It has been such a lovely afternoon. The halls were filled with cadets "on permit," when she came out from the dining-room, but nothing but ill-luck seemed to attend her. The young gentleman who had invited her to walk to Fort Putnam, most provokingly twisted an ankle at cavalry drill that very morning, and was sent to hospital. Now, if Mr. Stanley were all devotion, he would promptly tender his services as substitute. Then she could take him to task and punish him for his disloyalty to Will. But Mr. Stanley was not to be seen: "Gone off with another girl," was the announcement made to her by Mr. Werrick, a youth who dearly loved a joke, and who saw no need of explaining that the other girl was his own sister. Sorely disappointed, yet hardly knowing why, she accepted her mother's invitation to go with her to the barracks where Will was promenading the area on what Mr. Werrick called "one of his perennial punishment tours." She went, of course; but the distant sight of poor Will, duly equipped as a sentry, dismally tramping up and down the asphalt, added fuel to the inward fire that consumed her. The mother's heart, too, yearned over her boy,—a victim to cruel regulations and crueler task-masters. "What was the use of the government's enticing young men away from their comfortable homes," Mrs. McKay had once indignantly written, "unless it could make them happy?" It was a question the "tactical department" could not answer, but it thought volumes.
But now evening had come, and with it Mr. Stanley's card. Nan's heart gave a bound, but she went down-stairs with due deliberation. She had his card in her hand as she reached the hall, and was twisting it in her fingers. Yes. There he stood on the north piazza, Pennock with him, and one or two others of the graduating class. They were chatting laughingly with Miss Stanley, "Miss Mischief," a bevy of girls, and a matron or two, but she knew well his eyes would be on watch for her. They were. He saw her instantly; bowed, smiled, but, to her surprise, continued his conversation with a lady seated near the door. What could it mean? Irresolute she stood there a moment, waiting for him to come forward; but though she saw that twice his eyes sought hers, he was still bending courteously and listening to the voluble words of the somewhat elderly dame who claimed his attention. Nan began to rebel against that woman from the bottom of her heart. What was she to do? Here was his card. In response she had come down to receive him. She meant to be very cool from the first moment; to provoke him to inquiry as to the cause of such unusual conduct, and then to upbraid him for his disloyalty to her brother. She certainly meant that he should feel the weight of her displeasure; but then—then—after he had been made to suffer, if he was properly contrite, and said so, and looked it, and begged to be forgiven, why then, perhaps she might be brought to condone it in a measure and be good friends again. It was clearly his duty, however, to come and greet her, not hers to go to the laughing group. The old lady was the only one among them whom she did not know,—a new arrival. Just then Miss Stanley looked round, saw her, and signalled smilingly to her to come and join them. Slowly she walked towards the little party, still twirling the card in her taper fingers.
"Looking for anybody, Nan?" blithely hails "Miss Mischief." "Who is it? I see you have his card."
For once Nannie's voice fails her, and she knows not what to say. Before she can frame an answer there is a rustle of skirts and a light foot-fall behind her, and she hears the voice of a girl whom she never has liked one bit.
"Oh! You're here, are you, Mr. Stanley! Why, I've been waiting at least a quarter of an hour. Did you send up your card?"
"I did; full ten minutes ago. Was it not brought to your room?"
"No, indeed! I've been sitting there writing, and only came down because I had promised Mr. Fearn that he should have ten minutes, and it is nearly his time now. Where do you suppose they could have sent it?"
Poor little Nan! It has been a hard day for her, but this is just too much. She turns quickly, and, hardly knowing whither she goes, dodges past the party of cadets and girls now blocking the stairway and preventing flight to her room, hurries out the south door and around to the west piazza, and there, leaning against a pillar, is striving to hide her blazing cheeks,—all in less than a minute.
Stanley sees through the entire situation with the quick intuition of a lover. She has not treated him kindly of late. She has been capricious and unjust on several occasions, but there is no time to think of that now. She is in distress, and that is more than enough for him.
