CHAPTER XIII

THANKSGIVING DAY

Thanksgiving day--and I have written nothing since the middle of October! But you remember I told you in the beginning that my journal might be, not so much a record of deeds as a setting forth of wishes; and my wishes all come to pass so speedily these days that there is no time to write them down.

To be honest, I had no idea of bringing my journal up here to Charlotteville with me, when I came for this Thanksgiving visit, for I thought of course Richard would be here all the time and I should not find a moment dull enough for me to sit down and write. But, as it happens, I am glad that the book was slipped into the tray of my trunk almost without my knowledge, else I should be spending a lonely evening right now.

Let me see--shall I begin where I left off--that sunny morning when I parried with Richard across half the state and lived to regret it? Or shall I begin with my entrée into Charlotteville and then jot down the past happenings as they come to me? The latter course strikes me as rather the better, then perhaps I shall not be tempted to give any one little occurrence too much space. Things seen in a sort of over-the-shoulder perspective are more likely to shrink into their normal size.

If I had snatched you up, my journal, the day that Richard sent me that exquisite chased card-case--a counterpart in pattern of his own sacred cigarette-case which I had once fingered with admiring reverence--I should have used up pages and pages of space, besides impoverishing myself in the way of adjectives. But I spent so many days dangling that card-case in front of me, as I stood before the mirror--using always my sparkling left hand--that before I had grown accustomed to the possession of it there came something even better calculated to take my breath away. A dull gold brooch it was this time, set with a green jade scarab--the little beetle bearing along with it a page of typed pedigree, showing the why and wherefore of its being. It in nowise detracted from the joy of possession, that these trinkets came in the nature of olive branches.

Yes, my sovereign was angry when I brought up the discussion of the book again, the Byron book, which I had promised to return, but with the proviso, under my breath, that I should be made to see the reason why first. I learned that he not only has the heart of a lion, but a little of that beautiful animal's kingly fury also when he is aroused. And he was aroused at what he termed my deception.

I made a clean breast of the matter the very first hour we were together again, knowing that I could make him listen to reason if I got him _literally_ at arm's length. But I had to listen to some things, too, in that hour; coming off victorious to such an extent that he finally called himself every kind of high-class villain imaginable. Then, the next week this plethora of express packages.

So it seems that my idea concerning the warring elements in his character was not altogether wrong.

But to hasten on to Charlotteville! Mrs. Chalmers wrote mother several weeks ago that she wanted me to come for Thanksgiving, so there was plenty of time for the getting together of clothes which I now knew to be absolutely essential to my peace of mind when I should be with Richard. I never knew a man to pay such attention to these little details. But what else can you expect when you are engaged to an Olympian god? Still--I almost wish sometimes that he did not lay so much stress on mere luxuries, for people can have a lot of enjoyment in life without them. Yet to Richard a big house, servants, expensive clothes, all are as necessary as the air he breathes, and he wants to make me feel the same dependence on them.

During the one little visit I have made in the city since our engagement he kept his promise of taking me for long country drives--but always in a big touring car, with a chaperon and a chauffeur! When I suggested that it would be more "fun" to drive that pretty horse of his and go alone, he assured me gravely that many things in this life which were good "fun" were not proper. So I said no more, but I felt a sudden sense of gratitude toward fate for not ever sending Richard driving past me last winter when I used not only to drive out the pikes with Alfred, but get out and go down on my knees to help him with a puncture. True, I wasn't much help, usually being good only to hand him things, or _blow_ on the patches to make them dry the faster--but I always liked to help, and he always let me.

But Charlotteville! Well, it is a small town in the eastern end of the state--a citified little place enough--where there are at least a dozen people who own handsome motor-cars; and the ices are always frozen in fancy shapes at the parties. Still it is a little town, where everybody likes to talk about everybody else--and the power-house shuts off the electricity at midnight.

I was glad when I found that there were other guests for this occasion, for I thought that would give me more time alone with Richard, and after I had met these guests I felt glad on their own account, for they are delightful.

Mr. Maxwell, the only other man, came down the same day that I reached here; on the same train, in fact, but neither of us knew this at the time, for I happened to be in the day-coach and he was in the Pullman.

When I reached the station here at Charlotteville, and at first saw no one on the little platform to meet me, I felt a sudden sinking around my heart; but, after the crowd had moved along a bit, I espied Richard's tall form at the extreme end of the platform. He was looking with a good deal of eagerness into the windows of the one Pullman car. With him, and talking exuberantly, was a boyish-looking young man who had forgotten to remove his traveling-cap. Richard seemed to be paying no attention to this bright-faced youth.

