Part 7 (2/2)

”Exactly!” she answered, smiling, and watching Thorne scribble his name in several places on her card. ”It is Berkeley. The Byrd girls and I always saved a waltz for him to prevent his feeling left out. He don't like to ask girls generally; his one arm makes it look awkward, and he knows they wouldn't like to refuse, because they all feel sorry for him. _We_ put a hand on each shoulder, and don't care how it looks. Berke is adroit, and manages quite nicely. Often, too, it's an advantage to have a dance you can dispose of later on, so I continue to put the initials, although Berke seldom dances now. He liked waltzing with the Byrd girls best.”

”You were very intimate with the Byrds, I think you said,” Thorne remarked idly, bowing to an acquaintance as he spoke.

”Very intimate. See what came to me this morning; all these exquisite flowers, just when I needed them for to-night. Roy searched the neighborhood through for white flowers without success, and then these came. Aren't they beautiful?” And she lifted her bouquet toward his face.

”Extremely beautiful!” he a.s.sented, bending his head to inhale their fragrance. ”It was very kind and thoughtful of your friends to send them.

I suppose, from the connection, that they are a Byrd offering.”

Pocahontas laughed softly. ”Yes,” she said, ”but they did not come from Belle, or Nina, and Susie is in California. Jim ordered them for me.

I am so pleased.”

Thorne instantly raised his head and stiffened his back as though the delicate perfume were some noxious poison, and moved on with her toward the parlors in silence.

”I wish you knew Jim, Mr. Thorne,” pursued the happy voice at his side; ”he's such a good fellow, so n.o.ble, generous, and unselfish; we're all so fond of Jim. I wish he were here to-night to tread a measure with me in the old rooms. You would be sure to fraternize with Jim. You could not help liking him.”

Thorne drew in his lips ominously. He could help liking Jim Byrd well enough, and felt not the faintest desire for either his presence or his friends.h.i.+p. The intervention of a woman with whom two men are in love has never yet established amity between them; the very suggestion of such a thing on her lips is sufficient to cause an irruption of hatred, malice and all unkindness.

Moreover, Thorne was in a fury with himself.

He had thought of sending for flowers for Pocahontas at the same time he dispatched the order to the Richmond florist for his aunt. He had feverishly longed to do it, and had pondered the matter fully half an hour before deciding that he had better not. He had not scrupled to pay Pocahontas attentions _before_ he realized that he was in love with her, but that fact, once established in his mind, placed her in a different position in regard to him.

She was no longer the woman he wished to draw into a flirtation _pour pa.s.ser le temps_; she was the woman he wished to marry--was determined to marry, if possible. The instinct, common to every manly man, to hold in peculiar respect the woman whom he wishes to make his wife, led Thorne to feel that, until he should be free from the fetter that bound him, he should abstain from paying Pocahontas marked attention; to feel that she would have cause of complaint against him if he did not abstain.

So he argued the case in cold blood; but now his blood was boiling and he dubbed himself fool in language concise and forcible. See what had come of his self-denial? Another man had done what he had left undone; another hand had laid in hers the fragrant offering it should have been his to bestow. Fool that he had been, to stand aside and let another man seize the opportunity!

Jasmin, too! Pah! The heavy perfume made him ill. He was conscious of a fierce longing to s.n.a.t.c.h the blossoms from her hand and crush them down into the heart of the fire and hold them there--the pale, sickly things. _He_ would have given her roses, pa.s.sionate, glorious roses, deep-hearted and crimson with the wine of love.

Pocahontas had small time for wondering over her cavalier's sudden moroseness, for no sooner had she entered the parlors than old friends crowded forward to speak to her and claim a dance; the girl was popular among the young people of the vicinity. She was a wonderful success that night. Not even Norma, for all her rich tropical beauty, was more admired.

