The Carter Girls' Mysterious Neighbors

“Was your mother there?”

“Yassum!”

There was never any use in trying to make Chloe talk when she had decided not to, so Helen threw off her wraps and with a peep in the mirror where one could see from top to toe, she hastened to the aid of Count de Lestis.

“Mother will be along soon and she can do wonders with people who are bashful,” declared Helen, “but I’ll try my hand at it until she comes. They must dance, then they will thaw out.”

“Certainly, and will you dance with me to show them how?”

Helen forgot all about the fact that she had come with Dr. Wright and he might reasonably expect to claim the first dance.

“Yes, but you must introduce me to all these people and I’ll ask some of the girls to dance while you go get the young men to come fall in the breach.”

The shiny-eyed girls were willing enough and the young men seemed to think if the count didn’t mind his walls falling down, far be it from them to hold them up, so in a few moments the sad crowd were in a gale of good humor. The old farmer waked up and his wife looked as though she might try her new creaky shoes on the waxed floor if anyone would only ask her.

Dr. Wright looked on rather grimly as Helen was whisked from under his very nose. He might have stood it better if the count had not been such a perfect dancer and so very handsome. He had a way of whispering to his partner during the dance that was also a sore trial to the young physician.

“What could he be saying to Helen to make her dimple and blush?”

The arrival of the carriage containing Mrs. Sutton and Mrs. Carter with their rather bored husbands was a welcome interruption to the poor young man. Soon came the lumbering hay wagon with its giggling, chattering load, and then Helen was at liberty to dance with him, since the count perforce must again play the gracious host.

“Isn’t it perfect?” she exclaimed. “The floor, the music, and everything!”

“Not quite so perfect now as when you had the count for a partner, I am afraid,” he muttered, bending over to make her hear. He was too tall to converse while dancing with Helen. He had never regretted his inches before.

“Nonsense! You dance just as well as he does, and he talks so much while he is dancing. I hate to dance and talk, too, – just dancing is enough for me.”

“Me, too, then!” and once more he felt the satisfaction that a man who measures over six feet can’t help feeling.

Helen was right. Mrs. Carter was a born entertainer and she had hardly taken the social reins in her hands before the ball was running smoothly. Even Bobby found a partner, a funny little girl with such bushy hair that anyone could tell at a glance it had been put up in curl papers for several days. She looked like a pink hollyhock in her starched book-muslin that stood out like a paper lamp shade. Her round black eyes seemed very lovely to the gallant Bobby, who took her into the back hall where they turned round and round in imitation of the dance, and when dancing palled on them they showed each other how to make rabbits out of their handkerchiefs.

“This is the kind of party I like,” said the wholesome Mrs. Sutton. “Every Jill has her Jack and there are some Jacks to spare. Deliver me from parties where girls must sit against the wall and wait for partners to be released.”

“When you get the vote you can do the asking, and then parties where the females predominate will be more popular,” teased her husband.

“Nonsense! We can still do the asking if we care to. Come on and dance with me, sir!” and Mr. Sutton delightedly complied.

Mrs. Carter did not have to spend all the evening making other people have a good time. She was asked to dance by the count and her pretty little figure and graceful bearing attracted other partners, and she was soon tripping the light fantastic toe as untiringly as any of her daughters. Tillie Wingo herself did not get broken in on oftener.

Herz stood in corners, looking like one of the men out of Noah’s ark, Nan declared, so stiff and wooden.

“I don’t know which one he resembles most, Shem, Ham, or Japheth,” she whispered to Billy Sutton, “but I wonder if you licked him if the paint would come off.”

“I don’t know, but I’d like to try. I can’t abide that Dutchman. I believe he thinks he is superior to all of us, even his precious count. Jehoshaphat! I believe he is asking Douglas to dance.”

So he was. The secretary was stalking across the room, determination on his noble brow and his full mouth drawn together in a tight red line. He stopped in front of Douglas and placing one hand on his breast and the other one on his waist line in the back, he shut up like a jack-knife.