"Here comes Mr. Fearn himself to claim his walk, so I will go and find out about the card," he says, and blesses that little rat of a bell-boy as he hastens away.
Out on the piazza he finds her alone, yet with half a dozen people hovering nigh. The hush of twilight is over the beautiful old Point. The moist breath of the coming night, cool and sweet, floats down upon them from the deep gorges on the rugged flank of Cro' Nest, and rises from the thickly lacing branches of the cedars on the river-bank below. A flawless mirror in its grand and reflected framework of cliff and crag and beetling precipice, the Hudson stretches away northward unruffled by the faintest cat's-paw of a breeze. Far beyond the huge black battlements of Storm King and the purpled scaur of Breakneck the night lights of the distant city are twinkling through the gathering darkness, and tiny dots of silvery flame down in the cool depths beneath them reflect the faint glimmer from the cloudless heaven where—
"The sentinel stars set their watch in the sky."
The hush of the sacred hour has fallen on every lip save those of the merry party in the hall, where laugh and chatter and flaring gas-light bid defiance to influences such as hold their sway over souls brought face to face with Nature in this, her loveliest haunt on earth.
Phil Stanley's heart is throbbing as he steps quickly to her side. Well, indeed, she knows his foot-fall; knows he is coming; almost knows why he comes. She is burning with a sense of humiliation, wounded pride, maidenly wrath, and displeasure. All day long everything has gone agley. Could she but flee to her room and hide her flaming cheeks and cry her heart out, it would be relief inexpressible, but her retreat is cut off. She cannot escape. She cannot face those keen-eyed watchers in the hall-ways. Oh! it is almost maddening that she should have been so—so fooled! Every one must know she came down to meet Phil Stanley when his card was meant for another girl,—that girl of all others! All aflame with indignation as she is, she yet means to freeze him if she can only control herself.
"Miss Nannie," he murmurs, quick and low, "I see that a blunder has been made, but I don't believe the others saw it. Give me just a few minutes. Come down the walk with me. I cannot talk with you here—now, and there is so much I want to say." He bends over her pleadingly, but her eyes are fixed far away up the dark wooded valley beyond the white shafts of the cemetery, gleaming in the first beams of the rising moon. She makes no reply for a moment. She does not withdraw them when finally she answers, impressively,—
"Thank you, Mr. Stanley, but I must be excused from interfering with your engagements."
"There is no engagement now," he promptly replies; "and I greatly want to speak with you. Have you been quite kind to me of late? Have I not a right to know what has brought about the change?"
"You do not seem to have sought opportunity to inquire,"—very cool and dignified now.
"Pardon me. Three times this week I have asked for a walk, and you have had previous engagements."
She has torn to bits and thrown away the card that was in her hand. Now she is tugging at the bunch of bell buttons, each graven with the monogram of some cadet friend, that hangs as usual by its tiny golden chain. She wants to say that he has found speedy consolation in the society of "that other girl" of whom Mr. Werrick spoke, but not for the world would she seem jealous.
"You could have seen me this afternoon, had there been any matters you wished explained," she says. "I presume you were more agreeably occupied."
"I find no delight in formal visits," he answers, quietly; "but my sister wished to return calls and asked me to show her about the post."
Then it was his sister. Not "that other g
irl!" Still she must not let him see it makes her glad. She needs a pretext for her wrath. She must make him feel it in some way. This is not at all in accordance with the mental private rehearsals she has been having. There is still that direful matter of Will's report for "shouting from window of barracks," and "Miss Mischief's" equally direful report of Mr. Stanley's remarks thereon.
"I thought you were a loyal friend of Willy's," she says, turning suddenly upon him.
"I was—and am," he answers simply.
"And yet I'm told you said it was all his own fault, and that you yourself would have given him the report that so nearly 'found him on demerit.' A report on suspicion, too," she adds, with scorn in her tone.
Mr. Stanley is silent a moment.
