Marriage à la mode | Page 6

her from life any more; and thereby hung a tale. As far as he was concerned the train had passed--in flame and fury--leaving an echoing silence behind it.
What folly! He turned resolutely to Mrs. Verrier, and tried to discuss with her an exhibition of French art recently opened in Washington. In vain. After a few sentences, the talk between them dropped, and both he and she were once more watching Miss Floyd, and joining in the conversation whenever she chose to draw them in.
As for Roger Barnes, he too was steadily subjugated--up to a certain point. He was not sure that he liked Miss Floyd, or her conversation. She was so much mistress of herself and of the company, that his masculine vanity occasionally rebelled. A little flirt!--that gave herself airs. It startled his English mind that at twenty--for she could be no more--a girl should so take the floor, and hold the stage. Sometimes he turned his back upon her--almost; and Cecilia Boyson held him. But, if there was too much of the "eternal womanly" in Miss Floyd, there was not enough in Cecilia Boyson. He began to discover also that she was too clever for him, and was in fact talking down to him. Some of the things that she said to him about New York and Washington puzzled him extremely. She was, he supposed, intellectual; but the intellectual women in England did not talk in the same way. He was equal to them, or flattered himself that he was; but Miss Boyson was beyond him. He was getting into great difficulties with her, when suddenly Miss Floyd addressed him:
"I am sure I saw you in New York, at the opera?"
She bent over to him as she spoke, and lowered her voice. Her look was merry, perhaps a little satirical. It put him on his guard.
"Yes, I was there. You were pointed out to me."
"You were with some old friends of mine. I suppose they gave you an account of me?"
"They were beginning it; but then Melba began to sing, and some horrid people in the next box said 'Hush!'"
She studied him in a laughing silence a moment, her chin on her hand, then said:
"That is the worst of the opera; it stops so much interesting conversation."
"You don't care for the music?"
"Oh, I am a musician!" she said quickly. "I teach it. But I am like the mad King of Bavaria--I want an opera-house to myself."
"You teach it?" he said, in amazement.
She nodded, smiling. At that moment a bell rang. Captain Boyson rose.
"That's the signal for closing. I think we ought to be moving up."
They strolled slowly towards the house, watching the stream of excursionists pour out of the house and gardens, and wind down the hill; sounds of talk and laughter filled the air, and the western sun touched the spring hats and dresses.
"The holidays end to-morrow," said Daphne Floyd demurely, as she walked beside young Barnes. And she looked smiling at the crowd of young women, as though claiming solidarity with them.
A teacher? A teacher of music?--with that self-confidence--that air as though the world belonged to her! The young man was greatly mystified. But he reminded himself that he was in a democratic country where all men--and especially all women--are equal. Not that the young women now streaming to the steamboat were Miss Floyd's equals. The notion was absurd. All that appeared to be true was that Miss Floyd, in any circumstances, would be, and was, the equal of anybody.
"How charming your friend is!" he said presently to Cecilia Boyson, as they lingered on the veranda, waiting for the curator, in a scene now deserted. "She tells me she is a teacher of music."
Cecilia Boyson looked at him in amazement, and made him repeat his remark. As he did so, his uncle called him, and he turned away. Miss Boyson leant against one of the pillars of the veranda, shaking with suppressed laughter.
But at that moment the curator, a gentle, gray-haired man, appeared, shaking hands with the General, and bowing to the ladies. He gave them a little discourse on the house and its history, as they stood on the veranda; and private conversation was no longer possible.
CHAPTER II
A sudden hush had fallen upon Mount Vernon. From the river below came the distant sounds of the steamer, which, with its crowds safe on board, was now putting off for Washington. But the lawns and paths of the house, and the formal garden behind it, and all its simple rooms upstairs and down, were now given back to the spring and silence, save for this last party of sightseers. The curator, after his preliminary lecture on the veranda, took them within; the railings across the doors were removed; they wandered in and out as they pleased.
Perhaps, however,