Ellsworth American. [volume] (Ellsworth, Me.) 1855-current, 1901-06-19
A KNIGHT ERRANTy
How He Stood by an Innocent
Girl In the Hour of
Her Peril.

cold. He was indeed freshly and unex-
pectedly romantic under his apparent in
ivulnerability. Once, long ago in early
love as he had dreamed it. 1t had not
been for him, and it had flown to fairer
worlds almost before he had realized its
beauty, but he had never forgotten the
revelation.
II now he sometimes looked over curl
ously Mt the girls and women he met, it
was because he had always an irrational
hope that that divine glimpse might again
be vouchsafed to him. How did he know
but that any day, in any drawing room,
in the street on the river, he might meet
the lady of his dreams. He had always
been disappointed hitherto. Never since
Mary Grayson died had he met love.
Women of all ages made much of him.
lie was eligible as well as attractive and
had gifts of mind as well as of person
and manner.
SO it was that he had drifted into be-
ing made much of by Mrs. Lawrence, the
wife of Tom Lawrence, a good, honest,
stupid fellow, one fair hair of whose head
was worth all worthless little Mrs. Dolly.
Standish could hardly have explained
how he had drifted into being always at
Mrs. Dolly's beck and call and why he
was to be found so often on the hearth
rug at the Cedars when the Lawrences'
butler brought in the afternoon tea. 1t
was Mrs. Dolly's doing, no doubt, and
Tom, who was head over ears in love
with his heartless little wife. looked on
Dolly's friendship with Herbert Standish
contentedly.
Standish arrived one afternoon in April
rather later than usual and found Mrs.
Lawrence very much put out at some
thing or other. Even the lilies of the val
ley which he laid at her feet failed to dis
pei the cloud on her brow. For the first
time Standish felt that Mrs. Dolly was
inclined to impose a yoke upon him to
which his broad shoulders did not bend
gracefully.
While he was chatting a little at the
lady's exactions the hopes of the house,
Guy, Cecil aud Arthur. rioted into the
room, followed more demurely by their
sister, Millicent, a mincing little girl,
who, by and by, would be the image of
her mother. 1t was jest of Mrs. Dolly's
that Standish was to marry Millicent one
day, and even now, at s years old, Milli-
cent, nursing her doll, made unsupported
eyes at the tall figure on the hearthrug.
Following came Nora O'Brien. Mrs.
Lawrence's new governess.
As the slender girl in the straight blue
frock passed silently to her place behind
the tea table Standish's heart gave sud
den, unexpected throb. With such a
heart throb the lad of Is had looked on
the heaven destined beauty of Mary
Grayson, but never since, never since,
had it beaten with such high hope, with
such a quick despair.
An instant and he had stepped forward
to take the cups from the new govern
ess' hand.
! Mrs. Lawrence had not introduced him
to the new inmate of the house. She
never did introduce her governesses,
fact of which Standish was aware and
which had often caused him feeling Of
contemptuous irritation with charming
Mrs. Dolly. But since he was so often a
visitor he had come to be on speaking
terms with the long line of Mrs. Law
rences governesses, so many of whom
had failed to please the lady and her ex-
acting young daughter.
, As he took the cup from Miss O'Brien's
hand he paused an instant and looked
down into her eyes. She did not change
color, but looked up at him steadfastly.
Her ewes were dark blue, fringed with
black lashes. He seemed to look down
into her heart in that instant of time, to
ask her if she was really the one he had
been looking for since he lost Mary Gray
son. What she answered with her stead
fast long look he could not read easily.
l. oh honest and
true and that her love was his to win if
he could. He smelled the fresh. spring
like smell of the daffodils in the breast of
her blue gown. 1t was bewildering.
s. Then a word from his hostess. spoken
little snappishly, recalled him. He car
ried the cup of tea to Mrs. Dolly and
fetched her the tiny table to hold it
which she was in the habit of using. He
offered her the foie gras sandwiches and
the buttered toast. Only very fine OBJ
server would have noticed that his eyes
were alert now, no longer jaded. and that
something like spring wind had put
little color in his face and rufiied his
smooth hairs ever so little.
Little Millicent, on her footstool,
watched the new governess from eyes
that had a trick of narrowing like her
mothers, watched her and then went on
furtiyely to Herbert Standish's subtly al
tered face
The weeks OF the spring went by In
iocund procession. Standish was as as
siduous as ever in his attendance at the
Cedars, and the house by the river grew
pleasanter as the May burst in blossom
and the little fiotilla of the water lilies
rocked at its moorings.
He hardly ever spoke with Mrs. Law
rence's governess, yet from his place on
the hearthrug against the background Of
palms and ferns which had taken the
place of the FIRE his eyes watched her in
cessantly.
He had angered Mrs. Lawrence once or
twice nv. unnecessarily as it seemed to
her, turning over the pages of the gov
erness's music and lingering by the piano
while she sang heart piercing Irish songs
in the richest, softest of contraltos. How
ever, after a time he was forgiven, be-
cause he loved music, and 1t was excuse