The secret stairs

Contents

CHAPTEB PAGE

I. The News in New York 1

II. The News in Bayport 17

Chapter I The News In New York!

H ER name was Isabel Rodney, and it was the day after her fourteenth birthday. She stood in one of the front windows on the second floor of a house over on the west side of New York, and wished with all her heart that she and her aunt were back in the small town in the West where she had lived the greater part of her life. She felt lonely. New York was so vast a place, and her aunt was the only person in the whole huge city whom she really knew. Of course, there were the, people in this small hotel with whom they had become acquainted, but they could scarcely be said to count. Her aunt, Mrs. Todd, who was a widow with no children, had taken care of Isabel since she was little more than a baby, for both her father and, her mother had died before the child was two years old, and she, therefore, looked upon her Aunt Clara as her only relative.

A month or so ago Mrs. Todd, for some mystel rious reason which Isabel could not fathom, had sold her house in the West and had come to New York, for how long or short a stay Isabel did not know. She rather hoped it meant that she was to go to boarding school, although her aunt had not mentioned it. Indeed, she had been somewhat vague about everything. They would go to New York and would later make their plans. It seemed strange to Isabel, for they had no acquaintances there with the exception of a Spanish gentleman whom Mrs. ,Todd had met in San Francisco. He had recommended this small “family hotel,” and here they were staying until Aunt Clara “could decide.” Isabel, standing in the window and looking out that she might not see the dinginess of the room, wished that she would decide soon.

She longed to go to boarding school. She had heard about the life there, and she loved boardingschool stories. The girls in them were always getting into the most delightful scrapes, and getting out of them again by fascinating means. She could picture herself having precisely those thrilling adventures in the company of half a dozen congenial spirits of her own age. She longed for young friends. There was not a person of her own age or anywhere near it in this hateful hotel. All were elderly — twenty-five or thirty at the very youngest — and probably years and years older than that. If only she had a 3

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sister, or a brother just a little older than herself! That would be best of all. Ever since she could remember she had wished that she had a brother a few years older and very jolly and kind. She knew it was a wish that could not possibly be realized, and so, of course, it was silly to wish it. She told herself this often enough, but still, if only !

Opposite the window where she stood was a long row of brownstone houses, all with high flights of steps leading up to their front doors, all with little balconies outside the parlor windows, guarded by iron balustrades, one as like every other as peas in a pod. It was the middle of September, but the weather was warm. New York had the dusty, leftover aspect that cities wear in September. In the cracks and corners of the pavements were little heaps of dead leaves and bits of straw and paper, whirled there by an occasional gust of hot breeze. Immense numbers of English sparrows twittered and fluttered and fought in the ivy that grew over the houses. How she detested the city !

The sound of the opening and shutting of the door, told her that her aunt had returned from her shopping expedition, and Isabel turned to greet her.

“Oh, I’m so glad you’re back, Aunt Clara!” she exclaimed. “Did you have a horrid time? It must have been hot in the shops.”

“Horrid time ! My dear child, I’ve had a grand time. Bargains ! My, no end of ’em ! My, how I do love a city life !”

Mrs. Todd, a rather handsome woman, still too youthful in appearance to be considered even middleaged, except by her young niece, removed her large beflowered hat, and proceeded to exchange her highheeled, white shoes for something more comfortable. She was given to the careful consideration of clothes, and was always dressed in public in what she thought was the latest style, but in the seclusion of her own apartment she liked to be “easy,” as she called a pink silk kimono and slippers to match. The late Mr. Todd, a man much older than herself, had left her amply provided for, and since his death she had thoroughly enjoyed spending the fortune so painstakingly acquired by him, and of which she now had full control. She had a certain generosity of nature, in that she was always ready to buy for Isabel as well as for herself, so the girl had been brought up with all the pocket money that she needed.

The aunt and niece had traveled frequently, and by the persons whom they had happened to meet on these journeys Mrs. Todd was considered a wealthy and singularly unencumbered widow. She had a kindly and affectionate disposition, and she had always been good to the only child of her only sister, and Isabel felt for her a very real love, although she did not always agree with her.

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“Oh, Aunt Clara!” she exclaimed; “how can you say you like the city? I just hate New York!”

