Bessie's Fortune Part 25

But if Bessie heard or understood him she made no sign, and sat with her hands locked tightly together and her eyes looking far away across the sea of heads and the rapidly moving line of carriages.

This man knew her mother at her worst--not sweet, loving and kind as she was sometimes at Stoneleigh, but as a gambler, an adventuress, a woman of whom men jested and made sport--a woman who had probably ensured and fleeced him, as Neil would have expressed it. Bessie knew all the miserable catalogue of expedients resorted to by her mother to extort money from her victims; cards, chess, bets, philopenas, loans she never intended to pay, and which she accepted as gifts the instant the offer was made, and when these failed, pitiful tales of scanty means and pressing needs, an invalid husband at home, and a daughter who must be supported.

She knew the whole, for she had seen a letter to her father written by Lady Jane, who stated the case in plain language, and, denouncing Daisy as a disgrace to the McPherson family, asked that Archie should exercise his marital authority and keep his wife at home.

This letter had hurt Bessie cruelly, and when next her mother came to Stoneleigh she had begged of her to give up the life she was leading, and stay in her own home.

"And so all starve together," Daisy had answered her. "Do you know, child, that you would not have enough to eat or wear, if it were not for me? Your father has never earned a shilling in his life, and never will.

It is not in him. We are owing everybody, and somebody must work. If I am that somebody, I choose to do it in my own way, and I am not the highly demoralized female Lady Jane thinks me to be. Her bosom friend, old Lady Oakley, plays at Monte Carlo, and so do many high-bred English dames, and Americans, too, for that matter. I am no worse than scores of women, except that I am poor and play from necessity, while they do it for pastime. I have never been false to your father; no man has ever insulted me that way, or ever will. If he did, I would shoot him as I would a dog. I cannot help being pretty any more than you; I cannot sew myself up in a bag, and shall not try to catch the small-pox, so do not worry me again with this sickly sentiment about respectability, and the duties of a wife. I know my own business, and can protect my own reputation."

After this there was nothing more to be said. Daisy went back to her profession, and Bessie took up the old life again with an added burden of care and anxiety, and with a resolve that she would use for herself personally just as little as possible of the money her mother sent them.

Often and often had she speculated upon and tried to fancy the cla.s.s of men her mother a.s.sociated with, and whom Lady Jane called her victims, and now here was one beside her, speaking and acting like a gentleman, and she felt her blood tingle with bitter shame and humiliation. Had her mother fleeced _him_, she wondered, and at last, lifting her sad eyes to his face, she said:

"Do you know my mother well? Did you ever--play with her?"

"Yes, often," he replied; "side by side at _rouge et noir_, and at cards and chess where she is sure to beat. She bears a charmed hand, I think, or she would not be so successful."

He had lost money by her then, and Bessie at once found herself thinking that if she only knew how much, and who he was, she would pay it back pound for pound when she made a fortune.

In a vague kind of way she entertained a belief that somewhere in the world there was a fortune awaiting her; that little girl of fifteen summers, who sat there in Hyde Park, in her old washed linen dress and faded ribbons, with such a keen sense of pain in her heart for the mother who bore her, and pity for herself and her father. The latter had paid but little intention to what she was saying to her companion, for when he was not engrossed in the pa.s.sers-by he had been half asleep, but when he caught the names _rouge et noir_ and cards, he roused up and said:

"Sir, my daughter has never played for money in her life, and never will."

"I am sure she will not," the stranger rejoined, "though many highly respectable ladies do;" then, as if he wished to chance the subject, he turned to Bessie and said: "If Neil McPherson is your cousin there ought to be some relationship between you and me, for he is my cousin, too."

"Yours?" Bessie asked, in some surprise, and he replied:

"Yes, my father and his mother were cousins. I am Jack Trevellian. You have probably heard him speak of me."

"No," Bessie replied, with a decided shake of her head, which told plainly that neither from Neil nor any one else had she ever heard of Jack Trevellian, who felt a little chagrined that he, the man of fashion, whose name was so familiar in all the higher circles of London, should be wholly unknown to this girl from Wales.

Truly, she had much to learn. But she did not seem at all impressed now, or embarra.s.sed either, though she looked at him more closely and decided that he resembled Neil, but was not nearly so good-looking, and that he was awfully old.

"You know my cousin Blanche, of course," he said to her next. "You must have seen her when you visited at Neil's father's."

"I saw her at Penrhyn Park when I was a child, but not since then until this afternoon. I was never at Trevellian House," Bessie said, and with the mental decision: "Poor relations who are outside the ring," Jack Trevellian continued:

"She is not a beauty, though a great heiress. Rumor says Neil is engaged to her."

"Neil engaged! No, he isn't. He would have told me; he tells me everything; he is not engaged," Bessie said, quickly, while a keen sense of pain thrilled every nerve as she thought what it would be to lose Neil as he would be lost if he married the proud Blanche.

He was so much to her; something more than a brother, something less than a lover, for she was too young to think of such an ending to her friendship for him, and her heart beat rapidly and her lips quivered as she arose on the instant to go.

"Come, father, I think we have staid long enough. You must be tired,"

she said to her father; then turning to Jack, who was thinking: "Is the child in love with Neil? What a pity!" she said to him: "Thank you, Mr.

Trevellian, for telling me who the people were. It was very kind in you.

I will tell Neil I met you. Good-by," and she gave him her ungloved hand, which, though small and plump and well formed, showed that it was not a stranger to work.

