The Rich Mrs. Burgoyne
Page 3
CHAPTER III
Mrs. Burgoyne was a sweet-faced, fresh-looking woman about thirty-twoor-three years old, with a quick smile, like a child's, and blue eyes,set far apart, with a little lift at the corners, that, under levelheavy brows, gave a suggestion of something almost Oriental to herface. She was dressed simply in black, and a transparent black veil,falling from her wide hat and flung back, framed her face mostbecomingly in square crisp folds.
She and Barry presently walked up River Street in the mellow afternoonsunlight, and through the old wooden gates of the Holly grounds. Onevery side were great high-flung sprays of overgrown roses, dusty andchoked with weeds, ragged pepper tassels dragged in the grass, andwhere the path lay under the eucalyptus trees it was slippery with thedry, crescent-shaped leaves. Bees hummed over rank poppies and tangledhoneysuckle; once or twice a hummingbird came through the garden onsome swift, whizzing journey, and there were other birds in the trees,little shy brown birds, silent but busy in the late afternoon. Close tothe house an old garden faucet dripped and dripped, and a noisy,changing group of the brown birds were bathing and flashing about it.The old Hall stood on a rise of ground, clear of the trees, and bathedin sunshine. It was an ugly house, following as it did the fashion ofthe late seventies; but it was not undignified, with its big doorflanked by bay-windows and its narrow porch bounded by a fat woodenbalustrade and heavy columns. The porch and steps were weather-stainedand faded, and littered now with fallen leaves and twigs.
Barry opened the front door with some difficulty, and they stepped intothe musty emptiness of the big main hall. There was a stairway at theback of the house with a colored glass window on the landing, andthrough it the sunlight streamed, showing the old velvet carpet in thehall below, and the carved heavy walnut chairs and tables, and the oldengravings in their frames of oak and walnut mosaic. The visitorspeeped into the old library, odorous of unopened books, and with greatcurtains of green rep shutting out the light, and into the music roombehind it, cold even on this warm day, with a muffled grand piano drawnfree of the walls, and near it two piano-stools, upholstered inblue-fringed rep, to match the curtains and chairs. They went acrossthe hall to the long, dim drawing room, where there was another velvetcarpet, dulled to a red pink by time, and muffled pompous sofas andchairs, and great mirrors, and "sets" of candlesticks and vases on themantels and what-nots. The windows were shuttered here, the airlifeless. Barry, in George Carew's interest, felt bound to say that"they would clear all this up, you know; a lot of this stuff could bestored."
"Oh, why store it? It's perfectly good," the lady answered absently.
Presently they went out to the more cheerful dining-room, which ranstraight across the house, and was low-ceiled, with pleasantsquare-paned windows on two sides.
"This was the old house," explained Barry; "they added on the frontpart. You could do a lot with this room."
"Do you still smell spice, and apples, and cider here?" said Mrs.Burgoyne, turning from an investigation of the china-closet, with aradiant face. A moment later she caught her breath suddenly, and walkedacross the room to stand, resting her hands on a chair back, before alarge portrait that hung above the fireplace. She stood so, gazing atthe picture--the portrait of a woman--for a full minute, and when sheturned again to Barry, her eyes were bright with tears.
"That's Mrs. Holly," said she. "Emily said that picture was here." Andturning back to the canvas, she added under her breath, "You darling!"
"Did you know her?" Barry asked, surprised.
"Did I know her!" Mrs. Burgoyne echoed softly, without turning. "Yes, Iknew her," she added, almost musingly. And then suddenly she said,"Come, let's look upstairs," and led the way by the twisted sunny backstairway, which had a window on every landing and Crimson Rambler rosespressing against every window. They looked into several bedrooms, alldusty, close, sunshiny. In the largest of these, a big front cornerroom, carpeted in dark red, with a black marble fireplace and animmense walnut bed, Mrs. Burgoyne, looking through a window that shehad opened upon the lovely panorama of river and woods, said suddenly:
"This must be my room, it was hers. She was the best friend, in oneway, that I ever had--Mrs. Holly. How happy I was here!"
