Chapter IX: Part 9

The white light faded, to be followed by dazzling green, ruby, and gold, as one bomb followed another, to burst above the lake and cast abroad in the heavens fountains of jewels that rained down in glittering showers.

"Now, let us see if Fate is good-natured," said Van Tassel, leading his companion toward the nearest gondola-landing. A graceful willow hung above and obscured it.

"I must laugh at you, Jack," said the girl, suiting the action to the word. "The idea of expecting to find a gondola now, way over here."

"Stranger things have happened. Suppose," suddenly standing still and looking down into her eyes,--"suppose you should say that you wish it. Just for luck, you know."

"I never wish for impossibilities."

"Do you expect me to believe that?"

"Well, I try not to."

"But wish for this. You know it is possible to have strawberries in January."

"What a great boy you are still, Jack. Very well, I wish that two gondoliers may have been attacked by an unusual access of laziness this evening, have denied their craft to all applicants, and skulked over here away from the crowd, and that they may be waiting for us now in the shadow of the willow. Any more midsummer madness you would like me to indulge in?"

Van Tassel led her down the bank. "Behold!" he said. "Mildred, what a witch you are! This is necromancy."

The girl stood with lips parted, for the waiting gondoliers sent their graceful craft to her feet. She put her hand in Jack's and stepped within. In a moment Van Tassel was beside her, and they had glided away.

The lagoon rippled in a light breeze. Along the edge of Wooded Island the sedges dipped in the waves. Here and there on the bank a group of water-birds showed white, as a neighboring electric light touched the soft plumage beneath which their heads nestled.

Jack wanted his companion to speak first, but she kept silence long.

"Is the sorceress enjoying herself?" he asked gently, at last.

Mildred returned his gaze as she leaned back in her cushioned corner.

"I am a philosopher," she answered. "I am being kidnapped, but I might as well enjoy it."

"Well, that is pretty good. I should say"--

"I don't want to hear anything you have to say. I am convinced that you are the most designing creature alive. Ask your minions to sing, please."

Jack longed that he might know the thoughts that flitted white-winged through his companion's mind as their boat glided on, to the gondoliers' song.

This ceased as they entered the Court of Honor, grown dusk now in preparation for the second playing of the electric fountains. Half the weary sightseers had gone home; no black crowd lined the railings around the Grand Basin.

The rainbow jets sprang triumphant skyward. An invisible orchestra lent their colors richer meaning and beauty.

"Do you remember the song that Clover sang last night?" asked Jack, leaning a little toward his companion. "It suddenly came to my mind then as the water shot up. Those lines,--

'I share the skylark's transport fine,
I know the fountain's wayward yearning,
I love--and the world is mine!'

Clover says that is a man's song. I don't agree with her. A woman may be angel enough to feel divine fullness of content simply in loving; but a man who loves must be loved again, or else feel that nothing is his,--nothing; there is no beggar so poor as he. Isn't it so?"

The earnest tone thrilled close to Mildred's cheek. She caught her breath quickly. "I--I don't know," she said, nervously surprised.

"Still true to your bringing up," remarked her companion, controlling himself with a strong will as he felt her shrink, and leaning back with a short laugh. "Not afraid to say you don't know, when such is the case. Well, I can only speak for myself. When I love and am loved I will agree with the poet,--I would even sing with her if I could:

'For soft the hours repeat one story,
Sings the sea one strain divine,
My clouds arise, all flushed with glory,
I love--and the world is mine!'"

Mildred was startled. What a lover Jack would make! He was not Clover's. She was sure of it now, but the thought brought no elation, rather a new, timid humility, which made her seem strange to herself.

She felt her companion's dark eyes upon her, and her usually ready tongue was mute.

Van Tassel did not know whether to gather courage or alarm from her silence as they sat there side by side. The gondoliers slowly propelled the boat, keeping in view of the fountains' tossing banners of liquid light.

"Tell me what you are thinking, Mildred," he urged, at last.

"I am not thinking. Do you ever come to such times? I do always in this spot. Perhaps it is because I have no thoughts to match such unearthly beauty. At all events I never think, here. I feel. I absorb."

"Yes, that is it," answered Jack simply.

"Give me the Peristyle," said Mildred, "and what I can see from it, and sweep all the rest of the Fair away if you like. I don't love many things in this world beside Mildred Bryant, but the Peristyle is one of them."

It was a novel speech from her, and in a novel tone. The low cadence of her voice had lost the laughter or imperiousness which usually characterized it.

Jack was silent for a time. "Are you warm enough?" he asked at last.

"Yes; but I think we had better go home."

"Aren't you comfortable?"

"Oh, certainly, and it was very kind of you, Jack, to take so much trouble."

This gentleness alarmed Van Tassel more than any amount of coldness or impertinence would have done; but he fought off dejection.

"I have given you one thing, then, that you can't hand on to Clover," he said lightly.

The fountains leaped a last time and fell, dropping lower and lower, till only the white sea foaming about Columbia's barge was left. Soft radiance again lit up water and sculpture.

Mildred longed to be at home; and soon she and Jack entered a wagonette at the Park gate and were driven to the house. When they arrived, the orchestra at the hotel was playing the music of Carmen.

"There is a delicate compliment to you, Jack," she suggested, as they ascended the steps.

"Yes; but must you go right in?" for she showed symptoms of leaving him.

"It has been a long day," she answered, lingering with an unusual gentle compliance from which he gathered no hope.

