Part 12

The milk, now drumming steadily into the pail, served for a running accompaniment to the next verses.

"Is she black as the night with a star of white Above her bonny brow? And as clever to clear The dykes as a deer?"-- "That's just my own Kerry cow."

"Then cast your eye into that field of wheat She's there as large as life."-- "My bitter disgrace! Howe'er shall I face The farmer and his wife?"

What a voice! And what a picture she made leaning caressingly against the charmed and patient Bess! She was so slight, yet round and supple--strong, too, with the strength of perfect health! The thick fluffed black hair was rolled away from her face and gathered into a low knot in the nape of her neck. Her dress cut low at the throat enhanced the white purity of her face and the slim round grace of her neck which showed to advantage against the ebony flank of the mother of many milky ways. Her lips were red and full; the nose was a saucy stub; the eyes he could not see; they were downcast, intent upon her filling pail and the rising creamy foam; but he knew them to be an Irish blue-gray.

[Illustration: "What a picture she made leaning caressingly against the charmed and patient Bess"]

"Since the farmer's unwed you've no cause to dread From his wife, you must allow. And for kisses three-- 'Tis myself is he-- The farmer will free your cow."

The song ceased; the singer was giving her undivided attention to her self-imposed task. Octavius took a stool and began work with another cow. Champney, nothing loath to prolong the pleasure of looking at the improvised milkmaid, waited before making his presence known until she should have finished.

And watching her, he could but wonder at the ways of Chance that had cast this little piece of foreign flotsam upon the shores of America, only to sweep it inland to this village in Maine. He could not help comparing her with Alice Van Ostend--what a contrast! What an abyss between the circumstances of the two lives! Yet this one was decidedly charming, more so than the other; for he was at once aware that Aileen was already in possession of her womanhood's dower of command over all poor mortals of the opposite sex--her manner with Octavius showed him that; and Alice when he saw her last, now nearly six months ago, would have given any one the impression of something still unfledged--a tall, slim, overgrown girl of sixteen, and somewhat spoiled. This was indeed only natural, for her immediate world of father, aunt, and relations had circled ever since her birth in the orbit of her charming wilfulness. Champney acknowledged to himself that he had done her bidding a little too frequently ever since the first yachting trip, when as a little girl she attached herself to him, or rather him to her as a part of her special goods and chattels. At that time their common ground for conversation was Aileen; the child was never tired of his rehearsing for her delight the serenade scene. But in another year she lost this interest, for many others took its place; nor was it ever renewed.

The Van Ostends, together with Ruth and her husband, had been living the last three winters in Paris, Mr. Van Ostend crossing and recrossing as his business interests demanded or permitted. Champney was much with them, for their home was always open to him who proved an ever welcome guest. He acknowledged to himself, while participating in the intimacy of their home life, that if the child's partiality to his companionship, so undisguisedly expressed on every occasion, should, in the transition periods of girlhood and young womanhood, deepen into a real attachment, he would cultivate it with a view to asking her in marriage of her father when the time should show itself ripe. In his first youthful arrogance of self-assertion he had miscalculated with Ruth Van Ostend. He would make provision that this "undeveloped affair"--so he termed it--with her niece should not miscarry for want of caution. He intended while waiting for Alice to grow up--a feat which her aunt was always deploring as an impossibility except in a physical sense--to make himself necessary in this young life. Thus far he had been successful; her weekly girlish letters conclusively proved it.

While waiting for the milk to cease its vigorous flow, he was conscious of reviewing his attitude towards the "undeveloped affair" in some such train of thought, and finding in it nothing to condemn, rather to commend, in fact; for not for the fractional part of a second did he allow a thought of it to divert his mind from the constant end in view: the making for himself a recognized place of power in the financial world of affairs. He knew that Mr. Van Ostend was aware of this steadfast pursuit of a purpose. He knew, moreover, that the fact that the great financier was taking him into his New York office as treasurer of the Flamsted Quarries, was a tacit recognition not only of his six years' apprenticeship in some of the largest banking houses in Europe, but of his ability to acquire that special power which was his goal. In the near future he would handle and practically control millions both in receipt and disbursement. Many of the contracts, already signed, were to be filled within the next three years--the sound of the milking suddenly ceased.

"My, how my wrists ache! See, Tave, the pail is almost full; there must be twelve or fourteen quarts in all."

She began to rub her wrists vigorously. Octavius muttered: "I told you so. You might have known you couldn't milk steady like that without getting all tuckered out."

Champney stepped forward quickly. "Right you are, Tave, every time. How are you, dear old chap?" He held out his hand.

"Champ--Champney--why--" he stammered rather than spoke.

