# Munsey's Magazine/Volume 85/Issue 2/Miss What’s-Her-Name

Extracted from Munsey's Magazine, 1925 July, pp. 246–256.
Miss What's-Her-Name
AN INEXPERIENCED TRAVELER'S EVENTFUL VOYAGE TO A SUMMER ISLE OF PALM TREES AND SAPPHIRE WATERS
By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding
Miss Smith was a governess. She was not one of those beautiful young governesses so popular in romance, who live in the families of earls or millionaires and suffer all sorts of persecutions. Though young, Miss Smith was not exactly beautiful, and certainly she was not persecuted. On the contrary, the Pattersons were kind to her and thought very highly of her.
She was a brisk, sensible little thing, neat as a new pin, with crisp, curling black hair, clear blue eyes, and a lovely, healthy color. Her dress, her manner, her smile, were brisk and neat and sensible. Everything about her was pleasant—except for one great black shadow at the back of her mind, which she bravely pretended to ignore.
Sometimes, however, this lurking shadow refused to be ignored and crept out, clouding her clear blue eyes, troubling her nice, sensible thoughts, and making her, all in an instant, pale and downcast and dismayed. The shadow was a fear—fear of poverty, fear of defeat and failure, fear, above all, of romance.
Miss Smith's charming mother and father had been a romantic couple, and she remembered what had happened to them. They had both been too poor and too young and too charming. They had had no business to get married, but they had got married, and their daughter remembered—
She remembered her mother putting a piece of cardboard inside her slipper, because of a great hole in the sole, and her father going down on one knee to kiss the slender little foot. It was very romantic but Miss Smith had seen tears in her father's eyes and in her mother's.
She remembered a terrible quarrel over a boiled egg. There had been only two eggs. She, a little girl, had got one of them for her breakfast, and the other had been set before her father; but he wouldn't have it. He said that Nora positively needed it; and Nora—her mother—said that she didn't need it, didn't want it, and wouldn't have it.
In the end Mr. Smith had thrown the egg out of the window, where it lay in the mud, with the summer rain beating down on it. He had shouted bitterly that he was no good, because he couldn't make enough money to buy enough eggs for his family; and the little girl had cried, and her mother had cried, and their poor devoted little servant—their servants were always devoted—had cried, too. It had ended with her father sitting on the arm of her mother's chair, tenderly stroking that wonderful black hair, and herself sitting on her mother's lap, while the little servant stood in the doorway, drying her eyes on her apron. Everybody begged everybody else's pardon, and, after a while, they all laughed; and that very morning a devoted neighbor—for their neighbors were generally devoted, too—sent them a dozen new-laid eggs.
That was the sort of thing which was always happening to them; but Miss Smith remembered, not the gay ending, but the storm itself. Her mother had said, often and often, that her life had been a beautiful one, that she had been blessed above any woman she knew in the love and comradeship of her husband; but Miss Smith remembered too many tears, too many anxieties. She sometimes added, at the end of her prayers:
"And please, dear Lord, don't let me do anything like that!"
She would not have made that particular prayer with such particular earnestness if she had not known how easy it would be for her to do something like that; but she did know. She knew that the germs of that fatal disease called romance were in her blood, and she had to take frequent doses of a bitter sort of moral quinine to keep them inactive.
One of the best of these cures was in repeating to herself her full name—her poor, pathetic, dreadful name, which she never let any one know. Mr. and Mrs. Patterson were middle-aged and very serious, and Gladys Patterson, though only ten in years, was quite a settled and responsible character; and the life in that sedate West Side house was so calm, so orderly, that there was much time for idle, foolish thoughts. When any such came drifting through her mind, Miss Smith would repeat her name to herself with a stern smile, and would be deeply thankful for the "Smith" part of it, which was so thoroughly unromantic and sensible.
She tried to be thankful all the time. Before going to sleep she would tell herself how thankful she was for this nice, dignified, safe position, where she could probably remain five years longer, if she continued to do her duty. The very thought of having to leave the Pattersons and go out to look for a new position dismayed her; but she comforted herself by the thought that in five years' time she would be twenty-nine—which is almost thirty—and that she would probably be much more sensible then than she was now.
In the meantime all she asked was that life should let her alone, and she would let it alone. She couldn't bear the idea of change.
When Mr. Patterson first began talking about a trip to Bermuda, she was so much delighted with the idea that she knew it must be wrong, and became frightened, and hoped and hoped that that wonderful and dangerous thing would never happen. When the trip was definitely settled upon, she was increasingly miserable. Of course it wasn't her business to give advice to Mr. Patterson, and she never said a word, but she knew that it was foolish. She knew how much better it would be to stay at home and be safe.