"Here?" Barry echoed.
At his tone she turned, and looked keenly at him, a little smileplaying about her lips. Then her face suddenly brightened.
"Barry, of course!" she exclaimed. "I KNEW I knew you, but the 'Mr.Valentine' confused me." And facing him radiantly, she demanded, "Whoam I?"
Barry shook his head slowly, his puzzled, smiling eyes on hers. For amoment they faced each other; then his look cleared as hers had done,and their hands met as he said boyishly:
"Well, I will be hanged! Jappy Frothingham!"
"Jappy Frothingham!" she echoed joyously. "But I haven't heard thatname for twenty years. And you're the boy whose father was a doctor,and who helped us build our Indian camp, and who had the frog, and felloff the roof, and killed the rattlesnake."
"And you're the girl from Washington who could speak French, and whoput that stuff on my freckles and wouldn't let 'em drown the kittens."
"Oh, yes, yes!" she said, and, their hands still joined, they laughedlike happy children together.
Presently, more gravely, she told him a little of herself, of the earlymarriage, and the diplomat husband whose career was so cruelly cutshort by years of hopeless invalidism. Then had come her father'sillness, and years of travel with him, and now she and the little girlswere alone. And in return Barry sketched his own life, told her alittle of Hetty, and his unhappy days in New York, and of the boy, andfinally of the Mail. Her absorbed attention followed him from point topoint.
"And you say that this Rogers owns the newspaper?" she askedthoughtfully, when the Mail was under discussion.
"Rogers owns it; that's the trouble. Nothing goes into it without theold man's consent." Barry tested the spring of a roller shade, with ascowl. "Barnes, the assistant editor he had before me, threw up his jobbecause he wouldn't stand having his stuff cut all to pieces andchanged to suit Rogers' policies," he went on, as Mrs. Burgoyne's eyesdemanded more detail. "And that's what I'll do some day. In the sixyears since the old man bought it, the circulation has fallen off abouthalf; we don't get any 'ads'; we're not paying expenses. It's a crimetoo, for it's a good paper. Even Rogers is sick of it now; he'd sellfor a song. I'd borrow the money and buy it if it weren't for thepresses; I'd have to have new presses. Everything here is in prettygood shape," he finished, with an air of changing the subject.
"And what would new presses cost?" Sidney Burgoyne persisted, pausingon the big main stairway, as they were leaving the house a few minuteslater.
"Oh, I don't know." Barry opened the front door again, and they steppedout to the porch. "Altogether," he said vaguely, snapping dead twigsfrom the heavy unpruned growth of the rose vines, "altogether, Iwouldn't go into it without ten thousand. Five for the new presses,say, and four to Rogers for the business and good-will, and somethingto run on--although," Barry interrupted himself with a vehemence thatsurprised her, "although I'll bet that the old Mail would be paying herown rent and salaries within two months. The Dispatch doesn't amount tomuch, and the Star is a regular back number!" He stood staring gloomilydown at the roofs of the village; Mrs. Burgoyne, a little tired, hadseated herself on the top step.
"I wish, in all seriousness, you'd tell me about it," she said. "I amreally interested. If I buy this place, it will mean that we come hereto stay for years perhaps, and I have some money I want to invest here.I had thought of real estate, but it needn't necessarily be that. Itsounds to me as if you really ought to make an effort to buy the paper,Barry, Have you thought of getting anyone to go into it with you?"
The man laughed, perhaps a little embarrassed.
"Never here, really. I went to Walter Pratt about it once," headmitted, "but he said he was all tied up. Some of the fellows down inSan Francisco might have come in--but Lord! I don't want to settlehere; I hate this place."
