Louisiana. Burnett Frances Hodgson
And after they had reached the room and shut themselves in, she found that it was something very interesting which was to happen.
"You remember what I said to you this morning?" Miss Ferrol suggested.
"You said so many things."
"Oh, but you cannot have forgotten this particular thing. I said you looked as if you had been born in New York."
Louisiana remembered with a glow of rapture.
"Oh, yes," she answered.
"And I said Laurence himself would not know, if he was not told, that you had lived all your life here."'
"Yes."
"And I said I should like to try you on him."
"Yes."
Miss Ferrol kept her eyes fixed on her and watched her closely.
"I have been thinking of it all the morning," she added. "I should like to try you on him."
Louisiana was silent a moment. Then she spoke, hesitatingly:
"Do you mean that I should pretend – ," she began.
"Oh, no," interrupted Miss Ferrol. "Not pretend either one thing or the other. Only let me dress you as I choose, and then take care that you say nothing whatever about your past life. You will have to be rather quiet, perhaps, and let him talk. He will like that, of course – men always do – and then you will learn a great many things from him."
"It will be – a very strange thing to do," said Louisiana.
"It will be a very interesting thing," answered Olivia, her enthusiasm increasing. "How he will admire you!"
Louisiana indulged in one of her blushes.
"Have you a picture of him?"
"Yes. Why?" she asked, in some surprise.
"Because I should like to see his face."
"Do you think," Miss Ferrol said, in further bewilderment, "that you might not like him?"
"I think he might not like me."
"Not like you!" cried Miss Ferrol. "You! He will think you are divine – when you are dressed as I shall dress you."
She went to her trunk and produced the picture. It was not a photograph, but a little crayon head – the head of a handsome man, whose expression was a singular combination of dreaminess and alertness. It was a fascinating face.
"One of his friends did it," said Miss Ferrol. "His friends are very fond of him and admire his good looks very much. They protest against his being photographed. They like to sketch him. They are always making 'studies' of his head. What do you think of him?"
Louisiana hesitated.
"He is different," she said at last. "I thought he would be."
She gave the picture back to Miss Ferrol, who replaced it in her trunk. She sat for a few seconds looking down at the carpet and apparently seeing very little. Then she looked up at her companion, who was suddenly a little embarrassed at finding her receive her whimsical planning so seriously. She herself had not thought of it as being serious at all. It would be interesting and amusing, and would prove her theory.
"I will do what you want me to do," said Louisiana.
"Then," said Miss Ferrol, wondering at an unexpected sense of discomfort in herself, "I will dress you for supper now. You must begin to wear the things, so that you may get used to them."
CHAPTER IV.
A NEW TYPE
When the two entered the supper-room together a little commotion was caused by their arrival. At first the supple young figure in violet and gray was not recognized. It was not the figure people had been used to, it seemed so tall and slenderly round. The reddish-brown hair was combed high and made into soft puffs; it made the pretty head seem more delicately shaped, and showed how white and graceful the back of the slender neck was. It was several minutes before the problem was solved. Then a sharp young woman exclaimed, sotto voce:
"It's the little country-girl, in new clothes – in clothes that fit. Would you believe it?"
"Don't look at your plate so steadily," whispered Miss Ferrol. "Lean back and fan yourself as if you did not hear. You must never show that you hear things."
"I shall be obliged to give her a few hints now and then," she had said to herself beforehand. "But I feel sure when she once catches the cue she will take it."
It really seemed as if she did, too. She had looked at herself long and steadily after she had been dressed, and when she turned away from the glass she held her head a trifle more erect, and her cheeks had reddened. Perhaps what she had recognized in the reflection she had seen had taught her a lesson. But she said nothing. In a few days Olivia herself was surprised at the progress she had made. Sanguine as she was, she had not been quite prepared for the change which had taken place in her. She had felt sure it would be necessary to teach her to control her emotions, but suddenly she seemed to have learned to control them without being told to do so; she was no longer demonstrative of her affection, she no longer asked innocent questions, nor did she ever speak of her family. Her reserve was puzzling to Olivia.
"You are very clever," she said to her one day, the words breaking from her in spite of herself, after she had sat regarding her in silence for a few minutes. "You are even cleverer than I thought you were, Louise."
"Was that very clever?" the girl asked.
"Yes, it was," Olivia answered, "but not so clever as you are proving yourself."
But Louisiana did not smile or blush, as she had expected she would. She sat very quietly, showing neither pleasure nor shyness, and seeming for a moment or so to be absorbed in thought.
In the evening when the stages came in they were sitting on the front gallery together. As the old rattletraps bumped and swung themselves up the gravel drive, Olivia bent forward to obtain a better view of the passengers.
"He ought to be among them," she said.
Louisiana laid her hand on her arm.
"Who is that sitting with the driver?" she asked, as the second vehicle passed them. "Isn't that – "
"To be sure it is!" exclaimed Miss Ferrol.
She would have left her seat, but she found herself detained. Her companion had grasped her wrist.
"Wait a minute!" she said. "Don't leave me! Oh – I wish I had not done it!"
Miss Ferrol turned and stared at her in amazement.
She spoke in her old, uncontrolled, childish fashion. She was pale, and her eyes were dilated.
"What is the matter?" said Miss Ferrol, hurriedly, when she found her voice. "Is it that you really don't like the idea? If you don't, there is no need of our carrying it out. It was only nonsense – I beg your pardon for not seeing that it disturbed you. Perhaps, after all, it was very bad taste in me – "
But she was not allowed to finish her sentence. As suddenly as it had altered before, Louisiana's expression altered again. She rose to her feet with a strange little smile. She looked into Miss Ferrol's astonished face steadily and calmly.
"Your brother has seen you and is coming toward us," she said. "I will leave you. We shall see each other again at supper."
And with a little bow she moved away with an air of composure which left her instructress stunned. She could scarcely recover her equilibrium sufficiently to greet her brother decently when he reached her side. She had never been so thoroughly at sea in her life.
After she had gone to her room that night, her brother came and knocked at the door.
When she opened it and let him in he walked to a chair and threw himself into it, wearing a rather excited look.
"Olivia," he began at once, "what a bewildering girl!"
Olivia sat down opposite to him, with a composed smile.
"Miss Rogers, of course?" she said.
"Of