Part 24 (1/2)

Lawrence smiled, but very slightly. ”That subject,” said he, ”is one on which I don't joke.”

”Goodness!” exclaimed Miss Annie, clasping her hands and gazing with an air of comical commiseration at Mr Croft's serious face. ”I should think not!” and away she went.

Just before supper time, when Lawrence's door had been closed, and his lamp lighted, there came a knock, and Mrs Keswick appeared. ”That plan of mine didn't work,” she said, ”but I will bring Miss March out here, and manage it so that she'll have to stay till I come back. I have an idea about that. All that you have to do is to be ready when you get your chance.”

Lawrence thanked her, and a.s.sured her he would be very glad to have a chance, although he hoped, without much ground for it, that Roberta would not see through the old lady's schemes.

Mrs Keswick lotioned and rebandaged the sprained ankle, and then she said. ”I think it would be pleasant if we were all to come out here after supper, and have a game of whist. I used to play whist, and shouldn't mind taking a hand. You could have the table drawn up to your chair, and,--let me see--yes, there are three more chairs. It won't be like having her alone with you,” she said, with the cordial grin in which she sometimes indulged, ”but you will have her opposite to you for an hour, and that will be something.”

Lawrence approved heartily of the whist party, and a.s.sured Mrs Keswick that she was his guardian angel.

”Not much of that,” she said, ”but I have been told often enough that I'm a regular old matchmaker, and I expect I am.”

”If you make this match,” said Lawrence, ”you will have my eternal grat.i.tude.”

The supper sent out to Lawrence was a very good one, and the antic.i.p.ation of what was to follow made him enjoy it still more, for his pa.s.sion had now reached such a point that even to look at his love, although he could only speak to her of trumps and of tricks, would be a refres.h.i.+ng solace which would go down deep into his thirsty soul.

But bedtime and old Isham came, and the whist players came not. It needed no one to tell Lawrence whose disinclination it was that had prevented their coming.

”I reckon,” said Uncle Isham, as he looked in at Letty's cabin on his way to his own, ”dat dat ar Mister Crof' aint much use to gittin'

hisse'f hurt. All de time I was helpin' him to go to bed he was a growlin' like de bery debbil.”

CHAPTER XX.

Although October in Southern Virginia can generally be counted upon as a very charming month, it must not be expected that her face will wear one continuous smile. On the day after Lawrence Croft's misadventure the sky was gray with low-hanging clouds, there was a disagreeable wind from the north-east, and the air was filled with the slight drizzle of rain. The morning was so cool that Lawrence was obliged to keep his door shut, and Uncle Isham had made him a small wood fire on the hearth. As he sat before this fire, after breakfast, his foot still upon a stool, and vigorously puffed at a cigar, he said to himself that it mattered very little to him whether the sun shone, or all the rains of heaven descended, so long as Roberta March would not come out to him; and that she did not intend to come, rain or s.h.i.+ne, was just as plain as the marks on the sides of the fireplace, probably made by the heels of Mr Junius Keswick during many a long, reflective smoke.

On second thoughts, however, Lawrence concluded that a rainy day was worse for his prospects than a bright one. If the sun shone, and everything was fair, Miss March might come across the gra.s.sy yard and might possibly stop before his open door to bid him good morning, and to tell him that she was sorry that a headache had prevented her from coming to play whist the evening before. But this last, he presently admitted, was rather too much to expect, for he did not think she was subject to headaches, or to making excuses. At any rate he might have caught sight of her, and if he had, he certainly would have called to her, and would have had his say with her, even had she persisted in standing six feet from the door-step. But now this dreary day had shut his door and put an interdict upon strolls across the gra.s.s. Therefore it was that he must resign any opportunity, for that day, at least, of soothing the harrowing perturbations of his pa.s.sion by either the comforting warmth of hope, or by the deadening frigidity of a consummated despair. This last, in truth, he did not expect, but still, if it came, it would be better than perturbations; they must be soothed at any cost. But how to incur this cost was a difficult question altogether. So, puffing, gazing into the fire, and knitting his brows, he sat and thought.

