Amory grew pink, remembering her long walk and the precious dollar she had saved, and conscious, too, of her dusty slippers. But she must not tell the servant that she had walked. She must remember her two principles. And of course she should have known that this was no way to arrive at a place like this—on foot and carrying her own suitcase! However, she would probably learn.
“They are sending my trunk from the station soon,” she said, walking toward the window and trying to look unflustered. And then, catching sight of the view from the window, she forgot her resolve about gushing and burst forth again with a soft exclamation.
“Oh, isn’t it lovely from the window!” she said, as if the maid were another girl like herself. “I shall just drink in all this beauty!”
“Yes, it’s a lovely place,” said the girl, as if such things mattered little to her. “Would you like me to unpack your suitcase for you? Madam said I was to help you in any way you needed.”
Amory turned and flashed another smile at her.
“Oh, no, please,” she said, with an inward gasp at the idea of this prim maid going over all her intimate little possessions and pitiful makeshifts. “I’ve nothing else to do, you know, and I’ll enjoy getting settled.”
“Very well,” said the colorless voice. “Then I’ll go down. It’s time to serve tea, and they’ll be wanting me. I’ll bring your tea up here.”
“Oh!” said Amory, quite wondering at the idea, for tea wasn’t served as a rule in Rayport unless one was giving an affair. But she realized that she was hungry, and tea would be very refreshing.
“But do you need to bother coming up? Couldn’t I just slip down and get it myself, if you would show me the way about?”
“It’s no trouble,” said the maid, and Amory couldn’t be sure whether there was a note of scorn in her voice for one who had offered to serve herself, or whether it was gratitude.
“I’ll show you about later, if you like,” added the maid, and going out, closed the door.
Suddenly Amory felt tremendously alone, shut in by walls so thick that no sound penetrated, surrounded by a loveliness that was so foreign to all that she had known before that it made her throat ache to look at it. She felt as if she had stolen, unaware to the owners, into a spot that was too great for her small powers. She ought to go down and find them, somewhere, somehow, and tell them that she was only a bluff and that she would never be able to fill any kind of a position in such a great house as this.
But here she was, and bidden to keep out of the way till the morrow. There was nothing to do but put her things neatly away and bide her time until summoned to her employer.
She went about the room examining every article and making soft little gleeful noises of pleasure over things. This room was no servants’ quarters. It had evidently been one of the regular guest rooms, for everything in it was beautiful.
She went into the rose-draped bedroom and looked around in delight. She flung open a door that she thought must be a closet and a light sprang forth, revealing a room as large as Aunt Hannah’s bedroom in Rayport. Rods and hangers and shelves! Shoe trees and hat trees galore! Surely the maid had made a dreadful mistake and put her in the wrong room. Perhaps she ought to do something about it.
She hung up her small dark hat on a hand-painted dolly. She hung up her limp little georgette coat in which she had journeyed on a pink satin hanger finished in rosebuds. Then she went into the spacious white bathroom finished in rose and black borders, and washed her face and hands with a cake of soap that she had seen much advertised in the magazines but had never hoped to use because of its price. If this room was a mistake, at least she would have these few minutes of fun, playing it belonged to her.
When she had made her hair smooth and tidy and had hung up one or two things out of her suitcase that she was afraid might wrinkle, she went and sat down by the window in her green sitting room.
“This is my dressing room!” she said to herself, looking around with shining eyes. “What fun I’ll have writing to Aunt Hannah and Aunt Jocelyn about it!”
Then her eyes sought the lovely distance.
And all at once she saw something like a bird, or perhaps it was only a large insect sailing across the sky. Of course it was an airplane, but what fun to watch it from such a high place! She never had been where she could watch one so well. They were always high up overhead when they went over Rayport.
The insect became a bird, and the bird a great airplane at last, flashing its silver wings in the sunlight. She knelt by the windowsill and looked up at it. It seemed to be coming straight toward the house, and she could hear the throb of the engine now. Was that the flier looking down? It thrilled her to think she was so near to the great machine and to the man who dared to navigate the skies.
Then down below she heard voices, laughing, and a group of young people suddenly appeared on the terrace in light lovely dresses, sport frocks, and uniforms, things she had read about. They were looking up and calling, waving their hands. One girl took the long coral scarf from her head and waved it.
“That’s Teddy!” they called. “There he is! I knew he’d be on time!”
A white paper fluttered down as the plane circled away, and the girls ran screaming and laughing to catch it.
“It’s mine!” they called.
“No! It’s mine!”
“Better give it to Diana!” someone said, laughing. “She claims all that flies as her own!”
Amory drew back into the shadow of the curtain lest she be seen by the crowd below, but her eyes were on the great plane that was circling lower and lower now, and she realized with another thrill that it was going to land right there, and she was going to be able to see it.
The airstrip was not a quarter of a mile away, just beyond the garden, and the hedge was low there. Amory was far above the ground and felt that she had a front seat at the most exciting moment of her life.
Like a great silver moth it settled down, ran smoothly for a little space, and came to rest. She watched it in wonder, and presently a figure disengaged itself from the body of the machine and after walking about the creature and examining it here and there, started toward the garden gate.