"You are tired," he said, with tender contrition. "I have had you so long, and yet--when should I be ready to let you go! Oh, Mildred,--is it any use?" he burst forth suddenly, in a low tone, seizing both her hands and holding them with painful tightness.

A fluttering and wild, loud peeping came from the tangle of vines near which they stood, and a small dark object half fell, half flew down past their heads to the grass below.

Mildred started. "It is Electra,--a falling star." She laughed nervously. "I am glad she fell, else I might be crying now instead of laughing. It would be such a serious unhappiness to me if I should cause you pain, Jack," she added brokenly. "You are so different from anybody else."

"I am answered," he said briefly and steadily; but he did not loosen her hands. "I am going to ask a great deal of you now, Mildred. Can you forget what I have said?"

"I--I am afraid not."

"Please try to; I will help you."

"Help me?" repeated the girl, bewildered.

"Yes, for everything between us shall be the same as before. To-morrow morning you will say to yourself that you had a dream. That is all."

"Very well." The girl regarded him questioningly. "I hope you are not--are not thinking that I might--might speak of it?"

Jack threw his head back and gave an excited laugh before suddenly growing grave and gazing ardently into her eyes.

"Speak of it? What would it be to me, my darling, if every one knew," he said with swift ardor. "I love--but the world is not mine. That is the whole story, and the only peace for you is to forget it."

Her head drooped under his look.

"I am dreadfully tired, Jack," she said faintly.

"Yes, dear, go, and forgive me." He kissed her hands passionately and released them. She passed into the house, her head and heart pulsing. Bewilderment was her chief sensation. The finality with which Jack seemed to accept defeat was so at variance with his manner.

She stole upstairs silently to her room, closed the door, and turned up the light. Then she went to her mirror and questioned her own pale face with wistful eyes.

"I haven't expected it. I didn't know it was coming this time," she said, answering some thought. "Is Jack really so unselfish as that? Can he care for me enough to--and then cover his disappointment with gayety to save me pain?"

His loving words rang in her ears, her hands still felt the wild pressure of his, and the warmth of his kisses. No one had ever received failure so before. No man had ever dared to call her "darling." A look that was almost fear came into the eyes that gazed back from the mirror. How had Jack contrived to make himself seem victor instead of vanquished?

He had not even pressed his suit; he had not begged her to try to love him. How nobly he had spared her,--but how audaciously he had treated her!

The color was flowing back to her cheeks. Mildred could no longer study that face in the glass. She turned away, weary, perplexed, troubled by the restless beating of her heart.

"I will get to sleep as quickly as possible. He told me to believe it a dream. I must try to take it all as Clover would."

The thought of her sister was like calling up the image of a saint. She had not been the object of Jack's adoration, after all. How strange, strange! How much better it would have been for him. Not that Clover would have married him, but it would have been good for him merely to love her. Fevers, perplexities, could not come where Clover was; and with this thought came a great longing to breathe Clover's cool, wholesome atmosphere. Mildred slipped into a wrapper, and without pausing to think further, crossed to her door. There was but a dim light within.

She spoke her sister's name very softly, not to wake her if possibly she might be asleep; but Clover herself in an instant opened the door.

"I thought I heard you come in, Milly."

"Why, what are you doing here, all dressed, in the dark?" asked the younger, entering.

"Thinking." Clover laughed. "It sounds amusing, doesn't it; but the music was pleasant and my window especially enticing. I felt rather tired when I reached home a little while before you, and meant to be asleep by this time, but here I am, you see."

"Let me come and think too," said Mildred; "or rather, let me come where I can't think."

The two sisters sat down in the large bay window overlooking the lake.

"Haven't you had a pleasant day?" asked Clover.

"I've had all sorts of a day. How has yours been?"

"Delightful."

"You are my despair, Clover. Things are always delightful to you."

Clover heard the depression in her sister's voice, and wondered; her thoughts flew to Jack too, and she questioned what mood the day might have left him in. "Oh no," she answered, "but those nut-brown maids in the Javanese theatre would put any one into good humor. When they dance, you can no more help laughing than if you were being tickled with a feather. Such dear, cunning, absurd motions as they make, their little bits of mouths looking so serious all the time."

"You take such an interest in everything," said Mildred wistfully. "It is because you have 'a heart at leisure from itself.' I have never longed for that sort of a heart as I have to-day. For quite a while it has been slowly dawning upon me that I am more self-centred than most people; but to-day Gorham Page gave me the final blow."

"Mr. Page? Why, you astonish me. He has a high opinion of you. He was saying to-day how much deeper and more earnest you were"--

"For mercy's sake," exclaimed Mildred, flushing to her ears, "don't tell me what he said!"

"Why? Are you too conscientious to accept a compliment when you haven't a 'trade'?"

"I have plenty of 'trades.' Jack never talks about you without using superlatives."

"Dear Jack. He is far too appreciative," returned Clover, wishing it were light enough to see how her sister accepted this; "but you haven't told me how Mr. Page hurt you."

"No, it was the truth that hurt me."

"Mr. Page is a very good representative of that," smiled Clover.

"We were coming out of Old Vienna, and you and Jack fell behind to speak to one another, and I addressed Mr. Page. He looked at me vaguely, and answered at random. Well, it was the way that trifle affected me that made me see Mildred Bryant as I had never seen her before. I was deeply offended, yes, angry, that the important favor of a remark from my lips should be disregarded. Oh, Clover, the disgrace of it!"

