Out of the Primitive Part 45

"Hasn't your father told you?" replied Mrs. Gantry, reposing herself in the most comfortable seat. "It seems that he has arranged--"

"Beg pardon," said Lord James. "It was the Coville Construction Company that made the offer."

"Very true. An arrangement has been made, my dear, that will take that person to the bridge and keep him there."

"Provided he accepts the offer," added Lord James.

"How can it be otherwise? The salary is simply stupendous for a man of his cla.s.s and standing."

"Laffie gets only twelve thousand a year, yet he designed the bridge,"

remarked Dolores. "He told me it wasn't even enough for pin-money."

"I fancy he must contrive to make it go farther since his last trip to town," said Mrs. Gantry. "The little visit proved rather expensive. His father made another reduction in his allowance."

"Goodness!" exclaimed Dolores. "Poor dear Laffie boy! If I conclude to marry him, I shall insist that Papa Ashton is to give me a separate allowance."

"My word, Miss Dolores!" expostulated Lord James. "You're not encouraging that fellow?"

"Oh, it's as well to have more than one hook on the line. Ask mamma if it isn't. Besides, Laffie would be a gilt-edged investment--provided his papa made the right kind of a will. Anyway, I could get Uncle Herbert's lawyers to fix up an agreement as to that--a kind of pre-nuptial alimony contract between me and Laffie's papa's millions."

Mrs. Gantry held up her hands. "Could you have believed it, Genevieve!

She was frivolous enough before I went over for you. But now!"

Dolores coolly disregarded her mother, to turn a meaning look on Lord James. "If I have frivolled enough, it's about time you said something."

The young Englishman put an uneasy hand to his mustache. "Er--I should have preferred a--a rather more favorable time, Miss Dolores."

"Yes, and have mamma slam him before you put in the buffer," rejoined the girl. "See here, Vievie. It's too bad, but you must have tattled something to Uncle Herbert, and he--"

"Tattled!" repeated Genevieve. "I have always been candid with papa, if that is what you mean, Dolores."

"All right, then, Miss Candid. Though we called it tattling ten years ago. Anyway, Uncle Herbert wrote about it to mamma. He sent the letter out this noon. Next thing, it'll be all over Chicago--and England."

"Dolores! I must insist!" admonished Mrs. Gantry.

"So must I, mamma! If it's wrong to destroy the property of others, it's no less wrong to destroy their reputations."

Her mother expanded with self-righteous indignation. "Well, I never!--indeed! When the fellow has neither character nor reputation!"

"Dear auntie," soothed Genevieve, "I know you too well to believe you could intentionally harm any one."

"I would do _anything_ to save you from ruining your life!" exclaimed Mrs. Gantry, moved almost to tears.

"I shall not ruin my life," replied Genevieve, with a quiet firmness that brought a profound sigh of relief from her aunt.

"_A-a-h!_--My dear child! Then you at last realize what sort of a man he is."

"Vievie knows he _is_ a man--which is more than can be said of some of them," thrust Dolores, with a mocking glance at Lord James.

"My dear," urged Mrs. Gantry, "give no heed to that silly chit. I wish to commend your stand against the fatal attraction of mere brute efficiency."

"Oh, I say!" put in Lord James. "It's this I must protest against, Miss Leslie--this talk of his brute qualities--when it's only the lack of polish. You should know that. He's a thistle, p.r.i.c.kly without, but within soft as silk."

"Do I not know?" exclaimed Genevieve, for the moment unable to maintain her perfect composure.

"The metaphor was very touching and most loyal, my dear earl," said Mrs. Gantry. "Yet you must pardon me if I suggest that your opinion of him may be somewhat biased by friendship."

"But of course mamma's opinion isn't biased," remarked Dolores. She shot an angry glance at her mother, and added--"by friendship."

"It would relieve me very much if no more were said about Mr. Blake,"

said Genevieve.

"We can't--now," snapped Dolores, frowning at the footman who had appeared in the doorway. "Some one must have sighted the right honorable earl in our coupe."

Her irony was justified by the actions of the three young matrons who fluttered in on the breeze of the footman's announcement. They immediately fell into raptures over his lordship, who was forced in self-defence to tug and twist at his mustache and toy with his monocle.

At this last Dolores flung herself out of the room in ill-concealed disdain.

She was not to be found when, all too soon, her mother tore the "charming Earl Avondale" away from his chattering adorers. After the worshipful one had been borne off, the dejected trio did not linger long. Their departure was followed by the prompt reappearance of Dolores.

She came at her cousin with eyes flashing. "Now you're all alone, Vievie! I've been waiting for this. Do you know what I'm going to do?

I'm going to give you a piece of my mind."

"Please, dear!" begged Genevieve.

"No. I'll not please! You deserve a good beating, and I'm going to give it to you. That poor Mr. Blake! Aren't you 'shamed of yourself?

Breaking his big n.o.ble heart!"

"Dolores! I must ask you--"

"No, you mustn't! You've got to listen to me, you know you have. To think that you, who've always pretended to be so kind and considerate, should be a regular cat!"

"You foolish dear!" murmured Genevieve. "Do you imagine that anything that you can say can hurt me, after--after--" She turned away to hide her starting tears.

"That's it!" jeered her cousin. "Be a snivelly little hypocrite.

Pretend to be so sorry--when you're not sorry at all. _Pah!_"

Genevieve recovered her dignity with her composure. "That is quite enough, my dear. I can overlook what you have already said. You know absolutely nothing about love and the bitter grief it brings."

"You don't say!" retorted Dolores, her nostrils quivering. "Much you know about me. But you!--the idea of pretending you love him--that you ever so much as dreamed of loving him!"

Genevieve shrank back as if she had been struck. "Oh! for any one to say that to me!"

"It's true--it must be true!" insisted Dolores, half frightened yet still too surcharged with anger to contain herself. "If it isn't true, how could you break his heart?--the man who saved you from that terrible savage wilderness!"

"I--I cannot explain to you. It's something that--"

"I know! You needn't tell me. It's mamma. She's been knocking him.

I'll bet she started knocking him when she first cabled to you--at least she would have, had she known anything about him. Think I don't know mamma and her methods? If only he'd been his lordship--Owh, deah!