I dropped my bag and hastened down the platform.

"Oh, she's disappointed you, old boy! 'Tain't another thing," the man in the cap was saying as I came up close behind them and slackened my pace. "I'll swear there wasn't a thing in that car that looked like a cross between Venus de Milo and--"

"Richard," I called softly, and he wheeled around in delighted surprise.

"Bless your little heart!" he said, so genuinely glad to see me that he forgot for a moment the presence of the other man. That is, I thought at the time he had forgotten, but I soon saw that he considered Mr. Maxwell too much of a good-natured fool to count. "I thought you had failed to come," he kept on. "Where the dickens were you?"

"I was in the day-coach," I answered, after I had shaken hands with Mr. Maxwell, when Richard remembered to present him.

"What?"

His tone was low and quiet, but his eyes spoke surprise, and I remembered, with a sudden chill, that according to his ethics I had done almost a disgraceful thing.

"There were some people in the day-coach I--wanted to be with," I began by way of explanation, but I saw that this was making matters worse.

"What kind of people?" he asked drily.

"A woman. I got to talking to her when we changed trains at M--; she had _such_ a headache--and two babies. The littlest one consented to let me walk him around some; and I fed the other one the remains of a box of chocolates. When this train came they got into the day-coach, and of course I went with them."

"Why 'of course?'" he asked again, but with an amused smile dawning in his eyes.

"Well, I was still carrying the baby! I couldn't go off into another car with him, could I?"

Richard looked at Mr. Maxwell and laughed perfunctorily, but I knew that in some way he felt that I had humiliated him. Mr. Maxwell did not laugh, although his is essentially a laughing face.

"I understand," Richard said finally, turning to me again and asking for my checks. "You have quite the appearance of a good Samaritan. Your hair is--er--just a trifle ruffled. Couldn't you have managed some way to smooth it a little before you reached here? Evelyn always spends the last hour of a journey back in the dressing-room arranging her hair and powdering her face."

"Well, of course I know that is the ladylike thing to do," I responded, with something more nearly like sarcasm than I had ever used to him before.

Mr. Maxwell was busy taking his things from the porter, and as he exchanged his cap for a more dignified, but less becoming, hat, I noticed a scar on his forehead, high up and extending quite a distance toward the crown of his head. His hair grew queerly along the line of the scar. He seemed purposely to have detached himself from us for a moment, so I spoke to Richard again.

"Richard," I said, speaking low and rapidly, so that only he could hear. "I am sorry if I am a _fright_! But I just couldn't prink before that woman on the train. She was deathly sick, so I kept the baby all the way. Then she was _poor_ and proud and--I didn't care about opening my bag and spreading all my silver things out before her!"

He laughed again.

"You are an extremist, Ann," he said. "But you are not a fright. Only, you're so fine, when you're at your best--and mother won't understand."

"Of course not," I answered rather shortly; and the drive out to the house might have been a very quiet one if it had not been for Mr. Maxwell's irrepressible chatter.

I was grateful for the chatter at the time, still more so when we reached the house, for it helped my ruffled hair to pass unnoticed.

The feminine portion of the family met us at the front steps, and, as darkness was drawing on, I failed to take in at the time the full magnificence of the outside of the house. When I saw it next morning in the bright sunshine it struck me as being an oppressively massive, gleaming structure, with a great display of plate-glass doors and windows; and, instead of long, generous porches, as we have at home, there are several tiled vestibules that each morning are--no, not scoured, they are _manicured_.

Mr. Maxwell is a great friend of Richard's, strange as it may seem that two such incompatible natures should find so much in common; and, being heir to his mother's fortune, is such a desirable catch that Mrs. Chalmers frequently has him down here, hoping that he and Evelyn will take a fancy to each other. Richard told me this, quite simply. Evelyn wears her prettiest gowns and uses her softest tones when he is around, but she is no more interested in him than she is in any other man. In fact, she is too well brought-up to display any preference in her marriage. Whatever her mother arranges for her will be entirely satisfactory.

And as for Mr. Maxwell--but that brings me up to a mention of the other guest here now, and it is surprising that I have not said something about her before, for she and I have been great friends from the day I arrived.

