Miss Anstruther

“ There was a great deal of assorted merit scattered among those moths. Looks, intellect, a nice voice, an operatic moustache, or an aptitude for the informal recitation of engaging verses, werea purely random selection from their several strong points; but even these, picked out and fitted together, would have made a dazzling being: whom Miss Anstruther would have rejected as firmly and as finally as she had rejected his integral parts.
For there was no pleasing the girl. ”

“ She now tore open the envelope with strange misgivings; and the letter turned out to be from the squatter's wife on Ted Miller's station, telling how a buck-jumper had broken Ted Miller's back; and how, before his death, which ensued in a matter of hours, he had directed her to write to his family, and also—but separately—to "his greatest friend."
The fire dulled down, the candles shortened, and in their light Miss Anstruther sat in her dazzling ball-dress, her face as grey as its satin sheen. Her rounded arms were more florid than her face. She moaned a little to herself—she could not cry. ”

“ Her sister gazed at her fondly. Her own family, at all events, loved and believed in Miss Anstruther, and held that her faults were on the surface. The sister now saw in the sweet, flushed face the look that Lord Nunthorp had seen (and underestimated) more than once.
"Is there someone you care for after all, Midge dear?" she asked softly.
"There may have been someone all the time," the young girl whispered, her eyelids fallen, her hand squeezing the letter under her shawl. ”

“ This is where Miss Anstruther was so much more wholesome than the flirt who doesn't think she flirts: Miss Anstruther never rankled.
She had no mother to check her notorious propensity in its infancy, and no brother to bully her out of it in the end. Her father, an Honourable, but a man of intrinsic distinction as well, was queer enough to see no fault in her; but he was a busy man. She had, however, a kinsman, Lord Nunthorp, who used to talk to her like a brother on the subject of her behaviour, only a little less heavily than brothers use. Nunthorp knew what he was talking about. ”

“ A sweetly pretty and highly accomplished young girl, little Miss Anstruther came to know too much to dream of taking any man's word on this point. She was reputed to have refused more offers than a good girl ought to get ”

“ I am on my way to meet Miss Anstruther, my wife’s cousin.’
‘Lucky dog!’ said Forster. He is one of those fellows who imagine that no age, position, or circumstances are powerful enough to prevent a man admiring a pretty woman. ‘If all I have heard about her from Dunn is true, you are not likely to have your house much to yourself whilst Miss Anstruther is in it, Norton.’
‘Well, I shall go out of it, then,’ I answered, not over pleased at the notion of never being left in peace with Janie. ”

“ If you are to blame anybody, I'm afraid it must be yourself. You must give them some encouragement, Midge, or I don't think they'd all come to the point as they do. I never saw such sportsmen as they are! They walk in and walk out again one after the other, and they seem to like it——'
'I wish they did!' said Miss Anstruther, devoutly. ”

“ But love at sight is such a miracle to the seer that he never imagines its duplication. Terence saw nothing on Miss Anstruther's features but the attention an intelligent woman might show to any man with a name in the making. ”

“ After all, supposing that Miss Anstruther does remain with us during the whole of her uncle’s sojourn in China, where will be the great misfortune of entertaining a young lady for a few months? and how could [66] we have done otherwise than offer to receive a friendless girl, arriving in the country under such peculiar circumstances? who has also, by marriage, become a connection of my own, and been reared in such intimate relations with my wife, as to be looked on by Janie almost in the light of a sister. ”

“ ROSE-MARIE SCHMIDT.
XXVIII Jena, April 26th.
Dear Mr. Anstruther,—You seem to be incurably doleful. You talk about how nice it must be to have a sister, a mother, some woman very closely related to whom you could talk. You astonish me; for have you not Miss Cheriton? Still, on reflection I think I do see that what you feel you want is more a solid bread-and-butter sort of relationship; no sentiment, genial good advice, a helping hand if not a guiding one—really a good thick slice of bread-and-butter as a set-off to a diet of constant cake. ”

