkling eyes.
But not a sparkle sparkled from the eyes of the Greek scholar. He stood silently looking at the book, his face a little flushed, his eyes blinking as if the sunlight were too strong for him.
"Suppose you walk out on the lawn with me," said the nurse-maid, "and then we shall not disturb the others. I will not keep you more than five minutes."
She went down the steps of the piazza, and Mr. Tippengray, having apparently lost the power of making up his mind what he should do, did what she wanted him to do, and followed her. They did not walk very far, but stood barely out of hearing of the persons on the piazza; her eyes sparkling up into his face, as his helpful words took root in her understanding.
At the instant of the appearance of the maid Ida Miss Calthea Rose stopped talking. Her subsequent glances towards this young woman and Mr. Tippengray might have made one think of steel chilled to zero. Mrs. Cristie looked at Lodloe, and he at her, and both slightly smiled. "She understands that sort of thing," he thought, and "He understands that sort of thing," she thought.
At this moment Mrs. Petter glanced at her two guests and saw the smile which passed between them. She understood that sort of thing.
"Who is that?" said Miss Calthea Rose, presently.
Mrs. Cristie, full of the humor of the situation, hastened to answer.
"It is my nurse-maid," she said, "Ida Mayberry."
"A child's nurse!" ejaculated Miss Calthea Rose.
"Yes," said Mrs. Cristie; "that is what she is."
"I expect," said Mrs. Petter, "that he is teaching her Greek, and of course it's hard for her at the beginning. Mr. Tippengray's such a kind man that he would do anything for anybody, so far as he could; but I must admit that I can't see how Greek can help anybody to nurse children, unless there is some book on the subject in that language."
"Greek!" scornfully ejaculated Miss Calthea, and, turning her steely glance from the couple on the lawn, she began to talk to Mr. Petter about one of his cows which had broken its leg.
Ida Mayberry was a young woman who meant what she said, and in less than five minutes, with a sparkling glance of thanks, she released Mr. Tippengray. That gentleman returned to the piazza, but his appearance elicited no more attention from the lady who had so recently brought into view their friendly relationship than if he had been the head of a nail in the floor beneath her. From Mr. Petter she turned to speak to some of the others, and if her words and manner did not make Mr. Tippengray understand that, so far as she was concerned, he had ceased to exist, her success was not what she expected it to be.
Although he had been amused and interested, Walter Lodloe now thought that he had had enough of Miss Calthea Rose, and wandered away to the little garden at the foot of his staircase. He had not reached it before he was joined by Mr. Tippengray.
"Look here," said the latter, with something of his usual briskness; "if you are still in the humor, suppose we walk over to Lethbury."
Lodloe looked at him in surprise. "I thought you didn't want to go there," he said.
"I've changed my mind," replied the other. "I think this is a very good day to go to Lethbury. It is a pretty village, and you ought to have some one with you to show you its best points."
As soon as she thought etiquette would permit, Mrs. Cristie withdrew, pleading the interests of her baby as an excuse.
"Do you mean to tell me," said Miss Calthea Rose, the moment the young mother was out of hearing, "that she leaves her baby in the care of that thing with a book?"
"Oh, yes," was the answer; "Mrs. Cristie tells me she is a very good nurse-maid."
"Well," said Miss Calthea, "babies are troublesome, and it's often convenient to get rid of them, but I must say that I never heard of this new style of infanticide. I suppose there isn't any law against it yet."
Mr. Petter looked uneasy. He did not like fault found with Mrs. Cristie, who was a great favorite with him.
"I am inclined to think, Miss Calthea," he said, "that you judge that young person too harshly. I have formed a very good opinion of her. Not only does she attend to her duties, but she has a good mind. It may not be a fine mind, but it is a good mind. Her desire to learn from Mr. Tippengray is a great point in her favor."
Here Mrs. Petter, who sat near her husband, pressed violently upon his foot; but she was too late, the words had been said. Mrs. Petter prepared herself for a blaze, but none came. There was a momentary flash in the Calthean eyes, and then the lids came down and shut out everything but a line of steely light. Then she gazed out over the landscape, and presently again turned her face towards her companions, with nothing more upon it than her usual expression when in a bad humor.
