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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Quin, by Alice Hegan Rice
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Quin
+
+Author: Alice Hegan Rice
+
+Release Date: December 5, 2006 [EBook #20033]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK QUIN ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by David Garcia and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was
+produced from images generously made available by The
+Kentuckiana Digital Library)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+    [Illustration: "If you don't leave the room instantly, I will!"]
+
+
+
+                               Q U I N
+
+
+
+                                 BY
+
+                           ALICE HEGAN RICE
+
+
+             Author of "Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch,"
+             "Lovey Mary," "Sandy," "Calvary Alley," etc.
+
+
+
+                               NEW YORK
+                            THE CENTURY CO.
+                                 1921
+
+
+
+                         Copyright, 1921, by
+                           THE CENTURY CO.
+
+                         PRINTED IN U. S. A.
+
+
+
+                        TO MY MERRIEST FRIEND
+
+                         JOSEPHINE F. HAMILL
+
+
+
+
+                         Transcriber's Note:
+
+         The Table of Contents was not in the original text and
+           has been created for the convenience of the reader.
+
+
+
+                               CONTENTS
+
+                CHAPTER  1                    CHAPTER 18
+                CHAPTER  2                    CHAPTER 19
+                CHAPTER  3                    CHAPTER 20
+                CHAPTER  4                    CHAPTER 21
+                CHAPTER  5                    CHAPTER 22
+                CHAPTER  6                    CHAPTER 23
+                CHAPTER  7                    CHAPTER 24
+                CHAPTER  8                    CHAPTER 25
+                CHAPTER  9                    CHAPTER 26
+                CHAPTER 10                    CHAPTER 27
+                CHAPTER 11                    CHAPTER 28
+                CHAPTER 12                    CHAPTER 29
+                CHAPTER 13                    CHAPTER 30
+                CHAPTER 14                    CHAPTER 31
+                CHAPTER 15                    CHAPTER 32
+                CHAPTER 16                    CHAPTER 33
+                CHAPTER 17
+
+
+
+
+                               Q U I N
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 1
+
+
+If the dollar Quinby Graham tossed up on New Year's eve had not elected
+to slip through his fingers and roll down the sewer grating, there might
+have been no story to write. Quin had said, "Tails, yes"; and who knows
+but that down there under the pavement that coin of fate was registering
+"Heads, no"? It was useless to suggest trying it over, however, for
+neither of the young privates with town leave for twenty-four hours
+possessed another coin.
+
+The heavier of the two boys, Cass Martel,--the lame one, whose nose began
+quite seriously, as if it had every intention of being a nose, then
+changed abruptly into a button,--scraped the snow from the sewer grating
+with his cane, and swore savagely under his breath. But Quin shrugged his
+shoulders with a slow, easy-going laugh.
+
+"That settles it," he said triumphantly. "We got to go to the Hawaiian
+Garden now, because it's the only place that's free!"
+
+"I'll be hanged if I know what you want to go to a dance for," argued his
+companion fiercely. "Here you been on your back for six months, and your
+legs so shaky they won't hardly hold you. Don't you know you can't
+dance?"
+
+"Sure," agreed Quin amicably. "I don't mean to dance. But I got to go
+where I can see some girls. I'm dead sick of men. Come on in. We don't
+need to stay but a little while."
+
+"That's too long for me," said Cass. "If you weren't such a bonehead for
+doing what you start out to do, we could do something interesting."
+
+One might have thought they were Siamese twins, from the way in which
+Cass ignored the possibility of each going his own way. He glared at his
+tall companion with a mingled expression of rage and dog-like devotion.
+
+"Cut it out, Cass," said Quin at last, putting an end to an argument that
+had been in progress for fifteen minutes. "I'm going to that dance, and
+I'm going to make love to the first girl that looks at me. I'll meet you
+wherever you say at six o'clock."
+
+Cass, seeing that further persuasion was useless, reluctantly consented.
+
+"Well, you take care of yourself, and don't forget you are going home
+with me for the night," he warned.
+
+"Where else could I go? Haven't got a red cent, and I wouldn't go back
+out to the hospital if I had to bunk on the curbstone! So long, _chérie_!"
+
+Sergeant Quinby Graham, having thus carried his point, adjusted his
+overseas cap at a more acute angle, turned back his coat to show his
+distinguished-conduct medal, and went blithely up the steps to the
+dance-hall. He was tall and outrageously thin, and pale with the pallor
+that comes from long confinement. His hands and feet seemed too big for
+the rest of him, and his blond hair stuck up in a bristly mop above his
+high forehead. But Sergeant Graham walked with the buoyant tread of one
+who has a good opinion not only of himself but of mankind in general.
+
+The only thing that disturbed his mind was the fact that, swagger as he
+would, his shoulders, usually so square and trim, refused to fill out his
+uniform. It was the first time he had had it on for six months, his
+wardrobe having been limited to pajamas and bath-robes during his
+convalescence in various hospitals at home and abroad.
+
+Two years before, when he had left a lumber camp in Maine to answer
+America's first call for volunteers to France, his personal appearance
+had concerned him not in the least. But the army had changed that, as it
+had changed most things for Quin.
+
+He checked his overcoat at the hall entrance, stepped eagerly up to the
+railing that divided the spectators from the dancers, and drew a deep
+breath of satisfaction. Here, at last, was something different from the
+everlasting hospital barracks: glowing lights, holiday decorations, the
+scent of flowers instead of the stale fumes of ether and disinfectants;
+soul-stirring music in place of the wheezy old phonograph grinding out
+the same old tunes; and, above all, girls, hundreds of them, circling in
+a bewildering rainbow of loveliness before him.
+
+Was it any wonder that Quin's foot began to twitch, and that, in spite of
+repeated warnings at the hospital, a blind desire seized him to dance? At
+the mere thought his heart gained a beat--that unruly heart, which had
+caused so much trouble. It had never been right since that August day in
+the Sevzevais sector, when, to quote his citation, he "had shown great
+initiative in assuming command when his officer was disabled, and, with
+total disregard for his personal safety, had held his machine-gun against
+almost impossible odds." In the accomplishment of this feat he had been
+so badly gassed and wounded that his career as a soldier was definitely,
+if gloriously, ended.
+
+The long discipline of pain to which he had been subjected had not,
+however, conquered Quin's buoyancy. He was still tremendously vital, and
+when he wanted anything he wanted it inordinately and immediately. Just
+now, when every muscle in him was keeping time to that soul-disturbing
+music, he heard his own imperative desire voiced at his elbow:
+
+"I don't want to go home. I want to dance. Nobody will notice us. Just
+one round, Captain Phipps."
+
+The voice was young and singularly vibrant, and the demand in it was
+quite as insistent as the demand that was clamoring in Quin's own
+khaki-covered breast.
+
+He craned his neck to see the speaker; but she was hidden by her escort,
+in whose supercilious profile he recognized one of the officers in charge
+of his ward at the hospital.
+
+"You foolish child!" the officer was saying, fingering his diminutive
+mustache and viewing the scene with a somewhat contemptuous smile. "You
+said if I would bring you in for a moment you wouldn't ask to stay."
+
+"I know, but I always break my promises," said the coaxing voice; "and
+besides I'm simply crazy to dance."
+
+"You surely don't imagine that I would get out on the floor with all this
+hoi-poloi?"
+
+Quin saw a pair of small gloved hands grasp the railing resolutely, and
+he was straightway filled with indignation that any man, of whatever
+rank, should stand back on his dignity when a voice like that asked a
+favor. A similar idea had evidently occurred to the young lady, for she
+said with some spirit:
+
+"The only difference I can see between these boys and you is that they
+are privates who got over, and you are an officer who didn't."
+
+Quin could not hear the answer, but as the officer shifted his position
+he caught his first glimpse of the girl. She was very young and obviously
+imperious, with white skin and coal-black hair and the most utterly
+destructive brown eyes he had ever encountered. Discretion should have
+prompted him to seek immediate safety out of the firing-line, but instead
+he put himself in the most exposed position possible and waited results.
+
+They arrived on schedule time.
+
+"Captain Phipps!" called a page. "Wanted on the telephone."
+
+"Will you wait for me here just a second?" asked the officer.
+
+"I don't know whether I will or not," was the spirited answer; "I may go
+home."
+
+"Then I'll follow you," said the Captain as he pushed his way through the
+crowd to the telephone-booth.
+
+It was just at this moment, when the jazz band was breaking into its most
+beguiling number, that Quin's eyes and the girl's eyes met in a glance of
+mutual desire. History repeated itself. Once again, "with total disregard
+for his personal safety, Sergeant Graham assumed command when his officer
+was disabled," and rashly flung himself into the breach.
+
+"Will you dance it with me?" he asked eagerly, and he blushed to the
+roots of his stubbly hair.
+
+There was an ominous pause, during which the young girl stood irresolute,
+while Mrs. Grundy evidently whispered "Don't" in one ear and instinct
+whispered "Do" in the other. It lasted but a second, for the next thing
+Quin knew, a small gloved hand was slipped into his, a blue plume was
+tickling his nose, and he was gliding a bit unsteadily into Paradise.
+
+What his heart might do after that dance was of absolutely no consequence
+to him. It could beat fast or slow, or even stop altogether, if it would
+only hold out as long as the music did. Round and round among the dancers
+he guided his dainty partner, carefully avoiding the entrance end of the
+hall, and devoutly praying that his clumsy army shoes might not crush
+those little high-heeled brown pumps tripping so deftly in and out
+between them. He was not used to dancing with officers' girls, and he
+held the small gray-gloved hand in his big fist as if it were a bird
+about to take flight.
+
+Next to the return of the Captain, he dreaded that other dancers, seeing
+his prize, would try to capture her; but there was a certain tempered
+disdain in the poise of his little partner's head, an ability to put up a
+quick and effective defense against intrusion, that protected him as
+well.
+
+Neither of them spoke until the music stopped, and then they stood
+applauding vociferously, with the rest, for an encore.
+
+"I ought to go," said the Radiant Presence, with a guilty glance upward
+from under long eyelashes. "You don't see a very cross-looking Captain
+charging around near the door, do you?"
+
+"No," said Quin, without turning his head, "I don't see him"--and he
+smiled as he said it.
+
+Now, Quin's smile was his chief asset in the way of looks. It was a
+leisurely smile, that began far below the surface and sent preliminary
+ripples up to his eyes and the corners of his big mouth, and broke
+through at last in a radiant flash of good humor. In this case it met a
+very prompt answer under the big hat.
+
+"You see, I'm not supposed to be dancing," she explained rather
+condescendingly.
+
+"Nor me, either," said Quin, breathing heavily.
+
+Then the band decided to be accommodating, and the saxophone decided to
+out-jazz the piano, and the drum got its ambition roused and joined in
+the competition, and the young couple who were not supposed to be dancing
+out-danced everything on the floor!
+
+Quin's heart might have adjusted itself to that first dance, but the
+rollicking encore, together with the emotional shock it sustained every
+time those destructive eyes were trained upon him, was too much for it.
+
+"Say, would you mind stopping a bit?--just for a second?" he gasped, when
+his breath seemed about to desert him permanently.
+
+"You surely aren't _tired_?" scoffed the young lady, lifting a pair of
+finely arched eyebrows.
+
+"No; but, you see--as a matter of fact, ever since I was gassed----"
+
+"Gassed!"
+
+The word acted like a charm. The girl's sensitive face, over which the
+expressions played like sunlight on water, softened to instant sympathy,
+and Quin, who up to now had been merely a partner, suddenly found himself
+individual.
+
+"Did you see much actual service?" she asked, her eyes wide with
+interest.
+
+"Sure," said Quin, bracing himself against a post and trying to keep his
+breath from coming in jerks; "saw sixteen months of it."
+
+Her quick glance swept from the long scar on his forehead to the bar on
+his breast.
+
+"What do all those stars on the rainbow ribbon mean?" she demanded.
+
+"Major engagements," said Quin diffidently.
+
+"And the silver one in the middle?"
+
+"A citation," He glanced around to make sure none of the other boys were
+near, then confessed, as if to a crime: "That's where I got my medal."
+
+"Come over here and sit down this minute," she commanded. "You've got to
+tell me all about it."
+
+It would be very pleasant to chronicle the fact that our hero modestly
+declined to take advantage of the opportunity thus offered. But it must
+be borne in mind that, his heart having failed him at a critical hour, he
+had to fall back upon his tongue as the only means at hand of detaining
+the Celestial Being who at any moment might depart. With what breath he
+had left he told his story, and, having a good story to tell, he did it
+full justice. Sometimes, to be sure, he got his pronouns mixed, and once
+he lost the thread of his discourse entirely; but that was when he became
+too conscious of those star-like eyes and the flattering absorption of
+the little lady who for one transcendent moment was deigning "to love him
+for the dangers he had passed." With unabated interest and curiosity she
+drank in every detail of his recital, her half-parted lips only closing
+occasionally to say, "Wonderful!" or "How _perfectly_ wonderful!"
+
+On and on went the music, round and round went the dancers, and still the
+private in the uniform that was too big and the officer's girl in blue
+and gray sat in the alcove, totally oblivious to everything but each
+other.
+
+It was not until the girl happened to look at the ridiculous little watch
+that was pretending to keep time on her wrist that the spell was broken.
+
+"Merciful heaven!" she exclaimed dramatically, "It's six o'clock. What
+_will_ the family say to me? I must fly this minute."
+
+"But ain't you going to finish this dance with me?" asked Quin with
+tragic insistence.
+
+"Ought you to dance again?" The note was personal and divinely
+solicitous.
+
+"I oughtn't, but I am"; and, with superb disregard for doctors and syntax
+alike, Quin put a firm arm around that slender yielding figure and swept
+her into the moving crowd.
+
+They danced very quietly this time, for he was determined to hold out to
+the end. In fact, from the dreamy, preoccupied look on their faces one
+might have mistaken them for two zealous young acolytes lost in the
+performance of a religious rite.
+
+Quin was still in a trance when he helped her on with her coat and
+piloted her down the crowded stairs. He could not bear to have her
+jostled by the boisterous crowd, and he glared at the men whose admiring
+glances dared to rest too long upon her.
+
+Now that the dance was over, the young lady was in a fever of impatience
+to get away. Qualms of remorse seized her for the way she had treated her
+one-time escort, and she hinted at the trouble in store for her if the
+family heard of her escapade.
+
+Outside the pavements were white with snow, and falling flakes glistened
+against the blue electric lights. Holiday crowds thronged the sidewalks,
+and every other man was in uniform.
+
+"I left my car at the corner," said Quin's companion, nervously
+consulting her watch for the fourth time. "You needn't come with me; I
+can find it all right."
+
+But Quin hadn't the slightest intention of forgoing one second of that
+delectable interview. He followed her to her car, awkwardly helped her
+in, and stood looking at her wistfully. In her hurry to get home she
+seemed to have forgotten him entirely. In two minutes she would never
+know that she had met him, while he----
+
+"Good-by, Soldier Boy," she said, suddenly holding out her hand.
+
+"My name is Graham," stammered Quin--"Sergeant Quinby Graham; Battery C,
+Sixth Field Artillery. And yours?"
+
+She was fussing with the starter by this time, but she smiled up at him
+and shook her head.
+
+"I? Oh, I haven't any! I'm just an irresponsible young person who is
+going to gets fits for having stayed out so late. But it was worth it,
+wasn't it--Sergeant Slim?"
+
+And then, before he knew what had happened, the small runabout was
+skilfully backed out of its narrow space and a red tail-light was rapidly
+wagging down the avenue, leaving him standing dazed on the curbstone.
+
+"Where in the devil have you been?" demanded a cross voice behind him,
+and turning he encountered Cass's snub-nose and irate eyes.
+
+Quin's own eyes were shining and his face was flushed. With a laugh he
+flung his arm around his buddy's shoulder and affectionately punched his
+head.
+
+"In heaven," he answered laconically.
+
+"Funny place to leave your overcoat!" said Cass, viewing him with
+suspicion. "Quin Graham, have you had a drink?"
+
+Quin hilariously declared his innocence. The draught of which he had so
+freely imbibed, though far more potent than any earthly brew, was one
+against which there are no prohibitory laws.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 2
+
+
+The fact that Cass had neglected to tell the family that he was bringing
+a friend home to supper did not in the least affect his welcome. It was
+not that the daily menu was of such a lavish nature that a guest or two
+made no difference; it was simply that the Martels belonged to that
+casual type which accepts any interruption to the regular order of things
+as a God-sent diversion.
+
+In the present instance Rose had only to dispatch Edwin to the grocery
+for eggs and cheese, and send Myrna next door to borrow a chafing-dish,
+and, while these errands were being accomplished, to complete her own
+sketchy toilet. Rose was an impressionist when it came to dress. She got
+the desired effect with the least possible effort, as was evinced now by
+the way she was whirling two coils of chestnut hair, from which the
+tangles had not been removed, into round puffs over each ear. A dab of
+rouge on each cheek, a touch of red on the lips, a dash of powder over
+the whole, sleeves turned back, neck turned in, resulted in a poster
+effect that was quite satisfactory.
+
+Of course the Martels had heard of Quinby Graham: his name had loomed
+large in Cass's letters from France and later in his conversation; but
+this was the first time the hero was to be presented in person.
+
+"What's he like, Rose?" asked Myrna, arriving breathlessly with the
+chafing-dish. Myrna was twelve and seemed to labor under the constant
+apprehension that she was missing something, due no doubt to the fact
+that she was invariably dispatched on an errand when anything interesting
+was pending.
+
+"Don't know," said Rose; "the hall was pitch-dark. He's got a nice voice,
+though, and a dandy handshake."
+
+"I bid to sit next to him at supper," said Myrna, hugging herself in
+ecstasy.
+
+"You can if you promise not to take two helps of the Welsh rabbit."
+
+Myrna refused to negotiate on any such drastic terms. "Are we going to
+have a fire in the sitting-room?" she asked.
+
+"I don't know whether there is any more wood. Papa Claude promised to
+order some. You go see while I set the table. I've a good notion to call
+over the fence and ask Fan Loomis to come to supper."
+
+"Oh, Rose, _please_ do!" cried Myrna. "I won't take but one help."
+
+Cass, in the meanwhile, was making his guest at home in the sitting-room
+by permitting him to be useful.
+
+"You can light the lamp," he said, "while I make a fire."
+
+Quin was willing to oblige, but the lamp was not. It put up a stubborn
+resistance to all efforts to coax it to do its duty.
+
+"I bet it hasn't been filled," said Cass; then, after the fashion of
+mankind, he lifted his voice in supplication to the nearest feminine ear:
+
+"Oh! Ro--ose!"
+
+His older sister, coming to the rescue, agreed with his diagnosis of the
+case, and with Quin's assistance bore the delinquent lamp to the kitchen.
+
+"Hope you don't mind being made home-folks," she said, patting the puffs
+over her ears and looking at him sideways.
+
+"Mind?" said Quin. "If you knew how good all this looks to me! It's the
+first touch of home I've had in years. Wish you'd let me set the
+table--I'm strong on K. P."
+
+"Help yourself," said Rose; "the plates are in the pantry and the silver
+in the sideboard drawer. Wait a minute!"
+
+She took a long apron from behind the door and handed it to him.
+
+"How do these ends buckle up?" he asked, helplessly holding out the
+straps of the bib.
+
+"They button around your little neck," she told him, smiling. "Turn
+round; I'll fix it."
+
+"Why turn round?" said Quin.
+
+Their eyes met in frank challenge.
+
+"You silly boy!" she said--but she put her arms around his neck and
+fastened the bib just the same.
+
+How that supper ever got itself cooked and served is a marvel. Everybody
+took a turn at the stirring and toasting, everybody contributed a missing
+article to the table, and there was much rushing from kitchen to
+dining-room, with many collisions and some upsets.
+
+Quin was in the highest of spirits. Even Cass had never seen him quite
+like this. With his white apron over his uniform, he pranced about,
+dancing attendance on Rose, and keeping Myrna and Edwin in gales of
+laughter over his antics. Every now and then, however, his knees got
+wabbly and his breath came short, and by the time supper was prepared he
+was quite ready to sit down.
+
+"What a shame Nell's not here!" said Rose, breaking the eggs into the
+chafing-dish. "Then we could have charades. She's simply great when she
+gets started."
+
+"Who is Nell?" asked Quin.
+
+"Eleanor Bartlett, our cousin. She's like chicken and ice-cream--the rich
+Bartletts have her on weekdays and we poor Martels get her only on
+Sundays. Hasn't Cass ever told you about Nell?"
+
+"Do you suppose I spend my time talking about my precious family?"
+growled Cass.
+
+"No, but Nell's different," said Rose; "she's a sort of Solomon's baby--I
+mean the baby that Solomon had to decide about. Only in this case neither
+old Madam Bartlett nor Papa Claude will give up their half; they'd see
+her dead first."
+
+"You did tell me about her," said Quin to Cass, "one night when we were
+up in the Cantigny offensive. I remember the place exactly. Something
+about an orphan, and a lawsuit, and a little girl that was going to be an
+actress."
+
+"That's the dope," said Cass. "Only she's not a kid any more. She grew up
+while I was in France. She's a great girl, Nell is, when you get her away
+from that Bartlett mess!"
+
+"Does anybody know where Papa Claude is?" Rose demanded, dexterously
+ladling out steaming Welsh rabbit on to slices of crisp brown toast.
+
+"He is here, _mes enfants_, he is here!" cried a joyous voice from the
+hall, followed by a presence at once so exuberant and so impressive
+that Quin stared in amazement.
+
+"This is Quinby Graham, grandfather," said Cass, by way of introduction.
+
+The dressy old gentleman with the flowing white locks and the white rose
+in his buttonhole bore down upon Quin and enveloped his hand in both his
+own.
+
+"I welcome you for Cassius' sake and for your own!" he declared with such
+effusion that Quin was visibly embarrassed. "My grandson has told me of
+your long siege in the hospital, of your noble service to your country,
+of your gallant conduct at----"
+
+"Sit down, Papa Claude, and finish your oration after supper," cried
+Rose; "the rabbit won't wait on anybody."
+
+Thus cut short, Mr. Martel took his seat and, nothing daunted, helped
+himself bountifully to everything within reach.
+
+"I am a gourmet, Sergeant Graham, but not a gourmand. Edwin Booth used to
+say----"
+
+"Sir?" answered Edwin Booth's namesake from the kitchen, where he had
+been dispatched for more bread.
+
+"No, no, my son, I was referring to----"
+
+But Papa Claude, as usual, did not get to finish the sentence. The advent
+of the next-door neighbor, who had been invited and then forgotten,
+caused great amusement owing to the fact that there was no more supper
+left.
+
+"Give her some bread and jam, Myrna," said Rose; "and if the jam is out,
+bring the brown sugar. You don't mind, do you, Fan?"
+
+Fan, an amiable blonde person who was going to be fat at forty, declared
+that she didn't want a thing to eat, honestly she didn't, and that
+besides she adored bread and brown sugar.
+
+"We won't stop to wash up," said Rose; "Myrna will have loads of time to
+do it in the morning, because she doesn't have to go to school. We'll
+just clear the table and let the dishes stand."
+
+"We are incorrigible Bohemians, as you observe," said Mr. Martel to Quin,
+with a deprecating arching of his fine brows. "We lay too little stress,
+I fear, on the conventions. But the exigencies of the dramatic
+profession--of which, you doubtless know, I have been a member for the
+past forty years----"
+
+"Take him in the sitting-room, Mr. Graham," urged Rose; "I'll bring your
+coffee in there."
+
+Without apparently being conscious of the fact, Mr. Martel, still
+discoursing in rounded periods, was transferred to the big chair beside
+the lamp, while Quin took up his stand on the hearth-rug and looked about
+him.
+
+Such a jumble of a room as it was! Odds and ends of furniture, the
+survival of various household wrecks; chipped bric-à-brac; a rug from
+which the pattern had long ago vanished; an old couch piled with shabby
+cushions; a piano with scattered music sheets. On the walls, from ceiling
+to foot-board, hung faded photographs of actors and actresses, most of
+them with bold inscriptions dashed across their corners in which the
+donors invariably expressed their friendship, affection, or if the
+chirography was feminine their devoted love, for "dear Claude Martel."
+Over the mantel was a portrait of dear Claude himself, taken in the rôle
+of Mark Antony, and making rather a good job of it, on the whole, with
+his fine Roman profile and massive brow.
+
+It was all shabby and dusty and untidy; but to Quinby Graham, standing on
+the hearth-rug and trying to handle his small coffee-cup as if he were
+used to it, the room was completely satisfying. There was a cozy warmth
+and mellowness about it, a kindly atmosphere of fellowship, a sense of
+intimate human relations, that brought a lump into his throat. He had
+almost forgotten that things could be like this!
+
+So absorbed was he in his surroundings, and in the imposing old actor
+encompassed by the galaxy of pictured notables, that he lost the thread
+of Mr. Martel's discourse until he heard him asking:
+
+"What is the present? A clamor of the senses, a roar that deafens us to
+the music of life. I dwell in the past and in the future, Sergeant
+Graham--the dear reminiscent past and the glorious unborn future. And
+that reminds me that Cassius tells me that you are both about to receive
+your discharge from the army and are ready for the next great adventure.
+May I ask what yours is to be? A return, perhaps, to your native city?"
+
+"My native city happens to be a river," said Quin. "I was born on a
+house-boat going up the Yangtse-Kiang."
+
+"Indeed!" cried Mr. Martel with interest. "What a romantic beginning! And
+your family?"
+
+"Haven't got any. You see, sir," said Quin, expanding under the
+flattering attention of his host, "my people were all missionaries. Most
+of them died off before I was fourteen, and I was shipped back to America
+to go to school. I didn't hold out very long, though. After two years in
+high school I ran away and joined the navy."
+
+"And since then you have been a soldier of fortune, eh? No cares, no
+responsibilities. Free to roam the wide world in search of adventure."
+
+Quin studied the end of his cigarette.
+
+"That ain't so good as it sounds," he said. "Sometimes I think I'd
+amounted to more if I had somebody that belonged to me."
+
+"Isn't it rather early in the season for a young man's fancy to be
+lightly turning----"
+
+The quotation was lost upon Quin, but the twinkle in the speaker's
+expressive eye was not.
+
+"I didn't mean that," he laughingly protested; "I mean a mother or a
+sister or somebody like that, who would be a kind of anchor. Take Cass,
+for instance; he's steady as a rock."
+
+"Ah! Cassius! One in ten thousand. From the time he was twelve he has
+shared with me the financial burden. An artist, Sergeant Graham, must
+remain aloof from the market-place. Now that I have retired permanently
+from the stage in order to devote my time exclusively to writing, my only
+business engagement is a series of lectures at the university, where, as
+you know, I occupy the chair of Dramatic Literature."
+
+The chair thus euphemistically referred to was scarcely more than a
+three-legged stool, which he occupied four mornings in the week, the rest
+of his time being spent at home in the arduous task of writing tragedies
+in blank verse.
+
+"What I got to think about is a job," said Quin, much more interested in
+his own affairs than in those of his host.
+
+"Commercial or professional?" inquired Mr. Martel.
+
+"Oh, I can turn my hand to 'most anything," bragged Quin, blowing
+smoke-rings at the ceiling. "It's experience that counts, and, believe
+me, I've had a plenty."
+
+"Experience plus education," added Mr. Martel; "we must not underestimate
+the advantages of education."
+
+"That's where I'm short," admitted Quin. "My folks were all smart enough.
+Guess if they had lived I'd been put through college and all the rest of
+it. My grandfather was Dr. Ezra Quinby. Ever hear of him?"
+
+Mr. Martel had to acknowledge that he had not.
+
+"Guess he is better known in China than in America," said Quin. "He died
+before I was born."
+
+"And you have no people in America?"
+
+"No people anywhere," said Quin cheerfully; "but I got a lot of friends
+scattered around over the world, and a bull-dog and a couple of cats up
+at a lumber-camp near Portland."
+
+"Cassius tells me that you are thinking of returning to Maine."
+
+Quin ran his fingers through his hair and laughed. "That was yesterday,"
+he said. "To-day you couldn't get me out of Kentucky with a machine-gun!"
+
+Claude Martel rose and laid an affectionate hand on his shoulder. "Then,
+my boy, we claim you as our own. Cassius' home is your home, his family
+your family, his----"
+
+The address of welcome was cut short by Cass's arrival with an armful of
+wood which he deposited on the hearth, and a moment later the girls,
+followed by Edwin, came trooping in from the kitchen.
+
+"Let's make a circle round the fire and sing the old year out," suggested
+Rose gaily. "Myrna, get the banjo and the guitar. Shall I play on the
+piano, Papa Claude, or will you?"
+
+Mr. Martel, expressing the noble sentiment that age should always be an
+accompaniment to youth, took his place at the piano and, with a pose
+worthy of Rubinstein, struck a few preliminary chords, while the group
+about the fire noisily settled itself for the evening.
+
+"You can put your head against my knees, if you like," Rose said to Quin,
+who was sprawling on the floor at her feet. "There, is that comfy?"
+
+"I'll say it's all right!" said Quin with heartfelt satisfaction.
+
+There was something free and easy and gipsy-like about the evening, a
+sort of fireside picnic that brought June dreams in January. As the hours
+wore on, the singing, which had been noisy and rollicking, gradually
+mellowed into sentiment, a sentiment that found vent in dreamy eyes and
+long-drawn-out choruses, with a languorous over-accentuation of the
+sentimental passages. One by one, the singers fell under the spell of the
+music and the firelight. Cass and Fan Loomis sat shoulder to shoulder on
+the broken-springed couch and gazed with blissful oblivion into the red
+embers on the hearth. Rose, whose voice led all the rest, surreptitiously
+wiped her eyes when no one was looking; Edwin and Myrna, solemnly
+plucking their banjo and guitar, were lost in moods of dormant emotion;
+while Papa Claude at the piano let his dim eyes range the pictured walls,
+while his memory traveled back through the years on many a secret tryst
+of its own.
+
+But it was the lank Sergeant with the big feet, and the hair that stood
+up where it shouldn't, who dared to dream the most preposterous dream of
+them all. For, as he sang there in the firelight, a little god was busy
+lighting the tapers in the most sacred shrines of his being, until he
+felt like a cathedral at high mass with all the chimes going.
+
+    "There's a long, long trail a-winding
+      Into the land of my dreams,
+    Where the nightingales are singing
+      And a white moon beams."
+
+How many times he had sung it in France!--jolting along muddy, endless
+roads, heartsick, homesick.
+
+    "There's a long, long night of waiting
+      Until my dreams all come true,
+    Till the day when I'll be going
+      Down that long, long trail with you."
+
+What had "you" meant to him then? A girl--a pretty girl, of course; but
+_any_ girl. And now?
+
+Ah, now he knew what he had been going toward, not only on those terrible
+roads in France, but all through the years of his life. An exquisite,
+imperious little officer's girl with divinely compassionate eyes, who
+wasn't ashamed to dance with a private, and who had let him hold her hand
+at parting while she said in accents an angel might have envied,
+"Good-by, Soldier Boy."
+
+Quin sighed profoundly and slipped his arm under his head, and at the
+same moment the owner of the knee upon which he was leaning also heaved a
+sigh and shifted _her_ position, and somehow in the adjustment two lonely
+hands came in contact and evidently decided that, after all, substitutes
+were _some_ comfort.
+
+It was not until all the whistles in town had announced the birth of the
+New Year that the party broke up, and it was not until then that Quin
+realized that he was very tired, and that his pulse was behaving in a way
+that was, alas, all too familiar.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 3
+
+
+Friday after New Year's found Sergeant Graham again flat on his back at
+the Base Hospital, facing sentence of three additional weeks in bed. In
+vain had he risked a reprimand by hotly protesting the point with the
+Captain; in vain had he declared to the nurse that he would rather live
+on his feet than die on his back. Judgment was passed, and he lay with an
+ice-bag on his head and a thermometer in his mouth and hot rage in his
+heart.
+
+What made matters worse was that Cass Martel had come over from the
+Convalescent Barracks only that morning to announce that he had received
+his discharge and was going home. To Quin it seemed that everybody but
+himself was going home--that is, everybody but the incurables. At that
+thought a dozen nameless fears that had been tormenting him of late all
+seemed to get together and rush upon him. What if the doctors were
+holding him on from month to month, experimenting, promising,
+disappointing, only in the end to bunch him with the permanently disabled
+and ship him off to some God-forsaken spot to spend the rest of his life
+in a hospital?
+
+He gripped his hands over his chest and gave himself up to savage
+rebellion. If they would let him alone he might get well! In France it
+had been his head. Whenever the wound began to heal and things looked a
+bit cheerful, some saw-bones had come along and thumped and probed and
+X-rayed, and then it had been ether and an operation and the whole
+blooming thing over again. Then, when they couldn't work on his head any
+longer, they'd started up this talk about his heart. Of course his heart
+was jumpy! All the fellows who had been badly gassed had jumpy hearts.
+But how was he ever going to get any better lying there on his back? What
+he needed was exercise and decent food and something cheerful to think
+about. He wanted desperately to get away from his memories, to forget the
+horrors, the sickening sights and smells, the turmoil and confusion of
+the past two years. In spite of his most heroic efforts, he kept living
+over past events. This time last year he had been up in the Toul sector,
+where half the men he knew had gone west. It was up there old Corpy had
+got his head shot off....
+
+He resolutely fixed his attention on a spider that was swinging directly
+over his head and tried to forget old Corpy. He thought instead of
+Captain Phipps, but the thought did not calm him. What sense was there in
+his ordering more of this fool rest business? Well, he told himself
+fiercely, he wasn't going to stand for it! The war was over, he had done
+his part, he was going to demand his freedom. Discipline or no
+discipline, he would go over Phipps' head and appeal to the Colonel.
+
+Throwing aside the ice-bag, he looked around for his uniform. But the
+nurse had evidently mistrusted the look in his eyes when she gave him the
+Captain's orders, for the hook over his bed was empty. He raised himself
+in his cot and glared savagely down the ward, sniffing the air
+suspiciously. Two orderlies were wheeling No. 17 back from the
+operating-room, and Quin already caught the faint odor of ether. The
+first whiff of it filled him with loathing.
+
+Thrusting his bare feet into slippers and his arms into a shabby old
+bath-robe, he flung himself out of bed and slipped out on the porch. The
+air was cold and bracing and gloriously free from the hospital
+combination of wienerwürst, ether, and dried peaches that had come to be
+a nightmare odor to him. He sat on the railing and drew in deep,
+refreshing breaths, and as he did so things began to right themselves.
+Fair play to Quin amounted almost to a religion, and it was suddenly
+borne in upon him that he would not be where he was had he observed the
+rules of the game. But then again, if he had not danced, he never would
+have----
+
+At that moment something so strange happened that he put a hot hand to a
+hotter brow and wondered if he was delirious. The singularly vibrant
+voice that had been echoing in his memory since New Year's eve was saying
+directly behind him:
+
+"I shall give them all the chocolate they want, Captain Harold Phipps,
+and you may court-martial me later if you like!"
+
+Quin glanced up hastily, and there, framed in the doorway, in a Red Cross
+uniform, stood his dream girl, looking so much more ravishing than she
+had before that he promptly snatched the blue and gray vision from its
+place of honor and installed a red, white, and blue one instead. So
+engrossed was he in the apparition that he quite failed to see Captain
+Phipps surveying him over her shoulder.
+
+"Number 7!" said the Captain with icy decision, "weren't you instructed
+to stay in bed?"
+
+"I was, sir," said Quin, coming to attention and presenting a decidedly
+sorry aspect.
+
+"Go back at once, and add three days to the time indicated. This way,
+Miss Bartlett."
+
+Now, it is well-nigh impossible to preserve one's dignity when suffering
+a reprimand in public; but when you are handicapped by a shabby
+bath-robe, a three days' growth of beard, and a grouch that gives you the
+expression of a bandit, and the public happens to be the one being on
+earth whom you are most anxious to please, the situation becomes tragic.
+
+Quin set his jaw and shuffled ignominiously off to bed, thankful for once
+that he had been considered unworthy a second glance from those luminous
+brown eyes. His satisfaction, however, was short-lived. A moment later
+the young lady appeared at the far end of the ward, carrying an absurd
+little basket adorned with a large pink bow, from which she began to
+distribute chocolates.
+
+A feminine presence in the ward always created a flutter, but the
+previous flutters were mere zephyrs compassed to the cyclone produced by
+the new ward visitor. Some one started the phonograph, and Michaelis, who
+had been swearing all day that he would never be able to walk again,
+actually began to dance. Witticisms were exchanged from bed to bed, and
+the man who was going to be operated on next morning flung a pillow at an
+orderly and upset a vase of flowers. Things had not been so cheerful for
+weeks.
+
+Quin, lying in the last bed in the ward, alternated between rapture and
+despair as he watched the progress of the visitor. Would she recognize
+him? Would she speak to him if she did, when he looked like that? Perhaps
+if he turned his face to the wall and pretended to be asleep she would
+pass him by. But he did not want her to pass him by. This might be the
+only chance he would ever have to see her again!
+
+Back in his fringe of consciousness he was frantically groping for the
+name the Captain had mentioned: Barnet? Barret? Bartlett? That was it!
+And with the recovery of the name Quin's mind did another somersault.
+Bartlett? Where had he heard that name? Eleanor Bartlett? Some nonsense
+about "Solomon's baby." Why, Rose Martel, of course.
+
+Then all thought deserted him, for the world suddenly shrank to five feet
+two of femininity, and he heard a gay, impersonal voice saying:
+
+"May I put a cake of chocolate on your table?"
+
+For the life of him, he could not answer. He only lay there with his
+mouth open, looking at her, while she straightened the contents of her
+basket. One more moment and she would be gone. Quin staked all on a
+chance shot.
+
+"Thank you, Miss Eleanor Bartlett," he said, with that ridiculous blush
+that was so out of keeping with his audacity.
+
+She looked at him in amazement; then her face broke into a smile of
+recognition.
+
+"Well, bless my soul, if it isn't Sergeant Slim! What are you doing
+here?"
+
+"Same thing I been doing for six months," said Quin sheepishly; "counting
+the planks in the ceiling."
+
+"But I thought you had got well. Oh, I hope it wasn't the dancing----"
+
+"Lord, no," said Quin, keeping his hand over his bristly chin. "I'm
+husky, all right. Only they've got so used to seeing me laying around
+that they can't bear to let me go."
+
+"Do you have to lie flat on your back like that, with no pillow or
+anything?"
+
+"It ain't so bad, except at mess-time."
+
+"And you can't even sit up to eat?"
+
+"Not supposed to."
+
+Miss Bartlett eyed him compassionately.
+
+"I am coming out twice a week now--Mondays and Fridays--and I'm going to
+bring you something nice every time I come. How long will you be here?"
+
+"Three weeks," said Quin--adding, with a funny twist of his lip, "three
+weeks and three days."
+
+"Oh! Were you the boy on the porch? How funny I didn't recognize you! I'm
+going to ask Captain Phipps to let you off those extra days."
+
+"No, you mustn't." Quin objected earnestly; "I'll take what's coming to
+me. Besides," he added, "one of those days might be a Monday or a
+Friday!"
+
+This seemed to amuse her, for she smiled as she wrote his name and bed
+number in a small notebook, with the added entry: "Oyster soup,
+cigarettes, and a razor."
+
+Just as she was leaving, she remembered something and turned back.
+
+"How did you know my name?" she asked with lively curiosity.
+
+"Didn't the Captain call it on the porch?"
+
+"Did he? But not my first name. How on earth _did_ you know that?"
+
+"Perhaps I guessed it," Quin said, looking mysterious. And just then a
+nurse came along and thrust the thermometer back in his mouth, and the
+conversation was abruptly ended.
+
+Of course the calendar must have been right about the three weeks that
+followed; there probably were seven days in each week and twenty-four
+hours in each day. But Quin wasn't sure about it. He knew beyond doubt
+that there were three Mondays and four Fridays and one wholly gratuitous
+and never-to-be-forgotten Sunday when Miss Bartlett brought his dinner
+from town, and insisted upon cutting his chicken for him and feeding him
+custard with a spoon. The rest of the days were lost in abstract time,
+during which Quin had his hair cut and his face shaved, and did
+bead-work.
+
+Until now he had sturdily refused to be inveigled into occupational
+therapy. Those guys that were done for could learn to knit, he said, and
+to make silly little mats, and weave things on a loom. If he couldn't do
+a man's work he'd be darned if he was going to do a woman's. But now all
+was changed. He announced his intention of making the classiest bead
+chain that had ever been achieved in 2 C. He insisted upon the instructor
+getting him the most expensive beads in the market, regardless of size or
+color.
+
+Now, for Quin, with his big hands and lack of dexterity, to have worked
+with beads under the most favorable conditions would have been difficult,
+but to master the art lying flat on his back was a _tour de force_. He
+pricked his fingers and broke his thread; he upset the beads on the
+floor, on the bed, in his tray; he took out and put in with infinite
+patience, "each bead a thought, each thought a prayer."
+
+"Don't you think you had better give it up?" asked the instructor, in
+despair, after the fourth lesson.
+
+"You don't know me," said Quin, setting his jaw. "You been trying to get
+me into this for two weeks--now you've got to see me through."
+
+It did not take long for the other patients to discover Quin's state of
+mind.
+
+"How about your heart disease, Graham?" they inquired daily; "think it's
+going to be chronic?"
+
+But Quin had little time for them. The distinction he had enjoyed as the
+champion poker-player in 2 C. began to wane as his popularity with the
+new ward visitor increased.
+
+"I like your nerve!--keeping her up there at your bed all the time,"
+complained Michaelis.
+
+"She's an old friend of mine," Quin threw off nonchalantly.
+
+"Aw, what you tryin' to put over on us?" scoffed Mike. "Where'd you ever
+git to know a girl like that?"
+
+"Well, I know her all right," said Quin.
+
+The little mystery about Miss Bartlett's first name had been a fruitful
+topic of conversation between a couple whose topics were necessarily
+limited. She had teased Quin to tell her how he knew, and also how he
+knew she wanted to go on the stage; and Quin had teased back; and at last
+it had resolved itself into a pretty contest of wits.
+
+This served to keep her beside him often as long as four minutes. Then he
+would gain an additional two minutes by showing her what progress he had
+made with his chain, and consulting her preference for an American flag
+or a Red Cross worked in the medallion.
+
+When every other means of detaining her had been exhausted, he sometimes
+resorted to strategy. Constitutionally he was opposed to duplicity; he
+was built on certain square lines that disqualified him for many a
+comfortable round hole in life. But under the stress of present
+circumstances he persuaded himself that the end justified the means.
+Ignoring the fact that he was as devoid of relations as a tree is of
+leaves in December, he developed a sudden sense of obligation to an
+imaginary cousin whom he added, without legal authority, to the
+population of Peru, Indiana. By means of Miss Bartlett's white hand he
+frequently informed her that she was not to worry about him, because he
+was "doing splendid," and that a hospital "wasn't so worse when you get
+used to it." And while he dictated words of assurance to his "Cousin Sue"
+his eyes feasted upon a dainty profile with long brown lashes that swept
+a peach-blow cheek. Once he became so demoralized by this too pleasing
+prospect that he said "tell him" instead of "tell her," and the lashes
+lifted in instant inquiry.
+
+"I mean--er--her husband," Quin gasped.
+
+"But you had me direct the other letters to Miss Sue Brown."
+
+"Yes, I know," said Quin, with an embarrassment that might have been
+attributed to skeletons in family closets; "but, you see--she--er--she
+took back her own name."
+
+The one cloud that darkened Quin's horizon these days was Captain Phipps.
+His visits to the ward always coincided with Miss Bartlett's, and he
+seemed to take a spiteful pleasure in keeping the men at attention while
+he engaged her in intimate conversation. He was an extremely fastidious,
+well groomed young man, with an insolent hauteur and a certain lordly air
+of possession that proclaimed him a conqueror of the sex. Quin regarded
+him with growing disfavor.
+
+When the three weeks were almost over, Quin was allowed to sit up, and
+even to walk on the porch. Miss Bartlett found him there one day when she
+arrived.
+
+"Aha!" she cried, "I've found you out, Sergeant Slim! You are Cass
+Martel's hero, and that's where you heard about me and found out my first
+name."
+
+Quin pleaded guilty, and their usual five minutes together lengthened
+into fifteen while she gave him all the news of the Martel family. Cass
+had taken his old position at the railroad office, and, dear knows, it
+was a good thing! And Rose was giving dancing lessons. And what did he
+think little old Myrna had done? Adopted a baby! Yes, a baby; wasn't it
+too ridiculous! An Italian one that the washwoman had forsaken. And Papa
+Claude had given up his lectures at the university in order to write the
+great American play. Weren't they the funniest and the dearest people he
+had ever known?
+
+It was amazing how intimate Quin and Miss Bartlett got on the subject of
+the Martels. He had to tell her in detail just what a brick her cousin
+Cass was, and she had to tell him what a really wonderful actor Papa
+Claude used to be.
+
+"Captain Phipps says he knows more about the stage than any man in the
+country."
+
+"What does the Captain know about it?" asked Quin.
+
+"Captain Phipps? Why, he's a playwright. He means to devote all his time
+to the stage as soon as he gets out of the army. You may not believe it,
+but he is an even better dramatist than he is a doctor."
+
+"Oh, yes, I do," said Quin; "that's easy to believe."
+
+The sarcasm was lost upon Miss Bartlett, who was intent upon delivering
+her message from the Martels. They had sent word that they expected Quin
+to come straight to them when he got his discharge, and that his room was
+waiting for him.
+
+"And you?" asked Quin eagerly. "You'll be there every Sunday?"
+
+Her face, which had been all smiles, underwent a sudden change. She said
+with something perilously like a pout:
+
+"No, I shan't; I'm to be shipped off to school next week."
+
+"School?" repeated Quin incredulously. "What do you want to be going back
+to school for?"
+
+"I _don't_ want to. I hate it. It's the price I am paying for that dance
+I had with you at the Hawaiian Garden--that and other things."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"Some old tabby of a chaperon saw me there and came and told my
+grandmother."
+
+"But what could she have told? You didn't do anything you oughtn't to."
+
+Miss Bartlett shook her head. It was evidently something she could not
+explain, for she sat staring gloomily at the wall above the bed, then she
+said abruptly: "Well, I must be going. Good-by if I don't see you again!"
+
+"But you will," announced Quin fiercely. "You are going to see me next
+Sunday at the Martels'. I'll be there if I land in the guard-house for
+it."
+
+"Why, your time's up Saturday, isn't it? Oh! I forgot those three extra
+days. Captain Phipps has got to let you off. He will if I tell him to."
+
+At this something quite unexpected and elemental surged up in Quin. He
+forgot the amenities that he had taken such pains to observe in Miss
+Bartlett's presence, he entirely lost sight of the social gap that lay
+between them, and blurted out with deadly earnestness:
+
+"Say, are you his girl?"
+
+This had the effect of bringing Miss Bartlett promptly to her feet, and
+the next instant poor Quin was saying in an agony of regret:
+
+"I'm sorry, Miss Bartlett. I didn't mean to be nervy. Honest, I didn't.
+Wait a minute--_please_----"
+
+But she was gone, leaving him to spend the rest of the afternoon searching
+for a phrase sufficiently odious to express his own opinion of himself.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 4
+
+
+Eleanor Bartlett, speeding home from the hospital with Captain Phipps
+beside her, repeated Quin's question to herself more than once. Up to the
+present her loves, like her friendships, had been entirely episodic. She
+had gone easily from one affair to another not so much from fickleness as
+from growth. What she wanted on Monday did not seem in the least
+desirable on Saturday, and it was a new and disturbing sensation to have
+the same person dominating her thoughts for so many consecutive days. If
+her relations with the young officer from Chicago were as platonic as she
+would have herself and her family believe, why had she allowed the affair
+to arrive at a stage that precipitated her banishment? Why was she even
+now flying in the face of authority and risking a serious reprimand by
+letting him ride in her car?
+
+In fierce justification she told herself it was simply because the family
+had meddled. If they had not interfered, things would never have reached
+the danger mark. She had met Captain Phipps three weeks ago at her Uncle
+Randolph Bartlett's, and had at first not been sure that she liked him.
+He had seemed then a little superior and condescending, and had evidently
+considered her too young to be interesting. But the next time they met
+there Aunt Flo had made her do the balcony scene from "Romeo and Juliet,"
+and since then all had been different.
+
+Captain Phipps had not only monopolized her at the dances--he had also
+found time from his not over-arduous military duties to drop in on her
+frequently in the afternoons. For hours at a time they had sat in the
+long, dim Bartlett parlor, with only the ghostly bust of old Madam
+Bartlett for a chaperon, ostensibly absorbed in the study of modern
+drama, but finding ample time to dwell at length upon Eleanor's
+qualifications for the stage and the Captain's budding genius as a
+playwright. And just when Ibsen and Pinero were giving place to
+Sudermann, and vague personal ambitions were crystallizing into definite
+plans, the family interfered.
+
+The causes of their condemnation were as varied as they were numerous. He
+was ten years older than Eleanor; he was too sophisticated a companion
+for a young girl; he had taken her to a public dance-hall on New Year's
+eve, where she had been seen dancing with an unknown private; he had been
+quite insolent to Madam when she had taken him to task for it; and, most
+heinous of all, he was encouraging her in her ambition to go on the
+stage. And beneath it all, Eleanor knew quite well, was the nervous
+flutter of apprehension that seized the entire family whenever a
+threatening masculine presence loomed on the horizon.
+
+She stole a glance at her handsome companion, and, seeing that he was
+observing her, quickly lowered her eyes. The Captain had a flattering way
+of studying her poses, remarking on the lines of her gowns and her hats.
+He was constantly discovering interesting things about her that she had
+not known before. But sometimes, as now, she was restive under his too
+close scrutiny.
+
+"So you are actually going to leave me next week?" he asked, with a note
+of personal aggrievement.
+
+"To leave you? I like that! If it weren't for you I shouldn't be going."
+
+"Are they really sending you away on my account?"
+
+"Indeed they are. Grandmother says you are encouraging me about the
+stage, and that poor Papa Claude is demoralizing us both."
+
+"Isn't that absurd?" said the Captain. "Dear old C. M. is about as
+innocuous as a peacock. Madam Bartlett should have been born in the
+seventeenth century. What will she say when she sees your name blazing
+over a Broadway theater?"
+
+"In one of your plays! Oh, Captain, wouldn't that be glorious?"
+
+"Haven't I asked you to drop the 'Captain'? My name is Harold. Say it!"
+
+"No; I can't."
+
+"Yes, you can. Come!"
+
+But she defied him with tightly closed lips and dancing eyes. With
+feminine instinct she had discovered that the irresistible Captain was
+piqued and stimulated by the unusual taste of opposition.
+
+"You little minx!" he said, lifting an accusing finger. "Those eyes of
+yours are going to do a lot of damage before they get through with it."
+
+Eleanor took kindly to the thought that she was dangerous. If she could
+cause disturbance to an individual by the guarded flutter of her eyelids,
+what effect might she not produce by giving them full play before a
+larger audience?
+
+"Do you really think I could act if I got the chance?" she asked
+dreamily.
+
+"I am absolutely sure. Your grandfather's quite right when he says you
+were born to the footlights. With your voice and your unusual coloring
+and your plastic little body----"
+
+"But you can't imagine the opposition," Eleanor broke in. "It isn't as if
+my mother and father were living. I believe they would understand. But
+grandfather and the aunties, and even Uncle Ranny, throw a fit at the
+mere mention of the stage."
+
+"You do not belong to them," said the Captain impatiently. "You do not
+even belong to yourself. A great talent belongs to the world. All these
+questions will settle themselves, once you take the definite step."
+
+"And you actually believe that I will get to New York to study?"
+
+"I don't believe--I _know_. I intend to make it my business to see that
+you do."
+
+There was a confident ring of masterful assurance in his voice that
+carried delicious conviction. A person who was so absolutely sure of
+himself made other people sure of him, too, for the moment.
+
+Eleanor, sitting low in the car, with her absent eyes fixed on the road
+ahead, lapsed into a daydream. From an absorbed contemplation of herself
+and her dramatic career, her mind veered in gratitude to the one who most
+believed in its possibility. What a friend he had been! Just when she had
+been ready to give up in despair, he had fanned her dying hope into a
+glorious blaze that illuminated every waking hour. And it was not only
+his sympathetic interest in her thwarted ambition that touched her: it
+was also the fact that he had rescued her from the daily boredom of
+sitting with elderly ladies making interminable surgical dressings, and
+by an adroit bit of diplomacy outwitted the family and introduced her as
+a ward visitor at the camp hospital.
+
+The mere thought of the hospital sent her mind flying off at a tangent.
+Even the stage gave way for the moment to this new and all-absorbing
+occupation. Never in her life had she done anything so interesting. The
+escape from home, the personal contact with all those nice, jolly boys,
+the excitement of being of service for the first time in her butterfly
+existence, was intoxicating. She smiled now as she thought of the way
+Graham's eager head always popped up the moment she entered the door,
+and of how his face shone when she talked to him. After all, she told
+herself, there _was_ something thrilling in having hands that had
+captured a machine-gun laboriously threading tiny beads for her, in
+having a soldier who had been decorated for courage stammer and blush
+in her presence.
+
+"Well," said the Captain, who had been lazily observing her, "aren't you
+about through with your mental monologue?"
+
+Eleanor roused herself with a start.
+
+"Oh, I am sorry! I was thinking about my boys at the hospital. You can't
+imagine how I hate to leave them!"
+
+The answer was evidently not what the Captain had expected. As long as
+his company of feminine admirers marched in adoring unison he was
+indifferent to their existence; but let one miss step and he was
+instantly on the alert.
+
+"I haven't noticed any tears being shed over leaving me," he said, and
+the aggrieved note in his voice promptly stirred her humor.
+
+"Why should I mind leaving you? You don't need me."
+
+"How do you know?"
+
+She looked at him scoffingly.
+
+"You don't need anything or anybody. You've got all you want in
+yourself."
+
+"I'll show you what I want!" he said, and, quickly bending toward her, he
+kissed her on the cheek.
+
+It was the merest brush of his lips, but it brought the color flaming
+into her face and the lightning into her eyes. She had never been so
+angry in her life, and it seemed to her an age that she sat there rigid
+and indignant, suffocated by his nearness but powerless to move away.
+Then she got the car stopped, and announced with great dignity that she
+was nearly home and that she would have to ask him to get out.
+
+Captain Phipps lazily descended from the car, then stood with elbows on
+the ledge of the door and rolled a cigarette with great deliberation.
+Eleanor, in spite of her wrath, could not help admiring the graceful,
+conscious movement of his slender hands with their highly polished nails.
+It was not until he had struck his match that he looked at her and smiled
+quizzically.
+
+"What a dear little goose you are! Do you suppose that stage lovers are
+going to stand in the wings and throw kisses to you?"
+
+"No," said Eleanor hotly; "but that will be different."
+
+"It certainly will," he agreed amiably. "You will not only have to be
+kissed, but you will have to kiss back. You have a lot of little
+puritanical prejudices to get over, my dear, before you can ever hope to
+act. You don't want to be a thin-blooded little old maid, do you?"
+
+The shot was well aimed, for Eleanor had no desire to follow in the arid
+footsteps of her two spinster aunts. She looked at Captain Phipps
+unsteadily and shook her head.
+
+"Of course you don't," he encouraged her. "You aren't built for it.
+Besides, it's an actress's business to cultivate her emotions rather than
+repress them, isn't it?"
+
+"Yes, I suppose it is."
+
+"Then, for heaven's sake, obey your impulses and let other people obey
+theirs. From now on you are to be identified with a profession that
+transcends the petty conventions of society. Confess! Aren't you already
+a little ashamed of getting angry with me just now?"
+
+She was not ashamed, not in the least; but her ardent desire to prove her
+fitness for that coveted profession, together with the compelling
+insistence of that persuasive voice, prompted her to hold out a reluctant
+hand and to smile.
+
+"You are a darling child!" said Captain Phipps, with a level glance of
+approval. "I shall see you to-morrow. When? Where?"
+
+But she would make no engagement. She was in a flutter to be gone. It was
+her first experience at dancing on a precipice, and, while she liked it,
+she could not deny, even to herself, that at times it made her
+uncomfortably hot and dizzy.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 5
+
+
+Eleanor's thoughts were still in a turmoil as she slowed her car to a
+within-the-law limit of speed and brought it to a dignified halt before
+an imposing edifice on Third Avenue. The precaution was well taken, for a
+long, pale face that had been pressed to a front window promptly
+transferred itself to the front door, and an anxious voice called out:
+
+"Oh, Nellie, _why_ did you stay out so late? Didn't you know it was your
+duty to be in before five?"
+
+"It's not late, Aunt Isobel," said Eleanor impatiently. "It gets dark
+early, that's all."
+
+"And you must be frozen," persisted Miss Isobel, "with those thin pumps
+and silk stockings, and nothing but that veil on your head."
+
+"But I'm _hot!_" declared Eleanor, throwing open her coat. "The house is
+stifling. Can't we have a window open?"
+
+Miss Isobel sighed. Like the rest of the family, she never knew what to
+expect from this troublesome, adorable, disturbing mystery called
+Eleanor. She worshiped her with the solicitous, over-anxious care that
+saw fever in the healthy flush of youth, regarded a sneeze as premonitory
+of consumption, and waited with dark certitude for the "something
+dreadful" that instinct told her was ever about to happen to her darling.
+
+"I am afraid your grandmother is terribly upset about your staying out so
+late," she said, with a note of warning in her voice.
+
+"What made you tell her?" demanded Eleanor.
+
+"Because she asked me, and of course I could not deceive her. I don't
+believe you know how hard it is to keep things from her."
+
+"_Don't_ I!" said Eleanor, with the tolerant smile of a professional for
+an amateur. "Well, a few minutes more won't make any difference. I'll go
+and change my dress."
+
+"No, dear; you must go to her first. She's been sending Hannah down every
+few minutes to see if you were here."
+
+"Oh, dear! I suppose I'm in for it!" sighed Eleanor, flinging her coat
+across the banister. Then, in answer to a plaintive voice from the
+library, "Yes, Aunt Enid?"
+
+"Why on earth are you so late, sweetheart? Didn't you know your
+grandmother would be fretted?"
+
+The possessor of the plaintive voice emerged from the library, trailing
+an Oriental scarf as she came. Like her elder sister, she was tall and
+thin, but she did not wear Miss Isobel's look of martyred resignation. On
+the contrary, she had the starved look of one who is constantly trying to
+pick up the crumbs of interest that other people let fall.
+
+Enid Bartlett might have passed for a pretty woman had her appearance not
+been permanently affected by an artist once telling her she looked like a
+Botticelli. Since that time she had done queer things to her hair, pursed
+her lips, and cultivated an expression of chronic yearning.
+
+"I haven't seen you since breakfast, Nellie," she said gently. "Haven't
+you a kiss for me?"
+
+Eleanor presented a perfunctory cheek over the banisters, taking care
+that it was not the one that had been kissed a few minutes before.
+
+"Remember your promise," Aunt Enid whispered; "don't forget that your
+grandmother is an old lady and you must not excite her."
+
+"But she excites me," said Eleanor doggedly. "She makes me want to smash
+windows and scream."
+
+"Why, Nellie!" Miss Enid's mournful eyes filled with tears. Instantly
+Eleanor was all contrition.
+
+"I'm sorry!" she said, with a real kiss this time. "I'll behave. Give you
+my word I will!" And, with an affectionate squeeze of the hand that
+clasped hers, she ran up the steps.
+
+The upper hall, like the rest of the house, was pervaded by an air of
+gloomy grandeur. Everything was dreary, formal, fixed. Not an ornament or
+a picture had been changed since Eleanor could remember. She was the only
+young thing about the place, and it always seemed to her as if the house
+and its occupants were conspiring to make her old and staid and stupid,
+like themselves.
+
+At the door of her grandmother's room she paused. As far back as she
+could remember, her quarrels with her grandmother had been the most
+terrifying events of her life. Repetition never robbed them of their
+horror, and no amount of spoiling between times could make up to her for
+the violence of the moment. It took all the courage she had to turn the
+knob of the door and enter.
+
+A brigadier-general planning an important campaign would have presented
+no more commanding presence than did the formidable old lady who sat at a
+flat-top desk, issuing orders in a loud, decisive tone to a small
+meek-looking man who stood before her. The most arresting feature about
+Madam Bartlett was a towering white pompadour that began where most
+pompadours end, and soared to a surprising height above her large,
+handsome, masculine face. The fact that her hair line had gradually
+receded from her forehead to the top of her head affected no change
+whatever in the arrangement of her coiffure. Neither in regard to her
+hair nor to her figure had she yielded one iota to the whims of Nature.
+Her body was still confined in the stiffest of stays, and in spite of her
+seventy years was as straight as an arrow. At Eleanor's entrance she
+motioned her peremptorily to a chair and proceeded with the business in
+hand.
+
+"You go back and tell Mr. Bangs," she was saying to the meek-looking
+person, "that I want him to send somebody up here who knows more than you
+do. Do you understand?"
+
+The meek one evidently understood, for he reached nervously for his cap.
+
+"Wait!" commanded Madam peremptorily. "Don't start off like that, while I
+am talking to you! Tell Mr. Bangs this is the third time I've asked him
+to send me the report of Bartlett & Bangs' export business for the past
+year. I want it immediately. I am not in my dotage yet. I still have some
+say-so in the firm. Well, what are you waiting for?"
