"If _I_ fall on your neck it will make seven this morning. Aren't you
satisfied?" And Phoebe drew her hand away from his, allowing, however, a
regretful squeeze as he let it go.
"No, six if you would do it," answered David disconsolately, "I told you
that Mrs. Cherry failed me."
"Yes," answered Phoebe as she lowered her eyes, "I know you told me."
David Kildare was keen of wit but it takes a most extraordinary wisdom to
fathom such a woman as Phoebe chose to be--out of business hours.
"Isn't it time for you to go to dress for the parade?" she asked quickly
with apparent anxiety.
"No," answered David as he filled his tooled leather case from the
major's jar of choice Seven Oaks heart-leaf--he had seen Phoebe's white
fingers roll it to the proper fineness just the night before, "I'm
all ready! Did you think I was going to wear a lace collar and a sash?
Everything is in order and I only have to be there at two to start them
off. Everybody is placed on the platform and everybody is satisfied. The
unveiling will be at three-thirty. You are going out with Mrs. Matilda
early, aren't you? I want you to see me come prancing up at the
head of the mounted police. Won't you be proud of me?"
"Sometimes, really, I think you are the missing twin to little Billy
Bob," answered Phoebe with a laugh, but in an instant her face became
grave again. "I'm worried about Caroline Darrah," she said softly. "I
found her crying last night after I had finished work. I was staying here
with Mrs. Matilda for the night and I went into her room for a moment on
the chance that she would be awake. She said she had wakened from an ugly
dream--but I know she dreads this presentation, and I don't blame her. It
was lovely of her to want to give the statue and plucky of her to come
and do it--but it's in every way trying for her."
"And isn't she the darling child?" answered David Kildare, a tender smile
coming into his eyes. "Plucky! Well I should say so! To come dragging old
Peters Brown's money-bags down here just as soon as he croaked, with the
express intention of opening up and passing us all our wads back. Could
anything as--as pathetic ever have happened before?"
"No," answered Phoebe. Then she said slowly, tentatively, as she looked
into David's eyes that were warm with friendliness for the inherited
friend who had preempted a place in both their hearts: "And the one awful
thing for which she can offer no reparation she knows nothing of. I pray
she never knows!"
"Yes, but it is about to do him to the death. I sometimes wake and find
him sitting over his papers at daybreak with burned-out eyes and as pale
as a white horse in a fog."