Flaming Youth

CHAPTER XV

Consciousness of virtue warmed Pat's heart as she jumped from the train at Dorrisdale and sniffed the shrewd October air with nostrils that quivered like a kitten's. She had been working hard at school, ever so much harder than there was any real need for, on her music and domestic science, and now she was to enjoy some deserved recreation. For this was the week of Dee's wedding and she had five days of unmitigated gaiety in prospect. She peopled her plans with the figures of those who were to be participants of and ministers to her pleasurings, nearly all of them, it is significant to note, of the masculine gender. There were the local youth of her own "crowd," with half a dozen of whom she had "had a flutter" more or less ardent, in the last year; the out-of-town contingent whom she had long known from the viewpoint of childhood and upon whom she aspired confidently to try her burgeoning charms; and two or three unknowns who were to be of the wedding party. Cary Scott had a place in the mosaic, too; but not an overshadowing one. The easy effacements of time, so potent upon a youthful mind, had dimmed, though they had not erased, his image. She was expectant of livelier excitements than association with him afforded. Nevertheless there was an abiding feeling of assurance in having him for a secure background: she looked forward happily to being approved by him for having worked so hard, much as a playful puppy looks for a tidbit as reward of a trick cleverly performed. Furthermore she had a surprise in store for him.

[Pg 160]
"What's doing to-night?" was her first question of Dee, after their greetings.

"Dinner-dance at the Vaughns'."

"Everybody going to be there?"

"All that are on hand. Some of the party aren't here yet."

"Who's back of my crowd?"

"Selden Thorpe, Billy Grant, Monty Standish; he was asking to-day about you."

"That stiff!" commented Pat, doing a pirouette. "No more pep than a jumping-jack."

"Neither would you have if you'd been brought up in a bandbox. But he's begun to lift the lid and look around. And he's a winner to look at."

"Maybe I'll have a shot at him. Dee, I'm out for trouble this trip. I've been being good so long it hurts."

"You look it; the trouble-hunting, I mean," commented the elder, appraising her maid-of-honour. "They ought to put a danger signal over you, Pat. Where do you get the stuff that you work on the men? Your features are nothing to hire out to an artist, you know. And yet——"

Pat laughed delightedly. "Aren't they? Well, you and Con have got enough cold and haughty beauty for the family. Being a bride is becoming to you, Dee. You look stunning."

Indeed, Dee's clean-cut, attractive athleticism seemed to have taken on a new quality. Her eyes had grown more brilliant; there was a higher glow of colour in the clear skin; but a more analytical observer than Pat might have discerned in the little, straightening lines at the corners of the firm, sweet mouth, a conscious effort at nervous control.

"Oh, I'm all right," said she, carelessly. "When's Cissie coming?"

[Pg 161]
Cissie Parmenter was the Philadelphia schoolmate whom Pat had adopted as "b.f." "To-morrow night. You're a peach to let me have her. What'll we do with her Wednesday, Dee? Only the actual wedding party are asked to the Dangerfields', aren't they?"

"That's all. I'll get Cary Scott to run her in town for luncheon."

"Isn't Mr. Scott one of the ushers?"

"No. He and Jimmy aren't very strong for each other. I'm using him as my general utility man for the show. Dad's no good for that, and Bobs is too busy."