The Earth Trembled Part 24

The kitchen Hebe of the morning was soon metamorphosed into a very charmingly costumed young woman.

Even Miss Ainsley was compelled to recognize the lovely and harmonious effect, although it did not bear the latest brand of fas.h.i.+on, or represent costly expenditure.

Both she and Mrs. Willoughby were pleased as Ella stepped lightly into the back parlor, and the young girl congratulated herself that she had come so opportunely, for they were evidently expecting visits like her own.

One and another dropped in until Mrs. Willoughby was entertaining three or four in the front parlor. Miss Ainsley remained chatting with Ella, who felt that the Northern girl's remarks were largely tentative, evincing a wish to draw her out. Shrewd Ella soon began to generalize to such a degree that Miss Ainsley thought, "You are no fool," and had a growing respect for the "little baker," as she had termed the young girl.

Then Clancy appeared, and Ella was forgotten, but she saw the same unmistakable welcome which from some women would mean all that a lover could desire. Ella thought that a slight expression of vexation crossed his brow as he recognized in her Mara's partner and friend, but he spoke to her politely and even cordially. Indeed, no one could do otherwise, for her face would propitiate an ogre. She thought there was a spice of recklessness in Clancy's manner, and she heard him remark to Miss Ainsley that he had come to say good-by for a short time. That young woman led the way to the balcony and began to expostulate; and then Ella's attention was riveted on a tall young fellow, who was shaking hands with Mrs.

Willoughby.

"Good gracious!" she thought, "what can I do if he sees me? How can I 'shake off and avoid' in this back parlor? I can't make a bolt for the front door or sneak out of the back door; I can't sit here like a graven image if he comes--"

"Miss Bodine! Well, I'm lucky for once in my ill-fated life."

"Oh! I beg your pardon," remarked Ella, turning from the window, out of which she had apparently been gazing with intense preoccupation.

"Good-afternoon, Mr. Houghton." But he held out his hand with such imperative cordiality that she had to take it. Then he drew up a chair to the corner of the sofa on which she sat and placed it in a way that barred approach or egress. "Oh, shade of Mrs. Hunter!" she groaned inwardly, "what can I do? I'm fairly surrounded--all avenues of retreat cut off. I must face the enemy and fight."

"I knew the chance would come for us to get acquainted," said Houghton, settling himself complacently in the great armchair, "but I had scarcely hoped for such a happy opportunity as this so soon."

"I must go in a few minutes," she remarked demurely. "I have been here some time."

"Miss Bodine, you are not capable of such cruelty. You know it is very early yet."

"I thought you came to call on Mrs. Willoughby?"

"So I did, and I have called on her. See her talking ancient history to those dowagers yonder. What a figure I'd cut in that group."

She laughed outright, as much from nervous trepidation as at the comical idea suggested, and was in an inward rage that she did so, for she had intended to be so dignified and cool as to depress and discourage the "objectionable person" who hedged her in.

"What a jolly, infectious laugh you have!" he resumed. "To be able to laugh well is a rare accomplishment. Some snicker, others giggle, chuckle, cackle, make all sorts of disagreeable noises, but a natural, merry, musical laugh-Miss Bodine, I congratulate you, and myself also, that I happened in this blessed afternoon to hear it. And that terrible chaperon of yours isn't here either. How she frowned on me the other evening as if I were a wolf in the fold," and the young man broke into a clear ringing laugh at the recollection.

Ella was laughing with him in spite of herself. Indeed the more she tried to be grave and severe the more impossible it became.

"Mr. Houghton," she managed to say at last, "will you do me a favor?"

"Scores of them."

"Then stop making me laugh. I don't wish to laugh."

His face instantly a.s.sumed such portentous and awful gravity that he set her off again to such a degree that the dowagers in the other room looked at her rebukingly. It was bad enough, they thought, that she should talk to old Houghton's son at all, but to show such unbecoming levity-well, it was not what they would "expect of a Bodine." Ella saw their disapproval, and felt she was losing her self-control. The warnings she had received against her companion embarra.s.sed her, and banished the power to be her natural self.

"Please don't," she gasped, "or I shall go at once. I asked a favor."

"Pardon me, Miss Bodine," he now said in a tone and manner which quieted her nerves at once. "I have blundered again, but I was so happy to think that I had met you here. I am not wholly a rattle-brain. What would you like to talk about?" and he looked so kindly and eager to please her that she cast down her eyes and contracted her brow in deepest perplexity.

"Truly, Mr. Houghton, I should be on my way homeward, and you have so hedged me in that I cannot escape."

"Is running away from me escaping?"

"I don't like that phrase 'running away.'"

"Yet that is what you propose to do."

"Oh, no, I shall take my departure in a very composed and dignified manner."

His face had the expression of almost boyish distress. "You find on further thought that you cannot forgive me?" he asked sadly.

"Did I not say that was all explained and settled? Southern girls are not fickle or false to their word." And she managed to a.s.sume an aspect of great dignity. "If I do not shake him off in the next few minutes I'm lost," she thought.

"I've offended you again," he said anxiously.

She took refuge in silence.

"Miss Bodine, I ask your pardon. You know I can't do more than that, or if I can, tell me what. I wish to please you very much."

The girl was at her wit's end, for his ingenuous expression emphasized the truth of his words. "There is no reason why you should please me," she began coolly, and then knew not how to proceed.

"Let us be frank with each other," he resumed earnestly. "We are too young yet to indulge in society lies. When a man apologizes at the North he is forgiven. I have been told that Southerners are a generous, warm-hearted people. In their cool treatment of me they counteract the climate. Are you, too, going to ostracize me?"

"I fear I shall have to," she replied faintly.

"Of your own free will?"

"No, indeed."

His heart gave a great throb of joy, but he had the sense to conceal his gladness. He only said quietly, "Well, I'm glad that you at least do not detest me."

"Why should I detest you, Mr. Houghton?"

"I'm sure I don't know why any one should. I have never harmed any one in this town that I know of."

She knew not how to answer, for she could not reflect upon his father.

"I don't care about others, but your case."

"Truly, Mr. Houghton," she began hastily, "this is a large city. A few impoverished Southern people are nothing to you."

"I was not thinking of Southern people," he replied gravely. "You said a moment since you saw no reason why I should try to please you. Am I to blame if you have inspired many reasons? I know you better than any girl in the world. You revealed your very self in a moment of danger to me as you thought. I saw that you were good and brave--that you possess just the qualities that I most respect and admire in a woman. Every moment I am with you confirms this belief. Why should I not wish to please you, to become your friend? I know I should be the better in every respect if you were my friend."

She shook her head, but did not venture to look at him.

"You believe I am sincere, Miss Bodine. You cannot think I am sentimental or flirtatious. I would no more do you wrong, even in my thoughts, than I would think evil of my dead mother. You are mirthful in your nature; so am I, but I do not think that either of us is shallow or silly. If I am personally disagreeable, that ends everything, but how can a man secure the esteem and friendly regard of a woman, when he covets these supremely, unless he speaks and reveals his feelings?"

"You are talking wildly, Mr. Houghton," said Ella, with averted face. "We have scarcely more than met."

"You would lead me to think that you Southern people are tenfold colder and more deliberate than we of the North. You may not have thought of me since we met, but I have thought of you constantly. I could not help it."

Ella felt that she must escape now as if for her life, and, summoning all her faculties and resolution, she said, looking him in the eyes, "I've no doubt, Mr. Houghton, you think you are sincere in your words at this moment, but you may soon wonder that you spoke such hasty words."