We left the professor somewhat abruptly in the midst of a cryptic ejaculation of "My Aunt!"
"How can it be your Aunt?" asked Desire reasonably.
"I don't know how. But, owing to some mysterious combination of the forces of nature, it is my Aunt. No one else could wear that hat."
"Then hadn't we better go to meet her? You can't sit here all night."
"I know I can't. It's too near. We didn't see her soon enough!"
"Cowardly custard!" said Desire, stamping her foot.
The professor's mild eyes blinked at her in surprise. "Good!" he said with satisfaction. "That is the first remark suitable to your extreme youth that I've ever heard you make. But the sentiment it implies is all wrong. Physical courage, as such, is mere waste when opposed to my Aunt. What is wanted is technique. Technique requires thought. Thought requires leisure. That is why I am sitting here behind a boulder—what is she doing now?"
Desire investigated.
"She is walking up and down."
"A bad sign. It doesn't leave us much time. The most difficult point is the introduction. Now, in an introduction, what counts for most? Ancestors, of course. My dear, have you any ancestors?"
"Not one."
"I was afraid of that. In fact I had intended to provide a few. But I never dreamed they would be needed so soon. What is she doing now?"
"She has stopped walking. She has turned. She is coming this way."
"Then we must take our chance." The professor rose briskly. "Never allow the enemy to attack. Come on. But keep behind me while I draw her fire."
Aunt Caroline advanced in full formation.
"Benis. Ben—nis!" she called piercingly. "He can't be very far away," she declared over her shoulder. "I have a feeling—Benis!"
"Who calls so loud?" quoted the professor innocently, appearing with startling suddenness from behind the boulder. "Why!" in amazed recognition. "It is Aunt Caroline!"
"It is." Aunt Caroline corroborated grimly.
"This is a surprise," exclaimed the professor. As we have noted before, he liked to be truthful when possible. "How'd'do, Aunt! However did you get here?"
"How I came," replied Aunt Caroline, "is not material. The fact that I am here is sufficient."
"Quite," said Benis. "But," he added in a puzzled tone, "you are not alone. Surely, my dear Aunt, I see——"
"You see Dr. Rogers who has kindly accompanied me."
"John Rogers here? With you?" In rising amazement.
"It is a detail." Aunt Caroline's voice was somewhat tart. "I could scarcely travel unaccompanied."
"Surely not. But really—was there no lady friend—"
"Don't be absurd, Benis!" But she was obscurely conscious of a check. Against the disturbed surprise of her nephew's attitude her sharpened weapons had already turned an edge. Only one person can talk at a time, and, to her intense indignation, she found herself displaced as the attacking party. Also the behavior of her auxiliary force was distinctly apologetic.
"Hello, Benis!" said Rogers, coming up late and reluctant. "Sorry to have dropped in on you like this. But your Aunt thought—"
"Don't say a word, my dear fellow! No apology is necessary. I am quite sure she did. But it might be a good idea for you to do a little thinking yourself occasionally. Aunt is so rash. How were you to know that you would find us at home? Rather a risk, what? Luckily, Aunt," turning to that speechless relative with reassurance, "it is quite all right. My wife will be delighted—Desire, my dear, permit me—Aunt, you will be glad, I'm sure—this is Desire. Desire, this is your new Aunt."
"How do you do?" said Desire. "I have never had an Aunt before."
It was the one thing which she should have said. Had she known Aunt Caroline for years she could not have done better. But, unfortunately, that admirable lady did not hear it. She had heard nothing since the shattering blow of the word "wife."
"John," she said hoarsely. "Take me away. Take me away at once!"
"Certainly," said John, "Only it's frightfully damp in the woods. And there may be bears."
"Bears or not. I can't stay here."
"Oh, but you must," Desire came forward with innocent hospitality. "You can sleep on my cot and I'll curl up in a blanket. I am quite used to sleeping out."
Aunt Caroline closed her eyes. It was true then. Benis Spence had married a squaw! Blindly she groped for the supporting hand of the doctor. "John," she moaned, "did you hear that? Sleeping out—oh how could he?"
"Very easily, I should think." Under the slight handicap of assisting the drooping lady to her chair, John Rogers looked back at Desire, standing now within the radius of the camp fire's light—and once again he felt the strangeness as of some half-glimpsed prophecy. "She is wonderful," he added. "Look!"