"It's I, Tave; the same old sixpence. Have I changed so much?"

"Changed? I should say so! I thought--I thought--" he was wringing Champney's hand; some strange emotion worked in his features--"I thought for a second it was Mr. Louis come to life." He turned to Aileen who had sprung from her stool. "Aileen, this is Mr. Champney Googe; you've forgotten him, I dare say, in all these years."

The rich red mantled her cheeks; the gray eyes smiled up frankly into his; she held out her hand. "Oh, no, I've not forgotten Mr. Champney Googe; how could I?"

"Indeed, I think it is the other way round; if I remember rightly you gave me the opportunity of never forgetting you." He held her hand just a trifle longer than was necessary. The girl smiled and withdrew it.

"Milky hands are not so sticky as spruce gum ones, Mr. Googe, but they are apt to be quite as unpleasant."

Champney was annoyed without in the least knowing why. He was wondering if he should address her as "Aileen" or "Miss Armagh," when Octavius spoke:

"Aileen, just go on ahead up to the house and tell Mrs. Champney Mr. Googe is here." Aileen went at once, and Octavius explained.

"You see, Champney--Mr. Googe--"

"Have I changed so much, Tave, that you can't use the old name?"

"You've changed a sight; it don't come easy to call you Champ, any more than it did to call Mr. Louis by his Christian name. You look a Champney every inch of you, and you act like one." He spoke emphatically; his small keen eyes dwelt admiringly on the face and figure of the tall man before him. "I thought 't was better to send Aileen on ahead, for Mrs. Champney's broken a good deal since you saw her; she can't stand much excitement--and you're the living image." He called for the boy who had taken Romanzo's place. "I'll go up as far as the house with you. How long are you going to stay?"

"It depends upon how long it takes me to investigate these quarries, learn the ropes. A week or two possibly. I am to be treasurer of the Company with my office in New York."

"So I heard, so I heard. I'm glad it's come at last--no thanks to _her_," he added, nodding in the direction of the house.

"Do you still hold a grudge, Tave?"

"Yes, and always shall. Right's right and wrong's wrong, and there ain't a carpenter in this world that can dovetail the two. You and your mother have been cheated out of your rights in what should be yours, and it's ten to one if you ever get a penny of it."

Champney smiled at the little man's indignation. "All the more reason to congratulate me on my job, Tave."

"Well, I do; only it don't set well, this other business. She ain't helped you any to it?" He asked half hesitatingly.

"Not a red cent, Tave. I don't owe her anything. Possibly she will leave some of it to this same Miss Aileen Armagh. Stranger things have happened." Octavius shook his head.

"Don't you believe it, Champney. She likes Aileen and well she may, but she don't like her well enough to give her a slice off of this estate; and what's more she don't like any living soul well enough to part with a dollar of it on their account."

"Is there any one Aunt Meda ever did love, Tave? From all I remember to have heard, when I was a boy, she was always bound up pretty thoroughly in herself."

"Did she ever love any one? Well she did; that was her husband, Louis Champney, who loved you as his own son. And it's my belief that's the reason you don't get your rights. She was jealous as the devil of every word he spoke to you."

"You're telling me news--and late in the day."

"Late is better than never, and I'd always meant to tell you when you come to man's estate--but you've been away so long, I've thought sometimes you was never coming home; but I hoped you would for your mother's sake, and for all our sakes."

"I'm going to do what I can, but you mustn't depend too much on me, Tave. I'm glad I'm at home for mother's sake although I always felt she had a good right hand in you, Tave; you've always been a good friend to her, she tells me."

Octavius Buzzby swallowed hard once, twice; but he gave him no reply. Champney wondered to see his face work again with some emotion he failed to explain satisfactorily to himself.

"There's Mrs. Champney on the terrace; I won't go any farther. Come in when you can, won't you?"

"I shall be pretty apt to run in for a chat almost anytime on my way to the village." He waved his hand in greeting to his aunt and sprang up the steps leading to the terrace.

He bent to kiss her and was shocked by the change in her that was only too apparent: the delicate features were sharpened; the temples sunken; her abundant light brown hair was streaked heavily with white; the hands had grown old, shrunken, the veins prominent.

"Kiss me again, Champney," she said in a low voice, closing her eyes when he bent again to fulfil her request. When she opened them he noticed that the lids were trembling and the corners of her mouth twitched. But she rallied in a moment and said sharply:

"Now, don't say you're sorry--I know all about how I look; but I'm better and expect to outlive a good many well ones yet."

She told Aileen to bring another chair. Champney hastened to forestall her; his aunt shook her finger at him.

"Don't begin by spoiling her," she said. Then she bade her make ready the little round tea-table on the terrace and serve tea.

