Astra

by Grace Livingston Hill

  “Well, I am her guardian. Haven’t I been in that place ever since she’s been with us? Of course, I am, and no Sargent or anybody else is going to take it away. You see, Miriam, they’re trying to get Astra’s money away, that’s what they are probably working this racket for, and it’s important that I attend to it at once. When does she come of age?”

  “I don’t remember exactly. Very soon, I think. Now, Marmaduke, get calm, and stop acting silly! You simply can’t go away till after this wedding is over, and that’s all there is to it!”

  Then came another sharp knock at the door, and another bellboy stood there with a silver plate and another specialdelivery letter.

  This quite surprised Marmaduke out of his quarrel, and he came forward to receive the letter which his wife had taken and was opening.

  “Yes, it’s for you,” said his wife, “but you opened my letter, so I’m opening yours. It’s from a lawyer. His name is Lauderdale.”

  She scanned the lines quickly.

  “Yes, he says you are not Astra’s guardian, and he is enclosing a copy of the papers about the guardianship. I guess, Duke, you better quiet down and get dressed for the wedding, and after the wedding, if there’s anything left to do, you can do it. But really, from this letter, I don’t believe you’ll think it is very dignified to go running off to the east clamoring to be a guardian. They certainly will begin to think you’ve got some racket or other, just as you said about them.”

  Marmaduke made no reply. He slammed into the bathroom and began to shave, while his wife made the most of his absence to get her face and hair into proper shape. But Clytie stood uncomfortably in the doorway, first on one foot and then on the other, looking uneasily at her mother. At last Miriam, who knew the signs of her daughter’s behavior pretty well, asked her, “Clytie, do you know how much money Astra had when we left?”

  “No, I don’t. Really, Mother. Astra was always very closed-mouthed about her money and what she was going to do with it. I know she didn’t have half enough for what she wanted.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because I asked her to lend me a little money, and she refused. She was practically always willing to lend me money when I asked her, but this time she said she couldn’t do it. She said she had some things she wanted to do, and some things she wanted to buy, and she had just paid her board, and she wouldn’t have enough if she let me have any. She said I should go and ask my father if I wanted money.”

  “What did you want money for, Clytie? Your father had given you more than your usual allowance, I know, on account of your having to get a wedding present. Why did you want more?”

  Clytie put on her most winsome smile.

  “Because, Mother dear, I wanted to get that darling pearl pin. It went so exquisitely with my blue-and-white dress.”

  “Well, but you have the pearl pin, Clytie. Where did you get the money for that? I know that pin cost about twenty dollars at least. It is a lovely thing, and I think you had very good taste to want it. But I don’t understand where you got it. Did your father give you more money? Did he buy it for you?”

  “No, Mother,” Clytie hung her head prettily.

  “Well, where did you get the money then?”

  “Well, I got it from Astra after all. When I went back, I got all she had.”

  “But Clytie, you must be mistaken. Where then would she get the money to take this journey?”

  “Well, I’m sure I don’t know. That’s her lookout, not mine. I suppose she has ways of getting more money out of that guardian, hasn’t she? Or maybe she was holding out on me, and it wasn’t all she had, but I got what I went after. Why do you worry, Mother? Astra will get along, and it’s not your worry anyway.”

  “Now Clytie, that’s not a very nice way to talk. You’ll never know how lovely Astra’s mother was to me when I was a lonely orphan girl!”

  “Oh, cut it out, Miriam! I’m fed up with Astra. Give us a change! Anyway, she’s gone, and I’m glad. So let’s let it rest there!” And Clytie turned and flung herself back into her own room.

  Just then Marmaduke came breezing out of the bathroom, looking as fresh and clean as a babe new born, and found his wife patting away a few tears she had let escape onto her freshly powdered countenance.

  “Now what’s the matter with you?” glared Marmaduke. “Haven’t you come out of your grouch yet?”

  “Duke, did Astra pay her board before we left?” said his wife, lifting her dismal countenance.

  Her husband turned and glared at her again.

  “Yes, she did!” he barked.

  “Paid it in advance?” asked his stricken wife.

  “Yes of course!” he barked again. “That’s what she always does. It was none of my doings.”

  “Well, you oughtn’t to have taken it!” wailed Miriam. “I don’t see what in the world that child traveled on. It’s dreadful to think that one of my own family was in actual straits like that! After the way her people took care of me when I had no one!”

  “Oh, shut up!” said her kindly husband. “Look at the clock! Have you forgotten we came west to a wedding? You’ll have to get in some repairs on your makeup or your family will be ashamed to own you belong to them. As for Astra, she had money enough left. She always has. If we had been staying at home, you would have made her buy another evening dress and another fur coat and thought nothing of it, just so your beloved daughter could wear them for her.”

  “But she didn’t have plenty left, Duke. Clytie went and borrowed everything she had, and I just can’t see where she got money to make that journey! Duke, we’ve got to do something about it. We really have. There’s no telling what she’ll tell about us when she gets up there with Father’s friends!”

