The Little Lady of the Big House Part 23

"I don't see how you can keep such a skin and expose yourself to the sun this way," Graham ventured, in mild criticism.

"I don't," she smiled with a dazzle of white teeth. "That is, I don't expose my face this way more than a few times a year. I'd like to, because I love the sun-gold burn in my hair; but I don't dare a thorough tanning."

The mare frisked, and a breeze of air blew back a flap of skirt, showing an articulate knee where the trouser leg narrowed tightly over it. Again Graham visioned the white round of knee pressed into the round muscles of the swimming Mountain Lad, as he noted the firm knee-grip on her pigskin English saddle, quite new and fawn-colored to match costume and horse.

When the magneto on the tractor went wrong, and the mechanics busied themselves with it in the midst of the partly plowed field, the company, under Paula's guidance, leaving d.i.c.k behind with his invention, resolved itself into a pilgrimage among the brood-centers on the way to the swimming tank. Mr. Crellin, the hog-manager, showed them Lady Isleton, who, with her prodigious, fat, recent progeny of eleven, won various nave encomiums, while Mr. Crellin warmly proclaimed at least four times, "And not a runt, not a runt, in the bunch."

Other glorious brood-sows, of Berks.h.i.+re, Duroc-Jersey, and O. I. C.

blood, they saw till they were wearied, and new-born kids and lambs, and rotund does and ewes. From center to center, Paula kept the telephones warning ahead of the party's coming, so that Mr. Manson waited to exhibit the great King Polo, and his broad-backed Shorthorn harem, and the Shorthorn harems of bulls that were only little less than King Polo in magnificence and record; and Parkman, the Jersey manager, was on hand, with staffed a.s.sistants, to parade Sensational Drake, Golden Jolly, Fontaine Royal, Oxford Master, and Karnak's Fairy Boy--blue ribbon bulls, all, and founders and scions of n.o.ble houses of b.u.t.ter-fat renown, and Rosaire Queen, Standby's Dam, Golden Jolly's La.s.s, Olga's Pride, and Gertie of Maitlands--equally blue-ribboned and blue-blooded Jersey matrons in the royal realm of b.u.t.ter-fat; and Mr.

Mendenhall, who had charge of the s.h.i.+res, proudly exhibited a string of mighty stallions, led by the mighty Mountain Lad, and a longer string of matrons, headed by the Fotherington Princess of the silver whinny.

Even old Alden Bessie, the Princess's dam, retired to but part-day's work, he sent for that they might render due honor to so notable a dam.

As four o'clock approached, Donald Ware, not keen on swimming, returned in one of the machines to the Big House, and Mr. Gulhuss remained to discuss s.h.i.+res with Mr. Mendenhall. d.i.c.k was at the tank when the party arrived, and the girls were immediately insistent for the new song.

"It isn't exactly a new song," d.i.c.k explained, his gray eyes twinkling roguery, "and it's not my song. It was sung in j.a.pan before I was born, and, I doubt not, before Columbus discovered America. Also, it is a duet--a compet.i.tive duet with forfeit penalties attached. Paula will have to sing it with me.--I'll teach you. Sit down there, that's right.--Now all the rest of you gather around and sit down."

Still in her riding habit, Paula sat down on the concrete, facing her husband, in the center of the sitting audience. Under his direction, timing her movements to his, she slapped her hands on her knees, slapped her palms together, and slapped her palms against his palms much in the fas.h.i.+on of the nursery game of "Bean Porridge Hot." Then he sang the song, which was short and which she quickly picked up, singing it with him and clapping the accent. While the air of it was orientally catchy, it was chanted slowly, almost monotonously, but it was quickly provocative of excitement to the spectators:

"_Jong-Keena, Jong-Keena, Jong-Jong, Keena-Keena, Yo-ko-ham-a, Nag-a-sak-i, Kobe-mar-o--hoy!!!_"

The last syllable, _hoy_, was uttered suddenly, explosively, and an octave and more higher than the pitch of the melody. At the same moment that it was uttered, Paula's and d.i.c.k's hands were abruptly shot toward each other's, either clenched or open. The point of the game was that Paula's hands, open or closed, at the instant of uttering hoy, should match d.i.c.k's. Thus, the first time, she did match him, both his and her hands being closed, whereupon he took off his hat and tossed it into Lute's lap.