When Mr. Patterson talked about crystal caves and sapphire water and angel fishes, when he spoke of blue skies and palm trees and roses in December, she was ready to cry. She knew it was perfectly impossible for such things to exist, and still more impossible that she could ever see them. It was a dream, and dreams are terribly dangerous. She would not buy any new clothes for the trip, and she would not believe in it.
That is how matters stood on that dreadful Saturday morning when Miss Smith cried:
"Oh, I've forgotten my ticket!"
II
Certain psychologists say that we forget only what we wish to forget, but it would be a gross libel to say that poor Miss Smith had wanted to forget her ticket. Quite the contrary! She was terribly ashamed of herself, and terribly worried.
"I'll go back and get it," she said.
They were all on the pier then, and other passengers, who had not forgotten their tickets, were showing them and going aboard. Trunks and bags were being trundled past. Miss Smith caught a glimpse of the gangplank, a curtain of fine, steady rain, and, behind that curtain, the deck of the ship. There was magic about that ship, as there is about all ships. There was the ship smell, as exciting as gunpowder.
"I'll rush back and get it!" cried Miss Smith.
That was really the beginning of the whole thing, and quite as strange as any of the other things that happened. For Miss Smith to cry, in that eager voice, that she would "rush," for Miss Smith to be so flushed and starry-eyed, for Miss Smith to be saying to herself, "Oh, I wouldn't miss going for anything!"—all this was nothing less than marvelous.
"You've just about got time," said Mr. Patterson severely.
She rushed madly. A taxi had just drawn up outside, and a young man dashed out of it in a frightful hurry. Miss Smith seemed vaguely to remember his face, but it didn't matter. She was in the taxi almost as soon as his foot touched the ground. She was off. She was urging on the taxi, in silence, with clenched hands. She would not miss that ship. She wanted to go! She would go!
Like a whirlwind she tore up the stairs of the sedate West Side house. She pulled open her bureau drawer so violently that it came out altogether and fell to the floor. There was the ticket. She thrust it into her coat pocket, flew down the stairs, past the astonished servants, hopped into the taxi again, and was off. How thankful she was now that Mr. Patterson, in his characteristic fashion, had insisted upon their going down to the ship in good time!
The rain was coming down steadily. The taxi splashed through puddles, and sometimes skidded a little, but what cared she? She felt triumphant and happy. She felt sure she would not miss the ship; and she did not. The crowd standing on the pier and the crowd standing on the deck, separated by the curtain of rain, saw a flushed and breathless young woman hurry up the gangplank at the very last moment. Up went the plank, a minute later the whistle blew, and they were off.
Still a little breathless. Miss Smith stood by the railing. In the excitement of the moment she felt inclined to wave her hand, or her handkerchief, as the people about her were doing; but that was absurd, for she wasn't saying good-by to any one, wasn't leaving any one behind. She turned, instead, to look for the Pattersons.
They were not in sight, and Miss Smith, being a very inexperienced traveler, did not quite know how to find them. As they were all on the same ship, however, this did not worry her very much. She found a steward to lead her to the stateroom that she was to share with Mrs. Patterson and Gladys, and knocked on the door. No one answered. She opened the door and went in. Not a trace of a Patterson there—no baggage except her own suit case. She had had a steamer trunk, too, but it was not there.
Miss Smith sat down in a wicker armchair and waited. She meant to wait patiently, but as a matter of fact she waited delightedly. The throb of the engines set her blood dancing. Everything she saw was fascinating—the three berths so neatly made up, the snugness, the coziness of this little cabin, with the rain falling outside. She knew that she had been very stupid and careless about the ticket, and that Mr. and Mrs. Patterson were surprised and not very well pleased; but even that couldn't disturb her just now. She was on a ship, sailing the sea!
The sound of a bugle interrupted her reverie. Common sense, and another and stronger inner voice, told her that this must mean lunch. There was a little book hanging up on the wall. She looked in it, and learned that lunch began at half past twelve. It was noon now.
"Perhaps they'll wait for me in the dining room—I mean, the dining saloon," thought Miss Smith. "I wonder if I ought to go down there or wait here! I wonder what I ought to do!"
She sat where she was for another very long half hour. Then she washed her hands, straightened her hat, and set forth, rather timidly. She felt that the Pattersons were keeping away from her in order to show their disapproval, and she didn't altogether blame them.
That apologetic look, that little shadow of a doubtful smile, were singularly becoming to her. What is more, the damp air had made her hair curl quite riotously, and the glow of her recent excitement still lingered on her face. Mr. Powers saw her standing there, looking anxiously about the dining saloon, and he thought he had never seen such a pretty little thing.
III
The fog had closed round them. The engines stopped, and the ship wallowed helplessly in a heavy sea. The great whistle blew warningly, threateningly, but nothing answered. The engines started up again, and the ship moved forward slowly. The captain was maneuvering very cautiously against this worst of all sea enemies.