Dishwashing, sweeping, dusting, bed making, and many other more menial things it had done at intervals to save old Dorothy, the only female domestic at Stoneleigh. But it was a very pretty hand for all that, and Jack Trevellian felt a great desire to squeeze it as it lay in his broad palm. But he did not, for something in Bessie's eyes forbade anything like liberty with her, and he merely said:

"I was very glad to tell you. I wish I could do something more for you while you stay in London. Perhaps you will let me call upon you--with Neil," he added, as he saw a flush in Bessie's face.

She was thinking of the old hair cloth furniture, and the room which Neil designated a hole, and which Jack Trevellian might wonder at and despise. Such men as he had nothing in common with Mrs. Buncher's lodgings, and she said to him, as she withdrew her hand and put on her mended gloves:

"You had better not; father and I are out so much that we might not be home, and you would have your trouble for nothing. Good-by again."

She took her father's arm and walked away, while Jack Trevellian stood looking after her and thinking to himself:

"That girl has the loveliest face I ever saw. It is so full of sweetness, and patience, and pathos, that you want to take her in your arms and pity her, and make much of her, as a child who has been hurt and wants soothing. She is even prettier than Flossie. By Jove, if the coronet were mine, and the money, I'd make that girl my lady as sure as my name is Jack. Lady Bessie Trevellian! It sounds well, and what a sensation she would make in society. But what a mother-in-law for a man to be saddled with. Welsh Daisy! Bah!" and with thoughts not very complimentary to Daisy, he left the park and walked rapidly along Piccadilly toward Grosvenor Square and Trevellian House.

CHAPTER VII.

NEIL'S DISCOMFORTURE.

Meanwhile Neil was driving on in no very enviable frame of mind.

Bessie's startling demonstration had annoyed him more than he liked to confess. Why had she made such a spectacle of herself? and how oddly she had looked standing there in that old linen gown with her hat hanging down her back--and such a hat! He had noticed it in the gardens and thought it quite out of style, and had even detected that the ribbons had been ironed! But he did not think as much about it, or her gown either, when he was alone with her, as he did now when there was all his world to see and Blanche to criticise, as she did unsparingly.

"I thought you once told me she was very pretty," she said: "but I think her a fright in that dowdy dress, and bare-headed, too! Did it to show her hair, no doubt! There is probably some of her mother's nature in her."

Neil could have sworn, he was so angry with Blanche and with all the world, especially Bessie, who had got him into this mess. He tried to make himself believe that he had intended to take Bessie and her father for a drive in the park, but he should not do it now. Probably the linen gown was the only one Bessie had brought with her, and the elegant Neil McPherson, who thought so much of one's personal appearance and what Mrs. Grundy would say, could not face the crowd with that gown at his side, even if Bessie were in it. She would never know it, perhaps, but she had lost her chances with Neil, who nevertheless, hated himself for his foolish pride, and when the drive, which he shortened as much as possible, was over, he left Blanche to go home alone, and taking a cab drove straight to Oxford street and bought a lovely navy-blue silk and a pretty chip hat, with a wreath of eglantines around it. These he ordered sent to Bessie, at No. ---- Abingdon road, and then, feeling that he was a pretty good fellow after all, he started for home, where to his surprise, he found his cousin Jack.

"Why, Jack!" he exclaimed; "I thought you were in Ireland! When did you return?"

"This morning; and, as you see, have lost no time in paying my respects to you all," Jack answered, as he rose from his seat by Blanche and went forward, with his easy, patronizing manner, which always exasperated Neil; it had in it such an air of superiority over him, as if he were a mere boy, to be noticed and made much of.

There was always a show of friendship between these two, but no genuine liking. Still, they were now very gracious to each other, and talked together until dinner was announced, when Jack offered his arm to Blanche, to whom he devoted himself so a.s.siduously that Neil was jealous at once, even though for Blanche herself he did not care a penny. And he knew Jack did not either, except as she was surrounded by the golden halo of ten thousand a year. Neil had not made up his mind whether he wanted that ten thousand with the inc.u.mbrance, or not; but he certainly did not want Jack to get it, and his brow grew cloudy, and he became very silent, until Jack startled him by saying:

"By the way, Neil, why have you never told me of that pretty little wild blossom hidden away in Wales?"

"Whom do you mean?" Neil asked savagely; and Jack replied:

"I mean your cousin Bessie. I stumbled upon her and her father in the park this afternoon, and told them who some of the people were. I was standing by Miss McPherson's chair when you drove by--"

"And she made that rush at Neil as if she had been a mad thing; it was too absurd!" Blanche chimed in, and turning to Lady Jane, she described the scene with great minuteness of detail. "It was really too ridiculous, to see her standing there waving her handkerchief with her head bare to show her abundant hair, and that old linen gown, which must have seen some years' service. I was intensely mortified to have our friends see her, and so was Neil."

"I beg your pardon, I was not mortified at all; I liked it, and I do not care who saw her," Neil said, rousing up in defense of Bessie, and lying easily and fluently, for Blanche's cruel remarks made him very angry.

"Oh, you did like it, then? Your face told a different story," Blanche retorted; while Lady Jane, forgetting her dignity, commenced a tirade against both Bessie and her mother, the latter of whom she cordially despised. Of the girl she knew nothing, she said, but it was fair to suppose she was like her mother, and she did not blame Blanche for feeling shocked at such unmaidenly advances in public to a young man.

Had Neil been a few years younger he would have called his mother a fool, as he had done more than once in his boyhood; but he could not do that now, and turning to Jack, who had been quietly eating his dinner, he said:

"Jack, what did you think of Bessie? Is she a bold hussy, and ought Blanche to smash her red parasol because Bessie's eyes have rested upon it?"

Thus appealed to, Jack looked up, with an amused smile on his face, and said: