"Then, do you know where Daisy Dow is? I MUST flirt with somebody!"
"Try me," said pretty little Mrs. Kenerley, demurely.
"I would, but I"m afraid Baby May would tell her father."
"That"s so; she might. Well, Daisy is at the telephone in the library; I hear her talking."
"Thank you," said Big Bill, abruptly, and started for the library.
"Yes," he heard Daisy saying as he entered the room, "a long, light green veil, floating backward, held by a wreath of silver stars ...
Certainly ... Oh, yes, I understand ... Good-bye."
She hung up the receiver, and turned to see Bill looking at her with a peculiar expression on his handsome, honest face.
"What are you going to represent in your light green veil, Daisy?" he asked.
"The Spirit of the Sea," she replied. "I"ve arranged for the loveliest costume,--all green and shimmery, and dripping with seaweed."
"How did you happen to be chosen for that part, Daisy?"
"Guy Martin insisted upon it. He said there was no one else just right for it."
"How about Patty Fairfield?"
"Oh, she WOULDN"T take it. She told Guy so."
"She did! I wonder WHY she wouldn"t take it?"
"I don"t know, Bill, I"m sure. It COULDN"T have been because you"re Neptune, could it?"
"It might be," Bill flung out, between closed teeth, and turning, he strode quickly away.
"Bill," called Daisy, and he returned.
"What is it?" he said, and his face showed a hurt, pained look, rather than anger.
"Only this: Patty asked Guy as a special favour not to mention this matter to her. So I daresay you"ll feel in honour bound not to speak of it."
"H"m; I don"t know as my honour binds me very strongly in that direction."
"But it MUST, Bill!" and Daisy looked distinctly troubled. "I oughtn"t to have told you, for Patty trusted me not to tell anybody."
"Patty ought to know better than to trust you at all!" and with this parting shaft, Bill walked away. On the veranda he met Guy Martin, who had called for a moment to discuss some Pageant plans with Mona. Guy was just leaving, and Bill walked by his side, down the path to the gate.
"Just a moment, Martin, please. As man to man, tell me if Patty Fairfield refused to take the part of the Spirit of the Sea?"
"Why, yes; she did," said Guy, looking perplexed. "It"s a queer business and very unlike Patty. But she wrote me a note, saying she didn"t want the part, and asking me not to mention the matter to her at all."
"She did? Thank you. Good-bye." And Bill returned to the house, apparently thinking deeply.
"h.e.l.lo, Billy Boy, what"s the matter?" called Mona, gaily, as he came up the veranda steps.
"I"m pining for you," returned Bill. "Do shed the light of your countenance on me for a few blissful moments. You"re the most unattainable hostess I ever house-partied with!"
"All right, I"ll walk down to the lower terrace and back with you. Now, tell me what"s on your mind."
"How sympathetic you are, Mona. Well, I will tell you. I"m all broken up over this Pageant business. I wanted Patty Fairfield on the float with me, and she won"t take the part, and now Daisy has cabbaged it."
"I know it. But Patty says Guy Martin chose Daisy in preference to her.
And she says it"s all right."
"Great jumping Anacondas! She says THAT, does she? And she says it"s all right, does she? Well, it"s just about as far from all right as the North Pole is from the South Pole! Oh--ho! E--hee! Wow, wow! I perceive a small beam of light breaking in upon this black cat"s pocket of a situation! Mona, will you excuse me while I go to raise large and elegant ructions among your lady friends?"
"Now, Bill, don"t stir up a fuss. I know your wild Western way of giving people "a piece of your mind," but Spring Beach society doesn"t approve of such methods. What"s it all about, Bill? Tell me, and let"s settle it quietly."
"Settle it quietly! When an injustice has been done that ought to be blazoned from East to West!"
"Yes, and make matters most uncomfortable for the victim of that injustice."
Big Bill calmed down. The anger faded from his face, his hands unclenched themselves, and he sat down on the terrace bal.u.s.trade.
"You"re right, Mona," he said, in a low, tense voice. "I"m nothing but an untamed cowboy! I have no refinement, no culture, no judgment. But I"ll do as you say; I"ll settle this thing QUIETLY."
As a matter of fact, Bill"s quiet, stern face and firm-set jaw betokened an even more strenuous "settlement" than his bl.u.s.tering mood had done; but he dropped the whole subject, and began to talk to Mona, interestedly, about her own part in the Pageant.
CHAPTER XV
IN THE ARBOUR
After returning from her motor ride with Roger, Patty went to her room to write some letters.
But she had written only so far as "My dearest Nan," when a big pink rose came flying through the open window and fell right on the paper.
Patty looked up, laughing, for she knew it was Bill who threw the blossom.
The bay window of Patty"s boudoir opened on a particularly pleasant corner of the upper veranda,--a corner provided with wicker seats and tables, and screened by awnings from the midday sun. And when Patty was seated by her desk in that same bay window, half-hidden by the thin, fluttering curtain draperies, Big Bill Farnsworth had an incurable habit of strolling by. But he did not respond to Patty"s laughter in kind.
"Come out here," he said, and his tone was not peremptory, but beseechingly in earnest. Wondering a little, Patty rose and stepped over the low sill to the veranda. Bill took her two little hands in his own two big ones, and looked her straight in the eyes.
"What part are YOU going to take in this foolish racket they"re getting up?" he asked.
"I"m going to be Maid of the Mist," answered Patty, trying to speak as if she didn"t care.
"Why aren"t you going to be Spirit of the Sea?"