The passengers, thought Mr. Powers, were as unconcerned as so many babies in a huge perambulator. There they sat, wrapped up in their steamer chairs, reading, or talking, or flirting, or disapproving of flirting, trusting absolutely to that unseen captain. Mr. Powers had traveled so much that he knew that things could happen. He was not apprehensive or nervous, for that was not his nature; but he was alert and interested. He lay back in his own deck chair, his soft hat pulled well down, and under it his dark eyes stared thoughtfully before him at the impenetrable fog. People tramped past him, but he took only a mild interest in them until—
"Again!" he said to himself. "What on earth is that girl doing?"
By "that girl" he meant Miss Smith, who had just hurried by like a leaf in the wind, her face pale and anxious. It was the third time she had hurried by like that, and he felt quite sure that she was not walking for amusement or health. Evidently she was troubled—very much troubled; and Mr. Powers, instead of telling himself that it was none of his business, wanted to help her.
That little figure hastening through the rainy dusk, so pale and troubled, made a strong appeal to his imagination. He did not make light of other people's difficulties, and was not afraid to meddle in other people's affairs, either, if he thought he could be of any use. He was not a very cautious or prudent young man, anyhow. He felt thoroughly at home in this world, and on excellent terms with his fellow creatures, and was not at all shy or awkward with them. He was waiting for a chance to speak to this young woman, and it came.
Miss Smith did not appear for some time. Before she passed Mr. Powers again, she had climbed to the upper deck, and had got thoroughly wet and chilled. She was thoroughly disheartened, too, so that there were tears in her eyes, and she couldn't see very well. In consequence, she stumbled against an empty deck chair.
"Oh! Excuse me!" she said, to nobody at all, and crossed hastily to the rail, ostensibly to look out over it, but really to dry her eyes.
Mr. Powers stood beside her.
"You're very wet," he said.
"Oh! No, thank you!" replied Miss Smith politely.
"Don't mention it," said he, equally polite; "but you really are. If I were you—"
"But I—I can't find the people I'm with!" cried Miss Smith, with something like a sob.
She was too miserable to realize that she was actually talking to a strange man. She didn't even glance at him. She didn't care what he looked like. He had an agreeable and steady sort of voice, however. Anyhow, the moment had come when she had to tell some one.
"I've looked and looked—and I can't find them!" she went on.
Now some people pretend, out of pompousness and self-importance, never to be surprised by anything, and Mr. Patterson was one of these. If you told him of anything amazing, he would say:
"Ah! Is that so? Well, I'm not at all surprised."
Some people really are not surprised by anything, because they know what an astounding world this is; and Mr. Powers was one of these. So he said, in a quiet and friendly way:
"Perhaps I can help you. I'll try."
Poor little Miss Smith had no objection to his trying. She went below to her cabin. changed into dry clothes from her suit case, and rested. She did everything that Mr. Powers had suggested, and one thing that he had not suggested—which was to shed a few tears, for it was a very distressing situation.
A little after four o'clock she descended to the dining saloon for a cup of tea, and to see Mr. Powers, who was to meet her there and give her his news of the lost Pattersons. She had felt sure that Mr. Powers would be there waiting for her, and he was; yet Miss Smith gave a start at the sight of him.
This benevolent stranger who had so kindly offered to help her was not the bespectacled, middle-aged stranger he ought to have been, but a remarkably good-looking young man. Though he was neatly and quietly dressed, and in no way conspicuous, either in appearance or manner, yet there was something in the nonchalant grace of his tall body, in the expression of his dark, keen face, that was unmistakably—romantic. She felt it, she knew it. As she came toward him, her own expression changed, and she became every inch a governess.
It seemed to be part of Mr. Powers's mental equipment, however, to judge pretty shrewdly what other people were feeling. He spoke to Miss Smith in quite an impersonal tone.
"I'm afraid," he said, "that the people you're with aren't with you. It appears that neither they nor their luggage ever came aboard."
"Oh!" cried Miss Smith. "But they must have come! They had their tickets, and I left them on the pier, with all their trunks and bags. Oh, can I possibly have got on the wrong ship?"
"No," said he. "Your name's on the passenger list, and so are their names; but they're not aboard."
"But where are they? They couldn't have—have fallen overboard?"
"Well," said Mr. Powers thoughtfully, "three of them together would make quite a splash. I imagine some one would have noticed it."
"I've read about people falling down into holds," said Miss Smith. "Do you think—"
"I shouldn't count on that," said Mr. Powers. "No—it seems pretty clear to me that they changed their minds at the last moment, for some reason, and remained ashore."
Mr. Patterson change his mind at the last moment? That was the most impossible solution of all.
"It can't be that," said Miss Smith, shaking her head. "No! Something has happened!"
Mr. Powers looked down at her in silence for a moment.
