But Bella's fascinations were not so placidly accepted with the opposite sex. It had been a pet theory of hers that cadets and officers were fair game for flirtation à l'outrance. She had become involved in her very first visit to the Academy in two very serious affairs; retaining complete mastery over her own susceptibilities, while obtaining mastery as complete over those of two cadet admirers who chanced to be rather close friends. One of them, at least, had been desperately in earnest at the outset; both of them were before they got through; and Bella was, or professed to be, totally incapable of believing that they had intended more than a mere flirtation. To her credit be it said, she was grievously distressed when the actual truth came to light; but her theories were in nowise shaken, for with the following year a still more desperate victim was at her feet, while the singed moths of the previous season looked gloomily and sardonically on the throes which they had so recently suffered. It was an attribute of Bella's as marvellous as the ascendency she maintained over her sisterhood, that even in jilting an admirer she had so sweet, sympathetic, caressing, and self-reproachful a manner as to make the poor devil feel that the whole thing was his own fault, or that of his blindness; and to send him on his way comforted, perhaps enslaved. She never could succeed in absolutely and definitely disposing of a lover. New ones might come, and did come, every season of the year. She had them wherever she moved; but Bella could no more let one go than a cat could a captured mouse,—another statement at her expense that first excited her wrath and afterwards nearly convulsed her by its humorous accuracy. She would turn her back on him; lose sight of him to all appearances; but let him but display a desire for freedom; let him but make an effort to get away from the toils; and under the patte de velours was an inflexible grasp that once more stretched the victim panting at her feet.
And yet she was so winning, so plaintive, so appealing with it all! Volumes of pity and trust and sympathy beamed from Bella's clear gray eyes. Volumes of half-playful reproach and condolence in the letters she would write. "Even in bidding you go she implores you to stay," was once said of her by an exasperated yet enthralled victim, and Uncle George was quite ready to believe it.
And Bella was still unmarried; still careering over the old preserves; still maintaining, apparently, her old theory that "men are deceivers ever;" and still, to judge from recent developments, bringing down fresh victims among the too inflammable youngsters of the battalion of cadets. Now, was Frank Amory a victim in good earnest, or only a narrow escape from being one? She wrote to him, but that proved nothing: she wrote to a dozen, and all at the same time. Aunt Ethel declared of her that she was writing to two classmates an entire winter, receiving almost daily missives from both, and responding when she felt disposed; and that not until they came to be stationed at the same post; to occupy the same quarters; to make the simultaneous discovery that each had parted with his class ring; and, one never-to-be-forgotten day, that each was receiving letters from the same damsel; had either of the young fellows the faintest idea that he was not the sole possessor of such attentions. It was alleged of Bella that she could have worn a class ring on every finger if she chose; but whatever may have been her object in accepting them, it was not for purposes of self-glorification. Her most intimate friend never knew whose rings she had; never knew how many; and Bella's flirtations, whatever may have been the wide-spread destruction she effected, were subjects that never could be spoken of in her presence. A dozen men were believed to confide in her, and she held their confidence inviolable. No one of them ever extracted from her the faintest admission that she ever received a line or an attention from any one else.
Now, what in the world was I to do? Here was a complication that baffled me completely. If Mars were really smitten with my fascinating niece, how far had it gone? That he had been I could readily believe; but, whether she looked it or not, Bella must now be older than he, and probably had only been—involuntarily, as usual—amusing herself with his devotions. And now he was interested in Kitty,—of that I felt certain,—and, by Jove! I had it. He felt himself still bound by the old ties; still fettered by some real or imaginary allegiance to his West Point affinity; still—"Why, the whole thing was plain as A, B, C," thought I, in my masculine profundity. "Bella would not accept, could not discard him, and here she has kept him dangling at her beck and call ever since." I decided to write to Bella,—oh, the bewildering idiocy of some men!—and I wrote forthwith.
That evening a letter winding up as follows was on its way northward:
"Yes, I have met your friend, young Amory; have seen a good deal of him, in fact, and am greatly interested in him. He strikes me as a gallant young soldier and gentleman, and his evident admiration for a fair young friend of mine—an heiress, by the way—commands my entire sympathy. I've half a mind to take you into my confidence, Bella, for perhaps you can dispel my perplexity. I think—mind you, I only say I think—that the young people are quite ready to fall in love with one another. They have been thrown together under most romantic circumstances, but he has behaved very oddly of late, and I could not but indulge in some theory as to the cause. I have learned that he has some young lady correspondent up North, and, knowing what susceptible fellows cadets are (from your own statements), it has occurred to me that he may have gotten into some entanglement there from which he would now gladly escape. Now, Bella, put on your thinking-cap. You have been there every summer for six or eight years (oh!), and although much above cadets now I fancy, you still retain your old ascendency over the sex. You knew Amory well, probably, and possibly he has made you a confidante of his affairs. What young girl was there to whom he was devoted? Perhaps you and I can help him out of his boyish folly and into something that is worth having."
Was there ever such a colossal ass?
CHAPTER XII.
That evening we dined at Moreau's. Things had quieted down in the city, though the troops still remained on duty in the streets; and it was with eager anticipation of meeting Frank Amory that I wended my way to the tidy old restaurant with its sanded floor, its glittering array of little tables, and the ever-attentive waiters. Colonel Summers and his party had not yet arrived. Would Monsieur step up to the room and wait their coming? Monsieur would; and, taking the Evening Picayune to while away the time, Mr. Brandon seated himself on the balcony overlooking Canal Street,—busy, bustling, thronged as usual; yet bustling in the languid, Latinized sense of the term; bustling in a way too unlike our Northern business centres to justify the use of the term. No sign of disorder or turmoil was manifest. The banquettes on both sides were covered with ladies and children; the street-cars on the esplanade were filled with passengers going in every direction; the booths, fruit-stands, confectioneries were all doing a thriving business; the newsboys were scurrying to and fro in their picturesque tatters screaming the headlines of their evening bulletins; carriages and cabriolets were rattling to and fro; the setting sun shone hot on the glaring façade of the stone Custom-House down the street; and beyond, across the crowded and dusty levee, dense volumes of black smoke were rising from the towering chimneys of the boats even now pushing from the shore and ploughing huskily up the stream. All spoke of business activity and lively trade. The mercurial spirit of the populace seemed to have subsided to the normal level; and the riot of yesterday was a thing of the distant past.