Part 32 (1/2)

Breslaw, as she handed me the paper.

”Did he tell you he wanted to disguise his ident.i.ty while here?”

”Yes; he told me all about it one day when we went to Sydney,” she replied, leaving me wondering what else they might have confided during these jaunts.

Now that we required his presence Mr p.o.r.nsch was not in evidence, and neither was anything to be heard of the red-headed footballer's reappearance, though he had been absent four weeks, and this brought us towards the end of June. At this date there appeared a paragraph stating that Breslaw and several other amateur sportsmen were contemplating a tour of America, to include the St Louis Exposition.

That night some one besides myself heard the roar of the pa.s.sing locomotives, but she did not confess the cause of her sleeplessness.

It was one of those irritations one cannot tell, so she let off her irritation in other channels.

Matters did not brighten as the days went on. Two nights after Ernest's reported departure for the States, ”Dora” Eweword brought Dawn home from Walker's committee meeting, and remained talking to her in the otherwise deserted dining-room till a late hour. As soon as he left Dawn came upstairs, and throwing herself face downwards on her bed burst into violent weeping.

”What has come to you lately, Dawn?” I inquired. ”Tell me what sort of a twist you have put in your affairs so that I may be able to help you.”

”No one can help me,” she crossly replied.

”Don't you think that I was once young, and have suffered all these worries too? It is not so long since I was your age that I have forgotten what may torment a girl's heart.”

Thus abjured she presently made me her father-confessor.

Eweword it appeared had grown very pressing, and her grandma had urged her to accept him as the best of her admirers. The old dame had not observed the trend of matters with Ernest. In a house where week-end boarders came and went, and the landlady had a pretty granddaughter, there were strings of ardent admirers who came and went like the weeks, and in all probability transferred their week-end affections as frequently and with as great pleasure as they did their person, and the old lady was too sensible to place any reliance in their earnestness, while Dawn too was very level-headed in the matter. Thus Ernest, if considered anything more than my friend, would have merely been placed in the week-end category. The old lady, not feeling so vigorous as usual, was anxious to have Dawn settled, and had tried to put a spoke in ”Dora” Eweword's wheel by threatening Dawn with deprivation of her coveted singing lessons did she not receive him favourably. Dawn in a fit of the blues, probably brought on by seeing the announcement of Ernest's departure, had accepted Eweword conditionally. The conditions were that he should wait two years and keep the engagement entirely secret, and she had promised her grandma that she would think of marriage with him at the end of that time, provided her vocal studies should be continued till then.

”That's the way I'll keep grandma agreeable to pay for the lessons, and in that time, do you think, I'll be able to go on the stage and do what I like and be somebody?” asked the girl from out the depths of her inexperience.

”And what of '_Dora_'?”

”He can go back to Dora Cowper then. I'll tell him I was only 'pulling his leg,' like he said about her. It will do him good.”

”You might break his heart,” I said with mock compa.s.sion.

”Break his heart! _His_ heart! He's got the sort of heart to be compensated by a good plate of roast-beef and plum-pudding--like a good many more!”

”Will he consent to this?”

”He'll have to or do the other thing; he can please himself which. I don't care a hang. He said that if I would marry him soon he would let me continue the singing lessons and get me a lovely piano,--all the soft-soap men always give a girl beforehand. I wonder did he think me one of the folks who would swallow it? Couldn't I see as soon as I was married all the privileges I would get would be to settle down and drudge all the time till I was broken down and telling the same hair-lifting tales against marriage as aired by every other married woman one meets;” and Dawn, her cheeks flushed and her white teeth gleaming between her pretty lips, looked the personification of furious irritation.

”All I care for now is to get the singing lessons, as long as I don't have to do anything too bad to get them.”

I suddenly turned on her and asked--

”Honestly, why did you throw that dish of water on Ernest Breslaw?”

Thus unexpectedly attacked, her answer slipped out before she had time to prevaricate.

”Because I was a mad-headed silly fool--the biggest idiot that ever walked. That's why I did it!”

”Do you know that it hurt him very, very keenly?”

No answer.