"Our coming here was the merest chance. My father and I were on our wayhome from Japan, you know, and he suddenly remembered that the Hollyswere near San Francisco, and we came up here for a night. That," saidMrs. Burgoyne in a lower tone, as if half to herself, "that was twentyyears ago; I was only twelve, but I've never forgotten it. Fred andOliver and Emily and I had our supper on the side porch; and afterwardthey played in the garden, but I was shy--I had never played--and Mrs.Holly kept me beside her on the porch, and talked to me now and then,and finally she asked me if I would like to spend the summer with her.Like to!--I wonder my heart didn't burst with joy! Father said no; butafter we children had gone to bed, they discussed it again. How Emilyand I PRAYED! And after a while Fred tiptoed down to the landing, andcame up jubilant. 'I heard mother say that what clothes Sidney neededcould be bought right here,' he said. Emily began to laugh, and I tocry--!" She turned her back on Barry, and he, catching a glimpse of herwet eyes, took up the conversation himself.
"I don't remember her very well," he said; "a boy wouldn't. She diedsoon after that summer, and the boys went off to school."
"Yes, I know," the lady said thoughtfully. "I had the news in Rome--ahot, bright, glaring day. It was nearly a month after her death, then.And even then, I said to myself that I'd come back here, some day. Butit's not been possible until now; and now," her voice was bright andsteady again, "here I am. And I don't like to hear an old friendabusing Santa Paloma."
"It's a nice enough place," Barry admitted, "but the people are--well,you wait until you meet the women! Perhaps they're not much worse thanwomen everywhere else, but sometimes it doesn't seem as if the womenhere had good sense. I don't mean the nice quiet ones who live out onthe ranches and are bringing up a houseful of children, but this RiverStreet crowd."
"Why, what's the matter with them?" asked Mrs. Burgoyne with vivacity.
"Oh, I mean this business of playing bridge four afternoons a week, andrunning to the club, and tearing around in motor-cars all day Sunday,and entertaining the way they think people do it in New York, andgetting their dresses in San Francisco instead of up here," Barryexplained disgustedly. "Some of them would be nice enough if theyweren't trying to go each other one better all the time; when one getsa thing the others have all got to have it, or have something nicer.Take the Browns, now, your neighbors there--"
"In the shingled house, with the babies swinging on the gate as we cameby?"
"Yes, that's it. They've got four little boys. Doctor Brown is a king;everybody worships him, and she's a sweet little woman; but of courseshe's got to strain and struggle like the rest of them. There's a Mrs.Willard White in this town--that big gray-shingled place down there istheir garage--and she runs the whole place. She's always letting theothers know that hobbles are out, and everything's got to hang from theshoulder--"
"Very good!" laughed Mrs. Burgoyne, "you've got that very nearly right."
"Willard White's a nice fellow," Barry went on, "except that he's alittle cracked about his Packard. They give motoring parties, and ofcourse they stop at hotels way up the country for lunch, and the womenhave got to have veils and special hats and coats, and so on. WayneAdams told me it stood him in about thirty dollars every time he wentout with the Whites. Wayne's got his own car now; his wife kept at himday and night to get it. But he can't run it, so it's in the garagehalf the time."
"That's the worst of motoring," said the lady with a thoughtful nod,"the people who sell them think they've answered you when they say,'But you don't run it economically. If you understood it, it wouldn'tcost you half so much!' And the alternative is, 'Get a man atseventy-five dollars a month and save repairing and replacing bills.'Nice for business, Barry, but very much overdone for pleasure, I think.I myself hate those days spent with five people you hardly know," shewent on, "rushing over beautiful roads that you hardly see, eating toomuch in strange hotels, and paying too much for it. I sha'n't have acar. But tell me more about the people. Who are the Adamses? Didn't yousay Adams?"
"Wayne Adams; nice people, with two nice boys," he supplied; "but she'slike the rest. Wayne lies awake nights worrying about bills, and shegives silver photograph-frames for bridge prizes. That white stuccohouse where they're putting in an Italian garden, is the Parker Lloyds.Mrs. Lloyd's a clever woman, and pretty too; but she doesn't seem tohave any sense. They've got a little girl, and she'll tell you thatMabel never wore a stitch that wasn't hand-made in her life. Lloyd hada nervous breakdown a few months ago--we all knew it was nothing butmoney worry--but yesterday his wife said to me in all good faith thathe was too unselfish, he was wearing himself out. She was trying topersuade him to put Mabel in school and go abroad for a good rest."