It is amazing that people can get so well acquainted in such a short space of time when they are staying together in the same house, yet when neither of them is what you would call "easy to get acquainted with." I am not, I know, and I feel equally as sure that Sophie is the same way, yet you will notice that sometimes when two such diffident people are thrown together they will take a liking to each other right away.

It was this way with Sophie Chalmers and me. She is Richard's cousin and lives in some vague place "out west." She happened to be visiting some of the other Chalmers relatives in a near-by town for a few weeks this fall and I think Mrs. Chalmers must have felt that if she had to invite her it would be less trouble to have her when there were other guests, so she asked her to come and spend the Thanksgiving holidays with them. If the girl had been less obviously a sort of "poor relation" (though by no means looking the part) or if Mrs. Chalmers had not tried so persistently to keep her in the background the "unexpected" which happened in this case would have been less surprising.

For Mr. Maxwell had no more than walked into the drawing-room and been presented to her than he fell in love with her; and, like most merry-eyed people, he fell very deeply in love.

Even their meeting was most unusual--dramatic, you might call it. And, as it took place at the moment of our arrival, it served to divert somewhat the attention from my disheveled looks, which had been such a shock to Richard. "Mr. Maxwell--Miss Chalmers," some one had said, as we all passed into the house and the tall, rather tired-looking girl unfolded herself from one of the big chairs drawn up close to the hearth. She showed no surprise as she extended her hand to the new arrival, but Mr. Maxwell looked at her for a moment as he held her hand in his; then he asked quite simply: "Where have we met before?"

The question was so earnest and so direct that the girl's face flushed, but before she could even start to offer a suggestion as to whether they had met before or had not, Mrs. Chalmers hastily put in that there was little probability of a former meeting, inasmuch as Sophie had not been in this part of the country in several years.

"We have certainly met before," Mr. Maxwell persisted, his eyes still fastened on Sophie's face, and running his fingers through his hair, along the line of the scar, as if that could help him in remembering. "I am certain of that. And I should surely not be so discourteous as to acknowledge that I have forgotten--except there are so many things hazy in my mind--since that night just outside El Paso."

I, too, was watching Sophie intently, as we all were, and I saw her eyes wander to the scar along his forehead. She looked away, but in another moment had returned to it again, as if the queer little white line held a fascination for her. At his mention of El Paso she gave a distinct start, but regained her equilibrium almost immediately.

"I must be a very common-looking person," she said with a little laugh, turning to me as she spoke, "for I seldom meet a stranger who doesn't know some one whom I am so exactly like that the resemblance is startling!"

We had all moved about a little from the positions into which Mr. Maxwell's first earnest words had petrified us, and Mrs. Chalmers was beginning to say something about taking us to our rooms, when that persevering young man spoke again. He had not moved an inch, but stood there in the middle of the floor, his eyes fastened on Sophie's face.

"It's not your looks, that is, your looks are not so convincing as your--your voice," he said, his expression still showing his bewildered surprise; but something in the girl's face must have pleaded with him to change the subject, which he did, easily.

"Well, don't you think the scar adds to my list of attractions?" he asked banteringly, as he turned to Mrs. Chalmers, who beamed approval upon him. "The girls all think I acquired it in some brave, though mysterious, manner--those who don't know that I got my sky-piece cracked in a wreck in Texas last year."

From that hour he began a course of small attentions, minor courtesies, but none the less meaning, all of which have been calculated to make Sophie regard him with quite a degree of favorable interest, and if I am not mistaken none of these calculations has failed to hit the mark. But since their first meeting I have only once heard him refer to that unusual resemblance she bears to some one whom he has known; and I am sure he found the impulse then to speak so strong and sudden that the words were out before he had time to think, for Sophie so clearly disliked a mention of the subject. This proves to me that they have known each other in some mysterious manner, but as she has never told me the secret, of course I have never questioned her.

Last night at the dinner table was when it came about, and, when I think it over, it was a ludicrous happening rather than a sentimental or even mysterious one. Mrs. Chalmers had been holding forth upon some Scriptural interpretations which her beloved pastor has recently made use of in his sermons, and, among others, the casting of pearls before swine was brought forward for discussion.

From the moment the word "swine" was mentioned Mr. Maxwell's face took on its bewildered look and he fixed his eyes on Sophie with that same intensity of expression which they have worn so often this last week. Suddenly he seemed to remember what his mind was so evidently searching for.

