Chapter 4. The Earl And The Others

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_ CHAPTER IV. THE EARL AND THE OTHERS

Miss Dolores Gantry shook the snow from her furs, and with the graceful assurance of a yacht running aslant a craft-swarming harbor, cut into the crowd that surged through the Union Station. She brought up in an empty corner of the iron fence, close beside the exit gate through which passengers were hurrying from the last train that had arrived. Her velvety black eyes flashed an eager glance at the out- pouring stream, perceived a Mackinaw jacket, and turned to make swift comparison of the depot clock and the tiny bracelet watch on her slender wrist.

As she again looked up she met the ardent gaze and ingratiating smile of an elegant young man who was sauntering up the train-platform to the exit gate, fastidiously apart from his fellow passengers. He raised his hat, and at the girl's curt nod of recognition, hastened through the gate for a more intimate greeting.

"My dear Dodie!" he exclaimed, reaching for her hand. "This is a most delightful surprise."

"My dear Laffie!" she mocked, deftly slipping both slender hands into her muff. "I quite agree as to it's being a surprise."

"Then you didn't come down to meet me?"

"You?" she asked, with an irony too fine drawn for his conceit. "Come to meet you?"

"Yes. Didn't you get my note saying that all work on my bridge was stopped by the cold and that I would run down to see you?"

"To see me--plus the world, the flesh, and the devil!"

"Now, Dodie!" he protested, with a smirk on his handsome, richly colored face.

The girl's eyes hardened into black diamonds as she met his assured gaze. "Mr. Brice-Ashton, you will hereafter kindly address me as 'Miss Gantry.' You must be aware that I am now out."

"Oh, I've no objections, just so we're not out," he punned.

She gave him her shoulder, and peered eagerly through the pickets of the iron fence at a train that was backing into the station. Ashton shrugged, lighted a gilt-tipped cigarette, and asked: "Permit me to inquire, Miss Gon-tray, if I'm not the happy man for whom you wait, who is?"

She replied without turning: "How can I tell until I see him? I think it will be the hero. If not, it will be the earl."

"Hero?--earl?" repeated Ashton.

"Yes, whichever one Vievie leaves for me."

"What! Genevieve? Miss Leslie? She's not--Is she really coming home so soon?--when she had such a chance for a gay season in London?"

"Don't give yourself away. The London season is in summer."

"You don't say! Well, in England, then. Why didn't you write me?"

"I'm not running a correspondence-school or news agency, Mr. Brice- Ashton."

"Oh, cut it, Dodie! Post me up, that's a good girl! What I've heard has been so muddled. This hero business, for a starter--what about it? I thought it was an English duke that chartered the steamer to rescue Genevieve."

"No, only the son of a duke,--James Scarbridge, the Right Honorable the Earl of Avondale."

"My ante!"

"It's in the jack-pot, and as good as lost. What chance have you now to win Genevieve,--with a real earl and a real hero in the field?"

"Earl and hero? I thought he was the hero."

"That's one of the jokes on mamma. Earl Jimmy had nothing to do with the rescue ships that Uncle Herbert cabled to search the Mozambique coast. No; Jeems chartered a tramp steamer on his own account, to look for friend Tommy. He found the heroic Thomas and, incidentally, the fair Genevieve--who wasn't so very fair after weeks of broiling in that East African sun."

"It's wonderful--wonderful! To think that she alone of all aboard her steamer should have survived shipwreck on that savage coast!"

"She didn't survive alone--she couldn't have. That's where Tommy came in. There was another man, but he didn't count for much, I guess. Vievie merely wrote that he died during the second cyclone."

"What an experience!--and for a girl like Genevieve!"

"She, of all girls!" chimed in Dolores enviously. "You remember she never went in for sports of any kind, not even riding. And for her to be flung out that way into the tropical jungles, among lions and crocodiles and snakes and things! Why can't I ever have romantic adventures?"

"You wouldn't give the man a chance to prove himself a hero," objected Ashton. "You'd shoot the lions yourself."

"I am good at archery. A bow and arrows, you know, were all that Mr. Blake had."

"Blake?" repeated Ashton in rather a peculiar tone.

"Yes, Tommy the hero, otherwise Mr. Thomas Blake."

"Blake--Thomas Blake?" echoed Ashton.

"I--rather odd--I once--seems to me I once knew a man of that name. You don't happen to know if he's a--that is, what his occupation is, do you?"

