Home > Authors Index > Elizabeth M. Duffield > Lucile Triumphant > This page
Lucile Triumphant, a fiction by Elizabeth M. Duffield |
||
Chapter 24. "Two's Company" |
||
| < Previous |
Table of content |
Next > |
|
________________________________________________
_ CHAPTER XXIV. "TWO'S COMPANY" Lucile was happy even before she awoke that morning. The sense of something delightful in store pervaded even her dreams. For a long time she lingered in that delightful interim between waking and sleeping, when the spirit seems to detach itself and fly on wings of golden sunshine through a dewy, scented universe. In her confused imagining she was resting on a rose-colored cloud, while all around her other clouds of varying tints swam and swirled, taking different shapes as they passed her by. "How pretty!" she murmured, and woke with a start to find Jessie regarding her sleepily. "What on earth were you muttering about, Lucy?" cried the latter, fretfully. "I guess you must have been having a bad dream." "No, it wasn't; it was beautiful," she contradicted, putting her hands behind her head and gazing up at the ceiling. "I wish you hadn't waked me up; I was having an awfully good time." "Well, I wasn't," said Jessie, so sourly that Lucile chuckled. "You know, Jessie," she said, "the only time you are ever cross is when you are sleepy--and that's most all the time," she added, wickedly. "What?" said the accused, sitting up in bed and seizing Lucile by the arm. "Unsay those words or I will have your life!" "Now, you know you don't need it half as much as I do," reasoned Lucile. "You have one of your own." Whereupon Jessie laughed, and peace was almost restored when there came a knock at the door. The girls started and looked at each other in questioning bewilderment. "Now what have you been doing?" whispered Lucile. "I knew one of these days you would have the law upon us." "Up to your old tricks again, I suppose," Jessie countered. "But you'd better answer them, Lucy." "Why don't you?" said Lucile; but, receiving no answer, called out in a small voice, as the rap was repeated, "Who is it?" "Aren't you girls ever going to get up?" whispered a gruff voice, which they, nevertheless, recognized as belonging to Phil. "It's almost eight o'clock and you said you'd be down by half-past seven. We've been waiting for half an hour." "All right; we'll be down right away, Phil," said Lucile, jumping out of bed and beginning to dress hastily. "I had no idea it was so late." "You know you won't have time for a walk before breakfast, even if you are down in half an hour--which I doubt," said Phil, pessimistically. "Jack and I are going for our walk, anyway." "Run along," sang Jessie, cheerfully, "and don't hurry back." "You just wait till I get you, Jet," he threatened--Jet being a recent nickname to which he had clung despite Jessie's vehement protestations that the name would fit a Southern mammy a good deal better than it did her, for the simple reason that a darky was jet, but she wasn't nor ever would be. "All right; only see that you pay enough," she assented. "I'm mercenary." "I have always suspected something in your life, woman," he hissed through the keyhole. "Farewell!" And they heard his retreating footsteps on the stairs. The girls laughed merrily, just as Evelyn, fully dressed, emerged from the next room--they always drew lots to see who slept together--looking very sweet and dainty in her spotless white. "Hurry up, you old slow-pokes," she greeted them, gaily. "I've been up for ever so long. It's a wonderful day." "Oh, Evelyn, dear, you look darling in that dress! I've never seen it before!" cried Lucile, enthusiastically. "Turn around in the back. Isn't it cute, Jessie? Goodness! You make me ashamed of myself!" And she began dressing with renewed vigor. "Will you get dressed for me, too, Evelyn?" begged Jessie. "With so much energy flying around loose, I ought to catch some of it, but I don't. Oh, for another hour's sleep!" "You don't have to get up," said Evelyn, sitting down on the edge of the bed. "You can sleep till noon if you want to, while Lucy and I have a look at the Capitol and dine at some nice little cafe----" "Say not another word," commanded Jessie, bouncing out of bed and winding her long braids about her head. "I'd like to see anybody leave me behind. Lucy, do get out of my way--I have to have the mirror some of the time!" Lucile laughed. "All right; I'll fix my hair in Evelyn's room, now she's through, and let you have the whole place to yourself," she said, and