At the Sign of the Fox: A Romance

by Mabel Osgood Wright

Brooke was no analyst who had made the mental dissipation of the dissection of motives take the place of natural emotion. The ideal of her nature had its outlet; why not then the real? It was the natural man in Maarten that drew her, something beneath the surface, obliterating the bands of caste and the social grades that divided their normal positions, though for that, except for her father’s disastrous city career, she was equally born a child of the soil and its heredities.

She avoided the hay-fields, now swept by the June snow-storm of daisies, and in spite of success and her friend’s companionship, was truly miserable for the first time, for she could neither understand nor throw off the spell she felt upon her. Self-respect is not oblivion, and is but a chilly comforter for youth.

The frequent thunder-showers had forced a new necessity upon the Sign of the Fox. An open shed at least must be had to protect vehicles that needed cover, while their occupants were sheltered by either screened porch or welcomed in the neat kitchen itself; so that an old lumber room in the cow barn had been cleared, and furnished with rings for tying up, the drivers upon the upper road being chiefly of horses; for the chauffeur avoided the steep, uneven hills, which jarred the constitution of the car of Juggernaut unpleasantly, even in the downward trip.

It chanced a little before this time that a party of young fellows, headed by Charlie Ashton, in his big Mercedes touring car, built for long-distance runs, had started for Gordon, where they were in demand for a tennis tournament. Ashton’s chauffeur turning ill and unfit at the last moment, they had beat about, and discussed the possibility of substituting one of their number for the professional, as they all had more or less experience; and the lot had fallen to Tom Brownell, who had joined the party for a brief vacation, at the end of which he was to take the position of city editor of the Daily Forum, a well-earned promotion for which his gift of discerning the true from the merely sensational peculiarly fitted him.

Brownell knew from Ashton that the Lawtons were located somewhere on the route they were to take, and ever since his first maladroit interview with Brooke he had desired to be of some service to her, that should atone for his blunder.

The pair of keys on which he had stepped that day in leaving the apartment had always remained, as it were, before his eyes, and after learning all possible details of the Lawton failure from many sources, he felt doubly convinced that, if these keys were placed, they might solve at least one of the many questions unanswered because of Mr. Lawton’s illness. He had therefore asked Lucy Dean to get them if possible—which she had done.

Two months of following the faint trail furnished by two thin keys merely bearing numbers but not even the initials of their makers, had at last brought about a certain result which might or might not be satisfactory, but at least warranted him in seeing Brooke, and telling her of his progress; and this was one of his many motives of touring to Gordon.

He knew, from Lucy herself, that the Lawtons were located in the vicinity of Gilead, and inquired the nearest way to the homestead, when they reached the village late in the afternoon. On learning that it was on the hill road, and as the machine he was driving had had two temper fits within the hour, Brownell side-tracked it in a pleasant spot on the lower road, and leaving his companions to spend an hour with their pipes and the liquid remains of their luncheon, he started afoot up the cross-road.

There had been many people stopping for tea at the Sign of the Fox that afternoon; in fact, the last trap was only leaving as Brownell turned the corner, being that of Mrs. Parks, who dined at eight on purpose to have the sunset hours for driving,—a performance that the Senator could not understand.