+
+"I was waiting to know if there was anything more, ma'am."
+
+"If there had been I would have said so. Tell Hannah to come in as you go
+out."
+
+Eleanor looked at her grandmother expectantly, but there was no answering
+glance. The old lady was evidently in one of her truculent moods that
+brooked no interference.
+
+"Has the plumber come?" she demanded of the elderly colored maid who
+appeared at the door.
+
+"No, ma'am. He can't get here till to-morrow."
+
+"Tell him I won't wait. If he can't come within an hour he needn't come
+at all. Where is Tom?"
+
+Hannah's eyes shifted uneasily. "Tom? Why, Tom, he thought you discharged
+him."
+
+"So I did. But he's not to go until I get another butler. Send him up
+here at once."
+
+"But he ain't here," persisted Hannah fearfully, "He's went for good this
+time."
+
+Eleanor, sitting demurely by the door, had a moment of unholy exultation.
+Old black Tom, the butler, had been Madam's chief domestic prop for a
+quarter of a century. He had been the patient buffer between her and the
+other servants, taking her domineering with unfailing meekness, and even
+venturing her defense when mutiny threatened below stairs. "You-all don't
+understand old Miss," he would say loyally. "She's all right, only she's
+jes' nachully mean, dat's all."
+
+In the turning of this humble worm, Eleanor felt in some vague way a
+justification of her own rebellion.
+
+His departure, however, did not tend to clear the domestic atmosphere. By
+the time Madam had settled the plumbing question and expressed her
+opinion of Tom and all his race, she was in no mood to deal leniently
+with the shortcomings of a headstrong young granddaughter.
+
+"Well," she said, addressing her at last, "why didn't you make it
+midnight?"
+
+"It's only a little after five." Eleanor knew she was putting up a feeble
+defense, and her hands grew cold.
+
+"It is nearly six, and it is dark. Couldn't you have withdrawn the
+sunshine of your presence from the hospital half an hour sooner?"
+
+Under her sharp glance there was a curious protective tenderness, the
+savage concern of a lioness for her whelp; but Eleanor saw only the
+scoffing expression in the keen eyes, and heard the note of irony in all
+she said.
+
+"Your going out to the hospital is all foolishness, anyhow," the old lady
+continued, sorting her papers with efficiency. "Contagious diseases,
+germs, and what not. But some women would be willing to go to Hades if
+they could tie a becoming rag around their heads. Why didn't you dress
+yourself properly before you came in here?"
+
+"I wanted to, but Aunt----"
+
+"Aunt Enid, I suppose! If it was left to her she'd have you trailing
+around in a Greek tunic and sandals, with a laurel wreath on your head."
+
+There was an ominous pause, during which Madam's wrinkled, bony hands,
+flashing with diamonds, searched rapidly among the papers.
+
+"You are all ready to start on Monday? Your clothes are in good
+condition, I presume?"
+
+Eleanor brought her gaze from a detached contemplation of the ceiling to
+a critical inspection of her finger-nails.
+
+"I suppose Aunt Isobel has attended to them," she said indifferently.
+
+"Aunt Isobel, indeed!" snarled Madam. "You'd lean on a broken reed if you
+depended on Isobel. And Enid is no better. _I_ attended to your clothes.
+I got you everything you need, even down to a new set of furs."
+
+"Silver fox?" asked Eleanor, brightening visibly.
+
+"No, mink. I can't abide fox. Ah! here's what I am looking for. Your
+ticket and berth reservation. Train leaves at ten-thirty Monday morning."
+
+"Grandmother," ventured Eleanor, summing up courage to lead a forlorn
+hope, "you are just wasting money sending me back to Baltimore."
+
+"It's my money," said the old lady grimly.
+
+"It's your money, but it is my life," Eleanor urged, with a quiver in her
+voice. "If you are going to send me away, why not send me to New York and
+let me do the one thing in the world I want to do?"
+
+That Madam should be willing to furnish unlimited funds for finishing
+schools, music lessons, painting lessons, and every "extra" that the
+curriculum offered, and yet refuse to cultivate her one real talent,
+seemed to Eleanor the most unreasonable autocracy. She had no way of
+knowing that Madam's indomitable pride, still quivering with the memory
+of her oldest son's marriage to an unknown young actress, recoiled
+instinctively from the theatrical rock on which so many of her old hopes
+had been wrecked.
+
+Eleanor's persistence in recurring to this most distasteful of subjects
+roused her to fury. A purple flush suffused her face, and her cheeks
+puffed in and out as she breathed.
+
+"I suppose Claude Martel has it all mapped out," she said. "He and that
+fool Harold Phipps have stirred you up to a pretty pitch. What do you see
+in that silly coxcomb, anyhow?"
+
+"If you mean Captain Phipps," Eleanor said with dignity, "I see a great
+deal. He is one of the most cultivated men I ever met."
+
+"Fiddlesticks! He smells like a soap-counter! When I see an affected man
+I see a fool. He has airs enough to fill a music-box. But that's neither
+here nor there. You understand definitely that I do not wish you to see
+him again?"
+
+Eleanor's silence did not satisfy Madam. She insisted upon a verbal
+assurance, which Eleanor was loath to give.
+
+"I tell you once for all, young lady," said Madam, by this time roused to
+fury, "that you have _got_ to do what I say for another year. After that
+you will be twenty-one, and you can go to the devil, if you want to."
+
+"Grandmother!" cried Eleanor, shrinking as if from a physical blow. Then,
+remembering her promise to her Aunt Enid, she bit her lip and struggled
+to keep back the tears. As she started to leave the room, Madam called
+her back.
+
+"Here, take this," she said gruffly, thrusting a small morocco box into
+her hand. "Isobel and Enid never had decent necks to hang 'em on. See
+that you don't lose them." And without more ado she thrust Eleanor out of
+the room and shut the door in her face.
+
+Eleanor fled down the hall to her own room, and after locking the door
+flung herself on the bed. It was always like that, she told herself
+passionately; they nagged at her and tormented her and wore her out with
+their care and anxiety, and then suffocated her with their affection. She
+did not want their presents. She wanted freedom, the right to live her
+own life, think her own thoughts, make her own decisions. She did not
+mean to be ungrateful, but she couldn't please them all! The family
+expectations of her were too high, too different from what she wanted.
+Other girls with half her talents for the stage had succeeded, and just
+because she was a Bartlett----
+
+She clenched her fists and wished for the hundredth time that she had
+never been born. She had been a bone of contention all her life, and,
+even when the two families were not fighting over her, the Bartlett blood
+was warring with the Martel blood within her. Her standards were
+hopelessly confused; she did not know what she wanted except that she
+wanted passionately to be let alone.
+
+"Nellie!" called a gentle voice on the other side of the door. "Are you
+ready for dinner?"
+
+"Don't want any dinner," she mumbled from the depths of a pillow.
+
+The door-handle turned softly and the voice persisted:
+
+"You must unlock the door, dearie; I want to speak to you."
+
+Eleanor flung herself off the bed and opened the door. "I tell you, I
+don't want any dinner, Aunt Enid," she declared petulantly.
+
+Miss Enid drew her down on the bed beside her and regarded her with
+pensive persuasion. "I know, Nelchen; I often feel like that. But you
+must come down and make a pretense of eating. It upsets your grandmother
+to have any one of us absent from meals."
+
+"Everything I do upsets her!" cried Eleanor with tragic insistence. "I
+can't please her--there's no use trying. Why does she treat me the way
+she does? Why does she sometimes almost seem to hate me?"
+
+Miss Enid's eyes involuntarily glanced at the picture of Eleanor's mother
+over the desk, taken in the doublet and hose of _Rosalind_.
+
+"Hush, child; you mustn't say such awful things," she said, drawing the
+girl close and stroking her hair. "Mother adores you. Think of all she
+has done for you ever since you were a tiny baby. What other girl of your
+acquaintance has her own car, all the pretty clothes she can wear, and as
+much pin-money as she can spend?"
+
+"But that's not what I _want_!" cried Eleanor tragically. "I want to _be_
+something and to _do_ something. I feel like I am in prison here. I'm not
+good and resigned like you and Aunt Isobel, and I simply refuse to go
+through life standing grandmother's tyranny."
+
+Poor Eleanor, so intolerably sensitive to contacts, so hopelessly
+confused in her bearings, sitting red-eyed and miserable, kicking her
+feet against the side of the bed, looked much more like a naughty child
+than like the radiant Lady Bountiful who had dispensed favors and
+received homage in the hospital a few hours before.
+
+So swift was the sympathetic action of her nerves that any change in her
+physical condition affected her whole nature, making her an enigma to
+herself as well as to others. Even as she sat there rebellious and
+defiant, her eyes fell upon the small morocco box on her pillow, and she
+picked it up and opened it.
+
+"Oh, Aunt Enid!" she cried in instant remorse. "Just look what she's
+given me! Her string of pearls! The ones she wore in the portrait! And
+just think of what I've been saying about her. I'm a beast, a regular
+little beast!"
+
+And with characteristic impetuosity she flung herself on Miss Enid's neck
+and burst into tears.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 6
+
+
+The sun was getting ready to set on Sunday afternoon when a tall,
+trim-looking figure turned the corner of the street leading to the
+Martels' and broke into a run. In one hand he carried a large suit-case,
+and in the other he held a bead chain wrapped in tissue-paper. In the
+breast pocket of his uniform was a paper stating that Quinby Graham was
+thereby honorably discharged from the U.S.A.
+
+Whether it was his enforced rest, or his state of mind, or a combination
+of the two, it is impossible to say; but at least ten pounds had been
+added to his figure, the hollows had about gone from his eyes, and a
+natural color had returned to his face. But the old cough remained, as
+was evident when he presented himself breathless at the Martels' door and
+demanded of Cass:
+
+"Has she gone?"
+
+"Who?"
+
+"Miss Bartlett."
+
+"I believe she's fixing to go now. What's it to you?"
+
+"Oh, I just want to say good-by," Quin threw off with a great show of
+indifference. "She was awful good to me out at the hospital."
+
+"Oh, I see." Then Cass dismissed the subject for one of far more
+importance. "Are you out for keeps? Have you come to stay?"
+
+"You bet I have. How long has she been here?"
+
+"Who?"
+
+"Miss Bartlett, I tell you."
+
+"Oh! I don't know. All day, I reckon. I got to take her home now in a
+minute, but I'll be back soon. Don't you go anywhere till I come back."
+
+Quin seized his arm: "Cass, I'll take her home for you. I don't mind a
+bit, honest I don't. I need some exercise."
+
+"Old lady'd throw a fit," objected Cass. "Old grandmother, I mean.
+Regular Tartar. Old aunts are just as bad. They devil the life out of
+Nell, except when she's deviling the life out of them."
+
+"How do you mean?" Quin encouraged him.
+
+"I mean Nell's a handful all right. She kicks over the traces every time
+she gets a chance. I don't blame her. They're a rotten bunch of snobs,
+and she knows it."
+
+"Well, I could leave her at the door," Quin urged. "I wouldn't let her in
+for anything for the world. But I got to talk to her, I tell you; I got
+to thank her----"
+
+Meanwhile, in the room above the young lady under discussion was
+leisurely adjusting a new and most becoming hat before a cracked mirror
+while she discussed a subject of perennial interest to the eternal
+feminine.
+
+"Rose," she was asking, "what's the first thing you notice about a man?"
+
+Rose, sitting on the side of the bed nursing little Bino, the latest
+addition to the family, answered promptly:
+
+"His mouth, of course. I wouldn't marry a man who showed his gums when he
+laughed, not if every hair of his head was strung with diamonds!"
+
+The visualization of this unpleasant picture threw Eleanor into peals of
+laughter which upset the carefully acquired angle of the new hat, to say
+nothing of the nerves of the young gentleman just arrived in the hall
+below.
+
+"I wasn't thinking of his looks only," she said; "I mean everything about
+him."
+
+"Why, I guess it's whether he notices me," said Rose after deliberation.
+
+"Exactly," agreed Eleanor. "Not only you or me, but girls. Take Cass, for
+instance; girls might just as well be broomsticks to Cass, all except Fan
+Loomis. Now, when Captain Phipps looks at you----"
+
+"He never would," said Rose; "he'd look straight over my head. I'll tell
+you who is a better example--Mr. Graham."
+
+Eleanor smiled reminiscently. "Oh, Sergeant Slim? _he's_ thrilled, all
+right! Always looks as if he couldn't wait a minute to hear what you are
+going to say next."
+
+"He's not as susceptible as he looks," Rose pronounced from her
+vantage-point of seniority. "He's just got a way with him that fools
+people. Cass says girls are always crazy about him, and that he never
+cares for any of them more than a week."
+
+"Much Cass knows about it!" said Cass's cousin, pulling on her long
+gloves. Then she dismissed the subject abruptly: "Rose, if I tell you
+something will you swear not to tell?"
+
+"Never breathe it."
+
+"Captain Phipps is coming up to Baltimore for the Easter vacation."
+
+"Does your grandmother know?"
+
+"I should say _not_. She's written Miss Hammond that I'm not to receive
+callers without permission, and that all suspicious mail is to be
+opened."
+
+"How outrageous! You tell Captain Phipps to send his letters to me; I'll
+get them to you. They'll never suspect my fine Italian hand, with my name
+and address on the envelope."
+
+Eleanor looked at her older cousin dubiously. "I hate to do underhand
+things like that!" she said crossly.
+
+"You wouldn't have to if they treated you decently. Opening your letters!
+The idea! I wouldn't stand for it. I'd show them a thing or two."
+
+Eleanor stood listlessly buttoning her glove, pondering what Rose was
+saying.
+
+"I wonder if I could get word to the Captain to-night?" she said. "Shall
+I really tell him to send the letters to you?"
+
+"No; tell him to bring them. I'm crazy to see what his nibs looks like."
+
+"He looks like that picture of Richard Mansfield downstairs--the one
+taken as _Beau Brummel_. He's the most fastidious man you ever saw, and
+too subtle for words."
+
+"He's terribly rich, isn't he?"
+
+"I don't know," said Eleanor indifferently. "His father is a Chicago
+manufacturer of some kind. Does Papa Claude think he is _very_ talented?"
+
+"Talented! He says he's one of the most gifted young men he ever met.
+They are hatching out some marvelous schemes to write a play together.
+Papa Claude is treading on air."
+
+"Bless his heart! Wouldn't it be too wonderful, Rose, if Captain Phipps
+should produce one of his plays? He's crazy about him."
+
+"You mean he's crazy about you."
+
+"Who said so?"
+
+"I don't have to be told. How about you, Nell? Are you in love with him?"
+
+Eleanor, taking a farewell look in the mirror, saw a tiny frown gather
+between her eyebrows. It was the second time that week she had been asked
+the question, and, as before, she avoided it.
+
+"Listen!" she said. "Who is that talking so loud downstairs?"
+
+Investigation proved that it was Cass and Quin in hot dispute, as usual.
+On seeing her descend the stair the latter promptly stepped forward.
+
+"Cass is going to let me take you home, Miss Bartlett."
+
+"I never said I would," Cass contradicted him. "I'm not going to get her
+into trouble the night before she goes away."
+
+"That's for her to decide," said Quin. "If she says I can go I'm going."
+
+The very novelty of being called upon to decide anything for herself,
+augmented perhaps by the ardent desire in his eyes, caused Eleanor to tip
+the scales in his favor.
+
+"I don't mind his taking me home," she said somewhat condescendingly.
+"They'll think it's Cass."
+
+"All buck privates look alike to them," added Rose, laughing.
+
+"My private days are over," said Quin grandly. "This time next week I'll
+be out of my uniform."
+
+"You won't be half so good-looking," said Eleanor, surveying him with
+such evident approval that he had a wild idea of reënlisting at once.
+
+"Tell Papa Claude I couldn't wait for him any longer," Eleanor then said.
+"Kiss him good-by for me, Rose, and tell him I'll write the minute I get
+to Baltimore."
+
+Then Cass kissed her, and Rose and the baby kissed her, and Myrna came
+downstairs to kiss her, and Edwin was called up from the basement to kiss
+her. It seemed the easiest and most natural thing in the world for
+everybody to kiss her but Quin, who would have given all he had for the
+privilege.
+
+At last he found himself alone with her in the street, trying to catch
+step and wondering whether or not it was proper to take hold of a young
+lady's elbow. With commendable self-restraint he compromised on street
+crossings and muddy places. It was not quite dark yet, but it was going
+to be very soon, and a big pale moon was hiding behind a tall chimney,
+waiting for a chance to pounce out on unwary young couples who might be
+venturing abroad.
+
+As they started across Central Park, an open square in the heart of the
+city, Eleanor stopped short, and with eyes fixed on the sky began
+incanting:
+
+    "Star light, star bright
+    Very first star I see to-night
+    Wish I may, wish I might--
+    May these three wishes come true before to-morrow night."
+
+"I haven't got three wishes," said Quin solemnly; "I've only got one."
+
+"Mercy, I have dozens! Shall I lend you some?"
+
+"No! mine's bigger than all yours put together."
+
+She flashed a look at him from under her tilted hat-brim:
+
+"What on earth's the matter with you? You look so solemn. I don't believe
+you wanted to bring me home, after all."
+
+Quin didn't know what was the matter with him. Heretofore he had fallen
+in love as a pebble falls into a pond. There had been a delicious splash,
+and subsequent encircling ripples, each one further away than the last.
+But this time the pebble had fallen into a whirlpool, and was being
+turned and tossed and played with in a manner wholly bewildering.
+
+"Oh, I wanted to come, all right," he said slowly. "I _had_ to come. Say,
+I wish you weren't going away to-morrow."
+
+"So do I. I'd give anything not to."
+
+"But why do you go, then?"
+
+"Because I am always made to do what I don't want to do."
+
+Quin, who had decided views on individual freedom and the consent of the
+governed, promptly espoused her cause.
+
+"They've got no right to force you. You ought to decide things for
+yourself."
+
+"Do you really think that? Do you think a girl has the right to go ahead
+and do as she likes, regardless of her family?"
+
+"That depends on whether she wants to do the right thing. Which way do we
+turn?"
+
+"This way, if we go home," said Eleanor. Then she stopped abruptly. "What
+time is it?"
+
+Quin consulted his watch and his conscience at the same time.
+
+"It's only five-thirty," he said eagerly.
+
+"I wonder if you'd do something for me?"
+
+"You bet I will."
+
+"I want to go out to the hospital. I can get out there and back in my
+machine in thirty minutes. Would you be willing to go with me?"
+
+Would he be willing? Two hours before he had sworn that no power on earth
+could induce him to return to those prison walls, and now he felt that
+nothing could keep him away. Forty minutes of bliss in that snug little
+runabout with Miss Bartlett, and the destination might be Hades for all
+he cared.
+
+It took but a few minutes to get to the garage and into the machine, and
+then they were speeding out the avenue at a pace that would surely have
+landed them in the police station had the traffic officer been on his
+job.
+
+Quin, doubled up like a jack-knife beside her, was drunk with ecstasy.
+His expression when he looked at her resembled that of a particularly
+maudlin Airedale. Having her all to himself, with nobody to interfere,
+was an almost overwhelming joy. He longed to pour out his soul in
+gratitude for all that she had done for him at the hospital; he burned to
+tell her that she was the most beautiful and holy thing that had ever
+come into his life; but instead he only got his foot tangled in the
+steering gear, and muttered something about her "not driving a car bad
+for a girl"!
+
+But Eleanor was not concerned with her companion or his silent
+transports. She evidently had something of importance on her mind.
+
+"What time is the officers' mess?" she asked.
+
+"About six. Why?"
+
+"I want to catch Captain Phipps before he leaves the hospital."
+
+Quin's glowing bubble burst at the word. She _was_ Captain Phipps' girl,
+after all! She had simply pressed him into service in order to get a last
+interview with the one officer in the battalion for whom he had no
+respect.
+
+The guard challenged them as they swung into the hospital area, but,
+seeing Quin's uniform, allowed them to enter. Past the long line of
+contagious wards, past the bleak two-story convalescent barracks, and up
+to the officers' quarters they swept.
+
+"You are not going in yourself?" Quin protested, as she started to get
+out of the car.
+
+"Why not? Haven't I been coming out here all the time?"
+
+"Not at night--not like this."
+
+"Nonsense. What's the harm? I'll only be a minute?"
+
+But Quin had already got out, and was holding the door with a large, firm
+hand.
+
+"No," he said humbly but positively; "I'll go and bring him out here."
+
+The unexpected note of authority in his voice nettled her instantly.
+
+"I shall go myself," she insisted petulantly. "Let me out."
+
+For a moment their eyes clashed in frank combat, hers angry and defiant,
+his adoring but determined.
+
+"Listen here, Miss Bartlett," he urged. "The men wouldn't understand your
+coming out like this, at night, without your uniform. I told Cass I'd
+take care of you, and I'm going to do it."
+
+"You mean that you will dare to stop me from getting out of my own car?
+Take your hand off that door instantly!"
+
+She actually seized his big, strong fingers with her small gloved ones
+and tried to pull them away from the door. But Quin began to laugh, and
+in spite of herself she laughed back; and, while the two were childishly
+struggling for the possession of the door-handle, Captain Phipps all
+unnoticed passed out of the mess-hall, gave a few instructions to his
+waiting orderly, and disappeared in the darkness.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 7
+
+
+By the time they were on their way home, the moon, no longer dodging
+behind chimneys, had swaggered into the open. It was a hardened old
+highwayman of a moon, red in the face and very full, and it declared with
+every flashing beam that it was no respecter of persons, and that it
+intended doing all the mischief possible down there in the little world
+of men.
+
+Miss Eleanor Bartlett was its first victim. In the white twilight she
+forgot the social gap that lay between her and the youth beside her. She
+ceased to observe the size and roughness of his hands, but noted instead
+the fine breadth of his shoulders. She concerned herself no longer with
+his verbal lapses, but responded instead to his glowing confidence that
+everybody was as sincere and well intentioned as himself. She discovered
+what the more sophisticated Rose had perceived at once--that Quinby
+Graham "had a way with him," a beguiling, sympathetic way that made one
+tell him things that one really didn't mean to tell any one. Of course,
+it was partly due to the fact that he asked such outrageously direct
+questions, questions that no one in her most intimate circle of friends
+would dare to ask. And the queer part of it was that she was answering
+them.
+
+Before she realized it she was launched on a full recital of her woes,
+her thwarted ambition to go on the stage, her grandmother's tyranny, the
+indignity of being sent back to a school from which she had run away six
+months before. She flattered herself that she was stating her case for
+the sole purpose of getting an unprejudiced outsider's unbiased opinion;
+but from the inflection of her voice and the expressive play of eyes and
+lips it was evident that she was deriving some pleasure from the mere act
+of thus dramatizing her woes before that wholly sympathetic audience of
+one.
+
+It was not until they reached the Eastern Parkway and were speeding
+toward the twinkling lights of the city that their little bubble of
+intimacy, blown in the moonlight, was shattered by a word.
+
+"Say, Miss Eleanor," Quin blurted out unexpectedly, "do you like me?"
+
+The question, together with the fact that he had dared used her first
+name, brought her up with a start.
+
+"Like you?" she repeated in her most conventional tone, "Why, of course.
+Whatever made you think I didn't?"
+
+"I didn't think that. But--do you like me enough to let me come to see
+you when you come back?"
+
+Now, a romantically wounded hero receiving favors in a hospital is one
+thing, and an unknown discharged soldier asking them is quite another.
+The very thought of Quinby Graham presenting himself as a caller, and the
+comments that would follow made Eleanor shy away from the subject in
+alarm.
+
+"Oh, you'll be on the other side of the world by the time I get back,"
+she said lightly.
+
+"Not me. Not if there's a chance of seeing you again."
+
+A momentary diversion followed, during which Eleanor fancied there was
+something wrong with the radiator and expatiated at length on her
+preference for air-cooled cars.
+
+Quin listened patiently. A gentleman more versed in social subtleties
+would have accepted the hint and said no more. But he was still laboring
+under the error that language was invented to reveal rather than to
+conceal thought.
+
+"You didn't answer my question," he said, when Eleanor paused for breath.
+
+"What question?"
+
+"About my coming to see you."
+
+She took shelter in a subterfuge.
+
+"I told you that the family was horrid to everybody that came to see me.
+To tell you the truth, I don't think you would be comfortable."
+
+"I'm not afraid of 'em," Quin insisted fatuously. "I'd butt in anywhere
+to get to see you."
+
+Eleanor's eyes dropped under his gaze.
+
+"You don't know my grandmother," she said; "and, what is much more
+important, she doesn't know you."
+
+"No, but she might like to," urged Quin, with one of his most engaging
+smiles. "Old ladies and cats always cotton to me."
+
+Eleanor laughed. It was impossible to be dignified and superior with a
+person who didn't know the first rules of the game.
+
+"She might," she admitted; "you never can tell about grandmother. She
+really is a wonderful person in many ways, and just as generous and kind
+when you are in trouble! But she says the most dreadful things; she's
+always hurting people's feelings."
+
+"She couldn't hurt mine, unless I let her," said Quin.
+
+"Oh, yes, she could--you don't know her. But even if she happened to be
+nice to you, there's Aunt Isobel."
+
+"What is she like?"
+
+"_Horribly_ good and conscientious, and shocked to death at everything
+people do and say. I don't mean that she isn't awfully kind. She'll do
+anything for you if you are sick. But Uncle Ranny says her sense of duty
+amounts to a vice. Whatever she's doing, she thinks she ought to be doing
+something else. And she expects you to be just as good as she is. If she
+knew I was out here with a strange man to whom I'd never been
+introduced----"
+
+Eleanor was appalled at the effect upon her aunt of such indiscretion.
+
+"Oh, I could handle her all right," said Quin boastfully. "I'd talk
+foreign missions to her. Any others?"
+
+"Heaps. There's Aunt Flo and Uncle Ranny. He's a dear, only he's the
+black sheep of the family. He says I am a promising gray lamb, which
+makes grandmother furious. They all let her twist them round her finger
+but me. I won't twist. I never intend to."
+
+"Is that all the family?"
+
+"No; there's Aunt Enid. She is the nicest of them all."
+
+"What is her line?"
+
+"Oh, she's awfully good, too. But she's different from Aunt Isobel. She
+was engaged to be married once, and grandmother broke it off because the
+man was poor. I don't think she'll ever get over it."
+
+"Do you think she would like me?" Quin anxiously inquired.
+
+"Yes," admitted Eleanor, "I believe she would. She simply adores to mold
+people. She doesn't care how many faults they have, if they will just let
+her influence them to be better. And she does help loads of people. I am
+her one failure. She wouldn't acknowledge it for the world, but I know
+that I am the disappointment of Aunt Enid's life."
+
+She gazed gloomily down the long moonlit road and lapsed into one of her
+sudden abstractions. A belated compunction seized her for not going
+straight home from the Martels', for being late for dinner on her last
+night, for going on with her affair with Captain Phipps, when she had
+been forbidden to see him.
+
+"Miss Nell," said the persistent voice beside her, "do you know what I
+intend to do while you are away?"
+
+"No; what?"
+
+"I'm going to start in to-morrow morning and make love to your whole darn
+family!"
+
+Now, if there is one thing Destiny admires in a man, it is his courage to
+defy her. She relentlessly crushes the supine spirit who acquiesces, but
+to him who snaps his fingers in her face she often extends a helping
+hand. In this case she did not make Quin wait until the morrow to begin
+his colossal undertaking. By means of a humble tack that lay in the way
+of the speeding automobile, she at once set in motion the series of
+events that were to determine his future life.
+
+By the time the puncture was repaired and they were again on their way,
+it was half-past seven and all hope of a timely arrival was abandoned. As
+they slowed up at the Bartlett house, their uneasiness was increased by
+the fact that lights were streaming from every window and the front door
+was standing open.
+
+"Is that the doctor?" an excited voice called to them from the porch.
+
+"No," called back Eleanor, scrambling out of the car. "What is the
+matter?"
+
+No answer being received, she clutched Quin's sleeve nervously.
+
+"Something has happened! Look, the front hall is full of people. Oh, I'm
+afraid to go in! I----"
+
+"Steady on!" said Quin, with a firm grip on her elbow as he marched her
+up the steps and into the hall.
+
+Everything was in confusion. People were hurrying to and fro, doors were
+slamming, excited voices were asking questions and not waiting for
+answers. "What's Dr. Snowden's telephone number?" "Can't they get another
+doctor?" "Has somebody sent for Randolph?" "Are they going to try to move
+her?" everybody demanded of everybody else.
+
+Eleanor pushed through the crowd until she reached the foot of the steps.
+There, lying on the floor, with her towering white pompadour crushed
+ignominiously against the newel-post, lay the one person in the house who
+could have brought prompt order out of the chaos. On one side of her
+knelt Miss Enid frantically applying smelling salts, while on the other
+stood Miss Isobel futilely wringing her hands and imploring some one to
+go for a minister.
+
+Suddenly the buzz of excited talk ceased. Madam was returning to
+consciousness. She groaned heavily, then opened one eye.
+
+"What's the matter?" she demanded feebly. "What's all this fuss about?"
+
+"You fell down the steps, mother. Don't get excited; don't try to move."
+
+But Madam had already tried, with the result that she fell back with a
+sharp cry of pain.
+
+"Oh, my leg, my leg!" she groaned. "What are you all standing around like
+fools for? Why don't you send Tom for the doctor?"
+
+"Tom isn't with us any more, dearest," said Aunt Enid with trembling
+reassurance, "and Dr. Snowden is out of town. But we are trying to get
+Dr. Bean."
+
+"I won't have Bean," Madam declared, clinching her jaw with pain. "I'll
+send him away if he comes."
+
+"Dr. Vaughn, then?" suggested Miss Enid tenderly.
+
+"Vaughn nothing! Send for Rawlins. He's an old stick, but he'll do till
+Dr. Snowden gets here."
+
+"But, mother," protested Miss Isobel. "Dr. Rawlins lives in the country;
+he can't get here for half an hour."
+
+"Do as I tell you and stop arguing," commanded Madam. "Has anybody
+telephoned Ranny?"
+
+The two sisters exchanged significant glances.
+
+"Their line is busy," said Miss Enid soothingly. "We will get him soon."
+
+"I want to be taken upstairs," announced Madam; "I want to be put in my
+own bed."
+
+A buzz of protest met this suggestion, and a small, nervous man in
+clerical garb, who had just arrived, came forward to add his voice to the
+rest.
+
+Madam glared at him savagely. "There'll be plenty of time for parsons
+when the doctors get through with me," she said. "Tell some of those
+able-bodied men back there to come here and take me upstairs."
+
+Quin, who had been standing in the background looking down at the
+formidable old lady, promptly came forward.
+
+"I'll take you up," he said. "Which leg is hurt?"
+
+The old lady turned her head and looked up at him. The note of confidence
+in his voice had evidently appealed to her.
+
+"It's my left leg. I think it's broken just above the knee."
+
+"Do you want me to put a splint on it?"
+
+"Are you a doctor?"
+
+"No, ma'am; but I can fix it so's it won't hurt you so bad when we move
+you," Quin replied.
+
+"How do you know you can?"
+
+Quin ran his fingers through his hair and smiled.
+
+"Well, I wasn't with the Ambulance Corps for six months in France for
+nothing."
+
+Madam eyed him keenly for a moment; then, "Go ahead," she commanded.
+
+A chorus of protests from the surrounding group only deepened her
+determination.
+
+"It's _my_ leg," she said irritably. "If he knows how to splint it, let
+him do it. I want to be taken upstairs."
+
+It is difficult enough to apply a splint properly under favorable
+circumstances; but when one has only an umbrella and table napkins to
+work with, and is hemmed in by a doubtful and at times protesting
+audience, it becomes well-nigh impossible.
+
+Quin worked slowly and awkwardly, putting the bones as nearly as possible
+in position and then binding them firmly in place. He paid no more
+attention to the agitated comments of those about him than he had paid to
+the whizzing bullets when he rendered first aid to a fallen comrade in No
+Man's Land.
+
+During the painful operation Madam lay with rigid jaws and clenched
+fists. Small beads of perspiration gathered on her forehead and her lips
+were white. Now and then she flinched violently, but only once did she
+speak, and that was when Miss Enid held the smelling salts too close to
+her high-bridged nose.
+
+"Haven't I got enough to stand without that?" she sputtered, knocking the
+bottle into the air and sending the contents flying over the polished
+floor.
+
+When Quin finished he looked at her with frank admiration.
+
+"You got nerve, all right," he said; then he added gently: "Don't you
+worry about getting upstairs; it won't hurt you much now."
+
+"You stay and help," said Madam peremptorily.
+
+"Sure," said Quin.
+
+It was not until she was in her own bed, and word had come that Dr.
+Rawlins was on his way, that she would let Quin go, and even then she
+called him back.
+
+"You! Soldier! Come here," was the faint edict from the canopied bed. She
+was getting very weak from the pain, and her words came in gasps. "Do you
+know where--the--Aristo Apartments are?"
+
+"No, but I can find out," said Quin.
+
+"I want you--to--go for my son--Mr. Randolph Bartlett. If he's not at
+home--you find him. I'll make it--worth your while."
+
+"I'll find him," Quin said, with a reassuring pat on her wrinkled hand.
+
+As he went into the hall, Eleanor slipped out of the adjoining room and
+followed him silently down the stairs. She did not speak until they were
+at the front door, and even then took the precaution of stepping outside.
+
+"I just wanted to come down and say good-by," she said.
+
+"But you surely won't be going now?" said Quin hopefully.
+
+"Yes, I'm to go. Grandmother has just told Aunt Isobel that everything is
+to be carried out exactly as she planned it. But I wish they'd let me
+stay and help. Poor granny!"
+
+Her eyes brimmed with ready tears.
+
+"She'll pull through all right," said Quin, to whom the tear-dimmed eyes
+of youth were more unnerving than age's broken bones. "Don't worry, Miss
+Eleanor, please. What time does your train go in the morning?"
+
+"Ten-thirty."
+
+"I'll be there at ten."
+
+Eleanor brushed her tears away quickly. "No, no--you mustn't," she said
+in quick alarm. "They don't know that we ever saw each other before. They
+think you just happened to be passing and ran in to help. Oh, I don't
+want to give them any more trouble. Promise me not to come!"
+
+"Well, when you come back, then?"
+
+"Yes, yes, when I come back," she whispered hurriedly. Then she put out
+her hand impulsively. "I think you've been perfectly splendid to-night.
+Good-by."
+
+For a moment she stood there, her dainty figure silhouetted against the
+bright doorway, with the light shining through her soft hair giving her
+an undeserved halo. Then she was gone, leaving him on the steps in the
+moonlight, tenderly contemplating the hand that had just held hers.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 8
+
+
+It was well that Quin had an errand to perform that night. His emotions,
+which had been accumulating compound interest since five o'clock,
+demanded an outlet in immediate action. He had not the faintest idea
+where the Aristo Apartments might be; but, wherever they were, he meant
+to find them. Consultation with a telephone book at the corner drug-store
+sent him across the city to a newer and more fashionable residence
+quarter. As he left the street-car at the corner indicated, he asked a
+man who was just dismounting from a taxi-cab for further information.
+
+When the dapper gentleman, thus addressed, turned toward him, it was
+evident that he had dined not wisely but too well. He was at that mellow
+stage that radiates affection, and, having bidden a loving farewell to
+the taxi driver, he now linked his arm in Quin's and repeated gaily:
+
+"'Risto? Of course I can find it for you, if it's where it was this
+morning! Always make a point of helping a man that's worse off than I am.
+Always help a sholdier, anyhow. Take my arm, old chap. Take my cane, too.
+I'll help you."
+
+Thus assisted and assisting, Quin good-humoredly allowed himself to be
+conducted in a zigzag course to the imposing doorway of a large
+apartment-house across the street.
+
+"Forgive me f' taking you up stairway," apologized the affable gentleman.
+"Mustn't let elevator boy see you in this condishun. Take you up to my
+apartment. Put you bed in m' own room. Got to take care sholdiers."
+
+At the second floor Quin tried to disentangle himself from his new-found
+protector.
+
+"You can find your way home now, partner," he said. "I got to go down and
+find out which floor my party lives on."
+
+But his companion held him tight.
+
+"No, my boy! Mustn't go out again to-night. M.P.'s'll catch you. I'll get
+you to bed without anybody knowing. Mustn't 'sturb my wife, though.
+Mustn't make any noise." And, adding force to persuasion, he got his arms
+around Quin and backed him so suddenly against the wall that they both
+took an unexpected seat on the floor.
+
+At this inopportune moment a door opened and a delicate blonde lady in a
+pink kimono, followed by an inquisitive poodle, peered anxiously out.
+
+"'S perfectly all right, darling!" reassured the nethermost figure
+blithely. "Sholdier friend's had a little too much champagne. Bringing
+him in so's won't be 'rested. Nicest kind of chap. Perfectly harmless!"
+
+Quin scrambled to his feet and exchanged an understanding look with the
+lady in the doorway.
+
+"I found him down at the corner. Does he belong here?" he asked. And,
+upon being informed sorrowfully that he did, he added obligingly, "Don't
+you want me to bring him in for you?"
+
+"Will you?" said the lady in grateful agitation. "The maids are both out,
+and I can't handle him by myself. Would you mind bringing him into his
+bedroom?"
+
+Quin succeeded in detaching an affectionate arm from his right leg and,
+getting his patient up, piloted him into the apartment.
+
+"I'd just as leave put him to bed for you if you like?" he offered,
+noting the nervousness of the lady, who was fluttering about like a
+distracted butterfly.
+
+"Oh, would you?" she asked. "It would help me immensely. If he isn't put
+to bed he is sure to want to go out again."
+
+"Shure to!" heartily agreed the object of their solicitude. "Leave him to
+me, darling. I'll hide his uniform so's he can't go out. Be a good girl,
+run along--I'll take care of him."
+
+Thus left to each other, a satisfactory compromise was effected by which
+the host agreed to be undressed and put to bed, provided Quin would later
+submit to the same treatment. It was not the first time Quin had thus
+assisted a brother in misfortune, but he had never before had to do with
+gold buttons and jeweled cuff-links, to say nothing of silk underwear and
+sky-blue pajamas. Being on the eve of adopting civilian clothes for the
+first time in two years, he took a lively interest in every detail of his
+patient's attire, from the modish cut of his coat to the smart pattern of
+his necktie.
+
+The bibulous one, who up to the present had regarded the affair as
+humorous, now began to be lachrymose, and by the time Quin got him into
+the rose-draped bed he was in a state of deep dejection.
+
+"My mother loves me," he assured Quin tearfully. "Gives me everything. I
+don't mean to be ungrateful. But I can't go on in the firm. Bangs is
+dishonest, but she won't believe it. She thinks I don't know. They both
+think I'm a cipher. I _am_ a cipher. But they've made me one. Get so
+discouraged, then go break over like this. Promised Flo never would take
+another drink. But it's no use. Can't help myself. I'm done for. Just a
+cipher, a cipher, a ci----"
+
+Quin standing by the bed waiting for him to get through adding noughts to
+his opinion of himself, suddenly leaned forward and examined the picture
+that hung above the table. It was of an imperial old lady in black
+velvet, with a string of pearls about her throat and a tiara on her
+towering white pompadour. His glance swept from the photograph to the
+flushed face with the tragic eyes on the pillow, and he seemed to hear a
+querulous old voice repeating: "Ranny--I want Ranny. Why don't they send
+for Ranny?"
+
+With two strides he was at the door.
+
+"Are you Mrs. Randolph Bartlett?" he asked of the lady who was nervously
+pacing the hall.
+
+"Yes; why?"
+
+"Because they sent me after him. It's his mother, you see--she's hurt."
+
+"Madam Bartlett? What's happened?"
+
+"She fell down the steps and broke her leg."
+
+"How terrible! But she mustn't know about him," cried Mrs. Ranny in
+instant alarm. "It always makes her furious when he breaks over; and yet,
+she is to blame--she drives him to it."
+
+"How do you mean?" asked Quin, plunging into the situation with his usual
+temerity.
+
+"I mean that she has dominated him, soul and body, ever since he was
+born!" cried Mrs. Ranny passionately. "She has forced him to stay in the
+business when every detail of it is distasteful to him. His life is a
+perfect hell there under Mr. Bangs. He ought to have an outdoor life. He
+loves animals--he ought to be on a ranch." She pulled herself up with an
+effort. "Forgive me for going into all this before a stranger, but I am
+almost beside myself. Of course I am sorry for Madam Bartlett, but what
+can I do? You can see for yourself that my husband is in no condition to
+go to her."
+
+"Can't you say he's sick?"
+
+"She wouldn't believe it. She's suspicious of everything I do and say. Do
+you _have_ to take back an answer?"
+
+"I told the old lady I'd find him for her. You see, I'm a--sort of a
+friend of Miss Eleanor's."
+
+Under ordinary circumstances Mrs. Ranny would have been the last to
+accept this without an explanation; but there were too many other
+problems pressing for her to worry about this one.
+
+"I wonder how it would do," she said, "for you to telephone that we are
+both out of town for the night, spending the week-end in the country?"
+
+"I guess one lie is as good as another," said Quin ruefully. He was
+getting involved deeper than he liked, but there seemed no other way out.
+"I'll telephone from the drug-store. Anything else I can do for you?"
+
+"You have been so kind, I hate to ask another favor."
+
+"Let's have it," said Quin.
+
+"Would you by any chance have time to leave a package of papers at
+Bartlett & Bangs' for me the first thing in the morning? Mr. Bangs has
+been telephoning me about them all day, and I've been nearly distracted,
+because my husband had them in his pocket and I did not know where he
+was."
+
+"Wait a minute," said Quin, going back into the bedroom. "Are these the
+ones?"
+
+"Yes. They must be very important; that's why I am afraid to intrust them
+to my maid. Be sure to take them to Mr. Bangs himself, and if he asks any
+questions----" She caught her trembling lip between her teeth and tried
+to force back the tears.
+
+"Don't you worry!" cried Quin. "I'll make it all right with him. You
+drink a glass of hot milk or something, and go to bed."
+
+She looked up at him gratefully. "I don't know your name," she said, "but
+I certainly appreciate your kindness to me to-night. I wish you would
+come back some time and let us thank you----"
+
+"Oh, that's all o.k.," said Quin, turning to the door in sudden
+embarrassment. Then he discovered that he was trying to shake hands and
+hold his cap with the same hand, and in his confusion he slipped on the
+hard-wood floor, and achieved an exit that was scarcely more dignified
+than his entrance a half-hour before.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 9
+
+
+The news that Quin had broken through the Bartlett barrage afforded great
+amusement to the Martels at breakfast next morning. Of course they were
+sympathetic over Madam Bartlett's accident--the Martels' sympathy was
+always on tap for friend or foe,--but that did not interfere with a frank
+enjoyment of Quin's spirited account of her high-handed treatment of the
+family, especially the incident of the smelling salts.
+
+"She ought to belong to the Tank Brigade," said Rose. "'Treat 'em rough'
+is her motto."
+
+"I like the old girl, though," said Quin disrespectfully, "she's got so
+much pep. And talk about your nerve! You should have seen her set her jaw
+when I put the splint on!"
+
+"Is the house very grand?" asked Myrna, hungering for luxurious details.
+
+"No," Cass broke in scornfully. "I been in the hall twice. It looks like
+a museum--big pictures and statuary, and everything dark and gloomy."
+
+"Yes, and Miss Isobel and Miss Enid are the mummies," added Rose. "The
+only nice one in the bunch besides Nell is Mr. Ranny, and he is hardly
+ever sober."
+
+"Well, I wouldn't be, either," said Cass, "if I'd been held down like he
+has all his life. The Bartlett estate was left in trust to the old lady,
+and she holds the purse-strings and has the say-so about everything."
+
+Quin refrained from mentioning the fact that he had also met Mr. Ranny.
+It was a point to his credit, for the story would have been received with
+hilarity, and he particularly enjoyed making Rose laugh.
+
+The entrance of Mr. Martel put an end to the discussion of the Bartletts.
+Bitter as was his animosity toward the old lady, he would permit no
+disrespect to be shown her or hers in his presence. In the garish light
+of day he looked a trifle less imposing than he had on New Year's eve in
+the firelight. His long white hair hung straight and dry about his face;
+baggy wrinkles sagged under his eyes and under his chin. The shoulders
+that once proudly carried Mark Antony's shining armor now supported a
+faded velvet breakfast jacket that showed its original color only in
+patches. But even in the intimacy of the breakfast hour Papa Claude
+preserved his air of distinction, the gracious condescension of a
+temporary sojourner in an environment from which he expected at any
+moment to take flight.
+
+When Cass had gone to work and the girls were busy cleaning up the
+breakfast dishes, he linked his arm in Quin's and drew him into the
+living-room.
+
+"I have never allowed myself to submit to the tyranny of time!" he said.
+"The wine of living should be tasted slowly. Pull up a chair, my boy; I
+want to talk to you. You don't happen to have a cigar about you, do you?"
+
+"Yes, sir. Here are two. Take 'em both. I got to cut out smoking; it
+makes me cough."
+
+Mr. Martel, protesting and accepting at the same time, sank into his
+large chair and bade Quin pull up a rocker. In the Martels' living-room
+all the chairs were rockers; so, in fact, were the table and the sofa,
+owing to missing castors.
+
+"I am going to talk to you quite confidentially," began Mr. Martel,
+giving himself up to the enjoyment of the hour. "I am going to tell you
+of a new and fascinating adventure upon which I am about to embark. You
+have doubtless heard me speak of a very wealthy and talented young friend
+of mine--Mr. Harold Phipps?"
+
+Quin admitted without enthusiasm that he had, and that he also knew him.
+
+"Well, Mr. Phipps,--or Captain, as you probably know him,--after a short
+medical career has found it so totally distasteful that he is wisely
+returning to an earlier love. As soon as he gets out of the army he and I
+are going to collaborate on a play. Of course I have technic at my
+finger-tips. Construction, dramatic suspense, climax are second nature to
+me. But I confess I have a fatal handicap, one that has doubtless cost me
+my place at the head of American dramatists to-day. I have never been
+able to achieve colloquial dialogue! My style is too finished, you
+understand, my diction too perfect. Manager after manager has been on the
+verge of accepting a play, and been deterred solely on account of this
+too literary quality. I suffer from the excess of my virtue; you see?"
+
+Quin did not see. Mr. Martel's words conveyed but the vaguest meaning to
+him. But it flattered his vanity to be the recipient of such a great
+man's confidence.
+
+"Well, here's my point," continued his host impressively. "Mr. Phipps
+knows nothing of technic, of construction; but he has a sense for
+character and dialogue that amounts to genius. Now, suppose I construct a
+great plot, and he supplies great dialogue? What will be the inevitable
+result? A masterpiece, a little modern masterpiece!"
+
+Mr. Martel, soaring on the wings of his imagination, failed to observe
+that his listener was not following.
+
+"Does--does Miss Eleanor know about all this?" Quin asked.
+
+"Alas, no. I had no opportunity to tell her. Ah, Mr. Graham, I must
+confess, it hurts me, it hurts me here,"--he indicated a grease-spot just
+below his vest pocket,--"to be separated from that dear child just when
+she needs me most. She should be already embarked in her great career.
+Ellen Terry, Bernhardt, Rachel, all began their training very early. If
+she had been left to me she would be behind the footlights by now."
+
+"They'll never stand for her going on the stage," said Quin
+authoritatively. It was astonishing how intimate he felt with the
+Bartletts since he had put two of them to bed.
+
+"Ah, my friend," said Mr. Martel, shaking his head and smiling, "what can
+be avoided whose end is purposed by the mighty gods? Eleanor will follow
+her destiny. She has the temperament, the voice, the figure--a trifle
+small, I grant you, but lithe, graceful, pliant as a reed."
+
+"Yes, I know what you mean," Quin agreed ardently; "you can tell that in
+her dancing."
+
+"But more than all, she has the great ambition, the consuming desire for
+self-expression, for----"
+
+Quin's face clouded slightly and he again lost the thread of the
+discourse.
+
+"Lots of girls are stage-struck," he said presently, breaking in on Mr.
+Martel's rhapsody. "Miss Eleanor's young yet. Don't you believe she will
+get over it?"
+
+"Young! Why, Mary Anderson was playing _Meg Merrilies_ when she was two
+years younger than Eleanor. I tell you, Quinby--you'll forgive my
+addressing you thus--I tell you, the girl will never get over it. She has
+inherited the histrionic gift from her mother--from me. The Bartletts
+have given her money, education, social position; but it remained for
+me--the despised Claude Martel--to give her the soul of an artist. And
+mark me,"--he paused effectively with a lifted forefinger,--"it will be
+Claude Martel who gives her her heart's desire. For years I have fostered
+in her a love for the drama. I have taken her to see great plays. I have
+taught her to read great lines, and above all I have fed her ambition.
+The time was limited--a night here, a day there; but I planted a seed
+they cannot kill. It has grown, it will flower; no one can stop it now."
+
+The subject was one upon which Quin would fain have discoursed
+indefinitely, but a glance at his watch reminded him that the business of
+the day did not admit of further delay. He not only had an important
+errand to perform, but he must look for work. His exchequer, as usual,
+was very low and the need for replenishing it was imperative.
+
+When he reached Bartlett & Bangs' on the outskirts of the city, the big
+manufacturing plant was ominously still. The only sign of life about the
+place was at the wide entrance doors at the end of the yards, where a
+group of men were talking and gesticulating excitedly.
+
+"What's the shindy?" Quin asked a bystander.
+
+"Union men trying to keep scabs from going to work," answered his
+informant. "Somebody's fixin' to get hurt there in about two minutes."
+
+Quin, to whom a scrap was always a pleasant diversion, ran forward and
+craned his neck to see what was happening. Speeches were being made, hot
+impassioned speeches, now in favor of the union, now against it, and
+every moment the excitement increased. Quin listened with absorbed
+attention, trying to get the straight of the matter.
+
+Just now a sickly-looking man, with a piece of red flannel tied around
+his throat, was standing on the steps, making a futile effort against the
+noise to explain his return to work.
+
+"I can't let 'em _starve_," he kept repeating in a hoarse, apologetic
+voice. "When a man's got a sick wife and eight children, he ain't able to
+do as he likes. I don't want to give in no more 'n you-all do. Neither
+does Jim here, nor Tom Dawes. But what can we do?"
+
+"Do like the rest of us!" shouted some one in the crowd, "Stick it out!
+Learn 'em a lesson. They can't run their bloomin' old plant without us.
+Pull him down off them steps, boys!"
+
+"Naw, you don't!" cried another man, seizing a stick and jumping at the
+steps. "We got a right to do as we like, same as you! Come on up, Tom
+Dawes! We ain't going to let our families in for the Charity
+Organization."
+
+Quick cries of "Traitor!" "Scab!" "Pull 'em down!" were succeeded by a
+lively scrimmage in which there was a rush for the steps.
+
+Quin, from his place at the edge of the crowd, saw a dozen men surround
+three. He saw the man with the red rag about his throat put up a feeble
+defense against two assailants. Then he ceased to see and began only to
+feel. Whatever the row was about, they weren't fighting fairly, and his
+blood began to rise. He stood it as long as he could; then, with a cry of
+protest, he plunged through the crowd. In his sternest top-sergeant voice
+he issued orders, and enforced them with a brawny fist that was used to
+handling men. A moment later he dragged a limp victim from under the
+struggling group.
+
+This unexpected interruption by an unknown man in uniform, together with
+the appearance of a stern-faced man in spectacles at an upper window, had
+an instant effect on the crowd. The strikers began to slink out of the
+yards, while the three assaulted men dusted their clothes and entered the
+factory.
+
+Quin followed them in, and upon inquiring for the office was directed to
+the second floor, where he followed devious ways until he reached the
+door of a large room filled with desks in rows, at each of which sat a
+clerk.
+
+"Mr. Bangs?" repeated a red-nosed girl, in answer to his inquiry. "Got an
+appointment?"
+
+"No," said Quin; "but I've got a parcel that's to be delivered in
+person."
+
+The red-nosed one thereupon consulted the man at the next desk, and,
+after some colloquy, conducted Quin to one of the small rooms at the rear
+of the large one.
+
+The next moment Quin found himself face to face with the stern-looking
+personage whose mere appearance at the window a few minutes before had
+had such a subduing effect on the crowd below.
+
+As he listened to Quin's message he looked at him narrowly and
+suspiciously with piercing black eyes that seemed intent on seeking out
+the weakest spot of whatever they rested upon.
+
+"When did Mr. Bartlett give you these letters?" he asked in a tone as
+cold as the tinkle of ice against glass.
+
+"I got 'em last night, sir."
+
+"Where?"
+
+"At his house, when I went to carry word about his mother's accident."
+
+"Close that door back of you," said Mr. Bangs, with a jerk of his head;
+then he went on, "So Mr. Bartlett was at home when you reached there last
+night?"
+
+"Oh, _yes_, sir!" Quin assured him with an emphasis that implied Mr.
+Randolph Bartlett's unfailing presence at his own fireside on every
+Sabbath evening.
+
+"That is strange," Mr. Bangs commented dryly. "Miss Enid Bartlett
+telephoned an hour ago that her brother and his wife were out of the
+city."
+
+Quin was visibly embarrassed. He was not used to treading the quicksands
+of duplicity, and he felt himself sinking.
+
+"Young man," said Mr. Bangs sternly, "I am inclined to think you are
+deceiving me."
+
+"No," said Quin with spirit, "I haven't deceived you; but I did lie to
+Miss Eleanor's aunt over the telephone."
+
+"What was your object?"
+
+"Well, I couldn't tell her Mr. Bartlett was stewed, could I?"
+
+Mr. Bangs gave a short, contemptuous laugh. "As I thought," he said.
+"That will do."
+
+But Quin had no intention of going until he had spoken a word in his own
+behalf. The idea had just occurred to him that by obtaining a position
+with Bartlett & Bangs he could add another link to the chain that was to
+bind him to Eleanor.
+
+"You don't happen to have a job for me?" he inquired of the back of Mr.
+Bangs's bald, dome-like head.
+
+"A job?" repeated Mr. Bangs, glancing over his shoulder at Quin's
+uniform.
+
+"Yes, sir. I'm out of the service now."
+
+"What can you do?"
+
+Quin looked at him quizzically. "I can receive and obey the orders of the
+commanding officer," he said.
+
+Mr. Bangs, being humor-proof, evidently considered this impertinent, and
+repeated his question sharply.
+
+"Oh, I'll do anything," said Quin rashly. "Soldiers can't be choosers
+these days."
+
+Mr. Bangs cast a critical eye on his strong, well built frame:
+
+"We might use you in the factory," he said indifferently; "we need all
+the strike-breakers we can get."
+
+Quin's face fell. "I don't know about that," he said slowly. "I haven't
+made up my mind yet about this union business."
+
+"I thought you were helping the union men in the yard just now."
+
+"I was helping that little Irishman that was getting the life choked out
+of him."
+
+Mr. Bangs's mouth became a hard, straight line.
+
+"Then I take it you sympathize with the strikers?"
+
+"I don't know whether I do or not," Quin declared stoutly. "I don't know
+anything about it. But one thing's certain--I'm not going to take another
+fellow's job, when he's holding out for better conditions, until I know
+whether those better conditions are due him or not."
+
+Mr. Bangs's fish eyes regarded him with glittering disfavor.
+
+"Perhaps you would prefer an office job?" he suggested with cold
+insolence. "I need some one to brush out in the morning and to wash
+windows when necessary."
+
+The erstwhile hero of the Sixth Field Artillery felt his heart thumping
+madly under his distinguished-conduct medal; but he had declared that he
+would accept any kind of work, and he was determined not to have his
+bluff called.
+
+"All right, sir," he said gamely; "I'll start at that if it will lead to
+something better."
+
+"That rests entirely with you," said Mr. Bangs. "Report for work in the
+morning."
+
+Quin got out of the office with a hot head, cold hands, and a terrible
+sinking of the heart. He had forged the first link in his chain--he was
+an employee of the great Bartlett & Bangs Company; but the gap between
+himself and Eleanor seemed suddenly to have widened to infinity.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 10
+
+
+If the window-washing did not become an actuality, it was due to the
+weather rather than to any clemency on the part of Mr. Bangs. He seemed
+bent upon testing Quin's mettle, and required tasks of him that only a
+man used to the discipline of the army would have performed.
+
+Quin, on his part, carried out instructions with a thoroughness and
+dispatch that upset the entire office force. He had been told to clean
+things up, and he took an unholy joy in interpreting the order in
+military terms. Never before had there been such a drastic overhauling of
+the premises. He did not stop at cleaning up; he insisted upon things
+being kept clean and orderly. In a short time he had instituted reforms
+that broke the traditions of half a century.
+
+"Who moved my desk out like this?" thundered Mr. Bangs on the second day
+after Quin's arrival.
+
+"I did, sir," said Quin. "You can get a much better light here, and no
+draught from the door."
+
+"Well, when I want my desk moved I will inform you," said Mr. Bangs.
+
+But a day's trial of the new arrangement proved so satisfactory that the
+desk remained in its new position.
+
+Other innovations met with less favor. The clerks in the outer office
+objected to the windows being kept down from the top, and Mr. Bangs was
+constantly annoyed when he found that his papers were disturbed by a
+daily dusting and sorting. Quin met the complaints and rebuffs with easy
+good humor, and went straight on with his business. The moment his
+energies were dammed at one point, they burst forth with fresh vigor at
+another.
+
+The only object about the office that was left undisturbed was Minerva, a
+large black cat which the stenographer told him belonged to Mr. Randolph
+Bartlett. Quin was hopelessly committed to cats in general, and to black
+cats in particular, and the fact that this one met with Mr. Bangs's
+marked disfavor made him champion her cause at once. One noon hour, in
+his first week, he was sitting alone in the inner office, scratching
+Minerva's head in the very spot behind the ear where a cat most likes to
+be scratched, when a lively voice from the doorway demanded:
+
+"Well, young man, what do you mean by making love to my cat in my
+absence?"
+
+"She flirted with me first," said Quin. Then he took a second look at the
+stranger and got up smiling. "You are Mr. Bartlett, I believe?"
+
+"Yes. Are you waiting for Mr. Bangs?"
+
+"No, sir," said Quin; "he's waiting for me. I'm to let him know as soon
+as you come in. I am the new office-boy."
+
+He grinned down on the shorter man, who in his turn laughed outright.
+
+"Office-boy? What nonsense! Where have I seen you before? What is your
+name?"
+
+"Quinby Graham, sir."
+
+"Drop the sir, for heaven's sake. I'm no officer. Where in the dickens
+have I met you? Oh! wait a second, I've got it! Sunday night. We were out
+somewhere together----"
+
+"Hold on there," said Quin. "_You_ were out together, but I was out by
+myself. We met at your door."
+
+"So you were the chap that played the good Samaritan? Well, it was damned
+clever of you, old man. I'm glad of a chance to thank you. I hadn't
+touched a drop for six weeks before that, but you see----"
+
+Mr. Bangs's metallic voice was heard in the outer office, and the two
+younger men started.
+
+"You bet I see!" said Quin sympathetically as he hurried out to inform
+the senior member of the firm that the junior member awaited his
+pleasure.
+
+What happened at that interview was recounted to him by Miss Leaks, the
+little drab-colored stenographer, who had returned from lunch when the
+storm was at its height.
+
+"It's a wonder Mr. Ranny don't kill that old man for the way he sneers at
+him," she said indignantly to Quin, "Why, _I_ wouldn't take off him what
+Mr. Ranny does! But then, what can he do? His mother keeps him here for a
+mouth-piece for her, and Mr. Bangs knows it. It's no wonder he drinks,
+hitched up to a cantankerous old hyena like that. He never can stand up
+for himself, but he stood up for you all right."
+
+"For me?" repeated Quin. "Where did I come in?"
+
+"Why, he said it was a shame for a man like you to be doing the work you
+are doing, and that he for one wouldn't stand it. He talked right up to
+the boss about patriotism and our duty to the returned soldier, until he
+made the old tyrant look like ten cents! And then he come right out and
+said if Mr. Bangs couldn't offer you anything better he could."
+
+"What did he say to that?" asked Quin.
+
+"He curled up his lip and asked Mr. Ranny why he didn't engage you for a
+private secretary, and if you'll believe me Mr. Ranny looked him straight
+in the eye and said it was a good idea, and that he would."
+
+"A private secretary!" Quin exclaimed. "But I don't know a blooming thing
+about stenography or typewriting."
+
+"Don't you let on," advised Miss Leaks. "Mr. Ranny doesn't have enough
+work to amount to anything, and he's so tickled at carrying his point
+that he won't be particular. I can teach you how to take dictation and
+use the typewriter."
+
+The following week found Quin installed in the smaller of the two private
+offices, with a title that in no way covered the duties he was called
+upon to perform. To be sure, he got Mr. Ranny's small affairs into
+systematic running order, and, under Miss Leaks's efficient instruction,
+was soon able slowly but accurately to hammer out the necessary letters
+on the typewriter. He was even able at times to help Mr. Chester, the
+melancholy bookkeeper whom the other clerks called "Fanny."
+
+Through working with figures all his life Mr. Chester had come to
+resemble one. With his lean body and drooping oval head, he was not
+unlike the figure nine, an analogy that might be continued by saying that
+nine is the highest degree a bachelor number can achieve, the figures
+after that going in couples. It was an open secret that the tragedy of
+Mr. Chester's uneventful life lay in that simple fact.
