Julia The Apostate Read online

more delicate, just because you must look harderto discover them, just because you must get as much from a pot ofhyacinths on the Avenue as from a whole field of primroses in thebackwoods, you know," she concluded, and the little circle nodded sagelyand congratulated themselves on an unpublished paragraph.

  "I don't agree with you, Mrs. Ranger," said Aunt Ju-ju flatly, to theabsolute amazement of her nieces and the tolerant amusement of theassembly. "I guess you haven't lived in the country much, or youwouldn't talk so. And primroses don't grow in fields here, anyway.If you could see my hyacinths and crocuses in round beds at home, youwouldn't mention those poor little stalks in the pots."

  Mrs. Ranger laughed, and directed her searching, level glance atthe older woman, who combined in her comely, undisguised middle agesomething at once more matronly and more childish than the analyticauthoress could ever find in her own mirror.

  "Aha!" she cried, "then you are no friend of dear old Horace, after all,Miss Trueman! He and I, you see--"

  The relation of these two urbanites was revealed no further, for abustle in the little hall drew attention to a newcomer unknown notonly to the guests but evidently to the hostesses, who rose, smilinguncertainly, as a portly, broad-shouldered man with iron-gray hair madehis way through the group about the samovar.

  "I'll have to introduce myself, I see," he began, not preciselywith what an exigent society calls ease of manner, but with a certainpractical self-possession quite as effective.

  "I didn't expect the girls to remember me, but I thought perhaps youmight, Julia."

  Miss Trueman peered out from the shaded five-o'clock gloom so dear toCarolyn's soul.

  "I don't seem--it's not--why, Cousin Lorando Bean, it's not you?"

  "That's it," he said heartily, "that's just exactly it. And he's mightyglad to see some of his relations again, I can tell you. And these areCarrie and Lizzie, I suppose. Well, well, fifteen years is a long time,even to an old fellow like me, and you girls were just beginning to beyoung ladies when I left Connecticut. How are you all?"

  If this simple greeting came like a breath of her native air to MissTrue-man, it cannot be said to have had a similar effect on her nieces.Courtesy prevented a full expression of their feelings, but theyaffected no undue delight at the presence of their new-foundrelative--whom they had very sincerely forgotten, along with many otherdetails of a somewhat inartistic youth--and turned to their other guestswith a frank relief when they had established him, with a cup of tea, asandwich, and Aunt Julia, in the near-by dining-room.

  "A third or fourth cousin, I believe, who has lived a long time in theWest," they explained. The company, some of whom doubtless possessedthird or fourth cousins from the West, nodded comprehensively, and theinterrupted function flowed smoothly on again.

  Cousin Lorando Bean balanced his cup on his broad palm and gazed aboutappreciatively at the casts and water-colors on the dull green walls.

  "Very snug little quarters, these," he volunteered, "but, do you know,Cousin Jule, I suppose it's all right for ladies, but I don't seem tobreathe extra well in these little rooms, somehow! I've been in two orthree of them like this, more or less, since I came to New York--peopleI used to know that I've been hunting up--and, by George, I began tofeel as if I was getting red in the face, if you see what I mean."

  "Yes, indeed, Cousin Lorando, I do," returned Miss Trueman eagerly, "Isee exactly. And not having any cellar--you've no idea! Nor anyattic, either. And often and often we have the gas lighted all throughbreakfast. Of course there are a great many conveniences," she addedloyally, "and there's no doubt it saves steps. But I almost think I'drather take 'em."

  He nodded.

  "What's become of the old place, Cousin Jule? I judge you've been out ofit some time?"

  "Two years, Cousin Lorando. The girls had been boarding up to then, andwhen Aunt Martha died they got up this plan for me to come down and livewith them, for they couldn't afford it quite, alone, and then I couldchaperon them."

  Aunt Julia delivered herself of this phrase with a certain complacency.Mr. Bean looked up sharply.

  "That means that nobody gets a show to abduct 'em while you're around, Itake it?" he inquired.

