Chapter III: An Invitation and a Warning

Mabin’s sprained ankle was a more serious affair than she had supposed. For a month she never left the house, and for another she went out in a wheel-chair, or hopped about on a pair of crutches.

And during all that time she caught no glimpse of the pretty neighbor who had done her such eminent service at the time of the accident. In vain she had hung about the road outside “The Towers” looking up at the west side of the house, which was built into the wall alongside the road, trying to distinguish the fair, blue-eyed face at one of the windows which peeped sombrely out of the ivy.

Dreary the place looked, Mabin thought, as she pondered over the mystery surrounding the lady in black. The lowest window visible from the road was about three feet above the girl’s head; and all she could see was a pair of crimson moreen curtains, which, she thought, harmonized ill with what she had seen of the tenant of the gloomy house. The house had long been “To let, Furnished.” But why had not dainty Mrs. Dale improved away those curtains?

Mabin did not usually trouble her head about such trifles as furniture; but she had enshrouded the figure of the pretty widow in romance; and she felt that her fairy queen was not living up to her proper standard in contenting herself with crimson moreen.

“What are you looking at so intently?”

Mabin, who, leaning on her crutches, was gazing up at that mysteriously interesting window, started violently as she saw a white hand, glistening with diamonds, thrust suddenly out through the ivy in the midst of a space which she had taken for blank wall.

And, parting the close-growing branches, Mrs. Dale peeped out, pink and fair and smiling, from a window at the same level as the one Mabin had been watching, but so thickly covered with ivy that the girl had not suspected its existence.

“I--I was looking for you. I was hoping to see you,” stammered Mabin.

“And now that you have seen me, won’t you please condescend to see a little more of me?” asked Mrs. Dale. “I won’t eat you up if you come into my den. Look, here is another inhabitant whom I have entrapped. But there are strawberries enough for three.”

Mabin hesitated; not from any scruples about the propriety of visiting the lady about whom so much gossip was talked, certainly, but because she was shy, and because the thought of a meeting and a talk with her ideal heroine and a stranger seemed rather formidable.

But Mrs. Dale would not allow her time to refuse.

“I will send the other inhabitant down to let you in,” said she.

And the ivy closed again, and Mabin could hear the lady’s voice giving some directions to some person within. She moved mechanically, on her crutches, toward the high closed gates. And by the time she reached them they were opening, and Rudolph was holding them back for her.

The girl could not repress a slight exclamation of astonishment. Rudolph reddened.

“You are surprised to see me,” said he, rather bashfully. “I hope you won’t refuse to come in because I am here? I will go away rather than that.”

Mabin hesitated. She was not very worldly-wise, but it seemed to her that there was something rather strange about his presence in the house where the rest of the Vicar’s family were not allowed to enter. And at the same moment she remembered Mrs. Dale’s apparent horror at the idea of the young fellow’s admiration for her.

Rudolph’s color deepened still more.

“Why are you always so rude to me, Mabin, or I suppose I ought to say--Miss Rose?” asked he quickly. “Doesn’t it seem rather unfair, when you come to think of it? We were great chums once, you know? Weren’t we?”

“When we were children, yes,” replied Mabin stiffly.

“And why not now?”

The blood rushed to the girl’s forehead.

“How can you ask?” she said, indignantly. “When I owe my lameness to you?”

Rudolph stared at her, as if uncertain whether he heard aright.

“To me?”

“Why, yes. Surely you don’t pretend it was not you who threw the stone which knocked my bicycle over?”

The stiff haughtiness with which she said this melted suddenly into apologetic alarm when she saw by the change to fierce indignation in Rudolph that she had made another, and most absurd blunder. At first he could only stare at her in speechless anger and amazement.

“Do you take me for a street-urchin?” he asked at last.

Mabin recovered herself a little, and refused to be withered up. “Your brothers do it,” she said below her breath.

“Then I’ll give the little beggars a good hiding the first time I catch them at it,” said Rudolph sharply. “But I should have thought you could distinguish the difference between a man and a schoolboy, and not have visited their sins upon me.”

