Part 34

There seemed to be a crowd on the dock, which was made most unattractive by a colossal mountain of coal that concealed everything behind it. The Diana made a slow approach, but we finally passed the coal-heap and came within thirty feet of the shore. I could feel Dolly's heart beat through her pulse that lay under my hand. Then suddenly her quick eyes searched the outer edge of the crowd and found the shape they were looking for.

"I think I see him! I think I am going to faint, for I didn't really expect him! Yes; I know it is he, though he is wearing summer clothes that I never saw before. Look, Charlotte! Away back near that grove of cocoanut-trees! He's with other people--I knew he would find somebody! Give me the glasses. There's an elderly man in a Panama hat, and two ladies, and--why, Charlotte, take the glasses yourself. It can't be, but it looks like your Winthrop!"

My hand trembled so that I could hardly hold the glass. I could scarcely believe Dolly's eyes or my own; but the Diana crept nearer, and it was true! Inch by inch the picture grew clearer, and then a pathetic surprise met my gaze.

I could see Clive plainly now, and felt that he was searching the line of passengers on the Diana's deck to find me. My heart gave a furious leap to think that a man like my chief would look for only one woman's face in that crowd, and regard it, with all its blemishes, as a precious thing.

Duke had separated himself from the little group and was swinging his hat to Dorothea; but I could not explain why the two men were not standing nearer together and what was the meaning of the wheeled chair, with the nurse's head rising above the back. The identity of the person in the chair was hidden by a tiny black frilled parasol with a handle bent in the middle so that it could be used for a shield. Did I know that little old-fashioned sunshade? I did! It was the property of some one whose belongings had a certain air of difference from those of other people. She lifted it at last, as we came close to the dock, and I met Ellen Winthrop's affectionate, welcoming glance. Her eyes swam in unshed tears, and mine were so wet I could see only dimly that her beautiful hair was a shade whiter, her face paler and thinner, that she had aged mysteriously in a month, and the hand that was holding the parasol trembled like a leaf. She had been very ill; there was no doubt of that. She had been ordered a voyage, and I felt that she had chosen this one because she knew Clive's wish. That meant she was willing to welcome me into the heart of the family; perhaps even that she wished to help me fit myself to take her own unique place in her brother's life. Oh, what joy to feel that I could not only take freely all that my chief wanted to give me, but that I could be of real service to her!

Down the precipitous landing-steps we went, Dolly, as usual, well in the front. Clive and Duke were at the foot awaiting us, and, as we felt a sense of safety in the midst of strangers, Dolly flung herself at once into Duke's arms, while all the male watchers on deck or dock gazed at him with envy. Finding myself unobserved in this spectacular tableau, I could give Clive my own greeting as my heart dictated, while I told him that his sister's presence answered my last doubt.

When Dolly withdrew from the embrace of her adoring swain--rosy, joyous, unabashed--she adjusted her hat from its perilous position on one side of her head, and gazed upon Clive and me with unflattering astonishment mixed with awe.

"You, too, perfidious Charlotte! You needn't deny it; I saw you both--just finishing!"

"Not at all, Miss Valentine," laughed Clive, putting out his hand to shake hers. "We were, in fact, only just beginning."

"And to think I never suspected, when I might have known that you are the only man in the world learned enough and good enough for Charlotte."

"You were too absorbed in your own affairs to think about mine, missy," I said. "Now, will you be modest and grateful for the rest of your life, since you see that my Mr. Winthrop has brought your young man to St. Thomas in a discreet manner that you never could have achieved by yourself? Take me to your sister, Clive; I want her to know without a moment's delay how I appreciate her coming with you."

"She has been terribly ill, Charlotte. For ten days after you left it was almost hopeless, but at length she rallied, and since the doctor insisted on a change of climate her whole heart was bent on coming here. She has long suspected our feeling for each other, and you will be such a joy to her as well as to me, my dear."

"It makes me so happy, so happy!" I faltered, my eyes swimming with tears. "I was so unwilling to take all and give so little--now it will be more!"

"Don't go off by yourselves," said Dolly. "Be dignified and indifferent, like us. Take Mr. Winthrop's arm and I'll take Duke's." (Here she suited the action to the word.) "There's the Governor, expecting us to luncheon and not knowing us by sight. He won't suspect what has happened; but after saluting him and asking him to put some more plates on the table, we'll all walk up to Miss Winthrop's chair, and you and I will say: 'Good-morning, dear lady. Let us introduce to you "our new possessions," our spoils of travel, our souvenirs of a sea-voyage.' Then Duke and Mr. Winthrop will make a profound obeisance, and all will be over."

And so it turned out! Everybody laughed and chatted; Dorothea kissed Ellen Winthrop's hand prettily, coquetted with Clive, and began to lay siege to the nurse's heart, while she riveted the chains by which she held Marmaduke Hogg in bondage. She was in high spirits, but she was distinctly nervous, and whenever she introduced her fiancé to one of her fellow voyagers she showed a heightened color as she slid quickly over his surname.

Presently Clive withdrew a little distance to talk with the Governor's secretary, and Dorothea caught the captain on his way from the ship and entangled him in a merry conversation with Miss Winthrop. This gave Marmaduke an opportunity to take me aside. I suspected that he wanted to confide in me that Mrs. Valentine had made one last determined refusal to receive him as a son-in-law, and that after the next few days of sea-voyaging we should meet an irate parent at the landing in New York and that there would be metaphorical "wigs on the green."

I confess in that moment, as I envisaged the recalcitrant Dolly locked in her room and fed upon bread and water, that I wished Mr. Marmaduke Hogg had remained in Washington, which is the scene of so many battles that one more or less would not be obvious on the horizon. On the contrary, his first words were a surprise.

"Miss Clifford," he said, "no one knows what Dolly and I owe to you!"

"But what have I done?" I inquired laughingly.

"Oh, a thousand things! Taken my part gently and kindly with Mrs. Valentine; and above all, allowed Dolly to come on this journey with you, when she was so utterly confused by her mother's objections to our marriage that she did not know which way to turn.--It's rather a big job for a girl to decide whether she'll break her mother's heart, or her lover's!"

"Mrs. Valentine has no heart, save in the physiological sense," I interrupted.

"Well, I have cut the Gordian knot," continued Marmaduke. "I don't want Dolly to know just at first, but I have set plans in motion for changing my name back to Forrest!"

"But you lose six thousand dollars a year!" I exclaimed.

"It doesn't matter. I am offered a New York partnership when the war is over and it won't be very long before I make it up."

"And what about your dear old uncle?"

"That hurts me, I confess. But I think if departed spirits know nothing of our doings, it doesn't matter, and if they know everything, uncle must have kept an eye on Mrs. Valentine and will understand."

"I never thought of leaving the whole matter to 'uncle,'" I observed.

"I'm not shifting the responsibility; I'm simply counting on him. I always counted on him and he always trusted me. If I could get him on a spiritual long-distance telephone, he would see that I cannot part an only daughter from her only mother."