”Our little squaw is smas.h.i.+ng things, Berke,”

remarked Roy Garnett, later in the evening, as he joined his brother-in-law in the recess by the fireplace. ”The men all swear she's the handsomest woman in the room--and on my soul I believe they're right.”

”She does look well,” responded Mason with all a brother's calm moderation. ”Her dress is in good taste, and she moves gracefully. But she isn't the handsomest woman in the room by long odds. Look at Norma Smith.”

”I have looked at her,” retorted Roy shortly, ”and so I suppose have the other men. There's no more comparison between her and Princess than there is between a gorgeous, striped tulip, and a white tea rose.” (For some inscrutable reason Roy had never been able to endure Norma, and even grudged acknowledgment of her undeniable beauty). ”Look at that fellow Thorne, now!”

he added, with the pleased alacrity of one producing an unexpected trump, ”I should say that _he_ shared my opinion. He hasn't danced voluntarily with another woman in the room, nor left her side a moment that he could help. It looks as though he were pretty hard hit, doesn't it?”

Garnett was right; for after the episode with Jim Byrd's flowers, Thorne had thrown self-control to the winds. He danced with Pocahontas as frequently as she would allow him, hovered constantly in her vicinity, and only lost sight of her when dragged off by his aunt for duty dances. Twice during the evening--and only twice--did he leave her voluntarily, and then it was to dance with Norma, whose suspicions he did not wish to arouse. The instinct of rivalry had overthrown all restraint and for this evening he was madly determined to let things take their course. They were here, he and his family, in Jim Byrd's place; living in the house that had been his, entertaining the friends that had been his, in the very rooms that so short a time ago had echoed to his footsteps and resounded with his laugh. He had been thrust aside, and must continue to stand aside; the past had been his, let him keep out of the present; let him beware how he marred the future.

And for the bond that held himself, Thorne had forgotten all about it. In his pa.s.sion and excitement it was a thing without existence.

Later in the evening, there came a gleam of brightness for little Blanche; a blissful hour which indemnified her for the boredom so unflinchingly endured. As Norma only did what pleased her, most of the drudgery of entertaining fell upon Blanche, whose grievous portion it was to attend to the comfort of dowagers; to find partners for luckless damsels unable to find them for themselves, and to encourage and bring out bashful youths. As the latter considered that the true expression of their grat.i.tude lay in devoting themselves exclusively and eternally to their pretty little preceptress, Blanche had lately come to hold this part of her duty a wearisome affliction.

She was seated on a tiny sofa surrounded by a band of uneasy and enamored youths ranging in age from sixteen to twenty, when Mason caught sight of her pretty, fatigued, but resolutely courteous face, and came instantly to her rescue. He was very fond of Blanche, and teased and petted her with almost cousinly freedom. He felt himself a middle-aged man beside her, and admired her sweet face, and gentle unselfishness as unreservedly as he would have done those of a child.

Moving her draperies aside with a kindly, if unceremonious hand, he ensconced himself beside her right willingly and devoted his best energies to her amus.e.m.e.nt, and that of her small court; lifted the burden of their entertainment from her shoulders with ready tact, and waked the boys up vigorously, causing them to enjoy themselves, and forget that they were _young_; and lonesome, and foolish. Kind, thoughtful Berkeley! No wonder the silly little heart beside him fluttered joyously, and the shy blue eyes were raised to his grave handsome face with full measure of content.

And so the hours sped, golden-footed, silver-footed; and the pipers piped and the men and maidens danced and the elders gossiped, drank champagne, and reveled in the fleshpots, yawning surrept.i.tiously behind fans and handkerchiefs as the evening waned.

Pocahontas, roused from a dream of enjoyment by Roy's mandate, sped lightly up stairs to the dressing-room, and arrayed herself hastily in her m.u.f.flings. At the stairway Thorne joined her, and as her foot touched the lowest step he took her unresisting hand and raised it to his lips murmuring softly; ”A happy New Year to you--my darling! my queen!”

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