The speaker's voice was unsteady, and she suddenly covered her face with her hands.

Clover leaned forward and put a hand on her knee.

"Isn't it beautiful," she said earnestly, "to find yourself shrinking from sin? It is so safe to condemn it in ourselves. Hatred of evil is only treacherous when we feel it for the mistakes of others."

"The worst of it was that I knew I should have felt less injured had it not been that another woman was what was preoccupying his attention. He was thinking of you, and I resented it. I couldn't live if I didn't tell you. It proved to me that I was growing into a regular--oh, a regular octopus. Everything must be absorbed to feed my vanity, and especially every man."

"Why, Mildred, I am so glad for you," said Clover simply, her cool tones falling on the other's scornful heat and extinguishing its fire. "We have to come to these places, you know, for we mustn't be left in our badness, and a little light is let in at a time as we can bear it."

"But I can't bear it," exclaimed Mildred wildly, "for it is second nature to me to be vain and exacting."

"You won't indulge it now."

"Yes, I shall."

"Not so carelessly as before. All this is what comes into the battle of life. One part of our dual nature loves our evils and the other hates them. You can have God's help if you ask it, you know, and you will find how little and how deceptive the progress will be that you make without Him."

"Your battle seems won, Clover."

"I am in one of the peaceful places now, and I am very happy and grateful. I wasn't given your tempestuous nature, dear, so our experiences always are and will be different. The Father in mercy lets us develop as irresponsibly as the plants until we get such a glimpse into our souls as you had to-day; but then responsibility begins. It is sinning against light that warps and distorts us."

"I wonder if it would be good for me to be married," said Mildred musingly. "When girls are married, they haven't much time to think about themselves."

"It is good for every girl to marry when she truly loves a man who is unexceptionable," returned Clover, smiling at her own triteness. "But you remember the girl must ask herself, not Can I live with this man? but Can I live without him?"

"Then I should certainly never marry. You didn't do that, Clover."

Clover looked musingly out at the window. "No; I didn't do that. I often think of that little ignorant girl who married dear Mr. Van Tassel. I don't know whether I did right or not; but at the time I thought I did, and that is all I have any concern with; but I was not in freedom. You are in freedom. The Can I live without him? ought to mean Can we be more useful together than we could apart?"

"Why, you don't leave a girl any comfort in thinking about herself at all," complained Mildred, half in tears.

"There isn't much comfort in it, that is a fact," returned Clover, smiling. "You are tired, dear; go to bed now."

They rose, and Mildred took the smaller woman in her arms and their cheeks clung together. "I am unhappy, Clover," she said, with plaintive surprise at the fact.

"It is so restful," replied the other, "to think you have all eternity before you. Even if we only make a beginning here, it will be all right."

"I like your arms around me," said Mildred. "Let me sleep with you to-night."

*CHAPTER XXIII.*

*THE HOTEL DANCE.*

It was Gorham Page's habit to drop in at the Van Tassel house before making his nearly daily visit to the Fair.

One morning, as he ascended the steps, his sister met him. "I hoped you would come," she said. "I want to be condoled with. Robert's foot has descended. We are going home."

"Oh, I am sorry," replied Gorham, taking the chair she offered him; "but can't some arrangement be made?"

"No. Robert has said 'positively;' and when he says 'positively,' I never waste any more nervous force. Poor, dear boy, he wants to stay as badly as I do, but we have been here longer than we expected already, and after all I would rather go back than to give up the apartment and go to the poorhouse, which he says is the alternative."

"I must go to Boston before long," said Page. "Wouldn't you like to stay and go back with me?"

"Let Robert go home alone?"

"Yes."

"No, I thank you," with a firm shake of the head. "I shouldn't care for the Fair without Robert."

"That is nice," remarked Gorham, regarding her attentively. "I think I should like my wife to feel like that."

Hilda laughed. "Oh, that vague and shadowy wife of yours! Once I believed in her. Too bad that such a good-natured match-maker as I would have been should be burdened with such an impossible brother as you. I have lost all my interest in you, and have transferred it to Jack."

Gorham smiled pensively, and struck the palm of one of his hands with the knuckles of the other. "You think yourself very clever about Jack, don't you?"

"It goes without saying that I am clever, of course, but this occasion does not demand much insight. If they were a trifle more secret in their chats in corners and their exchange of masonic signals, I should think, perhaps, I was a treacherous guest to mention them; but they enjoy their little comedy, and are perfectly willing others should. I think it is unkind in them not to come out openly and allow me to give them my blessing before I go."

"I must say, Hilda, I don't enjoy hearing you use that tone about Mrs. Van Tassel."

"What is the matter with my tone?" asked Hilda.

"It is light," answered Page, with grave simplicity.

His sister stared a moment, then burst into laughter. "What crotchet have you taken now?" she asked. "Doesn't the match please you?"

"It is not a match. You are laboring under a false idea. If Mrs. Van Tassel should ever distinguish a man in the way you are speaking of, it will come to our knowledge in a different manner from the one you describe. We are talking in low tones in a corner now; but we are not sentimentally interested in one another."

"An unanswerable argument," said Hilda good-naturedly. "You needn't take the matter _au grand serieux_. I am profoundly grateful to Mrs. Van Tassel, and think her one of the most charming women I ever knew."

Page's countenance, which had been grave to sternness, relaxed until, slowly smiling, he looked into his companion's eyes and beamed mutely upon her.

