Chapter III: A Search

DINNER in the hotel was served always at six o’clock. Though now somewhat late in the season, tourists to the number of fifty still mustered around the table of horseshoe shape. Considerable sensation was caused by the late appearance of that “interesting man, Mr. Rutherford,” with a dark-browed infant in his arms.

Joan was by this time exceedingly wide awake; and efforts had been made to detach her from George in time for dinner, Dulcibel proposing to remain upstairs in charge of the little creature, having a tray sent up for herself. But Joan saw matters differently. She refused to be won over under any pretence or inducement whatever. George had dressed for dinner while Joan was still asleep. The moment her black eyes opened, however, she was by his side. In vain Dulcibel petted and lectured, pleaded and scolded, offered kisses and offered cake. Kisses were spurned, and cake was rejected, and blandishments fell unheeded. Joan would not so much as look at Dulcibel. She seemed quite content while clutching George’s hand, or holding to his coat; but any serious attempt to separate the two raised shouts of such indignant remonstrance that Dulcibel’s hands went to her ears.

“There’s no time to fight the matter out now. She must come downstairs with us,” said George, more than half gratified.

So some fifty pairs of eyes were treated to the sight of Mr. Rutherford, marching in the rear of his slim, little wife, bearing a small “new arrival” in his strong arms; her black eyes surveying the company with a certain jealous defiance, and her black hair pressed confidingly against his tawny beard.

“Halloo, Mr. Rutherford! Fished up a mermaid in your day’s wanderings?” asked a friendly clergyman, Mr. Meredith, George’s opposite companion at table.

“Something like it,” responded George. “Another chair here, please! We shall have to break through the rules as to newcomers. This lady is too young to manage for herself.”

The waiter grinned and obeyed; but Joan declined the chair. She slid to the ground, and stood there solemnly, clutching George’s coat; her velvety eyes just above the level of the table. If anybody smiled at Joan, the response was an immediate frown; otherwise she seemed indifferent to her surroundings. Curiosity was evidently rife; and George briefly sketched, for the benefit of his near neighbors, the manner in which Joan had been found.

“I wasn’t far wrong. It’s a river-maid, not a mermaid!” said Mr. Meredith.

“It’s a very odd little mortal, anyhow,” the stout widow, Mrs. Tracy, remarked. She sat on the other side of the table, a few seats lower down. “What do you think of doing with her?”

“Put her to sleep on the sofa in our room,” said George.

“I am afraid your night’s rest will be broken. And then?”

“Find out to whom she belongs.”

“And if you cannot?”

“It is well never to start in an enterprise expecting failure,” said George.

“But still—”

“And this is not London.”

“Probably the friends are at least as anxious to discover the child as you can be to discover them,” said Mr. Meredith.

“Unless,” Mrs. Tracy observed—“unless somebody meant to leave it there.”

“Oh, impossible!” cried Dulcibel, from a constitutional instinct of contradiction. She had herself made the same suggestion, and Leo’s laughing face showed recollection of hearing her do so. “Such a little darling!”

Mrs. Tracy surveyed the small subject of discussion.

“Something just a degree vixenish about her, isn’t there?” she asked. “I’m not quite sure that I should care to deal with that nature by-and-by.”

“Oh, but so lovable!” said Dulcibel. “Look at her now with my husband!” And indeed the upward glance of those black eyes into the face of the big fair man to whom the little creature had attached herself could hardly have been surpassed in tenderness.

“Yes, that is quite charming,” assented Mrs. Tracy; “but—” and she shook her head—“but—”

Conversation drifted in other directions, and Joan was more or less forgotten. She stood so very still that forgetfulness was not difficult. George fed her now and then with scraps, as he might have fed a pet dog; and she consented to be so treated. A basin of bread and milk had been already disposed of upstairs, therefore more was not needed. If Leo, on Joan’s other side, offered anything, he met with the usual severe refusal.

