The matrimonial bureau

By Carolyn Wells and Harry Persons Taber

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Title: The matrimonial bureau

Author: Carolyn Wells
Harry Persons Taber

Illustrator: C. M. Relyea

Release date: July 5, 2026 [eBook #79028]

Language: English

Original publication: Boston: Houghton Mifflin & Company, 1905

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/79028

Credits: This eBook was produced by: Mardi Desjardins, John Routh & the online Distributed Proofreaders Canada team at https://www.pgdpcanada.net This file was produced from images generously made available by Internet Archive.

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MATRIMONIAL BUREAU ***

[Cover Illustration]

[Illustration: _The Matrimonial Bureau_]

The
Matrimonial Bureau
by
Carolyn Wells
and
Harry Persons Taber

BOSTON•AND•NEW•YORK
Houghton Mifflin & Company
THE•RIVERSIDE•PRESS•CAMBRIDGE
1905

_Published April 1905_

TO NANCY

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

1. “I’M NOT A SPOILED CHILD”

2. TEA ON THE EAST PORCH

3. IN THE BROILING SUN, OBLIVIOUS OF THE HEAT

4. “SUPPOSE YOU TAKE MISS FOWLER HOME”

[Illustration: _The Matrimonial Bureau_]

Think you there was, or might be such a man as this I dreamed
of?—_Antony and Cleopatra._

It all happened in the most curious fashion to begin with. If Lieutenant
Adams had not sent to Miss Esther the particularly heavy box which
contained some sort of a plaster cast which he had picked up somewhere,
and which necessitated a great deal of packing-stuff to keep it from
breaking, Tekla never would have found the paper. Then, too, she never
would have found the paper if Michael had been about the place on the
afternoon the box came. But he wasn’t, and Miss Esther was impatient.
The box had to be unpacked, so she and Tekla, armed with a hatchet, a
screw-driver, and a monkey-wrench, went at it.

“I expect it’s broken,” said Miss Esther, after the protecting boards
had been removed, with that lack of dexterity but determined
effectiveness which characterizes the carpenter work of the average
woman; “I have no doubt it’s broken all to pieces.”

“Yes’m, I suppose it is; they always are,” said Tekla, cheerfully, as
she pulled out the bunches of paper which were stuffed about the cast.

“It was packed carefully enough,” said Miss Esther.

“Yes, indeed, ma’am. They must have used all the papers they had saved
up for housecleaning time. I don’t know what they’ll have left to put on
their pantry shelves.”

“I’m glad they did; this is a specially fine cast, and I do hope it
isn’t broken. It looks as if it were, though.”

Miss Esther took hold of the end of the cast and tried to lift it out.
She succeeded in extricating it from the mass of papers and carried it
off in triumph.

Tekla brought a basket and began picking up the crumpled papers from the
kitchen floor. Some large figures on one bit caught her eye.

“‘Circulation yesterday, 840,327,’” she read; “must have used ’em all.”

She went on picking up the papers, carefully smoothing out those pieces
which she believed might be of use for such purposes as suggest
themselves to the careful housewife. “I wish,” she thought, “that they
hadn’t crumpled these things up so much. They might just as well have
left them flat. We could have used them then.”

At the very bottom of the box she found several voluminous Sunday
newspapers that apparently had never been opened. “At least here’s a few
smooth ones,” she continued with a satisfied air.

As she laid them aside, a conspicuous picture attracted her attention.
“That,” said Tekla, after a long, steady stare at it, “is the kind of
place I’m going to live in. There should be cows—yes—like those,” and
she held the picture at arm’s length. “Chickens—yes—and dogs. Some
calves, maybe, and pigeons and pigs, the same like those! Ah!”

Again she held the picture out before her and gazed at it. “It is all
there, all—but the man—not!”

Taking down the big shears from their nail, Tekla cut out the picture
and pinned it up above the kitchen table. “But I will have the cow-sheds
nearer the house,” she said as she turned away. “They are not handy,
so.”

* * * * *

In the household of Miss Esther Adams, a Sunday newspaper was almost an
unknown quantity. To Tekla the discovery of three or four complete
sheets, with all the various “sections” carefully put together, was an
event of thrilling importance. She hurried through her work, and sat
down that evening to enjoy without interruption the unexpected windfall.

By a slow and laborious process of elimination she laid aside the
primarily colored pages, the reproduced photographs, the editorial
sections, and other interesting but unbelievable stories, and reserved
only the advertisements.

These she read eagerly, marking with her pencil such pictured glories of
feminine apparel as appealed to her somewhat barbaric taste.

Idly scanning one of the more uninteresting looking pages, she chanced
upon a sort of advertisement which seemed to her to be wholly new.
Nothing like it had ever fallen under her observation.

SPINSTERS ATTENTION!

Why remain unappropriated blessings? Why waste your sweetness on
the desert air? Somewhere there is a heart that beats for you
alone. He may be on our list. We have bankers, brokers,
clergymen, lawyers, merchants, farmers,—

“Farmers!” said Tekla, thoughtfully.

—machinists, carpenters, masons, and others. Every one of our
clients is a worthy, honorable gentleman who wants a wife. If
you will send $1 and your photograph, we will enter your name
upon our records.

Tekla read and re-read this advertisement. “Only a dollar,—that is not
so much. And they said farmers.”

She raised her eyes to the picture she had pinned up on the wall.

“A farm—and a farmer, and some cows yet, and chickens. A house like
that, and two pigs and two horses and a kitchen all over white
paint—with a yellow floor—”

She hesitated, looked at the picture again doubtfully, and continued.
“It stands in the advertisement that there should be a farmer. I will do
it! I will send yet one dollar.”

Tekla had lived under the influence of Miss Esther so long that whatever
she did was more or less tinged with the old-fashioned fineness which
characterized her large-hearted, gentle-minded mistress. Therefore,
after a considerable amount of earnest effort, she produced this letter:

WHITFIELD, June 8th.

DEAR SIR,—I have read your advertisement and would say that I
inclose herewith one dollar. Please enter my name on your
records, and I would like a farmer.

The farm must contain many acres, also many cows, pigs, sheep,
and a donkey. But there must be no bees, as I do not enjoy
stinging.

I have never lived on a farm, but I have a picture of one, and I
am sure it will be good. I have lived with Miss Esther for seven
years and she has trusted me with the care of her large house,
and she says I am too good for James, who drives for the Doctor.

So please, Dear Sir, if among your worthy and honorable
gentlemen there is a farmer with a farm which I have described,
I should be glad to hear from you by return of post.

Yours to Command,
TEKLA KLEIN.

P. S.—My Mother is dead.

Tekla carefully copied the address given in the advertisement, folded
her letter, and inclosed it in the envelope. Then she took from the top
drawer of the old dresser, which stood in the kitchen closet, a new
dollar bill, which Major Bradford had given her on his last visit. That
was the day, Tekla remembered, when she had taken particular pains with
the brushing of his uniform—it was the day of the dedication of the
soldiers’ monument. She regarded the new bill with real affection. She
had had it more than a year. For a moment she hesitated. What if the
farmer were not forthcoming in response to her request? But before her
hung the picture of the farmhouse, the horses, cows, chickens—not one
single bee was visible.

Tekla’s sense of justice was such that she felt a certain responsibility
to Miss Esther for the spending of her wages, but surely, she thought,
with this particular dollar she had every right to do as she chose.

Therefore, trusting that the end would justify the means, she neatly
folded the bill and placed it carefully with the letter in the already
stamped and addressed envelope, and sealed it.

And so, as we said at first, if Lieutenant Adams had not sent the cast
to his cousin, and if Michael had not been absent the day it came, and
if Miss Esther had not in her impatience insisted upon Tekla’s opening
the box, the little German girl would not have seen the picture of her
farm, the letter would not have been written, Adolf Hecksher would never
have come to Whitfield, this story would never have been written—and
what would you have done then?

This green plot shall be our stage, this hawthorn brake our
tyring-house; and we will do it in action.—_Midsummer Night’s
Dream._

How the town came to be named Whitfield nobody who was fortunate enough
to live there could remember, even if ever there had been any accurate
information on the subject. The town was as old as those others in
central and southern New York which are still worrying along under the
burden of names bestowed upon them by that band of surveyors who, fresh
from the schools where they had learned much of the history of ancient
cities, had christened the still unpopulated quarter sections with the
names of classic heroes, states, and battles. Utica, Syracuse, Troy,
Palmyra, Cicero, Manlius, Sparta, Homer, Ovid, Ithaca,—these towns, it
had been hoped by their sponsors in baptism, might grow up to be a
credit to their distinguished namesakes. Whitfield may have been named
for an eminent Methodist clergyman. Or possibly not. And it didn’t
matter anyway.

Whitfield was like a hundred other towns of its sort. One may find the
sort in almost any state except perhaps Arizona. It had an escape about
three miles wide from being on the railroad, and in consequence there
was little manufacturing. There was a long street which ran out at both
ends of the town and got lost somewhere in the country. This street was
cut at right angles by another of less pretension. Both streets were
bordered by great old trees, maples and elms and an occasional hickory,
which had been left from the days when there had been a forest
thereabouts. Looking at the town from the surrounding hillsides, these
trees shut out all view of the houses, but when the casual visitor
arrived in the village he found that they merely shaded them, and they
were grateful. There were other streets in the village, and according to
the census reports Whitfield had a population of 896, but that was
before the Henderson twins were born, and before the Richardsons—eight
of them—had moved into the Bradley house. Of course, this increase had
been offset somewhat by the death of Kirk Buckley, who in a moment of
temporary inebriety had walked one dark night into Deacon Wilson’s stone
quarry, with a fatal result.

So Whitfield had remained for some years practically stationary as to
population. It was a quiet, orderly, rather dignified town. Its
officials took it seriously. Casual visitors, who were entirely
unsympathetic because they had been born in cities, were apt to smile a
little at its peculiarities, which were not peculiarities, but only the
natural outpourings of a heart interested in the doings of whosoever
came within the line of vision. That was, and is to this day, the
Whitfield of this story.

At one corner of the long street and the shorter one which intersected
it stood the Adams house. When it had been built, a century before, the
Putnam Adams who built it had called the place Elmwood, but the name had
been forgotten. The house itself showed that essential severity which
characterized the Adamses, and was the pride of all Whitfield. It
reproduced, as well as wood and white paint could do so, the development
of the classic impulse which had its beginnings in eastern New York at
the time when Sir William Johnson was made colonel of the Six Nations.

The broad, low pediment set squarely upon four Ionic columns, the wide
stone veranda and massive stone steps were as much a part of the
landscape as the historic Whitfield elms. The interior of the house
reflected the Adams attitude of mind and action. There were few curves
in the decorations. The white-painted panels were uncompromisingly
square. The mahogany balustrade ran straight up from the broad hall, and
the stairs opened frankly at the top into the wide corridor which cut
the upper floor into two halves,—five rooms on one side, five on the
other, all precisely similar in size and shape. Every line which,
architecturally, had to do with the making of the house, was straight up
and down or straight across. There were no angles but right ones. There
were no curves except those of the Ionic columns, and Colonel Adams had
said after the house was built that he even wished he had made these
square. But it was too late, and to-day in Whitfield these same columns
stand, a lasting monument to the one weakness of decision in the
character of Colonel Putnam Adams, of His Majesty’s forces in the
Colonies.

But there was one other monument—the library.

While the library as it exists now could not, in the very nature of
things, have been built entire by the first Putnam Adams, yet he laid
the foundation for it; and when he was sent to America by the king, and
found a place where he was to build his home, he fetched with him from
England the library which he had collected in France and Italy and
Germany. Begun with little thought as to its ultimate fate, this
collection of books had grown with the changing tastes of the young
soldier. There were the classics in original and translation; much Greek
poetry, a wonderful edition of Horace, picked up in Rome, and bound in
leather and gold, which bore the magic signature, deeply wrought, of
Leonardo da Vinci. Then there was a Machiavelli and the stories of his
wars and his methods of statesmanship; there was the story of the Life,
which Benvenuto Cellini himself had written, and this book the Colonel
had caused to be inclosed in a case of silver which bore upon its cover
the arms of the House of the Cenci. This book he worshiped with a
worship which was little short of idolatry. In the long evenings, when
the Indians were at rest and the messages from Sir William were such as
to allow him some freedom, he would shut himself in his rooms—wherever
he might be—and sit the whole night through, living again with the
Benvenuto those fearsome hours when he fought his way through the
streets of Florence, leaving in his wake a line of fourteen dead men’s
bodies—but rushing on to his Art and his Love.

Perhaps, after all, that was why Colonel Putnam Adams decided on the
curves for the capitals of the columns which guarded the entrance to the
home which he had built for Margery, the daughter of the governor of
Plymouth Colony.

The second Putnam Adams inherited his father’s tastes and spent much of
his time among the books, eagerly adding to the shelves such volumes as
his somewhat limited opportunities made possible.

Miss Esther’s father, the third Putnam Adams, enlarged the collection
still further, for in his time the flood of literature which marked the
Victorian era had already begun. He acquired not only valuable classics,
as had his ancestors, but also contemporary fiction, essays, and poetry.

The wife of the third Putnam Adams died when Esther was a baby, and the
child grew up in the great house with only her father for guide,
counselor, and friend. He was a silent man,—not stern with his little
daughter, but maintaining the uncompromising dignity of the Adams
family. He spent his days in the library, and Esther was allowed to stay
there only on condition that she should not speak to him when he was
reading. Often the child would stand wistfully waiting until he should
lay down his book. But often he would do so only to take up another, and
Esther would turn hopelessly away to amuse herself. Her amusements were
peculiarly her own, and were not those which would have been considered
entertaining by most children. She invented her own games. For the
lonely child there was a certain fascination about a crowd of people,
and her games always included certain strange individuals, who, though
invisible to others, were very real to her. She peopled the stairs with
vast armies marching valiantly up the hill and down again; she crowded
the parlors with squires and dames of high degree, who danced minuets of
great intricacy, bowing gallantly and languidly waving feathered fans.

The old Adams stables she filled with palfreys and milk-white steeds,
and the barnyard with peacocks and falcons. In the grass plot in front
of the house Esther could see a sun-dial where she fully expected in
some year to come to hold tryst with a lover who should wear a velvet
cloak and a curling feather, and who would say “Parting is such sweet
sorrow, that I could say good-night till it be morrow,” and then would
kiss her hand—just as Romeo did in the wonderful old engraving in the
Gilbert Shakespeare.

Thus Esther Adams grew up. She went through the Whitfield school as a
matter of course, but her tasks were easily learned and her school life
was casual and perfunctory and quite outside the sentient part of her
being. She lived in “that land where Rosalind and Imogen are—a Paradise
apart.” The woodland about the old place was the Forest of Arden. The
bank of the brook formed the shores of Illyria where the musicians
played before the duke, and where Esther played the part—yes, lived the
part—of Viola, and told to the wondering birds how she was letting
concealment feed on her damask cheek.

Instead of these fancies passing away, later years brought to Esther
Adams a stronger sense of reality in her dreams, and she but the more
thoroughly identified herself with the creatures which her imagination
had appropriated. Through girlhood to womanhood she lived Romance,
sometimes as Rosalind, sometimes as Iseult, and sometimes, when in
desperate mood, as Catherine of Medici.

But though the grass plot and the stairs had certain advantages of
stage-setting, yet it was in the library that Esther gave her fancy
fullest rein. The reason for this was too subtle to be understood by the
child; but she had an inexplicable, intangible sense of the atmosphere
of the books. As she grew older, this became clear to her, and she
enjoyed her library with the definite knowledge of the satisfaction to
be derived from the actual physical presence of books.

For forty-five years she had enjoyed this library, as she believed, as
much as was possible for her, without quite realizing that there was a
sense of restraint in the presence of her father. Though she adored the
silent man and gladly submitted to his mandates, the restrictions placed
upon her as a child were never removed until the day of her father’s
death, and it was not until after that event that she came to know what
freedom from even unconsciously obeyed authority meant. And in the ten
years since she had invested the room with more of her own personality,
and instead of being as it had been before, merely a library, it was now
her home.

Although always surrounded by her unreal associates, for the last seven
years Miss Esther’s only human companion had been Tekla, the maid, and
Tekla was very human. When she came to live at the Adams house, Miss
Esther was shocked at her deplorable ignorance, and immediately began to
teach her at least the rudiments of an education. The good lady
consciously and laboriously taught her charge reading and writing, but
far more easily yet, she unwittingly instilled in Tekla’s mind a
romantic sort of fancy not unlike her own. And that’s how it happened
that Tekla’s stolidly practical German adaptation of Miss Esther’s ideas
clothed the problematical farmer with a reality only second to Miss
Esther’s Romeos.

III

But where is Kate? where is my lovely bride?

—_Taming of the Shrew._

Not that Miss Esther had preferred imaginary Romeos. Imagination was all
very well in its place, but she would have gladly welcomed a hero who
could have spoken his own lines. Although she had never consciously or
definitely wished for a husband, yet she had often felt the lack of that
companionship which she knew could only be afforded by association with
one whose mentality was equal to her own, whose tastes were congenial,
and whose temperament was similar.

Without reflection upon her own sex, but with total indifference to the
lack of feminine comradeship, Miss Esther preferred masculine society.
During their long and somewhat lonely life together, her association
with her father had been a real friendship; and though not a whit
mannish, indeed being herself the essence of femininity, men’s traits
and characteristics appealed strongly to Esther Adams.

More than this, she had, and knew she had, the capability to be a great
deal to some one man. Responsive, tactful, loyal, and possessed of an
instant perception, she demanded these qualities in the man she could
love.

No one in Whitfield had ever qualified.

The young men who had entered into Miss Esther’s girlhood life were not
of inferior mental calibre, in the opinion of the best Whitfield
society, but owing to Esther’s possibly unfortunate fastidiousness, they
did not come up to her standards. Her mentally intimate association with
Galahad, Romeo, and The Admirable Crichton had made her exacting. It is
not that she was unreasonable, nor did she complain; her demeanor toward
the young men of Whitfield was marked by a gentle courtesy and frank
good comradeship. Whitfield society did not understand her attitude, and
could not have done so had she explained it to them—which she did not.
Indeed, so misleading was her apparent acceptance of their attentions,
that more than one young man had put himself in a position to receive
her gracious but decided refusal.

Through her girlhood years Miss Esther had thought it not impossible
that she might yet meet a man who would be the realization of her
ideals. But no strangers ever came to Whitfield, and her filial sense of
duty would not allow her to leave her father alone, so she could not
accept invitations to visit elsewhere, which would otherwise have given
her great pleasure. Major Adams was so deeply occupied with his books
that it never occurred to him that his daughter needed a change, or
recreation of any sort other than that which was offered at home,
although had she asked to go he would have gladly given consent. It had
never occurred to him, either, but that she would sometime make a choice
among the men of Whitfield, for he knew nothing of his daughter’s ideals
and was himself amply content with the society of his native town.

Once, when Whistler was shooting at a Scotch country place, he
deliberately shot a dog which was standing near by. Because, as he
afterward explained, the dog was out of drawing. He should have been
twenty feet further to the left, if in the landscape at all. And so it
seemed to Miss Esther that the men who had come into her life had been
“out of drawing.” She did not shoot them, but she put them out of her
life as completely as if they had been shot.

This state of things, however, did not leave Miss Esther’s life as empty
as might have been expected. The very qualities which induced this lack
brought with them their own means of fulfilling it. Although without any
definite acceptance of these facts, Miss Esther went on from day to day,
living in the way which seemed to her to offer the best possible
selection from all that life had to offer. The Romeos and Galahads of
her happy fancies came nearer the perfection of her standards than did
the men of Whitfield, and her dream-life with them was happier in its
ideality than any real life she had seen. This play-life was begun by
Esther Adams, sitting in prim frocks, silent, her foot tucked
comfortably under her on the straight-backed sofa of her father’s
library. It continued through the girlhood days when she was still known
as Esther Adams; and now, after many years, when, a woman of fifty, she
was called Miss Esther by everybody in Whitfield, the gentle,
gray-haired lady still found in the atmosphere of her wonderful old
books the realization of the ideals which had been denied her elsewhere.

And so this is the explanation of why Miss Esther Adams never married.

One morning Miss Esther sat in her broad-armed veranda chair with her
hands idly folded in her lap. She rocked slowly as she gazed across the
lawn at the riotous rose-garden.

“Ay, ’tis as thou sayest, Rosalind; the blossoms be o’er-blown. They
ought to have been cut earlier. They are really of no use now except to
make potpourri. Heigh-ho, Rosalind, I wonder if your roses in the Forest
of Arden ever bothered you as much as mine do me.”

Miss Esther’s attention was attracted from the roses by a stranger
within her gates. This was an unusual occurrence; even more so in that
this stranger was a man. And he was big and broad and black-bearded, and
distinctly of Teutonic origin. His air was assured, yet deferential, and
he approached the house with the look of one who was certain of a
waiting welcome.

“He looks like Thor,” said Miss Esther, critically, “but I never saw a
brunette Thor before.”

With the pleasant manner of childlike confidence characteristic of the
people of his country, he said:

“Is this Tekla Klein’s house?”

“No,—not exactly—”

“That is too bad. I wished to marry her.”

“Is that so?” said Miss Esther, with interest. “In that case perhaps I
had better call her.”

“If you will be so kind.”

The big man seated himself on the lowest of the stone steps, removed his
wide-brimmed hat, and calmly wiped his forehead with a huge
handkerchief.

Miss Esther looked at her brunette Thor steadily, with a dawning
appreciation that here at last she was confronted by a dramatic
situation quite to her taste. She went into the house and into the
library. She rang the bell and in a moment Tekla appeared.

“There is a person inquiring for you at the front door,” said Miss
Esther.

“Yes, ma’am,” said Tekla.

The stranger had not moved since Miss Esther went into the house, but at
the sound of a footstep behind him he rose and went up the steps to
where Tekla Klein stood by one of Putnam Adams’s fluted pillars.

He took a letter from his pocket, and she saw that it was the one which
she had written in answer to the advertisement.

“I have come,” he said, simply.

Tekla looked at him critically, and then with an air of satisfaction she
said, “It is good. And you have the farm?”

“Yes, a half-section, many—three hundred and twenty acres—one hundred
wheat, one hundred corn, one hundred and twenty in pasture.”

“Is it in America?” asked Tekla.

“It is in Nebraska,” he replied.

“Oh! I would rather it had been in America. But it does not matter. I
will go.”

Again the pleased smile broke over the big, good-natured face.

“I was born near Breslau. I am a German. I have lived in America fifteen
years—ten years in Nebraska. I own my farm there, and my cattle. I am
thirty-five years old. My name is Adolf Hecksher.”

“Adolf is a nice name,” said Tekla.

“Yes, it is a good name. It was my father’s. Can you go soon?”

“Yes, soon; but first I must tell Miss Esther. She will not be pleased.”

“She will miss you?”

“Yes, I have lived with her for seven years, and she has been very kind
to me.”

“But she will let you go?”

“Oh, yes; I will go. Come with me and we will tell her together.”

Leading her big captive, Tekla went straight to the library. Miss Esther
smiled at the pair as they entered, and said indulgently, “Well?”

“He has come to marry me,” said Tekla.

“So he told me,” said Miss Esther. “Who is he?”

“I am Adolf Hecksher—” began the accepted suitor.

“And he has three hundred and twenty acres,” interrupted Tekla, “and he
wants to marry me.”

“I understand that,” said Miss Esther, “but where did you find him or
where did he find you?”

“It was an advertisement,” said Tekla, “and—”

“What!” exclaimed Miss Esther, “you answered an advertisement? a
matrimonial advertisement!”

“It was in one of those papers Lieutenant Adams sent with the cast,”
asserted Tekla, “and it cost but a dollar.”

Miss Esther smiled. “He’s big enough to be worth it,” she said.

“Yes, ma’am,” and Tekla looked at the giant beside her, “he is.”

“But I don’t understand,” pursued Miss Esther. “Did that dreadful
matrimonial agency send this man to you? Have you ever seen him before?
Do you know who he is?”

“Yes,” said Tekla; “he is Adolf Hecksher.”

“You are a little fool,” said Miss Esther. “Leave the room and I will
talk with your Adolf Hecksher myself.”

Tekla left the room, smiling. Miss Esther invited her guest to be
seated, and in the next half hour satisfied herself from the credentials
which he produced in the shape of savings-bank books, deeds of property,
and a draft which he had received from the last lot of cattle which had
been shipped to Chicago, that he was at least in a position to take care
of a wife. She promised to communicate with the people whom he had named
as references in the little Nebraska town where he lived. This matter
being disposed of, Miss Esther again rang the bell for Tekla. “It is all
right,” she said, “and you may ask Mr. Hecksher to stay to dinner with
you if you wish.”

“Yes, ma’am,” said Tekla.

As Miss Esther passed through the kitchen shortly before dinner, Tekla
showed her the picture she had cut from the paper.

“That is what my farm will be like,” she said. “There will be cows and
sheep and many, many acres—and Adolf.”

Miss Esther returned to the veranda. “It is very nice for them,” she
thought; “but where can I find another Tekla?”

Did you ever see the picture of we three?—_Twelfth Night._

After several trials Miss Esther succeeded in obtaining a maid who,
while she was not another Tekla, seemed capable of following in her
footsteps. In most respects the new maid was competent and satisfactory,
but in the matter of afternoon tea Miss Esther had found some difficulty
in having her instructions rightly carried out. Afternoon tea was rather
unusual in Whitfield, except as a special function. It was only at the
Adams house that tea was served every afternoon at five o’clock, whether
guests were present or not, but the custom appealed to Miss Esther
because in the English novels she had read it had been such an
attractive feature. Consequently tea was served every day at five
o’clock—in winter in the library, and in summer on the veranda.

The mistress of the house was punctilious as to the appointments of her
tea service, and Tekla, who was after all but a reflection of Miss
Adams, had found no difficulty in pleasing her. But Nora, the new maid,
had not yet learned to appreciate the vital importance of synchronizing
the time and the tea.

As a consequence of this, Miss Esther had sometimes to arrange or
rearrange her own tea-table. And so when Jean Richards came flying
across the lawn one warm afternoon, she found Miss Esther fussing over
her alcohol lamp with her usual calm a little bit ruffled.

“Tea ready?” she called out.

“No, it is not. That good sister in the kitchen is making a bondmaid and
a slave of me. She hasn’t toasted the muffins.”

“Let me take them out and toast them.”

“No, you can’t. They’re already buttered.”

“Oh, well, never mind. We’ll eat them as they are. What are you playing
to-day, Miss Esther?”

“To-day I am Katherine. Nora is enough to make a shrew of anybody.”

“Well, I’m sure you’re Bonny Kate, and not Kate the Curst. May I take
this chair or is Petruchio sitting in it?”

“He has already risen, that you may have it. Sit down.”

Jean sat down suddenly, as she always did everything, and took her cup
of tea from Miss Esther.

“This is the very nicest part of the day’s work,” she said, “drinking
tea here with you. I wonder if the other girls are coming.”

“I hope so,” said Miss Esther; “I haven’t seen Helen for a week.”

“Helen’s got the blues,” said Jean. “She’s had ’em for three days.”

“What’s the matter this time?” asked Miss Esther; “or is she just having
the blues from a sense of duty?”

“That’s it,” said Jean, cheerfully. “It’s her make-up, you know. She has
to have the blues about once in so often to live up to that temperament
of hers. I’m glad I haven’t any.”

“Yes. It is a fearful thing to have to entertain a temperament. Don’t
ever acquire one, Jeanie.”

“No, ma’am,” said Jean, submissively; “I wouldn’t have one of the
ridiculous things. People don’t like people with temperaments.”

“Nonsense,” replied Miss Esther; “everybody likes Helen.”

“Not as much as they like me,” said Jean, comfortably sipping her tea.

“Well, if they don’t,” said Miss Esther, stoutly, “it is Helen’s own
fault. She likes so few people.”

“That’s just what I said; and that’s the fault of her everlasting
temperament.”

Jean leaned back in her chair and happily munched her untoasted muffin.

“Now just look at the two of them,” she said, as two girls came in at
the gate. “Couldn’t you tell at a glance which one has the blues? Helen
looks as though she owned all the indigo mines in India, or wherever it
comes from. Anybody could see, though, that Lillian hasn’t a blue to her
name.”