"You have heard a very unfair account of my words," he says at last. "I have volunteered no opinions on the subject. In answer to direct question I have said that it was not justifiable to call that a report on suspicion."
"But you said you would have given it yourself."
"I said that, as officer of the day, I would have been compelled to do so. I could not have signed my certificate otherwise."
She turns away in speechless indignation. What makes it all well-nigh intolerable is that he is by no means on the defensive. He is patient, gentle, but decidedly superior. Not at all what she wanted. Not at all eager to explain, argue, or implore. Not at all the tearful penitent she has pictured in her plans. She must bring him to a realizing sense of the enormity of his conduct. Disloyalty to Will is treason to her.
"And yet—you say you have kept, and that you value, that knot of blue ribbon that I gave you—or that you took—last summer. I did not suppose that you would so soon prove to be—no friend to Willy, or——"
"Or what, Miss Nannie?" he asks. His face is growing white, but he controls the tremor in his voice. She does not see. Her eyes are downcast and her face averted now, but she goes on desperately.
"Well, never mind that now; but it seems to me that such friendship is—simply worthless."
She has taken the plunge and said her say, but the last words are spoken with sinking inflection, followed instantly by a sinking heart. He makes no answer whatever. She dares not look up into his face to see the effect of her stab. He stands there silent only an instant; then raises his cap, turns, and leaves her.
Sunday comes and goes without a sight of him except in the line of officers at parade. That night she goes early to her room, and on the bureau finds a little box securely tied, sealed, and addressed to her in his well-known hand. It contains a note and some soft object carefully wrapped in tissue-paper. The note is brief enough:
"It is not easy to part with this, for it is all I have that was yours to give, but even this must be returned to you after what you said last night.
"Miss Nannie, you may some time think more highly of my friendship for your brother than you do now, and then, perhaps, will realize that you were very unjust. Should that time come I shall be glad to have this again."
It was hardly necessary to open the little packet as she did. She knew well enough it could contain only that
"Knot of ribbon blue."
* * *
CHAPTER IV.
THE WOMAN TEMPTED ME.
June is here. The examinations are in full blast. The Point is thronged with visitors and every hostelrie in the neighborhood has opened wide its doors to accommodate the swarms of people interested in the graduating exercises and eager for the graduating ball. Pretty girls there are in force, and at Craney's they are living three and four in a room; the joy of being really there on the Point, near the cadets, aroused by the morning gun and shrill piping of the reveille, saluted hourly by the notes of the bugle, enabled to see the gray uniforms half a dozen times a day and to actually speak or walk with the wearers half an hour out of twenty-four whole ones, being apparent compensation for any crowding or discomfort. Indeed, crowded as they are, the girls at Craney's are objects of boundless envy to those whom the Fates have consigned to the resorts down around the picturesque but distant "Falls." There is a little coterie at "Hawkshurst" that is fiercely jealous of the sisterhood in the favored nook at the north edge of the Plain, and one of their number, who is believed to have completely subjugated that universal favorite, Cadet McKay, has been heard to say that she thought it an outrage that they had to come home so early in the evening and mope away the time without a single cadet, when up there at Craney's the halls and piazzas were full of gray-coats and bell buttons every night until tattoo.
A very brilliant and pretty girl she is, too, and neither Mrs. McKay nor Nannie can wonder at it that Will's few leisure moments are monopolized. "You are going to have me all to yourself next week, little mother," he laughingly explains; "and goodness knows when I'm going to see Miss Waring again." And though neither mother nor sister is at all satisfied with the state of affairs, both are too unselfish to interpose. How many an hour have mothers and, sometimes, sisters waited in loneliness at the old hotel for boys whom some other fellow's sister was holding in silken fetters somewhere down in shady "Flirtation!"
