smart-looking woman I met in Chicago did?" "He is n't a chauffeur; he 's the owner," murmured Mr. Allerby, squirming. "Oh, you job the car when you want it. A good idea for us, Nick," she said to her husband, brightly. "It would save a pot of money. Everybody's so frightfully poor at home now, Hal dear!" She sighed. "It's a relief to find you all so comfy here in the States." "Sybil was always strong on comfort, you remember, Hal," remarked Sir Nicholas, smiling. "Oh, but I can rough it, too; you'll see," she protested. "I know about bachelor establishments." If Mr. Allerby had a momentary picture of his own bachelor establishment above Meehan's livery-stable, with a gas-range in one corner, beside the wash-stand, and a clothes-line stretched conveniently across the room, he promptly banished it, with other ghosts. It was not to such a place, thanks to Miss Sara Truman, that his guests were bound. But as they passed Juggernaut, somnolent upon a switch, he averted a conscious and rather guilty eye. Not so Lady Sybil, who was an expe rienced tourist and determined to be interested in everything. "Fancy, Nick, a tram-car out in these wilds! Are n't the Americans wonderful? But it does n't appear to be a very active tram-car, does it?" "Takin' its vacation this week," explained Mr. Cassidy, from the front seat. "How quaint!" murmured Lady Sybil, whether of Juggernaut or of the talkative chauffeur it would be difficult to say. "Quaint" was a word she found fre quent use for, especially when Mr. Cassidy drew up with a flourish in front of a wide, white brick cottage set well back from the street, among elms; on the pillared portico Dr. Grant's 'Mandy was to be seen, rather flustered, hastening to remove Dr. Grant's forgotten sign from beside the front door. The doctor kept a cot, fortunately, in his consulting-room down-town. "Come in; come right in, folks, and rest yo' hats," urged 'Mandy, ingratiatingly, concealing the sign behind her. Lady Sybil gazed at this fat brown person in some dismay. "A native woman, Nick, and apparently in charge! Do you do you suppose it's all right?" she whispered. "Certainly," reassured her husband, audibly. "Old Hal 's no squawman. Besides, that sort of thing happens farther West, I fancy." The interior of the house reassured her still further a long, pleasant room, filled with books and etchings and other Lares and Penates, in which Dr. Grant took a pardonable pride. "Really, you do yourself awfully well, Hal," commented Lady Sybil in distinct relief. "This room might have been at home. That portrait, for instance, and the old spinet, quite charming. You seem to have accumulated rather nice moss for such a rolling stone." Mr. Allerby, who had accumulated nothing except years and friends, shrugged a deprecating shoulder. And when the native woman came in, bearing a native drink in frosted silver cups, which Lady Sybil pronounced quite as invigorating as tea, her satisfaction was complete. "So glad you 've a woman to maid me," she said graciously. "I left Jenkins at home, she hates so to rough it. Send her up in half an hour, will you, Hal? I'll be ready for my bath." "Huh?" inquired 'Mandy, in a deep contralto. Mr. Allerby took her aside and explained rather nervously, Dr. Grant's 'Mandy being a personage with whom it was not well to take liberties. But the famous Arbuthnot smile was not without its effect even here, for 'Mandy was heard to mutter: "Oh, well, ef it's on'y hookin' up and such-like, reck'n I could mek out to oblige her. But I ain't goin' to wash no grown-up pusson, not for nobody! I is a modest woman, I is, ef some ain't." He WINFIELD, at least, will never forget the festivities with which it made hectic the three days of the baronet's visit. spoke on the first night at the operahouse, thereby displacing Charlie Chaplin himself (in screen version). And though his words were brief and to the point, he was secretly felt to be outdone in eloquence by the introduction of Judge Cary, and even by the impromptu epilogue of Mr. Cassidy, who was moved by the Arbuthnot smile, and other things, to pay an Irishman's tribute to the women of England. Indeed, during the evening every eye in the house remained eagerly fastened upon the women of England as personified in Lady Sybil, shameless and quite astonishingly lovely in a little black tulle and the Allerby diamonds. "And she fifty, if a day!" was the feminine verdict. They had dined first with Miss Sara Truman, an event which brought out of storage not only the Truman silver and the Truman lace, but which went to the length of Tipsy Parson Sauce on the ice-cream, than which Winfield hospitality can no further spread itself. Miss Sara was by principle and practice a strict total abstainer, but every one knows that Tipsy Parson is not a beverage, but a condiment. Until