Mabin felt miserable. She blushed, she stammered when she tried to speak; and the tears came into her eyes.

“I--I’m sorry!” she said in a constrained voice. “I--I see, I might have known. But you know--you were rude to me--that very day--when I saw you at Seagate!”

“Ah! I remember! I asked you to have a cigarette. It was injudicious, not rude. You should have made a distinction again.”

There was an awkward silence. Rudolph was still resentful; but when he saw the downcast eyes, and the tears which were beginning to fringe the long black lashes, he found himself softening. And, putting her hand too hastily into her pocket for the handkerchief to wipe away her tears, Mabin dropped one of her crutches.

“Let me help you along,” said he in a gentle voice, as he picked up the fallen crutch. “I don’t like to see a girl using those things.”

And, without waiting for her permission, he thrust the crutch under one arm, and insisted on supporting the unwilling girl with the other. And as they crossed the broad gravelled space to the portico, in the shade of the trees, Mabin felt a curious sensation of peace and of pleasure, and suddenly looked up at her companion with a frank smile.

“I’m very glad we’re friends again,” said she.

And he, smiling too, but with a little more malice, a little more guile, than she, answered readily:

“Why, so am I. But I must remind you that it is your fault, not mine, that we have ever been anything else.”

Mabin hung her head, feeling rather guilty, but with yet more enjoyment of the present reconciliation than remorse for the past estrangement. Instead of taking her straight in, Rudolph led her across the gravel to a flower-border, where, in a little open patch of sunlight, a rosebush grew. It was a “Mrs. John Lang,” and the huge pink blossoms were in their full beauty and fragrance.

“I’ve brought you here,” he said didactically, “to read you a moral lesson. Here we have a rose, full of beauty and sweetness to every one, but without any thorns. While _some_ Roses I know----”

“Are all thorns to everybody, and are without any beauty,” finished Mabin for him, laughing, “and without any sweetness.”

“No, no, not at all. But they seldom let you come near enough to admire the beauty, and they are rather chary of their sweetness. Now I hope you’ll profit by this lesson.”

“To be sure I--shan’t!” replied Mabin with a rather doleful smile. “I do try to be less--less objectionable--sometimes,” she added with seriousness which made Rudolph smile. “But it doesn’t seem to be very successful. I think I’m going to give up the effort and accept the fate of ‘an awful example’ as serenely as I can.”

Rudolph tried not to let his smile grow too broad for politeness.

“You are an odd girl,” he said at last. “Or is it another insult to tell you so?”

Mabin shook her head.

“If it’s an insult,” answered she, “it is one that I’m used to.”

“One is almost as much afraid of saying anything complimentary to you as of giving you what you call insults,” he began cautiously. “Otherwise I would tell you that I like ‘odd’ people, people who don’t always say and do the right thing, that is.”

“Then you ought to appreciate me,” retorted Mabin quickly. “For everybody says I always do and say the _wrong_ thing!”

“I do appreciate you.”

Mabin laughed and blushed.

“I only said that in fun,” she said awkwardly.

“Well, I said what I did in earnest.”

“Mrs. Dale will be wondering what has become of us,” said Mabin.

She was not at all anxious to go in; but the pleasure she felt in this talk with Rudolph had grown rather alarming to her reserve. She began to fear that she would spoil it all by one of her far-famed blunders of speech. And so she chose to cut short the enjoyment while it could remain a recollection of unalloyed delight.

Rudolph, on his side, was in no hurry to go in; although he took a step obediently toward the portico.

From a feeling of perversity which she could not have accounted for, Mabin chose to talk about Mrs. Dale as they went slowly toward the house.

“I have been longing to see her ever since my accident,” she said. “But although I have been always hovering about the place, wishing she would come out, to-day is the very first time I have caught sight of her.”

“That is exactly my own experience,” said Rudolph. “She seems to have given up driving about the place, and to have shut herself up in this dreary old house just like a nun.”

“Oh!” said Mabin, feeling quite relieved to hear that he had not, as she had supposed, been in the society of the beautiful widow constantly since the day of the accident.

