"Dalhousie! Colonel Dalhousie's son!--that young sot! Why, you don't know him, do you?--you never met him in your life--"

"Please don't storm and rant, mamma. It only makes things worse. As I was saying, when you interrupted, I--I met this man once--a long time ago. Some one introduced him, I suppose. That must have been it. I--I've never seen him from that time. He hadn't the faintest right to get into my boat--not the faintest. He--"

"But what did he do it _for_? What did he want? What was his purpose, I say?"

Carlisle turned away with a wet skirt to hang. It was certainly very difficult to explain things to mamma.

"Oh, mamma!--How can I tell you why he wanted to get into my boat? All this just wastes time. Perhaps he thought he would have a little flirtation. Perhaps he wanted to rest from his--"

"What did he _say_ when he got in? He didn't just step on like you were a street car, did he? Speak up! What ex--"

"That's just it! That's just what he did. He climbed in, and didn't say a word. I at once told him to get out. That is what we talked about _entirely_. Then at last he got out, in--in an angry way--shaking the boat, and then I--I went over--"

"It pa.s.ses belief! The young ruffian, after upsetting you, simply deserted--Were you in the water long? Are you cold? Do you feel like you were going to have chills?"

"No--I feel well enough, physically.... But--mamma--"

"You're going to have chills--that's it. No wonder! Wait! I never in my life!..."

She whisked into her bedroom, and, returning with the travelling-bag, produced a bijou flask with a silver top that turned into a little drinking-cup. Into the top she swiftly poured a thimbleful of excellent French brandy.

"Drink this. It will keep them off." And she added: "It pa.s.ses belief...."

And then she walked the floor, her unexpected hands, so oddly stubbed and thick, clasped before her.

"You called out to him, of course? You screamed for his a.s.sistance?"

Carlisle, choking over the inflammatory draught, set the silver top down on the bureau. There was a gratifying absence of cynicism in her manner.

She was always, as her mother knew, a serious girl at heart. She had to drink nearly half a gla.s.s of water before she could dislodge all the brandy from her larynx.

"Oh, mamma--how can I remember just exactly what I did? Please be reasonable. I was too excited and frightened, suddenly plunged into the water, to think what I was doing. The point--"

"You must have cried out. Of course you screamed for his a.s.sistance. And the young blaggard ... What time is it? Five o'clock? Then Willie's train is already in ..."

The spoken thought brought a full stop to the good lady's e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns, shot her mind in dead silence round a corner. She stopped walking, stood intently still. After all, what so serious had happened? Her daughter was, indeed, the talk of the place, which was an exceedingly undesirable thing; especially since an "exclusive" girl's name is so tender a bloom, and Mr. Canning was very probably downstairs listening to it now--the talk, that is. But, after all, young Dalhousie's dissolute misbehaviors were so well known, n.o.body could possibly ...

"They can hardly say anything to reflect upon _you_," the mother summed up aloud, frowning intently. "You have been foolish, most indiscreet.

How you ever permitted anybody to introduce such a character to you pa.s.ses my understanding. However--any attractive girl is likely to draw the attacks of ruffianly men. His conduct surpa.s.s--"

"Yes--but do you think everybody'll understand that?" said Carlisle, hurriedly, and rather felt that the worst was over. "That's just it, mamma,--don't you see? How do we know what sort of gossip is being bandied about downstairs now? You know people _always_ put the worst possible construction they can on a--an episode like this!..."

Her mother wheeled on her, struck afresh in her dearest possession, namely: her pride in the prestige of the name of Heth in an envious and backbiting world.

"How do you mean, construction? What construction could they possibly--"

"Why, anything, mamma!--anything their horrid minds can think of. That I'm a great friend of this charming man's, for instance,--engaged to him, perhaps! That this exhibition in the boat was only a refined little lovers' quarrel--"

"How under heaven could any fool say--"

"Well, you _know_ they'll wonder why he got into the boat in the first place, and say the hatefullest thing they can think of ... There are plenty of people who would like to see us h-humiliated."

Mrs. Heth, staring at her with an intake of the breath, then said slowly: "_Ah--h_!" And she took in a whole range of new possibilities with one leap of her immensely constructive mind.

