Chapter XV: The Drive

At precisely four o’clock Jeff drove the hotel carriage up to the door with a flourish and a feint as if it were hard to hold the horses, who looked like anything but runaways and would have dropped their heads if they had not been checked so high. Jeff had spent two hours in scrubbing the carriage, polishing the harness and rubbing down the horses. His divinity, Miss Alice, was going to drive, and there was nothing too good for her. Helen had not impressed him as favorably as her cousin. “She don’t look as real as my girl,” he had thought when he first saw her, and he never had cause to change his opinion. At intervals Uncle Zach had superintended the washing and polishing and rubbing of the turnout which he said couldn’t be beaten outside of Worcester, and he waited with a good deal of pride for the effect it would have upon the young ladies.

Alice was the first to appear, looking very cool and fresh and pretty in her dark blue serge made over from a last year’s dress, and adapted as nearly as possible to the prevailing style. She was a natural dressmaker and had given her costume a few touches of her own ideas. Like Uncle Zach Jeff thought her a daisy, and although Craig and Mark were both there, the former fastening his gloves and the latter holding the reins by the horses’ heads, he gallantly helped her to the back seat and smoothed down her dress with the air of a much older person. Then they waited five minutes and ten minutes until the young men began to get impatient. They did not know that Helen was seldom on time. She had taken her after dinner nap and bath and had dawdled in her dressing, notwithstanding Celine’s efforts to hurry her. When at last she did appear she was like a picture stepping out of a fashion plate. Her tailor made dress and jacket were without a flaw in style and fit, her gloves harmonized perfectly with her dress, and the soft light veil twisted around her sailor hat and tied in a big bow under her chin was very becoming. In the morning she had worn Mark’s rose; this afternoon she had a great clump of the _fleurs-de-lis_, Craig’s color, fastened to her dress.

“Have I kept you waiting long? I am very sorry,” she said, with such an air of penitence that both Craig and Mark forgave her, assuring her that it was of no consequence. “Alice, I know, thinks me delinquent,” she said. “She is always on time; always doing the right thing.”

“That’s so,” came from Jeff, who emphasized his words with a sudden whopover on the grass.

They all laughed, Helen the most of all.

“You see you have an admiring champion,” she said to Alice; then to Mark, “You are to drive, I conclude.”

“Yes, I go in the capacity of driver and guide, as I know all the points of interest,” he replied, and Helen continued, “I suppose you and Mr. Mason should sit on the front seat, and Alice and I on the back, but I want to drive part of the time, and if you do not mind I will sit with you.”

“I shall be delighted,” Mark said, and in his delight he dropped the reins and almost lifted Helen to her place in front.

“Take care there! take care!” Uncle Zach exclaimed, hopping about like a grasshopper and seizing one of the horses by the bit. “You didn’t or’to be so rash droppin’ them lines. There’s no knowin’ what the horses will take it into their heads to do. Virginny is frothin’ at her mouth now. She’ll be pawin’ next.”

“I think it’s the high check. It makes her neck ache. Won’t you please lower it?” Alice said.

She was a lover of animals of all kinds and could not bear to see them needlessly pained. The high checks were Jeff’s idea, but if Alice wanted them lowered they should be, and he at once let them out, evidently to the satisfaction of the horses, who shook their heads as if relieved from some disagreeable restraint. Mrs. Tracy, who had slept longer than usual, now came down the walk, with a frown on her face as she saw where her daughter was sitting.

“Helen,” she said, “Won’t you be more comfortable with Alice? You will get all the wind and sun and dust where you are, and burn your face. Mr. Mason will change with you.”

“I don’t want him to change. I like where I am. There isn’t any wind, and I neither freckle nor burn; besides that I am going to drive,” Helen replied.

There was no use arguing with her, and Mrs. Tracy could only look her disapproval, while Uncle Zach, still hopping about and very proud for this fine equipage to be seen before his door by the passers by, said in some alarm, “Better not let her drive till the horses have had some of the wind taken out of their sails. They’ve et two quarts of oats extra, and may take it into their heads to run away and upset the kerridge.”

“Oh, please go on, or we shall not get started till dark,” Helen said, and with a chirrup to the horses the carriage started, Uncle Zach taking off his hat to it, and Jeff indulging in two or three summersaults as it went rapidly up the street and past the houses from which many eyes looked curiously at the young ladies of whom every one had heard, although they had not been twenty-four hours in town.

When the carriage disappeared Mrs. Tracy, who evidently had something on her mind, followed Uncle Zacheus into the office and said in her most insinuating, amiable voice, “Dear Mr. Taylor, I don’t want to be troublesome, but would you mind opening the safe for me? I mean would you mind showing me how to open it; then when I feel nervous about the diamonds I can see for myself that they are there, and need not trouble any one. I could ask your hired man to show me if he would, but I’d rather you should do it.”

“My hired man! Great guns! How does Joel Otis know anything about the safe?” Uncle Zach exclaimed, thinking of his man of all work.

Mrs. Tracy saw her mistake and hastened to explain: “I mean your clerk, Mr. what’s his name? He is hired, isn’t he?”