But if Helen Fairbanks had the blues they were certainly rather becoming
to her than otherwise. As she approached the house, trailing her parasol
listlessly along the walk, she was apparently paying no attention to her
companion, who was pointing enthusiastically toward the distant
landscape.

Helen Fairbanks’s sponsors in baptism had disagreed as to the child’s
name. Her father had insisted on Pearl, but her mother had finally
carried the day, and had given to her daughter the only name which
absolutely fitted her. Tall, fair, graceful, statuesque, Helen
Fairbanks’s beauty was of that classic perfection which is inevitably
associated with the name of Helen. Her large, calm, gray eyes which had
never yet lived up to the possibilities of their dark lashes, her golden
hair which she wore a bit too smooth, her mouth which showed all too
seldom the little curves at its corners, were trustworthy indexes of her
beautiful but cold nature. Miss Esther had said of Helen that she
reminded her of Cassius:

“Seldom he smiles; and smiles in such a sort,
As if he mock’d himself, and scorn’d his spirit
That could be mov’d to smile at any thing.”

As for Lillian Hastings, she was as unlike Helen as Helen was unlike
Jean. But the three were united in their friendship for each other and
their admiration of Miss Esther, which amounted almost to adoration.
Lillian was an artist; that is, she was by every implication of her
being, by every wish and desire of her soul, and by every intent of her
strong and somewhat stubborn character. The mere fact that owing to
limited opportunities she had not as yet achieved much on canvas, in no
way contradicts the statement that she was an artist. She had spent two
blessed weeks one summer at Shinnecock, and there fallen under the
direction of Chase and his associates. There the impulse had its
beginnings—possibly from the inspiration of the instructors, possibly
because of the fact that she met there other girls who, so they had told
her, could paint no better than she did when they began, but who now,
after three years of work, had had the distinction of really selling a
picture. So her ambition formed itself into an absolute mania for
definite accomplishment.

During those two weeks a great artist had asked her to pose for him, and
he had painted her portrait. “Gad!” he had said to his friends,
afterward, “she’s built like a greyhound. Her figure is the figure of a
girl of eight—grown up. Her hair is Burne-Jones’s ladies’ hair, and her
complexion—well, I tried to paint it here, but I haven’t got the
transparency of it yet.”

“Who is this paragon?” his friends had asked him.

“By George!” he exclaimed, “I forgot to ask her name. She was just a
painter girl, working with the others down there on Peconic Bay.”

And so Lillian had kept on painting. She had a studio which was an
honest workroom, without draperies, plaster casts, or cosy corners, and
here she worked doggedly, perseveringly, and without a moment’s doubt as
to her ultimate success. She understood herself. She had no false or
flattering opinions of her own ability, but she was sure that
intelligent effort, properly directed, would lead her eventually to the
Roman Road.

“Confide in us, Helen, dear,” cried Jean as the two came up the steps.
“Why so blue and wan, fair lady? Is it your doll or tea-set that’s
broken to-day?”

“Neither,” said Helen, briefly.

“Perhaps it’s her heart,” suggested Lillian.

“Not Helen’s,” returned Jean; “she hasn’t any heart.”

Helen sat down on the wicker settee beside Miss Esther, with a look of
patient exasperation.

“Oh, it’s nothing,” she said, “only another proposal; that’s all.”

“It’s a perfect shame,” said Miss Esther, “the way those men bother
you.”

“It is,” said Jean. “Why don’t you hang out a sign, ‘No Others Need
Apply’?”

“I think it’s awfully hard on Helen,” said Lillian, sympathetically;
“she’s so kind-hearted, she hates to say ‘no’ to a goose.”

“And yet they keep her saying it most of the time,” said Jean.

“Who is it this time?” asked Miss Esther.

“Mr. Walker,” said Helen.

“The young man who is staying at Bradstreet’s?”

“Yes, that pretty boy with the glasses,” said Jean. “He came here for
health, and he found Helen, and now he wants to take them both back to
New York.”

“But you’ve always said you’d like to live in New York, Helen.”

“Yes, Miss Esther, but I didn’t mean with Mr. Walker.”

“Why not?” asked Miss Esther, straight-forwardly. “Why don’t you like
Mr. Walker?”

“Because there’s nothing to like about him. He has no more to recommend
him than—than—”

“Than any of the Whitfield men who have asked you to marry them?”
queried Jean.

“Yes, that’s exactly what I mean, Jeanie, as nobody knows better than
you do.”

“Yes,” said Jean, with an exaggerated sigh. “I, too, have my troubles.
It’s a fearful thing, girls, to be belles of society, with no society to
be belles of.”

“And who are you, my girl,” asked Miss Esther, “that you scorn Whitfield
society? Pray what sort of people would you like, if given your choice?”

“Oh, a lot of gay people,” said Jean, “at some kind of a summery place,
with lovely clothes, and hops, and bathing-suits. And beautiful men in
white flannels, and automobiles, and—and—everything!”

“Modest child! With such easily gratified tastes, it’s a pity they
cannot be realized.”

“Oh, they will be, sometime,” said Jean. “What would you choose,
Lillian?”

“Oh, I don’t care for a lot of people, but if I just had one—”

“A nearer one still, and a dearer one?” asked Jean.

“No, what I mean is some fairy godmother or grandmother or
great-grandmother who would take me abroad and let me see pictures—and
paint them.”

“It’s your turn next, Helen,” said Miss Esther.

“I,” said Helen, slowly, “want nothing more nor less than a castle in
Spain, but it must be the largest and handsomest castle there is in
Spain, and it must be my own.”

“Anybody there with you?” asked Jean.

“Yes, I think so; one of Miss Esther’s best Galahads or Romeos.”

“I hope you’ll find your castle,” said Miss Esther, looking at Helen
with keen appreciation. “You would make an admirable châtelaine.”

Love, lend me wings to make my purpose swift,
As thou hast lent me wit to plot this drift.

—_Two Gentlemen of Verona._

In her library that evening Miss Esther’s thoughts came back to Helen
and her castle in Spain.

“She ought to have one,” she thought. “She’s just the girl for a castle
in Spain,—no, not exactly in Spain,—a Joyous Gard would suit her
better. There should be a maze and a pleasaunce, and a mailed knight
should come on his charger to beg for her glove, that he might joust for
it in the Field of the Cloth of Gold. She would have made a wonderful
Iseult, with a touch of Morgan le Fay. She is wonderful enough as it is,
and it is a shame that there are no available Apollos or Abelards or
Aucassins who want châtelaines for their castles.”

It is clearly to be seen that Miss Esther fully appreciated the fact
that the ultimate ambition of the eternal feminine is the individual
interpretation of that ubiquitous architectural structure known as a
castle in Spain. This is distinctly opposed to the masculine attitude of
mind which looks only for the Princess at the Window.

Though not definitely conscious of this differentiation, Miss Esther was
building in her imagination various castles for Helen, when it suddenly
occurred to her that the Prince would provide the castle, could she but
find the Prince.

“Tekla found her Prince for herself,” thought Miss Esther, smiling as
she remembered the big brunette Thor; “but one could scarcely imagine
Helen applying to a matrimonial agency. I might apply for her, select a
suitable Prince, and deposit him on her doorstep the way that Adolf man
was dropped here.”

The whimsical idea pleased Miss Esther’s fancy, and she went into it in
detail. “While I’m about it,” she thought, “I may as well select Princes
for Jean and Lillian, too. This thing is not without precedent.
Petruchio was brought and dropped at Katherine’s feet by outside
influences. If I can help Helen, I’m going to do it. If she wants a
castle, she’s going to have it, and if, as Tekla’s experience seems to
prove, a matrimonial bureau is a necessary factor in the case—I’ll _be_
one!”

The beauty of the plan grew upon Miss Esther. The possibilities widened
as she thought about it, and she grew so excited that she found herself
walking about the library, peering into the bookcases and making quick,
explosive remarks to her friends:

“You, Henry the Eighth, you ought to appreciate what I’m doing! You were
nothing but a matrimonial bureau yourself!” and she shook her fist at
the worn, leather-backed volume. “And you, Don Quixote, if you had
applied to a matrimonial bureau, you would have found your old Dulcinea
without any trouble, and you wouldn’t have had to fight those ridiculous
windmills.”

“Yes, I’ll be a matrimonial bureau—a first-class one, and I’ll apply to
myself for Princes for those three girls—and I’ll get them, too!”

“Dr. Isaiah Bushnell,” announced Nora, appearing at the library door;
“do you want to see him?”

“Of course she does,” said the Reverend Doctor Bushnell, affably, as,
rubbing his hands, he walked past Nora into the room.

“How do you do, Dr. Bushnell. Pray be seated. You find me very busy
to-night.”

“Ah, yes, my dear Miss Adams, ’tis a busy world; but work is a blessing;
as one of our poets has it, ‘’Tis better to have—better to have—’ but
there, I have no doubt you know the quotation. You are so familiar with
the flowers of poesy.”

“I fear I cannot place the quotation you refer to,” replied Miss Esther,
a little coldly.

“Ah, well, ’tis no matter, ’tis no matter. How often our memory fails us
just as we need it most. It was only yesterday that I intended to
approach you in reference to a most unfortunate affair which has been
brought recently to my attention. But, ah, that fickle memory again. The
little errand entirely escaped my mind, but to-night, as I was passing
your beautiful home, and remembered that here dwelt the most charitable
of women, I said to myself, ‘I will ask her!’ That, my dear Miss Adams,
is my errand.”

“Is it?” said Miss Esther; “and how much money do you want?”

“Please do not be so abrupt, dear lady. Let me state the case. Let me
tell you of the destitution—”

“Never mind the destitution, Dr. Bushnell, I will contribute to your
cause, but as I said, I am extremely busy this evening.”

“Ah, yes indeed, yes indeed! and can I not help you? The benefit of my
wider experience is yours for the asking. Let me advise and assist.”

“Do,” said Miss Esther, with sudden cordiality. “I should be glad of
your help. Does your wide experience embrace the organization of a
matrimonial agency?”

“Ah, you jest,” said Dr. Bushnell, a little stiffly; “surely you cannot
mean to resort to such methods. You, who are destined to fill so nobly
the niche in which Providence has placed you!”

The matter being presented to her in this light, Miss Esther perceived a
certain humor in the situation that had not appealed to her before.

“Oh, if you advise against it, I will drop all thought of such a thing.”

“I do, my dear Miss Adams,” said Dr. Bushnell, earnestly. “Trust to my
maturer judgment. It would be a mistake to take any such step, I do
assure you. As I was reading yesterday, in my collection of famous
poetry, ‘’Twas ever thus—’ ah, again the flowing numbers have escaped
me. But you know—doubtless you know the lines. Now, as you were saying,
my dear Miss Adams, every little counts, and your contribution will be
gladly welcomed not only by myself, but by the worthy people whom we are
endeavoring to assist. If you will pardon my abrupt departure, I will,
upon the receipt of your beneficence, take my leave.”

Once again by herself, Miss Esther’s mind returned to her daring scheme.

“Let me see,” she thought, “young Putnam Adams must be about thirty now,
and the Adamses are good enough Princes for anybody. I wonder how he
would do for Helen. But no. A lieutenant in the regular army would never
be able to provide the kind of a castle that ambitious girl insists
upon. He would suit Jean better. She loves uniforms and a gay life; her
happy disposition would be a fair match for his. In fact, the more I
think of it, the more appropriate it seems. But I haven’t seen Putnam of
late. The last time I saw him was when he was graduated at West Point,
and that was six years ago. Since then he has been stationed in Manila,
and goodness knows where else. Now all this may have made a man of him,
and then, again, it may not, but he is an Adams, and he has won his
shoulder-straps since he went away, so I think the boy must be all
right. At any rate, I will invite him up here. I wonder if he will
come.”

Having satisfactorily settled Jean’s future, Miss Esther turned her
attention to the next name on the records of her matrimonial agency.

“Lillian,” she thought, “is so different from Jean. She takes everything
so seriously—even that ridiculous art of hers. Well, perhaps ridiculous
isn’t the word, for Lillian is not the sort that paints calla-lilies on
a black background. She goes only so far, but every step she takes is
just right; the trouble is that’s as far as she goes, and she never will
get far enough to know that she can’t go any farther. A woman has no
business with art, anyway. There never was one that did anything really
worth while. I’m glad nobody’s here to say George Eliot at me, or Rosa
Bonheur, or Chaminade. Sporadic instances count for nothing except to
prove the rule. And I think that Lillian would be much happier married
to some good, kind fairy godfather than going to Europe with some fairy
godmother.

“But Putnam Adams would never do for Lillian—no, he is better for Jean.
Lillian should have an older man—I don’t know why, for Lillian is no
older than Jean, and yet it seems to me that the man who would be just
the one for Lillian Hastings would be a kind, wise, staid sort of
man—who would guide, counsel, and befriend her, and then if he thought
she ought to go on with her art work, I’m sure I’d be perfectly willing.
Then the responsibility of that girl would be off my mind. Now all I’ve
got to do is to find that man. I wish there had been one in Whitfield,
but as there isn’t, I must get him somewhere else. It’s positively
maddening to think that there are probably hundreds of them in the
world, if I only knew their addresses.”

Miss Esther possessed an absurd but absolutely unshakable belief in the
way-pointing possibilities of the nearest available piece of printed
matter.

She calmly picked up the morning paper with the certainty that she would
find in it some indicating arrow pointing toward the material
manifestation of the man whose image she had so clearly in her mind. It
was part of her method to accept the first hint that could by any
possibility be made available for her use as an accomplished fact.

“This will do nicely,” she said:—

A PHILANTHROPIC BEQUEST

Hiram Briggs Founds an Art School—The Wealthy Button
Manufacturer Dedicates His New Edifice—Cost $500,000—A
Memorial to His Late Wife.

—“That’s the one,” said Miss Esther, decidedly. “I need look no
further. A man who is loving enough to erect such a memorial to his dead
wife, and who is rich enough to spend $500,000 on it, and who is clever
enough to have got rich on buttons, and who is sensible enough to be
named Hiram Briggs, is just the man to take care of that artistic
temperament of Lillian Hastings. He will act as a blender to her sharply
colored views of life. Where does this altogether desirable man live? I
will write to him to-night. Of course, Lillian may object to the
buttons, but when she realizes Mr. Briggs’s devotion to Art, she will
see the matter in its right light, I am sure.”

Miss Esther skimmed through the article quickly and discovered that Mr.
Briggs was a citizen of Nashua, New Hampshire. This was entirely
satisfactory, and the further details of the story also confirmed her
good opinion of the man.

“He ought to get my letter by the day after to-morrow,” she thought,
“which will give him ample time to take Lillian abroad this summer. They
ought to sail by the fifteenth of August, I should think. And I shall
give her one of those lovely traveling-bags furnished with any number of
silver things. It must be such fun to find out what they’re all for, and
I should think her honeymoon would just about give her time enough.”

Give up yourself merely to chance and hazard.—_Othello_, iii,
7.

The Matrimonial Bureau had proved successful in meeting the demands of
two of its clients, but the third name on its records still baffled Miss
Adams. It seemed to her that the only possible mate for Helen Fairbanks
was a being so far above and beyond the ordinary mortal that it would be
impossible to find him outside the glass doors of her mahogany
bookcases.

“He might be in there,” she thought, looking toward a favorite corner
where the fairy books were, “or even in there,” she added, as she
glanced at the Thackeray shelf; “but one thing is certain, he never
would be in a newspaper, so there’s no use looking there. I suppose he’s
in the directory, but I don’t know what letter his name begins with, so
I can’t find him there. I don’t know how I shall find him. I don’t
believe there are many of that type of men in the world. The only one I
ever knew was a woman. Cousin Emily Westcott—of the Chester Adams
branch—is just the kind of person I mean. It’s a pity she is a woman,
though of course she is too old for Helen. Let me see,—Cousin Emily
must be sixty by now; she had four boys, and nice, well-behaved young
chaps they were. I wonder if they are all married. I remember sending
Roger his piece of the old Adams silver two years ago, and Emily wrote
that Hugh was engaged. Still, that leaves two, and if they take after
their mother they’re just the kind of men I want. I will write to her,
too, and I’m sure one of them will be all right for Helen. They’re
Adamses, anyway.”

The president of the Matrimonial Bureau now resigned the chair in favor
of the secretary, and Miss Esther began the clerical work. She wrote
first to Lieutenant Putnam Adams and invited him to spend his vacation
with her that summer. “I do not know,” she wrote, “whether the state of
the country is such as to allow officers of the army anything like
vacations, but if there is any for you this summer, please come up and
visit your old cousin. I haven’t seen a real live Adams for a long time,
and I want to thank you for the cast. Even if your visit must be a short
one, I hope you can come, and come soon.”

To her cousin Emily Westcott Miss Esther wrote very frankly, saying that
Lieutenant Putnam Adams was coming to visit her, and asking that one of
the two younger Westcott boys come at the same time. She informed Mrs.
Westcott that she wished her to send the one who was most distinctly an
Adams, and said further that she would trust the mother’s judgment in
the matter.

“But they’re _all_ Adams—both of them!” exclaimed Mrs. Westcott, as she
read this letter. “I’ll have to send them both!”

Miss Esther’s letter to Hiram Briggs, the philanthropist of Nashua, was
a more trying ordeal. For once in her life she found it difficult to
express herself, and it was nearly midnight when she completed the
following business-like if unconventional epistle:—

WHITFIELD, June 22.

MR. HIRAM BRIGGS, NASHUA, N. H.

DEAR SIR,—I have just read in the morning paper an account of
the art school which you have founded. I have been thinking the
matter over, for I am much interested in such philanthropic
movements, and I have a special reason for a peculiarly personal
interest in this one.

It is apparent, from the facts stated in the account of your
worthy undertaking, that you are an art patron, and are
therefore alive to the possibilities in the development of the
artistic effort. I am quite certain that a man with the name of
Hiram Briggs, and who is the proprietor of a button manufactory,
must be possessed of sound common sense and fully able to
appreciate and understand the proposition which I am about to
make.

I have a young girl friend who believes that she is well on the
way toward becoming a great artist, and who certainly has the
artistic temperament. Her ambition is to go abroad for the study
of art, but at present she has not the means to do this.

From the fact that the praiseworthy memorial which you have
built must have taken several years to complete, I assume that
Mrs. Briggs must have long since been laid to rest. My young
friend is eminently fitted to assist in the carrying out of the
plans which you have evidently made for this great work which
you have begun, and further, her education and accomplishments
are such as to enable her to take her place in any social
sphere.

I trust, my dear Mr. Briggs, that you will receive this
communication in the spirit in which it is written, and if at
any time you wish to call on me I should be pleased to welcome
you to my home in Whitfield.

Most sincerely yours,
ESTHER ADAMS.

The next morning Miss Esther was favored with a visit from her young
neighbor, Jack Remington. Jack was a social character and often dropped
in, apparently for no particular reason. These fortuitous calls were
liable to happen on baking days, or when he felt the need of Miss
Esther’s moral support in his seasons of tribulation. Ten years old,
sturdily built, stolidly minded, he was of the stuff of which Lincolns
are made, rather than Michael Angelos or Robert Brownings. Miss Esther
had been obliged to recognize this fact, but she still hoped to train
his young ideas into grooves of her own choosing. Though as yet no
visible progress had been made, she did not despair, but continued in a
course which gave her much pleasure and did not bother Jack.

The boy had a passion for battle-ships, and his highest ambition was to
build one. He had already begun it, but obstacles often confronted him,
and he depended on Miss Esther both for advice and for more material
assistance. She did not know much about battle-ships, but her elementary
knowledge was supplemented by furtive consultations of the encyclopedia
between Jack’s visits. Afterward, she conversed on these subjects with
much erudition, and Jack’s admiration grew, for she was the only woman
of his acquaintance who even knew on which end of a ship the bow was
placed. Miss Esther really cared very little about the technical
construction of any ship, but she was fond of the boy and had her own
notions as to his future career. Of these notions Jack was entirely
aware, but since, in his opinion, they were totally unnecessary to a
builder of ships, he ignored them with the superiority of a
ten-year-old.

With a view to gracious influences, the would-be architect of Jack’s
fortunes had endeavored to induce a friendship between him and a
golden-haired siren of four, who was her neighbor on the other side. Her
name was Amabel, but for obvious reasons she was known as Chub. Miss
Esther’s efforts toward the foundation of this friendship had resulted
disastrously. On their first introduction the children had cordially
approved of each other, and Amabel had not changed her mind. But just as
the friendship was ripening, Jack discovered Chub’s calamitous ignorance
concerning the necessity for guns on battle-ships. She had promised to
sail with him on his to the great naval battle which he assured her was
imminent. More, she had promised to assist in any capacity in the
working of the ship, when, in an impulsive burst of generosity, Jack
responded that she might man one of the guns.

“Gunth!” and Chub suddenly sat down on the floor and shrieked. Her
terror-stricken squeals brought Miss Esther to the scene. She looked
from the screaming baby on the floor to the disdainful ship-builder, who
stood with his legs apart and his hands in his pockets, surveying the
disturbance with an expression of absolute disgust.

“If she yells like that when I say guns,” said he, contemptuously, “I
wonder what she’ll do when the shooting begins.”

“Thooting!” exclaimed Chub, her demonstrations checked for the moment,
“who we going to thoot?”

“The enemy,” said Jack, tersely.

“Won’t it hurt ’em?”

“It’ll _kill_ ’em!”

Chub’s wails began again with redoubled force. “Take her away,” said
Jack. He turned to continue the building of his warship with the fixed
resolve that henceforth and forever womankind should have no part or
parcel in his life.

But the young misanthrope made an exception of Miss Esther Adams. He
relied implicitly upon her knowledge and judgment, not only in nautical
matters, but regarding all the vicissitudes which beset his somewhat
strenuous existence. His mother always accompanied the application of
court-plaster with a reproof. When Miss Esther bound up his wounds, a
delectable doughnut added largely to the healing qualities of her
ministrations.

On this particular morning, however, the doughnut was of minor
importance. He ate it, and even abstractedly took a second one, but
without enthusiasm. Not observing any necessity for sticking-plaster,
Miss Esther concluded the distress was mental and awaited developments.

Jack wriggled into one of the big veranda chairs opposite Miss Esther,
and with his elbows on his knees and his chin in his hands stared
moodily into space. Miss Esther waited.

“I got to be a minister,” he said at last.

“Have you, dear? When?”

“Soon’s I’m big enough. ’Tain’t fair, jes’ ’s I got my ship most done,
and was goin’ to be a sailor like Dewey or somebody, and now I got to be
an old minister; mother told me so las’ night.”

“But perhaps you’ll like being a minister,” suggested Miss Esther.

“No sirree! I bet I won’t. I know the stunt. I was over to Dr.
Bushnell’s jes’ now, and I asked him what a fellow had to do to be a
minister, but he said, don’t be ’reverent, little boy, and I wasn’t. But
I know my own self what they got to do. Preach and bury people and marry
’em and baptize kids and have prayer-meetin’s and donations and wear
high hats and never smoke nor go to circuses nor go in swimmin,’—least
I never seen Dr. Bushnell in,—and where’s any fun in all that, I’d like
to know. But they was another man there a-visitin’ the minister, and he
asked me what I wanted to be, and I told him a sailor and he said ’s
that so. And I told him you and me was a-buildin’ a battle-ship and
asked him to come over ’n see it and he said he would and he’s comin’
to-morrow mornin’ and he give me this card with his name on it.”

The name on the card was

THEODORE WINTHROP BREWSTER.

Although the surname meant nothing to Miss Esther, she remembered that
there had been a Theodore Winthrop in her mother’s line. “Possibly he
may be of that family,” she thought.

“I wish mother’d let me be a sailor,” went on Jack, wistfully.

“Well, wait until Mr. Brewster comes over here to-morrow,” said Miss
Esther, “and we’ll see what he thinks about it.”

Jack, much comforted at the thought of a possible escape from the
reverend calling, went whistling to the kitchen, where he enjoyed
another doughnut with an appetite unhampered by a depressed mentality.

“It would be strange,” said Miss Esther, still looking at the card she
held, “if this man were one of our Winthrops. I don’t remember the
Brewster connection, but I’ll look it up in the book.”

VII

My noble and well warranted cousin.

—_Measure for Measure_, v, 1.

When a telegram arrived announcing that Lieutenant Adams accepted his
cousin’s invitation, Miss Esther was greatly pleased, and at once began
a pleasant flurry of preparation for his reception. A letter following
the next day told how exceedingly welcome her invitation had been, and
how it was necessary for him to leave Fort Monroe on sick leave for a
time. “Your letter,” he wrote, “could not have reached me at a time when
the prospect of a few weeks in the country was more attractive. In
working out on the ramparts where we have been taking down the old guns,
I slipped, and broke my leg. I had planned to go into the mountains of
Virginia. I have changed my plans. I am coming to you. All I want is
rest in a quiet place where my foolish leg can get well. I have already
telegraphed, and I may reach Whitfield on the same day with this letter,
for I am going north to-night. I can get about on crutches fairly well.
Thank you again for the inspiration which led you to ask me to come.”

Miss Esther was pleased rather than otherwise at her cousin’s
misfortune, for she was a born nurse and dearly loved to fuss over an
invalid, and, moreover, she could keep him longer and use him to better
advantage in the accomplishment of her fell project.

Miss Esther knew, however, that a broken leg did not necessarily affect
a man’s appetite, so she enjoyed stocking her larder with the lavishness
which always characterized her hospitality. It was in the midst of these
preparations that a letter arrived from Nashua.

NASHUA, N. H., June 24.

MISS ESTHER ADAMS,

DEAR MADAM,—Mr. Briggs received your letter yesterday, and
wishes me to thank you for your kind words. He especially
appreciates your commendation of his philanthropic efforts, and
wishes all success to your young friend in her pursuit of art.

He regrets his inability to accept your kind invitation to call
on you at Whitfield, and assures you that he received your
proposition quite in the spirit in which it was written.

Mr. Briggs and myself have just returned from our wedding trip,
and unite in sending you hearty good wishes for the future
success of your own philanthropic plans. I am, my dear Miss
Adams,

Very sincerely yours,
EMMELINE FISHER BRIGGS,
(MRS. HIRAM BRIGGS.)

“Just returned from their wedding journey!” exclaimed Miss Esther. “I
should have written Mr. Briggs at least two months ago. Well,” she went
on, cheerfully, “I must get somebody else for Lillian. And it’s just as
well, too, for ‘Lillian Briggs’ wasn’t a very pretty name; but I did
want her to sail in August. I shall have to hurry. Let me see what I can
do—”

“Hullo, Aunt Esther,” called Jack from the driveway, “I’ve got Mr.
Brewster to come to see the ship.”

Miss Esther rose to greet the big blond man who accompanied Jack, and
shook his hand cordially.

“I am assured,” began Mr. Brewster, “by my young friend, Mr. Remington,
that any friend of his is welcome at the Adams house.”

“Not only that,” said Miss Esther, graciously, “but I have reason to
think that your family and mine are connected, and that I may welcome
you as a sort of relative. You are a Winthrop?”

“My mother was a Winthrop,” said Mr. Brewster, “of the Gideon Winthrop
branch.”

“And my mother,” said Miss Esther, “was a Winthrop of the Wingate
Winthrops. But of course, a few generations back they were identical,
and I claim you as a relative.”

“I am very glad to be claimed,” responded Mr. Brewster, with a touch of
foreign-mannered courtesy which Miss Esther afterward discovered was
characteristic of the man.

“Providential,” thought Miss Esther. “Here is Mr. Briggs’s substitute
ready-made to my hand.”

“Then, Aunt Esther,” interrupted Jack, “that makes Mr. Brewster my
uncle, don’t it? And now can he go see our ship?”

Miss Esther acquiesced, and Mr. Brewster and Jack went at once to the
large room on the second floor which had been given over to the young
ship-builder.

Then Nora brought the tea-table, and Miss Esther supervised the
arrangement of her beloved cups and saucers, and when the two
enthusiasts returned from the inspection of the ship, they found the
hostess surrounded by three chattering girls.

“Hullo, Jean!” cried Jack, “come on up and see my ship.”

