CHAPTER VIII.
T was in this way," said Fanny. "Mr. Brinsley brought a letter of introduction from Cousin Frank. You know who Frank is, don't you? He's the brother of the three Miss Miners."
"Of course," nodded Lawrence. "Everybody knows Frank Miner."
"And he knows everybody. But he didn't say much in his note, and Cordelia has written to him since, because she wants to know all about Mr. Brinsley, and it appears that Frank has only met him once or twice at a club, and doesn't know anything about him. However, it doesn't matter! The main point is that he called the day after we got here, and in twenty-four hours we were all in love with him."
"Please don't include yourself," said Lawrence, his delicate face betraying that he winced.
"I will include myself, because it's true," answered Fanny, very much in earnest. "I shouldn't put it just in that way about myself, perhaps,—but I took a fancy to him, and I took him to drive, and I found that he could drive quite as well as I, and we went out riding with a party, and he rides like an angel—he really does—it's divine. And then I tried him in the boat, and he was good at that. So I began to like him very much."
"They're all excellent reasons for liking a man," observed Lawrence, with a little contempt.
"Don't scoff at things you can't do yourself," said Fanny, severely. "It's not in good taste. Besides, I don't care. All women admire men who are stronger, and quicker, and better with their hands than other men. One always thinks they must be braver, too."
"Yes, that's true," assented Lawrence, seeking to retrieve himself by meekness.
"And they generally are. It takes courage to ride well, and it needs nerve to handle a boat in a squall. I don't mean to say that you can't be brave if you don't know how to do those things. That would be nonsense. You—for instance—you could learn. Only nobody has ever taught you anything, and you're getting old."
Lawrence laughed outright, and forgot his ill-humour in a moment.
"Oh—I don't mean really old," said Fanny, immediately. "I only mean that one ought to learn when one is a child, as I did. Then it's no trouble, you see—and one never forgets. Now, Mr. Brinsley began young—"
"Yes," interrupted the young man, "I should say so. I'm sorry I didn't."
"So am I. It would have been so nice to do things—"
She stopped abruptly, and pulled up a blade of rank grass, which she proceeded to twist thoughtfully round her finger.
"I shouldn't like you to think I was a flirt," she said, suddenly turning her grey eyes upon him.
He met her glance curiously, being considerably surprised by her remark.
"Because I sometimes think I am, myself," she added, still looking at him. "Do you think so?" she asked earnestly. "What is a flirt, anyway?"
"A woman who draws a man on for the pleasure of breaking his heart, I suppose," answered Lawrence, keeping his eyes fixed intently on hers.
"Then I'm only half a flirt," said Fanny, "because I only draw a man on, without meaning to break anybody's heart."
"Don't," said Lawrence. "It hurts, you know."
"I wonder-" The young girl laughed a little, and turned away from his eyes.
"What?"
"Whether it really hurts." She bit the end of the grass blade, and slowly tore it with her teeth, looking dreamily across the brook.
"Don't try it, at all events."
"Mr. Brinsley doesn't seem to mind."
"Brinsley isn't a human being," said Lawrence, savagely.
"What is he, then?"
"A fraud—of some sort. I don't care. I hate him!"
"You're hard on Mr. Brinsley," observed Fanny, slowly, and watching her companion sideways.
"Considering what you've been saying about him—"
"I said nothing about him except that I began by liking him awfully."
"Well—you left the rest to my imagination. I did as well as I could. If you didn't hate him yourself, you'd hardly have been telling me all this, would you?"
"Oh—I don't know. I might be going to ask your advice about—about him."
"Take him out in your boat and drown him," suggested Lawrence. "That's my advice about him."
"What has he done to you, Mr. Lawrence?" enquired Fanny, gravely. "Why do you hate him so?"
"Why? It's plain enough, it seems to me—plain as a—what do you call the thing?"
"Plain as a marlinespike, you mean. Only it isn't. I want to know two things. Do you think I'm a flirt? And why do you want me to murder poor, innocent Mr. Brinsley? Do you mind answering?"
Lawrence's dark eyes began to gleam angrily. He bit his pipe and pulled at it, though it had gone out; then he took it from his lips and answered deliberately.