“Now, isn’t that funny? I was just opening my mouth to say, ‘Give me a life in New York I’ Well, my dear, so far as anybody can tell, we’re each of us going to have what we like best — you for the country and me for the city ! It’s pretty much settled' as far as I’m concerned, though, of course, ‘there’s many a slip ’twixt the cup and the lip,’ as the old saying has it, but I’m pretty sure it’s all right for me, and I dare say it will be all right for you, for, of course, they can’t refuse to take you after me supporting you all these years and giving you the best of everything, the way I have right along. You can never say I haven’t treated you right — just like my own child, Bella. N’est-ce pas, ma cherie?”

Mrs. Todd was given to little foreign phrases in her conversation, and of late they had increased in frequency. She even attempted an occasional bit of Spanish. She sat in a rocking-chair and fanned herself vigorously with a small fan. It was evident to her niece that she was in a nervous although a cheerful frame of mind.

“Why, of course, you have always been lovely to me, Auntie Clara!” replied Isabel, slightly bewildered. She was accustomed to her aunt’s voluble way of speaking, and yet she could not imagine what she meant by her last remark. Were they not to 5 stay together? Perhaps she was to be allowed to go to boarding school after all, and in the country somewhere, although her aunt had declared more than once that it would be out of the question because she herself could not be left alone. “Am I really to go to school? Oh, I do hope they will take me ! Why shouldn’t they? But I should hate to leave you all alone. Do you think I had better? Would you stay on here all by yourself, Auntie?”

“All by myself! I guess not!” exclaimed Mrs. Todd, rocking and fanning more vigorously than ever, and smiling broadly as she spoke. “Now, cherie, haven’t you suspected anything at all? It seems as if you must have !”

A dull dread began to gather shape in Isabel’s mind — a something which until now she had refused to recognize by thinking the matter out, although she had been conscious of its existence. Instinctively she knew what was coming, and yet she would not believe it until her aunt spoke the words.

“Suspected what?” she asked.

“That I’m going to marry again !” exclaimed Mrs. Todd, triumphantly. “I’m engaged, and I guess you know who to, all right !”

Isabel sat down. She felt suddenly quite limp and queer. Her whole world was tottering.

Her aunt watched her. She had wondered how the child would take it, and she was prepared for 6

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trouble. She determined if possible to forestall It.

“See here,” she began briskly, but not unkindly; “there’s no use fussing over what can’t be helped, is there? If you’d only used a little atom of common sense the last month you might have known it was coming. Why, he’s been just perfectly devoted! You’ve seen that, haven’t you, now?”

“I suppose you mean Mr. Zorolla,” said her niece. Isabel’s voice was clear and distinct. There was no mistaking the scornful utterance of the foreign name.

“Don Manuel y Zorolla of the Castle Zorolla, Spain!” corrected Mrs. Todd, superbly. “He is a marquis. I shall be making you the niece of a Spanish grandee.”

To this announcement Isabel made no reply. She: was not in the least impressed by it. She sat by the. table in the center of the room, which was covered with a heavy rep tablecloth, and on which was a bowl of flowers, the grandee’s gift of the day before. Isabel was filled with an immense desire to dash the bowl and all that it contained across the room. To avoid this drastic action she went back to the window at which she had been standing. There were the same brownstone steps opposite, the same iron balconies, the same English sparrows that had been there five minutes ago — and yet in those five minutes her whole world had changed. At last she 7 turned and faced her aunt, who was obviously waiting for her to say something.

“Of course, I hope you will be very happy, Aunt Clara,” she faltered. “You — you like foreigners, so — so — perhaps you will be. I hope so, I’m sure.”

“Well, I think it’s about time for you to congratulate me ! The idea ! Such a queer girl as you are, Bella, it’s a wonder we’ve got along together as well as we have, I’m sure! You can’t say I haven’t been good to you, can you, now?” j

“Why, of course not, Aunt Clara ! There is no one I would say it to, even if I thought it, which I don’t, and never have. That is what makes me feel so badly — to know it’s all over — that it won’t ever be just you and me any more. Of course, I suppose Mr. — Don Manuel — will be kind to me when I come home for holidays, but it won’t be just the same as it always has been, will it?”

“Come home for holidays? Why, what do you suppose you are going to do, child?”

“I thought — at least I hoped — you meant I was to go to boarding school somewhere. Didn’t you?”

“Boarding school! Well, I never! If you ain’t the limit, Bella, child!”

“Then am I to stay with you all the time? Am I to live with you?”

“Live with us? Not by a long shot! The Don 8

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would never stand for that. No, indeed, Bella, my^ dear. Of course, you are to go to your father’s relations.”