“ This strong man liked to feel that he had everybody in his power; it was good to him to know that he could move others as the man behind the curtain moves the puppets in a marionette show. It was not particularly that Anstruther cared for crime for its own sake, but he loved to be subtle and mysterious; it was a joy to him to get the better of his fellow creatures. Had Carrington but known it, the major part of the trouble which was racking his mind now had been brought about by the very man to whom he turned most readily in the hour of his misfortunes. ”

“ ROSE-MARIE SCHMIDT.
XLIV Galgenberg, Sept. 16th.
Dear Mr. Anstruther,—It is kind of you to want to contradict what I said in my last letter about the outward appearance of my life, but really you know I am past my first youth. At twenty-six I cannot pretend to be what is known as a young girl, and I don't want to. Not for anything would I be seventeen or eighteen again. I like to be a woman grown, to have entered into the full possession of whatever faculties I am to have, to know what I want, to look at things in their true proportions. ”

“ I do miss dear Vicki whom I greatly loved, I do miss the cheery Joey, I miss Papa Lindeberg who likened me to Hebe, I miss his wife who kept me in my proper place—it is quite true that I miss these people, but that would never of itself be a feeling strong enough to sweep me off my feet into black pools of misery as I was swept this afternoon, and never, never would make me, who have so fine a contempt for easy tears, cry. No, Mr. Anstruther, bitter truths once seen have to be stared at squarely, and I am simply comparing my lot with Vicki's and being sorry for myself. ”

“ I went through the required formula; but after the customary acknowledgment of it, Miss Anstruther took no further notice of Mr Forster or myself, and the conversation, after several ineffectual attempts to draw her into it, was kept up between us alone. Meanwhile, I could not help stealing an occasional glance to where my wife’s cousin sat, calm and silent, gazing on the bright glancing waters, and answering the occasional remarks directed to her with a smile which was almost too faint to be called so. Only once did I see the expression [82] of her face change ”

“ You will go with Padini to-night to----"
"No, no!" Serena cried. "I implore you to spare me that humiliation again. What have I done that I should have to endure all this--what can be possibly gained by it?"
For the first time Anstruther displayed real signs of anger. "Now, listen to me," he said. "Once for all, I tell you not to speak to me like this again. Do you think I have studied you all these years for nothing? Do you suppose I do not know how disloyal you are in your heart towards me? There is one class of woman who has to be ruled by fear alone, and you are one of them. ”

“ Leave Iris alone. At present she is strung up to an intense pitch of gratitude, having barely escaped a terrible fate. Let her come back to the normal. Anstruther's shady record must gradually leak out. That will disgust her. In a week she will appeal to you to buy him off. He is hard up—cut off by his people and that sort of thing. There you probably have the measure of his scheming. He knows quite well that he can never marry your daughter. It is all a matter of price. ”

“ Anstruther,—Our new address is Galgenberg, Jena,—rather grim, but what's in a name? The thing itself is perfect. It is a tiny house, white, with green shutters, on the south slope of the hill among apple-trees. ”

“ Anstruther sprang to his feet and hurried into the patient's bedchamber.
"The woman's dead, Doctor," cried Jason Jones, standing in the middle of the room. "She's dead!"
The physician hastened to the bedside, where Janet Orme, the nurse, was bending over the still form. Pushing her away, Dr. Anstruther made a hurried examination.
It was true; the woman was dead. At the very moment of reunion with the husband from whom she had so long been parted, she had passed on to another life, leaving reconciliation in abeyance. ”

“ Seymour laughed. "From what you told me just now, it is evident that Anstruther means to leave a note for his pal if the latter is away. In the event of 'Simple Charlie' being professionally engaged elsewhere to-morrow night, he will be asked to find a substitute. As we are perfectly well aware of the fact that there is no chance of Anstruther finding his friend at home, it is only logical to assume that he will leave the note behind. ”

