CHAPTER SIXTEEN

IN WHICH MUCH ADDED LIGHT IS SHED UPON MISS BERYL DRANE, BUT ONLY A GLIMMER UPON MY PROBLEM

"This is a beautiful day."

Such was my exceedingly original and extremely interesting greeting to Beryl Drane this morning. I arrived at the house at eight o'clock, found, as I thought, no one astir, and was preparing to knock when I discovered the young lady diligently clipping roses from a hedge near the back. It is not often that I descend to sheer ba.n.a.lity, but I can offer no excuse for my opening remark as I came up over the gra.s.s behind her. She was a little startled. She turned quickly with a short "Oh!"

and looked at me curiously. Somehow I did not like the look. It was possessive, in a way; intimate, as though we shared a secret, or something like that. She was dressed in a polka dot brown gingham, and had on an old bonnet whose projecting hood softened those lines which seemed to shriek of the things which made them. A low collar encircled her firm neck snugly. She wore leather half mitts, had a pair of shears in one hand, and from the elbow of her other arm hung a wicker basket over half filled with voluptuously red, dew-bright roses. She regarded me with that subtly smiling, upward glance which coquettes have, and in that morning air, with the flowers, under the shielding bonnet, she was pretty. She was too adroit to overdo the pose. It lasted scarcely two ticks from a grandfather's clock, then she smiled frankly, deftly looped the shears on a finger of her left hand, and held out her arm.

"I'm _so_ glad to see you!" she said, winningly, and for the soul of me I could not help but feel my heart grow warmer in response to her tone.

Ah, little sibyl! You have conjured more than one man's mind into deadly rashness, but you have paid, little moth with the soot-spotted wings!

"Are you?" I replied, surprisedly, as I grasped her grippy, slender hand and uncovered.

"Sure!... Don't you suppose Hebron is a trifle monotonous to me after the fleshpots of Egypt?"

"I had thought you would be--not angry, but displeased and disgusted with me that I had not come sooner."

"Oh! I have learned to make allowances for men!" she retorted, airily, with a toss of her head and a half pout; "and I'd have no respect for a man who'd have to be kicked away from a woman's feet. I've seen that kind. I supposed you would come when it suited your inclination."

She deliberately turned to the hedge again and tiptoed to grasp a heavy-headed bloom which seemed to have dropped asleep, drugged by its own perfume. She could not reach it.

"Let me," I said, and stepping forward, caught the thorn-set spray and pulled it toward her. The action made a little shower of water drops to patter on her upturned face, and a single rich-hued petal became displaced, drifted gently down, and actually lodged in the crevice of her slightly parted lips. Both laughed at the incident, for it was unusual.

"You shall have this one," she said, when she had clipped it, "from me."

I felt foolish, in a way, as she came close to me, fumbling here and there about her waist and the bosom of her dress.

"Have you a pin?" she queried, archly, and before I could answer her swift white fingers were searching the lapels of my coat. "Here's one,"

she added, on the instant, and tugged it out.

Then she secured that rose to my coat, standing so close to me that the bottom of her spreading skirt brushed my legs.

"You are very forgiving and very kind," I a.s.sured her, "and I thank you for the favor. I'm sure I do not deserve it."

"Do men ever deserve what they receive from women?" was her startling reply, and she did not look me in the eyes then, but instead fingered the jumble of Jaqueminots in the basket with head averted. Surely this niece of the Rev. Jean Dupre's who had journeyed to Hebron to rest was not conventional. Equally true it was that she possessed an unusual degree of intelligence, and was accustomed to speaking her mind.

I hesitated briefly. Not that I was in doubt what to say, but among us men of the South that old chivalry toward women which is always stubborn and often reasonless, still struggles mightily. And it is a goodly thing, forsooth, this same chivalry; but truth is better.

"I think so," was my steady answer, and I held my eyes ready to meet hers, but she did not move her head. Only the white fingertips with their whiter nails yet burrowed among the fragrant ma.s.s of green and red.

"You do?... How can you say that? Uncle says it, too--but he's a priest."

