A modern knight : (a trans-Atlantic trifle)

Front matter

OF CONGRESS

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Copyright N?.

Chapter One

ETON really noticed her for the first time as she came into the Pullman at the Terminal Station, trailing along despondently in the wake of a stout, middle-aged woman and a most attenuated specimen of humanity of the masculine gender. It was merely a cursory glance, caught as the party passed his section, en route for their own next beyond, and the only thing about the girl which at all impressed him was a pair of dark, frightened-looking eyes which stole a tiny peep in his direction as their owner drifted by. Then he proceeded to settle himself in his own seat, arranged a goodly number of papers and periodicals within comfortable reaching distance, and before the train had fairly pulled out of the station he was many miles removed from such trivial matters as girls with appealing brown eyes and grotesquely matched escorts.

While his person was being whirled away upon the first stage of his journey across a continent which, to him, should have possessed all the charms of the unknown, his unruly mind persisted in dwelling upon the people and things that he had left behind him in a peaceful English town, only ten days or so before. His life, as he looked back upon it now, seemed to have been a particularly uneventful one. All through his much-repressed childhood he appeared to have done the usual things, — things which were expected of the elder son of an old and fiercely aristocratic family. His little school-fellows had one and all deferred to him a trifle more than to his younger half-brother, — everyone had seemed to expect a greater degree of excellence in conduct and proficiency in study, — a finer show of prowess upon the athletic-field, and a few extra honors upon his graduation, — just because he happened to be Fordyce, MAJOR! He wondered, idly, as he had often and often done before, why, when this general excellence was always so plainly demanded and expected of the elder sons of his race. Nature so often endowed the younger brothers with a little the most brains, perseverance, and industry, thus rendering it so difficult for the elder ones to maintain their supremacy. It certainly did not seem fair, and he lazily pondered the matter as he watched 6 the long lines of telegraph-poles reel drunkenly past the grimy windows of the train.

Alton Fordyce was six years the senior of his half-brother, Harry, and, as eldest son, direct heir to the title of Baronet and to the estate of Fairmead Park, now occupied by his father, James Fordyce, an elderly and feeble man, with only a short vista of years ahead of him. But with his seniority, and his consequent claim to the title, his superiority over his brother ceased, — at least in Alton’s opinion. Harry was so handsome, so bright, so altogether charming in mind, manners and person, that it was little wonder that people should like him the better of the two, — (so ran Alton’s thoughts,) and it certainly was not at all remarkable that, deep down in her heart, a girl of twenty should prefer the fascinating, debonair Harry, only four years her senior, to his graver brother of thirty!

It had been an unmistakable shock to him when he had come face to face with that preference, crudely expressed, but in reviewing the matter, it had all seemed perfectly reasonable and natural. All his life he remembered being impressed with the idea that one of the many things he was “ expected to do ” was to some 7 day marry Miss Frances Stanhope, only child of his father’s dearest friend, whose lands adjoined Fairmead on the eastern side. Just how he had received that impression he could not have told, but it had been definitely embodied in the atmosphere which had surrounded himi, for as far back as he was able to remember. As children, the two brothers had often quarreled over which should do this or that small service for Fanny, and whenever the older lad had been chosen by the girl for any of her small expeditions and plans, it had never even occurred to Alton that Harry’s fits of sulks could have been occasioned by anything more serious than childish temper. How blind he had been, he thought, as he went mercilessly on with his mental arraignment of himself! As the young people grew older, Frances and Alton were naturally thrown more and more into the society of each other until, when she was approaching the age of twenty, he had begun to urge their marriage, as an event long looked forward to and anticipated by both their families. He was forced to acknowledge, in looking back over the affair, that, obviously, he could never have really loved the girl, — at least not as she deserved and had the right to be loved, — he had always taken everything concerning their ultimate union too much for granted for that! He remembered that he had always been a little shy where women were concerned, and very probably this had prevented his knowing just how to make himself sufficiently indispensable to this particular member of the sex, for it certainly seemed that he had failed in this one of the “ expected things,” even as in some of the others.

He did not feel quite so bitterly about it as he had at first, although he knew that the girl’s white face among the tall roses in the dear old garden at home would live in his memory for many a long day. They had been chatting together at dusk, and as they carelessly rested their elbows upon the mossy old sun-dial, he had remarked, tentatively, “ Well, Fan, what do you say to our being married in the Autumn? ” and he felt that he would never be able to banish from, his remembrance her startled look and pleading eyes as she had visibly withdrawn from his proffered caress, and buried her face in her hands, in a paroxysm of weeping. It had taken some very clever strategy on his part to gain her confidence, but at last he heard the whole, short and pitiful as it was, — how she cared for Harry and Harry loved her;

how she had vainly endeavored to make herself care for Alton in that way, and, being thoroughly aware of the attitude of both families upon the subject, how very unhappy both she and Harry were over the whole affair.

