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Clark's Field, a novel by Robert Herrick |
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Chapter 20 |
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_ CHAPTER XX Adelle went straight to her own rooms, but before she could close the door Miss Comstock was on her heels. Having taken the direct route to London in Adelle's swift car, she had had ample time to change her gown, and now looked specially groomed and ready for the encounter, with keen, knowing green eyes. Closing the door carefully, Miss Comstock turned, looked Adelle over from her hat, which was still slightly tipped, to her ungloved hands. "Well?" she remarked with perceptible irony. Adelle did not mean to tell anything. She wanted to keep this, her first affair, to herself, no matter what she might consider it to be, and she was not yet sure what she should think of it finally. So she had tried her best to dodge her companions until she had had time to simulate her usual appearance. But she had been caught by "Pussy" red-handed. To the mentor's repeated "Well?" she said nothing, a foolish little smile starting without her will around the corners of her mouth. "So he kissed you?" Miss Comstock continued; and as Adelle's eyes dropped guiltily, she remarked contemptuously,--"The cad!" Adelle was only vaguely acquainted with the meaning of this hateful word, but if she had realized its full significance she would not have cared, though she had no desire to defend Mr. Ashly Crane. She was silent, while Miss Comstock tore a few more shreds from Adelle's poor little "affair." "I knew that was what he was after from the first, my dear. It was written all over him!... A pretty kind of an officer for a trust company to have! If the directors of the Washington Trust Company knew of this there would be trouble for Mr. Ashly Crane!... A ward, too--" "He's always been nice to me," Adelle protested lamely, feeling that in her invective Pussy was reflecting upon her guardians. "Of course!... I have no doubt he made up his mind to get you, as soon as he knew how rich you would be." This was too raw even for Adelle. The girl drew herself up haughtily, and Miss Comstock adroitly covered up her mistake. "You know, my dear, that is one of the dangers any woman with money is exposed to. Luckily this is your first experience with the mere fortune-hunter, but you will find that there are many men in the world just like this Mr. Ashly Crane, who are incapable of a genuine passion for any woman, and are always looking for a rich wife. No girl wants to think that a man is making love to her because she has money--especially when she has other attractions.... To think that this man, who ought to have shielded you from everything, should be the one to humiliate you so!" She proceeded with an admirable mingling of flattery and friendliness to put Adelle on her guard against the male sex. "At least," she concluded, "a man ought to have something to offer a rich girl,--a name or position. What has that little cad to give you? Social position? A title? Nothing! If a woman must marry, she should get something in the bargain." She succeeded in thoroughly humiliating Adelle for what she had secretly been a little proud of, her first "affair," and easily killed with her contempt any possibility of the girl's yielding to the banker's persistency. "He said he was coming to see me to-morrow," Adelle finally pouted almost tearfully. "He will see me to-morrow instead," Miss Comstock said promptly; "and I don't think he will trouble you again." The encounter on the following morning between the trust officer and Pussy Comstock is not a part of this story. Enough to say that Mr. Crane got his steamer at Southampton and was happily so seasick all the way across that he could not worry over his failure in the gentle art of love-making. He told his friends that he had spent a dull vacation in England, and spoke disparagingly of British institutions and of Europe for Americans generally. When President West inquired about the ward, he spoke very guardedly of Adelle and of Miss Catherine Comstock. He intimated that Miss Clark had developed into an uninteresting and somewhat headstrong young woman, and implied that he had doubts about the influence which her present mentor had upon her character. However, the trust company would soon be absolved from all responsibility for its ward, and it might be as well to let matters rest as they were for the present, if the drafts from Paris did not become too outrageous, which, of course, was exactly what Mr. West and the other officers wished to do--nothing. Hereafter Mr. Ashly Crane must honor any draft that Adelle might make, no matter how "outrageous" it was. (The drafts came fluttering across the ocean on every steamer for ever-increasing amounts until the young heiress was living at the rate of nearly forty thousand dollars a year.) The banker might wonder how a young girl, still nominally in school, could get away with so much money. He might fear that her extravagance would become a habit and carry her even beyond the limits of her large means. But he could not say a word. Miss Comstock, indeed, had put him in a sorry situation for a full-grown banker. The more he thought about the unfortunate episode of his love-making, the more he cursed himself. President West, whose special protege the young banker had always been, held very strict notions about honor and the relation of the officers of the company to its clients. In Adelle's case--that of a minor entrusted to them by the probate court--the president would feel doubly incensed if he suspected that any officer had attempted to take advantage of her unprotected and inexperienced youth. So Mr. Ashly Crane walked softly these days and promptly honored Adelle's drafts. _ |
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