"Is it—serious?" he asked. "I mean, does it make very much difference to you, your friends not being here?"
"Difference!" cried Miss Smith. "Why, it—" She stopped short. "You see," she went on, in an altered tone, "I'm their governess."
She looked steadily at the stranger as she said this, because she knew that to some persons a governess would be quite a different creature from an independent traveler. If it made a difference to this young man, she thought she would like to know it. As far as she could judge, it did not. He returned her glance in the same friendly, quiet fashion.
"I see!" he said.
Miss Smith was quite sure, however, that he did not see, or even imagine. If he had, he wouldn't have suggested her sending a radio message to the Pattersons' house.
"I—no, thanks," said Miss Smith. "It really wouldn't do any good. I'm here, and I've got to go on. I'll come back on the same ship."
For she had her return ticket and nothing else—absolutely nothing else except two quarters, which she found in her coat pocket. When she made her mad dash for the forgotten ticket, she had had a bill clutched in her hand, and the two coins were the change that the driver had given her. She knew that she had had her purse with her on the pier, just before that, but what had become of it she could not tell. Had she dropped it on the pier? Had she intrusted it to the Pattersons? Had she left it in the taxi, or in the house? Anyhow, it was gone. The Pattersons were gone. Her trunk was gone. Here she was, sailing over the Atlantic, with two quarters and a suit case.
She wasn't going to allow this strange young man to pay for a radio message for her. Besides, what could she say? "Where are you?" "What shall I do?" Impossible! Something had happened—something mysterious, inexplicable. All that she could do now was to go on to Bermuda, come back as fast as possible, and present herself before the Pattersons. Then she would be informed; and she felt pretty sure that she had lost not only her purse but her nice, safe position as well.
The Pattersons had been disgusted with her for forgetting her ticket, and, in their anger, they had set her adrift. Perhaps she would never find them again. She would never get another position, if she couldn't get a reference from the Pattersons. Her trunk was lost, with almost all her clothes. Things were as bad as they could be.
As she considered this appalling situation, a strange thing happened to Miss Smith. Instead of feeling utterly crushed, a curious sort of elation came over her. She suddenly felt very happy, very light, as if her worldly possessions and prospects had been so many heavy burdens, which had now fallen from her shoulders and left her free.
"We might as well have our tea," she remarked cheerfully.
There were little fancy cakes on the table, and she liked little fancy cakes. The tea was good, too. It was the most refreshing, invigorating tea she had ever tasted. She had two cups of it. Then she went up on the promenade deck with Mr. Powers, and they walked. It was dark now, and chilly and windy, but she liked that strong, salt wind.
"Where's your deck chair?" asked Mr. Powers.
"Oh, I don't know!" said she. "I never asked."
"I'll find it for you," said he, and settled her comfortably in his, with his rug wrapped about her, while he went off.
She watched him going. Then she watched every one else who passed by; and it could not be denied that of all the men whom Miss Smith saw not one was so handsome, so distinguished, so interesting as Mr. Powers.
She leaned back and closed her eyes. The wind had blown away the fog, the ship was forging steadily ahead through the rainy night, and she was on it! Penniless and alone, she was sailing the sea to a coral isle! She, the brisk, sensible Miss Smith who, twenty-four hours ago, had been a governess on the West Side of New York!
"I don't care!" she said to herself, with a sort of triumph. "I'm young and healthy. I can—"
She didn't complete the thought, but at that moment she actually felt that she could do pretty nearly anything, and could face the wide world undaunted. It was a very nice sort of feeling.
IV
The weather was rough, and many people who had appeared for lunch were not to be seen at dinner; but Miss Smith came down, quite fresh and rosy. Her suit case could provide nothing better than a blue linen blouse, which she had intended for breakfasts, not dinners. As she dressed, she thought, with a sigh, that she looked very sedate and unattractive; but Mr. Powers did not seem to think so. At least, he looked pleased to see her.
"I hope you don't mind," he said, "but I've taken a place for you at Herbert's table. I've had Herbert for table steward before, and he's good."
Miss Smith did not mind, and she, too, found Herbert a good table steward.
"But I shan't be able to give him any tip," she thought. "And when I come back, all alone—"
Resolutely she banished that thought. She remembered how her father and motlier used to talk about the folly of "borrowing trouble." She had often thought that a shiftless sort of maxim, but now she found it wise. Perhaps they themselves had been wiser than she realized, for they had lived joyously in the day that was actually present, not troubling about days that had gone, or about future days which no one can really foresee.
Perhaps, she thought, the people who so anxiously provide for the future are the true romantics; for don't they invent a future all full of troubles, and then believe firmly in what they have invented? Perhaps the so-called romantic people are the most practical, after all.