+
+In addition to Quin's heterogeneous duties at the office, he was
+frequently pressed into service for more personal uses. When Mr. Ranny
+failed to put in an appearance, he was invariably dispatched to find him,
+and was often able to handle the situation in a way that was a great
+relief to all concerned.
+
+One day, after he had been with the firm several weeks, he was dispatched
+with a budget of papers for Madam Bartlett to sign. It was the first time
+he had entered the house since the night of the accident, and as he stood
+in the front hall waiting instructions, he looked about him curiously.
+
+The lower floor had been "done" in peacock blue and gold when Miss Enid
+made her début twenty years before, and it had never been undone. An
+embossed dado and an even more embossed frieze encircled the walls, and
+the ceiling was a complicated mosaic of color and design. The
+stiff-backed chairs and massive sofas were apparently committed for life
+to linen strait-jackets. Heavy velvet curtains shut out the light and a
+faint smell of coal soot permeated the air. Over the hall fireplace hung
+a large portrait of Madam Bartlett, just inside the drawing-room gleamed
+a marble bust of her, and two long pier-glasses kept repeating the image
+of her until she dominated every nook and corner of the place.
+
+But Quin saw little of all this. To him the house was simply a background
+for images of Eleanor: Eleanor coming down the broad stairs in her blue
+and gray costume; Eleanor tripping through the hall in her Red Cross
+uniform; Eleanor standing in the doorway in the moonlight, telling him
+how wonderful he was.
+
+He had written her exactly ten letters since her departure, but only two
+had been dispatched, and by a fatal error these two were identical. After
+a superhuman effort to couch his burning thoughts in sufficiently cool
+terms, he had achieved a partially successful result; but, discovering
+after addressing the envelope that he had misspelled two words, he
+laboriously made another copy, addressed a second envelope, then
+inadvertently mailed both.
+
+He had received such a scoffing note in reply that his ears tingled even
+now as he thought of it. It was only when he recalled the postscript that
+he found consolation. "How funny that you should get a position at
+Bartlett & Bangs's," she had written. "If you should happen to meet any
+member of my family, for heaven's sake don't mention my name. They might
+link you up with the Hawaiian Garden, or the trip to the camp that night
+grandmother was hurt. Just let our friendship be a little secret between
+you and me."
+
+"'You and me,'" Quin repeated the words softly to himself, as he stood
+there among the objects made sacred by her one-time presence.
+
+"Madam Bartlett wishes you to come upstairs and explain the papers before
+she signs them," said a woman in nurse's uniform from the stair landing,
+and, cap in hand, Quin followed her up the steps.
+
+At the open door of the large front room he paused. Lying in royal state
+in a huge four-poster bed was Madam Bartlett, resplendent in a purple
+robe, with her hair dressed in its usual elaborate style, and in her ears
+pearls that, Quin afterward assured the Martels, looked like moth-balls.
+
+"You go on out of here and stay until I ring for you," she snapped at the
+nurse; then she squinted her eyes and looked at Quin. She did not put on
+her eye-glasses; they were reserved for feminine audiences exclusively.
+
+"What do they mean by sending me this jumble of stuff?" she demanded,
+indicating the papers strewn on the silk coverlid. "How do they expect me
+to know what they are all about?"
+
+"They don't," said Quin reassuringly, coming forward; "they sent me to
+tell you."
+
+"And who are you, pray?"
+
+"I am Mr. Randolph's er--er--secretary."
+
+For the life of him he could not get through it without a grin, and to
+his relief the old lady's lips also twitched.
+
+"Much need he had for a secretary!" she said, then added shrewdly:
+"Aren't you the soldier that put the splint on my leg?"
+
+Quin modestly acknowledged that he was.
+
+"It was a mighty poor job," said Madam, "but I guess it was better than
+nothing."
+
+"How's the leg coming on?" inquired Quin affably.
+
+"It's not coming on at all," Madam said. "If I listen to those fool
+doctors it's coming off."
+
+Quin shook his head in emphatic disapproval.
+
+"Don't you listen to 'em," he advised earnestly.
+
+"Doctors don't know everything! Why, they told a fellow out at the
+hospital that his arm would have to come off at the shoulder. He lit out
+over the hill, bath-robe and all, for his home town, and got six other
+doctors to sign a paper saying he didn't need an amputation. He got back
+in twenty-four hours, was tried for being A. W. O. L., and is serving his
+time in the prison ward to-day. But he's still got his arm all right."
+
+"Good for him!" said Madam heartily; then, recalling the business in
+hand, she added peevishly: "Well, stop talking now and explain these
+papers."
+
+Quin went over them several times with great patience, and then held the
+ink-well while she tremblingly signed her name.
+
+"Kinder awkward doing things on your back," he said sympathetically, as
+she sank back exhausted.
+
+"Awkward? It's torture. The cast is bad enough in itself; but having to
+lie in one position like this makes me sore all over."
+
+"You don't have to tell me," said Quin, easing up the bed-clothes with
+quite a professional air; "I was six months on my back. But there's no
+sense in keeping you like this. Why don't they rig you up a pulley, so's
+you can change the position of your body without disturbing your leg?"
+
+"How do you mean?"
+
+"Like this," said Quin, taking a paper-knife and a couple of spoons from
+the table and demonstrating his point.
+
+Madam listened with close attention, and so absorbed were she and Quin
+that neither of them were conscious of Miss Isobel's entrance until they
+heard her feeble protest:
+
+"I would not dare try anything like that without consulting Dr. Rawlins."
+
+"Nobody wants you to dare anything," flared out her mother. "What the boy
+says sounds sensible. He says he has fixed them for the soldiers at the
+hospital. I want him to fix one for me."
+
+"When shall I come?" Quin asked.
+
+"Come nothing. You'll stay and do it now. Telephone the factory that I am
+keeping you here for the morning. Isobel, order him whatever he needs.
+And now get out of here, both of you; I want to take a nap."
+
+Thus it was that, an hour later, the new colored butler was carrying the
+papers back to Bartlett & Bangs's, and Mr. Randolph's new secretary was
+sawing wood in Madam Bartlett's cellar. It was a humble beginning, but he
+whistled jubilantly as he worked. Already he saw himself climbing, by
+brilliant and spectacular deeds, to a dazzling pinnacle of security in
+the family's esteem.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 11
+
+
+Madam Bartlett's accident had far-reaching results. For fifty years her
+firm hand had brooked no slightest interference with the family
+steering-wheel, and now that it was removed the household machinery came
+to a standstill. She who had "ridden the whirlwind and directed the
+storm" now found herself ignominiously laid low. Instead of rising with
+the dawn, primed for battle in club committee, business conclave, or
+family council, she lay on her back in a darkened room, a prisoner to
+pain. The only vent she had for her pent-up energy was in hourly tirades
+against her daughters for their inefficiency, the nurses for their
+incompetency, the doctors for their lack of skill, and the servants for
+their disobedience.
+
+The one person who, in any particular, found favor with her these days
+was her son's new secretary. Every Saturday, when Quinby Graham stopped
+on his way to the bank with various papers for her to sign, he was plied
+with questions and intrusted with various commissions. A top sergeant was
+evidently just what Madam had been looking for all her life--one trained
+to receive orders and execute them. All went well until one day when Quin
+refused to smuggle in some forbidden article of diet; then the
+steam-roller of her wrath promptly passed over him also.
+
+He waited respectfully until her breath and vocabulary were alike
+exhausted, then said good-humoredly:
+
+"I used to board with a woman up in Maine that had hysterics like that.
+They always made her feel a lot better. Don't you want me to shift that
+pulley a bit? You don't look comfortable."
+
+Madam promptly ordered him out of the room. But next day she made an
+excuse to send for him, and actually laughed when he stepped briskly up
+to the bed, saluted smartly, and impudently asked her how her grouch was.
+
+There was something in his very lack of reverence, in his impertinent
+assumption of equality, in his refusal to pay her the condescending
+homage due feebleness and old age, that seemed to flatter her.
+
+"He's a mule," she told Randolph--"a mule with horse sense."
+
+Quin's change from khaki to civilian clothes affected him in more ways
+than one. Constitutionally he was opposed to saying "sir" to his fellow
+men; to standing at attention until he was recognized; to acknowledging,
+by word or gesture, that he was any one's inferior on this wide and
+democratic planet. He much preferred organizing to being organized,
+leading to being led. Early in his military training he had evinced an
+inclination to take things into his own hands and act without authority.
+It was somewhat ironic that the very trait that had deprived him of a
+couple of bars on his shoulder should have put the medal on his breast.
+
+But freedom from the restrictions of army life brought its penalties. He
+found that blunders condoned in a soldier were seriously criticized in a
+civilian; that the things he had been at such pains to learn in the past
+two years were of no apparent value to him now. It was a constant
+surprise to him that a plaid suit and three-dollar necktie should meet
+with less favor in the feminine eye than a dreary drab uniform.
+
+About the first of March he was getting somewhat discouraged at his slow
+progress, when an incident happened that planted his feet firmly on the
+first rung of his social ladder.
+
+Ever since their mother's accident, Miss Isobel and Miss Enid had stood
+appalled before their new responsibilities. They were like two trembling
+dead leaves that still cling to a shattered but sturdy old oak. What made
+matters worse was the absence of the faithful black Tom, who for years
+had served them by day and guarded them by night. They lived in constant
+fear of burglars, which grew into a veritable terror when some one broke
+into the pantry and rifled the shelves.
+
+Quin heard about it when he arrived on Saturday morning, and as usual
+offered advice:
+
+"What you need is a man in the house. Then you wouldn't be scared all the
+time."
+
+"Well," said Madam, "what about you?"
+
+Quin's face fell. He had no desire to exchange the noisy, wholesome
+family life of the Martels for the silent, somber grandeur of the
+Bartletts. His affections had taken root in the shabby little brown house
+that always seemed to be humming gaily to itself. When the piano was not
+being played, the violin or guitar was. There were bursts of laughter,
+snatches of song, and young people going and coming through doors that
+never stayed closed.
+
+"You don't seem keen about the proposition," Madam commented dryly,
+smoothing the bed-clothes with her wrinkled fingers.
+
+"Well, I can't say I am," Quin admitted. "You see, I'm living with some
+friends out on Sixth Street. They are sort of kin-folks of yours, I
+believe--the Martels."
+
+A carefully aimed hand grenade could have produced no more violent or
+immediate result. Madam damned the Martels, individually and
+collectively, and furiously disclaimed any relationship.
+
+"They are a trifling, worthless lot!" she stormed. "I wish I'd never
+heard of them. They fastened their talons on my son Bob, and ruined his
+life, and now they are doing all they can to ruin my granddaughter.
+Haven't you ever heard them speak of me?"
+
+"Oh, yes," said Quin with laughing significance.
+
+"What do they say?" Madam demanded instantly.
+
+"You want it straight?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Well, Mr. Martel told me only last night that he thought you were an
+object of pity."
+
+Madam's jaw relaxed in amazement.
+
+"What on earth did he mean?" she asked.
+
+"He said you'd got 'most everything in life that he'd missed, but he'd
+hate to change places with you."
+
+She lay perfectly still, staring at him with her small restless eyes, and
+when she spoke again it was to revert to the subject of burglars.
+
+Quin was relieved. He had been skating on thin ice in discussing the
+Martels, for any moment might have brought up a question concerning
+Eleanor.
+
+"I used to have a corporal that was an ex-burglar," he said, plunging
+into the new subject with alacrity. "First-rate fellow, too. Last I heard
+of him, he had a position as chauffeur with a rich old lady who lived
+alone up in Detroit. She had two burglar-alarm systems, but the joke of
+it was she made him sleep in the house for extra protection!"
+
+"I suppose you are trying to frighten me off from engaging you?" Madam
+asked.
+
+"Not exactly," Quin smiled. "Of course I'll come if you can't get anybody
+else. But there's no question of engaging me. If I come, I pay board."
+
+Madam laughed aloud for the first time since her accident.
+
+"Do you take me for a landlady?" she asked.
+
+"Only when you take me for a night-watchman," said Quin.
+
+They eyed each other steadily for a moment, then she held out her hand.
+
+"We'll compromise," she said. "No salary and no board. We'll try it out
+for a week."
+
+The next day Quin's suit-case, containing all his worldly possessions,
+was transferred from the small stuffy room over the Martels' kitchen to
+the large luxurious one over the Bartletts' dining-room. It was quite the
+grandest room he had ever occupied, with its massive walnut furniture and
+its heavily draped windows; but, had it been stripped bare but for a
+single picture, it would still have been a _chambre de luxe_ to him. The
+moment he entered he discovered a photograph of Eleanor on the mantel,
+and ten minutes later, when Hannah tapped at the door to say that dinner
+was served, he was still standing with arms folded on the shelf in
+absorbed adoration.
+
+That first meal with the Misses Bartlett was an ordeal he never forgot.
+Their formal aloofness and evident dismay at his presence were enough in
+themselves to embarrass him; but combined with the necessity of choosing
+the right knife and fork, of breaking his bread properly, and of removing
+his spoon from his coffee-cup, they were quite overpowering. During his
+two years in the army he had drifted into the easy habits and easier
+vernacular of the enlisted man. Whatever knowledge he had of the
+amenities of life had almost been forgotten. But, though his social
+virtues were few, he passionately identified himself with them rather
+than with his faults, which were many. To prove his politeness, for
+instance, he insisted upon his hostesses having second helps to every
+dish, offered to answer the telephone whenever it rang, and even
+obligingly started to answer the door-bell during the salad course.
+
+That dinner was but the initiation into a week of difficult adjustments.
+When he was not in the arctic region surrounding Miss Isobel and Miss
+Enid, he was in the torrid zone of Madam's presence. New and embarrassing
+situations confronted him on every hand, and when he was not breaking
+conventions he was breaking china. But Quin was not sensitive, and, in
+spite of the fact that he was being silently or vocally condemned most of
+the time, he cheerfully persevered in his determination to win the
+respect of the family.
+
+The saving of his ignorance was that he never tried to conceal it. He
+looked at it with surprise and discussed it with disconcerting frankness.
+He was no more abashed in learning new and better ways of conducting
+himself than he would have been in learning a new language. He laughed
+good-humoredly at his mistakes and seldom committed the same one a second
+time. His limitations were to him like the frontier to a pioneer--a thing
+to be reached and crossed.
+
+If only he could have contented himself with performing the one duty
+required of him and then gracefully effacing himself, his success would
+have been assured. But that was not Quin's nature. Having identified
+himself with the family, he promptly assumed full responsibility for its
+welfare. By the end of the second week he was the self-constituted head
+of the establishment. No mission was too high or too low for him to
+volunteer to perform. One moment he was tactfully severing diplomatic
+relations with a consulting physician in the front hall, the next he was
+firing the furnace in the basement. Whenever he was in the house he was
+meeting emergencies and adjusting difficulties, upsetting established
+customs and often achieving unexpected results with new ones.
+
+Miss Isobel and Miss Enid stood aghast at his temerity, and waited hourly
+for the lightning of Madam's wrath to annihilate him. But, though the
+bolts rained about him, they failed to destroy him.
+
+On one occasion Miss Isobel was so outraged by his familiar attitude
+toward her mother that she plucked up courage to remonstrate with him;
+but Madam, instead of appreciating the interference on her behalf,
+promptly turned upon her defender.
+
+"Now, Isobel," she said caustically, "_you_ may be old enough to want men
+to respect you, but I am young enough to want them to like me. You leave
+young Graham alone."
+
+Quin meanwhile, in spite of his arduous duties at the office and at home,
+was living in a world of dreams. The privilege of hearing Eleanor's name
+frequently mentioned, of getting bits of news of her from time to time,
+the exciting possibility of being under the same roof with her when she
+returned, supplied the days with thrilling zest. Since her teasing note
+in answer to his double-barreled communication, he had written but once
+and received no answer; but he knew that she was expected home for the
+Easter vacation, and he lived on that prospect.
+
+One evening, when he was summoned to Madam's room to shorten her new
+crutches, he realized that the all-important subject was under
+discussion.
+
+"Isn't that exactly like her?" Madam was saying. "Refusing to go in the
+first place, and now objecting to coming home."
+
+"Well, it isn't especially gay for her here, is it?" Miss Enid ventured
+in feeble defense. "I am afraid we are rather dull company for a young
+girl."
+
+"Well, make it gay," commanded Madam. "You and Isobel aren't so old and
+feeble that you can't think of some way to entertain young people."
+
+"A tea?" suggested Miss Enid.
+
+"A tea would never tempt Eleanor. She's too much her mother's child to
+enjoy anything so staid and respectable."
+
+"Why don't you give her a dance?" suggested Quin enthusiastically,
+looking up from his work.
+
+"Give who a dance?" demanded Madam in surprise.
+
+"Miss Eleanor," said Quin, bending over his work and blushing to the
+roots of his stubby hair.
+
+The three ladies exchanged startled glances; then Miss Enid said:
+
+"Of course. I had forgotten that you met her the night of the accident. I
+wonder if we _could_ give the dear child a party?"
+
+"It is not to be thought of," said Miss Isobel, "with no regular butler,
+and mother ill----"
+
+"I tell you, I'm _not_ ill!" snapped Madam. "I intend to be up and about
+by Easter. I'll give as many parties as I like. Hurry up with those
+crutches, Graham; do you think I am going to wait all night?"
+
+One of Quin's first acts upon coming into the house had been to aid and
+abet Madam in her determination to use her injured leg. Dr. Rawlins had
+infuriated her by his pessimistic warnings and his dark suggestions of a
+wheeled chair.
+
+"We'll show 'em what you can do when you get that cast off," Quin had
+reassured her with the utmost confidence. "I've limbered up heaps of
+stiff legs for the fellows. It takes patience and grit. I got the
+patience and you got the grit, so there we are!"
+
+Now that the cast was off, a few steps were attempted each night, during
+which painful operation Miss Enid fled to another room to shed tears of
+apprehension, while Miss Isobel hovered about the hall, ready to call the
+doctor if anything happened.
+
+"Is that better?" he asked now, as he got Madam to her feet and carefully
+adjusted the crutches. "If you say they are too short, I'll tell you what
+the little man said when he was teased about his legs. 'They reach the
+ground,' he said; 'what more can you ask?'"
+
+"Shut up your nonsense, and mind what you are doing!" cried Madam. "My
+leg is worse than it was yesterday. I can't put my foot to the ground."
+
+"Oh, yes, you can," Quin insisted, coaxing her from the bed-post to the
+dresser. "You are coming on fine. I never saw but one person do better.
+That was a guy I knew in France who never danced a step until he lost a
+leg, and then his cork leg taught his other leg to do the fox-trot."
+
+"Didn't I tell you to hush!" commanded Madam, laughing in spite of
+herself. "You will have me falling over here in a minute."
+
+When she was back in her chair and Quin was leaving, she beckoned to him.
+
+"What about Mr. Ranny?" she asked in an anxious whisper. "Was he at the
+office to-day?"
+
+Quin had been dreading the question, but when it came he did not evade
+it. Randolph Bartlett's lapses from grace were coming with such alarming
+frequency that the sisters' frantic efforts to keep the truth from their
+mother only resulted in arousing her suspicion and making her more
+unhappy.
+
+"No," said Quin; "he hasn't been there for a week. He's never going to be
+any better as long as he stays in the business. You don't know what he
+has to stand from Mr. Bangs."
+
+"I know what Mr. Bangs has had to stand from him."
+
+"Yes; but Mr. Ranny's never mean. He is one of the kindest, nicest
+gentlemen I ever met up with. But he can't stand being nagged at all the
+time, and he feels that he don't count for anything. He says Mr. Bangs
+considers him a figurehead, and that he'd rather be selling shoestrings
+for himself than be in partnership with him."
+
+"Yes, and if I let him go that's what he _would_ be doing," said Madam
+bitterly.
+
+"Mr. Chester don't think so," persisted Quin; "he says Mr. Ranny's got a
+lot of ability."
+
+"Don't quote that sissified Francis Chester to me. He may be a good
+man--I suppose he is; but I can't abide the sight of him. He goes around
+holding one hand in the other as if he were afraid he'd spill it! What
+did you say he said about Ranny?"
+
+"He said he had ability; that if he was on his own in the country some
+place----"
+
+"'On his own'!" Madam's contempt was great. "He hasn't _got_ any own.
+He's just like the girls--no force or decision about any of them. Their
+father wasn't like that; I am sure _I'm_ not. What's the matter with
+them, anyhow?"
+
+Quin looked her straight in the eyes. "Do you want to know, honest?"
+
+Disconcerting as it was to have an oratorical question taken literally,
+Madam's curiosity prompted her to nod her head.
+
+"The same thing's the matter with them," said Quin, with brutal
+frankness, "that's the matter with your leg. They've been broken and kept
+in the cast too long."
+
+Then, before he could get the berating he surely deserved, he was off
+down the stairs, disturbing the silence of the house with his cheerful
+whistle.
+
+At breakfast the next morning he scented trouble. Until now he had made
+little headway with the two sisters, having been too much occupied in
+storming the fortress of Madam's regard to concern himself with the
+outlying districts. But this morning he met with an even colder reception
+than usual. In vain he fired off his best jokes: Miss Enid remained pale
+and languid, and Miss Isobel presided over the coffee-pot as if it had
+been a funeral urn. A crisis was evidently pending, and he determined to
+meet it half way.
+
+"Is Queen Vic mad at me?" he asked suddenly, leaning forward on his
+folded arms and smiling with engaging candor.
+
+Miss Isobel started to pour the cream into the sugar-bowl, but caught
+herself in the act.
+
+"If you mean my mother," she said with reproving dignity, "she has asked
+me to tell you--that is, we all think it best----"
+
+"For me to go?" Quin finished it for her. "Now, look here, Miss Isobel;
+you can fire me, but you know you can't fire the furnace! Who is going to
+stay here at night? Who is going to carry Madam up and down stairs? Of
+course I don't want to butt in, but if ever a house needed a man it's
+this one. Why don't you have me stay on until things get to running easy
+again?"
+
+There was an embarrassing pause during which Miss Isobel fidgeted with
+the cups and saucers and Miss Enid bit her lips nervously.
+
+"Don't you-all like me?" persisted Quin with his terrible directness.
+
+Now, Miss Isobel had spent her life in evasions and reservations and
+compromises. To have even a personal liking stripped thus in public
+offended her maiden modesty, and she scurried to the cover of silence.
+
+"Of course we like you," murmured Miss Enid, coming to her rescue. "We
+like you very much, Mr. Graham, and we appreciate your kindness in coming
+to help us out. But mother feels that we shouldn't impose on your good
+nature any longer."
+
+Quin shook his impatient head.
+
+"That's not it," he said. "She's mad at something I said last night, and
+she's got a right to be. It was true all right, but it was none of my
+business. I made up my mind before I went to bed that I was going to
+apologize. I can fix things up with her. It's you and Miss Isobel I can't
+understand. You say you like me, but you don't act like it. I know I make
+mistakes about lots of things, and that I do things wrong and say things
+I oughtn't to. But all you got to do is to call me down. I want to help
+you; but that's not all--I want to learn the game. When a fellow has
+knocked around with men since he was a kid----"
+
+He broke off suddenly and stared into his coffee-cup.
+
+"I think he might go up and speak to mother, don't you, Isobel?" asked
+Miss Enid tentatively.
+
+Quin pushed back his chair and rose precipitately from the table,
+dragging the cloth away as he did so.
+
+"That's not the point!" he said heatedly. "It's for you two to decide, as
+well as her. Do you want me to go or to stay?"
+
+Miss Isobel and Miss Enid, who had been assuring each other almost hourly
+that they could not stand that awful boy in the house another day, looked
+at each other intercedingly.
+
+"It would be a great help if you could stay at least until mother learns
+to use her crutches," urged Miss Enid.
+
+"Yes, and until we get some one we can trust to stay with us at night,"
+added Miss Isobel.
+
+"I'll stay as long as you like!" said Quin heartily; and he departed to
+make his peace with Madam.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 12
+
+
+From that time on Quin's status in the family became less anomalous. To
+be sure, he was still Mr. Randolph's private secretary, Madam's top
+sergeant, Miss Isobel's and Miss Enid's body-guard, and the household's
+general-utility man; but he was now something else in addition. Miss
+Isobel had discovered, quite by chance, that he was the grandson of Dr.
+Ezra Quinby, whose book "Christianizing China" had been one of the
+inspirations of her girlhood.
+
+"And to think we considered asking him to eat in the pantry!" she
+exclaimed in horror to her sister.
+
+"Well, I told you all along he was a gentleman by instinct," said Miss
+Enid.
+
+To be sure, they were constantly shocked by his manners and his frank
+method of speech, but they were also exhilarated. He was like a
+disturbing but refreshing breeze that swept through their quiet, ordered
+lives. He talked about things and places they had never heard of or seen,
+and recounted his experiences with an enthusiasm that was contagious.
+
+As for Quin, he found, to his surprise, that he was enjoying his new
+quarters quite as much as he had the old ones. Madam was a never-ending
+source of amusement and interest to him, and Miss Isobel and Miss Enid
+soon had each her individual appeal. He liked the swish of their silk
+petticoats, and the play of their slim white hands about the coffee-tray.
+He liked their super-feminine delicacies of speech and motion, and the
+flattering interest they began to take in all his affairs.
+
+Miss Isobel developed a palpitating concern for his spiritual welfare and
+invited him to go to church with her. She even introduced him to the
+minister with proud reference to his distinguished grandfather, and
+basked in the reflected glory.
+
+Quin did not take kindly to church. He considered that he had done his
+full duty by it in the first fourteen years of his life, when he, along
+with the regenerate heathen, had been forced to attend five services
+every Sunday in the gloomy chapel in the compound at Nanking. But if
+Eleanor's aunt had asked him to accompany her to the gates of hell
+instead of the portals of heaven, he would have acquiesced eagerly. So
+strenuously did he lift his voice in the familiar hymns of his youth that
+he was promptly urged to join the choir, an ordeal whose boredom was
+mitigated only during the few moments when the collection was taken up
+and he and the tenor could bet on which deacon would make his round
+first.
+
+Not for years had Miss Isobel had such thrilling occupation as that of
+returning Ezra Quinby's grandson to the spiritual fold. In spite of the
+fact that Quin was a fairly decent chap already, whose worst vices were
+poker and profanity, she persisted in regarding him as a brand which she
+had been privileged to snatch from the burning.
+
+What gave him a yet more intimate claim upon her was the fact that his
+heart and lungs were still troublesome, and with any over-exertion on his
+part, or a sudden change in the weather, his chest became very sore and
+his racking cough returned. At such times Miss Isobel was in her glory.
+She would put him to bed with hot-water bottles and mustard plasters and
+feed him hot lemonade. Quin took kindly to the coddling. No one had
+fussed over him like that since his mother died, and he was touchingly
+grateful.
+
+"Say, you'd be a wonder out at the hospital," he said to her on one of
+these occasions. "I wish some of those fellows with the flu could have
+you to look after them."
+
+Miss Isobel's long, sallow face with its dark-ringed eyes lit up for a
+moment.
+
+"There is nothing I should like better," she said. "But of course it's
+out of the question."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Mother doesn't approve of us doing any work at the camp. She did make an
+exception in the case of my niece, but Eleanor was so insistent. Sister
+and I try never to oppose mother's wishes. It cuts us off from a great
+many things; but then, I contend that our first duty is to her."
+
+Miss Isobel's attitude toward her mother was that of a monk to his
+haircloth shirt. She acquired so much merit in her friends' eyes and in
+her own by her patient endurance that the penance was robbed of half its
+sting.
+
+"Things are awful bad out at the hospital now," went on Quin. "A fellow
+was telling me yesterday that in some of the wards they only have one
+nurse to two hundred patients. The epidemic is getting worse every day.
+You-all in town here don't know what it's like where there's so many sick
+and so few to take care of 'em."
+
+Miss Isobel, with morbid interest, insisted upon the details. When Quin
+had finished his grim recital, she turned to him with scared
+determination.
+
+"Do you know," she fluttered, "I almost feel as if I ought to go in spite
+of mother's wishes."
+
+"Of course you ought," Quin conceded, "especially when you are keeping a
+trained nurse here in the house who doesn't do a thing but carry up trays
+and sit around and look at herself!"
+
+"I know it," Miss Isobel admitted miserably. "I've lain awake nights
+worrying over it. Sister and I are perfectly able to do what is to be
+done. But mother insists upon keeping the nurse."
+
+"Well, she can't keep you, if you really want to go. I guess you got a
+right to do your duty."
+
+The word was like a bugle call to Miss Isobel. She went about all day in
+a tremor of uncertainty, and at last yielded to Quin's insistence, and,
+donning Eleanor's Red Cross uniform, accompanied him to the hospital.
+
+Every afternoon after that, when Madam was taking her rest, Miss Isobel,
+feeling like Machiavelli one moment and Florence Nightingale the next,
+stepped into the carriage, already loaded with delicacies, and proceeded
+on her errand of mercy. She invariably returned in a twitter of subdued
+excitement, and recounted her experiences with breathless interest at the
+dinner-table.
+
+"I've never seen sister like this before," Miss Enid told Quin. "She
+talks more in an hour now than she used to talk in a week, and she seems
+so happy."
+
+The change wrought in Miss Isobel's life by Quin's advent into the family
+was mild, however, compared to the cataclysm effected in the life of her
+sister. Miss Enid, having had her own affections wrecked in early youth,
+spent her time acting as a sort of salvage corps following the
+devastation caused by her cyclonic mother. When Madam shattered things to
+bits, Miss Enid tried patiently to remold them nearer to the heart's
+desire. She had acquired a habit of offsetting every disagreeable remark
+by an agreeable one, and she was apt to see incipient halos hovering
+above heads where less sympathetic observers saw horns. When the last
+chance of getting rid of the disturbing but helpful Quin vanished, she
+set herself to work to discover his possibilities with the view of
+undertaking his social reclamation.
+
+One evening, as he was passing through the hall, she called him into the
+library. It was a small, high-ceilinged room, with bookcases reaching to
+the ceiling, and a massive mahogany table bearing a reading-lamp with two
+green shades. Lincoln and his Cabinet held session over one door, and
+Andrew Jackson, surrounded by his weeping family, died over the other.
+Miss Enid, with books piled up in front of her, was sitting at the table.
+
+"Quinby," she said,--it had been "Quinby" ever since the discovery of his
+grandfather,--"I wonder if you can help me? I have a club paper on the
+14th, and I can't find a thing about my subject. Can't you tell me
+something about the position of women in China?"
+
+Quin, who had come in expecting to be called upon to put up a window or
+fix the electric light, looked at her blankly. Under ordinary
+circumstances he would have laughingly disclaimed any knowledge of the
+subject; but with Miss Enid sitting there looking up at him with such
+flattering confidence, it was different. Out of the dusty pigeon holes of
+his brain he dragged odds and ends of information, memories of the native
+houses, the customs and manners of the people, stories he had heard from
+his Chinese nurses, street incidents he had seen, stray impressions
+picked up here and there by a lively active American boy in a foreign
+city.
+
+"I ought to be able to tell you a lot more," he said apologetically in
+conclusion. "I could if I wasn't such a bonehead."
+
+"But you've given me just what I wanted!" cried Miss Enid. "And you've
+made it all so _vivid_. It takes a very good mind to register details
+like that and to be able to present them in such good order."
+
+Quin looked at her quizzically. He was confident enough of his abilities
+along other lines, but he had a low opinion of his mental equipment.
+
+"I guess the only kind of sense I got is common," he said.
+
+But Miss Enid would not have it so. "No," she said, earnestly regarding
+the toe of her beaded slipper; "your mind is much above the average. But
+it isn't enough to be born with brains--one must know how to use them."
+
+"I suppose you mean I don't?" asked Quin, also regarding the beaded
+slipper.
+
+"Nobody does who has had no training," Miss Enid gently suggested. "It
+seems a pity that a young man of your possibilities should have had so
+little opportunity for cultivating them."
+
+"Well, I ain't a Methuselah!" said Quin, slightly peaked. "What's the
+matter with me beginning now?"
+
+"It's rather late, I am afraid. Still, other men have done it. I wonder
+if you would consider taking up some night courses at the university?"
+
+"I'd consider anything that would get me on in the world. I've got a very
+particular reason, Miss Enid, for--for wanting to get on."
+
+She looked at him with increased interest.
+
+"Really? How interesting! You must tell me all about it some day. But
+this would keep you back for a time. You would have to give all your
+spare hours to study, and you might not even be able to take the better
+position they promised you at the factory this spring."
+
+"I've already got it," Quin said. "Mr. Bangs told me to-day that I was to
+start in as shipping clerk Monday morning. But he'd let me off nights if
+I'd put it up to him. Old Chester says----"
+
+Miss Enid's Pre-Raphaelite brows contracted slightly. "Don't you think it
+would be more respectful----"
+
+"Sure," agreed Quin; "I didn't mean any harm. I like Mr. Chester. He
+asked me to come up to his rooms some night and see his collection of
+flutes."
+
+"That was like him," Miss Enid said warmly. "He's always doing kind
+things like that. I know his reputation for being diffident and hard to
+get acquainted with, but once you get beneath the surface----"
+
+Quin was not in the least interested in Mr. Chester's surface. He sat on
+the edge of the table, swinging his foot and staring off into space,
+wholly absorbed in the idea of cultivating that newly discovered
+intellect of his.
+
+"Say, Miss Enid," he said, impulsively interrupting her eulogy of Mr.
+Chester's neglected virtues, "I wish you'd sort of take me in hand. _You_
+know what I need better than I do. If you'll get a line on that school
+business, I'll start right in, if I have to start in the kindergarten.
+Hand out the dope and I'll take it. And whenever you see me doing things
+wrong, or saying things wrong, I'd take it as a favor if you'd jack me
+up."
+
+Miss Enid smiled ruefully. "Why, Quinby, that is just what we have all
+been doing ever since you came. If you weren't the best-natured----"
+
+"Not a bit of it," disclaimed Quin. "Queen Vic lets me have it in the
+neck sometimes, but that's nothing. I've learned more since I've been in
+this house than I ever learned in all my life put together. Why,
+sometimes I don't hardly know myself!"
+
+"Two negatives, Quinby, make an affirmative," suggested Miss Enid primly;
+and thus his higher education began.
+
+Miss Enid was right when she said his mind was above the average. Its one
+claim to superiority lay in the fact that it had received the little
+training it had at first hand. What he knew of geography he knew, not
+from maps, but from actual observation in many parts of the world. Higher
+mathematics were unknown to him, but through years of experience he had
+learned to solve the most difficult of all problems--that of making ends
+meet. He had learned astronomy from a Norwegian sailor, as they lay on
+the deck of a Pacific transport night after night in the southern seas.
+He had even tackled literature during his six months in hospital, when he
+had plowed through all the books the wards provided from Dante's
+"Inferno" to "Dere Mable."
+
+Soon after his talk with Miss Enid he decided to call upon Mr. Chester,
+not because Mr. Chester was an enlivening companion, but because he was
+so touchingly grateful for the casual friendship that Quin bestowed upon
+him.
+
+"He's so sort of lonesome," Quin told Miss Leaks. "When he looks at me
+with those big dog eyes of his, I feel like scratching him back of his
+ear."
+
+Mr. Chester, in his small but tastefully furnished bachelor apartment,
+outdid himself in his efforts to be hospitable. He insisted upon Quin
+taking the best chair, gave him a good cigar, showed him some rare first
+editions, displayed his collection of musical instruments, and struggled
+valiantly to establish a common footing. But there was only one subject
+upon which they could find anything to say, and they came back again and
+again to the affairs of the Bartlett family.
+
+"Why don't you ever come around and see the folks?" Quin asked
+hospitably. "They get awful lonesome with so few people dropping in."
+
+Mr. Chester in evident embarrassment flicked the ash from his cigar and
+answered guardedly:
+
+"I used to be there a great deal in the old days. Unfortunately, Madam
+Bartlett and I had a misunderstanding. As a matter of fact, I have not
+crossed that threshold in--let me see--it must be fifteen years! It was a
+party, I remember, given for Eleanor, the little granddaughter, on her
+fifth birthday."
+
+"Oh, yes!" said Quin, finding Mr. Chester for the first time interesting.
+"They've got a picture of her taken with Miss Enid in her party dress."
+
+"I suppose you mean this?" Mr. Chester reached over and took from his
+desk a somewhat faded photograph, in a silver frame, of a little girl
+leaning against a big girl's shoulders, both enveloped in a cloud of
+white tulle.
+
+"Gee, but she was pretty!" exclaimed Quin, devouring every detail of
+Eleanor's chubby features.
+
+"A beautiful woman," sighed Mr. Chester--and Quin, looking up suddenly,
+surprised a look in his host's eyes that was anything but numerical.
+
+Obligingly relinquishing his application of the pronoun for Mr.
+Chester's, he said:
+
+"She certainly thinks a lot of you!"
+
+"How do you know?" demanded Mr. Chester.
+
+"From the way she talks. She says people are barking up the wrong tree
+when they think you are cold and indifferent and all that; says you've
+got one of the noblest natures _she_ ever knew."
+
+Quin was appalled at the effect of these words. Mr. Chester's eyes got
+quite red around the rims and his lips actually trembled.
+
+"Poor Enid!" he said. Then he remembered himself, or rather forgot
+himself, and became a Number Nine again, and bored Quin talking business
+until ten o'clock.
+
+At parting they shook hands cordially, and Mr. Chester urged him to come
+again.
+
+"I wonder if you would care to use one of my tickets for the Symphony
+Orchestra next week?" he asked.
+
+Quin looked embarrassed. He had accepted a similar invitation the week
+before, and had confided to Rose Martel afterward that he "never heard
+such a bully band playing such bum music." But Mr. Chester's intention
+was so kind that he could run no risk of offending him.
+
+"I'll go if I can," he said, leaving himself a loophole.
+
+"Here is the ticket," said Mr. Chester, "and in case you do not use it,
+perhaps you will so good as to pass it on to some one who can."
+
+This suggestion afforded Quin an inspiration.
+
+"Say, Miss Enid," he said the next morning at breakfast. "I want to give
+you a ticket to the Symphony Orchestra next Friday night. Will you go?"
+
+"But, my dear boy," she protested greatly touched, "I cannot go by
+myself."
+
+"You don't have to. I'm going to take you and come for you. You ain't
+going to turn me down, are you?"
+
+"Have you got the ticket?"
+
+"Right here. Now you will go, won't you?"
+
+It would have taken a less susceptible heart than Miss Enid's to resist
+Quin's persuasive tones, and in spite of Miss Isobel's disapprobation she
+agreed to go.
+
+Just what happened on that opening night of the Fine Arts Series, when
+two old lovers found themselves in embarrassing proximity for the first
+time in fifteen years, has never been told. But from subsequent events it
+is safe to conclude that during the long program they became much more
+interested in their own unfinished symphony than in Schubert's, and when
+Quin came to take Miss Enid home, he found them in a corner of the lobby,
+still so engrossed in conversation that he obligingly walked around the
+block to give them an additional five minutes.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 13
+
+
+Quin's desire for self-improvement soon became an obsession. With Miss
+Enid's assistance he got into a night course at the university, and
+proceeded to attack his ignorance with something of the fierce
+determination he had attacked the Hun the year before in France. He
+plunged through bogs of history, got hopelessly entangled in the barbed
+wire of mathematics, had hand-to-hand struggles with belligerent parts of
+speech, and more than once suffered the shell-shock of despair. But his
+watchword now, as then, was, "Up and at 'em!" And before long he had the
+satisfaction of seeing his enemy gradually giving way.
+
+Having taken his small public into his confidence in regard to his
+belated ambition to get an education, he was surprised to find how ready
+everybody was to help him. Mr. Chester not only assisted him with his
+mathematics, but insisted upon taking him to hear good music, in the vain
+effort to reclaim an ear hopelessly attuned to jazz and rag-time. Mr.
+Martel devoted Sunday afternoons to making him read aloud from the
+classics, with great attention to precise enunciation. Miss Isobel still
+looked after his moral welfare, and Miss Enid continued to devote herself
+to his social improvement. But it remained for Madam Bartlett to render
+him the service of which he was most in need. Whenever the bubble of his
+self-esteem threatened to carry him away, she always took pains to
+puncture it.
+
+"Don't let them make a fool of you, Graham," she said one day, as she
+leaned heavily upon his arm in a painful effort to walk without her
+crutches--an experiment that she allowed neither one of her daughters to
+share, as they invariably limped with her and got frightened when she
+stumbled. "They all treat you like a puppy that has learned to walk on
+its hind legs. Remember that you belong on your hind legs. You are only
+doing what most boys in your position do in their teens. If you were as
+smart as they claim, you would have got an education long ago. But young
+people these days have no sense! Just look at my granddaughter, for
+instance."
+
+There being no direction in which he was more eager to look, Quin gave
+her his undivided attention.
+
+"I've spent thousands of dollars on that girl's education," Madam
+continued, "and what do you suppose she elected to specialize in?
+'Expression'! In my day they called it elocution. When a girl was too
+dumb to learn anything else, the teacher got money out of her parents by
+teaching her to swing her arms around her hear and say, 'Curfew Shall Not
+Ring To-night.' Now they all want to write poetry, or play the flute, or
+go on the stage, or some other fool thing like that."
+
+"What about those that want to go on a farm? That's sensible enough for
+you." Quin couldn't resist the thrust on behalf of Mr. Ranny.
+
+"It's sensible for a sensible person," Madam said crossly. "It's where
+_you_ belong, instead of attempting all this university business."
+
+There were times these days when Quin quite agreed with Madam. When the
+tide of his confidence was out, he regarded himself as a hopeless fool
+and despaired of ever making up the years he had lost. But at high tide
+there was no limit to his aspirations, nor to his courage. While his
+struggles at the university kept him humble, his success at the factory
+constantly elated him. Having achieved two promotions in less than three
+months, he already saw himself a prospective member of the firm. In fact,
+he slightly anticipated this event by flinging himself into the affairs
+of Bartlett & Bangs with even more ardor than was advisable. Hardly a day
+passed that he did not seek a chance to apprise Mr. Bangs of some
+colossal scheme or startling innovation that would revolutionize the
+business.
+
+"See here, young man," said Mr. Bangs, when this had occurred once too
+often; "I pay you to work for me, not to think for me."
+
+"But they are the same thing," urged Quin, with appalling temerity. "Why,
+I can't sleep nights for thinking how other firms are walking away with
+our business. Smith & Snelling, up in Illinois, have got a plant that's
+half as big as ours, and they export twice as much stuff as we do. And
+their plows can't touch ours; they ain't in a thousand miles of 'em."
+
+"How do you know?"
+
+"I've seen 'em both in action, and I've heard men talk about 'em. Why, if
+we could get a start in the Orient, and open up an agency in Japan and
+China----"
+
+"There--that will do," said Mr. Bangs testily; "you get back to your
+work. You talk too much."
+
+Both Mr. Ranny and Mr. Chester warned Quin again and again that he was
+not supposed to emerge from the obscurity of his humble position as
+shipping clerk. But Quin was the descendant of a long line of
+missionaries whose duty it was to reform. The effect of his heredity and
+early environment was not only to increase his self-reliance and
+intensify his motive power, but to commit him to ideals as well. Once he
+recognized a condition as being capable of improvement, he could not rest
+until he had tried to better it.
+
+It was not until the approach of Easter that his mind began to stray from
+the highroads of industry and learning into the byways of pleasure. From
+certain signs about the Bartlett house it was apparent that preparations
+were in progress for an event of importance. Paperhangers and cleaners
+came and went, consultations were held daily concerning new rugs and
+curtains. Miss Enid and Miss Isobel gave tentative orders and Madam
+promptly countermanded them. Workmen were engaged and dismissed and
+reëngaged. The door to the room at the head of the stairs, which he knew
+to be Eleanor's, now stood open, revealing a pink-and-white bower. Stray
+remarks now and then concerning caterers and music and invitations
+further excited his fancy, and he waited impatiently for the time when he
+should be formally apprised of Eleanor's home-coming.
+
+Never before in his life had he been so inordinately happy. He burst into
+song at strange times and places, and had to be spoken to more than once
+for whistling in the office. Instead of studying at night, he frequently
+lapsed into delectable reveries in which he anticipated the bliss of
+being under the same roof with Eleanor. He already heard himself telling
+her about his promotions, his work at the university, his capture of her
+family. And always he pictured her as listening to him as she had that
+day at the Hawaiian Garden, with lips ready to smile or tremble and eyes
+that sparkled like little pools of water in the sunlight.
+
+Occasionally reason suggested that she would be at home very little and
+that the obnoxious Phipps would be lying in wait for her whenever she
+went abroad. But Phipps was forbidden the house, and with such a handicap
+as that he surely was out of the running. Besides, Miss Eleanor had
+probably forgotten all about the Captain by this time! Thus reassuring
+himself, the fatuous Quin loosened the reins of his fancy and rode full
+tilt for an inevitable fall.
+
+The first intimation of it came the week before Easter, when Madam
+presented him with a handsome watch in recognition of his services. The
+gift itself was sufficiently overwhelming, but the formal politeness of
+the presentation sounded ominous. Madam suggested almost tactfully, in
+conclusion, that, now she was on her feet again, he need not feel
+obligated to remain longer.
+
+"But I _don't_ feel obligated!" he burst out impetuously. "I'd rather
+stay here than anywhere in the world."
+
+"Well, you can't stay," said Madam, whose small stock of courtesy had
+been exhausted on her initial speech. "My granddaughter is bringing some
+girls home with her for the Easter vacation, and I need your room."
+
+"But I'll sleep in the third story," urged Quin wildly. "You can billet
+me any old place--I don't care _where_ you put me."
+
+"No," said Madam firmly. "It's best for you to go."
+
+That night at dinner the sisters did what they could to soften the blow
+for Quin. They gave vague excuses that did not excuse, and explanations
+that did not explain.
+
+"Of course, we have no idea of losing sight of you," Miss Enid said with
+forced brightness. "You must drop in often to tell us how you are getting
+along and to make mother laugh. You are the only person I know who can do
+that."
+
+"Yes, and we shall count on you to come to supper every Sunday evening,"
+Miss Isobel added; "then we can go to church together."
+
+"Next Sunday?" asked Quin, faintly hopeful.
+
+"Well, no," said Miss Isobel. "For the next two weeks we shall be
+occupied with the young ladies and their friends; but after that we shall
+look for you."
+
+Quin looked at the two gentle sisters in dumb amazement. How _could_ they
+sit there saying such kind things to him, and at the same time shut the
+door between him and the great opportunity of his life? What did it all
+mean? Where had he failed? Surely there was some terrible misunderstanding!
+In his complete bewilderment he created quite the most dreadful blunder
+that is registered against him in his long list of social sins.
+
+"But don't you expect me to meet the young ladies?" he blurted out
+indignantly. "Aren't you going to ask me to the party?"
+
+A horrible pause followed, during which the walls seemed to rock around
+him and he felt the blood surging to his head. He was starting up from
+the table when Miss Enid laid a quieting hand on his sleeve.
+
+"Of course you are to be invited, Quinby," she said in her suavest tones;
+"the invitation will reach you to-morrow."
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 14
+
+
+On the night of the Bartlett party, Quin stood before the small mirror
+of his old room over the Martels' kitchen and surveyed himself in
+sections. The first view, obtained by standing on a chair, was the
+least satisfactory; for, in spite of the most correct of wing-toed
+dancing-shoes, there was a space between them and the cuffs of his
+trousers that no amount of adjustment could diminish. The second
+section was far more reassuring. Having amassed what to him seemed a
+fortune, for the purchase of a dress-suit, Quin had allowed himself to
+be persuaded by the voluble and omniscient salesman to put all of his
+money into a resplendent dinner-coat instead. The claim for the coat
+that it was "the classiest garment in the city" was reinforced by the
+fact that it had adorned the dummy in the shop window for seven
+consecutive days and occasioned much comment by its numerous
+"novelties." Quin had no doubts whatever about the coat. Its glory not
+only dimmed his eyes to the shortcomings of the trousers, which he had
+rented for the occasion, but even made him forget the aching tooth that
+had been harassing him all day.
+
+As he went down to present himself for the family inspection, it is
+useless to deny that he was very much impressed with the elegance and
+correctness of his costume. It had been achieved with infinite pains
+and considerable expense. Nothing was lacking, not even a silver
+cigarette-case, bearing an unknown monogram, which he had purchased at
+a pawn-shop the day before.
+
+His advent into the sitting-room produced a gratifying sensation.
+
+"Ha! Who comes here!" cried Mr. Martel. "The glass of fashion and the
+mould of form." Then he came forward for close inspection. "Hadn't you
+any better studs than those, my boy?"
+
+"They are the ones that came in the shirt," said Quin, instantly on the
+defensive.
+
+"Well, they hardly do justice to the occasion. Step upstairs, Cassius,
+and get my pearl ones out of the top chiffonier drawer."
+
+"I wish Captain Phipps could see you," said Rose admiringly. "You should
+have seen his face when I told him you were going to-night! He wasn't
+invited, you know."
+
+"Where did you see him?" Quin asked, brushing a speck of lint from the
+toe of his shining shoe.
+
+"Here. He's been coming twice a week to work with Papa Claude ever since
+you left. Give 'em to me, Cass"--this to her brother. "I'll put them in."
+
+"Aren't they too little for the buttonholes?" asked Quin anxiously.
+
+"Not enough to matter," Rose insisted. Then, as she finished, she added
+in a whisper: "Tell Nell somebody sent his love."
+
+"Nothing doing," laughed Quin with a superior shrug; "somebody else is
+taking his."
+
+The curb was lined with automobiles by the time he arrived at the
+Bartletts'. The house looked strangely unfamiliar with its blaze of
+lights and throng of arriving guests. He instinctively felt in his pocket
+for his latch-key, and then remembered, and waited for the strange butler
+to open the door. The inside of the house looked even less natural than
+the outside. The floors were cleared for dancing and the mantels were
+banked high with flowers and ferns. Under the steps the musicians were
+already tuning their instruments.
+
+"Upstairs, sir; first room to your left," said the important person at
+the door, and Quin followed the stream of black-coated figures who were
+filing up the stairs and turning into the room he had occupied a short
+week ago. It was just as he had left it, except for the picture that no
+longer adorned the mantel.
+
+"Beg pardon, sir," said the lofty attendant who took his overcoat, "your
+stud's come loose."
+
+"I bet the damn thing's going to do that all night," Quin said
+confidentially. "Say, you haven't got a pin, have you?"
+
+"Oh, no, sir, it couldn't be pinned," protested the man in a shocked
+tone.
+
+Quin adjusted it as best he could, took a final look at himself in the
+mirror, and proceeded downstairs. Arrived in the lower hall, he glanced
+about him in some perplexity. Not a member of the family was visible, and
+he looked in vain for a familiar face. In his uncertainty as to his next
+move, he went back to the pantry and got himself a glass of water.
+
+As he was returning to the hall, some one plucked at his sleeve and
+whispered:
+
+"Hello there, Graham!"
+
+Turning around, he encountered the gaping mouth of a shining saxophone,
+behind which beamed the no less shining countenance of Barney McGinness.
+
+Barney had been in the 105th Infantry Band, and he and Quin had returned
+from France on the same transport. They exchanged hearty greetings under
+their breath.
+
+"Serving here to-night, are you?" asked Barney.
+
+"Serving?" repeated Quin; then he laughed good-naturedly. "You got
+another guess coming your way, Barney."
+
+"So it's the parlor instid of the pantry, is it? I'd 'a' seen it for
+meself if I had used me eyes instead of me mouth. You look grand enough
+to be doing a turn on the vawdyville."
+
+Quin tried not to expand his chest in pride, for fear the movement would
+disturb those temperamental studs. He would fain have lingered
+indefinitely in the warmth of Barney's admiring smile, but the signal for
+the first dance was already given, and he moved nervously out into the
+throng again.
+
+Now that the moment had come for him to meet Eleanor--the moment he had
+longed for by day and dreamed of by night,--he found himself overcome
+with terrible diffidence. Suppose she did not want to see him again?
+Suppose she should be angry at him for coming to her party? Suppose she
+should be too taken up with all these strange friends of hers to have
+time to dance with him?
+
+After obstructing social traffic in the hall for several moments, he
+encountered Miss Enid. She was all a lavender flutter, with sleeves
+floating and scarf dangling, and she wore an air of subdued excitement
+that made her almost pretty.
+
+"Why, Quinby!" she said, and her eyes swept him. "Have you spoken to
+mother yet?"
+
+"No; where is she?"
+
+"In the library. And sister will present you to the young ladies in the
+parlor."
+
+She hesitated a moment, then she placed a timid hand on Quin's arm.
+
+"But before you go in would you mind doing something for me? Will you
+watch the front door and let me know as soon as Mr. Chester arrives?"
+
+"Mr. Chester?"
+
+"Yes. You see, it's been a great many years since he came to the house,
+and I want to--to make sure that he is properly welcomed."
+
+"I'll wait for him," said Quin, glad of any excuse for not entering that
+crowded parlor.
+
+Lovely young creatures in rainbow tints drifted down the stairs and
+disappeared beyond the portières; supercilious young men, all in tail
+coats and most of them wearing white gloves, passed and repassed him.
+
+Quin was experiencing the wholly new sensation of timidity. In vain he
+sought reassuring reflections from the long pier-glass, as he did guard
+duty in the front hall pending Mr. Chester's arrival. He'd be all right,
+he assured himself, as soon as he got to know some of the people. Once he
+had spoken to Eleanor and been sure of her welcome, he didn't care what
+happened. Meanwhile he worked with his shirt-stud and tried not to think
+about his tooth.
+
+It was late when Mr. Chester arrived, and by the time he had been placed
+in Miss Enid's care the receiving line in the parlor had dissolved and
+the dance was in full swing.
+
+Quin made his way back to the library and presented his belated respects
+to Madam, who sat enthroned in state where she could command the field
+and direct the manoeuvers. She was resplendent in black velvet and old
+lace. A glittering comb topped her high white pompadour, and a dog-collar
+of diamonds encircled her wrinkled neck.
+
+"Well, I am glad one man has the manners to come and speak to his
+hostess!" she said grimly, extending her hand to Quin. "The young lords
+of the present day seem to consider a lady's house a public dance-hall.
+Sit down and talk to me."
+
+Quin didn't wish to sit down. He wished very ardently to plunge into that
+dancing throng and find Eleanor. But the old lady's vise-like grip closed
+on him, and he had to content himself with watching the couples circle
+past the door while he listened to a tirade against present-day customs.
+
+"Why, this dancing is indecent!" stormed the old lady. "I never saw
+anything like it in my life! Look at that little Morris chit with her
+cheek plastered up to Johnnie Rawlins'! If somebody doesn't speak to her,
+I will! I will not have such dancing in my house! And there's Kitty
+Carey, the one with no back to her dress. What her mother is thinking
+of--Mercy! Look at the length of that skirt!"
+
+It was not until Mr. and Mrs. Ranny arrived, and Madam had no time for
+any one else, that Quin was able to escape.
+
+"Can you tell me where I can find Miss Eleanor?" he asked eagerly of Miss
+Isobel, whom he encountered in the back hall.
+
+Miss Isobel, looking thoroughly uncomfortable in a high-necked,
+long-sleeved evening dress, sighed anxiously:
+
+"I am looking for her myself. She has had all the windows opened, and
+mother gave express orders that they were to be kept closed. Would you
+mind putting this one down? It makes such a draught."
+
+It was a high window and an obstinate one, and by the time it was down
+Quin's cuffs were six inches beyond his coat sleeves and his vest was
+bulging.
+
+"I don't want that window down," said a spirited voice behind him. "I
+wish you had left it alone."
+
+"Eleanor!" said Miss Isobel reprovingly. "He is doing it at my request.
+It is our young friend Quinby Graham."
+
+Quin wheeled about in dismay, and found himself face to face with a
+slender vision in shimmering blue and silver, a vision with flushed
+cheeks and angry eyes, who looked at him in blank amazement, then burst
+out laughing.
+
+"Why, for mercy sakes! I never would have known you. You look so--so
+different in civilian clothes."
+
+The words were what he had expected, but the intonation was not. It
+seemed to call for some sort of explanation.
+
+"It's my face," he blurted out apologetically, drawing attention to the
+fact that of all others he most wished to ignore. "Had an abscess in my
+tooth; it's swelled my jaw up a bit."
+
+Eleanor was not in the least concerned with his affliction. A civilian
+with the toothache could not expect the consideration of a hero with a
+shrapnel wound. Moreover, this was her first appearance in the rôle of
+hostess at a large party, and she fluttered about like a distracted
+humming-bird.
+
+Miss Isobel laid a detaining hand on her bare shoulder.
+
+"Did you know they were smoking in the dining-room, Nellie? Even some of
+the _girls_ are smoking. If mother finds it out I don't know _what_ she
+will do!"
+
+"Call out the fire department, probably," said Eleanor flippantly.
+
+"But listen! She will speak to them--you know she will. Don't you think
+you can stop them?"
+
+"Of course I can't!" declared Eleanor, her anger rekindling. "And we
+can't dance with the windows down, either. Oh, dear, I wish we'd never
+_tried_ to give a party!"
+
+"May I have the next dance, Miss Eleanor?" Quin ventured at this
+inopportune moment.
+
+She turned upon him a perturbed face, "It's taken," she said absently.
+"They are all taken until after supper. I'll give you one then." And with
+this casual promise she hurried away.
+
+Quin wandered disconsolately into the hall again. Everybody seemed to
+know everybody else. Apparently he was the one outsider. At the soldier
+dances to which he was accustomed, he was used to boldly asking any girl
+on the floor to dance, sure of a welcoming smile. But here it was
+different. It seemed that a fellow must wait for an introduction which
+nobody took the trouble to give. He leaned against the door-jamb and
+indulged in bitter reflections. Much that bunch cared whether he had
+risked his life for his country or not! The girls had already forgotten
+which were the heroes and which were the slackers. He didn't care! All he
+had come for, anyhow, was to see Eleanor Bartlett. Just wait until he got
+her all to himself in that dance after supper----
+
+Finding the strain of being a spectator instead of a participant no
+longer endurable, he wandered upstairs and bathed his face. The pain was
+getting worse and he had a horrible suspicion that the swelling was
+increasing. In the men's dressing-room he found a game of craps in
+progress, and, upon being asked to join, was so grateful for being
+included in any group that he accepted gladly, and for half an hour
+forgot his woes while he won enough to repay Cass the sum he had advanced
+on the dress-shirt.
+
+"Stud's undone, old chap," said his opponent as he paid his debt.
+
+"Thanks, so it is," said Quin nonchalantly.
+
+As he went downstairs he encountered Miss Enid and Mr. Chester sitting
+under the palms on the landing in intimate tête-à-tête.
+
+"Will you dance this with me, Miss Enid?" asked Quin, leading a forlorn
+hope.
+
+"I am afraid I don't know those new dances," said Miss Enid evasively,
+"the only thing I can do is to waltz."
+
+"You mean a one-step?"
+
+"She means a waltz," Mr. Chester repeated impressively, "the most
+beautiful and dignified dance ever invented. Shall we show him, Miss
+Enid?"
+
+And, to Quin's unbounded amazement, Mr. Chester and Miss Enid proceeded
+to demonstrate, there on the narrow landing, the grace and beauty of the
+"glide waltz"; and so absorbed were they in the undertaking that they did
+not even know when he ceased to be a spectator and Miss Isobel became
+one.
+
+The latter, inexpressibly shocked at the way things were going in the
+ball-room, was on her way upstairs, when she was confronted with the
+amazing spectacle of her sister and the bald-headed Mr. Chester revolving
+solemnly and rhythmically in each other's arms on the shadowy landing.
+
+The only doubt that Miss Isobel had ever harbored concerning an all-wise
+Providence arose from the passage in Scripture that read: "Man and woman
+created He them." In her secret heart she had always felt that some
+other, less material scheme might have been evolved. Softly retracing her
+steps, she slipped back downstairs and took her place beside her
+increasingly indignant mother.
+
+The new wine was proving entirely too much for the old bottles. Madam's
+ultimatums and Miss Isobel's protests had alike proved unavailing. The
+young people invaded the house like a swarm of noisy locusts. Between
+dances they flew out to the porch, some of the couples dashing out to sit
+in automobiles, others driving madly around the block to the incessant
+honking of horns. Then the music would call them back, and in they would
+pour, singing and whistling as they came, shouting jests from room to
+room, playing ball with the decorations, utterly regardless of everything
+save their own restless, reckless, daring selves. Maddest of them all was
+Eleanor, who, conscious of the stern disapproval of the family and
+rebelling against their attempted restraint, led the merry revolt against
+old-time proprieties and took her fling, for once regardless of
+consequences.
+
+Quin, meanwhile, had gone back to the dressing-room and was making
+frantic efforts to reduce the swelling in his face. If he could only keep
+it down until after his dance with Eleanor, it might swell to the
+dimensions of the dome of St. Peter's! A hurried survey from over the
+banisters assured him that supper was soon to be served, and he went back
+to his hot applications with renewed courage.
+
+But ill luck pursued him. No sooner had the guests been seated at small
+round tables and the refreshments served, than some one remembered that a
+big charity ball was in progress at the armory, and it was proposed that
+the evening be concluded there. The suggestion met with instant approval.
