A Matter of Interest | Page 3

know;" she cried with every symptom of relief; "and you know my
brother."
"I am the author," said I coldly, "of 'Culled Cowslips,' but 'Faded
Fig-Leaves' was an earlier work, which I no longer recognise, and I
should be grateful to you if you would be kind enough to deny that I
ever imitated Maeterlinck. Possibly," I added, "he imitates me."
"Now, do you know," she said, "I was afraid of you at first? Papa is
digging in the salt meadows nearly a mile away."
It was hard to bear.
"Can you not see," said I, "that I am wearing a shooting coat?"
"I do see--now; but it is so-so old," she pleaded.
"It is a shooting coat all the same," I said bitterly.
She was very quiet, and I saw she was sorry.
"Never mind," I said magnanimously, "you probably are not familiar
with sporting goods. If I knew your name I should ask permission to
present myself."
"Why, I am Daisy Holroyd," she said.
"What! Jack Holroyd's little sister?"
"Little!" she cried.

"I didn't mean that," said I. "You know that your brother and I were
great friends in Paris "
"I know," she said significantly.
"Ahem! Of course," I said, "Jack and I were inseparable--"
"Except when shut in separate cells," said Miss Holroyd coldly.
This unfeeling allusion to the unfortunate termination of a
Latin-Quarter celebration hurt me.
"The police," said I, "were too officious."
"So Jack says," replied Miss Holroyd demurely.
We had unconsciously moved on along the sand hills, side by side, as
we spoke.
"To think," I repeated, "that I should meet Jack's little--"
"Please," she said, "you are only three years my senior."
She opened the sunshade and tipped it over one shoulder. It was white,
and had spots and posies on it.
"Jack sends us every new book you write," she observed. "I do not
approve of some things you write."
"Modern school," I mumbled.
"That is no excuse," she said severely; "Anthony Trollope didn't do it."
The foam spume from the breakers was drifting across the dunes, and
the little tip-up snipe ran along the beach and teetered and whistled and
spread their white-barred wings for a low, straight flight across the
shingle, only to tip and skeep and sail on again. The salt sea wind
whistled and curled through the crested waves, blowing in perfumed
puffs across thickets of sweet bay and cedar. As we passed through the

crackling juicy-stemmed marsh weed myriads of fiddler crabs raised
their fore-claws in warning and backed away, rustling, through the
reeds, aggressive, protesting.
"Like millions of pigmy Ajaxes defying the lightning," I said.
Miss Holroyd laughed.
"Now I never imagined that authors were clever except in print," she
said.
She was a most extraordinary girl.
"I suppose," she observed after a moment's silence--"I suppose I am
taking you to my father."
"Delighted!" I mumbled. "H'm! I had the honour of meeting Professor
Holroyd in Paris."
"Yes; he bailed you and Jack out," said Miss Holroyd serenely.
The silence was too painful to last.
"Captain McPeek is an interesting man," I said. I spoke more loudly
than I intended; I may have been nervous.
"Yes," said Daisy Holroyd, "but he has a most singular hotel clerk."
"You mean Mr. Frisby?"
"I do."
"Yes," I admitted, "Mr. Frisby is queer. He was once a bill-poster."
"I know it!" exclaimed Daisy Holroyd, with some heat. "He ruins
landscapes whenever he has an opportunity. Do you know that he has a
passion for bill-posting? He has; he posts bills for the pure pleasure of
it, just as you play golf, or tennis, or billiards."

"But he's a hotel clerk now," I said; "nobody employs him to post
bills."
"I know it! He does it all by himself for the pure pleasure of it. Papa
has engaged him to come down here for two weeks, and I dread it,"
said the girl.
What Professor Holroyd might want of Frisby I had not the faintest
notion. I suppose Miss Holroyd noticed the bewilderment in my face,
for she laughed, and nodded her head twice.
"Not only Mr. Frisby, but Captain McPeek also," she said.
"You don't mean to say that Captain McPeek is going to close his
hotel!" I exclaimed.
My trunk was there. It contained guarantees of my respectability. ©
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"Oh, no; his wife will keep it open," replied the girl. "Look! you can
see papa now. He's digging."
"Where?" I blurted out.
I remembered Professor Holroyd as a prim, spectacled gentleman, with
close-cut, snowy beard and a clerical allure. The man I saw digging
wore green goggles, a jersey, a battered sou'wester, and hip-boots of
rubber. He was delving in the muck of the salt meadow, his face
streaming with perspiration, his boots and jersey splashed with