To Alton’s unselfish nature it had seemed quite in the natural course of events that pretty Frances should prefer his brother, and after spending a full half hour in administering comfort to her, he had left her divided between smiles and tears, with a most brotherly salutation, and the assurance that she should never be forced into a marriage with himself against her will, and that he would explain matters to his father for her.

He was fanatically devoted to his attractive half-brother and consequently was eager and willing to do anything within his power to promote his happiness. Therefore he had gone to his parent with a plain statement of the facts, — braved his anger at this declination upon the part of his son to fulfill the share of the long-cherished plan which devolved upon him, — and heard with a stony calm, but an uplifted soul, the irate gentleman’s forcibly expressed wish “ never to set eyes upon him again until he came to his senses I ”

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Then he had penned a note to Harry, — a note brimming with affectionate good wishes and explanations, — said a fond adieu to the step-mother who had cared for him so lovingly since his boyhood, and of whom he was very fond, — collected his traveling necessities, the revolver which was his especial pet, — the little pearl-encircled miniature of the young mother whom he did not even remember, — and hurried to take his passage upon the first Americanbound liner, heading for California, — perhaps Alaska, — then — he had not really decided where.

CHAPTER TWO. UST call fo’ dinner! ”

The cry, in the broad, melodious drawl of the colored race, rang through the car, whirling Alton Fordyce back with a jerk over three thousand miles of ocean to his immediate surroundings. He began to realize that he was the possessor of an “ aching void ” in the vicinity of his beltline, so he leisurely followed the white-clothed negro back through several swaying Pullmans to the diner. It was very comfortably filled by the time he arrived upon the scene, and he stood for some time waiting for the presiding genius of the miniature hotel to find him a place.

“ If you’ll wait, sir, I can give you a seat facing forward, in a few moments,” remarked that functionary, politely. Somehow, Alton Fordyce was a man to whom those of an inferior station usually deemed it advisable to be more or less deferential.

“ Never mind,” answered Fordyce cheerfully, “ I’d just as soon ride backward.”

“ All right, sir, — this way, sir! ” and before he knew it he was being installed at the table already occupied by the three people whom he had remarked upon their entrance into the train. He became distinctly curious about them when he began to appreciate what a peculiarly assorted group they were.

The man was very tall, extremely homely, and thin almost to the point of emaciation. His chin was clean-shaven, leaving a heavy, drooping moustache and small side-whiskers of a very indeterminate shade of brown, — his eyes were small and grey with a look of craftiness about them, — his nose was hooked, — and he was topped off by a heavy shock of hair of the same color (or lack of definite color!) as his whiskers. He had a somewhat furtive manner of glancing about him which contrasted oddly with a rather cruel mouth and a very determined chin, and in spite of himself Fordyce was interested in the combination.

The elder woman looked to be at least ten years her husband’s junior, and notwithstanding her avoirdupois, one would be at once aware that she was, of necessity, the least effective of

*3 the two. She had thin, mouse-colored hair, drawn tightly back from her temples and twisted into a hard little knot on top of her head. Her face was round and plump, with a receding chin and a narrow and flattened forehead, and when she opened her eyes to their fullest extent they had the opaque appearance of china-blue marbles. Judging from the glances which she cast at her husband when he spoke, it was easy to see that she was completely under his domination.

The third member of the party was clearly not yet out of that enchanting period, extending approximately from fifteen to eighteen, when a girl has ceased to be a child, but has not yet arrived at the real estate of womanhood ; the period when, being familiar only with her own shadowy world, peopled with her dream-ideals, she eagerly welcomes each new type which the great Juggler, Chance, places before her as one more specimen to be studied and added to her ever growing store of impressions. She was of medium height, slender and graceful, with the unstudied charm of a child, and Fordyce noted that except for a touch of white at throat and wrists she was attired with extreme simplicity in the deepest black, which served to accentuate the fragility of her appearance. Her light brown hair fell in wavy profusion about a broad low forehead and was massed in a loose knot at the back of her head, where it was held in place by two large-headed pins, the whole seeming almost too heavy for the slender neck and delicate, oval countenance.