Dinner over, and the move into the drawing-room made, Joan calmly climbed upon George’s knee, evidently satisfied that he had nothing better in life to do than to nurse her small self. Dulcibel remonstrated, but George would not turn the child away. He read the paper, with the dark head lying placidly on his shoulder; and when it was decided that Joan must go to bed George carried her upstairs.

“Just for once,” he said, half laughing; “we shall find her people to-morrow, poor wee mite!” There was a sound of regret in his voice. Somehow he did not wish to give her up.

A bed had been made on the sofa, and a nightdress of tiny dimensions lent by somebody. Joan was growing very sleepy once more, and made no objections to the removal of her frock, submitting so far to Dulcibel’s handling, while George sat down at a table to write a letter.

There, however, Joan made a stand. She stood, pouting, in her little red petticoats, with bare arms and shoulders. Evidently something was customary next, which she could not or would not explain, every suggestion being received with an indignant “No!” Finally Joan took the matter into her own hands, knelt down, shut her eyes, and said solemnly, with distinct utterance—

“‘Desuo, Dentle Shepherd, hear me,
Bress Thy nittle lamb to-night!’”

Recollection seemed to fail there, and no more words were forthcoming.

“Yes, darling—go on,” coaxed Dulcibel.

“Through the darkness be Thou near me—”

No; Joan refused to be prompted. She opened her eyes, frowned at Dulcibel, and scrambled to her feet.

“Is that all, Joan?” asked George.

“Dess,” Joan answered. She seemed to have an odd affection for the fourth letter of the alphabet.

“Did mother teach you that?” asked George.

No answer.

“Joan, did mother say good-bye when she went away from you to-day?” George inquired suddenly.

“Dess,” Joan replied again; and a look of unmistakable sadness came into the black eyes. “Dood-bye!”

Husband and wife looked at each other.

“That’s odd,” said Dulcibel.

“Didn’t mother mean to come back again to Joan?” asked George, bending down towards the child.

Again there was no reply.

“Joan, is mother gone?”

“Don!” Joan echoed.

“Mother—gone—where?” inquired George.

Joan only echoed “Don!” once more, and looked very sleepy.

“You won’t find out anything in that way Georgie dear,” said his wife. “I don’t believe Joan knows much more than we do ourselves.”

“Well, the sooner she is in bed the better,” said George.

* * * * * * *

Morning come, and Joan appeared at breakfast, fresh and rosy, still as George’s devoted attendant. He could not move an inch without her. Peals of laughter were evoked when she endeavored to place herself upon the same chair with her new friend. George laughed as heartily as any one, and Joan showed a sublime disdain of people’s opinions.

Breakfast over, a battle took place. Rather fortunately for George’s purposes, it had turned out a wet day. Inquiries about Joan were an immediate necessity, and there could be no doubt that they would be three times as rapid and efficient without Dulcibel to delay his steps. Rain came down in a continuous pelt, and she decided to remain indoors with Joan, while George and Leo sallied forth on their hunt.

But the parting of George from Joan was not quite an easy matter. Dulcibel coaxed and George reasoned without avail. Joan held on to his coat-tails like a vice. When at length he gently wrenched himself free from the little hands and vanished, shutting the door, Joan gave one fearful and prolonged yell of rage. Having thus let off steam, and relieved herself, she subsided into a corner of the drawing-room, with solemn disdain of everybody present, scorning all blandishments.

Lunch-time arrived, but not George or Leo. Dulcibel had scarcely passed so wearisome a day since her marriage. Hitherto her life had been as one continued honeymoon. She could almost have shed tears at her husband’s non-appearance, only she was ashamed.

Joan was by this time sufficiently hungry to consent to eat, and Dulcie found half an hour’s amusement in ministering to her wants. But, hunger once satisfied, Joan retreated again to the corner, presently dropping asleep there.

The afternoon hours crept by slowly, rain still falling in a ceaseless drench, George and Leo still absent.

