Jimmy Spence, paying no attention to the accusations of the girl, gave a war-whoop which had formerly been so effective in the second act of "Pocahontas," in which Jimmy had enacted the n.o.ble savage, and then he danced a jig that had done service in _Colleen Bawn_. While the amazed girl watched these antics, Jimmy suddenly swooped down upon her, caught her around the waist, and whirled her wildly around the room.
Setting her down in a corner, Jimmy became himself again, and dabbed his heated brow with his handkerchief carefully, so as not to disturb the makeup.
"Sidney in England again? That"s too good news to be true. Say it again, my girl, I can hardly believe it. Why didn"t he come with you?
Is he ill?"
"He has been very ill."
"Ah, that"s it, poor fellow. I knew nothing else would have kept him.
And then when he telegraphed to me at the old address, on landing, of course, there was no reply, because, you see, I had disappeared. But Sid wouldn"t know anything about that, and so he must be wondering what has become of me. I"ll have a great story to tell him when we meet; almost as good as his own African experiences. We"ll go right up to London to-night, as soon as this confounded supper is over. And what is your name, my girl?"
"Mary Radford."
"And you"re engaged to old Sid, eh? Well! well! well! well! This is great news. You mustn"t mind my capers, Mary, my dear; you see, I"m the only friend Sid has, and I"m old enough to be your father. I look young now, but you wait till the paint comes off. Have you any money? I mean, to live on when you"re married; because I know Sidney never had much."
"I haven"t very much either," said Mary, with a sigh.
Jimmy jumped up and paced the room in great glee, laughing and slapping his thigh.
"That"s first rate," he cried. "Why, Mary, I"ve got over 20,000 in the bank saved up for you two. The book and lectures, you know. I don"t believe Sid himself could have done as well, for he always was careless with money--he"s often lent me the last penny he had, and never kept any account of it; and I never thought of paying it back, either, until he was gone, and then it worried me."
The messenger put his head into the room, and said the Mayor and the Corporation were waiting.
"Oh, hang the Mayor and the Corporation!" cried Jimmy; then, suddenly recollecting himself, he added, hastily, "No, don"t do that. Just give them Jimmy--I mean Sidney--Ormond"s compliments, and tell his Worship that I have just had some very important news from Africa, but will be with him directly."
When the messenger was gone Jimmy continued in high feather. "What a time we shall have in London. We"ll all three go to the old familiar theatre, yes, and by Jove, we"ll pay for our seats; _that_ will be a novelty. Then we will have supper where Sid and I used to eat. Sidney shall talk, and you and I will listen; then I shall talk, and you and Sid will listen. You see, my dear, I"ve been to Africa too. When I got Sidney"s letter saying he was dying I just moped about and was of no use to anybody. Then I made up my mind what to do. Sid had died for fame, and it wasn"t just he shouldn"t get what he paid so dearly for. I gathered together what money I could and went to Africa, steerage. I found I couldn"t do anything there about searching for Sid, so I resolved to be his understudy and bring fame to him, if it were possible. I sank my own ident.i.ty and made up as Sidney Ormond, took his boxes and sailed for Southampton. I have been his understudy ever since, for, after all, I always had a hope he would come back some day, and then everything would be ready for him to take the princ.i.p.al, and let the old understudy go back to the boards again and resume competing with the reputation of Macready. If Sid hadn"t come back in another year, I was going to take a lecturing trip in America, and when that was done, I intended to set out in great state for Africa, disappear into the forest as Sidney Ormond, wash the paint off and come out as Jimmy Spence. Then Sidney Ormond"s fame would have been secure, for they would be always sending out relief expeditions after him and not finding him, while I would be growing old on the boards and bragging what a great man my friend, Sidney Ormond, was."
There were tears in the girl"s eyes as she rose and took Jimmy"s hand.
"No man has ever been so true a friend to his friend as you have been,"
she said.