It was a good thing that notions like this came into her head, for they helped her to endure the disturbing events of that evening with more calmness than she could have felt if she had been entirely the old Miss Smith. Even as it was, she was brightly lighted little stateroom. The ship pitched up and down. Her coat, hanging on a hook, flapped like a great bird, and her patent leather suit case slid over to the wall and out again. The thoughts in her mind were quite as uneasy.
"Darcy!" she said to herself. "Darcy! Heavens!"
For Mr. Powers had casually mentioned that his first name was Darcy. He was an Irishman—a mining engineer—and he had lived in South America for several years.
"Oh, Heavens!" said poor Miss Smith again.
For here were all the qualifications for a true hero of romance. And the way he had told her all this! It was on the almost deserted promenade deck, where the storm curtains filled and flapped in the wind, and the rain beat against them, and the scuppers rippled and gurgled like little brooks. Sensible people stayed within, but there these two had sat, side by side. The electric lights overhead had shone fiercely upon Mr. Powers's dark, eager face, and upon his hair, black as a raven's wing. He had told her all these things because he wanted her to know about him, because he hoped she would understand and like him. He had almost said so in words, and he had certainly said so with that half smiling, half anxious glance of his.
"I don't care!" said Miss Smith to herself, with a sob.
She might be silly, but she wasn't so silly as that. This thing might be an adventure. Indeed, she was willing to admit that it was one, and to see it through gallantly; but an adventure with a "heart interest" in it she would not have!
In desperation she looked about for something to distract her mind. There was nothing to read except the little booklet hanging on the wall and an old copy of Lamb's "Essays," which she had brought along partly because she loved it, and partly because it seemed a fitting book for a governess. She took the booklet down. Once more she read the hours for meals, and then:
DECK CHAIRS AND RUGS—Deck chairs and rugs can be hired for the voyage at fixed charges. Payment should be made to the deck steward, who will issue a ticket.
Then payment had been made to the deck steward for her chair and rug, and by Mr. Darcy Powers, and she could not reimburse him!
"I'll have to be civil to him, at least, after that!" thought Miss Smith.
V
Sunday was the fairest day that ever dawned. Mr. Powers was on deck early. He saw the sun come up, and he was sorry Miss Smith was not there to see it, too. He thought she would have enjoyed the spectacle, and he himself would have enjoyed it more if she had been there.
At half past eight he went down into the dining saloon and looked about. Ten minutes later he descended again. Three times during the half hour he went into the dining saloon and looked about; and at last, at nine o'clock, he sat down and ordered his breakfast.
"Perhaps she's seasick," he thought.
Powers, as a rule, like all those who are never seasick, was unsympathetic toward those who were. He was inclined to consider seasickness a rather humorous thing; but in this case he did not think so. He thought of Miss Smith with unreasonable compassion. Sitting there over his very hearty breakfast, he began to worry about her. He thought it was a monstrous thing, an outrage, that she should be seasick. He began to grow angry with the Pattersons for getting themselves lost. They had no right to be so careless about themselves, and to leave Miss Smith all alone.
"She shouldn't have to be a governess, anyhow—a pretty little thing like that," he reflected.
Why Miss Smith's small size or personal appearance should have debarred her from that useful employment he could not have explained, or why he found her so very touching. He had no idea how truly terrible her situation was. He had fancied, indeed, that it might be a good thing for her to have a little holiday from her Pattersons; but he was sorry for her, just the same. He remembered how her curly dark hair blew about her face in the wind, how the ruffled collar of her blouse stood up, how busy her small hands had been in quelling this enchanting disorder.
Mr. Powers sent a steward to inquire after her, and ten minutes later she appeared in person.
"I overslept myself!" she explained cheerfully.
He did not realize what that meant. For years and years Miss Smith had got up at seven o'clock. She had needed no alarm clock, for her sense of duty had never failed to arouse her; and now the sense of duty had slumbered. She was a little shocked at herself, and just a little proud. Coming down to breakfast at half past nine!
"You've finished, haven't you?" she said.
But she knew very well that he would wait with her, and so he did.
"I think you'll like Bermuda," he said. "It's a pretty place. I have an aunt living there, you know. I hope you'll let me bring her to call on you."
"Oh, I'm sorry, but, you see, I shan't be there," said Miss Smith. "I'm going right back on this ship."
"But the ship doesn't sail again till Saturday, you know."
"Saturday!" cried Miss Smith. "Doesn't sail till Saturday!"
"No. At this time of the year there's only one sailing a week."
The breakfast had come. Herbert stood by, benevolently watching, but Miss Smith could not eat. She swallowed a cup of coffee and rose.
"I—I think I'll go up on deck now," she faltered.
Mr. Powers naturally went with her. He settled her in her deck chair and sat down beside her, and for a long time there was silence.