Ashton was not the kind of man from whom is expected hesitancy of speech. The girl spared him a swift glance from the out-flocking stream of passengers. His fixed gaze and slack lower jaw betrayed even more uneasiness than had his voice.

"Don't be afraid," she mocked. "He's not a minister; so he couldn't marry her without help, and he's not done it since the rescue."

"Not done it?" repeated Ashton vaguely.

"No. According to mamma's letter, Earl Jimmy outgeneraled the low- browed hero. At Aden he put Vievie on a P. and O. steamer, in the charge of Lady Chetwynd. He and the hero followed in the tramp steamer to England, where he kept friend Thomas at his daddy's ducal castle until Vievie made mamma start home with her. You know mamma streaked it for London, at Uncle Herbert's expense, the moment Vievie cabled from Port Mozambique that she was safe. Uncle Herbert would have sent me, too, but mamma wouldn't have it. Just like her! It was her first chance to do England and crowd in on Vievie's noble friends. She said I might spoil the good impression she hoped to make, because I'm too much of a tomboy."

"But if it's your mother and Genevieve you're waiting for--I understood you to say the earl and that man Blake."

"Oh, they followed on the next steamer. Mamma wired that they are all coming on together from New York." "Where's Mr. Leslie? Did he go to meet them?"

"He? You should know how busy Uncle Herbert always is. I called by his office for him. He sent out word to go on. He would follow."

"What! after all Genevieve went through, all those hardships and dangers? You'd think that even he--"

"Look I oh, look I there she is now!" cried the girl, pressing close against the fence and waving her handkerchief between the pickets.

"Where? Yes, I see! beside your mother!" exclaimed Ashton, and he lifted his hat on his cane.

The signals won them recognition from the approaching ladies, the younger of whom responded with a quietly upraised hand. Beside her walked a rosy-cheeked blonde young Englishman, while in front a big square-built man thrust the crowd forward ahead of them. They were followed by two maids, a valet, and two porters, with hand luggage.

As the party emerged from the gateway the younger lady leaned forward and spoke in a clear soft voice: "Turn to the left, Tom."

The big man in the lead swerved out of the crowd and across the corner past Miss Gantry, who was advancing with outstretched arms, her eyes sparkling with joyous excitement.

"Vievie!" she half shrieked.

Blake glanced over his shoulder and stopped short at sight of the girls locked in each other's arms. After a moment's fervent embrace, Dolores thrust her cousin out at arm's-length and surveyed her from top to toe with radiant eyes.

"Vievie! Vievie! I really can't believe it! To think you're home again--when we never expected to see you--and you've got almost all the tan off already!"

Genevieve looked up into the vivacious face of the younger girl with an affectionate smile on her delicately curved lips and tears of joy in her hazel eyes.

"It is good to be home again, dear!" she murmured. She drew Dolores about to face the big man, who stood looking on with rather a surly expression, in his pale blue eyes. "Tom," she said, "this is my cousin, Miss Gantry. Dolores, Mr. Blake."

"The hee-row!" sighed Dolores, clasping a hand dramatically on her heart.

Blake's strong face lighted with a humorous smile. "Guess I've got to own up to it, Miss Dolores. Anything Jenny--Miss Leslie--says goes."

As he spoke he raised his English steamer cap slightly and extended a square powerful hand. Dolores entrusted her slender fingers to the calloused palm, which closed upon them with utmost gentleness.

"Really, Mr. Blake!" she exclaimed," I mean it. You are a hero."

Blake's smile broadened, and as he released her hand, he glanced at her mother, who had drawn a little apart with the Englishman. "Don't let me shut out your mamma and Jimmy."

"Oh, mamma believes that any display of family affection is immodest," she replied. "But duty, you know--duty!"

She whirled about and impressed a loud salute upon the drooping jowl of the stately Mrs. Gantry.

"Dolores!" admonished the dame. "When will you remember you're no longer a hoyden? Such impetuosity--and before his lordship!"

"Goodness! Is he really?" panted her daughter, surveying the Englishman with candid curiosity.

"Is he really!" Mrs. Gantry was profoundly shocked. "If you weren't out, I'd see that you had at least two more years in a finishing school."

"Horrors! that certainly would finish me. But you forget yourself, mamma. You keep his earlship waiting for his introduction."

The Englishman shot a humorous glance at Blake, and drew out his monocle. He screwed it into his eye and stared blandly at the irrepressible Miss Gantry, while her mother, with some effort, regained a degree of composure. She bowed in a most formal manner.

"The Right Honorable the Earl of Avondale: I present my daughter."

The earl dropped his monocle, raised his cap, and bowed with unaffected grace. Dolores nodded and caught his hand in her vigorous clasp.

"Glad to meet you," she said. "It's rare we meet a real live earl in Chicago. Most of 'em are caught in New York, soon as they land."

"It's good of you to say it, Miss Gantry," he replied, tugging at the tip of his little mustache. "I've been over before, you know. Came in disguise. This time I was able to march through New York with colors flying, thanks to your mother and Miss Leslie."

Dolores sent her glance flashing after his, and saw Genevieve responding coldly to the effusive greeting of Ashton. The young man was edging towards the earl. But Genevieve turned to introduce him first to her companion.

"Mr. Blake, Mr. Brice-Ashton."

"I'm sure I'm--pleased to meet you, Mr. Blake," murmured Ashton, his voice breaking slightly as Blake grasped his gloved hand in the bare calloused palm.

"Any friend of Miss Jenny's!" responded Blake with hearty cordiality. But as he released the other's hand, he muttered half to himself, "Ashton?--Ashton? Haven't I met you before, somewhere?"

As Ashton hesitated over his reply, Genevieve spoke for him: "No doubt it's the familiarity of the name, Tom. Mr. Brice-Ashton's father is Mr. George Ashton, the financier."

"What! him?" exclaimed Blake. "But no. It's his face. I remember now. Met him in your father's office."

"In father's office?"

"When I was acting as secretary for your father, Miss Genevieve," Ashton hastened to explain. "You remember, I was in your father's office for a year. That was before I succeeded with my--plans for the Michamac cantilever bridge and went to take charge of the construction as resident engineer."

"Your plans?" muttered Blake incredulously.

"To be sure. I remember now," said Genevieve absently, and she turned to look about, with a perplexed uptilting of her arched brows. "But, Dolores, where is papa?"

"Coming--coming, Viviekins," reassured her cousin, breaking short an animated conversation with the earl. "Don't worry, dear. He'll be along in a few minutes."

Genevieve stepped forward beside Blake to peer at the crowd. Dolores took pity on Ashton, who had edged around, eager for an introduction to the titled stranger.

"Oh, your earlship," she remarked, "this, by the way, is Mr. Laffie Brice-Ashton. I'd like to present him to you, but I'm afraid your Right Honorableness wouldn't take him even as a gift if you knew him as well as I do."

"Oh, now, Do--Miss Gon-tray!" protested Ashton.

The Englishman bowed formally and adjusted his monocle, oblivious of the hand that Ashton had stripped of its glove.

"Your--your grace--I should say, your lordship," stammered Ashton, hastily dropping his hand, "I'm extremely delighted--honored, I mean-- at the unexpected pleasure of meeting your lordship."

"Ah, really?" murmured his lordship.

"Mr. Brice-Ashton's father is one of our most eminent financiers," interposed Mrs. Gantry.

"Ah, really? What luck!" politely exclaimed the Englishman. He stepped past the son of the eminent financier, to address Genevieve in an impulsive, boyish tone, "I say, Miss Leslie, hop up on a suitcase between Tom and me. You'll see over their heads."

"Hold on," said Blake, who was staring towards the outer door. "He's coming now."

"Where? Are you sure, Tom?" asked Genevieve, here eyes radiant.

"Sure, I'm sure," said Blake. "Met your father once. That was enough for me."

"Tom! You'll not-?"

"Enough for me to remember him," he explained with grim humor. "Don't worry. I don't want a row any more than you do."

"Or than he will! He'll not forget that had it not been for you--"

"And Jimmy!"

"Chuck it, old man," put in Lord James. "Miss Leslie knows as well as you do that one or more of the steamers chartered by her father must certainly have sighted your signal flag within a fortnight. I merely had the luck to be first."

"A lot of things can happen inside two weeks, down on the Mozambique coast. Eh, Miss Jenny?" said Blake.

For the moment, forgetful even of her father, Genevieve clasped her gloved hands and gazed upwards over the heads of the rushing multitude at a vision of swampy lagoons, of palm clumps and tangled jungles, of towering cliffs, and hot sand beaches, all aglare with the fierce downbeat of the tropical sun. _

Read next: Chapter 5. A Refractory Hero

Read previous: Chapter 3. Lord And Man

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