+In spite of the indignant protests of the elders, the gay company, headed
+by Eleanor, left the half-eaten ices melting on their plates, and, rising
+in a body, took noisy and immediate flight.
+
+At twelve o'clock the elaborately decorated rooms were empty, the
+musicians were packing their instruments, the caterers were removing
+trays of untasted food, and Quin, standing dazed in the deserted hall,
+one hand clasping his shirt-front and the other on his face, was trying
+in vain to realize that the party which he had inspired had proved his
+Waterloo!
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 15
+
+
+The next day Quin sold his dinner-coat for a fourth of what he paid for
+it, and forswore society forever. There was absolutely nothing in it, he
+assured the Martels, a conviction that assorted strangely with the fact
+that he devoured the columns in the daily papers devoted to the doings of
+the social elect, and waded through endless lists under the caption
+"Among Those Present." Every hour in the day he invented a new scheme for
+seeing Eleanor, which pride alone prevented him from carrying out. He
+wrote her a dozen notes, all of which he tore up; he went out of his way
+to pass through the streets where he might catch a glimpse of her, and
+seized the slightest excuse for errands to the Bartlett house. But the
+days of her holiday slipped away, and he neither saw nor heard from her.
+
+Each morning at breakfast Mr. Martel would say hopefully, "Well, Eleanor
+will surely grace our humble abode to-day," or, "Something tells me my
+lady-bird will come to-day!" And each evening Quin would rush home from
+work buoyed up by the hope that he might find her.
+
+"I bet she'd come to-day if she knew Captain Phipps was going to be
+here," said Myrna one morning, wagging her head wisely.
+
+"What's that got to do with it?" Rose asked sharply.
+
+"They're sweethearts," said Myrna, with the frightful astuteness of
+twelve. "And old Madam Bartlett won't let him come to the house, and Nell
+has to see him on the sly."
+
+"Tut, tut, child! Where did you get that notion?" asked Mr. Martel,
+peeling an orange with his little fingers gracefully extended. "Harold
+Phipps is years older than Nellie. He is interested solely in her
+professional career. He has a lovely, detached soul, as impersonal--What
+is the matter, Rosalind?"
+
+"Nothing--crumb went down wrong. What are _you_ laughing at, Quinby
+Graham?"
+
+"Another crumb," said Quin.
+
+Between him and Rose there had sprung up a curious intimacy. All sorts of
+little wireless messages flashed between them, and Rose always seemed to
+know things without being told. She had discovered long ago that he was
+in love with Eleanor, and, instead of scoffing at him or teasing him, she
+did him the supreme favor of listening to him. Many a night, after the
+rest of the family had gone to bed, they lingered on before the fire in
+the shabby sitting-room, Rose invariably curled up in the sofa corner and
+Quin stretched out on the floor with his head against her knees.
+
+After his somewhat rigorous discipline at the Bartletts' it was like
+slipping out of the harness to be back at the Martels'. They held him up
+to no standard, and offered no counsel of perfection. He could tell his
+best stories without fear of reproof, laugh as loud as he liked, and
+whistle and sing without disturbing anybody. Rose mended his clothes,
+doctored him when he was sick, petted him in public as well as in
+private, and even made free to pawn his uniform when the collector
+threatened to turn off the gas if the bill was not paid.
+
+One evening, coming in unexpectedly, he had surprised her kissing Harold
+Phipps in the front hall. Harold's back had been to the door, and at a
+signal from Rose Quin had beat a hasty retreat. She explained later that
+she was letting the magnificent Harold have just enough rope to hang
+himself; and Quin, glad of anything that deflected Phipps from the
+pursuit of Eleanor, laughed with her over the secret flirtation and
+failed to see the danger lights that hung in her eyes.
+
+Financial affairs were evidently going worse than usual with the Martels
+these days. Cass, adamant in his resolve to pay off the numerous debts
+contracted by the family during his absence abroad, refused to contribute
+more than the barest living expenses. Rose had given up the dancing
+classes and taken a position in one of the big department-stores. Edwin
+B. had had to leave high school and go to work. The adopted baby had been
+regretfully sent to the Orphans' Home. The little brown house was reefing
+all its sails in a vain effort to weather the coming storm.
+
+The one member of the family who soared on wings of hope above the sordid
+facts of the situation was Claude Martel. After years of search, he had
+at last found the generous benefactor, the noble young patron, who
+recognized the merit of his work. They spent hours together elaborating
+the plot of "Phantom Love" and discussing every detail of its
+construction. Occasionally on Saturday night Mr. Martel would mention
+quite confidentially to Quin that, owing to some delayed payments, he was
+a little pressed for ready money and that a small loan would be
+appreciated. This request invariably resulted in an elaborate Sunday
+dinner, capped with a couple of bottles of Haut Sauterne in which Mr.
+Martel took the precaution of drinking everybody's health twice over.
+
+Ten days after the Easter party, when Quin had almost despaired of seeing
+Eleanor at all, he found her car parked in front of the house when he
+returned in the evening. Mounting the front steps two at a time, he
+opened the door with his latch-key, then paused with his hand still on
+the knob. Queer sounds were coming from the sitting-room--sounds of a
+man's agitated voice, broken by sobs. Undeterred by any sense of
+delicacy, Quin pushed open the door and bolted in.
+
+Mr. Martel was sitting in the arm-chair in an attitude _King Lear_ might
+have envied. Every line of his face and figure suggested unmitigated
+tragedy. Even the tender ministrations of Eleanor Bartlett who knelt
+beside him, failed to console him or to stem the tide of his
+lamentations.
+
+"What's the matter?" cried Quin in alarm. "What has happened?"
+
+Papa Claude, resting one expressive hand on Eleanor's head, extended the
+other to Quin.
+
+"Come in, my boy, come in," he said brokenly. "You are one of us: nothing
+shall be kept from you in this hour of great affliction. I am ruined,
+Quinby--utterly, irrevocably ruined!"
+
+"But how? What's happened?"
+
+"It's grandmother!" exclaimed Eleanor, struggling to her feet and
+speaking with dramatic indignation. "She's written him a letter I'll
+never forgive--never! I don't care if the money _is_ due me. I don't
+want it. I won't have it! What is six thousand dollars to me if it turns
+Papa Claude out in the street?"
+
+"But here--hold on a minute!" said Quin. "What's all the racket about?"
+
+"It's about money," Mr. Martel roused himself to explain--"the grossest
+and most material thing in the world. Years ago Eleanor's father and I
+entered into a purely personal arrangement by which he advanced me a few
+thousand dollars in a time of temporary financial depression, and as a
+mere matter of form I put up this house as security. Had the dear lad
+lived, nothing more would ever have been said about it. He was the soul
+of generosity, a prince among men. But, unfortunately, at his death he
+left his mother Eleanor's trustee."
+
+"And she has simply _hounded_ Papa Claude," Eleanor broke in. "She has
+tried to make him pay interest on that old note every single year, when
+she knew I didn't need the money in the least. And now she had notified
+him she will not renew the note on any terms."
+
+"She can't collect what you haven't got, can she?" Quin asked.
+
+"She can sell the roof over our heads," said Papa Claude, with streaming
+eyes lifted to the object referred to. "She can scatter my beloved family
+and drive me back into the treadmill of teaching. And all through this
+blessed, innocent child, who would give all she has in the world to see
+her poor old grandfather happy!"
+
+Again Eleanor, moved to a passion of sympathy, flung her arms around him,
+declaring that if they made him pay the note she would refund every penny
+of it the day she was twenty-one.
+
+But Papa Claude was not to be consoled.
+
+"It will be too late," he said hopelessly. "All I required was one year
+more in which to retrieve my fortunes and achieve my life ambition. And
+now, with success almost within my grasp, the goal within sight, this
+cruel blow, this bolt from the blue----"
+
+"Haven't you got any other property or stocks or insurance that you could
+turn over?" asked Quin, who felt that the occasion demanded numerical
+figures rather than figures of speech.
+
+"Only a small farm out near Anchordale, which belonged to my precious
+wife's father. It is quite as worthless as he was, poor dear! I have
+offered it repeatedly in payment, but they refused to consider it."
+
+"Is there a house on it?" persisted Quin.
+
+"Yes--an uninhabitable old stone structure that has stood there for
+nearly a century. For years I have tried in vain to rent or sell it. I
+have left no stone unturned, Quinby. I know I am regarded as a visionary,
+a dreamer, but I assure you----"
+
+"What about the ground?"
+
+"Very hilly and woody. Absolutely good for nothing but a stock farm.
+Utterly incapable of cultivation. It's no use considering it, my dear
+boy. I have viewed the matter from every conceivable angle. There is no
+reprisal. I am doomed. This beloved house will be sold, my family
+scattered. I an old man, a penniless outcast----"
+
+"No, no, Papa Claude!" protested Eleanor. "You _sha'n't_ be turned out.
+We must borrow the money. It's only a little over a year until I'm of
+age, and then I can pay it all back. Surely we can find somebody to help
+us out!"
+
+"Ah, my darling, your trust is born of inexperience. People do not lend
+money without security. There is absolutely no one to whom I can appeal."
+
+Eleanor, sitting on the arm of his chair, suddenly started up.
+
+"I have it!" she cried. "I know who will help us! Captain Phipps! He
+knows better than any one else what it means to you to have this next
+year free to finish the play. He will be _glad_ to do it; I know he
+will."
+
+Mr. Martel looked slightly embarrassed. "As a matter of fact, he has been
+approached on the subject," he said. "He was most sympathetic and kind,
+but unfortunately his money is all invested at present."
+
+"Fiddlesticks!" cried Eleanor in a tone so suggestive of her paternal
+grandmother that Quin smiled. "What difference does it make if it _is_
+invested? Let him un-invest it. I am sure I could get him to lend it to
+_me_, only I would hate awfully to ask him."
+
+Mr. Martel's roving eyes came back to hers hopefully.
+
+"I wonder if you could?" he said, grasping at the proffered straw.
+"Perhaps if he understood that _your_ career was at stake, that my
+disappointment would mean _your_ disappointment, he would make some
+special effort to assist us. Will you go to him, child? Will you plead
+our cause for us?"
+
+Eleanor hesitated but a moment; then she set her lips firmly. "Yes," she
+said, with a little catch in her voice; "I will. I'll go to him in the
+morning."
+
+Quin, who had been staring out of the window, deep in thought, turned
+abruptly to Mr. Martel.
+
+"When do you have to have the money?" he asked.
+
+"By next Wednesday, the first--no, the second of April. The date is
+burned in my memory."
+
+"You see, there's no time to lose," said Eleanor. "I'd rather die than do
+it, but I'll ask Harold Phipps to-morrow morning."
+
+"No, you won't," said Quin peremptorily; "I am going to get the money
+myself."
+
+"But he wouldn't lend it to _you_. You don't understand!"
+
+"Yes, I do. Will you leave the matter with me until Sunday night, Mr.
+Martel, and let me see what I can do?"
+
+Quin made the suggestion as calmly as if he had unlimited resources at
+his disposal. Had the sum been six million dollars instead of six
+thousand, he would have made the offer just the same. The paramount
+necessity of the moment was to keep Eleanor Bartlett from borrowing money
+from a man like Harold Phipps. Mr. Martel's claims were of secondary
+consideration.
+
+"We might let him try, grandfather," suggested Eleanor. "If he doesn't
+succeed, there would still be time for me to speak to the Captain."
+
+"But, my boy, where would _you_ turn? What influence could you bring to
+bear?"
+
+"Well, you'd have to trust me about that," Quin said. "There are more
+ways than one of raising money, and if you'll leave it to me----"
+
+"I will! I will!" cried Mr. Martel in a burst of confidence. "I shift my
+burden to your strong young shoulders. For three days I have borne the
+agony alone. There were special reasons for Cassius not being told. He is
+one of the noblest of God's creatures, but he lacks sentiment. I confess
+I have too much. These old walls are but brick and mortar to him, but to
+me they are the custodians of the past. Here I had hoped to sit in the
+twilight of my life and softly turn the leaves of happy memories. But
+there! Enough! 'The darkest hour oft precedes the dawn!' I will not
+despair. In your hands and my darling Eleanor's I leave my fate.
+Something tells me that, between you, you will save me! In the mean
+season not a word, not a syllable to any one. And now let us have some
+music and banish these unhappy topics."
+
+It was amazing how a gentleman so crushed by fate at five could be in
+such splendid form by seven. Mr. Martel had insisted upon having a salad
+and ices for dinner in honor of Eleanor's presence, and he mixed the
+French dressing with elaborate care, and enlivened the company with a
+succession of his sprightliest anecdotes.
+
+It was Quinby Graham who was the grave one. He ate his dinner in
+preoccupied silence, arousing himself to sporadic bursts of merriment
+only when he caught Eleanor's troubled eyes watching him. Just how he was
+going to proceed with his colossal undertaking he had not the faintest
+idea. One wild scheme after another presented itself, only to be
+discarded as utterly impractical.
+
+Under cover of leaving the dining-room, Eleanor managed to whisper to
+him:
+
+"Make Cass let you take me home. I've simply got to talk to you."
+
+But neither Cass nor Quin was to have the privilege. Mr. Martel announced
+that he was going to escort her himself. The only crumb of comfort that
+Quin was able to snatch from the wretched evening was when he was helping
+her on with her coat in the hall.
+
+"When can I see you?" he whispered anxiously.
+
+"I don't know," she whispered back; "every hour's taken."
+
+"What about Sunday afternoon?"
+
+"I've promised to motor out to Anchordale with Aunt Flo and Uncle Ranny
+to hunt for wild flowers. Think of it! When all this trouble's brewing."
+
+"Anchordale," repeated Quin absently, holding her coat suspended by the
+collar and one sleeve. "Anchordale! By golly! I've got an idea! Say, I'm
+going along Sunday. You manage it somehow."
+
+"But I can't manage it! You aren't invited; and, besides----"
+
+"I can't help that--I'm going. What time do you start?"
+
+"Three o'clock. But you can't go, I tell you! They won't understand."
+
+"All ready, Nellie?" called a voice on the stairway; and Papa Claude,
+with a smile of perfect serenity on his face, bore lightly and
+consciously down upon them.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 16
+
+
+During the rushing Easter vacation, Eleanor had seen less of Harold
+Phipps than Quin had feared. Considering the subliminal state of
+understanding at which they had arrived in their voluminous letters, it
+was a little awkward to account for the fact that she had found so little
+time to devote exclusively to him. They had met at dances and had had
+interrupted tête-à-têtes in secluded corners, and several stolen
+interviews in the park; but her duties as hostess to two lively guests
+had left little time for the exacting demands of platonic friendship. Now
+that the girls were gone, she had counted on this last Sunday at Uncle
+Ranny's as a time when she could see Harold under proper conditions and
+make amends for any seeming neglect.
+
+But when Sunday came, and she found herself seated at Aunt Flo's small,
+perfectly appointed dinner-table, she found it increasingly difficult to
+keep her mind upon the brilliant and cynical conversation of her most
+admired friend. To be sure, they exchanged glances freighted with
+meaning, and as usual her vanity was touched by the subtle homage of one
+who apparently regarded the rest of humanity with such cold indifference.
+He was the first person, except Papa Claude, who had ever taken her and
+her ambitions seriously, and she was profoundly grateful. But,
+notwithstanding the fact that she felt honored and distinguished by his
+friendship, she sometimes, as now, found it difficult to follow the trend
+of his conversation.
+
+An hour before she had received an agonized note from her grandfather
+saying that nothing had been accomplished, and that, unless she could use
+her influence "in a quarter that should be nameless, all, all would be
+lost!"
+
+Her dark, brooding eyes swept the table with its profusion of silver and
+cut glass, its affectation of candle-light when the world without was a
+blaze of sunshine. She looked at Uncle Ranny, with his nervous, twitching
+lips and restless, dissatisfied eyes; at Aunt Flo, delicate, affected,
+futile; at Harold Phipps, easy, polished, serene. What possible chance
+would there be of rousing people like that to sympathy for poor,
+visionary Papa Claude? For three days the dread of having to fulfil her
+promise had hung over her like a pall. Now that the time was approaching,
+the mere thought of it made her head hot and her hands cold.
+
+"Cheer up, Nell!" her uncle rallied her. "Don't let your misdeeds crush
+you. You'll be in high favor again by the time you get back from
+Baltimore."
+
+"Are you sharing my unpopularity with the family?" asked Harold.
+
+Eleanor confessed that she was. "I've been in disgrace ever since my
+party," she said. "Did Uncle Ranny tell you the way we shocked the
+aunties?"
+
+"I did," said Mr. Ranny; "also the way sister Isobel looked when little
+Kittie Mason shook the shimmy. It's a blessing mother did not see her; I
+veritably believe she would have spanked her."
+
+"A delicious household," pronounced Harold. "What a pity they have
+banished me. I should so love to put them in a play!"
+
+"But I wouldn't let you!" Eleanor cried, so indignantly that the other
+three laughed.
+
+"Neither bond nor free," Harold said, pursing his lips and lifting his
+brows. "A little pagan at home and a puritan abroad. How are we going to
+emancipate her, Ran?"
+
+"You needn't worry," said Mrs. Ranny, lazily lighting her cigarette.
+"Eleanor is a lot more subtle than any one thinks; she'll emancipate
+herself before long."
+
+Eleanor was grateful to Aunt Flo. She was tired of being considered an
+ingénue. She wanted to be treated with the dignity her twenty years
+demanded.
+
+"I have a plan for her," said Harold, with a proprietary air. "Who knows
+but this time next year she will be playing in 'Phantom Love'?"
+
+Eleanor's wandering thoughts came to instant attention.
+
+"Is there a part I could play?" she asked eagerly, leaning across the
+table with her chin on her clasped hands.
+
+Harold watched her with an amused smile. "What would you say if I told
+you I had written a rôle especially for you? Would you dare to take it?"
+
+Eleanor closed her eyes and drew a breath of rapture.
+
+"_Would_ I? There isn't anything in heaven or earth that could prevent
+me!"
+
+"Mrs. Bartlett," said the trim maid, "there's a young man at the front
+door."
+
+The conversation hung suspended while Mrs. Ranny inquired concerning his
+mission.
+
+"It's the young man that brings messages from the office, ma'am."
+
+"Oh, it must be Quin," said Mr. Ranny, rising and going into the hall.
+"Did you want to see me about something?"
+
+Eleanor held her breath to listen. Was it possible that that absurd boy
+had actually followed her up to the Bartletts' with the intention of
+going with them on their expedition? Hadn't it been enough for him to
+come to her party in that idiotic coat, with his shirt-front bulging and
+his face swollen? Of course she liked him--she liked him immensely; but
+he had no right to impose upon her kindness, to make a pretext of his
+interest in Papa Claude to force himself in where he was not invited. Now
+that he had got into the scrape, he would have to get out of it as best
+he could. She was resolved not to lift a finger to help him.
+
+"Oh! I didn't understand"--Mr. Ranny's voice could be heard from the
+hall, with a cordial emphasis evidently intended to cover a blunder.
+"Come right in the dining-room; we are just having coffee. You know these
+ladies, of course, and this is Captain Phipps, Mr. Graham."
+
+Quin came into the room awkwardly, half extended his hand, then withdrew
+it hastily as Harold, without rising from the table, gave him a curt nod
+and said condescendingly:
+
+"How do you do, Graham?"
+
+Eleanor's quick understanding glance swept from the erect, embarrassed,
+boyish figure in the badly fitting cheap suit and obviously new tan
+shoes, to the perfectly groomed officer lounging with nonchalant grace
+with his crossed arms on the table. A curious idea occurred to her:
+Suppose they should change places, and Harold should stand there in those
+dreadful clothes Quin wore, and receive a snub from an ex-officer--would
+he be able to take it with such simple dignity and give no sign of his
+chagrin except by the slow color that mounted to his neck and brow? She,
+who a moment before had been ready to annihilate the intruder, rose
+impulsively and held out a friendly hand.
+
+"Mr. Graham and I are old friends," she said lightly. "We knew each other
+out at the hospital even before he came to stay at grandmother's."
+
+The next instant she was sorry she had spoken: for the self-control for
+which she had commended him suddenly departed, and his eyelids, which
+should have been discreetly lowered, were lifted instead, and such an
+ardent look of gratitude poured forth that she was filled with confusion.
+
+For half an hour four uncomfortable people sat in the little gilded cage
+of a drawing-room, and everybody wondered why somebody didn't do
+something to relieve the situation. Mr. and Mrs. Ranny made heroic
+efforts to entertain their unwelcome guest; Harold Phipps moved about the
+room with ill-concealed impatience; and Eleanor sat erect, with tightly
+clasped hands, as angry with Harold as she was with Quin.
+
+"Mr. Graham," said Mrs. Ranny at length, when Harold had looked at his
+watch for the fourth time, "I am afraid we shall have to ask you to
+excuse us. You see, this is our wedding anniversary, and we always
+celebrate it by a sentimental pilgrimage in search of wild flowers. I am
+afraid it's about time we were starting."
+
+Eleanor felt Quin's eyes seek hers confidently, but she refused to meet
+them. There was a painful silence; then he spoke up hopefully:
+
+"I know where there are wild flowers to burn: I was at a place yesterday
+where you could hardly walk for them; I counted seven different kinds in
+a space about as big as this room."
+
+"Where?" demanded Mr. and Mrs. Ranny in one breath.
+
+"Out Anchordale way--I don't know the name of the road. It's an
+out-of-the-way sort of place. Never was there myself until yesterday."
+
+"Could you find it again?" Mrs. Ranny asked with an enthusiasm hitherto
+reserved for her poodle.
+
+"Sure," said Quin, shoving his hands in his pockets and leaning back with
+the frankest and best-natured of smiles. "I never saw so many cowslips
+and buttercups and yellow violets, and these here little arums."
+
+"Arums!" repeated Eleanor. "What do you know about wild flowers?"
+
+"I lived with 'em up in the Maine woods," said Quin. "I don't know their
+high-brow names, but I know the kind of places they grow in and where to
+look for 'em."
+
+"Let's take him along!" said Mrs. Ranny. "We won't mind being a bit
+crowded in the motor, will we?"
+
+Involuntarily all eyes turned toward Harold Phipps.
+
+"Not in the least," he said, flicking an ash from the sleeve of his
+uniform with a dexterous little finger, "especially as I am not going to
+be with you all the way. These bucolic joys are hardly in my line. I'll
+get you to drop me at the Country Club."
+
+It was Eleanor's turn to cast a look of tragic appeal and get no
+response. In vain she tried to persuade him to reconsider his decision.
+His only concession was that he would remain at the apartment with her if
+she would give up the expedition, a suggestion that was promptly vetoed
+by Aunt Flo. Eleanor was angry enough to cry as she flung on her wraps in
+the little silk-hung guest-room. Men were so selfish, she savagely told
+herself; if either Quin or Harold had had a particle of consideration for
+her they would not have spoiled her last day at home.
+
+On the way out to the club she sat between them, miserably indifferent to
+the glory of the spring day and refusing to contribute more than an
+occasional monosyllable to the conversation, which needed all the
+encouragement it could get to keep going.
+
+"Shall I see you again before you go?" Harold asked coldly, upon leaving
+the car.
+
+She wanted very much to say no, and to say it in a way that would punish
+him; but, in view of the important matter pending, she was forced to
+swallow her pride and compromise.
+
+"I can see you to-night at the Newsons', unless you prefer spending your
+evening here at the club."
+
+"You know perfectly well what I prefer," he said with a meaning look; and
+then, without glancing at Quin, across whose knees he had clasped
+Eleanor's hand, he bade his host and hostess an apologetic good-by and
+mounted the club-house steps.
+
+"What _made_ you come?" Eleanor demanded fiercely of Quin, under cover of
+the starting motor.
+
+"I had to," Quin whispered back apologetically. "We got to sell 'em the
+farm."
+
+"What farm? Papa Claude's? Whom are you going to sell it to?"
+
+Quin lifted a warning finger and nodded significantly at the back of Mr.
+Ranny's unsuspecting head.
+
+"Uncle Ranny?" Eleanor's lips formed the words incredulously. Then the
+mere suggestion of outwitting her grandmother and saving Papa Claude by
+such a master stroke of diplomacy struck her so humorously that she broke
+into laughter, in which Quin joined.
+
+"You two are very lively all of a sudden," Mrs. Ranny said over her
+shoulder. "What is the joke?"
+
+"Miss Eleanor and I have gone into the real estate business. Do you want
+to buy a farm?"
+
+"We always want to buy a farm. We look at every one we hear is for sale.
+But they all cost too much."
+
+"This one won't. It's a bargain-counter farm. A house and fifteen acres.
+You can get it for six thousand dollars if you'll buy it to-day."
+
+"All right; we'll take it," cried Mr. Ranny gaily. "Lead us to it."
+
+The quest for the farm became so absorbing that the wild flowers were
+forgotten. The oftener they took the wrong road and had to start over,
+the keener they became to reach their destination.
+
+"I believe it was a pipe-dream," said Mr. Ranny; "you never saw the place
+at all."
+
+"Yes, I did! I'm not kidding you. It's a regular peach of a place for
+anybody that's got money to fix it up. Hold on a minute; this looks like
+the side lane. Do you mind walking the rest of the way?"
+
+"Not if we get anywhere," said Mr. Ranny.
+
+Their way led through a tangled thicket, across a log bridge, and up a
+steep hillside abloom from base to summit with early spring flowers. Down
+through the tender green leaves the sunshine poured, searching out many
+nooks and corners at which it would get no chance when the heavier
+foliage intervened.
+
+"This is where the land begins," said Quin. "Did you ever see such bully
+old trees? Any time you wanted to sell off lots, you see, you could do it
+on this side, without touching the farm."
+
+"Where's the house?" asked Mrs. Ranny.
+
+"Right through here," said Quin, holding back the branches, "Now, ain't
+that a nice old place?"
+
+His enthusiasm met with no response.
+
+In the center of what had once been a clearing stood an old stone
+building, half smothered in a wilderness of weeds and sassafras and cane,
+its one big chimney dreaming in the silence that seemed to have
+encompassed it for ages. The shutters hung disconsolate on their hinges,
+the window-panes were broken, the cornice sagged dejectedly.
+
+Eleanor's heart sank. It was worse, far worse, than Papa Claude had
+described it, fit only for the birds and spiders and chipmunks that were
+already in possession. How Quin could ever for a moment have thought of
+selling such a place to the fastidious Bartletts was more than she could
+imagine.
+
+But he was carrying the matter off with a high hand, in spite of the
+dismayed faces of his prospective buyers.
+
+"Of course it needs a shave," he admitted, as he tore down a handful of
+trailing vines that barred the front door. "But you just wait till you
+get inside and see the big stone fireplace and the queer cupboards. Why,
+this house is historic! It's been here since pioneer days. Look out for
+the floor; it's a bit rotten along here."
+
+"I don't think I'll come in," said Mrs. Ranny, holding up her skirts.
+
+"What a funny little staircase!" cried Eleanor. "And what huge rooms! You
+_must_ come in, Aunt Flo, and see the fireplace."
+
+"And look at the walls!" cried Quin. "You don't see walls like those
+these days. But you just wait till you get upstairs. You've got the
+surprise of your life coming to you."
+
+"Outside's good enough for me," Mr. Ranny declared. "I want to take a
+look at that old apple orchard."
+
+"I'll go upstairs with you!" said Eleanor. "Come on, Aunt Flo; let's see
+what it's like."
+
+At the top of the steps they both gave an exclamation of delight. The
+house, hemmed in, in front, by its trees and underbrush, overlooked from
+its rear windows a valley of surpassing loveliness. For miles the eye
+could wander over orchards full of pink-and-white peach blossoms on
+leafless boughs, over farm-lands and woody spaces full of floating clouds
+of white dogwood. Through the paneless windows came the warm spring air,
+full of the odor of tender growing things and the wholesome smell of the
+freshly upturned earth.
+
+"Randolph Bartlett, come up here this instant!" called Mrs. Ranny. "It's
+the loveliest thing you ever saw!"
+
+But Mr. Ranny was eagerly examining the remains of a somewhat extensive
+chicken farm.
+
+"Go down and show him around," Eleanor advised Quin, with a glimmer of
+hope. "Aunt Flo and I will explore the rest of the house."
+
+They not only explored, but in their imagination they remodeled it.
+Eleanor, in spite of her daydreams, was a very practical little person,
+and, with her power of visualizing a scene for others as well as for
+herself, she soon made Mrs. Ranny see the place painted and clean, with
+rag rugs on the floors, quaint old mahogany furniture, tall brass
+candlesticks on the mantel, and gay chintz curtains at the windows.
+
+Mrs. Ranny grew quite animated talking about it, and forgot the
+disturbing fact that she had not had a cigarette since dinner.
+
+"Do you know," she said to Eleanor, as they came back to the window and
+looked down at the two men talking and gesticulating eagerly in the
+garden below, "I believe if Ranny had something like this to work with
+and play with, things would be different."
+
+"Of course they would," Eleanor agreed eagerly--"for him and for you too.
+Why don't you try it, Aunt Flo?"
+
+"Oh, it would cost too much to put it in repair. But then, six thousand
+dollars is very little, isn't it? Ran spent that much for his big car."
+
+"Yes; and he could _sell_ his big car. You'd lots rather have this than
+an extra motor. And we could get him interested in fixing the place up,
+and he could keep dogs and cows and things----"
+
+"But what about his mother?"
+
+"You wouldn't have to tell her. She will be going to Maine in June, and
+you and Uncle Ranny could be all settled by the time she comes home!"
+
+Eleanor had forgotten all about Papa Claude in her eagerness to get Uncle
+Ranny his heart's desire.
+
+"I believe we could do it!" Mrs. Ranny was saying. "The chief expense
+would be putting in a couple of bath-rooms and fixing up the floors. As
+for the furniture, I have all my mother's stuff packed away in the
+warehouse--nice, quaint old things that would suit this place perfectly."
+
+"Oh, Aunt Flo, let's go down this minute and make Uncle Ranny buy it!"
+
+Randolph Bartlett, whose powers of resistance were never strong, was
+already lending a willing ear to Quin's persuasive arguments, when
+Eleanor and Mrs. Ranny descended upon him in a whirlwind of enthusiasm.
+They both talked at once, rushing him from one spot to another, vying
+with each other in pointing out the wonderful possibilities of the place.
+
+"See here, is this a frame-up?" he asked laughingly. "You are not
+actually in earnest, Flo? You don't mean that you would consider the
+place seriously?"
+
+"But I do. I never wanted anything so much in my life!"
+
+Mr. Ranny looked at her in amazement. "And you mean you'd be willing to
+come out here and live four months in the year?"
+
+"I mean, if we could get it fixed up right, I'd live here the year round.
+We are only fifteen minutes from town, and all our friends live out this
+way."
+
+"By George, I've almost a notion to try it!" Mr. Ranny's eyes were
+shining. "Do you believe I could pull it off, Quin? I've made such a
+darned fizzle of things in the past that I'm almost afraid to kick over
+the traces again."
+
+"The trouble is, you've never given a big enough kick to get loose," said
+Quin. "Here's your chance to show 'em what you can do. I believe if you'd
+buy this place, and buckle down to knocking it into shape, you could have
+as pretty a little stock farm as there is in the State."
+
+"That sounds mighty good to me!" said Mr. Ranny with the look of a
+prisoner who is promised a parole. "When do you have to give an answer?"
+
+"My option is up at midnight."
+
+"Good heaven! You don't mean to-night?"
+
+"Yes, sir: not a minute later."
+
+"I am afraid that settles it, as far as I'm concerned."
+
+"No, it doesn't!" insisted Mrs. Ranny. "If you really want it, there is
+no reason you shouldn't have it. The ground alone is worth the price
+asked. Let the others go back to the car while you and I talk the matter
+over. It's the chance we've been looking for for ten years, and I'm not
+going to let it slip."
+
+The next hour was one Eleanor never forgot. She and Quin, confident of
+the success of their conspiracy, were also jubilant over what they
+regarded as Mr. Ranny's possible emancipation. They already saw him a
+reformed character, a prosperous and contented farmer, no longer a menace
+to the peace of the family. So elated were they that, instead of going to
+the road, they explored the woods, and ended by racing down the hill like
+a couple of irresponsible children.
+
+When they at last got back to the car, Eleanor, disheveled and limp, sank
+on the running-board and laughingly made room for Quin beside her. She
+had quite forgotten to be grown up and temperamental, a fact that Quin
+was prompt to take advantage of.
+
+"See here!" he said. "Am I going to get a commission for all this?"
+
+"How much do you want?"
+
+"I want a lot!" he threatened.
+
+He was leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, tracing figures in
+the sand with his shoe. Eleanor noticed the nice way his hair grew on the
+back of his neck and the white skin that met the clear brown skin at the
+collar-line. In spite of his bigness and his strength, he seemed very
+young and defenseless when it came to his dealings with girls.
+
+It was useless to deny that she knew what he wanted. His eyes had been
+saying it persistently each time they had met hers for three months. They
+had whispered it after that first dance at the Hawaiian Garden; they had
+murmured it through the hospital days; they had shouted it this afternoon
+at Uncle Ranny's, so loud that she thought every one must surely hear.
+But when a young lady is engaged in the exciting business of playing with
+fire she doesn't always heed even a shouted warning. As long as she was
+very careful, she told herself, and snuffed out every blaze that
+threatened to become unmanageable, no damage would be done. The present
+moment was one requiring snuffers.
+
+"We can't begin to pay you what we owe you," she said in her most
+conventional tone. "If things go as we hope they will, it will mean
+everything to Uncle Ranny as well as to Papa Claude."
+
+"I didn't do it for them only," Quin blurted out. "I didn't want you to
+borrow money from Captain Phipps."
+
+The temptation to encourage this special spark was not to be resisted.
+
+"You don't love Mr. Phipps very much, do you?" she said.
+
+"No; do you?"
+
+"Well, I _like_ him. He is one of my very best friends."
+
+"Am I?" demanded Quin with terrible directness.
+
+It was Eleanor's turn to trace patterns in the sand.
+
+"Well, you see----" she began.
+
+"No, I don't." Quin rose indignantly. "There's nobody in the world that
+would do any more for you than I would. I may be chasing the kite in
+thinking that you _want_ me to do anything, but if you'll just let me
+under the ribbon, you bet your life I'll give Phipps and the rest of the
+talent a run for their money!"
+
+He stood staring hard down the road for a moment, while she sat in
+embarrassed silence; then he broke forth again:
+
+"I know you don't want me to say these things. I know every time you head
+me off. But if you'll just let me get it off my chest this once, then I
+promise to keep the cork in if it busts the bottle!"
+
+Eleanor laughed in spite of herself.
+
+"All right," she said; "I'll listen."
+
+"Well," said Quin, "it's this way. I know you don't care a tinker's damn
+for me in the way I care for you. But you can't deny that you do like me
+some. You wouldn't talk to me like you do and let me do things for you if
+you didn't. What I want you to promise is that whenever you need a
+friend--a _best_ friend, mind you--you will come straight to me."
+
+He looked worth coming to as he stood there, big and strong and earnest;
+and Eleanor, being young and a woman, promptly forgot her good
+resolutions not to encourage him, and rose impulsively and held out her
+hand.
+
+"I do promise, Quin," she said, "and I thank you with all my heart."
+
+Then a curious and unexpected thing happened to her. As she stood there
+on the lonely country road with her hand in his, a curious, deep, still
+feeling crept over her, a queer sensation of complete satisfaction that
+she never remembered to have felt before. For a long moment she stood
+there, her cheek almost touching that outrageous plaid tie that had so
+recently excited her derision. Then she snatched her hand away. "Look
+out!" she warned. "They are coming."
+
+Two minutes later Mr. and Mrs. Ranny, emerging from the thicket with
+their hands full of wild flowers, found Eleanor seated in the car in a
+bored attitude, while Quin solicitously examined a rear tire.
+
+"It's all settled!" Mr. Ranny cried exultingly. "The farm is ours!"
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 17
+
+
+Although Quin had taken himself and his career seriously before Eleanor's
+home-coming, it was nothing in comparison to the fever of energy that
+possessed him after her departure. He was determined to forge ahead in
+business, get an education, and become versed in the gentler branches of
+social life at the earliest possible moment. His chief trouble was that
+the days contained only twenty-four hours. Even his dreams were a jumble
+of plows and personal pronouns, of mathematical problems and social
+proprieties.
+
+At the factory he flung himself into the affairs of the firm with a zeal
+that at times bordered on officiousness. But Mr. Bangs was beginning to
+find him useful, and, while he continued to snub him and correct him, he
+also came to depend upon him, especially in an emergency. Quin, on his
+part, was for the first time turning a critical eye on his own
+achievements in relation to those of bigger and abler men, and the result
+was chastening.
+
+As for his mad thirst for knowledge, even the university classes,
+difficult as they were proving, failed to satisfy him. He purchased an
+expensive "system" in fifteen volumes, by means of which, the prospectus
+assured him, he could easily achieve a college education in eight months.
+He wore the covers off the first two booklets, then became disgusted, and
+devoted himself instead to a small handbook entitled "Words We
+Mispronounce."
+
+The branch of his education in which he was making least effort and most
+progress was in the customs and manners of polite society. He did not
+shine as yet, but he had ceased to offend, and that was a long step
+forward. Once initiated into the refinements of life, he took to them
+naturally. Miss Isobel and Miss Enid Bartlett had given him the cue, and
+Mr. Chester was keeping him up to his standard.
+
+Between him and the latter had sprung up a queer friendship verging on
+intimacy. Ever since the night of the symphony concert he had served as a
+connecting link between the long-severed lovers, and out of gratitude he
+had been adopted as a protégé. It was Mr. Chester who assumed
+responsibility not only for his musical and literary tastes but for his
+neckties and hosiery as well. Mr. Chester, in fact, being too negative
+and conservative, acted as a much-needed soft pedal on Quin's noisy
+aggressiveness. "Not so loud, Quinby," or, "A little more gently, my
+boy," he would often say. And Quin would acquiesce good-naturedly and
+even gratefully. "That's right, call me down," he would say; "I guess
+I'll learn before I die."
+
+In all that he did and said and thought, one object was paramount. He
+never lost sight of the fact that he was making himself over for Eleanor,
+and the prize at stake was so colossal that no obstacles deterred him. To
+be sure, this was not by any means his first amatory venture. As Rose
+Martel had said, he "had a way with him"--a way that had kept him
+involved in affairs of the heart since the early days in Nanking when he
+had succumbed to the charms of a slant-eyed little Celestial at the
+tender age of seven. He had always had a girl, just as he had always had
+a job; but both had varied with time and place. With a vocabulary of a
+dozen words and the sign language, he had managed to flirt across France
+and back again. He had frivoled with half a dozen trained nurses in as
+many different hospitals, and had even had a sentimental round with a
+pretty young stewardess on the transport coming home.
+
+But this affair had been quite different. Instead of wading about in the
+shallows of love, he had tumbled in head first, and found himself beyond
+his depth and out of sight of land. It was a case of sink or swim, and
+Quin was determined not to sink if he could help himself.
+
+The fact that Eleanor Bartlett was not of his world, that she apparently
+never gave him a second thought, that he had less than nothing on which
+to build his hopes, only made him take a deeper breath and a longer
+stroke.
+
+The first gleam of encouragement he had received was that Sunday in the
+country, when for the fraction of a second she had let him hold her hand.
+Since then he had written her five letters and received but one brief
+note in reply. Her silence, however, did not depress him. She had told
+him she hated to write letters, a sentiment he fully shared. Only in this
+case he could not help himself. The moment anything of interest happened,
+he was seized with an uncontrollable impulse to tell Eleanor. He would
+rush home from the university at night, go up to his room, and, using the
+corner of his bureau for a desk, cover pages of lined tablet paper with a
+detailed account of the day's adventures. When every doubtful word has to
+be looked up in the dictionary, and newly acquired knowledge concerning
+participles and personal pronouns duly applied, letter-writing is a
+serious business. Sometimes a page was copied three times before it met
+with the critical approval of the composer.
+
+Since the passing of the acute financial crisis in the Mattel family,
+Papa Claude had revived amazingly, and was once more wearing a rose in
+his buttonhole and courting the Muse. He and Harold Phipps spent several
+afternoons a week working on their play, which they hoped to get fully
+blocked out before the latter left the service and returned to his home
+in Chicago.
+
+But, even though the sale of the farm had relieved the financial strain,
+some other trouble was brewing in the family, the cause of which Quin
+could not make out. The usually sunny atmosphere was disturbed by
+frequent electric storms between Cass and Rose, marked by stern
+disapproval on his part and fiery rebellion on hers. "Rose is going to
+get herself into trouble!" Cass predicted darkly to Quin; while Rose, on
+her part, declared that Cass should shave his head and enter a monastery.
+
+"What are you two ragging about, anyhow?" Quin asked one morning at
+breakfast, when things were worse than usual.
+
+"Rose knows what I'm talking about," said Cass significantly. "Somebody's
+going to get his face pushed in if things keep on like they are going."
+
+Absorption in his own affairs alone prevented Quin from taking an
+immediate hand in this new family complication. It was not until late in
+May that he hit upon the truth, quite by accident.
+
+Coming home rather later than usual one night, he stumbled over Cass
+sitting hunched up on the dark stairway, looking in his striped pajamas
+like an escaped convict.
+
+"What in the devil are you up to?" Quin demanded, rubbing a bruised shin.
+
+"I am waiting for Rose," said Cass grimly. "Some fellow comes by here
+every few nights and takes her out in a machine."
+
+"Who is he?"
+
+"I don't know--that's what I'm going to find out."
+
+"You crazy wop!" said Quin. "What's got into you lately? Can't you trust
+Rose to take care of herself?"
+
+"Yes; but I don't trust any fellow that'll go with a girl and be ashamed
+to be seen with her."
+
+"How do you know he's ashamed to be seen with her?"
+
+"Because he comes sneaking in here after we've all gone to bed. He don't
+ring the door-bell; he honks once or twice; and then I hear Rose slipping
+past my door."
+
+"I didn't know any of Rose's beaux had a machine."
+
+"They haven't. This is some rich guy that thinks any girl that works for
+her living is an easy mark. I'll show him a thing or two! I'll break his
+damned---- Listen! There's an automobile stopping now."
+
+He started excitedly down the steps, but Quin grasped his arms.
+
+"Come back here, Cass! You can't go cavorting out there in your pajamas,
+making a mess of things. You leave it to me. I'll go out the side way and
+amble around to the front door the same time they do. They'll think I'm
+just getting home, and I can size him up for you."
+
+The next moment he was out of the house, over the low hedge, and casually
+sauntering toward the corner. The night was very dark, lightened only by
+the swinging street lamp and the two staring eyes of an automobile that
+had stopped a little distance from the house. Quin saw Rose dart out of
+the shadows and run toward the house. Some one called her name softly and
+peremptorily, but she did not stop. A man was following her out of the
+shadows. But Quin did not wait for him to arrive; he promptly stepped
+around the corner and met Rose at the front gate.
+
+"What's up?" he demanded, seeing her quivering lips and angry, excited
+eyes.
+
+"Tell him to go away!" she whispered, trying to get the gate open. "Tell
+him I never want him to speak to me again. He _can't_ apologize--there
+isn't anything he can say. Just make him go away, that's all."
+
+"Miss Martel is making a mountain out of a molehill," said a suave voice
+behind them, and, turning, Quin saw the somewhat perturbed face of Harold
+Phipps, "If she would listen to me for two minutes----"
+
+"But I won't--not for one minute! You sha'n't speak to me----"
+
+"Just one word alone with you----"
+
+"See here," said Quin, stepping between them and looking Harold Phipps
+squarely in the eyes. "You heard what she said, didn't you?"
+
+"Yes; but I insist upon her listening to me. She entirely misunderstood
+something I said."
+
+"I did not!" Rose broke in furiously. "You know perfectly well I didn't.
+I won't listen to anything you have to say on that or any other subject."
+
+"I sha'n't let you go until you do," he replied in his most authoritative
+tone.
+
+"Oh, yes, you will," said Quin quietly. "I don't know what the row's
+about, but she doesn't have to talk to you if she doesn't want to."
+
+For a moment the two men stood silently measuring each other; then the
+one in uniform gave a slight shrug and permitted himself a faint superior
+smile.
+
+"I see," he said. "The young lady's conduct did not lead me to suppose
+she was engaged. I congratulate you!" And, turning on his heel, he went
+back to his car.
+
+Rose turned quickly and seized Quin's arm.
+
+"Don't tell anybody about this, please," she implored. "I've had my
+lesson--the beast!"
+
+"What did he do?" demanded Quin, longing for an excuse to annihilate
+Phipps.
+
+"It wasn't so much what he did--it was what he said. But you've got to
+promise not to give me away, Quin. You mustn't let on that I was out
+to-night."
+
+"But Cass is on to it. He's waiting there in the hall now."
+
+She caught her breath sharply.
+
+"Does he know who I was with?"
+
+"Not yet."
+
+"Then he mustn't. It would spoil everything for Papa Claude and the play;
+and, besides, Cass is so excitable. I _haven't_ done anything wrong,
+Quin! I was just out for a little fun, and that contemptible puppy
+thought----"
+
+"I wish to God I'd cracked his bean!" said Quin fervently.
+
+"Promise me that you won't tell!"
+
+"I won't tell, but I intend to have it out with him."
+
+"No, no!" she whispered hysterically. "I tell you, nothing more must be
+said about it. It was partly my fault; only, I didn't know he was that
+kind of a man. You know yourself I never really liked him. Only it was
+fun to go out in his car, and I get so sick of not having any clothes or
+money and having to stay in that deadly old store day in and day out!"
+
+She buried her face in her hands and sobbed violently for a moment; then
+she caught hold of Quin's sleeve.
+
+"You won't speak to him," she implored, "and you won't tell Cass?"
+
+"I won't do anything you don't want me to," promised Quin, proffering his
+handkerchief with his sympathy, "It's your shooting-match, and Cass has
+got to keep his hands off."
+
+Cass at this moment cautiously opened the front door, and stood in his
+bare feet, viewing them with anxious suspicion.
+
+"It's all right, old cove," said Quin, slipping Rose into the house and
+pulling the door to after her. "No harm's done, and she won't do it
+again."
+
+"How do you know?"
+
+"Because she and the fellow had a blow-out. She says she is through with
+him for good and all."
+
+"Did you see him?"
+
+"Yes; he's a average-sized fellow with a smooth face and brown hair."
+
+"Would you know him if you saw him again?"
+
+"Sure. I'll keep an eye out for him. But you've got to leave it to me. I
+can handle the situation all right now, if you just won't butt in."
+
+"If you can get Rose to promise not to see him again, she'll stick to it;
+I can say that for her."
+
+"She won't see him. They've quarreled, I tell you. I heard her balling
+him out good before he left. The whole thing is settled, and all you got
+to do is to button up your lip and go to bed."
+
+A week later Papa Claude announced that Harold Phipps was at last
+released from his onerous duties in the army and had returned to his home
+in Chicago, where he would in future devote himself to the writing and
+producing of great American plays.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 18
+
+
+In everybody's life there are hours or days or even weeks that refuse to
+march on with the solemn procession of time, but lag behind and hide in
+some byway of memory, there to remain for ever and ever. It was such a
+week that tumbled unexpectedly out of Quin's calendar about the first of
+June, and lived itself in terms of sunshine and roses, of moonshine and
+melody, seven halcyon days between the time that Eleanor returned from
+school and the Bartletts went away for the summer. For the first time
+since he met her, she seemed to have nothing more demanding to do than to
+emulate "the innocent moon, who nothing does but shine, and yet moves all
+the slumbering surges of the world."
+
+There was no doubt about Quin's "slumbering surges" being moved. Within
+twenty-four hours of her return to town he became totally and hopelessly
+demoralized. Education and business were, after all, but means to an end,
+and when he saw what he conceived to be a short cut to heaven, he rashly
+discarded wings and leaped toward his heart's desire.
+
+The hour before closing at the factory became a time of acute torture. He
+who usually stayed till the last minute, engrossed in winding up the
+affairs of the day, now seemed perfectly willing to trust their
+completion to any one who would undertake it. The instant the whistle
+blew he was off like a shot, out of the factory yard, clinging to the
+platform of a crowded trolley, catching an interurban car, plunging
+through a thicket, down an old lane, and emerging into Paradise.
+
+The Rannys were having the adventure of their lives with the secret farm,
+an adventure shared with equal enthusiasm by their co-conspirators.
+"Valley Mead" was proving the most marvelous of forbidden playthings, and
+was doing for Randolph Bartlett what doctors and sanitariums and tears
+and threats had failed to do. The old place had been overhauled, the
+house made habitable, and now that furnishing was in progress, each day
+brought new and fascinating developments.
+
+Eleanor had arrived from school just in time to fling herself heart and
+soul into the enterprise. By a happy chance she had been allowed to spend
+the week with the Randolph Bartletts, only reporting to her grandmother
+from time to time for consultations regarding summer clothes. Her strange
+indifference to this usually all-important question, together with her
+insistent plea to remain in Kentucky all summer, might have aroused the
+old lady's suspicion had she not long ago decided that the explanation of
+all Eleanor's motives was perversity.
+
+Every morning Eleanor and Mrs. Ranny went out to the farm, and worked
+with enthusiasm. Each piece of furniture that was taken out of the crate
+was hailed with delight and dragged from one place to another to try its
+effect. The hanging of curtains was suspended while they rushed out to
+see the newly arrived rabbits with their meek eyes and tremulous pink
+mouths, or dashed out to the poultry-yard to have another look at the
+downy little fluffs of yellow that were pretending to be chickens.
+
+But the real excitement of the day was when the workmen had departed, and
+Mr. Ranny came out with his machine laden with priceless treasures from
+the ten-cent store, or later when Quin Graham dashed up the lane with
+anything from a garden-spade to a bird-house in his hands, and with an
+enthusiasm and energy in his soul that communicated themselves to all
+concerned. Then everybody would talk at once, and everybody insist upon
+showing everybody else what had been done since morning, and there was
+more hanging of pictures and changing of furniture, and so much chatter
+and laughter that it was a wonder anything was accomplished.
+
+Mr. and Mrs. Ranny had agreed that they would make Valley Mead livable at
+the least possible expense, looking forward to a future day to make the
+improvements that would require much outlay of money. The pride and
+satisfaction they took in their petty economies were such as only the
+inexperienced wealthy can feel.
+
+As for Quin, he moved through the enchanted days, blind, deaf, and dumb
+to everything but Eleanor. She was the dazzling sun in whose effulgent
+rays the rest of humanity floated like midges. So wholly blinded was he
+by her radiant presence that he did not realize the darkness into which
+he was about to be plunged until her departure was imminent.
+
+The evening before she left found them perched upon the orchard stile, in
+that stage of intimacy that permitted him to sit at her feet and toy
+pensively with the tassel on her girdle while his eyes said the
+unutterable things that his lips were forbidden to utter.
+
+The sky was flooded with luminous color, neither blue nor pink, but
+something deliciously between, and down below them fields of wheat
+rippled under the magic light.
+
+"We ought to go in," said Eleanor for the third time. "We've been out
+here an outrageously long time."
+
+"They won't miss us," pleaded Quin; "besides, it's our last night."
+
+"Don't talk about it!" said Eleanor. "It makes me so cross to have to
+leave it all at the most exciting time! When I get back everything will
+be finished and the fun all over."
+
+"When _are_ you coming back?"
+
+"Not until September. We have to come home then. Something's going to
+happen."
+
+Quin stopped twisting the tassel and looked at her quickly.
+
+"What?" he demanded.
+
+"Can you keep a secret?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"It's a wedding, Quin."
+
+If the earth had suddenly quaked beneath him he could not have
+experienced a more horrible sense of devastation. He put out a hand as if
+to steady himself.
+
+"You don't mean----" he began, and could get no further.
+
+"Yes, I do. It's to be a home wedding, very quiet, with only the family,
+and afterward they are going out to the coast."
+
+"Who are?" he asked dully.
+
+"Aunt Enid and Mr. Chester. After waiting for twenty years. Isn't it too
+funny for words?"
+
+Quin thought it was. He threw himself back and shouted. He had never
+enjoyed a joke so much in his life. It seemed replete with humor,
+especially when he shared with Eleanor the part he had played in bringing
+them together and described the waltz on the landing the night of the
+Easter party. With the arrogance of youth they laughed hilariously at the
+late blooming romance.
+
+"What about Queen Vic?" asked Quin. "How did they ever get her consent?"
+
+"They didn't ask for it. After letting her keep them apart all these
+years, they just announced that they were going to be married in
+September. I expect she raised the roof; but when she saw it was all
+settled and she couldn't unsettle it, she came around and told Aunt Enid
+she could be married at home."
+
+"Good work!" said Quin, who was genuinely fond of both Miss Enid and Mr.
+Chester. "How is Miss Isobel taking it?"
+
+"Better than you would think. I don't know what has come over Aunt
+Isobel, she's so much nicer than she used to be. The boys out at the
+hospital have made her over."
+
+"Miss Isobel's a pippin," said Quin, in a tone that implied a compliment.
+"You ought to have seen how she looked after me when I was sick. Has
+Madam found out about her going out to camp?"
+
+"Yes; but she hasn't stopped her. Something you said once about everybody
+having a right to do his duty as he saw it made Aunt Isobel take a firm
+stand and stick it out. You have certainly jolted the family out of its
+ruts, Quin. Look at Uncle Ranny; would you ever take him for the same
+person he was six months ago?"
+
+Quin removed his enamored gaze from her face long enough to glance toward
+the house, where the usually elegant useless Randolph was perched in the
+crotch of an old ash tree, sawing off a dead limb, and singing as he
+sawed.
+
+"Well, when it comes to him, I guess I _have_ had a finger in the pie,"
+said Quin with pardonable pride. "He hasn't slipped the trolley for two
+months; and if he can stay on the track now, it will be a cinch for him
+after the first of July. All he needed was a real interest in life, and a
+chance to work things out for himself."
+
+"It's what we all need," Eleanor said gloomily. "I wish I could do what I
+liked."
+
+"What would you do?"
+
+"I'd go straight to New York and study for the stage. It isn't a
+whim--it's what I've wanted most to do ever since I was a little girl. I
+may not have any great talent, but Papa Claude thinks I have. So does
+Captain Phipps. To have to wait a whole year until I'm of age is too
+stupid for words. It's just some more of grandmother's tyranny, and I'm
+not going to submit much longer; would you?"
+
+Quin contemplated his clasped fists earnestly. For the first time, his
+belief in the consent of the governed admitted of exceptions.
+
+"I'd go a bit slow," he said, feeling his own way cautiously. "This stage
+business is a doubtful proposition. I don't see where the fun comes in,
+pretending to be somebody else all the time."
+
+"You would if you didn't like being yourself. Besides, I don't live my
+own life as it is."
+
+"You will some day--when you get married."
+
+"But that's just it! I don't intend to marry--I am going to devote my
+whole life to my work."
+
+Quin, having but recently recovered from the fear that she was
+contemplating matrimony, now underwent a similar torture at her avowal
+that she was not. The second possibility was only a shade less appalling
+than the first.
+
+"The trouble is," she went on very confidentially, "I am not interested
+in anything in the world but my art."
+
+"Oh, come now, Miss Eleanor!" Quin rallied her. "You know you were
+interested in the work out at the camp."
+
+"That's true. I except that."
+
+"And you can't say you haven't been interested in our selling this farm,
+and getting Mr. and Mrs. Ranny fixed up, and all that."
+
+"Of course I've been interested in that; it's been no end of fun."
+
+"And then," Quin pursued his point quite brazenly, "there's me. I hope
+you are a little bit interested in me?"
+
+She tried to take it lightly. "Interested in you? Why, of course I am. We
+all are. Uncle Ranny was saying only this morning----"
+
+"I don't care a hang what he said. It's _you_ I'm talking about. Do you
+like me any better than you did in the spring?"
+
+"You silly boy, I've always liked you."
+
+"But I told you I wanted a lot. Have I made any headway?"
+
+"Headway? I should say you have. I never saw such improvement! If the
+university classes have done this much for you in four months, what will
+you be by the end of the year?"
+
+"That's right," said Quin bitterly. "Open the switch and sidetrack me!
+But just tell me one thing: is there anybody you _are_ interested in?"
+
+"Now, see here, Quin," said Eleanor peremptorily, "you haven't any right
+to ask me questions like that. All I promised was that you could be my
+chum."
+
+"Yes; but I meant a chum plus."
+
+"Well, you'd better look out or you will be a chum minus." Then she
+caught sight of his eyes, and leaned forward in sudden contrition. "I'm
+sorry to hurt you, Quin, but you must understand----"
+
+"I do," he admitted miserably. "Only this week out here together, and the
+way you've looked at me sometimes, made me kind of hope----" His voice
+broke. "It's all right. I'll wait some more."
+
+This was the time Eleanor should have carried out her intention of going
+back to the house. Instead, she sat on in the deepening twilight under
+the feminine delusion that she was being good to the miserable youth who
+sat huddled close to her knees on the step below her.
+
+Through his whole big being Quin was quivering with the sense of her
+nearness, afraid to move for fear something stronger than his will would
+make him seize her slender little body and crush it to him in an agony of
+tenderness and yearning.
+
+"How beautiful it is out here now!" she said softly. "Don't you love the
+feel of wings everywhere? Little flying things going home? Everything
+seems to be whispering!"
+
+Quin did not answer. He sat silent and immovable until the light in the
+valley had quite faded, and the twitter of the birds had been superseded
+by the monotonous, mournful plaint of a whip-poor-will in a distant tree.
+Then he stirred and looked up at Eleanor with a rueful smile.
+
+"I know what's the matter with that damned old bird," he said. "He's in
+love!"
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 19
+
+
+Notwithstanding the fact that the sale of the Martels' house was averted
+and Rose's affair with Harold Phipps successfully terminated,
+catastrophe, which was evidently due the family, arrived before the
+summer had fairly begun. The irrepressible Claude had no sooner weighed
+the anchor of responsibility than he set sail for New York to embark once
+more on dramatic waters. He had secured a small part in a summer stock
+company which would leave him ample time to work on "Phantom Love," which
+he confidently counted upon to retrieve his fortunes. The withdrawal of
+even his slender contribution to the household expenses made a
+difference, especially as Edwin came down with the measles early in July.
+Before the boy had got the green shade off his afflicted eyes, Cass was
+laid low with typhoid fever.
+
+No other event in the family could have wrought such disastrous results.
+Rose was compelled to give up her position to nurse him, and while the
+income ceased the expenses piled up enormously.
+
+Nothing was more natural than that Quinby Graham should fling himself
+into the breach. His intimacy with Cass had begun on the transport going
+to France, and continued with unabated zeal until he was wounded in the
+summer of 1918. For six months he had lost sight of him, only to find him
+again in the hospital at Camp Zachary Taylor. He was not one to share the
+privileges of Cass's home without also sharing its hardships.
+
+"It's a shame we've got to take help from you," said Rose; "just when you
+are beginning to get ahead, too!"
+
+"You cut that out," said Quin. "I'd like to know if you didn't take me in
+and treat me like one of the family? Ain't Cass the best friend a man
+ever had? And wouldn't he do as much and more for me?"
+
+But even Quin's salary failed to meet the emergency. Doctor's bills, drug
+bills, grocery bills, became more and more formidable. One day Rose was
+reduced to selling two of Papa Claude's autographed photographs.
+
+"I wouldn't do that--yet," said Quin, who had begun to walk to the
+factory to save carfare. "Those old boys and girls are his friends; we
+can't sell them. I can see him now talking to 'em through his pipe smoke.
+I ought to have some junk we can soak. Let's go see."
+
+The investigation resulted in the conversion of a pair of new wing-toed
+dancing-shoes and a silver cigarette-case into an ice-bag and an electric
+fan.
+
+"I could stand everything else," said Rose, "if we could just get the
+children out of the house. Edwin is still as weak as a kitten, and Myrna
+looks as if she might come down with the fever any day."
+
+Quin had a brilliant idea. "Why not ship 'em both to the country? Ed
+could come to town to work every day, and Myrna could help somebody
+around the house."
+
+"That sounds mighty fine; but who is going to take two children to board
+for nothing?"
+
+"I don't know yet," said Quin; "that's what I've got to find out."
+
+That night he went out to Valley Mead and put the matter squarely up to
+Mr. and Mrs. Ranny.
+
+"We're up against it at our house," he said; "I want to borrow something
+from you two good people."
+
+"You can have anything we've got!" said Mr. Ranny rashly.
+
+"Well, I want to borrow some fresh air for a couple of sick kids. I want
+you to ask 'em out here for a week."
+
+Mr. and Mrs. Ranny looked aghast at the preposterous suggestion, but Quin
+gave them no time to demur. He plunged into explanation, and clinched his
+argument by saying:
+
+"Ed would only be here at night, and Myrna could help around the house.
+They are bully youngsters. No end of fun, and they wouldn't give you a
+bit of trouble."
+
+"But I have only one maid!" protested Mrs. Ranny.
+
+"What of that?" said Quin. "Myrna's used to working at home; she'd be
+glad to help you."
+
+"If it was anybody on earth but the Martels," Mr. Ranny objected, with
+contracted brow. "The families have been at daggers' points for years.
+Why, the very name of Martel makes mother see red."