"Look here!" he said at last. "I'm sorry to see you so upset, Miss Smith; but these people—these Pattersons—can't be so unreasonable as—"
"Oh, it's not that!" said she, in a sort of despair. "Only—"
He waited, looking at her face, which had suddenly grown so pale.
"I wish you'd tell me," he said at length. "I know I'm a stranger to you, but—" He paused. "My aunt's down there, you know," he went on. "She might be able to—to advise you."
Advice! What good would that do? Miss Smith was obliged to live on a strange island from Monday until Saturday on two quarters. She shook her head mutely. She couldn't talk. She wished Mr. Powers would go away and leave her alone, to think.
After a while, he did. He saw he wasn't wanted, and he went; but then it was worse than ever.
At half past twelve he came back.
"Won't you come down to lunch?" he asked.
"I—I don't feel like eating," said Miss Smith.
Now, however, she was not so anxious for Mr. Powers to go away and let her think, and he did not go.
"Look here!" he said firmly. "Miss Smith, are you a good judge of character?"
"We-ell, yes," replied Miss Smith. "Yes, I think so."
There is no one in the world who does not think the same thing. Just ask anybody!
"Then please look at me," said Mr. Powers.
She raised her eyes to his face, only for an instant, and then glanced away.
"Do you think I have an honest face?" he asked. "Trustworthy?"
"Ye-es," said Miss Smith.
"Then won't you trust me? Tell me what's wrong. I'm older than you, and I've knocked about a lot. I've been up against all sorts of difficulties, and I know pretty well how to get out of them. You're here, all alone. You're very young and very—" Again he paused. "Very much worried," he continued; "and if you would tell me—"
Miss Smith stole another glance at his face, and it seemed to her not only trustworthy but intelligent and friendly; so she told him. The sedate and sensible Miss Smith confessed to a strange man that she only had two quarters.
He was silent for a moment, staring before him.
"If I'm any good at all," he thought, "I'll handle this thing properly, so that she won't be hurt or offended or troubled in any way."
So he said aloud, in just the right tone, calm and good humored:
"I see! Of course you were worried; but it's all right now. I'll take you to my aunt, Mrs. Mount. She'll understand."
Fortunately Miss Smith was not a sufficiently good judge of character to read Mr. Powers's mind just then; for he was thinking:
"You poor, sweet little thing! You poor little darling! I'd like to buy the whole island and give it to you! You ought to have everything. You deserve everything, you dear little thing!"
Miss Smith didn't believe that people ever really thought things like that.
VI
Nor was Darcy Powers so good a judge of character as he fondly imagined; for his aunt did not accept the situation in the right spirit at all. She pretended to do so, and he thought she did, but in her heart she was bitterly angry and hurt. Her nephew was all she had in the world, and she loved him. She had been looking forward to this vacation of his for two years; and then he came driving up with this Miss Smith!
She listened to his explanation with a pleasant smile. Still with a pleasant smile, she conducted Miss Smith to the spare bedroom and was very civil to her. Then her nephew had to go off to see certain old ladies who had known him since childhood and wanted to see him immediately, and Mrs. Mount ceased to smile.
Miss Smith was not worrying any more. Indeed, she had almost stopped blinking altogether. She had got off the boat that morning into a new world. She had got into a carriage with Mr. Powers and driven along a dream road. The colors. The white road, the white walls, the white houses, glistening like sugar in the sun! The pure blue of the sky, the glimpses of the sapphire sea, the glossy green of the palm leaves, the dark green of the cedars, the pink roses, the purple bougainvillea, the scarlet hibiscus!
Mrs. Mount's cottage was an enchanted cottage, like the one that Hänsel and Gretel found in the wood, standing in a garden glorious with flowers. And Mrs. Mount herself was so handsome and dignified and polite, and this little bedroom was so bright, so sweet, so sunny!
"I'm really here!" thought Miss Smith. "I did come! It's true!"
She had not even taken off her hat or opened her suit case. She just sat there by the window, lost in an innocent and utterly happy dream. This new world was so beautiful, and every one was so kind to her!
"Darcy is a dear boy," said a voice from the garden, which she recognized as Mrs. Mount's; "but this is too much!"
"I heard," said another voice, unknown to Miss Smith, but belonging to Mrs. Mount's cousin, Miss Pineville, "that Darcy got off the boat this morning with some stranger—"
"And brought her here!" said Mrs. Mount. "She scraped up an acquaintance with him on shipboard—you know how easy that is—and told him some preposterous tale about being a governess, and having lost her purse and the family she was with. Of course there's not a word of truth in it. A governess! An adventuress—that's what she is!"
"Does Darcy—" began the other.