dessert arrived, the hostess had been a little nervous, despite her lofty assurances to their married niece that a lady could be no more than a lady, no matter what people called her; but under the beneficent influence of the sauce her slight stiffness toward her guests melted into a warm benevolence. This the tact of Lady Sybil augmented into something like intimacy. "Do you know," she had remarked as they left the table, "you look in all that lace and jet"-Miss Sara was wearing the Truman jets-"like a dear aunt of my own, father's sister?" "The the earl's sister?" Lady Sybil smiled assent. Now, to be reminiscent of the sister of an earl can but be flattering to the stanchest American heart; the old lady responded in kind: "And you look, my dear, like the sort of woman a man could never forget-if he tried." Which led, naturally, to confidences. Seated upon the parlor sofa, with the others safely listening to Sir Nicholas's expurgated edition of the war, Miss Sara learned much that she had not learned from Mr. Allerby. "But I don't quite understand," she "So they are, when there are any. With the Allerbys there are n't, you see. Only there was a rich aunt of sorts, married into soap, or something; and naturally, at the time Nick and I eloped, we thought she 'd die pretty soon and leave us a bit. Instead, she left it all to Hal. Rather a sell on us, was n't it?" The effect of the Tipsy Parson Sauce was wearing off, but Miss Sara forgave something to the quiver of that lip. "You must be very glad," she said, laying her hand upon the other's. "I am," was the stanch reply, "even if they don't-but of course they will! What troubled us most about Hal," she went on evenly, "was the fear that "I wonder why she did that," said possibly things were n't going quite well Miss Sara. "Oh, because she was vexed with Nick for marrying anything so useless as me, I think. And because she was angry with me for having jilted Hal." "Oh, you did jilt Mr. Allerby?" asked the other, gravely. Lady Sybil hung her fair head like a child that is being scolded. "I'm afraid I did, rather. You see, we 'd grown up together, and they both wanted me so badly, and I simply could n't decide which I 'd have. You know how that is?" Miss Sara, who had never been "wanted badly" by any one in her life, nodded a comprehending head. "If one could only have married them both! But since one could n't, and Nick went off to India, I thought it would better be Hal. Then when Nick came back, I-I saw it really could n't be. Hal was too sweet about it. He said, in marrying Nick, it really was like marrying them both. But," she added, with a rueful little sigh, "at first things went rather badly. Father could n't do anything for us, and Nick was in such an expensive regiment, and I'm afraid I 'm rather expensive myself. It looked as if Nick would have to resign from the service and go into trade, or something. The soap aunt died just in time. "Of course one hated to take Hal's money, but he insisted that it ought to go with the title, and that there had always been an Allerby in the service and always must be, and that in any case he 'd settle the property on our first son. Then, too, he kept writing back that everything he touched turned to gold, he 's always so lucky. So for the sake of the children" "There are children?" "I've two boys fighting in France," said the Englishwoman, quietly, and her lip quivered. with him, that he was 'bluffing' us, as you say in the States. It seemed so odd that he never wanted to come home even to see the boys off. He's always been so good to the boys. Then I was afraid, too, that he might have got himself into trouble of sorts, bad ways you know what bachelors are. So Nick and I were awfully glad of the opportunity to look him up. That's why I came." "And if he had been 'bluffing' you?" inquired the prosecuting counsel. "Then we should have taken him home, of course. Whatever we have is his, you know," said Lady Sybil. "But I ought to have known he 'd never let us down in any way. He's so proud. And as for the rest, while he 's not really rich should you say?" "Not exactly rich," murmured Miss Sara. "Not for America, certainly; but quite comfortable. I can't tell you what a relief that is to us. Simple, of course, that odd little cottage, with only the one native woman to look after him. But Hal never cared for luxury, like the rest of us. And he seems to have fallen among friends." "Yes," said Miss Sara; "that at least is true." And the look she sent across to the "lucky" man who had chosen to buy happiness for those he loved was a tribute he ought not to have missed. The entertainment of the distinguished visitors progressed without a hitch even until the final moment. The Allerbys, personally conducted, gazed appreciatively at scenery, at