Hilda noted the change with private astonishment, and determined to experiment.

"She is so refined," she added after a pause.

"The perfection of refinement," said Page.

"And very graceful."

Gorham nodded. "It is a pleasure to see her move, is it not?"

"She has plenty of spirit too, and wit."

"Yes, indeed. In whatever company she is, she makes her mark."

"And it is never a black and blue one either," responded Hilda, passing her handkerchief over her lips as she returned the rapt gaze of the earnest face drinking in her words. "There is so much in that. Her wit could never hurt. Her uniform, considerate kindness is her most prominent trait."

"Yes," responded Page, faithfully antiphonal. "Only a pure, true heart like hers could prompt such behavior."

"There is a subtle charm and stimulus in her society."

"And a restfulness, a satisfaction. It is hard to word it, but you have felt it; you recognize it. One can only say, it is good to be in her presence."

Hilda pushed back her chair so suddenly that her companion started. "Gorham Page," she said, gazing at him with sparkling eyes, and rising, "don't you see what has happened?"

"No," he answered, removing his fixed gaze and pushing aside the vines, the better to peer about.

"Not out there!" exclaimed his sister.

"Oh," he answered mildly. "I thought perhaps Blitzen had killed Electra."

Mrs. Page burst into laughter. Peal after peal broke from her, and she clasped her hand to her side.

Robert appeared on the scene.

"It is time you arrived," said Gorham, vaguely smiling. "I haven't the least idea what ails Hilda."

Mrs. Page dropped her head on her husband's shoulder.

"Gorham thought--thought that--that perhaps Blitzen--had killed Electra," she gasped.

"How intensely amusing," remarked Robert. "This girl is tired to death, Gorham," he went on, patting his wife's convulsed shoulder. "She thinks she doesn't want to go home, but I know it is time. Mrs. Van Tassel urges our remaining. What a spirit of sunshine she is! If ever there was an angel in a house, she is one."

Hilda lifted her head, to look at Gorham's face. She found it beaming upon his brother with tender delight, and falling back she relapsed into another spasm of laughter.

"Stop this, stop this," said her husband, giving her a little shake.

"I am really afraid Hilda isn't well," said Gorham with concern. "I am sorry if she is too tired, for I wanted to see if you all wouldn't like to come over to the dance at the hotel to-night."

"That is sensible, profoundly sensible," remarked his brother. "What could finish off a day at the Fair more appropriately than a dancing party!"

"You've got to go, Robert," said Hilda, wiping her eyes. "It will be lovely. We will smoke on the piazza, and watch the others through the windows."

"Yes, I know how you enjoy looking on at a dancing party."

"Yes, thank you, Gorham, we will come," continued Mrs. Page relentlessly. "I shall just go down to the Court of Honor for one last look," she added, sighing. "I will go up in that little balcony at the corner of the Electrical Building, and gaze once more down the stately, spacious square. I shall see the peacock-blue lake through the columns of the Peristyle, look up into the Italian sky roofing all, and say my prayers or sing the doxology; then I shall come home and pack. Oh, Robert, how can we leave it all!"

That evening Jack entered the parlor and found Clover leaning back in an armchair. He dropped into a seat beside her.

"You look fitter to adorn some marble shrine in the White City than to decorate a humdrum, mortal home," he remarked, regarding her thin gown approvingly.

"I believe I never saw you before in a dress-suit," she answered lazily. "You look very neat, my dear. That is what mother used to say to us to suppress our vanity, when we were in festive array. It is rather amusing to see Fair pilgrims in evening dress, isn't it?"

"Where is Mildred?" asked Van Tassel, looking about.

"She will be here directly. If my sister were entirely costumed at any appointed time, I should be anxious about her."

"I haven't had a chance to confess before," went on Jack, low and hastily. "I spoke to her too soon, after all. I need a keeper."

"Oh, Jack! I'm sorry."

Clover looked dismayed, and her tone was heart-felt.

"The milk is spilled, though; there is no going back. Didn't she tell you?"

"No, indeed. When did it happen?"

"The night we took the gondola ride."

"Days since, then. You are a wonder, Jack. Are you going to stay here and live it down?"

"I am going to stay here if you will let me."

"Let you? It is your home. Oh Jack, I am afraid of your tone. You haven't given up. I must tell you, though, that Mildred would be honest, uncompromisingly honest, in a serious matter like that. She is not a coquette."

"I know it."

"If she doesn't love you, you do not want her."

"I don't know whether she loves me or not, and I don't believe she knows any better."

As his handsome, frank eyes looked up at her, Clover's heart swelled with the approval and admiration she felt.

"We must relax to it," she said involuntarily.

"Or brace up to it," he replied, with his brilliant smile; "but it is too late now for the Petruchio act, Clover. I have literally and figuratively given myself away."

"Yes," said the other simply; "what you have to do now is to leave her in freedom. The Lord loves you both alike. If He does not give you Mildred, it will be because that marriage would stand in the way of your real advancement."

"Do you really believe that?" Van Tassel regarded her in curiosity and surprise.

"Why, Jack, think it out some time. How can it be any other way?" she answered, speaking hastily, for she heard a rustle on the stairs; and a moment after her voice ceased, Mildred came into the room.

She was dressed in a pale violet gown, which revealed her superb neck, and she pulled long gloves up over her bare arms as she came.

Jack sprang to his feet. How could she help liking the homage in his eyes?

