Mr. Vertrees, pinched, retired to his Landseers, and Mrs. Vertrees “managed somehow” on the dividends, though “managing” became more and more difficult as the years went by and money bought less and less. But there came a day when three servitors of Bigness in Philadelphia took greedy counsel with four fellow-worshipers from New York, and not long after that there were no more dividends for Mr. Vertrees. In fact, there was nothing for Mr. Vertrees, because the “traction stock” henceforth was no stock at all, and he had mortgaged his house long ago to help “manage somehow” according to his conception of his “position in life”—one of his own old-fashioned phrases. Six months before the completion of the New House next door, Mr. Vertrees had sold his horses and the worn Victoria and “station-wagon,” to pay the arrears of his two servants and re-establish credit at the grocer's and butcher's—and a pair of elderly carriage-horses with such accoutrements are not very ample barter, in these days, for six months' food and fuel and service. Mr. Vertrees had discovered, too, that there was no salary for him in all the buzzing city—he could do nothing.
It may be said that he was at the end of his string. Such times do come in all their bitterness, finally, to the man with no trade or craft, if his feeble clutch on that slippery ghost, Property, shall fail.
The windows grew black while he paced the room, and smoky twilight closed round about the house, yet not more darkly than what closed round about the heart of the anxious little man patrolling the fan-shaped zone of firelight. But as the mantel clock struck wheezily six there was the rattle of an outer door, and a rich and beautiful peal of laughter went ringing through the house. Thus cheerfully did Mary Vertrees herald her return with her mother from their expedition among the barbarians.
She came rushing into the library and threw herself into a deep chair by the hearth, laughing so uncontrollably that tears were in her eyes. Mrs. Vertrees followed decorously, no mirth about her; on the contrary, she looked vaguely disturbed, as if she had eaten something not quite certain to agree with her, and regretted it.
“Papa! Oh, oh!” And Miss Vertrees was fain to apply a handkerchief upon her eyes. “I'm SO glad you made us go! I wouldn't have missed it—”
Mrs. Vertrees shook her head. “I suppose I'm very dull,” she said, gently. “I didn't see anything amusing. They're most ordinary, and the house is altogether in bad taste, but we anticipated that, and—”
“Papa!” Mary cried, breaking in. “They asked us to DINNER!”
“What!”
“And I'm GOING!” she shouted, and was seized with fresh paroxysms. “Think of it! Never in their house before; never met any of them but the daughter—and just BARELY met her—”
“What about you?” interrupted Mr. Vertrees, turning sharply upon his wife.
She made a little face as if positive now that what she had eaten would not agree with her. “I couldn't!” she said. “I—”
“Yes, that's just—just the way she—she looked when they asked her!” cried Mary, choking. “And then she—she realized it, and tried to turn it into a cough, and she didn't know how, and it sounded like—like a squeal!”
“I suppose,” said Mrs. Vertrees, much injured, “that Mary will have an uproarious time at my funeral. She makes fun of—”
Mary jumped up instantly and kissed her; then she went to the mantel and, leaning an elbow upon it, gazed thoughtfully at the buckle of her shoe, twinkling in the firelight.
“THEY didn't notice anything,” she said. “So far as they were concerned, mamma, it was one of the finest coughs you ever coughed.”
“Who were 'they'?” asked her father. “Whom did you see?”
“Only the mother and daughter,” Mary answered. “Mrs. Sheridan is dumpy and rustly; and Miss Sheridan is pretty and pushing—dresses by the fashion magazines and talks about New York people that have their pictures in 'em. She tutors the mother, but not very successfully—partly because her own foundation is too flimsy and partly because she began too late. They've got an enormous Moor of painted plaster or something in the hall, and the girl evidently thought it was to her credit that she selected it!”
“They have oil-paintings, too,” added Mrs. Vertrees, with a glance of gentle price at the Landseers. “I've always thought oil-paintings in a private house the worst of taste.”
“Oh, if one owned a Raphael or a Titian!” said Mr. Vertrees, finishing the implication, not in words, but with a wave of his hand. “Go on, Mary. None of the rest of them came in? You didn't meet Mr. Sheridan or—” He paused and adjusted a lump of coal in the fire delicately with the poker. “Or one of the sons?”
Mary's glance crossed his, at that, with a flash of utter comprehension. He turned instantly away, but she had begun to laugh again.
“No,” she said, “no one except the women, but mamma inquired about the sons thoroughly!”
“Mary!” Mrs. Vertrees protested.
“Oh, most adroitly, too!” laughed the girl. “Only she couldn't help unconsciously turning to look at me—when she did it!”
“Mary Vertrees!”
“Never mind, mamma! Mrs. Sheridan and Miss Sheridan neither of THEM could help unconsciously turning to look at me—speculatively—at the same time! They all three kept looking at me and talking about the oldest son, Mr. James Sheridan, Junior. Mrs. Sheridan said his father is very anxious 'to get Jim to marry and settle down,' and she assured me that 'Jim is right cultivated.' Another of the sons, the youngest one, caught me looking in the window this afternoon; but they didn't seem to consider him quite one of themselves, somehow, though Mrs. Sheridan mentioned that a couple of years or so ago he had been 'right sick,' and had been to some cure or other. They seemed relieved to bring the subject back to 'Jim' and his virtues—and to look at me! The other brother is the middle one, Roscoe; he's the one that owns the new house across the street, where that young black-sheep of the Lamhorns, Robert, goes so often. I saw a short, dark young man standing on the porch with Robert Lamhorn there the other day, so I suppose that was Roscoe. 'Jim' still lurks in the mists, but I shall meet him to-night. Papa—” She stepped nearer to him so that he had to face her, and his eyes were troubled as he did. There may have been a trouble deep within her own, but she kept their surface merry with laughter. “Papa, Bibbs is the youngest one's name, and Bibbs—to the best of our information—is a lunatic. Roscoe is married. Papa, does it have to be Jim?”
“Mary!” Mrs. Vertrees cried, sharply. “You're outrageous! That's a perfectly horrible way of talking!”