Part 3 (2/2)

”Wouldn't it have been better for you both if you had remained at Madame Celeste's, and had sent Jim to boarding-school? There are such nice cadet schools up the Hudson.”

A faint smile overspread the woman's face. ”Madame always insisted that her employees should dress well. I know exactly what it cost me. It would have left just a dollar and a half a week for Jim. Do you know of any boarding-school that would have taken him at those rates?”

Winnie sorrowfully confessed that she did not, and we reluctantly took our leave, Mrs. Halsey promising to finish the costume immediately, and to send it by Jim in ample time for the evening's performances.

Our escapade lay heavily upon my conscience in spite of our success in obtaining the costume, but I felt still more troubled for poor Mrs.

Halsey and her overworked boy. ”I wonder,” I said to Winnie, ”if Madame could not make him useful here at the school, and let him work for his board, tend furnace and run errands.”

”You could not tell her about him without confessing our lark, and don't you do that for the world!”

”No,” I promised, against my will, ”of course not, unless you consent; the secret is half yours, but I really think it would be the best way.”

Adelaide was greatly interested in our report. ”I am to have my violin dress for the concert made at Madame Celeste's,” she said, ”and I mean to ask her about this Mrs. Halsey.”

Jim came with the package while we were at supper, and Adelaide ran down to the office to receive it. She told us that he was an undersized, stoop-shouldered boy, with a cough which she fancied he had contracted by driving in the early morning mists. He took off his hat like a little gentleman, however, and his finger-nails and teeth were clean. Any clown might wear good clothes, Adelaide insisted, but these little details marked the gentleman. He had at first declined the dime which Adelaide proffered, but accepted it on her insistence that it was only for car-fare and it was raining. He put it away carefully in a little worn purse which contained just one cent, at the same time remarking, ”I don't mind the rain, and I can get Ma the quinine the doctor says she ought to be taking.”

”That's the boy for me,” Witch Winnie remarked; ”he's got clear grit, and tenderness for his mother besides.”

And Guinevere's gown? It was a beauty. The golden lilies gave it a sumptuous effect, and it fulfilled almost exactly the promises of the forged letter; there was even a _riviere_ of fish-scale pearls and gla.s.s beads down the side, which really resembled a chatelaine. The Hornets were overcome with amazement--simply dazzled and dazed.

According to Adelaide--who always resorted to French to express her superlatives, and, when that language proved inadequate, pieced it out with translations of American slang or coinage of her own--they were ”_Completement bouleversees, stupefiees, mortifiees, et frappee plus haute q'un--q'un--kite_!”

CHAPTER III.

THE PRINCESS.

[Ill.u.s.tration: {Drawing of the dear old lady.}]

That's the dear old lady, In a green tabby gown And a great lace cap, With long lace ruffles hanging down.

There she sits In a cus.h.i.+oned high-backed seat, Covered over with crimson damask, With a footstool at her feet.

You see what a handsome room it is, Full of old carving and gilding; The house is, one may be sure, Of the Elizabethan style of building.

--_Mary Howitt._

Our interest in Mrs. Halsey and her son slumbered for a time; not that we forgot her, or gave up our determination to do something for Jim whenever the opportunity offered. It was soon to come, but our time and interest were filled with other things. Just now it was a mystery--and what so dear to a girl's imagination?

It was brought up for discussion afresh, because Miss Prillwitz had said to Emma Jane Anton that the diadem which I wore as Guinevere was not a suitable one for a queen, but a rather nondescript arrangement half-way between that of a marquis and an earl.

This a.s.sumption of authoritative knowledge in regard to coronets revived an old rumor as to the n.o.ble birth of Miss Prillwitz.

No one could tell who first circulated the report that Miss Prillwitz was a princess. It developed little by little, I fancy, but when it began to be whispered we received it without a shadow of doubt. Miss Prillwitz was a prim little woman, who always came to Madame's receptions dressed in the same brocade dress, once gaudy with a great bouquet pattern, but now faded into faint pink and primrose on a background of silvery-green, with the same carefully cleaned gloves and fine old fan of the period of Marie Antoinette. She wore her perfectly white hair a la Pompadour, and further increased her diminutive height by French heels, but in spite of these artificial contrivances she was a tiny woman, though she had dignity enough for a very tall one. Adelaide said she had ”the unmistakable air of a _grande dame_,” and that she would have suspected her in any disguise. Milly had once spied, half tucked in her belt and dependent from a slender chain, a miniature, set in brilliants, of a handsome young man in uniform, a row of decorations on his breast, crosses and stars hanging from strips of bright ribbon.

This was a great discovery, and Milly was sure that the original was no less a personage than Peter the Great. She had thought out a thrilling romance of true love crossed by jealousy and heartbreak, which the rest of the girls accepted as more than probable, until Emma Jane Anton suggested that as Peter the Great died in 1725, it would really make the princess much older than she appeared, to fancy that he was the hero of her girlhood. Emma Jane Anton always had a disagreeable faculty of remembering dates. The other girls were unanimous in the opinion that she knew entirely too much, and each one looked and longed for an opportunity of publicly detecting her in a mistake and correcting her--an opportunity which never came. Milly never made herself offensive by being certain of anything, and was loved and petted accordingly. The myth of a royal lover was a congenial one, and gained credence, though none of us dared to give him a name or date, at least not in the presence of Emma Jane Anton. No one had the temerity to question Adelaide's infallibility in detecting a great lady at first sight. It did not ever occur to Emma Jane Anton to ask how many princesses she had met, and what was the ”unmistakable air” of distinction and n.o.bility which announced them like a herald's proclamation. Perhaps this was because Adelaide herself possessed this grand air by nature, and was far more regal in appearance and feeling than many a Guelph or Stuart. Witch Winnie, perhaps because she was the mad-cap of the boarding-school, and was always getting into sc.r.a.pes herself, snuffed a political plot, and suggested that the princess had been exiled on account of deep-laid machinations against one of the reigning families, a supposition which would account for her living in exile and disguise, and even in comparative poverty. This explanation, as being the most ingenious, and affording fascinating scope for the imagination, was the most popular one, and was more or less elaborated according to the individual fancy of the young lady. Emma Jane Anton was obliged to admit that she might be a princess, and that there was no harm in calling her so amongst ourselves. Madame had let fall some very singular expressions when she announced the fact that we were to have her for our teacher in Botany.

Emma Jane had heard her, and it was she who had reported the news to the others.

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