+
+"Well, the children aren't responsible for that!" Quin broke in
+impatiently; then he pulled himself up. "However, if you don't want to do
+'em a good turn, that settles it."
+
+"But it doesn't settle it," said Mr. Ranny. "What are you going to do
+with them?"
+
+"Hanged if I know," said Quin; "but you bet I'll do something."
+
+The conversation then wandered off to Eleanor, and Quin listened with
+vague misgivings to accounts of her good times--yachting parties, tennis
+tournaments, rock teas, shore dinners--all of which suggested to him an
+appallingly unfamiliar world.
+
+"I tell you who was up there for a week," said Mr. Ranny. "Harold Phipps.
+You remember meeting him at our apartment last spring?"
+
+"What's he doing there?" Quin demanded with such vehemence that they both
+laughed.
+
+"Probably making life miserable for Mother Bartlett," said Mrs. Ranny. "I
+can't imagine how she ever consented to have him come, or how he ever had
+the nerve to go, after the way they've treated him."
+
+"Harold's not concerned with the feelings of the family," said Mr. Ranny;
+"he is after Nell."
+
+But Mrs. Ranny scorned the idea. "He looks upon her as a perfect child,"
+she insisted; "besides, he's too lazy and conceited to be in love with
+anybody but himself."
+
+"That may be, but Nell's got him going all right."
+
+Then the conversation veered back to the Martels, with the result that an
+hour later Quin was on his way home bearing a gracefully worded note from
+Mrs. Ranny inviting the children to spend the following week at Valley
+Mead. But, in spite of the success of his mission, he sat with a box of
+fresh eggs in his lap and a huge bunch of flowers in his hand, his hat
+rammed over his eyes, staring gloomily out of the car window into the
+starless night.
+
+Since Eleanor's departure he had had no word from her, and the news that
+filtered through Valley Mead was more disconcerting than the silence. The
+thought of her dancing, sailing, and motoring with Harold Phipps filled
+him with a frenzy of jealousy. He grew bitter at the thought of her
+flitting heedlessly from one luxurious pleasure to another, while Cass
+lay in that stifling city, fighting for his life and lacking even the
+necessities for his comfort.
+
+Every week since her departure he had written her, even though the
+letters grew shorter and blunter as his duties increased. Up until now,
+however, he, like every one else, had tried to shield Eleanor from
+anything ugly and sordid. He had tried to make light of the situation and
+reassure her as to results; but he was determined to do it no longer. It
+wasn't right, he told himself angrily, for anybody to go through life
+blinded to all the misery and suffering and poverty in the world. He was
+going to write her to-night and tell her the whole story and spare her
+nothing.
+
+But he did not write. When he reached home Cass had had a turn for the
+worse, and there were ice-baths to prepare and other duties to perform
+that left him no time for himself.
+
+The next day Edwin and Myrna were sent out to the Randolph Bartletts',
+and Rose and Quin cleared the decks for the hard fight ahead. Fan Loomis
+came in to help nurse in the day-time, and Quin was on duty through the
+long, suffocating August nights.
+
+At the end of the week Cass's condition was so serious that the Bartletts
+insisted on keeping the children at the farm. Myrna had proved a cheery,
+helpful little companion, and Edwin, while more difficult to handle, was
+picking up flesh and color, and was learning to run the car.
+
+Cass's fever dragged on, going down one day only to rise higher the next.
+Seven weeks, eight weeks, nine weeks passed, and still no improvement.
+
+Quin, trying to keep up his work at the factory on two or three hours'
+sleep out of the twenty-four, grew thin and haggard, and coughed more
+than at any time since he had left the hospital. During the long night
+vigils he made sporadic efforts to keep up his university work, but he
+made little headway.
+
+"Go on to bed, Quin," Rose whispered one night, when she found him asleep
+with his head against the bed-post. "You'll be giving out next, and God
+knows what I'll do then."
+
+"Not me!" he declared, suppressing a yawn. "You're the one that's done
+in. Why don't you stay down?"
+
+"I can't," she murmured, kneeling anxiously beside the unconscious
+patient. "He looks worse to me to-night. Do you believe we can pull him
+through?"
+
+She had on a faded pink kimono over her thin night-gown, and her heavy
+hair was plaited down her back. There were no chestnut puffs over her
+ears or pink spots on her cheeks, and her lips looked strange without
+their penciled cupid's bow. But to Quin there was something in her drawn
+white face and anxious, tender eyes that was more appealing. In their
+long siege together he had found a staunch dependence and a power of
+sacrifice in the girl that touched him deeply.
+
+"I don't know, Rose," he admitted, reaching over and smoothing her hair;
+"but we'll do our darnedest."
+
+At the touch of his hand she reached up and impulsively drew it down to
+her cheek, holding it there with her trembling lips against its hard
+palm.
+
+The night was intensely hot and still. That afternoon they had moved Cass
+into Rose's room in the hope of getting more air from the western
+exposure; but only the hot smell of the asphalt and the stifling odor of
+car smoke came through the curtainless window. The gas-jet, turned very
+low, threw distorted shadows on the bureau with its medley of toilet
+articles and medicine bottles. Through the open door of the closet could
+be seen Rose's personal belongings; under the table were a pair of
+high-heeled slippers; and two white stockings made white streaks across
+the window-sill.
+
+Quin sat by Cass's bedside, with his hand clasped to Rose's cheek, and
+fought a battle that had been raging within him for days. Without being
+in the least in love with Rose, he wanted desperately to take her in his
+arms and comfort her. They were both so tired, so miserable, so
+desperately afraid of that shadowy presence that hovered over Cass. They
+were practically alone in the house, accountable to no one, and drawn
+together by an overwhelming anxiety. In Rose's state of emotional tension
+she was responsive to his every look and gesture. He had but to hold out
+his arms and she would sink into them.
+
+Again and again his eyes traveled from her bright tumbled head to Cass's
+flushed face, with its absurd round nose and eyes that could no longer
+keep watch over a pleasure-loving sister. What would happen if Cass
+should die? Who would take care of her and the children, helpless and
+penniless, with only Papa Claude and his visions to stand between them
+and the world? A great wave of sympathy rushed over him for the girl
+kneeling there with her face buried in the bed-clothes. She had asked so
+little of life--just a few good times to offset the drudgery, just an
+outlet for the ocean of love that was dammed up in her small body. Love
+was the only thing she cared about; it was the only thing that mattered
+in life. Cass never understood her, but Quin understood her. He was like
+that himself. The blood was pounding through his veins too, a terrible
+urgence was impelling him toward her. Why shouldn't they throw discretion
+to the winds and answer the call?
+
+Then his mind did a curious thing. It brought up out of the sub-conscious
+a question that Eleanor Bartlett had once asked him: "Do you think a
+person has a right to go ahead and do what he wants, regardless of
+consequences?" He saw her face, moonlit and earnest, turned up to his,
+and he heard himself answering her: "That depends on whether he wants the
+right thing."
+
+Rose stirred, and he withdrew his hand and stood up.
+
+"See here, young lady," he said with authority; "I'll give you just two
+minutes to clear out of here! No, I don't want you to leave your door
+open; I'll call you if there's any change."
+
+"But, Quin, I don't want to be alone--I want to be with you." Her eyes
+were full of frank appeal, and her lips trembling.
+
+"You are too sleepy to know what you want," he said. "Up with you--not
+another word. You'll feel better to-morrow. Good-night." And with a
+little push he put her out of the room and closed the door.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 20
+
+
+Quin stood under the big car-shed at the Union Depot, and for the sixth
+time in ten minutes consulted the watch that was the pride of his life.
+He had been waiting for half an hour, not because the train was late, but
+because he proposed to be on the spot if by any happy chance it should
+arrive ahead of schedule time. The week before he had received a picture
+post-card on whose narrow margin were scrawled the meager lines:
+
+    So glad Cass is up again. Rose says you've been a brick. Home on
+    Sept. 2. Hope to see you soon. E. M. B.
+
+It was the only communication he had had from Eleanor since they sat on
+the stile in the starlight at Valley Mead three months before. To be
+sure, in her infrequent letters to Rose she had always added, "Give my
+love to Quinby Graham," and once she said: "Tell him I've been meaning to
+write to him all summer." Notwithstanding the fact that Quin had waited
+in vain for that letter for twelve consecutive weeks, that he had passed
+through every phase of indignation, jealousy, and consuming fear that can
+assail a young and undisciplined lover, he nevertheless watched for the
+incoming train with a rapture undimmed by disturbing reflections. The
+mere fact that every moment the distance was lessening between him and
+Eleanor, that within the hour he should see her, hear her, feel the clasp
+of her hand, was sufficient to send his spirits soaring into sunny spaces
+of confidence far above the clouds of doubt.
+
+"Hello, Quinby; what are you doing here?" asked a voice behind him; and
+turning he saw the long, oval face and lady-like figure of Mr. Chester.
+
+"Same thing you are," said Quin, grinning sympathetically. "Only if I was
+in your shoes I'd be walking the tracks to meet the train."
+
+Mr. Chester shook his head and smiled primly.
+
+"When you have waited twenty years for a young lady, twenty minutes more
+or less do not matter."
+
+"They would to me!" Quin declared emphatically. "When is the wedding to
+be?"
+
+"On the fourteenth. And that reminds me"--Mr. Chester ran his arm
+confidentially through Quin's and tried to catch step. "I want to ask a
+favor of you."
+
+A favor to Quin meant anything from twenty-five cents to twenty-five
+dollars, and the fact that Mr. Chester should come to him flattered and
+embarrassed him at the same time.
+
+"What's mine is yours," he said magnanimously.
+
+"No, you don't understand," said Mr. Chester. "You see, not being a club
+man or a society man, I have in a way dropped out of things. I have
+comparatively few friends, and unfortunately they are not in a set
+personally known to Madam Bartlett. Miss Enid and I thought that it might
+solve the difficulty, and avoid complications, if you would agree to
+serve as my best man."
+
+"Why, I'd be willing to serve as the preacher to see you and Miss Enid
+get married," said Quin heartily. Then his thoughts flew after his
+departed Tuxedo and the gorgeous wing-toed pumps. "What'll I have to
+wear?"
+
+"It is to be a noon affair," reassured Mr. Chester. "Simple morning coat,
+you know, and light-gray tie."
+
+Quin's ideas concerning a morning coat were extremely vague, and the
+possibility of his procuring one vaguer still; but the occasion was too
+portentous to admit of hesitation. He and Mr. Chester continued their
+walk to the far end of the shed, and then stood looking down at the coal
+cars being loaded from the yards.
+
+"White gloves, I suppose?" observed Quin.
+
+"Pearl gray, with very narrow stitching. I think that's better taste,
+don't you?"
+
+"Sure," agreed Quin. "Flower in the buttonhole, or anything like that?"
+
+While this all-important detail was being decided, a clanging bell and
+the hiss of an engine announced the incoming train. Before the two
+waiting cavaliers could reach the gate, Eleanor Bartlett came through,
+laden with wraps and umbrellas.
+
+"I like the way you meet us," she called out. "For mercy sake, help me."
+And she deposited her burden in Quin's outstretched arms. Then, as Mr.
+Chester strode past them with flying coat-tails in quest of Miss Enid,
+she burst out laughing.
+
+"Say, you are looking great," said Quin, with devouring eyes, as he
+surveyed her over the top of his impedimenta.
+
+"It's more than you are." She scanned his face in dismay. "Have you been
+sick?"
+
+"No, indeed. Never felt better."
+
+"I know--it was nursing Cass that did it. Rose wrote me all about it. If
+you don't look better right away, I shall make you go straight to bed and
+I'll come feed you chicken soup."
+
+"My fever's rising this minute!" cried Quin, "I believe I've got a chill.
+Send for the ambulance!"
+
+"Not till after the wedding. I'll have you know I am to be Aunt Enid's
+bridesmaid."
+
+"You've got nothing on me," said Quin, "I'm the best man!"
+
+This struck them both as being so excruciatingly funny that they did not
+see the approaching cavalcade, with Madam walking slowly at its head,
+until Quin heard his name called.
+
+"Oh, dear," said Eleanor, "there they come. And I've got a thousand
+questions to ask you and a million things to tell you."
+
+"Come here, young man, and see me walk!" was Madam's greeting. "Do I look
+like a cripple? Leg off at the knee, crutches for life? Bah! We fooled
+them, didn't we?"
+
+Quin made a tremendous fuss over the old lady. He also threw the aunties
+into pleased confusion by pretending that he was going to kiss them, and
+occasioned no end of laughter and good-natured banter by his incessant
+teasing of Mr. Chester. He was in that state of effervescence that
+demanded an immediate outlet.
+
+Madam found him so amusing that she promptly detailed him as her special
+escort.
+
+"Eleanor can look after the baggage," she said, "and Isobel can look
+after Eleanor. The turtle-doves can take a taxi." And she closed her
+strong old fingers around Quin's wrist and pulled him forward.
+
+He shot an appealing glance over his shoulder at Eleanor, who shook her
+head in exasperation; then he obediently conducted Madam to her carriage
+and scrambled in beside her.
+
+"Now," she said, when he had got a cushion at her back and a stool under
+her foot, "tell me: where's Ranny--drunk as usual?"
+
+"No, siree!" said Quin proudly. "Sober as usual. He hasn't touched a drop
+since you went away."
+
+She looked at him incredulously.
+
+"Are you lying?"
+
+"I am not."
+
+Her hard, suspicious old face began to twitch and her eyelids reddened.
+
+"This is your doing," she said gruffly. "You've put more backbone into
+him than all the doctors together."
+
+"That's not all I've done," said Quin. "What are you going to say when I
+tell you I've sold him a farm?"
+
+"A farm? You've got no farm; and he had no money to buy it, if you had."
+
+"That's all right. He has had a farm for three months. You ought to see
+him--up at six o'clock every morning looking after things, and so keen
+about getting back to it in the evening that he never thinks about going
+to the club or staying in town."
+
+"What's all this nonsense you are talking?"
+
+"It's not nonsense. He's bought a little place out near Anchordale. They
+are living there."
+
+"And they did this without consulting me!" Madam's eyes blazed. "Why, he
+is no more capable of running a farm than a ten-year-old child! I have
+fought it for years. He knew perfectly well if he told me I'd stop it
+instantly. He will appeal to me to help out within six months, you'll
+see! I sha'n't do it! I'll show my children if they can do without me
+that I can go without them."
+
+She was working herself into a fine rage. The aigrette on her bonnet
+quivered, and the black velvet band about her neck was getting so tight
+that it looked as if it couldn't stand the strain much longer.
+
+"Why didn't he write me?" she stormed. "Am I too old and decrepit to be
+consulted any more? Is he going to follow Enid's high-handed way of
+deciding things without the slightest reference to my wishes?"
+
+"I expect he is," said Quin cheerfully. "You see, you can't stiffen a
+fellow's backbone, as you call it, for one thing and not another. When he
+found out he could stop drinking, he decided he could do other things as
+well. He's started a chicken farm."
+
+Madam groaned: "Of course. I never knew a fool that sooner or later
+didn't gravitate to chickens. He will get an incubator next."
+
+"He has two already. He and Mrs. Ranny are studying out the whole
+business scientifically."
+
+"And I suppose they've got a rabbit hutch, and a monkey, and some white
+mice?"
+
+"Not quite. But they've got a nice place. Want to go out with me next
+Saturday and see 'em?"
+
+"I do not. I'm not interested in menageries. I never expect to cross the
+threshold."
+
+Quin pulled up the cape that had slipped from her shoulder, and adjusted
+it carefully.
+
+"When Mr. Ranny comes in to see you," he said, "I hope you won't ball him
+out right away. He's awful keen on this stunt, you know. It sort of takes
+the place of the things he has given up."
+
+Madam glared straight ahead of her for a few moments, then she said
+curtly:
+
+"I'll not mention it until he does."
+
+"Oh, but I _want_ you to. He's as nervous as a witch about how you are
+going to take it. You see, he thinks more of your opinion than he does of
+anybody's, and he wants your approval. If you could jump right in and say
+you think it's a bully idea, and that you are coming out to see what he
+has done, and----"
+
+"Do you want me to lie?" Madam demanded fiercely.
+
+"No," said Quin, laughing; "I am trying to warm you up to the project
+now, so you won't have to lie." Then, seeing her face relax a little, he
+leaned toward her and said in his most persuasive tone:
+
+"See here, now! I did my best to straighten Mr. Ranny out. He's making
+the fight of his life to keep straight. It's up to you to stand by us.
+You don't want to pitch the fat back in the fire, do you?"
+
+They had reached the big house on Third Avenue, and the carriage was
+slowing up at the curbing. Quin, receiving no answer to his question,
+carefully helped Madam up the steps and into the house, where black
+Hannah was waiting to receive her.
+
+"You can't come in," said Madam gruffly. "I am tired. I will see you some
+other time."
+
+"All right," said Quin. "What time shall I come Saturday afternoon?"
+
+"Saturday afternoon? Why then?"
+
+"To go out to Mr. Ranny's farm."
+
+For an instant they measured glances; then Quin began to laugh--a
+confident, boyish laugh full of teasing affection.
+
+"Come on," he coaxed, "be a good scout. Let's give 'em the surprise of
+their lives."
+
+"You rascal, you!" she said, hitting at him with her cane. "I believe you
+are at the bottom of all this. Mind, I promise you nothing."
+
+"You don't have to," he called back. "I can trust you. I'll be here at
+three!"
+
+He arrived on Saturday an hour early in the hope of seeing Eleanor, and
+was gloriously rewarded by thirty minutes alone with her in the big dark
+drawing-room. All the way up from the factory he had thought of the
+things he wanted to tell her--all the Martel news, the progress of
+affairs at Valley Mead, the fact that he had won his first-term
+certificate at the university, and above all about his promotion at
+Bartlett & Bangs. But Eleanor gave him no chance to tell her anything.
+She was like a dammed-up stream that suddenly finds an outlet. Into
+Quin's sympathetic ears she poured her own troubles, talking with her
+hands and her eyes as well as her lips, exaggerating, dramatizing,
+laughing one minute, half crying the next.
+
+The summer, it seemed, had been one long series of clashes with her
+grandmother. She hadn't enjoyed one day of it, she assured him; that is,
+not a _whole_ day, for of course there were some gorgeous times in
+between. Her friends had not been welcome at the house, and one (whom
+Quin devoutly hoped was Mr. Phipps) had been openly insulted. She had not
+been allowed to take part in the play given at the club-house, when it
+had been planned with her especially in mind for the leading rôle. She
+had even been forbidden to go to the last boathouse dance, because it was
+a moonlight affair, and grandmother had never heard of such a thing as
+dancing without lights.
+
+"She has spent the entire summer nagging at me," Eleanor concluded. "I
+couldn't do a thing to please her. If I stayed in she wanted me to go
+out; if I went out she thought I ought to stay in. If I put on one dress
+she invariably made me change it for another. And as for being late to
+meals, why, each time it happened you would have thought I'd broken the
+ten commandments."
+
+"Couldn't you have pushed up the stroke and got there on time?" asked
+Quin, whose army training made him inclined to sympathize with Madam at
+this point.
+
+"No, I could not. I am always late. It's a Martel trait--that's why it
+infuriates grandmother. But it wasn't any of these things I've been
+telling you that caused the real trouble. It was her constant
+interference in my private affairs. I am simply sick of being dictated to
+about my choice of friends."
+
+"You mean Mr. Phipps?"
+
+She looked at him quickly. "How did you know?"
+
+"Mrs. Ranny told me he was up there, and I guessed there was a shindy."
+
+"I should say there was--for the entire three days he was there! If he
+hadn't been big enough to rise above it and ignore grandmother, she would
+have succeeded in breaking up one of the most beautiful friendships of my
+life."
+
+Quin absently twisted a corner of the corpulent sofa cushion which he
+held in his lap, before he asked cautiously:
+
+"What is it you like so much in him. Miss Nell?"
+
+Eleanor curled her feet under her on the sofa, and launched forth on a
+favorite theme:
+
+"Well, to begin with, he's the most cosmopolitan man I ever met."
+
+"Cosmopolitan? How do you mean?"
+
+"Awfully sophisticated. A sort of citizen of the world, you know."
+
+"You mean he's traveled a lot, knocked around in queer places, like me?"
+
+"Oh, no; it isn't that. As a matter of fact, he has never been out of
+this country. But I mean that, wherever he'd go, he would be at home."
+
+"Yes," Quin admitted, with a grim smile; "that's where he was most of the
+time when he was in the army. What else do you like about him?"
+
+"I sha'n't tell you. You are prejudiced, like all the rest. He says that
+only an artist can understand an artist."
+
+"Meaning, I suppose, that he understands you?"
+
+"Yes; and I believe I understand him. Of course I don't agree with him in
+all his ideas. But then, I've been brought up in such a narrow way that I
+know I am frightfully conventional. He is awfully advanced, you know. Why
+don't you like him, Quin?"
+
+Numerous concrete and very emphatic reasons sprang to Quin's lips. He
+would have liked nothing better than to answer her question fully and
+finally; but instead he only smiled at her and said:
+
+"Why, I guess the main reason is because you do."
+
+Eleanor looked at him dubiously: "No," she said; "it's something besides
+that. The family have probably filled your ears with silly gossip. Mr.
+Phipps _was_ wild at one time--he told me all about it. But that's
+ancient history; you can take my word for it."
+
+Quin would have taken her word for almost anything when she looked at him
+with such star-eyed earnestness, but he was obliged to make an exception
+in the present instance.
+
+"He's nothing in my young life," he said indifferently. "What I want to
+know is whether you are home to stay?"
+
+Eleanor glanced at the door, listened, then she said:
+
+"I don't know yet. You see, Papa Claude is to be in New York this winter,
+finishing his play. He says if I will come on he will put me in the
+Kendall School of Expression and see that I get the right start. It's the
+chance of a life-time, and I'm simply wild to go."
+
+"And Queen Vic won't hear of it?"
+
+"Not for a second. She knows perfectly well that I can go on the stage
+the day I am twenty-one, yet through sheer obstinacy she refuses to
+advance me a penny to do as I like with before the 20th of next July."
+
+"She don't do it for meanness," Quin ventured. "She'd give you all she
+had if it came to a showdown. But none of 'em realize you are grown up;
+they are afraid to turn you loose."
+
+"Well, I've stood it as long as I intend to. I made up my mind that I
+would stick it out until after Aunt Enid's wedding. It nearly breaks my
+heart to do anything to hurt her and Aunt Isobel; but even they are
+beginning to rebel against grandmother's tyranny."
+
+"What do you mean to do?" asked Quin, with a sudden sinking of the heart.
+
+"I am not sure yet; I haven't quite made up my mind. But I am not going
+to stay here. I am too unhappy, Quin, and with Aunt Enid gone----" Her
+voice broke, and as she caught her lip between her small white teeth she
+stared ahead of her with tragic eyes.
+
+Quin laid his arm along the sofa, as close to her shoulders as he dared,
+and looked at her in dumb sympathy.
+
+"Don't you think you might try a different tack with the old lady?" he
+ventured presently. "Even a porcupine likes to have its head scratched,
+and I think sometimes she's kind of hungry for somebody to cotton up to
+her a bit. Don't you think you might----"
+
+"Who left that front door open?" broke in a harsh, peremptory voice from
+the landing. "I don't care _who_ opened it--I want it shut, and kept
+shut. Where's Quinby Graham? I thought you said he was waiting."
+
+Quin rose precipitately and made a dash for the hall, while Eleanor
+discreetly disappeared through a rear door.
+
+"Well," said Madam grimly, pulling on her gloves, "it is a novel
+experience to find a young person who has a respect for other people's
+time."
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 21
+
+
+For the next two weeks Eleanor made a heroic effort to follow Quin's
+advice and be nice to Madam. She wanted, with all her heart, to gain her
+point peacefully, and she also wanted Quin's approval of what she was
+doing. In spite of his obvious adoration, she frequently detected a note
+of criticism in his voice, that, while it piqued her, also stirred her
+conscience and made her see things in a new and disturbing light. For the
+first time, she began to wonder if she could be partly to blame for the
+friction that always existed between herself and her grandmother. She
+certainly had taken an unholy joy in flaunting her Martel characteristics
+in the old lady's face. It was not that she preferred to identify herself
+with her mother's family rather than with her father's. The Martel
+shiftlessness and visionary improvidence were quite as intolerable to her
+as the iron-clad conventions of the Bartletts. She could take correction
+from Aunt Isobel and Aunt Enid, but there was something in her
+grandmother's caustic comments that made her tingle with instant
+opposition, as a delicate vase will shiver at the sound of its own
+vibration.
+
+During the days before the wedding she surprised herself by her docility
+and acquiescence in all that was proposed for her. She even accepted
+without demur the white swiss and blue ribbons that a week before she had
+considered entirely too infantile for an adult maid of honor. This
+particular exhibition of virtue was due to the exemplary behavior of the
+bride herself. Miss Enid had longed for the regulation white satin, tulle
+veil, and orange blossoms; but Madam had promptly cited the case of the
+old maid who waited so long to marry that her orange blossoms turned to
+oranges.
+
+Miss Enid was married in a sober traveling dress, and carried a
+prayer-book. She and Mr. Chester stood in front of the drawing-room
+mantel, where twenty years before Madam had expressed her opinion
+concerning sentimental young fools who thought they could live on fifteen
+dollars a week.
+
+The budding romance, snatched ruthlessly up and flung into the dust-heap
+of common sense, had lain dormant all these years, until Quinby Graham
+had stumbled upon its dried old roots, and planted them once again in the
+garden of dreams.
+
+Why is it that we will breathlessly follow the callowest youth and the
+silliest maiden through the most intricate labyrinth of love, never
+losing interest until they drop safely into one another's arms, and yet
+when two seasoned, mellowed human beings tried by life and found worthy
+of the prize of love, dare lift a sentimental lid or sigh a word of
+romance, we straightway howl with derision?
+
+It was not until Eleanor stood beside the elderly bride that the affair
+ceased to be funny to her. For the first time, she saw something pathetic
+and beautiful in the permanence of a love that, starved and thwarted and
+blasted by ridicule, could survive the years and make two faded,
+middle-aged people like Aunt Enid and Mr. Chester eager to drain the
+dregs of life together, when they had been denied the good red wine.
+
+Her eyes wandered from their worn, elated faces to the rows of solemn
+figures behind them. Madam, as usual, dominated the scene. Her portrait
+gazed in portentously from the hall; her marble bust gleamed from a
+distant corner; and she herself, the most resplendent person present, sat
+in a chair of state placed like a proscenium-box, and critically observed
+the performance.
+
+"If she only _wouldn't_ curl her lip like that!" thought Eleanor
+shudderingly; then she remembered her resolution and looked at Quin.
+
+He too was looking preternaturally solemn, and his lips were moving
+softly in unison with Mr. Chester's. If Eleanor could have heard those
+inaudible responses she would have been startled by the words: "I,
+Quinby, take thee, Eleanor." But she only observed that he was lost in a
+day-dream, and that she had never seen him look so nice.
+
+Indeed, he was a very different-looking person from the boy that six
+months ago had mortified her by his appearance at her Easter party in
+"the classiest coat in the market." The propriety of his garments made
+her suspect that Uncle Ranny had had a hand in their selection.
+
+"And I like the way he's got his hair slicked back," she thought. "I
+wonder how he ever managed it?"
+
+After the wedding breakfast, which was a lavish one, and the departure of
+the bride and groom, for California, where they were to make their future
+home, Madam summoned Eleanor.
+
+"There's no use in you and Quin Graham staying here with all these
+fossils," she said, lowering her voice. "People hate to go home from a
+wedding almost as much as they do from a funeral! You two take this and
+go to a matinée."
+
+This unexpected concession to Eleanor's weakness touched her deeply. She
+flew into the hall to tell Quin, and then rushed upstairs to change her
+dress.
+
+"I believe the scheme is working!" she said joyously, as she and Quin sat
+in the theater waiting for the curtain to rise. "Grandmother has been
+peaches and cream to me all week. This morning she capped the climax by
+giving me a check for a hundred dollars to buy a gold mesh bag."
+
+"A _what!_" cried Quin, aghast.
+
+"A mesh bag. But I am not going to get it. I sent the check to Rose. It
+has nearly killed me not to have a penny to send them all summer, and
+this came just in time. Have you heard about Myrna?"
+
+"Being asked to spend the winter at Mrs. Ranny's? I should say I have!
+She's the happiest kid alive."
+
+"And grandmother has even stood for that! It's a perfect scream to hear
+her bragging about 'my son's farm.' She will be talking about 'my
+daughter's husband' next."
+
+"Queen Vic's all right," Quin declared stoutly. "Her only trouble is that
+she's been trying to play baseball by herself; she's got to learn
+team-work."
+
+The play happened to be "The Better 'Ole"; and from the moment the
+curtain rose Eleanor was oblivious to everything but the humor and pathos
+and glory of the story. She followed with ready tears and smiles the
+adventures of the three Tommies; she thrilled to the sentimental songs
+beside the stage camp fire; she laughed at the antics of the incomparable
+Corporal Bill. It was not until the second act that she became conscious
+of the queer behavior of her companion.
+
+Quin sat hunched up in his wedding suit, his jaw set like a vise, staring
+solemnly into space with an expression she had never seen in his face
+before. He seemed to have forgotten where he was and whom he was with.
+His hand had crushed the program into a ball, and his breath came short,
+as it always did when he was excited or over-exerted.
+
+Eleanor, whose emotions up to now had been pleasantly and superficially
+stirred, suddenly saw the play from a new angle. With quick imagination
+she visualized the great reality of which all this was but a clever sham.
+She saw Quin passing through it all, not to the thunder of stage shrapnel
+and the glare of a red spot-light, but in the life-and-death struggle of
+those eighteen months in the trenches. Before she knew it, she too was
+gazing absently into space, shaken with the profound realization that
+here beside her, his shoulder touching hers, was one who had lived more
+in a day than she had ever lived in a life-time.
+
+They said little during the last intermission, and the silence brought
+them closer together than any words could have done.
+
+"It takes a fellow back--all this," Quin roused himself to say in
+half-apology.
+
+"I know," said Eleanor.
+
+They walked home in the autumn twilight in that exalted, romantic mood in
+which a good play leaves one. Now that the tension was over, it was quite
+possible to prolong the enjoyment by discussing the strong and weak
+points of the performance. Eleanor was surprised to find that Quin, while
+ignorant of the meaning of the word technic nevertheless had decided and
+worth-while opinions about every detail, and that his comments were often
+startlingly pertinent.
+
+They reached the Bartletts' before they knew it, and Quin sighed
+ruefully:
+
+"I wish Miss Enid and Mr. Chester could get married every Wednesday! When
+can I see you again?"
+
+"Some time soon."
+
+"To-morrow night?"
+
+"I am afraid that's too soon."
+
+"Friday?"
+
+"No; I am going to a dance at the Country Club Friday night."
+
+Still he lingered disconsolately on the lower step, unable to tear
+himself away.
+
+"Do you know," he said, gaining time by presenting a grievance, "you
+never have danced with me but twice in your life?"
+
+She looked at him dreamily.
+
+"The funny thing is that I remember those two dances better than any I've
+ever had with anybody else."
+
+He came up the steps two at a time.
+
+"What do you mean by that?" he demanded. "Are you joshing me?"
+
+"No, honest. That New Year's eve with the blizzard raging outside, and
+that bright crowded hall, and all you boys just home from France. Do you
+remember the big blue parrots that swung in hoops from the chandeliers?
+And that wonderful saxophone and the big bass drum!"
+
+"Then it isn't _me_ that you remember? Just a darned old parrot hanging
+on a hoop, and a saxophone and a drum!"
+
+"You silly! Of course it's you too! I remember every single thing you
+told me, and how terribly thrilled I was. This afternoon brought it all
+back. I shall never forget this, either. Not as long as I live!"
+
+She started to put out her hand; but, seeing the look in Quin's eyes, she
+reconsidered and opened the door instead.
+
+"So long," she said casually. "I'll probably see you sometime next week.
+In the meanwhile I'll be good to granny!"
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 22
+
+
+When Eleanor reached the Country Club on Friday night, she found a box of
+flowers waiting for her in the dressing-room. It was the second box she
+had received that day. The first bore the conspicuous label, "Wear-Well
+Shoes," and contained a bunch of wild evening primroses wrapped in wet
+moss. With this more sophisticated floral offering was a sealed note
+which she opened eagerly:
+
+    _Mademoiselle Beaux Yeux_--[she read]:
+
+    Save all the dances after the intermission for me. I will reach L. at
+    nine-thirty, get out to the club for a couple of hours with you, and
+    catch the midnight express back to Chicago. Pin my blossoms close to
+    your heart, and bid it heed what they whisper.
+
+    H. P.
+
+Eleanor read the note twice, conscious of the fact that a dozen envious
+eyes were watching her. She considered this quite the most romantic thing
+that had happened to her. For a man like Mr. Phipps to travel sixteen
+hours out of the twenty-four just to dance with her was a triumph indeed.
+It made her think of her old friend Joseph, in the Bret Harte poem, who
+
+    Swam the Elk's creek and all that,
+    Just to dance with old Folingsbee's daughter,
+    The Lily of Poverty Flat.
+
+Not that Eleanor felt in the least humble. She had never felt so proud in
+her life as she smiled a little superior smile and slipped the note in
+her bosom.
+
+"Not orchids!" exclaimed Kitty Mason, poking an inquisitive finger under
+the waxed paper.
+
+"Why not?" Eleanor asked nonchalantly. "They are my favorite flowers."
+
+"But I thought the orchid king was in Chicago?"
+
+"He is--that is, he was. He's probably on the train now. I have just had
+a note saying he was running down for the dance and would go back
+to-night."
+
+The news had the desired effect. Six noses, which were being vigorously
+powdered, were neglected while their owners burst forth in a chorus of
+exclamations sufficiently charged with envious admiration to satisfy the
+most rapacious débutante.
+
+"I should think you'd be perfectly paralyzed trying to think of things to
+talk to him about," said little Bessie Meed, who had not yet put her hair
+up. "Older men scare me stiff."
+
+"They don't me," declared Lou Pierce; "they make me tired. Sitting out
+dances, and holding hands, and talking high-brow. When I come to a dance
+I want to dance. Give me Johnnie Rawlings or Pink Bailey and a good old
+jazz."
+
+Eleanor pinned on her orchids and moved away. The girls seemed incredibly
+young and noisy and crass. Less than six months ago she, too, was romping
+through the dances with Jimmy and Pink, and imagining that a fox-trot
+divided between ten partners constituted the height of enjoyment. Mr.
+Phipps had told her in the summer that she was changing. "The little
+butterfly is emerging from her chrysalis," was the poetic way he had
+phrased it, with an accompanying look that spoke volumes.
+
+Once on the dance floor, however, she forgot her superior mood and
+enjoyed herself inordinately until supper-time. Just as she and Pink were
+starting for the refreshment room, she caught sight of a familiar
+graceful figure, standing apart from the crowd, watching her with level,
+penetrating eyes.
+
+"Pink, I forgot!" she said hastily; "I'm engaged for supper. I'll see you
+later." And without further apology she slipped through the throng and
+joined Harold.
+
+"Let's get out of this," he said, lightly touching her bare arm and
+piloting her toward the porch.
+
+"But don't you want any supper?" asked Eleanor, amazed.
+
+"Not when I have you," whispered Harold.
+
+Eleanor gave a regretful glance at a mammoth tray of sandwiches being
+passed, then allowed herself to be drawn out through the French window
+into the cool darkness of the wide veranda.
+
+"Let's sit in that car down by the first tee," Harold suggested. "It's
+only a step."
+
+Eleanor hesitated. One of the ten social commandments imposed upon her
+was that she was never to leave the porch at a Country Club dance. That
+the porch edge should be regarded as the limit of propriety had always
+seemed to her the height of absurdity; but so far she had obeyed the
+family and confined her flirtations to shadowy corners and dim nooks
+under bending palms.
+
+"What's the trouble?" Harold inquired solicitously. "The little gold
+slippers?"
+
+"No--I don't mind the slippers; but, you see, I'm not supposed to go off
+the porch."
+
+"How ridiculous! Of course you are going off the porch. I have only one
+hour to stay, and I've something very important to tell you."
+
+"But why can't we sit here?" she insisted, indicating an unoccupied
+bench.
+
+"Because those ubiquitous youngsters will be clamoring for you the moment
+the music begins. Haven't you had enough noise for one night? Perhaps you
+prefer to go inside and be pushed about and eat messy things with your
+fingers?"
+
+"Now you are horrid!" Eleanor pouted. "I only thought----"
+
+"You mean you _didn't_ think!" corrected Harold, putting the tip of his
+finger under her chin and tilting her face up to his. "You just repeated
+what you'd been taught to say. Use your brains, Eleanor. What possible
+harm can there be in our quietly sitting out under the light of the
+stars, instead of on this crowded piazza with that distracting din going
+on inside?"
+
+"Of course there isn't really."
+
+"Well, then, come on"; and he led the way across the strip of dewy lawn
+and handed her into the car.
+
+Eleanor experienced a delicious sense of forbidden joy as she sank on the
+soft cushions and looked back at the brilliantly lighted club-house. The
+knowledge that in many of those other cars parked along the roadway other
+couples were cozily twosing, and that not a girl among them but would
+have changed places with her, added materially to her enjoyment.
+
+It was not that Harold Phipps was popular. She had to admit that he had
+more enemies than friends. But rumors of his wealth, his position, and
+his talent, together with his distinguished appearance, had made him the
+most sought after officer stationed at the camp. That he should have
+swooped down from his eagle flight with Uncle Ranny's sophisticated group
+to snatch her out of the pool of youthful minnows was a compliment she
+did not forget.
+
+"Well," he said, lazily sinking into his corner of the car and observing
+her with satisfaction, "haven't you something pretty to say to me, after
+I've come all these miles to hear it?"
+
+Eleanor laughed in embarrassment. It was much easier to say pretty things
+in letters than to say them face to face.
+
+"There is one thing that I always have to say to you," she said, "and
+that's thank you. These orchids are perfectly sweet, and the candy that
+came yesterday----"
+
+"Was also _perfectly_ sweet? Come, Eleanor, let's skip the formalities.
+Were you or were you not glad to see me?"
+
+"Why, of course I was."
+
+"Well, you didn't look it. I am not used to having girls treat me as
+casually as you do. How much have you missed me?"
+
+"Heaps. How's the play coming on?"
+
+"Marvelously! We've worked out all the main difficulties, and I signed up
+this week with a manager."
+
+"Not _really!_ When will it be produced?"
+
+"Sometime in the spring. I go on to New York next month to make the final
+arrangements. When do you go?"
+
+"I don't know that I am going. I'm trying my best to get grandmother's
+consent."
+
+"You must go anyhow," said Harold. "I want you to have three months at
+the Kendall School, and then do you know what I am going to do?"
+
+"What?" she asked with sparkling eagerness.
+
+"I am going to try you out in 'Phantom Love.' You remember you said if I
+wrote a part especially for you that nothing in heaven or earth could
+prevent your taking it."
+
+"And _have_ you written a part especially for me?"
+
+"I certainly have. A young Southern girl who moves through the play like
+a strain of exquisite music. The only trouble is that the rôle promises
+to be more appealing than the star's."
+
+"That's the loveliest thing I ever heard of anybody doing!" cried
+Eleanor, breathless with gratitude. "Does Papa Claude know?"
+
+"Of course he knows. We worked it out together. I am going to find him a
+small apartment, so he can be ready for you when you come. It shouldn't
+be later than November the first."
+
+Eleanor wore such a look as Joan of Arc must have worn when she first
+heard the heavenly voices. Her shapely bare arms hung limp at her sides,
+and her white face, with its contrasting black hair, shone like a
+delicate cameo against the darkness.
+
+Harold, leaning forward with elbows on his knees, kept lightly touching
+and retouching his mustache.
+
+"In the first act," he continued softly, "I've put you in the Red Cross
+Uniform--the little blue and white one, you know, that you used to break
+hearts in out at the camp hospital. In the second act you are to be in
+riding togs, smart in every detail, something very chic, that will show
+your figure to advantage; in the last act I want you exactly as you are
+this minute--this soft clingy gold gown, and the gold slippers, and your
+hair high and plain like that, with the band of dull gold around it. I
+wouldn't change an inch of you, not from your head to your blessed little
+feet!"
+
+As he talked Eleanor forgot him completely. She was busy visualizing the
+different costumes, even going so far as to see herself slipping through
+folds of crimson velvet to take insistent curtain calls. Already in
+imagination she was rich and famous, dispensing munificent bounty to the
+entire Martel family. Then a disturbing thought pricked her dream and
+brought her rudely back to the present. As long as her grandmother
+regarded her going to New York as a foolish whim, a passing craze, she
+might be wheedled into yielding; but at the first suggestion of a
+professional engagement, her opposition would become active and violent,
+Eleanor sighed helplessly and looked at Harold.
+
+"What shall I do if grandmother refuses to send me?" she asked
+desperately.
+
+"You can let me send you," he said quietly. "It's folly to keep up this
+pretense any longer, Eleanor. You love me, don't you?"
+
+"I--I like you," faltered Eleanor, "better than almost anybody. But I am
+never going to marry; I don't think I shall ever care for anybody--that
+way."
+
+He watched her with an amused practised glance. "We won't talk about it
+now," he said lightly. "We will talk instead of your career. You remember
+that night at Ran's when you recited for me? I can hear you now saying
+those lines:
+
+    'Or if thou think'st I am too quickly won
+    I'll frown and be perverse, and say thee nay.'
+
+For days I was haunted by the beauty and subtlety of your voice, the
+unconscious grace of your poses, your little tricks of coquetry, and the
+play of your eyebrows."
+
+"Did you really see all that in me the first night?"
+
+"I saw more. I saw that, if taken in time, you were destined to be a
+great actress. I swore then and there that you should have your chance,
+and that I should be the one to give it to you."
+
+"But----"
+
+"No. Don't answer me now. You are like a little bud that's afraid to open
+its petals. Once you get out of this chilling atmosphere of criticism and
+opposition, you will burst into glorious bloom."
+
+"But it would mean a terrible break with the family. I don't believe I
+can----"
+
+"Yes, you can. I know you better than you know yourself. If Madam
+Bartlett persists in refusing to send you to New York, you are going to
+be big enough to let me do it."
+
+He was holding her hand now, and talking with unusual earnestness.
+Eleanor thought she had never seen a greater exhibition of magnanimity.
+That he was willing to give all and ask for nothing, to be patient with
+her vacillations, and understand and sympathize with what everybody else
+condemned in her, touched her greatly. She turned to him impulsively.
+
+"I'll do whatever you say," she said. "You and Papa Claude go ahead and
+make the arrangements, and I promise you I'll come."
+
+Harold Phipps should have left it there; but Eleanor was never more
+irresistible than when she was in a yielding mood, and now, when she
+lifted starry eyes of gratitude, he tumbled off his pedestal of noble
+detachment, and drew her suddenly into his arms.
+
+In an instant her soft mood vanished. She scrambled hastily to her feet
+and got out of the car.
+
+"I am going in," she said abruptly. "I'm cold."
+
+Harold laughingly followed. "Cold?" he repeated in his laziest tone. "My
+dear girl, you could understudy the North Pole! However, it was my
+mistake; I'm sorry. Shall we go in and dance?"
+
+For the next half-hour he and Eleanor were the most observed couple on
+the floor. The "ubiquitous youngsters," seeing his air of proprietorship,
+forbore to break in, and it was not until the last dance that Pink
+Bailey, looking the immature college boy he was, presented himself
+apologetically to take Eleanor home.
+
+"Bring your car around, and she will be ready," said Harold loftily. Then
+he turned to Eleanor, "I shall expect a letter every day. You must keep
+me posted how things are going."
+
+They were standing on the club-house steps now, and she was looking
+dreamily off across the golf links.
+
+"Did you hear me?" he said impatiently.
+
+"Oh, I was listening to the whip-poor-wills. They always take me back to
+Valley Mead. Write every day? Heavens, no. I hate to write letters."
+
+"But you'll write to me, you little ingrate! I shall send you such nice
+letters that you'll have to answer them."
+
+A vagrant breeze, with a hint of autumn, blew Eleanor's scarf across his
+shoulder, and he tenderly replaced it about her throat.
+
+"Are you cold?" he asked solicitously.
+
+Eleanor, under cover of the crowd that was surging about them, felt a
+sudden access of boldness.
+
+"Not so cold as some people think," she said mischievously; then, without
+waiting for further good-by, she sped down the steps and into the waiting
+car.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 23
+
+
+Of all the multitudinous ways in which Dan Cupid, Unlimited, does
+business, none is more nefarious than his course by correspondence. Once
+he has induced two guileless clients to plunge into the traffic of love
+letters, the rest is easy. Wild speculation in love stock, false
+valuations, hysterical desire to buy in the cheapest and sell in the
+dearest market, invariably follow. Before the end of the month Harold
+Phipps and Eleanor Bartlett were gambling in the love market with a
+recklessness that would have staggered the most hardened old speculator.
+
+Harold, instead of being handicapped by his absence at the most critical
+point in his love affair, took advantage of it to exhibit one of his most
+brilliant accomplishments. He sent Eleanor a handsome tooled-leather
+portfolio to hold his letters, which he wrote on loose-leaf sheets and
+mailed unfolded. They were letters that deserved preservation, prose
+poems composed with infinite pains and copied with meticulous care. If
+the potpourri was at times redolent of the dried flowers of other men's
+loves, Eleanor was blissfully unaware of it. When he wrote of the
+lonesome October of his most immemorial year, or spoke of her pilgrim
+soul coming to him at midnight in the silence of the sleep-time, she
+thrilled with admiration for his genius.
+
+Such literary masterpieces deserved adequate answers, and she found
+herself trying to make up in quantity what she lacked in quality. His
+letters always began, "Dearest Héloïse," or "Mélisande," or "Baucis," or
+"Isolde"; and, rather than acknowledge her ignorance of these classic
+allusions, she looked them up and sent her answers to "Dear Abélard," or
+"Pelléas," or "Philemon," or "Tristan," as the case demanded. She indited
+her missives with a dainty gold pen engraved with an orchid, which Harold
+had requested her never to profane by secular use.
+
+The correspondence, while throbbing with emotion, was not by any means
+devoid of practical details. Harold lost no opportunity of urging Eleanor
+to remain firm in her resolve to go to New York. It would be sheer folly,
+he pointed out, to give up the chance of a professional début, a chance
+that might not come again in years. He pointed out that her grandfather
+had changed all his plans on the strength of her coming, and would be
+utterly heartbroken if she failed to keep her promise. He delicately
+intimated that her failure to take the part he had so laboriously written
+for her might seal the fate of "Phantom Love" and prove the downfall of
+both its creators.
+
+His conclusion to all these specious arguments was that the only way out
+of the tangle was for her to consent to a nominal engagement to him that
+would bind her to nothing, and yet would give him the right to send her
+to New York if Madam Bartlett refused to do so. In answer to Eleanor's
+doubts and misgivings, he assured her in polyphonic prose that he knew
+her far better than she knew herself, and that he would be "content to
+wait at the feet of little Galatea, asking nothing, giving all, until the
+happy day when she should wake to life and love and the consciousness
+that she was wholly and happily his."
+
+And Galatea read his letters with increasing ardor and slept with them
+under her pillow. It was all so secret and romantic, this glorious
+adventure rushing to fulfilment, under the prosy surface of everyday
+life. Of course she did not want to be married--not for ages and ages;
+but to be engaged, to be indefinitely adored by a consummate lover like
+Harold Phipps, who so beautifully shared her ambition, was an exciting
+and tempting proposition. Like most girls of her type, when her personal
+concerns became too complex for reason, she abandoned herself to impulse.
+She merely shut her eyes and allowed herself to drift toward a
+destination that was not of her choosing. Like a peripatetic Sleeping
+Beauty, she moved through the days in a sort of trance, waiting
+liberation from her thraldom, but fearing to put her fate to the test by
+laying the matter squarely and finally before her grandmother.
+
+It was easy enough to drop out of her old round of festivities. She had
+been away all summer, and new groups had formed with which she took no
+trouble to ally herself. Her friends seemed inordinately young and
+foolish. She wondered how she had ever endured the trivial chatter of
+Kitty Mason and the school-boy antics of Pink Bailey and Johnnie
+Rawlings. After declining half a dozen invitations she was left in peace,
+free to devote all her time to composing her letters, to poring over
+plays and books about the theater, or to sitting listless absorbed in
+day-dreams.
+
+The one old friend who refused to be disposed of was Quinby Graham. On
+one pretext or another he managed to come to the house almost every day,
+and he seldom left it without managing to see her. Sometimes when she was
+in the most arduous throes of composition, the maid would come to her
+door and say: "Mr. Quin's downstairs, and he says can you come to the
+steps a minute--he's got something to show you?" Or Miss Isobel would
+pause on the threshold to say: "Quinby is looking for you, Eleanor. I
+think it is something about a new tire for your automobile."
+
+And Eleanor would impatiently thrust her letter into a desk drawer and go
+downstairs, where she would invariably get so interested in what Quin had
+to say to her or to show her that she would forget to come up again.
+
+Sometimes they went out to Valley Mead together for week-ends. On those
+days Eleanor not only failed to write to Harold, but also failed to think
+about him. The excitement of seeing what new wonders had been wrought
+since the last visit, of scouring the woods for nuts and berries, of
+going on all-day picnics to a neighboring hill-top, made her quite forget
+her castles in the air. She descended from the clouds of art and under
+Quin's tutelage learned to fry chops and bacon and cook eggs in the open.
+She got her face and hands smudged and her hair tumbled, and she forgot
+all about enunciating clearly and holding her poses. So abandoned was she
+to what Harold called her "bourgeois mood" that she was conscious of
+nothing but the sheer joy of living.
+
+Often when she and Quin were alone together, she longed to take him into
+her confidence. She was desperately in need of counsel, and his level
+head and clear judgments had solved more than one problem for her. But
+she realized that, in spite of the heroic effort he was making to keep
+within bounds, he was nevertheless liable to overflow into sentiment with
+the slightest encouragement. Confession of her proposed flight, moreover,
+involved an explanation of her relation to Harold Phipps, and upon that
+point Quin could not be counted to sympathize.
+
+With the first of November came a letter that brought matters to a
+crisis. Claude Martel wrote that he must know immediately the date of her
+arrival in New York, since the place he had bespoken for her at the
+Kendall School of Expression could no longer be held open; he must also
+give a definite answer about the apartment.
+
+Eleanor received the letter one Saturday as she was starting to a tea.
+All afternoon she listened to the local chatter about her as a lark
+poised for flight might listen to the twittering of house sparrows. Her
+mind was in a ferment of elation and doubt, of trepidation and joyful
+anticipation. The moment she had longed for and yet dreaded was at hand.
+
+Returning across Central Park in the dusk, she rehearsed what she was
+going to say to her grandmother. The moment for approaching her had never
+seemed more propitious. Ever since she had accepted Quin's advice and
+"cottoned up" to the old lady, relations between them had been amazingly
+amicable. Her willingness to stay at home in the evening and take Miss
+Enid's place as official reader and amanuensis had placed her in high
+favor, and Madam, not to be outdone in magnanimity, had allowed her many
+privileges.
+
+Now that there seemed some ground for the hope that she might gain her
+grandmother's consent to the New York proposition, Eleanor realized how
+ardently she wanted it. It was not the money alone, it was her moral
+support and approval--hers and Aunt Isobel's. Aunt Enid would understand,
+had understood in a way; so would Uncle Ranny and Aunt Flo. As for Quin
+Graham----
+
+She heard a cough near by, and turning saw a couple sitting on a bench
+half hidden in the heavy shrubbery. Their backs were toward her, and she
+noticed that the girl's hand rested on the man's shoulder and that their
+heads were bent in intimate conversation. The next instant she recognized
+Rose Mattel's hat and the dim outline of Quin's troubled profile.
+
+Turning sharply to the right, she hurried up through the pergola and out
+into the avenue. She wondered why she was so unaccountably angry. Rose
+and Quin had a perfect right to sit in the square at twilight and talk as
+much as they liked. It was not her business, anyhow, she told herself;
+she ought to be glad for poor Rose to have any diversion she could get
+after being in that hideous store all day. She didn't blame Rose one bit.
+But if Quin thought as much of somebody else as he pretended to, she
+couldn't see what he would have to say to another girl out here in the
+park at twilight, especially a girl that he saw three times a day at
+home! Could there be anything between them? She had scorned the idea when
+it was once tentatively suggested to her by Harold Phipps. Of
+_course_ there couldn't. And yet----
+
+So preoccupied was she with these disturbing reflections that she almost
+forgot the real business in hand until she stood on her own doorstep
+waiting to be admitted.
+
+"Old Miss says for you to come up to her room the minute you git in,"
+Hannah said, with an ominous note in her voice.
+
+"What's the matter, Hannah? Uncle Ranny?"
+
+"Lord, no, honey! Mr. Ranny's behavin' himself like a angel. Hit was
+somethin' that come in the mail. Miss Isobel she don't know, and I don't
+know; but Old Miss certainly has got it in fer somebody."
+
+Eleanor's new-found confidence promptly deserted her, and she hastily
+took stock of her own shortcomings. Of course she was writing daily to
+Harold, but the matter of her private correspondence had been threshed
+out during the summer and she had emerged battered but victorious. Aside
+from that, she could think of no probable cause she had given for
+offense.
+
+In the hall she met Miss Isobel.
+
+"Mother has been asking for you, dear," she said in a voice heavy with
+premonition. "She's very much upset about something."
+
+Eleanor anxiously mounted the stairs. It was evidently not a propitious
+moment to present her case; and yet, Papa Claude must have an answer
+within twenty-four hours. At the door of Madam's room she hesitated. Then
+she took the small remnant of her courage in both hands and entered.
+
+Madam was sitting at her desk under the crystal chandelier, with a
+severity of expression that suggested nothing less than a court martial.
+Without speaking she waved Eleanor to a seat, and began searching through
+her papers. The light fell full on her high white pompadour and threw the
+deep lines about her grim mouth into heavy relief.
+
+"Do you remember," she began ponderously, "a check I gave you the day of
+Enid's wedding?"
+
+"Yes, grandmother."
+
+"Well, where is the bag you bought with it?"
+
+Evasion had so often been Eleanor's sole weapon of defense that she
+seized it now.
+
+"I--I haven't bought it yet," she faltered; then she added weakly: "I
+haven't seen any I particularly cared about."
+
+"You still have the money?"
+
+"Well--I've spent some of it."
+
+"How much?"
+
+"I don't know that I remember exactly."
+
+Madam's lip curled.
+
+"Perhaps I can stimulate your memory," she said, running her fingers
+through a bunch of canceled checks. "Here is the check I gave you,
+indorsed to Rose Martel."
+
+Eleanor flushed crimson. The imputation of untruthfulness was one to
+which she was particularly sensitive. Her fear of her grandmother had
+taught her early in life to take refuge in subterfuge, a shelter that she
+heartily despised but which she still clung to. In her desire to meet
+Rose's imperative need, she had passed her gift on to her, with the
+intention of saving enough from her own allowance to get the mesh bag
+later. The fact that the canceled check would be returned to her
+grandmother had never occurred to her.
+
+"So _that's_ where my money has been going!" cried Madam. "They've
+succeeded in working me through you, have they? Just as they succeeded in
+working Ranny through Quinby Graham."
+
+"No--no, grandmother! Please listen! They have never asked me for a
+penny. But when I found out the terrible time they'd been having, the
+children sick all summer and Cass down with typhoid--why, if it hadn't
+been for Quin----"
+
+"So they sponged on him too, did they? He's a bigger fool than I gave him
+credit for being."
+
+"But they _didn't_ sponge. He is Cass's best friend, and he was glad to
+help. He and Rose did all the nursing themselves."
+
+"Yes, I heard about it. In the house alone for six weeks. That doesn't
+speak very well for her reputation."
+
+"Grandmother! You've no right to say that! Rose may talk recklessly and
+do foolish things, but she wouldn't do anything wrong for the world."
+
+"Well, if she did, she wouldn't be the first member of her family to
+compromise a man so that he had to marry her."
+
+"What do you mean?" demanded Eleanor, quivering with indignation.
+
+"That's neither here nor there," said Madam. "There's enough rottenness
+in the present without raking up the past. But one thing is certain: if
+they ask you for money again----"
+
+"I tell you, they didn't ask me!"
+
+"Not in so many words, perhaps, but they worked on your sympathies. I
+know them! As for Claude Martel, he would want nothing better than have
+you traveling around in some Punch and Judy show. But I scotched that
+nonsense once and for all. As for their bleeding you for money,"--she
+rose and crushed the check in her hand,--"I guess I know a way to stop
+that."
+
+Eleanor rose too, and faced her. She was very pale now, her anger having
+reached a white heat.
+
+"My mother's people may be poor," she said deliberately, "but they aren't
+beggars, and at least they've come by what they have honestly."
+
+It was Madam's turn to flinch. A certain famous law-suit in the history
+of Bartlett & Bangs had brought out some startling testimony, and the
+subject was one to which reference was never allowed in Madam's presence.
+At Eleanor's words the whirlwind of her wrath let loose. Her words
+hurtled like flying missiles in a cyclone. She lashed herself into a
+fury, coming back to Eleanor again and again as the cause of all her
+trouble.
+
+"I tried giving you your head," she raged in conclusion; "I let you work
+through that crazy stage fever; I gave in about that man Phipps coming up
+to Maine, in the hope that you'd find out what a fool he is. That wasn't
+enough! You had to write to him. Very well, said I; go ahead and write to
+him. I flattered myself that you might develop a little sense. But I was
+mistaken. You haven't got the judgment of a ten-year-old child. Therefore
+I intend to treat you like a child. From this time on you are not to
+write to him at all. And you'll get no allowance. I'll buy you what you
+need, and you'll account for all the pin-money you spend, down to every
+postage stamp. Do you understand?"
+
+Eleanor was by this time at the door, standing with her hand on the knob,
+straight, pale, and defiant, but quivering in every limb. She felt as
+beaten, bruised, and humiliated as if the violence directed against her
+had been physical. A sick longing surged over her for Aunt Enid, into
+whose arms she could rush for comfort. But there was no Aunt Enid to turn
+to, and it was no use seeking Aunt Isobel, whose sole advice in such a
+crisis was to apologize and propitiate.
+
+Catching her breath in a long, sobbing sigh, Eleanor rushed down the
+gloomy hall and shut herself in her room. For ten minutes she sat at her
+desk, staring grimly at the wall, with her hands gripped in her lap. She
+was like a frenzied prisoner, determined to escape but with no
+destination in view. Suddenly her eyes fell on an unopened letter on her
+blotting-pad. She tore off the envelop and read it twice. For another
+five minutes she stared at the wall. Then she seized her pen and dashed
+off a note. It took but a few minutes after that to change her light gown
+for a dark one and to fling some things into a suit-case. Just as dinner
+was being announced, she slipped down the back stairs and out of the side
+door into the somber dusk of the November evening.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 24
+
+
+Quin's life at the factory these past three weeks had been full of new
+and engrossing business complications. Mr. Bangs seemed bent upon trying
+him out in various departments, each change bringing new and distracting
+duties. Just what was the object of the proceeding Quin had no idea; but
+he realized that he was being singled out and experimented with, and he
+applied to each new task the accumulated knowledge and experience of
+those that had gone before. It was all very exciting and gratifying to a
+person possessed of an inordinate ambition to have a worthy shrine ready
+the moment his goddess evinced the slightest willingness to occupy it.
+
+"Old Iron Jaw's got his optic on you for something," said Miss Leaks, the
+stenographer. "Maybe he wants you to pussy-foot around in Shields' shoes
+and do his dirty work for him."
+
+"Well, he's got another guess coming," said Quin; but her remark
+disturbed him. Of course it was no concern of his how the firm did
+business, but more than once he had been called upon to negotiate some
+delicate matter that was not at all to his liking.
+
+"See here, young man," Mr. Bangs said upon one of these occasions, "I am
+not paying you for advice. You are here to carry out my orders and to
+make no comments."
+
+"That's all right," Quin agreed good-naturedly; "but I got a conscience
+that was trained to stand on its hind legs and bark at a lie."
+
+"The quicker you muzzle it the better," said Mr. Bangs. "You can't do
+business these days by the Golden Rule."
+
+On the Saturday when Eleanor saw Quin in the park with Rose Martel, the
+factory had been in the throes of one of its most violent upheavals. Some
+weeks before the old steam engine had been replaced by an expensive
+electric drive. There had been much interest manifested in the
+installation of the modern motor, and Quin, with his natural love of
+machinery, had rejoiced that his duties as shipping clerk required him to
+be present at the unpacking. He and Dirk, the foreman, never tired of
+discussing the perfection of each particular feature. But a few days
+after the departure of the installation foreman, the new motor burnt out,
+necessitating the shutting down of the factory and causing much
+inconvenience.
+
+Dirk was beside himself with rage. He declared that something heavy had
+been dropped upon the armature winding, and he blamed every one who could
+have been responsible, and some who could not. In the midst of his tirade
+he was summoned to the office, where he was closeted for more than an
+hour with Mr. Bangs and Mr. Shields. When he emerged, it was with the
+avowed belief that the armature had been defective when received. This
+sudden change of front, taken in connection with the fact that the third
+payment was due on the motor in less than sixty days, set every tongue
+wagging.