As a good-looking young man, as a well-dressed young man, as an educated and cultured man, as a man of the clubs, and of society, and, when occasion required, as a very sensible man of business, Mr Croft might be looked upon as essentially a commonplace personage, and in our walks abroad we meet a great many like him. But there dwelt within him a certain disposition, which, at times, removed him to quite a distance from the arena in which commonplace people go through their prescribed performances. He would come to a determination, generally quite suddenly, to attain a desired end in his own way, without any reference to traditionary or conventional methods; and the more original and startling these plans the better he liked it.

This disposition it was which made Lawrence read with so much interest the account of the defeated general who made the cavalry charge into the camp of his victorious enemy. Defeat had been his, all through his short campaign, and it now seemed that the time had come to make another bold effort to get the better of his bad luck. As he could not woo Miss March himself, he must get some one else to do it for him, or, if not actually to woo the lady, to get her at least into such a frame of mind that she would allow him to woo her, even in spite of his present disadvantages.

This would be a very bold stroke, but Lawrence put a good deal of faith in it.

If Miss March were properly talked to by one of her own s.e.x, she might see, as perhaps she did not now see, how cruel was her line of conduct toward him, and might be persuaded to relent, at least enough to allow his voice to reach her; and that was all he asked for. He had not the slightest doubt that the widow Keswick would gladly consent to carry any message he chose to send to Miss March, and, more than that, to throw all the force of her peculiar style of persuasion into the support of his cause. But this, he knew very well, would finish the affair, and not at all in the way he desired. The person he wanted to act as his envoy was Mrs Null. To be sure, she had refused to act for him, but he thought he could persuade her. She was quiet, she was sensible, and could talk very gently and confidingly when she chose; she would say just what he told her to say, and if a contingency demanded that she should add anything, she would probably do it very prudently. But then it would be almost as difficult to communicate with her as with Miss March.

While he was thus thinking, in came the old lady, very cross. ”You didn't get any rubber of whist last night, did you?” said she, without salutatory preface. ”But I can tell you it wasn't my fault. I did all that I could, and more than I ought, to make her come, but she just put her foot down and wouldn't stir an inch, and at last I got mad and went to bed. I don't know whether she saw it or not, but I was as mad as hops; and I am that way yet. I had a plan that would have given you a chance to talk to her, but that ain't any good, now that it is raining.

Let me look at your ankle; I hope that is getting along all right, any way.”

While the old lady was engaged in ministering to his needs, he told her of his plan. He said he wished to send a message to Miss March by some one, and if he could get the message properly delivered, it would help him very much.

”I'll take it,” said she, looking up suddenly from the piece of soft, old linen she was folding; ”I'll go to her this very minute, and tell her just what you want me to.”

”Mrs Keswick,” said Lawrence, ”you are as kind as you can possibly be, but I do not think it would be right for you to go on an errand like this. Miss March might not receive you well, and that would annoy me very much. And, besides, to speak frankly, you have taken up my cause so warmly, and have been such a good friend to me, that I am afraid your earnest desire to a.s.sist me might perhaps carry you a little too far.

Please do not misunderstand me. I don't mean that you would say anything imprudent, but as you are kind enough to say that you really desire this match, it will be very natural for you to show your interest in it to a degree that would arouse Miss March's opposition.”

”Yes, I see,” said the old lady, reflectively, ”she'd suspect what was at the bottom of my interest. She's a sharp one. I've found that out. I reckon it will be better for me not to meddle with her. I came very near quarreling with her last night, and that wouldn't do at all.”

”You see, madam,” said Lawrence, well satisfied that he had succeeded in warding off the old lady's offer without offending her, ”that I do not want any one to go to Miss March and make a proposal for me. I could do that in a letter. But I very much object to a letter. In fact it wouldn't do at all. All I wish is, that some one, by the exercise of a little female diplomacy, should induce her to let me speak to her. Now, I think that Mrs Null might do this, very well.”