"If you are a flirt, Miss Trehearne, I don't wish Brinsley any further damage. He'll do very well in your hands, I'm sure. I have no anxiety."
"I wouldn't hurt a fly," said Fanny. "If I liked the fly," she added.
"I believe the spider said something to the same effect, when he invited the fly into his parlour."
At this a dark flush rose in the girl s cheeks.
"You're rude, Mr. Lawrence," she said.
"I'm sorry, Miss Trehearne—but you're unkind, so you'll please to excuse me."
Instead of flushing, as she did, Lawrence turned slowly pale, as was his nature.
"Even if I were,—but I'm not,—that's no reason why you should be rude."
"I didn't mean to be rude," answered Lawrence. "I don't see what I said that was so very dreadful."
"It was much worse than anything I said," retorted Fanny, biting her blade of grass again. "Because I didn't say anything at all, you know. Oh, well—if you'll say you're sorry, we'll bury it."
"I'm sorry," said Lawrence, without the least show of contrition.
"I was going to tell you such lots of things about myself," said the young girl. "You've made me forget them all. What was I talking about when we began to fight? I began by saying that I liked you, and you've been horrid ever since. I won't say that again, at all events."
"Excuse me—you began by saying that you'd liked Brinsley—liked him awfully, you said. It must have been awful—anything connected with Brinsley is necessarily awful."
"There you go again. Don't bolt so—it makes bad running. I told you why I liked him so much at first, and you admitted that it was natural. Do you remember that? Well—that isn't all. After I liked him, I began to care for him. I told you that, too. Horrid of me, wasn't it?"
"Horrid!"
"I wish you wouldn't agree with me all the time!" exclaimed Fanny, impatiently. "You know I really did care—a little. And then one day in the catboat, he asked me—" She stopped and looked at Lawrence.
"To marry you? Why don t you say it? It wouldn't surprise me a bit."
"No," said Fanny, slowly, "he didn't ask me to marry him."
"In Heaven's name, what did he ask you?" enquired Lawrence, exasperated to impatience.
"Oh I don't know. It was something about the channel between Bar and Sheep, I believe. Nothing very important, anyway. I'm not sure that I could remember, if I tried."
Then,—excuse me, but what's the point?"
"Oh—I know!" exclaimed Fanny, as though suddenly recollecting something. "Not that it matters much, but I like to be accurate. It was about the bell buoy off Sheep Porcupine. You know, I showed it to you the other day. Well—I told him how it had been carried away in a storm some time ago, and that this was a new one. And the next day I heard him telling Augusta all about it, as though he had known before, you see."
"Well—that wasn't exactly a crime," observed Lawrence, who could not understand at all. "You'd told him—"
"Yes, but he said he remembered the old one. That was impossible, as he hadn't known anything about it. It was a little slip, but it made me open my eyes and watch him. I used to think he was perfection until then."
"Oh, I see! That was when you first began to find out that he wasn't quite straight."
"Exactly. It made all the difference. I've caught him out more than once since then. The other night, it was too much for me when he talked about the navy—so I promptly smashed him. He knows that I know, now."
"I should think so. All the same—I don't mean to be rude this time, Miss Trehearne—"
"Be careful!"
"No—I'll risk it. Just now when you said he had 'asked you'—you stopped short. You knew I should believe that you had been going to say that he had asked you to marry him, didn't you?"
"Oh, I know! I couldn't help it—I believe I really am a flirt, after all."
"I shouldn't like to believe it," said Lawrence, gravely.
"Nor I—either. I only wanted to see how you'd look if you thought he'd offered himself just then."
"Just then! Do you mean to say that he has offered himself at any other time?"
"Now you're rude again—only, I forgive you, because you don't know that you are. It's rude to ask such questions—so I'll be polite and refuse to answer. Not that there's any good reason why he shouldn't have asked me to marry him, you know. The fact that you hate him isn't a reason."
"But you do, yourself—"
"Not at all. At least, I haven't said so. I wish you'd listen to me, Mr. Lawrence, instead of interrupting me with questions every other moment. How in the world am I to make a confession, if you won't let me say two words?"
"Are you going to make a confession?" asked Lawrence, incredulously. "It's all chaff, you know!"
