VI
They were all having dinner together in a restaurant. In the circumstances, Miss Torrance could not well refuse, especially as it was Mr. Martin’s one night on shore; but she was not happy. Every one else was happy, but not she.
As a rule, she strong-mindedly concealed her feelings, but to-night she didn’t. She allowed Mr. Robertson to see just how miserable she was. Olive and Mr. Martin might have seen this, too, if they had looked at her.
“It looks as if there was a new story beginning there,” observed Mr. Robertson. “Might be called ‘Mr. Martin Swallows the Anchor.’”
Miss Torrance refused to smile.
“I shall miss Olive so,” she said, in a not very steady voice, “if she—”
“I’m sure you would,” agreed Mr. Robertson; “but she couldn’t find a better fellow than young Martin. I’ve known him all his life, and—”
“Yes, I know,” said Miss Torrance; “but I shall be lonely—oh, so lonely!”
It turned out, however, that she was not destined to be lonely.[Pg 192]
MUNSEY’S
MAGAZINE
JANUARY, 1925
Vol. LXXXIII NUMBER 4
Too French
THE STORY OF A NERVOUS WRECK AND HER ATTRACTIVE YOUNG COMPANION
By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding
YOUNG MANDEVILLE RYDER entered the employment bureau with extreme reluctance. Indeed, when he opened the door and saw so many women in there, and heard so many feminine voices, he would have backed out again, only that he was too young to dare to run away.
He was twenty-five—the age of pig-headed valor. He had undertaken to do this thing, and he meant to do it. Instinct warned him to flee, but he paid no heed. Hat in hand, he advanced to the desk and somewhat vaguely made known his wants.
It was a question of engaging a companion for his sister, who was a nervous wreck. His brother-in-law had implored him to do this.
“B-because,” Sheila’s husband said, “if I find any one—well, Mandy, you know what she’ll probably say.”
Mandeville did know. He had taken pity upon his luckless brother-in-law, and had agreed to go and pick out a companion for Sheila; so here he was.
The young woman in charge of the bureau listened to him with courteous inattention. She had long ago ceased to trouble with any one’s detailed requirements. She knew that both employers and employees wanted and demanded things that never existed in this world, and that in the end they would take what they could get and be more or less satisfied.
She was, however, rather favorably impressed by this client. Not only was he more than six feet tall, extraordinarily good-looking, and extremely well dressed, but he had an air about him—a superb sort of nonchalance, which she saw through at once, and which she recognized as merely a disguise for an honest, candid, and endearingly youthful spirit; so she decided not to inflict Miss Mullins upon him. Miss Mullins had been registered for six weeks, and, considering her temperament and personal appearance, she needed every possible chance.
“No!” thought the young woman in charge. “I’ll let him see Miss Twill.”
Smiling pleasantly, she led Mandeville into a room where four women were already established, talking, two in each corner, in low tones, and eying each other with quick, terribly penetrating glances. A prominent clubwoman was interviewing a poor little secretary, and a mild, home-keeping lady was being interviewed by a stern and handsome English governess.
Young Mandeville had to sit either on a very low wicker rocking-chair, or on a settee. He tried the rocking-chair first, but it brought his knees up to his chin, so he had to take the settee, and this caused him considerable anxiety; for suppose—
Well, it happened. Miss Twill, brought in and presented to him, did sit down on the settee beside him. She was a cheery soul. All her unimpeachable references mentioned her “cheerful disposition.” She really had no perceptible faults at all, but she wouldn’t do.
Young Mandeville was absolutely incapable of telling her this to her cheerful face, and their conversation had trailed into an awful succession of one “well” after another, when the intelligent manageress of the bureau saved him. She sent him another prospective companion to be interviewed, another and yet another, and none of them would do.
Mandeville suffered exceedingly. He wished that he could give the discouraged, pinched little old one a present—a dozen pairs of gloves, for instance. He wished that he could invite the pert, pretty young one out to lunch. He was sorry for all of[Pg 194] them, and he felt like a brute; but he knew what he wanted, and these would not do. There he sat, like a caliph in his divan, pronouncing judgment upon these poor, anxious creatures, and waiting, without much hope, for the right one.
He had a clear idea of the right one. He had met her—in novels and in the theater—a tall, grave, lovely young woman, exquisitely well bred, dignified, and yet subtly pathetic; the sort of companion who can stand about and converse with diplomats. Not that his sister ever entertained diplomats, but that was the type.
The manageress was becoming a little severe. It was dawning upon her that this client was not so manageable as he looked. After he had seen and—with great mental suffering—rejected six companions, she decided to make an end of him.
The room was temporarily empty of all but Mandeville when she returned with the seventh applicant.
“Miss La Chêne!” said she, and, saying, vanished.
Miss La Chêne did not sit beside Mandeville on the settee—not she! She took the low rocking-chair opposite him, crossed her feet modestly, clasped her little white-gloved hands in her lap, and raised her eyes to his face. Enormous, soft black eyes they were, set in a dark, lovely, pointed face. She was dressed with an innocent sort of elegance, in a dark suit and a small, close-fitting hat. She had about her such an air of propriety, something so decorous and demure and delightful, that Mandeville couldn’t repress a smile. She smiled, too, and dropped her eyes.
He didn’t know how to begin. This charming little thing was nothing but a child, a kid.
“Er—” he said, in his vague, grand manner. “Er—I don’t imagine you’ve had much experience as a—er—a companion.”
“None!” said she, almost with vehemence. “None at all; but I speak French just as I do English, I can sew, I can read aloud, I can play the piano. I have good personal references from people in Quebec, and I have a diploma from the convent.”
In hot haste she opened her hand bag, brought out some letters, and handed them to the young man. Somehow he didn’t care to read them. Somehow this interview lacked a businesslike tone. No—he couldn’t read the poor little thing’s letters!
She was watching him anxiously.
“I’ll try very hard, if some one will only give me a chance!” said she.
Poor little thing! Such a sweet, well bred little voice!
“I know,” said Mandeville earnestly; “but—you see, my sister wants—”
For instinct warned him that this delightful creature would not do.
“You see—” he went on, but stopped short, because the poor little thing’s black eyes filled with tears.
“I’m only eighteen,” she said, “and all alone in the world.”
This was more than he could endure. He was silent for a moment, trying honestly to weigh the merits of the case. She was obviously well bred, she spoke French, she could sew, she could read aloud, she could play the piano; but all these qualifications became confused in his mind with the quite irrelevant facts that she was only eighteen and all alone in the world, and that she had those extraordinary, those marvelous eyes.
“I’ll take you to see my sister,” he said, at last, for he thought that his sister could not fail to be touched by so much youth, beauty, and innocence.