In The Bishop’s Carriage(在主教的马车里)

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IN THE BISHOP'S CARRIAGE

IN THE BISHOP'S

CARRIAGE

MIRIAM MICHELSON

IN THE BISHOP'S CARRIAGE

When the thing was at its hottest, I bolted. Tom, like the darling he

is--(Yes, you are, old fellow, you're as precious to me as--as you are to the

police--if they could only get their hands on you)--well, Tom drew off the

crowd, having passed the old gentleman's watch to me, and I made for the

women's rooms.

The station was crowded, as it always is in the afternoon, and in a

minute I was strolling into the big, square room, saying slowly to myself

to keep me steady:

"Nancy, you're a college girl--just in from Bryn Mawr to meet your

papa. Just see if your hat's on straight."

I did, going up to the big glass and looking beyond my excited face to

the room behind me. There sat the woman who can never nurse her baby

except where everybody can see her, in a railroad station. There was the

woman who's always hungry, nibbling chocolates out of a box; and the

woman fallen asleep, with her hat on the side, and hairpins dropping out of

her hair; and the woman who's beside herself with fear that she'll miss her

train; and the woman who is taking notes about the other women's rigs.

And--

And I didn't like the look of that man with the cap who opened the

swinging door a bit and peeped in. The women's waiting-room is no

place for a man--nor for a girl who's got somebody else's watch inside her

waist. Luckily, my back was toward him, but just as the door swung

back he might have caught the reflection of my face in a mirror hanging

opposite to the big one.

I retreated, going to an inner room where the ladies were having the

maid brush their gowns, soiled from suburban travel and the dirty station.

The deuce is in it the way women stare. I took off my hat and jacket

for a reason to stay there, and hung them up as leisurely as I could.

"Nance," I said under my breath, to the alert-eyed, pug-nosed girl in

the mirror, who gave a quick glance about the room as I bent to wash my

hands, "women stare 'cause they're women. There's no meaning in their

look. If they were men, now, you might twitter."

IN THE BISHOP'S CARRIAGE

I smoothed my hair and reached out my hand to get my hat and jacket

when--when--

Oh, it was long; long enough to cover you from your chin to your

heels! It was a dark, warm red, and it had a high collar of chinchilla that

was fairly scrumptious. And just above it the hat hung, a red-cloth toque

caught up on the side with some of the same fur.

The black maid misunderstood my involuntary gesture. I had all my

best duds on, and when a lot of women stare it makes the woman they

stare at peacock naturally, and--and--well, ask Tom what he thinks of my

style when I'm on parade. At any rate, it was the maid's fault. She took

down the coat and hat and held them for me as though they were mine.

What could I do, 'cept just slip into the silk-lined beauty and set the toque

on my head? The fool girl that owned them was having another maid

mend a tear in her skirt, over in the corner; the little place was crowded.

Anyway, I had both the coat and hat on and was out into the big anteroom

in a jiffy.

What nearly wrecked me was the cut of that coat. It positively made

me shiver with pleasure when I passed and saw myself in that long mirror.

My, but I was great! The hang of that coat, the long, incurving sweep in

the back, and the high fur collar up to one's nose--even if it is a turned-up

nose--oh!

I stayed and looked a second too long, for just as I was pulling the

flaring hat a bit over my face, the doors swung, as an old lady came in,

and there behind her was that same curious man's face with the cap above

it.

Trapped? Me? Not much! I didn't wait a minute, but threw the

doors open with a gesture that might have belonged to the Queen of Spain.

I almost ran into his arms. He gave an exclamation. I looked him straight

in the eyes, as I hooked the collar close to my throat, and swept past him.

He weakened. That coat was too jolly much for him. It was for me,

too. As I ran down the stairs, its influence so worked on me that I didn't

know just which Vanderbilt I was.

I got out on the sidewalk all right, and was just about to take a car

when the turnstile swung round, and there was that same man with the cap.

IN THE BISHOP'S CARRIAGE

His face was a funny mixture of doubt and determination. But it meant

the Correction for me.

"Nance Olden, it's over," I said to myself.

But it wasn't. For it was then that I caught sight of the carriage. It

was a fat, low, comfortable, elegant, sober carriage, wide and well-kept,

with rubber-tired wheels. And the two heavy horses were fat and elegant

and sober, too, and wide and well-kept. I didn't know it was the Bishop's

then--I didn't care whose it was. It was empty, and it was mine. I'd

rather go to the Correction--being too young to get to the place you're

bound for, Tom Dorgan--in it than in the patrol wagon. At any rate, it

was all the chance I had.