"It isn't fair," said Carlisle, nervously, slipping into a pretty pink negligee. "And you know how a gossipy story flies, growing all the time--"

"I know," murmured her mother, intensely, as one who has suffered much from just that demeanor of stories....

The falling sun shot a ray into the white-and-cherry bedroom; peeped at the lovely girl sitting stiffly on the bed's edge, turned thick mote-beams upon the lady of deceptive delicacy who stood, with flowing brown hair and still more flowing robe de chambre, silent upon her peak in Darien. The leather-shod clocklet, which always accompanied these two upon their travels could now be heard ticking. Carlisle looked at her mother, and there were both apprehensiveness and dependence in her look.

She herself was the cleverer of the two women, but very comforting it was to her to feel this rock-like support behind her now.

Into Mrs. Heth's gray eyes had sprung a kind of glitter, the look of a commanding general about to make an exterminative rush upon the enemy.

Hugo Canning to be maliciously informed that _her_ daughter was, had been, or ever should be engaged to Jack Dalhousie! Not while she retained her love of justice, and the power of locomotion in her limbs.

"Oho!" said she. "Well, I'll fix _that_ ... I'll stamp upon their miserable lies ..."

The room telephone rang loudly, hastening decisions. Carlisle winced visibly. In her mood of acute sensitiveness, she was for not answering at all. But Mrs. Heth, the fighting man now in full possession of her, tossed off the receiver with a brigadier air.

"Well?" demanded she sharply; and then, continuing: "Yes. Oh, yes!

Howdedo, Willie ... You've arrived, have you? (It's Willie Kerr, Cally.) What? Oh, yes. She's quite well, though naturally somewhat upset by the shock. It is a most unpleasant occurrence, and I feel deeply for the young man's father, and his friends if he has any. Certainly, Willie. We want the whole affair perfectly understood. Our position demands it.

Yes. I want to talk with you about it, at once. Will you meet me in the Blue Parlor in ten minutes? Very well. Mr. Canning came with you, I suppose?... Ah, yes ... What? _No_, Willie! Not a _line_! You must put your foot down on that! This is entirely a personal matter and I will not allow a piece in the paper about it. I won't have it.... Ah. All right, then. I'll trust that to you. In ten minutes, Willie...."

The capable little general turned from the telephone to find the eyes of the lieutenant or private fixed fearfully upon her.

"Willie," she explained, hurriedly, "says there's a newspaper reporter hanging about--think of it!--trying to pick up something scandalous for his wretched sheet. Willie has promised to attend to _him_. He says he knows the editor or correspondent or whoever it is, and there won't be the slightest trouble in shutting him up. There shan't be either. Now to business."

At her best in action, mamma glided through the door into her own room, slipping off her robe as she glided. In an amazingly short time she was back again, breathing hard, and dressed for no-quarter affray.

"You didn't talk downstairs, Cally? No one pumped you as to what had happened?"

"No, I spoke to no one."

Mrs. Heth wielded hatpins before the mirror, the glitter surviving in her eyes.

"I am putting on a hat," she threw out, "to give matters a casual air. A public hotel's a hotbed of gossip. Everything depends on the story's being started right--on just the right note.... Thank G.o.d, I'm here!"

"Lie down," added Mrs. Heth, and Carlisle lay down.

The most exhaustive details of the affair had not, perhaps, been laboriously collected as yet, but luckily Mrs. Heth was not the sort that requires a ma.s.s of verbose testimony and dull statistics. The right note awaited her touch six floors below, and time was pressing. Already her mind had flown well ahead, perceived with precision just what was required. Willie must be seen, and at least two ladies, of different sets, great gossips, for preference; and to these she would confide, with some little just indignation but without excitement, the astounding truth about the young blackleg who, having boarded and upset her daughter's boat, turned coward and scuttled off, ignoring her frightened cries. Nor would she fail to express her sincere sympathy for Colonel Dalhousie, whose heart (she understood) the behavior of his degenerate son had broken before now....

"Do you want Flora with you?"

"No--I'd rather be alone."

"Remain quietly here till I return."

Briefly framed in the doorway, Mrs. Heth added: "You must get some sleep to be fresh for the evening ... _I'll_ nail their slanderous falsehoods."

Her daughter's glance upon her was touched with a flash of admiration, the more striking in that she herself was quite unconscious of it.