"You think so – we all know that," said Jeannette, flashing a spiteful glance at him; "you have been making a simpleton of yourself about her for the last two years. Why don't you propose at once."
"Because she wouldn't have me," blurted honest Alick; "I wish to heaven she would! I would soon do the popping."
"Faint heart never won fair lady; take courage and try," said the captain.
Jeannette looked at him with her most taking smile.
"Are you quite sincere in that, Captain Cavendish?"
"Quite! Why not?"
"Oh, nothing! Only rumor says you are going to carry a Bluenose bride back to Merrie England."
"Perhaps I may. You are a Bluenose, are you not, Miss Jeannette?"
Before Jeannette could answer, a sort of shout from Alick, who was at the window, took their attention. Miss McGregor looked languidly over.
"Oh, how noisy you are! What is it, pray?"
The door-bell rang loudly.
"It's Natty herself and Laura Blair. You ought to have seen Natty driving up, captain; she handles the ribbons in tiptop style, and that black mare of Blair's is no joke to drive."
Before he had finished speaking, the door opened, and a servant showed in the two young ladies. Miss Jeannette sprang up with the utmost effusion, and kissed each on both cheeks.
"You darling Natty! It is ages since you were here. Laura, how good it is of you to fetch her! for I know it must have been you."
"So it was," said Laura, shaking hands with Captain Cavendish. "I haven't time, I haven't time, is always her cry. I tell her there will be time when we are all dead – won't there, captain?"
"I presume so, unless at the loss of Miss Laura Blair the whole economy of creation blows up with a crash."
"And so you see," said Laura, sitting down on a chair, and flirting out her skirts all around her, "I drove up to Redmon this morning, with a great basketful of English strawberries the size of crab-apples, as a coaxer to Lady Leroy; and through their eloquence, and the promise of another, got her to let Natty come to town with me on business."
"On business;" said Captain Cavendish; "that means shopping."
"No, sir, it doesn't; it means something serious, and that you must take share in. You, too, Jeannette, and you, Alick, if we run short."
"Thank you," said Alick, "what is it?"
"Why, you know," began Miss Blair, with the air of one about entering upon a story, "there's that Mrs. Hill – you know her, Alick?"
"What! the wife of the pilot who was drowned in the storm last week?"
"That's the one," nodded Laura. "Well, she's poor – Oh, dear me! ever so poor, and her two children down in the measles, and herself half dead with rheumatism. I shouldn't have known a thing about it only for Miss Rose. I do declare Miss Rose is next door to an angel; she found her out, and did lots of things for her, and told me at last how poor she was, and asked me to send her some things. So then I made up this plan."
"What plan?" inquired Jeannette, as Laura stopped for want of breath, and Nathalie sat listening with an amused look.
"Oh, didn't I tell you? Why, we're going to have a play, and every one of us turn into actors; admission, half a dollar. Won't it be grand?"
"And the play is Laura's own," said Nathalie; "nothing less than the adventures of Telemachus dramatized."
"That is delightful," said Jeannette, with sparkling eyes. "Have I a part, Laura?"
"To be sure, and so has Natty, and myself, and Captain Cavendish, and Val Blake, and Charley Marsh, and as many more as we want. The new wing that pa has built to our house is just finished, and, being unfurnished, will make a lovely theater. Only a select number of tickets will be issued, and the place is sure to be crowded. The proceeds will be a little fortune to Mrs. Hill."
"You should have given Miss Rose a part, as she was the head of it," suggested Alick.
"She wouldn't have it. I tried hard enough, but she was resolute. She is such a timid little thing, you know, and she would make a lovely nymph, too."
"What part have you assigned me?" inquired Captain Cavendish.
"Being a soldier and a hero, you are Ulysses, of course; Charley is Telemachus; Val is Mentor – fancy Val with flowing white hair and beard, like an old nanny-goat. Jeannette, you will be Calypso; Natty will take Eucharis; I, Penelope. I wanted Miss Rose to be Eucharis – the part would have suited her so well."
"I don't believe it would come natural to Charley to make love to her," said Alick; "he'll have to, won't he, if he is Telemachus?"
"You must change the casts, Miss Blair," said the captain, decidedly. "If Telemachus is to do the love-making, I must be Telemachus. Mr. Marsh and I must change."
"You would make such a nice Ulysses," said Laura, meditatingly, while Nathalie blushed; "but please yourself. You must all spend the evening at our house, and when the whole dramatis personæ are gathered, we can discuss and settle the thing for good, fix the rehearsal and the night of the play. Don't fail to come."
"You need not be in a hurry," said Jeannette, as Laura rose and was sailing off; "stay for luncheon."
"Couldn't possibly – promised to leave Natty back safe and sound in an hour, and it only wants ten minutes now. If we fail one second, she will never get off for rehearsals. Remember, you are all engaged for this evening."
The two long parlors of the Blairs were pretty well filled that night with young ladies and gentlemen, and a very gay party they were. There was so much laughing and chaffing over it, that it was some trouble to settle preliminaries; but Laura was intensely in earnest, and could see nothing to laugh at, and Captain Cavendish coming gallantly to her aid, matters were arranged at last. Charley Marsh, who was a Rubens on a small scale, undertook to paint the scenery, superintend the carpenters and the machinery of the stage. The young ladies arranged the costumes; everybody got their parts in MS.; rehearsals were appointed, and some time before midnight the amateurs dispersed. In the June moonlight, the English officer drove Nathalie home, and it was not all theatricals they talked by the way. There was a good deal of trouble about the thing yet, now that it was finally started. In the first place, there was that tiresome Lady Leroy, who made a row every time Natty went to rehearsal, and required lots of strawberries, and jellies, and bottles of old wine, to bring her to reason. Then they bungled so in their parts, and wanted so much prompting, and Miss Elvira Tod, sister to the Rev. Augustus, who was tall and prim, and played Minerva, objected to wearing a tin shield, and wanted to keep on her hoops.
"Now, Miss Tod," expostulated Laura, ready to cry, "you know the goddess Minerva always is painted with a breastplate, to conceal her want of a bust; and as for your skeleton, you would be a nice goddess with hoops – wouldn't you?"
On the whole, things progressed as favorably as could be expected; and the eventful night was announced, tickets were issued and eagerly bought, and Speckport was on the qui vive for the great event. When the appointed night came, the impromptu theater was crowded at an early hour, and with nothing but the upper-crust, either; the military band, which formed the orchestra, played the "Nymph's Dance" ravishingly, and amid a breathless hush, the curtain rose.
Mrs. Hill, the destitute widow, was made happy next day by some twenty pounds, the produce of the play, and Speckport could talk of nothing else for a week. The Speckport Spouter even went into personalities. "Miss Nathalie Marsh," that journal said, "as Eucharis, astonished every one. The fire, the energy, the pathos of her acting could not be surpassed by the greatest professionals of the day. Captain Cavendish, as the hero, performed his part to the life – it seemed more like reality than mere acting; and Mr. C. Marsh as Ulysses, and Miss Laura Blair as Penelope, were also excellent."
On the morning after this laudatory notice appeared in the Spouter, a young gentleman, one of the employees of that office, walked slowly along Queen Street,