Fanny turned her cool eyes upon him instantly.
"There's a lot besides chaff," she said, in a very different tone. "I can be in earnest, too—when I care."
She certainly emphasized the last three words in a way which might have meant much, accompanied as they were by her steady look. Lawrence felt himself growing a little pale again.
"Do you care?" he asked, and his voice shook perceptibly.
"For Mr. Brinsley?" enquired Fanny, instantly changing her tone again and beginning to laugh.
"No—for me."
"For you! Oh dear, what a question!" She laughed outright.
Lawrence leaned down and knocked the ashes out of his pipe against the toe of his heavy walking-shoe without saying a word. Then he put the pipe into his pocket. She watched him.
"You've no right to be angry this time," she said. "But you are."
The young man faced her quietly and waited a moment before he spoke.
"You're playing with me," he said, calmly and without emphasis, as stating a fact.
"Of course I am!" laughed Fanny Trehearne. "What did you expect? But I'm sorry that you've found it out," she added, with appalling cynicism. "It won't be fun any more."
"Unless we both play," suggested Lawrence, who had either recovered his temper very quickly, or possessed a better control over it than Fanny had supposed.
"All right!" she exclaimed cheerfully. "Let's play—let us play. That sounds solemn, somehow—I wonder why? Oh—of course—it's like 'Let us pray' in church."
Lawrence laughed drily.
"Let us pray beforehand, for the one who gets the worst of it," he said. "He or she will need it. But I shall win at the game, you know. That's a foregone conclusion."
Fanny was surprised and amused at the confidence he suddenly affected—very unlike his habitual modesty and self-effacement.
"You seem pretty sure of yourself," she answered. "What shall the forfeit be, as they say in the children's games?"
"To marry or not to marry, at the discretion of the winner. I think that's fair, don't you? I shouldn't like to propose anything serious—the head of Roger Brinsley in a charger, for instance."
Fanny laughed again.
"Yes, it's all very well!" she protested. "But of course the one who loses will be in earnest, and the one who wins will not."
"He may be, by that time," suggested Lawrence.
"Don't say 'he,' so confidently—I mean to win. Besides, are we starting fair? Of course I don't care an atom for you, but don't you care for me—just a little?"
"I!" exclaimed Lawrence. "What an idea!" He laughed quite as naturally as Fanny herself. "Do you think that a man in love would propose such a game as we are talking about?" he asked.
"I'm sure I don't know what to think," answered the young girl. "Perhaps I shall know in a day or two."
She looked down, quite grave again, and pulled a bit of fern from the bank, and crushed it in her hand, and then smelled it.
"Don't you like sweet fern?" she asked, holding it out to him. "I love it!"
"That's why you crush it, I suppose," said Lawrence.
"It doesn't smell sweet unless you do. Oh—I see! You were beginning to play the game. Very well. Why should we lose time about it? But I wish it were a little better defined. What is it we're going to do? Won't you explain? I'm so stupid about these things. Are we going to flirt for a bet?"
"What a speech!"
"Because it's a plain one? Is that why you object to it? After all, that's what we said."
"We only said we'd play," answered Lawrence. "Whichever ends by caring must agree to marry the winner, if required. But I'm afraid the time is too short," he added, more gravely. "I've only a week more."
"Only a week!" exclaimed Fanny, in a tone of disappointment. "Why, I thought there was ever so much more. That isn't nearly time enough."
"We must play faster—and hope for 'situations,' as they call them on the stage."
"Oh—the situation is bad enough, as it is," answered the young girl, with a change of manner that surprised her companion. "If you only knew!"
"Was that what you were going to tell me about?" asked Lawrence, quickly, and with renewed interest. "I thought you were making game of me."
"That's the trouble! You'll never believe that I'm in earnest, now. That's the worst of practical jokes. Come along! We must be going home. The sun's behind the hill and ever so low, I'm sure. We shan't get home before dusk. How sweet that fern smells! Give it back to me, won't you?"
They rose and began to walk homeward in the warm shadow of the woods. As before, Fanny went first along the narrow path, and Lawrence, following close behind her, and watching the supple grace of her as she moved, breathed in also the intoxicating perfume of the aromatic sweet fern which she still carried in her hand.
