The Key Note

"That is exciting," remarked Mr. Wilbur, looking approvingly at the lady with the fresh robin-voice and the charming costume.

"Miss Veronica and I are all eyes, Mr. Wilbur," she continued. "I'm sure you allow newcomers to stare as much as they please."

"Certainly. Let me show you some of our snug arrangements for 'a life on the ocean wave.'"

The guests followed him, and Mrs. Wilbur and her daughter regarded one another, the elder with some consternation, the younger with brilliant eyes and flaming cheeks.

"I do hope he won't have to break his date with me," said Mrs. Wilbur.

"Perhaps to sing with the Metropolitan is more important," returned Diana.

"You never have taken any interest in my plan," said her mother, her eyes snapping. "I'm sure I don't know what has come over you on this island. From the time you came back to the yacht yesterday, I have had to speak twice to make you hear anything, and I've been afraid every minute that you would let your father see that you were depressed at leaving this foolish place and going with him."

"I am perfectly willing to go, Mamma," was the docile reply, the change of heart that had taken place in the last fifteen minutes not being explained.

"Well, I'm glad to hear it," declared Mrs. Wilbur, placated. "You are looking wonderfully well to-night, Diana. Clinging stuff suits you, and in that silver girdle you have quite a classical appearance."

"Do I look statuesque, Mamma?" Diana smiled, but not pensively. Her eyes were alive with anticipation of this one more, this last evening. "To-day I have been remembering my first days at the island, all alone with Miss Burridge, the long, cold evenings with their wonderful coloring, the vesper songs of the hardy robins and sparrows; the grinding pebbles swept back and forth on the beach; the entrancing odors that one cannot name, so mingled of balsam and sea – the great spaces of earth and sky – " Something seemed to stop the rush of reminiscence.

Mrs. Wilbur regarded her child's kindling face with fond admiration. "Yes," she returned, laughing softly, "I know how all that captured you, but what has it to do with your being statuesque?"

"Oh," – Diana seemed to come to herself with a little start, – "Miss Burridge used to say sometimes that I looked like a statue," she returned, rather lamely.

Motor boats were constantly putt-putt-ing around the yacht.

"I'm glad," said Mrs. Wilbur, looking down upon them now, "that this is the last night we are to stay here. Didn't those inquisitive little things keep you awake all last night, just like gnats?"

"I didn't sleep much," admitted Diana.

"There they come," said Mrs. Wilbur, suddenly, looking across at the float.

Two men in white flannels were stepping aboard the waiting boat whose brasses flashed in the light of the lowering sun. Diana's heart bounded toward her throat.

"Well, I shall make him understand that he must tell me just as soon as he knows himself," said Mrs. Wilbur rather fretfully, watching the approach.

The dinner party was a gay one. When the guests were seated at table, they looked out through a wide semicircle of glass at the familiar sights of the cove – its wooded shore, and the silhouettes of great waves far out against the horizon.

"I shall not forgive Kelly for giving me away," said Philip when his host congratulated him on his call to New York. "How shall I feel when you all hear that I didn't pass muster?"

"Believe me," said Barney feelingly, "if that proves to be the case, you'll all have cause to congratulate him. The life of an American singer in a Grand Opera Company is one fight, if it isn't an inferno. The call-boy forgets to call him, the prompter forgets to prompt him. Every curtain-call is begrudged him."

"I'm glad you're husky, Barrison," remarked Mr. Wilbur.

"Yes," laughed Philip. "Kelly has been an industrious crêpe-hanger ever since the letter arrived. At the same time he shoves me on."

"Oh, certainly," said Barney, setting his lips energetically. "Must be done. I think he's safe to win."

"I am thinking about October and Pittsfield," said Mrs. Wilbur ruefully.

Philip turned toward her. "I think there is little doubt that I shall be with you," he answered.

"Mamma doesn't mean that," declared Diana of the steadily burning cheeks. "She wants you to succeed, of course."

"Yes, Barrison," added her father, "but when your voice fails, we know what you can do: skip around a vessel at sea for the movies."

"You rather liked that fracas, didn't you, Mr. Wilbur?" returned Philip.

"Indeed, I did. When you come here to recuperate from the atrocities of singer allies, I'll join you and we will repeat the dose."

"Dose is the word," put in Kelly in an undertone.