“Is the rudder working properly yet?” the young lady inquired, but
before he could answer, Miss Esther presented Mr. Brewster to Helen,
Lillian, and Jean.

“I’m so glad to meet you, Mr. Brewster,” exclaimed Jean. “I’ve been
longing to meet you all day—ever since I saw you at the post-office
this morning with Dr. Bushnell; but I didn’t know you knew Miss Adams.”

“I didn’t until half an hour ago, but she, too, has been kind enough to
say that she was glad to meet me; though she didn’t say she had been
longing for it all day.”

“But she didn’t see you at the post-office,” said Jean.

“No,” said Miss Esther, “but if I had I shouldn’t have waited for an
introduction until now, for he is one of our own Winthrops.”

“I bet that’s Cousin Putnam coming now,” exclaimed Jack, watching a
carriage turning in at the gate.

“Who’s Cousin Putnam?” asked Jean, as Miss Esther hurried down the
steps.

“Oh,” explained Jack, ecstatically, “he’s Aunt Esther’s cousin and he’s
a lieutenant in the army with a uniform and a sword and he knows all
about war and navies and ships and he was in Cuba with General Kent and
he was in Manila after Dewey was there, and he saw Dewey once, ’cause he
wrote Aunt Esther so, and he’s had fights with natives and things and
he’s going to tell me all about the ships, ’cause Aunt Esther said she’d
make him, and he fell on a fort where he lives down South somewheres and
he bust his leg and he’s come here to get well—and everything.” Jack
paused for want of further breath as the carriage drove up, when he flew
down the steps exclaiming, “Hello, Cousin Putnam! Why didn’t you wear
your uniform?”

Seeing Lieutenant Adams’s crutches, Mr. Brewster followed Jack and
offered his assistance.

Notwithstanding Lieutenant Adams’s ability to manage his crutches, he
was glad of Brewster’s support. Miss Esther had scarcely more than
spoken to her cousin when she was surprised by seeing another carriage
closely following the first.

“More company!” cried Jack. “Who is it, Aunt Esther?”

As the second carriage stopped, two young men jumped out, exclaiming,
“Here we are. Mother sent us. She said you wanted us. You’re our Cousin
Esther, aren’t you?”

“Goodness! are you Emily’s boys? and what are the two of you doing
here?”

“Why you sent for us, didn’t you? Mother telegraphed us to stop here on
our way home. Didn’t you get our telegram saying we’d be here to-day?”

“No, I didn’t; but I’m just as glad to see you. Come right in. Which of
you is Kenneth?”

“I am. I am Kenneth Adams Westcott, and he is Mark Adams Westcott. He’s
a little older than I am, but I’m a whole lot nicer than he is.”

“You look like the Adamses,” said Miss Esther, as she led the way up the
steps and straight to the group around the tea-table.

When Brewster reached the veranda with Lieutenant Adams, he suddenly
realized that the responsibility of the hospitality of the house of
Adams devolved upon him. He presented the newcomer to the young ladies
and Jean promptly shared the honors with Mr. Brewster. She appropriated
the bronzed invalid, and impressing Brewster into her service, she
ordered from him successive relays of tea and muffins with which to
regale her newly acquired subject, when she saw Miss Esther approaching
with what seemed like two new worlds to conquer.

Miss Esther introduced the Westcott boys to Lillian and Helen, and then
bringing them over to Jean, begged her to make tea for them.

This effervescent young woman was in her element. With four newly made
and evidently admiring acquaintances, she fairly bubbled with
excitement, and wondered how Helen and Lillian could take it all so
calmly.

“It’s a funny thing,” said Miss Esther, looking proudly at the four
young men, “to think that for years not a single one of my cousins has
visited me, and now they come not single spies, but in battalions.”

“I think battalions are very nice things,” said Jean.

“So do I,” replied Miss Esther; “I only wish all my cousins were here.”

“There are something like two hundred of them, I believe,” said
Lieutenant Adams.

“Well, I don’t care; I would put up tents on the lawn.”

“Won’t you have to put up tents for us as it is?” inquired Kenneth
Westcott. “You seem to have had an unexpected avalanche of relatives
to-day.”

“Oh, no, indeed,” replied Miss Esther. “The Adams house has plenty of
room, and, too, Mr. Brewster is not staying here. He’s a guest of Dr.
Bushnell.”

“Is this a surprise party to you as well as to us, Miss Esther?” asked
Helen.

“_I_ was expected,” said Lieutenant Adams; “these other scions of the
house of Adams are base interlopers, but Cousin Esther wrote me that she
specially wanted me to come, and I wrote her that I was coming to-day.”

“And mother telegraphed us that Cousin Esther specially wanted us to
come,” said Mark, “and we telegraphed that we were coming to-day.”

“Here comes the telegram now,” said Lillian, as the boy from the
telegraph-office rode slowly up the driveway on a bicycle.

“Hello, Mercury!” said Jean, as he dismounted from his wheel.

“Ah, gwan!” said the boy, gallantly, as he remounted and rode away.

Miss Esther read the message. “I learn from this,” she said, “that my
two Westcott cousins are coming to-day to make me a visit.”

“Then we’re not interlopers any more?” asked Kenneth.

“Not at all. You are honored and expected guests, and I hope you will
stay all summer.”

“I hope so, too,” said Jean.

When Brewster and the three girls went away, Lieutenant Adams said, “Do
you often have such tea-parties as this, Cousin Esther?”

“Nearly every afternoon,” replied Miss Adams.

“Then we’ll all stay all summer,” exclaimed the Lieutenant.

“I want you to, anyway, Putnam; and at least one of you other boys,”
said Miss Esther.

“Why can’t my little brother stay, too?” asked Mark.

“Oh, let’s all stay,” said the Lieutenant, “and I have a friend who’s
awfully anxious to come to Whitfield for the summer with me, and he’s an
all-round good fellow, too; besides, he has barrels of money, and he can
sing and paint and everything.”

“Send for him,” said Miss Esther, in a sudden enthusiastic burst of
hospitality.

VIII

And wears upon his baby brow the round and top of
sovereignty.—_Macbeth_, iv, 1.

Not only because her Cousin Putnam was an Adams, but also because he was
a soldier and an invalid, he was invested to Miss Esther’s mind with a
certain halo of romance. The mere incidental fact that his injury had
not been received on the field of battle, but in the more commonplace
pursuit of supervising the moving of certain heavy guns from the
ramparts of Fort Monroe on a peaceful June afternoon, made no difference
in her attitude toward it. She felt that a dearth of woman’s tears was
just as pathetic in an accident of this sort as in the case of an
Algiers hero, and she was resolved that there should be no lack of
woman’s nursing if she had her way about it. Since he had decided on the
career of a soldier and left home for West Point, Putnam Adams had seen
enough of woman’s tears, for they were not an unknown commodity in Cuba
and the Philippines, but he had had but little experience with the
woman’s nursing part of the problem. His work had been cut out for him
from the very day of his graduation, and when he was finally ordered
home and to service at the artillery school at Fort Monroe there had
been no thought but the accurate carrying out of the general and special
orders of his commanding officer, with, back of it, the firm resolve to
take his place at the very front rank of the profession which he loved
with that love which comes through generations of trained
soldiers—fighters.

And now in one of Miss Esther’s dimity-curtained bedrooms he was
receiving the gentle motherly care which he had never had since his
boyhood years. She did not fuss over him, or at least, if she did, it
was with that practical, sensible fussing which carried conviction and
brought a sense of absolute peace and rest.

The Westcotts were more easily disposed of. Miss Esther sent them off to
bed as unceremoniously as she would have done ten years earlier had they
visited her then. Their rooms boasted as many dimity-curtains and the
wall-paper as many pink roses as were to be found in Putnam Adams’s room
across the hall. But these details were entirely lost upon these two
healthy young cubs whose physical prowess far outstripped their artistic
instinct. They fell asleep without appreciating that the drapery of
their couches was the traditional lavender-scented Adams linen.

Having said good-night to her cousins, Miss Esther returned to her
library. The immediate success of her plans had surpassed all her
expectations. Within four days she had gathered under her own roof four
eligible candidates for the hands of the unconscious clients of her
Matrimonial Bureau. To be sure, she had only three clients, but it was
well to have an extra man in case another client presented herself.

“It seems to me, Portia,” she said, “that I have managed this thing
quite as well as even you could have done it. I have laid my plans
carefully, and I feel sure that they will work out successfully. Putnam
Adams is a dear, and, as I thought, he is just the one for Jean.
Winthrop Brewster I am not so sure of. He must be the one for Lillian,
for he came almost the very moment after I received the refusal from
Hiram Briggs. And Mr. Brewster is apparently very intellectual, though
he doesn’t seem to have any special leaning toward art. The Westcott
boys are all right. Either of them is good enough for Helen, and she can
take her choice. I don’t suppose they have very large castles as yet;
but the Westcott fortune is great and there is plenty of time. Yes,
things are certainly working out well. The Matrimonial Bureau has
already proved its right to existence, and I shall be glad to see my
girls married and settled.”

With the feeling of satisfaction that comes from an achieved purpose,
Miss Esther turned out the library lights and went slowly up the stairs.
As she passed Jack’s shipyard, she smiled happily. “And after the
weddings are all over,” she said, “Jack and I will go on with the
building of the ship.”

* * * * *

On the east side of the Adams house was a square porch which had been
built by Miss Esther’s father in order that he might have an out-of-door
reading-room when the days of summer made it too warm to remain
comfortably in the library. This was now inclosed in vines,—wistaria,
honeysuckle, and crimson ramblers,—which gave the place a frisky
appearance quite in contrast to the stately effect of the stone-floored,
white-columned front porch.

After breakfast next morning Miss Esther formally transferred this
desirable bit of property to the boys, and especially to Putnam. For his
especial benefit she had arranged a big wicker lounging-chair with a
convenient table by its side. Then there were rugs and hammocks,
ash-trays, and other things supposed to be necessary to the comfort of
the average man. Lieutenant Adams, who found himself after his tiresome
journey provokingly helpless, dropped gratefully into his pillow-filled
chair, but the Westcott boys promptly upset the orderly scheme of things
which Miss Esther had so happily arranged during the early morning
hours. Kenneth picked up a large palm in a pot which he summarily
deposited on the lawn outside. Mark pitched the pillows out of the
hammocks. “There’s no place for my feet,” he said.

Much as Miss Esther had enjoyed arranging these things for the comfort
of her guests, she enjoyed still more their high-handed demolishing of
that arrangement. “Now have you everything you want?” she asked, beaming
on the twelve-feet-six of Westcott humanity that was festooned end to
end across the porch.

“All but one thing,” said Kenneth, “and that’s some fishing-tackle. I
want to go fishing.”

“But there’s no place to fish.”

“That doesn’t make any difference. I don’t want to fish; I just want to
go fishing, and so I want some tackle and bait and a creel and a pair of
hip-boots.”

“There is a little bit of a brook that runs through the east meadow,”
said Miss Esther, thinking hard in her endeavor to provide what was
wanted. “But there are no fish in it that I know of.”

“That will do nicely, thank you. Of course, I would have preferred
something with tarpon in it; but a brook is a brook, after all. Where
are the things?”

“Father used to have all those things. They’re in the big attic now.
I’ll go and get them.”

“Not on your life you won’t!” And Kenneth bounced out of the hammock,
picked Miss Esther up bodily and carefully deposited her in his place,
tucking some pillows about her feet. “I’ll get them myself. You stay
right there. Watch her, fellows!”

The screen door slammed behind him and Kenneth went in search of his
fishing-tackle. He returned triumphantly with the hip-boots and much
other paraphernalia which he scattered over the floor, chairs, and also
over his hostess, whom he decorated with red and yellow trout flies.
Even after the good lady had escaped and unwillingly obeyed Nora’s
summons to the kitchen, Kenneth was still fussing with his flies.

“By Jove!” exclaimed Putnam, looking down across the lawn, “what a
picture!” Kenneth paused, and, looking through a vine-framed opening,
saw an exceeding fat baby propelling herself on all-fours through a
too-small aperture in the boxwood hedge. Halfway through she had paused
perforce and beamed contentedly. Then redoubling her efforts she
wriggled through the rest of the way, stood upright and carefully
brushed the dirt from her tiny skirts, and started toward the house. She
walked deliberately, as one with a set purpose. At a rose-bush a few
feet from the hedge she stopped, kissed one of the roses, patted another
lovingly, clasped her fat little hands and stood for a moment in rapt
adoration of the flowers. Then she turned and trotted on toward the
house.

A small toad hopped in front of her. The baby gave a little squeal, and
putting her hands over her eyes, she walked carefully and deliberately
around the toad, leaving plenty of room between them. Contentedly then
she came slowly on.

“Hullo, Yellowtop!” called out Mark, who with the others had watched the
eventful journey across the lawn.

At this the baby looked up, saw the three strange men, and with a sudden
absolute collapse she dropped to the ground where she stood, sitting
squarely down, her chubby fingers outstretched on either side of her,
and her feet sticking up in front. For a moment she stared blankly at
the awful sight before her, and then, opening her mouth wide, there came
forth a wail of terror and indignant surprise such as never was on land
or sea.

“Bless your baby heart!” said Kenneth, “what in the world’s the matter?”

The response to this was another yell, more prolonged and terrified than
the first. This brought Miss Esther.

“What are you doing to Chub?” she exclaimed.

“Nothing,” said Kenneth, honestly; “she’s hollering at me.”

“I’ll get her,” said Mark, helpfully, and bounding down the steps he
picked up the tumultuous morsel of humanity. Pausing in the vocal
demonstration of her temper, she resorted to effective pugilism and
pounded Mark with her dimpled fists, her blue eyes flashing with the
indignation of outraged dignity.

“Don’t hit him so hard, Baby,” laughed Putnam; “you’ll kill him!”

“Will I?” asked Chub, pausing in her warlike enterprise, and looking
straight into Mark’s eyes.

“Of course you will,” said Mark, reproachfully. “I’m almost dead now.”

“I wath goin’ to thtop anyway,” said Chub with a final thump on his
chest. Then she threw her arms around him as far as they would go and
beamed adoringly at him.

From that moment Mark bent his neck to Chub’s yoke. Her monarchy was
absolute. Anything less than instantaneous obedience occasioned
blood-curdling yells that always reduced Mark to sudden subjection, not
only in self-defense but for the sake of suffering humanity. By the time
Mark had reached the porch Chub had reached a state of intermittent
calm, and submitted with a fine air of condescension to the
introductions thrust upon her.

She greeted Lieutenant Adams and Kenneth Westcott pleasantly at Miss
Esther’s bidding, but allowed it plainly to be seen that she very much
preferred Mark’s society.

Miss Esther, seeing that Chub was peacefully settled, turned to enter
the house.

“Don’t go,” called Lieutenant Adams after her.

“I must,” said Miss Esther; “I have a lot of things to attend to.”

“They can wait; I want you. I wish you’d get one of the new magazines
and read me a story.”

Miss Esther went into the house and soon returned with several
magazines. “Here are the books,” she said, “but I can’t read to you. I
have a hundred things to do this morning.”

Putnam looked at her calmly. “You are not going to do any of them,” he
said; “you are going to stay right straight here with me—and read to
me. Sit down in that chair.”

Miss Esther sat down, and Putnam regarded her with a look of entire
satisfaction. “Any story will do,” he said.

She turned the pages, hunting for the most interesting story.

Her mind was slightly distracted by the novel sensation of submitting to
irresistible authority. The feeling was distinctly pleasant.

“Romeo couldn’t have done that,” she thought. “A lover is more
condoling, but my chief humor is for a tyrant. Well, I’ve certainly
found one in this dominating cousin of mine.”

I pr’ythee, pretty youth, let me be better acquainted with
thee.—_As You Like It_, iv, 1.

Kenneth started on his fishing expedition. The road which passed the
Adams house wandered aimlessly off toward a woodland, and at the edge of
this there was a brook. Here was shade, and fallen trees which offered
particularly comfortable seats. As Miss Esther had said, there were no
fish now. There had been one once—a very large one—which had been
caught, but that was in the days when Miss Esther’s father used to fish
there. This lack, however, did not cause the least worry to Kenneth. His
mood was rather for the manner than the matter in hand. He wanted to
fish—not to catch fish, and his mother’s pail, had there been nothing
else available, would have suggested to him those essential ideas which
are of the Waltonian impulse. He wanted to think, and there is nothing
more subtly conducive to the reflective frame of mind than sitting on a
log, dangling a fish-line in a brook. If one catches fish, then there is
immediate business in hand which spoils a train of thought. Your true
philosopher, therefore, desires no fish—he simply wants to sit and
think. That is the secret of fishing, and Kenneth Westcott knew it.

Jean Richards, from behind the vines of her own veranda, had watched
Kenneth’s departure from the Adams house and his subsequent progress
toward the brook. “How absurd,” she thought, as she noted the rod and
creel. “He can’t catch anything in that brook. I’ll go down and tell him
so. I rather like those boys of Miss Esther’s. I think I’ll cultivate
them—the brothers I mean; that lame lieutenant is a prig, I’m sure, but
the Westcott boys seem quite worth while. Yes, I’ll go down there. He’ll
be glad of somebody to amuse him when he finds he can’t catch any fish.”

Jean waited until she thought that Kenneth had had time to discover the
fishlessness of the brook, and then leisurely proceeded along the same
path he had taken.

She came upon him suddenly. Seated on the ground, his back against a
fallen log, his hands clasped behind his head, and his fish-line
trailing in the brook, Kenneth was staring vacantly toward the blue of
the sky.

“Good gracious, how you scared me!” cried Jean. “I didn’t know you were
here.”

“I’m going away in a minute,” he replied, as, after a disinterested
glance at the intruder, he went on with his sky-gazing.

“Well, of _all_ things!” exclaimed Jean. “May I sit here until you go?
I’m awfully tired.”

“Certainly, sit down if you like. It isn’t my log.”

Jean sat down. Kenneth continued to gaze at the sky.

“What are you doing?” she asked at last.

“Cleaning my automobile.”

“Papa has just got a new buggy,” said Jean, ingratiatingly.

“Has he?”

“My father is the manager of the Whitfield Flour and Feed Company.”

“Is he?”

“Yes, he is. He thinks I’m nice.”

“Does he?”

Jean rested her chin in her hand and regarded the young man steadily for
some moments. “Do you know, I rather like you? Nobody ever talked to me
like that before.”

“Do you like to be talked to that way?” Kenneth glanced critically at
his fishing-rod, and moved his position a trifle.

“Yes; who are you, anyway?”

“You know my name.”

“Well, what are you, then?”

“I’m a fairy prince.”

“What are you doing?”

“I’m hunting a fairy princess.”

“How fortunate I happened along just now.”

Kenneth rose, picked up his rod, walked a little way and leaned it
against a tree.

“Oh, are you going?” asked Jean. “Good-bye!”

“No, I’m not going. I’m coming back to sit on the log and talk to you;
but I see an interruption approaching in the shape of two able-bodied
men. One of them is our friend, Mr. Brewster.”

“And the other is Dr. Bushnell, the minister. Mr. Brewster is staying at
his house.”

The two newcomers accepted the hospitality offered by the occupants of
the log, Brewster throwing himself at full length on the grass, and Dr.
Bushnell, carefully selecting an available place, seated himself with
great dignity. “What a poetic spot,” he said. “It reminds me of that
wonderful line of Mrs. Hemans’s, ‘Men may come and men may go, but I go
on forever.’ That is a beautiful thought. It is well said that there are
sermons in running brooks.”

“Why don’t you pick one out for next Sunday, Dr. Bushnell?” inquired
Jean, with an air of seriousness.

“I think I will. I think I will. That is by no means a bad idea. I thank
you, my dear young lady, for suggesting it to me. From a brook one may
draw many—”

“Fish,” said Jean.

“Not from this brook,” said Kenneth. “I’ve been fishing all the morning
and haven’t caught a thing.”

“I referred to sermons, not fish,” remarked Dr. Bushnell, mildly.

“Oh, I didn’t have any sermon bait.”

“And haven’t you really caught anything?” inquired Brewster.

“Only a fairy princess,” said Jean.

“And that without any bait,” retorted Kenneth.

“Oh, I knew he wouldn’t catch any fish, so I came down to amuse him. We
were playing fairy prince and princess.”

“Was this log your castle?” asked Brewster, interestedly.

“No, indeed,” replied Jean. “I think the fairy prince was going to build
a real air-castle, with moats and dungeons and things.”

“I don’t think that kind of a castle would suit you,” said Kenneth.

“What kind would suit me?” asked Jean.

“A more modern one,” said Brewster. “A brownstone front on Fifth Avenue,
for instance.”

“That would suit me exactly,” she replied, “but it isn’t a castle.”

“Wouldn’t you rather be suited exactly than to have a castle?” said
Brewster, quizzically.

“Yes, I would,” said Jean, honestly. “Helen is the one for the castle.
You know Miss Fairbanks,—you met her yesterday. She has set her heart
upon a real castle with turrets and drawbridges and moats.”

“She ought to have it, too,” said Brewster. “She would grace it
perfectly.”

“I am grieved to learn,” said Dr. Bushnell, “that Miss Helen has set her
heart on anything so far beyond her reach. It seems to me not only the
height of folly, but almost a sin to aspire to something that one may
never hope to gain.”

“‘Ah, but a man’s reach should exceed his grasp,
Or what’s a heaven for?’”

quoted Brewster.

“Heaven, my dear sir, is quite another matter. We may all hope to attain
that blessed state.”

“True,” said Brewster, in such a bland tone of acquiescence that Jean
giggled.

“It is not a matter for flippancy,” said Dr. Bushnell, with his most
ministerial air. “Ambition, rightly directed, and not having its source
in a prideful desire for vainglory, is admirable and praiseworthy in
all. But ambition that is selfish and based on a desire for vulgar
ostentation and display—”

“Helen Fairbanks is not vulgar or ostentatious,” broke in Jean. “She
doesn’t want a castle for show. What she wants and what she ought to
have is the sort of thing represented by a moated castle. She would fit
right into a picture of that kind, and she knows it, and so, naturally,
she longs intensely for it. But she isn’t miserable over it.”

“Of course,” said Brewster; “I have only met Miss Fairbanks once, and
she certainly gives a stranger the impression of the Haughty Princess.
One would hardly imagine her longing intensely for anything.”

“That’s only because you don’t know her,” said Jean. “Her likes and
dislikes are extreme. It is not the material castle that she cares for,
either. It is simply that she wants to realize her tremendous ideals.”

“Just as I said,” interposed Dr. Bushnell. “Her ideals are so tremendous
that I fear they can never be realized, and therefore I say that it is
wrong for her to hold them. It is better to be like you, my dear young
lady—contented with your lot and cherishing no overweening ambitions.”

“Is that so?” said Kenneth, with much interest. “Do I really see before
me an absolutely contented individual?”

“You do not!” said Jean, indignantly, as if content were a thing to be
ashamed of. “I have fully as many ideals as Helen, though they are quite
different ones.”

“What is the chief one?” asked Kenneth; “a fairy prince?”

“No, indeed; I have dozens of fairy princes who await but my nod. My
chief desire this morning is for a white chiffon parasol and a maltese
kitten.”

“They are not exactly in line with the ideals you attribute to Miss
Fairbanks,” said Brewster.

“No,” said Dr. Bushnell, “but they are within the possibilities, and so
show a more admirable trait of character, in that your desires are
subservient to your probable attainments. Yours is a disposition to be
envied.”

“I’ll tell Helen that,” said Jean. “I would like to have her envy me. It
would be such a pleasant change.”

“Why, do you envy her?” asked Kenneth.

“I do, indeed. She is so beautiful and stately, and so great-hearted
under her apparent calm indifference, and so unswerving in her aims, and
so—so fond of kittens.”

“But you are that,” said Kenneth.

“Yes, but the kittens are fond of her in return—that’s Helen.”

“If Miss Helen would confine her ambitions to kittens,” said Dr.
Bushnell, “it would be so much wiser and better for her. She is a dear
girl, but it occasions me much serious thought when I observe her
mistaken tendencies. Does it not seem to you, Mr. Brewster—I ask you
now in a general way—does it not seem to you that our extravagant
desires, which in the very nature of things are impossible of
fulfillment, should be curbed—nay, should be rooted out by the kind
hand of friendly counsel?”

“I am sorry that I do not agree with you, Dr. Bushnell,” replied
Brewster, “but I’m afraid I must confess to a deep sympathy with Miss
Fairbanks, for I myself am a victim of unattainable and often even
incomprehensible ideals.”

If he fail, yet go we under our opinion still that we have
better men.—_Troilus and Cressida_, i, 3.

After thinking it all over seriously, Miss Esther had concluded that
Mark Westcott and Theodore Winthrop Brewster were the most suitable
candidates yet entered on the books of her Matrimonial Bureau for the
hand of her artist-client, Lillian Hastings. It had been difficult to
choose between them, for they were both distinctly eligible, but after
two or three days’ acquaintance, she had discovered that Mark possessed
more of the traits which might develop into the character of the
traditional fairy godfather. In pursuance of her plans, the wily lady
one afternoon invented an errand for one unsuspecting youth.

“Mark,” she said, ingratiatingly, “wouldn’t you like to go over to
Lillian Hastings’s for me?”

“Why, are you over there?”

“Don’t be saucy. I assumed that you could understand English. I’ll try
again. Cousin, or, fair cousin, I would wish you, or, I would request
you, or, I would entreat you, not to fear, not to tremble: but to go,
or, to walk, or, to amble withal, to the house, or the home, or the
studio of Miss Lillian Hastings, and there with deep diplomacy acquaint
thyself with that which I desire. This having done, I bid thee tell me
true that which with subtle art thou hast discovered.”

“Sure, I’ll go; but what is this tremendous mission?”

“Lillian is painting a picture, and I want to know if it is finished
yet.”

“But where does the diplomacy come in?”

“You see, I don’t want her to know that I want to know, but when the
picture is finished, I’m going to have a party or something for her.”

“What is the picture? How am I to know it?”

“It’s a great big field with a cow in the middle.”

“All right. I can tell it by the cow, but how am I to know if it is
finished?”

“That’s where you must use your ingenuity. Take your time and lead the
conversation around by devious by-paths until you find out.”

“All right; put me up a little luncheon and I’ll stay all day.”

“You haven’t any diplomacy,” said Kenneth. “I’ll go along with you and
manage the ingenious part.”

“No, no! You can’t go, Kenneth. I want you this afternoon. I want you to
take me driving.”

“But you can’t go driving, Cousin Esther,” broke in Lieutenant Adams.
“You promised to stay with me. I’ve got to have you. Clear out, you two
boys, and stay as long as you like.”

In the few days of Putnam Adams’s stay it had come about that the
household obeyed him unquestioningly. Miss Esther realized that
Kenneth’s going would interfere with her plans, yet there was no escape
from the inevitable, and she docilely remained with Putnam and watched
the brothers as they sauntered across the lawn.

They found Lillian at her easel, at work on a large landscape.

“That’s the picture, now,” exclaimed Mark, diplomatically.

“I told you you hadn’t any ingenuity,” said Kenneth, “and besides that
can’t be the picture. There isn’t any cow in it!”

“There was a cow—” began Lillian.

“How did it get away?”

“I painted it out,” replied the artist.

“Then that’s the picture. I knew it was,” said Mark.

“What picture?”

“We can’t tell you. We’re diplomats. When will it be finished?”

“It’s almost finished now. I think it will be done by Saturday.”

“Then that’s all right. I’ll tell Cousin Esther,” said Mark.

“What does she want to know for?”

“We can’t tell you. That’s a surprise. How can people be diplomats if
other people ask them questions all the time?”

“Hullo, who painted this head?” Kenneth had discovered a portrait among
a lot of sketches.

“By Jove!” exclaimed Mark, “that looks like the girls.”

“What girls?” asked Lillian.

“Our girls,” said Kenneth. “We’re engaged to them, you know. Want to see
’em?”

“Yes, indeed. Where are they?”

The boys simultaneously drew from their pockets two thin gold cases each
containing a miniature of a young woman.

“Why, these are pictures of the same girl,” said Lillian.

“Not exactly,” explained Kenneth. “We’ve each got one. You see they’re
twins.”

