“Dear Stevie,” she said, “be good-natured and bear an old woman company—you know you are as dear as my own sons.”
She used to call him Stevie when he was a lonely little boy, and she made her house his home; when all he knew of family life was supplied by that good-natured, worldly household—the name touched a chord of memory that softened his irritation.
“I wish I could, Aunt Adelaide,” he answered, “but I have managed to tie myself to my work in a way you cannot understand. You will have to take Bob as a companion.”
Bob was her only unmarried child, wedded only to his clubs and amateur soldiering, and even less available than Stephen for a cruise.
“Bob!” she said, contemptuously. “He never voluntarily went to a foreign country except Cuba, and I don’t believe he knows on which side of the Mediterranean Africa lies! I shall find some one who will be glad to go with me—perhaps your charming friend, Mrs. Ponsonby, might go. She looks as if she would be a pleasant traveling companion.”
French’s heart tightened as he thought of the horror that stood between Deena and pleasure, and was even debating in his mind whether it would not be better to tell his aunt the truth, when conversation was rendered impossible for the moment by the puffing and tooting of a great automobile advancing toward them down the west drive of the park—its wheels slipping in a crazy manner, that made the coachman of Mrs. Star’s sleigh give it a wide berth. Just as it got abreast of them, it became perfectly unmanageable—slewed to the left, made a semicircle which turned it round, and, catching the back of the sleigh on its low front, turned the light vehicle over as easily as if it had been made of pasteboard.
Mrs. Star allowed herself a shrill shriek as the sleigh went over and then lay quite still in a heap by the side of the road, with Stephen across her feet. The automobile seemed to have recovered its serenity, for it now stood still like any well-behaved machine, quiet save for its noisy breathing, while the sleigh was being bumped, on its side, far up the road, at the heels of the outraged horses.
French scrambled to his feet and endeavored to help his aunt, who had raised herself to a sitting posture and was looking white and disheveled, while she cast furious glances at the motor and its owner. She took her nephew’s hands and attempted to rise, but fell back, declaring she had broken her knee, as it hurt her excruciatingly when she tried to move it.
The owner of the auto now came forward in great contrition to offer help and apologies. He was a physician, he explained, hastening to a case of great urgency, and he had taken his automobile as the quickest means of covering the distance, though he had known it at times to behave badly on slippery and snowy roads.
The admission was a mistake—it put him in the wrong, and Mrs. Star, who distrusted all modern doctors, felt a consuming rage against this one in particular.