From his little twelve by ten apartment, where the summer sun was pouring in a perfect blaze of heat, Dr. Richards saw them pass, and after wondering who they were, gave them no farther thought, but sat jamming his pen-knife into the old worm-eaten table, and thinking savage thoughts against that capricious lady, Fortune, who had compelled him to come to Saratoga, where rich wives were supposed to be had for the asking. Too late he had discovered the ruse imposed on him by Mr. Liston—had discovered that Alice was the heiress of more than $50,000, and following the discovery came the mortifying knowledge that not one dime of it would probably ever be used for defraying his personal expenses. Alice had learned how purely sordid and selfish was the man whom she had thought so misunderstood by the Snowdonites, and in Dr. Richard’s vest pocket there lay at this very moment a note, the meaning of which was that Alice Johnson declined the honor of becoming his wife. They would still be friends, she said; would meet as if nothing had occurred, but she could not be his wife. This it was which had brought him to Saratoga, indignant, mortified and desperate. There were other heiresses beside Alice Johnson—others less fastidious; and he could find them, too. Love was out of the question, as that had died with poor Lily, so that now he was ready for the first chance that offered, provided that chance possessed a certain style, and was tolerably good-looking. He did not see ’Lina at all, for she had passed the door before he looked up, so he only saw the mother, with Lulu trudging obediently behind, and hearing them enter the room, returned to his cogitations.
From his pleasanter, airier apartment, on the other side of the narrow hall, Irving Stanley looked through his golden glasses, pitying the poor ladies condemned to that slow roast, thinking how, if he knew them, he would surely offer to exchange, as it did not matter so much where a man was stowed away, he was so seldom in his room, while ladies must necessarily spend half their time there at least in dressing; and with a sigh for unfortunate ladies in general, the kind-hearted Irving Stanley closed his door and proceeded to make his own toilet for dinner, then only an hour in the future.
How hot, and dusty, and cross ’Lina was, and what a look of dismay she cast around the room, with its two bedsteads, its bureaus, its table, its washstand, and its dozen pegs for her two dozen dresses, to say nothing of her mother’s. She’d like to know if this was Saratoga, and these its accommodations. It was not fit to put the pigs in, and she wondered what the proprietor was thinking of when he sent her up there.
“I s’pects he didn’t know how you was an Airey,” Lulu said, demurely, her eyes brimming with mischief.
’Lina turned to box her ears, but the black face was so grave and solemn in its expression that she changed her mind, thinking she had been mistaken in Lulu’s ironical tone.
How tired and faint poor Mrs. Worthington was, and how she wished she had staid at home, like a sensible woman, instead of coming here to be made so uncomfortable in this hot room. But it could not now be helped, ’Lina said; they must do the best they could; and with a forlorn glance at the luxuriant patch of weeds, the most prominent view from the window, ’Lina opened one of her trunks, and spreading a part of the contents upon the bed, began to dress for dinner, changing her mind three times, driving her mother and Lulu nearly distracted, and finally deciding upon a rich green silk, which, with its crimson trimmings, was very becoming to her dark style, but excessively hot-looking on that sultry day. But ’Lina meant to make a good first impression. Everything depended upon that, and as the green was the heaviest, richest thing she had, so she would first appear in it. Besides that, the two young men who had looked at her from the door had not escaped her observation. She had seen them both, deciding that Dr. Richards was the most distingue of the two, though Irving Stanley was very elegant, very refined, and very intellectual looking in those glasses, which gave him so scholarly an appearance. ’Lina never dreamed that this was Irving Stanley, or she would have occupied far more time in brushing her hair and coiling among its braids the bandeau of pearls borrowed of Ellen Tiffton. As it was, the dinner bell had long since ceased ringing, and the tread of feet ceased in the halls below ere she descended to the deserted parlor, followed by her mother, nervous and frightened at the prospect of this, her first appearance at Saratoga.
“Pray, rouse yourself,” ’Lina whispered, as she saw how white she was, when she learned that their seats were at the extreme end of the dining room—that in order to reach it, nearly one thousand pair of eyes must be encountered, and one thousand glances braved. “Rouse yourself, do; and not let them guess you were never at a watering place before,” and ’Lina thoughtfully smoothed her mother’s cap by way of reassuring her.
But even ’Lina herself quailed when she reached the door and caught a glimpse of the busy life within, the terrible ordeal she must pass.
“Oh, for a pair of pantaloons to walk beside one, even if Hugh were in them,” she thought, as her own and her mother’s lonely condition rose before her.
But Hugh was watching a flat boat on the Mississippi that summer afternoon, and as there was no other person on whom she had a claim, she must meet her fate alone.