  “Oh, hang it all! Can’t you shut up till this shindig is over? Then we’ll all go east and raise the biggest rumpus there ever was. The world war won’t beat it! But I’ll be blamed if I’ll stand another whining word about it till after the wedding!” He flung into his dress coat and slammed out the door.

  Then, with her eye on the clock, Miriam went to her dressing table and got in makeup repairs in short order. And Clytie, in the other room, fastened on the pearl pin and the darling earrings that matched the ones she had bought with Astra’s stolen money and went down to the car, en route to the wedding, knowing that the adoring eyes of her parents were upon her uncritically and contentedly.

  And at the reception, more than one admiring young guest watched her enviously and said, “Oh, what a darling pin and earrings! Where did you get them, Clytie dear?” and Clytie dimpled and smiled and looked demurely down and said, “They were a present from my darling cousin, Astra Everson.”

  “What, the one that’s been living with you since her father died?”

  “Yes, but she’s gone away from us now, and we don’t know how we’re going to get along without her. She was simply adorable! We think she’s going to get married. She’s gone back to her old home, and she must have had a great many admirers there, of course. You don’t know how we’re going to miss her.”

  But that night, when the last of the wedding was over, even to the scrambled eggs in the wee small hours, and everybody herded finally to their beds as the morning began to dawn grayly into the hotel bedroom windows, Miriam and her tempestuous husband lay gravely considering the situation.

  “I think,” said Miriam, after a long pause, during which only a series of momentous sighs showed that Marmaduke was not sleeping the sleep of the just and happy, “I think that we have got to find out somehow whether Clytie really borrowed that money for those pearl earrings from Astra or whether she just took it. It’s time we checked up on Clytie. She’s getting too casual about other people’s things. She may, of course, have merely bullied Astra until she gave it to her, but I wouldn’t like to think she took it without Astra’s knowledge or permission.”

  “You would bring a thing like that up when we’ve got Astra on our hands. One girl is enough to attend to at once.
”

  “Yes, but which girl? Clytie is our own, and this is a pretty serious thing.”

  “Well, if you consider the investigations had better begin at home, suppose you stay at home and work on Clytie, and I’ll go east by myself and begin on Astra. Perhaps we’ll accomplish more in that way.”

  “I think,” said Miriam after another long pause, “that you better stay at home and work with me on Clytie and let Astra go her own way. Because to tell the truth, I don’t believe you’ll get anywhere with Astra. She’s too much like her father, and she just adores those lawyers and the guardian her father used to have. You’ll just wish you hadn’t if you attempt to go out there and argue with an unknown quantity.”

  The head of the house lay silent for a space, and then he said with a deep yawn, “Well for heaven’s sake, let’s get some sleep!”

  So Duke said no more about it that night, but he did a good deal of tossing and angry thinking. The next morning he diligently searched until he found a certain agency that would do almost anything that was asked, for money. Behind closed doors, his arrangements were made. And that very night an eastern bound plane took aboard a man who understood the plans thoroughly, and knew that action was required in the course of the next few days. For Marmaduke Lester had definite ways in which he could use the comfortable fortune that he knew was left to Astra. He had planned to wait until near time for her majority when her money would soon be in her own hands and he could use his persuasive powers on her quietly. But her sudden departure had upset his schemes so that force was going to be necessary.

  Chapter 12

  Astra and Cameron went to church twice on Sunday and had a precious time. The church that had been Mr. Everson’s choice had stayed true to the faith, and while the old preacher was gone, the one who had succeeded him was just as good.

  The people were warmhearted and welcomed them, and they felt at home and happy there at once. To Cameron, at least, the whole experience was wonderful. He had not known that people who knew and loved the Lord could love others just because they belonged to Him. Moreover, the preaching was more teaching of the Word than preaching and appealed to Cameron in every way. He had never heard such teaching in his life. It was as if the wonderful music they had heard together the night before had come alive in human lives and they could see its practical working.

  Afterward they came back to the plain little parlor where Astra was boarding and sat in the farthest corner talking a few minutes, each reluctant to end the day.

  “Tomorrow I shall be very busy,” said Cameron, “getting things in my office ready to leave. Perhaps Tuesday also. But I’ll try and get away a little while one of the evenings to run over a few minutes. So if there is anything I can do to help you over the holiday emptiness, just think it up and tell me, and I’ll endeavor to save a space for it.”

  “Oh, that’s very kind of you,” Astra said, suddenly realizing the beautiful day was over, and she had but blankness and her own company to depend upon until Christmas was past and she could call up some of her old friends and get into familiar life again. “But you mustn’t!” she went on, getting the idea that she was becoming a sort of burden on his mind. “It’s been wonderful to go to church with somebody who was in sympathy, and the concert was marvelous, but you really must cast me off now. You have more than paid any debt you may have fancied you had to me. And I know you are a busy man.”

  “Well, I’m not so busy that I can’t enjoy real things now and then in company with real people.”

  Their glances met again, and Astra caught her breath. She simply mustn’t let herself be so glad over a simple little sentence like that. He was a wonderful companion, but there was no sense in letting herself get all stirred up about him. She wasn’t the only young woman he knew.

  “Well,” she said pleasantly, “you certainly have made these days in my hometown delightful ones, and I shall never forget your kindness.”

