Part 32 (1/2)

”There is some one,” Mrs. Bal went on, with a slight but lessening constraint, ”who--rather likes me, and I rather like him--better than I can remember liking anybody. He's got lots of money. His name is Morgan Bennett. Somerled--you know him.”

”Yes,” said Somerled. ”I thought his back looked familiar.”

So the big fellow who helped Mrs. Bal out of the blue car (also big, in proportion to the size of the owner and his fortune) was Morgan P.

Bennett of New York, the Tin Trust millionaire. Somerled's puny horde of millions dwindle into humble insignificance beside Morgan Bennett's pile. If Somerled has made two millions out of his mines and successful speculations, and a few extra thousands out of his pictures, M. P.

Bennett has made twenty millions out of tin--and unlimited cheek. He is so big that his pet name in Wall Street used to be ”The Little Tin Soldier.”

”He has been--dangling lately,” Mrs. Bal went on. ”Oh, nothing settled!

I confess I wish it were. I mean to take him if he asks me, and I think he will. You wouldn't believe it, but he's a shy man with women. I do believe he's frightened to propose. He's bought a house in London, in my favourite square. And now he's taken a shooting-lodge in Forfars.h.i.+re--such an amusing place: a huge round house with as many eyes as in a peac.o.c.k's tail, all staring cheerfully, and high chimneys grouped together like bundles of asparagus. I've just been staying there with his sister, Mrs. Payne, whom I believe he imported from America on purpose to play gooseberry. You know--or perhaps you don't--I tried my new play for the first time in Dundee, just one night, and it went gorgeously. This house of his isn't far off, and I was motored back and forth for rehearsals and so on, while the company stayed in town. I simply fell in love with the place; and he's trying to buy it--to please me, I _hope_. There's a round porter's lodge and a round garage: and the round house stands on a round lawn with a round road running round it like a belt, so that it all seems the centre of a round world with the sun moving round it. He brought me from there to Edinburgh to-day, and two of my maids in another car. He won't stop here in the same hotel with me, of course, but he'll drop in now and then--naturally--and he's taken his box at the theatre for the whole week. We must arrange this sister business before he calls. I've confessed to him that I'm twenty-nine, and it's perfectly true. I've been twenty-nine for several years. But he'd hardly believe me so old. And what _should_ I do--I ask you all--if a grown-up--oh, but an extremely grown-up--daughter suddenly loomed over my horizon? Even if I put back her clock to fifteen instead of--never mind!--I couldn't manage to be less than thirty-one, and that with the greatest difficulty. Now you see how I am placed.”

”Shall I go away and--and save you all the bother?” asked Barrie, in a very small voice.

”Oh, no, no, dear child; nothing of the sort, of course,” protested Mrs.

Bal, patting the hands which Barrie held tightly clasped together in her lap. ”You mustn't be naughty and misunderstand. I don't want to lose you like that, now you've taken all the trouble to find me--with the help of our good Somerled. But--will you be a sister to me?--as popular men have to say in Leap Year.”

”I'll do whatever you want me to do,” Barrie answered in the same little voice, like that of a chidden child. ”Am I--would you like me to stay with you here, or----”

”Why, I suppose”--Mrs. Bal showed that she was startled--”I suppose we must fix up a place for you--for a few days. But I don't see how you can go with me on tour. It wouldn't be good for you at all. The best way is for us to have a nice little visit together, and get acquainted with each other, and then perhaps I'd better send you to--er--to my flat in London, or--to boarding-school, or somewhere. I _quite_ understand you wouldn't go back to your grandmother at any price, would you?”

”I'd rather do that than be a trouble to you,” said Barrie. ”Only, I don't think she'd take me back. But I could try----”

”Certainly Mrs. Ballantree MacDonald won't hear of your going back to live in Carlisle, I'm sure,” said Somerled, looking somehow formidable to reckon with as his eyes met Mrs. Bal's. Then, to the girl's mother: ”I am connected with her father's family in a way, you know, and I took advantage of the connection to make Mrs. MacDonald's acquaintance at Hillard House, after I'd met--her granddaughter. The arrangement between us was that I should play guardian _pro tem_. So if you want any advice about--Miss MacDonald's future, perhaps you'll be good enough to let me help you.”

”Thanks, oh, thanks! I accept gratefully,” replied Mrs. Bal, who had no doubt already heard downstairs some few words explaining Barrie's presence with our party in Scotland. ”And you'll tell everybody she's my sister, won't you?”

”I'll not say anything to the contrary,” he promised grimly.

”And you, Mr. Norman? You, dear Mrs. James?”

”I'll protect the secret with my life,” said I, laughing. If I were a woman, I should have been hysterical by this time.

”I'll keep my mouth shut,” replied Mrs. James, with pitying eyes that said to the girl, ”If _I_ were your mother, dear child, young as I like to look, I'd be _proud_ to own you!”

”What about your American victims?” I inquired of Barrie.

Mrs. Bal p.r.i.c.ked up her ears. ”What victims?” she asked before her daughter had time to speak.

”Four young men who have prostrated themselves under Miss MacDonald's chariot,” I explained. ”All who see her do this.” In adding the little tribute I meant well; but I saw in an instant that I'd been tactless.

Mrs. Bal regarded the girl reflectively; and that uncomfortable faculty I have for reading people's thoughts told me she was repeating to herself, ”Ah, so all the men who see this child fall in love with her, do they? H'm!”

”They--I never talked to them about--about having a--mother,” Barrie stammered.

”And this Mr. Douglas?” Mrs. Bal asked. ”Is he too a 'victim?'”

”He appears to be something of the sort,” I was obliged to answer, as she appealed to me. ”The Douglas Heart, you know! And he has a cousin with whom he's staying----”

”Oh, do, dear Mr. Norman, like an angel of mercy 'square' them for me, will you, and all the others who know?” Mrs. Bal implored, ostentatiously ignoring Somerled, who had too evidently gone over to the younger generation. ”Your sister, too--and her friends? Will you go and see if they have come, and if they have, bring them here--or plead my cause eloquently, or something?”

”I'll go at once,” I agreed, rising. On principle, I disliked and despised the gorgeous, selfish creature; but there was that in me which longed to please her, and delighted in being chosen as her defender, over the head of Somerled, so to speak. I was not sorry to escape from the scene which Barrie's pale face and o'er-bright eyes made very trying; also I was really anxious to find out if Aline had come. If she had not, I should begin to worry about her and the poor old car--to say nothing of the tribe of Vanneck.