“I should think they were twins. I never saw anything so much alike in
my life. How do you tell them apart?”

“We can’t,” said Mark. “At least we can tell the girls apart, but not
the pictures. They got mixed up once and we’ve never known which is
which since. But it doesn’t matter. They can tell us apart.”

“Yes, of course, they can tell which of you they are engaged to.”

“Yes,” said Kenneth, “we have to depend on them to sort us out. But
sometimes I think they fool us.”

“I know they do,” said Mark. “They think it’s a great joke.”

“Are you to be married soon?” asked Lillian.

“Yes, there’s to be a double wedding in the fall. Great time—I wish
you’d come to it.”

“I’d love to go. Is Miss Esther going?”

“Oh, I guess so. She came on to Roger’s wedding, but she hasn’t said
anything about ours.”

“They’re awfully pretty girls. What are their names?”

“Butler—Edna and Edwina. We call them Ed for short.”

“How do they know which one you mean?”

“Why, according to who says it. I wouldn’t call Edna ‘Ed.’”

“You’d better not,” said Mark. “I’d pound you if you did.”

“Where are they now?” asked Lillian, interestedly.

“They are going on with mother this week from Boston to the Adirondacks,
and Mark and I are to join them there later.”

Just then Brewster and Helen Fairbanks came into the studio.

“We’ve been walking miles and miles,” said Helen, “and we’re going over
to Miss Esther’s for a cup of tea, and we want you to come with us.”

“All right,” said Mark, “we’ll go. Just wait a few minutes till Miss
Hastings paints a cow into her picture.”

“Oh, the cow can wait till to-morrow,” said Lillian; “but won’t you show
Miss Fairbanks those two miniatures, or one at least?”

The boys produced the lockets and handed them to Helen. “What a
beautiful girl,” she said. “Is she your sister?”

“No—she isn’t one girl, she’s twins, and she’s engaged to these two
brothers here,” said Lillian.

“Which is which?” asked Helen.

“Merciful powers!” exclaimed Kenneth, “you haven’t mixed them up again,
have you? We just got them sorted out.”

“Why these are the Butler twins,” said Brewster as he looked at the
pictures. “I’ve known them all their lives;—this is Edna and this is
Edwina.”

“How can you tell?” asked Mark, admiringly; “but give me Edwina quick,
while you know.”

“Now I’m ready,” said Lillian, sticking her brushes into an already
crowded ginger jar. “Come on, let’s go. It’s almost five.”

On the way to the Adams house they passed Dr. Bushnell’s. Brewster
turned in at the gate. “Go on,” he said, “I’ll get the book I promised
Miss Fairbanks, and catch you before you get to Miss Esther’s.”

That afternoon had proved an eventful one for Miss Adams, and had
completely disarranged her Matrimonial Bureau.

She had been sitting on the east porch with Putnam, when Nora announced
the arrival of three ladies.

“Well, Emily Westcott!” exclaimed Miss Esther, “I’m so glad to see you.
Where under the sun did you come from?”

“I’m on my way to Saranac, and just stopped over for the night to see
you and to show you my new daughters. This is Edwina Butler and this is
Edna Butler. Where are the boys?”

“I’m very glad to see you—all of you. But why do you call these young
ladies your daughters?”

“Why, they’re engaged to Mark and Kenneth. Haven’t they told you?”

“Mark and Kenneth?” said Miss Esther, “Mark and Kenneth! but which of
you is which? How can they tell you apart?”

“They can’t,” said Edna Butler. “We tell them.”

Miss Esther sat down. “Well, of _all_ things!” she said.

“Why are you so surprised?” asked Mrs. Westcott. “The boys are old
enough. Mark is twenty-five—”

“Yes, yes, I know. And I’m very much pleased,—very much pleased. I am
sure,” she added, turning to the young ladies, “that you must be twins.
You are, aren’t you?”

“Yes, we are; I am Edwina. There’s no way to tell us apart except by our
first names. Mark is my special property.”

“And Kenneth is mine,” said Edna. “He has written so much about you and
this beautiful place that we’re perfectly delighted to be here. He told
us, too, about numbers of new cousins he had found here. Mayn’t we see
them?”

“Yes, indeed,” said Miss Esther. “At least we have one of them on
exhibition. Your boys have gone calling somewhere, but one of the new
cousins—Lieutenant Adams—is on the east porch, laid up with a broken
leg. Come out and amuse him for a while.”

She took the Butler twins to the east porch, presented Lieutenant Adams,
and then returned to Mrs. Westcott. “Those young people can take care of
themselves,” she said, “and you and I can have a good old-time chat.”

“We’ve come out to get acquainted,” announced Edna. “You may not know
it, but you are to be one of our new cousins, Lieutenant Adams.”

“I’m very glad to hear that,” he said; “but if I’m your cousin, you must
call me Putnam. What’s your name?”

“Mine’s Edna, and hers is Edwina. You may use them, if you like.”

“I don’t know how I can remember which belongs to which. Your gowns are
exactly alike. You ought to have some distinguishing mark.”

“All right. Give me one of your gilt buttons,” said Edna, “and I’ll wear
it on my chain.”

“Of course,” said Lieutenant Adams, cutting off a button from his white
duck coat, which Edna gleefully attached to her long chain.

“I want one, too,” said Edwina, “to put on my chain.”

“Of course. Here’s one for you.”

Edwina strung the button on her chain. “Now shut your eyes,” she said,
“and count ten.”

During the counting Putnam heard an ostentatious rustle and two very
similar giggles. Then he announced “Ten!”

“Now look at us,” said one of them. “Which am I?”

“That’s dead easy; you’re Edwina.”

“How can you tell?”

“Why, because one of you is so much prettier than the other.”

“Which?” cried the twins together.

“Both,” said Putnam, gallantly.

“Well, if that doesn’t look like Winthrop Brewster,” said Edwina, as she
saw a tall man in white flannels crossing the lawn.

“It is,” said her sister.

“Of course it is,” said Putnam. “Do you know him?”

“Yes, known him all our lives. Hullo, Winthrop!”

“Well, Peaches Butler!” exclaimed Brewster as he came up the steps. “How
did you get here? You see,” he explained to Putnam, “that when I address
these young women together I have to refer to them in the plural. When I
meet only one of them I call her Peach.”

From the library window Miss Esther could hear the laughter on the east
porch. She had left Mrs. Westcott in her room, after hearing from her
the details of the boys’ engagements.

“Mark and Kenneth both out of it,” she thought. “To be sure, I only
needed one of them, but I can’t have either, it seems. I think the Jean
and Putnam affair will turn out as I have planned. Then, of course, I
must give Winthrop Brewster to Lillian. That still leaves Helen. She is
certainly my most troublesome client. This being a Matrimonial Bureau is
harder work than I thought it would be.”

He well may be a stranger, for he comes to an honored
triumph.—_Pericles_, ii, 2.

After leaving Brewster at Dr. Bushnell’s, Mark explained to his
companions that he had forgotten to go to the post-office as he had
promised Miss Esther he would do. They all went with him. When they
reached the Adams house there was no one on the front veranda.

“We’re late,” said Helen, “and yet I don’t see any appearance of
tea-things. I wonder where everybody is?”

“Some fearful accident must have happened in this well-regulated family
to have interfered with the tea routine,” said Lillian.

“Yes,” exclaimed Kenneth, “the fearful accident is Putnam Adams. He has
regulations of his own, and he has hypnotized Cousin Esther into
thinking that they are hers. He’s probably having tea in that padded
cell of his.”

“From the racket, I should say he had a whole tea-party,” said Mark.

“We’ll invite ourselves to it,” said Lillian.

They sauntered slowly toward the porch, Lillian and Mark ahead, and
Helen following with Kenneth.

“That’s Mark’s laugh,” said Edwina. “The boys are coming, Ed.”

The Butler twins flew to the vine-framed window and looked out to see
Mark and Kenneth apparently very much interested in two merry young
women. At the same moment Lillian spied the twin faces in the leafy
frame. “There,” she cried, “are the girls out of your lockets!”

“Edwina Butler!” yelled Mark, dropping in an astonished heap on the
grass. “Whichever one of you belongs to me, come out here—quick!”

“No, you come up here. Aren’t you awful glad to see us? We’re a surprise
party,” said Edwina.

“You certainly are,” said Kenneth, bounding up the steps. “What are you
doing here, anyway?”

Lillian and Helen followed Kenneth, and Brewster introduced them to the
Butler twins. Just as Mark rose to go, too, Jean came around the corner
of the house. “Where’s everybody?” she said.

“Up in Putnam’s porch,” replied Mark. “Come on up.”

“Here comes Mark with another girl,” said Edwina to Brewster. “Is he
making a collection?”

“Yes, I think he is,” replied Brewster; “and I admire his taste in
gems.”

“His latest acquisition seems to be a sparkling one.”

“She’s all of that,” said Brewster. “Jean Richards is a witch; but I’m
not sure that I would call her Mark’s acquisition.”

“Is she yours?”

“No, not that either. Lieutenant Adams—”

Just at this moment Mark came up and Edwina lost interest in Brewster’s
sentence.

“Mark has good taste,” thought Brewster, glancing at Miss Butler, “but
for myself—” He deliberately walked across the porch and seated himself
beside Helen Fairbanks.

Miss Esther and Mrs. Westcott appeared at the door.

“The Mother!” shrieked Kenneth, and sprang to meet her.

“What a lot of people for tea,” said Miss Esther. “We must all go out on
the front veranda right away. Everything is ready.”

“We are going to have tea here to-day,” said Putnam.

He looked at Miss Esther with that air of absolute finality which she
had already learned meant ultimate acquiescence on her part; and while
she felt it necessary to parley a little, if only for a compromise with
her own dignity, yet she was secretly pleased with the positive
knowledge that she would capitulate at last. In a word, she enjoyed
Putnam’s despotism.

“But we always have it on the front veranda. We’ll have to go out
there,” she said.

“No,” said Putnam; “it is to be served here. Sit down.”

Miss Esther sat down.

“Now, Miss Richards,” began Putnam, “you will kindly ask Nora to
superintend moving all that tea baggage out here, and you Westcott boys
get busy and do the boosting.”

Usually Putnam’s orders were carried out to the letter, but when Jean
reached the front veranda, she was surprised to see a strange young man
sitting there. He was a fat little man, who looked as though he might be
merry in favoring circumstances. But just now he sat in an attitude of
deep dejection, his round face showing a most woe-begone expression.

“Don’t cry!” said Jean. “It’s all right. What’s the matter?”

“Somebody’s broke the doorbell, and I can’t get in. Sit down, won’t
you?”

Jean sat down beside him. “I really must be going,” she said; “they’re
waiting for me inside.”

“Can’t I go in, too? I’m expected. I am Abraham Lincoln Dodd.”

Jean regarded him critically. “You don’t look like Abraham Lincoln,” she
said.

“No; I favor the Dodds. We are the Dodds of Lawrence. We spell our name
D-o-double-d. It is pronounced Dodd—the final d is silent.”

“How interesting,” said Jean.

“Yes, isn’t it? Putnam Adams wrote for me to come down here. He said
that his Cousin Esther said I might. Are you his Cousin Esther?”

“Oh, no. Miss Adams is a lady of about fifty.”

“Yes, so Putnam said.”

“Where are you, Miss Richards?” called Mark from the doorway.

“Here I am. Come out and meet Mr. Dodd.”

“Certainly,” said Mark, dropping down on the top step. “Did Putnam tell
you to keep Mr. Dodd out here?”

“We can’t get in,” said Abraham Lincoln Dodd. “Nobody answered my ring,
and I can’t find Putnam.”

“What’s up?” asked Kenneth, coming out after more teacups.

“I’ve found a stranger,” said Jean, “and I took him in. Want to see
him?”

“She hasn’t taken me in _yet_,” said Dodd, cheerfully.

“She will, though,” said Kenneth, sitting down beside his brother. “It’s
a happy little faculty Miss Richards possesses. But you’re not a
stranger. Putnam expected you.”

“Yes, Miss Adams was kind enough to invite me. They said to come as soon
as I could, and so I came right away. I drove over from Richfield
Springs in my automobile.”

“You did?” cried Jean. “Have you got an automobile? Will you take me out
in it?”

“All right,” replied Dodd. “Get your hat.”

“There’s a riot on the east porch,” said Brewster, appearing suddenly.
“_Where_ is that tea-table?”

“Never mind the tea,” exclaimed Jean. “Here’s Mr. Dodd, and he’s got an
automobile! Come out and see him.”

“Where is it?” asked Brewster, joining the group.

“Why,” said Dodd, “it was most unfortunate. Just as I was coming through
the village it had a pain, so I left it at the blacksmith’s. It will be
all right by to-morrow.”

“I can go to-morrow,” said Jean. “We’ll all go.”

“How many are there of us?” asked Dodd.

“Oh, there’s a lot of us,” replied Jean. “There’s Miss Esther—”

“Yes, here’s Miss Esther,” said that lady coming through the hall. “What
is going on? Are you going to keep these boys here all the afternoon?”

“Why,” said Jean, “I’m entertaining your company. Mr. Dodd is here.”

“Oh, Putnam’s Mr. Dodd?”

“Your Mr. Dodd, if you will have me,” said Abraham Lincoln, rising.

“Certainly I will. Consider yourself one of my adopted boys. I have a
great many. Won’t you come in?”

“I’ve been trying to get in, but Miss Richards has kept me out.”

“She is quite capable of it. You’re a bad girl, Jean. Go back to the
east porch at once. Putnam wants you. Also, I left two girls weeping for
the Westcott boys. Mr. Brewster, tell Putnam that Mr. Dodd is here. I’ll
bring him out there directly.”

“It was right down good of you to ask me over here, Miss Adams,” said
Dodd as they were left alone.

“I am glad to have you. Any friend of Putnam’s is welcome. I am very
fond of that boy.”

“Yes, he’s an all-round good fellow. I’m sorry he’s laid up, but this is
certainly an ideal spot to be laid up in. The country is beautiful, and
I’m glad I brought my sketching-traps.”

“Oh, yes. Putnam told me you painted. I’m so glad.”

“You won’t be when you see my pictures. I don’t paint very well.”

“But you take an interest in art?”

“Oh, yes. I like pictures and I like people who like pictures.”

It was with great satisfaction that Miss Esther showed Abraham Lincoln
Dodd to his room. When she came down stairs she paused a moment in the
library. “It’s nothing short of providential,” she thought. “Just when I
had to give up all hopes of one of those Westcott boys for Lillian, here
comes along an even better candidate. He is not only available along the
art lines, but Putnam says he is rich and so, of course, he could take
Lillian abroad or anywhere she wants to go. I really think he’ll do very
well. Dodd isn’t a much prettier name than Briggs, and I did want
Westcott; but I must not sit too long on trifles. It is working out
admirably. There does seem to be a special providence that waits on
Matrimonial Bureaus. If all goes well, Lillian can sail by the middle of
August after all.”

XII

My chief humor is for a tyrant.—_Midsummer Night’s Dream_, i,
2.

Putnam’s tea on the east porch proved a decided success. Abraham Lincoln
Dodd was an acquisition, and Miss Esther viewed the entire group with a
secret elation that at last she had secured a stage-setting such as she
wanted, and furthermore had brought her actors all together upon the
scene.

It seemed to her the perfected realization of her attempt to model a
situation after those described in her favorite English novels. The
wicker tea-table and its complete appointments, the pretty girls in
their light summer frocks, the jolly, careless men with their
unostentatious thoughtfulness for Putnam, the blue sky, the green,
close-cut grass, and even the sweep of the graveled driveway, along
which Miss Esther’s imagination could see Lady Rose’s daughter rolling
in her victoria,—all these filled her heart with joy. This joy was not
expressed in words, but its manifestation was evident in her demeanor
and made her, appropriately enough, a fitting central figure for the
picture. She looked at the three girls she was so fond of, she looked at
her recently acquired collection of cousins, and then she looked
curiously at Mr. Dodd and wondered. “I think he will do,” she thought,
“and he seems to like Lillian already.”

As a matter of fact, Mr. Dodd seemed to like not only Lillian but all of
Miss Esther’s guests, and apparently the regard was mutual. The centre
of an admiring group, he was telling of some exciting experience which
befell him when he was young. “It wasn’t so bad, then, but after I grew
up—” he began.

“But you didn’t grow very far,” interrupted Jean.

“Not up, no; but I grew a lot cross-wise. I think Nature intended me for
a sphere.”

“She accomplished her purpose admirably,” said Putnam.

[Illustration: _Tea on the east porch._]

“The minister was telling me the other day,” said Jean, “that I ought to
find my sphere. I wonder if you’re it.”

“No,” said Miss Esther, involuntarily. “That is, I mean,” she went on
hurriedly, “I won’t have anybody calling my guests spheres or any other
geometrical solids. And by the way, Mr. Dodd, what am I to call you? You
see, all these other adopted boys of mine I call by their first names.”

“But Mr. Dodd’s first name is so ponderous,” said Helen.

“It is,” said Dodd, hopelessly. “But,” he added, brightening, “they used
to call me Little Sunshine.”

“I shall call you Lincoln,” said Miss Esther, decidedly. “It suits you.”

“I am very glad to hear that somebody has at last realized my essential
Lincolnic attributes. I have always wanted to issue a proclamation. I am
a born proclaimer, and if I could only emancipate somebody from
something, I could die happy. I am Lincolnian to the backbone. I was cut
out for a great fighter.”

“If you’re talking about fighters,” said Mark, “Fitzsimmons is my
choice.”

“Well, call me Fitz if you like. I might just as well have been named
after him, if he had done his fighting as early as Lincoln did. He’s
another kind of fighter, to be sure, but if a man fights to win, what’s
the odds whether he fights men or conditions?”

“I don’t see why men like to fight so much,” said Lillian. “I should
think you would rather be something nice. A painter, for instance, like
Sir Joshua Reynolds.”

“Oh, I am a painter, and you may call me Sir Josh if you like.”

“Are you really a painter?”

“Yes, I am. I’m a big painter. My last picture was a scene up Gloucester
way, and covered the whole coast, all the shore from Rocky Neck to Cape
Ann.”

“All on one canvas?” asked Putnam.

“Yes, I wanted it for a certain space, but somehow I got the thing too
long, and when I got it home it wouldn’t fit.”

“What did you do then?”

“I had to take a tuck in it,—up and down, you know. It didn’t make any
difference. It only cut out a few miles between the DeCamp cottage and
the hotels on the eastern shore. That stretch is uninteresting, anyway.”

“I’m awfully glad you paint,” said Lillian; “I paint some, too. If you
paint better than I do, you can teach me.”

“I will, with pleasure, and if you paint better than I do, you can teach
me.”

Miss Esther smiled. Mr. Dodd was certainly a most tractable man. If she
had told him just what she wanted, he couldn’t have fallen in with her
plans better. She foresaw a friendship that should begin over the paint
tubes, and should lead straight to the deck of the European steamer.
“Perhaps I am not exactly the god in the machine,” she thought, while
apparently listening to Mrs. Westcott’s periphrases, “but I am the
machinist, and I must set the god to work. And if ’t were done when ’t
is done, then ’twere well ’twere done quickly.”

Miss Esther regarded Lillian with the expression a chess-player would
bestow upon an idle pawn. She decided to make a move upon her
matrimonial chessboard. “Lillian,” she said, transparently diplomatic,
“wouldn’t you like to take Mr. Dodd over to your studio and let him
advise you about that new picture of yours?”

Lillian did want to, but not feeling sure of Mr. Dodd’s state of mind on
the subject, she looked at him, inquiringly.

“Nothing I should like better,” said he, jumping up. “As an adviser I am
a great success. I make a specialty of advising. I have noticed that
nowadays it is the thing to be a specialist.”

“But I thought specialists were surgeons or doctors,” said Edwina
Butler. “Are you a doctor?”

“Yes, I am. I administer advice in capsules to my patients, and they’re
not always sugar-coated, either.”

“Then sometimes they are hard to take,” said Lillian. “I hope you’ll
sugar-coat mine.”

“I don’t know,” Dodd returned. “I haven’t seen your picture yet, and I
don’t know what kind you’ll need.”

“Advise her to put her cow back in the pasture,” said Mark.

“Where is she now?” asked Dodd. “Do you allow your cow to paint on your
pictures, Miss Hastings, while you’re away?”

“No, it was only a painted cow upon a painted picture, and I unpainted
her, because—”

“Because she wouldn’t moo,” interrupted Helen.

“Oh, you are a realist?” asked Dodd.

“Yes. I want to paint cows that can moo,” replied Lillian, “although I
may not hear them.”

“They’d scare you to death if they did,” said Jean. “I never knew
anybody so afraid of cows as you are.”

“Well, go on,” said Miss Esther. “I’ve no doubt if you meet any cows on
the way Mr. Dodd will—”

“Paint them out,” supplemented Putnam.

“We will,” said Dodd as he walked down the steps with Lillian; “but
remember that sometimes it requires a good deal of courage to paint
out.”

Lillian gave him a glance of admiring appreciation. Miss Esther caught
it, and smiled.

Pursuing her rôle of a zealous and very active fate, Miss Esther next
proceeded to clear the stage for the more prominent actors in her
comedy-drama. “Girls,” she said to the Butler twins, “wouldn’t you like
to see something of the place? Why don’t you ask that pair of Westcotts
of yours to take you down where Kenneth was fishing the other day?
That’s a most romantic spot.”

“Oh, we’re not so romantic as all that,” said Edwina, “or at least if we
are, we have plenty of opportunities for romance; but it isn’t often
that we get a chance at such a lovely afternoon tea as this is, and we
want to stay to it.”

“This is my tea,” said Putnam, “and I can manage it any way I like. Now
I’ll interrupt it right here, and you kids go down to the brook. We’ll
begin the tea again when you come back.”

“Yes,” said Miss Esther, delighted that her necessary acquiescence with
Putnam’s views should coincide so perfectly with her wishes, “run along
at once. Stay as long as you like, and be sure to be here at seven
o’clock for dinner.”

“They’ll never get back by that time,” said Mrs. Westcott. “You don’t
know that quartette as well as I do. They have no idea of time. You
ought not to let them go.”

“Why, she’s sending us,” cried Edna. “I don’t care a snip about going.”

“Oh, go along,” said her hostess, “you’ll be back in time.”

The four ran laughing down the steps and crossed the lawn in the
direction of the woodland. Elated by her success so far, Miss Esther
proceeded to dispose of Helen and Mr. Brewster, for her ultimate plan
was nothing less than to leave Jean and Lieutenant Adams in undisturbed
possession of the east porch. But Theodore Winthrop Brewster was not so
easily managed as the Westcott boys. She made several unsuccessful
attempts. “Mr. Brewster,” she said, finally, “have you seen Jack’s ship
since he has painted it?”

“I have, indeed,” said Brewster, cheerfully; “in fact I helped him paint
it yesterday.”

“But he put on another coat this morning, and it really looks very
different. Take Helen up to see it. She’s so interested in Jack’s ship.”

“I’m the one that is interested in Jack’s ship,” broke in Jean; “let me
go.”

“Stay where you are,” said Putnam, dictatorially; “you weren’t invited.
Miss Fairbanks was.”

“But I don’t want to go,” said Helen. “I am very comfortable here;” and
she leaned back in her lounging-chair with one of her best expressions
of reposeful content.

“You always exasperate me when you look like that,” said Jean. “I wish
Miss Esther would make you go.”

“I can’t,” said Miss Esther. “I can make some people do some things some
of the time, but I know better than to order Helen Fairbanks around.
Besides, Putnam is the only one here who can make anybody do anything.”

“Try it,” said Helen, looking over at Putnam.

“Not I. I should be proud to have you give me orders, but I should never
dream of commanding Miss Helen Fairbanks.”

“Your decision is a wise one, as my family could tell you. Collectively
and individually they have tried to make me mind, but without any very
startling success.”

“Come with me, Miss Fairbanks,” said Brewster. “There are some
interesting details about Jack’s ship that I would like to show you.”

Helen rose smilingly, and with an evident unconsciousness that she was
obeying dictation, she walked into the house with Brewster. Putnam
caught Miss Esther’s glance across the porch and threw back an amused
smile of comprehension.

After Helen and Mr. Brewster left them, Miss Esther diplomatically
contrived an exit for herself and Mrs. Westcott. “If you will come into
the library with me, Emily,” she said, “I will look up those papers and
we will settle those disputed genealogical questions.”

“Oh, there’s no hurry about it,” said Mrs. Westcott, “I shall be here
two or three days.”

“Come now,” said Miss Esther, “I’m just in the mood for it.”

She held the door open with such an air of compulsion that Mrs. Westcott
reluctantly went in.

Left alone with Putnam on the veranda, Jean, for some unaccountable
reason, felt vaguely embarrassed. “I must take these things out to
Nora,” she said, as she began rather aimlessly to fuss with the teacups.

“Stay where you are,” said Putnam.

“But you see,” said Jean, “I really must look after these things. It’s
Nora’s afternoon out—at least I think it is—and Miss Esther always
depends on me to look after things for her—especially if she has
company—and so, you see, I really must—”

“Sit down,” said Putnam.

XIII

And I for no woman.—_As You Like It_, v, 2.

“I won’t sit down,” said Jean. “You can boss Miss Esther as much as you
like, but you needn’t think that I’m going to do exactly as you say. I
am in the habit of doing the ordering myself. That is the divine right
of an only child.”

“An only child needn’t be a spoiled child,” said Putnam, lazily.

[Illustration: “_I’m not a spoiled child!_”]

“I’m not a spoiled child,” and Jean’s eyes flashed; “nobody ever said
that before!”

“I don’t object to being a pioneer. The rôle has always appealed to me.”

“Well, don’t indulge your proclivities in this undiscovered country.”

“Why not?”

Putnam regarded Jean deliberately, and with an expression of amused
curiosity. He was an unusually handsome man, and his magnificent
physique gave an impression of resolute power to a degree rare, even in
a soldier. This impression was in no way lessened, but was rather
accented by his present condition of physical helplessness. Stretched at
full length in a steamer-chair, and consequently incapable of active
exertion, he still showed unmistakable evidence of an immense amount of
reserve force. It was this air of indolently conscious superiority which
proved so excessively tantalizing to Jean.

She sat down in a low chair beside him, and resting her chin in her
hands, gazed straight into his eyes.

“Why not?” repeated Putnam.

“Because I won’t stand it. You’re the spoiled child yourself. You always
have your own way, irrespective of what anybody else wants, and it makes
me furious to have you think that you can order me about as you do
others. You shan’t do it!”

“Why not?” said Putnam again.

He still looked at her quizzically with the added provocation of a
slight patronizing smile. Jean flushed angrily. Putnam changed his
position, but with difficulty, and the expression of pain which came
into his eyes roused all Jean’s instincts of helpfulness. Without
realizing what she was doing, she rose and took a pillow from the
hammock. This she placed under Putnam’s shoulder, and with quick, deft
touches patted it into exactly the right position.

“Thank you,” he said, with a grave courtesy quite at variance with his
former teasing mood. Jean flushed again, but this time it was not with
anger. She could not have analyzed the reason even if she had tried. It
was simply the charm of Putnam Adams’s personality. Splendid physical
strength and an iron will, with a calm, consummate indifference, born of
unqualified self-confidence, make the most attractive combination
possible in a man, and he possessed these qualities in their perfection.
Possibly the consciousness of this had added to his manner a little too
great a touch of autocracy, but this was always forgiven him, because,
when necessary, Putnam Adams commanded forgiveness with the same
assurance that he commanded everything else.

And so this personality appealed to Jean, not only because of its
effectiveness with all women, but because this was the first time that a
man of this stamp had come within her experience. She was a little
bewildered by it, and in consequence lost much of her self-confident
ability to hold her own against any odds.

Indeed, it was otherwise inexplicable that she, the high-handed
dispenser of begged-for favors, should, not only without invitation, but
without volition, have bestowed upon an outrageously indifferent
beneficiary a favor which, however casual it might seem, was really a
tribute to his masterfulness. She was conquered, although she didn’t
know it.

Putnam Adams knew it, but he did not tell her.

