FullReads

“Well, I am discovered–and lost.” Julie, lazily making the announcement after a long silence, shut her magazine with a sigh of sleepy content; and braced herself more comfortably against the old rowboat that was half buried in sand at her back. She turned as she spoke to smile at the woman near her, a frail, keen-faced little woman luxuriously settled in an invalid’s wheeled chair.

“Ann–you know you’re not interested in that book. Did you hear what I said? I’m discovered.”

“Well, it was sure to happen, sooner or later, I suppose.” Mrs. Arbuthnot, suddenly summoned from the pages of a novel brought her gaze promptly to the younger woman’s face, with the pitifully alert interest of the invalid. “You were bound to be recognized by some one, Ju!”

“Don’t worry, a cannon wouldn’t wake him!” said Julia, in reference to Mrs. Arbuthnot’s lowered voice, and the solicitous look the wife had given a great opened beach umbrella three feet away, under which Dr. Arbuthnot slumbered on the warm sands. “He’s forty fathoms deep. No,” continued the actress, returning aggrievedly to her own affairs, “I suppose there’s no such thing as escaping recognition–even as late in the season as this, and at such an out-of-the-way place. Of course, I knew,” she continued crossly, “that various people here had placed me, but I did rather hope to escape actual introductions!”

“Who is it–some one you know?” Mrs. Arbuthnot adjusted the pillow at her back, and settled herself enjoyably for a talk.

“Indirectly; it’s that little butterfly of a summer girl–the one Jim calls ‘The Dancing Girl’–of all people in the world!” said Julie, locking her arms comfortably behind her head. “You know how she’s been haunting me, Ann? She’s been simply DETERMINED upon an introduction ever since she placed me as her adored Miss Ives of matinee fame. I imagine she’s rather a nice child–every evidence of money–the ambitious type that longs to do something big–and is given to desperate hero worship. She’s been under my feet for a week, with a Faithful Tray expression that drives me crazy. I’ve taken great pains not to see her.”

“And now–?” prompted the other, as the actress fell silent, and sat staring dreamily at the brilliant sweep of beach and sea before them.

“Oh–now,” Miss Ives took up her narrative briskly. “Well, a new young man arrived on the afternoon boat and, of course, the Dancing Girl instantly captivated him. She has one simple yet direct method with them all,” she interrupted herself to digress a little. “She gets one of her earlier victims to introduce him; they all go down for a swim, she fascinates him with her daring and her bobbing red cap, she returns to white linen and leads him down to play tennis–they have tea at the ‘Casino,’ and she promises him the second two-step and the first extra that evening. He is then hers to command,” concluded Julie, bringing her amused eyes back to Mrs. Arbuthnot’s face, “for the remainder of his stay!”

“That’s exactly what she DOES do,” said Mrs. Arbuthnot, laughing, “but I don’t see yet–“

“Oh, I forgot to say,” Miss Ives amended hastily, “that to-day’s young man happens to be an acquaintance of mine; at least his uncle introduced him to me at a tea last winter. She led him by to the tennis courts an hour ago, and, to my disgust, I recognized him. That’s all Miss Dancing Girl wants. Now–you’ll see! They’ll come up to our table in the dining-room to-night, and to-morrow she’ll bring up a group of dear friends and he’ll bring up another–to be introduced; and–there we’ll be!”

“Oh, not so bad as that, Julie!”

“Oh, yes, indeed, Ann!” pursued Miss Ives with morose enjoyment. “You don’t know how helpless one is. I’ll be annoyed to death for the rest of the month, just so that the Dancing Girl can go back to the city this winter and say, ‘Oh, girls, Julia Ives was staying where mamma and I were this summer, and she’s just a DEAR! She doesn’t make up one bit off the stage, and she dresses just as PLAIN! I saw her every day and got some dandy snapshots. She’s just a darling when you know her.'”