Part 2 (1/2)

A group of girls came up the deck. Both women scanned the foremost one critically. ”I like that wholesome, candid look of her,” said Miss Vance.

”Oh, she is well enough,” said Frances. ”But I am sure George does not like yellow hair. Nothing but an absolutely beautiful woman will attract him.”

”An artist,” said Miss Vance hastily, ”would tell you her features were perfect. And her flesh tints----”

”For Heaven's sake, Clara, don't dissect the child. Who is that girl with the red cravat? Your maid?”

”It is not a cravat, it's an Indian scarf. If it only were clean----”

Miss Vance looked uneasy and perplexed. ”She is not my maid. She is Fraulein Arpent. The Ewalts brought her as governess from Paris, don't you remember? They sent the girls to Bryn Mawr last week and turned her adrift, almost penniless. She wished to go back to France. I engaged her as a.s.sistant chaperone for the season.”

Mrs. Waldeaux's eyebrows went up significantly. She never commented in words on the affairs of others, but her face always was indiscreet.

George, who had come up in time to hear the last words, was not so scrupulous. He surveyed the young woman through his spectacles as she pa.s.sed again, with cold disapproval.

”French or German?” he asked.

”I really don't know. She has a singular facility in tongues,” said Miss Vance.

”Well, that is not the companion _I_ should have chosen for those innocent little girls,” he said authoritatively, glad to be disagreeable to his cousin. ”She looks like a hawk among doves.”

”The woman is harmless enough,” said Miss Vance tartly. ”She speaks exquisite French.”

”But what does she say in it?” persisted George. ”She is vulgar from her red pompon to her boots. She has the swagger of a soubrette and she has left a trail of perfume behind her--pah! I confess I am surprised at you, Miss Vance. You do not often slip in your judgment.”

”Don't make yourself unpleasant, George,” said his mother gently. Miss Vance smiled icily, and as the girls came near again, stopped them and stood talking to Mlle. Arpent with an aggressive show of familiarity.

”Why do you worry Clara?” said Mrs. Waldeaux. ”She knows she has made a mistake. What do you think of that little blonde girl?” she asked presently, watching him anxiously. ”She has remarkable beauty, certainly; but there is something finical--precise----”

”Take care. She will hear you,” said George. ”Beauty, eh? Oh, I don't know,” indifferently. ”She is pa.s.sably pretty. I have never seen a woman yet whose beauty satisfied ME.”

Mrs. Waldeaux leaned back with a comfortable little laugh. ”But you must not be so hard to please, my son. You must bring me my daughter soon,” she said.

”Not very soon. I have some thing else to think of than marriage for the next ten years.”

Just then Dr. Watts came up and asked leave to present his friend Perry. The doctor, like all young men who knew Mrs. Waldeaux, had succ.u.mbed to her peculiar charm, which was only that of a woman past her youth who had strong personal magnetism and not a spark of coquetry. George's friends all were sure that they would fall in love with a woman just like her--but not a man of them ever thought of falling in love with her.

Young Perry, in twenty minutes, decided that she was the most brilliant and agreeable of companions. He had talked, and she had spoken only with her listening, sympathetic eyes. He was always apt to be voluble.

On this occasion he was too voluble. ”You are from Weir, I think, in Delaware, Mrs. Waldeaux?” he asked. ”I must have seen the name of the town with yours on the list of pa.s.sengers, for the story of a woman who once lived there has been haunting me all day. I have not seen nor thought of her for years, and I could not account for my sudden remembrance of her.”

”Who was she?” asked George, trying to save his mother from Perry, who threatened to be a bore.

”Her name was Pauline Felix. You have heard her story, Mrs. Waldeaux?”

”Yes” said Frances coldly. ”I have heard her story. Can you find my shawl, George?”

But Perry was conscious of no rebuff, and turned cheerfully to George.

”It was one of those dramas of real life, too unlikely to put into a novel. She was the daughter of a poor clergyman in Weir, a devout, good man, I believe. She had marvellous beauty and a devilish disposition. She ran away, lived a wild life in Paris, and became the mistress of a Russian Grand Duke. Her death----”

He could not have told why he stopped. Mrs. Waldeaux still watched him, attentive, but the sympathetic smile had frozen into icy civility.