Society silhouettes; collection of short stories

Contents

I" Keeping Up Appearances, - - 145

S*' The Touch of Nature, - 172

A SEARCH FOR SENSATIONS.

Chapter II

Miss Darlington sat alone at the break fast table. The morning sunlight streamed in at the bay window, giving the room a cheery brightness, and flooding with its warmth a small dog that lay curled upon the window cushions.

Miss Darlington sipped her coffee and nibbled her muffin, while she gazed at the picture of content which he presented.

" I wish I could forget my troubles as easily as Laddie does," she sighed, rising at last and ringing the bell for her maid.

" Now, Miss Darlington, shure an' ye ain't a thinkin' o' doin with that bit an' sup till lunch?" cried a hearty voice from the doorway.

" Yes, it's all I could eat, Kitty, but you may take up a nice breakfast to Miss Dorris, and tell her it's nearly ten o'clock."

Kitty's brow darkened. She had lived with them for many years and considered herself one of the family, almost.

"It's always Miss Dorris an' niver yoursilf that gets the aisy things o' life !" she muttered, but a quiet glance silenced her, as she removed the untasted breakfast.

" Kitty's impertinence is getting very troublesome," murmured the girl, seating herself beside the dog and pulling his long ears. " Seems to me everything gets to be troublesome, Laddie."

Laddie opened one eye, feebly wagged his tail, and, considering this was all that good manners required by way of reply, continued his doze.

Suddenly Miss Darlington's attention was drawn to a carriage, which finally came to a standstill before her own house. Her heart beat rapidly as she watched the footman descend and open the door. Yes, it was John Dryden ! He must have received her sister's note in the morning's mail, and here he was, as eager a lover as if his hair were not grey, nor crow's feet grew about his eyes — and Dorris was still in bed !

Running breathlessly upstairs,she burst into her sister's room.

" Quick, Dorris, Mr. Dryden has come to see you ; do hurry and get up, child ; he is waiting!"

Dorris was sitting up among the pil lows, leisurely enjoying her breakfast. " Let him wait," she said, calmly. " It's good for him to begin in the right way. He'll have lots of waiting to do later on."

" Aren't you coming down at all?"

" Oh, yes," she answered, yawning, " but there's no such mad haste. He was a goose to come rushing here at this time in the morning!"

Miss Darlington turned to go down stairs again, her very back expressive of such strong disapprobation that Dorris laughed. " I'll trust him to your tender mercies, my love!" she called after the retreating form, but her sister would not reply.

Kitty had admitted the elderly lover, and Miss Darlington found him pacing up and down the little drawing-room. He turned eagerly as she entered, but the disappointment in his face showed he had expected to see Dorris.

" My sister will be down soon," began Miss Darlington, rather stiffly, and then, as she read the honest love in the face before her, she held out her hands with simple earnestness. " I feel that you have done her a great honor in asking her to be your wife, Mr. Dryden, but I fear she is too young to know her own mind. She can not understand, as yet, the real meaning of love. She is only a frivolous girl. I am so afraid she will not bring you the happiness you hope for! "

John Dryden pressed the hands he held.

" Have no fear of that," he answered quickly. "I know she is only a child, a frivolous girl, as you put it, but I— er — I think that is why I am so fond of her, you know !"

Miss Darlington looked at him as he stood before her. An old man, tall, thin, with narrow, stooped shoulders, yet with the fire of youth in his eyes. Truly, it was a picture to make the gods laugh, or weep, to see the dignity of age so bound and fettered in the flowery chains of frivolous Cupid.

She motioned to a chair and seated herself at her work table. She knew the dawdling ways of her younger sister, and felt she was in for a prolonged tetee-tete with her future brother-in-law.

It grew almost impossible to sustain the conversation, however, as the slight est sound drew her companion's atten tion to the door, with evident disregard of what she was saying, and at last they heard light footsteps on the stairs.

" Dorris is coming," she said, rising and holding out her hand to him once more, "but before I go I want to warn you against the step you are taking. She is a mere child, and you, forgive me, are no longer young. She does not love you as she should. I doubt if she ever will. Do you realize all this?"

The hand that held hers trembled, " I realize it all," he murmured. " Thank you for your honesty. I know you mean to be generous, but — but — I love her, Miss Darlington . I would rather be miserable with her than wretched 'without her."

Miss Darlington was silenced. " You do love her," she said softly.

" Heavens ! what long faces ! Are you talking about me, I'd like to know ?" the gay young voice broke in upon them, and Miss Darlington watched John Dryden's face as he turned to greet her sister.