* * * * *

After a few weeks of rest and Miss Esther’s care, Putnam’s condition
improved to such an extent that he was able to get about without his
crutches, and was able to take his place in the sextette which had many
excursions by automobile and otherwise in the surrounding country about
Whitfield.

The Westcott party had gone on to the Adirondacks, after promising to
stop at Miss Esther’s on the way back. After Mark’s departure, Chub had
transferred her affections to Abraham Lincoln Dodd, whom she called
Linkum, and whom she alternately petted and tyrannized over.

One morning Dodd lay on his back on the lawn, looking up at a very blue
sky, and Chub amused herself by piling leaves upon his face.

“I’m a wobin,” she said, gleefully, “and you’re my Babeth in the
Woodth.”

“I knew a robin once,—” began Dodd.

“A nither wobin than me?”

“No, not nicer than you, except that that robin didn’t put sand in my
eyes.”

“Wath it a weally wobin?”

“Yes, a really robin, with feathers. We were great friends.”

“I have a friend—he’th a chipmuk; and I have ’nother friend, and he’th
a tagger; and I have ’nother friend, and he’th a—a—a—Bear—a awful
big Bear; and I had ’nother friend, and he wath a little
kittypillar—but he ranned away.”

“Is your bear a really bear?” asked Dodd.

“Oh, yeth; a big live bear with featherth, and he livth wight over
there.”

With a comprehensive sweep of her dimpled arm, Chub vaguely indicated
the habitat of the bear.

“Lovely!” said Dodd. “And do the tiger and chipmunk live there, too?”

“Yeth, we all live there, and we have thupper together and the tagger
eath bread and milk, and the chipmuk eath cuthtard, and the bear—”

“Eats the caterpillar?” questioned Dodd.

“No, he didn’t. The little kittypillar ranned away, cauth the bear theen
him go, and he ranned acroth the woad and acroth the brook and acroth
the fenth, he ranned awful fatht.”

“Did you run after him?”

“Yeth, and I felled in the brook and got all drownded up, and the
chipmuk come ’long and he felled in the brook, and the tagger come ’long
and he felled in the brook, and the bear come ’long and he felled in the
brook, and the chipmuk come ’long and he felled in the brook, and—”

“Oh, you had the chipmunk in the brook before.”

“Yeth, but he felled in two timeth; and the bear come ’long—”

But the end of this thrilling tale was lost to history, and so far as we
know authoritatively, the animals are still in the brook, for just at
this moment Chub’s nurse appeared and carried the baby off for her
morning nap.

Dodd rose, brushed off the leaves and wisps of grass with which Chub had
favored him, and went into the house in search of Miss Esther. When he
reached the hall he saw her in the library.

As he entered the room, she said, apparently to nobody, “They are all
doing beautifully, except Winthrop Brewster. I cannot understand,
Cassius,” she said, “what is the matter with that man. I’m sure he cares
a lot about Helen, and last night I managed to leave them alone on the
East porch, and,” seeing Dodd in the doorway, “if you’ll believe me,
Lincoln Dodd, nothing came of it!”

“You don’t mean it!” said Dodd.

“Yes, I do, and I was just telling Cassius—”

“I heard you address Cassius. Is he a dog?”

“No, I mean Caius Cassius. I often talk to my books—especially when I
want advice.”

“Do you often get it?”

“Always, if I ask the right ones.”

“How do you know who are the right ones?”

“My intuitions tell me, and just now they tell me that you are the one.”

“I’m a good adviser,” said Dodd.

“Yes, I believe you are, and that is why I’m going to ask you seriously
about a very important matter.”

“Do,” he replied. “I’ve been wanting excitement of some kind.”

“Well, this will be exciting enough, I promise you. It’s nothing more
nor less than that you are to get married,—sooner than you expect to.”

“To you? All right!”

“No. Don’t be foolish. Not to me. But really, a rich young man like you
are, and a good man, and a kind man, ought to make some girl happy.”

“But perhaps it wouldn’t make me happy,” said Dodd.

“Oh, don’t attempt to be coy with me. I understand perfectly how the
land lies, and I am thoroughly pleased, I can assure you. Lillian
Hastings is one of the dearest girls I know, and—”

“Good Heavens! Miss Esther, what in the world are you talking about?”

“Oh, anybody can see with half an eye that you’re in love with her.”

“But I’m not. I’m not a bit in love with Miss Hastings or with any other
lady, and I never wish to marry or be given in marriage.”

“You’re not in love with Lillian Hastings!”

Miss Esther dropped onto the sofa. She looked the picture of woe.

“Et tu, Brute!” she said. “Another candidate defeated!”

XIV

Here’s a small trifle of wives.—_Merchant of Venice_, ii, 2.

Lillian’s studio was peculiarly fitted for confidences. It was away up
in the top of a house which had been constructed in the time when
gingerbread formed a part of the architectural impulse of Central New
York. Still, up in the attic there had been left an unfinished
room—garret, with rafters and other things dear to the heart of those
who were born in Central New York in the middle seventies. This room the
young woman had adapted to her own uses. She had impressed the men from
the Whitfield Planing Mill and Agricultural Works, and she had directed
them to construct a ceiling of matched lumber—though she did not know
what matched lumber meant.

After it was finished she discovered that it was simply a ceiling of
boards closely fitted together, and that by no possibility could the
boards be said to match—so far as her eye for color could discover.
Still, she was satisfied, for she had covered the whole affair with a
coat of burlap, and over this she had put a coat of paint—dark green,
with splashes of gold in it—and when it was done she sat down and
thought it all out.

“They thought it was matched lumber,” she said. “I have made it match.”

That, in effect, was the attitude which Lillian Hastings, she of the
artistic temperament, held toward life.

This point of view had been questioned by Jean, but Helen understood it.
“It’s this way,” said she, as they discussed it for the thousandth time.
“Very often Lillian’s lumber doesn’t match, but she covers it up with a
bit of decorative drapery and is perfectly satisfied.”

“Yes,” said Lillian, “but the decoration, if it is of my own choosing,
pleases me so much that I forget the unmatchedness of the lumber.”

“Just in the same way, I suppose,” said Jean, “that you have forgotten
the ugliness of that picture which you have so cleverly covered with
that square of Turkish embroidery.”

“Exactly that. As it is, I forget that the ugliness is behind, and see
only the beautiful. To me the ugliness is not there.”

“No,” said Helen, “I know it. Now to me the ugliness is not only there,
but is all the more visible to me from the fact that I try to cover it
up.”

“That’s foolishness,” said Jean. “There’s no sense in seeing ugly things
because they’re covered up; but then, there’s no sense in having them
there, anyway. If a thing is ugly, why not take it away, or else go
somewhere else yourself?”

Lillian went about the work of the studio thoughtfully. “There are some
uglinesses,” she said, presently, “that one cannot get away from. If
they are there, and are put there by those who put things there for us
in the beginning—then why not either accept them or get away from them,
or—cover them up? The system is complicated. Not all can be escaped.
Not all can be accepted—but all of them can be covered up to a greater
or less degree, and the mere fact that we are conscious of them
ourselves need not make them visible to those who happen to come under
the influence of the beautiful things with which we cover the
uglinesses—Bah! the very idea of exploiting all our guilty consciences
and all our ugly little ideas before everybody that may come along! It
is disgusting. We know they are there. We know the spots on the
wall-paper, and we know that there is a worn place in the carpet, and
these mean either carelessness or something else. Whatever they mean, we
back a chair up against the spot on the wall and we put a rug over the
carpet’s shortcomings—just exactly as we put figurative chairs and rugs
over the spots on our consciences. We know they are there—but the other
people do not, maybe, and if they don’t, then they are not offended by
the sight. They haven’t got to fight the thing out. If we have—then we
can do it after they have gone away. We will have to do it alone,
anyway.”

“I am more glad than ever that I haven’t the artistic temperament,” said
Jean, “if you have to reason things out as deeply as that. I don’t see
the use of paying any attention to ugly things. It’s all I can do to
find time enough for all the beautiful things there are in the world.”

“Much you know about the world!” flung in Lillian.

“Mr. Brewster says,” remarked Helen, “that nothing is ugly, _per se_.”

“I always did wonder what _per se_ meant,” said Jean; “but it seems to
me, Helen, that Mr. Brewster’s opinions mean an awful lot to you of
late.”

“That’s because his opinions are valuable _per se_.”

“Now you see, Jean,” said Lillian, “what _per se_ means. It means to
Helen.”

“Well, if he expresses his opinions to me more than he does to you
girls, it’s because I listen with some serious attention, and you—well,
you never seem to be around when he’s talking.”

“There’s gratitude for you!” exclaimed Jean. “After we have purposely
kept out of your way and tried our best to give you opportunities for
hearing opinions—”

“And for serious attentions,” broke in Lillian.

“You needn’t have troubled yourselves,” said Helen, “for your kind
efforts were not even noticed, let alone appreciated.”

“Speak for yourself,” said Jean; “speak for Mr. Brewster too, if you
like; but I can tell you that Miss Esther understood and appreciated our
delicate little unattentions.”

Helen looked at Jean—blankly at first, and then with a slow-dawning
realization of her meaning. “Am I to understand,” she said, “that you
think Miss Esther thinks that I am trying to attract Mr. Brewster’s
attentions?”

“Not so much that,” remarked Lillian, “but that Miss Esther is trying to
attract them for you.”

“Indeed,” said Helen; “do you imagine for a minute that I—”

“Oh, Helen,” interrupted Jean, “take off that haughty Princess air. Have
you ever seen anywhere one who fitted the rôle of Prince for your castle
better than this same man whose opinions you have been quoting?”

“Oh, if you are going to be serious about the matter,” said Helen, “I am
quite willing to admit that Mr. Brewster comes nearer to my ideal than
any other man I have ever met.”

“He ought to appreciate that compliment,” said Lillian; “that is, if he
knows what your ideals are.”

“He does know,” said Helen, slowly. “I have told him.”

“Wasn’t he scared, then?” asked Jean.

“Of course he was,” replied Helen. “He was so scared that he ran away
and I haven’t seen him since.”

“You can see him right away, if you like,” cried Jean, who was sitting
on the broad window-seat. “Mr. Brewster!” she called loudly.

The automobile stopped. Brewster got out and came toward the house,
smiling up at Jean.

The machine, with Miss Esther and Lincoln Dodd as the only occupants,
went puffing on along the country road.

“I am glad of this opportunity to talk to you alone, Lincoln,” began
Miss Esther.

“Well, you said you wanted to talk to me about something; that’s why I
brought you out this afternoon. I thought we’d manage to drop Brewster
somewhere.”

“Do you know, I was perfectly astounded when you told me the other day
that you were not in love with Lillian Hastings!”

“I told you only the truth. I was not, I am not, and I am positive that
I shall not be. But I have no reason to think that if I were, it would
particularly please Miss Hastings.”

“That does not make any difference,” said Miss Esther, impatiently. “It
would please me.”

“You know, Miss Esther,” said Lincoln, “I would do anything in the world
to please you, and if you are sure that Miss Hastings—”

“Oh, will you, really? I do want you to fall in love with Lillian, and I
want you to be married by the middle of August and then take her abroad
to study art.”

“Well, that is certainly a delightful programme you have mapped out for
us.”

“I’m so glad you think so. I knew that when you came to understand them
fully, you would agree to my plans.”

“Have you many plans of this sort?”

“Three,” said Miss Esther, very seriously. “But the other two are all
right. It was only you that I was worried about. I am very much obliged
to you.”

“Look here, Miss Esther, what in the world are you talking about? You
surely are not in earnest?”

“I believe I’ll tell you all about it.”

“If I’m to be married in August, I think it’s about time that I knew
something definite.”

With an enthusiasm born of her deep interest in the cause, supplemented
by her success with Lincoln Dodd, Miss Esther detailed to him the plans
of her Matrimonial Bureau. She told him of the inception of the plan,
and how happy Tekla was in her Nebraska home. She told him, too, of the
dearth of suitable material for her protégées in Whitfield, and she told
it all with a quaintness of argument that carried conviction. She
enumerated instances which proved conclusively that Lieutenant Adams was
interested in Jean; she confessed that the affair between Helen and
Brewster was not progressing quite as rapidly as she desired, but looked
forward with a cheerful confidence to what she hoped was inevitable.
“And now,” she said, “that I feel assured of your regard for Lillian, I
cannot help flattering myself that perhaps my seemingly unusual methods
have not been employed altogether in vain.”

“But, my dear Miss Esther,” cried Dodd, “now that I grasp your meaning
as one having inside information, let me hasten to tell you that
although I must refuse to be a candidate, even for the hand of any one
of your charming protégées, I shall be more than glad to remain upon the
executive committee, and I promise to help you in every way that I
possibly can.”

Miss Esther was of a buoyant nature; she was persevering, even
persistent, and it took a pretty hard blow to daunt her, and now the
blow had fallen. A week before Lincoln Dodd had discouraged her. He had
refused to fall in with her plans. But to-day she had thought he was
more tractable, even to the point of acquiescence; and to have her hopes
ruthlessly crushed to earth, even though sure they would rise again,
made her feel for the moment absolutely discouraged. “I don’t see,” she
said, “how you can help me in any other way.”

“Oh, there are lots of other ways, my dear Miss Esther. For one thing, I
might provide a substitute. I know a man who I am sure would admire your
Lillian Hastings. He is a most kind and estimable gentleman, admirably
fitted for the rôle of loving fairy godfather. He is intensely
interested in art and would enjoy nothing better than a honeymoon trip
to Europe on the fifteenth of August. Is that a sailing-day? I never can
be sure of what day a steamer sails.”

“That doesn’t matter,” said Miss Esther; “who is the man?”

“He is my father,” said Dodd.

Pray thee, let it serve for table talk.—_Merchant of Venice_,
iii, 5.

It was certainly surprising that when Dodd’s father accepted Miss
Esther’s invitation and came to the Adams house, the gayety of that
particular nation was increased rather than diminished. The young people
most interested had felt that the advent of an elderly gentleman might
prove an obstacle to the careless fun and frolic which they had enjoyed
all summer. Instead of which, Mr. George Washington Dodd, father of
Abraham Lincoln Dodd, proved himself not only ready to follow the
leader, but to lead the followers. He not only fell in with their plans,
but he proposed plans of his own and insisted upon their being carried
out.

The plans were usually impracticable, but he insisted just the same, and
the attempts at them were just as much fun as if they had been
successful. He had not been in the house twenty-four hours before he had
turned the East porch inside out. “I think the hammocks would be more
comfortable out under the trees,” he said, and out the hammocks went.

Michael was instructed how to trim the box-hedges, and the cook was
inducted into the mysteries of a salad dressing which had chives—and
not too many. He persuaded all the clocks in the house to strike
together, and painted the chicken-coops red because he liked them better
so.

He reconstructed Jack’s battle-ship upon more approved models and showed
him the distinctive difference between a brig and a brigantine. As for
Chub, he proved himself to be an adept in the quelling of the ebullient
fits of temper which manifested themselves so often. Her most theatrical
pose was to sit down and yell with much enthusiasm, as she did when she
first discovered the young men on the East porch. When George Washington
Dodd saw this exhibition for the first time, he approached Chub
casually, put his hand over her mouth, and said “Stop that!” whereupon
Chub immediately stopped. Though often repeated, this process continued
efficacious.

In a word Mr. Dodd became a power in the house. Not just such a power as
was Lieutenant Adams. Putnam’s masterfulness was actuated by motives
which would be considered rules under the Army Regulations, and, so far
as he was concerned, they made law. They were reasonable and—well, when
he wanted a thing done, he wanted it done instantly. They have that
habit of demanding obedience in the Army. Dodd, on the contrary, had the
wayward whims of a spoiled child, but carried them out with an
unflinching determination before which even Putnam Adams went down.

Miss Esther pondered deeply over this difference in the characters of
the two men. She realized that she implicitly obeyed Putnam, and she
enjoyed doing so. She assisted in the carrying out of Mr. Dodd’s plans,
as they all did, compelled by the sheer force of his whimsical,
inconsequent personality.

“He’s like a child,” she thought, “a great, big, overgrown boy; and he’s
just made to be humored. If Lillian can only learn to humor him, she can
have her own way as much as she likes.”

It was at this point in her meditations that Miss Esther was interrupted
by Lincoln Dodd.

“Didn’t I tell you Father would admire your Lillian Hastings?” he said,
dropping astride of the first chair he came to.

“Does he?” said Miss Esther, eagerly.

“Does he! I should say so. Just look at them now!”

Miss Esther looked and saw Dodd Senior and Lillian Hastings sitting on
the lawn deeply interested in a game of mumble-peg. Although Lillian’s
discarded parasol lay only a few feet away, the players sat in the
broiling sun, apparently oblivious of the heat.

“Coming on all right, isn’t it?” said Lincoln.

“Yes. I hope so—I think so; but he hasn’t said anything definite.”

“How do you know he hasn’t?” asked Lincoln.

“Oh, I’m sure Lillian would have told me if he had.”

“Perhaps he hasn’t had a chance.”

“Oh, if that’s the case, let’s make a chance for them.”

Lincoln entered into the spirit of the game with enthusiasm. “Let’s ask
Lillian to stay to tea,” he exclaimed.

“She’ll stay anyway,” replied Miss Esther; “and besides, that won’t give
them a chance alone.”

“Well, ask her to stay to dinner, and Dad can take her home.”

“That will do,” said Miss Esther; “and it’s a lovely moonlight night.”

So the conspiracy succeeded, and Lillian stayed to dinner.

“Am I the only guest?” asked Lillian, when dinner was announced.

“Yes,” said Miss Esther; “that doesn’t embarrass you, does it?”

“I was afraid it might,” said Putnam, “so I’ve sent for Jean. Stay the
proceedings, Cousin Esther; she’ll be here in a minute.”

[Illustration: _In the broiling sun, oblivious of the heat._]

Jean came flying in, becomingly flushed after her run across the field.
“I came across lots,” she exclaimed, “because I was in such a hurry to
get here. Thank you, so much, Miss Esther, for sending Jack for me.”

“Why, I didn’t send him,” said Miss Esther.

“But he said that you said that I must come because you were going to
have strawberry shortcake for dinner.”

“How ridiculous,” said Miss Esther. “I never sent any message at all by
Jack, and besides, there aren’t any strawberries now. It’s too late.”

“I never thought of that,” said Jean, looking a little blank. “I was so
glad to come,” she explained, ingenuously.

“I sent the message myself,” said Putnam, calmly. “I knew you wouldn’t
come unless I sent an invitation from Cousin Esther. And of course, I
didn’t mean real strawberry shortcake.”

“Perhaps you didn’t mean for me really to come,” said Jean.

“I meant I really wanted you to come.”

“If I had known that you sent the invitation I wouldn’t have come.”

“Not if you knew that I really wanted you?”

At this, Lincoln, who was behind the speakers, nudged Miss Esther’s arm,
and rolled up his eyes ecstatically. Miss Esther looked like a
beneficent Machiavelli, and folded her hands with an air of intense
complacency.

“Of course,” said Jean, “you always succeed in getting what you
want;—that’s your way. But in this case—”

“In this case,” said Putnam, provokingly, “I succeeded in getting you.”

“Indeed you haven’t succeeded in getting me!”

“Well, if I haven’t, I will,” said Putnam, as he rose to go to dinner.

This speech so pleased the conspirators, that Lincoln Dodd seized Miss
Esther’s hands, and the two fairly danced down the long hall toward the
dining-room.

“Hang out our banners on the outward walls,” sang Miss Esther.

“What for?” asked Lillian, who, accompanied by Mr. Dodd, had joined the
procession.

“So people can see them, of course,” said Lincoln. “It’s foolish to hide
your banners under a bushel.”

With what Miss Esther deemed a masterpiece of generalship, she arranged
that Lillian should sit next to Mr. Dodd. Lillian, willfully
misunderstanding instructions, took the chair on the side of the table
where Lincoln stood.

“Oh, she doesn’t mean me,” he exclaimed in dismay. “She means the
Ancient.”

“What are you?” asked Putnam; “the Honorable?”

“I think,” said Lillian, “that the young Mr. Dodd looks older than the
old Mr. Dodd.”

“It’s quite as bad,” said Putnam, “to say ‘the old Mr. Dodd,’ as to say
‘the Ancient.’”

“But I have to distinguish them in some way, and I don’t see that either
one looks older than the other.”

“You might call me George,” suggested Mr. Dodd, casually.

“I’m afraid if I did, you would call me Lillian.”

“Very likely,” said Mr. Dodd.

“Let’s order some more banners,” whispered Lincoln to Miss Esther. “I
think we’ll need them.”

“What are you talking about?” said Jean. “What are these banners?”

“A banner,” said the Ancient, instructively, “is one who or that which
bans.”

“What does ban mean?” asked Lillian.

“A ban,” said the Ancient, still instructively, “is a thing you put
things under.”

“I thought it meant to get married,” said Jean.

“That’s when it’s plural,” explained the Ancient, kindly. “It takes two
banns to get married.”

“May I interrupt your very wise discourse,” said Putnam, “long enough to
request you to pass me the salt?”

“Now that’s always the way,” said the Ancient in an exasperated tone;
“the conventional dinner-table appointments are sadly at fault. One
never gets fairly started on a logical sequence of ideas, but one is
interrupted by a request to pass the salt. I use the term advisedly. The
passing of the salt is but a type of the things which we are made to do
at the time when we do not want to do them. There should be a remedy for
all this. Invention, as it stands to-day, is deplorably neglectful of
our minor needs. Invention, after all, is but the application of some
well-known force or principle to a new use.”

Here the Ancient produced from his pocket a small mechanical toy. It was
a tiny automobile, made of tin and painted red, and when wound up would
run by itself for several minutes. Turning it upside down, he proceeded
to wind it; then reversing it, and holding the wheels tightly, he
emptied into it the contents of Miss Esther’s salt-cellar. Starting it
in the direction of Putnam, he released the wheels and the machine moved
slowly along the table.

“You see,” he observed, “how easy it is to apply mechanical power in a
way which will do the most good. If every dinner-table were supplied
with this simple contrivance, it would do away with the passing of the
salt. Consequently, there would be no interruption in one’s flow of
conversation.”

“With _one’s_ flow of conversation!” said Jean. “And pray, when would
the other five get a chance to speak?”

“They wouldn’t,” said the Ancient.

“I don’t see why any one wants to interrupt,” said Lillian, “when the
conversation is so instructive and entertaining as Mr. Dodd’s is.”

“Banners!” said Lincoln, aside to Miss Esther.

But later in the evening there was reason to bring in the banners from
the outward walls, or at least it seemed so. Miss Esther’s deep-laid
scheme for sending the elder Mr. Dodd home with Lillian seemed in
imminent peril. When Lillian announced that it was time for her to go,
Putnam suggested that as he was about to go home with Jean, Lincoln and
Lillian could go with them, and they would all walk around by the brook.
Miss Esther was not present at the moment, and though three people
strongly objected to the arrangement, as Putnam’s suggestions were
looked upon as commands, none of them dared question it.

Lincoln Dodd did not wish to appear ungallant; Washington Dodd was not
quite sure that his escort was desired, and Lillian naturally hesitated
to express her preference.

Lincoln Dodd rushed into the house, ostensibly to fetch his hat, but
really to find Miss Esther. He almost ran over that lady in the hall,
and whispered tragically, “Haul in the banners! Awful things are
happening! Putnam says I’ve got to go home with Lillian.”

“Putnam, indeed!” cried Miss Esther. “I’ll fix Putnam.”

She hurried out on the veranda.

“Lincoln can’t go home with you, Lillian,” she said. “I want him myself
this evening. He promised to—transplant some bulbs for me.”

“They’re night-blooming cereus,” said Lincoln, “and they always have to
be moved at night.”

“Yes,” said Miss Esther; “and so, Mr. George Dodd, will you please
escort Miss Hastings home?”

“Certainly, if Miss Hastings doesn’t object to the transfer,” said Mr.
Dodd; but he spoke without enthusiasm.

“Oh, all Dodds look alike to me,” said Lillian, flippantly.

Miss Esther looked the picture of despair, as, after this speech,
Lillian and her apparently unwilling escort walked silently down the
path.

“Honestly,” said Miss Esther, “from the depths of your heart, tell me
truly what you think; tell me by the light of your greater experience,
and by the knowledge you have of your father’s affections; tell me,” she
continued, tragically, “_will_ those two hearts find each other?”

She hung on his words with the air of a doomed prisoner awaiting
sentence.

“I don’t know,” said Dodd.

XVI

Conspirant ’gainst this ’high-illustrious prince.—_King Lear_,
v, 3.

“I suppose,” said George Washington Dodd, indulgently, as they went out
the gate, “that you, being possessed of youth, beauty, and a romantic
temperament, would prefer to go home around by the brook.”

“Yes,” said Lillian, “I would, and I am going that way. But if you, not
being possessed of those very desirable qualities, prefer to go the
other way, you may.”

“No, we’ll both go around by the brook,” said Dodd, airily; “for those
qualities are as much mine as yours. Beauty is entirely a matter of
opinion, and my own opinion is that I am very beautiful. Youth is a
matter of comparison, and by some standards I am exceedingly young; and
as to my romantic temperament—give me a chance.”

“Your beauty of its kind, I will admit, though perhaps it is not equal
to my own,” said Lillian, consideringly; “your romantic temperament is
an unknown quantity—it may be like mine; but surely I am not quite as
old as you are.”

“I’m not sure about that,” Dodd replied. “Of course, you are young, but
then so am I. The gods love me, and I shall never grow old.”

“But,” objected Lillian, “those whom the gods love die young.”

“That is, I admit, the accepted intent of the quotation, but its real
meaning is that those whom the gods love are young when they die, for
the simple reason that they never grow old. That makes me just the same
age as you, and I shall always stay so.”

“All right,” said Lillian; “then we’ll go around by the brook.”

“And now,” said Dodd, as they walked along the path to the brook, “since
you have conceded my youth and beauty, I will proceed to convince you of
my romantic temperament. Just now it is wildly enthusiastic over the
beauty of the night. To me, the moon is a beautiful golden boat, sailing
away over blue waters. And that reminds me, I shall sail myself next
month, I am going abroad.”

“To study art?”

“No, not that, although I mean to buy a few pictures that I’ve had my
eye on for some years. By the way, I want you to go with me.”

“To advise you about the pictures?” said Lillian, delightedly.

“No, as my wife.”

“What!” exclaimed Lillian.

“You heard me,” said Dodd. “It may seem precipitate, but I am a man of
quick decisions. I always decide quickly when I find what I
want—whether it’s a picture or you.”

“Are you sure you want me?” asked Lillian.

“Yes, I’m sure. I was sure the moment I saw you. I want you, and I want
you now. I want you to marry me and go abroad with me next month.”

“And then may I study art?”

“You may not. There’s to be no more of this art foolishness. We will
look at pictures together, and we will buy pictures together, but you
have painted your last picture. Will you go with me?”

“Well, for a girl with a confessedly romantic temperament, this is about
the most unromantic proposal I ever heard of; and from a man, too, who
boasted of his own romantic temperament.”

“Never you mind that. Once you have answered my question in the way I
want you to, my romantic temperament is at your disposal for the rest of
your life; but just now I am in earnest.”

“You seem to be in earnest,” said Lillian, “but if ever I want an
exhibition of your romantic temperament, it is at a time like this.
Unless you can—”

“Oh, I can ask you in more romantic terms, if that’s what you want.”

Dodd dropped on one knee, struck his breast melodramatically, and
began—

“Queen Regent of my heart, may I supplicate—”

“Oh, not that way,” interrupted Lillian. “That’s foolish. I don’t
believe your romantic temperament is the real thing at all.”

“Yes, it is—truly, it is. I’ll try again.”

He put his arm around Lillian, and began with an impassioned, “My
darling—”

“Oh, that won’t do at all—that’s too familiar.”

“Is it?” said Dodd, composedly, but he did not release her. “Well, then,
I’ll tell you what. I’ll just say in plain English, ‘Will you be my
wife?’ and you just say, ‘Yes,’ and then to-morrow I’ll make a study of
this and write it out in a sort of an essay. We’ll write it together.
Now then, will you marry me?”

Lillian was helpfully silent.

“Say Yes,” he prompted.

Lillian said yes.

