CHAPTER II--THE DUCHESS APPROVES
His attentions to the Duchess of Breakwater had not been so conspicuousor so absorbing as to prevent the eager mothers--who, true to her word,Lady Galorey had invited down--from laying siege to Dan Blair. LadyGalorey asked him:
"Don't you want to marry any one of these beauties, Dan?" And Blair,with his beautiful smile and what Lily called his inspired candor,answered:
"Not on your life, Lady Galorey!"
And she agreed, "I think myself you are too young."
"No," Dan refuted, "you are wrong there. I shall marry as fast as Ican."
His hostess was surprised.
"Why, I thought you wanted your fling first."
And Dan, from his chair, in which, with a book, he had been sitting whenLady Galorey found him, answered cheerfully:
"Oh, I don't like being alone. I want to go about with some one. Ishould like a fling all right, but I want to fling with somebody as Igo."
The lady of the house was not a philosopher nor an analyst. She hadcertain affairs of her own and was engrossed in them and lived in them.As far as Lady Galorey was concerned the rest of the world might go andhang itself as long as it didn't do it at her gate-post. But Blaircouldn't leave any one indifferent to him very long, not unless onecould be indifferent to a blaze of sunlight; one must either draw theblinds down or bask in its brightness.
She laughed. "You're perfectly delicious! You mean to say you want to bemarried at once and let your _wife_ fling around with you?"
"Just that."
"How sweet of you, Dan! And you won't marry one of these girls here?"
"Don't fill the bill, Lady Galorey."
"Oh, you have a sweetheart at home, then?"
"All off!" he assured her blithely, and rose, tall and straight andslender.
The Duchess of Breakwater had come in, indeed she never failed to whenthere was any question of finding Blair.
Dan stood straightly before the two women of an old race, and theAmerican didn't suggest any line of noble ancestors whatsoever. Hisfeatures were rather agglomerate; his muscles were possibly not theperfect elastic specimens that were those muscles whose strain and sinewhad been made from the same stock for generations. He was, nevertheless,very good to look on. Any woman would have thought so, and he bent hisblond head as he looked at the Duchess of Breakwater with something likebenevolence, something of his father's kindness in his clear blue eyes.Neither of the noble ladies vaguely understood him. His hostess thoughthim "a good sort," not half bad, a splendid catch, and the other woman,only a few years his senior, was in love with him. The duchess hadmarried at eighteen, tired of her bargain at twenty, and found herself awidow at twenty-five. She held a telegram in her hand.
"We've got the box for _Mandalay_ to-night at the Gaiety, and let'smotor in."
Only Lady Galorey hesitated, disappointed.
"Too bad--I had specially arranged for Lady Grandcourt to drive over withEileen. I thought it would be a ripping chance for her to see Dan."
When at length the duchess had succeeded in getting Dan to herselftoward the end of the day in the red room, after tea, she said:
"So you won't marry a London beauty?"
And rather coldly Dan had answered:
"Why, you talk, all of you, as if I had only to ask any girl of them,and she would jump down my throat."
"Don't try it," the duchess answered, "unless you want to have yourmouth full!"
Dan did not reply for a second, but he looked at her more seriously,conscious of her grace and her good looks. She was certainly better tolook at than the simple girls with their big hands, small wits, longfaces, and, as the boy expressed it, "utter lack of get-up." The duchessshone out to advantage.
"Why don't you talk to me?" she asked softly. "You know you would rathertalk to me than the others."
"Yes," he said frankly; "they make me nervous."
"And I don't?"
"No," he said. "I learn a lot every time we are together."
"Learn?" she repeated, not particularly flattered by this. "What sort ofthings?"
"Oh, about the whole business," he returned vaguely. "You know what Imean."
"Then," she said with a slight laugh, "you mean to say you talk with mefor _educational purposes_? What a beastly bore!"
Dan did not contradict her. She was by no means Eve to him, nor was hethe raw recruit his simplicity might give one to think. He had had histemptations and his way out of them was an easy one; for he was veryslow to stir, and back of all was his ideal. The reality and power ofthis ideal Dan knew best at moments like these. But the Duchess ofBreakwater was the most lovely woman--the most dangerous woman that hadcome his way. He liked her--Dan was well on the way to love.
The two were alone in the big dark room. At their side the small table,from which they had taken their tea together, stood with its empty cupsand its silver. Without, the day was cold and windy, and the sunsetthrew along the panes a red reflection. The light fell on the Duchess ofBreakwater, something like a veil--a crimson veil slipped over her faceand breast. She leaned toward Dan, and between them there was no morebarrier than the western light. He felt his pulses beat and a tiderising within him. She was a delicious emanation, fragrant and near, andas he might have gathered a cluster of flowers, so in the next second hewould have taken her in his arms, but from the other room just then LadyGalorey, at the piano, played a snatch from _Mandalay_, striking at onceinto the tune. The sound came suddenly, told them quickly some one wasnear, and the Duchess of Breakwater involuntarily moved back, and soknocked the small tray, jostled it, and it fell clattering to the floor.
The Girl From His Town Page 2