I slipped in, closing the door sharply behind me. The man on the

box--he was wide and well-kept, too--was tired waiting, I suppose, for he

continued to doze gently, his high coachman's collar up over his ears. I

cursed that collar, which had prevented his hearing the door close, for then

he might have driven off.

But it was great inside: soft and warm, the cushions of dark plum, the

seat wide and roomy, a church paper, some notes for the Bishop's next

sermon and a copy of Quo Vadis. I just snuggled down, trust me. I

leaned far back and lay low. When I did peek out the window, I saw the

man with the brass buttons and the cap turning to go inside again.

Victory! He had lost the scent. Who would look for Nancy Olden

in the Bishop's carriage?

Now, you know how early I got up yesterday to catch the train so's

Tom and I could come in with the people and be naturally mingling with

them? And you remember the dance the night before? I hadn't had more

than three hours' sleep, and the snug warmth of that coach was just nuts to

me, after the freezing ride into town. I didn't dare get out for fear of

some other man in a cap and buttons somewhere on the lookout. I knew

they couldn't be on to my hiding-place or they'd have nabbed me before

this. After a bit I didn't want to get out, I was so warm and comfortable--

and elegant. O Tom, you should have seen your Nance in that coat and in

the Bishop's carriage!

First thing I knew, I was dreaming you and I were being married, and

IN THE BISHOP'S CARRIAGE

you had brass buttons all over you, and I had the cloak all right, but it was

a wedding-dress, and the chinchilla was a wormy sort of orange blossoms,

and--and I waked when the handle of the door turned and the Bishop got

in.

Asleep? That's what! I'd actually been asleep.

And what did I do now?

That's easy--fell asleep again. There wasn't anything else to do. Not

really asleep this time, you know; just, just asleep enough to be wide

awake to any chance there was in it.

The horses had started, and the carriage was half-way across the street

before the Bishop noticed me.

He was a little Bishop, not big and fat and well-kept like the rig, but

short and lean, with a little white beard and the softest eye--and the softest

heart--and the softest head. Just listen.

"Lord bless me!" he exclaimed, hurriedly putting on his spectacles,

and looking about bewildered.

I was slumbering sweetly in the corner, but I could see between my

lashes that he thought he'd jumped into somebody else's carriage.

The sight of his book and his papers comforted him, though, and

before he could make a resolution, I let the jolting of the carriage, as it

crossed the car-track, throw me gently against him.

"Daddy," I murmured sleepily, letting my head rest on his little, prim

shoulder.

That comforted him, too. Hush your laughing, Tom Dorgan; I mean

calling him "daddy" seemed to kind of take the cuss off the situation.

"My child," he began very gently.

"Oh, daddy," I exclaimed, snuggling down close to him, "you kept me

waiting so long I went to sleep. I thought you'd never come."

He put his arm about my shoulders in a fatherly way. You know, I

found out later the Bishop never had had a daughter. I guess he thought

he had one now. Such a simple, dear old soul! Just the same, Tom

Dorgan, if he had been my father, I'd never be doing stunts with tipsy

men's watches for you; nor if I'd had any father. Now, don't get mad.

Think of the Bishop with his gentle, thin old arm about my shoulders,

IN THE BISHOP'S CARRIAGE

holding me for just a second as though I was his daughter! My, think of

it! And me, Nance Olden, with that fat man's watch in my waist and

some girl's beautiful long coat and hat on, all covered with chinchilla!

"There's some mistake, my little girl," he said, shaking me gently to

wake me up, for I was going to sleep again, he feared.

"Oh, I knew you were kept at the office," I interrupted quickly. I

preferred to be farther from the station with that girl's red coat before I got

out. "We've missed our train, anyway, haven't we? After this, daddy

dear, let's not take this route. If we'd go straight through on the one road,

we wouldn't have this drive across town every time. I was wondering,

before I fell asleep, what in the world I'd do in this big city if you didn't

come."

He forgot to withdraw his arm, so occupied was he by my

predicament.

"What would you do, my child, if you had--had missed your--your

father?"

Wasn't it clumsy of him? He wanted to break it to me gently, and this

was the best he could do.

"What would I do?" I gasped indignantly. "Why, daddy, imagine me

alone, and--and without money! Why--why, how can you--"

"There! there!" he said, patting me soothingly on the shoulder.

That baby of a Bishop! The very thought of Nancy Olden out alone

in the streets was too much for him.