"Oh, bless you, yes," cried Jimmy, jauntily. "Sid would have done the same for me. But he is luckier in having you than in having his friend, although I don"t deny I"ve been a good friend to him. Yes, my dear, he is lucky in having a plucky girl like you. I missed that somehow when I was young, having my head full of Macready nonsense, and I missed being a Macready too. I"ve always been a sort of understudy, so you see the part comes easy to me. Now I must be off to that confounded Mayor and Corporation, I had almost forgotten them, but I must keep up the character for Sidney"s sake. But this is the last act, my dear. To- morrow I"ll turn over the part of explorer to the real actor ... to the star."
"OUT OF THUN."
1.--BESSIE"S BEHAVIOUR.
On one point Miss Bessie Durand agreed with Alexander von Humboldt--in fact, she even went further than that celebrated man, for while he a.s.serted that Thun was one of the three most beautiful spots on earth, Bessie held that this Swiss town was absolutely the most perfectly lovely place she had ever visited. Her reason for this conclusion differed from that of Humboldt. The latter, being a mere man, had been influenced by the situation of the town, the rapid, foaming river, the placid green lake, the high mountains all around, the snow-peaks to the east, the ancient castle overlooking everything, and the quaint streets with the pavements up at the first floors.
Bessie had an eye for these things, of course, but while waterfalls and profound ravines were all very well in their way, her hotel had to be filled with the right sort of company before any spot on earth was entirely satisfactory to Bessie. She did not care to be out of humanity"s reach, nor to take her small journeys alone; she liked to hear the sweet music of speech, and if she started at the sound of her own, Bessie would have been on the jump all day, for she was a brilliant and effusive talker.
So it happened that, in touring through Switzerland, Bessie and her mother (somehow people always placed Bessie"s name before that of her mother, who was a quiet little un.o.btrusive woman) stopped at Thun, intending to stay for a day, as most people do, but when Bessie found the big hotel simply swarming with nice young men, she told her mother that the local guide-book a.s.serted that Humboldt had once said Thun was one of the three most lovely places on earth, and, therefore, they ought to stay there and enjoy its beauties, which they at once proceeded to do. It must not be imagined from this that Bessie was particularly fond of young men. Such was far from being the case. She merely liked to have them propose to her, which was certainly a laudable ambition, but she invariably refused them, which went to show that she was not, as her enemies stated, always in love with somebody.
The fact was that Miss Bessie Durand"s motives were entirely misunderstood by an unappreciative world. Was she to be blamed because young men wanted her to marry them? Certainly not. It was not her fault that she was pretty and sweet, and that young men, as a rule, liked to talk with her rather than with any one else in the neighbourhood. Many of her detractors would very likely have given much to have had Bessie"s various charms of face, figure, and manner. This is a jealous world, and people delight in saying spiteful little things about those more favoured by Providence than themselves. It must, however, be admitted that Bessie had a certain cooing, confidential way with people that may have misled some of the young men who ultimately proposed to her into imagining that they were special favourites with the young lady. She took a kindly interest in their affairs, and very shortly after making her acquaintance, most young men found themselves pouring into her sympathetic ear all their hopes and aspirations. Bessie"s ear was very sh.e.l.l-like and beautiful as well as sympathetic, so that one can hardly say the young men were to blame any more than Bessie was.
Nearly everybody in this world wants to talk of himself or herself, as the case may be, and so it is no wonder that a person like Bessie, who is willing to listen while other people talk of themselves, is popular.
Among the many billions who inhabit this planet, there are too many talkers and too few listeners; and although Bessie was undoubtedly a brilliant talker on occasion, there is no doubt that her many victories resulted more from her appreciative qualities as a talented listener than from the entertaining charms of her conversation. Those women who have had so much to say about Bessie"s behaviour might well take a leaf from her book in this respect. They would find, if they had even pa.s.sably good looks, that proposals would be more frequent. Of course there is no use in denying that Bessie"s eyes had much to do with bringing young men to the point. Her eyes were large and dark, and they had an entrancing habit of softening just at the right moment, when there came into them a sweet, trustful, yearning look that was simply impossible to resist. They gazed thus at a young man when he was telling in low whispers how he hoped to make the world wiser and better by his presence in it, or when he narrated some incident of great danger in which he took part, where (unconsciously, perhaps, on the teller"s part) his own heroism was shown forth to the best possible advantage. Then Bessie"s eyes would grow large and humid and tender, and a subdued light would come into them as she hung breathlessly on his words. Did not Desdemona capture Oth.e.l.lo merely by listening to a recital of his own daring deeds, which were, doubtless, very greatly exaggerated?
