Pearl of Pearl Island | Page 5

ray or so somewhere about, if you
know where to look for it," suggested Graeme.
"I was just accusing Jock of coming here as regularly as the milkman,"
twinkled Lady Elspeth.
"We have a community of tastes, you see," he said, looking across at
Margaret. "I also have a craving for sunshine, and I naturally come
where I know it is to be found," and Lady Elspeth's eyes twinkled
knowingly again.
"It's a good conceit of myself I'll be getting, if you two go on like this."

"I'm quite sure you will never think half as well of yourself as your
friends do," said Graeme.
"Besides, you might even pass some of the credit on to us for the
excellent taste we display."
"Ay, ay! Well, it's good to be young," said Lady Elspeth.
"And it's very good to have delightful old sunbeams for friends."
"To say nothing of the young ones," laughed the old lady.
"They speak for themselves."
"We are becoming quite a mutual admiration society," said Margaret.
"Have you been dining with your fellow Friars lately, Mr. Graeme?"
"I'm sorry to say I've been neglecting my privileges in that respect. I
haven't been there for an age--not since that last Ladies' Dinner, in fact.
You see, I'm an infant there yet, and I scarcely know anybody, and I've
been very busy--"
"Chasing sunbeams," suggested Lady Elspeth.
"And other things."
"You are busy on another book?" asked Margaret.
"Just getting one under way. It takes a little time to get things into
proper shape, but once it is going, the work is very absorbing and sheer
delight. You were talking of going abroad again. Are you still thinking
of it?"
"I was hoping to get away. I wanted Aunt Susan to come with me to the
Riviera, but she flatly refuses to leave home at present, so I'm afraid
that's off."
"Well, now, that's curious. I've been feeling something of an inclination
that way myself," said Lady Elspeth. "I wonder if you'd feel like

coming with me, Margaret. I don't believe we would quarrel."
"Oh, I would be delighted, dear Lady Elspeth, and I'll promise not to
quarrel whatever you do to me."
"Who ever heard of sunbeams quarrelling?" said Graeme gaily, with
Lady Elspeth's earlier suggestion to himself dancing in his brain. "But
think of London left utterly sunless."
"London will never miss us," said Margaret. "It still has bridge, and we
are neither of us players."
And then, having an appointment from which he could not escape, and
knowing that they always enjoyed a little personal chat, he reluctantly
took his leave, and left them to the discussion of their new plans.
III
He had met Margaret Brandt for the first time at a Ladies' Banquet of
the Whitefriars Club.
Providence,--I insist upon this. No mere chance set them next to one
another at that hospitable board,--Providence, forecasting the future,
placed them side by side, and he was introduced to her by his good
friend Adam Black, who had the privilege of her acquaintance and sat
opposite enjoying them greatly.
For they were both eminently good to look upon;--Margaret, tall and
slender, and of a most gracious figure and bearing, with thoughtful,
dark-blue eyes, a very charming face accentuated by the characteristics
of her northern descent, and a wealth of shining brown hair coiled
about her shapely head;--Graeme, tall, clean-built, of an outdoor
complexion, with nothing of the student about him save his deep,
reflective eyes, and the little lines in the corners which wrinkled up so
readily at the overflowing humours of life.
It was Charles Pixley--Charles Svendt Pixley, to accord him fullest
justice, which I am most anxious to do--who brought her, and to that

extent we are his debtors.
Though why Pixley should be a Whitefriar passes one's comprehension.
His pretensions to literature were, I should say, bounded by his Stock
Exchange notebook and his betting-book. He had not even read
Graeme's latest, though it was genuinely in its second--somewhat
limited--edition, and he did not even smile affably when Adam Black
introduced them. Graeme, however, had no fault to find with him for
that. There were others in like dismal case.
Pixley nodded cursorily at the introduction, with a
"How-d'ye-do-who-the-deuce-are-you?" expression on his face. He
struck Graeme as not bad-looking, in a somewhat over-fed and
self-indulgent fashion, and inclined to superciliousness and
self-complacency, if not to actual superiority and condescension. It
occurred to him afterwards that this might arise from his absorption in
his companion, for he turned again at once to Miss Brandt and began
chattering like a lively and intelligent parrot.
Graeme was one of the silent and observant ones, and he could not but
think how beneficent Nature is in casting us in many moulds. If we
were all built alike, he thought,