"Do you know," she said abruptly, "that Lanigan Beam is coming back?"
"Goodness gracious!" exclaimed Mrs. Petter, "I thought he was settled in Patagonia."
"It was not Patagonia," said Mr. Petter; "it was Nicaragua."
"Well, I knew it was the little end of some place," said she; "and now he's coming back. Well, that is unfortunate."
"Unfortunate!" said Miss Calthea; "it's criminal. There ought to be a law against such things."
Again the host of the Squirrel Inn moved uneasily on his chair and crossed and recrossed his legs. He liked Lanigan Beam.
"I cannot see," he said, "why it is wrong for a man to return to the place where he was born."
"Born!" scornfully exclaimed Miss Calthea; "it's the greatest pity that there is any place where he was born; but there's no use talking about him. He has written to them at the hotel at Lethbury that he will be there the day after to-morrow, and he wants them to have a room ready for him. If he'd asked them to have a grave ready for him it would have been much more considerate."
Mr. Petter now rose to his feet; his manner was very dignified.
"Excuse me, Miss Calthea," he said, "but I must go and look after my men in the cornfield."
Miss Calthea Rose sat up very straight in her chair.
"If there's anything you want to do, Mrs. Petter, I beg you won't let me keep you."
"Now, Calthea," said Mrs. Petter, "don't work yourself into such a terrible stew. You know Stephen doesn't like to have Lanigan pitched into; I'm sorry for even what I said. But that about his grave was enough to rouse a saint."
Miss Calthea was on the point of retorting that that was something which Stephen Petter was not, by any means, but she restrained herself. If she quarreled with the Petters, and cut herself off from visiting the Squirrel Inn, a great part of the pleasure of her life would be gone.
"Well," she said, "we all know Lanigan Beam, and if there's anybody who wants the peace of the community to vanish entirely out of sight, the responsibility's on him, and not on me."
"Mrs. Petter," said Ida Mayberry, appearing so suddenly before that good woman that she seemed to have dropped through the roof of the piazza, "do you know where Mr. Tippengray is? I've been looking all over for him, and can't find him. He isn't in his little house, for I knocked at the door."
"Does Mrs. Cristie want him?" asked Mrs. Petter, making this wild grasp at a straw.
"Oh, no," said Ida. "It is I who want him. There's a Greek sentence in this book he lent me which I am sure I have not translated properly; and as the baby is asleep now, there couldn't be a better time for him to help me, if only I could find him."
Self-restraint was no longer possible with Miss Calthea Rose. A red blaze shot into her face, and without deigning to look in the direction of the creature who had just spoken, she said in the sharpest tones of contemptuous anger:
"Greek to a child's nurse! I expect next he'll teach French to the pigs."
The maid Ida lifted up her eyes from the book and fixed them on Miss Calthea.
"The best thing he could do," she quietly remarked, "would be to teach the old hens good manners"; and then she walked away with her book.
Miss Calthea sprang to her feet, and looked as if she was going to do something; but there was nothing to do, and she sat down again. Her brow was dark, her eyes flashed, and her lips were parted, as if she was about to say something; but there was nothing to say, and she sat silent, breathing hard. It was bad enough to be as jealous as Miss Calthea was at that moment, but to be so flagrantly insulted by the object of her jealousy created in her a rage that could not be expressed in words. It was fortunate that she did not look at Mrs. Petter, for that good lady was doing her best to keep from laughing.
"Well!" she exclaimed, as soon as she could speak composedly, "this is too much. I think I must speak to Mrs. Cristie about this. Of course she can't prevent the young woman from answering back, but I think I can make her see that it isn't seemly and becoming for nurse-maids to be associating with boarders in this way."
"If you take my advice, Susan Petter," said Miss Calthea, in a voice thickened by her emotions, "you will keep your mouth shut on that subject. If your boarders choose to associate with servants, let them alone. It simply shows what sort of people they are."
Calthea Rose did not like to hear herself speak in a voice which might show how she was feeling, and as there was no use of staying there if she could not talk, she rose to leave, and, in spite of Mrs. Petter's hospitable entreaty to make a longer stay, she departed.