* * * * *

The next day George Washington Dodd wandered around the house in a sort
of beatific daze quite contrary to his usual alert activity.

He and Lillian had planned to announce their engagement that afternoon
at tea, and they anticipated a truly exciting occasion. After luncheon
Mr. Dodd strolled into the darkened library and lay down upon a couch in
a remote corner, where he promptly fell asleep. A little later he was
wakened by voices in the room.

“I wish I knew,” said Miss Esther, “exactly how the situation stands. Do
you think there’s any hope?”

“I don’t know,” said Lincoln. “Dad thinks an awful lot of her, but don’t
believe she cares for him much; and it’s awfully soon, anyway. Give them
time.”

“Oh, I think Lillian is very fond of your father,” said Miss Esther;
“but somehow he doesn’t seem to have a very high opinion of her art
work.”

“He hasn’t,” said Lincoln, honestly. “But he has a high opinion of her.”

“Well, that will do just as well, if only he will come to the point
soon. I wish you’d ask him what he means to do, for if Lillian sails by
the fifteenth of August something must be done soon.”

“Me ask him!” exclaimed Dodd; “he’d tell me to go about my business. No,
you ask him, or at least with your clever tact find out from him. I’d
rather ask Lillian.”

“Well, then, you do that,” said Miss Esther; “and find out what you can
and we’ll compare notes. You meet me here in the library to-night and
tell me what you’ve learned, and in the mean time I’ll find out what I
can from your father. And another thing that’s bothering me is this, I’m
afraid Helen is not going to accept Mr. Brewster.”

“Has he asked her?” said Lincoln.

“No,” replied Miss Esther; “but it’s because she won’t give him a
chance. She is so proud and reserved, and she snubs him far more than
she realizes. I don’t wonder that he doesn’t like it.”

“Can’t you reason with her?”

“No; the more you reason with Helen Fairbanks, the worse she is. The
only girl who is acting just right is Jean, and Putnam is a dear. That
affair is going on just as I want it to.”

George Washington Dodd, on the sofa, suddenly realized that he was
deliberately listening to the deep-laid plans of a desperate conspiracy,
but as he had not made his presence known in the first place, he
certainly could not do so now, and it was with a decided feeling of
relief that he saw the conspirators leave the room, quite unaware of his
eavesdropping presence.

“Huh!” he exclaimed; “so they’re going to hold a court of inquiry over
Lillian and me, are they? Well, we’ll be ready for them. After I’ve made
up my mind what to say, and after I’ve told Lillian what she’s to say,
they may begin as soon as they like. I’ll go over and see her now, and I
rather think we’ll defer that announcement this afternoon. We’ll have a
lot of fun out of this thing.”

As he left the house, Lincoln was just coming from the stables in his
automobile. “Take me in,” said his father. “Where are you going?”

“Over to the Hastings house,” said Lincoln. “Where do you want to go?”

“That’s where I want to go. I wish you’d leave me there and then do an
errand for me down in the village.”

“But I was going to take Miss Hastings for a ride.”

“All right. You can come back and get her after you do this errand for
me. I want to send a wire to New York. Here it is. I have written it
down.”

Lincoln tucked the paper in his pocket. “All right,” he said; “I’ll be
back in half an hour.”

While the telegraph operator waited, Lincoln read the message his father
had given him. It ran:

“No message for New York. Just want to be rid of you for a few minutes.”

“There’s some mistake here,” said Lincoln to the operator. “I have
brought the wrong paper. I’ll see you again later.”

“Phew!” he said. “Dad’s coming it rather strong. To think of his sending
me on a kid’s errand like that! But I’ll be even with him yet!”

When he reached the Hastings house he found his father and his hoped-for
stepmother apparently wrapped in the deepest gloom. They sat far apart
on the veranda and appeared to be dejected beyond power of words. As he
drew up, his father said, “I believe you were to take Miss Hastings for
a drive. She is quite ready to go. I will walk on home.”

“Just as well take you over, Dad!”

“No, thank you. I prefer to walk.”

After a very slight exchange of courtesies with Lillian, which Lincoln
had no idea was part of a carefully prearranged plan, George Washington
Dodd walked away, inwardly chuckling, but displaying great gravity of
demeanor.

“That telegram scheme was an inspiration,” he said to himself. “Now if
Lillian only does exactly as I told her to, and I think she will, that
young hopeful of mine will have a ripping report to take home to his
fellow conspirator. As for the fellow conspirator herself, I will see to
it that she has a report equally hair-raising.”

XVII

A quarrel, but nothing wherefore.—_King Lear_, ii, 3.

Delighted with the little comedy he had devised, Mr. Dodd walked on
toward home. At the gate he was joined by Jean.

“Why are you looking so particularly pleased?” she asked.

“I was thinking about a friend of mine who is very, very happy.”

“What made him so?” demanded Jean.

“He has just become engaged to a very beautiful young lady.”

“Oh,” she replied; “I thought you were looking happy on your own
account.”

“No, no, indeed; far from it. On my own account I am deeply, desperately
dismal.”

“What are you going to do about it?”

“I don’t know. What would you do?”

“When I feel like that I always go to Miss Esther and she talks to me.”

“Good. I will go straight to Miss Esther, and somehow I have a feeling
that she will talk to me.”

“Do,” said Jean.

By this time the two had reached the East porch, where, as usual, Putnam
was reading in the hammock.

“How do you do,” said Jean. “Where’s Miss Esther?”

“I think she’s in the library,” said Putnam. “Shall I call her?”

“No,” replied Jean; “Mr. Dodd wants to see her; don’t you, Mr. Dodd?”

“Oh, I do want to see her. I want to see her dreadfully.”

“What’s the matter with Dodd?” asked Putnam, as that gentleman went into
the house.

“I don’t know,” said Jean; “but he’s got the blues something fearful.
I’m so sorry for him.”

“Be sorry for me, won’t you?” said Putnam; “I’ve got the blues, too.”

“Why do you have the blues?”

“So you’ll be sorry for me.”

“But I’m always sorry for you.”

“Why?”

“Because you have such a dreadful disposition.”

“Yes, I have, haven’t I?” said Putnam, placidly.

“Yes, you have; and the worst of it is you don’t care a bit.”

“Do _you_ care?”

“No, indeed—why should I?”

Jean tossed her head, and Putnam observed, coolly, “If you bob your head
about like that, you’ll lose that very beautiful pink rose out of your
hair, which you have arranged with such accuracy and precision.”

“I don’t care if I do!”

“If you don’t care for the rose, then give it to me.”

“Indeed I won’t. I wouldn’t give you a rose for anything.”

“Why not?”

“Oh, because it’s so silly and sentimental.”

“Oh, I didn’t mean it in a sentimental way. I never thought of that. I
just saw a beautiful rose, and wanted you to give it to me.”

“Oh, well, if you want it that way, then take it!” Jean snatched the
rose from her hair, and threw it on the table between them.

“Give it to me,” said Putnam, dictatorially.

“I’ve given it to you just as much as I intend to. If you want it, take
it.”

“I do want it, but I won’t take it, and you _shall_ give it to me.”

“I won’t do any such thing! You are altogether too domineering. It was
all very well when you were an invalid, and ought to be read to, and
coddled, and fussed over, but you needn’t think you can keep on ruling
everybody who comes anywhere near you.”

“I don’t mean to rule you—”

“You’d better not,” she interrupted.

“But I’m going to ask you once more to give me the rose.”

“I have given it to you,” said Jean, stubbornly. “If you don’t take it,
it’s because you don’t want it.”

“I only want it if you’ll give it to me,” said Putnam, more gently than
he had spoken before.

“Nothing of the sort! You only want to have your own way. You’re a
horrid, dictatorial, arrogant, overbearing, conceited man! and I _hate_
you!”

Jean ran down the steps and across the lawn toward her own home.

Putnam got up lazily from the hammock, and taking the rose from the
table, smiled as he put it carefully away in his pocket-book.

“I did tease her,” he said, “but ’twas worth it!” And he smiled again.

Having held the session of the court of inquiry in the library, Miss
Esther, after leaving Mr. Dodd, was in no mood to receive the shock
which awaited her on the East porch.

“Where’s Jean?” she asked, when she saw Putnam alone.

“She got mad at me,” said Putnam, “and ran away home.”

“One of her usual playful jests, I suppose.”

“No,” said Putnam, “this time she seemed very much in earnest.”

“Oh, she doesn’t mean anything, Putnam. Don’t take her too seriously.”

“I’m not sure that I shall take her at all,” said Putnam. “She’s a
little spitfire.”

Miss Esther, clasping her hands in despair, was about to speak, when
Nora announced that Mr. Brewster was on the front veranda.

Brewster’s dejected air was quite in harmony with Miss Esther’s mood,
but she was unprepared for the news he brought her.

“I am going away,” he said, “and I have come to say good-bye.”

By a whimsical association of ideas, Miss Esther suddenly realized
exactly how Chub felt when she indulged in her favorite trick of sitting
flat down on the ground and squealing. The elder lady did not squeal,
but had circumstances permitted it, she would have been glad to do so.
All in the same day her three clients had disappointed her hopes. She
wrung her hands, tragically. “One woe doth tread upon another’s heels,
so fast they follow!” she exclaimed.

“Yes, I, too, am sorry to go,” said Brewster. “I have had a very happy
summer, and you have been very kind to me, Miss Esther.”

“But you are leaving us very suddenly.”

“I know it; but there are reasons—good reasons.”

“But Helen—Miss Fairbanks—does she know you’re going?”

“Oh, yes, she knows. I have just come from there.”

“And doesn’t she care?”

“No, I think not,” said Brewster, with his calm dignity.

“Oh, Mr. Brewster,” cried Miss Esther, “I wish she did care.”

“I wish so, too,” he replied.

“But have you made allowances for Helen’s excessive pride?”

“She hasn’t made allowances for mine,” said Brewster.

“Hullo, you people,” cried Lincoln Dodd, as he rushed up the driveway in
his automobile; “is tea ready? I’m nearly starving.”

“Not quite,” said Miss Esther; “but it soon will be. Come on in.”

For the first time that summer, none of the girls came over to tea.
Obliged to do all the honors herself, Miss Esther rose to the occasion
nobly, and presided with her usual grace, her unruffled calm giving no
hint of the perturbation of spirit beneath. But late that evening when a
meeting of the conspirators was held in the library, Miss Esther
confided to Abraham Lincoln Dodd her doubts of the final success of her
Matrimonial Bureau.

“To think,” she said, “of that stupid Jean having a fight, a real fight
with Putnam!”

“Oh, they’re always squabbling,” said Lincoln.

“Yes, but this time it’s serious. Putnam told me so. And now Helen has
offended Mr. Brewster and he’s going away, and Lillian’s case is equally
hopeless.”

“Why, what did you find out from father?”

“Why, it’s the strangest thing, and I’m not sure that I ought to tell
you.”

“And I’m not sure, either, that I ought to tell you what Lillian said.”

“Well, I must know what you learned, so I’ll tell you what I found out.
Your father was awfully nice, and he said that he was very much in love
with Lillian,—very much; and he thinks she cares for him. And he wants
to marry her, but he thinks you wouldn’t like it if he did.”

“Me!” exclaimed Dodd; “why of course I want him to marry her, and I’ll
tell him so so that he will understand it!”

“No, no,” said Miss Esther; “he said not to let you know anything about
it. He didn’t even want to suggest the idea to you for fear you’d be
displeased.”

“Well, if that doesn’t beat all! Lillian said just the same thing about
you. She didn’t say right out, you know, that she was fond of the
Governor, but she said that even if she were she couldn’t marry him, for
she felt sure that you wouldn’t approve of the match.”

“Me!” cried Miss Esther; “why of course I want her to marry him, and
I’ll tell her so so that she will understand it.”

“No, don’t say a word. She expressly said that she didn’t want you to
know she had ever had such a thought, for fear it would displease you.”

“Good gracious!” cried Miss Esther, exasperated beyond all endurance.
“Was there ever such a lot of intractable men and ridiculous girls.”

“Why don’t you give them up?” suggested Lincoln.

“Never! I’m going to carry this thing through and you’re going to help
me as you agreed. I haven’t brought these six people together and looked
after them all summer, and brought them all to the very verge of
success, to have my plans fail now. Jean and Putnam shall be persuaded
to make up; though I don’t know how it will be accomplished, for he’s
stubbornness itself and she’s just as bad. Helen and Brewster must be
reconciled, and that’s harder yet, for she’s as proud as Lucifer and
he’s more so. As to your father and Lillian—”

“Oh,” interrupted Dodd, “if they care for each other, surely they can be
brought around.”

“Oh, I don’t know—Lillian is a perverse little witch; but anyhow, it
shall be done. On that I am resolved, and if I don’t succeed I will be
the first Adams who ever failed in a great undertaking.”

“And you will succeed,” said Dodd, carried away by her eloquence.

“I certainly shall,” said Miss Esther.

XVIII

With a solemn earnestness, more than indeed belonged to such a
trifle.—_Othello_, v, 2.

When Brewster left Miss Esther’s house, after telling her good-bye, he
met Jack Remington.

“Hullo, Mr. Brewster,” exclaimed Jack; “I thought you had gone away.”

“I am going early in the morning,” replied Brewster; “and I won’t forget
the book I promised to send you.”

Jack turned and walked along by Brewster’s side. “I’m sorry you’re
going,” he said; “we’ve been good chums, haven’t we?”

“Yes, we have,” said Brewster, heartily; and then somehow the
conversation seemed to flag. Jack was dimly conscious of this and tried
to relieve the situation.

“I’ve just been over to Cousin Helen’s house,” he said,
conversationally.

“Have you?” said Brewster, with an unexpected exhibition of interest in
his tone.

“Yes, and she gave me this,” said Jack, producing a knife from his
pocket; “see, it has a saw-blade and a screw-driver and a lot of
things.”

“So it has,” said Brewster, looking at Jack’s treasure critically. “It’s
much better than the one I gave you last week.”

“Yes, it is; and what do you think, Cousin Helen traded with me. She
gave me this and I gave her that one you gave me.”

“You did? What made you think she wanted it?”

“Why, she asked me for it. She said if I’d give her that one she’d give
me this.”

“What did she want of an old knife like that?”

“I don’t know. I was showing it to her and she said she wanted it, and
so we traded.”

“Did she know I gave it to you?”

“Yes, I told her it was an old one of yours; and besides she saw your
initials on it, but she didn’t mind that.”

“Oh, she didn’t!” Brewster walked on in silence for a moment. “Jack,” he
said, “it’s lucky you have that new knife. It is just what we want to
use in working on the ship. I’ll come over to-morrow and we can finish
it all up.”

“To-morrow!” exclaimed Jack; “I thought you were going away in the
morning.”

“I’ve changed my mind,” said Brewster.

If Jack was surprised at Brewster’s sudden change of plans, Helen was
none the less so when the next afternoon she saw him walk in at her
gate.

“How do you do,” she said, in her calm, sweet way. “I thought you had
left us.”

“No,” said Brewster, easily; “I’ve decided to stay a while longer.”

He dropped naturally into his accustomed place at the end of the
veranda. He had been at the Fairbanks house a great deal that summer and
in consequence had assumed the air of a privileged guest.

“It’s a beautiful day,” said Brewster, gazing affably into the
atmosphere.

“Yes,” said Helen, agreeingly. “It is a good day for reading aloud; and
as you are going to stay longer, we may have time to finish the book we
were reading yesterday.”

This was a distinct concession on Helen’s part, and Brewster accepted it
as such. The book in question had been the cause of a violent argument
the day before, which had resulted in his sudden determination to leave
Whitfield. The immediate theme of the discussion had been certain
ethical propositions which Brewster upheld and which seemed to him the
very mainsprings of masculine action, but which Helen had denounced with
a scornful pride that acknowledged no exceptions. So positive had been
her assertions that he had been unable to escape the conviction that,
knowing his views, she had deliberately intended to arraign him
personally.

Helen had not meant this personal application—at least not to the
extent that Brewster assumed. With all her uncompromising positivism and
her insistence upon theoretical perfection, she was more than willing in
individual cases to ignore shortcomings, even in important directions,
for the sake of the things which she found good. But Brewster did not
know this, and when she had so specifically condemned traits which he
knew he possessed, he was forced to believe that her opinion of him was
unfavorable and unchangeable. And as he was conscious of his own growing
regard for her, it seemed to him that the only thing to do was to go
away at once.

The trifling episode of the penknife had changed all this. It seemed to
prove that Helen’s well-defined laws were capable of being at least
slightly affected by the personal element. If she had cared enough for
his old penknife to secure it for herself, then she had shown that there
was a vulnerable point in her armor, and Brewster was not lacking in
courage.

It was characteristic of him that the slight favorable indication should
impart to his attitude an air of assured success. His exultation, which
was out of all proportion to its cause, was evident. This was a mistake
on Brewster’s part, for Helen saw it and resented it. And so he defeated
his own ends; for the girl, especially sensitive to Brewster’s moods,
was annoyed at his mysterious air of triumph.

“Certainly,” he said, most amiably; “I should be more than glad to read
the book to you if I may; but this afternoon we are all going over to
the Crossways Inn to supper. I have just come from Miss Esther’s, who
sent your invitation by me.”

“Is everybody going?” asked Helen.

“Yes, in Lincoln’s automobile.”

“Oh, we’re all going together. Yes; certainly I will go.”

“I thought I would drive you over myself,—may I?”

“Thank you, no. I prefer to go with the others.”

“Very well,” said Brewster; “we’ll go with them, then.”

* * * * *

Chub crawled through the hedge and trotted across the lawn to the Adams
house. Finding nobody on the East porch, she wandered aimlessly about
the grounds and finally found herself on the path which led down to the
brook. This was forbidden territory, and Chub had not forgotten it, but
this afternoon she was in an irresponsible frame of mind and paid no
heed to the unwelcome voice of conscience. Besides, where the bridge was
there grew some wonderful scarlet blossoms, and these the young explorer
desired for her very own. Even from the edge of the lawn she could see
them, but beyond, where the wood began, there was darkness. The
temptation to go down there was irresistible, so on the baby went.

The scarlet blossoms were achieved without mishap, and then, lured by
the fascinations of the unknown, she strayed a little further into the
wood.

“I don’t thee any puthy willowth,” she said, “but Uncle Linkum thaid
they lived here. I’ll wait a li’le while and p’rapth I’ll hear thome
mew.”

She sat down in the shade of a big tree to wait. She did not hear the
mewing of the pussy-willows, but she found plenty of things to interest
her. A butterfly came. A black beetle labored with a leaf at her very
feet, and she asked him questions concerning the welfare of his family.
A squirrel chattered from a tree-top, and she scolded back at him. A
bird perched on a dead twig and sang his very best song right at her.
Then she sang—and then she went to sleep, the scarlet blossoms tightly
clutched in her arms.

Chub’s propensity for getting lost was recognized by the members of her
family. As she explained it, she “just losed herself,” and if she had
thought of it, she might have added that the losing process was no part
of her prearranged plans. All was well, and presently she was lost. Then
people came and found her, and all was well again. It had never failed.
She knew that somebody would eventually find her.

But on this occasion there was no conscious feeling of being lost. She
slept peacefully, and the butterfly came back and hovered over the
scarlet blossoms in her arms. The squirrel, with the insistent curiosity
of his kind, came down from his tree and looked at the baby at close
range. The bird still continued his song—a sort of lullaby now—and
Chub slept, while the people up at her home and at the Adams house began
the search.

It was Putnam who found her, and he picked her up, still fast asleep,
and carried her toward the house. Jean met him near the bridge. It was
the first time he had seen her since the episode of the rose, and he
wondered what attitude she would assume toward him.

“Where did you find her?” she asked.

“In the woods—asleep,” he replied, shortly.

Jean turned and walked beside him toward Chub’s home. Neither spoke.
Presently the baby wakened. The scarlet flowers were still clasped
tightly in her dimpled hand—crushed, perhaps, but they were none the
less effective for all that.

She looked sleepily up into Putnam’s eyes.

“For you,” she said, offering the wilted blossoms.

“Did you pick them for me?” said Putnam.

“I don’t know; but I will give them to you becauth I love you.”

Putnam took the flowers. “Thank you, sweetheart,” he said; but he looked
squarely at Jean.

Jean stared straight ahead, but she saw his expression.

“Do you care for flowers?” she asked.

“Yes, when they are given to me.”

“Not otherwise?”

“Never but once otherwise.”

“When was that?”

“Oh, long ago.”

“Before you knew me?”

“Well, it was before I knew you as well as I do now.”

“Tell me about it,” said Jean.

“I don’t think you’d be interested in the story.”

“Yeth,” said Chub, “tell me thtory.”

“Well,” began Putnam, “once upon a time there was a little girl.”

“A very pretty little girl,” said Jean.

“And she had a rose,” continued Putnam, “and a man—”

“A perfectly horrid man,” said Jean.

“Asked her for it,” Putnam went on; “and what do you think?”

“She gave it to him,” said Chub, “becauth she loved him.”

“So she did,” said Putnam, “and he carried it with him always after
that.”

“Ith he got it yet?” asked Chub.

“Yes,” said Putnam; “he has it yet.”

“What for?” questioned Chub; “it mutht be all dead.”

* * * * *

When the truant had been returned to her anxious family, Putnam and Jean
went back to Miss Esther’s.

“Had you finished the story of the rose?” she asked.

“Why, would you like to hear more of it?”

“Not particularly; but I would like to have some one care enough for my
roses to carry them always and always.”

Without a word Putnam produced his pocket-book and took from it a
withered rose.

“This is the one you gave me,” said he.

“So it is,” said Jean, complacently; “I knew you’d keep it.”

XIX

She is beautiful and therefore to be woo’d.—_1 Henry VI_, v, 3.

The horse had seen better days—better in the sense that he had been in
his earlier youth a better horse. Grown old in the service of a livery
stable in the town of Farmington—the next one to Whitfield on the left
as you go from Utica—he still maintained a sort of dignity and absolute
safety which made him a valuable asset when his owner had a request from
timid women for what is technically known as a “rig.”

He drew a phaeton of the type built on the lines of Central New York
styles of carriage building—distinctly unattractive and ungraceful.
Driving the horse was a young woman whose impetuosity urged her steed to
greater efforts in the matter of speed. The horse wore no “blinders,”
and when his driver told him to get up, and beat him gingerly with a
whip, he glanced casually back at her over his shoulder, as who should
say, “If I go faster I may be very dangerous.” So he strolled on, and
Julia Fowler’s efforts, directed toward swifter locomotion, met with no
response from him. He knew his business. He was a safe horse, and he did
not propose to risk his reputation by any undue exertion.

Miss Fowler herself was of a type distinctly different from that
represented by her equipage. She could by no chance have been the
product of Central New York. Possibly her ancestors might have been, but
she was urban to her finger tips. Suburbanity had no accent on her
appearance. Her beauty was of a spectacular order. She was the type of
the twentieth century—its best expression—and she had come to
Farmington to rest at the boarding-house of one Mrs. Moore. She had
tired of it in a week, and her excursion to Whitfield was for the
purpose of finding a place which might prove more attractive to her
exacting demands.

She had been told that a certain Mrs. Hemingway in Whitfield conducted a
boarding-house, and she was in search of this establishment when she
caught sight of the Adams house. This seemed an ideal place to spend a
few weeks, and being by no means timid, Miss Fowler concluded to make
the attempt to induce the owner of the place to take her in for a time.
She turned in at the gate, and when she saw Miss Esther on the veranda
she was quite positive that she had found exactly what she was looking
for.

Miss Esther watched the stranger as she jumped out of the phaeton, ran
up the steps, and without invitation seated herself in one of the large
rocking-chairs.

“Don’t mind me,” she said, pleasantly. “I always come in like that. I am
Julia Fowler, and I am staying over in Farmington, but I don’t like it
there, and somebody told me that Whitfield was lovely, and that Mrs.
Hemingway kept a very nice boarding-house. I was on my way there when I
noticed this house, and I thought I should like it here a great deal
better. So won’t you please take me for a couple of weeks? I’m awfully
good-natured and I won’t make a bit of trouble.”

Miss Esther looked at her visitor and came to the conclusion that she
was the most beautiful woman she had ever seen.

It was not only a beauty of feature and coloring; but the vivacity and
charm of Julia Fowler were of a degree which exceeded anything Miss
Esther had ever known. Though her manner was gay and informal to the
verge of sauciness, yet it was tinged with a delightful deference, and
Miss Esther proved herself no exception to the rule that whoever met
Julia Fowler fell immediately under the spell of her wonderful charm.

“Nonsense, child,” said Miss Esther, smiling at her pretty visitor; “I
don’t take boarders, but you will like it at Mrs. Hemingway’s, I’m sure.
She can make you very comfortable.”

“But I like this house so much better,” said Julia, coaxingly; “and I’m
sure you have room enough.”

“Yes, of course, there are rooms enough in the Adams house, but we never
take boarders.”

“Oh, is this the Adams house?” asked Julia; “and are you Miss Adams,
Miss Esther Adams? I have often heard of you in Farmington.”

“Yes, I am the one,” and Miss Esther smiled graciously. Somehow people
always smiled graciously on Miss Fowler.

“Oh, then do let me stay. I have heard so much about your house and your
library; and I’ll keep to myself when you don’t want me around, and I’ll
be jolly good company when you do. You live alone, don’t you?”

Like a flash Miss Esther realized what it would be to have a young woman
with such compelling attractions in her house, or, indeed, for that
matter, in Whitfield at all. The three affairs which she was managing
seemed to be complicated enough as it was, without an additional
disturbing element. Putnam, she knew, would rave over her. Lincoln Dodd
would flirt desperately, and she felt sure that Winthrop Brewster must
also inevitably succumb to this bewitching beauty. It was apparent,
then, to Miss Esther that it would never do to have Miss Fowler remain
in Whitfield.

Miss Esther’s three girls were sweet and attractive, but she well knew
that they would not shine by comparison with this exquisite and
experienced woman of the world. Though probably not older in years, Miss
Fowler was far more sophisticated than the Whitfield girls, and her own
personality, helped by her social training, gave her a fascination which
could not otherwise be attained.

The imminent danger of this catastrophe almost stunned Miss Esther.
Something must be done, and that quickly, to prevent Miss Fowler’s
staying in Whitfield. In consequence her attitude towards her visitor
changed instantly.

“Yes, I live alone,” she said, “and it is from preference. I have small
need for company, for I am never lonely, and I could not think of taking
a boarder even for a short time. Pray do not ask me again.”

“Indeed, I shall ask you again,” said Julia, with one of her most
ingratiating smiles. “I shall keep on coaxing until I persuade you to
say yes.”

Had circumstances been otherwise, nothing would have pleased Miss Esther
better than to have granted the request and taken this most attractive
young woman into her house for a fortnight. This fact made it difficult
for her to continue her refusals; but, awake to the seriousness of the
situation, she answered decidedly, “No, I shall never say yes. I am not
of a vacillating nature, and rarely change my mind. It is quite
impossible for me to take you. Now that I think of it, I don’t believe
that you would be satisfied at Mrs. Hemingway’s, either. They are plain
people, and live very plainly.”

“That would just suit me,” said Julia. “I came up here for rest and
quiet, and I love a simple country home.”

“But it is very dull in Whitfield,” continued Miss Esther. “There are no
gayeties of any sort.”

“That would just suit me, too. I have a surfeit of gayety at home in the
winter.”

Baffled at every turn, and determined to accomplish her end, Miss Esther
deliberately drew upon her imagination. “There are five little children
at Mrs. Hemingway’s, and they are a most spoiled, disagreeable lot. I am
sure they’d make your life a burden there.”

“That alters the case,” said Julia, decidedly. “I detest spoiled
children. How old are they?”

“I don’t know,” said Miss Esther, a little vaguely, which was only
natural, considering the fact that there were really no children at the
Hemingway house. “About four or five years old, I think.”

“Oh, I don’t mind such little children,” said Julia, airily; “but I
dislike them when they get to be about ten years old.”

“Oh, there are several as old as that, too,” declared Miss Esther, whose
imagination was equal to juveniles of any age.

“Then I won’t go there,” said Julia. “I’m surprised that she has any
boarders. I think you might let me stay here.”