"What do you think of her?" she asked him after Aileen had entered the house. She spoke with a directness of speech that warned Champney the question was a cloak to some other thought on her part.

"That she does you credit, Aunt Meda. I don't know that I can pay you or her a greater compliment."

"Very well said. You've learned all that over there--and a good deal more besides. There have been no folderols in her education. I've made her practical. Come, draw up your chair nearer and tell me something of the Van Ostends and that little Alice who was the means of Aileen's coming to me. I hear she is growing to be a beauty."

"Beauty--well, I shouldn't say she was that, not yet; but 'little.' She is fully five feet six inches with the prospect of an additional inch."

"I didn't realize it. When are they coming home?"

"Early in the autumn. Alice says she is going to come out next winter, not leak out as the other girls in her set have done; and what Alice wants she generally manages to have."

"Let me see--she must be sixteen; why that's too young!"

"Seventeen next month. She's very good fun though."

"Like her?" She looked towards the house where Aileen was visible with a tea-tray.

"Well, no; at least, not along her lines I should say. She seems to have Tave pretty well under her thumb."

Mrs. Champney smiled. "Octavius thought he couldn't get used to it at first, but he's reconciled now; he had to be.--Call her Aileen, Champney; you mustn't let her get the upper hand of you by making her think she's a woman grown," she added in a low tone, for the girl was approaching them, slowly on account of the loaded tray she was carrying.

Champney left his seat and taking the tea-things from her placed them on the table. Aileen busied herself with setting all in order and twirling the tea-ball in each cup of boiling water, as if she had been used to this ultra method of making tea all her life.

"By the way, Aileen--"

He checked himself, for such a look of amazement was in the quickly lifted gray eyes, such a surprised arch was visible in the dark brows, that he realized his mistake in hearing to his aunt's request. He felt he must make himself whole, and if possible without further delay.

"Oh, I see that it must still be Miss Aileen Armagh-and-don't-you-forget-it!" he exclaimed, laughing to cover his confusion.

She laughed in turn; she could not help it at the memories this title called to mind. "Well, it's best to be particular with strangers, isn't it?" Down went the eyes to search in the bottom of a teacup.

"I fancied we were not wholly that; I told Aunt Meda about our escapade six years ago; surely, that affair ought to establish a common ground for our continued acquaintance. But, if that's not sufficient, I can find another nearer at hand--where's my dog?"

This brought her to terms.

"Oh, I can't do anything with Rag, Mr. Googe; I'm so sorry. He's over in the coach house this very minute, and Tave was going to take him home to-night. Just think! That seven-year-old dog has to be carried home, old as he is!"

"If it's come to that, I'll take him home under my arm to-night--that is, if he won't follow; I'll try that first."

"But you're not going to punish him!--and simply because he likes me. That wouldn't be fair!"

She made her protest indignantly. Champney looked at his aunt with an amused smile. She nodded understandingly.

"Oh, no; not simply because he likes you, but because he is untrue to me, his master."

"But that isn't fair!" she exclaimed again, her cheeks flushing rose red; "you've been away so long that the dog has forgotten."

"Oh, no, he hasn't; or if he has I must jog his memory. He's Irish, and the supreme characteristic of that breed is fidelity."

"Well, so am I Irish," she retorted pouting; she began to make him a second cup of tea by twirling the silver tea-ball in the shallow cup until the hot water flew over the edge; "but I shouldn't consider it necessary to be faithful to any one who had forgotten and left me for six years."

"You wouldn't?" Champney's eyes challenged hers, but either she did not understand their message or she was too much in earnest to heed it.

"No I wouldn't; what for? I like Rag and he likes me, and we have been faithful to each other; it would be downright hypocrisy on his part to like you after all these years."

"How about you?" Champney grew bold because he knew his aunt was enjoying the girl's entanglement as much as he was. She was amused at his daring and Aileen's earnestness. "Didn't you tell me in Tave's presence only just now that you couldn't forget me? How is that for fidelity? And why excuse Rag on account of a six years' absence?"

"Well, of course, he's your dog," she said loftily, so evading the question and ignoring the laugh at her expense.

"Yes, he's my dog if he is a backslider, and that settles it." He turned to his aunt. "I'll run in again to-morrow, Aunt Meda, I mustn't wear my welcome out in the first two days of my return."

"Yes, do come in when you can. I suppose you will be here a month or two?"

"No; only a week or two at most; but I shall run up often; the business will require it." He looked at Aileen. "Will you be so kind as to come over with me to the coach house, Miss Armagh, and hand my property over to me? Good-bye, Aunt Meda."

