"I say," he told her when the others were going, "you--do you know, you're wonderful! I--do you mind if I come over tomorrow? There's a lot of things I'd like to ask you about Alton Havenith. I--could I?"

"Why, of course," said Joy, with her usual eager desire to do anything nice she could for people.

He thanked her fervently, and went with obvious reluctance. Gail was a little silent, even for her, who only talked when she chose. And at last Joy and John were alone. She felt a little shy of him.

"I must go clear up," she said presently, as he did not speak, moving toward the dining-room.

"You must not," he told her, with the affectionate note in his voice she loved to hear. "I want to stay here and appreciate my princess a little, and I can't do it well when she's away--or I don't want to.

Sit down, Joy. I scarcely ever see anything of you any more.... Dear child, why on earth did you let Gail rampage all over the house this way? You could have had a maid in from the village."

"But she said she was going to--and I thought you knew!" cried Joy, her heart leaping up.

"Oh, you mean she took possession?" he said. "I see. That is like Gail. Well--don't let her, next time, my dear."

"I'd much, much rather not!" said Joy enthusiastically, "but she said she'd made it all right with your mother, and----"

"Oh, in that case," said John, "all right." Then he dismissed the subject, looking into the fire. "I find out some new thing about you every day, kiddie," he said. "I'm afraid I must seem like a rather quiet and unaccomplished person to you,--compared to other men."

"You mean because I ran off with Clarence," said Joy with remorseful directness, and her usual child-likeness. "I _was_ cross because you liked Gail."

He laughed. "And _I_ was cross because you liked Clarence.

Shall we both reform a bit, little girl?"

"Oh, yes!" replied Joy radiantly. "Only I haven't much to reform about," she added thoughtfully. "Except he's kind to me, and he understands things sometimes you don't...."

John sighed a little. "I see. Yes, he's that sort. Well, try to make me understand, dear, won't you? ... I want to."

She slipped her hand impulsively in his as she did sometimes.

"Then that's all right," he said contentedly.

But the most all right thing, to Joy's unregenerate heart, was next morning, when she went up to pay her usual morning visit to Mrs. Hewitt.

"Joy, will you tell me," demanded the lady, "what you meant by telling Gail you wanted her to do the housekeeping?"

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

THE SERIOUS BUSINESS OF "IOLANTHE"

There was no use having it out with Gail. Joy was not one of those nerve-shaking people who insist on having things out, anyhow. She was perfectly content with things as they were.

The weather settled down to be legitimate October weather, a little early: crisply lovely outdoors, and of the temperature to be an excuse for fires indoors at night. Tiddy transferred his allegiance, still a little shyly, to Joy. The change was good for him, because they were, after all, very much of an age. They got to be excellent friends. Also Joy kept him at his studies in a fashion that was, for her, quite severe: he had asked her if she wouldn't, and she did.

She went off for tramps with him when John was otherwise employed, which seemed to please John, and prevented her from having Clarence too much underfoot.

Gail referred to Tiddy's desertion with her usual note of indolent amus.e.m.e.nt--it did not occur to Joy till years later that Gail might occasionally pretend a superiority to such things as annoy other girls--and summoned another man from the city for week-ends. Tiddy was indigenous to the soil. This, as Clarence, with _his_ amiable superiority, said, was so much to the good, for when you come to amateur theatricals every man is a man. Clarence was working with an industry n.o.body would ever have suspected in him, over "Iolanthe."

It was easy enough to collect the princ.i.p.als. With a certain amount of n.o.bility of character, Clarence a.s.signed himself the part of _Lord Chancellor_, remarking that he could make a fool of himself rather better than most men he knew. Incidentally he played opposite to Joy, who refused flatly to take the leading part of _Phyllis_, and was therefore cast for _Iolanthe_. They found a suitable and sufficiently stalwart _Fairy Queen_ in the neighborhood, and made Gail's weekend man _Private Willis_, because two rehearsals a week were enough for that part, and he was the tallest man, nearly, that any one had ever seen. He was six feet three and a half, which is about two and a half inches more than is necessary for beauty and suitability, to quote Clarence again; but quite what they wanted just here.