" He is happy now, at any rate," she thought to herself, as she left them alone together.

An hour later, Dorris danced into the sitting-room, where she sat sewing.

"Look! Look! Look!" she cried, flashing an immense solitaire before the other's eyes. " Isn't that worth a few kisses and silly little speeches?"

" Dorris, if you talk like that, I shall — I shall despise you !"

Dorris laughed. "You don't show much interest in my changed fortunes, my dear ; you haven't asked when the great event is to come off. Aren't you at least curious?"

" Do you mean that you have already set the time for your marriage?"

Dorris nodded.

" It's to be in six weeks. I'm in a hurry to come into my kingdom, you see, and as for John — isn't it funny to call him 'John'? — he begged me to with tears in his eyes, almost ; so I promised that I would. It really doesn't matter, only when people take us for father and child, as I suppose they will, sometimes, it may shock their sense of filial respect to hear me address him as ' John' ! "

She laughed again and kissed the jewel that flashed on her hand.

" Louise !" she cried, " don't look so sober ! You shall have everything that his money will buy, and you shall live

A SEARCH FOR SENSATIONS. Ip

with me forever and ever in splendid style. You were made for velvets and satins and rich things in general, with that regal air of yours, and I'll fix up a whole suite of rooms for your very own."

Miss Darlington shook her head. " I couldn't, Dorris ; the life you will live would stifle me !"

Her sister caught her about the waist.

"Then you'll have to 'stifle,' Sissy, for it's settled that you are to live with us, so there! I couldn't live without you, don't you see?"

Chapter III

Kitty's life for the next six weeks was miserable enough to draw tears from the sympathetic.

Breakfasts went unappreciated, lunch eons were sometimes completely ignored, — and dinners left untasted by her two young ladies, who were "too tired to eat."

Dorris wanted a church wedding, but the fact that the ushers would have to be elderly men, being friends of the bride groom, caused her to relinquish her plans and content herself with the quiet house wedding her sister advocated.

The wedding gown was to be gor geous enough to yield compensation, however, and John Dryden's gift was a diamond necklace, which outrivalled her wildest dreams of splendor.

" You are spoiling her already," Miss Darlington told him, but he shook his head and smiled.

" Did I ever tell you anything of my past life?" he asked, after a short pause, and as she answered in the negative, he continued :

" I was born in poverty. My whole youth and manhood were spent in hardest labor. I had no time, no opportunity, no money, for the joys and pleasures and beautiful things of life.

" Then I began to make my way in the world. I pressed on and up, eagerly grasping each rung of the ladder which carried me higher, supposing that when I reached the top, I should find what my soul had hungered for all through life.

' ' One day I woke to realize that I had gained that summit, that I was the envied of men and that I had bartered my youth in exchange. Can you understand how I felt then ?

" That was ten years ago. Now I feel that I am young again ! Life is once more mine ! If I can not win love, I can give it, and that is the best joy, after all !"

He turned impulsively to his com panion.

" It is your sister that has done this for me. All the beauty, the joyousness, the gaiety, I missed in my youth, I find realized in her. I feel through her. I delight in her light-hearted nonsense. I live again in her airy, capricious willful ness. She is the very embodiment of all the lost joys of my youth, and I love her, Louise, I love her!"

He picked up a dainty handkerchief that belonged to Dorris and fingered it lovingly. " 'There's no fool like an old fool,' you know !" he murmured, shame facedly, and Miss Darlington turned away her eyes as the bit of lace was covertly thrust into his pocket.

So the days wore away, each seem ingly shorter than the last.

Dorris went about as if dancing on air. " Everything is so deliciously new," she would exclaim, and her sister found her one day, making up a bundle of her old gowns. " I'm going to give them to Kitty," she explained. " I want to get them out of my sight — I never want to see the shabby old duds again. They make me feel dreary just to look at them."

And so the wedding day dawned and the April sunlight waked the bride by kissing her eyes in a warm caress.

"Sunshine!" she cried, sitting up in bed. " That means good luck ! Sissy, your doleful prophecies are scattered to the four winds. No bride that the sun shown on was ever yet known to be unhappy !"

Miss Darlington had been up before the sun, and now came in with a bunch of bride's roses in her hands.

" John sends his greetings to you," she said, laying the exquisite flowers upon the bed.

" Goose !" laughed the little bride, bury ing her nose among the creamy petals. " Do you know, Sissy, my only fear for my future content lies in the dread that John will bore me with his dreadful devotion. I wish he would hate me, just a little ; 'twould be a new sensation !"

" Perhaps he will some day. I think / should !"

Dorris looked surprised. "Why?" she asked.