When finally the party adjourned to the deck, they fell into groups: Mrs. Lowell and Diana, Veronica and Barney, Mr. and Mrs. Wilbur and Philip. The sun had gone down, and the western sky was still crimson.

Diana put her hand over in Mrs. Lowell's lap. "We know how violet the sea looks this minute from the Inn piazza," she said. "You will go on seeing it."

"And you will carry it away," returned Mrs. Lowell. "That, and many another picture which you will stop to look at sometimes on a winter day."

"Yes, they are mine," said Diana gravely. "Even this pond of a cove with the green banks and woods rising all about it. This is a picture that I love, too."

"Bert was quite troubled because he thought you seemed sad at leaving."

"Good little sympathetic fellow," said Diana. "I don't want to believe, Mrs. Lowell, that this is good-bye for us."

"I hope it is not. New York and Philadelphia are not far apart, but you will begin to be absorbed in other interests as soon as this yacht leaves the cove."

Diana shook her head. "My memory is not so short."

Mrs. Lowell looked at her with thoughtful affection. "I hope they won't spoil you, my dear," she said wistfully. "It is very remarkable that you have come along so far with 'a heart at leisure from itself.'"

"Oh, do you think I have that?" returned Diana, looking up with seeking eyes.

"I do, my dear. The key note of happy usefulness is unselfishness. I have been surprised by your unselfishness, Diana – under circumstances that usually make for the other thing."

"But, Mrs. Lowell, I am frightfully selfish!" exclaimed the girl. "You don't know!"

Her friend smiled. "Well, if you see it, that is half the battle. The other half is putting it down – destroying it."

"It is usually about – about people," said Diana unsteadily. "I – I am afraid I am a monopolist – "

"My word, but you people are interested in each other," said Philip Barrison, suddenly appearing beside them. "Just lift your eyes."

They looked up and saw the moon rising majestically above the hill-road, and the cove beginning to glitter.

"Now that mustn't make any difference," said Mrs. Wilbur firmly. "The moon won't run away and Mr. Barrison has consented to sing for us."

"The minutes are going so fast, so fast," thought Diana, "and there will be no more."

Mrs. Wilbur herded her group together and convoyed them to the music-room.

"This is really an especial treat for Mr. Wilbur," she said to Philip. "You know he is the only one of us who hasn't heard you."

"And you needn't imagine," added Mr. Wilbur, "that you are singing for the impresario of the Metropolitan, either. So long as I am the chief beneficiary to-night, it is only fair to tell you, Barrison, that musically I am very despicable. 'The Last Rose of Summer,' and 'Annie Laurie,' are where I am. So don't waste any moderne stuff on me."

Philip smiled as he moved to the piano, and the company chose their places. Mrs. Wilbur took a seat beside her husband, enveloped in the anticipatory glow of the matinée girl.

"I want to be where I can hold your hand if I need to, dear," she said. Her husband glanced at Diana, flushed and grave, as she placed herself on a low stool near the door, then back at the upstanding white figure beside the piano.

Philip said a few words to his accompanist as Barney's fingers strayed softly over the keys – then a familiar strain began, and the heralded voice was heard:

"Believe me, if all those endearing young charmsThat I gaze on so fondly to-day – "

At the close, the host was smiling and nodding while his wife's eyes challenged him in mute triumph. Philip discoursed with Barney a few moments and apparently the pigeonholes of the accompanist's mind were well-stored and the contents available, for the old favorite was followed by "If I but Knew," "At Parting," "To Mary," and so on, Mr. Wilbur growing more enthusiastic at each number.

"You can speak, young man, so as to be understood, and you're the singer for me," he said. "You have been very indulgent. Now if you don't mind, let us have 'Drink to me only.'"

Philip, for the first time, turned and looked directly at Diana. Her father noticed it. He was becoming every moment more alert as to the hundred-per-cent man in the white flannels.

The song followed. Diana, on her low seat, had her elbows on her knees and her chin in her hands, and never once looked at the singer.

"I have one more for you," said Philip when the applause had died away. "It is a song of Maude Valérie White's, which I think fits into your category, Mr. Wilbur. It has been haunting me of late."

He turned for a few words to the accomplished Barney, during which Diana looked up questioningly, apprehensively. She felt she could not bear much more of the beating upon her heart-strings.

Philip turned back, and, after only one running chord of prelude, began to sing:

"Let us forget we loved each other much,Let us forget we ever have to part.Let us forget that any look or touchFirst let in either to the other's heart."Only we'll sit upon the daisied grass,And hear the larks and see the swallows pass.Only we'll live awhile as children play,Without to-morrow, without yesterday."

