Part 30 (1/2)

”Come, let us compromise,” suggested her guest, ”if Madame Caron sounds too new and strange in your ears, I have another name, Judithe; it may be more easily remembered.”

”In Europe and England,” she continued, ”where there are so many royal paupers, t.i.tles do not always mean what they are supposed to. I have seen a Russian prince who was a hostler, an English lord who was an attendant in a gambling house, and an Italian count porter on a railway. Over here, where t.i.tles are rare, they make one conspicuous; I perceived that in New Orleans. I have no desire to be especially conspicuous. I only want to enjoy myself.”

”You can't help people noticing you a great deal, with or without a t.i.tle,” and Mrs. McVeigh smiled at her understandingly. ”You cannot hope to escape being distinguished, but you shall be whatever you like at the Terrace.”

They walked arm in arm the length of the veranda, chatting lightly of Parisian days and people until ten o'clock sounded from the tall clock in the library. Mrs. McVeigh counted the strokes and exclaimed at the lateness.

”I certainly am a poor enough hostess to weary you the first evening with chatter instead of sending you to rest, after such a drive,” she said, in self accusation. ”But you are such a temptation--Judithe.”

They both laughed at her slight hesitation over the first attempt at the name.

”Never mind; you will get used to it in time,” promised the Marquise, ”I am glad you call me 'Judithe.'”

Then they said good night; she acknowledged she did feel sleepy--a little--though she had forgotten it until the clock struck.

Mrs. McVeigh left her at the door and went on down the hall to her own apartment--a little regretful lest Judithe should be over wearied by the journey and the evening's gossip.

But she really looked a very alert, wide-awake young lady as she divested herself of the dark green travelling dress and slipped into the luxurious lounging robe Mademoiselle Louise held ready.

Her brows were bent in a frown of perplexity very different from the gay smile with which she had parted from her hostess. She glanced at her attendant and read there anxiety, even distress.

”Courage, Louise,” she said, cheerily; ”all is not lost that's in danger. Horrors! What a long face! Look at yourself in the mirror. I have not seen such a mournful countenance since the taking of New Orleans.”

”And it was not your mirror showed a mournful countenance that day, Marquise,” returned the other. ”I am glad some one can laugh; but for me, I feel more like crying, and that's the truth. Heavens! How long that time seemed until you came.”

”I know,” and the glance of her mistress was very kind. ”I could feel that you were walking the floor and waiting, but it was not possible to get away sooner. Get the other brush, child; there are wrinkles in my head as well as my hair this evening; you must help me to smooth them.”

But the maid was not to be comforted by even that suggestion, though she brushed the wavy, dusky mane with loving hands--one could not but read tenderness in every touch she gave the s.h.i.+ning tresses. But her sighs were frequent for all that.

”Me of help?” she said, hopelessly. ”I tell you true, Marquise, I am no use to anybody, I'm that nervous. I was afraid of this journey all the time. I told you so before you left Mobile; you only laughed at my superst.i.tious fears, and now, even before we reach the place, you see what happened.”

”I see,” a.s.serted the Marquise, smiling at her, teasingly, ”but then the reasons you gave were ridiculous, Louise; you had dreams, and a coffin in a teacup. Come, come; it is not so bad as you fear, despite the prophetic tea grounds; there is always a way out if you look for paths; so we will look.”

”It is all well for you, Marquise, to scoff at the omens; you are too learned to believe in them; but it is in our blood, perhaps, and it's no use us fighting against presentiments, for they're stronger than we are. I had no heart to get ready for the journey--not a bit. We are cut off from the world, and even suppose you could accomplish anything here, it will be more difficult than in the cities, and the danger so much greater.”

”Then the excitement will provide an attraction, child, and the late weeks have really been very dull.”

The hair dressing ceased because the maid could not manipulate the brush and express sufficient surprise at the same time.

”Heavens, Madame! What then would you call lively if this has been dull? I'm patriotic enough--or revengeful enough, perhaps--for any human sort of work; but you fairly frighten me sometimes the way you dash into things, and laughing at it all the time as if it was only a joke to you, just as you are doing this minute. You are harder than iron in some things and yet you look so delicately lovely--so like a beautiful flower--that every one loves you, and--”

”Every one? Oh, Louise, child, do you fancy, then, that you are the whole world?”

The maid lifted the hand of the mistress and touched it to her cheek.

”I don't only love you, I wors.h.i.+p you,” she murmured. ”You took me when I was nothing, you trusted me, you taught me, you made a new woman of me. I wouldn't ever mind slavery if I was your slave.”

”There, there, Louise;” and she laid her hand gently on the head of the girl who had sunk on the floor beside her. ”We are all slaves, more or less, to something in this world. Our hearts arrange that without appeal to the law-makers.”

”All but yours,” said the maid, looking up at her fondly and half questioningly, ”I don't believe your heart is allowed to arrange anything for you. Your head does it all; that is why I say you are hard as iron in some things. I don't honestly believe your heart is even in this cause you take such risks for. You think it over, decide it is wrong, and deliberately outstrip every one else in your endeavor to right it. That is all because you are very learned and very superior to the emotions of most people;” and she touched the hand of the Marquise caressingly. ”That is how I have thought it all out; for I see that the motives others are moved by never touch you; the others--even the high officials--do not understand you, or only one did.”