"But where on earth to get a chorus!" wailed Clarence, after a rehearsal in the big Hewitt parlor. They were keeping it more or less a family affair. The Harringtons had returned, bringing the De Guenthers with them in triumph. Mrs. De Guenther was a dear little old lady who took a deep interest in the whole scheme, and was of great use in the costuming. Mr. De Guenther, scholarly, soft-voiced, and courteously precise, was also allowed to be present at rehearsals; not because of the costuming, but because he remembered performances at the Savoy when he was a young man in London, and could coach them in the business.

"With a whole village full of people, I should think you could!"

said Gail. "The trouble with you is, Clarry, you're lazy." She leaned back herself in a long chair as she said it, looking the personification of indolence.

"Of course I could!" he said scornfully. "My good girl, have you seen the worthy New Englanders in this village? There are some of the most beautiful characters, hereabouts, I was told when I went seeking for chorus-ladies, that ever existed. But they are far from being worn on the outside."

"Laura Ward is coming down over that week, to stay with me," Gail offered.

"Yes, and Laura Ward has played _Celia_, and is going to have to do it again," stated Clarence. "We can't waste a good dancer like that on the chorus."

John, who was _Lord Mountararat_, one of _Phyllis'_ two suitors from the House of Lords, was looking out of the window absently, humming under his breath one of his songs:

_"It seems that she's a fairy From Andersen's lib_rary _And we took her for The proprietor Of a Ladies' Semi_nary!"

One of the unaccountable silences which sometimes fall made every absently-sung word quite audible. As he ended Clarence sprang at him in what would have been a wild embrace if he had not ducked in time.

"Here, don't let your troubles drive you crazy, Rutherford," John protested, holding him off with a strong hand.

"They haven't!" proclaimed Clarence. "But 'them beautiful words!'

See here, you dwellers in this happy vale, isn't there a girls'

school somewhere adjacent? Why don't we bribe the teachers by making it a benefit for whatever they want--a stained gla.s.s window to their founder, or a new laboratory or something--and lift those girls bodily, as a chorus?"

They had been seeking painfully for some worthy object to give the opera for, and so far hadn't been able to find a thing. So his project was greeted joyfully.

"John, as usual, will have to go ask," suggested Allan. "Johnny, old boy, what _would_ we do without your reputation? You physish at that school, and I hear they kiss your very shadow."

"It's probably all they get a chance at," Gail kindly helped John out.

John, who was wildly adored, as a matter of fact, by most of the fifteen-year-olds of the school, said "Nonsense!" sternly.

"Oh, do!" begged Tiddy. Tiddy was _Strephon_, the leading juvenile, "a fairy down to his waist," and was pa.s.sionately anxious to have the whole thing go through. "If you will _I'll_ go and see what I can yank out of my old prep school. There ought to be enough boys with changed voices and long legs----"

"Harold Gray, you are inspired!" said Gail, for once shaken out of her indolence. _She_ had taken unto herself the part of _Phyllis_ and was also anxious for the success of "Iolanthe." "And I myself will go with you. I'll go work my rabbit's foot on the masters. There's one over there who has already known my fatal charm."

"You mean the rabbit's foot, or----"

"I mean that one of the masters is in love with me. The cla.s.sical master. We'll work him," stated Gail brutally.

"If you can make him sell you sixteen boys into slavery your fatal charm has been some use for once," said Clarence, unruffled.

Phyllis and John, who were the most serious-minded of the roomful, saw breakers ahead, but they said nothing.

"My dear, I _don't_ think the way Miss Maddox talks is nice,"

whispered Mrs. De Guenther, who had taken to Joy as all old ladies did.