The last note was one of those high ones which Kelly had stated did such fell work upon the feminine heart, and Mrs. Wilbur's lips were tremulous as she met her husband's eyes.

"Say, my dear," he said, while clapping his hands manfully, "you have Barrison sing that at Pittsfield, and I'll come to your party and make love to you the rest of the night."

Philip smiled and nodded, and drifted away from the piano, while Barney got up and stretched his legs.

"Where's Diana?" exclaimed her father, and instantly condemned himself for drawing attention to her departure.

"Oh, but she heard it, I'm sure," said Mrs. Wilbur apologetically, still wiping her eyes. "I'm sure no one appreciates your singing more than Diana."

"Gone to look after her moon, probably," said Philip. "You know a goddess has her duties."

"There have been things going on," thought Charles Wilbur, with ever-deepening conviction. "Mr. Kelly, you are a wizard," he said, shaking Barney by the hand while Mrs. Lowell and Veronica were thanking Philip.

"You have both been so good to us," said Mrs. Wilbur warmly. "Why, Diana, where have you been? We missed you," she added, as the girl came into the room.

"I wanted to see if the steward understood," she replied. "I think, if we go on deck now, we shall have something else refreshing after this delightful feast." Her father watched the girl approach Barney. "Mr. Kelly, you are wonderful. I remember the comical things you said about your insignificance at recitals. I've seen again how apocryphal those statements are."

Her father continued to watch for her thanks to Philip. Apparently there were none forthcoming, and fortunately Mrs. Wilbur was too busy talking to him herself to notice it.

"But won't Mr. Kelly play something before we leave?" she said supplicatingly.

"Oh, no, my dear lady," returned Barney lightly. "One has no appetite for dinner after dessert."

They went on deck, and the moon was glorifying the still cove. Apparently the motor boats had sated their curiosity as to the yacht, and all was peaceful. The company sat about in a social group and ate and drank. Barney Kelly told some amusing experiences which he and Philip had had on the road last season. Diana scarcely heard his anecdotes, but she laughed with the rest.

"Without to-morrow, without yesterday."

The words sang themselves over and over in her heart, and her cheeks still burned. The minutes were flying, flying, and Philip was sitting near her mother, who waited on him assiduously and rallied him upon his lack of appetite.

"Say, boy," said Kelly at last, "do you know we have a cart-load of music to look over and we ought to do it to-night?"

Then they would go. She would not see him alone again!

"Mrs. Lowell, are you ready?" asked Philip. "We four will have a grand moonlight walk up to the Inn."

"No, indeed," replied that lady. "The faithful Bill is expecting us. I know how busy you and Mr. Kelly must be."

"Oh, dear!" burst forth Veronica. It was almost her first utterance of the evening. "Isn't it a shame that the pleasantest things in life are always the shortest!" She did wish Mrs. Lowell would not be so considerate of the men's time. "Miss Diana, don't you really feel just a little bit sorry to go and leave us?"

"I do, indeed," returned Diana, receiving the girl's offered hand in her cold one. "The best way probably is to remember Mr. Barrison's song and live as children play – 'without to-morrow, without yesterday.' It has been a – a wonderful playtime."

"But there will be a to-morrow," said Philip, approaching her. "Will you come to the opera next winter and hear me peep a few lines like 'Madam, the carriage waits'?" He smiled radiantly. "That is, if I get in at all."

"Certainly, all your friends will be there," she returned, with palpitating dignity. How could he speak so gayly? Probably the dazzling possibilities of the future had effaced for him the memories that glowed in her. That is what life with him would be: a constant craving, and a constant disappointment.

"I want a word with you, Barrison, before we break up," said Mr. Wilbur. "You have been some star in this island visit of mine." He took Philip's arm and walked apart with him.

"Oh, Mr. Kelly, see the phosphorescence," cried Veronica from where she had moved near the rail. Barney followed her.

"What do you suppose Mr. Wilbur wants with Barrison?" said Kelly softly, as they leaned over the rail. "Going to write him a check for a million, maybe. He'd never miss it."

"I don't believe Mr. Barrison will need anybody else's millions. He made a lump come right up in my throat when he sang that last song about forgetting and sitting on the daisies. I just wished I was in love with somebody so I could be miserable all night like girls in books. But" – Veronica sighed – "I am the most unsentimental girl in the world."