He had put his free hand into his pocket and had just taken out a bill

and was trying to plan a way to offer it to me and reveal the fact to poor,

modest little Nance Olden that he was not her own daddy, when an awful

thing happened.

We had got up street as far as the opera-house, when we were caught

in the jam of carriages in front; the last afternoon opera of the season was

just over. I was so busy thinking what would be my next move that I

didn't notice much outside--and I didn't want to move, Tom, not a bit.

Playing the Bishop's daughter in a trailing coat of red, trimmed with

chinchilla, is just your Nancy's graft. But the dear little Bishop gave a

jump that almost knocked the roof off the carriage, pulled his arm from

IN THE BISHOP'S CARRIAGE

behind me and dropped the ten-dollar bill he held as though it burned him.

It fell in my lap. I jammed it into my coat pocket. Where is it now?

Just you wait, Tom Dorgan, and you'll find out.

I followed the Bishop's eyes. His face was scarlet now. Right next

to our carriage--mine and the Bishop's--there was another; not quite so fat

and heavy and big, but smart, I tell you, with the silver harness jangling

and the horses arching their backs under their blue-cloth jackets

monogrammed in leather. All the same, I couldn't see anything to cause a

loving father to let go his onliest daughter in such a hurry, till the old lady

inside bent forward again and gave us another look.

Her face told it then. It was a big, smooth face, with accordion-

plaited chins. Her hair was white and her nose was curved, and the

pearls in her big ears brought out every ugly spot on her face. Her lips

were thin, and her neck, hung with diamonds, looked like a bed with

bolsters and pillows piled high, and her eyes--oh, Tom, her eyes! They

were little and very gray, and they bored their way straight through the

windows--hers and ours--and hit the Bishop plumb in the face.

My, if I could only have laughed! The Bishop, the dear, prim little

Bishop in his own carriage, with his arm about a young woman in red and

chinchilla, offering her a bank-note, and Mrs. Dowager Diamonds, her

eyes popping out of her head at the sight, and she one of the lady pillars of

his church--oh, Tom! it took all of this to make that poor innocent next

to me realize how he looked in her eyes.

But you see it was over in a minute. The carriage wheels were

unlocked, and the blue coupe went whirling away, and we in the plum-

cushioned carriage followed slowly.

I decided that I'd had enough. Now and here in the middle of all

these carriages was a bully good time and place for me to get away. I

turned to the Bishop. He was blushing like a boy. I blushed, too. Yes, I

did, Tom Dorgan, but it was because I was bursting with laughter.

"Oh, dear!" I exclaimed in sudden dismay. "You're not my father."

"No--no, my dear, I--I'm not," he stammered, his face purple now with

embarrassment. "I was just trying to tell you, you poor little girl, of your

mistake and planning a way to help you, when--"

IN THE BISHOP'S CARRIAGE

He made a gesture of despair toward the side where the coupe had

been.

I covered my face with my hands, and shrinking over into the corner, I

cried:

"Let me out! let me out! You're not my father. Oh, let me out!"

"Why, certainly, child. But I'm old enough, surely, to be, and I wish--

I wish I were."

"You do!"

The dignity and tenderness and courtesy in his voice sort of sobered

me. But all at once I remembered the face of Mrs. Dowager Diamonds,

and I understood.

"Oh, because of her," I said, smiling and pointing to the side where the

coupe had been.

My, but it was a rotten bad move! I ought to have been strapped for

it. Oh, Tom, Tom, it takes more'n a red coat with chinchilla to make a

black-hearted thing like me into the girl he thought I was.

He stiffened and sat up like a prim little school-boy, his soft eyes hurt

like a dog's that's been wounded.

I won't tell you what I did then. No, I won't. And you won't

understand, but just that minute I cared more for what he thought of me

than whether I got to the Correction or anywhere else.

It made us friends in a minute, and when he stopped the carriage to let

me out, my hand was still in his. But I wouldn't go. I'd made up my

mind to see him out of his part of the scrape, and first thing you know we

were driving up toward the Square, if you please, to Mrs. Dowager

Diamonds' house.

He thought it was his scheme, the poor lamb, to put me in her charge

till my lost daddy could send for me. He'd no more idea that I was

steering him toward her, that he was doing the only thing possible, the

only square thing by his reputation, than he had that Nance Olden had

been raised by the Cruelty, and then flung herself away on the first

handsome Irish boy she met.

That'll do, Tom.

Girls, if you could have seen Mrs. Dowager Diamonds' face when she

IN THE BISHOP'S CARRIAGE

came down the stairs, the Bishop's card in her hand, and into the gorgeous

parlor, it'd have been as good as a front seat at the show.