"Oh, Darcy!" interrupted Mrs. Mount impatiently. "He's completely taken in by her; but I'm going to talk to him later. For instance, there's her name. She distinctly told me her name was Nina Smith; but she left the book she'd been reading on the sitting room table, and written in it was 'Little M., from father.' Nina doesn't begin with an 'M,' does it? And Smith! That's just the name any one would take as an alias, to avoid suspicion. But you wait! I'll find out the truth! I won't have my nephew imposed upon!"
"I'd like to see her," said the other eagerly. "Perhaps I—"
"I'll call her out for a cup of tea," said Mrs. Mount. "But be polite to her, Eliza, until I've found out."
So Mrs. Mount went in and knocked on Miss Smith's door. There was no answer. She knocked again, and then she opened the door. Miss Smith and her suit case were gone.
At first Mrs. Mount was glad.
"She must have heard what I said to Eliza in the garden," she told her nephew. "She was frightened and ran away."
"Frightened?" said he. "Is that how you imagine a sensitive young girl feels when she hears herself slandered and insulted? I brought her here—to you—because I thought you'd understand, and you've driven her away. An adventuress? Why, one look at her face might have told you—"
He turned away abruptly, but one look at his face had certainly told Mrs. Mount something. She was no longer glad, but very sorry. She would have told him so, but it was too late. He had gone out of the house, slamming the door behind him.
VII
Miss Smith had done the obvious thing. She could not set off with her suit case and walk home, so she had taken the next best course. She bad gone quietly out of the back door, through the garden, and down the road in the direction of the ship, which was, after all, a sort of bridge to home.
It was a long walk, and she had to ask her way, but in the course of time she got there. A young officer was standing under the shed, superintending the unloading of the cargo, and she went up to him.
"You're one of the officers, aren't you?" she asked.
He took off his cap and smiled at her. It was such a nice smile that she was able to go on, in a brisk, sensible way:
"I was one of the passengers, you know."
"Yes," said he. "I saw you on board."
"And I want to go back," said Miss Smith. "I want to go on the ship now, and stay there until it sails."
He couldn't help looking astonished.
"But I'm afraid—" he began.
"Well, I've got to!" cried Miss Smith, and he saw, with dismay, that there were tears in her eyes. "I've g-got to! I have some money in the savings bank in New York, and I can pay whatever it costs as soon as we get back."
"Yes, I'm sure," he said politely; "but I'm afraid—"
He was silent for a moment, thinking of some tactful way of offering his assistance to this young person with tears in her eyes. No one could have felt more sympathetic than he; but Miss Smith, weary and sick at heart, firmly believed that he, too, thought her an adventuress.
"I'm a governess," she said, in an unexpectedly loud and severe tone. "The family I was coming with somehow missed the ship, and—"
"What?" he cried. "A governess! But wait—look here!"
"Yes, I am!" said she. "I am!"
"Yes, but look here! I was at the gangway, you know, and just before we sailed a young chap came dashing up and gave me a purse—a long brown purse—"
"My purse!"
"'It's for Miss—can't remember the name,' he said. 'It's for Miss What's-Her-Name, the governess,' and then he dashed off again."
"That's me!" cried Miss Smith, pardonably ungrammatical in her emotion.
"Look here! I'm most awfully sorry!" said the young officer earnestly. "It's all my fault. I turned it over to the purser and told him that Miss What's-Her-Name would probably come and ask for it. You see, I never thought you could be a governess, you know. I am sorry!"
"But is it there? Can I get it?"
"Rather!" said he. "Purser's on board now, getting ready to go ashore. I'll fetch him."
Off he went, and was back in no time with the purser and Miss Smith's pocketbook.
There was a note inside it.
My dear Miss Smith:
At the moment of embarkation I have received a message that my father in Chicago is dangerously ill, and wishes his family with him. I find we have just time to catch the next train. As it is too late to cancel our tickets, it seems advisable that you at least should continue with the trip, so that the entire outlay will not be wasted. You will, I am sure, have an instructive and entertaining account of your experience for Gladys when you rejoin us in New York. You will find your trunk and suit case in your stateroom.
As I do not know what money you may have in hand, I inclose an express money order, to cover whatever expenses may arise.
Wishing you a pleasant and profitable trip, I remain.
Very truly yours, Henry Patterson.
"You see!" cried Miss Smith. "You see, I am—"
But she could not go on. The purser and the second officer—the latter had come up just then—decided that she ought to have a cup of tea, to quiet her nerves, so they all went over to a little tea room in the town.
It was there that Powers found her sitting at the table with two young men, all of them very jolly and cheerful. For a moment she was glad that he should see her like that—no longer forlorn and dejected, but a real human girl. Hat in hand, he stood beside her. He, too, tried to look jolly and cheerful, but he failed; and, looking up at him, Miss Smith felt a sudden sharp stab of regret. The adventure was over.
She introduced him to the two young men, and explained to him about the recovery of her purse.
"Good!" said he. "Then everything's all right now?"
