The Honorable Miss: A Story of an Old-Fashioned Town, L. T. Meade [unputdownable books .txt] 📗

whistled a plantation melody with such precision and clearness that Loftus exclaimed, "Oh, how shocking!" and Mabel rolled up her eyes, and said sagely, that no one ever could turn Kate into anything but a tom-boy.

"Girls, what are we to do after breakfast?" asked the brother.

"Have you any money at all in your pocket, Loftie?" demurely asked Mabel, "for if so, if so—" her eyes danced, "I can undertake to provide a pleasant day for us all."

"Well, puss, I don't suppose an officer in her Majesty's Royal Artillery—is quite without some petty cash. How much do you want?"

"A few shillings will do. Let us pack up a picnic basket. Kate, you needn't look at me. I have taken Mrs. Masters into confidence, and there's a cold roast fowl downstairs—and—and—but I won't reveal anything further. We can have a picnic—we can go away an hour after breakfast, and saunter to that place known as the Long Quay, and hire the very best boat to be had for money, and we can float about on this lovely harbor, and land presently on the shore over there where the ruins of the old Port are; and we can eat our dinners there and be jolly. Remember that we have never but once been on the water since we came. Think how we have pined for this simple pleasure, Loftie, and fork out the tin."

"My dear Mabel, I must place my interdict on slang."

"Nonsense. When the cat's away. Oh, don't look shocked! Are we to go?"

"Go! of course we'll go. Is there no pretty girl who'll come with us? It's rather slow to have only one's sisters."

"Very well, Loftus. We'll pay you out presently," said Kate.

"And there is a very pretty girl," continued Mabel, "At least Catherine considers her very pretty—only—" her eyes danced with mischief.

"Only what?"

"The mother doesn't like her. There's a dear old Rector here, and he introduced the girl to Kitty, and mother was wild. Mother sounded the Rector the next day and heard something which made her wilder still, but we are not in the secret. Kate fell in love with the girl."

"Did you, Kate? When a woman falls in love with another woman the phenomenon is so uncommon that a certain amount of interest must be roused. Describe the object of your adoration, Kitty."

"Her name," responded Kate, "is Beatrice Meadowsweet. I won't say any more about her. If ever you meet her, which isn't likely, you can judge for yourself of her merits."

"Kitty is rather cross about Beatrice," said Mabel; then she continued, "Loftie, what do you think? Mother has cut all the Northbury folk."

"Mabel, you talk very wild nonsense."

It was Kate who spoke. She rose from the breakfast-table with an annoyed expression.

"Wild or not—it is true," replied Mabel. "Mother has cut the Northbury people, cut them dead. They came to see us, they came in troops. Such funny folk! The first lot were let in. Mother was like a poker. She astonished her visitors, and the whole scene was so queer and uncomfortable, although mother was freezingly polite, that Kate and I got out of the room. The next day more people came—and more, and more every day, but Clara had her orders, and we weren't 'at home.' Kitty and I used to watch the poor Northburians from behind the summer-house. One day Kitty laughed. It was awful, and I am sure they heard.

"Another day a dreadful little woman with rolling eyes said she would leave a tract on Lying in the avenue—I wish she had. But I suppose she thought better of it.

"Then there came a bazaar, a great bazaar, and the Rector invited us, and said all the Northburians would be there. What do you think mother did? She returned their calls on that day. She knew they'd be out, and they were. Wasn't that a dead cut, Loftie?"

"Rather," responded Loftus.

He rose slowly, looked deliberately at Kate, and then closed his lips.

"Mother is away, so we won't discuss her," said Kate. "Run and pack the picnic basket, Mabel, and then we'll be off."

The picturesque little town of Northbury was built on the slope of a hill. This hill gently descended to the sea. Nowhere was there to be found a more charming, landlocked harbor than at Northbury. It was a famous harbor for boating. Even at low tide people could get on the water, and in the summer time this gay sheet of dark blue sparkling waves had many small yachts, fishing smacks, and row-boats of all sizes and descriptions skimming about on its surface. In the spring a large fishing trade was done here, and then the steamers whistle? and shrieked, and disturbed the primitive harmony of the place. But by midsummer the great shoals of mackerel went away, and with them the dark picturesque hookers, and the ugly steamers, and the inhabitants were once more left to their sleepy, old-fashioned, but withal pleasant life.

Rosendale Manor was situated on high ground. It was surrounded by a wall, and the wide avenue was entered by ponderous iron gates. It was about eleven o'clock when the girls and their brother started gayly off for their day on the water. Loftus carried a couple of rugs, so that the fact of Mabel lugging a heavy picnic basket on her sturdy left arm did not look specially remarkable. They went down a steep and straggling hill, passed through an old-fashioned green, with the local club at one side, and a wall at the other which seemed to hang right over the sea.

They soon reached the Long Quay, and made their bargain for the best boat to be had. A man of the name of Driver kept many boats for hire, and he offered now to accompany the young party and show off the beauties of the place.

This, however, Mabel would not hear of. They must go alone or not at all. Loftus did not like to own to his very small nautical experience; the sea was smooth and shining, and apparently free from all danger, and the little party embarked gayly, and put out on their first cruise in high spirits.

Miss Peters and Mrs. Butler watched them with intense interest from their bay window. Miss Peters had possession of the spy-glass. With this held steadily before her eyes, she shouted observations to her sister.