When her visitor was well out of sight, Mrs. Petter allowed herself to lean back in her chair and laugh quietly.
"Leave them alone indeed," she said to herself. "You may want me to do it, but I know well enough that you are not going to leave them alone, Miss Calthea Rose, and I can't say that I wonder at your state of mind, for it seems to me that this is your last chance. If you don't get Mr. Tippengray, I can't see where you are going to find another man properly older than you are."
XI
LANIGAN BEAM
That evening about eleven o'clock Walter Lodloe was sitting in his room in the tower, his feet upon the sill of the large window which looked out over the valley. He had come up to his room an hour or two before, determined not to allow the whole day to pass without his having done any work; and now, having written several pages of the story on which he was engaged, he was enjoying the approbation of his conscience, the flavor of a good cigar, and the beautiful moonlighted scene which he beheld from his window.
More than this, he was thinking over the events of the day with a good deal of interest and amusement, particularly of his afternoon walk with Mr. Tippengray. He had taken a great fancy to that gentleman, who, without making any direct confidences, had given him a very fair idea of his relations with Calthea Rose. It was plain enough that he liked that very estimable person, and that he had passed many pleasant hours in her society, but that he did not at all agree with what he called her bigoted notions in regard to proprietorship in fellow-beings.
On the other hand, Lodloe was greatly delighted with Miss Calthea's manner of showing her state of mind. Quite unexpectedly they had met her in Lethbury, – to which village Mr. Tippengray had not thought she would return so soon, – and Lodloe almost laughed as he called to mind the beaming and even genial recognition that she gave to him, and which, at the same time, included effacement and extinction of his companion to the extent of being an admirable piece of dramatic art. The effect upon Lodloe had been such, that when the lady had passed he involuntarily turned to see if the Greek scholar had not slipped away just before the moment of meeting.
"When a woman tries so hard to show how little she thinks of a man," thought Lodloe, "it is a proof that she thinks a great deal of him, and I shall not be surprised – " Just then there came a tap at the window opposite the one at which he was sitting.
Now when a man in the upper room of a fairly tall tower, access to which is gained by a covered staircase the door at the bottom of which he knows he has locked, hears a tap at the window, he is likely to be startled. Lodloe was so startled that his chair nearly tipped over backward. Turning quickly, he saw a man's head and shoulders at the opposite window, the sash of which was raised. With an exclamation, Lodloe sprang to his feet. His lamp had been turned down in order that he might better enjoy the moonlight, but he could plainly see the man at the window, who now spoke:
"Hold hard," said he; "don't get excited. There's nothing out of the way. My name is Beam – Lanigan Beam. I tapped because I thought if I spoke first you might jump out of the window, being turned in that direction. May I come in?"
Lodloe made no answer; his mind did not comprehend the situation; he went to the window and looked out. The man was standing on the sharp ridge of a roof which stretched from the tower to the rear portion of the building. By reaching upward he was able to look into the window.
"Give me a hand," said the man, "and we'll consider matters inside. This is a mighty ticklish place to stand on."
Lodloe had heard a good deal that evening about Lanigan Beam, and although he was amazed at the appearance of that individual at this time and place, he was ready and willing to make his acquaintance. Bracing himself against the window-frame, he reached out his hand, and in a few moments Mr. Beam had scrambled into the room. Lodloe turned up the wick of his lamp, and by the bright light he looked at his visitor.
He saw a man rather long as to legs, and thin as to face, and dressed in an easy-fitting suit of summer clothes.
"Take a seat," said Lodloe, "and tell me to what I owe this call."
"To your lamp," said the other, taking a chair; "it wasn't burning very brightly, but still it was a light, and the only one about. I was on my way to Lethbury, but I couldn't get any sort of conveyance at Romney, so I footed it, thinking I would like a moonlight walk. But by the time I got to the squirrel on the post I thought I would turn in here and stay with Stephen Petter for the night; but the house was all shut up and dark except this room, and as I knew that if I woke Stephen out of a sound sleep he'd bang me over the head with his everlasting Rockmores of Germantown, I determined to take a night's lodging without saying a word to him about it.