"My forfeit," he explained. "Come on, Paul, again." And again they sang and clapped:

"_Jong-Keena, Jong-Keena, Jong-Jong, Keena-Keena, Yo-ko-ham-a, Nag-a-sak-i, Kobe-mar-o--hoy!!!_"

This time, with the _hoy_, her hands were closed and his were open.

"Forfeit!--forfeit!" the girls cried.

She looked her costume over with alarm, asking, "What can I give?"

"A hair pin," d.i.c.k advised; and one of her turtlesh.e.l.l hair pins joined his hat in Lute's lap.

"Bother it!" she exclaimed, when the last of her hair pins had gone the same way, she having failed seven times to d.i.c.k's once. "I can't see why I should be so slow and stupid. Besides, d.i.c.k, you're too clever. I never could out-guess you or out-antic.i.p.ate you."

Again they sang the song. She lost, and, to Mrs. Tully's shocked "Paula!" she forfeited a spur and threatened a boot when the remaining spur should be gone. A winning streak of three compelled d.i.c.k to give up his wrist watch and both spurs. Then she lost her wrist watch and the remaining spur.

"Jong-Keena, Jong-Keena," they began again, while Mrs. Tully remonstrated, "Now, Paula, you simply must stop this.--d.i.c.k, you ought to be ashamed of yourself."

But d.i.c.k, emitting a triumphant "_Hoy!_" won, and joined in the laughter as Paula took off one of her little champagne boots and added it to the heap in Lute's lap.

"It's all right, Aunt Martha," Paula a.s.sured Mrs. Tully. "Mr. Ware's not here, and he's the only one who would be shocked.--Come on, d.i.c.k.

You can't win every time."

"Jong-Keena, Jong-Keena," she chanted on with her husband. The repet.i.tion, at first slow, had accelerated steadily, so that now they fairly rippled through with it, while their slapping, striking palms made a continuous patter. The exercise and excitement had added to the sun's action on her skin, so that her laughing face was all a rosy glow.

Evan Graham, a silent spectator, was aware of hurt and indignity. He knew the "Jong-Keena" of old time from the geishas of the tea houses of Nippon, and, despite the unconventionality that ruled the Forrests and the Big House, he experienced shock in that Paula should take part in such a game. It did not enter his head at the moment that he would have been merely curious to see how far the madness would go had the player been Lute, or Ernestine, or Rita. Not till afterward did he realize that his concern and sense of outrage were due to the fact that the player was Paula, and that, therefore, she was bulking bigger in his imagination than he was conscious of. What he was conscious of at the moment was that he was growing angry and that he had deliberately to check himself from protesting.

By this time d.i.c.k's cigarette case and matches and Paula's second boot, belt, skirt-pin, and wedding ring had joined the mound of forfeits.

Mrs. Tully, her face set in stoic resignation, was silent.

"Jong-Keena, Jong-Keena," Paula laughed and sang on, and Graham heard Ernestine laugh to Bert, "I don't see what she can spare next."

"Well, you know her," he heard Bert answer. "She's game once she gets started, and it certainly looks like she's started."

"_Hoy_!" Paula and d.i.c.k cried simultaneously, as they thrust out their hands.

But d.i.c.k's were closed, and hers were open. Graham watched her vainly quest her person for the consequent forfeit.

"Come on, Lady G.o.diva," d.i.c.k commanded. "You hae sung, you hae danced; now pay the piper."

"Was the man a fool?" was Graham's thought. "And a man with a wife like that."

"Well," Paula sighed, her fingers playing with the fastenings of her blouse, "if I must, I must."