"I know I haven't kept you waiting," she said brightly, "for Mrs. Page's light is still burning, and of course it will take her some little time to wake up Mr. Page."

Hilda's feet, in their little black satin slippers, came flying down the stairs as she spoke.

"Is Robert in a hammock?" she exclaimed apprehensively. "I meant to stick them both full of pins, but I haven't had time. That poor dear man has done a lot to-day, in spite of all my warnings. I expect he will sleep from here to Boston, when we get started. You two girls look perfectly lovely. I shall wake him up with that information."

As they were all finally setting out, Gorham Page came up the walk.

"I thought I would wander down and make sure of you," he said to Clover, as he turned back beside her.

"You were sure of us," she returned. "I have not danced for five years. It seems to me I should never have thought of it again but for your invitation."

"You do not care for the amusement, then?"

"Clover Bryant used to care greatly," she said, smiling; "but perhaps Mrs. Van Tassel has forgotten how to dance."

They found the long, spacious piazza of the hotel gay with promenaders.

Robert Page groaned. "How marvelous is the endurance of man and woman kind," he remarked. "How many of these people do you suppose have been doing the Fair to-day?"

"You mustn't talk about the Fair," returned his wife. "It is fortunate for you that the diversion came up, else I should have spent this evening weeping because I have said good-by."

"Have you come over here with the notion that I am going to dance?" asked Page mildly.

"No, I haven't the least idea you will. I wouldn't ask it, since you were foolish enough to tramp miles to-day."

"How could I help that, my dear, with the awful 'last chance' sensation hanging over me?"

The orchestra in the hotel parlor began to play. Jack Van Tassel came up to where the husband and wife were sitting.

"Are you going to dance, Hilda?"

"Apparently not," she answered gayly.

"Give me this, won't you?"

"Oh, you don't need to. Why, where are Mildred and Clover?"

"They are sitting over yonder. They have many friends here. It seems to me this is rather a peculiar way for you to treat my invitation."

"No, Jack," said Page, with a heart-rending sigh. "The old man will have to dance once. 'Let it be soon,' as the song says. Come, my love, weary and footsore, let us tread the dreamy maze together."

"Robert really wants to dance," said Hilda to Van Tassel confidentially. "The music inspires him. I haven't the heart to refuse. Thank you. Perhaps later we can have a turn."

"Now, wasn't that sweet of Jack and exactly like him?" asked Hilda, when they had drifted in among the floating couples. "He was afraid you were going to be immovable; and the very first dance, when of course you would suppose he would ask Mildred"--

"Or Mrs. Van Tassel, according to your theories."

"My dear, I am shaken on my theories. I may have been wrong. I hope I have been. What do you think, Robert?"

"I can't tell any of my thoughts while I am dancing, Hilda. Don't ask it. If you do, I shall probably step on your foot. I have the greatest sympathy with the man who, when his partner insisted on talking to him in a round dance, replied as follows: Yes, two, three; one, no, three; one, two, yes; and so forth."

"What a goose you are, dear; but you dance as well as you ever did, if you have forgotten how to say sweet nothings during a waltz."

"Pray remember how much more breath I used to have. The spirit is willing still, but the flesh is too many for me."

"There go Gorham and Clover," said Mrs. Page with some excitement, pausing in the dance, and taking her husband's willing arm. "Robert, I want you to watch Gorham to-night," she added impressively.

"More mysteries?" returned Page plaintively. "I don't see anything out of the way about him. He is rather stunning in a dress-suit."

"I wonder if Clover thinks so," responded Hilda significantly.

"Oh, you are only marrying him again," remarked her husband, with an air of enlightenment. "If all your plans succeeded, I don't know what would become of Gorham. He couldn't even take refuge in Utah, for I understand the Mormons are discouraging plural marriages."

"You can chaff, Robert; but mark my words, some day you will look back to this evening and exclaim over my cleverness. I haven't told you all I know. I have proofs, if I chose to"--

"Yes, my dear, your fate is the common one of those who cry 'Wolf' too often. I've heard your proofs before." Then squeezing his wife's hand against his side, he added, "There isn't another Hilda for poor Gorham, so how can I take a breathless interest in his prospects?"

Mrs. Page was mollified, of course; but she shrugged her shoulder. "I don't understand how you can see those four people together and not weave romances. Now, for instance, I am burning to know why Mildred and Jack are not dancing this first dance together, instead of with Lieutenant Eames and his cousin. I dare say poor Jack lost his chance by coming to take care of me."

But Hilda was wrong. A little circle of friends had gathered about Clover and Mildred as soon as they appeared on the hotel piazza, and Mildred saw at once in Jack's quiet withdrawal that he did not intend to ask any favor for himself. She liked this in theory, but it half-vexed her to find herself alertly cognizant of his every movement even while she chatted and laughed with her other friends. She saw him approach Hilda, and wondered if he were asking her to dance; then, when the latter moved away into the hotel with her husband, Mildred talked volubly to Eames in order to prevent his having an opportunity to offer himself for her partner. These dances were informal. There were no printed programmes. She wished to give Jack time to return to their group and claim her before the lieutenant should.

How exasperatingly deliberate his motions seemed to her, as he sauntered along!