“ They all seem to get over it pretty easily; and that doesn't make you think much better of yourself, you know. Of course I'm inconsistent!"
"Of course you are," said Nunthorp, cordially. "I approve of you for it. I'd rather see you an old maid, Midge, than going through life in a groove. Consistency's a narrow groove for narrow minds! I can do better than this about consistency, Midge; I'm hot and strong on the subject. But you're not listening."
"Ah!" cried Miss Anstruther, who had not listened to a word, "they're driving me crazy, between them! There's Mr. ”

“ Still, although doubtless she can boast of some good features, to call such a woman beautiful is absurd; and one has only to see her stand side by side with my rosebud wife to perceive the worse points which she possesses. It brings out at once, as I made Janie laugh by observing, all the yellow that is in her. She is not so plain, perhaps, as I expected; but ‘beautiful’ is the last epithet I should apply to Margaret Anstruther. No woman [86] who is not fair can possibly be pretty; and how any man can prefer a dark face is to me inexplicable. ”

“ It was Anstruther who first broke the silence.
"Are we going to stand fooling here all night?" he exclaimed angrily. "Padini, get that exaggerated fur coat of yours off, and make yourself up to look like an English gentleman as far as possible. You will find everything necessary in the room at the back of the house. The same remark applies to you, Serena. My word! To think that a woman so pale, so haggard, as you are now can make up to look like eighteen and possess the beauty of Diana! What a pity it was you ever left the stage!"
The woman's face flushed angrily. ”

“ ROSE-MARIE SCHMIDT.
XXV. Jena, March 31st.
Dear Mr. Anstruther,—Yes, of course I will be friends. And if I can be of any use in the way of admonishment, which seems to be my strong point, pray, as people say in books, command me. Naturally we are all much interested in you, and shall watch your career, I hope, with pleasure. I am sorry the Foreign Office bores you so much. Do you really have to spend your days gumming up envelopes? Not for that did you win all those scholarships and things at Eton and Oxford, and study Goethe and the minor German prophets so diligently here. ”

“ There was something so pitifully imploring in the speech that the listeners thrilled in sympathy. From the first word they had no difficulty in guessing the identity of the speaker. It was none other than Serena who was addressing them in those despairing accents.
"I am afraid you are too late, Serena," Jack said. "Besides, we have some one else to consider in the business. It is possible that your efforts may be successful as far as we are concerned; but we have discovered to-night that Anstruther is plotting against the happiness of many people who are as innocent as ourselves. ”

“ But Carrington was impervious to insult. His face was ghastly, and the strong glare of the electric lights showed the beads of moisture upon his forehead.
"It is all very well for you," he growled. "The greater the danger the better you seem to like it."
"There isn't any danger," Anstruther protested. "Didn't you tell me that the police had no special orders as far as the bank was concerned? And everybody knows you have two night watchmen. ”

“ Madame Martelli will not allow her to sing much to me, or to any one, at present. She likes to hear every note she utters. I think her grandfather will be pleased with her progress when she goes home. He told me she had a nice voice, well worth some good finishing lessons, and Madame Martelli seems to be taking great pains with her."
Lady Strangways smiled as she thought of the immense difference that lay between Mr. Anstruther's conception of the quality of his granddaughter's voice, and that voice as it actually was. But she had no time to stay and enlighten Mrs. Murray as to the truth. ”

“ Hugh Anstruther exclaimed: he was having luncheon with Vincent at the latter's hotel. "Here are you, a fresh-elected member of Parliament—and I dare say as proud as Punch in consequence; and within a measurable distance of your taking your place in the House, you leave England, and come away over to America to hunt up an old man and a young girl. Do I wonder?—I do not wonder. A bonnier lassie, a gentler creature, does not step the ground anywhere; ay, and of good birth and blood, too; though there may be something in that to account for George Bethune's disappearance. ”