As he came nearer, Amory could see that he wore an aviator’s uniform and that he had a handsome face, tanned to a lovely golden brown.
Striding through the garden gate as the group of young people ran laughing to meet him, he pulled off his helmet and swung it in his hand. Amory saw that he had golden brown hair, crisp and curly and short cut, and a strong, well-chiseled chin and nose. His eyes were very blue, and he raised them suddenly to her window, while the group of giddy girls below caught him and pulled him and pretended to try to kiss him. They were laughing eyes, and they looked straight into Amory’s with a laughing, astonished question in their blue depths.
“What does he see? What is he looking at?” cried the struggling girls as he warded them off, and they all looked up at Amory’s window, but Amory was not there. She had dropped suddenly to her knees, with her burning cheeks hidden in her hands.
Just then there came a knock at the door!
Chapter 2
It was only the maid with a tray, but Amory was trembling as if she were about to be brought to trial in a court of law. What on earth was the matter with her, she wondered, acting silly like this! Just because she had been caught looking out the window. She had a right to look out the window, didn’t she, even if she was only a hired servant?
She scrambled to her feet and met the question in the maid’s eye.
“I was watching an airplane land,” she explained confusedly.
“Oh, that’s Mr. Theodore,” explained the maid. “He’s just back from his Canada hop. They said he was coming, but his aunt didn’t seem to expect him very much. Now he’s come, things will happen fast. He keeps things always on the go.”
“Oh,” said Amory, striving for some of her vanished dignity. “Does he live here? It must be exciting to know someone who flies.??
?
“Well, no, he doesn’t live here, but he comes often. His aunt always sends for him whenever she has a house party. But since he’s been flying, she can’t always get him. That’s why she let them make an airstrip over there on her property, so he could come just any time and not have to travel far after he landed. Do you like your tea strong, Miss Lorrimer? And will you have cream or lemon?”
“Oh, lemon, please,” said Amory, “but don’t trouble about me. I’ll look after myself. I’m used to doing it.”
“You’re very kind,” said the maid, “but I have my orders, of course. The cook sent you a bit of salad and a chicken sandwich. She thought you might be hungry after your journey, and dinner’s not till half past eight.”
“Oh, that was kind,” said Amory. “Thank her for me, please. And I hope I can do something for both of you sometime.”
The maid melted a little from her settled apathy. “You can call me Christine,” she volunteered, “and I’ll be back later for the tray.”
The tray proved to be most tempting. Delicate little chicken sandwiches, a delectable salad of which Amory had difficulty in identifying the ingredients, fragrant tea, cinnamon toast, and delightful little delicate cakes.
She settled down in an unobtrusive chair, quite out of range from any curious eyes below, and arranged the curtain so that she could watch the pretty panorama and bright costumes on the terrace and listen to the cheerful banter as it rose to her window while she ate.
Several young men had appeared below, and there was a subdued clatter of tea things as the well-trained servants moved about serving everybody. Amory could see Christine waiting with her serving tray, and that would likely be Mrs. Whitney in the violet frock pouring the tea. Amory felt she was wearing far too startling makeup to be pleasant, for the contrast of her whitened skin, carmine lips, and dead black, severely cut hair did not make a pleasing ensemble. Yet she could see that there was a certain style and character about her that made her attractive. She noticed that all listened when she spoke, as if they liked her and wanted to please her.
The Whitney girls were probably those two with dark hair and blue eyes. They looked like their mother, and presently she heard someone say, “Caroline Whitney, where on earth have you been all afternoon? You don’t mean you went off and played tennis again with that kid brother of yours! I say, that isn’t fair. None of the rest of us are practicing for the tournament.”
“Oh,” said the girl called Caroline, “you all have the same opportunity to practice. There are plenty of courts, and Ned will play with anybody that asks him at any hour of the day.”
“I’ll say he will,” said the other dark-haired girl. “He’s nagged me all day long, but I couldn’t see it. It was too hot.”
So, she had identified three of the household. Now who was the striking girl with the gold hair? Beautiful, even in spite of the dangling earrings and the too-high color, which to Amory seemed in bad taste. Wait! Wasn’t she the one who had caught the fluttering paper from the airplane as if it were her right? She must be Diana, then.
And now came the young aviator, with marvelous promptness, considering that he seemed to have changed his garments and looked as fresh as if he had not just arrived from a long flight.
It was interesting to watch them as they sat chattering and sipping their tea, calling little nothings back and forth to one another, gossiping about others who were to arrive that evening or on the morrow. Amory, from her sheltered chair behind the curtain, could see them all quite well and hear what they were saying. She hoped it wasn’t eavesdropping, this watching in on a group of beings who were as much out of her world as a bird is out of a human’s. It was just as well, she thought, for her to get a line on the people she was to be among. It would help her to adjust her life to her surroundings more quickly.
She sat there after she had finished her tray and put it aside, trying to think how it would seem if she were one of the guests in that house, instead of a paid secretary. How would she feel if she were sitting, for instance, down in that great chair with the high fan-shaped back, where the golden Diana sat, and the young aviator near with his teacup in his hand looking down and smiling at her? Would she be able to hold her own in a group of young people like that? It was not her world, but could she make a good showing in it if she had to, or would she be shy and awkward and be thinking of herself all the time?