Alton was struck by her strong resemblance to a pretty child whom he had known at home, but he soon saw that where there should have been bright, laughing eyes and a merry, childish mouth to complete the illusion, yet neither one was there before him. In some indefinable way she impressed him as discouraged and sad, and he furtively studied her, behind the screen of his menu-card, mentally coming to the decision that she must have been going through some heavy sorrow or trouble. Her dreamy, brown eyes seemed to have tears lurking not far back of their velvety depths, and there was a pathetic droop to the lovely mouth which comported ill with the firm compression of the red lips and the upward tilt of the small, round chin.

“ Decidedly, an interesting specimen 1 ” mused Fordyce, over his dinner, as he noted the defiant uplifting of her shapely head, when- 15 ever the masculine member of the party addressed a remark to her, and the look of utter disgust and loathing with which she favored his unconscious head. She possessed an odd little trick of lifting her hand to push some straying tendrils of hair back from her face, which, somehow, was very familiar to the man sitting opposite her, and he racked his brain to remember where he had ever seen it before. Suddenly there leaped into the forefront of his memory, a picture, — a green waste of tumbling waters, as far as the eye could reach, — a leaden sky, as a background, — and a slim, childish figure wrapped in some sort of a long, dark cloak, leaning against the rail of a huge, transatlantic liner, gazing with wide eyes over the great expanse of ocean, — entirely alone and utterly lonely, — and now and then putting up a slender hand to push back the hair from her face, as the blustering wind made havoc of what it could reach, under her tumed-down, felt hat. He had thought the little figure was that of a child as he had passed and re-passed it each evening in his own restless pacing of the deck, — but it must have been this girl! As he arrived at this conclusion he unconsciously raised his eyes, in order to verify his surmise, and met the gaze of the brown ones opposite, turned full upon him. For a moment he could think of nothing so much as the expression in the eyes of a doe (once wounded by his hand), — an expression which had haunted him and prevented his ever hunting again. In the short space in which their glances crossed he read fear, dislike and a pitiful look of hopelessness which it hurt him to see, — then she lowered her eyes to her plate and did not meet his glance again during the meal.

The Englishman, having just been separated from all his personal Lares and Penates, was in a mental condition which readily permitted of his regarding this forlorn girl with more interest than, under other and happier circumstances, would have been possible to his reserved and self-contained nature. Himself a stranger in a strange land, he thought of this young girl as a kindred spirit in his lonely trip across an unfamiliar continent, for he was beginning to appreciate that, in all this world, there is no sense of loneliness which can compare, in its intensity, with the feeling of utter isolation which assails the traveler in any densely populated section of a foreign country. In the midst of the roar and bustle of the busy cosmopolitan life which surges around the wanderer, he realizes that not one single individual, out of all these thronging thousands, cares one particle what happens to himself, and this sensation of complete detachment was heavy upon the mind and heart of this son of Britain as he steadily and relentlessly added to the number of miles between himself and Fairmead.

Fordyce had lingered over his dinner and later, over a cigar, and when he finally returned to his own small domain, he found a commotion in the section next beyond his. The tall man was speaking angrily and gesticulating wildly, — his wife was huddled in a corner, — while both porter and conductor were endeavoring to pacify the enraged individual. Alton made out, from the scraps of the conversation which reached his ears, that through some error, the upper berth in their section had been sold to someone who was to board the train at its next stop, and then re-sold to the thin gentleman, and the conductor was vainly trying to straighten out the tangle by offering to exchange their section for one in another car. This would necessitate an early morning change, before that car should be

i8 detached from the train, but it was the best they could do, the porter informed them.

Fordyce, noting their predicament, rose and addressing the elder woman, said, with a formal little bow,

“ I beg your pardon. Madam, but if it would be any accommodation to either of you two ladies, the lower berth in my section is at your disposal. I usually spend the greater part of my sleeping-car nights either in reading or in the observation-car, so the upper will be entirely sufficient for my needs ! ”

The tall man wheeled sharply about, with a suspicious look in his eye.

“What’s that? What’s that?” he demanded, testily, casting uneasy glances from Alton to the two ladies, and back again.

“ Beg pardon,” answered Fordyce, calmly, “ I said that if it would be any more convenient for your wife or — er — daughter, — the lower berth in section three is at their disposal.”

“But Uncle, we can’t possibly do that!” quickly protested the young girl who had been gazing straight in front of her with a singularly detached air. It was the first time Alton had heard her voice, which was low and clear, seeming an integral part of its possessor. “We *9 ought not to inconvenience a stranger in this way! We don’t mind an early ”

“ Be quiet, Barbara 1 ” sternly interrupted her uncle. “ Of course we will accept this gentleman’s kind offer, — and I will occupy that berth myself, leaving you and your aunt the original one. Don’t attempt to dissuade me ! ” (as the girl seemed about to speak) “ My mind is made up, — it never changes I Come, it is high time you were in bed, — you know you are not at all strong, and you have had a very trying day.”

