Affairs of State Part 2

"It sounds terribly involved, but I'll help you reason it out, dad, any time you like," said Susie, obligingly. "And you'll stay, won't you, dear?"

"Oh, I'll stay, since your heart's so set upon it. I'll try to bear up and find a diversion of some kind and not rust out any more than I can help. I might dig in the sand or make mud pies or play mumbly-peg. But I draw the line at plunging into that whirlpool across the street. My bed here is nearly as comfortable as the one at home, and the grub's first-rate."

"Very well, dad," agreed Susie, instantly seizing the concession, but speaking as though it were she who was making it, "we'll stay here, then. Only I _do_ wish there were a few more people," she added, with a sigh. "I hate to sit down in that big, empty dining-room. I imagine I'm at an Egyptian banquet, and that there are horrid, rattly skeletons sitting in all those high, covered chairs."

"What you need is some fresh air," said her father. "You girls get your hats and go for a walk. You're growing morbid. If you think of skeletons again, I'll give you a liver pill."

"Won't you come, dad?"

"No; you know you don't want me. Besides, I see the panjandrum who brings the mail coming up the d.y.k.e down yonder."

He stood gazing down the Digue until his womenkind reappeared, bedight, ready for the walk.

"You'll do," he said, looking them over critically. "In fact, my dears, if I wasn't afraid of making you conceited, I'd say I'd never seen two handsomer girls in my life."

"Now it's you who are blarneying, dad!" cried Susie, but she dimpled with pleasure nevertheless, and so did Nell.

"No I'm not," retorted Rushford; "and I dare say there are plenty of other men, even in this Dutch limbo, who have an eye for beauty; let them break their hearts, if they have any, but keep your own hearts whole, my dears."

They were laughing in earnest, now, as they looked up in his face, which had grown suddenly serious.

"Why, dad, what ails you?" questioned Sue. "I think it is you who need the pill!"

Rushford's face cleared; they were heart-whole thus far--there could be no doubt of that.

"Perhaps I do," he agreed. "Or perhaps it's only that I'm beginning to feel the responsibilities of my position."

"Your position?"

"As chaperon," he explained.

"Dear dad!" cried Susie, and squeezed his arm. "Do you suppose that as long as we have you, either of us will ever think of another man?"

"I don't know," said her father, dubiously. "I scarcely believe I'm so fascinating as all that. But I just wanted to remind you, girls, that there's plenty of nice boys at home--boys whom you can trust, through and through--boys who are clean, and honest, and worth loving. If you _must_ lose your hearts--and I suppose it's inevitable, some day--please do me the favour of choosing two of them. I'll sleep better at night and breathe easier by day!"

CHAPTER II

The Role of Good Angel

Rushford waved them good-bye from the door as they sallied forth into the bright sunlight, paused a moment to look after them admiringly, and then turned slowly back into the hotel, smiling softly to himself. He sauntered through the deserted vestibule, and its emptiness struck him as it had never done before.

"Really," he said to himself, "we seem to be the only patrons the house has got. I'll have to look over my bill."

He went on to the desk and demanded his letters of the boy in resplendent uniform who presided there.

"There are none, monsieur," answered that individual, blandly.

"What!" cried Rushford, his smile vanished in an instant. "Are you sure?"

The boy answered with a shrug and a significant gesture toward the letter-rack on the wall. It was visibly, incontestably empty.

Rushford turned away in disgust.

"Those fellows at the office are a.s.suming altogether too much responsibility," he muttered savagely, as he wandered on into the smoking-room. "I told them I didn't want to be bothered with little things, but I certainly expected to hear from them once in a while. If I don't look out, they'll reduce me to the status of a rubber stamp! I'll have to stir them up," and he gloomily extracted from the rack the newly-arrived, two-days-old London paper, brought by the little rickety train which struggled through at uncertain and infrequent intervals from Zunderburg to Weet-sur-Mer, lighted a fresh cigar, and sat down to a perusal of the news.

He proceeded in the most leisurely manner, for he knew that he had plenty of time. Indeed, the paper once finished, the remainder of the day would stretch before him an empty wilderness--a waste as monotonous and bare as the beach he had grown so weary of gazing at. So he gave careful and minute attention to every item. He was in the midst of a long and wholly uninteresting account of a charity bazaar, which the Princess of Wales had opened, and where the d.u.c.h.ess of Blank-Blank had made a tremendous. .h.i.t and much money for a worthy cause, by selling her kisses for a guinea each, when his attention was attracted by a discreet shuffling of feet on the floor beside his chair. He looked up to see standing there the little fat Alsatian-German-French proprietor of the hotel.

"Why, h.e.l.lo, Pelletan," he said. "Want to speak to me?"

"Eef monsieur please," and Pelletan rubbed his chubby hands together in visible embarra.s.sment.

"All right; sit down."

Monsieur Pelletan coughed deprecatingly and deposited his plump body on the extreme edge of a chair. It was easy to see that he was much depressed--his usually rosy cheeks hung flaccid, his mustachios drooped limply, his little black eyes were suffused and needed frequent wiping--a service performed by a hand that was none too steady.

"Eet iss a matter of pusiness, monsieur," he began, falteringly. "You haf perhaps perceive' t'at our custom ha.s.s fallen off."

Rushford glanced about the deserted smoking-room.

"No," he said; "I haven't seen any to fall off. I've been wondering how you managed to pay out."

"Ah, monsieur," cried Pelletan, wringing his hands, "t'at iss eet--I haf been paying out unt paying out until t'e las' franc iss gone. I wa.s.s at no time reech, monsieur; at t'is moment I am in ruins!"

And, indeed, he looked the part.

"You mean you'll have to shut up shop?" inquired Rushford.

"Eet preaks my heart to say eet, monsieur; but I fear eet will come to t'at, unless--"

"Unless what?" asked Rushford, eyeing him as he hesitated.

"Unless I shall pe able to interes' monsieur--"

Rushford grunted and stared out of the window at the dunes, puffing his cigar meditatively. He thought of the comfortable bed, of the admirable cuisine--he would hate to give them up. It would mean going to the other hotel, and the mere idea made him s.h.i.+ver. Anything but that!

His host watched him in an agony of apprehension.

"What does it cost a day to run this shebang?" asked the American at last.

Monsieur Pelletan, with feverish haste, produced a paper from his pocket.

"I haf antic.i.p.ate' monsieur's question; t'is statement will show heem."

Rushford took it and glanced at the total.