Aunt Caroline looked, shuddered, and collapsed again upon a whispered "Indian!"
"Nonsense!" Rogers almost shook her. And yet, considering the suggestive force of the poor lady's preconceived ideas, the mistake was not unpardonable. In those surroundings, against that flickering light, standing, straight and silent in her short skirt and moccasins, her leaf-brown hair tied with bracken and turned to midnight black by the shadows, her grey eyes mysterious under their dark lashes, and her lips unsmiling, Desire might well have been some beauty of that vanishing race. A princess, perhaps, waiting with grave courtesy for the welcome due her from her husband's people.
"And not a bit ashamed of it," murmured Aunt Caroline in what she fondly hoped was a whisper. "Utterly callous! Benis," in a wavering voice, "I had a feeling—"
"Wait!" interrupted Benis, producing a notebook and pencil. "Let us be exact, Aunt. Just when did you notice the feeling first?"
"What difference does that make?" Aunt Caroline's voice was perceptibly stronger.
"Why," eagerly, "don't you see? If you had the feeling at the time (allowing for difference by the sun) it is a case of actual clairvoyance. If the feeling was experienced previous to the fact then it is a case of premonition only, and, if after, the whole thing can be explained as mere telepathy."
"Oh," said Aunt Caroline. But she said it thoughtfully. Her voice was normal.
"Wonderful thing—this psychic sense," went on her nephew. "Fancy you're knowing all about it even before you got my letter!"
"Did you send a letter?" asked Aunt Caroline after a pause. "Why Aunt! Of course. Two of them. Before and after. But I might have known you would hardly need them. If you had only arrived a few days sooner, you might have been present at the ceremony."
"Ceremony? There was a ceremony?"
"My dear Aunt!"
"The Church service?"
"My dear Aunt!"
"In a church?"
"Not exactly a church. You see it was rather late in the evening. The care-taker had gone to bed. In fact we had to get the Rector out of his."
"Bern's!"
"He didn't mind. Said he'd sleep all the better for it. And he wore his gown—over his pyjamas—very effective."
"Had the man no conscientious scruples?" sternly.
"Scruples—against pyjamas?"
"Against mixed marriages."
"I don't know. I didn't ask him. We weren't discussing the ethics of mixed marriage."
"Don't pretend to misunderstand me, Benis. For a man who has married an Indian, your levity is disgraceful."
"How ridiculous, Aunt! If you will listen to an explanation—"
"I need no explanation," Aunt Caroline, once more mistress of herself rose majestically. "I hope I know an Indian when I see one. I am not blind, I believe. But as there seems to be no question as to the marriage, I have nothing further to say. Another woman in my place might feel justified in voicing a just resentment, but I have made it a rule to expect nothing from any relative, especially if that relative be, even partially, a Spence. When my poor, dear sister married your father I told her what she was doing. And she lived to say, 'Caroline, you were right!' That was my only reward. More I have never asked. All that I have ever required of my sister's child has been ordinary docility and reliance upon my superior sense and judgment. Now when I find that, in a matter so serious as marriage, neither my wishes nor my judgment have been considered, I am not surprised. I may be shocked, outraged, overwhelmed, but I am not surprised."
"Bravo!" said Benis involuntarily. He couldn't help feeling that Aunt Caroline was really going strong. "What I mean to say," he added, "is that you are quite right Aunt, except in these particulars, in which you are entirely wrong. But before we go further, what about a little sustenance. Aren't you horribly hungry?"
"I am sure they are both starved," said Desire. "And I hate to remind you that you ate the last sandwich. Will you make Aunt Caroline comfortable while I cut some more? Perhaps Dr. John will help me—although we haven't shaken hands yet."
She held out her hands to the uneasy doctor with a charming gesture of understanding. "Did you expect to see a squaw, too', Doctor?"
"I expected to see, just you." His response was a little too eager. "I had seen you before—by a pool, bending over—"
"Oh, the photograph? Benis is terribly proud of it,"
"Best I've ever done," confirmed the professor. "Did you notice the curious light effect on that silver birch at the left?"
"Wonderful," said Rogers, but he wasn't thinking of the light effect on the silver birch. As he followed Desire to the tent his orderly mind was in a tumult. "He doesn't know how wonderful she is!" he thought. "And she doesn't care whether he does or not. And that explains—" But he saw in a moment that it didn't explain anything. It only made the mystery deeper.