“My father’s relations!” repeated the girl slowly., “But — but they will not want me! You have told, me that they didn’t like Mamma. How can I go to them? Oh, Aunt Clara, surely you don’t mean it? And I’ve never seen one of them!”

“I know you haven’t, but it’s high time you did, and I must say it has been my doings that you haven’t. I told them when your father and mother both died and left you that little helpless baby that you were, that I’d take you if they would promise never to interfere, and they haven’t. I will say that for them — they have kept to their part of the bargain, but things are going to be different now, and I guess they will take you, all right. I’m not a bit. worried about that.”

“How many are there?”

“Oh, lots of ’em, for all I know. An uncle, anyway. I know that for sure — unless he’s died, and I never heard that he had. And two or three aunts, and — and — well, I suppose I’ve got to tell you, for you’ll have to know it some time — you’ve got a brother, too.”

Isabel could not speak. There was a strange feeling in her throat, and her mouth became parched and dry.

“For goodness’ sake, child, don’t take it so hard!, I don’t know how they’ll treat you, but they certainly won’t bite you ! Here, take my fan. I guess, this warm weather is affecting you.”

But Isabel shook her head. “Did you say a brother?” she asked, in a voice quite unlike her own. “Why did you never tell me before that I had a brother? Oh, Aunt Clara !”

“For goodness’ sake, Bella, don’t take on so! He’s only a half brother, anyway, and I thought it would unsettle you to know about him — you ’way off in Wyoming, and him in Massachusetts, and me not wanting anything to do with ’em after the nasty way they’d acted about your mother. Your father was twice married. He was a widower with one son when he married your mother, my own dear sister, and a sweeter woman never lived than my sister Isabel. I don’t want you ever to forget that, Bella, nor allow anything different. And you’re the living image of her. I declare, I think sometimes it’s Isabel herself. You’ve got the same kind of blue eyes she had, kind of grayish blue, and set far apart, just like hers. And your nose is just like hers, too, sort of retrousse , but not a real turn-up. And you’ve got her kind of a temper, too, Bella! Awful quick, but soon over with. She never sulked or bore malice, and you don’t either. I will say that for you. But set on having her own way, just as you are some- 10

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times. And up to mischief, too ! Oh, you’re as like as two peas !”

Isabel had heard all this before. She sat very still, looking at her aunt. A brother — an uncle — aunts! Where were they? What were they like? Why had she never heard of that brother? It simply could not be true. Her Aunt Clara had invented this tale of the brother. She did exaggerate, and sometimes she fancied things to be entirely different from what Isabel knew them to be. She was excited about her coming marriage — but what if she Had imagined that, too? Perhaps she was not really going to marry that man after all!

“I can’t believe it,” said Isabel slowly. “I can’t believe a single word of any of it. Are you really and truly going to marry that Spanish man? Have I really and truly a brother?”

“Well, I never!” cried Mrs. Todd, indignantly. “If you don’t beat everything, Isabel Rodney!. Don’t believe your own aunt! That’s a pretty thing for you to say ! Take it right back now before I get real mad. Do you suppose I’d make up such things? Answer me, quick!”

“Oh, no, I suppose not,” said Isabel, sadly. It would have been too good to be true. This news only was the truth after all. “But why haven’t you told me before about my brother?”

“Because I just didn’t want to,” proclaimed Mrs., 11

Todd. “I took you and brought you up. I told ’em, ‘Hands off!’ I said, ‘If she’s to stay with me, she’s to be mine. I won’t tell her about any of you till I get good and ready.’ So we made a sort of a bargain, him and me. I mean your uncle, who came out West when your mother died, and offered to take you back home with him. You see they had the boy. They had taken him when his mother died, and the aunts thought the world and all of him, and were bringing him up like their own child, and I set out to do the same by you. When your father first met your mother he was a widower with this one child, but he left him with his own people when he came West, so your mother never had the care of him.”

“Did he go out West and meet her there?” asked Isabel. She had always longed to know more about her parents, but until now had been unable to learn anything on the subject from her aunt, who had been strangely silent on a subject which to Isabel was of such importance.