Of course everything was all right now, and yet—and yet somehow it wasn't. Something seemed to be wrong. The two young men from the ship seemed to know this. They said they had better be getting along, and, after cordial farewells, they did go along.
Mr. Powers still stood where he was, still trying to look pleased, and still failing to do so; and in a flash Miss Smith understood just how he felt. He had wanted to be the one to make everything come out right, and it was cruel that he had not been. It was their adventure—his and hers. Nobody else had any business to get into it. It was coming out wrong!
Now Miss Smith knew very well that heroines in adventures rarely take a very active part, and that things just happen to them; but she was not quite accustomed to adventures yet, and she was in the habit of doing things for herself. Moreover, Darcy Powers was playing his part very poorly, simply standing there and not suggesting their talking it over.
"I'd like to go back and see Mrs. Mount," she said firmly.
His face brightened remarkably.
"I didn't think you'd ever—" he began.
"I'd like to show her that letter and explain—"
"See here!" he interrupted. "It's not for you to make explanations!"
She liked the way he said that!
"Still," she said, "I'd rather."
So they got into a carriage and drove off along that same road; but it was all very different now. The sun had gone down, leaving a soft, dark violet sky. The bright colors were dimmed. It was, she thought, a subdued and rather melancholy world. The adventure was over.
Mr. Powers remarked again how glad he was that everything had come out all right; but, as Miss Smith said nothing in response to this, he was discouraged and fell silent for a time.
"I never thought you'd come back there," he said at last. "I thought—perhaps you had overheard what my aunt said, and—"
"Yes, I did overhear it," said Miss Smith, in a calm and reasonable tone; "but, after all, she knew nothing about me. Why should she?"
"Anybody would know that you were—" he began, and stopped.
Miss Smith waited in vain to hear what she was. Turning a corner, they entered a road where the trees arched overhead and the low white walls gleamed ghostlike. A faint breeze rustled the leaves, and the little whistling frogs had set up their music. The lights of Mrs. Mount's cottage were visible at the end of the road.
A strange pain seized Miss Smith. The lights of that little house, shining out steadily into the tranquil dusk, put her in mind of another cottage—her home, so long ago—and of the mother and father who had lived in it. She thought of the careless laughter, the hope, the courage, the great love, that had made their whole life a delightful adventure. Foolish? Romantic? Unpractical?
"They were the wisest, most wonderful people who ever lived," she said to herself, with a stifled sob; "and the bravest. They weren't afraid of life, like me!"
"I wonder what happened to your trunk!" said Mr. Powers.
So that was all he could think of to say!
"I don't know," she answered; "and I don't care, either. I suppose it must have been taken away by mistake with the Pattersons' luggage."
"I hope you'll recover it," said he.
Another silence, very long.
"I did tell Mrs. Mount one thing that wasn't quite true," said Miss Smith.
"What was that?" asked Darcy Powers, and she knew by his voice that he thought whatever she had said was right.
"I told her my first name was Nina—and it isn't."
"What is it, then?" he asked.
The carriage had stopped before the gate. He got out and helped her down, and they both stood there until the sound of the horse's hoofs had died away.
"What is your name?" he asked again.
"It's a very silly name," she said. "I never tell it to any one."
Her hand was on the gate, to open it. His hand closed over hers.
"Please!" he said. "I know you're going away. I think you've begun to go already. Can't you just let me know that, so that I can think of you by your own dear name?"
"No!" said Miss Smith.
She was really frightened. She knew that if she told him her name, here in this enchanted garden, in the twilight, it would be fatal. The adventure was becoming too much for her. Her own heart was getting too much for her, filled with emotions she could not bear. She was Miss Smith, the governess—the brisk, sensible, unromantic Miss Smith—she tried valiantly to remember that.
"No!" she said again, and pulled away her hand.
Just then the door of the cottage opened, and Mrs. Mount appeared in the lighted doorway.
"Darcy!" she called. "And—oh, Miss Smith! Oh, come in, my dear!"
Her voice had warmth in it, and kindliness. It reminded Miss Smith of her mother, who used to stand in a lighted doorway like that, and call her in from her play. She thought of herself going back to New York to be a governess again. She thought of Mr. Powers—Darcy—left alone in that garden, thinking of her. Was he, after all his kindness, to be left thinking of her as "Miss Smith"?
She turned toward him.
"My name's really Mavourneen," she said. "You see, I was the only child, and father and mother—"
"Mavourneen!" said he, and somehow, as he said it, the name was not a silly one at all. "That means—"
"Yes, I know," she interrupted hastily, and walked quickly up the path toward Mrs. Mount.
Somewhat to the young man's surprise, Mrs. Mount held out her arms, and Miss Smith went into them; and after all, it was not the end of the adventure, but only the beginning.
This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1929.
The longest-living author of this work died in 1955, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 68 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.
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