It was with relief inexpressible that Mrs. McKay and Uncle Jack had hailed the coming of the 1st of June. With a margin of only two demerits Will had safely weathered the reefs and was practically safe,—safe at last. He had passed brilliantly in engineering; had been saved by his prompt and ready answers the consequences of a "fess" with clean black-board in ordnance and gunnery; had won a ringing, though involuntary, round of applause from the crowded galleries of the riding-hall by daring horsemanship, and he was now within seven days of the prized diploma and his commission. "For heaven's sake, Billy," pleaded big Burton, the first captain, "don't do any thing to ruin your chances now! I've just been talking with your mother and Miss Nannie, and I declare I never saw that little sister of yours looking so white and worried."
McKay laughs, yet his laugh is not light-hearted. He wonders if Burton has the faintest intuition that at this moment he is planning an escapade that means nothing short of dismissal if detected. Down in the bottom of his soul he knows he is a fool to have made the rash and boastful pledge to which he now stands committed. Yet he has never "backed out" before, and now—he would dare a dozen dismissals rather than that she should have a chance to say, "I knew you would not come."
That very afternoon, just after the ride in the hall before the Board of Visitors, Miss Waring had been pathetically lamenting that with another week they were to part, and that she had seen next to nothing of him since her arrival.
"If you only could get down to Hawkshurst!" she cried. "I'm sure when my cousin Frank was in the corps he used to 'run it' down to Cozzens's to see Cousin Kate,—and that was what made her Cousin Kate to me," she adds, with sudden dropping of the eyelids that is wondrously effective.
"Easily done!" recklessly answers McKay, whose boyish heart is set to hammer-like beating by the closing sentence. "I didn't know you sat up so late there, or I would have come before. Of course I have to be here at 'taps.' No one can escape that."
"Oh,—but really, Mr. McKay, I did not mean it! I would not have you run such a risk for worlds! I meant—some other way." And so she protests, although her eyes dance with excitement and delight. What a feather this in her cap of coquetry! What a triumph over the other girls,—especially that hateful set at Craney's! What a delicious confidence to impart to all the little coterie at Hawkshurst! How they must envy her the romance, the danger, the daring, the devotion of such an adventure—for her sake! Of late years such tales had been rare. Girls worth the winning simply would not permit so rash a project, and their example carried weight. But here at "Hawkshurst" was a lively young brood, chaperoned by a matron as wild as her charges and but little older, and eager one and all for any glory or distinction that could pique the pride or stir the envy of "that Craney set." It was too much for a girl of Sallie Waring's type. Her eyes have a dangerous gleam, her cheeks a witching glow; she clings tighter to his arm as she looks up in his face.<
br />
"And yet—wouldn't it be lovely?—To think of seeing you there!—are you sure there'd be no danger?"
"Be on the north piazza about quarter of eleven," is the prompt reply. "I'll wear a dark suit, eye-glass, brown moustache, etc. Call me Mr. Freeman while strangers are around. There goes the parade drum. Au revoir!" and he darts away. Cadet Captain Stanley, inspecting his company a few moments later, stops in front and gravely rebukes him,—
"You are not properly shaved, McKay."
"I shaved this morning," is the somewhat sullen reply, while an angry flush shoots up towards the blue eyes.
"No razor has touched your upper lip, however, and I expect the class to observe regulations in this company, demerit or no demerit," is the firm, quiet answer, and the young captain passes on to the next man. McKay grits his teeth.
"Only a week more of it, thank God!" he mutters, when sure that Stanley is beyond ear-shot.
Three hours more and "taps" is sounded. All along the brilliant façade of barracks there is sudden and simultaneous "dousing of the glim" and a rush of the cadets to their narrow nests. There is a minute of banging doors and hurrying footsteps, and gruff queries of "All in?" as the cadet officers flit from room to room in each division to see that lights are out and every man in bed. Then forth they come from every hall-way; tripping lightly down the stone steps and converging on the guard-house, where stand at the door-way the dark forms of the officer in charge and the cadet officer of the day. Each in turn halts, salutes, and makes his precise report; and when the last subdivision is reported, the executive officer is assured that the battalion of cadets is present in barracks, and at the moment of inspection at least, in bed. Presumably, they remain so.
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