  "We-ell, not exactly," she demurred.

  "But that's the idea? I thought so. Yes. How old is Lizzie now? Thirty?"

  "Oh, no, Cousin Lorando; L---- Elise isn't twenty-nine yet. Carolyn isabout thirty."

  "I don't seem to recall any one chaperoning you and Hattie when you werethirty," he suggested thoughtfully.

  She laughed involuntarily.

  "Oh, Hattie was married, Cousin Lorando, and the children were ten yearsold! And, anyway, it was different then."

  "The girls were just as pretty, I guess," he insisted. "And there wereplenty of buggies, if anybody had designs."

  There was a pause, and the buzz of voices from the other room roseloudly.

  "They've neither of them got their mother's looks," he observed; andthen, with apparent irrelevance: "When will they be considered safe togo about alone?"

  "I don't know exactly what you mean," she began a little coldly, but hislaugh reassured her.

  "Oh, yes, you do," he contradicted, "and don't you be getting cross atyour Cousin Lorando Bean! You know I always loved to tease you; it madeyour eyes snap--and it does now."

  "How can you?" She looked reproachfully at him.

  "And I tell you this, Cousin Jule: neither of those girls will ever getup a color like that!"

  She shook her head, but she was not displeased. He took out a fatchocolate-colored cigar and fingered it wistfully.

  "I suppose I mustn't smoke?" he queried.

  Her quick answer surprised herself.

  "I should hope you could, if that woman can!"

  "Which one?"

  "That Mrs. Ranger, the one near the samovar--that big brass thing.Liz--Elise didn't introduce her to you. They don't introduce people theway they do at home, Cousin Lorando--I hope you didn't mind. They thinkit's awkward."

  "Oh, Lord, no, I don't mind. I can spare her, anyway. She's checked uptoo high for me. But she can look you through pretty thoroughly, can'tshe?"

  "She writes books," Miss Trueman returned, the finality of her toneindicating that she had explained any possible idiosyncrasy of the ladyin question.

  "Oh, I see. And the little red-haired one, does she write books, too?"

  "No; she's an artist. She smokes too, though. Not cigars, like yours,but cigarettes. She's supposed to be a very good painter, but shedoesn't make what Carrie--lyn makes. The girls have very good positionsin Miss Abrams' school."

  "Um, what do they get, now?"

  Miss Trueman mentioned the modest sum with pride.

  "And then with my money and what we get from the rent of the place--thegirls and I each have a third, you know--we do very nicely."

  "So you rented the place?"

  "Yes, Cousin Lorando, though I hated to. But I wouldn't sell it, thoughthey wanted me to. I just couldn't."

  "I know."

  He lighted his cigar and puffed at it in meditative silence for amoment, while the babble from the parlor floated in with the odor of theCeylon tea and cigarettes.

  "That's what I came about, Cousin Jule--the old place. You may thinkit's queer, for I never lived there but two years once, when father andyour Uncle Joe farmed it on shares; but those two years just made ithome to me. Of course Uncle Joe wasn't any real relation of mine, andyou-all weren't my real cousins, but it was the only family I ever had,so to say, and I loved every one of you. Then we moved back into town;but you know I came in every week or so, and Aunt Martha used to have myroom in the attic ready for me, just the same."

  "Yes, I know; Aunt Martha never forgot you, Cousin Lorando."

  "Well, it's fifteen years since I saw the old place, and a lot'shappened since then, I tell you. First place, I'm a rich man, CousinJule.

  "Oh, I don't mean one of these multi-millionaires you have about here,for I haven't even seven figures opposite my name; but short of
thatI did very well for myself out West there, and I earned it all fair,too--though I was pretty lucky, and that counts.

  "Anyhow, never mind about that. Only I've got enough to have anything Iwant, and to give my friends something, too. So as soon as I got back.East I went straight down to the farm. But it was all shut up and a kindof green hedge where the fence used to be, and I judged it was sold, andI felt pretty sore about it, so I came right away."

  "They only come there in June,"