Walking out, even for five minutes, was not to be thought of, Dulcibel being a person who caught cold easily. But being also a little person of restless tendencies, accustomed to a good deal of small change and excitement in everyday life, and not at all given to reading or needlework, she found it by no means easy to get through such a day. A year earlier she would have risked a wet ramble unhesitatingly, and probably would have laid herself up for a month, without much of after regret. Illness itself supplies a certain measure of satisfying excitement to some natures. But Dulcibel the wife, might not venture to do what Dulcibel the spinster could have done. The fear of her husband’s disapprobation was stronger than wilfulness.

So she staid indoors, and dipped listlessly into several books, and talked about nothing in particular with divers persons, and made several vain attempts upon Joan, and tried a few stitches of knitting now and then. And at length she took to standing at the window, gazing out forlornly upon the wet and dripping scene.

Presently she found Mr. Meredith at her side. He was a man in early middle life, pleasant-faced, and kind-mannered. Dulcibel involuntarily turned to him for sympathy.

“I can’t think why my husband does not come back,” she said.

“He will soon appear now, no doubt. Mr. Rutherford is not one to care much about weather, I should suppose.”

“If not, I suppose I may care for him,” said Dulcibel rather tartly.

“Just so. Quite right that you should,” said Mr. Meredith with intent to soothe. “No doubt, the inquiries about yonder little maid have taken longer than he expected.” Mr. Meredith glanced at Joan, coiled up still in her corner.

“I never saw such an unsociable child in my life,” said Dulcibel. “One can do nothing with her.”

“It requires patience. But the shyness will break down in time,” said Mr. Meredith, cheerfully. “That is to say, it would do so, if any delay occurred in finding her belongings.”

“Shyness! It is all pride and temper,” said Dulcibel.

Mr. Meredith thought of certain utterances at dinner the evening before.

“Perhaps not altogether,” he said. “There may have been some fault in the training.”

“I have seen plenty of spoilt children, and they are not like this,” retorted Dulcibel. “I believe she is disagreeable by nature. Think of keeping to that corner, and refusing to speak civilly to anybody all day. It is quite unnatural. I hope we shall hear that her friends are found. There is no return for kindness shown to such a child.”

“Bad bargain, in short,” mused Mr. Meredith. “We don’t object to being repaid in full for our good deeds, do we?”

Dulcibel colored. “Now, how horrid you must have thought me, before you could say that!”

“No, indeed,” Mr. Meredith answered. “I fancy you, like many people, are better than your words.”

“But isn’t it natural to wish for a little love and gratitude in return, when one gives out to people?”

“Quite natural, and not wrong; only sometimes one has to put aside the wish, and rise to a higher level—to ‘do good, hoping for nothing again,’” Mr. Meredith said, looking towards the small person in question. He added softly—“‘Freely ye have received, freely give.’”

Dulcibel sighed.

“Well; we have not given much yet,” she said. “The child’s friends ought to have passed an anxious night. But I begin to think they have left her on purpose. Children are forsaken sometimes.”

“The position in which she was found hardly gives one that impression,” said Mr. Meredith.

Another hour passed, and at length, not long before dinner, two dripping figures appeared within the front door. Dulcibel ran eagerly out of the drawing-room, regardless of certain smiles caused there by her impulsive movement. But Joan’s rush of welcome was even quicker than Dulcibel’s. George put them both off with his hands.

“No; don’t touch me; I am soaked,” he said in his hearty voice. “We have had a day of it, I assure you. Couldn’t possibly come back to lunch, or we would have done so, Dulcie; but I knew you would understand. Well, Joan, have you been good?”

“Have you found out anything, Georgie?” asked Dulcibel with eagerness.

“Yes; I will tell you presently,” said George, in rather a grave tone. “Nothing certain yet, but very probable. No, Joan, you must stand off. I can’t be handled till I am dry.” In a lower voice George added—“Somehow it does not look as if the non-return of the mother could have been accidental.”

“I told you so!” Dulcibel averred.

George imagined that she had “told him” exactly the opposite, but he wisely entered on no discussion.