Well, it ended by Jim's graciously permitting Bella to remain--there
being nothing else to do--and by his magnanimously agreeing to keep her
real identity from Aunt Selina and Mr. Harbison, and to break the news
of her presence to Anne and the rest. It created a sensation beside
which Anne's pearls faded away, although they came to the front again
soon enough.
Jim broke the news at once, gathering everybody but Harbison and Aunt
Selina in the upper hall. He was palpitatingly nervous, but he tried to
carry it off with a high hand.
"It's unfortunate," he said, looking around the circle of faces, each
one frozen with amazement, and just a suspicion, perhaps of incredulity.
"It's particularly unfortunate for her. You all know how high-strung
she is, and if the papers should get hold of it--well, we'll all have to
make it as easy as we can for her."
With Jim's eyes on them, they all swallowed the butler story without a
gulp. But Anne was indignant.
"It's like Bella," she snapped. "Well, she has made her bed and she can
lie on it. I'm sure I shan't make it for her. But if you want to know my
opinion, Mr. Harbison may be a fool, but you can't ram two Bellas, both
NEE Knowles, down Miss Caruthers' throat with a stick."
We had not thought of that before and every one looked blank. Finally,
however, Jim said Bella's middle name was Constantia, and we decided to
call her that. But it turned out afterward that nobody could remember
it in a hurry, and generally when we wanted to attract her attention, we
walked across the room and touched her on the shoulder. It was quicker
and safer.
The name decided, we went downstairs in a line to welcome Bella, to try
to make her feel at home, and to forget her deplorable situation. Leila
had worked herself into a really sympathetic frame of mind.
"Poor dear," she said, on the way down. "Now don't grin, anybody, just
be cordial and glad to see her. I hope she doesn't cry; you know the
spells she takes."
We stopped outside the door, and everybody tried to look cheerful and
sympathetic, and not grinny--which was as hard as looking as if we had
had a cup of tea--and then Jim threw the door open and we filed in.
Bella was comfortably reading by the fire. She had her feet up on a
stool and a pillow behind her head. She did not even look at us for a
minute; then she merely glanced up as she turned a page.
"Dear me," she said mockingly, "what a lot of frumps you all are! I had
hoped it was some one with my breakfast."
Then she went on reading. As Leila said afterward, that kind of person
OUGHT to be divorced.