It was seldom, indeed, that Major Lacey ventured so far from his home, in view of his increasing age, with which his infirmities waxed in proportion, except, indeed, on the various occasions of Confederate reunions, when his years fell from him, and the scales dropped from his eyes, and he was once more a dashing young officer with his sword in his hand and his heart in his cause. He was now returning from one of these symposia, and the old soldier would canvass its incidents, and discuss its personnel, and repeat the toasts, and recount the old stories and live again in the days of yore, growing ever dimmer, till the next reunion would endow the past with reviviscence and it would glow anew and the dull present would sink out of sight. He was barely ensconced in his chair when Miss Dean gaily accosted him.
“Yes,—here we are, indeed, Major,—you remember me?—Miss Hildegarde Dean,—but you ought to have been on deck when we were trying to get away. It was just like an attempt to jump over a fence by pulling on the rosettes of your slippers,—wasn’t it, Mrs. Floyd-Rosney?”
“Oh, she didn’t witness it,” said Floyd-Rosney hastily, reminded of his displeasure because of her tardiness. “Too late,—as usual. She closely resembles Athelstane the Unready. You remember the Saxon nobleman, Major Lacey.”
His bland patronage was a bit more insufferable than his obvious disapproval, if such comparison be attempted, for the casual stranger had done naught to incur his unwelcome benignities, whereas his wife, by consenting to become his wife, had brought her doom upon her own head.
The receptivity of the object of his grace in this instance was blunted by misunderstanding. “Well, now,” the Major replied, knitting his brows, “there was a foreign nobleman—a native of Saxony,—for a time on the staff of General Lancaster while I, too, was a member of his military family. This stranger was eager to see our artillery in action,—greatly interested in the Gatling gun,—it was new, then, invented by a gentleman from North Carolina. But I don’t remember that the officer’s name was Athelstane,—my memory is not so good as it once was,—his name has escaped me. But he had been a lieutenant of the Line in his own country,—light artillery.”
Colonel Kenwynton observed Floyd-Rosney’s satiric smile and resented it. He would not suffer the matter to rest here. “Mr. Floyd-Rosney is alluding to a character in one of the Waverley novels, Major,” he said tactfully.
“Eh? Oh, I remember, now,—I remember,—Ivanhoe,—Athelstane of Coningsburgh,” the Major replied casually. “But I was thinking of that foreign nobleman from Saxony,—much impressed by the Gatling gun in action.”
The war was all-in-all with the Major.
Miss Hildegarde Dean suddenly rose and, with her swinging athletic gait, walked across the deck and seated herself in a chair beside the Major. He was conscious, of course, of an approach and a new proximity, but whose presence it was and of what intent he could not divine. He turned his sightless face toward his unseen neighbor, expressive of a courteous abeyance, ready and reciprocal toward the advance were it charged with a meaning for him, yet with a dignity of reserve in awaiting it. He, of course, could not see Hildegarde smiling at him so brightly that one must needs deplore afresh his affliction which debarred him from such suffusive and gracious radiance.
“Major Lacey,” she began blithely, “I have just lived for this moment. I want you to tell me exactly how your grandmother—now that is your great-niece Elodie Lacey’s great, great stupendously great grandmother,—Elodie is a chum of mine and a precious monkey-fied thing.” (The Major’s eyebrows were elevated doubtfully at this description of his young relative, but the tone was one of approval and affection and he took the compliment on trust.) “We have such gay old times together,” in a burst of reminiscent enthusiasm. “But now about your grandmother’s romance. How did she happen to marry the Revolutionary lieutenant and not the rich English baronet whom she sent away in despair. Elodie delights in telling the story,—all about the fox-chase and all—but she mixes things up so with a piece of the white brocade of the wedding dress that she treasures and the carved ivory fan and the white satin slippers and she owns the whole bertha too—it is Honiton,—lovely lace, but out of style now,—that one can’t get at the details for the millinery. A rational account of the whole affair would be as sentimental and exciting as a novel. Take a turn with me up and down the guards, Major, and justify your grandmother’s choice. I am as steady as a rock, and this ship is not going to pitch and toss among the breakers on this sand-bar,—eh, Captain Disnett?” with an arch smile over her shoulder.