" Because such love as he gives you deserves a better return than you are capable of yielding."

Dorris yawned and pelted the sober face opposite with roses.

"You're a darling old sentimental goose!" she cried.

The day went all too fast for the many things that had to be attended to, but at last Dorris stood robed in her shimmer ing satin gown, while her sister adjusted the veil.

A knock at the door interrupted her, and the white-haired bridegroom came into the room.

His eyes were dark with excitement, and as he caught sight of the girl in her bridal robes, his face flushed warmly. "Oh, Dorris, you beautiful child!" he murmured.

She nodded to him brightly. " Is it time to go?" she asked.

"Almost, but I — I wanted to bring you this/' he stammered, drawing forth a jewel case as he spoke. " I have always heard that a bride should wear a star upon her brow. It's a foolish old super stition ; but you will wear it, for my sake, won't you?"

He opened the box and took out a star composed of pearls.

" John, you dear, please go on indulg ing your foolish superstitions !" cried his bride, brushing his cheek with her lips.

" Louise, do fasten my veil with it; isn't it a gem!"

He stood by as the star was being placed, and then, taking both her hands in his, he stooped and reverently kissed the forehead where his gift shone forth. All through the ceremony his eyes dwelt upon the face at his side, and whatever

Miss Darlington may have read in his look, it filled her with compassion, and she vowed within herself that she would do all that lay in her power to make his future life as happy as she could.

Chapter IV

May was smiling upon the world, and Kitty stood under the budding leaves, watching for the postman.

' ' Shure, an' it's toime that pretty blath erskite sint anither letter. Och ! the ways o' the wourld ! Miss Louise, the swate angil, stayin' quiet at home — an' that pert sparrow gettin' all the foine things under the skoi !"

Here her soliloquy was interrupted by the appearance of the blue-coated carrier.

" Good morning, Mistress Kitty. Is there anything I can do for you to-day?"

"Shure, yis! It's a letter from me swateheart in the ould countree that I'm a pinin' fer ! she answered, with a pon derous imitation of coquetry.

" He has died, then — a little bird told me all about it, so you'd better keep your bright eyes out for some one nearer home."

Kitty tossed her head as she took the letter he handed her. " Shure, an' when me bright eyes see what they call a man, Mr. Postman, they'll be after keeping a lookout ferhim!" With which retort she fled into the house, having a truly feminine love of the last word.

Miss Darlington looked up expectantly as Kitty brought in the letter.

"An' is it news from the little spal peen ?" she asked.

" Yes, Kitty ; she has remembered our existence once more ; she must be coming home."

" ' You darling old duckie,' " the letter began; " ' I suppose it has been awful of me not to write you ! Every morning John has asked me if I did not intend writing you, and I have always answered ' yes,' for I have intended to, you know ! But, heavens ! the days have been so full of new wonders and sensations !

" Fancy me, if you can, a grande dame, with a maid to wait on me and nothing to do but look as pretty as I can, and allow myself to be petted and admired. John is a dear ! He loads me with every thing that I happen to fancy for the mo ment, until, alas ! even the delights of possession pall on me a little. Isn't it odd that the fact of knowing I can have everything I want robs me of half the desire? You can study that out with your owl-like wisdom. It gave me an odd sensation at first, when the men I met made love to me. Don't be shocked; that's only fashionable. I find they all do it to the married women, and it isn't much fun, either. I always want to laugh at them ; they are so silly ! Once I did. I was in a gondola with Tom Benton, and he was so idiotically sentimental that I giggled right out ! He was furious and so sulky he wouldn't talk, so I fell asleep and never woke up till we were moored at the hotel steps. I told John, but he didn't laugh as much as I expected him to.

"Well, Italy is beautiful, I suppose, but I'm tired of it now ; besides, I'm crazy to return to my new grandeur, so we are coming back home ; perhaps we will sail by the next steamer.

" John says you must be there in the town house to meet us, so you had better rent the old home to those people you wrote me of, for we want to find you quite settled in the big house when we come back.

"Good-bye, you darling old Sissy. I blow you a kiss across the water.

" DORR is DRYDEN."

Miss Darlington laid down the letter. Perhaps, for John's sake, she ought to move into the "big house ;" but it would be very hard to give up the little shabby, old house that had been "home" to her as long as she could remember.