The young men at the big hotel in Thun were clad mostly in knickerbockers, and many of them had alpenstocks of their own. It soon became their delight to sit on the terrace in front of the hotel during the pleasant summer evenings and relate to Bessie their hairbreath escapes, the continuous murmur of the River Aare forming a soothing chorus to their dramatic narrations. At least a dozen young men hovered round the girl, willing and eager to confide in her; but while Bessie was smiling and kind to them all, it was soon evident that some special one was her favourite, and then the rest hung hopelessly back. Things would go wonderfully well for this lucky young fellow for a day or two, and he usually became so offensively conceited in his bearing towards the rest, that the wonder is he escaped without personal vengeance being wreaked upon him; then all at once he would pack up his belongings and gloomily depart for Berne or Interlaken, depending on whether his ultimate destination was west or east. The young men remaining invariably tried not to look jubilant at the sudden departure, while the ladies staying at the hotel began to say hard things of Bessie, going even so far as to a.s.sert that she was a heartless flirt. How little do we know the motives of our fellow- creatures! How p.r.o.ne we are to misjudge the actions of others! Bessie was no flirt, but a high-minded, conscientious girl, with an ambition-- an ambition which she did not babble about to the world, and therefore the world failed to appreciate her, as it nearly always fails to appreciate those who do not take it into their confidence.
It came to be currently reported in the hotel that Bessie had refused no less than seven of the young men who had been staying there, and as these young men had, one after another, packed up and departed, either by the last train at night or the earliest in the morning, the proprietor began to wonder what the matter was, especially as each of the departing guests had but a short time before expressed renewed delight with the hotel and its surroundings. Several of them had stated to the proprietor that they had abandoned their intention of proceeding further with their Swiss tour, so satisfied were they with Thun and all its belongings. Thus did the flattering opinion of Alexander von Humboldt seem about to become general, to the great delight of the hotel proprietor, when, without warning, these young men had gloomily deserted Thun, while its beauty undoubtedly remained unchanged.
Naturally the good man who owned the hotel was bewildered, and began to think that, after all, the English were an uncertain, mind-changing race.
Among the guests there was one young fellow who was quite as much perplexed as the proprietor. Archie Severance was one of the last to fall under the spell of Bessie--if, indeed, it is correct to speak of Archie falling at all. He was a very deliberate young man, not given to doing anything precipitately, but there is no doubt that the charming personality of Bessie fascinated him, although he seemed to content himself with admiring her from a distance. Bessie somehow did not appear to care about being admired from a distance, and once, when Archie was promenading to and fro on the terrace above the river, she smiled sweetly at him from her book, and he sat down beside her. Jimmy Wellman had gone that morning, and the rest had not yet found it out.
Jimmy had so completely monopolised Miss Durand for the last few days that no one else had had a chance, but now that he had departed, Bessie sat alone on the terrace, which was a most unusual state of things.
"They tell me," said Bessie, in her most flattering manner, "that you are a famous climber, and that you have been to the top of the Matterhorn."
"Oh, not famous; far from it," said Archie modestly. "I have been up the Matterhorn three or four times; but then women and children make the ascent nowadays, so that is nothing unusual."
"I am sure you must have had some thrilling escapes," continued Bessie, looking with admiration at Archie"s stalwart frame. "Mr. Wellman had an awful experience----"
"Yesterday?" interrupted Archie. "I hear he left early this morning."