Aileen rose. "I'll be back in a few minutes, Mrs. Champney, or will you go in now?"

"There's no dew, and the air is so fresh I'll sit here till you come."

The two went down the terrace steps side by side. Mrs. Champney watched them out of sight; there was a kindling light in her faded eyes.

"Now, we'll see," said Champney, as they neared the coach house and saw in the window the bundle of brown tow with black nose flattened on the pane and eyes filled with longing under the tangled topknot. The stub of a tail was marking time to the canine heartbeats. Champney opened the door; the dog scurried out and sprang yelping for joy upon Aileen.

"Rag, come here!" The dog's day of judgment was in that masculine command. The little terrier nosed Aileen's hand, hesitated, then pressed more closely to her side. The girl laughed out in merry triumph. Champney noted that she showed both sets of her strong white teeth when she laughed.

"Rag, dear old boy!" She parted with caressing fingers the skein of tow on the frowsled head.

"Come on, Rag." Champney whistled and started up the driveway. The terrier fawned on Aileen, slavered, snorted, sniffed, then crept almost on his belly, tail stiff, along the ground after Champney who turned and laid his hand on him. The dog crouched in the road. He gently pulled the stumps of ears--"Now come!"

He went whistling up the road, and the terrier, recognizing his master, trotted in a lively manner after him.

Champney turned at the gate and lifted his hat. "How about fidelity now, Miss Armagh?" He wanted to tease in payment for that amazed look she gave him for taking a liberty with her Christian name.

"Well, of course, he's your dog," she called merrily after him, "but _I_ wouldn't have done it if I'd been Rag!"

Champney found himself wondering on the homeward way if she really meant what she said.

IV

It was a careless question, carelessly put, and yet--Aileen Armagh, before she returned to the house, was also asking herself if she meant what she said, asking it with an unwonted timidity of feeling she could not explain. On coming in sight of the terrace, she saw that Mrs. Champney was still there. She hesitated a moment, then crossed the lawn to the boat house. She wanted to sit there a while in the shade, to think things out with herself if possible. What did this mean--this strange feeling of timidity?

The course of her life was not wholly smooth. It was inevitable that two natures like hers and Mrs. Champney's should clash at times, and the impact was apt to be none of the softest. Twice, Aileen, making a confidant of Octavius, threatened to run away, for the check rein was held too tightly, and the young life became restive under it. When the child first came to Champ-au-Haut, its mistress recognized at once that in her mischief, her wilfulness, her emphatic assertion of her right of way, there was nothing vicious, and to Octavius Buzzby's amazement, she dealt with her, on the whole, leniently.

"She amuses me," she would say when closing an eye to some of Aileen's escapades that gave a genuine shock to Octavius in the region of his local prejudices.

There had been, indeed, no "folderols" in her education. Sewing, cooking, housework she was taught root and branch in the time not spent at school, both grammar and high. During the last year Mrs. Champney permitted her to learn French and embroidery in a systematic manner at the school established by the gentle Frenchwomen in The Gore; but she steadily refused to permit the girl to cultivate her voice through the medium of proper instruction. This denial of the girl's strongest desire was always a common subject of dissension and irritation; however, after Aileen was seventeen a battle royal of words between the two was a rare occurrence.

At the same time she never objected to Aileen's exercising her talent in her own way. Father Honoré encouraged her to sing to the accompaniment of his violin, knowing well that the instrument would do its share in correcting faults. She sang, too, with Luigi Poggi, her "knothole boy" of the asylum days; and, as seven years before, Nonna Lisa often accompanied with her guitar. The old Italian, who had managed to keep in touch with her one-time _protégée_, and her grandson Luigi, made their appearance in the village one summer after Aileen had been two years in Flamsted. Luigi, now that his vaudeville days were over, was in search of work at the quarries; his grandmother was to keep house for him till he should be able to establish himself in trade--the goal of so many of his thrifty countrymen.

These two Italians were typical of thousands of their nationality who come to our shores; whom our national life, through naturalization and community of interests, is able in a marvellously short time to assimilate--and for the public good. Intelligent, business-like, keen at a bargain, but honest and graciously gentle and friendly in manner, Luigi Poggi soon established himself in the affections of Flamsted--in no one's more solidly than in Elmer Wiggins', strange to say, who capitulated to the "foreigner's" progressive business methods--and after three years of hard and satisfactory work at the quarries and in the sheds, by living frugally and saving thriftily he was able to open the first Italian fruit stall in the quarry town. The business was flourishing and already threatened to overrun its quarters. Luigi was in a fair way to become fruit capitalist; his first presidential vote had been cast, and he felt prepared to enjoy to the full his new Americanhood.