"Swine! _Pigs!_" he blurted out, in such a startled way that we all instinctively stopped eating to await developments. "_That's_ what I heard you--or the girl with your voice--saying that night. I remember it distinctly now! It was hot--heavens, how hot it was!--and there was a fierce pain in my head for some reason; but I heard your voice, just a short distance away from me, saying: 'This little pig went to market, this little pig stayed at home; this little pig had--' and there you broke off, because you couldn't remember what it was the third little pig had. There was a peevish child's voice crying: 'Tell little pigs! Tell little pigs,' and then a man's voice, trying to help you out. You asked the man, '_Do_ you know what the third little pig had--or did?' But he couldn't remember either. He began saying the doggerel over again, 'This little pig went to market; this little pig stayed at home; this little pig had--'

"'Roast beef, damn you,' I hollered, for somehow I wasn't as near being dead as you thought. 'Roast beef, but you needn't stand outside my door rehashing it all night. Then you and the man laughed in a surprised, though subdued way, and walked away from me, although I didn't hear the sound of footsteps."

His scar showed very white as he finished this queer little story; and he looked at Sophie almost beseechingly. He had the appearance of a man groping about in the dark.

Sophie, too, was clearly embarrassed, but said nothing by way of explanation; and, ridiculous as the incident was, not one of us even smiled.

There was a heavy, tense silence about the board for a moment, then Richard spoke.

"Upon my word, but this is interesting," he said, in a slow, sarcastic drawl. "Sophie, have you been traveling in vaudeville?"

* * * * *

As we left the dining-room one of the servants told Richard that there was a long-distance call for him, a bit of news which brought a frown to my lord's handsome face.

"Well, tell 'em I can't be found," he commanded briefly, as he caught the extreme tip of my elbow and began steering our course toward the library. We usually had a few short minutes alone there after dinner.

"The operator has already told the party that you are here, Mr. Chalmers," the colored boy answered, looking embarrassed and trying to slink away into the back hall as soon as he could.

"The devil!" Richard exclaimed, under his breath, but he loosed his hold upon my arm as we reached the foot of the steps, and he suggested that I run on up-stairs and wait until I thought he had had time to finish his conversation, then come back and join him in the library.

"If you mix up with them in the drawing-room now you can't find an excuse to get up and leave when I have finished," he explained, and I smiled a happy assent.

Sophie, too, had gone to her room for a few minutes after dinner, and, as she heard me stirring around in mine, she called at my open door to say that she wanted my advice about something.

"Come in, by all means," I bade her. "I have lots of advice."

"It's about a dress for the ball to-morrow night," she said, holding over her arm a dainty gown of soft white silk. She spread the garment out upon my bed, then stood off a few steps and looked at it. "Do you think it will do?" she finally asked.

"Do? Why, I think it's lovely!" I declared truthfully.

"Well, I want to look lovely," she answered, with a queer little smile, but as she sat down on the bed and picked up a bit of chiffon flounce in the neck of the gown, she looked up at me again, with an expression of almost tragedy in her eyes. "But I have no gloves that are long enough and clean enough to wear with this!"

"Well, wear a pair of mine, then," I began, noting that her hands and mine are about the same size, but before I could suggest this she had interrupted me.

"I didn't come in here for _that_," she exclaimed, rather haughtily, throwing back her head a little and looking me squarely in the eyes. "I wanted to talk with you a little because you don't seem so oppressively elegant and _rich_, you know--"

"I am not in the least rich," I assured her comfortingly. "Nearly all my gloves have been _cleaned_."

I hastily threw up the top of my trunk and scrambled around for my glove box.

"See!" I exclaimed, holding up a pair that she had seen me working on the day before. "They _look_ as good as new, but whew! it would take one of your Texas cyclones to blow the smell of gasolene out!"

"One of _my_ Texas cyclones?" She looked surprised, but I fancied that she was pleased. "Who told you that I live in Texas?"

"Nobody that I remember; yet I got it into my head somehow that you live in Texas."

"I do. I live in El Paso," she threw aside the flounce of chiffon which she was still fingering and started to her feet. I was standing in front of her with the pair of freshly cleaned gloves in my hand. "Ann, I hate lying, and I am going to tell you something, for I can't keep up this deception any longer. I don't care what Aunt Ida says."

There was a quick rap at the door at this most interesting juncture and Evelyn stuck her head in.

"Ann," she said, glancing quickly at us both and seeming a little surprised to see us closeted together in this familiar fashion. "Richard has just had a long-distance message from the city. He has to go up there to-night on business and he wants to know if you'll let him come up to your door and say good-by?"