She was mad, and she was curious, and she was amazed, and she was

disarmed; for the very nerve of his bringing me to her staggered her so that

she could hardly believe she'd seen what she had.

"My dear Mrs. Ramsay," he began, confused a bit by his remembrance

of how her face had looked fifteen minutes before, "I bring to you an

unfortunate child, who mistook my carriage for her father's this afternoon

at the station. She is a college girl, a stranger in town, and till her father

claims her--"

Oh, the baby! the baby! She was stiffening like a rod before his

very eyes. How did his words explain his having his arm round the

unfortunate child? His conscience was so clean that the dear little man

actually overlooked the fact that it wasn't my presence in the carriage, but

his conduct there that had excited Mrs. Dowager Diamonds.

And didn't the story sound thin? I tell you, Tom, when it comes to

lying to a woman you've got to think up something stronger than it takes

to make a man believe in you--if you happen to be female yourself.

I didn't wait for him to finish, but waltzed right in. I danced straight

up to that side of beef with the diamonds still on it, and flinging my arms

about her, turned a coy eye on the Bishop.

"You said your wife was out of town, daddy," I cried gaily. "Have you

got another wife besides mummy?"

The poor Bishop! Do you think he tumbled? Not a bit--not a bit.

He sat there gasping like a fish, and Mrs. Dowager Diamonds, surprised

by my sudden attack, stood bolt upright, about as pleasant to hug as--as

you are, Tom, when you're jealous.

The trouble with the Bishop's set is that it's deadly slow. Now, if I

had really been the Bishop's daughter--all right, I'll go on.

"Oh, mummy," I went on quickly. You know how I said it, Tom--the

way I told you after that last row that Dan Christensen wasn't near so

good-looking as you--remember? "Oh, mummy, you don't know how

good it feels to get home. Out there at that awful college, studying and

studying and studying, sometimes I thought I'd lose my senses. There's a

IN THE BISHOP'S CARRIAGE

girl out there now suffering from nervous prostration. She worked so

hard preparing for the mid-years. What's her name? I can't think--I

can't think, my head's so tired. But it sounds like mine, a lot like mine.

Once--I think it was yesterday--I thought it was mine, and I made up my

mind suddenly to come right home and bring it with me. But it can't be

mine, can it? It can't be my name she's got. It can't be, mummy, say it

can't, say it can't!"

Tom, I ought to have gone on the stage. I'll go yet, when you're sent

up some day. Yes, I will. You'll be where you can't stop me.

I couldn't see the Bishop, but the Dowager--oh, I'd got her. Not so

bad an old body, either, if you only take her the right way. First, she was

suspicious, and then she was scared. And then, bit by bit, the stiffness

melted out of her, her arms came up about me, and there I was, lying all

comfy, with the diamonds on her neck boring rosettes in my cheeks, and

she a-sniffling over me and patting me and telling me not to get excited,

that it was all right, and now I was home mummy would take care of me,

she would, that she would.

She did. She got me on to a lounge, soft as--as marshmallows, and

she piled one silk pillow after another behind my back.

"Come, dear, let me help you off with your coat," she cooed, bending

over me.

"Oh, mummy, it's so cold! Can't I please keep it on?"

To let that coat off me was to give the whole thing away. My rig

underneath, though good enough for your girl, Tom, on a holiday, wasn't

just what they wear in the Square. And, d'ye know, you'll say it's silly,

but I had a conviction that with that coat I should say good-by to the nerve

I'd had since I got into the Bishop's carriage,--and from there into society.

I let her take the hat, though, and I could see by the way she handled it that

it was all right--the thing; her kind, you know. Oh, the girl I got it from

had good taste, all right.

I closed my eyes for a moment as I lay there and she stood stroking my

hair. She must have thought I'd fallen asleep, for she turned to the

Bishop, and holding out her hand, she said softly:

"My dear, dear Bishop, you are the best-hearted, the saintliest man on

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摘要：

INTHEBISHOP'SCARRIAGEINTHEBISHOP'SCARRIAGEMIRIAMMICHELSONINTHEBISHOP'SCARRIAGEI.Whenthethingwasatitshottest,Ibolted.Tom,likethedarlingheis--(Yes,youare,oldfellow,you'reasprecioustomeas--asyouaretothepolice--iftheycouldonlygettheirhandsonyou)--well,Tomdrewoffthecrowd,havingpassedtheoldgentleman'swatc...

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