thoroughbred horses, at oil-wells in action; they were introduced to a barbecue, following a fox-hunt, conducted, to their shocked astonishment, on foot, among the underbrush of the river-bank. "If we flush a fox, shall I be expected to take a shot at it?" demanded Sir Nicholas, unhappily, of his brother. Even her husband seemed to like to look at her, a fact unprecedented in Winfield's experience of the middleaged married. Lest it be feared that the franchise of the Winfield Street Railway Company was in danger, Lady Sybil herself may be quoted: "Do you know, it's the oddest thing about your little tram-car. I find it sitting about in different parts of town, and in the very early He looked up and down the street desperately for a possible conveyance. But there was nothing in sight, not even the Prewitt pony, which for once in his life he would have suffered gladly. Nothing, that is, except Juggernaut, waiting idly under the maples near by. Lady Sybil's eye lit upon this at the same moment as did Mr. Allerby's. the Winfield populace was thrilled and aghast morning I fancy I hear it passing up the street; but I 've never yet been able to catch it in action." "Nor ever will," murmured Judge Cary. "You see, it-it feels the heat. Like the rest of us, yourself always excepted, Madam, it is not so young as it used to be." "How absurd of you!" she laughed, tapping him deliciously with her fan. The only hitch in in arrangements occurred at the very moment of departure, when Mr. Cassidy and his limousine, which was to carry the distinguished guests to their train in a final burst of elegance, failed to appear. Whether because of a more pressing need elsewhere, or because of the proximity of the mint-bed to Mr. Cassidy's private supply, is not known to this history. The weather was very hot, however. Mr. Allerby, on his tenth trip from telephone to window, tasted despair. The train was due in half an hour, and "There's that absurd little car! What a pity," she said, "that it is n't running to-day, or we could go to the train in it." Mr. Allerby flushed suddenly and deeply. "I dare say I could manage to run you down in it, if you would n't mind." "You? Why, Hal, do you actually know how to run a tram-car? But you were always so clever about everything!" "Oh, any child can run a car like that," he explained nonchalantly. "It's that sort." She gave a cry of pleasure. "What, you mean to say it's automatic, like that lift we saw in New York? Why have n't I known this earlier! Nick, what a lark! We 're going to the train in an automatic tram-car." Nor would she consent to remain inconspicuously a passenger, but insisted upon standing beside Mr. Allerby on the platform to see how it worked. Even that was not the worst; she soon demanded to be allowed to run the thing herself. And Sybil Allerby was not the sort of woman whose pleadings go unheeded. "You must let me try it, you really must, Hal, there's a dear boy! I 've handled automobiles and motor-boats, and young Hal almost let me drive his plane, and I 've steered elephants in India and camels in Biskra, and I could n't possibly go back from the States without having once driven an automatic tram-car!" "Better humor her in the interests of peace," advised the indulgent husband. So that the Winfield populace was thrilled and aghast at the sight of the third daughter of a belted earl at the wheel of their humble public conveyance, her veils floating on the breeze, her musical laughter ringing gay and clear above the cheerful clanging of the gong. And one old lady, at least, hearing of the madcap performance, thought she knew why men still fell in love with Sybil Allerby at fifty. "It 's the jolliest lark we 've ever had together, Hal dear! I'll always remember," called back a lovely voice from the departing train. She would always remember! Mr. Allerby did not lack for company on his homeward journey. Half the town seemed moved to go about its business by trolley that day, exchanging respectful pleasantries with the motorman. But people found him a trifle unresponsive; not "airy," quite, but rather reserved, as became the accredited scion of British nobility. Juggernaut went her ways softly, a consecrated trolley-car, and she has never since been quite the rampageous, sporting vehicle she used to be. Perhaps Mr. Allerby drives now with a ghost beside him, a spirit out of another life, her veils blowing fragrantly about him, her joyous laughter making him forget that romance can ever be fifty if a day, or that there is anything ignoble in a task her white hands made a "lark" of. But when somebody asked him not long ago when he 'd be running over to visit his English relatives, he shook his head, murmuring words which only Miss Sara would have understood: "O rest ye, brother mariners, we will not wander more." |