"No, not yesterday," said Miss Durand coldly, drawing herself up with some indignation; but as she glanced sideways at Mr. Severance, that young man seemed so innocent that she thought perhaps he meant nothing in particular by his remark. So, after a slight pause, Bessie went on again. "It was a week ago. He was climbing the Stockhorn and all at once the clouds surrounded him."
"And what did Jimmy do? Waited till the clouds rolled by, I suppose."
"Now, Mr. Severance, if you are going to laugh at me, I shall not talk to you any more."
"I a.s.sure you, Miss Durand, I was not laughing at you. I was laughing at Jimmy. I never regarded the Stockhorn as a formidable peak. It is something like 7,195 feet high, I believe, not to mention the inches."
"But surely, Mr. Severance, you know very well that the danger of a mountain does not necessarily bear any proportion to its alt.i.tude above the sea."
"That is very true. I am sure that Jimmy himself, with his head in the clouds, has braved greater dangers at much lower levels than the top of the Stockhorn."
Again Miss Durand looked searchingly at the young man beside her, but again Archie was gazing dreamily at the curious bell-shaped summit of the mountain under discussion. The Stockhorn stands out n.o.bly, head and shoulders above its fellows, when viewed from the hotel terrace at Thun.
There was silence for a few moments between the two, and Bessie said to herself that she did not at all like this exceedingly self-possessed young man, who seemed to look at the mountains in preference to gazing at her--which was against the natural order of things. It was evident that Mr. Severance needed to be taught a lesson, and Bessie, who had a good deal of justifiable confidence in her own powers as a teacher, resolved to give him the necessary instruction. Perhaps, when he had acquired a little more experience, he would not speak so contemptuously of "Jimmy," or any of the rest. Besides, it is always a generous action towards the rest of humanity to reduce the inordinate self-esteem of any one young man to something like reasonable proportions. So Bessie, instead of showing that she was offended by his flippant conversation and his lack of devotion to her, put on her most bewitching manner, and smiled the smile that so many before her latest victim had found impossible to resist. She would make him talk of himself and his exploits. They all succ.u.mbed to this treatment.
"I do so love to hear of narrow escapes," said Bessie confidingly. "I think it is so inspiring to hear of human courage and endurance being pitted against the dangers of the Alps, and coming out victorious."
"Yes, they usually come out victorious, according to the accounts that reach us; but then, you know, we never get the mountain"s side of the story."
"But surely, Mr. Severance," appealed Bessie, "you do not imagine that a real climber would exaggerate when telling of what he had done."
"No; oh no. I would not go so far as to say that he would exaggerate exactly, but I have known cases where--well--a sort of Alpine glow came over a story that, I must confess, improved it very much. Then, again, curious mental transformations take place which have the effect of making a man, what the vulgar term, a liar. Some years ago a friend of mine came over here to do a few ascents, but he found sitting on the hotel piazza so much more to his taste that he sat there. I think myself the verandah climber is the most sensible man of the lot of us; and, if he has a good imagination, there is no reason why he should be distanced by those you call real climbers, when it comes to telling stories of adventures. Well, this man, who is a most truthful person, took one false step. You know, some amateurs have a vile habit of getting the names of various peaks branded on their alpenstocks--just as if any real climber ever used an alpenstock."
"Why, what do they use?" asked Bessie, much interested.
"Ice-axes, of course. Now, there is a useful individual in Interlaken, who is what you might call a wholesale brander. He has the names of all the peaks done in iron at his shop, and if you take your alpenstock to him, he will, for a few francs, brand on it all the names it will hold, from the Ortler to Mont Blanc. My friend was weak enough to have all the ascents he had intended to make, branded on the alpenstock he bought the moment he entered Switzerland. They always buy an alpenstock the first thing. He never had the time to return to the mountains, but gradually he came to believe that he had made all the ascents recorded by fire and iron on his pole. He is a truthful man on every other topic than Switzerland."
"But you must have had some very dangerous experiences among the Alps, Mr. Severance. Please tell me of the time you were in the greatest peril."
"I am sure it would not interest you."