“No,” replied Mrs. Todd, rather reluctantly. “Your mother came East with some Eastern people,, who took a fancy to her and engaged her for a governess to their children. They lived in the same place as the Rodneys, and it was there she came across Philip Rodney. As soon as they were married they came out and lived near us. His people were awfully down on your mother, because — well, 12

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for reasons — pretty poor ones, I always thought. She had a right to do as she liked, and she was just sweet. I always thought my sister Isabel as pretty as a picture, and everybody who ever knew her loved her, except the Rodney family. But they were awful prejudiced. Eastern people all are, I’ll tell you that, Bella ! And set ! My goodness, set ain’t the word for it, especially New England people, and they’re New England to their very backbone. Think no end of themselves, too. Awfully high and mighty. They live in Bayport, Massachusetts. I don’t know much about the place, except a few things your mother let out now and then. I never could get her to talk much about it when she came back, but I should judge it to be a kind of a country town, so I guess you’ll be living in the country, all right, just as you want to.”

Mrs. Todd paused for a moment, but Isabel said nothing, and presently her aunt began again.

“Well, I said to your Uncle Rodney when he came out to my poor dear sister’s funeral, s’l, ‘I’ll take the girl and bring her up, but I don’t want any interference. I’m not going to tell her anything about you folks until I get good and ready — not until she’s fifteen or thereabouts, for I don’t want her getting unsettled. If she’s mine, she’s mine, and I mean to keep her to myself as far as relations are concerned. I’ll tell her then, and I’ll leave it written out in case

I die, and in that case Mr. Todd would attend to it if he’s living, and I should die first.’ Which, of course, he didn’t, seeing he was a good ten years older than me. Well, your Uncle Rodney didn’t like the idea a bit, for he had come out there with his mind all made up to take you back home with him — said his sisters would bring you up right, and they thought you and the boy ought to be brought up together, but when I remembered how they’d acted about your mother, my own precious sister, I just couldn’t let you go to them, and I didn’t. I kept you, and I’ve never regretted it, Bella, my dear, and I hope you’ll put in a good word for me when they begin to criticize me, as they sure will. But now the time has come to make a change. Of course, I never dreamed I’d be a widow quite so early, and that I’d meet before long a real titled nobleman who’d fall in love with me and I’d become almost a princess. I declare, it’s like a fairy tale. But you’ve never asked to see my ring ! Ain’t it a beauty? Did you ever see such a big diamond? My, don’t it flash!”

She held out her hand, adorned with a stone which was certainly of great size, and the flash of which was dazzling. Isabel felt half blinded by it — or was it by the story which she had just heard? “It’s very large and — and — grand!” she murmured, knowing that her aunt would be deeply offended if.

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she did not express some admiration, but feeling no enthusiasm.

“Grand! I should say so! It’s a family stone, a regular heirloom, and I’m to have other precious jewels. His family’s almost royal. Of course, we shall live in the old family castle in Spain, but we’re going to travel a lot, and live part of the time in Paris. I can tell you, I’m going to be no end of a swell, Bella! We’re going over as soon as ever he gets through his business in this country, so you see I can’t keep you with me, and it’s a good thing you’ve got your father’s folks to go to. It’s all turning out all right, after all. Now, I’m going to write them a letter, and you can mail it this afternoon. Now it’s all decided with the marquis, I feel as if I’d rather like to get everything else finished up and settled’ and out of the way. I’ll sit right down and write to them now.”

She seated herself at the table and after a brief period of thought her pen began to fly over the paper. It was a scratchy pen, and at intervals of a. few minutes its progress ceased, while Mrs. Todd^ bit the end of it and considered what to say next. She signed her name at last with a flourish, sealed and stamped her letter, and handed it to Isabel.

“There, that’s done!” she exclaimed, in a voice of relief. “Funny, how I’ve been dreading writing that letter, and it went as smooth as silk. Suppose 15 you take it out right now, Bella — you take to the branch post office near here, and you get a special delivery stamp for it. It will get there sooner, and make those old ladies and the old gent realize there’s something doing, and it’s up to them to hurry. My, but I’m glad to get it off myj mind 1”

Isabel put on her hat, took the letter and left the room without a word. She wondered in a dull way t what her aunt had said, but she asked no questions. She had an odd feeling of remoteness, and of having no identity of her own. She was nothing more than the business that was being “finished up,” but she was also a desolate and unhappy little girl. She told herself that she did not really care what her aunt had said to those old people in Bayport, for of what^ use would it be to care? She could do nothing tO ( change the fate which hung over her. And so she had a brother! What kind of brother would he prove to be?