"I can easily believe what you say, Mr. Eames," she said glibly. "The papers print a great many of the amusing blunders that are made, and I am sure they are not exaggerated, by my own experience. There were two women standing near me in front of the Manufactures Building the other day, and one said to the other: 'Oh, look at that big statute of Liberty; do you suppose it's solid gold?' 'No!' replied the other scornfully, 'it's holler. If that was solid gold it would be worth ten thousand dollars.' Then this sophisticated one turned to me. 'Can you tell me where the Court of Honor is? Is it in the Administration Building?' I answered that this was the Court of Honor, and I suppose I gestured generally, for she looked down at the Basin and then at me with a pitying smile. 'Oh no,' she said, 'that is the lagoon.'"

Why _would_ Jack stop to look in at the window? How slow he was! "Oh yes, and, Mr. Eames, was there any truth in that story I read about the battle-ship? Somebody says, you know, that although it looks so solid and impressive, an angry man could do it considerable damage with a crowbar, and I read lately about some country people who were visiting it. While they were exploring, the ship's bells rang, and coincidently the whistle of a neighboring tug began to blow. The story said those poor people thought the boat was going to start and rushed for the gang-plank, panic-stricken. One man fell into the water, and a woman broke her ankle. It ought not to be amusing, but it is."

"Ha, ha," responded Eames, "there is a grain of truth in it;" (Jack was drawing near) "the rest is the reporter's imagination. I can tell you what was the foundation of that yarn." (Jack approached and stood near the speaker.) "Won't you dance this with me, Miss Bryant, and I will initiate you into some of the methods of newspaper men as discovered by the officer-of-the-day at Jackson Park."

They moved away, and Helen Eames, who had audaciously escaped a would-be partner in the hope of this very event, fell to Jack's lot.

She was a vivacious, jolly girl, and a man was not obliged to talk much while with her, so Van Tassel yielded to her determination to detain him at her side as long as was feasible.

Mildred, promenading with her partner on the piazza after the dance, passed them sitting near the water where one could see, down the curve of the lake, the fireworks of the White City bursting in starry brilliance. Far out upon Michigan's breast shone a row of steady lights, beside which, as on a liquid boulevard, the illuminated passenger-boats plied up and down.

Van Tassel was playing with his companion's fan, and laughing as though he were well entertained, at the moment Mildred passed by.

The sight did not please her.

"It is all my monumental vanity," she thought. "I am glad Jack isn't one of the sort of men who stand around in corners and watch one tragically."

She had danced several times when Clover, left near her by Gorham Page while he went to bring her a glass of water, addressed her.

"You haven't danced with Jack once," she said, with hasty reproach.

"Haven't I?" Mildred raised her eyebrows.

"But aren't you going to, dear?"

"Not unless he asks me, darling."

Clover stared, then turned away to smile. She had not often seen Mildred in such an ill-humor.

"Poor, dear, unconscious Petruchio," she reflected. "I wonder if he is building better than he knows."

Here Page returned with the water, and she could say no more, even if she wished. Moreover, Gorham now addressed Mildred, to claim the dance for which the strains of the Washington Post March were already sounding assertively.

Jack had this two-step with Hilda, and when it was over he brought her to a seat near those which Mildred and Gorham had taken on the piazza.

"Mildred," remarked Hilda, "this young man does know how to dance."

Van Tassel bowed until the parting in his hair was visible.

"That is nice," returned Miss Bryant languidly.

"The fireworks are over," continued Hilda. "That awful word 'nevermore' is hanging over everything for me to-night. I meant to be out here to see the last piece, but I wasn't,--that superb volcano, or mine, or whatever name they try to describe it by. I want you all to think of me with compassion every time you see it hereafter. Where do you suppose Robert is?"

"Perhaps I ought to know," suggested Gorham. "I will hunt him up if you will allow me, Miss Mildred."

"I'll go with you," said Mrs. Page. "It is rather cool here to sit still after dancing. You will excuse me, Jack? I think I ought to let poor Robert off now, and take him home."

It was the first time Mildred and Jack had been alone together since the memorable evening.

"May I have the next dance?" asked Van Tassel abruptly.

"If you like," answered the girl carelessly. "Haven't you had enough dancing?"

"I haven't had any," he answered briefly; and Mildred told herself that the demon of her vanity had received what it craved, so warm a sensation of satisfaction stole around her heart.

"I thought I would make myself safe before one of your other friends espied you here; but if you are tired"--

"I am never tired--physically," said the girl, with a slow smile.

"I was only going to say that I would be content to sit out the next with you; although we have not danced together since that night in the boathouse." Jack smiled. "Do you remember what you told me?"

"Oh yes. You made that child very happy. She owes you a dance."

"These surroundings are strange. Have you been thinking of it?"

"Yes. Only last year this ground was a tangle of goldenrod and willow-trees. How many times we have gone bathing on that beach! It was as good a playground for jolly youngsters as could be imagined; and now"--

She paused.

"Now, the music has commenced," suggested Jack, rising. "In consideration of the manner in which I have effaced myself so far, you should allow our dance to begin promptly."

They entered the parlor by the door which leads from the east piazza. She put her hand in his, and they glided away over the polished floor among the pillars with their vine-like wreaths of electric lights.

Amid the scattering groups which, outside, watched the dancers through the windows, was one spectator who was seeing a conventional dancing party for the first time in her life. It had suddenly occurred to Robert Page that it would be worth the exertion of going after Aunt Love to see her view this pretty scene; and when Hilda and Gorham reached the front entrance of the hotel in their search for Robert, they found him ascending the steps with Miss Berry.

"The young ladies did ask me if I didn't want to come over, and I thought I should feel out o' place," she said; "but Mr. Page, he just made me, so here I am."

