XVII
ON THE NARROW-GAUGE
For a certain breath-cutting minute after he had made good his grasp on the hand-rails of the rear car, Brockway was too angry to congratulate himself. A blow, even though it be given by a senior, and that senior the father of the young woman with whom one chances to be in love, is not to be borne patiently save by a philosopher or a craven, and Brockway was far enough from being either the one or the other.
But, fortunately for his own peace of mind, the young man reckoned a quick temper among his compensations. By the time he had recovered his breath, some subtle essence of the clean, crisp morning air had gotten into his veins, and the insult dwindled in the perspective until it became less incendiary. Nay, more; before the engineer whistled for Argo, Brockway was beginning to find excuses for the exasperated father.
He a.s.sumed that Gertrude was on the train with the Burtons--Mrs.
Burton"s message could mean no less--and Mr. Francis Vennor had doubtless been at some pains to arrange the little plan of separation.
And to find it falling to pieces at the last moment was certainly very exasperating. Brockway admitted it cheerfully, and when he had laughed aloud at the President"s discomfiture until the sore spot under his right collar-bone ached again, he thought he was fit to venture among the Tadmorians. Accordingly, he made his way forward through the two observation-cars to the coach set apart for the thirty-odd.
His appearance was the signal for a salvo of exclamatory inquiry from the members of the party, but Brockway had his eyes on the occupants of a double seat in the middle of the coach, and he a.s.sured himself that explanations to the thirty-odd might well wait. A moment later he was shaking hands with Mrs. Burton and Miss Vennor.
"Dear me!" said the proxy chaperon, with shameless disingenuousness; "I was really beginning to be afraid you were left. Where have you been all the time?"
"Out on the rear platform, taking in the scenery," Brockway replied, calmly, sitting down beside Gertrude. "Didn"t you see me when I got on?"
Mrs. Burton had seen the little incident on the station platform out of the tail of her eye as the train was getting under way, so she was barely within truthful limits when she said "No." But she looked very hard at Brockway and succeeded in making him understand that Gertrude was not to know anything about the plot or its marring. The young man telegraphed acquiescence, though his leaning was rather toward straight forwardness.
"Did you rest well after your spin on the engine last night?" he asked of Gertrude.
"Quite well, thank you. Have you ever ridden on an engine, Mrs. Burton?"
"Many times," replied the marplot; and then she made small-talk desperately, while she tried to think of some way of warning her husband not to be surprised at the sudden change in Brockway"s itinerary for the day. Nothing better suggesting, she struck hands with temerity when Burton appeared at the forward door with the conductor, and ordered Brockway to take Gertrude back to the observation-car.
"It"s a shame that Miss Vennor should be missing the scenery," she said.
"Go along with her and make yourself useful. We will take care of your ancients."
The small plotter breathed freer when they were gone. She knew she had a little duel to fight with her conservative husband, and she preferred to fight it without seconds. Her premonition became a reality as soon as he reached her.
"How is this?" he began; "did you know Fred had changed his plans?"
She shook her head. "He didn"t take me into his confidence."
"Well, what did he say for himself?"
"About changing his mind? Nothing."
"He didn"t? that"s pretty cool! What does he mean by running us off up here on a wild-goose chase?"
"How should I know, when he didn"t tell me?"
"Well, I"ll just go and find out," Burton declared, with growing displeasure.
But his wife detained him. "Sit down and think about it for a few minutes, first," she said, coolly. "You are angry now, and you mustn"t forget that he"s with Miss Vennor."
"By Jove! that is the very thing I"m not forgetting. I believe you were more than half-right in your guess, yesterday; but we mustn"t let them make fools of themselves--anyway, not while we are responsible."
"I don"t quite _savez_ the responsibility," retorted the little lady, flippantly. "But what do you imagine?"
"I don"t imagine--I know. He found out, somehow, that she was going with us, and just dropped things and ran for it."
"Do you think he did that?"
"Of course he did. And if we"re not careful the odium of the whole thing will fall on us."
"Well, what are you going to do about it?"
"I don"t know. I suppose we ought to go back from Golden and take Miss Vennor along with us."
"Wouldn"t that be a.s.suming a great deal? You would hardly want to tell the President that you had brought his daughter back because you were afraid she might do something rash."
"Oh, pshaw!" said Burton, who was rather out of his element in trying to pick his way among the social ploughshares.
"But that is what you will have to tell him, if we go back," she insisted, with delicious effrontery.
Burton thought about it for a moment, and ended by accepting the fact merely because it was thrust upon him. "I couldn"t very well do that, you know," he objected, and she nearly laughed in his face because he had fallen so readily into her small trap; "but if we don"t break it off, what shall we do?"
"Do? why, nothing at all! Mr. Vennor asks us to take his daughter with us on a little pleasure-trip, and he doesn"t tell us to bring her back instanter if we happen to find Fred on the train."
Burton was silenced, but he was very far from being convinced, and he gave up the return project reluctantly, promising himself that he should have a very uncomfortable day of it.
In the meantime, the two young people in the observation-car were making hard work of it. A good many undiscussable happenings had intervened between their parting and their meeting, and these interfered sadly with the march of a casual conversation. As usually befalls, it was the young woman who first rose superior to the embarra.s.sments.
"I"m glad of this day," she said, frankly, when they had exhausted the scenery, the matchless morning, the crisp air, and half a dozen other commonplaces. "I enjoyed our trip down from Silver Plume a year ago so much, and it seemed the height of improbability to imagine that we"d ever repeat it. Did you think we ever should?"
"No, indeed," replied Brockway, truthfully; "but I have wished many times that we might. Once in awhile, when I was a boy, I used to get a day that was all my own--a day in which I could go where I pleased and do as I liked. Those days are all marked with white stones now, and I often envy the boy who had them."
"I think I can understand that."
"Can you? I didn"t know little girls ever had such days."
"I"ve had a few, but I think they were never given me. They were usually stolen, and so were doubly precious."
Brockway laughed. "Suppose we call this a stolen day, and try to make it as much like the others as we can. Shall we?"
"It"s a bargain," she said, impulsively.
"From this minute, I am any irresponsible age you please; and you--you are to do nothing whatever that you meant to do. Will you agree to that?"
"Gladly," Brockway a.s.sented, the more readily since his plans for the day had been so recently demolished and rebuilt. "We"ll go where we please, and do as we like; and for this one day n.o.body shall say "Don"t!""
She laughed with him, and then became suddenly grave. "It"s no use; we can"t do it," she said, with mock pathos; "the "ancients and invalids"
won"t let us."