"There's a room back here that you can only get into by a ladder put up on the outside. I knew all about it, so I went to the ice-house and got a ladder and climbed into the room. I put my valise under my head, and prepared to take a good sleep on the floor, but in three minutes I found the place was full of wasps. I couldn't stay there, you know, and I was just getting ready to go down the ladder again when I happened to look out of a window that opened on the roof, and saw you in here. I could see only the back of your head, but although it was pretty well lighted, I couldn't judge very well by that what sort of a person you were. But I saw you were smoking, and it struck me that a man who smokes is generally a pretty good fellow, and so I came over."
"Glad to see you," said Lodloe; "and what can I do for you?"
"Well, in the first place," said Beam, "have you any liquid ammonia? The first notice I had of the wasps in that room was this sting on my finger."
Lodloe was sorry that he did not possess anything of the kind.
"If I'm not mistaken," said the visitor, "there is a bottle of it on the top shelf of that closet. I have frequently occupied this room, and I remember putting some there myself. May I look for it?"
Permission being given, Mr. Beam speedily found the bottle, and assuaged the pains of his sting.
"Now then," said he, resuming his seat, "the next favor I'll ask will be to allow me to fill my pipe, and put to you a few questions as to the way the land lies about here at present. I've been away for a year and a half, and don't know what's going on, or who's dead or alive. By the way, have you happened to hear anybody speak of me?"
"I should think so," said Lodloe, laughing. "The greater part of this evening was occupied in a discussion on your life, adventures, moral character, disposition, and mental bias. There may have been some other points touched upon, but I don't recall them just now."
"Upon my word," said Lanigan Beam, putting his arms on the table, and leaning forward, "this is interesting. Who discussed me?"
"Mr. and Mrs. Petter had the most to say," answered Lodloe.
"I'm glad to hear they're alive," interpolated the other.
"And Mrs. Cristie, who knew you when her husband was alive."
"Dead, is he?" said Beam. "Very sorry to hear that. A mighty pretty woman is Mrs. Cristie."
"Miss Calthea Rose was not present," continued Lodloe, "but her opinions were quoted very freely by the others, and sometimes combated."
"Calthea alive, is she?" ejaculated Beam. "Well, well, I ought to be glad to hear it, and I suppose I am. Anybody else?"
"Yes; there was Mr. Tippengray, one of the guests at the inn. There are only three of us in all. He had heard a great deal about you from Miss Rose. She seems to have been very communicative to him."
"Chums, are they?" cried Lanigan Beam. "Well, bless his soul, I say, whatever sort of man he is. Now what did they say about me?"
"It's my opinion," answered Lodloe, smiling, "that it is a very unsafe thing to tell a man what other people say about him."
Lanigan sprang to his feet, and stood, pipe in hand, before the other. "Now, sir," said he, "I have not heard your name yet – Lodloe; thank you. Now, Mr. Lodloe, I have before me the greatest chance of my life. It almost never happens that a man has an opportunity of hearing a straightforward account of what people say about him. Now if you want to do the biggest kind of favor to a fellow-being, just tell me what you heard of me to-night. You are a perfect stranger to me, and you can speak out plainly about it without having the least feeling one way or the other."
Lodloe looked at him.
"Here's a chance," he said to himself, "that seldom comes to a man; an opportunity to tell a man exactly what his friends and neighbors think about him. It's a rare experience, and I like it. I'll do it."
"Very good," said he, aloud; "if you want to see yourself as others see you, I'll turn on the lights and act as showman; but remember I have nothing to do with the painting. I have no prejudices one way or the other."
"All right," said Lanigan, reseating himself; "let the panorama move."
"About the first thing I was told," said Lodloe, "was that you were a good-hearted fellow, but the fact that your father was an Irishman had deprived your character of ballast."
"Umph," said Lanigan; "there are some people who are all ballast. I don't mind that."
"And then I heard that, although you were a wild and irresponsible youth, people generally expected that as you grew older you would gradually accumulate ballast; but instead of that you had steadily gone downhill from the moment of your birth."
"Now, then," said Lanigan, "I suppose I have no right to ask you, but I would like very much to know who said that."
