The Story Book Girls Part 9

"Did she condescend to ask for me?" he asked abruptly. "Or pretend that she knew me at all?"

"She never said a word about you," said his mother; "but----"

"But--what a lot there may be in a but," said Jean.

"She looked most sympathetic," said Mrs. Leighton lamely. Cuthbert moved impatiently.

"What silly affairs afternoon calls must be," said he.

"Miss Steven--the girl you ran away with--isn't well to-day, and they are rather anxious about her. She is very upset, but wanted to come and tell you how much she thanked you."

"Oh, lor," said Cuthbert, "what a time I shall have when I'm well. I shall go abroad, I think."

Elma gazed at him with superb devotion. He seemed such a man--to be careless of so much appreciation, and from the Story Books too!

Cuthbert appeared very discontented.

"Oh, these people!" he exclaimed; "they call and thank one as they would their gardener if he had happened to pull one of 'em out of a pond.

It's the same thing, mummy! They never intend to be really friendly, you know."

Elma slipped downstairs and entered the drawing-room once more. A faint perfume (was it "Ideal" or "Sweet Pea Blossom"?) might be discerned. A Liberty cus.h.i.+on had been decidedly rumpled where Mrs. Leighton would be bound to place Mrs. Dudgeon. Where had Adelaide Maud, the G.o.ddess of smartness and good breeding, located herself? Elma gave a small scream of rapture. On the bend of the couch, where the upholstering ran into a convenient groove for hiding things, she found a little handkerchief.

It was of very delicate cambric, finely embroidered. Elma's first terror, that it might be Mrs. Dudgeon's, was dispelled by the magic letters of "Helen" sewn in heliotrope across a corner. It struck her as doubtful taste in one so complete as Adelaide Maud that she should carry heliotrope embroidery along with a blue gown. She held her prize in front of her.

"Now," said she deliberately, "I shall find out whether it is 'Ideal' or 'Sweet Pea.'"

She sniffed at the handkerchief in an awe-stricken manner. The enervating news was thus conveyed to her--Adelaide Maud put no scent on her handkerchiefs.

This was disappointing, but a hint in smartness not to be disobeyed.

Mrs. Dudgeon must have been the "Ideal" person. Elma rather hoped that Hermione used scent. This would provide a loophole for herself anyhow.

But Mabel would be obliged to deny herself that luxury.

Elma sat down on the couch with the handkerchief, and looked at the dear old drawing-room with new eyes. She would not take that depressing view of the people upstairs with regard to the Story Books. She was Adelaide Maud, and was "reviewing the habitation" of "these Leighton children"

for the first time.

"Dear me," said Adelaide Maud, "who is that sweet thing in the silver frame?"

"Oh," said Mrs. Leighton, "that's Mabel, my eldest."

Then Adelaide Maud would be sure to say with a refined amount of rapture, "Oh, is that Mabel? I have heard how pretty she is from Mr.

Maclean."

Then mother--oh, no; one must leave mother out of this conversation.

She would have been so certain to explain that Mabel was not pretty at all.

Elma sat with her elbows out and her hands presumably resting on air.

"Never lean your elbows on your hips, girls," Miss Stanton, head of deportment, informed them in school. "Get your shoulder muscles into order for holding yourself gracefully." One could only imagine Adelaide Maud with a faultless deportment.

Elma carried the little handkerchief distractedly to her lips, then was appalled at the desecration.

Oh--and yet how lovely! It was really Adelaide Maud's!

She tenderly folded it.

How distinguished the drawing-room appeared! How delightful to have had a father who made no mistakes in the choice of furniture! Cuthbert had said so. She could almost imagine that the mauve toque must have bowed before the Louis Seize clock and acknowledged the Cardinal Wolseley chair. It did not occur to her to think that Mrs. Dudgeon might size up the whole appearance of that charming room in a request for pillars and Georgian mirrors, and beaded-work cus.h.i.+ons. It is not given to every one to see so far as this, however, and Elma--as Miss Dudgeon for the afternoon--complimented her imaginary hosts on everything. As a wind-up Miss Dudgeon asked Mrs. Leighton particularly if her third daughter might come to take tea with Hermione.

"So sweet of you to think of it," said the imaginary Mrs. Leighton, once more in working order.

Out of these dreams emerged Elma. Some one was calling her abruptly.

"Coming," she shrieked wildly, and clutched the handkerchief.

She kept it till she got to Cuthbert. It seemed to her that he, as an invalid, might be allowed a bit of a treat and a secret all to himself.

"Adelaide Maud left her handkerchief," she said. "We shall have to call to return it."

He gazed at the bit of cambric.

"Good gracious, is that what you girls dry your eyes on?"

He took it, and looked at it very coldly and critically.

"Thank you," he said calmly.

"Oh, Cuthbert," she exclaimed with round eyes, "you won't keep it, will you?"

"I shall return it to the owner some day, when she deserves it," said the hero of yesterday, with a number of pauses between each phrase.

"Don't say a word, chucky, will you not?"

"I won't," said Elma honourably, yet deeply puzzled.

Imaginary people were the best companions after all. They did exactly what one expected them to do.

It seemed rather selfish that Cuthbert should hang on to the handkerchief. But of course they would never have even seen it had it not been for the accident.

She surrendered all owners.h.i.+p at the thought, and then gladly poured tea for the domineering Cuthbert.

"You are a decent little soul, Elma," said he.

"And you are very extraasperating," said Elma.

CHAPTER VI

The Mayonnaise