Mrs. Burgoyne laughed.
"That's like Jeanette Carew showing me her birthday present," Barrywent on with a grin. "It seems that George gave her a complete set ofbureau ivory--two or three dozen pieces in all, I guess. When I askedher she admitted that she had silver, but she said she wanted ivory,everybody has ivory now. Present!" he repeated with scorn, "why, shejust told George what she wanted, and went down and charged it to him!She's worried to death about bills now, but she started right intalking motor-cars; and they'll have one yet. I'd give a good deal," hefinished disgustedly, "to know what they get out of it."
"I don't believe they're as bad as all that," said the lady. "Thereused to be some lovely people here, and there was a whist club too, andit was very nice. They played for a silver fork and spoon everyfortnight, and I remember that Mrs. Holly had nearly a dozen of theforks. There was a darling Mrs. Apostleman, and Mrs. Pratt with two shypretty daughters--"
"Mrs. Apostleman's still here," he told her. "She's a fine old lady.When a woman gets to be sixty, it doesn't seem to matter if she wastestime. Mrs. Pratt is dead, and Lizzie is married and lives in SanFrancisco, but Anne's still here. She and her brother live in thatvault of a gray house; you can see the chimneys. Anne's another," histone was cynical again, "a shy, nervous woman, always getting newdresses, and always on club reception committees, with white gloves anda ribbon in her hair, frightened to death for fear she's not doing thecorrect thing. They've just had a frieze of English tapestries put inthe drawing-room and hall,--English TAPESTRIES!"
"Perhaps you don't appreciate tapestries," said Mrs. Burgoyne, with hertwinkling smile. "You know there is a popular theory that such thingskeep money in circulation."
"You know there's hardly any form of foolishness or vice of which youcan't say that," he reminded her soberly; and Mrs. Burgoyne, serious inturn, answered quickly:
"Yes, you're quite right. It's too bad; we American women seem somehowto have let go of everything real, in the last few generations. Butthings are coming around again." She rose from the steps, still facingthe village. "Tell me, who is my nearest neighbor there, in the whitecottage?" she demanded.
"I am," Barry said unexpectedly. "So if you need--yeast is it, thatwomen always borrow?"
"Yeast," she assented laughing. "I will remember. And now tell me abouttrains and things. Listen!" Her voice and look changed suddenly:softened, brightened. "Is that children?" she asked, eagerly.
And a moment later four children, tired, happy and laden with orchardspoils, came around the corner of the house. Barry presented them asthe Carews--George and Jeanette, a bashful fourteen and aself-possessed twelve, and Dick, who was seven--and his own small dustyson, Billy Val
entine, who put a fat confiding hand in the strangelady's as they all went down to the gate together.
"You are my Joanna's age, Jeanette," said Mrs. Burgoyne, easily. "Ihope you will be friends."
"Who will I be friends with?" said little Billy, raising blue expectanteyes. "And who will George?"
"Why, I hope you will be friends with me," she answered laughing; "andI will be so relieved if George will come up sometimes and help me withbonfires and about what ought to be done in the stable. You see, Idon't know much about those things." At this moment George, hoarselymuttering that he wasn't much good, he guessed, but he had some goodtools, fell deeply a victim to her charms.
Mrs. Carew came out of her own gate as they came up, and there was timefor a little talk, and promises, and goodbyes. Then Barry took Mrs.Burgoyne to the station, and lifted his hat to the bright face at thewindow as the train pulled out in the dusk. He went slowly to hisoffice from the train and attacked the litter of papers and clippingson his desk absent-mindedly. Once he said half aloud, his big scissorsarrested, his forehead furrowed by an unaccustomed frown, "We were onlykids then; and they all thought I was the one who was going to dosomething big."