But what a silly idea. It was not her world, and why should she imagine such things?
She was half impatiently turning away from the window when Mrs. Whitney spoke, and she lingered to listen to the pleasant, cultured voice, curious to know just what her employer would be like.
“I have just had a most annoying letter from Mr. Whitney’s nephew,” she said in a voice touched just the least shade with plaintiveness, as if appealing to her young guests to somehow make right whatever was troubling her. “He writes that he is coming to visit us if we will have him, and of course Mr. Whitney will think he’ll have to be made welcome. The worst of it is, Mr. Whitney adores him. He’s the son of his youngest sister who died years ago, and he idealized her. I shall have to have him, there are no two ways about it.”
Groans ensued from the two young Whitney girls. “What a plague!” said Caroline, tossing her curly black mane.
“It’s perfectly poisonous!” said Doris. “I mean to reason with Dad about it.”
“Well, it won’t do a particle of good!” said the mother sweetly. “Besides, he’s on the way. He’ll be here tomorrow morning, more is the pity, and your father won’t be home till tomorrow night. If I should tell him we had no room for his only nephew, he would never forgive me.”
“What’s the matter with him? Why worry so much? Isn’t he young?” called out a young woman who was stretched out, with a good length of silk stocking in evidence, on a long steamer chair. “Let him come! We can get away with several more men in the crowd and not know it.”
“Oh, but Susanne, he’s quite impossible!” said the hostess wearily. “He’s religious, you know, and he won’t be in the least congenial. In fact, he’s a regular preacher, has taken some kind of orders, you know. Besides all that, he has some awfully strange ideas. Thinks the end of the world is coming soon or something like that. Oh, he’s quite impossible! And to have him arrive just at this time, too, when I wanted everything to be perfect!”
“Holy cats!” exclaimed an impudent, pink-cheeked girl whose body resembled an animated pole. “I should say! Mother Whitney, what’ll you give us if we get rid of him without bothering Papa Whitney at all? I’ll bet we could do it. Leave it to us, and we’ll send him flying, without letting him know what it’s all about.”
“That’s an idea!” said one of the young men. “Send him flying! Get Teddy to carry him off and lose him, somewhere so far away he can’t get back till the party’s over.”
“Oh, but Mr. Whitney would never forgive Ted if he did that. Besides, I doubt if John would go. He’s quite too devoted to his work to take a day off for anything he considers worldly. I don’t know how he is now, but he was bad enough as a child. He’s bound to be worse from all I’ve heard.”
“Well, it will be dead easy to get rid of him,” declared Susanne. “We’ll just whoop it up and make it too hot for him to stay! He’ll pick up his belongings and run, if he’s that kind. I personally will see to that.”
“But Susanne, dear,” pleaded the hostess, “I couldn’t really let you do that, for the man will simply have to stay until his engagement to preach is over. It seems he’s supplying the village church for three weeks, and Mr. Whitney will insist on our being courteous to him. I’m not sure but he will think we ought to even go to church to hear him.”
Groans ensued from the entire party, and then Diana spoke up.
“What’s the use in making such a fuss about something we can’t help? Leave him to me! I’ll make him forget he’s ever seen a pulpit! Let’s make the best of it and get a good time out of it. What do you say to my getting the po
or sap to fall for me and reducing him to common sense? I think it would be rather fun myself. I’m tired to death of all the old excitements and would just enjoy a new thrill.”
“Mercy, Diana, he wouldn’t look at you, with all that makeup on you!” declared his cousin Caroline with a sneer. “Why, he’d simply run from the sight of those worldly earrings, and you’d have to let down your skirts and wear stockings! I’m sure if he would ever see you in your new bathing suit, he’d faint completely away, and you wouldn’t have a chance with him unless you cut all cocktails and stopped smoking!”
“It couldn’t be done!” chanted Doris. “Even Diana couldn’t do that!”
“Oh, yes, I could, if I chose,” said Diana lazily, looking up at the clouds. “I’m not sure but I’d enjoy it. I could get converted, you know. It would be a new line. Naive, you know. I could telephone in town for some simple white frocks. If I couldn’t get rid of him, I could at least keep him busy so he wouldn’t bother the rest of you.”
“Oh, but really, Diana, I couldn’t let a guest sacrifice herself to that extent. I really couldn’t,” protested the hostess.
“But it wouldn’t be a sacrifice,” said Diana, showing her pretty white teeth in a fiendish little grin. “I tell you, it would be a new thrill, and I’ll do it so perfectly that Papa Whitney will never suspect.”
“But Diana, I wouldn’t like to have you carry it too far! You know Mr. Whitney was very fond of his youngest sister—and the young man is really a fine fellow, only he just doesn’t fit here—”
“I understand, Mama Whitney, and I won’t be anything but a means of grace to the dear fellow—isn’t that what you call it? I’ll just let him see how much he’s missing, being like that. That’s all.”
Mrs. Whitney smiled indulgently at the pretty girl and shook her head reprovingly.