  “Please don’t think of it just as kindness,” he said as he took her hand in a farewell clasp. “It’s been delightful to me. Good night. I’ll be seeing you soon.”

  As she went up to her room in the elevator Astra said to herself, “Well, that’s been a nice time. Now forget it! Get some sleep, and tomorrow I’m going to work copying Dad’s article that I brought back with me.”

  In the morning she woke with a comfortable feeling that she had had a good time and had made a true friend, no matter how many mink coats there were to the contrary. She went down to breakfast, and while she was eating, decided that when she had done a good morning’s work, she would call up Mr. Lauderdale and get things fixed up for Tilly, then either today or tomorrow she would take a run out and set Tilly’s mind to rest.

  She stopped at the desk to see if there was any mail for her, and then remembered that the only address the Lesters’ knew was care of Mr. Sargent. So, if Marmaduke had written in a disagreeable strain, as undoubtedly he would do when he got around to it, it could not reach her until that Sargent secretary forwarded it to her.

  So she went to her room quite contentedly.

  She had brought her portable typewriter over with the papers from the Albans’ house, and she went quite happily to work, cleaning and oiling and putting it in first-class order. Then she went at the typing with zeal.

  As she read a few pages over, she could almost hear the dear, familiar voice of her dead father as he dictated them to her. Such a little time before, it seemed to her now. Being back in the home surroundings seemed to bring it so much nearer. All that long, monotonous, uncongenial time at the Lesters seemed to have vanished now, leaving little behind to remember. How surprised they would be if they knew she felt that way!

  At eleven o’clock she called up Mr. Lauderdale and told him what Tilly’s son-in-law was trying to put over on poor Tilly and received his assurance that nothing of the sort had been said by him, that the young man had done all the talking and made it very plain that Tilly wished to give up the house. He advised her that it would be a good thing if he could have a talk with Tilly. Could she get in touch with her and bring her to his office that afternoon?

  “Of course her son-in-law can’t do anything to harm her. I’ll call Mr. Boyd. He’s the head of that pension affair and fixed it up for her. We’ll get it all straightened out so she can have an easy Christmas. Now, how about that unpleasant cousin of yours? Have you heard from him again?”

  “Not yet,” said Astra, with a worried look in her eyes. “The wedding they went out to attend was Saturday night. They wouldn’t have had time to do much yet. Besides, your letter must have reached them about the time my letter did, and that may have stalled them off a bit. Though if I know Cousin Duke as well as I think I do, it may have only made him angrier. I wouldn’t be in the least surprised if he took the first plane he could get and came over here to force me back there!”

  “So! Well that’s bad! I’m sorry I arranged to go away. Of course, if he arrives before I leave, or you have word that he is coming, I’ll put off my departure. But if he should turn up after I’ve gone, you write me or call me up, and I’ll fly back at once. I’m not going to run any risk of your being harrassed!”

  “Oh, no indeed! You mustn’t think of doing that! I’ll manage. And besides, he doesn’t know where I am staying. He sent his telegram to Mr. Sargent’s office, and the secretary forwarded it to me.”

  “Oh, is that it? Well, leave it to me then. I’ll see that that secretary doesn’t give him your address. In fact, I think she told me she or her assistant is to be away after tomorrow till the end of the week. I’ll look after them, anyway. And it will probably take him a little time to find you. You might decide to spend Christmas with friends and not be immediately available. But be sure to keep me in touch with you at all times. Haven’t you a few friends upon whom you can call if you are in a trying situation?”

  Astra thought instantly of Cameron, but immediately put him out of her mind. She didn’t want to tell the story of how she came to know Camero
n, not just yet. It was all right, of course, but Mr. Lauderdale might not understand. Besides, Cameron was to be away over Christmas. Well, she wouldn’t need any help, of course. It wasn’t in the least likely that Miriam would let Duke run away until all her plans were carried out.

  “Why, yes,” she said after a second’s hesitation. “I have plenty of friends, only I didn’t want to let them know I was here until after the holidays. They would feel they must invite me, and I’m not ready yet to be invited. If it hadn’t been for my cousins’ absence, I wouldn’t have chosen just this time to come, but I thought it would be easier to run away when they were not there. Of course, though, if it came to an emergency, there are several people I can go to. But the Lesters wouldn’t be as bad as that. If they should come and insist that I go back with them, I would tell them I must stay till you get back to sign some papers, or something like that.”

  “You’re a smart girl. I believe you’d make a good lawyer. Well then, run along, child, and take things easy. I’ll see that you have all the addresses you need, and I’ll be right there at the end of the wire whenever you choose to call me. Now go and see what you can do with Tilly. The earlier this afternoon the better. That will help a lot.”

  So Astra went out to Willow Haven and dragged Tilly away from a washing she was doing at home for a woman in the village. She made Tilly leave her clothes soaking, promising to return soon so she could finish.

  Poor Tilly was greatly delighted to see her, for after Astra had left she had been regarding her visit in the light of a vision or dream that couldn’t possibly be true, and she had even gone on getting her things in order, with the probability in mind that she was going to have to leave her home and go into family servitude.