"Now, come to this window," said Robert, "and tell me what you think of that."

The others clustered around Miss Lovina, as she murmured and exclaimed in her surprise.

"I never approved o' dancin'," she said. "I never saw any before. Mr. Gorham, do you remember that hall in the New York Buildin'? That must be temptin' to young critters when it's lighted up, and the music's a-playin'. Why," eagerly, "see Miss Mildred and Mr. Jack. My, don't they go pretty! And there's Mrs. Van Tassel herself and some feller. Why," turning suddenly upon Gorham, "why ain't you in there dancin' with her?"

"I have danced with her twice," he answered. "I mustn't be a monopolist, although it is a temptation. She is by far the best dancer here."

Upon this Hilda pressed her small satin shoe against her husband's foot, and he obtusely moved it out of her way.

"Well, I declare," exclaimed Miss Berry, gazing in ever-warming admiration, "if it ain't enough to make a body want to be young and pretty. To think this is the real, wicked thing itself, and I ain't shocked. What's the matter with me, Mr. Gorham?"

"Considering your prejudices and traditions, it is a little odd. Perhaps it is because you cannot associate an idea of evil with anything you see Mrs. Van Tassel engaging in."

Here Mrs. Page again endeavored to gain her lord's sympathy, with the result that he ejaculated: "Where would you like to have me put my feet, Hilda?"

"Why don't you go in there and dance, Mr. Gorham?" pursued Miss Berry.

"Am I so young and pretty that you want to see me? Well, if Hilda is willing to favor me."

"Oh certainly, so long as Robert doesn't care to go home. _Au revoir_, dears."

"Now, then," Aunt Love turned upon her companion argumentatively, "are you perfectly willin' a man should put his arm around your wife's waist?"

"On the contrary, I should object seriously."

"How about that, then?" Miss Berry gestured toward the hall.

"For a man to place his hand on a woman's waist to steady and support her is not to put his arm around her. There are too many other things for a couple to think of in guiding themselves successfully through a crowd of dancers to allow of their usually being conscious of the intimacy of their position. Don't be afraid to admire the dancing, Aunt Love. It can be abused, like everything else; but it is an excellent exercise, inculcating grace, strength, and good manners."

"Well, now, I'm goin' to tell some folks I know what you say. Ain't your wife just as light as a fairy, and don't your brother look handsome to-night? No, sir, there ain't any folks here as good-lookin' as ours."

When the waltz was finished, Gorham Page and Hilda approached Clover and told her that Aunt Love was without. She excused herself from her partner to go with them, and soon afterward Gorham walked home with her.

"Thank you so much for coming," he said, when he was bidding her good-night.

"I am sure we have all to thank you," she answered. "Isn't it hard to be reconciled to letting your brother and Hilda go? We have been such a pleasant party."

"Yes," returned Page, looking down at her as she stood in her white wrap, an unconsciously adoring expression in his eyes; "this summer is an experience that one could wish would never end. Going away," he smiled vaguely, "leaving you, having these weeks come to an end, is almost as difficult to grasp in prospect as the thought of death."

Clover laughed softly. "We won't borrow trouble," she said. "Good-night."

*CHAPTER XXIV.*

*DRESS PARADE.*

"Do you think Jack enjoyed himself?" asked Clover, when her sister crossed the hall to her room that night for the usual last word before retiring.

"I suppose he did. How anxious you are about Jack all the time! You make an absolute fetish of him. It used to mislead me."

"Did it?" Clover smiled, and turned back to her dressing-table.

"Yes, indeed, and no wonder. It is a good thing, however, that I was mistaken, else I'm sure there would have been coffee and pistols ordered for two. I want your opinion, Clover, on a delicate question. Supposing a man of some strength of character spends a whole evening at a dance following about after a woman, smiling pensively at her face, or the back of her head, or her shoulder, or whatever of her he can get to smile at, and finding spots of vantage from which he can behold her dance when he is not dancing with her himself. Supposing he flies about to bring her glasses of water, and wraps, and fans, and performs all the other offices which are usually the privilege of her partners, driving said partners to the last pitch of exasperation. What, I ask you, is the matter with that man?"

Clover turned her tender glance upon her sister, marveling that the spirit of mischief could be so rampant in her eyes.

"Dear," she said reproachfully, "that man is very deeply in love."

"That is what I supposed myself," replied Mildred demurely; "but I wanted to be sure I didn't exaggerate."

"Too seriously so for you to make merry over it," continued Clover, shaking her head.

"Well, if you aren't a pair of you!" exclaimed Mildred, bursting into laughter, which she endeavored to repress out of consideration of the lateness of the hour. Then she seized her sister's astonished face between her hands and kissed her repeatedly. "I suppose there isn't another man in the world beside Jack Van Tassel, is there? How glad I am, I am not attached to him; I should be wildly jealous."

"Oh--let me go, Mildred. I didn't know you meant--I didn't know that any one noticed"-- Clover was as red as her namesake, and looking everywhere except at her sister.

"Noticed! Why, my dear, he was a perfect spectacle. I fancy everybody in the room noticed except himself. He doesn't know what is the matter with him, either. He asked me once, when we were out on the piazza, if there wasn't some malaria here. He isn't able to sleep of late, and his appetite isn't right." Mildred went off into a peal of laughter.