“ Insufferable cad ! ” muttered Alton to himself, for he felt aggrieved to think of his comfortable lower berth, so calmly appropriated by the man to whom he had taken such an unaccountable dislike, when his sole desire had been to extricate the two ladies from what had appeared to be a rather unpleasant predicament.

The sections were speedily made up and Fordyce noted that some argument seemed to be in progress between the two elders of the party, who cast uneasy glances toward their young companion, while the girl sat with averted head and a mutinous-looking mouth, evidently awaiting the result of their colloquy. Finally the ladies retired to the dressing-room, and as they departed he heard the girl fling back, over her shoulder, —

“Very well, Uncle, it is your own fault if you drive me to desperate measures! This is the last time I shall warn you, — hereafter, I shall act without that formality, and the consequences, (whatever they are!) will be upon your head! ’’

Alton betook himself almost immediately to the observation car, where he indited a long letter to his half-brother, a note to Frances, and one to his solicitors at their London address, — then settled himself for a long and comfortable evening. As he touched a match to an old and much battered pipe the young man commenced a mental summary of the events of the day, as was his invariable habit, and soon he was so deep in the puzzle of the peculiar relations of his three fellow-passengers that he failed to hear the other occupant of the platform go into the car, and failed again, an hour later, to hear the cautious re-opening of the door or the subdued sound of someone taking a seat over by the opposite rail. Alton’s chair was entirely in the dense shadow, and the newcomer, evidently believing herself alone, laid her head on her folded arms upon the railing and gave way to a paroxysm of uncontrollable sobbing.

Fordyce was too much engrossed in his own thoughts to notice that his solitude had been invaded, until he was startled by the sound of a smothered sigh and a sob-caught breath.

“Great Scott!’’ thought the man, “how long has she been out here? ”

He couldn’t leave now, without allowing her to think that he had been all this time aware of her presence, and perhaps, spying upon her! Who was she, anyway, and why on earth didn’t she go in and go to bed, as became a lady?

A sudden lurch of the train caused the bowed head to lift, and the watching man beheld, full in the clear moonlight, the face of the girl with whom his mind had been so busily engaged. For a moment he was startled, — what was she doing there at that time of night, and alone? Then her words to her Uncle recurred to him, — “ Desperate measures, — last time I’ll warn you, — consequences on your own head ! ’’ What did it mean? Plainly the child was unhappy, — could it be that she was meditating anything rash, — such as making away with herself, for instance? She certainly looked a mere child to him, in her clinging, black train-negligee.

and he could not believe she was more than a child. While these thoughts had been racing through his head, the train dashed out upon a spidery bridge, spanning a swiftly running river, and the girl stepped quickly toward the rail while Fordyce made a rapid stride forward, to be ready in case of emergency.

The girl looked up, startled by the sudden apparition, and her hand flew to her heart while she swayed heavily against the rail, and gasped out,

“ What do you — what are you doing here? ”

“ Exactly what I wished to ask you,” returned Fordyce, quietly, placing a chair for her and forcing her gently back into it, while his hand remained, for a moment, reassuringly upon her shoulder.

There was a long period of silence. Alton was never a very talkative man, and the girl seemed to be trying to make up her mind to speak.

“ I’m not merely curious,” volunteered Alton, at length, “ please don’t think that! And please don’t feel obliged to tell me anything you would rather not, — but perhaps I might be able to help you in some way, you know ! ”

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“ I don’t believe you could, though I’m very grateful for the thought,” replied the girl, in a queer, level little voice. “ I fear I am beyond outside help, now.”

Her tone was so absolutely lifeless and she looked so forlorn and altogether pathetic that Alton felt a strange lump rise in his throat at the hopelessness of her. He wondered what her trouble could be, and how she happened to be out there at midnight, alone? Visions of kidnappers and child-stealers flashed through his brain, but in the same instant he decided against them. She was far too self-possessed for that, and besides, she had owned to kinship with both her fellow-travelers, — that he had heard with his own ears! He debated within himself whether or not he ought to insist upon some sort of an explanation, — and deep down in his inner consciousness he realized that he felt, in some indefinable way, strangely drawn toward this slip of a maiden, with the sad eyes and the air of having passed through stormy waters.