She looked about the room. There was the cosy old sofa, where she used to curl up on rainy days to read impossible fairy tales, and many a childish trouble had been wept away within its wide-spreading arms. Such a comfortable old sofa, faded and worn, like the face of some dear old friend. Would there be any thing to take its place in the "big house?" Her eyes wandered to their mother's writing desk, old-fashioned and battered, with notches cut in the legs, where Dorris had played at being a "wood-cutter" one winter's afternoon, long ago. The mischievous little fingers had been sharply rapped, and Miss Dar lington remembered how she had con soled her by rolling her in the fur rug, and playing bear.

Laddie was lying on the rug now, and Miss Darlington dropped down beside him, burying her face in his neck.

" We all belong together, Laddie— the old sofa and you and I and the rest of it, and we won't show off well in the fine, new house ; but I'm afraid we'll have to go, Laddie, I'm afraid we'll have to go !" And Laddie rubbed his nose against her cheek in dumb sympathy, wondering foolishly what made it feel so wet !

Chapter V

Three busy weeks had flown by. Miss Darlington and her few personal belong ings were installed in their new home, while Kitty ruled as head cook in the kitchen.

The little old house had been rented with all its shabby furniture and every thing in the big house put in order for the arrival of its master and mistress.

Louise sat in the large drawing-room, trying to interest herself in a book, though her ears were listening for the sound of carriage wheels, and at last she heard them stop before the door.

A slim figure ran lightly up the steps into the out-stretched arms. "O, Sissy! It's so good to have you here. I was so afraid you wouldn't be on hand to wel come us, and oh ! I'm so tired and warm !

Send my maid right up to my room ; I must have a tubbing before I eat. John ? He's coming, but he has been ill, so Ritchie has to handle him with care."

Miss Darlington turned to find John Dryden painfully climbing the steps with the help of his valet. He looked old and tired, and her heart went out to him.

"Lean on me," she said, going to his side. " I am so sorry you have been ill, but we will soon have you well again, now you are at home. I'm a famous nurse, you know."

"Yes," he murmured, his glance search ing the hall. " Where did she go?"

" Dorris ?" She went to her room to prepare for dinner. Will you rest here, or have something served to you in your own apartments ?"

He sighed. " I'll wait down here. It might sadden her home-coming if I were sick upstairs."

Miss Darlington bit her lip. " But you really are not equal to it," she remon strated.

"Yes, I am," he insisted, with slight irritation, adding eagerly, " Did you see her? Did you notice how beautiful she has grown ?"

" She was looking very well and ex tremely gay," answered Miss Darlington, rather coldly.

"That's it, 'extremely gay ;' she laughs and sings and dances all day, and a good part of every night. They all admire her so much ; but she is mine, Louise, my wife — all mine, you know !"

" Of course, she is yours; your own happy little bride," she said, soothingly, and he brightened at her words.

He scarcely touched a morsel of food at dinner, sitting with his eyes fastened upon Dorris, at the other end of the table. Once, as she glanced brightly across at him, he smiled and raised his wine glass to his lips. " To your home-coming, Mrs. John Dryden," he said.

She nodded : " It's nice to be at home at last, isn't it, John?" and the few care less words brought a flush to his cheek, which lingered long after she had for gotten the remark.

Later on, she sat on a low stool at his feet, allowing him to play with her hair as it rested against his knee, while her tongue ran on about all that she had seen and heard since she had been away.

"I liked Paris best of all," she de clared. ' 'There were a lot of artists there ; funny people who lived in scrubby rooms. John ran across the son of one of his old friends, who was one of these amusing creatures, so he took us right into the midst of their queer life. It was perfect Bohemia, and I used to enjoy going to his studio. He painted my picture, too— don't twitch my hair so, John !"

Louise glanced at his face and was struck at the change she saw in it. Dorris moved her head from beneath his touch and continued her chatter.

" He did it superbly ! I sat to him in my wedding gown, you know, and John wanted to buy the picture from him, but he would not sell it. He called it his

'inspiration.' Odd that he wouldn't sell it, I think, for he appears to be awfully poor."

"John is ill!" suddenly exclaimed Louise, springing towards him.

He shook his head. " Only tired," he murmured. "If you'll ring for Ritchie, I'll go to my room."

His face looked white and drawn, but Dorris called forth a shadowy smile by drawing his head against her breast and lightly touching her lips to his brow.

" Too bad !" she said. "You're all tired out. You ought to have gone straight to bed as soon as you got here."

He did not reply, save by the look of devotion that lay in his eyes as they rested upon her face, and she stood at his side, running her fingers through his whitened hair, until the valet appeared to take him to his room.

" Why didn't you go with him ?" asked Miss Darlington, as the door closed.

"Go with him? Why on earth should I?

Ritchie is paid to take care of him, and he does it all right."

