CHAPTER XV
I MAKE AN ENGAGEMENT
The south-bound train had not arrived and as Iturned away the station-agent again changed its timeon the bulletin board. It was now due in ten minutes.A few students had boarded the Chicago train, but agreater number still waited on the farther platform.The girl in gray was surrounded by half a dozen students,all talking animatedly. As I walked toward themI could not justify my stupidity in mistaking a grownwoman for a school-girl of fifteen or sixteen; but it wasthe tam-o’-shanter, the short skirt, the youthful joy inthe outdoor world that had disguised her as effectuallyas Rosalind to the eyes of Orlando in the forest of Arden.She was probably a teacher,—quite likely theteacher of music, I argued, who had amused herselfat my expense.
It had seemed the easiest thing in the world to approachher with an apology or a farewell, but those fewinches added to her skirt and that pretty gray toquesubstituted for the tam-o’-shanter set up a barrier thatdid not yield at all as I drew nearer. At the last moment,as I crossed the track and stepped upon the otherplatform, it occurred to me that while I might havesome claim upon the attention of Olivia Gladys Armstrong,a wayward school-girl of athletic tastes, I hadnone whatever upon a person whom it was proper toaddress as Miss Armstrong,—who was, I felt sure, quitecapable of snubbing me if snubbing fell in with hermood.
She glanced toward me and bowed instantly. Heryoung companions withdrew to a conservative distance;and I will say this for the St. Agatha girls: their mannersare beyond criticism, and an affable discretion isone of their most admirable traits.
“I didn’t know they ever grew up so fast,—in a dayand a night!”
I was glad I remembered the number of beads in herchain; the item seemed at once to become important.
“It’s the air, I suppose. It’s praised by excellentcritics, as you may learn from the catalogue.”
“But you are going to an ampler ether, a diviner air.You have attained the beatific state and at once takeflight. If they confer perfection like an academic degreeat St. Agatha’s, then—”
I had never felt so stupidly helpless in my life.There were a thousand things I wished to say to her;there were countless questions I wished to ask; but hercalmness and poise were disconcerting. She had not,apparently, the slightest curiosity about me; and therewas no reason why she should have—I knew that wellenough! Her eyes met mine easily; their azure depthspuzzled me. She was almost, but not quite, some one Ihad seen before, and it was not my woodland Olivia.Her eyes, the soft curve of her cheek, the light inher hair,—but the memory of another time, anotherplace, another girl, lured only to baffle me.
She laughed,—a little murmuring laugh.
“I’ll never tell if you won’t,” she said.
“But I don’t see how that helps me with you?”
“It certainly does not! That is a much more seriousmatter, Mr. Glenarm.”
“And the worst of it is that I haven’t a single thingto say for myself. It wasn’t the not knowing that wasso utterly stupid—”
“Certainly not! It was talking that ridiculous twaddle.It was trying to flirt with a silly school-girl. Whatwill do for fifteen is somewhat vacuous for—”
She paused abruptly, colored and laughed.
“I am twenty-seven!”
“And I am just the usual age,” she said.
“Ages don’t count, but time is important. There aremany things I wish you’d tell me,—you who hold thekey of the gate of mystery.”
“Then you’ll have to pick the lock!”
She laughed lightly. The somber Sisters patrollingthe platform with their charges heeded us little.
“I had no idea you knew Arthur Pickering—whenyou were just Olivia in the tam-o’-shanter.”
“Maybe you think he wouldn’t have cared for myacquaintance—as Olivia in the tam-o’-shanter. Menare very queer!”
“But Arthur Pickering is an old friend of mine.”
“So he told me.”
“We were neighbors in our youth.”
“I believe I have heard him mention it.”
“And we did our prep school together, and thenparted!”
“You tell exactly the same story, so it must be true.He went to college and you went to Tech.”
“And you knew him—?” I began, my curiosity thoroughlyaroused.
“Not at college, any more than I knew you at Tech.”
“The train’s coming,” I said earnestly, “and I wishyou would tell me—when I shall see you again!”
“Before we part for ever?” There was a mischievoushint of the Olivia in short skirts in her tone.
“Please don’t suggest it! Our times have beenstrange and few. There was that first night, when youcalled to me from the lake.”
“How impertinent! How dare you—remember that?”
“And there was that other encounter at the chapelporch. Neither you nor I had the slightest businessthere. I admit my own culpability.”
She colored again.
“But you spoke as though you understood what youmust have heard there. It is important for me to know.I have a right to know just what you meant by thatwarning.”
Real distress showed in her face for an instant. Theagent and his helpers rushed the last baggage down theplatform, and the rails hummed their warning of theapproaching train.