+
+Quin was in no way involved in the transaction; but, as usual, he had an
+emphatic opinion, which he did not hesitate to express.
+
+"I don't know what's got into Dirk!" he said indignantly to Mr. Shields,
+the traffic manager, as they left the office together. "He knows the
+injury to the armature was done in our shop and that we are responsible
+for it."
+
+"I guess Dirk's like the rest of us," said Shields bitterly; "he knows a
+lot he can't tell."
+
+"What do you mean? Do you think it was a frame-up?"
+
+"Well, we don't call it that. But when the boss gets in a hole,
+somebody's got to pull him out. I'm getting mighty sick of it myself.
+Wish to the Lord I could pull up stakes as Mr. Bartlett and Mr. Chester
+did."
+
+It was not until they separated that Quin's thoughts left the disturbing
+events of the day and flew to something more pleasing. For two weeks now
+he had had to content himself with chance interviews with Eleanor, meager
+diet for a person with an omnivorous appetite; but to-night there was the
+prospect for a long, uninterrupted evening. Since the day of Miss Enid's
+wedding he had found her perplexed and absent-minded; but the fact that
+she always had a smile for him, and that nothing was seen or heard of
+Harold Phipps, sufficed to satisfy him.
+
+When he started across Central Park the sun was just setting, and he
+turned off the main path and dropped down on a bench to rest for a
+moment. He had acquired a taste for sunsets at a tender age, having
+watched them from many a steamer's prow. He knew how the harbor of
+Hongkong brimmed like a goblet of red wine, how Fujiyama's snow-capped
+peak turned rose, he knew how beautiful the sun could look through a
+barrage of fire. But it was of none of these that he thought as he sat on
+the park bench, his arms extended along the back, his long legs stretched
+out, and his eyes on a distant smokestack. He was thinking of a country
+stile and a girl in white and green, in whose limpid eyes he watched the
+reflected light of the most wonderful of all his sunsets.
+
+For the third time since leaving the office, he consulted his watch.
+Six-thirty! Another hour and a half must be got through before he could
+see her.
+
+A rustle of leaves behind him made him look up, but before he could turn
+his head two hands were clapped over his eyes. Investigation proved them
+to be feminine, and he promptly took them captive.
+
+"It's Rose?" he guessed.
+
+"Let me go!" she laughed; "somebody will see you."
+
+She slipped around the bench and dropped down beside him.
+
+"I was coming out the avenue and spied you mooning over here by yourself.
+What's the trouble?"
+
+"No trouble at all. Just stopped to get my wind a bit--and watch the
+sunset."
+
+"I think you are working too hard." She looked at him with anxious
+solicitude. "I've a good notion to put you on buttermilk again."
+
+"Good work! Put me on anything you like except dried peaches and
+wienies."
+
+"And you need more recreation," Rose persisted. "It's not good for
+anybody to work all day and go to school at night. What's the matter with
+us getting Cass and Fan Loomis and going down to Fontaine Ferry
+to-night?"
+
+"Can't do it," said Quin with ill-concealed pride. "Got a date with Miss
+Eleanor Bartlett."
+
+Rose sat silent for a moment, stirring the dead leaves with her shabby
+boot; then she turned and laid her hand on his shoulder.
+
+"Quin," she said, "I am worried sick about Nell and Harold Phipps."
+
+Quin, who had been trying to beguile a squirrel into believing that a
+pebble was a nut, looked up sharply.
+
+"What do you mean?" he said. "She hasn't seen him since last summer, and
+she never mentions his name."
+
+"_Don't_ she? She hardly talks about anything else. She writes to him all
+the time and wears his picture in her watch!"
+
+"Do you know that?"
+
+"Of course I know it. She can't talk about him at home, so she pours it
+all out to me."
+
+"But haven't you told her what you know about him?"
+
+"I've hinted at it, but she won't believe me because she knows I hate
+him. I wanted to tell her about what he said to me, and about that nurse
+he got into trouble out at the hospital; but I was afraid it might make
+an awful row and spoil everything for Papa Claude."
+
+"I don't care who it spoils things for! She's got to be told." Quin's
+eyes were blazing.
+
+"But perhaps if we leave it alone he'll get tired of her. They say he
+keeps after a girl until he gets her engaged to him, then drops her."
+
+"He'd never drop Miss Nell. No man would. He'd be trying to marry her."
+
+"But what can we _do?_ The more people talk about him, the more she's
+going to take up for him. That's Nell all over."
+
+"Couldn't Mr. Martel----"
+
+"Papa Claude's as much taken in as she is. You remember the night over
+home when he talked about his lovely detached soul? He never sees the
+truth about anybody."
+
+"Well, he's going to see the truth about this. If you don't write to him
+to-night and tell him the kind of man Mr. Phipps is, I will!"
+
+"Wait till to-morrow. I'll have another round with Nell. I've got some
+proof that I think she'll have to believe."
+
+Quin rose restlessly. He wanted to go to the Bartletts' at once, if only
+to stand guard at the gate against the danger that threatened Eleanor.
+
+"Aren't you coming home to supper?" asked Rose.
+
+"No," he said absently; "I don't want any supper."
+
+For an hour he paced the streets, trying to think things out. His burning
+desire was to go straight to Eleanor and lay the whole matter before her.
+But according to his ethics it was a poor sport who would discredit a
+rival, especially on hearsay. He must leave it to Rose, and let her
+furnish the proof she said she possessed.
+
+At eight o'clock he rang the Bartletts' bell, and was surprised when Miss
+Isobel opened the door.
+
+"She isn't here," she said in answer to his inquiry. "We cannot imagine
+what has become of her. She must have gone out just before dinner, and
+she has not returned."
+
+"Didn't she say where she was going?"
+
+"No." Miss Isobel's lips worked nervously; then she drew Quin into the
+dining-room and closed the door, "She and mother had a very serious
+misunderstanding, and--and I'm afraid mother was a little severe. I did
+not know Eleanor was gone until she failed to come down to dinner. I've
+just sent Hannah up to telephone my brother to see if she is there."
+
+"She probably is," Quin spoke with more assurance than he felt. "About
+what time did she leave here?"
+
+"It must have been between six-thirty and seven. How long would it take
+her to get out to Ranny's?"
+
+"Depends on whether she went in her machine or a street-car," said Quin
+evasively. "Besides, she may have gone to the Martels'."
+
+"I don't think so," said Miss Isobel, twisting her handkerchief in her
+slender fingers; "because, you see, she--she took her suit-case."
+
+For the first time, Quin's face reflected the anxiety of Miss Isobel's.
+
+When Hannah returned she reported that no one answered the telephone at
+the Randolph Bartletts'.
+
+"Suppose the child gets there and nobody is at home!" groaned Miss
+Isobel, whose imagination always rushed toward disaster. "What on earth
+shall I do?"
+
+"Leave it to me," said Quin. "I'll run around to the Martels', and if
+she's not there I'll go out to Valley Mead. She's sure to be one place or
+the other."
+
+"Of course she must be; but I'm so anxious! You will go right away, won't
+you? And telephone the minute you find out where she is. Then I'll tell
+mother I gave her permission to go."
+
+Miss Isobel pushed him toward the door as she spoke:
+
+"You--you don't think anything dreadful could have happened to her, do
+you?"
+
+Quin patted her shoulder reassuringly.
+
+"Of course not," he blustered. "She'll probably be in before I get around
+the corner. If not, I bet I find her at the Martels', toasting
+marshmallows."
+
+In spite of his assumed confidence, he ran every step of the way home. As
+he turned the corner he saw with dismay that the house was dark. His call
+in the front hall brought no answer. He turned on the light, and saw an
+unstamped letter addressed to himself on the table. The fact that the
+writing was Eleanor's did not tend to decrease his alarm.
+
+He tore off the envelop and read:
+
+    _Dear Quin:_
+
+    Grandmother has said things to me that I can never forgive as long as
+    I live. I am leaving her house in a few moments forever. By the time
+    you get this I shall be on my way to Chicago to join Harold Phipps.
+    We have been engaged for two weeks. I did not mean to marry him for
+    years and years, but I've simply _got_ to do something. He cares
+    more for me and my career than any one else in the world, and he
+    understands me better than anybody.
+
+    You'll get this when you go home to supper, and I want you to
+    telephone Aunt Isobel right away and tell her I won't be home
+    to-night. She will think I am with Rose and that will keep her from
+    being anxious. I don't care how anxious grandmother is! To-morrow
+    I'll send them a wire from Chicago telling them I'm married.
+
+    Dear Quin, I know this is a terribly serious step, and I know you
+    won't approve; but I am unhappy enough to die, and I don't know where
+    else to turn, or what to do. Some day I hope you will know Mr. Phipps
+    better, and see what a really fine man he is. Do try to comfort Aunt
+    Isobel, and make her understand. Please don't hate me, but try to
+    forgive your utterly miserable friend,
+
+    E. M. B.
+
+Quin stood staring at the letter. He felt as he had on that August day
+when the flying shrapnel struck him--the same intense nausea, the deadly
+exhaustion, the bursting pain in his head. Involuntarily he raised his
+hand to the old wound, half expecting to feel the blood stream again
+through his fingers.
+
+"Married! Married!" he kept repeating to himself dazedly. "Miss Nell gone
+to marry that man, that scoundrel!"
+
+He sat down on the stair steps and tried to hold the thought in his mind
+long enough to realize it. But Phipps himself kept getting in the way:
+Phipps the slacker, as he had known him in the army; Phipps the
+condescending lord of creation, who had refused to take his hand at Mr.
+Ranny's; and oftenest of all Phipps the philanderer, who had insulted
+Rose Mattel, and been responsible for the dismissal of more than one
+nurse from the hospital. The mere thought of such a man in connection
+with Eleanor Bartlett made Quin's strong fingers clench around an
+imaginary neck and brought beads of perspiration to his forehead.
+
+"Something's got to be done!" he thought wildly, staggering to his feet.
+"I got to stop it; I got----"
+
+Then the sense of his helplessness swept over him, and he sat down again
+on the steps. She had evidently left on the eight-o'clock train for
+Chicago, and it was now eight-thirty. There was nothing to be done. What
+a fool he had been to go on hoping and daring! She had told him again and
+again that she didn't care for him; but she had also told him that she
+did not intend to many anybody. But if she hadn't cared for him, why had
+she come to him with her troubles, and followed his advice, and wanted
+his good opinion? Why had she looked at him the way she had the day of
+Miss Enid's wedding, and said she remembered her dances with him better
+than those with anybody else? In bitterness of spirit he went over all
+the treasured words and glances he had hoarded since the day he met her.
+He didn't believe she loved Harold Phipps! She didn't love anybody--yet.
+But, in her mad desire to escape from home, she had taken the first means
+that presented itself. She had stepped into a trap, from which he was
+powerless to rescue her.
+
+In a sudden anguish of despair he flung himself face downward on the
+steps and gave way to his anguish. There was no one to see and no one to
+hear. All the doubts and discouragements, the humiliations and
+disappointments, through which he had passed to win her, came back to
+mock him, now he had lost her. The world had suddenly become an
+intolerable vacuum in which he gasped frantically for breath.
+
+What was the use in going on? Why not put an end to everything? He could
+make it appear an accident. Nobody would be the wiser. The temptation was
+growing stronger every second, when he suddenly remembered Miss Isobel.
+
+"I forgot she was waiting," he muttered, stumbling into the sitting-room
+and fumbling for the telephone. "Miss Nell said I was to keep her from
+being anxious--she wanted me to comfort her. But what in hell can I say!"
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 25
+
+
+At nine-thirty Edwin came in and passed up the creaking stairs. Ten
+minutes later Cass limped by the door, stopping a moment in the pantry to
+get a bite to eat. Quin sat motionless in the dark sitting-room and made
+no sign. He was waiting for Rose, with a dumb dependence the strongest
+man feels for the understanding feminine in times of crisis.
+
+When he heard her cheerful voice calling good night to Fan Loomis, the
+clock was just striking ten.
+
+"Quin! What is it?" she cried in alarm the moment she saw his face. "Is
+anybody dead?"
+
+"Worse! She's run away to get married!"
+
+"Not Myrna?"
+
+"No. Miss Nell. She left to-night for Chicago to marry Phipps!"
+
+"But she can't!" cried Rose wildly. "It's got to be stopped. He's not fit
+to marry anybody! We've got to stop her!"
+
+"I tell you, it's too late! She left on the eight-o'clock train."
+
+"Who said so? Are you sure? Do the Bartletts know?"
+
+"Nobody knows but you and me; nobody must know--yet. Maybe she'll change
+her mind."
+
+"But the Bartletts will miss her. Have they called up?"
+
+"I 'phoned Miss Isobel that she was all right and she'd telephone in the
+morning. All right! Good God, Rose, can't we do something?"
+
+"If I could get Harold Phipps's address I'd send him a telegram that
+would scare the wits out of him."
+
+Quin brushed the suggestion aside. "It's no use wasting time on him;
+we've got to reach her."
+
+"But how can we? Let me think. Do you suppose I could send her a telegram
+to be delivered on the train? _Anything_ that would make her wait until
+somebody could get to her."
+
+"I'll get to her," Quin cried. "I'll search every hotel in Chicago. You
+send the telegram and I'll start on the next train."
+
+A hurried consultation of time-tables showed that a Pennsylvania train
+left in ten minutes, and was due in Chicago the next morning at
+seven-thirty.
+
+"You can't make that," said Rose, but even as she spoke Quin was rushing
+for the door.
+
+"Have you got enough money?" she called after him.
+
+His meteor flight was checked. Ramming his hands in his pockets, he
+pulled out a handful of silver.
+
+"Wait!" cried Rose, speeding up to her room and returning with a small
+roll of bills. "It's what's left of Nell's check. Good-by--I'll send the
+telegram."
+
+Ten minutes later, as the night express for Chicago pulled out of the
+station, the bystanders were amused by the sight of a bare-headed young
+man dashing madly through the gate and across the railroad tracks. The
+train had not yet got under way, but its speed was increasing and the
+runner's chances lessened every moment.
+
+"He'll never catch it," said the gate-keeper. "He'd lost his wind before
+he got here."
+
+"He ain't lost his nerve," said a negro porter, craning his neck in
+lively interest. "He's lettin' hisself go lak a Derby-winner on de home
+stretch!"
+
+"Has he give up?" asked the gate-keeper, turning aside to stamp a ticket.
+
+"Not him. He's bound to ketch dat train ef it busts a hamstring. He's
+done got holt de rear platform! He's pullin' hisself up! There! I tole
+you so! I knowed he was the kind of fellow that gits what he goes after."
+
+Quin caught the train, but he paid for his run. A brakeman found him
+collapsed on the platform, in such a paroxysm of coughing that the train
+had covered many miles before he was sufficiently recovered to go inside
+and take a seat. But, even as he leaned back limp and exhausted, he was
+conscious of a dull satisfaction that he was traveling toward Eleanor. He
+refused to think of the absurdity of his wild quest, of her probable
+anger at his interference. He fought back his despair, his jealousy, his
+inordinate fear. The one thing necessary now was to get to her--to be on
+hand in case she needed him.
+
+Through the interminable hours of the night almost every breath came with
+an effort, but he scarcely heeded the fact. With characteristic
+persistence he forced himself to follow her steps in imagination from the
+time she left home until she reached her destination. The eight-o'clock
+sleeper that she had taken was due in Chicago at five-thirty. She would
+probably not leave it before seven at the earliest, and by that time
+Rose's telegram ought to have reached her. He tried to picture its effect
+on her. Much would depend upon the time that intervened between its
+reception and her seeing Mr. Phipps. If he met her, as he probably would,
+he would sweep aside all her doubts. If, on the other hand, Eleanor had
+time to think the matter over, her innate common sense might make her
+wait at least until she heard what Rose had to tell her. On the bare
+chance of his not meeting her, what would she do? Take the next train
+home? Go to his apartment? Go to a hotel alone?
+
+Plan after plan rushed through Quin's mind, only to be impatiently
+discarded. He sat tense and still, with his clenched hands rammed in his
+pockets and his eyes fixed on the black square of the window. Sometimes
+dim objects flew past, and now and then sharp, vivid lights stabbed the
+darkness. Once the smelting-pots of a huge iron foundry belched forth a
+circle of swirling flames, and for a moment wrenched his mind off his
+problems. Then the regular pounding of the wheels on the rails recalled
+him.
+
+"She's gone to be married. Gone--to be married. Gone--to be married."
+
+He realized that they had been saying it in monotonous rhythm ever since
+he started--that they would go on saying it through eternity.
+
+Suddenly the train jarred to a standstill. Figures with lanterns emerged
+through a cloud of steam and stood under his window.
+
+"Guess we got a hot-box," said a sleepy passenger across the aisle. "That
+means I'll miss my connection."
+
+Quin got up and went out on the platform. He was filled with rage at the
+lazy deliberation with which the men set about their task. He longed to
+wrench the tools out of their hands and do the job himself.
+
+"How much will this put us behind?" he demanded of the conductor.
+
+"Oh, not more than twenty minutes. We'll make some of it up before
+morning."
+
+Once more under way, Quin dropped into a troubled sleep. He dreamed that
+he was pursuing a Hun over miles of barbed-wire entanglements; but when
+he overtook him and forced him to the ground, the face under the steel
+helmet was the smiling, supercilious face of Harold Phipps. He woke up
+with a start and stretched his cold limbs. The black square of the window
+had turned to gray; arrows of rain shot diagonally across it. He realized
+for the first time that he had neither hat nor overcoat, but he did not
+care. In ten minutes more he would be in Chicago, in the same city with
+Eleanor.
+
+Notwithstanding the fact that it was pouring rain when the train pulled
+into the station, Quin stood on the lowest step of the platform, ready to
+alight.
+
+"Say, young fellow, you forgot your hat," said a man behind him.
+
+"Didn't have any," answered Quin.
+
+"I got an extra cap if you want it," offered the man obligingly.
+
+Quin, already on the platform, caught it as the man tossed it out to him.
+Dashing through the depot, he hurled himself into a taxi.
+
+"Monon Station!" he shouted, "and drive like the devil."
+
+Just what kind of chauffeur the devil is has never been demonstrated, but
+if that taxi-driver, urged on by Quin, was his counterpart, it is safe to
+infer that there are no traffic laws in Hades. In spite of the fact that
+the streets were like glass from the driving rain, and the wind-shield a
+gray blur, in spite of the fact that a tire went flat on a rear wheel,
+that decrepit old taxi rose to the occasion and made the transit in
+record time.
+
+Arrived at the station, Quin thrust a bill into the driver's hand and
+dashed down the steps to the lower level. In answer to his frenzied
+inquiry he was told that the Express had come in two hours before and
+that the passengers had probably all left the sleeper by this time.
+
+Nothing daunted, he rushed out to the tracks and accosted a porter who
+was sweeping out the rear coach.
+
+"Yas, sir, this is it," answered the negro. "Young lady? Yas, sir; there
+was five or six of 'em on board last night. Pretty? Yas, sir, they was
+all pretty--all but one, and she wasn't so bad looking."
+
+"Did one of them get a telegram in the night or this morning?"
+
+The porter's face brightened. "Yas, sir. Boy come through soon as we got
+in. Had a wire for young lady in lower six."
+
+"Do you know what time she left the car?"
+
+"About half hour ago, I should say. Party she was expecting to meet her
+didn't turn up, and I had to git her a red-cap to carry her suit-case.
+Thanky, sir."
+
+Quin tore back to the station and dashed through the waiting-room, the
+dining-room, the baggage-room. He was on the point of going out to the
+taxi-stand and interrogating each driver in turn, when his eyes were
+caught by a smart suit-case that lay unattended on one of the seats. It
+bore the inscription "E.M.B.--Ky."
+
+In his sudden relief he could have snatched it up and embraced it. But
+where was Eleanor? For five interminable minutes he stood guard over her
+property, watching every exit and entrance, and pacing the floor in his
+impatience. Suddenly an idea occurred to him, and, cursing himself for
+his stupidity, he strode over to the telephone-booths.
+
+Eleanor was in the corner one, the receiver at her ear, evidently waiting
+for her call. As Quin flung upon the door she turned and faced him in
+defiant surprise.
+
+"What are you doing here?" she demanded indignantly. "Did grandmother
+send you?"
+
+"No; she doesn't know I'm here."
+
+Eleanor turned nervously to the telephone.
+
+"Hello! I can't understand you. Put--what? Oh! I forgot. Wait a
+minute----"
+
+Letting the receiver swing, she fumbled in her purse; then, finding no
+small change, looked appealingly at Quin.
+
+He produced the necessary coin and handed it to her.
+
+"I don't think I'd put it in just yet," he said quietly.
+
+For a moment she paused irresolute; then she dropped the coin in the
+slot.
+
+"Is this the Hotel Kington?" she asked. "Will you please try again to get
+Mr. Phipps--Harold Phipps? P-h-i-p-p-s."
+
+Quin watched her fingers drumming on the shelf, and he knew he ought to
+go out of the booth and close the door; but instead he stayed in and
+closed it.
+
+"He doesn't answer?" Eleanor was repeating over the telephone. "Will you
+please page the dining-room, and if he is not at breakfast send a
+bell-boy up to waken him? It's _very_ important."
+
+Again there was a long wait, during which Eleanor did not so much as turn
+her head in Quin's direction. It was only when her answer came that she
+looked at him blankly.
+
+"They say he isn't there. The chambermaid was cleaning the room, and said
+his bed had not been disturbed."
+
+Then, seeing a humorously unsympathetic look flit across Quin's face, she
+burst out angrily:
+
+"What right had you to follow me over here?"
+
+They were standing very close in the narrow glass enclosure, and as he
+looked down at the small, trembling figure with her back against the wall
+and her eyes full of frightened defiance, he felt uncomfortably like a
+hunter who has run down some young wild thing and holds it at bay.
+
+"Please, Miss Nell," he implored, "don't think I'm going to peach on you!
+Whatever you do, I'll stand by you. Only I thought, perhaps, you might
+need a friend."
+
+"I _have_ a friend!" she retorted furiously. "If Harold Phipps had
+received my telegram last night, nothing in the world could have stopped
+him from meeting me--nothing!"
+
+Then the defiance dropped from her eyes, leaving her small sensitive face
+quivering with hurt pride and an overwhelming doubt. She bit her lips and
+turned away to hide her tears.
+
+Quin put a firm hand on her arm and piloted her back to her suit-case.
+
+"What we both need is breakfast," he said. "Come to think of it, I
+haven't had a mouthful since yesterday noon."
+
+"Neither have I; but I couldn't swallow a bite. Besides, I've got to find
+Harold."
+
+"Well, you can't do anything till he gets back to the hotel. If you'll
+come in with me while I get a cup of coffee, we can talk things over."
+
+She followed him reluctantly into the dining-room, but refused to order
+anything. For some time she sat with her chin on her clasped hands,
+watching the door; then she turned toward him accusingly.
+
+"Did you see Rose's telegram?"
+
+"No."
+
+He watched her open her purse and take out a yellow slip, which she
+handed to him.
+
+    "Don't take the step planned. Imperative reasons forbid. Rose."
+
+he read slowly; then he looked up. "Well?" he said.
+
+"What does she mean?" burst forth Eleanor. "How dared she send me a
+message like that unless she knew something----"
+
+She broke off abruptly and her eyes searched Quin's face. But he was
+apparently counting the grains of sugar that were going into his coffee,
+and refused to look up.
+
+"If it had been grandmother or Aunt Isobel I shouldn't have been in the
+least surprised; they are just a bunch of prejudices and believe every
+idle story they hear. But Rose is different. She's known about Harold and
+me for months. She forwarded his letters to me when I was in Baltimore.
+And now for her to turn against me like this----"
+
+"Why don't you wait till you hear her side of it?" suggested Quin, still
+concerned with the sugar-bowl.
+
+"How can I?" cried Eleanor, flinging out her hands. "I've no place to go,
+and I've no money. If I had had money enough I'd have gone straight to
+Papa Claude last night."
+
+Quin's heart gained a beat. He made a hurried calculation of his
+financial resources in the vain hope that that might yet be the solution
+of the difficulty. Whatever was to be done must be done at once, for
+Harold Phipps might arrive at any moment, and Quin felt instinctively
+that his advent would decide the matter.
+
+"I wish I had enough to send you," he said, "but all I've got is my
+return ticket and enough to buy another one for you."
+
+At the mere suggestion Eleanor's anger flared.
+
+"I'll never go back to grandmother's! I'll jump in the lake first!"
+
+"What's the matter with Valley Mead?"
+
+"What good would that do? Grandmother would make Uncle Ranny send me
+straight home. No; I've thought of all those things--it's no use."
+
+"You could go to the Martels'."
+
+"Yes, and put another burden on Cass. I tell you, I'm not going home. I
+am going to see Harold, and--and talk things over, and perhaps go
+straight on to New York to-night."
+
+"You can't see him if he is out of town."
+
+"Why do you think he is out of town?"
+
+"Well, he isn't here," Quin observed dryly.
+
+The next moment he was sorry he had said it, for the light died out of
+her face and she looked so absurdly young and helpless that it was all he
+could do to refrain from gathering her up in his arms and carrying her
+home by force.
+
+"See here, Miss Nell," he said earnestly, leaning across the table.
+"Would you be willing to go back to the Martels' if you knew that this
+time next month you'd be in New York with money enough to carry you
+through the winter?"
+
+"No. That is--whose money?"
+
+"Your own. I'll go to Queen Vic and put the whole thing up to her so she
+can't get around it."
+
+Eleanor brushed the suggestion aside impatiently.
+
+"Don't you suppose I've exhausted every possible argument? And now, when
+she finds out what I've done----"
+
+"But you haven't done anything--yet."
+
+"She wouldn't believe me if I told her that I hadn't seen Harold. She
+never believes me."
+
+"She'd believe _me_," said Quin, "and what's more she'd listen to me."
+
+Eleanor did not answer; she sat doggedly watching the swinging doors,
+through which a draggled throng came and went.
+
+"He'll be here soon," she said half-heartedly--"unless he's gone off for
+a week-end somewhere. If he doesn't come soon we can go up to the hotel
+and find out whether he left any address. Perhaps you could get me a room
+there until to-morrow."
+
+Quin's courage was at its lowest ebb. It was like trying to save a
+drowning person who fights desperately against being saved. He heard a
+stentorian voice through a megaphone announcing that the eight-thirty
+train for the southwest would leave in five minutes on track three, and
+he decided to stake his all on a last chance.
+
+"That's my train," he said, rising briskly. "Are you coming with me, or
+are you going to stay here?"
+
+"I am going to stay. But you can't leave me like this! It's pouring rain
+and I haven't any umbrella, and if I get to the hotel and he isn't there,
+what shall I do? Why don't you help me, Quin? Why don't you stay with me
+till he comes?"
+
+"Sorry," said Quin, steeling his heart against those appealing eyes and
+praying for strength to be firm, "but I've got to be ready to go back to
+work to-morrow morning. Is it good-by?"
+
+He held out his hand, but she did not take it. Instead she clutched his
+sleeve.
+
+"What would _you_ do, Quin?" she asked. "Tell me honestly, not what you
+want me to do, or think I ought to do, but what would you do in my
+place?"
+
+In spite of his pretended haste, he stopped to consider the matter.
+
+"Well," he admitted frankly, "it would depend entirely on how much I
+trusted the fellow I'd promised to marry."
+
+"I _do_ trust him, and I'm going to marry him; but, you see, Rose's
+telegram, and his not being here, and all, have made me so unhappy! I
+know he can explain everything when I see him, only I don't know what to
+do now. Do you think I ought to go back?"
+
+"That's for you to decide."
+
+"But I tell you I can't decide. Somebody's always made up my mind for me,
+and now to have to decide this big thing all in a minute----"
+
+"All aboard for the Southwestern Limited!" came the voice through the
+megaphone.
+
+Eleanor glanced instinctively at her suit-case, then up at Quin.
+
+"Shall I take it?" he asked, with his heart in his throat; and then, when
+she did not say no, he seized it in one hand and her in the other.
+
+"We'd better run for it!" he said.
+
+"But, Quin--wait a minute--I won't go to grandmother's! You've got to
+protect me----"
+
+"You leave it to me!" he said, as he thrust her almost roughly through
+the crowd and rushed her toward the gate.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 26
+
+
+"So I am to understand that the young lady defies my authority and
+refuses point-blank to come home."
+
+"That's about what it comes to, I reckon."
+
+It was evening of that eventful Sunday when Eleanor and Quin had returned
+from Chicago. He and Madam Bartlett sat facing each other in the
+sepulchral library, where the green reading-light cast its sickly light
+on Lincoln and his Cabinet, on Andrew Jackson dying in the bosom of his
+family, on Madam savagely gripping the lions' heads on the arms of her
+mahogany chair.
+
+That her quarrel with Eleanor and the girl's subsequent flight had made
+the old lady suffer was evinced by the pinched look of her nostrils and
+the heavy, sagging lines about her mouth; but in her grim old eyes there
+was no sign of compromise.
+
+"Very well!" she said. "Let her stay at her precious Martels'. She will
+stand just about one week of their shiftlessness. I shan't send her a
+stitch of clothes or a cent of money. Maybe I can starve some sense into
+her."
+
+Quin traced the pattern in the table-cover with a massive brass
+paper-knife. It was a delicate business, this he had committed himself
+to, and everything depended upon his keeping Madam's confidence.
+
+"You never did try letting her have her head, did you?" He put the
+question as a disinterested observer.
+
+"No. I don't intend to until she gets this fool stage business out of her
+mind."
+
+"Well, of course you can hold that up for six months, but you can't stop
+it in the end."
+
+"Yes, I can, too. I'd like to know if I didn't keep Isobel from being a
+missionary, and Enid from marrying Francis Chester when he didn't make
+enough money to pay her carfare."
+
+"That's so," agreed Quin cheerfully. "And then, there was Mr. Ranny." He
+waited for the remark to sink in; then he went on lightly: "But say! They
+all belong to another generation. Things are run on different lines these
+days."
+
+"More's the pity! Every little fool of a kite thinks all it has to do is
+to break its string to be free."
+
+"Miss Nell don't want to break the string; she just wants it lengthened."
+
+Madam turned upon him fiercely.
+
+"See here, young man. You think I don't know what you are up to; but,
+remember, I wasn't born yesterday. If Eleanor has sent you up here to
+talk this New York stuff----"
+
+"She hasn't; I came of my own accord."
+
+"Well, you needn't think just because I've shown you a few favors that
+you can meddle in family affairs. It's not the first time you've attended
+to other people's business."
+
+Her fingers were working nervously and her eyes beginning to twitch. She
+made Quin think of Minerva when Mr. Bangs came into the office.
+
+"I bet there's one time you are glad I meddled," he said with easy good
+humor. "You might have been walking on a peg-stick, Queen Vic, if I
+hadn't butted in. Do you have to use your crutches now?"
+
+"Crutches! I should say not. I don't even use a cane. See here!"
+
+She rose and, steadying herself, walked slowly and painfully to the door
+and back.
+
+"Bully for you!" said Quin, helping her back into the chair. "Now what
+were we talking about?"
+
+"You were trying to hold a brief for Eleanor."
+
+"So I was. You see, I had an idea that if you'd let me put the case up to
+you fair and square, maybe you'd see it in a different light."
+
+"Well, that's where you were mistaken."
+
+"How do you know? You haven't listened to me yet!"
+
+Madam glared at him grimly.
+
+"Go ahead," he said. "Get it out of your system."
+
+"Well, it's like this," Quin plunged into his subject. "Next July Miss
+Nell will be of age and have her own money to do as she likes with, won't
+she?"
+
+"She won't have much," interpolated Madam. "Twenty thousand won't take
+her far."
+
+"It will take her to New York and let her live pretty fine for two or
+three years. Everybody will cotton up to her and flatter her and make her
+think she's a second Julia Marlowe, and meantime they'll be helping her
+spend her money. Now, my plan is this. Why don't you give her just barely
+enough to live on, and let her try it out on the seamy side for the next
+six months? Nobody will know who she is or what's coming to her, and
+maybe when she comes up against the real thing she won't be so keen about
+it."
+
+Madam followed him closely, and for a moment it looked as if the common
+sense of his argument appealed to her. Then her face set like a vise.
+
+"No!" she thundered her decision. "It would be nothing less than handing
+her over bodily to that pompous old biped Claude Martel! For the next six
+months she has got to stay right here, where I can know what she is doing
+and where she is!"
+
+"Do you know where she was last night?" Quin played his last trump.
+
+She shot a suspicious look at him from under her shaggy brows.
+
+"You said she was at the Martels'."
+
+"I did not. I said she was all right and you'd hear from her to-day."
+
+"Where was she?"
+
+"She was on the way to Chicago to join Mr. Phipps."
+
+He could not have aimed his blow more accurately. Its effect was so
+appalling that he feared the consequences. Her face blanched to an ashy
+white and her eyes were fixed with terror.
+
+"She--she--hasn't married him?" she cried hoarsely.
+
+"No, no; not yet. But she may any time."
+
+"Good Lord! Why haven't you told me this before? Call Isobel! No! she's
+at church! Get Ranny! Somebody must go after the child!"
+
+Quin laid a quieting hand on her arm, which was shaking as if with the
+palsy.
+
+"Don't get excited," he urged. "Somebody did go after her last night, and
+brought her home."
+
+"But where is she now? Where is that contemptible Phipps? I'll have him
+arrested! Are you sure Nellie is safe?"
+
+"I left her safe and sound at the Martels' half an hour ago. Will you
+listen while I tell you all about it?"
+
+As quietly as he could he told the story, interrupted again and again by
+Madam's hysterical outbursts. When he had finished she struggled to her
+feet.
+
+"The child is stark mad!" she cried. "I am going after her this instant."
+
+"She won't see you," warned Quin.
+
+"I'll show you whether she sees me or not! I am going to bring her home
+with me to-night. She's got to be protected against that scoundrel. Ring
+for the carriage!"
+
+Quin did not move. "She said if any of you started after her you'd find
+her gone when you got there."
+
+"But who will tell her?"
+
+"I will. I promised she wouldn't have to see you. It was the only way I
+could get her back from Chicago."
+
+She scowled at him in silence, measuring his determination against her
+own.
+
+"Very well," she said at last. "Since you are in such high favor, go and
+tell her that she can come home, and nothing more will be said about it.
+I suppose there's nothing else to do under the circumstances. But I'll
+teach her a lesson later!"
+
+Quin balanced the paper-knife carefully on one finger.
+
+"I don't think you quite understand," he said. "She isn't coming home.
+She still says she is going to marry Mr. Phipps. He will probably get her
+telegram when he goes to the hotel, and when she doesn't turn up in
+Chicago he will take the first train down here. That's the way I've
+figured it out."
+
+"And do you think I am going to sit here, and do nothing while all this
+is taking place?"
+
+"No; that's what I been driving at all along. I want you and Miss Nell to
+come to some compromise before he gets here."
+
+"What sort of compromise? Haven't I swallowed my pride and promised to
+say nothing if she comes back? Does she want me to get down on my knees
+and apologize?"
+
+"No. That's the trouble. She don't want you to do anything. All she is
+thinking about is getting married and going to New York."
+
+"She can go to New York without that! That contemptible man! I knew all
+summer he was filling her head with romantic notions, but I never dreamed
+of this. Why, she's nothing but a child! She doesn't know what love
+is----" Then her voice broke in sudden panic. "We must stop it at any
+cost. Go--go promise her anything. Tell her I'll send her to New York, to
+Europe, anywhere to get her out of that wretch's clutches. My poor child!
+My poor baby!"
+
+Her grief was no less violent than her anger had been, and her tearless
+sobs almost shook her worn old frame to pieces.
+
+Quin knew just how she felt. It had been like that with him last night
+when he heard the news. With one stride he was beside her and had
+gathered her into his arms.
+
+"There, there!" he said tenderly. "It's going to be all right. We are
+going to find a way out."
+
+This unexpected caress, probably the first one Madam had received in many
+years, reduced her to a state of unprecedented humility. She transferred
+her resentment from Eleanor to Harold Phipps, and announced herself ready
+to follow whatever course Quin suggested.
+
+"I'd offer her just this and nothing more," he advised: "The fare to New
+York, tuition at the dramatic school, and ten dollars a week."
+
+"She can't live on that."
+
+"Yes, she can. Rose Martel does."
+
+Madam became truculent at once.
+
+"Don't quote that girl to me. Eleanor's been used to very different
+surroundings."
+
+"That's the point. Let her have what she hasn't been used to. You have
+tried giving her a bunch of your money and telling her how to spend it.
+Try giving her a little of her own and letting her do as she likes with
+it."
+
+"I don't care what she does for the present, if she just won't marry that
+man Phipps. Make her give you her word of honor not to have anything
+whatever to do with him for the next six months. By that time she will
+have forgotten all about him."
+
+"I'll do my best," said Quin, rising. "You'll hear from me first thing in
+the morning."
+
+"Well, go now! But ring first for Hannah. We must pack the child's things
+to-night. The main thing is to get her out of town before that hound can
+get here. Don't you think either Ranny or Isobel had better take her on
+to New York to-morrow?"
+
+Quin returned to the Martels' breathing easily for the first time in
+twenty-four hours. As he passed Rose's room on the way to his own, he saw
+a light over the transom, and heard the girls' voices rising in heated
+argument. He knew that the subject under discussion was Harold Phipps,
+and that Rose's arraignment was meeting with indignant denial and
+protest. But the fact that Rose could offer specific evidence that would
+shake the staunchest confidence gave him grim satisfaction.
+
+He stumbled into his own small room, and lay across the bed looking up at
+the shadows made by the street lamp on the ceiling. Would Miss Nell
+believe what she heard? Would it go very hard with her? Would she give
+Phipps up? Would she accept Madam's offer? And, if she did, would she
+ever be willing to come home again?
+
+Then his thoughts swerved away from all those perplexing questions and
+went racing back over the events of the day. For nine blissful hours he
+had had Eleanor all to himself. They had taken a day-coach to avoid
+meeting any one she knew, and he had managed to secure a rear seat, out
+of the range of curious eyes. Here she had poured out all her troubles,
+allowing the accumulated bitterness of years to find vent in a torrent of
+unrestrained confidence.
+
+She recalled the days of her unhappy childhood, when she had been fought
+over and litigated about and contended for, until the whole world seemed
+a place of hideous discord and petty jealousies. She pictured her
+circumscribed life at the Bartletts', shut in, watched over, smothered
+with care and affection, but never allowed an hour of freedom. She dwelt
+on the increasing tyranny of her grandmother, the objection to her
+friends, the ruthless handling of several prospective lovers. And she
+ended by telling him all about her affair with Harold Phipps, and
+declaring that nothing they could say or do would make her give him up!
+And then, quite worn out, she had fallen asleep and her head had drooped
+against his shoulder.
+
+Quin could feel now the delicious weight of her limp body as she leaned
+against him. He had sat so still, in his fear of waking her, that his arm
+had been numb for an hour. Then, later on, when she did wake up, he had
+got her some cold water to bathe her face, and persuaded her to eat a
+sandwich and drink a glass of milk. After that she had felt much better,
+and even cheered up enough to laugh at the way he looked in the queer cap
+the obliging stranger had given him.
+
+"I could make her happy! I know I could make her happy!" he whispered
+passionately to the shadows on the ceiling. "She don't love me now; but
+maybe when she gets over this----"
+
+His thoughts leaped to the future. He must be ready if the time ever
+came. He must forge ahead in the next six months, and be in a position by
+the time Eleanor had tried out her experiment to put his fate to the
+test. He must make up to old Bangs, and stop criticizing his methods and
+saying things that annoyed him. He must sacrifice everything now to the
+one great object of pleasing him. Pleasing him meant advancement;
+advancement meant success; success might mean Eleanor!
+
+He got up restlessly and tiptoed to the door. The light over Rose's
+transom was gone and the house was silent.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 27
+
+
+Eleanor did not leave for New York the following day. Neither did she see
+Harold Phipps when he arrived on the morning train. His anxious inquiries
+over the telephone were met by Rose's cool assurance that Miss Bartlett
+was spending the week-end with her, and that she would write and explain
+her silly telegram. His demand for an immediate interview was parried
+with the excuse that Miss Bartlett was confined to her bed with a severe
+headache and could not see any one. Without saying so directly, Rose
+managed to convey the impression that Miss Bartlett was quite indifferent
+to his presence in the city and not at all sure that she would be able to
+see him at all.
+
+This was an interpretation of the situation decidedly more liberal than
+the facts warranted. Even after Eleanor had been served with the
+unpalatable truth, generously garnished with unpleasant gossip, she still
+clung to her belief in Harold and the conviction that he would be able to
+explain everything when she saw him. Quin's report of Madam's offer to
+send her to New York was received in noncommittal silence. She would
+agree to nothing, she declared, until she saw Harold, her only concession
+being that she would stay in bed until the afternoon and not see him
+before evening.
+
+About noon a messenger-boy brought her a box of flowers and a bulky
+letter. The latter had evidently been written immediately after Harold's
+talk with Rose, and he made the fatal mistake of concluding, from her
+remarks, that Eleanor had changed her mind after sending the telegram and
+had not come to Chicago. He therefore gave free rein to his imagination,
+describing in burning rhetoric how he had received her message Saturday
+night just as he was retiring, how he tossed impatiently on his bed all
+night, and rose at dawn to be at the station when the train came in. He
+pictured vividly his ecstasy of expectation, his futile search, his
+bitter disappointment. He had dropped everything, he declared, to take
+the next train to Kentucky to find out what had changed her plans, and to
+persuade her to be married at once and return with him to Chicago. The
+epistle ended with a love rhapsody that deserved a better fate than to be
+torn into shreds and consigned to the waste-basket.
+
+"Tell the boy not to wait!" was Eleanor's furious instruction. "Tell him
+there's no answer now or ever!"
+
+Then she pitched the flowers after the note, locked her door, and refused
+to admit any one for the rest of the day.
+
+After that her one desire was to get away. She felt utterly humiliated,
+disillusioned, disgraced, and her sole hope for peace lay in the further
+humiliation of accepting Madam's offer and trying to go on with her work.
+But even here she met an obstacle. A letter arrived from Papa Claude,
+saying that he would not be able to get possession of the little
+apartment until December first, a delay that necessitated Eleanor's
+remaining with the Martels for another month.
+
+The situation was a delicate and a difficult one. Eleanor was more than
+willing to forgo the luxuries to which she had been accustomed and was
+even willing to share Rose's untidy bedroom; but the knowledge that she
+was adding another weight to Cass's already heavy burden was intolerable
+to her. To make things worse, she was besieged with notes and visits and
+telephone calls from various emissaries sent out by her grandmother.
+
+"I'll go perfectly crazy if they don't leave me alone!" she declared one
+night to Quin. "They act as if studying for the stage were the wickedest
+thing in the world. Aunt Isobel was here all morning, harping on my
+immortal soul until I almost hoped I didn't have one. This afternoon Aunt
+Flo came and warned me against getting professional notions in my head,
+and talked about my social position, and what a blow it would be to the
+family. Then, to cap the climax, Uncle Ranny had the nerve to telephone
+and urge me against taking any step that would break my grandmother's
+heart. Uncle Ranny! Can you beat that?"
+
+"I'd chuck the whole bunch for a while," was Quin's advice. "Why don't
+you let their standards go to gallagher and live up to your own?"
+
+"That's what I want to do, Quin," she said earnestly. "My standards are
+just as good as theirs, every bit. I've got terrifically high ideals.
+Nobody knows how serious I feel about the whole thing. It isn't just a
+silly whim, as grandmother thinks; it's the one thing in the world I care
+about--now."
+
+Quin started to speak, reconsidered it, and whistled softly instead. He
+had formed a Spartan resolve to put aside his own claims for the present,
+and be in word and deed that "best friend" to whom he had urged Eleanor
+to come in time of trouble. With heroic self-control, he set himself to
+meet her problems, even going so far as to encourage her spirit of
+independence and to help her build air-castles that at present were her
+only refuge from despair.
+
+"Just think of all the wonderful things I can do if I succeed," she said.
+"Papa Claude need never take another pupil, and Myrna can go to college,
+and Cass and Fan Loomis can get married."
+
+"And don't forget Rose," suggested Quin, to keep up the interest. "You
+must do something handsome for her. She's a great girl, Rose is!"
+
+Eleanor looked at him curiously, and the smallest of puckers appeared
+between her perfectly arched brows. Quin saw it at once, and decided that
+Rose's recent handling of Mr. Phipps had met with disfavor, and he sighed
+as he thought of the hold the older man still had on Eleanor.
+
+During the next difficult weeks Quin devoted all his spare time to the
+grateful occupation of diverting the Martels' woe-begone little guest.
+Hardly a day passed that he did not suggest some excursion that would
+divert her without bringing her into contact with her own social world,
+from which she shrank with aversion. On Sundays and half-holidays he took
+her on long trolley rides to queer out-of-the-way places where she had
+never been before: to Zachary Taylor's grave, and George Rogers Clark's
+birthplace, to the venerable tree in Iroquois Park that bore the carved
+inscription, "D. Boone, 1735." One Sunday morning they went to Shawnee
+Park and rented a rowboat, in which they followed the windings of the
+Ohio River below the falls, and had innumerable adventures that kept them
+out until sundown.
+
+Eleanor had never before had so much liberty. She came and went as she
+pleased; and if she missed a meal the explanation that she was out with
+Quin was sufficient. Sometimes when the weather was good she would walk
+over to Central Park and meet him when he came home in the evening. They
+would sit under the bare trees and talk, or look over the books he had
+brought her from the library.
+
+At first she had found his selections a tame substitute for her recent
+highly spiced literary diet; but before long she began to take a languid
+interest in them. They invariably had to do with outdoor things--stars
+and flowers, birds and beasts, and adventures in foreign lands.
+
+"Here's a jim-dandy!" Quin would say enthusiastically. "It's all about
+bees. I can't pronounce the guy that wrote it, but, take it from me, he's
+got the dope all right."
+
+It was in the long hours of the day, when Eleanor was in the house alone,
+that she faced her darkest problems. She had been burnt so badly in her
+recent affair that she wanted nothing more to do with fire; yet she was
+chilled and forlorn without it. With all her courage she tried to banish
+the unworthy image of Harold Phipps, but his melancholy eyes still
+exercised their old potent charm, and the memory of his low, insistent
+tones still echoed in her ears. She came to the tragic conclusion that
+she was the victim of a hopeless infatuation that would follow her to her
+grave.
+
+So obsessed was she by the thought of her shattered love affair that she
+failed to see that a troubled conscience was equally responsible for her
+restlessness. Her life-long training in acquiescence and obedience was at
+grips with her desire to live her own life in her own way. She had not
+realized until she made the break how much she cared for the family
+approval, how dependent she was on the family advice and assistance, how
+hideous it was to make people unhappy. Now that she was about to obtain
+her freedom, she was afraid of it. Suppose she did not make good? Suppose
+she had no talent, after all? Suppose Papa Claude was as visionary about
+her career as he was about everything else? At such times a word of
+discouragement would have broken her spirit and sent her back to bondage.
+
+"Would you go on with it?" she asked Quin, time and again.
+
+"Sure," said Quin stoutly; "you'll never be satisfied until you try it
+out."
+
+"But suppose I'm a failure?"
+
+"Well, then you've got it out of your system, and won't have to go
+through life thinking about the big success you'd have been if you'd just
+had your chance."
+
+She was not satisfied with his answer, but it had to suffice. While he
+never discouraged her, she felt that he shared the opinion of the family
+that her ambition was a caprice to be indulged and got rid of, the sooner
+the better.
+
+The first day of December brought word from Claude Martel that the
+apartment was ready. Eleanor left on twenty-four hours' notice, and it
+required the combined efforts of both families to get her off. She had
+refused up to the last to see her grandmother, but had yielded to united
+pressure and written a stiff good-by note in which she thanked her for
+advancing the money, and added--not without a touch of bitterness--that
+it would all be spent for the purpose intended.
+
+Randolph Bartlett took her to the station in his car, and Miss Isobel met
+them there with a suit-case full of articles that she feared Eleanor had
+failed to provide.
+
+"I put in some overshoes," she said, fluttering about like a distracted
+hen whose adopted duckling unexpectedly takes to water. "I also fixed up
+a medicine-case and a sewing basket. I knew you would never think of
+them. And, dear, I know how you hate heavy underwear, but pneumonia is so
+prevalent. You must promise me not to take cold if you can possibly avoid
+it."
+
+Eleanor promised. Somehow, Aunt Isobel, with her anxious face and her
+reddened eyelids, had never seemed so pathetic before.
+
+"I'll write to you, auntie," she said reassuringly; "and you mustn't
+worry."
+
+"Don't write to me," whispered Miss Isobel tremulously. "Write to mother.
+Just a line now and then to let her know you think of her. She's quite
+feeble, Nellie, and she talks about you from morning until night."
+
+Eleanor's face hardened. She evidently did not enjoy imagining the nature
+of Madam's discourse. However, she squeezed Aunt Isobel's hand and said
+she would write.
+
+Then Quin arrived with the ticket and the baggage-checks, the train was
+called, and Eleanor was duly embraced and wept over.
+
+"We won't go through the gates," said Mr. Ranny, with consideration for
+Miss Isobel's tearful condition. "Quin will get you aboard all right.
+Good-by, kiddie!"
+
+Eleanor stumbled after Quin with many a backward glance. Both Aunt Isobel
+and Uncle Ranny seemed to have acquired haloes of kindness and affection,
+and she felt like a selfish ingrate. She looked at the lunch-box in her
+hand, and thought of Rose rising at dawn to fix it before she went to
+work. She remembered the little gifts Cass and Myrna and Edwin had
+slipped in her bag. How good they had all been to her, and how she was
+going to miss them! Now that she was actually embarked on her great
+adventure, a terrible misgiving seized her.
+
+"Train starts in two minutes, boss!" warned the porter, as Quin helped
+Eleanor aboard and piloted her to her seat.
+
+"You couldn't hold it up for half an hour, could you?" asked Quin. Then,
+as he glanced down and met Eleanor's eyes brimming with all those recent
+tendernesses, his carefully practised stoicism received a frightful jolt.
+
+As the "All aboard!" sounded, she clutched his sleeve in sudden panic.
+
+"Oh, Quin, I know I'm going to be horribly lonesome and homesick. I--I
+wish you were going too!"
+
+"All right! I'll go! Why not?"
+
+"But you can't! I was fooling. You must get off this instant!"
+
+"May I come on later? Say in the spring?"
+
+"Yes, yes! But get off now! Quick, we are moving!"
+
+She had almost to push him down the aisle and off the steps. Then, as the
+train gained speed, instead of looking forward to the wide fields of
+freedom stretching before her, she looked wistfully back to the
+disconsolate figure on the platform, and, with a sigh that was half for
+him and half for herself, she lifted her fingers to her lips and rashly
+blew him a good-by kiss.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 28
+
+
+That aërial kiss proved more intoxicating to Quin than all the more
+tangible ones he had ever received. It sent him swaggering through the
+next few months with his head in the air and his heart on fire. Nothing
+could stop him now, he told himself boastfully. Old Bangs was showing him
+signal favor, Madam Bartlett was his staunch friend, Mr. Ranny and the
+aunties were his allies, and even if Miss Nell didn't care for him yet,
+she didn't care for anybody else, and when a girl like Miss Nell looks at
+a fellow the way she had looked at him----
+
+At this rapturous point he invariably abandoned cold prose for poetry and
+burst into song.
+
+Almost every week brought him a letter from Eleanor--not the romantic,
+carefully penned epistles she had indited to Harold Phipps, but hasty
+scrawls often dashed off with a pencil. In them she described her absurd
+attempts at housekeeping in the little two-room apartment; her absorbing
+experiences in the dramatic school; all the ups and downs of her
+wonderful new life. She was evidently enjoying her freedom, but Quin
+flattered himself that between the lines he could find evidences of
+discouragement, of homesickness, and of the coming disillusionment on
+which he was counting to bring her home when her six months of study were
+over.
+
+It was only when Rose read him Papa Claude's lengthy effusions that his
+heart misgave him. Papa Claude announced that Eleanor was sweeping
+everything before her at the dramatic school, where her beauty and talent
+were causing much comment, and that he had not been mistaken when he had
+foreseen her destiny, and, "single-handed against the world," forced its
+fulfilment.
+
+Usually, upon reading one of Papa Claude's pyrotechnical efforts, Quin
+went to see Madam Bartlett. After all, he and the old lady were paddling
+in the same canoe, and their only chance of success was in pulling
+together.
+
+As the end of the six months of probation approached, Madam became more
+and more anxious. Ever since Eleanor's high-handed departure she had been
+undergoing a metamorphosis. Like most autocrats, the only things of which
+she took notice were the ones that impeded her progress. When they proved
+sufficiently formidable to withstand annihilation, she awarded them the
+respect that was their due. Eleanor's childish whim, heretofore crushed
+under her disapprobation, now loomed as a terrifying possibility. The
+girl had proved her mettle by living through the winter on a smaller
+allowance than Madam paid her cook. She had shown perseverance and pluck,
+and an amazing ability to get along without the aid of the family. In a
+few months she would be of age, and with the small legacy left her by her
+spendthrift father, would be in a position to snap her fingers in the
+face of authority.
+
+"If it weren't for that fool Phipps I'd have her home in twenty-four
+hours," Madam declared to Quin. "She'll be wanting to take a professional
+engagement next."
+
+Quin tried to reassure her, but his words rang hollow. He too was growing
+anxious as the months passed and Eleanor showed no sign of returning. He
+longed to throw his influence with Madam's in trying to induce her to
+come back before it was too late. The only thing that deterred him was
+his sense of fair play to Eleanor.
+
+"You let Miss Nell work it out for herself," he advised; "don't threaten,
+her or persuade her or bribe her. Leave her alone. She's got more common
+sense than you think. I bet she'll get enough of it by May."
+
+"Well, if she doesn't, I'm through with her, and you can tell her so. I
+meant to make Eleanor a rich woman, but, mark my word, if she goes on the
+stage I'll rewrite my will and cut her off without a penny. I'll even
+entail what I leave Isobel and Enid. I'll make her sorry for what she's
+done!"
+
+But with the approach of spring it was Madam who was sorry and not
+Eleanor. Quin's sympathies were roused every time he saw the old lady.
+Her affection and anxiety fought constantly against her pride and
+bitterness. For hours at a time she would talk to him about Eleanor,
+hungrily snatching at every crumb of news, and yet refusing to pen a line
+of conciliation.
+
+"If she can do without me, I can do without her," she would say
+stubbornly.
+
+Quin's business brought him to the Bartlett home oftener than usual these
+days. For twenty years Madam and Mr. Bangs, as partners in the firm of
+Bartlett & Bangs, had tried to run in opposite directions on the same
+track, with the result that head-on collisions were of frequent
+occurrence. Since Randolph Bartlett's retirement from the firm, Quin had
+succeeded him as official switchman, and had proven himself an adept. His
+skill in handling the old lady was soon apparent to Mr. Bangs, who lost
+no time in utilizing it.
+
+One afternoon in April, when Quin was busily employed at his desk, his
+eyes happened to fall upon a calendar, the current date of which was
+circled in red ink. The effect of the discovery was immediate. His
+energetic mood promptly gave way to one of extreme languor, and his gaze
+wandered from the papers in his hand across the grimy roof tops.
+
+This time last year he and Miss Nell had made their first pilgrimage to
+Valley Mead. It was just such a day as this, warm and lazy, with big
+white clouds loafing off there in the west. He wondered if the peach
+trees were in bloom now, and whether the white violets were coming up
+along the creek-bank. How happy and contented Miss Nell always seemed in
+the country! She had never known before what the outdoor life was like.
+How he would like to take her hunting for big game up in the Maine woods,
+or camping out in the Canadian Rockies with old Cherokee Jo for a guide!
+Or better still,--here his fancy bolted completely,--if he could only
+slip with her aboard a transport and make a thirty days' voyage through
+the South Seas!
+
+It was at this transcendent stage of his reveries that a steely voice at
+his elbow observed:
+
+"You seem to be finding a great deal to interest you in that smokestack,
+young man!"
+
+Quin descended from his height with brisk embarrassment.
+
+"Anything you wanted, sir?" he asked.
+
+Mr. Bangs looked about cautiously to make sure that nobody was in
+ear-shot, then he said abruptly:
+
+"I want you to come out to my place with me for overnight. I want to talk
+with you."
+
+Quin's amazement at this request was so profound that for a moment he did
+not answer. Surmises as to the nature of the business ranged from summary
+dismissal to acceptance into the firm. Never in his experience at the
+factory had any employee been recognized unofficially by Mr. Bangs. To
+all appearances, he lived in a large limousine which deposited him at the
+office at exactly eight-thirty and collected him again on the stroke of
+four. Rumor hinted, however, that he owned a place in the suburbs, and
+that the establishment was one that did not invite publicity.
+
+"Very well, sir," said Quin. "What time shall I be ready?"
+
+"We will start at once," said Mr. Bangs, leading the way to the door.
+
+On the drive out, Quin's efforts at conversation met with small
+encouragement. Mr. Bangs responded only when he felt like it, and did not
+scruple to leave an observation, or even a question, permanently
+suspended in an embarrassing silence. Quin soon found it much more
+interesting to commune with himself. It was exciting to conjecture what
+was about to happen, and what effect it would have on his love affair. If
+he got a raise, would he be justified in putting his fate to the test?
+All spring he had fought the temptation of going to New York in the hope
+that by waiting he would have more to offer. If by any miracle of grace
+Miss Nell should yield him the slightest foothold, he must be prepared to
+storm the citadel and take possession at once.
+
+The abrupt turn of the automobile into a somber avenue of locusts
+recalled him to the present, and he looked about him curiously. Mr. Bangs
+had not been satisfied to build his habitation far from town; he had
+taken, the added precaution to place it a mile back from the road. It was
+a somewhat pretentious modern house, half hidden by a high hedge. The
+window-shades were drawn, the doors were closed. The only signs of life
+about the place were a porch chair, still rocking as if from recent
+occupation, and a thin blue scarf that had evidently been dropped in
+sudden flight.
+
+Mr. Bangs let himself in with a latch-key, and led the way into a big
+dreary room that was evidently meant for a library. A handsome suite of
+regulation mahogany furniture did its best to justify the room's claim to
+its title, but rows of empty bookshelves yawned derision at the pretense.
+
+Mr. Bangs lit the electrolier, and, motioning Quin to a chair, sat down
+heavily. Now that he had achieved a guest, he seemed at a loss to know
+what to do with him.
+
+"Do you play chess?" he asked abruptly.
+
+"I can play 'most anything," Quin boasted. "Poker's my specialty."
+
+For an hour they bent over the chess-board, and Quin was conscious of
+those piercing black eyes studying him and grimly approving when he made
+a good play. For the first time, he began to rather like Mr. Bangs, and
+to experience a thrill of satisfaction in winning his good opinion.
+
+Only once was the game interrupted. The colored chauffeur who had driven
+them out came to the door and asked:
+
+"Shall I lay the table for two or three, sir?"
+
+Mr. Bangs lifted his head long enough to give him one annihilating
+glance.
+
+"I have but one guest," he said significantly. "Set the table for two."
+
+The dinner was one of the best Quin had ever tasted, and his frank
+enjoyment of it, and franker comment, seemed further to ingratiate him
+with Mr. Bangs, who waxed almost agreeable in discussing the various
+viands.
+
+After dinner they returned to the library and lit their cigars, and Quin
+waited hopefully.
+
+This time he was not to be disappointed.
+
+"Graham," said Mr. Bangs, "what salary are you drawing?"
+
+"One hundred and fifty, sir."
+
+"How long have you been at the factory?"
+
+"A year last February."
+
+"Not so long as I thought. You are satisfied, I take it?"
+
+Quin saw his chance and seized it.
+
+"It's all right until I can get something better."
+
+Mr. Bangs relit his cigar, and took his time about it. Then he blew out
+the match and threw it on the floor.
+
+"I am looking for a new traffic manager," he said.
+
+"What's the matter with Mr. Shields?" Quin inquired in amazement.
+
+"I have fired him. He talks too much. I want a man to manage traffic, not
+to superintend a Sunday-school."
+
+"But Mr. Shields has been there for years!"
+
+"That's the trouble. I want a younger man--one who is abreast of the
+times, familiar with modern methods."
+
+Quin's heart leaped within him. Could Mr. Bangs be intimating that he,
+Quinby Graham, with one year and four months' experience, might step over
+the heads of all of those older and more experienced aspirants into the
+empty shoes of the former traffic manager?
+
+The South Seas seemed to flow just around the corner.
+
+"I have been considering the matter," continued Mr. Bangs, catching a
+white moth between his thumb and forefinger and taking apparent pleasure
+in its annihilation, "and I've decided not to get a new man in for the
+summer, but to let you take the work for the present and see what you can
+do with it."
+
+Quin's joy was so swift and sudden that even the formidable banks of Mr.
+Bangs's presence could not keep it from overflowing.
+
+"I can handle it as easy as falling off a log!" he cried excitedly. "I
+know every State in the Union and then some. Of course, I hate to see old
+Shields go, but he _is_ a slow-coach. I'll put it all over him! You'll
+see if I don't!"
+
+"I am not so sure about that," said Mr. Bangs. "Shields had the sense to
+do what he was told without arguing the matter."