Dorris lounged over to the window. "It's a heavenly night," shewenton. "I wish something nice would happen, somebody awfully interesting come, or an exciting bit of news blow in to us."

" Still longing for sensations ? I should think even you would be satisfied with the new experiences of the last few months."

Dorris shook her head, yawning. "Everything gets to be a bore if you have all you want of it. Not that I would go back to the old days in that shabby little house of ours — ugh ! it makes me ill just to think of those days. I don't see how I existed then. Imagine me, now, wearing a gown that I had ' made over' myself on that rheumatic old machine — stitch, stitch, stitch, clack, clack, clack — horrors ! It's much pleasanter to be bored as I am !"

Miss Darlington laughed. " You are nothing but a child," she said ; " always

I in search of new toys. What will it be next?"

"The seaside! I'm going there in a few days."

" I don't think John is strong enough," objected her sister.

"Well, we can leave him here, then."

"What! desert that poor old man, whose very sun sets when you are away from him?"

" O, don't be a prig, Louise ! I shan't ' desert' him, but I can't be tied to him all summer long."

" If you go, you'll go alone. I shall stay with John !"

Dorris lost her temper. " You act as if he were your husband !" she cried.

" If he were, I should do my duty towards him!" was the quick reply.

"Duty! duty! duty! What a bug bear you make of that word ! I do do my ' duty ' when I am pleasant and agreeable to him. Didn't you see how I rubbed his head and kissed him to-night?"

Miss Darlington looked at her sister as she lay stretched full length among the cushions of the couch.

"You are incorrigible!" she sighed.

"Don't preach, Sissy ; it does bore me so. I endured it as Dorris Darlington, but as Mrs. John Dryden — I won't!"

A pause followed her words. " You won't go to the shore with me, then?" she asked, at last.

" Then don't. Mrs. Nettleton will be glad to have me at her cottage."

No answer was made to this announce ment, but Miss Darlington rose and folded her embroidery.

Dorris watched her until she had reached the door, then she sprang up and ran after her.

"O, you dear, sanctimonious old Sissy," she cried, squeezing her. " Kiss me good night, quick, or I'll cry. You mustn't scold me; it doesn't agree with me!"

Her sister melted — she always did when those clinging arms were about her neck, and she gave the kiss as they went up-stairs together.

"I don't approve of you, though, Dorris," she said, but young Mrs. John ran away laughing, with her hands held over her ears.

Chapter VI

As Miss Darlington had expected, John Dryden made an attempt to accom pany his wife to the seaside ; but after spending two days there, he was fo.rced to return to the quiet of his own home, leaving young Mrs. Dryden at her friend's cottage.

The parting was hard for him, and Miss Darlington's heart ached sympa thetically as she watched the sadness grow in his face, as every mile bore him further and further from the sunshine of his life.

She redoubled her attentions, and felt rewarded when, after reaching home, he looked up at her and told her it was good to have her with him.

"Why did you come back with the old man, instead of staying on there to enjoy yourself?"

"I wanted to come," she assured him. "It is much nicer here than at that crowded hotel, and we will have a cosy time of it, all by ourselves."

She read to him until he fell asleep from utter weariness, then leaning back in her chair she gave herself up to dreams.

How strange this new life was ; this new world of ease and luxury, which seemed so oddly unreal after the years she had spent in fighting with stern realities. Would she ever feel at home amid all this stifling grandeur? Her thoughts went back to the dear familiarity of the old house. It may have been shabby, but it was hers ! It had grown to be part of her, and home is where the heart is, surely.

" Nothing is worth anything without love!"

The sound of her own voice startled her, or was it the step behind which she had not heard before ?

Turning quickly, she came face to face with a young man, in whose eyes she read an open amusement, which showed he had overheard her soliloquy. Her color rose.

" I am Mr. Dryden's secretary," he explained, coining to her relief. "He sent for me, but I see he is now otherwise engaged." *

They both smiled, as a slight snore tes tified to the soundness of the sleep en joyed by the old man.

"He was very tired; would you mind waiting? I can't bear to disturb him," she pleaded.

The young man seated himself. "Mr. Dryden is not very strong ; he has been such a hard worker all his life," he said.

"Yes," she answered. "He has spent his life in accumulating wealth, and now he finds he can't eat it, nor warm his heart with it, nor buy love with it!"

Her companion looked at her in sudden surprise.

"I beg pardon, but — er — aren't you Mrs. John Dryden?"

" Good heavens, no!" she cried. "How could you suppose such a thing?"

Her indignation brought a flush to his face.

" I have never seen his wife," he mur mured apologetically.

She flushed in her turn.