Raging inwardly, Graham averted his gaze, and kept it averted. There was a pause, in which he knew everybody must be hanging on what she would do next. Then came a giggle from Ernestine, a burst of laughter from all, and, "A frame-up!" from Bert, that overcame Graham's resoluteness. He looked quickly. The Little Lady's blouse was off, and, from the waist up, she appeared in her swimming suit. It was evident that she had dressed over it for the ride.

"Come on, Lute--you next," d.i.c.k was challenging.

But Lute, not similarly prepared for _Jong-Keena_, blus.h.i.+ngly led the retreat of the girls to the dressing rooms.

Graham watched Paula poise at the forty-foot top of the diving scaffold and swan-dive beautifully into the tank; heard Bert's admiring "Oh, you Annette Kellerman!" and, still chagrined by the trick that had threatened to outrage him, fell to wondering about the wonder woman, the Little Lady of the Big House, and how she had happened so wonderfully to be. As he fetched down the length of tank, under water, moving with leisurely strokes and with open eyes watching the shoaling bottom, it came to him that he did not know anything about her. She was d.i.c.k Forrest's wife. That was all he knew. How she had been born, how she had lived, how and where her past had been--of all this he knew nothing.

Ernestine had told him that Lute and she were half sisters of Paula.

That was one bit of data, at any rate. (Warned by the increasing brightness of the bottom that he had nearly reached the end of the tank, and recognizing d.i.c.k's and Bert's legs intertwined in what must be a wrestling bout, Graham turned about, still under water, and swam back a score or so of feet.) There was that Mrs. Tully whom Paula had addressed as Aunt Martha. Was she truly an aunt? Or was she a courtesy Aunt through sisterhood with the mother of Lute and Ernestine?

He broke surface, was hailed by the others to join in bull-in-the-ring; in which strenuous sport, for the next half hour, he was compelled more than once to marvel at the litheness and agility, as well as strategy, of Paula in her successful efforts at escaping through the ring.

Concluding the game through weariness, breathing hard, the entire party raced the length of the tank and crawled out to rest in the suns.h.i.+ne in a circle about Mrs. Tully.

Soon there was more fun afoot, and Paula was contending impossible things with Mrs. Tully.

"Now, Aunt Martha, just because you never learned to swim is no reason for you to take such a position. I am a real swimmer, and I tell you I can dive right into the tank here, and stay under for ten minutes."

"Nonsense, child," Mrs. Tully beamed. "Your father, when he was young, a great deal younger than you, my dear, could stay under water longer than any other man; and his record, as I know, was three minutes and forty seconds, as I very well know, for I held the watch myself and kept the time when he won against Harry Selby on a wager."

"Oh, I know my father was some man in his time," Paula swaggered; "but times have changed. If I had the old dear here right now, in all his youthful excellence, I'd drown him if he tried to stay under water with me. Ten minutes? Of course I can do ten minutes. And I will. You hold the watch, Aunt Martha, and time me. Why, it's as easy as--"

"Shooting fish in a bucket," d.i.c.k completed for her.

Paula climbed to the platform above the springboard.

"Time me when I'm in the air," she said.

"Make your turn and a half," d.i.c.k called.

She nodded, smiled, and simulated a prodigious effort at filling her lungs to their utmost capacity. Graham watched enchanted. A diver himself, he had rarely seen the turn and a half attempted by women other than professionals. Her wet suit of light blue and green silk clung closely to her, showing the lines of her justly proportioned body. With what appeared to be an agonized gulp for the last cubic inch of air her lungs could contain, she sprang up, out, and down, her body vertical and stiff, her legs straight, her feet close together as they impacted on the springboard end. Flung into the air by the board, she doubled her body into a ball, made a complete revolution, then straightened out in perfect diver's form, and in a perfect dive, with scarcely a ripple, entered the water.

"A Toledo blade would have made more splash," was Graham's verdict.