"There they go! No, Dan Driver is not going with them! Any one can see by the way that young man handles the oar that he doesn't know a great deal about the water. Good gracious, Martha, they're taking a sail with them! Now I do call that tempting Providence. That young man has a very elegant figure, Martha, but mark my words he knows nothing at all about the management of a boat. The girls know still less."

"Put down your spy-glass for a moment, and let me speak to you, Maria," exclaimed Mrs. Butler in an exasperated voice. "I never knew such a tongue as yours for clap, clap, clapping. Did you say those two Bertram girls were going out alone with a man! Well, I have known what to think for some time! Alone on the water with a young man. Surely, Maria, you must have made a mistake."

"It's just like you, Martha, you never believe in any one's eyes but your own. Here's the glass, look for yourself. If that isn't a man, and a young man, and a stylish, handsome man, my name isn't Maria Peters."

"You'd be very glad if your name wasn't Peters," replied the irate sister. "But I fear me there's little likelihood of your changing it now. Ah, here's Beatrice Meadowsweet. Good-morning, Bee, my dear. How's your dear mother? Is her poor precious cough any better?"

"Come here, Bee," said Miss Peters. "Come over to the window this minute, and use your young eyes. Who are those people in Dan Driver's boat? There, you tell Martha, she wont believe me."

"Those are the Bertrams," exclaimed Beatrice.

She put up her hand to shade her eyes, and took a long steadfast look over the shining water.

"Those are the Bertrams, and of course, their brother."

"Oh, my dear Bee, how you have relieved me!" exclaimed Mrs. Butler.

She re-seated herself on a settee which stood near, and took her handkerchief to wipe out some wrinkles of anxiety from her stout face.

Beatrice stared in astonishment.

"I don't quite understand," she said.

"My dear! I feared something improper was going on. A young man, not a relation, out alone on the water with two girls! That's the kind of thing we don't allow, in Northbury, Bee. Now, what's the matter?"

"Look," said Beatrice, "look! They are putting up the sail, and they are not doing it right. They oughtn't all three to stand up in the boat together. It will capsize! Oh, I must fly to them. Good-bye, Mrs. Butler. Mother would like to see you at tea, to-night. Good-bye, Miss Peters."

She rushed away, and the next moment was down on the quay. Three moments later she was speeding with swift long strokes across the harbor in her own beautifully appointed row-boat.

Her dress was of dark blue serge, with white collar and cuffs. Her hat was a simple sailor one. The exercise brought the color into her cheeks, and her big somewhat pathetic gray eyes were bright.

"There she goes!" exclaimed Miss Peters. "Never saw such a girl. Doesn't she handle her oars with a touch? Oh, of course she is off to the rescue of those poor bunglers. And I daresay they don't think her good enough to speak to."

"Good enough!" exclaimed Mrs. Butler. "She's twice too good for any one of them. Didn't her dress fit neat, Maria? Well, I hope she won't get let in by their fine ways. For my part, I'm not going to take any notice of the Bertrams. The way they behaved was past enduring. Not at homing when I called, and then leaving their cards on the day when I was at the bazaar. Highty-tighty, says I, who's Mrs. Bertram that she should look down on us in this fashion? Isn't the widow of a good honest butter merchant who paid his way, and left a comfortable fortune behind him, fit to associate with any lady of the land? Mrs. Bertram, indeed! A nice way she has treated us all. It isn't every newcomer we Northbury folks would take up. We hold ourselves high, that we do. Now, what's the matter, Maria?"

"We didn't hold ourselves high about Mrs. Bertram," replied Miss Peters. "It isn't fair to say that we did. We all rushed up to call before she had the carpets well down. I did say, Martha, and you may remember too that I said it, for you were helping me to the tail of the salmon at the time, and I remarked that there was little or nothing to eat on it, you'll remember that I said to you: 'let them put their carpets straight at least.' But you wouldn't—you were all agog to be off, when you saw that Mrs. Gorman Stanley had gone up there in her new bonnet, with the red and yellow poppies—the bonnet you know that she said she got from London."

"Which she didn't," snapped Mrs. Butler; "for I saw those identical poppies in Perry's shop on the quay. Well, well, Maria, I may have been a bit hasty in rushing after those who didn't want me, but the result would have been all the same. Maria, there's only one solution of the way we have been treated by that proud, stuck-up, conceited body. Maria, she doesn't pay her way."

Miss Peters rolled her eyes with a quick dart at her sister.

"They do say she's very close in the kitchen," she remarked; "and the butcher told Susan that they only go in for New Zealand."

Mrs. Butler rose from her seat, to express more markedly her disgust for colonial viands.

"Ugh!" she said. "Catch me putting a morsel of that poisonous stuff inside my mouth. Well, well, you'll see I'm right, Maria. She don't pay her way, so she's ashamed, and well she may be, to look honest folk in the face."

"Beatrice has got up to the other boat," interrupted Miss Peters. Give me the glass, quickly, Martha. My word, the two boats are touching. And—would you believe it?—one of the young ladies is getting into Bee's boat, Martha. She's towing Driver's boat after her own! Well, well, that will be nuts to Mrs. Bertram. I declare, Martha, I shouldn't be one bit surprised if that young jackanapes of a brother fell in love with our Bee."

"He won't get her for his pains," retorted Mrs. Butler. "Those who don't pay their way won't touch Beatrice Meadowsweet's fortune. But, there, I'm sick of the subject. Let's talk of something else. Isn't that Mrs. Gorman Stanley coming down the street? Open the window