"And now, Benis, that we are alone—" began Aunt Caroline....
We may safely leave out several pages here. If you realize Aunt Caroline at all, you will see that at least so much self-expression is necessary before anyone else can expect a chance. Time enough to pick up the thread again when the inevitable has happened and her exhausted vocabulary is replaced by tears.
"Not that I care at all for my own feelings," wept Aunt Caroline. "There are others to think of. What will Bainbridge say?"
Her nephew roused himself. From long experience he knew that the worst was over.
"Bainbridge, my dear Aunt," he said, "will say exactly what you tell it to say. It was because we realized this that we decided to leave the whole matter in your hands—all the announcing and things. But of course," with resignation, "if we have taken too much for granted; if you are not equal to it, we had better not come back to Bainbridge at all."
"Oh," cried Aunt Caroline with fresh tears. "My poor boy! The very idea! To think that I should live to hear you say it! How gladly I would have saved you from this had I known in time."
"I am sure you would, Aunt. But the gladness would have been all yours. I did not want to be saved, you see, and people who are saved against their will are so frightfully ungrateful. Wouldn't you like a dry hanky? Just wait till you've had a couple of dozen sandwiches. You'll feel quite differently. Think what a relief it will be to have me off your mind. You can relax now, and rest. You've been overworking for years. Consider how peaceful it will be not to have to ask any more silly girls to visit. You know you hated it, really, and only did it for my sake."
"I did everything for your sake," moaned Aunt Caroline brokenly. "And they were silly. But I hoped you would not notice it. And you will never know what I went through trying to get them down for breakfast at nine."
"I can imagine it," with ready sympathy. "They always yawned. And there must have been many darker secrets which I never guessed. You kept them from me. Do you remember that hole in Ada's stocking?"
"Yes, but I—"
"Never mind. The fib wasn't nearly as big as the hole. But how could you expect me to help noticing the general lightness and frivolity of your visitors, shown up so plainly against the background of your own character?"
"Y-es. I didn't think of that"
"Perhaps I should never have married if I had not got away—from the comparison, I mean."
"There was a danger, I suppose. But," with renewed grief, "Oh, Benis, such a wedding! No cards, no cake—and in pyjamas—oh!"
"Come now, Aunt, don't give way! And do you feel that it is quite right to criticise the clergy? I always fancy that it is the first step toward free-thinking. And you couldn't see much of them, you know, only the legs. Besides, consider what a wedding with cards and cake would have meant in Bainbridge at this time. No second maid, no proper cook! We should have appeared at a disadvantage in the eyes of the whole town. As it is, we can take our time, engage competent help, select a favorable date and give a reception which will be the very last word in elegance."
"Yes! I could get—what am I talking about? Of course I shan't do anything of the kind. How can you ask me to? Oh, Benis—a heathen!"
"Not a bit of it, Aunt. Church of England. But I can see what has happened. You have been allowing old Bones to cloud your judgment. I never knew a fellow so prone to jump to idiotic conclusions. No doubt he heard that I had come in search of Indians and, without a single inquiry, decided that I had married one."
"It was hasty of him. I admit that," said Aunt Caroline wiping her eyes.
"But with your knowledge of my personal character you will understand that my interest in, and admiration for, our aborigines in their darker and wilder state—"
"John said they were only fairly wild."
"Well, even in a fairly wild state. Or indeed in a wholly tame one. My interest at any time is purely scientific and would never lead me to marry into their family circle. My wife's father, as a matter of fact, is English. A professional man, retired, and living upon a small—er—estate near Vancouver. Her mother, who died when Desire was a child, was English also."
"Who took care of the child?"
"A Chinaman." The professor was listening to Desire's distant laugh and answered absently with more truth than wisdom.
"What!" The tone of horror brought him back.
"Oh, you mean who brought her up? Her father, of course."
"You said a Chinaman."
"They had a Chinese cook."
"Scandalous! Had the child no Aunt?"
The professor sighed. "Poor girl," he said. "One of the first things she told me about herself was, 'I have no Aunt.'"
Aunt Caroline polished her nose thoughtfully.
"That would account for a great deal," she admitted. "And her being English on both sides is something. Now that you speak of it, I did notice a slight accent. I never met an English person yet who could say "a" properly. But she is young and may learn. In the meantime—"
"The sandwiches are ready," called Desire from the tent.
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