“Why, yes; and I pay him a good round sum. He’s worth it, too, and runs everything. I never think of callin’ him my hired man, and I dunno’s he’d like me to show you how to open the safe.”

“Surely you are the master here, aren’t you?” Mrs. Tracy asked, in a tone which at once piqued the man’s pride.

“Of course I am. This is my house. What did you say you wanted?”

“I want to know how to unlock the safe, so I can see my diamonds whenever I choose,” Mrs. Tracy replied.

Uncle Zach thought a minute, standing first on one foot, then on the other, and rubbing his bald head and wishing Dot were there. But Dot was at a neighbor’s, gossiping about her city boarders and their elegant clothes, even their night dresses trimmed with real Valenciennes and nothing but silk stockings for every day. Dot could not help him. He must act alone, and it would not do to disoblige Mrs. Tracy, so he finally said, “Wall, seein’ it’s you, I don’t care if I do, though I mistrust Mark won’t like it.”

“I don’t see what business it is of Mark’s. The safe is yours,” Mrs. Tracy replied.

“That’s so,” Uncle Zach rejoined, and in a minute he was explaining to the lady the intricacies of the lock.

“The word is ‘_John_,’” he said. “That’s our little boy who died and is down in the cemetry. For J you give four turns _so_; for O three turns _so_; for H two turns _so_; for N a final jerk, and here you be. No you ain’t neither! What ails the pesky thing?” he exclaimed, as with all his right and left turns and twists and yanks the safe resisted his efforts to open it.

He tried again with no better result; then yielded his place to Mrs. Tracy, to whom he gave the most minute directions. She, too, failed and after two or three trials called to Celine, whom she heard on the piazza.

“It’s strength we need, and Celine has it,” she said, explaining to the girl what was wanted and crouching down by her as she tried her skill on the obdurate lock.

Uncle Zach had lost his wits entirely, and went down on his knees to assist with advice and orders.

“Whew!” came through the window in a tone of surprise, and the next moment Jeff came in like a whirlwind, and made the fourth in the group by the safe. “What are you up to?” he asked, and at sight of him Mrs. Tracy, remembering what Alice had told her, rose to her feet.

Celine, however, had no such prejudice, and she explained the matter very volubly.

“Pshaw!” Jeff said contemptuously. “Is that all? I’ll bet I can pick the lock, give me time. Any way, I can open it. I’ve seen Mark do it a hundred times. Get out of the way.”

He spoke to Celine, but Mr. Taylor and Mrs. Tracy both stepped back with Celine, leaving Jeff a fair field. It did not take him long to open the door, and with an “I told you I could,” he disappeared, leaving Mrs. Tracy no better off than she was before. She could not open the door after it was shut, for she tried it until she was tired, and scorning to ask Jeff to teach her, gave it up, saying she supposed she was foolish in wishing to look at her diamonds whenever she chose without calling on any one to assist her, but something made her very nervous about them.

“Dot gets nervous spells, too, about nothin’. It’s the way of wimmen,” Uncle Zacheus said. “I guess we better not let Mark know we tinkered with his safe. He’d be awful mad.”

“I think you defer too much to the opinion of an employee. It spoils them,” Mrs. Tracy suggested, and Uncle Zach replied, “Can’t spile Mark,—the best feller ever born. I’d trust him with my life.”

Meanwhile Mark was feeling that he was as near Paradise as he would ever be until he reached its gates. It was a good deal to be sitting side by side with the most beautiful girl he had ever seen, and it was still more to have the beautiful girl as friendly and gracious as she was, treating him as if she had known him for years, and seldom looking back to speak to Craig, whom she left entirely to Alice. She professed to be enchanted with everything, and her face glowed with excitement. The spirit, which in one of her confidences with Alice she had ascribed to his satanic majesty whom she called the _old gentleman_ was upon her, and she could no more help flirting with Mark Hilton than she could have helped breathing. Craig’s reserve had piqued her, but while ignoring him she didn’t forget him at all, or lose a word he was saying to Alice. He was the fish she meant to draw into her net eventually, but she was very happy watching Mark getting more and more entangled in her meshes.

It was a lovely summer afternoon and owing to the heavy rain of the previous night the road was neither dusty nor rough, and for a time Paul and Virginia did credit to Uncle Zach’s praise of them and trotted on without a sign of lagging. Mark still held the lines, but when they had crossed the river and the causeway and were out among the hills Helen said to him, “Don’t you believe the bloods have digested that two quarts of oats by this time and had the wind taken out of their sails sufficiently for me to drive.”

She held out her hands for the lines which Mark gave to her, asking if she had ever driven much.

“No,” she said, “but I want to learn, and I like to drive fast and feel the wind on my face. Touch them, please, with the whip.”

Mark touched Paul, while woman-like Helen jerked the reins and told them to go on, which they did at a rapid rate, until a long, steep hill was reached, or rather a succession of short hills, with level spaces like plateaus between. Up two of these hills the bloods pulled steadily, but stopped at the third, while Paul looked back expectantly and Virginia laid her head against his neck in a caressing kind of way.

“What have they stopped for? Get up! Get up!” Helen said, but her get ups were unavailing.