“I asked you not to mention that again,” said Miss Esther, with a sudden
exhibition of the Adams dignity; “but if you really want country home
life, there is a very delightful place at Westfield that I am sure would
please you.”

“Where is Westfield?”

“About eight miles the other side of Farmington.”

“I’ll drive over there to-morrow,” said Julia, “and look at the place,
and if I don’t like it I’ll come back here.”

This bit of bravado was accompanied by such a winning smile that Miss
Esther could not respond as sternly as she would have liked to do.

“Will you have tea on the veranda or on Lieutenant Adams’s porch?” asked
Nora, appearing at the door.

“On the East porch,” said Miss Esther, shortly.

“Oh, mayn’t I stay to tea?” exclaimed Julia. “Please let me. I’ll be
very good, and go away immediately after.”

“Excuse me one moment,” said Miss Esther, without answering her guest’s
question.

She went to the East porch where she knew Lincoln Dodd was reading. He
was the only one of her guests at home.

“Lincoln,” she exclaimed, “come to my rescue, and come quick. What under
the sun am I going to do?”

“What in the world’s the matter?” asked Dodd.

“Oh, it’s dreadful. The most beautiful girl in the world is on the front
veranda.”

“Command my services,” said Lincoln, rising with alacrity. “What makes
her so dreadful? Is she a maniac?”

“No, indeed. I only wish she were. She’s perfectly charming.”

“What am I to do for you? Do you want me to marry her?”

“Don’t be foolish. But don’t you see I expect the people home to tea at
any minute now, and if any of those men see that raving beauty, they’ll
fall in love with her on the spot.”

“Of course they will,” said Dodd. “Give her to me. I’ll take her off to
a desert island.”

“No, but I want you to take her home in your automobile. That’s the only
way I can get rid of her.”

“Where is her home? How did she come?”

“She came in a forlorn old gig, but I can let Michael take that home for
her. And mind, now, you’re not to make yourself too entertaining, or ask
her to come again, or let her know that I have any young men staying
here. She’s the most dangerous thing I’ve ever seen. You get your
machine and come around in front just as if you were going out for a
drive, and I’ll do the rest.”

“All right,” said Dodd. “I’ll go, but I don’t know when I’ll be back.
Don’t wait tea for me.”

[Illustration: “_Suppose you take Miss Fowler home._”]

“Now don’t go scouring all over the country with her. She lives in
Farmington, and you can go there and back in an hour.”

“Perhaps I can and perhaps I can’t,” said Dodd, as he ran down the
steps.

“And hurry,” called Miss Esther after him. “There’s no time to be lost.”

Miss Esther returned to the veranda, and in a few moments Lincoln came
whirling up from the stables.

“Ah, Mr. Dodd,” called Miss Esther, “are you going anywhere in
particular?”

“No,” said Lincoln, pleasantly; “just out for a little spin.”

“Well, then, suppose you take Miss Fowler home. My dear,” she said,
turning to the young lady, “you’d like to drive over with Mr. Dodd,
wouldn’t you?”

“Oh, ever so much,” cried Julia, showing her most engaging dimples and
laughing down at Dodd. “But what will become of my fractious steed?”

“Michael can drive him home for you,” said Miss Esther. “Run along
quick, now. Mr. Dodd doesn’t like to wait.”

As the pair disappeared, Miss Esther drew a long breath of relief. Her
manœuvre had been accomplished none too quickly, for they were hardly
out of sight before Brewster, Putnam, and George Washington Dodd came
strolling in to tea.

“That was a narrow escape,” she thought. “The times would have been very
much out of joint if I had not set them right. I have rescued the
Matrimonial Bureau from the jaws of one more danger.”

Make feasts, invite friends and proclaim the banns.—_Taming of
the Shrew_, iii, 2.

The three men came up to the East porch where Miss Esther gave them
their tea. She was plainly in a mood of the utmost complacency. Nor were
her guests less complacent. George Washington Dodd, with the knowledge
that he had arranged his little comedy quite to his liking, was placidly
awaiting its working out. Brewster was in a seventh heaven. The trifling
affair of the penknife was to him a wind-proving straw, and, always
self-confident, he felt now not the slightest doubt of his ability to
win Helen Fairbanks.

However, as time went on and the three girls did not appear, the edge of
Miss Esther’s complacency was dulled, and she grew more and more
perturbed.

“I don’t see what can be keeping them,” she said. “They said they’d come
over for tea, and then we would all start for the Crossways together.”

“Where’s Lincoln?” said his father.

“He went off to do an errand for me,” said Miss Esther, casually. “He’ll
be back very soon. I told him particularly not to dawdle by the way. If
we start by six we’ll have plenty of time.”

But at half-past five Dodd had not returned, nor had any of the girls
come. Miss Esther began to show signs of nervousness. Putnam’s brow
clouded, and the senior Dodd began to fidget.

At twenty minutes to six a decided gloom had settled upon the whole
party, and at ten minutes of six, consternation was palpably apparent.

“I can’t imagine why those girls don’t come,” said Miss Esther.

“At least one of them,” said Putnam. “She said she’d be here at five.”

Miss Esther smiled happily at her cousin; but her face clouded again as
she said, “I wish Lincoln would come, then we could start and pick up
the girls on the way.”

Six o’clock struck, and still there were no signs of the expected ones.

“I believe I’ll go over to Miss Fairbanks’s,” said Brewster, “and see
why they don’t come.”

“I’ll go with you,” said Putnam. “I hope nothing has happened to her.”

“Your pronoun is ambiguous,” said Dodd, “but never mind; we understand.”

Before the investigating party could start, the automobile came romping
up the driveway, and in it were Lincoln Dodd and the three girls. They
all seemed to be in unusually good spirits.

“We’ve had the loveliest ride,” cried Jean. “We’ve been over to
Farmington!”

“What!” cried Miss Esther.

“Yes,” began Helen; “we went with Mr. Dodd and the loveliest—”

“Yes, yes,” interrupted Miss Esther, “I’ve no doubt you had a lovely
time.”

“She’s certainly a peach,” said Lincoln, winking at Miss Esther.

“Oh, you mean your automobile. Has she acted well to-day? She certainly
is a beauty,” said Miss Esther, fearful lest he refer more explicitly to
Julia Fowler.

“Yes, she certainly is a beauty,” replied Dodd; “and she acted very
well.”

“Come, come,” said Miss Esther, still a bit nervously; “we must be
starting.”

“All right,” said Lillian; “and on the way I’ll tell you how Mr. Dodd
picked us girls up and took us over to Farmington. As a traveling
companion we had the most beautiful—”

“Do you consider Lincoln Dodd such a raving beauty,” said Miss Esther,
looking at him critically.

“Oh, I didn’t mean him,” replied Lillian; “I—”

“Oh, then you mean Helen? We all acknowledge her beauty.”

“I wish she had meant me,” said Helen; “but she meant—”

“She meant me!” cried Jean, whose quick wit perceived that Miss Esther
did not care to discuss Julia Fowler.

“You would be a beautiful traveling companion,” said Putnam, judicially,
“if your hat were on straight and that bunchy fluff which is supposed to
decorate the back of your neck hadn’t twisted itself around under one
ear.”

“That’s where it belongs,” said Jean. “That’s where they’re wearing them
now, and my hat is at the very latest fashionable angle. I’m not one of
those women who get all disheveled just because they take a little
automobile ride.”

“We’re obliged to believe your statement,” said Lincoln Dodd; “but you
are certainly giving a very good imitation of the type.”

“Well, I don’t look a bit more tumbled than your friend Julia did. Her
veil hung by one pin.”

“Julia who?” asked Putnam, looking up.

Jean caught Miss Esther’s bothered look, and good-naturedly helped her
out. “I don’t mean Julia, exactly,” she said. “I mean—er—Alice.”

“Alice who?” inquired the elder Dodd.

“Alice Ben Bolt,” said Miss Esther, shortly.

“Oh, that one? By the way, did anybody ever remember her? I always hear
people tunefully inquiring.”

“I didn’t know she wore an automobile coat,” said Lincoln, doubtfully.
“At any rate, her costume must have been awfully queer.”

“How do you know what she wore?” said Lillian. “Have you ever seen her
picture?”

“No, but the song says they fitted a slab of granite so gray; it must
have been a very superior tailor that could do it.”

“All women look well in gray,” said Brewster, glancing approvingly at
Helen.

“Do you know, I like green best,” said George Washington Dodd, staring
at Lillian’s crisp linen costume.

“This isn’t green; it’s reseda,” said Lillian, scornfully; “and if I’d
known you’d like it, I wouldn’t have worn it.”

When Dodd admired Lillian’s gown Miss Esther looked distinctly pleased,
but when that young lady spoke so rudely in reply her hopes fell again.
Dodd, however, realized that she was reminding him of his almost
forgotten rôle, and taking his cue, he replied, “I don’t like it. I said
I liked green.”

“Huh!” said Lillian.

* * * * *

Crossways Inn is one of the few survivals of that class of hostelry that
had its beginnings in the eighteenth century. Around many of them
hamlets sprang up,—some grew into cities. In the stage-coach days they
were the resting places of the weary travelers. When the railroads came
the travelers rushed by in trains, and the inns were forgotten.

No hamlet had sprung up about Crossways. Standing at the intersection of
two country roads it had held its own through a century and a half of
varying fortunes. There was little travel thereabouts, until the
automobiles came. Then, after a time, the drivers of the machines came
to understand that at Crossways there was to be had a dinner like
grandmother used to cook, and now scarcely a day went by without some
merry party from Richfield Springs, Farmington, or even Utica, making a
pilgrimage in the direction of the fried chicken and green corn in the
season.

It was at a dinner of this sort that the Matrimonial Bureau entertained
its clients. If gayety be a proof of appreciation, then were the
clients, though unsuspecting of their claim to that title, deeply
appreciative.

“This would be a fine place to establish a rest-cure,” said Lillian. “It
is the quietest place I ever saw.”

“If you’ll establish one,” said George Washington Dodd, “I’ll be press
agent for you. I’ll engage to get you a lot of patients.”

“I’ll do better than that,” said Lincoln; “I’ll be a patient.”

“Good idea,” said Putnam; “you need a rest-cure.”

“He does,” said his father; “he certainly needs to be cured of the
resting habit. It has become chronic with him.”

“What will be your course of treatment?” asked Helen.

“At first I shall only have the patients stop resting three times a
day,” said Lillian, consideringly.

“For meals?” suggested Lincoln.

“Yes; and then after that, oftener, until they can go without resting
for an hour at a time.”

“A whole hour?” asked Jean.

“Yes; and if they show signs of a relapse I shall make them work.”

“Work!” exclaimed Lincoln; “then I withdraw my application.”

“Oh,” said Lillian, “I don’t mean manual labor; I mean brain work.”

“Oh, that would be the same to me as resting. My brain works
automatically without any exertion on my part.”

“I’ve often thought so,” observed Putnam.

“Yes,” said Lincoln; “it’s a great convenience. I just set it going and
then I go off and leave it.”

“Where did you leave it to-night?” asked Jean, innocently.

“I left it at home, working out a great problem. You see, Miss Esther
and I—”

“This is good pie,” said Miss Esther, hurriedly.

“It is,” said Lincoln. “As I was saying, Miss Esther and I are very much
worried—”

“This is good pie,” said Miss Esther, glaring at him.

“Yes, I said it was,” said Lincoln. “Miss Esther and I are trying very
hard—”

“This is good pie,” remarked Miss Esther, determinedly.

“That speech is getting to be a habit with you, Cousin Esther,” said
Putnam. “Why don’t you take something for it?”

“Well,” said Lincoln’s father, “if you have quite finished that exciting
story about yourself and Miss Esther, I will tell you a little story.
Miss Hastings and I—”

“This is good pie,” said Lillian, blushing furiously.

“It seems to have gone to your head,” remarked Jean, looking at Lillian,
inquiringly.

“Miss Hastings and I,” went on Dodd, “are engaged to be married.”

To say that Miss Esther’s face beamed with delight, would be an
inadequate expression of the illumination that took place on her
countenance. She fairly radiated happiness and coruscated with joy.

“One home, and two on bases,” cried Lincoln, exultantly; but no one
heard him in the tumult and the shouting consequent upon the
announcement.

As is usual with the inspirers of great movements, Miss Esther was
entirely forgotten at the moment of final triumph. Oblivious to this,
however, she sat in silent rapture, gloating over her first and
irrevocable success.

“Ah! King John,” she said, though not aloud, “at last Victory doth perch
upon one of my dancing banners; and as to the other two, I am Sir
Oracle, and when I ope my mouth, let no dog bark!”

XXI

A contract of true love to celebrate.—_The Tempest_, iv, 1.

Whitfield’s observance of holidays was in the nature of a religious
rite. The patriotism of the Fourth of July, as shown in the firing of
the anvil in the early morning, the speeches in the grove, and the
reading of the Declaration of Independence, invariably by Dr. Bushnell,
was all that the Father of his Country could have desired. Christmas and
Thanksgiving had lost none of their original character. The flippant
might have observed the groaning of boards from one end of the town to
the other. May Day was a triumph of maidens crowned with wilted wild
flowers holding court in rickety bowers. Other days had their
importance; in fact any holiday which had any excuse for being was
seized upon and made much of by the Whitfield citizens.

But above and beyond all others, in the hearts of the countrymen, was
Circus Day. For the days intervening between the posting of the bills
announcing its coming and the fateful day of its arrival, there were
fierce debates at the post-office and at the blacksmith shop concerning
the relative merits of the hippopotamus and the other animals. The
postmaster himself averred that the man-eating tiger and the
hippopotamus, whose wide-opened jaws showed glistening teeth of vast
size, were much more fearsome beasts than the Behemoth of Holy Writ, and
although this staggered the ultra-orthodox, yet were they fain to
believe it.

The fact that the people of Whitfield had seen for many successive years
the same posters representing the same gaudily attired ladies whose
skirts were the soul of wit itself, poised on toe-tip upon the same
madly careering charger, in no way interfered with their interest in
them.

This interest perennially expressed itself in long and deep arguments,
embracing various views which resolved themselves finally into a
generally commendatory condemnation.

The laws of the Medes and Persians were laxly obeyed in comparison with
the unwritten but traditional law which demanded that every citizen take
his or her nearest child relative to see the show. Census reports,
however, showed the proportion of about one child to seventeen grown
people. But this rather aided than hindered the law-abiding citizens,
and uncles, aunts, and cousins cheerfully accompanied their particular
portion of the juvenile audience.

The fact that there were no children in the Adams house in no wise
disconcerted Miss Esther and her guests. They appropriated Jack and
Chub, and days before the circus, had arranged to escort them. Jack
announced that he had already been invited to attend the function by Dr.
Bushnell, but this, of course, made no difference. Chub, being
unattached, graciously signified her willingness to attend.

“I have theen the thircuth,” Chub announced. “It ith on the big, high
fenth. There are lionth and ’pottymutheth and a beauty horth with a
lovely lady on it—oh, a lovely lady, jutht like Couthin Helen.”

“I noticed the picture,” said Brewster. “It is indeed just like Miss
Fairbanks.”

“But that isn’t the real circus,” explained Helen. “Those are only the
pictures of what you are going to see when you get there.”

“Oh,” said Chub; “and will you weally wide on the horth on your
tippy-toeth?”

“If she doesn’t, somebody else will,” said Brewster.

Another traditional law required that the country people for miles
around, as well as the villagers, should assemble at the railway station
to see the circus train come in. As its arrival was inconsiderately
timed at four in the morning, this necessitated early rising. But this
necessity was cheerfully met, the more so in that it made Circus Day
just that much longer.

At the Adams house all the traditions were strictly observed.
Alarm-clocks were set for half-past three, and after a hasty cup of
coffee Lincoln hustled Miss Esther, his father, and Putnam into the
automobile, picked up Brewster and the three girls, and they reached the
station just in time for the first act of the day’s play.

To the men of the party the sight was a novel one, and not
uninteresting. The sun was rising much as usual, although George
Washington Dodd remarked that he thought the sun was always up a few
feet in the morning. He was not given to getting up solely to see the
spectacle, and though he had a dim idea that there were such things as
sunrises, raved over by poets and such persons, he found the
picturesqueness of the real thing of a character to call forth approving
remarks from him. “Pretty good work for such a young sun,” he said,
looking at the long streaks of light that shot across the fields and
made a spectacular gathering of the otherwise commonplace crowd that
swarmed over the railroad tracks. Into this crowd the locomotive puffed
and snorted, and children shrieked with delight, while their
elders—though hardly less vociferous, were no less eager. Vehicles of
all descriptions lined the roadway. Luncheon baskets were in evidence in
the democrat wagons. There was a superfluity of whiskers of varying
shades of color and cut, and alpaca dresses, still showing the wrinkles
of long-time packing, gave evidence that the holiday spirit was rampant
in the hearts, even of the staid grandmothers and the mothers.

“I’ll bet,” said Lincoln, “that every one of them is possessed of some
haircloth chairs, and is distinctly proud of a certain bunch of wax
fruit under a glass bell in the parlor.”

The small boys stood about, ecstatically rubbing bare foot against bare
leg, and letting off sympathetic grunts of helpfulness as the men of the
circus train pushed and shoved and lifted the big wagons and other
paraphernalia off the cars. From one of the closed cages came the roar
of a lion. Little girls clutched their mothers’ hands in an agony of
fear and delight. These sounds were the foretaste of the joys to come.

The people who had come from the surrounding country prepared to make a
full day of it camped under the trees in the grove near the circus
grounds. The men sat about and discussed the outlook for the crops,
while the women prepared a breakfast. The children stared,
wide-open-eyed, at the closed cages, from which from time to time there
issued strangely fascinating growlings of wild beasts. The circus men
laid out the ring and raised the tent, and the side-show men, being
quick in action, insistently proclaimed the presence of the bearded
lady, the educated pig, the living skeleton, and the strong man who
could shiver rocks with his fist. From the top of the big tent-pole a
wire was stretched, and from the dizzy height a wonderful woman, clad in
tightly fitting pink, slid boldly to the ground. This was in the nature
of a daring advertisement of the wonderful, magnificent, marvelous,
myriad of startling feats to be seen during the performance.

“Well, I swan!” exclaimed an elderly man, with whiskers of an ancient
design; “I should think she’d of fell off’n that slim wire.”

But the villagers, not being obliged to camp under the trees, returned
to their homes for breakfast. In celebration of Circus Day, and
incidentally because it might materially assist her plans, Miss Esther
had a house-party, and the clients of her Bureau made merry at the Adams
house breakfast.

“We’ll see the morning parade,” said George Washington Dodd, “from the
front fence.”

“I choose to sit on the gate-post,” said Jean.

“You can have one gate-post,” said Mr. Dodd, “but I want the other
myself.”

“One is enough,” said Jean. “I rarely use two at once.”

“And then this afternoon we’ll take the children and Dr. Bushnell to the
performance, and this evening we’ll go by ourselves.”

“And stay to the concert,” said Helen.

“And then we’ll all walk home in the moonlight,” continued Dodd. “My
fiancée is very romantic.”

“It must be very nice to have a romantic fiancée,” said Putnam.

“You never will have,” said Jean. “No romantic girl could possibly
accept you.”

“This is good pie,” said Lincoln, gazing off into space.

“Do they have nice circuses in Europe?” asked Lillian.

“Yes,” replied Dodd, instructively; “they have a very large one in Rome,
and Paris is a good deal of a circus all by itself, as you shall see.”

“Yes,” said Lillian, happily; “I’m so glad I’m going. I’ve always loved
a circus, and if Paris is anything like it, I know I shall like that
city.”

“People always take their little boys to the circus,” said Lincoln,
plaintively, “and I think you might take me—Ma-ma!”

“All right, son, you shall go if you want to—the next time we go,”
replied Lillian, kindly.

“Oh, that’s what I meant,” said Lincoln. “Of course I’d be a bother this
time.”

“Indeed you would,” said his father. “We’re going for pleasure.”

“When do you sail?” asked Brewster.

“I’ve tickets for the fifteenth,” said Dodd.

“So soon?” said Brewster, in surprise.

“Yes; isn’t it lovely,” said Lillian. “I always did like to get married
in a hurry.”

“I don’t care how soon you get married,” said Jean, “so long as you wait
till after this year’s Circus Day, and come home before the next one.”

“Next Circus Day you may be away on your own wedding trip,” said Miss
Esther.

“No,” said Jean; “I’d never marry anybody who would take me away from
Whitfield on Circus Day.”

“January would be a safe month,” said Putnam, musingly.

Jean’s only reply to this sally was a glance which was meant to be
withering, but somehow it turned into a vivid blush.

“Do you know the address of a good flagmaker in the city, Governor?”
said Lincoln. “I want to telegraph an order for some banners.”

“Do!” said Miss Esther.

XXII

Was ever woman in this humour woo’d?—_Richard III_, i, 2.

Although the afternoon performance was scheduled for three o’clock, Jack
and Chub, anxious to be in time, arrived at the Adams house while Miss
Esther and her guests were still at breakfast.

“We’re all weddy,” announced Chub, consciously patting down her starched
white ruffles, and turning her back to give a better view of her pink
sash bows.

Jack, no less conscious of his new sailor suit, but striving manfully
not to call undue attention to it, remarked, casually, “I s’pose we’re a
little early, but we’ll wait till you’re ready to go.”

“How fortunate,” said Lincoln; “then you’ll be here to help us watch the
morning parade go by.”

“Yeth,” said Chub; “we’re going to thit on the gate-potht, and you can
hold uth on.”

“Huh,” said Jack; “I don’t need to be held on. I wasn’t last year, and I
didn’t fall off but once, and that was when the elephant hollered.”

“I will be held on,” said Chub, “by Uncle Linkum.”

“You’ll have to sit backward, Chub, so the folks in the parade can see
that big sash of yours.”

Chub said nothing, but after a few moments’ deep thought began tugging
at her pink sash so effectively that she finally landed the big bow
exactly in front.

“There!” she said, with a satisfied sigh.

By eleven o’clock the children were on their respective gate-posts, Miss
Esther and Dr. Bushnell occupying large arm-chairs in the gateway
between them. The rest of the party were ranged along the fence on
either side like birds on a telegraph wire.

Rocking amiably, his finger tips together in an attitude of judicial
consideration, Dr. Bushnell filled the hour of waiting with pleasant
discourse. Whitfield always expected to wait an hour after the scheduled
time for the arrival of the circus parade, and in this it was never
disappointed.

“It has gratified me to note,” the Doctor said, “that the proprietors of
this exhibition have among their collected animals a fine specimen of
the wombat.”

“Whath a wombat?” asked Chub.

“A wombat,” went on Dr. Bushnell, with the air of imparting information
to a large audience,—“a wombat is simply a _Phascolomys ursinus_. It is
fond of hay—”

“We’ll take some hay along for the wombat,” said Lincoln, kindly.

“—which he bites into short pieces with his knife-edged teeth. As the
poet has it,

Let dogs delight to bark and bite,
For ’tis—for ’tis—”

“Their nature to,” put in Miss Esther, involuntarily.

“True,” continued Dr. Bushnell; “and it is the wombat’s nature to
excavate the earth until it forms a deep tunnel. The wombat is by no
means an active animal, but trudges along with a heavy, rolling waddle,
like the gait of a very fat bear.”

“I have always admired the gait of a very fat bear,” said Brewster,
dispassionately. “There is something peculiarly attractive and
exceedingly graceful about it.”

Dr. Bushnell was a trifle ruffled by this slighting allusion to his
favored animal, and went on with some asperity.

“A wombat, my dear sir, is far from being an ungraceful animal. I take
it you have never seen one on its native heath. Indeed, a perfect
wombat, a perfect wombat—”

“Nobly planned,” said Miss Esther, helpfully.

At this Lincoln Dodd fell off the fence.

“Ho!” said Chub; “Uncle Linkum wath going to hold me on, and now he’th
felled off himthelf!”

Except that Lincoln was nearly choked to death by Chub in her exuberance
over the little white ponies, the parade passed without accident. Dr.
Bushnell gazed eagerly at the open cages, and disappointedly at the
closed ones, hoping to see the promised wombat. He philosophically met
his failure to find it by an unshaken confidence in its appearance at
the show proper.

* * * * *

At the afternoon performance Lincoln took especial charge of Chub. This
proved to be a more arduous undertaking than he had anticipated. Twice
he pulled her out from under the seats, and once he rescued her from
apparent instant death at the feet of the elephant. He was also obliged
to temper generosity with wisdom in the matter of pink lemonade and
peanuts.

Miss Esther had started under the mistaken impression that she was
taking charge of Jack, but he soon made it evident that his
understanding of the case was that she was in his charge. He grandly
offered her prize packages of gum. He bought for her a complete
programme of the whole show, and carefully scrutinized the numbers on
their tickets and seats to make sure that they corresponded.

Miss Esther herself was enjoying the afternoon. Aside from the
entertainment provided by the circus troupe, she was delightedly
entertained by the performances of her own immediate circle. Lillian and
Mr. Dodd were a most exemplary engaged couple. Jean and Putnam, if not
announced allies, were at least preserving an armed truce. As for Helen
and Brewster, the more she saw them together, the more she thought that
they were born for each other, and she felt confident that soon they
would realize this for themselves. In consequence of this, it seemed to
Miss Esther that the last cloud was dissipated and that the intents of
her Matrimonial Bureau were practically the same as fulfilled.

To the exclusion of the startlingly incredible feats in the ring, Miss
Esther’s thoughts were entirely concentrated on the pleasant outcome of
her plans. It was with an expression of blank surprise, and a half
conscious realization of impending disaster, that she looked up suddenly
and saw Julia Fowler coming toward her along the aisle. Her first
impulse was to stay the invader’s advance at any cost. Involuntarily,
she half rose from her seat and glared at the intruder. Her unwelcoming
expression was entirely lost on Miss Fowler, who rushed up to her and
shook her warmly by both hands.

“I’m so glad to see you again!” she cried.

“How do you do?” said Miss Esther, perfunctorily, and with a frigidity
of manner that would have repelled a less volatile personage than Julia
Fowler.

“Isn’t the circus perfectly lovely!” she exclaimed. “I’m enjoying it so
much, and when I saw your party I flew right over here, and Lieutenant
Adams has asked me to go home to dinner with you all, and come back to
the show to-night—and may I go?”

However much she may have wanted to, Miss Esther’s ideas of hospitality
would not allow her to say no. “Certainly,” she said; and if the
invitation was not noticeably heartfelt, Julia seemed to overlook any
lack of enthusiasm. Of course, Miss Esther still realized, and more
emphatically than ever as she looked at Julia, the dangers involved. Mr.
Dodd was out of the running. Lincoln’s heart interests were not her
affair; but Putnam was decidedly susceptible, and her ideas of
Brewster’s intentions toward Helen were as yet so unauthorized that she
was by no means certain that they might not be easily swerved. Still,
the mischief was done; the blow had fallen, and as a consequence, the
Adams pluck rose triumphant.

But Miss Esther had crossed her bridge before she came to it. At dinner
that night Julia was a decided acquisition, and charmed everybody. But
the two men for whom Miss Esther had feared the most were not unduly
interested in the fair visitor. Indeed, the only one who surrendered at
sight was Lincoln Dodd. This state of mind, however, on Lincoln’s part
was not necessarily a permanence, as Miss Esther well knew. Putnam, of
course, showed the courteous deference and gentle consideration which
all women received from him, but there was no apparent undercurrent of
personal interest; Brewster maintained his usual attitude of polite
indifference, which, however, had in it no lack of civility, but neither
did it show any trace of a special attraction.

Although Whitfield went to the afternoon performance ostensibly for the
benefit of its juvenile element, in the evening it attended the show
frankly and openly for its own amusement. Following this precedent the
Adams house-party at eight o’clock again bundled into the automobile and
started for the tent. The men vowed that it was the hardest day’s work
they had ever done in their lives, but the girls took the day as a
matter of course, and would not hear of omitting any part of the
regulation programme.

Miss Esther’s complacency was restored by the turn affairs had taken,
and her mind was relieved regarding Julia’s invasion. Therefore, she
started off in the same high spirits that had marked the early
afternoon.