gathering up hairpins and ribbons, she ran into the other room to finish up. "What are you going to wear this morning, Lucy?" asked Evelyn, from the doorway, where she could see both girls at once. "The little flowered one, I guess," said Lucile, struggling with her hair. "I haven't worn it yet and Dad raves about it." "I wish you would wear the blue one," Evelyn suggested. "I think it's the prettiest thing you have." "But I've worn it so much," Lucile objected. "I don't want to be known by my dress." With apparent irrelevance, Jessie called out from the other room, "Jack loves blue." Instead of looking confused, as she knew was expected of her, Lucile answered, readily. "I'll wear it then, of course. Phil likes blue, too." Evelyn and Jessie exchanged glances and the latter laughed aggravatingly. "Evelyn, what have you done with my tan shoes?" cried Jessie, searching wildly under the bed. "I'm sure I put them in their place, and they're nowhere to be seen," and she sat back on her heels to glare menacingly about her. "Here they are," called Lucile from the other room. "You left them here last night. Hurry up! I'm all ready now." They were pictures of youthful loveliness as they began to descend the stairs--Evelyn, in her snowy white, looking for all the world like a plump and mischievous little cherub, and Jessie in the palest pink, which set off and enhanced her fairness. But it was to Lucile that all eyes instinctively clung. The soft curls framing the lovely, eager face; the color that came and went with each varying emotion; the instinctive grace with which she carried her proud little head, won her admiration wherever she went. All this, and more, Jack was thinking as he watched the trio descend. He and Phil were occupying a strategic position, from which they could see but not be seen; in fact, they had left the front door slightly ajar with that very end in view. "It seems very strange," Lucile was saying as they reached the foot of the stairs, "that we haven't heard any breakfast bell. If it's as late as the boys say it is, everybody ought to be up." Then she flung open the door and came upon the boys, seated on the railing of the veranda, apparently engrossed in conversation. The girls gasped with amazement at sight of the boys, and the boys gasped with very genuine admiration at sight of the girls. "Wh-what----" began Lucile, bewildered. "I thought you and Phil were going for a walk." "So we are," said Jack, easily. "We were only waiting for you." "Phil," Lucile turned accusingly to her brother, "this is some trick you are trying to play on us. Why isn't there any breakfast and why aren't there any people. Come on, 'fess up!" Jessie threw up her hands wearily. "We ought to know enough to suspect him by this time," she sighed. "But I guess we'll never get over being taken in." "By the position of the sun," quoth Evelyn, "it ought to be about six thirty." "Just about," Lucile corroborated. "No wonder we were sleepy." All this time the boys had been regarding the victims of their deception with an assumption of innocence, made ineffective by the suppressed laughter in their eyes. "Now I guess we're even for all the insults you've heaped upon my unoffending head in days gone by, Jet," Phil gibed. "Routing you up at six o'clock evens up for a lifetime." "You needn't take so much credit to yourself, brother, dear," Lucile countered. "We were going to get up, anyway, weren't we, girls," to which the girls agreed shamelessly. "It's a compliment, anyway," said Jessie, philosophically. "They were so eager for our society that they even had to resort to tricks." "Right you are," laughed Jack. "Now that we have some time, let's make good use of it. Come on; we'll hike," and, taking Lucile's arm, he started down the drive. "Where to?" called Phil. "Makes no difference to me where we go," Jack flung back, recklessly. "Let the girls decide." "Make Lucile take the lead," Jessie suggested. "Maybe she can unearth some more mysteries." "No, she won't; she's through," said Phil, decidedly. "If there are any more clues floating around loose, it's going to be her brother that will find them. I want that distinctly understood." Meanwhile, Lucile and Jack had swung off into a narrow and much more difficult road than the one they were on, and Phil shouted a remonstrance. "Why not stick to the road we know about?" he shouted, and they stopped and looked back. "That looks like a pretty stiff climb." "We know as much about this as we do the other," Jack shouted back, "and this