Part 5 (1/2)

”You'll have money from your father's brooch. Now--will you trust me and come to Mrs. Keeling's house, as your grandmother bows to her?”

”I'd rather go to a hotel, thank you.”

”Nonsense. You can't go alone to a hotel.”

”Why?”

”It wouldn't be proper for Miss MacDonald of Dhrum.”

”Now you talk like Grandma!”

”I talk common sense. I'll lend you no money to spend in a hotel.”

”Then take me to Mrs. West,” the girl said, as she might have said, ”Take me to the scaffold.”

Somerled laughed with amus.e.m.e.nt and triumph. He was astonis.h.i.+ngly interested in his adventure, astonis.h.i.+ngly pleased at the prospect of continuing it. Surely this girl was unique! He believed in comparatively few things, but he believed in her: for not to do so would have been indeed ungrateful, as she was ready to prove her implicit belief in him.

”A daughter of Mrs. Bal!” he said to himself as he led Mrs. Bal's daughter to his motor-car.

Poor Barrie would have believed in almost any man who owned a motor.

IV

Aline West and her brother, Basil Norman, were walking slowly up and down the garden path in front of the old-fas.h.i.+oned manor farmhouse lent to them for ten days by an admiring friend. They were waiting for Somerled, who had expressed a desire not to be met at the station; and listening for the teuf-teuf of motors along the distant road prevented Mrs. West from attending to her brother's suggestions. He had had an inspiration for the new novel they were planning together, and was explaining it eagerly, for Basil was a born story-teller. Only, he had never found time for story-telling until lately. He was tremendously happy in his new way of life, although only a terrible illness which had closed others paths of success had opened this door for him. It did not matter in the least that Aline got the credit. Not only was he glad that she should have praise, but he was convinced that it ought to be hers.

If she had not thought of asking him to try his hand at helping her four years ago, when the incentive to live seemed gone, he might have been driven to put himself out of the way. It was to her, therefore, that he owed everything; and though success as an author had never come to Aline until after the first book they wrote together, that, to Basil Norman's mind, was no more than a coincidence, and he had never ceased to feel that she was generous in letting his name appear with hers on their t.i.tle pages.

”I wonder if anything can have happened to him!” Aline murmured.

”Which, d.i.c.k or Claud?” her brother asked, puzzled. d.i.c.k was to be their hero, Claud the villain. Basil had been engaged in outlining the two characters for his sister's approval.

”No. Ian Somerled,” she explained almost crossly, though her voice was sweet, because it was never otherwise than sweet. ”Either the train's late or----”

”I'd have met him with pleasure,” Basil reminded her.

”It would be _fatal_ to do anything he didn't wish,” she answered. ”He's a man who knows exactly what he wants, and hates to have people go against his directions in the smallest things.”

Norman looked at her rather anxiously through the soft summer darkness that was hardly darkness. She was walking beside him with her hands clasped behind her back and her head bent. He thought her extremely pretty, and wondered if Somerled thought so too. But he wished that she did not care quite so much what Somerled thought. And he was not sure whether she were right about what Somerled liked.

”I wonder if we understand Somerled?” he asked, as if he were questioning himself aloud. ”After all, we don't know him very well.”

”I do,” Aline said. ”I know him like a book. He's bored to death with everything nearly. Only I--we--haven't bored him yet. And we must take care not to.”

”You could never bore anybody,” Basil a.s.sured her loyally. ”But--I wish you'd tell me something honestly, old girl.”

”Not if you call me that!” She laughed a little. ”It wouldn't matter if I were twenty-five instead of--never mind! I don't want people to think, when they hear you, 'Many a true word spoken in jest.'”

”Somerled's older than you are, anyhow,” Basil consoled her.

”I should think so--ages! Don't forget, dear, I'm only just thirty. I don't look more, do I--truly?”