Douglas looked a little astonished, not knowing exactly what the young man wanted, and then the memory of the early days at dancing school came to her when the little boys were forced to bow to the little girls before they danced with them.

“Certainly,” she said, excusing herself from Lewis, who looked a little sullen, having expected to claim this particular waltz with his cousin, but who had neglected to do so, being too intent on gazing at her pretty flushed face.

Herz clasped her around the waist and began to twirl in a most astonishing manner. She could hardly keep her footing and very early lost her breath. Skilful guiding was not necessary, although when they arose to dance the floor was well filled with other couples, but these, knowing full well that discretion was the better part of valor, gave the spinning pair the right of way. The man never lost his gravity or dignity, but his mouth broke from the hard red line to its usual full-lipped curve. Douglas felt as though that dance would never end. His strong arm held her like an iron ring as round and round they went.

“‘Hi! Lee! Hi! Low!
Hi! Lee! Hi! Low!
I jus’ come over,
I jus’ come over —
Hi! Lee! Hi! Low!
Hi! Lee! Hi! Low!
I jus’ come over the sea,’”

sang Billy Sutton, as he and Nan watched the gyrations of their host’s secretary. “Did you ever see such a proof of foreign blood in any man who pretends to be American born?”

“Why, Billy, he is American born. The count says he was born and raised in Cincinnati.”

“Yes, and the count says he himself was born and raised in Hungary, but I bet you anything they may have been born where they say they were but they were raised in Berlin. Look at that fellow and tell me if he doesn’t dance like Old Heidelberg.”

“The count doesn’t, anyhow. I never saw such divine dancing as the count’s.”

As though he had heard her, the handsome smiling de Lestis came to claim her for the rest of the dance.

“Aren’t these foreigners the limit?” said the boy, seeking the disconsolate Lewis. “I know I oughtn’t to say anything about a fellow when I am in his house, but somehow that count gets my goat.”

“Mine, too! Who is this Herz?”

“Oh, he is a kind of lady’s maid or secretary or something for his nibs. Says he is an American, but I have my doubts. I don’t see how Miss Douglas Carter can stand for him, but she lets him walk home from school with her any time, so I hear,” announced Billy, absolutely unconscious of the fact he was retailing very unwelcome news to his companion.

“Humph!” was all Lewis could say, but that monosyllable had a world of meaning in it. And so although the music was gay and the lights were bright and the laughter was merry in that ballroom, there were several sore hearts, and the little green-eyed monster was waltzing or fox trotting or one stepping every dance.

“I wonder why Miss Ella and Louise don’t get here,” Helen said to Dr. Wright, who had at last persuaded her to sit out one dance with him. “They have had plenty of time even with their slow old horse.”

They had found a sofa in the back hall behind a clump of palms. There were many plants artistically grouped by the florist from town, who had tastefully decorated the whole mansion.

“The telephone has been ringing a great deal since we came. Could they be trying to get the count? I always feel like jumping when the ’phone rings, feeling that it must be for me.”

“Oh, no! The ring for Weston is two long and three short rings. These country ’phones are hard to learn, but I often answer the one at Grantly for my old friends.”

“Listen, there goes the bell again! Goodness! I believe one of these ’phones that rings everybody’s number would send me crazy.”

“They say you get used to them. That is four shorts and a long. That’s for Dr. Allison, who lives miles and miles from here. Don’t you remember Page Allison, that lovely girl who came to Greendale with the Tucker twins? It is her father.”

“Of course I do, and I know Dr. Allison, too! A delightful gentleman!”

“I believe I’ll call up Miss Ella and see what is the matter, – why they don’t come on.”

George Wright sighed. There always seemed to be something to keep Helen from talking to him tête-à-tête. Still, he felt glad to think that Helen was so fond of these old ladies and so thoughtful of them.

The telephone was under the stairway, quite near their retired nook. Helen rang the number for Grantly and there was a quick response.