"I wonder if that is what makes you so nice," said Barney, regarding her mignonne face instead of the phosphorescence. "You're a little brick. Do you know it? Are you coming back here again next summer?"

"Perhaps," returned Veronica demurely. "But meanwhile I live in Newark; quite near New York."

"I know, my dear, but when I get submerged, even little bricks can't make me come to the surface to breathe. Do you think your father would let you come over to lunch with me sometimes?"

"You can ask him," replied Veronica.

"Oh, dear, is that the way you feel about it?"

"Just the way."

"All ashore that's going ashore." It was Philip's voice. "Come on, Kelly, and Little V."

Diana had been talking with Mrs. Lowell. She kissed her now hurriedly, and stood rigid. The time had come. She would never go to the opera. She would never see him again. Meanwhile, she joined her mother's gracious reception of the parting courtesies, and shook hands with all the guests alike. They went down the guarded stairway. It was midnight, and the cove was very still. Diana could not watch the departure of the small boat.

"I'm tired," she said, stifling a yawn. "Good-night, dears."

She disappeared quickly. Mr. and Mrs. Wilbur stood by the rail and waved to the departing boat-load.

"What a delightful evening it has been," said the lady with a sigh. "But wasn't it strange that Mr. Barrison wasn't hungry after singing? I thought people always were. Didn't you think the sandwiches were as good as usual?"

"Better. I was as hungry as a hunter – or a sailor. Great air, this, Laura."

CHAPTER XXIII

THE MOON-GODDESS

In the twin beds of the master's room on the yacht Idlewild two persons lay wide awake at one-thirty o'clock that morning.

One of them finally said softly and tentatively: "Charlie, are you awake?"

"I am, my dear," came the reply, "and I should like to ask whether it is simply insomnia with you, or whether you are suffering from incipient St. Vitus?"

"Why, I thought I had been keeping so still. It was the same way after I heard that man sing the last time. I couldn't sleep for hours. Isn't he all I said? I'll warrant he is keeping you awake, too."

"I think he is."

"There!" exclaimed Mrs. Wilbur triumphantly. "You do consider him extraordinary, don't you?"

"I do. So much so that I have asked him to go out with us to-morrow night – Oh, it's to-night, isn't it? The Captain says we will leave at nine-thirty, and go as far as Portland."

"Why, I think that is fine," said Mrs. Wilbur, greatly surprised. "Well," she added, after a pause, "you could scarcely give a greater proof of your liking, for I know how careful you are not to commit yourself to being bored by anybody on the yacht. Why didn't he tell me when he left to-night?"

"Because he did not expect to accept. He may do so yet, however. I told him he might decide at the last minute."

"Why did he hesitate? Perhaps because you didn't invite Mr. Kelly."

"Oh, but I did. I told him they might reign supreme in the music-room and work as much as they pleased."

"How delightful! Then why didn't he jump at such a prospect? I suppose because they wouldn't get to New York so quickly."

"No, he has considerable latitude concerning the date for arrival in New York. I'll tell you just what he replied when I asked him. He looked me straight in the eye and he said: 'Thank you, Mr. Wilbur, but it wouldn't do me any good to take such a trip. It's best for me to play safe. I've passed the age when it is permissible to cry for the moon.' He said it slowly, with pauses. He was perfectly willing I should know what he meant, and he saw that I did know."

"Will you kindly tell me" – Mrs. Wilbur sat up in bed and looked across at her husband, bewildered – "what the man was talking about?"

"Can't you possibly think it out?" asked Charles Wilbur quietly.

She frowned into the darkness. "You don't mean – he teases Diana about being goddess of the moon – " She paused.

"You're getting warm, dear, very warm," remarked her husband.

"Why, Charlie, it's impossible!" Then hotly: "He is very wise. Nothing would induce Diana to think of him."

"You wouldn't like it, eh?"

"Why, the idea! It's an impossible idea! I was a little apprehensive at first, when I saw how attractive he was and knew that she had been up here alone with him so long, but I soon saw there was nothing in it, and you should hear what Diana says – "

"Yes, I know young girls say a great many things besides their prayers."

"Well, what did you say to him when he answered you like that?" Mrs. Wilbur's tone was tense.

"I told him that he might think it over, and that I should be glad to have him come."