+
+Quin laughed joyously. "Right you are!" he agreed. "I'd have come out of
+the service with a couple of bars on my shoulders if I hadn't argued so
+much. I don't know what gets into me, but when I see a better way of
+running things I just have to say so."
+
+"Well, I don't want you to say so to me," warned Mr. Bangs. "There are
+certain business methods that we've got to observe, whether we like them
+or not. Take the matter of listing freight, for instance. That's where
+Shields fell down. He knows perfectly well that there isn't a successful
+firm in the country that doesn't classify its stuff under the head that
+calls for the lowest freight rates."
+
+"How do you mean?"
+
+Mr. Bangs proceeded to explain, concluding his remarks with the
+observation that you couldn't afford to be too particular in these
+matters.
+
+"But it is beating the railroads, isn't it?"
+
+"The railroads can afford it. They lose no chance to gouge the
+manufacturers. It's like taxes. The government knows that everybody is
+going to dodge them, and so it allows for it. Nobody is deceived, and
+nobody is the worse for it. Human nature is what it is, and you can't
+change it."
+
+"Does the traffic manager have to classify the exports?" Quin asked.
+
+"Certainly; that and routing the cars is his principal business. It's a
+difficult and responsible position in many ways, and I have my doubts
+about your being able to fill it."
+
+"I can fill it all right," said Quin, as confidently as before, but with
+a certain loss of enthusiasm. Upon the shining brows of his great
+opportunity he had spied the incipient horns of a dilemma.
+
+For the next two hours Mr. Bangs explained in detail the duties of the
+new position, going into each phase of the matter with such efficient
+thoroughness that Quin forgot his scruples in his absorbed interest in
+the recital. It was no wonder, he said to himself, that Mr. Bangs was one
+of the most successful manufacturers in the South. A man who was not only
+an executive and administrator, but who could make with his own hands the
+most complicated farming implement in his factory, was one to command
+respect. Even if he did not like him personally, it was a great thing to
+work under him, to have his approval, to be trusted by him.
+
+When Quin went up to his room at eleven o'clock, his head was whirling
+with statistics and other newly acquired facts, which he spent an hour
+recording in his note-book.
+
+It was not until he went to bed and lay staring into the darkness that
+the mental tumult subsided and the moral tumult began. The questions that
+he had resolutely kept in abeyance all evening began to dance in impish
+insistence before him. What right had he to take Shields's place, when he
+had said exactly the things that Shields had been fired for saying? Did
+he want to go the way Shields had gone, compromising with his conscience
+in order to keep his job, ashamed to face his fellow man, cringing,
+remorseful, unhappy?
+
+Then Mr. Bangs's arguments came back to him, specious, practical,
+convincing. Business was like politics; you could keep out if you didn't
+like it, but if you went in you must play the game as others played it or
+lose out. Five hundred a month! Why, a fellow wouldn't be ashamed to ask
+even a rich girl to marry him on that! The thought was balm to his pride.
+
+As he lay there thinking, he was conscious of a disturbing sound in the
+adjoining room, and he lifted his head to listen. It sounded like some
+one crying--not a violent outburst, but the hopeless, steady sobbing of
+despair. His thoughts flew back to that blue scarf on the porch, to the
+inquiry about an extra seat at the table. They were true, then, those
+rumors about the lonely, unhappy woman whom Mr. Bangs had kept a virtual
+prisoner for years. Quin wondered if she was young, if she was pretty. A
+fierce sympathy for her seized him as he listened to her sobs on the
+other side of the wall. What a beast a man was to put a woman in a
+position like that!
+
+His wrath, thus kindled, threw Mr. Bangs's other characteristics into
+startling relief. He saw him at the head of his firm, hated and despised
+by every employee. He saw him deceiving Madam Bartlett, sneering at Mr.
+Ranny's efforts at reform, terrorizing little Miss Leaks. Then he had a
+swift and relentless vision of himself in his new position, a well
+trained automaton, expected to execute Mr. Bangs's orders not only in the
+factory but in the Bartlett household as well.
+
+He tossed restlessly on his pillow. If only that woman would stop crying,
+perhaps he could get a better line on the thing! But she did not stop,
+and somehow while she cried he could see nothing good in Bangs or what he
+stood for. Hour after hour his ambition and his love fought against his
+principles, and dawn found him still awake, staring at the ceiling.
+
+Going back to town after an early breakfast, he said to Mr. Bangs:
+
+"I've been thinking it over, sir, and if you don't mind I think I'll keep
+the position I've got."
+
+"What do you mean?" demanded Mr. Bangs. "You decline the promotion?"
+
+"I am afraid I am not the man for the job," said Quin.
+
+"That's for me to decide."
+
+Quin was visibly embarrassed. After his enthusiasm of the night before,
+his present attitude called for an explanation.
+
+"Well, you see," he said awkwardly, "it may be good business and all
+that, but there are some things a fellow can't do when he feels about
+them the way I do."
+
+"Meaning, I suppose, that your standards are so much higher than those of
+the rest of us that you cannot trade in the market-place?"
+
+"No, sir; I don't mean anything of the kind," Quin flashed back, hot at
+the accusations of self-righteousness, but unable to defend himself
+without criticizing his employer.
+
+"And this is final? You've definitely decided?"
+
+"I have."
+
+"Very well; I am through with you." And Mr. Bangs unfolded his newspaper
+and read it the rest of the way to the city.
+
+At the office door he was dismounting from the car with his silence still
+unbroken, when Quin asked nervously:
+
+"Shall I go on with my old job, sir?"
+
+Mr. Bangs wheeled upon him, his eyes like fiery gimlets.
+
+"No!" he thundered. "You needn't go on with anything! For six months I
+have wasted time trying to teach you something about business. I've
+pushed you along faster than your ability warranted. I've given you a
+chance to quadruple your salary. And what is the result? You give me a
+lot of hot air about your conscience. Why don't you get a soap-box and
+preach on the street-corners? You can draw your money and go. There is no
+room on my pay-roll for angels!"
+
+And, with a contemptuous shrug, he passed into the factory, leaving Quin
+standing dazed and appalled on the sidewalk.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 29
+
+
+As long as a man can see his goal shining, however faint and distant, he
+will steer his craft with tolerable reason and patience; but let the
+beacon-light be extinguished, and he promptly abandons reason and rashly
+trusts to instinct to guide him.
+
+Quin, who had resolutely kept his course as long as he had been sure of
+his steady progress toward success, lost his head completely at this
+sudden collapse of his hopes, and took the first train for New York. A
+sudden mad necessity was upon him to see Eleanor at once. One look of
+encouragement, one word of hope from her, and he would rush back to port
+and gladly begin the voyage all over again.
+
+He arrived at the Eighty-second Street apartment about six o'clock in the
+evening, and, after studying the dingy name-plates, took the five flights
+of stairs with uncommendable speed, and presented himself at the rear
+door on the sixth floor.
+
+As he waited for an answer to his ring, he wondered if he had not made a
+mistake about the name on the door-plate. The narrow dark hall, permeated
+with a smell of onions and cabbage, was all too familiar to him, but it
+was not at all the proper setting for Eleanor. His bewilderment increased
+when the door was opened by a white-aproned figure, who after a moment of
+blank amazement seized his hand in both of hers and pressed it
+rapturously.
+
+At least, that was what Quin imagined took place; but when, a moment
+later, he sat opposite a composed young lady who had removed her impulse
+with her apron, he knew that he must have been mistaken. She was still
+his adored Miss Nell, but with a difference that carried her leagues away
+from him. He knew how to cope with the hot-headed, rebellious Miss Nell;
+with the teasing, indifferent, provocative Miss Nell; and even with the
+disconsolate little Miss Nell who had wept against his shoulder coming
+home from Chicago. But in the presence of this beautiful, grown-up,
+self-contained young lady he felt thoroughly awkward and ill at ease. Had
+it not been for the warmth of her smile and the eagerness with which she
+plied him with questions, his courage would have failed him utterly.
+
+"Now tell me all about everything!" she urged. "You are the first human
+being I've seen from home for four mortal months. How's everybody at
+grandmother's? Has Aunt Enid come home? How are Rose and the children?"
+
+"One at a time!" protested Quin. "Tell me first about yourself. What sort
+of a place is this you are living in?"
+
+"You mustn't criticize our suite!" she said gaily. "This is a combination
+bedroom, dining-room, and kitchen. I am the cook and housemaid, and Papa
+Claude is the butler. You ought to see the way I've learned to cook on
+the chafing-dish!"
+
+Quin was not in the least interested in her culinary accomplishments. It
+offended his sense of the proprieties to see his divinity reduced to such
+necessities, and he did not at all approve of her surroundings.
+
+"When are you coming home?" he asked abruptly.
+
+Eleanor's eyes dropped.
+
+"That depends. I may be here all summer. I've had an engagement offered
+me."
+
+Quin's hands grew cold. "You don't mean that you're going to act for
+_pay_?"
+
+"Of course. Why not? That's what I've been working for."
+
+"But I thought when you tried it out that you would change your
+mind--that you wouldn't like it as much as you thought you would."
+
+"But I _do_. I adore it! Nothing on earth can ever make me give it up!"
+
+Quin's heart sank. "But I thought you'd had enough," he said. "I thought
+you were homesick and lonesome."
+
+"Who wouldn't have been? Look at the way they have treated me at home? Do
+you know, none of them ever write to me any more?"
+
+Quin tried not to look guilty, but the fact that he had counseled this
+course of discipline weighed upon him.
+
+"Haven't I written enough for the family?" he asked.
+
+But she was not to be put off.
+
+"They treat me as if I had done something disgraceful!" she said
+indignantly. "My allowance is just half what it used to be, and yet I
+have to pay all my own expenses. As for clothes, I never was so shabby in
+my life. But I can stand that. It's grandmother's silence that I resent.
+How can she pretend to care for me when she ignores my letters and treats
+me with perfect indifference?"
+
+Hurt pride quivered through the anger in her voice, and she looked at
+Quin appealingly. Stung by his silence, she burst out afresh:
+
+"Doesn't she ever ask about me? Has she let me go for good and all?"
+
+"Wasn't that what you wanted?"
+
+"You _know_ it wasn't! I did everything to get her consent. I'd--I'd give
+anything now if she would look at things differently. Do you think, when
+she finds out that I am actually on the stage, that she will ever forgive
+me--that she will ever want me to come home again?"
+
+That was the moment when Quin should have delivered Madam's ultimatum;
+but, before he had the chance, a key was turned in the lock, and the next
+instant Claude Martel's effulgent presence filled the room.
+
+For a moment he stood poised lightly, consciously, his cane and gloves in
+one hand, and his soft felt hat turned gracefully across the other. On
+his ankles were immaculate white spats, and in his buttonhole blossomed
+the inevitable rose.
+
+"Quinby Graham!" he cried in accents of rapture. "My Cassius's beloved
+Quin! _My_ beloved Quin! What happy fortune blew you hither? But no
+matter. You are here--you are ours. Eleanor and I are going out to a
+studio party at a dear, dear friend's. You shall accompany us!"
+
+"Oh, no, Papa Claude," protested Eleanor. "Quin doesn't want to go to
+Miss Linton's messy old party. Neither do I. You go and leave us here.
+There are a million things I want to ask him."
+
+But Papa Claude would not consider it. "You can ask them to-morrow," he
+said. "To-night I claim you both. We will introduce Quinby as one of the
+gallant heroes of the Great War. I shall tell his story--no--he shall
+tell it! Come, put on your hat, Eleanor; we must start at once."
+
+"But here! Hold on!" protested Quin, laughing and freeing himself from
+Papa Claude's encircling arm, "I'm not fixed to go to a party, and I
+haven't got any story to tell. I'll clear out and come back to-morrow."
+
+"No, no!" protested Eleanor and Papa Claude in a breath, and after a
+brief struggle for supremacy the latter triumphantly continued:
+
+"I promise you shall say nothing, if you prefer it. Modesty is gallantry's
+crowning grace. But you _must_ accompany us. My heart is set upon it.
+Eleanor darling, here's your wrap. Come, Quinby, my boy!" And the dynamic
+little gentleman hooked an arm through each of theirs and, in spite of
+their protests, bore them triumphantly down the stairs and off to the
+party.
+
+It was not until they had boarded a crowded downtown car and found
+themselves wedged in the aisle that Quin and Eleanor managed to have
+another word alone.
+
+"It's a shame we had to come!" she pouted, looking up at him from under a
+tilted hat-brim that supported three dangling cherries.
+
+"Where are we going?" he asked, thrilled by the discovery that her lips
+and the cherries matched.
+
+"To a studio party down in Washington Square. Papa Claude is trying to
+get Estelle Linton to play the lead in 'Phantom Love.' You always meet
+all sorts of freaks at her parties."
+
+"I didn't come to New York to meet freaks."
+
+"What did you come for?"
+
+"Shall I tell you?"
+
+"Of course--why not?"
+
+"You want to know? Right now?"
+
+He was looking at her with an expression that was never intended to be
+worn in a public conveyance, and the thin-faced Polish woman on whose
+toes they were all but standing looked at them with such lively
+comprehension that Eleanor felt called upon to assume her most haughty
+and dignified manner for the rest of the way.
+
+Miss Linton's party was in full swing when they arrived. It was an
+extremely hilarious party, the interest centering about a fat man in a
+dress-suit, with a bath towel around his waist, who was attempting to
+distil a forbidden elixir from an ingenious condenser of his own
+invention.
+
+The studio, under a grimy skylight, was cluttered with bric-à-brac,
+animate and inanimate. A Daibutsu in a gilded shrine dominated one
+corner, and a handsome woman in a Manchu coat and swinging ear-rings of
+jade held court in another. At sight of the Martel group she laid down
+the small silver pipe she was smoking, and swam toward them through a
+cloud of incense and tobacco smoke.
+
+"Dear old C. M.! Bless his heart!" she cried, kissing Papa Claude
+effusively. Then she nodded good-naturedly to Eleanor, and held out a
+welcoming hand to Quin.
+
+"Who is this nice boy?" she asked, her languid black eyes sweeping his
+face.
+
+"Allow me to present ex-Sergeant Quinby Graham," said Papa Claude
+impressively--"a soldier of whom his friends and his country have every
+reason to be proud."
+
+Then, to Quin's utter chagrin, he was conscious of the fact that Papa
+Claude was giving, in an audible aside, an account of his prowess that
+placed him second only to another sergeant whom the world acclaimed its
+chief hero.
+
+"For the Lord's sake, head him off!" he whispered in an agony of
+embarrassment to Eleanor. "I didn't do half those things he's telling
+about, and besides----"
+
+But it was too late to interfere. Papa Claude, the center of one animated
+group after another, was kissing his way through the crowd, whispering
+the news as he went--that the guest of the evening was no other than the
+distinguished young Graham whom they all doubtless remembered, etc.
+
+Within fifteen minutes Quin found himself the lion of the evening. Even
+the fat man and his improvised still were eclipsed by the
+counter-attraction. His very earnestness in disclaiming the honors thrust
+upon him added enormously to his popularity. The more clumsy and awkward
+he was, and the more furiously he blushed and protested, the more
+attention he received.
+
+"So naïf!" "So perfectly natural!" "Nothing but a boy, and yet think what
+he has done!" were phrases heard on every side.
+
+Papa Claude corralled him in the corner with the Daibutsu and pompously
+presented each guest in turn. Quin felt smothered by the incense and the
+flattery. His collar grew tight, perspiration beaded his brow, and he
+began to cough.
+
+"Effects of mustard-gas," Papa Claude explained in a stage whisper.
+
+For seeming hours the agony endured, until the advent of refreshments
+caused a momentary diversion, and he made a hasty bolt for Eleanor and
+freedom.
+
+He found her sitting on the divan, looking rather bored by the attentions
+of a stout elderly person with small porcine eyes and a drooping black
+mustache. Without troubling to apologize, Quin interrupted the
+conversation to say abruptly:
+
+"Miss Nell, I am going."
+
+Eleanor started to rise, but the red-faced one lifted a protesting voice.
+
+"See here, young man," he blustered. "You can't run off with this little
+girl just when I've got my first chance at her this evening. She's going
+to stay right here and let me make love to her--isn't she?"
+
+He turned a confident eye upon Eleanor, and even ventured to lay a plump
+detaining finger on her cool, slim wrist.
+
+Eleanor rose instantly.
+
+"I thought you were never coming!" she said impatiently over the stout
+man's head, "I've been ready to go for an hour!"
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 30
+
+
+Down in the open square, under the clear cool stars, they looked at each
+other and laughed.
+
+"Lead me to a bus!" cried Quin. "I want to ride on top of it where the
+wind can blow through my whiskers. My head feels like a joss-house!"
+
+"Oh, but you were funny!" cried Eleanor. "I wish you could have seen your
+face when all those women swarmed around you. I was afraid you were going
+to jump out of the window! Did you ever feel anything so hot and stuffy
+as that room? And weren't they all silly and make-believe?"
+
+Quin gave a mighty sigh of relief at being out of it.
+
+"Is this the sort of thing you get let in for often?" he inquired,
+aghast.
+
+"Oftener than I like. You see, all those people are Papa Claude's old
+friends, and he's been having a lovely time showing me off as he showed
+you off to-night."
+
+"But you surely don't _like_ it?"
+
+"Of course I don't. And they know it. They are already calling me a prig,
+and poking fun at me for not smoking and for not liking to have my hands
+patted and my cheeks pinched. Isn't it funny, Quin? At home I was always
+miserable because there were too many barriers; I wanted to tear them all
+down. Here, where there aren't any, I find myself building them up at
+every turn, and getting furious when people climb over them."
+
+"Bartlett _versus_ Martel, eh?"
+
+"I suppose so. Heaven knows, I wish I were one thing or the other."
+
+"Oh, I don't know," said Quin. "You are pretty nice just as you are."
+Then he added inconsequently: "Who was that fat man you were talking to
+when I came up?"
+
+"Mr. Pfingst. He is Estelle Linton's backer."
+
+"Backer?" queried Quin. Then, when he saw Eleanor's eyes drop, he added
+vaguely: "Oh! I see!"
+
+For the next block, strange to say, he did not think so much about
+Eleanor as he did about Miss Isobel Bartlett. The whole situation kept
+presenting itself through her austere eyes, and instinctively he put a
+protecting hand on Eleanor's elbow.
+
+When at last they were on top of the bus, with the big, noisy city
+apparently going in the opposite direction, they promptly forgot all
+about the studio party and plunged headlong into their own important
+affairs.
+
+"Begin at the _very_ beginning," commanded Eleanor, settling herself for
+a good long ride; "I want you to tell me everything."
+
+The beginning and the end and all that lay between them could easily have
+been compassed in three words by Quin. But there were things he had
+pledged himself to tell her before he even broached the subject that was
+shrieking for utterance. With painstaking exactness he set forth the
+facts that led up to his dismissal, trying to be fair to Mr. Bangs as
+well as to himself, and, above all, to claim no credit for taking the
+stand he had.
+
+But Eleanor would not see it thus. With characteristic fervor she
+espoused his cause. She declared he had been treated outrageously. He
+ought to have taken the matter straight to her grandmother. The very
+idea! After all the work he had done at the factory, for him to be
+dismissed just because he wouldn't do a thing that he considered
+dishonorable! She _hated_ Mr. Bangs--she always had hated him; and the
+more she dwelt upon the fact, the more ardently she approved Quin's
+course.
+
+"It was perfectly splendid of you to refuse his offer!" she cried, and
+her eyes blazed with that particular ray of feminine partisanship that is
+most soothing to the injured masculine. "And you won't lose by it in the
+long run. You'll get another position right off. Why don't you try to get
+one here in New York?"
+
+"Would you like me to?"
+
+"I should say I should! Then we could do all sorts of jolly things
+together. Not studio parties or cabarets, but jolly outdoor things like
+we used to do at home. Do stay, Quin; won't you?"
+
+She was looking up at him with such frank urgency and such entire
+sympathy that Quin lost his head completely.
+
+"Miss Nell," he blurted out, "if I stay and get a job and make good, will
+you marry me?"
+
+Eleanor, who was used to much more subtle manoeuvers, was caught unaware
+by this sudden attack. For a second she was thrown into confusion; then
+she rallied all her forces for the defense.
+
+"Why, of course I won't!" she said--then added with more conviction: "I
+am not going to marry _anybody_--not for years and years."
+
+"But I'll wait years and years," persisted Quin eagerly. "I wouldn't
+marry any girl until I could take care of her. But if you'll just give me
+a tip that maybe some day perhaps----"
+
+It was very difficult to go on addressing his remarks to an impassive
+classic profile--so difficult, in fact, that he abandoned the effort and
+let his eyes say the rest for him.
+
+Eleanor stirred uneasily.
+
+"I _wish_ you wouldn't be foolish, Quin, and spoil all our fun. I've told
+you I mean to go on the stage for good and all. You know you wouldn't
+want an actress for a wife."
+
+"I'd want you, whatever you were," he said with such fervor that she
+rashly gave him her luminous eyes again in gratitude.
+
+He made the most of the opportunity thus offered.
+
+"Honest, now!" he boldly challenged her. "You can't deny that you love me
+just a little bit, can you?"
+
+She stared straight ahead of her down the long dim avenue, making no
+response to his question. The cherries that swung from her hat-brim
+stirred not a hair's-breadth, but the commotion their stillness caused in
+Quin's heart was nothing short of cyclonic.
+
+"More than when you left Kentucky?" he persisted relentlessly.
+
+This time a barely perceptible nod stirred the cherries.
+
+"There!" he said triumphantly. "I knew it! Just keep right on the way you
+are going, and I won't say a word!"
+
+"But I haven't given you any encouragement; you mustn't think I have."
+
+"I know it. But you haven't turned me down."
+
+At this she smiled at him helplessly.
+
+"You are not very easy to turn down, Quin."
+
+"No," he admitted; "it can't be done."
+
+At this moment the bus rounded a sharp corner without slowing up, and the
+passengers on top were lurched forward with such violence that at least
+one masculine arm took advantage of the occasion to clasp a swaying lady
+with unnecessary solicitude. It may have been a second, and it may have
+been longer, that Quin sat with his arm about Eleanor and his hand
+clasping hers. Time and space ceased to exist for him and blessed
+infinity set in. And then----
+
+"Good gracious!" she cried, starting up. "Where are we? I'd forgotten all
+about our cross-street."
+
+As a matter of fact they were in Harlem.
+
+All the way back Eleanor refused to be serious about anything. The
+mischievous, contradictory, incalculable little devil that always lurked
+in her took full possession. She teased Quin, and laughed at him, leading
+him on one minute and running to cover the next.
+
+When they reached the apartment, she tripped up the five flights as
+lightly as a bird, and Quin, in his effort to keep up with her, overtaxed
+himself and paid the penalty. Heart and lungs were behaving outrageously
+when he reached the top landing, and he had to steady himself by the
+banister.
+
+"Oh, Quin, I ought to have remembered!" Eleanor cried, with what he
+considered divine compassion. "I can't bear to hear you cough like that!
+It sounds as if it were tearing you to pieces."
+
+"It's nothing!" said Quin, struggling to get his breath. "I'll be all
+right in a minute. What's the box by the door?"
+
+Eleanor's glance followed his.
+
+"If that old walrus, Pfingst, has dared to send me flowers again!" she
+cried, pouncing on the card and holding it so they both could read it.
+
+Penciled in small, even lines were the words:
+
+    Sorry to find the lady-bird flown. Will call up in the morning. H. P.
+
+Even in the dimly lighted hall, Quin could see the flush that suffused
+Eleanor's face.
+
+"It's Harold Phipps," she said, trying to be casual. "I--I didn't know he
+was in town."
+
+Quin followed her into the apartment, and stood dully by the table as she
+untied the box and lifted half a dozen exquisite white orchids from their
+bed of maidenhair ferns. Then, trying very hard to keep his voice steady,
+he asked gently:
+
+"What does this mean, Miss Nell? I thought you weren't going to have
+anything more to do with that man."
+
+"Well, I haven't. That is, not--not until he came on last month to see
+about the play."
+
+"What play?"
+
+"'Phantom Love.'"
+
+"But why did you have to see him?"
+
+"Because I am to be in the play."
+
+"Not in _his_ play?"
+
+"No more his than Papa Claude's."
+
+Quin's face darkened.
+
+"I saw him for only a few minutes," Eleanor went on, "and Papa Claude was
+with us. I give you my word, Quin, I've never spoken to him alone, or
+answered one of his letters."
+
+"Then he has been writing to you? What business has he got worrying you
+with letters and flowers when you have told him you are through with
+him?"
+
+In spite of his effort to keep calm, there was a rising note of anger in
+his voice.
+
+"He is not worrying me," said Eleanor, evidently conscious of her
+weakness in admitting Harold at the window of friendship when she had
+banished him from the door of love. "He understands perfectly that
+everything is over between us. But it would be silly for us to refuse to
+speak to each other when we shall necessarily be thrown together a lot."
+
+"Thrown together? How do you mean?"
+
+"At rehearsals."
+
+"Do you mean he is to be here in New York?"
+
+"Yes--after next month. He has given up his position in Chicago, so he
+can devote all the time to the play. You see, he not only helped to write
+it, but he is financing it."
+
+"So he is the--backer?" Quin was scarcely responsible for what he said,
+so suddenly had disaster trodden on the heels of ecstasy.
+
+"He is Papa Claude's partner and producer," said Eleanor with dignity.
+"If I don't care anything for him, I don't see what harm there is in
+seeing him."
+
+"Not liking whisky won't keep it from going to your head," said Quin
+stubbornly.
+
+"That's perfect nonsense; and besides, what can I do? It's his play as
+well as ours. I can't ask him to stay away from rehearsals."
+
+"No; but you can stay away yourself. You don't have to be in this play.
+Something else will turn up. You can afford to wait."
+
+"But that's just the point--I can't! And, besides, think how silly and
+childish it would be for me to refuse a wonderful chance for a
+professional début that might not come again in years."
+
+"But don't you see, Miss Nell, you are in honor bound not to go on with
+this?"
+
+"Honor bound? How do you mean?"
+
+"Why, to Queen Vic."
+
+"I agreed to break my engagement with Harold Phipps and not to answer any
+of his letters. I've kept my promise."
+
+"Yes; but I thought, and I made her think, that you agreed not to see him
+or have anything to do with him for six months."
+
+"Well, the time will be up in six weeks."
+
+"Lots can happen in six weeks."
+
+If Quin had been wise he would have taken another tack; but, in his
+earnest effort to make her see her duty to Madam, he failed to press his
+own more personal claims, and thus lost his one chance of reaching her.
+
+Eleanor understood impulse, emotion, but she would not listen to reason.
+The mere mention of Madam's name stirred up a whirlwind that snuffed out
+any love-lights that might have been kindling. She stood with her back to
+the table, twisting Harold Phipps's card in her fingers, and she looked
+at Quin suspiciously.
+
+"Did grandmother send you up here to see if I was keeping my word?"
+
+"She did not. She doesn't know I am here."
+
+"Then it's just _you_ who don't trust me?"
+
+"Well, I don't think you are playing quite fair," admitted Quin bluntly,
+"either to Queen Vic or to me."
+
+"And I suppose you propose to go back and tell her so?"
+
+"I propose nothing of the kind. It's up to you whether we both keep our
+word, or whether we both break it. You know what I think, and you see the
+position I am in."
+
+"I can settle that," said Eleanor with spirit. "I can write home to-night
+and tell them what I intend to do. That will exonerate you, if that is
+what you are after."
+
+"It _isn't_ what I am after, and you know it! For God's sake, Miss Nell,
+be fair! You know you can't go on with this thing without starting up the
+old trouble with Mr. Phipps."
+
+"But, I tell you, I _can_. I can control the situation perfectly. Why
+can't you trust me, Quin?"
+
+"I don't trust _him_. He's got ways of compromising a girl that you don't
+know anything about. If he ever gets wind of your going to Chicago----"
+
+"I wish you wouldn't throw that up to me!" There was real anger in her
+voice, which up to now had shown signs of softening. "Just because I
+happened to me a fool once, it doesn't follow that I'll be one again! It
+won't be pleasant for me, but I am not going to let his connection with
+'Phantom Love' spoil my chance of a lifetime."
+
+"And he will be at all the rehearsals, I suppose, and up here in the
+apartment between-times." Quin's jealousy ran through him like fire
+through dry stubble. "You'll probably be seeing him every day."
+
+"And what if I do?" demanded Eleanor. "I have told you our relations are
+strictly professional."
+
+"That card looks like it," said Quin bitterly.
+
+Eleanor tossed the object referred to in the trash-basket and looked at
+him defiantly. The very weakness of her position made her peculiarly
+sensitive to criticism, and the fact that her mentor was her one-time
+slave augmented her wrath.
+
+"See here, Miss Nell." Quin came a step closer, and his voice was husky
+with emotion. "I know how keen you are about the stage; but, take it from
+me, you are making a wrong start. If you'll just promise to wait until
+your time is up----"
+
+"I won't promise anything! What's the use? Nobody believes me. Even you
+are siding with grandmother and suspecting me of breaking my word. I
+don't intend to submit to it any longer!"
+
+Queer, spasmodic movements were going on in Quin's lungs, and he
+controlled his voice with difficulty.
+
+"You mean you are going on seeing Mr. Phipps and letting him send you
+flowers and things?"
+
+"I am _not!_" Eleanor cried furiously. "But, if I should, it's nobody's
+business but my own!"
+
+For an agonizing moment they faced each other angrily, both of them lost
+in the labyrinth of their own situation. At the slightest plea for help
+on her part, Quin would have broken through his own difficulties and
+rushed to her rescue. He would even have offered to plead her cause again
+at the family tribunal. But she was like a wilful child who is determined
+to walk alone on a high and dangerous wall. The very effort to protect
+her might prove disastrous.
+
+"If that's the case," said Quin, with his jaw thrust out and his nostrils
+quivering, "what do you want me to do?"
+
+"I don't care what you do!" Eleanor flung back--"just so you leave me
+alone."
+
+Without a word, he picked up his hat and strode out of the apartment and
+down the stairs. At every landing he paused, hoping against hope that she
+might call him back. Even at the door he paused, straining his ears for
+the faintest whisper from above. But no sound broke the stillness, and
+with a gesture of despair he flung open the door and passed out into the
+darkness.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 31
+
+
+When an extremely energetic person has spent eighteen months making
+connections with a family, he does not find it easy to sever them in a
+day. Quin's announcement that he was going to leave the Martels met with
+a storm of protest. He had the excellent excuse that when Cass married in
+June there would be no room for him, but it took all his diplomacy to
+effect the change without giving offense. Rose was tearful, and Cass
+furious, and a cloud of gloom enveloped the little brown house.
+
+With the Bartletts it was no easier. On his return from New York he had
+found three notes from them, each of which requested an immediate
+interview. Madam's stated that she had heard of his dismissal from the
+factory and that she was ready to do battle for him to the death.
+"Geoffrey Bangs got rid of Ranny," she wrote, "and now he thinks he can
+ship you. But I guess I'll show him who is the head of the firm."
+
+The second note was from Miss Isobel and was marked "Confidential." In
+incoherent sentences it told of a letter just received from Eleanor, in
+which she announced that she was planning to make her professional début
+in July, and that as Mr. Phipps was connected with the play in which she
+was to appear, she felt that she could accept no further favors from her
+grandmother. Miss Isobel implored Quin to come at once and advise her
+what to do about telling Madam, especially as they were leaving for Maine
+within the next ten days.
+
+The third delicately penned epistle was a gentle effusion from Miss Enid,
+who was home on a visit and eager to see "dear Quin, who had been the
+innocent means of reuniting her and the dearest man in all the world."
+
+It was these letters that put Quin's desire for flight into instant
+action. He must go where he would not be questioned or asked for advice.
+The mere mention of Eleanor's name was agony to him. It contracted his
+throat and sent the blood pounding through his veins. His hurt was so
+intolerable that he shrank from even a touch of sympathy. Perhaps later
+on he would be able to face the situation, but just now his one desire
+was to get away from everything connected with his unhappiness.
+
+In beating about in his mind for a temporary refuge, he remembered a
+downtown rooming-house to which he had once gone with Dirks, the foreman
+at Bartlett & Bangs. Here he transferred his few possessions, and
+persuaded Rose to tell the Bartletts that he had left town for an
+indefinite stay. This he hoped would account for his absence until they
+left for their summer vacation.
+
+The ten weeks that followed are not pleasant ones to dwell upon. The
+picture of Quin tramping the streets by day in a half-hearted search for
+work, and tramping them again at night when he could not sleep, of him
+lying face downward on a cot in a small damp room, with all his
+confidence and bravado gone, and only his racking cough for company, are
+better left unchronicled.
+
+He fought his despair with dogged determination, but his love for Eleanor
+had twined itself around everything that was worth while in him. In
+plucking it out he uprooted his ambition, his carefully acquired
+friendships, his belief in himself, his faith in the future. For eighteen
+months he had lived in the radiance of one all-absorbing dream, with a
+faith in its ultimate fulfilment that transcended every fear. And now
+that that hope was dead, the blackness of despair settled upon him.
+
+That fact that Eleanor had broken faith with him, that she was willing to
+renew her friendship with Harold Phipps when she knew what he was, that
+she was willing to give up friends and family and her inheritance for the
+sake of being with him, could have but one explanation.
+
+Quin used to tell himself this again and again, as he lay in the hot
+darkness with his hands clasped across his eyes. He used it as a whip
+with which to scourge any vagrant hopes that dared creep into his heart.
+Hadn't Miss Nell told him that she didn't care what he said or did, just
+so he left her alone? Hadn't she let him come away without expressing a
+regret for the past or a hope for the future?
+
+But, even as his head condemned her, his heart rushed to her defense.
+After all, she had never said she cared for him. And why should she care
+for a fellow like him, with no education, or money, or position? Even
+with her faults, she was too good for the best man living. But she cared
+for Harold Phipps--and with that bitter thought the turmoil began all
+over again.
+
+He was not only unhappy, but intolerably lonely and ill. He missed Rose
+and her care for him; he missed Cass's friendship; he missed his visits
+to the Bartletts; and above all he missed his work. His interest still
+clung to Bartlett & Bangs, and the only times of forgetfulness that he
+had were when he and Dirks were discussing the business of the firm.
+
+What made matters worse was the humid heat of the summer. A low
+barometer, always an affliction to him, in his present nervous state was
+torture. Night after night he lay gasping for breath, and in the morning
+he rose gaunt and pale, with hollow rings under his eyes. Having little
+desire for food, he often made one meal a day suffice, substituting
+coffee for more solid food.
+
+This method of living could have but one result. By the middle of July he
+was confined to his bed with a heavy bronchial cold and a temperature
+that boded ill. Once down and defenseless, he became a prey to all the
+feminine solicitude of the rooming-house. The old lady next door pottered
+in and out, putting mustard plasters on his chest and forgetting to take
+them off, and feeding him nauseous concoctions that she brewed over a
+coal-oil stove. A woman from upstairs insisted on keeping his window and
+door wide open, and trying cold compresses on his throat. While the
+majorful mother of six across the hall came in each night to sweep the
+other two out, close the window and door, and fill the room with
+eucalyptus fumes.
+
+Quin let them do whatever they wanted. The mere business of breathing
+seemed to be about all he could attend to these days. The only point on
+which he was firm was his refusal to notify his friends or to have a
+doctor.
+
+"I'll be all right when this beastly weather lets up," he said to Dirks
+one Sunday night. "Is there any sign of clearing?"
+
+"Not much. It's thick and muggy and still raining in torrents. I wish
+you'd see a doctor."
+
+Pride kept Quin from revealing the fact that he had no money to pay a
+doctor. Five weeks without work had completely exhausted his exchequer.
+
+"I'm used to these knockouts," he wheezed with assumed cheerfulness one
+Sunday night. "It's not half as bad as it sounds. I'll be up in a day or
+so."
+
+Dirks was not satisfied. His glance swept the small disordered room, and
+came back to the flushed face on the pillow.
+
+"Don't you want some grub?" he suggested. "I'll get you anything you
+like."
+
+"No, thanks; I'm not hungry. You might put the water-pitcher over here by
+the bed. My tongue feels like a shredded-wheat biscuit."
+
+Dirks gave him some water, then turned to go.
+
+"Oh, by the way," he said, "Here's a letter for you that's been laying
+around at the factory for a couple of days. Nobody knew where to forward
+it."
+
+Like a shot Quin was up in bed and holding out an eager hand. But at
+sight of the small cramped writing he lay back on his pillow listlessly.
+
+"It's from Miss Isobel Bartlett," he said indifferently. "Wonder what
+she's doing back in town in the middle of the summer."
+
+"I hear they are all back," Dirks said. "The old lady is very ill and
+they had to bring her home. If you want anything in the night, just pound
+on the wall. I'm going to fetch a doctor if you ain't better in the
+morning."
+
+When Dirks had gone Quin opened his letter and read:
+
+    _Dear Quin:_
+
+    I am rushing this off to the factory in the hope that they have your
+    address and can get into communication with you at once. Mother has
+    had two dreadful attacks with her appendix, and the doctors say she
+    cannot survive another. But she refuses point-blank to be operated
+    on, and my brother and sister and I are powerless to move her. Won't
+    you come the moment you get this, and try to persuade her? She has
+    such confidence in your judgment, and you could always do more with
+    her than any one else. I am almost wild with anxiety and I don't know
+    which way to turn. Do come at once.
+
+    Your friend,
+
+    ISOBEL BARTLETT.
+
+Quin sprang out of bed, and then sat down limply, waiting for the
+furniture to stop revolving about him. It was evident that he would have
+to use his head to save his legs, if he expected to make any progress.
+Holding to the bed-post, he brought all his concentration to bear on the
+whereabouts of the various garments he had thrown off ten days before.
+The lack of a clean shirt and the imperative need of a shave presented
+grave difficulties, but he would have gone to Miss Isobel's rescue if he
+had had to go in pajamas!
+
+When at last he had struggled into his clothes, he put out his light and
+tiptoed past Dirks' door. At the first sniff of night air he began to
+cough, and he clapped his hand over his mouth, swearing softly to
+himself. On the front steps he hesitated. The rain was falling in sheets,
+and the street lights shone through a blur of fog. For the first time,
+Quin realized it was a block to the car line, and that he had no
+umbrella. Hard experience had taught him the dire results of exposure and
+overexertion. But the excitement of once more getting in touch with the
+Bartletts, of being of service to Madam, and above all of hearing news of
+Eleanor, banished all other considerations. Turning up his coat collar
+and pulling his hat over his eyes, he went down the steps and started on
+an uncertain run for the corner.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 32
+
+
+During the days that Quin was floundering in the bog of poverty, illness
+and despair, Eleanor Bartlett was triumphantly climbing the peak of
+achievement. "Phantom Love," after weeks of strenuous rehearsal and
+nerve-racking uncertainty, had had its premiere performance at Atlantic
+City and scored an instantaneous hit.
+
+All spring Eleanor had lived in excited anticipation of the event. In the
+hard work demanded of her she had found welcome relief from some of her
+own complicated problems. She wanted to forget that she had broken her
+word, that she was causing the family serious trouble, and more than all
+she wanted to forget Quinby Graham and the look on his face when he left
+her.
+
+During her stay in New York she had suffered many disillusions. She had
+seen her dreams translated into actual and disconcerting realities. But,
+in spite of the fact that much of the gold and glamour had turned to
+tinsel, she was still fascinated by the life and its glorious
+possibilities.
+
+It was not until she got into the full swing of the rehearsals that she
+made a disconcerting discovery. Try as she would, she could not adapt
+herself to the other members of the company. She hated their petty
+jealousies and intermittent intimacies, the little intrigues and the
+undercurrent of gossip that made up their days. From the first she
+realized that she was looked upon as an alien. The fact that she was
+shown special favors was hotly resented, and her refusal to rehearse
+daily the love passages with Finnegan, the promising young comedian who
+two years before had driven an ice-wagon in New Orleans, was a constant
+grievance to the stage manager. In the last matter Harold Phipps had
+upheld her, as he had in all others; but his very championship
+constituted her chief cause of worry.
+
+Since the day of his joining the company she had given him no opportunity
+for seeing her alone. By a method of protection peculiarly her own, she
+had managed to achieve an isolation as complete as an alpine blossom in
+the heart of an iceberg. But in the heat and enthusiasm of a successful
+try-out, when everybody was effervescing with excitement, it was
+increasingly difficult to maintain this air of cold detachment.
+
+Papa Claude alone was sufficient to warm any atmosphere. He radiated
+happiness. Every afternoon, arrayed in white flannels and a soft white
+hat, with a white rose in his buttonhole, he rode in his chair on the
+boardwalk, bowing to right and to left with the air of a sovereign
+graciously acknowledging his subjects. Night found him in the
+proscenium-box at the theater, beaming upon the audience, except when he
+turned vociferously to applaud Eleanor's exits and entrances.
+
+The entire week of the first performance was nothing short of
+pandemonium. Mr. Pfingst had brought a large party down from New York on
+his yacht, and between rehearsals and performances there was an endless
+round of suppers and dinners and sailing-parties.
+
+With the arrival of Sunday morning Eleanor was in a state of physical and
+emotional exhaustion. She was sitting before her dressing-table in a
+sleeveless pink négligée, with her hair dangling in two thick childish
+braids over her shoulder, when Papa Claude dashed in from the next room
+to announce that Mr. Pfingst had invited the entire cast to have lunch on
+his yacht.
+
+"Not for me!" said Eleanor, sipping her coffee between yawns. "I am going
+straight back to bed and sleep all day."
+
+"Morning megrims!" cried Papa Claude, fresher than the proverbial daisy.
+"What you need is a frolic with old Neptune! We bathe at eleven, go
+aboard the _Minta_ at twelve, lunch at one. Pfingst's chef is an artist;
+he can create a lobster Newburg that is an epic!" Papa Claude's tongue
+made the circle of his lips as he spoke.
+
+"I don't like lobster," Eleanor pouted; "and, what's more, I don't like
+Mr. Pfingst."
+
+"Nonsense, my love! Pfingst is a prince of good fellows. Very
+generous--very generous indeed. Besides, there will be others on
+board--Harold and Estelle and myself."
+
+Eleanor laid her face against his sleeve.
+
+"I wish you and I could run off somewhere for the day alone. I am so sick
+of seeing those same people day in and day out. They never talk about
+anything but themselves."
+
+Papa Claude stroked her hair and smiled tolerantly. It was natural that
+his little Eleanor should be capricious and variable and addicted to
+moods. She was evidently acquiring temperament.
+
+Some one tapped at the door, and he sprang to answer it.
+
+"I've just been to your room, and the maid said you were in here," said
+Harold Phipps's voice.
+
+"Come right in!" cried Papa Claude, flinging wide the door. "We are just
+discussing plans, and need you to cast the deciding vote."
+
+"But I'm not dressed, Papa Claude!" expostulated Eleanor. "I still have
+on my kimono."
+
+"A charming costume," said Papa Claude--"one in which a whole nation
+appears in public. I leave it to my distinguished collaborator: could any
+toilet, however elaborate, be more becoming?"
+
+Harold gave a light laugh as his glance rested with undisguised approval
+on the slender figure in its clinging silk garment, the rosy hues of
+which were reflected in the girl's flaming cheeks.
+
+"Just stopped for a second, C. M.," Harold said, avoiding her indignant
+eyes. "I wanted to tell you about the New York press notices. They are
+simply superb! _Tribune_ has a column. The _Times_ and _Herald_ give us
+a headliner. And even the old _Sun_ says there are passages in 'Phantom
+Love' that might have been written by Molière!"
+
+"Where are the papers?" cried Papa Claude, prancing with excitement.
+
+"I gave mine to Estelle. You can get them downstairs at the news-stand."
+
+"I'll run down now--be back in a second." And Papa Claude rushed
+impetuously from the room.
+
+Eleanor and Harold stood facing each other where he had left them, he
+with an air of apologetic amusement, and she with an angry dignity that
+rested incongruously on her childish prettiness.
+
+"Will you please go down and tell Mr. Pfingst that I am not coming to his
+party?" she asked, with the obvious intention of getting rid of him.
+
+"Why aren't you?"
+
+"Because I don't like him."
+
+"Neither do I. But what has that to do with it? Estelle Linton will take
+him off our hands."
+
+"I don't care for Miss Linton, either. If I had known----"
+
+"Oh, come! Haven't we got past that?" scoffed Harold, sitting astride a
+chair and looking at her quizzically. "Nobody pays any attention to
+Estelle's numerous little affairs. I'd as soon think of criticizing a
+Watteau lady on an ivory fan!"
+
+"You can probably catch Mr. Pfingst in the dining-room if you go down at
+once," suggested Eleanor pointedly.
+
+"But I've no intention of going down at once. Eleanor, why do you play
+with me like this? Can't you see that this can't go on? I've been
+patient, God knows. For two months I've done nothing but advance your
+interests, put you forward in every conceivable way. And what have I got?
+The merest civility! Do you suppose it's pleasant for me to know that
+everybody in the company is whispering about my infatuation for you and
+your indifference to me? The maddening part of it is that I know
+perfectly well you are _not_ indifferent. You are in love with me. You
+always have been. You'd have married me last fall if some busybody hadn't
+filled your ears with scandal. Confess, wouldn't you?"
+
+"Yes; but----"
+
+"I knew it! And you are going to marry me now. You can do anything you
+want, have anything you want. I'll put you at the head of your own
+company; I'll take you over to London. I'll do anything under heaven but
+give you up."
+
+He rose suddenly and went toward her, catching her bare arm and trying to
+draw her toward him; but she struggled from his embrace.
+
+"Let me go!" she cried furiously. "If you don't leave the room instantly,
+I will! There's Papa Claude now. Let me pass!"
+
+It was not Papa Claude, however, to whom she opened the door. It was
+Estelle Linton, smartly attired for the day's expedition, and exhibiting
+all the compensating charms with which she sought to atone for her lack
+of brains and morals. With a glance of sophisticated comprehension she
+took in the disordered room, the perturbed young people, the unfinished
+breakfast-tray; then she burst into a gay little laugh.
+
+"Ten thousand pardons!" she cried, backing away from the door in assumed
+confusion. "I shouldn't have called so early. I just ran in to bring you
+_Town Topics_. The most killing article about you, dear. By-by; I'll see
+you later!" And, kissing her hand to Eleanor, she flitted down the hall.
+
+"Shall I go or will you?" Eleanor demanded of Harold.
+
+She was standing in the open door, all the color fled from her face and
+her eyes blazing with anger.
+
+"I'll go, of course," said Harold. "Only, you must not mind Estelle.
+Everybody knows she's a fool----"
+
+The door was slammed in his face and locked before he finished the
+sentence.
+
+For a moment Eleanor stood immovable; then her eye fell on the paper that
+Estelle Linton had thrust into her hand, and she saw her stage name on
+the title-page.
+
+    Pretty little romance back of the production of "Phantom Love" [she
+    read]. It is rumored that a wealthy young Chicago playwright, having
+    met with family opposition in winning a young Southern belle, took
+    advantage of her histrionic ambition, and persuaded her to play a
+    rôle in his new play, which he wrote especially for her. Those who
+    saw the opening performance of "Phantom Love" at Atlantic City
+    Wednesday night will have little trouble in recognizing the heroine
+    of the story. Miss Nell Martel is one of the daintiest bits of
+    femininity that have flitted behind the footlights in many moons.
+    She has youth and beauty and a certain elusive charm. But the fact
+    remains that she can not act. For the continued success of the really
+    brilliant play, let us hope that the young lady's lover may soon
+    become her husband, and that, having won his prize, he will
+    substitute a professional for the charming young amateur who is in
+    no way up to the rest of the really excellent cast.
+
+Eleanor crushed the paper in her hand, flung herself across the bed, and
+buried her hot face in the pillow. All her life she had walked unafraid
+and inviolate, protected by her social position, the over-zealous
+solicitude of the family, and her own purity. She had flown out of the
+family nest, confident of her power to take care of herself, to breast
+any storm. And here, at the beginning of her flight, she found herself in
+utter confusion of body and spirit, powerless to protect herself against
+such conduct as Harold's, such printed gossip as lay before her, or such
+unspeakable insinuations as Estelle Linton's.
+
+When Papa Claude returned, her first impulse was to pour out her troubles
+to him; but second thought restrained her. He was too much a part of that
+casual, irresponsible world to take anything it did or said seriously.
+She called through the door to him that she had gone to bed and was going
+to stay there.
+
+But she did not stay there. She got up and knelt by the open window,
+looking across the seething mass of humanity on the boardwalk below to
+the calm stretches of blue sea beyond. For the first time, she faced her
+problem fairly and squarely. Up to now she had been trying to compromise,
+to be broad and tolerant and cosmopolitan. But she had to admit that the
+new life satisfied her no more than the old had. One was too
+circumscribed, the other too free. If it was true that she had no talent
+and was simply tolerated in the company because of Harold Phipps, she
+must know it at once. To be drawing a salary that she did not earn, and
+accepting favors for which a definite reward would be expected, was
+utterly intolerable to her.
+
+A wild desire seized her to go back to New York and seek another
+engagement. In spite of what that odious article said, she believed that
+she could succeed on the stage. Papa Claude believed in her; the Kendall
+School people were enthusiastic about her work; they would help her to
+make another start.
+
+But did she honestly want to make another start? A conscience that had
+overslept itself began to stir and waken. After all, what did the
+plaudits of hundreds of unknown people count for, when the approval and
+affection of those nearest and dearest was withdrawn? What would any
+success count for against the disgust she felt for herself.
+
+A wave of terrific homesickness swept over her. But what was it she
+wanted, she asked herself, in place of this gay kaleidoscope of light and
+color and ceaseless confusion? Not the stagnation of the Bartlett
+household, certainly not the slipshod poverty of the Martels. She
+searched her heart for the answer.
+
+And as she knelt there with her head on the window-sill, looking
+miserably out to sea, a strange thing happened to her. In a moment of
+swift, sure vision she saw Quinby Graham's homely, whimsical face, she
+felt his strong arms around her, and into her soul came a deep, still
+feeling of unutterable content.
+
+"I am coming, Quin!" she whispered, with a little catch in her voice.
+
+Then it was that Destiny played her second trump for Quin. It was in the
+form of a telegram that a bell-boy brought up from the office, and it
+announced that Madam Bartlett was not expected to live through the day.
+
+Within twenty-four hours Eleanor was in Kentucky.
+
+"Is she living?" she demanded of Hannah, who answered her ring at her
+grandmother's door.
+
+"I don't know, honey," whispered Hannah, ashy with fright. "They's
+operatin' now. We thought she was going to die all day yesterday, but she
+never give in to be operated on till Mr. Quin come."
+
+"Where are Aunt Isobel and Aunt Enid?"
+
+"They's all in the library. Mr. Ranny's there, too. Ain't nobody upstairs
+with her but jest the doctors an' the nurse an' Mr. Quin."
+
+Eleanor crept upstairs and sat down on the top step, outside that door
+before which she had halted in dread so many times before. Remorse and
+sympathy and acute apprehension struggled for mastery. All the old
+antagonism for her grandmother was swept away in the dread prospect of
+losing her. It was impossible to think of the family existing without
+her. She held it up, kept it together, maintained the proud old Bartlett
+tradition.
+
+There was a sound behind the closed doors. Eleanor strained her ears to
+listen. It was someone coughing, at first gently, then violently. The
+next moment the door opened and a wild-eyed, unshaven figure staggered
+into the hall.
+
+"Damn that ether!" some one muttered.
+
+And then, before Eleanor could get to her feet, Quinby Graham came
+unsteadily toward her, stumbled twice, then pitched forward on his face,
+striking his head on the banister as he fell.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 33
+
+
+Two weeks later, when Quin struggled back to consciousness, he labored
+under the delusion that he was still in the army and back in the camp
+hospital. Eleanor, who scarcely left his bedside, was once more Miss
+Bartlett, the ward visitor, and he was Patient Number 7. He tried to
+explain to all those dim figures moving about the darkened room that he
+was making her a bead chain, and unless they got him more beads he could
+not finish it in time. When they reassured him and tried to get him to
+take food, he invariably wanted to know if Miss Bartlett had brought it,
+and which was her day to come again. Then the doctor and the nurse would
+argue with him, and try to make him remember things he was sure had never
+happened, and his mental distress would become acute. At such times
+somebody, who of course could not be Miss Bartlett, but who had her voice
+and eyes, would take his hand and tell him to go to sleep, then the
+tangles would all come straight.
+
+One day he was startled out of a stupor by the sound of a querulous old
+voice saying:
+
+"I guess if he could get out of bed to come across the city to me, I can
+come across the hall to him. Wheel me closer!"
+
+Quin was drifting off again, when a hand gripped his wrist.
+
+"Open your eyes, boy! Look at me. Do you know who this is?"
+
+He lifted his heavy lids, and wondered dully what Madam was doing at the
+camp hospital.
+
+"Put the blinds up," she commanded to some one back of her. "Let him see
+the wall-paper, the furniture. Move that fool screen away."
+
+For the first time, Quin brought his confused attention to bear on his
+surroundings, and even glanced at the space over the mantel to see if a
+certain picture was at its old place.
+
+"You are in my house," said Madam, with a finality that was not to be
+disputed. "Do you remember the first time you came here?"
+
+He shook his head.
+
+"Yes, you do. I fell down the steps and broke my leg, and you came in off
+the street to tie me up with an umbrella and the best table napkins. What
+are you smiling about?"
+
+"Smelling salts," Quin murmured, as if to himself.
+
+"You don't need any smelling salts!" cried Madam, missing his allusion.
+"All you need is to rouse yourself and put your mind on what I am saying.
+Do you remember living in this house?"
+
+He could not truthfully say that he did, though familiar objects and
+sounds seemed to be all around him.
+
+"Well, I'll make you," said Madam, nothing daunted. "You stayed in this
+very room for three months to keep the burglars from stealing Isobel and
+Enid, and every night you walked me up and down the hall on my crutches."
+
+She paused and looked at him expectantly; but things were still a blur to
+him.
+
+"You surely remember the Easter party?" she persisted. "If you can forget
+the way your shirt kept popping open that night, and the way your jaw
+swelled up, it's more than I can!"
+
+Quin winced. Even concussion of the brain had failed to deaden the memory
+of that awful night.
+
+"I sort of remember," he admitted.
+
+"Good! That will do for to-day. As for the rest, I'll tell you what
+happened. You came here one night two weeks ago, when everybody had me
+dead and buried, and you deviled me into having an operation that saved
+my life. You stood right by me while they did it. Then you collapsed and
+knocked your head on the banister, and, as if that wasn't enough,
+developed pneumonia on top of it. Now all you've got to think about is
+getting well."
+
+"But--but--Miss Eleanor?" Quin queried weakly, fearing that the blessed
+presence that had hovered over him was but a figment of his dreams.
+
+"She came home to help bury me," said Madam. "Failing to get the job, she
+took to nursing you. Now stop talking and go to sleep. If I hear any more
+of this stuff and nonsense about your being in a hospital and making bead
+chains, I'll forbid Eleanor crossing the threshold; do you hear?"
+
+From that time on Quin's convalescence was rapid--almost too rapid, in
+fact, for his peace of mind. Never in his life had he been so watched
+over and so tenderly cared for. Mr. Ranny kept him supplied with fresh
+eggs and cream from Valley Mead; Mr. Chester and Miss Enid deluged him
+with magazines and flowers; Miss Isobel gave him his medicine and fixed
+his tray herself; Madam chaperoned his thoughts and allowed no intruding
+fancies or vagaries.
+
+But all these attentions were as nothing to him, compared with the
+miracle of Eleanor's presence. Just why she was remaining at home he
+dared not ask, for fear he should be told the date of her departure. The
+fact that she flitted in and out of his room, flirting with the doctor,
+teasing the aunties, assuming a divine proprietorship over him, was
+heaven enough in itself.
+
+Sometimes, when they were alone and she thought he was asleep he would
+see the dancing, restless light die out of her eyes, and a beautiful
+exalted look come into them as if she were listening to the music of the
+spheres.
+
+He attributed this to the fact that she was happy in being once more
+reconciled to the family. Even she and Madam seemed to be on terms of the
+closest intimacy, and he spent hours in trying to understand what had
+effected the change.
+
+As he grew stronger and was allowed to sit up in bed, he realized, with a
+shock, what a fool's paradise he was living in. A few more days and he
+must go back to that dark, damp room in Chestnut Street. He must find
+work--and work, however menial, for which he had the strength. Eleanor
+would return to New York, and he would probably never see her again.
+During his illness she had been heavenly kind to him, but that was no
+reason for thinking she had changed her mind. She had given him his final
+answer there in New York, and he was grimly determined never to open the
+subject again.
+
+But one day, when they were alone together, his resolution sustained a
+compound fracture. Eleanor was reading aloud to him, and in the midst of
+a sentence she put down the book and looked at him queerly.
+
+"Quin," she said, "did you know I am not going back?"
+
+"Why not? Did the play fail?"
+
+"No. It's a big success. Papa Claude will probably make a small fortune
+out of it."
+
+"But you? What's the trouble?"
+
+"I've had enough. I had made up my mind to leave the company even before
+I was sent for."
+
+Quin's eyes searched her face, but for once he held his tongue.
+
+She was evidently finding it hard to continue. She twisted the fringe of
+the counterpane in her slender, white fingers, and she did not look at
+him.
+
+"It all turned out as you said it would," she admitted at last. "I--I
+simply couldn't stand Harold Phipps."
+
+Quin's heart performed an athletic feat. It leaped into his throat and
+remained there.
+
+"But you'll be joining some other company, I suppose?" He tried to make
+his voice formal and detached.
+
+"That depends," she said; and she looked at him again in that queer,
+tremulous, mysterious way that he did not in the least understand.
+
+Her small hands were fluttering so close to his that he could have
+captured them both in one big palm; but he heroically refrained. He kept
+saying over and over to himself that it was just Miss Nell's way of being
+good to a fellow, and that, whatever happened, he must not make her
+unhappy and sorry--he must not lose his head.
+
+"Quin,"--her voice dropped so low he could scarcely hear it,--"have you
+ever forgiven me for the way I behaved in New York?"
+
+"Sure!"
+
+He was trembling now, and he wondered how much longer he could hold out.
+
+"Do you--do you--still feel about me the way you--you did--that night on
+the bus?" she whispered.
+
+Quin looked at her as a Christian martyr might have looked at his
+persecutor.
+
+"I think about you the way I've always thought about you," he said
+hopelessly--"the way I shall go on thinking about you as long as I live."
+
+"Well," said Eleanor, with a sigh of relief, "I guess that settles it";
+and, to his unspeakable amazement, she laid her head on his pillow and
+her cheek on his.
+
+When he recovered from his shock of subliminal ecstasy, his first thought
+was of the trouble he was storing up for Eleanor. Even his rapture was
+dimmed by the prospect of involving her in another love affair that could
+only meet with bitter opposition of her family.
+
+"We must keep it dark for the present," he urged, holding her close as if
+he feared she would slip away. "Maybe, when I am well, and have a good
+position, and all, they won't take it so hard."
+
+Eleanor refused to listen to any such counsel. She wanted to announce
+their engagement at once, and be married at the earliest possible date.
+He needed her to take care of him, she declared; and besides, they could
+make a start on the money that would soon be due her from her father's
+estate. To this proposition Quin would not listen, and they had a
+spirited quarrel and reached no agreement.
+
+Eleanor had fallen seriously in love for the first time in her life, and
+it was a sudden and overwhelming experience. During those anxious days of
+Quin's illness, when his life had hung in the balance, she had time to
+realize what he meant to her. Now that he needed skilful nursing and
+constant care to assure his recovery, she was determined not to be
+separated from him.
+
+In spite of his protests, she joyfully announced their engagement to
+Uncle Ranny and the aunties at dinner, and was surprised to find that the
+family tree, instead of being rocked to its foundation, was merely
+pleasantly stirred in its branches.
+
+"You see, we could not help suspecting it," Miss Isobel twittered
+excitedly to Quin, when she brought him his tray. "You talked about her
+incessantly in your delirium, and the dear child was almost beside
+herself the night we thought you might not recover. I told sister then
+that if you got well----"
+
+"But what about Madam?" Quin interrupted anxiously. "What will she think
+of Miss Nell's being engaged to a fellow like me, with no money or
+position, or any prospects of being able to marry for God knows how
+long?"
+
+Miss Isobel looked grave. "Nellie is breaking the news to her now," she
+said primly. "I am afraid she is going to find it very hard. But, as
+sister says, there are times when one has to follow one's own judgments.
+When mother sees that we all stand together about this----"
+
+She waved her hand with a little air of finality. It was the second time
+in her life that she had made even a gesture toward freedom.
+
+The interview between Eleanor and her grandmother lasted for more than an
+hour, and nobody knew the outcome of it until the next morning, when a
+family council was called in Quin's room. Madam was wheeled in in state,
+resplendent in purple and gold, with her hair elaborately dressed, as
+usual.
+
+To everybody's amazement, she opened the conference by abruptly announcing
+that she had decided that Eleanor and Quin should be married at once.
+
+"She's at loose ends, and he's at loose ends. The sooner they get tied
+up, the better," was the way she put it.
+
+"But hold on!" cried Quin, sitting up in bed. "I can't do that, you know;
+I've got to get on my feet first."
+
+"How are you going to get on your feet until you get your strength back?"
+demanded Madam. "You look like going to work, don't you?"