“Yes,” he went on. “I was passing by only half an hour ago, when I glanced up at the windows, and Mrs. Dale stopped me to ask if I had heard how you were. And then she asked me in, saying she felt lonely. And so should I, so would any one, in that mouldy old house all alone.”

“Poor lady! I am so sorry for her!” said Mabin.

Rudolph looked at her quickly.

“Do you feel like that about her too?” said he earnestly. “All the other people one meets are either jealous of her beauty, or envious of her handsome turnout, or angry with her for not wanting to make their acquaintance.”

“I am very sorry for her,” answered the girl gravely. “I feel certain that she has had some very great sorrow--”

“Why, yes, her husband’s death,” suggested Rudolph.

“Oh, yes, that of course,” assented Mabin, surprised to find that the universal doubts whether Mrs. Dale really was a widow had infected her also. “But something even more than that, I should think. I have an idea that there is something tragic in her story, if one only knew it.”

Rudolph said nothing to this, but he looked at his companion with a quick glance of surprise, as if he himself shared her opinion, and was astonished to find it echoed.

They were under the portico now, and as their footsteps sounded on the stone, they saw through the open door into the dark hall and heard Mrs. Dale’s soft voice calling to them.

“It takes ever so much longer to get a thing done than to do it one’s self!” she exclaimed brightly, with a sigh, as she came out of the room on the left, and invited them to go in. “I could have brought Miss Rose in in half the time, even if she had fought to get away. Did she fight?” went on Mrs. Dale with arch innocence.

They were in the room by this time, and Mabin, coming in out of the glare of the sun, stood for a few seconds without seeing anything. Then her hands were gently taken, and she found herself pushed into a low chair.

“Bring her some strawberries, Mr. Bonnington,” said Mrs. Dale. “By the by, I may as well remark that I don’t intend to call you Mr. Bonnington very long. I shall drop into plain ‘Rudolph’ very soon, if only to give a fresh shock to the neighborhood, to whom I am Shocker in ordinary.”

“The sooner the better. I can’t understand anybody’s being Mr. Bonnington but my father. Now he looks equal to the dignity, while I don’t. I always feel that there is a syllable too many for me, and that people despise me in consequence.”

Mabin, who had recovered the use of her eyes, felt rather envious. The quick give and take of light talk like this was so different from the solemn conversations carried on at home, where her father laid down the law and everybody else agreed with him, that she felt this levity, while pleasant and amusing, to be something which would have caused the good folk at home to look askance.

“And how have you been, child, since that unhappy day when I saw you last?”

And Mrs. Dale came to the next chair, and piled sugar on the strawberries.

“Oh, I’ve been getting on all right, but it is tiresome not to be able to walk without those things. And it has made me in everybody’s way,” sighed Mabin.

“How is that?”

“Papa could have let the house to go abroad, as he wanted to, when the accident happened. Only I couldn’t well be moved then. And now that I could go, he has lost the house he had heard of at Geneva, and one which he could have now is too small for us. So that I feel I am in the way again.”

“Do you mean,” asked Mrs. Dale quite eagerly, “that they could go if only they could dispose of you?”

“Yes. There is one room short.”

Little Mrs. Dale sprang up, and the color in her cheeks grew pinker.

“Do you think,” she asked, after a moment’s pause, “that your parents would allow you to stay with me? If you would come?” she finished with a plaintive note of entreaty on the last words.

“Oh, I am sure they would, and I am sure I would!” cried Mabin, with undisguised delight.

And then quite suddenly the face of the black-robed lady grew ashy gray, and she sank down into her chair trembling from head to foot.

“No. I--I mustn’t ask you,” she said hoarsely.

And there was a silence, during which both her young hearers cast down their eyes, feeling that they dared not look at her. It was Mabin who spoke first. Putting her hand between the two white hands of Mrs. Dale, she said gently:

“Is it because you are lonely you want me to come?”

She did venture to look up then, startled by the shiver which convulsed Mrs. Dale as she spoke. And in the blue eyes she saw a look of terror which she never forgot.

