CHAPTER XXXIX

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HOW THE TIDE EBBED AND FLOWED IN ROTHSAY.

Josephine had resolved to be popular at any cost, and make for herself a party, and so good use had she made of her time and opportunities that when Beatrice arrived the weaker ones, who, with Mrs. Rider at their head, had from the first espoused her cause, were gradually gaining in numbers; while the better class of people, Everard’s friends, were beginning to think more kindly of the lady of the Forrest House, where an entire new state of things and code of laws had been inaugurated. Axie had, of course, vacated immediately after Rossie’s departure, and Josephine had been wise enough not to ask her to remain. She knew the old negress was strongly prejudiced against her, and was glad when she departed, bag and bundle, for the little house she had purchased in town, where she could be near “her boy,” and wash and mend his clothes, and fight for him when necessary, as it sometimes was, for people could not easily understand his indifference to the beautiful creature who was conducting herself so sweetly and modestly, and whom women ran to the windows to see when she drove by in the pretty phaeton which, through Rossie’s influence, she had managed to get from Everard, or rather, from the Forrest estate. It is true the horse did not suit her. It was too old and slow, and not at all like the spirited animal she used to drive with Captain Sparks at her side in Holburton, but it was an _heir-loom_, as she called it, laughingly, raised from a stock of horses which had been in the family for years, and was so steady that Mr. Forrest was perfectly willing to trust her with it; and each day she drove around the town, showing herself everywhere, bowing to everybody high and low, and because she had heard that Miss Belknap used to do so, taking to drive the sick and infirm among the poor and needy, to whom she was all kindness and sympathy. With this class, however, she did not stand as well as with the grade above them. It would almost seem as if they were gifted with a special insight, and read her character aright; and though they accepted what she offered them, they did not believe in her, and privately among themselves declared she was not a lady born,—or a fitting wife for Everard.

Agnes never appeared with her in public, and was seldom seen at the house when people called. “She was very shy and timid, and shrank from meeting strangers,” Josephine said, to the few who felt that they must ask for her, and who accepted the excuse and left Agnes free to become in Rothsay what she had been in Holburton, a mere household drudge, literally doing all the work for the colored woman whom Josephine employed and called her cook, but who was wholly incompetent as well as indisposed to work. So the whole care devolved on Agnes, who took up her burden without a word of protest, and worked from morning till night, while Josephine lounged in her own room, where she had her meals more than half the time, or drove through the town in her phaeton, managing always to pass the office where Everard toiled early and late, in order that he might have the means to support her without touching a dollar of Rossie’s fortune.

As yet Josephine’s demands upon him were not very great. Old Axie had been a provident housekeeper, and Josephine found a profusion of everything necessary for the table. Her wardrobe did not need replenishing, and she could not venture upon inviting company so soon, consequently she was rather moderate in her demands for money; but Everard knew the time would come when all he had would scarcely satisfy her, and for that time he worked, silently, doggedly, rarely speaking to any one outside his business unless they spoke to him, and never offering a word of explanation with regard to the estrangement, which was becoming more and more a matter of wonder and comment,—as people saw only sweetness and graciousness in Josey, and knew nothing of her other side.

Such was the state of affairs when Beatrice came home, very unexpectedly to the Rothsayites, who wondered what she would think of matters at the Forrest House. Josephine had spoken frequently of Miss Belknap, who, she said, was for a few weeks an inmate of her mother’s family, and whom she admired greatly. Josey was the first to call upon Beatrice; and throwing herself upon her neck, burst into tears, saying:

“Oh, Miss Belknap, I am so glad you have come to be my friend and sister, and I need one so much. I wish I had told you the truth when you were in Holburton, but Everard was afraid of having it known, and now he is so cold and distant and I,—am,—so unhappy. You will be my friend and help me. You were always so kind to me, and I liked you so much.”

Beatrice shook her off as gently as possible, and answered that she should certainly try to do right, and asked after Agnes, and how her visitor liked Rothsay, and if Rosamond had written to her, and gradually drew the conversation away from dangerous ground, and did it in such a manner that Josephine felt that she had more to fear from Bee Belknap than from all the world besides. And she had, for Bee’s opinion was worth more than that of any twenty people in Rothsay; and when it was known that there was little or no intercourse between Elm Park and the Forrest House, that the two ladies were polite to each other and nothing more, that Beatrice never expressed herself with regard to Mrs. Forrest or mentioned her in any way, but was on the same friendly terms with Everard as ever, and when, as a crowning act, she made a little dinner party from which Josephine was omitted, the people who had been loudest in Josey’s praises began to whisper together that there must be something wrong, and gradually a cloud not larger than a man’s hand began to show itself on the horizon. But small as it was, Josephine discovered its rising, and fought it with all her power, even going so far as to insinuate that jealousy and disappointment were the causes of Miss Belknap’s coolness toward her. But this fell powerless and dead, and Josey could no more injure Beatrice than she could turn the channel of the river from its natural course. For a time, however, Josephine held her ground with a few, but when early in June the new hotel on the river road was filled with people from the South, many of them gay, reckless young men, ready for any excitement, she began to show her real nature, and her assumed modesty and reticence slipped from her like a garment unfitted to the wearer. How she managed it no one could guess, but in less than two weeks she knew every young man stopping at the Belknap House, as it was named in honor of Beatrice, and in less than three weeks she had taken them all to drive with her, and Forrest House was no longer lonely for want of company, for the doors stood open till midnight, and young men lounged on the steps and in the parlors, and came to lunch and dinner, and the rooms were filled with cigar-smoke, and Bacchanalian songs were sung by the half-tipsy young men, and toasts were drank to their fair hostess, whom they dubbed “Golden Hair,” and called an angel to her face, and at her back, among themselves, a _brick_, and even “the old girl,” so little did they respect or really care for her.

And Josephine was quite happy again, and content. It suited her better to be fast than to play the part of a quiet, discreet woman, and so long as she did not overstep the bounds of decency, or greatly outrage the rules of propriety, she argued that it was no one’s business what she did or how much attention she received. As Axie had predicted, the real color was showing through the whitewash, and people began to understand the reason why Everard was becoming so grave, and reserved, and even old in his appearance, with a look upon his face such as no ordinary trouble could ever have written there.

And so the summer waned and autumn came and went, and then Josephine, who, while affecting to be so merry and gay, writhed under the slights so often put upon her, discovered that she needed a change of air, and decided that a winter in Florida was necessary to her health and happiness, and applied to Everard for the means with which to carry out her plan. At first Everard objected to the Florida trip as something much more expensive than he felt able to meet, but his consent was finally given, and one morning in December the clerk at the St. James Hotel, in Jacksonville, wrote upon his books “Mrs. J. E. Forrest and maid, and Miss Agnes Fleming, Rothsay, Ohio,” while a week later there was entered upon another page, “Dr. John Matthewson, New York City,” and two weeks later still “Mrs. Andrews and family, and Miss Rosamond Hastings, St. Louis, Mo.”

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