The circus managers, desirous of saving every possible scrap of time,
had facilitated the midnight moving of their paraphernalia by taking the
roof off the tent before the beginning of the evening performance. After
sunset, and if the weather permitted, they always did this. The plan was
acceptable to the audience, and the general effect of the crowded tent,
open to the starry heavens, appealed especially to Brewster as a
picturesquely humorous situation. Desirous of seeing it all from the
best possible viewpoint, he asked Helen to sit with him in the top row
of seats. The rest preferred seats nearer the ground, Lincoln devoting
himself to Julia, and Miss Esther, supremely satisfied, listening
willingly to Dr. Bushnell’s oratorical periods.

“What a curious picture,” said Helen, as she took her seat.

“Yes,” replied Brewster; “I never saw anything just like it before.”

“I have seen this every year,” said Helen, “but it always impresses me
anew. The incongruity of the tawdry, noisy glitter of the scene below,
compared to the calm beauty of the stars above, is—”

“Is, perhaps, the ultimate contrast?”

“Yes, that is exactly what I mean. Why is it, I wonder, that I can’t
express myself as I want to? You always seem to know just what word to
use.”

“Perhaps I know more words than you do.”

“No, I know words enough, but I never can command them at the time I
want them, though they often come to me when it is too late to use
them.”

“Like Thackeray’s cab wit,” suggested Brewster.

“Yes, I can quite picture him, disconsolate in his cab, saying to
himself the bright things which he ought to have said an hour before. I
have done the same thing.”

“You should have a preceptor, one who could teach you to say the right
thing at the right time.”

“It would have to be one who would not only understand my moods, but be
in thorough sympathy with them; some one of—”

“Quick perception,” said Brewster.

“Yes; and gentle—”

“Instincts.”

“Yes; and a way of teaching that would not make me self-conscious or
embarrassed.”

“That goes without saying if the teacher be of a true perception and
sympathy.”

“_It might as well be you!_” sang a sextette of clowns through six
megaphones in the ring.

“So it might,” said Brewster; “in fact it might much better be me than
anybody else. I think I will begin now.”

“I wish you would,” said Helen; “I do, honestly, but I’m afraid you will
find it a hopeless task. There are so many things that you know so much
more about than I do—”

“_There are a few_,” came bellowing up from the megaphone sextette.

“The megaphone men seem inclined to help out,” said Brewster.

“Yes, and I am grateful to any one who will help me.”

“May I try, Helen, though gratitude is not the return I ask?”

“_I may love you too well to let you go_,” vociferated the insistent
megaphones.

Helen looked at Brewster. “The megaphone men _are_ helping,” she said.

“Would you have said that if you had thought of it in time?” he asked.

“Yes,” said Helen.

XXIII

And certainly a woman’s thought runs before her actions.—_As
You Like It_, iv, 1.

“Where’s Putnam?” asked Miss Esther, coming out on the East porch the
next morning.

“Don’t know,” said Lincoln. “I haven’t seen him since breakfast.”

Chub, seated on a low stool directly in front of Lincoln, regarding him
with worshiping eyes, volunteered the information that she “thaw him
picking a lot of wotheth,” and that he had afterward gone out of the
gate and walked rapidly up the street.

“Ah,” said Miss Esther, with a satisfied smile, “I suppose he has gone
over to Jean’s.”

“I thuppothe tho,” Chub acquiesced.

But when, a little later, Jean came over to the Adams house, Miss Esther
looked at her aghast. “Where’s Putnam?” she said, sternly.

“That’s what I want to know,” said Jean. “He asked me to play tennis
with him this morning.”

“Why, I don’t see where he can be,” said Miss Esther; “but he’ll
probably be back in a few minutes. Chub said he went up the road—”

“Oh, _up_ the road,” said Jean.

Jean sat down by Chub. “I did want to play tennis this morning,” she
said. “I think somebody else might take Lieutenant Adams’s place.”

“If that very obscure hint is aimed at all in my direction,” said
Lincoln, “I refuse to act upon it. When I play tennis I must have a
foeman worthy of my skill. Why don’t you ask Chub to play with you?”

Chub, taking this as an invitation, rose and began a search for Putnam’s
racket. “I will play with Couthin Jean,” she said, kindly, “becauthe bad
old Uncle Putnam hath ranned away, and ithn’t never coming back to play
with you.”

Although Miss Esther was used to Chub’s romancing, this oracular
utterance gave her a sudden but unmistakable shock. “Don’t mind what the
baby says,” she said.

“Couthin Jean doethn’t care if Couthin Putnam doethn’t never come back,”
insisted Chub.

“Oh, yes, she does, Chub,” said Lincoln; “we all love Cousin Putnam.”

“Yeth,” said Chub, who always agreed with Lincoln; “we all love Couthin
Putnam.”

“Do you?” asked Miss Esther, looking pointedly at Jean.

“Yes, I love him a lot. I began worshiping at his shrine the very day he
arrived. He seems to compel that sort of thing.”

“He’s an all-round good fellow,” said Lincoln.

“He is, indeed,” said Miss Esther, earnestly. “I don’t know what I shall
do without him. He says he can’t stay more than a fortnight longer. I
wonder where he is now? I thought he was over at your house.”

“I know where he ith,” said Chub, with the air of one who is possessed
of a state secret.

“Where?”

“I don’t think Uncle Putnam wanth me to tell.”

“Well, don’t tell if it’s a secret,” said Lincoln.

“It ith a thecret,” said Chub, “and I won’t tell, becauthe he don’t want
anybody to know he wath going to Farmington.”

“What did he go to Farmington for?” asked Miss Esther.

“I don’t know, but I gueth he wath going to thell wotheth.”

“There ought to be a good market for roses in Farmington,” said Lincoln,
reflectively.

“Well,” exclaimed Miss Esther; “if Putnam is carting roses over to Julia
Fowler—”

“Oh, maybe she likes roses,” remarked Jean, casually.

“Oh,” said Miss Esther, softening a little; “if you say it’s all right,
I suppose it is.”

“Of course it’s all right,” said Lincoln. “Whatever Putnam does is
right.”

“What an enviable reputation,” said Helen, appearing suddenly in the
doorway. “I wish people would say that whatever I did was always right.”

“But, my dear girl,” said Miss Esther, “you couldn’t expect to be looked
up to as such a paragon of all the virtues as my cousin is. Of course,
though, you’re always right—as far as you go.”

“I’ve gone pretty far this time,” said Helen.

“I thought as much,” said Jean. “When did it happen?”

“Last night—at the circus,” replied Helen, serenely.

“Good for you!” said Lincoln.

“What did Couthin Helen do at the thircuth?” asked Chub, with interest.

“She went and engaged herself to Mr. Brewster,” said Jean.

“What!” exclaimed Miss Esther. “Winthrop Brewster!”

“He’s the only Mr. Brewster I know,” said Helen, apologetically.

“He’s all right,” said Lincoln. “He’s the best Brewster going. I think
it’s great.”

Jean said nothing, but flew at Helen and bestowed upon her a few dozen
of that particular variety of kisses which are supposed to mean a
congratulatory acknowledgment of tidings such as these, and taking
possession of her, marched her down the steps and across the lawn.

“As President of the Matrimonial Bureau,” said Lincoln,
enthusiastically, “you are certainly making a screaming success of
yourself.”

“Yes,” said Miss Esther, still looking a little bewildered, “but I am so
surprised.”

“Why, you planned it yourself.”

“Yes, I know, but I thought my plans had all fallen through. Helen was
so haughty and Mr. Brewster was so reserved. I wasn’t half so surprised
when Lillian announced her engagement. I wish Helen would come back. I
want to ask her more about it.”

“Oh, she’s engaged all right—just as much as Lillian. Now that makes
two, and you only have Jean left on your books.”

“Yes,” said Miss Esther, complacently. “And she’s all right, too, for
I’m just as sure Putnam means to marry her as if he had said so.
Sometimes I think she’s engaged now.”

“Perhaps she is,” said Lincoln.

When Helen and Jean reached the gate they turned naturally in the
direction of Lillian’s house. They found her on the veranda, but when
she saw the excited visitors she jumped to the conclusion that the
exigencies of the occasion could only be met in the studio.

“Come on up,” she cried; “what is the matter?”

“Ask Helen,” said Jean.

“Well, you see,” began Helen, “you said that Miss Esther said that she
thought I ought to marry Mr. Brewster, and so—”

“And so she feels that she must,” interrupted Jean.

“How perfectly lovely,” cried Lillian; “I am so glad.”

“On the principle that misery loves company?” suggested Jean.

“Yes—on that principle, of course; but I don’t believe we call it
misery, do we, Helen?”

“Not yet,” said Helen.

“May I come in?” said a voice from the doorway; and without waiting for
a reply Miss Esther walked in. “I couldn’t wait another minute,” said
she; “I just had to see Helen and hear more about this affair.”

“Helen says it’s all your doing, anyway,” said Lillian.

“Well, I didn’t say exactly that,” replied Helen.

“Well, what did you say, then?” demanded Lillian.

“Why, I don’t know that I said anything.”

“Then it’s time you began,” said Jean; “and you’ve got to tell us every
single thing about it right straight away.”

“It was just this way,” said Helen; “Mr. Brewster said if I wanted to
marry him I could, and I said I did, and that was all there was about
it.”

“What a kind man he is,” remarked Lillian, reflectively.

“Did he tell you anything about his castle?” asked Jean.

“Yes, he described it at length. It has the most modern and approved
automatic drawbridges and an electric moat—”

“Is that anything like an electric motor?” asked Jean.

“Same thing,” replied Helen; “and it has a portcullis and scullions and
castellated turrets and—”

“And a Prince?” said Lillian.

“Yes; a very beautiful Prince, too.”

“Yes, Helen, he is,” said Miss Esther, “and I am very much pleased. He
seems to come pretty near realizing the ideals which you were discussing
last spring.”

“Yes,” said Helen, disdainfully; “Winthrop goes far beyond any ideals I
had then.”

“Well,” exclaimed Jean, “for a driveling idiot, give me a girl who has
been engaged something less than twenty-four hours!”

“I think so, too,” agreed Lillian; “I’ve been engaged most a week, and
I’m as sensible as a judge.”

“I wonder how I’d act if I were engaged,” said Jean, reflectively.

“Aren’t you?” said Miss Esther.

“When I am,” said Jean, “you shall be the first to know of it.”

“Of course I shall,” said Miss Esther; “I made Putnam promise that he’d
tell me the very first one.”

“Well, you keep right on asking him every day,” said Jean, “and perhaps
you’ll find out.”

“Just to think,” said Miss Esther, “only last spring we were discussing
the futures of you three girls, and now you are all practically settled.
Helen has her ideal Prince, Lillian has her fairy godfather, and Jean—”

“Jean isn’t engaged yet,” said Lillian.

“When I see how it affects you two girls,” said Jean, “I am not sure
that I want to be.”

“Sour grapes,” said Helen.

“Nothing of the sort,” said Miss Esther. “Jean can be engaged any minute
she wants to.”

“Well, I wish she’d hurry up, then,” said Lillian. “It makes me
embarrassed to have her left out.”

“Could you give me till to-morrow?” asked Jean, meekly.

XXIV

I am in haste; go along with me: I’ll tell you all.—_Merry
Wives of Windsor_, v, 1.

Miss Esther was more than delighted when Putnam came to her in the
library that evening and said that he had something to tell her.

“Perhaps I can guess what it is,” she said.

“You’re pretty clever if you can,” he replied, “for I didn’t know it
myself until to-day.”

“No,” said Miss Esther, smiling; “you didn’t know it yourself until
eleven o’clock this morning.”

“No, I didn’t,” said Putnam, honestly. “In fact it came over me rather
suddenly, and I thought you’d like it if I told you first.”

“Are you really engaged?” asked Miss Esther.

“Oh, no; I haven’t spoken to her yet about anything like that.”

“Well, why don’t you?” said Miss Esther, with a slight show of
impatience.

“I don’t know how she’d take it,” said Putnam, with the first indication
of diffidence that Miss Esther had ever seen in her cousin.

“There’s only one way to find out.”

“Oh, of course, I shall ask her sometime, but not yet.”

“Well, don’t wait too long. I am very glad you have told me this. I
think you and she were made for each other.”

“So do I. I never before believed in love at first sight, but it
certainly is what has happened to me. She is the most beautiful girl I
ever saw.”

“Perhaps not beautiful,” said Miss Esther, “but she is certainly very
pretty.”

“More than pretty. I think she is a raving beauty.”

“You’re probably prejudiced,” said Miss Esther, comprehendingly, “but
I’m glad you do admire her so much. She is a good-hearted little thing
with all her whimsical temper; but I feared you might think her perhaps
too countrified and unsophisticated.”

“Well!” exclaimed Putnam, “I never should call Julia Fowler
unsophisticated. To my mind she stands for everything that represents
the best and highest type of a cultured woman of the world. That kind of
a woman, Cousin Esther, is the kind that appeals most strongly to me. It
is the type I like best and Miss Fowler is the perfection of that type,
just as little Jean Richards is the perfection of the peach-blossom
type, or Chub is the perfection of winsome babyhood, and it’s a great
thing to meet at last the highest possible expression of the type one
most desires. I have a great deal of the Adams clannishness in me, and I
am glad you so thoroughly approve my choice.”

“Putnam,” said Miss Esther, looking at her cousin desperately, “go to
bed!”

Left to herself, Miss Esther faced the situation. Her worst fears were
verified. The invasion of Julia had proved as disastrous as she had
anticipated. Not only were her own plans defeated, but she realized the
appalling wrong she had done to Jean by assisting to bring about a state
of affairs that now she knew must inevitably break the child’s heart.

“It seems,” she thought, “that this glorious summer of mine is like to
be turned into a winter of discontent. Not that I care so much for
myself: the Matrimonial Bureau is not yet at the end of its rope. I
could, of course, find another Prince for Jean, but the trouble is, I’m
sure she has set her heart on Putnam, notwithstanding her apparent
antagonism, and after what she said this morning I feel sure I am right.
I think she expected him to tell her so to-night, and now—well, I will
do what I can. Patience, and shuffle the cards—perhaps there’ll be a
way out of it yet. But I can’t see a ray of hope for my poor little
Jean.”

* * * * *

But if Miss Esther had seen her poor little Jean at that moment she
would have been obliged to confess that at least one ray of hope was
illuminating her darksome horizon.

As a matter of fact she was spinning along with Lincoln Dodd in his
automobile, quite as contented as though there were no Putnam Adams in
existence.

“You see,” Dodd was saying, “I would have gone, but I had reasons for
not wanting to go.”

“I don’t see,” insisted Jean, “what reasons you could possibly have for
not wanting to go on a lovely yachting trip like that—way up the coast
to Labrador—to be gone for weeks, and with such a lovely party—they
are lovely, aren’t they?”

“Yes; the people are nice enough,” said Lincoln.

“And a crew all in white duck, with beautiful gilt buttons—aren’t
they?”

“Yes; the crew is good enough.”

“And beautiful ladies, in gorgeous clothes, sitting around in wicker
arm-chairs on the deck! Aren’t they?”

“Oh, yes; the women’s gowns are good enough.”

“And then, whenever they stop anywhere, there would be gala nights, with
flowers and music, and dances on deck and Japanese lanterns and flags
flying and banners waving! Oh, I think it would be heavenly! I wish I
could go!”

“Come on, and go—with me!”

“Oh,” cried Jean, “I wish I could! But I’m not invited.”

“My wife is invited wherever I am.”

“I didn’t know you had a wife,” said Jean, with an air of polite
interest.

“I haven’t,” said Dodd, “but I will have in about twenty minutes.”

Lincoln turned the wheel and the huge machine swung around with reckless
speed.

“Where are you going to get her?” asked Jean.

“Now, listen,” said Lincoln, as they flew along the road, “and think
fast. If we go on this yachting party,—you and I,—we’ve got to catch
that twelve forty-five train from Utica.”

“What!” gasped Jean.

“It will take us about twenty minutes to get to Dr. Bushnell’s; about
twenty more to get married. That leaves us two hours to get over to the
Utica station, and I guess this old machine will do it.”

“You’re talking nonsense,” said Jean.

“Yes, I know,” said Lincoln, cheerfully; “but never mind that now. I
told you you had to think fast. Now you’ve got all the way from here to
Dr. Bushnell’s parsonage to make up your mind, and if you don’t want to
go on, say the word and I’ll turn around.”

As they stopped at Dr. Bushnell’s gate, Jean said, “I think we’d better
turn around.”

“Too late now,” said Lincoln, lifting her out.

“I thought it would be,” said Jean, softly.

In response to Lincoln’s imperative ring at the doorbell, Dr. Bushnell
appeared and looked with surprise at his two late visitors.

“Come in,” he said, blandly; “come in.”

“Thank you, we will,” said Lincoln.

Mrs. Bushnell rose to greet the pair as they entered the pastor’s study.
She was Jean’s aunt, and as Jean’s mother had been dead for many years,
Mrs. Bushnell had always exercised more or less authority over her
willful, high-spirited niece. Mr. Richards, Jean’s father, was away in a
distant Western city on a business trip, and so Mrs. Bushnell considered
Jean her special property for the time being.

“You must excuse us if we seem rather hurried,” said Lincoln, with a
more business-like air than he often showed. “We are sailing to-morrow
morning, and we must catch the twelve forty-five train out of Utica. We
want you to marry us, and you’ve got just twenty minutes to do it in.”

“Is that time enough?” asked Jean, anxiously.

“My dear young friends,” began Dr. Bushnell, “you must realize the grave
importance of the step you propose to take. The responsibilities of—”

“What are you two children talking about?” broke in Mrs. Bushnell.

“Never mind what we are talking about,” said Lincoln, hurriedly. “We’ll
tell you some other time—we’ll write to you—but now we want you to
marry us—”

“But,” said Mrs. Bushnell, “have you thought this thing all over?”

“Indeed I have,” said Jean; “I had twenty minutes, and I thought fast.
You see, it’s this way, Aunt Serena; I’m going to marry Lincoln, anyway,
and if I marry him to-night and catch that twelve forty-five train, we
can go on the most beautiful yachting trip you ever heard of. Way up to
Labrador, and the ladies have the most beautiful clothes, and Japanese
lanterns and flowers—and everything.”

“But, Jean—” began her aunt.

“Yes, I know, Aunt Serena, but we’ve only got twenty minutes, you
know—and, Auntie, the yacht is the loveliest thing—it’s all white and
brass and shining—”

“Ah, yes,” said Dr. Bushnell, “as the poet so effectively puts it, ‘A
painted ship—a painted ship’—”

“Now hold on, Dr. Bushnell,” said Lincoln; “as I told you, we’ve only
got twenty minutes—five are gone already. As Jean says, she’s going to
marry me, anyway; so you may as well let us go on that yachting trip and
send us off with your blessing.”

“You’re the only one that can do it, Uncle Isaiah,” said Jean; “and
please do, ’cause I would love that trip!”

“But, Jean,” said Mrs. Bushnell, “does Miss Esther know about this?”

“No, and that makes me downright sorry; but I can’t help it, Aunt
Serena. You tell her to-morrow, won’t you? and I’ll write to her. But we
must catch that twelve forty-five train.”

“So you must,” said Dr. Bushnell, rising to the occasion, “so you must.
Serena, my dear, if you will call the parlor maid—her name has for the
moment escaped me, but you will doubtless remember it—if you will call
her for a second witness we will proceed with the ceremony.”

“Her name is Martha,” said Mrs. Bushnell, still hesitating.

“Call Martha,” said Lincoln, decisively.

“Are you sure,” began Mrs. Bushnell, “that—”

“Call Martha,” said Jean.

XXV

Those men are happy; and so are all are near her.—_Henry_ VIII,
iv, 1.

After she had dismissed Putnam, Miss Esther sat disconsolately in her
library, worrying over the imminent breaking of Jean’s heart. She was
fully convinced that Jean’s interest in Putnam was very real, and she
feared the effect on her emotional nature when she should discover
Putnam’s attitude toward Julia Fowler.

Possibly Miss Esther had taken too much for granted. Neither Jean
herself nor Putnam had told her definitely of any intention that either
had in relation to the future happiness or unhappiness of the other. But
still, Miss Esther had observed the drifting of the straws, and being
used to the drawing of conclusions from seemingly unimportant premises,
she had decided in her own mind at least, that there was only one
conclusion to be drawn. This was one which pleased her very much.

On the whole, Miss Esther, up to this time, had thought that the plans
which had been so whimsically made in the beginning had been brought to
a conclusion that was not only quite to her liking, but which was
entirely fitting from every point of view.

And now, just as she had dreamed that beside being the architect of the
fortunes of her beloved girls, she had helped, too, in the detailed
drawings of the plans for Putnam’s future, he had come in with the
startling announcement that the design was not at all satisfactory, and
that he had decided upon using some home-made affair that she knew was
not drawn to a proper scale.

Somehow, though, even in spite of the fact that one of her pet plans had
apparently failed, Miss Esther believed that she should win. Nor was it
in a sense of winning that she thought of it. Rather, she believed that
now that two of her protégées had found what she chose to call their
Fates, the other one of the three should, sometime, come to a place
where there should be the proverbial happy ending of the chapter. How it
was all to come about she did not know. Her faith was secure in the fact
that she knew what she knew. She had said long ago that the Adams pluck
would ultimately win, and while the mere planning of the summer had been
begun in the same spirit of romantic whimsicality which made her as a
child play with the people of her dreams—on the stairs, on the lawns,
and through the severe old halls of the Adams house—and which later had
made her make these same heroes and heroines of her dreams her playmates
through a life that would have been otherwise very lonely—“Ah,” she
said, “some dreams come true; and after all, the jesting word is not so
often false but that it may be true.”

Perhaps Miss Esther did not realize that the whole summer had been a
living of the dream which, though built of the flimsiest of fabrics in
the beginning, had proved, at the last, to be constructed of very solid
materials.

Begun, as it was, it seemed that the summer, after all, had shaped
itself with a sort of seriousness of which Miss Esther had not dreamed.
She cared too much for the girls to play with them—and particularly she
would not have played a game that would bring to them anything but the
most perfect happiness. In planning it all, she had believed that it was
rather a bit of a game—such as she played with her characters in the
plays in the old volumes in her library—hers and her father’s—and
before that the father’s father’s—and even his father before him—they
had all lived and dreamed among the books which had been to Esther Adams
an inspiration and a delight which had lasted through the years of her
life.

That these dreams, in some subtle fashion, had really carried out the
mental suggestion of a mere advertisement in a Sunday newspaper, brought
to her notice in a way that was little short of providential—all this
entered not at all into the calculations of the woman who now faced a
condition which was far from being merely theoretical.

So far as two of her girls were concerned, she was satisfied. Not that
she—in thinking it all over—would admit to herself that she had
deliberately brought Helen and Brewster together, or that she had thrown
Lillian in the face of George Washington Dodd—far from it. That she was
satisfied, there could be no doubt. But, as she put it to herself, “It
was fortunate that Mr. Brewster came to visit Dr. Bushnell, and it was
fortunate that Mr. Dodd came to visit his son.”

Still—and this is the perversity of reasoning—she felt that Putnam’s
failure to carry out a cherished plan of her own was something for which
she was directly responsible—not alone because of the fact that she
felt that he would fail to do as she wished—and she disliked
antagonism, like all the Adamses—but she felt, too, that somehow she
was responsible to Jean in having brought her to the place where she
might by any chance fall in love with a man who was fickle enough to be
drawn away by the first pretty face that rose above the horizon.

There was in it all something which was altogether too like the
suggestion of failure to appeal to Miss Esther. A battle fairly
fought—won or lost—it didn’t matter, so long as it was in the open:
this was her delight. But to make an attempt, under cover, with however
good intentions, and then fail—that was a sting, and one which made her
feel that it would have been better never to have tried. Logic entered
into the discussion not at all. She would not admit that she had tried
to accomplish anything. And yet, behind it all, there was the haunting
shadow of a failure.

She was as much annoyed as surprised when at that late hour Dr. Bushnell
called upon her.

“How do you do,” she said, with a perfunctory politeness. “What is the
charity this time?”

“Ah, Miss Esther, you will have your little joke,” said her visitor,
blandly, “but it is not a charity this time. I come upon a far different
errand. I bring news that will surprise you—ay, that will surprise you
greatly. I come as winged messenger—as winged messenger—the quotation
has escaped me.”

“But what is your important news?”

“It is indeed important news. Mr. Dodd—Mr. Lincoln Dodd—”

“Has anything happened to Lincoln?” broke in Miss Esther.

“I do not know that ‘happened’ is the term which I should use, but
certainly something has occurred. Something has occurred to Mr. Lincoln
Dodd. But a half hour since, I married Mr. Lincoln Dodd to my niece,
Miss Jean Richards.”

“What!” exclaimed Miss Esther, excitedly. “What! Jean married!”

“Yes,” continued Dr. Bushnell, calmly, “they are married. My wife and I
were very much surprised, as you are; but Jean is impulsive, you know,
and Mr. Dodd said that it was absolutely necessary for them to catch the
twelve forty-five train from Utica—”

“From Utica,” gasped Miss Esther; “have they gone?”

“Yes, they have gone, and Mr. Dodd begged me to offer you his deepest
apologies for seeming to leave you thus suddenly. But he said he would
write.”

“Write!” exclaimed Miss Esther; “I should think he’d better! I never
heard of such a performance. Jean! Lincoln!”

Whistling blithely, George Washington Dodd came through the hall.

“_Will_ you come in here!” called out Miss Esther. “What _do_ you
think!”

“What has happened,” inquired Mr. Dodd, as he came smilingly into the
library.

“Tell him, Dr. Bushnell,” said Miss Esther.

“Prepare yourself, my dear sir,” began Dr. Bushnell, “for a great
surprise. As I was seated in my study this evening—”

“Lincoln took Jean over there and married her,” broke in Miss Esther.

“Exactly so,” agreed Dr. Bushnell; “exactly so.”

“Lincoln!” said Mr. Dodd, bewilderedly, “and Jean! Are you sure you mean
Lincoln?”

“Yes,” said Dr. Bushnell; “he came in his automobile. I am sure it was
Mr. Lincoln Dodd.”

“Yes,” said Mr. Dodd, reflectively; “it must have been he. On the whole,
I am rather pleased than otherwise.”

“Pleased!” cried Miss Esther, “pleased! It’s glorious. It’s perfectly
magnificent.”

“I am glad you feel that way, Miss Esther,” said Dr. Bushnell,
cheerfully. “As Shakespeare—as Shakespeare says—”

“As Shakespeare says,” said Miss Esther, interrupting him, “‘O, rejoice
beyond a common joy! and set it down with gold on lasting pillars.’”

* * * * *

Lincoln’s promised letter came. Miss Esther read it in the library. A
part of it ran thus:

“Although my most abject apologies are due for running away as I did,
with apparent ingratitude for your hospitality, I maintain that the
exigencies of the plans of the Matrimonial Bureau demanded quick action.
As Chairman of the Executive Committee and President of the Advisory
Board, I felt the responsibilities of my position, and I trust you will
approve and ratify my action in the matter.

“Your orders, when I enlisted in your service, I have carried out in
spirit if not in letter. You may remember that the first duty you
required of me was to marry one of your clients. This I have done, and
being thus disqualified for further assistance in your noble work, I am
forced regretfully to offer you my resignation.

“If I may be pardoned for referring to one small favor I was happily
enabled to grant, I will say, in connection with the fact of my bringing
my father to Whitfield, that my great regret is that I have only one
father to lay at the feet of the Matrimonial Bureau.”

“One was enough,” said Miss Esther, placidly. “I think I may
congratulate myself on the unqualified success of my plans. Fortune
brings in some boats that are not steered, and though I steered some
myself, Fortune played into my hands.”

“What are you doing, Couthin Ethter?” cried Chub, dancing into the room
with her arms full of flowers.

“I’m winding up the affairs of the Matrimonial Bureau,” replied Miss
Esther, taking the baby up in her lap.

“Whath that mean?” demanded Chub.

“It was an effort to make some people happy, which succeeded beyond
anything I ever dreamed of.”

“Thath nithe,” said Chub, contentedly. “Did it make _you_ happy?”

“Very happy,” said Miss Esther.

[Illustration]

TRANSCRIBER NOTES

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