Chapter II

T HE Rodneys had always lived in Bayport. The annals of the old town showed that a Rodney had been one of the earliest colonists, and the name had figured as one of importance all the way down from the seventeenth century to the present day in its history. There had been ministers and merchants, a sea captain or two, one army officer in the Revolution, another in the Civil War. Even as late as 1880, Mr. Charles Rodney was driving the horse his father rode in ’62, twenty years old to be sure, but still dancing and prancing at the sound of a band of music. Charles Rodney was a man of intellectual pursuits, professor of philosophy for a time in one of the smaller New England colleges, but now living at home, happy in his study ^ writing books too deep for his family to understand, but of which they were intensely proud.

Charles had not married, and his sister Abby presided over his house — so ably and completely, it was 17 said by the Bayport wags, that he had lacked the courage to make a change. Be that as it may, the sisters, Abby, Phoebe and Lydia, with their nephew Philip, lived in the Professor’s house, on a somewhat limited income to be sure, but in more than the average state of comfort and contentment.

Philip was the son of the brother who had died some twelve years ago, and he was the half brother of Isabel. This boy, who was now seventeen and who had known no other home, was not ignorant of his sister’s existence as she had been of his. On the contrary, he had more than once expressed a wish to “see the kid,” and had declared that some day, in spite of family promises of “hands off,” he intended to “look her up.” This idea had never met with the approval of his elder relatives, but Aunt Lyd, who was the youngest of his aunts and quite modern in her way of thinking, considered it natural and praiseworthy on Philip’s part, and promised to go with him when the time came. It was safe to say this, for Phil must finish school and go through college before he could set forth on his travels to find his unknown sister.

The family came down to breakfast one warm September morning, quite unconscious that a bomb, metaphorically speaking, was to explode in their midst unexpectedly before they rose from the table; but it is the way of bombs to surprise people.

It was a beautiful room, with wainscoting and landscape paper, and high-backed mahogany chairs, and a big table about which had gathered in the past the Rodneys whose portraits hung upon the ; walls. The ancient family silver gleamed on the huge sideboard in the sunshine which came through the eastern windows. Outside was the garden, still blooming with late hollyhocks and phlox. Everything both within and without the house was neat and orderly, and precisely as it had always been. Miss Abby poured the coffee as usual, making each cup to suit the person for whom it was intended with her customary care, and breakfast for Miss Phoebe, the invalid, was arranged on a dainty tray. The Professor glanced at the headlines of the morning paper, knocked his glasses from his nose with his daily remark of disgust at the state of the world, and then very cheerfully attacked his johnny-cake, made by the old Rodney rule. His sister Lydia picked up the. paper as he laid it down, and considered the first page while she stirred her coffee, and then Philip drifted in, as usual a little late, and took his place opposite to his Aunt Lycf.

“Hullo, everybody !” said he. “I won’t be home to-night, Aunt Abby. Lucky I remembered to tell you. You would have sat up till all hours, wouldn’t you?”

He was a good-looking youth, tall and well-made, with straight features and honest eyes. His hair, a, dark chestnut, grew thick above his forehead and his brows were strongly marked. He ruled his Aunt Lyd with a rod of iron, of which fact they were, both perfectly aware; but Aunt Abby was different. She also could wield the iron rod when necessity demanded its use, but even she looked with an easy tolerance on Philip and his ways, especially when he smiled at her as he was doing now.

“It is fortunate you told me,” she said. “By eleven o’clock to-night I should have been telephon-, ing all about for a little lost boy. Where is it this time, Philip?”

“New London for the week-end with Jimmy Curtis, and longer if we’re sufficiently urged. Lots doing there, and you know it will be our last fling before school begins, except the Duanes’ roof-garden party, which will be on Thursday night, a dinner and some sort of a show afterwards, so I won’t get home till late if we stay until Thursday. Not before midnight, so don’t think I’m burglars, and don’t wait up for me, will you, Auntie? But it’s New London to-day. Old Curtis lives there, Jimmy’s uncle, you know, and he is going to put us up.”

“I suppose I am ‘Old Rodney’ to Jimmy and all the other Bayport boys,” put in his uncle Charles, with his grave face and his humorous eyes.

“Right you are, sir I” his nephew agreed promptly; “when you’re not ‘the good old Prof.’ ”

The two exchanged an affectionate and understanding glance, and continued to eat breakfast. And then the door bell rang.

“A special delivery letter,” said the maid, as she entered the dining room. “Please sign it here.” She handed the slip to the Professor and he wrote his name in the designated blank space. He glanced at the address and the postmark, and in his leisurely and methodical fashion slit the envelope with a table knife. “From New York,” he said. “Whom do I know in New York who would be in such a hurry?”