is lots prettier. Come on; if it gets too steep, we can always go back." "No, I guess we'll stick to this one," Phil decided. "It looks like too much work where you are," and the trio walked on. Lucile started to follow, but Jack laid a restraining hand on her arm. "We don't have to follow them," he pleaded. "It's so long since I've seen you, and I haven't been able to talk to you yet." Lucile hesitated; then, "Well, just for a short distance," she conceded. "And then we can meet them on the way back." "Thanks," he said; then added, "I thought you weren't very glad to see me yesterday. You know, I was strongly tempted to take the next steamer across the Atlantic. Haven't you thought of me at all?" It was rather a hard question to ask, and Lucile blushed when she remembered how often she had thought of him and his letters. "Of course," she said; "and I wrote to you----" "Just twice," he finished. "I came very near sending you a box of writing paper--thought there must be a scarcity of it over here." Lucile laughed her gay little laugh. "That would have been a surprise," she chuckled; then, more seriously, "But you know, there are so many people to write to, and it was awfully hard----" "Oh, yes, I know all about it," he broke in. "Terribly busy; couldn't find time, and all that, but if you think very much of somebody, writing isn't a duty; it's a pleasure." "But I didn't say," Lucile began; then, desperately, "Oh, please, can't we talk of something else?" "Certainly," he agreed, and Lucile sensed the hurt in his voice. "We'll talk of anything you please. What plans have you made for the day?" "Why, Dad said he would take us to Paris," said Lucile, instantly sorry for her little speech, yet afraid to say so. "We simply can't wait to get there! Of course you are going with us?" "If I may. I came over with my uncle, you know, and left him in Paris to transact some important business while I hunted you up. It's a good little place--the inn, I mean--and I'm glad your father asked me to stay for the night. It's a charming spot and quite close enough to the city." "That's what Dad thought. Then, after we have lunch at some swell little restaurant--you know----" "Yes, I know," he agreed, laughingly. "Colored lights, and music, orchestra, and that," and he waved his hand expressively. "Uh-huh; and after all that, he's going to drop us at the Louvre--oh, how naturally I speak of it now, and it used to seem like something on a different planet--while he tries to look up M. Charloix--he gave Dad his card on shipboard, luckily." "And then?" he prompted, laughing eyes fixed on the lovely, animated face at his shoulder. "Well, then," she continued eagerly, "then comes the very best of all. We're going somewhere for dinner, then the theater, then dinner again, oh-h----" "Just one glorious day of gladness," he laughed; then, noticing her quickened breath, "We mustn't tire you too much this morning when you have such a long day before you. Suppose we rest a while." "And here is the very place," she agreed, indicating a great, flat rock, shaded by a huge, spreading tree. "Oh, isn't the view wonderful from here? I hadn't noticed it before." "You said it," Jack agreed, stretching his lazy length on the grass at her feet. "The hill has formed a sort of shallow precipice and the lake sure does look great down there." For a few moments they were silent, drinking in the beauty prodigal Nature lavished all about them. Furtively Lucile examined this cavalier of hers. Straight of feature, bronzed from living in the open, eyes so full of fun you had to laugh in sympathy--oh, he was handsome; there was no doubt of that. And his hair, black and wavy and soft--Lucile was sure it was soft---- "I wish you would tell me what you are thinking about," he said, looking up with a quizzical little smile. "You were quiet so long----" "That is unusual," she laughed, trying not to look confused. "Perhaps we had better be starting back," she added; "the others will be looking for us." "Just as you say," he answered for the second time that morning; then, as he helped her to her feet, "I wish we could have this day together; it's been great to be alone with you even for this short time. But I forgot that that subject was unwelcome----" "Oh, please," she begged, laying an impulsive little hand on his arm. "I--I didn't mean to be cross." He caught the little peace-making hand in both his own, laughing down into the prettiest eyes he had ever seen. "That's the best thing I have heard to-day," he exulted. _ |
||