"I say it because I think it true. I'm sure you would not have me tell a lie merely to please you. Your viewpoint must be restricted, circ.u.mscribed, for I know you are in earnest. The question is really too comprehensive to actually admit of a specific answer. Many women give all and get nothing; many men give all and get nothing. Many give and receive on an equable basis, and they are the ones who are happy. It depends simply upon one's experience or observation how he answers your question. My life leads me to believe in all sincerity men will do their part fuller and far more justly than a woman will. Perhaps yours has convinced you that just the reverse is true.... But for mercy's sake, let's not drift into a sociological argument this morning."

"By no means. I just wanted to know what you thought.... Now I must apologize for keeping you. You have come to see uncle?"

She started toward the house as though to call him, but I caught her arm and she halted.

"I came to see you, primarily. First, to a.s.sure myself that you had really quite recovered from drowning--I have asked of you down at the store--and second, to discuss a mighty secret with you."

"You have really--asked about me?" she returned with lifted eyebrows.

"You knew when you left that day I would recover, thanks to your skill.

Was not that enough?"

I felt annoyed. It appeared as if she was trying to make me confess a deeper interest than I truly owned.

"A common sense of decency would have impelled me to a.s.sure myself you were suffering no bad after effects," I replied.

"Oh, that was it?" she responded, I thought a bit coolly. Then--"You mentioned a secret. How on earth could a secret exist in this lonesome-ridden place? But of course I'm all curiosity now to hear it.

Let's go to the summerhouse. Uncle rises late, and is now in the midst of his breakfast."

She moved toward a conical shaped piece of greenery, and I put myself at her side. It proved to be some trellis work built in the form of a square, with a peaked top, the whole completely covered by some luxuriant vine. Even the doorway was so thickly hung that we had to draw the festoons aside to enter. Within the light was tempered to a gray-green tone. A hammock was swung across the center of the place, and on all sides except the entrance one were placed benches. Miss Drane set her basket down and promptly dropped into the hammock, where she twisted about into a comfortable att.i.tude. She apparently took no notice of the fact that her dress had become drawn up six or eight inches above her shapely ankles, but quietly loosened the strings under her chin and cast the bonnet on the floor, then threw her arms above her head, laced her fingers, and turned to me with a smile which was half humorous and half pathetic.

"Now I'm fixed. Settle yourself the best you can, and let's hear the mystery."

"May I smoke?" I asked, dodging under one of the ropes, and coming around so that I might sit facing her.

"Certainly."

"A pipe?"

"Oh, yes! I'm thoroughly smoke-cured."

I dropped upon a bench and drew forth my materials, while she lay and eyed me with her inscrutable stare.

"You're a funny man!" she declared, presently, her flexible lips twisting into an odd smile.

I chuckled, and jammed the tobacco in the bowl.

"How do you get that?" I ventured.

"Why didn't you ask to share the hammock with me?"

Now though I knew something of woman's ways and woman's wiles, I felt a blush rising, and to hide it I dropped the match I held and bent over to pick it up. Clearly his reverence's niece was bent on a flirtation wherewith to while away the days of her exile. It is needless to say that in my present state of mind I had no heart for dalliance of this sort, but I realized that I must not offend her, so I struck the match on the sole of my shoe and slowly lighted my pipe, thinking hard all the time of what I should say.

"You looked so very comfortable," I replied jocularly, between puffs, "that I could not bring myself to make the request. And--you lay down, you know, as though you wanted it all to yourself."

With a quick, lithe movement she turned on her side, rested her cheek on her hand, and retorted:

"Was that idea really in your mind before I spoke? The truth, mind you!"

I was thoroughly uncomfortable. Just what Beryl Drane was driving at I could not guess, but I knew the simple talk which I had come to have with her had suddenly a.s.sumed the proportions of a task. It would be silly and egotistic to think this little body was in love with me, and yet as she lay curled kitten-like within arm's length there was a seriousness in her face and manner which troubled me far more than what my answer to her last question would be.

"No, it was not," I replied, meeting her eyes steadily.