"Charles Wilbur!" exclaimed his wife severely. She threw off a down cover as if minded to rise.

"Cover yourself up, dear. It's rather cool."

"But that was encouraging him, Charlie."

"I think he perceived it dimly. He looked at me – a long gaze – by George, he's a good-looking boy – and he didn't say a word. Then we shook hands and rejoined the others."

"You have done very wrong," declared Mrs. Wilbur, pulling back the cover, but not lying down.

"What do you want for Diana, Laura? A title?"

"You needn't use that tone. I haven't thought out what I want for Diana."

"I have. I want happiness for her. From the day of my arrival here, I have seen signs. I'm a rich man, but there is one thing I can't buy for my only child, and that is happiness. Diana is a fastidious, carefully bred girl, unspoiled as they make 'em, yet, of course, just as liable to fall for an infatuation as Helen Loring was."

"But she hasn't, she has not, Charlie," interrupted his wife impetuously. "You don't know – "

"It is you who do not know, my dear. You have been so in love with him yourself, and so obsessed with the joy of springing him on Mrs. Coolidge and your other musical friends, that you haven't seen what was going on under your nose any more than if you were a dear little bat."

"Don't you call me a dear little bat! Diana is much more my child than yours. A mother understands her daughter far better than the father can. The idea of your high-handedly taking this matter into your hands without even consulting me!"

"Don't get excited, Laura. I'm not forcing anything. You've had your innings. You didn't even notice what that last song of Barrison's did to Diana to-night."

"Mere emotionality. The same thing that keeps me awake after I hear him sing. That proves nothing. It should even make you pull away from him instead of pulling for him. You're crazy, Charles. He has hypnotized you. The idea that a mere thrilling tenor voice and a fine figure could make you lay down your common sense." Mrs. Wilbur's voice quavered and she felt under her pillow for her handkerchief.

Her husband smiled in the darkness. "Wait, dear. I don't care whether Diana marries a singer or not. I want her to marry a real man. I was on the lookout for infatuation when I saw you so captivated, and I began to inquire into the facts. I found an all-American chap who had had a struggle from childhood and won out over poverty and discouragement by hitching his wagon to a star. He volunteered during the late war and was slightly wounded. He has a clean inheritance, good muscle, and plenty of red blood. I don't care for the blue kind, myself. In short, he is the sort of man I am perfectly willing our daughter should marry, if she wants to."

"I tell you – "

"Yes, I know. You tell me she doesn't want to. Now, I have an idea we shall very soon learn the truth about that. Barrison has shown that he knows how to get what he wants. In this case, I can see how our money will stick in his crop."

"Ho!" from the other bed. A tremendous aspiration.

"Don't blow me out of the room, dearie. I know people will laugh at that idea, but I have had lots of experience in reading character. Barrison will have a great deal to overcome in his own mind. He will not feel free to approach Diana. Perhaps, after all, the affair will amount to nothing. All right, if it does. I'm a passenger, now that I feel sure the boy is a clean specimen."

"Has it come to this!" ejaculated Mrs. Wilbur slowly. "That Diana Wilbur is to be given to a clean specimen!"

"If she so desires," returned the other. "Now I'm going to ask a big thing of you, Laura. It is not to speak to Diana on this subject until she speaks to you. She knows nothing of my invitation to Barrison. We can't handle the matter any further with good effect until the principals declare themselves. You know our girl. You know it is a hall mark of genuineness, a proof of pure metal when she likes a man or a woman. Can't you trust her?"

Mrs. Wilbur was lying down now. Her husband heard a sniff or two stifled in a pillow.

"I wasn't anybody when you married me, Laura," he went on gently. "Weren't we just as happy when we economized on taking a taxi as we are in this yacht? Our boy would be nearly twenty-three now if he had lived. I would have liked my son to look at me with as clear eyes, to have known as little of self-indulgence as Barrison. It is all up to the children, but wouldn't there be points in being mother-in-law to that voice, when you come to think it over?"

No answer, and soon Charles Wilbur completed his infamy by a long and regular breathing that assured his wife that he was sleeping the sleep of the unjust and the outrageous.

Léonie arose a few hours later to a hard day. Mrs. Wilbur had a headache and did not leave her bed. Diana, with dark shadows under her eyes, came in to make a dutiful visit of condolence, and was well snubbed. She retreated to the deck, where her father was cheerfully watching the life of the cove.