"I don't object in the least to telling you," said Lodloe; "it is fitter that you should know it than that I should know it. That was a quoted opinion of Miss Calthea Rose."
"Good for you," said Lanigan; "you'd be death to the members of a scandal-monger society. You would break up the business utterly."
"To this Mr. Petter remarked," said Lodloe, "that he thought in many ways you had improved very much, but he was obliged to admit that he could never think of anything that you had done which was of the least benefit to yourself or anybody else."
"Upon my word," cried Lanigan, "that's a pretty wide sweep for old Petter. I shall have to rub up his memory. He forgets that I helped him to make the plans for this house. And what did Mrs. Cristie say about me?"
"She said she thought it was a great pity that you did not apply yourself to something or other."
"She is right there," said Beam, "and, by George! I'll apply myself to her. However, I don't know about that," he continued. "What else did Calthea say?"
"One remark was that having proved false to every friend you had here you had no right to return."
"That means," said Mr. Beam, "that having promised at least five times to marry her, I never did it once."
"Were you really engaged to her?" asked Lodloe.
"Oh, yes," said the other; "it seems to me as if I had always been engaged to her. Born that way. Sort of an ailment you get used to, like squinting. When I was a youngster, Calthea was a mighty pretty girl, a good deal my senior, of course, or I wouldn't have cared for her. As she grew older she grew prettier, and I was more and more in love with her. We used to have quarrels, but they didn't make much difference, for after every one of them we engaged ourselves again, and all went on as before. But the time came when Calthea kept on being older than I was, and didn't keep on being pretty and agreeable. Then I began to weaken about the marriage altar and all that sort of thing, but for all that I would have been perfectly willing to stay engaged to her for the rest of my life if she had wished it, but one day she got jealous, kicked up a tremendous row, and away I went."
"Well," said Lodloe, "she must have considered that the best thing you could do for her, for Mrs. Petter said that she had heard her declare dozens of times that from her very youth you had hung like a millstone about her neck, and blighted her every prospect, and that your return here was like one of the seven plagues of Egypt."
"Mixed, but severe," said Mr. Beam. "Did anybody say any good of me?"
"Yes," answered Lodloe; "Mrs. Cristie said you were an obliging fellow, although very apt to forget what you had promised to do. Mr. Petter said that you had a very friendly disposition, although he was obliged to admit the truth of his wife's remark that said disposition would have been more agreeable to your friends, if you had been as willing to do things for them as you were to have them do things for you. And Mrs. Petter on her own motion summed up your character by saying, that if you had not been so regardless of the welfare and wishes of others; so totally given up to self-gratification; so ignorant of all kinds of business, and so unwilling to learn; so extravagant in your habits, and so utterly conscienceless in regard to your debts; so neglectful of your promises and your duty; so heretical in your opinions, political and religious, and such a dreadful backslider from everything that you had promised to be when a baby, you would be a very nice sort of fellow, whom she would like to see come into the house."
"Well," said Lanigan Beam, leaning back in his chair, "that's all of my bright side, is it?"
"Not quite," said Lodloe; "Mr. Tippengray declared that you are the first man he ever heard of who did not possess a single good point; that you must be very interesting, and that he would like to know you."
"Noble Tippengray!" said Mr. Beam. "And he's the man who is chumming it with Calthea?"
"Not at present," said Lodloe; "she is jealous, and doesn't speak to him."
Mr. Beam let his head drop on his breast, his arms hung down by his side, and he sank into his chair, as if his spine had come unhinged.
"There goes the last prop from under me," he said. "If Calthea had a man in tow I wouldn't be afraid of her, but now – well, no matter. If you will let me take that bottle of ammonia with me, – I suppose by rights it now belongs to the house, – I'll go back to that room and fight it out with the wasps. As I haven't any good points, they'll be able to put some into me, I'll wager."
Lodloe laughed. "You shall not go there," he said; "I have more bed-covering than I want, and an extra pillow, and if you can make yourself comfortable on that lounge you are welcome to stay here."
"Sir," said Lanigan Beam, rising, "I accept your offer, and if it were not that by so doing I would destroy the rare symmetry of my character, I would express my gratitude. And now I will go down your stairs, and up my ladder, and get my valise."
