Thornton Hastings had proved a most treacherous knight and overthrown
his general's plans entirely. Arthur's letter had affected him
strangely, for he readily guessed how deeply wounded his sensitive
friend had been by Anna Ruthven's refusal, while added to this was a
fear lest Anna had been influenced by a thought of him and what might
possibly result from an acquaintance. Thornton Hastings had been
flattered and angled for until he had grown somewhat vain, and it did
not strike him as at all improbable that the unsophisticated Anna
should have designs upon him.
"But I won't give her a chance," he said, when he finished Arthur's
letter. "I thought once I might like her, but I shan't, and I'll be
revenged on her for refusing the best man that ever breathed. I'll go
to Newport instead of Saratoga, and so be clear of the entire Meredith
clique, the Hethertons, the little Harcourt, and all."
This, then, was the secret of his being there at the Ocean House. He
was keeping away from Anna Ruthven, who never had heard of him but
once, and that from Lucy Harcourt. After that scene in the Glen, where
Anna had exclaimed against intriguing mothers and their bold,
shameless daughters, Mrs. Meredith had been too wise a maneuverer to
mention Thornton Hastings, so that Anna was wholly ignorant of his
presence at Newport, and looked up in unfeigned surprise at the tall,
elegant man whom her aunt presented as Mr. Hastings. With all
Thornton's affected indifference, there was still a curiosity to see
the girl who could say "no" to Arthur Leighton, and he had not waited
long after receiving Mrs. Meredith's card before going down to find
her.
"That's the girl, I'll lay a wager," he thought of a high-colored,
showily-dressed hoyden, who was whirling around the room with Ned
Peters, from Boston, and whose corn-colored dress swept against his
boots as he entered the parlor.
How, then, was he disappointed in the apparition Mrs. Meredith
presented as "my niece," the modest, self-possessed young girl, whose
cheeks grew not a whit redder, and whose pulse did not quicken at the
sight of him, though a gleam of something like curiosity shone in the
brown eyes which scanned him so quietly. She was thinking of Lucy, and
her injunction "not to speak to the hateful if she saw him;" but she
did speak to him, and Mrs. Meredith fanned herself complacently as she
saw how fast they became acquainted.
"You do not dance," Mr. Hastings said, as she declined an invitation
from Ned Peters, whom she had met at Saratoga. "I am glad, for now you
will, perhaps, walk with me outside upon the piazza. You won't take
cold, I think," and he glanced thoughtfully at the white neck and
shoulders gleaming beneath the gauzy muslin.
Mrs. Meredith was in rhapsodies and sat a full hour with the tiresome
dowagers around her, while up and down the broad piazza Thornton
Hastings walked with Anna, talking to her as he seldom talked to
women, and feeling greatly surprised to find that what he said was
fully appreciated and understood. That he was pleased with her he
could not deny himself, as he sat alone in his room that night,
feeling more and more how keenly Arthur Leighton must have felt at her
refusal.