Part 38 (1/2)

'Time indeed! did not this young man's card say, 'A moment. In haste'?

And can we entertain this strange young man by the hour? Fie upon thee, June! Do thy duty, else----'

June's hand went out in a pretty gesture, and between the two they made the 'dilemma' clear to me.

Some time since, when Miss Jenrys had expressed a wish to see the Plaisance thoroughly, I had offered my services, promising to take them safely through the strange places, behind the mysterious gates and doors, where they had not ventured to penetrate alone. Now they had an especial reason for wis.h.i.+ng to make this excursion on the next day, and--would I be at liberty?

I a.s.sured them that, in any case, I should doubtless pa.s.s a part of the day, at least, in Midway; and if they would allow me to include Lossing in our party there need be no change save that, instead of wearing our guards' uniform, we would go as citizen sight-seers; and instead of a party of two, there would be a quartet, and so it was arranged.

Before leaving the house I had been told what I had surmised before entering.

Monsieur Voisin had asked Miss Jenrys to drive with him, and when she had declined, upon a plea of indisposition, he had renewed the invitation for the following day, whereupon Miss Jenrys, in sheer desperation, recalled that proposed visit to Midway, and, falling back upon that, once more declined with thanks.

Certainly Monsieur Voisin was a persistent wooer!

He was much in my thoughts, after I had left the ladies, and quite naturally followed me into dreamland. My head was heavy with pain, and I went to my room at an early hour. It was long before the lotion did its work and I fell asleep, and then I dreamed that Monsieur Voisin had carried off June Jenrys, and had shut her into an old building in care of the brunette, who locked her in a room at the top of the house and then set it on fire below.

I saw the flames shoot forth; I saw June's face, pallid and desperate, at the window, beyond the reach of the highest ladder; I saw Lossing dash through the flames; and with a yell I awoke.

CHAPTER XXVII.

'I'D SWEAR TO THEM HANDS ANYWHERE.'

At one o'clock Lossing and I met the ladies at the rendezvous, as we had grown to call the Nebraska House parlour, and the little arbour beside the stream. Lossing, quite himself again, was handsome in his well-fitting light summer suit, and happy in the prospect of an afternoon with beautiful June Jenrys, as who would not be? and I was humbly thankful that I was not, for that afternoon at least, obliged to wear a skin-tight wig upon my sore and tender cranium.

That they might reserve their strength for the ins and outs of Midway, we brought to the gate, for the use of the ladies, the two stalwart chair-pushers, whose work, so far as they had been concerned, had been a sinecure indeed since the attack upon Lossing, and we went at once, and without stops by the way, to the post-office. But there was no letter for Miss Jenrys; and, although I looked about me with a practised eye, followed Miss Jenrys at a safe distance when she entered the office, and kept the others waiting while I took a last long look, I could see no signs of the brunette.

Midway Plaisance was almost unknown ground to Miss Ross, and her wonder, amus.e.m.e.nt, and quaint comments made her an interesting companion.

'We must see it all, auntie,' June Jenrys declared, her fair face glowing with the sweet content with her companion and the moment, that not even the sorrows of her distant friends, which had weighed so heavily upon her own kind heart, could for the time overshadow or abate.

'I shall be guided by my escort,' was the reply of my companion, 'and I do feel that we may forget our anxieties for a time, and take in all this strangeness and charm with our whole hearts.'

We did not linger long in the Hall of Beauty, the costumes of many nations being pa.s.sed by with scarce a glance. But my companions lingered longest before the queer little person described in the catalogue as the 'Display of China,' who was a genuine child of the Flowery Kingdom, and generally fast asleep.

We turned away from the very wet man in the submarine diving exhibit with a mutual s.h.i.+ver, and rejoiced anew in the sunlight and free air.

The gla.s.s-works, interesting as they a.s.suredly were, we pa.s.sed by as being not sufficiently foreign; and the Irish Industrial Village and Blarney Castle were voted among the things to be taken seriously, and not in the spirit of Midway. Miss Ross was full of interest in the little Javanese, and we entered their enclosure, feeling sure that here, at least, was something novel.

We had peered into the primitive little houses upon their stilt-like posts, and the ladies had spent some time in watching a quaint little native mother making efforts to at once ply the queer sticks which helped her in a strange sort of mat-weaving, and keep an eye upon a preternaturally solemn-faced infant, who, despite his gravity, seemed capable of quite as much mischief as the average _enfant terrible_ of civilization. And then----

'Les go an' see the orang-outang,' exclaimed someone behind us, and as they went, a sun-browned rustic and his sweetheart, we silently followed.

The orang was of a retiring disposition, and very little of him was visible from our point of vantage. As I s.h.i.+fted my position in order to give the ladies a better place, a familiar voice close beside me cried with evident pleasure:

'Wal! Lord a-ma.s.sy, if it ain't you! Come to see the big monkey, like all the rest of us? Ain't much of a sight yit.'

It was Mrs. Camp, and she seemed quite alone. She put out her hand with perfect faith in my pleasure at the meeting; and when I took it and spoke her name, I felt a soft touch at my elbow. I had told the ladies of my acquaintance with Mrs. Camp, and they had fully enjoyed the woman's sharp sallies at my expense. I quite understood the meaning of Miss Jenrys' hint, but while I hesitated, Mrs. Camp began again:

'I've left Camp to home this time. I've tramped and traipsed with him up and down this here Midway, but I've never once got him inside none of these places sense he took me to that blue place over there that they call the Pershun Palis; no more a palis than our new smoke-house.

But Adam seen so much foreign dancin'----' As she talked she ran her eyes from one of our group to another, and as she uttered the words 'foreign dancin',' her eyes fell full upon Miss Ross, who at once said, turning to me: