Lady Larkspur. Meredith Nicholson

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СКАЧАТЬ yielded himself to laughter. "An Englishwoman with lofty ideas of domestic service would certainly enjoy a romp with that crew. I supposed the trust company had brushed them into the Sound before this."

      "Oh, they are in the same class with me," I explained. "The place can't be sold till I die, and while I live they're to be harbored—about thirty of them—clothed and victualled."

      "I think there's a farce in the idea, and I may try it one of these days," he said, scribbling in his note-book. "A refuge for broken-down chambermaids, venerable bell-hops grown gray in the service, and the head waiter who amassed a fortune in tips and then toyed with the market once too often and lost his ill-gotten gains. What was the head waiter's name who presided with so much stateliness in the dining-room of the Tyringham? I mean the white-haired chap who was so particular about the foot-cushions for the nice old ladies in caps and lavender ribbons and India shawls—I think I can work him in somewhere."

      "That's Antoine, who married the assistant housekeeper at the Tyringham. He's the butler and has charge of the place—a sort of commander-in-chief of the outfit. When I get settled I'll ask you up and you can study the bunch at leisure."

      "Splendid! Reserve one room for me on the sunny side of the garage and I'll be up in a couple of weeks. I'm going to Ohio to-morrow for a family reunion and a look at the loved spots my infancy knew."

      "You're lucky to have home-folks even in Ohio," I remarked enviously.

      "Well, there's always your distant auntie, cruising the seven seas in pursuit of husbands. Nobody with an aunt to his credit can pretend to be alone in the world. There is something about an aunt, Singleton! Aunts must rank just a little below mothers in the heavenly kingdom. When I was a boy out in Ohio there were two great occasions every year in my life—one when I went to visit a grand old aunt I had in the country, the other when she visited us, arriving with a wagon-load of jam, jelly, salt-rising bread, pound-cake, and other unpurchasable manna."

      "Stop! or I'll call the food censor," I pleaded, picking up my hat. "Send me your copy of 'Lady Geranium,' and I'll tell you whether it's a classic or not."

      "'Lady Larkspur,'" he corrected with a shudder. "You shall have it by trusted messenger to-morrow."

      I wired Antoine that I would reach Barton-on-the-Sound the following day. This was September, 1917. The former servants of the Tyringham were established on the place by my uncle the year before he dropped business cares and departed for the Japan of his dreams, and as I had been often at the hotel where he spent so many of the years of his life, I knew most of the old retainers. They were deeply appreciative of his kindness, and when I had gone to the farm for an uninterrupted month in finishing some piece of writing they had shown me the greatest consideration.

      As the train rolled along the familiar shore toward Barton I shook off the depression occasioned by my enforced retirement from the great struggle overseas. I had done under the French flag all that it was possible for me to do; and there was some consolation in the fact that by reason of my two years on the battle-line I was just so much ahead of the friends I met in New York who were answering the call to the colors and had their experience of war all before them. The tranquil life that had been recommended by the doctors was not only possible at Barton, but it was the only life that could be lived there. Plenty of exercise in the open and regular habits would, I had been assured, set me up again, and my leisure I meant to employ in beginning a novel that had been teasing me ever since I sailed for home.

      Of my uncle Bash I had only the happiest and most grateful memories. Quite naturally it had occurred to me at times, and my friends had encouraged the idea, that my uncle would die some day and leave me his money. There was no particular reason why he should do so, as he had never manifested any unusual affection for me and I had certainly never done anything for him.

      Antoine was at the Barton station with the touring-car Uncle Bash had bought to establish communication with the village. Flynn, the big Irishman who had been the doorman at the Tyringham for years and retired because of rheumatism acquired from long exposure to the elements at the hostelry's portals, was at the wheel.

      Antoine greeted me with that air of lofty condescension tempered with a sincere kindliness that had made him a prince among head waiters. As I shook hands with him his lips quivered and tears came to his eyes. Flynn, standing beside the car, saluted with a welcoming grin.

      "Very glad to see you, sorr. The trunk came this mornin' all right, sorr, and we put it in your room."

      I bade Antoine join me in the back seat that he might the more easily bring me up to date as to affairs on the estate.

      "It must be a little slow up here after the years you lived in town," I suggested, "but of course you're all old friends."

      "Well, yes; all friends," he acquiesced, but with so little enthusiasm that I glanced at him quickly. He pretended to be absorbed in the flying landscape at the moment. Flynn, I noticed, was giving ear to our conversation from the wheel.

      "It was sad, very sad, Mr. Bashford passing away so far from home, sir. It was a great shock. And he had looked forward for years to a quiet life abroad. It must have been ten years ago he first mentioned his hope of retiring to Japan."

      Uncle Bash had given me no such forecast of his intentions, and I felt humble before this proof of Antoine's greater intimacy. Once at the beginning of our acquaintance, when I had complimented Antoine on his English, he explained that he was born in England of French parents. His father had been chef and his mother housekeeper for an American banker who lived for many years in London. Antoine's speech was that of a well-trained English upper servant, and I imagined that in his youth he had taken some English butler as his model. He used to pretend that he knew French very imperfectly, and I was surprised when he now addressed me quite fluently in that language.

      "You have been with the armies of dear France," he remarked. "The war is very dreadful. My parents were of Verdun; it grieves me to know of the suffering in the land of my people."

      As I replied sympathetically in French I saw Flynn straighten himself at the wheel with an impatient fling of his head. Antoine indicated him with a contemptuous nod: "Married Elsie, the German woman who worked in the linen-room at the Tyringham! This has caused some trouble, and there is a pantry girl, Gretchen, who was ill a long time before the master left, and he sent her here for the country air. She is a little devil with her dear Fatherland."

      I laughed at the old fellow's gravity and earnestness. That the war should be making itself felt on the quiet acres at Barton-on-the-Sound was absurd.

      "But there can be no trouble; everything is peaceful, of course, save for a little foolish talk——"

      The Gaul asserted itself in a shrug, a form of expression rare in him. I was pondering the recrudescence of race hatreds due to the upheaval in Europe when he startled me by a statement uttered close to my ear:

      "There have been inquiries for the widow; these have caused me much anxiety."

      "Widow! Whose widow?"

      "Madame, the widow of the dear master. It seems that there are persons anxious to see her. There have been inquiries, one—two—three times."

      "Probably some of her American friends anxious to pay their respects, or some of the neighbors making calls of courtesy," I suggested.

      "A foreign gentleman who acts very queerly," Antoine persisted.

      My uncle's widow was a vague, unknown being whom I had never СКАЧАТЬ