April Hopes

by William Dean Howells

  XXXVI.

  "Why, there's Dan Mavering now!" said Mrs. Brinkley, rather to herselfthan to her companion. "And alone!"

  Dan's face showed above most of the heads and shoulders about him; itwas flushed, and looked troubled and excited. He caught sight of Mrs.Brinkley, and his eyes brightened joyfully. He slipped quickly throughthe crowd, and bowed over her hand, while he stammered out, withoutgiving her a chance for reply till the end: "O Mrs. Brinkley, I'm soglad to see you! I'm going--I want to ask a great favour of you, Mrs.Brinkley. I want to bring--I want to introduce some friends of mine toyou--some ladies, Mrs. Brinkley; very nice people I met last summer atPortland. Their father--General Wrayne--has been building some railroadsdown East, and they're very nice people; but they don't know anyone--any ladies--and they've been looking at the pictures ever sincethey came. They're very good pictures; but it isn't an exhibition!" Hebroke down with a laugh.

  "Why, of course, Mr. Mavering; I shall be delighted," said Mrs.Brinkley, with a hospitality rendered reckless by her sympathy with theyoung fellow. "By all means!"

  "Oh; thanks!--thank you aver so much!" said Dan. "I'll bring them toyou--they'll understand!" He slipped into the crowd again.

  Corey made an offer of going. Mrs. Brinkley stopped him with her fan."No--stay, Mr. Corey. Unless you wish to go. I fancy it's the people youwere talking about, and you must help me through with them."

  "I ask nothing better," said the old man, unresentful of Dan's havingnot even seemed to see him, in his generous preoccupation. "I shouldlike to see how you'll get on, and perhaps I can be of use."

  "Of course you can--the greatest."

  "But why hasn't he introduced them to his Pasmers? What? Eh? Oh!"Corey made these utterances in response to a sharper pressure of Mrs.Brinkley's fan on his arm.

  Dan was opening a way through the crowd before them for two ladies, whomhe now introduced. "Mrs. Frobisher, Mrs. Brinkley; and Miss Wrayne."

  Mrs. Brinkley cordially gave her hand to the ladies, and said, "May Iintroduce Mr. Corey? Mr. Mavering, let me introduce you to Mr. Corey."The old man rose and stood with the little group.

  Dan's face shone with flattered pride and joyous triumph. He bubbledout some happy incoherencies about the honour and pleasure, while at thesame time he beamed with tender gratitude upon Mrs. Brinkley, who wasbehaving with a gracious, humorous kindliness to the aliens cast uponher mercies. Mrs. Frobisher, after a half-hour of Boston society,was not that presence of easy gaiety which crossed Dan's path on thePortland pavement the morning of his arrival from Campobello; but shewas still a handsome, effective woman, of whom you would have hesitatedto say whether she was showy or distinguished. Perhaps she was a littleof both, with an air of command bred of supremacy in frontier garrisons;her sister was like her in the way that a young girl may be like a youngmatron. They blossomed alike in the genial atmosphere of Mrs. Brinkleyand of Mr. Corey. He began at once to make bantering speeches with themboth. The friendliness of an old man and a stout elderly woman might nothave been their ideal of success at an evening party, used as they wereto the unstinted homage of young captains and lieutenants, but a briefexperience of Mrs. Bellingham's hospitality must have taught themhumility; and when a stout, elderly gentleman, whose baldness was stilltrying to be blond, joined the group, the spectacle was not withoutits points of resemblance to a social ovation. Perhaps it was a Bostonsocial ovation.

  "Hallo, Corey!" said this stout gentleman, whom Mrs. Brinkley at onceintroduced as Mr. Bellingham, and whose salutation Corey returned with"Hallo, Charles!" of equal intimacy.

  Mr. Bellingham caught at the name of Frobisher. "Mrs. Major DickFrobisher?"

  "Mrs. Colonel now, but Dick always," said the lady, with immediatecomradery. "Do you know my husband?"

  "I should think so!" said Bellingham; and a talk of common interestand mutual reminiscence sprang up between them. Bellingham graphicallydepicted his meeting with Colonel Frobisher the last time he was out onthe Plains, and Mrs. Frobisher and Miss Wrayne discovered to their greatsatisfaction that he was the brother of Mrs. Stephen Blake, of Omaba,who had come out to the fort once with her husband, and capturedthe garrison, as they said. Mrs. Frobisher accounted for her presentseparation from her husband, and said she had come on for a while to bewith her father and sister, who both needed more looking after than theIndians. Her father had left the army, and was building railroads.

  Miss Wrayne, when she was not appealed to for confirmation orrecollection by her sister, was having a lively talk with Corey and Mrs.Brinkley; she seemed to enter into their humour; and no one paid muchattention to Dan Mavering. He hung upon the outskirts of the littlegroup; proffering unrequited sympathy and applause; and at last hemurmured something about having to go back to some friends, and tookhimself off. Mrs. Frobisher and Miss Wrayne let him go with a certainshade--the lightest, and yet evident--of not wholly satisfied pique:women know how to accept a reparation on account, and without giving areceipt in full.

  Mrs. Brinkley gave him her hand with an effect of compassionateintelligence and appreciation of the sacrifice he must have made inleaving Alice. "May I congratulate you?" she murmured.

  "Oh yes, indeed; thank you, Mrs. Brinkley," he gushed tremulously; andhe pressed her hand hard, and clung to it, as if he would like to takeher with him.

  Neither of the older men noticed his going. They were both takenin their elderly way with these two handsome young women, and theyprofessed regret--Bellingham that his mother was not there, and Coreythat neither his wife nor daughters had come, whom they might otherwisehave introduced. They did not offer to share their acquaintance with anyone else, but they made the most of it themselves, as if knowing a goodthing when they had it. Their devotion to Mrs. Frobisher and her sisterheightened the curiosity of such people as noticed it, but it wouldbe wrong to say that it moved any in that self-limited company with astrong wish to know the ladies. The time comes to every man, no matterhow great a power he may be in society, when the general social opinionretires him for senility, and this time had come for Bromfield Corey. Hecould no longer make or mar any success; and Charles Bellingham was sonotoriously amiable, so deeply compromised by his inveterate habitof liking nearly every one, that his notice could not distinguish oradvantage a newcomer.

  He and Corey took the ladies down to supper. Mrs. Brinkley saw themthere together, and a little later she saw old Corey wander off;forgetful of Miss Wrayne. She saw Dan Mavering, but not the Pasmers, andthen, when Corey forgot Miss Wrayne, she saw Dan, forlorn and bewilderedlooking, approach the girl, and offer her his arm for the return to thedrawing-room; she took it with a bright, cold smile, making white ringsof ironical deprecation around the pupils of her eyes.

  "What is that poor boy doing, I wonder?" said Mrs. Brinkley to herself.