A Daughter of the Vine. Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
He was wondering if the driver had lost his way. The wheels were zigzagging through drifts so deep that the sand shot against the panes.
“No, I don’t know that she is beautiful at all. Miss Hathaway is that, and Mrs. McLane, and two of the ‘three Macs’. But she has it all her own way. It’s charm, I suppose, and then—well, she’s an only child and will come in for a fortune—a right big one if this place grows as people predict. She’s a deuced lucky girl, is Miss Nina Randolph, and it will be a deuced lucky fellow that gets her. Only no one does. She’s twenty-three and heart-whole.”
“Are you in love with her?”
“I’m in love with her and Guadalupe Hathaway and the ‘three Macs’ and Mrs. McLane. I never met so many attractive women in one place.”
“Would it be Mrs. Hunt McLane—a Creole? I met her once in Paris—got to know her very well.”
“You don’t say. She’ll make things hum for you. There’s something else I wanted to say. I thought I’d wait and see if you discovered it yourself, but I believe I won’t. It’s this: there’s something queer about the Randolphs in spite of the fact that they’re more to the front than any people in San Francisco. I never leave that house that I don’t carry away a vague impression that there’s something behind the scenes I don’t know anything about. I’ve never spoken of it to anyone else; it would be rather disloyal, after all the kindness they’ve shown me; but I’m too curious to know how they will impress you. I’ve only been here six months, and only know what everybody else knows about them—”
“Do you know, Hastings,” said the Englishman abruptly, “I think something is wrong outside. I don’t believe anyone is guiding those horses.”
Hastings lowered the window beside him and thrust out his head.
“Hi, there, Tim!” he shouted. “What are you about?”
There was no reply.
“Hello!” he cried, thinking the wind might have miscarried his voice.
Again there was no reply; but the horses, gratefully construing the final syllable to their own needs, came to a full stop.
Hastings opened the door and sprang on to the hub of the wheel, expostulating angrily. He returned in a moment to his companion.
“Here’s the devil to pay,” he cried. “Tim’s down against the dashboard as drunk as a lord. There’s nothing to do but put him inside and drive, myself. I’d chuck him into a drift if I were not under certain obligations of a similar sort. Will you come outside with me, or stay in with him?”
“Why not go back to the Presidio?”
“We are about half-way between, and may as well go on.”
“I’ll go outside, by all means.”
He stepped out. The two men dragged the coachman off the box and huddled him inside.
“We’re off the road,” said Hastings, “but I think I can find my way. I’ll cut across to the Mission road, and then we’ll be on level ground, at least.”
They mounted the box. Hastings gathered the reins and Thorpe lit a cigar. The horses, well ordered brutes of the livery stable, did their weary best to respond to the peremptory order to speed.
“We’ll be two hours late,” the young officer grumbled, as they floundered out of the sandhills and entered the Mission Valley.
“Damn the idiot. Why couldn’t he have waited till we got there?”
They were now somewhat sheltered from the wind, and as the road was level, although rutty, made fair progress.
“I didn’t mean to treat you to a nasty adventure the very night of your arrival,” continued Hastings apologetically.
“Oh, one rather looks for adventures in California. If I hadn’t so much sand in my eyes I’d be rather entertained than otherwise. I only hope our faces are not dirty.”
“They probably are. Still, if we are not held up, I suppose we can afford to overlook the minor ills.”
“Held up?”
“Stopped by road-agents, garroters, highway robbers—whatever you like to call ’em. I’ve never been held up myself; as a rule I go in the ambulance at night, but it’s no uncommon experience. I’ve got a revolver in my overcoat pocket—on this side. Reach over and get it, and keep it cocked. I couldn’t throw up my hands. I’d feel as if the whole United States army were disgraced.”
Thorpe abstracted the pistol, but although the long lonely road was favourable to crime, no road-agents appeared, and Hastings drove into the outskirts of the town with audibly expressed relief.
“We’re not far now,” he added. “South Park is the place we’re bound for; and, by the way, Mr. Randolph projected and owns most of it.”
A quarter of an hour later he drove into an oval enclosure trimmed with tall dark houses, so sombre in appearance that to the old Californian they must now, in their desertion and decay, seem to have been grimly prescient of their destiny.
As the carriage drew up before a brilliantly lighted house the door opened, and a man-servant ran down the steps.
“Keep quiet,” whispered Hastings.
The man opened the door of the carriage, waited a moment, then put his head inside. He drew it back with a violent oath.
“It’s a damned insult!” he cried furiously.
“Why, Cochrane!” exclaimed Hastings, “what on earth is the matter with you?”
“Captain Hastings!” stammered the man. “Oh I—I—beg pardon. I thought—Oh, of course, I see. Tim had taken a drop too much. A most deplorable habit. Can I help you down, sir?”
“No, thanks.”
He sprang lightly to the sidewalk, followed with less agility by the Englishman, who still held the cocked pistol.
“I forgot about this thing,” said Thorpe. “Here—take it. I suppose we don’t enter the houses of peaceable citizens, even in California, carrying loaded firearms?”
Cochrane led the horses into the little park which prinked the centre of the enclosure, and the young men ascended the steps.
“I’d give a good deal to know what set him off like that,” said Hastings. “Hitherto he’s been the one thoroughly impassive creature I’ve met in California; has a face about as expressionless as a sentinel on duty.”
He pushed open the door and they entered a large hall lavishly decorated with flowers and flags. Many people were dancing in a room at the right, others were strolling about the hall or seated on the stair. These made way rather ungraciously for the late comers, who went hurriedly up to the dressing-room and regarded themselves in the mirror.
“We’re not dirty, after all,” said the Englishman in a tone of profound relief. He was a tall thin man of thirty or less with a dark face lean enough to show hard ungraceful lines of chin and jaw. The mouth would have been sensual had it been less determined, the grey eyes cold had they been less responsive to humour. Mrs. McLane had told him once that he was the type of man for whom civilization had done most: that an educated will and humour, combined with high breeding, had saved him from slavery to the primal impulses. His voice was harsh in tone but well modulated. He held himself very erectly but without self-consciousness.
Hastings’ legs were his pride, and there were those who averred that they were the pride of the Presidio. His face was fair and round, his eyes were as talkative as his tongue. A past master of the noble art of flirting, no one took him more seriously than he took himself. He spoke with the soft rich brogue of the South; to-day it is hardened by years of command, and his legs are larger, but he is a doughty general, eager