A Fair Barbarian | Page 7

in her bonnet waved majestically. (Being a brunette, and Lady Theobald, she wore yellow.) As she tramped up the gravel walk, she held up her dress with both hands, as an example to vulgar and reckless young people who wore trains and left them to take care of themselves. Octavia was arranging afresh the bunch of long-stemmed, swaying buds at her waist, and she was giving all her attention to her task when her visitor first addressed her.
"How do you do?" remarked her ladyship, in a fine, deep voice.
Miss Belinda followed her meekly.
"Octavia," she explained, "this is Lady Theobald, whom you will be very glad to know. She knew your father."
"Yes," returned my lady, "years ago. He has had time to improve since then. How do you do?"
Octavia's limpid eyes rested serenely upon her.
"How do you do?" she said, rather indifferently.
"You are from Nevada?" asked Lady Theobald.
"Yes."
"It is not long since you left there?"
Octavia smiled faintly.
"Do I look like that?" she inquired.
"Like what?" said my lady.
"As if I had not long lived in a civilized place. I dare say I do, because it is true that I haven't."
"You don't look like an English girl," remarked her ladyship.
Octavia smiled again. She looked at the yellow feather and stout moire antique dress, but quite as if by accident, and without any mental deduction; then she glanced at the rosebuds in her hand.
"I suppose I ought to be sorry for that," she observed. "I dare say I shall be in time--when I have been longer away from Nevada."
"I must confess," admitted her ladyship, and evidently without the least regret or embarrassment, "I must confess that I don't know where Nevada is."
"It isn't in Europe," replied Octavia, with a soft, light laugh. "You know that, don't you?"
The words themselves sounded to Lady Theobald like the most outrageous impudence; but when she looked at the pretty, lovelock-shaded face, she was staggered the look it wore was such a very innocent and undisturbed one. At the moment, the only solution to be reached seemed to be that this was the style of young people in Nevada, and that it was ignorance and not insolence she had to do battle with--which, indeed, was partially true.
"I have not had any occasion to inquire where it is situated, so far," she responded firmly. "It is not so necessary for English people to know America as it is for Americans to know England."
"Isn't it?" said Octavia, without any great show of interest. "Why not?"
"For--for a great many reasons it would be fatiguing to explain," she answered courageously. "How is your father?"
"He is very sea-sick now," was the smiling answer,--"deadly sea-sick. He has been out just twenty-four hours."
"Out? What does that mean?"
"Out on the Atlantic. He was called back suddenly, and obliged to leave me. That is why I came here alone."
"Pray do come into the parlor, and sit down, dear Lady Theobald," ventured Miss Belinda. "Octavia"--
"Don't you think it is nicer out here?" said Octavia.
"My dear," answered Miss Belinda. "Lady Theobald"--She was really quite shocked.
"Ah!" interposed Octavia. "I only thought it was cooler."
She preceded them, without seeming to be at all conscious that she was taking the lead.
"You had better pick up your dress, Miss Octavia," said Lady Theobald rather acidly.
The girl glanced over her shoulder at the length of train sweeping the path, but she made no movement toward picking it up.
"It is too much trouble, and one has to duck down so," she said. "It is bad enough to have to keep doing it when one is on the street. Besides, they would never wear out if one took too much care of them."
When they went into the parlor, and sat down, Lady Theobald made excellent use of her time, and managed to hear again all that had tried and bewildered Miss Belinda. She had no hesitation in asking questions boldly; she considered it her privilege to do so: she had catechised Slowbridge for forty years, and meant to maintain her rights until Time played her the knave's trick of disabling her.
In half an hour she had heard about the silver-mines, the gold-diggers, and L'Argentville; she knew that Martin Bassett was a millionnaire, if the news he had heard had not left him penniless; that he would return to England, and visit Slowbridge, as soon as his affairs were settled. The precarious condition of his finances did not seem to cause Octavia much concern. She had asked no questions when he went away, and seemed quite at ease regarding the future.
"People will always lend him money, and then he is lucky with it," she said.
She bore the catechising very well. Her replies were frequently rather trying to her interlocutor, but she never seemed troubled, or ashamed of any thing she had to say; and she wore, from first