He waited quietly, still standing guard over the rail, his tall, massive form looming up huge and black against the silvery landscape, outside, while his calm gaze surveyed the flying panorama, and the silence seemed to invite his companion to relieve her mind of its burden.

CHAPTER THREE. URELY you were not thinking of ” he gave a shudder

ing glance at the rail as he spoke and her eyes followed his.

“ Oh, no,” she answered, simply, “ I’m not brave enough for that! ”

A great wave of pity swept over Alton Fordyce. He leaned down from his station near the rail and placed one large, protective hand over the two clasped listlessly in her lap. “ You poor child, — poor, troubled little girl,” he said gently: “ Wouldn’t it do you good to tell what’s bothering you? ”

She smiled wanly up at him but made no effort to withdraw her hands from his clasp for several moments.

“ I’m so ashamed to look you in the face after what happened about the berth,” she said at last, with a ghost of a smile, “ I just couldn’t sleep 1 ”

“For worry about that?’’ he asked, following her lead. It was borne in upon his masculine intellect that she was a child in her mental processes, and that unless she was permitted to take her own time and way in the telling there would never be anything told, at all.

“ Partly that,” she answered, musingly. “ And Uncle never even thanked you as he should have done.”

“ That was entirely unnecessary ! I saw that it helped you ladies out of a beastly hole, and was jolly glad to do it, — so don’t let that worry you one bit, please 1 ”

The girl gave him a grateful look, and after an interval of silence, exclaimed,

“ Oh ! When I think of everything, I wish

I had the courage to ” a quick glance at

the rail completed the sentence as clearly as words could have done.

“ Child! child! ” expostulated Alton, “you don’t know what you are saying ! The greatest coward on this earth is the person who takes his or her own life, don’t you realize that? It requires bravery to live and to force a recognition from that fickle goddess. Fate ! ” Then as if he wished to divert her mind and turn her thoughts into other channels, he finished, whim- 36 sically: “ I think women are really much braver than men, don’t you? ”

“ I’m not a child,” she returned,” truly I’m not, and you’ve called me that several times. And why do you consider women the braver? ”

“ Well, since you object to being called a child, don’t you think that, as a woman, you are showing bravery in defying Mrs. Grundy, and talking to a strange man in the wee small hours of the night, on the observation platform of a train, with only the moon for a chaperone? ”

“ You’re not a strange man,” returned she, naively, “ I saw you on the steamer every day, somewhere, and the stewardess said you were a perfect gentleman.”

Alton positively grinned to himself in the darkness. Heavens I What an inexperienced infant she was, in spite of all her assertions to the contrary. And she insisted that she was not a child, — yet she considered him “ not a strange man ” because, forsooth, she had spent six days and nights on the same ship which harbored him, and because the stewardess had characterized him as “ a perfect gentleman.” He wondered if she did not know that anyone who had favored a steward or his feminine counterpart with a sufficiently sizable gratuity would have the doubtful distinction of being considered a “ perfect gentleman ” by either of those worthies ! But loath to shake her childlike faith in the world which she knew so slightly, he only answered,

“ A gentleman, surely, — I hope, though far enough from perfect! Perhaps it would help to make matters a little more conventional if I were to introduce myself, — Alton Fordyce, — late of Fairmead, Surrey, England, — disinherited, — now of — well, it remains to be seen where! Now, if you wish to be considered a ‘ perfect lady ’ you must tell me about yourself!”

The girl eyed him seriously for several moments.

“ My name is Barbara Walton,” she replied, simply, ” and it won’t take very long to tell you all about myself. What do you particularly wish to know? ”

“ First, — how do you come to be in this position? ”

“You mean out here, at night, — with you? ”

Alton had not meant that, literally, but he deemed it wiser to let it go at that, merely nodding his head in affirmation.

“ Well, you see, Aunt Eva was made to share my berth, so I would not be able to do anything without their knowing it, — and she’s worn out from her trip, — sd, when she was sleeping soundly (I made her lie on the inside so she would get more air on her poor head,) I slipped out. I didn’t think anyone would be out here so late and — oh, I just can’t bear it! ” She drew a little sobbing breath before she came to the end of her explanation.

Fordyce was thoroughly nonplussed. “ Why aren’t you allowed to be alone? ” he finally inquired.

“ Because they’re afraid I’ll talk to people.”

” Then they wouldn’t approve of your talking to me? ”

” Oh, you least of all, — you’re a man! ”

The look of complete bewilderment upon the Englishman’s face momentarily deepened, until he could restrain himself no longer, and burst out with,