“Lonely! Oh, child, you will never know how lonely!” burst from her pale lips.

“Then I will come,” said Mabin. “I should like to come.”

There was another silence. Mrs. Dale had evidently to put strong constraint upon herself to check an outburst of emotional gratitude. Rudolph, moved himself by the little scene, was looking out of the window. The lady in black presently spoke again, very gravely:

“I don’t think you will be very much bored, dear, and you will be doing a great kindness to a fellow-creature. And yet--I hardly like--I don’t feel that I ought----”

“But I feel that I must and shall,” said Mabin brightly. “You don’t know how beautiful it would be for me to feel that at last, for a little while, I shouldn’t be in the way!”

And the overgrown girl, who was snubbed at home, had tears in her eyes at the remembrance of the kind touch which she had felt on the day of her accident. Mrs. Dale was too much moved to say much more, but it was agreed between the ladies that the suggestion should be formally made by the tenant of “The Towers” to the heads of the household at “Stone House” without delay, that Mabin should stay with her new friend during the absence abroad of the rest of the Rose family.

Mabin did notice, while they talked, that Rudolph remained not only silent but somewhat constrained; but it was not until she took her leave of Mrs. Dale, and he followed her out, that the young girl attached any importance to his reserve.

Once out of hearing of Mrs. Dale, who stood on the stone steps to bid them good-by, Rudolph asked her abruptly:

“Do you think they’ll let you come?”

“Oh, yes, they’ll only be too glad to get rid of me. Why do you ask in that tone?”

“Well, there is something I think I ought to tell you, if you are thinking of staying with Mrs. Dale.”

“Well, what is it?”

“It is that she is being watched.”

“Watched!”

“Yes, by a stranger, a man whom I have never seen in the place before. He hovers about this place, keeping out of range of possible eyes in the house, at all hours of the day and even of the night.”

“But how do you know this?”

The words slipped out of her mouth, and it was not until she saw Rudolph redden that she saw that she was too inquisitive.

“I am sure of what I say, anyhow,” said he quietly.

Mabin looked thoughtful.

“I don’t care!” she said at last.

“I thought you wouldn’t.”

“And I shan’t tell anybody anything about it.”

“I was sure you wouldn’t.”

“But I shall tell Mrs. Dale.”

Rudolph stopped and looked at her.

“I think you had better not do that,” he said.

“But why should a person watch her, except with the intention of trying to do her some harm?”

“Well, I don’t know. But I think if you do tell her, knowing how highly nervous she is, you will do her more harm than ever the mysterious watcher would. Perhaps you would even drive her out of the place, in which case most assuredly the watcher would go after her, while if we keep her here perhaps we may manage to draw his fangs.”

Mabin felt frightened. Then, being a matter-of-fact girl, she got the better of this feeling quickly, and looked up keenly at her companion.

“What do you exactly mean by that?” she asked.

“Only that I will get hold of the man quietly and find out what his little game is. Though I can guess.”

“Well, you can tell me what your guess is?”

“Why, debt, of course. One can see she is inclined to be extravagant, and very likely she has run up bills somewhere. Don’t you think that seems likely?”

His tone was rather anxious, Mabin thought. But she answered indignantly:

“No, I don’t. It would be very dishonorable to run away without paying one’s debts, and I don’t think you much of a friend to poor Mrs. Dale to suggest such a thing!”

Rudolph looked not guilty, but grave.

“Well” said he, “people don’t hang about a place, at the risk of getting taken up ‘on suspicion of loitering, for the purpose of committing a felony,’ without some reason.”

“Why,” cried Mabin triumphantly, “that _is_ the reason! Mrs. Dale has some lovely diamond rings, and the loitering gentleman wants to steal them!”

“Well, perhaps you are right,” said Rudolph doubtfully.

“I am sure of it!” retorted Mabin resolutely. And she held out her hand. “Good-by, and thank you for your help.”

“And you will remember my parable about the Roses?” said he, as he took her hand and thought he liked gray eyes after all better than blue ones.

“Perhaps,” said Mabin cautiously, as she hopped away on her crutches.