Paul still looked back and Virginia finally joined him while Mark and Craig laughed aloud. Craig had been up that hill, which was known as the mile hill and was rough and stony, but had at its summit one of the finest views in the surrounding country. He knew the habits of the horses and wondered that they had not stopped sooner and signified their wish for the load to be lightened, especially as it was more than double now with four people and the carryall to what it had been with himself and Uncle Zach and a light buggy.

“What are they stopping for?” Helen asked again, and Craig replied, “Stopping for us to get out and walk. Have you never heard that the horses in Norway are brought up to do that? I fancy the bloods may have come from that region.”

Alice sprang out in a moment and began to pat Virginia, whose eyes were beginning to have in them a dangerous gleam as she felt the weight of the load behind her and saw the long steep hill in front, with still another and another beyond. Craig alighted, too, and so did Mark, and tried to coax the horses to move on. At first Paul seemed inclined to do so, and turned half way towards Virginia, who, true to her sex, stood her ground and would not budge. She knew there was still one occupant in the carriage and until all were out she would stay where she was.

“Make them go. Give them the whip. I’m not going to walk up that mountain to please any brute,” Helen said, beginning to grow impatient.

Mark knew better than to use the whip, much as he wished to do so. Paul might not resent it, but Virginia was of a different make and knew how to use her heels if thwarted in having her way.

“How long do you think she will stand here if I don’t get out?” Helen asked, and Mark replied, “All night, I dare say. She is gentle enough except about the hills, which she abominates. She was born on a western ranche. Hadn’t you better give in?”

“No, never,” Helen said laughingly. “I’ll not be beaten by a horse. I can stay here as long as she can, if you’ll stay with me.”

“Of course I’ll stay,” Mark said, and folding his arms resigned himself to the situation, wondering which would give in first, the woman or the beast.

Neither showed any signs of it, and he began to think what he should do. Craig and Alice had walked on slowly, sometimes stopping to gather wild flowers and sometimes sitting on a boulder to rest. Evidently they were enjoying themselves, for more than once Alice’s merry laugh came down the hill and Helen saw Craig pinning some field flowers on her hat. Suddenly it struck her more forcibly than it had ever done before that Alice was just the one to attract a man like Craig. This would never do, for whatever her relations to Mark might be she looked upon Craig as her property.

“I submit to the inevitable,” she said, extending her arms to Mark, who lifted her very carefully and set her down upon the grass with a slight pressure of which he was scarcely conscious, but which Helen felt and knew that her subjugation of him was complete.

He was her slave and she could now give her attention to Craig. She had said she could not walk up the hill, but she did walk very rapidly until she reached the boulder on which Alice and Craig were seated. Then she grew so tired and exhausted and faint that when at last they started up the remainder of the declivity she said to Alice, “I must lean on you or never get there.”

This was surprising to Alice, who had heard her cousin boast of her ability to walk miles among the Alps and knew that she had walked up Mt. Washington without apparent fatigue.

“Let me assist you,” Craig said, offering her his arm, and finally passing it round her the better to support her when he felt her totter as if about to fall.

He was very kind, and the weaker and fainter she grew the kinder he became and the closer he held her, while he tried to divert her by laughing at the idiosyncrasies of Paul and Virginia, who were rushing up the hill with a rapidity which compelled Mark to run to keep pace with them. Of the two he was more exhausted than Helen when the crest of the hill was reached, for he was white about the lips and the perspiration was standing in great drops on his face. But he gave no thought to himself when he saw how limp and helpless Helen seemed as she sank down upon a broken bit of stone wall and closed her eyes wearily.

“You are not going to faint? You must not faint here where there is no water, and nothing but this hartshorn,” Alice said with energy, giving Helen a little shake as her head fell over on Craig’s shoulder, the only place where it could rest easily.

She did not look like fainting, for her color was as brilliant as ever, but she kept her eyes shut while Alice held smelling salts to her nose, and Mark and Craig fanned her with their hats, the former envying the latter his position with his arm now entirely round her and her head on his shoulder. Suddenly Mark exclaimed: “There is a spring not far from here where I can get some water in my hat,” and he darted off in the direction of a clump of trees. Helen was perfectly quiet until Mark came back with his straw hat half full of water. Then she started up with a laugh and throwing back her head said, “I am all right now. It was a little touch of the heart, climbing the steep hill. I hope I haven’t made a lot of trouble.”

She looked down at Craig still sitting on the stone wall, then at Mark holding his hat with the water dripping from it. From this she recoiled and held back her dress lest a drop should fall upon it.

“I am awfully sorry about your hat. Do you think you have spoiled it?” she asked, giving him a look which she knew always did its work and which made Mark feel that the price of forty hats would scarcely pay for a look like that.

He and Craig were greatly relieved at her recovery, and assisted her to the carriage, one on either side, while she made a protest against being helped, when she was perfectly able to walk by herself.

“Did you ever have an attack like this before?” Alice asked.

Helen gave her a warning look and answered, “Not exactly like this. My heart has troubled me some. Let us go home, please, before I do anything more that is foolish.”