"Hush. Do please hush, Milly," implored poor crimson Clover in an agony. "Supposing Hilda should hear you and come in. She will. Oh, _please_."

"He said he thought he should take--oh dear, I'm hurting myself--he thought he should take quinine!" Mildred wiped her eyes; "and I said--I was of the opinion--oh my! that something sweet would help him more; extract of Clover, perhaps."

"Mildred, tell me instantly you didn't say that!"

"Well, not quite so much as that; but he tempted me dreadfully."

"Go to bed, Milly. Go to bed straight off. It is late."

"All right; but isn't it funny?" pleadingly.

"No. I do not think it funny at all."

"Oh, you must; that big, absent man, vainly mooning around among his data"--

"Well, if you will only go away; perhaps--it's a little-- There, I have turned the gas out. You will have to go."

"I am about to set up a Gorham to match your Jack," said Mildred irrepressibly. "I am going to see that you treat the poor man right, and help him diagnose his symptoms. I am going to give you reproachful glances and him tender ones. I shall have to tell him they're tender, though"-- But here Clover succeeded in pushing her over the threshold and closing the door upon her.

The following day Mr. and Mrs. Page took their departure, the latter more reluctant than ever to leave so many objects of interest.

"Ain't it lonely without 'em?" said Aunt Love that night to Clover, after dinner. "I don't know but you'll want to ask Mr. Gorham over here to help fill up the gap," she suggested rather timidly.

"No, I think we won't disturb his arrangements," replied Clover quietly. "I suppose he can't stay here very much longer any way."

Miss Berry went to the back door to give Blitzen and Electra their supper, and arbitrate between them while they ate it.

"She won't ask him over. H'm!" she soliloquized, arranging two dishes of scraps, while the two pets barked and chirped expectantly. Then she seated herself on a step to watch their proceedings.

"That looks like it," she continued in her own thoughts. "Well, if this is what he's been waitin' for, thirty odd years, I don't feel to blame him. Now you get back, Electry. Blitzen ain't a-goin' to stand everything. Sometimes it does seem's if you had the most cheek of any critter in feathers. Well, look at that now!" for Blitzen, exasperated at a raid upon his plate, jumped at the chicken, who quick as thought hopped on his back, and clung to her perch by means of claw and wing while the terrier raced in a mad circle.

Aunt Love's hearty laugh rang out as she watched Blitzen's fruitless efforts to disembarrass himself. At last he lay down and rolled over, and Electra, squawking excitedly, ran back to her plate.

She was not pursued. The terrier ever afterward regarded her as something uncanny, and so far as possible refrained from acknowledging her existence.

An event of general interest during the Fair summer was the visit to the Exposition of the West Point cadets. Cro' Nest itself is scarcely more immovable from its position among the Highlands of the Hudson than these pets of Uncle Sam; but it is a matter of history that they and their paraphernalia were transferred to the Philadelphia Centennial, and now again with much form and ceremony their camp was set up in the green plain adjoining the Government Building on the shore of Lake Michigan. They arrived one dazzling afternoon, which began serenely calm, but toward evening gave the guests a northeast wind which sent white-capped waves rushing landward, and shook the tents in the new company-streets.

Starting from the Terminal Station, the young soldiers marched through the streets of the White City, preceded by their famous band, and as they proceeded looked neither to the right nor the left at the widely noised marvels surrounding them, but kept eyes front as though still treading their own quiet, elm-lined avenues, while the waiting crowds cheered and cheered again the elegant precision of their movements.

In an hour, gray-coated sentinels were again walking post in this new Camp Sheridan, alertly conscious of their routine business, and apparently without a thought of the surroundings beyond the camp.

Mildred Bryant felt considerable interest in the cadets, and assumed much more. "Helen Eames says that no matter how good a time a girl may have, she can never have as good a one as if she had spent a summer at West Point," she announced to Van Tassel one day, on the occasion of their being together. She felt that he made these occasions rare, and at times the fact touched her. At others she said to herself, "He is getting over it."

"Then why don't you go there?" asked Jack. "I don't know who has a better right to the flowers of life."

"I did think of getting Clover to take me next summer, but now, wonder of wonders, the mountain has come to Mahomet. Don't you want to go down to parade to-night?"

"Yes; I don't know just how to make you comfortable, though. The mob is something marvelous. I looked over their heads a minute last night, but being in the sixth or seventh row, concluded the game wasn't worth the candle."

"Ah, that is where the convenience comes in of having a military friend," returned Mildred gayly. "We shall not need to mingle with the _hoi polloi_. Won't you come too, Clover?" as her sister entered the room.

"Where?"

"To see dress parade this evening."

"Yes, I am going. Mr. Page has already asked me."

"I don't believe you had better try to get along without me. Jack and I are going to meet Mr. Eames on the steps of the Army Hospital at a quarter before six. There is a great crowd."

"Thank you. Perhaps we will be there. Did you hear Aunt Love's comment last night? She said that in the afternoon she ran into an impassable throng near the Administration Plaza, and after vainly trying a long time to get through, she finally found the attraction was only a lot of schoolboys drilling. If those important young heroes could have heard her scornful tone!"

When Clover had left the room, Jack spoke again. "Since you have an appointment with Eames, I withdraw, Mildred. I don't see why you asked me."

"He said I might bring my friends," she replied. "Do come, Jack."

Van Tassel looked straight into her eyes, and smiled with an expression which seemed to the girl both brave and hopeless.

"Won't you?" she persisted.

"Of course," he answered.