“I was eavesdropping on my own account,” she saidhurriedly and with a note of finality. “I was there byintention, and”—there was another hint of the tam-o’-shanterin the mirth that seemed to bubble for a momentin her throat—“it’s too bad you didn’t see me, forI had on my prettiest gown, and the fog wasn’t good forit. But you know as much of what was said there as Ido. You are a man, and I have heard that you have hadsome experience in taking care of yourself, Mr. Glenarm.”
“To be sure; but there are times—”
“Yes, there are times when the odds seem ratherheavy. I have noticed that myself.”
She smiled, but for an instant the sad look came intoher eyes,—a look that vaguely but insistently suggestedanother time and place.
“I want you to come back,” I said boldly, for thetrain was very near, and I felt that the eyes of the Sisterswere upon us. “You can not go away where I shallnot find you!”
I did not know who this girl was, her home, or herrelation to the school, but I knew that her life andmine had touched strangely; that her eyes were blue,and that her voice had called to me twice through thedark, in mockery once and in warning another time,and that the sense of having known her before, of havinglooked into her eyes, haunted me. The youth inher was so luring; she was at once so frank and soguarded,—breeding and the taste and training of anampler world than that of Annandale were so evidencedin the witchery of her voice, in the grace and ease thatmarked her every motion, in the soft gray tone of hat,dress and gloves, that a new mood, a new hope andfaith sang in my pulses. There, on that platform, I feltagain the sweet heartache I had known as a boy, whenspring first warmed the Vermont hillsides and themountains sent the last snows singing in joy of theirrelease down through the brook-beds and into the wakenedheart of youth.
She met my eyes steadily.
“If I thought there was the slightest chance of myever seeing you again I shouldn’t be talking to youhere. But I thought, I thought it would be good funto see how you really talked to a grown-up. So I amrisking the displeasure of these good Sisters just to testyour conversational powers, Mr. Glenarm. You see howperfectly frank I am.”
“But you forget that I can follow you; I don’t intendto sit down in this hole and dream about you. Youcan’t go anywhere but I shall follow and find you.”
“That is finely spoken, Squire Glenarm! But I imagineyou are hardly likely to go far from Glenarmvery soon. It isn’t, of course, any of my affair; and yetI don’t hesitate to say that I feel perfectly safe frompursuit!”—and she laughed her little low laugh thatwas delicious in its mockery.
I felt the blood mounting to my cheek. She knew,then, that I was virtually
a prisoner at Glenarm, andfor once in my life, at least, I was ashamed of my follythat had caused my grandfather to hold and check mefrom the grave, as he had never been able to control mein his life. The whole countryside knew why I was atGlenarm, and that did not matter; but my heart rebelledat the thought that this girl knew and mocked me withher knowledge.
“I shall see you Christmas Eve,” I said, “whereveryou may be.”
“In three days? Then you will come to my ChristmasEve party. I shall be delighted to see you,—andflattered! Just think of throwing away a fortune tosatisfy one’s curiosity! I’m surprised at you, but gratified,on the whole, Mr. Glenarm!”
“I shall give more than a fortune, I shall give thehonor I have pledged to my grandfather’s memory tohear your voice again.”
“That is a great deal,—for so small a voice; butmoney, fortune! A man will risk his honor readilyenough, but his fortune is a more serious matter. I’msorry we shall not meet again. It would be pleasant todiscuss the subject further. It interests me particularly.”
“In three days I shall see you,” I said.
She was instantly grave.
“No! Please do not try. It would be a great mistake.And, anyhow, you can hardly come to my partywithout being invited.”
“That matter is closed. Wherever you are on ChristmasEve I shall find you,” I said, and felt my heartleap, knowing that I meant what I said.
“Good-by,” she said, turning away. “I’m sorry Ishan’t ever chase rabbits at Glenarm any more.”
“Or paddle a canoe, or play wonderful celestial musicon the organ.”
“Or be an eavesdropper or hear pleasant words fromthe master of Glenarm—”
“But I don’t know where you are going—you haven’ttold me anything—you are slipping out into theworld—”
She did not hear or would not answer. She turnedaway, and was at once surrounded by a laughing throngthat crowded about the train. Two brown-robed Sistersstood like sentinels, one at either side, as she steppedinto the car. I was conscious of a feeling that from thedepths of their hoods they regarded me with un-Christiandisdain. Through the windows I could see thestudents fluttering to seats, and the girl in gray seemedto be marshaling them. The gray hat appeared at awindow for an instant, and a smiling face gladdened, Iam sure, the guardians of the peace at St. Agatha’s, forwhom it was intended.
The last trunk crashed into the baggage car, everywindow framed for a moment a girl’s face, and thetrain was gone.