+
+"Well, the doctor has promised me I can go out on Saturday. I ought to be
+able to go to work in a couple of weeks."
+
+"Couple of fiddle-sticks! Dr. Rawlins told me it would be two months
+before you would be fit for work, and even then you would have to be
+careful."
+
+"Well, you don't think I am going to let Miss Nell in on a deal like
+that, do you?" Quin's voice broke and he gripped Eleanor's hand until she
+winced.
+
+"But, Quin, I want it to be now," Eleanor begged. "Grandmother and I have
+gone over it from every standpoint, and she's come to see it as I do. You
+need me, and I need you. Why can't you be sensible and see it as we do?"
+
+How Quin ever withstood those pleading tones and beseeching eyes, it is
+impossible to say. But withstand them he did, announcing stubbornly that
+it was bad enough for a girl to marry a chap with broken bellows; but for
+her to marry one she would not only have to nurse, but support as well,
+was not to be thought of. There was but one thing to do, and that was to
+wait.
+
+Then it was that Madam, who had been reasonably patient up till now, lost
+her temper and delivered an ultimatum.
+
+"You'll marry her now or not at all," she thundered. "I am sick and tired
+of the way you try to run this family, Quinby Graham! For more than a
+year now you have carried things with a high hand. You got Ranny out of
+the factory and on a farm. You married Enid to Francis Chester, and sent
+them to California. You made me let Eleanor go to New York, and came very
+near landing her on the stage for good. And now, when I have been
+persuaded into letting the child marry you, you are not satisfied, but
+insist on doing it at your own time and in your own way!"
+
+"You forgot one thing, granny," suggested Eleanor demurely. "He made you
+have the operation."
+
+Madam was not to be diverted. She glared at Quin like an angry old
+lioness.
+
+"Are you going to do as I advise?" she demanded.
+
+"No; not until I get a job." Quin's jaw was set as firmly as hers, and
+their eyes measured each other's with equal determination.
+
+"Well, then I'll give you a job," she announced with sudden decision.
+"I'll send you to China."
+
+"To China?"
+
+"Yes. Bartlett & Bangs has just opened a branch house in Shanghai. They
+are looking for a man to take charge of it. Your knowledge of the
+language would make up for your lack of experience. Besides, the sea
+voyage will do you good."
+
+"Do you mean it?" cried Quinn eagerly. "Would Mr. Bangs agree?"
+
+"Geoffrey Bangs would take you back at the factory to-morrow. But I don't
+want you there, under him. I want to turn you loose on China. It's the
+only place I know that's big enough to exhaust your energies. You will
+probably have the entire country plowing up its ancestors before spring."
+
+"And what about you?" said Quin, turning eagerly to Eleanor. "Would you
+go with me?"
+
+"_Will_ I?" said Eleanor, her eyes dancing.
+
+                       *          *          *
+
+That night, when Miss Isobel was tucking Madam into bed, she made bold to
+ask her how she happened to give her consent to the wedding.
+
+"Isobel," said Madam, cocking a wise old eye, "it might as well be now as
+later. When a man like Quinby Graham makes up his mind to marry a certain
+girl, the devil himself can't stop him!"
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Quin, by Alice Hegan Rice
+
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+<meta content="HTML Tidy for Mac OS X (vers 1st March 2003), see www.w3.org" name="generator">
+<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
+<title>
+The Project Gutenberg eBook of Quin, by Alice Hegan Rice
+</title>
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+<pre>
+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Quin, by Alice Hegan Rice
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Quin
+
+Author: Alice Hegan Rice
+
+Release Date: December 5, 2006 [EBook #20033]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK QUIN ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by David Garcia and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was
+produced from images generously made available by The
+Kentuckiana Digital Library)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+<div class="ctr"><img src="images/001.jpg" alt="&#34;If you don't leave the room instantly, I will!&#34;" width="378" height="543" hspace="2" vspace="4"></div>
+<p class="ctr">&#34;If you don't leave the room instantly, I will!&#34;</p>
+
+
+<br>
+
+<h1>
+Q&nbsp;&nbsp;U&nbsp;&nbsp;I&nbsp;&nbsp;N
+</h1>
+<br>
+
+
+
+<h3>
+By
+</h3>
+
+<h2>
+ALICE HEGAN RICE
+</h2>
+
+
+<h4>
+Author of &#34;Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch,&#34;<br>
+&#34;Lovey Mary,&#34; &#34;Sandy,&#34; &#34;Calvary Alley,&#34; etc.
+</h4>
+<br>
+
+<p class="ctr"><img src="images/002.jpg" alt="Decoration" width="94" height="87" hspace="2" vspace="4"></p>
+<br>
+<h3>
+NEW YORK<br>
+THE CENTURY CO.<br>
+1921
+</h3>
+
+
+
+<h4>
+Copyright, 1921, by<br>
+<span class="sc">The Century Co.</span>
+</h4>
+
+<h4>
+<span class="sc">Printed in U. S. A.</span>
+</h4>
+
+<br>
+
+<h4>
+TO MY MERRIEST FRIEND
+</h4>
+
+<h3>
+JOSEPHINE F. HAMILL
+</h3>
+
+
+<hr class="med">
+
+<p class="ctr">
+<u>Transcriber's Note</u>:</p>
+<p class="ctr">The Table of Contents was not in the original text<br>
+and has been created for the convenience of the reader.
+</p>
+
+
+<br>
+<h3>
+CONTENTS
+</h3>
+
+<table summary="Contents">
+<tr>
+<td><a href="#1">CHAPTER&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;1</a></td>
+<td><a href="#18">CHAPTER 18</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td><a href="#2">CHAPTER&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;2</a></td>
+<td><a href="#19">CHAPTER 19</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td><a href="#3">CHAPTER&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;3</a></td>
+<td><a href="#20">CHAPTER 20</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td><a href="#4">CHAPTER&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;4</a></td>
+<td><a href="#21">CHAPTER 21</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td><a href="#5">CHAPTER&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;5</a></td>
+<td><a href="#22">CHAPTER 22</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td><a href="#6">CHAPTER&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;6</a></td>
+<td><a href="#23">CHAPTER 23</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td><a href="#7">CHAPTER&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;7</a></td>
+<td><a href="#24">CHAPTER 24</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td><a href="#8">CHAPTER&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;8</a></td>
+<td><a href="#25">CHAPTER 25</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td><a href="#9">CHAPTER&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;9</a></td>
+<td><a href="#26">CHAPTER 26</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td><a href="#10">CHAPTER 10</a></td>
+<td><a href="#27">CHAPTER 27</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td><a href="#11">CHAPTER 11</a></td>
+<td><a href="#28">CHAPTER 28</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td><a href="#12">CHAPTER 12</a></td>
+<td><a href="#29">CHAPTER 29</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td><a href="#13">CHAPTER 13</a></td>
+<td><a href="#30">CHAPTER 30</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td><a href="#14">CHAPTER 14</a></td>
+<td><a href="#31">CHAPTER 31</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td><a href="#15">CHAPTER 15</a></td>
+<td><a href="#32">CHAPTER 32</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td><a href="#16">CHAPTER 16</a></td>
+<td><a href="#33">CHAPTER 33</a></td>
+</tr>
+
+<tr>
+<td><a href="#17">CHAPTER 17</a></td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+<hr class="short">
+
+
+
+<h2>
+Q&nbsp;U&nbsp;I&nbsp;N
+</h2>
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="1">
+CHAPTER 1</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+If the dollar Quinby Graham tossed up on New Year's eve had not elected
+to slip through his fingers and roll down the sewer grating, there might
+have been no story to write. Quin had said, &#34;Tails, yes&#34;; and who knows
+but that down there under the pavement that coin of fate was registering
+&#34;Heads, no&#34;? It was useless to suggest trying it over, however, for
+neither of the young privates with town leave for twenty-four hours
+possessed another coin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The heavier of the two boys, Cass Martel,&#8212;the lame one, whose nose began
+quite seriously, as if it had every intention of being a nose, then
+changed abruptly into a button,&#8212;scraped the snow from the sewer grating
+with his cane, and swore savagely under his breath. But Quin shrugged his
+shoulders with a slow, easy-going laugh.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That settles it,&#34; he said triumphantly. &#34;We got to go to the Hawaiian
+Garden now, because it's the only place that's free!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll be hanged if I know what you want to go to a dance for,&#34; argued his
+companion fiercely. &#34;Here you been on your back for six months, and your
+legs so shaky they won't hardly hold you. Don't you know you can't
+dance?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Sure,&#34; agreed Quin amicably. &#34;I don't mean to dance. But I got to go
+where I can see some girls. I'm dead sick of men. Come on in. We don't
+need to stay but a little while.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's too long for me,&#34; said Cass. &#34;If you weren't such a bonehead for
+doing what you start out to do, we could do something interesting.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+One might have thought they were Siamese twins, from the way in which
+Cass ignored the possibility of each going his own way. He glared at his
+tall companion with a mingled expression of rage and dog-like devotion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Cut it out, Cass,&#34; said Quin at last, putting an end to an argument that
+had been in progress for fifteen minutes. &#34;I'm going to that dance, and
+I'm going to make love to the first girl that looks at me. I'll meet you
+wherever you say at six o'clock.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Cass, seeing that further persuasion was useless, reluctantly consented.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, you take care of yourself, and don't forget you are going home
+with me for the night,&#34; he warned.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Where else could I go? Haven't got a red cent, and I wouldn't go back
+out to the hospital if I had to bunk on the curbstone! So long,
+<i>ch&#233;rie</i>!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Sergeant Quinby Graham, having thus carried his point, adjusted his
+overseas cap at a more acute angle, turned back his coat to show his
+distinguished-conduct medal, and went blithely up the steps to the
+dance-hall. He was tall and outrageously thin, and pale with the pallor
+that comes from long confinement. His hands and feet seemed too big for
+the rest of him, and his blond hair stuck up in a bristly mop above his
+high forehead. But Sergeant Graham walked with the buoyant tread of one
+who has a good opinion not only of himself but of mankind in general.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The only thing that disturbed his mind was the fact that, swagger as he
+would, his shoulders, usually so square and trim, refused to fill out his
+uniform. It was the first time he had had it on for six months, his
+wardrobe having been limited to pajamas and bath-robes during his
+convalescence in various hospitals at home and abroad.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Two years before, when he had left a lumber camp in Maine to answer
+America's first call for volunteers to France, his personal appearance
+had concerned him not in the least. But the army had changed that, as it
+had changed most things for Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He checked his overcoat at the hall entrance, stepped eagerly up to the
+railing that divided the spectators from the dancers, and drew a deep
+breath of satisfaction. Here, at last, was something different from the
+everlasting hospital barracks: glowing lights, holiday decorations, the
+scent of flowers instead of the stale fumes of ether and disinfectants;
+soul-stirring music in place of the wheezy old phonograph grinding out
+the same old tunes; and, above all, girls, hundreds of them, circling in
+a bewildering rainbow of loveliness before him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Was it any wonder that Quin's foot began to twitch, and that, in spite of
+repeated warnings at the hospital, a blind desire seized him to dance? At
+the mere thought his heart gained a beat&#8212;that unruly heart, which had
+caused so much trouble. It had never been right since that August day in
+the Sevzevais sector, when, to quote his citation, he &#34;had shown great
+initiative in assuming command when his officer was disabled, and, with
+total disregard for his personal safety, had held his machine-gun against
+almost impossible odds.&#34; In the accomplishment of this feat he had been
+so badly gassed and wounded that his career as a soldier was definitely,
+if gloriously, ended.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The long discipline of pain to which he had been subjected had not,
+however, conquered Quin's buoyancy. He was still tremendously vital, and
+when he wanted anything he wanted it inordinately and immediately. Just
+now, when every muscle in him was keeping time to that soul-disturbing
+music, he heard his own imperative desire voiced at his elbow:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't want to go home. I want to dance. Nobody will notice us. Just
+one round, Captain Phipps.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The voice was young and singularly vibrant, and the demand in it was
+quite as insistent as the demand that was clamoring in Quin's own
+khaki-covered breast.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He craned his neck to see the speaker; but she was hidden by her escort,
+in whose supercilious profile he recognized one of the officers in charge
+of his ward at the hospital.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You foolish child!&#34; the officer was saying, fingering his diminutive
+mustache and viewing the scene with a somewhat contemptuous smile. &#34;You
+said if I would bring you in for a moment you wouldn't ask to stay.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I know, but I always break my promises,&#34; said the coaxing voice; &#34;and
+besides I'm simply crazy to dance.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You surely don't imagine that I would get out on the floor with all this
+hoi-poloi?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin saw a pair of small gloved hands grasp the railing resolutely, and
+he was straightway filled with indignation that any man, of whatever
+rank, should stand back on his dignity when a voice like that asked a
+favor. A similar idea had evidently occurred to the young lady, for she
+said with some spirit:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;The only difference I can see between these boys and you is that they
+are privates who got over, and you are an officer who didn't.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin could not hear the answer, but as the officer shifted his position
+he caught his first glimpse of the girl. She was very young and obviously
+imperious, with white skin and coal-black hair and the most utterly
+destructive brown eyes he had ever encountered. Discretion should have
+prompted him to seek immediate safety out of the firing-line, but instead
+he put himself in the most exposed position possible and waited results.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+They arrived on schedule time.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Captain Phipps!&#34; called a page. &#34;Wanted on the telephone.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Will you wait for me here just a second?&#34; asked the officer.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't know whether I will or not,&#34; was the spirited answer; &#34;I may go
+home.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Then I'll follow you,&#34; said the Captain as he pushed his way through the
+crowd to the telephone-booth.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was just at this moment, when the jazz band was breaking into its most
+beguiling number, that Quin's eyes and the girl's eyes met in a glance of
+mutual desire. History repeated itself. Once again, &#34;with total disregard
+for his personal safety, Sergeant Graham assumed command when his officer
+was disabled,&#34; and rashly flung himself into the breach.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Will you dance it with me?&#34; he asked eagerly, and he blushed to the
+roots of his stubbly hair.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+There was an ominous pause, during which the young girl stood irresolute,
+while Mrs. Grundy evidently whispered &#34;Don't&#34; in one ear and instinct
+whispered &#34;Do&#34; in the other. It lasted but a second, for the next thing
+Quin knew, a small gloved hand was slipped into his, a blue plume was
+tickling his nose, and he was gliding a bit unsteadily into Paradise.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+What his heart might do after that dance was of absolutely no consequence
+to him. It could beat fast or slow, or even stop altogether, if it would
+only hold out as long as the music did. Round and round among the dancers
+he guided his dainty partner, carefully avoiding the entrance end of the
+hall, and devoutly praying that his clumsy army shoes might not crush
+those little high-heeled brown pumps tripping so deftly in and out
+between them. He was not used to dancing with officers' girls, and he
+held the small gray-gloved hand in his big fist as if it were a bird
+about to take flight.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Next to the return of the Captain, he dreaded that other dancers, seeing
+his prize, would try to capture her; but there was a certain tempered
+disdain in the poise of his little partner's head, an ability to put up a
+quick and effective defense against intrusion, that protected him as
+well.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Neither of them spoke until the music stopped, and then they stood
+applauding vociferously, with the rest, for an encore.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I ought to go,&#34; said the Radiant Presence, with a guilty glance upward
+from under long eyelashes. &#34;You don't see a very cross-looking Captain
+charging around near the door, do you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No,&#34; said Quin, without turning his head, &#34;I don't see him&#34;&#8212;and he
+smiled as he said it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now, Quin's smile was his chief asset in the way of looks. It was a
+leisurely smile, that began far below the surface and sent preliminary
+ripples up to his eyes and the corners of his big mouth, and broke
+through at last in a radiant flash of good humor. In this case it met a
+very prompt answer under the big hat.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You see, I'm not supposed to be dancing,&#34; she explained rather
+condescendingly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Nor me, either,&#34; said Quin, breathing heavily.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then the band decided to be accommodating, and the saxophone decided to
+out-jazz the piano, and the drum got its ambition roused and joined in
+the competition, and the young couple who were not supposed to be dancing
+out-danced everything on the floor!
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's heart might have adjusted itself to that first dance, but the
+rollicking encore, together with the emotional shock it sustained every
+time those destructive eyes were trained upon him, was too much for it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Say, would you mind stopping a bit?&#8212;just for a second?&#34; he gasped, when
+his breath seemed about to desert him permanently.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You surely aren't <i>tired</i>?&#34; scoffed the young lady, lifting a pair
+of finely arched eyebrows.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No; but, you see&#8212;as a matter of fact, ever since I was gassed&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Gassed!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The word acted like a charm. The girl's sensitive face, over which the
+expressions played like sunlight on water, softened to instant sympathy,
+and Quin, who up to now had been merely a partner, suddenly found himself
+individual.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Did you see much actual service?&#34; she asked, her eyes wide with
+interest.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Sure,&#34; said Quin, bracing himself against a post and trying to keep his
+breath from coming in jerks; &#34;saw sixteen months of it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Her quick glance swept from the long scar on his forehead to the bar on
+his breast.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What do all those stars on the rainbow ribbon mean?&#34; she demanded.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Major engagements,&#34; said Quin diffidently.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And the silver one in the middle?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;A citation,&#34; He glanced around to make sure none of the other boys were
+near, then confessed, as if to a crime: &#34;That's where I got my medal.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Come over here and sit down this minute,&#34; she commanded. &#34;You've got to
+tell me all about it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It would be very pleasant to chronicle the fact that our hero modestly
+declined to take advantage of the opportunity thus offered. But it must
+be borne in mind that, his heart having failed him at a critical hour, he
+had to fall back upon his tongue as the only means at hand of detaining
+the Celestial Being who at any moment might depart. With what breath he
+had left he told his story, and, having a good story to tell, he did it
+full justice. Sometimes, to be sure, he got his pronouns mixed, and once
+he lost the thread of his discourse entirely; but that was when he became
+too conscious of those star-like eyes and the flattering absorption of
+the little lady who for one transcendent moment was deigning &#34;to love him
+for the dangers he had passed.&#34; With unabated interest and curiosity she
+drank in every detail of his recital, her half-parted lips only closing
+occasionally to say, &#34;Wonderful!&#34; or &#34;How <i>perfectly</i> wonderful!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On and on went the music, round and round went the dancers, and still the
+private in the uniform that was too big and the officer's girl in blue
+and gray sat in the alcove, totally oblivious to everything but each
+other.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was not until the girl happened to look at the ridiculous little watch
+that was pretending to keep time on her wrist that the spell was broken.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Merciful heaven!&#34; she exclaimed dramatically, &#34;It's six o'clock. What
+<i>will</i> the family say to me? I must fly this minute.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But ain't you going to finish this dance with me?&#34; asked Quin with
+tragic insistence.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Ought you to dance again?&#34; The note was personal and divinely
+solicitous.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I oughtn't, but I am&#34;; and, with superb disregard for doctors and syntax
+alike, Quin put a firm arm around that slender yielding figure and swept
+her into the moving crowd.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+They danced very quietly this time, for he was determined to hold out to
+the end. In fact, from the dreamy, preoccupied look on their faces one
+might have mistaken them for two zealous young acolytes lost in the
+performance of a religious rite.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin was still in a trance when he helped her on with her coat and
+piloted her down the crowded stairs. He could not bear to have her
+jostled by the boisterous crowd, and he glared at the men whose admiring
+glances dared to rest too long upon her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now that the dance was over, the young lady was in a fever of impatience
+to get away. Qualms of remorse seized her for the way she had treated her
+one-time escort, and she hinted at the trouble in store for her if the
+family heard of her escapade.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Outside the pavements were white with snow, and falling flakes glistened
+against the blue electric lights. Holiday crowds thronged the sidewalks,
+and every other man was in uniform.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I left my car at the corner,&#34; said Quin's companion, nervously
+consulting her watch for the fourth time. &#34;You needn't come with me; I
+can find it all right.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But Quin hadn't the slightest intention of forgoing one second of that
+delectable interview. He followed her to her car, awkwardly helped her
+in, and stood looking at her wistfully. In her hurry to get home she
+seemed to have forgotten him entirely. In two minutes she would never
+know that she had met him, while he&#8212;&#8212;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Good-by, Soldier Boy,&#34; she said, suddenly holding out her hand.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;My name is Graham,&#34; stammered Quin&#8212;&#34;Sergeant Quinby Graham; Battery C,
+Sixth Field Artillery. And yours?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She was fussing with the starter by this time, but she smiled up at him
+and shook her head.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I? Oh, I haven't any! I'm just an irresponsible young person who is
+going to gets fits for having stayed out so late. But it was worth it,
+wasn't it&#8212;Sergeant Slim?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+And then, before he knew what had happened, the small runabout was
+skilfully backed out of its narrow space and a red tail-light was rapidly
+wagging down the avenue, leaving him standing dazed on the curbstone.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Where in the devil have you been?&#34; demanded a cross voice behind him,
+and turning he encountered Cass's snub-nose and irate eyes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's own eyes were shining and his face was flushed. With a laugh he
+flung his arm around his buddy's shoulder and affectionately punched his
+head.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;In heaven,&#34; he answered laconically.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Funny place to leave your overcoat!&#34; said Cass, viewing him with
+suspicion. &#34;Quin Graham, have you had a drink?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin hilariously declared his innocence. The draught of which he had so
+freely imbibed, though far more potent than any earthly brew, was one
+against which there are no prohibitory laws.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="2">
+CHAPTER 2</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+The fact that Cass had neglected to tell the family that he was bringing
+a friend home to supper did not in the least affect his welcome. It was
+not that the daily menu was of such a lavish nature that a guest or two
+made no difference; it was simply that the Martels belonged to that
+casual type which accepts any interruption to the regular order of things
+as a God-sent diversion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In the present instance Rose had only to dispatch Edwin to the grocery
+for eggs and cheese, and send Myrna next door to borrow a chafing-dish,
+and, while these errands were being accomplished, to complete her own
+sketchy toilet. Rose was an impressionist when it came to dress. She got
+the desired effect with the least possible effort, as was evinced now by
+the way she was whirling two coils of chestnut hair, from which the
+tangles had not been removed, into round puffs over each ear. A dab of
+rouge on each cheek, a touch of red on the lips, a dash of powder over
+the whole, sleeves turned back, neck turned in, resulted in a poster
+effect that was quite satisfactory.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Of course the Martels had heard of Quinby Graham: his name had loomed
+large in Cass's letters from France and later in his conversation; but
+this was the first time the hero was to be presented in person.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What's he like, Rose?&#34; asked Myrna, arriving breathlessly with the
+chafing-dish. Myrna was twelve and seemed to labor under the constant
+apprehension that she was missing something, due no doubt to the fact
+that she was invariably dispatched on an errand when anything interesting
+was pending.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Don't know,&#34; said Rose; &#34;the hall was pitch-dark. He's got a nice voice,
+though, and a dandy handshake.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I bid to sit next to him at supper,&#34; said Myrna, hugging herself in
+ecstasy.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You can if you promise not to take two helps of the Welsh rabbit.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Myrna refused to negotiate on any such drastic terms. &#34;Are we going to
+have a fire in the sitting-room?&#34; she asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't know whether there is any more wood. Papa Claude promised to
+order some. You go see while I set the table. I've a good notion to call
+over the fence and ask Fan Loomis to come to supper.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, Rose, <i>please</i> do!&#34; cried Myrna. &#34;I won't take but one help.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Cass, in the meanwhile, was making his guest at home in the sitting-room
+by permitting him to be useful.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You can light the lamp,&#34; he said, &#34;while I make a fire.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin was willing to oblige, but the lamp was not. It put up a stubborn
+resistance to all efforts to coax it to do its duty.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I bet it hasn't been filled,&#34; said Cass; then, after the fashion of
+mankind, he lifted his voice in supplication to the nearest feminine ear:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh! Ro&#8212;ose!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+His older sister, coming to the rescue, agreed with his diagnosis of the
+case, and with Quin's assistance bore the delinquent lamp to the kitchen.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Hope you don't mind being made home-folks,&#34; she said, patting the puffs
+over her ears and looking at him sideways.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Mind?&#34; said Quin. &#34;If you knew how good all this looks to me! It's the
+first touch of home I've had in years. Wish you'd let me set the
+table&#8212;I'm strong on K. P.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Help yourself,&#34; said Rose; &#34;the plates are in the pantry and the silver
+in the sideboard drawer. Wait a minute!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She took a long apron from behind the door and handed it to him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How do these ends buckle up?&#34; he asked, helplessly holding out the
+straps of the bib.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;They button around your little neck,&#34; she told him, smiling. &#34;Turn
+round; I'll fix it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why turn round?&#34; said Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Their eyes met in frank challenge.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You silly boy!&#34; she said&#8212;but she put her arms around his neck and
+fastened the bib just the same.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+How that supper ever got itself cooked and served is a marvel. Everybody
+took a turn at the stirring and toasting, everybody contributed a missing
+article to the table, and there was much rushing from kitchen to
+dining-room, with many collisions and some upsets.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin was in the highest of spirits. Even Cass had never seen him quite
+like this. With his white apron over his uniform, he pranced about,
+dancing attendance on Rose, and keeping Myrna and Edwin in gales of
+laughter over his antics. Every now and then, however, his knees got
+wabbly and his breath came short, and by the time supper was prepared he
+was quite ready to sit down.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What a shame Nell's not here!&#34; said Rose, breaking the eggs into the
+chafing-dish. &#34;Then we could have charades. She's simply great when she
+gets started.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Who is Nell?&#34; asked Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Eleanor Bartlett, our cousin. She's like chicken and ice-cream&#8212;the rich
+Bartletts have her on weekdays and we poor Martels get her only on
+Sundays. Hasn't Cass ever told you about Nell?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you suppose I spend my time talking about my precious family?&#34;
+growled Cass.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, but Nell's different,&#34; said Rose; &#34;she's a sort of Solomon's baby&#8212;I
+mean the baby that Solomon had to decide about. Only in this case neither
+old Madam Bartlett nor Papa Claude will give up their half; they'd see
+her dead first.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You did tell me about her,&#34; said Quin to Cass, &#34;one night when we were
+up in the Cantigny offensive. I remember the place exactly. Something
+about an orphan, and a lawsuit, and a little girl that was going to be an
+actress.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's the dope,&#34; said Cass. &#34;Only she's not a kid any more. She grew up
+while I was in France. She's a great girl, Nell is, when you get her away
+from that Bartlett mess!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Does anybody know where Papa Claude is?&#34; Rose demanded, dexterously
+ladling out steaming Welsh rabbit on to slices of crisp brown toast.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He is here, <i>mes enfants</i>, he is here!&#34; cried a joyous voice from
+the hall, followed by a presence at once so exuberant and so impressive
+that Quin stared in amazement.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;This is Quinby Graham, grandfather,&#34; said Cass, by way of introduction.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The dressy old gentleman with the flowing white locks and the white rose
+in his buttonhole bore down upon Quin and enveloped his hand in both his
+own.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I welcome you for Cassius' sake and for your own!&#34; he declared with such
+effusion that Quin was visibly embarrassed. &#34;My grandson has told me of
+your long siege in the hospital, of your noble service to your country,
+of your gallant conduct at&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Sit down, Papa Claude, and finish your oration after supper,&#34; cried
+Rose; &#34;the rabbit won't wait on anybody.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thus cut short, Mr. Martel took his seat and, nothing daunted, helped
+himself bountifully to everything within reach.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am a gourmet, Sergeant Graham, but not a gourmand. Edwin Booth used to
+say&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Sir?&#34; answered Edwin Booth's namesake from the kitchen, where he had
+been dispatched for more bread.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, no, my son, I was referring to&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But Papa Claude, as usual, did not get to finish the sentence. The advent
+of the next-door neighbor, who had been invited and then forgotten,
+caused great amusement owing to the fact that there was no more supper
+left.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Give her some bread and jam, Myrna,&#34; said Rose; &#34;and if the jam is out,
+bring the brown sugar. You don't mind, do you, Fan?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Fan, an amiable blonde person who was going to be fat at forty, declared
+that she didn't want a thing to eat, honestly she didn't, and that
+besides she adored bread and brown sugar.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;We won't stop to wash up,&#34; said Rose; &#34;Myrna will have loads of time to
+do it in the morning, because she doesn't have to go to school. We'll
+just clear the table and let the dishes stand.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;We are incorrigible Bohemians, as you observe,&#34; said Mr. Martel to Quin,
+with a deprecating arching of his fine brows. &#34;We lay too little stress,
+I fear, on the conventions. But the exigencies of the dramatic
+profession&#8212;of which, you doubtless know, I have been a member for the
+past forty years&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Take him in the sitting-room, Mr. Graham,&#34; urged Rose; &#34;I'll bring your
+coffee in there.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Without apparently being conscious of the fact, Mr. Martel, still
+discoursing in rounded periods, was transferred to the big chair beside
+the lamp, while Quin took up his stand on the hearth-rug and looked about
+him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Such a jumble of a room as it was! Odds and ends of furniture, the
+survival of various household wrecks; chipped bric-&#224;-brac; a rug from
+which the pattern had long ago vanished; an old couch piled with shabby
+cushions; a piano with scattered music sheets. On the walls, from ceiling
+to foot-board, hung faded photographs of actors and actresses, most of
+them with bold inscriptions dashed across their corners in which the
+donors invariably expressed their friendship, affection, or if the
+chirography was feminine their devoted love, for &#34;dear Claude Martel.&#34;
+Over the mantel was a portrait of dear Claude himself, taken in the r&#244;le
+of Mark Antony, and making rather a good job of it, on the whole, with
+his fine Roman profile and massive brow.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was all shabby and dusty and untidy; but to Quinby Graham, standing on
+the hearth-rug and trying to handle his small coffee-cup as if he were
+used to it, the room was completely satisfying. There was a cozy warmth
+and mellowness about it, a kindly atmosphere of fellowship, a sense of
+intimate human relations, that brought a lump into his throat. He had
+almost forgotten that things could be like this!
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So absorbed was he in his surroundings, and in the imposing old actor
+encompassed by the galaxy of pictured notables, that he lost the thread
+of Mr. Martel's discourse until he heard him asking:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What is the present? A clamor of the senses, a roar that deafens us to
+the music of life. I dwell in the past and in the future, Sergeant
+Graham&#8212;the dear reminiscent past and the glorious unborn future. And
+that reminds me that Cassius tells me that you are both about to receive
+your discharge from the army and are ready for the next great adventure.
+May I ask what yours is to be? A return, perhaps, to your native city?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;My native city happens to be a river,&#34; said Quin. &#34;I was born on a
+house-boat going up the Yangtse-Kiang.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Indeed!&#34; cried Mr. Martel with interest. &#34;What a romantic beginning! And
+your family?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Haven't got any. You see, sir,&#34; said Quin, expanding under the
+flattering attention of his host, &#34;my people were all missionaries. Most
+of them died off before I was fourteen, and I was shipped back to America
+to go to school. I didn't hold out very long, though. After two years in
+high school I ran away and joined the navy.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And since then you have been a soldier of fortune, eh? No cares, no
+responsibilities. Free to roam the wide world in search of adventure.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin studied the end of his cigarette.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That ain't so good as it sounds,&#34; he said. &#34;Sometimes I think I'd
+amounted to more if I had somebody that belonged to me.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Isn't it rather early in the season for a young man's fancy to be
+lightly turning&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The quotation was lost upon Quin, but the twinkle in the speaker's
+expressive eye was not.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I didn't mean that,&#34; he laughingly protested; &#34;I mean a mother or a
+sister or somebody like that, who would be a kind of anchor. Take Cass,
+for instance; he's steady as a rock.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Ah! Cassius! One in ten thousand. From the time he was twelve he has
+shared with me the financial burden. An artist, Sergeant Graham, must
+remain aloof from the market-place. Now that I have retired permanently
+from the stage in order to devote my time exclusively to writing, my only
+business engagement is a series of lectures at the university, where, as
+you know, I occupy the chair of Dramatic Literature.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The chair thus euphemistically referred to was scarcely more than a
+three-legged stool, which he occupied four mornings in the week, the rest
+of his time being spent at home in the arduous task of writing tragedies
+in blank verse.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What I got to think about is a job,&#34; said Quin, much more interested in
+his own affairs than in those of his host.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Commercial or professional?&#34; inquired Mr. Martel.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, I can turn my hand to 'most anything,&#34; bragged Quin, blowing
+smoke-rings at the ceiling. &#34;It's experience that counts, and, believe
+me, I've had a plenty.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Experience plus education,&#34; added Mr. Martel; &#34;we must not underestimate
+the advantages of education.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's where I'm short,&#34; admitted Quin. &#34;My folks were all smart enough.
+Guess if they had lived I'd been put through college and all the rest of
+it. My grandfather was Dr. Ezra Quinby. Ever hear of him?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Martel had to acknowledge that he had not.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Guess he is better known in China than in America,&#34; said Quin. &#34;He died
+before I was born.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And you have no people in America?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No people anywhere,&#34; said Quin cheerfully; &#34;but I got a lot of friends
+scattered around over the world, and a bull-dog and a couple of cats up
+at a lumber-camp near Portland.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Cassius tells me that you are thinking of returning to Maine.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin ran his fingers through his hair and laughed. &#34;That was yesterday,&#34;
+he said. &#34;To-day you couldn't get me out of Kentucky with a machine-gun!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Claude Martel rose and laid an affectionate hand on his shoulder. &#34;Then,
+my boy, we claim you as our own. Cassius' home is your home, his family
+your family, his&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The address of welcome was cut short by Cass's arrival with an armful of
+wood which he deposited on the hearth, and a moment later the girls,
+followed by Edwin, came trooping in from the kitchen.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Let's make a circle round the fire and sing the old year out,&#34; suggested
+Rose gaily. &#34;Myrna, get the banjo and the guitar. Shall I play on the
+piano, Papa Claude, or will you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Martel, expressing the noble sentiment that age should always be an
+accompaniment to youth, took his place at the piano and, with a pose
+worthy of Rubinstein, struck a few preliminary chords, while the group
+about the fire noisily settled itself for the evening.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You can put your head against my knees, if you like,&#34; Rose said to Quin,
+who was sprawling on the floor at her feet. &#34;There, is that comfy?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll say it's all right!&#34; said Quin with heartfelt satisfaction.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+There was something free and easy and gipsy-like about the evening, a
+sort of fireside picnic that brought June dreams in January. As the hours
+wore on, the singing, which had been noisy and rollicking, gradually
+mellowed into sentiment, a sentiment that found vent in dreamy eyes and
+long-drawn-out choruses, with a languorous over-accentuation of the
+sentimental passages. One by one, the singers fell under the spell of the
+music and the firelight. Cass and Fan Loomis sat shoulder to shoulder on
+the broken-springed couch and gazed with blissful oblivion into the red
+embers on the hearth. Rose, whose voice led all the rest, surreptitiously
+wiped her eyes when no one was looking; Edwin and Myrna, solemnly
+plucking their banjo and guitar, were lost in moods of dormant emotion;
+while Papa Claude at the piano let his dim eyes range the pictured walls,
+while his memory traveled back through the years on many a secret tryst
+of its own.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But it was the lank Sergeant with the big feet, and the hair that stood
+up where it shouldn't, who dared to dream the most preposterous dream of
+them all. For, as he sang there in the firelight, a little god was busy
+lighting the tapers in the most sacred shrines of his being, until he
+felt like a cathedral at high mass with all the chimes going.
+</p>
+
+<div class="poem">
+<div class="stanza">
+<p>&#34;There's a long, long trail a-winding</p>
+<p class="i2">Into the land of my dreams,</p>
+<p>Where the nightingales are singing</p>
+<p class="i2">And a white moon beams.&#34;</p></div></div>
+
+<p class="noindent">
+How many times he had sung it in France!&#8212;jolting along muddy, endless
+roads, heartsick, homesick.
+</p>
+
+<div class="poem">
+<div class="stanza">
+<p>&#34;There's a long, long night of waiting</p>
+<p class="i2">Until my dreams all come true,</p>
+<p>Till the day when I'll be going</p>
+<p class="i2">Down that long, long trail with you.&#34;</p></div></div>
+
+<p class="noindent">
+What had &#34;you&#34; meant to him then? A girl&#8212;a pretty girl, of course; but
+<i>any</i> girl. And now?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Ah, now he knew what he had been going toward, not only on those terrible
+roads in France, but all through the years of his life. An exquisite,
+imperious little officer's girl with divinely compassionate eyes, who
+wasn't ashamed to dance with a private, and who had let him hold her hand
+at parting while she said in accents an angel might have envied,
+&#34;Good-by, Soldier Boy.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin sighed profoundly and slipped his arm under his head, and at the
+same moment the owner of the knee upon which he was leaning also heaved a
+sigh and shifted <i>her</i> position, and somehow in the adjustment two
+lonely hands came in contact and evidently decided that, after all,
+substitutes were <i>some</i> comfort.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was not until all the whistles in town had announced the birth of the
+New Year that the party broke up, and it was not until then that Quin
+realized that he was very tired, and that his pulse was behaving in a way
+that was, alas, all too familiar.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="3">CHAPTER 3</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+Friday after New Year's found Sergeant Graham again flat on his back at
+the Base Hospital, facing sentence of three additional weeks in bed. In
+vain had he risked a reprimand by hotly protesting the point with the
+Captain; in vain had he declared to the nurse that he would rather live
+on his feet than die on his back. Judgment was passed, and he lay with an
+ice-bag on his head and a thermometer in his mouth and hot rage in his
+heart.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+What made matters worse was that Cass Martel had come over from the
+Convalescent Barracks only that morning to announce that he had received
+his discharge and was going home. To Quin it seemed that everybody but
+himself was going home&#8212;that is, everybody but the incurables. At that
+thought a dozen nameless fears that had been tormenting him of late all
+seemed to get together and rush upon him. What if the doctors were
+holding him on from month to month, experimenting, promising,
+disappointing, only in the end to bunch him with the permanently disabled
+and ship him off to some God-forsaken spot to spend the rest of his life
+in a hospital?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He gripped his hands over his chest and gave himself up to savage
+rebellion. If they would let him alone he might get well! In France it
+had been his head. Whenever the wound began to heal and things looked a
+bit cheerful, some saw-bones had come along and thumped and probed and
+X-rayed, and then it had been ether and an operation and the whole
+blooming thing over again. Then, when they couldn't work on his head any
+longer, they'd started up this talk about his heart. Of course his heart
+was jumpy! All the fellows who had been badly gassed had jumpy hearts.
+But how was he ever going to get any better lying there on his back? What
+he needed was exercise and decent food and something cheerful to think
+about. He wanted desperately to get away from his memories, to forget the
+horrors, the sickening sights and smells, the turmoil and confusion of
+the past two years. In spite of his most heroic efforts, he kept living
+over past events. This time last year he had been up in the Toul sector,
+where half the men he knew had gone west. It was up there old Corpy had
+got his head shot off....
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He resolutely fixed his attention on a spider that was swinging directly
+over his head and tried to forget old Corpy. He thought instead of
+Captain Phipps, but the thought did not calm him. What sense was there in
+his ordering more of this fool rest business? Well, he told himself
+fiercely, he wasn't going to stand for it! The war was over, he had done
+his part, he was going to demand his freedom. Discipline or no
+discipline, he would go over Phipps' head and appeal to the Colonel.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Throwing aside the ice-bag, he looked around for his uniform. But the
+nurse had evidently mistrusted the look in his eyes when she gave him the
+Captain's orders, for the hook over his bed was empty. He raised himself
+in his cot and glared savagely down the ward, sniffing the air
+suspiciously. Two orderlies were wheeling No. 17 back from the
+operating-room, and Quin already caught the faint odor of ether. The
+first whiff of it filled him with loathing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thrusting his bare feet into slippers and his arms into a shabby old
+bath-robe, he flung himself out of bed and slipped out on the porch. The
+air was cold and bracing and gloriously free from the hospital
+combination of wienerw&#252;rst, ether, and dried peaches that had come to be
+a nightmare odor to him. He sat on the railing and drew in deep,
+refreshing breaths, and as he did so things began to right themselves.
+Fair play to Quin amounted almost to a religion, and it was suddenly
+borne in upon him that he would not be where he was had he observed the
+rules of the game. But then again, if he had not danced, he never would
+have&#8212;&#8212;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At that moment something so strange happened that he put a hot hand to a
+hotter brow and wondered if he was delirious. The singularly vibrant
+voice that had been echoing in his memory since New Year's eve was saying
+directly behind him:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I shall give them all the chocolate they want, Captain Harold Phipps,
+and you may court-martial me later if you like!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin glanced up hastily, and there, framed in the doorway, in a Red Cross
+uniform, stood his dream girl, looking so much more ravishing than she
+had before that he promptly snatched the blue and gray vision from its
+place of honor and installed a red, white, and blue one instead. So
+engrossed was he in the apparition that he quite failed to see Captain
+Phipps surveying him over her shoulder.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Number 7!&#34; said the Captain with icy decision, &#34;weren't you instructed
+to stay in bed?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I was, sir,&#34; said Quin, coming to attention and presenting a decidedly
+sorry aspect.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Go back at once, and add three days to the time indicated. This way,
+Miss Bartlett.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now, it is well-nigh impossible to preserve one's dignity when suffering
+a reprimand in public; but when you are handicapped by a shabby
+bath-robe, a three days' growth of beard, and a grouch that gives you the
+expression of a bandit, and the public happens to be the one being on
+earth whom you are most anxious to please, the situation becomes tragic.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin set his jaw and shuffled ignominiously off to bed, thankful for once
+that he had been considered unworthy a second glance from those luminous
+brown eyes. His satisfaction, however, was short-lived. A moment later
+the young lady appeared at the far end of the ward, carrying an absurd
+little basket adorned with a large pink bow, from which she began to
+distribute chocolates.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A feminine presence in the ward always created a flutter, but the
+previous flutters were mere zephyrs compassed to the cyclone produced by
+the new ward visitor. Some one started the phonograph, and Michaelis, who
+had been swearing all day that he would never be able to walk again,
+actually began to dance. Witticisms were exchanged from bed to bed, and
+the man who was going to be operated on next morning flung a pillow at an
+orderly and upset a vase of flowers. Things had not been so cheerful for
+weeks.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin, lying in the last bed in the ward, alternated between rapture and
+despair as he watched the progress of the visitor. Would she recognize
+him? Would she speak to him if she did, when he looked like that? Perhaps
+if he turned his face to the wall and pretended to be asleep she would
+pass him by. But he did not want her to pass him by. This might be the
+only chance he would ever have to see her again!
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Back in his fringe of consciousness he was frantically groping for the
+name the Captain had mentioned: Barnet? Barret? Bartlett? That was it!
+And with the recovery of the name Quin's mind did another somersault.
+Bartlett? Where had he heard that name? Eleanor Bartlett? Some nonsense
+about &#34;Solomon's baby.&#34; Why, Rose Martel, of course.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then all thought deserted him, for the world suddenly shrank to five feet
+two of femininity, and he heard a gay, impersonal voice saying:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;May I put a cake of chocolate on your table?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For the life of him, he could not answer. He only lay there with his
+mouth open, looking at her, while she straightened the contents of her
+basket. One more moment and she would be gone. Quin staked all on a
+chance shot.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Thank you, Miss Eleanor Bartlett,&#34; he said, with that ridiculous blush
+that was so out of keeping with his audacity.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She looked at him in amazement; then her face broke into a smile of
+recognition.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, bless my soul, if it isn't Sergeant Slim! What are you doing
+here?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Same thing I been doing for six months,&#34; said Quin sheepishly; &#34;counting
+the planks in the ceiling.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I thought you had got well. Oh, I hope it wasn't the dancing&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Lord, no,&#34; said Quin, keeping his hand over his bristly chin. &#34;I'm
+husky, all right. Only they've got so used to seeing me laying around
+that they can't bear to let me go.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you have to lie flat on your back like that, with no pillow or
+anything?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It ain't so bad, except at mess-time.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And you can't even sit up to eat?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not supposed to.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Bartlett eyed him compassionately.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am coming out twice a week now&#8212;Mondays and Fridays&#8212;and I'm going to
+bring you something nice every time I come. How long will you be here?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Three weeks,&#34; said Quin&#8212;adding, with a funny twist of his lip, &#34;three
+weeks and three days.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh! Were you the boy on the porch? How funny I didn't recognize you! I'm
+going to ask Captain Phipps to let you off those extra days.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, you mustn't.&#34; Quin objected earnestly; &#34;I'll take what's coming to
+me. Besides,&#34; he added, &#34;one of those days might be a Monday or a
+Friday!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This seemed to amuse her, for she smiled as she wrote his name and bed
+number in a small notebook, with the added entry: &#34;Oyster soup,
+cigarettes, and a razor.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Just as she was leaving, she remembered something and turned back.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How did you know my name?&#34; she asked with lively curiosity.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Didn't the Captain call it on the porch?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Did he? But not my first name. How on earth <i>did</i> you know that?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Perhaps I guessed it,&#34; Quin said, looking mysterious. And just then a
+nurse came along and thrust the thermometer back in his mouth, and the
+conversation was abruptly ended.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Of course the calendar must have been right about the three weeks that
+followed; there probably were seven days in each week and twenty-four
+hours in each day. But Quin wasn't sure about it. He knew beyond doubt
+that there were three Mondays and four Fridays and one wholly gratuitous
+and never-to-be-forgotten Sunday when Miss Bartlett brought his dinner
+from town, and insisted upon cutting his chicken for him and feeding him
+custard with a spoon. The rest of the days were lost in abstract time,
+during which Quin had his hair cut and his face shaved, and did
+bead-work.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Until now he had sturdily refused to be inveigled into occupational
+therapy. Those guys that were done for could learn to knit, he said, and
+to make silly little mats, and weave things on a loom. If he couldn't do
+a man's work he'd be darned if he was going to do a woman's. But now all
+was changed. He announced his intention of making the classiest bead
+chain that had ever been achieved in 2 C. He insisted upon the instructor
+getting him the most expensive beads in the market, regardless of size or
+color.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now, for Quin, with his big hands and lack of dexterity, to have worked
+with beads under the most favorable conditions would have been difficult,
+but to master the art lying flat on his back was a <i>tour de force</i>.
+He pricked his fingers and broke his thread; he upset the beads on the
+floor, on the bed, in his tray; he took out and put in with infinite
+patience, &#34;each bead a thought, each thought a prayer.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Don't you think you had better give it up?&#34; asked the instructor, in
+despair, after the fourth lesson.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You don't know me,&#34; said Quin, setting his jaw. &#34;You been trying to get
+me into this for two weeks&#8212;now you've got to see me through.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It did not take long for the other patients to discover Quin's state of
+mind.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How about your heart disease, Graham?&#34; they inquired daily; &#34;think it's
+going to be chronic?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But Quin had little time for them. The distinction he had enjoyed as the
+champion poker-player in 2 C. began to wane as his popularity with the
+new ward visitor increased.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I like your nerve!&#8212;keeping her up there at your bed all the time,&#34;
+complained Michaelis.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She's an old friend of mine,&#34; Quin threw off nonchalantly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Aw, what you tryin' to put over on us?&#34; scoffed Mike. &#34;Where'd you ever
+git to know a girl like that?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, I know her all right,&#34; said Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The little mystery about Miss Bartlett's first name had been a fruitful
+topic of conversation between a couple whose topics were necessarily
+limited. She had teased Quin to tell her how he knew, and also how he
+knew she wanted to go on the stage; and Quin had teased back; and at last
+it had resolved itself into a pretty contest of wits.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This served to keep her beside him often as long as four minutes. Then he
+would gain an additional two minutes by showing her what progress he had
+made with his chain, and consulting her preference for an American flag
+or a Red Cross worked in the medallion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When every other means of detaining her had been exhausted, he sometimes
+resorted to strategy. Constitutionally he was opposed to duplicity; he
+was built on certain square lines that disqualified him for many a
+comfortable round hole in life. But under the stress of present
+circumstances he persuaded himself that the end justified the means.
+Ignoring the fact that he was as devoid of relations as a tree is of
+leaves in December, he developed a sudden sense of obligation to an
+imaginary cousin whom he added, without legal authority, to the
+population of Peru, Indiana. By means of Miss Bartlett's white hand he
+frequently informed her that she was not to worry about him, because he
+was &#34;doing splendid,&#34; and that a hospital &#34;wasn't so worse when you get
+used to it.&#34; And while he dictated words of assurance to his &#34;Cousin Sue&#34;
+his eyes feasted upon a dainty profile with long brown lashes that swept
+a peach-blow cheek. Once he became so demoralized by this too pleasing
+prospect that he said &#34;tell him&#34; instead of &#34;tell her,&#34; and the lashes
+lifted in instant inquiry.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I mean&#8212;er&#8212;her husband,&#34; Quin gasped.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But you had me direct the other letters to Miss Sue Brown.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, I know,&#34; said Quin, with an embarrassment that might have been
+attributed to skeletons in family closets; &#34;but, you see&#8212;she&#8212;er&#8212;she
+took back her own name.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The one cloud that darkened Quin's horizon these days was Captain Phipps.
+His visits to the ward always coincided with Miss Bartlett's, and he
+seemed to take a spiteful pleasure in keeping the men at attention while
+he engaged her in intimate conversation. He was an extremely fastidious,
+well groomed young man, with an insolent hauteur and a certain lordly air
+of possession that proclaimed him a conqueror of the sex. Quin regarded
+him with growing disfavor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When the three weeks were almost over, Quin was allowed to sit up, and
+even to walk on the porch. Miss Bartlett found him there one day when she
+arrived.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Aha!&#34; she cried, &#34;I've found you out, Sergeant Slim! You are Cass
+Martel's hero, and that's where you heard about me and found out my first
+name.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin pleaded guilty, and their usual five minutes together lengthened
+into fifteen while she gave him all the news of the Martel family. Cass
+had taken his old position at the railroad office, and, dear knows, it
+was a good thing! And Rose was giving dancing lessons. And what did he
+think little old Myrna had done? Adopted a baby! Yes, a baby; wasn't it
+too ridiculous! An Italian one that the washwoman had forsaken. And Papa
+Claude had given up his lectures at the university in order to write the
+great American play. Weren't they the funniest and the dearest people he
+had ever known?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was amazing how intimate Quin and Miss Bartlett got on the subject of
+the Martels. He had to tell her in detail just what a brick her cousin
+Cass was, and she had to tell him what a really wonderful actor Papa
+Claude used to be.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Captain Phipps says he knows more about the stage than any man in the
+country.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What does the Captain know about it?&#34; asked Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Captain Phipps? Why, he's a playwright. He means to devote all his time
+to the stage as soon as he gets out of the army. You may not believe it,
+but he is an even better dramatist than he is a doctor.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, yes, I do,&#34; said Quin; &#34;that's easy to believe.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The sarcasm was lost upon Miss Bartlett, who was intent upon delivering
+her message from the Martels. They had sent word that they expected Quin
+to come straight to them when he got his discharge, and that his room was
+waiting for him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And you?&#34; asked Quin eagerly. &#34;You'll be there every Sunday?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Her face, which had been all smiles, underwent a sudden change. She said
+with something perilously like a pout:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, I shan't; I'm to be shipped off to school next week.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;School?&#34; repeated Quin incredulously. &#34;What do you want to be going back
+to school for?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I <i>don't</i> want to. I hate it. It's the price I am paying for that
+dance I had with you at the Hawaiian Garden&#8212;that and other things.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What do you mean?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Some old tabby of a chaperon saw me there and came and told my
+grandmother.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But what could she have told? You didn't do anything you oughtn't to.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Bartlett shook her head. It was evidently something she could not
+explain, for she sat staring gloomily at the wall above the bed, then she
+said abruptly: &#34;Well, I must be going. Good-by if I don't see you again!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But you will,&#34; announced Quin fiercely. &#34;You are going to see me next
+Sunday at the Martels'. I'll be there if I land in the guard-house for
+it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why, your time's up Saturday, isn't it? Oh! I forgot those three extra
+days. Captain Phipps has got to let you off. He will if I tell him to.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At this something quite unexpected and elemental surged up in Quin. He
+forgot the amenities that he had taken such pains to observe in Miss
+Bartlett's presence, he entirely lost sight of the social gap that lay
+between them, and blurted out with deadly earnestness:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Say, are you his girl?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This had the effect of bringing Miss Bartlett promptly to her feet, and
+the next instant poor Quin was saying in an agony of regret:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'm sorry, Miss Bartlett. I didn't mean to be nervy. Honest, I didn't.
+Wait a minute&#8212;<i>please</i>&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But she was gone, leaving him to spend the rest of the afternoon
+searching for a phrase sufficiently odious to express his own opinion of
+himself.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="4">CHAPTER 4</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+Eleanor Bartlett, speeding home from the hospital with Captain Phipps
+beside her, repeated Quin's question to herself more than once. Up to the
+present her loves, like her friendships, had been entirely episodic. She
+had gone easily from one affair to another not so much from fickleness as
+from growth. What she wanted on Monday did not seem in the least
+desirable on Saturday, and it was a new and disturbing sensation to have
+the same person dominating her thoughts for so many consecutive days. If
+her relations with the young officer from Chicago were as platonic as she
+would have herself and her family believe, why had she allowed the affair
+to arrive at a stage that precipitated her banishment? Why was she even
+now flying in the face of authority and risking a serious reprimand by
+letting him ride in her car?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In fierce justification she told herself it was simply because the family
+had meddled. If they had not interfered, things would never have reached
+the danger mark. She had met Captain Phipps three weeks ago at her Uncle
+Randolph Bartlett's, and had at first not been sure that she liked him.
+He had seemed then a little superior and condescending, and had evidently
+considered her too young to be interesting. But the next time they met
+there Aunt Flo had made her do the balcony scene from &#34;Romeo and Juliet,&#34;
+and since then all had been different.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Captain Phipps had not only monopolized her at the dances&#8212;he had also
+found time from his not over-arduous military duties to drop in on her
+frequently in the afternoons. For hours at a time they had sat in the
+long, dim Bartlett parlor, with only the ghostly bust of old Madam
+Bartlett for a chaperon, ostensibly absorbed in the study of modern
+drama, but finding ample time to dwell at length upon Eleanor's
+qualifications for the stage and the Captain's budding genius as a
+playwright. And just when Ibsen and Pinero were giving place to
+Sudermann, and vague personal ambitions were crystallizing into definite
+plans, the family interfered.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The causes of their condemnation were as varied as they were numerous. He
+was ten years older than Eleanor; he was too sophisticated a companion
+for a young girl; he had taken her to a public dance-hall on New Year's
+eve, where she had been seen dancing with an unknown private; he had been
+quite insolent to Madam when she had taken him to task for it; and, most
+heinous of all, he was encouraging her in her ambition to go on the
+stage. And beneath it all, Eleanor knew quite well, was the nervous
+flutter of apprehension that seized the entire family whenever a
+threatening masculine presence loomed on the horizon.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She stole a glance at her handsome companion, and, seeing that he was
+observing her, quickly lowered her eyes. The Captain had a flattering way
+of studying her poses, remarking on the lines of her gowns and her hats.
+He was constantly discovering interesting things about her that she had
+not known before. But sometimes, as now, she was restive under his too
+close scrutiny.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;So you are actually going to leave me next week?&#34; he asked, with a note
+of personal aggrievement.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;To leave you? I like that! If it weren't for you I shouldn't be going.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Are they really sending you away on my account?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Indeed they are. Grandmother says you are encouraging me about the
+stage, and that poor Papa Claude is demoralizing us both.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Isn't that absurd?&#34; said the Captain. &#34;Dear old C. M. is about as
+innocuous as a peacock. Madam Bartlett should have been born in the
+seventeenth century. What will she say when she sees your name blazing
+over a Broadway theater?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;In one of your plays! Oh, Captain, wouldn't that be glorious?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Haven't I asked you to drop the 'Captain'? My name is Harold. Say it!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No; I can't.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, you can. Come!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But she defied him with tightly closed lips and dancing eyes. With
+feminine instinct she had discovered that the irresistible Captain was
+piqued and stimulated by the unusual taste of opposition.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You little minx!&#34; he said, lifting an accusing finger. &#34;Those eyes of
+yours are going to do a lot of damage before they get through with it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor took kindly to the thought that she was dangerous. If she could
+cause disturbance to an individual by the guarded flutter of her eyelids,
+what effect might she not produce by giving them full play before a
+larger audience?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you really think I could act if I got the chance?&#34; she asked
+dreamily.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am absolutely sure. Your grandfather's quite right when he says you
+were born to the footlights. With your voice and your unusual coloring
+and your plastic little body&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But you can't imagine the opposition,&#34; Eleanor broke in. &#34;It isn't as if
+my mother and father were living. I believe they would understand. But
+grandfather and the aunties, and even Uncle Ranny, throw a fit at the
+mere mention of the stage.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You do not belong to them,&#34; said the Captain impatiently. &#34;You do not
+even belong to yourself. A great talent belongs to the world. All these
+questions will settle themselves, once you take the definite step.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And you actually believe that I will get to New York to study?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't believe&#8212;I <i>know</i>. I intend to make it my business to see
+that you do.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+There was a confident ring of masterful assurance in his voice that
+carried delicious conviction. A person who was so absolutely sure of
+himself made other people sure of him, too, for the moment.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor, sitting low in the car, with her absent eyes fixed on the road
+ahead, lapsed into a daydream. From an absorbed contemplation of herself
+and her dramatic career, her mind veered in gratitude to the one who most
+believed in its possibility. What a friend he had been! Just when she had
+been ready to give up in despair, he had fanned her dying hope into a
+glorious blaze that illuminated every waking hour. And it was not only
+his sympathetic interest in her thwarted ambition that touched her: it
+was also the fact that he had rescued her from the daily boredom of
+sitting with elderly ladies making interminable surgical dressings, and
+by an adroit bit of diplomacy outwitted the family and introduced her as
+a ward visitor at the camp hospital.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The mere thought of the hospital sent her mind flying off at a tangent.
+Even the stage gave way for the moment to this new and all-absorbing
+occupation. Never in her life had she done anything so interesting. The
+escape from home, the personal contact with all those nice, jolly boys,
+the excitement of being of service for the first time in her butterfly
+existence, was intoxicating. She smiled now as she thought of the way
+Graham's eager head always popped up the moment she entered the door, and
+of how his face shone when she talked to him. After all, she told
+herself, there <i>was</i> something thrilling in having hands that had
+captured a machine-gun laboriously threading tiny beads for her, in
+having a soldier who had been decorated for courage stammer and blush in
+her presence.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well,&#34; said the Captain, who had been lazily observing her, &#34;aren't you
+about through with your mental monologue?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor roused herself with a start.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, I am sorry! I was thinking about my boys at the hospital. You can't
+imagine how I hate to leave them!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The answer was evidently not what the Captain had expected. As long as
+his company of feminine admirers marched in adoring unison he was
+indifferent to their existence; but let one miss step and he was
+instantly on the alert.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I haven't noticed any tears being shed over leaving me,&#34; he said, and
+the aggrieved note in his voice promptly stirred her humor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why should I mind leaving you? You don't need me.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How do you know?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She looked at him scoffingly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You don't need anything or anybody. You've got all you want in
+yourself.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll show you what I want!&#34; he said, and, quickly bending toward her, he
+kissed her on the cheek.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was the merest brush of his lips, but it brought the color flaming
+into her face and the lightning into her eyes. She had never been so
+angry in her life, and it seemed to her an age that she sat there rigid
+and indignant, suffocated by his nearness but powerless to move away.
+Then she got the car stopped, and announced with great dignity that she
+was nearly home and that she would have to ask him to get out.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Captain Phipps lazily descended from the car, then stood with elbows on
+the ledge of the door and rolled a cigarette with great deliberation.
+Eleanor, in spite of her wrath, could not help admiring the graceful,
+conscious movement of his slender hands with their highly polished nails.
+It was not until he had struck his match that he looked at her and smiled
+quizzically.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What a dear little goose you are! Do you suppose that stage lovers are
+going to stand in the wings and throw kisses to you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No,&#34; said Eleanor hotly; &#34;but that will be different.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It certainly will,&#34; he agreed amiably. &#34;You will not only have to be
+kissed, but you will have to kiss back. You have a lot of little
+puritanical prejudices to get over, my dear, before you can ever hope to
+act. You don't want to be a thin-blooded little old maid, do you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The shot was well aimed, for Eleanor had no desire to follow in the arid
+footsteps of her two spinster aunts. She looked at Captain Phipps
+unsteadily and shook her head.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course you don't,&#34; he encouraged her. &#34;You aren't built for it.
+Besides, it's an actress's business to cultivate her emotions rather than
+repress them, isn't it?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, I suppose it is.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Then, for heaven's sake, obey your impulses and let other people obey
+theirs. From now on you are to be identified with a profession that
+transcends the petty conventions of society. Confess! Aren't you already
+a little ashamed of getting angry with me just now?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She was not ashamed, not in the least; but her ardent desire to prove her
+fitness for that coveted profession, together with the compelling
+insistence of that persuasive voice, prompted her to hold out a reluctant
+hand and to smile.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You are a darling child!&#34; said Captain Phipps, with a level glance of
+approval. &#34;I shall see you to-morrow. When? Where?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But she would make no engagement. She was in a flutter to be gone. It was
+her first experience at dancing on a precipice, and, while she liked it,
+she could not deny, even to herself, that at times it made her
+uncomfortably hot and dizzy.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="5">CHAPTER 5</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+Eleanor's thoughts were still in a turmoil as she slowed her car to a
+within-the-law limit of speed and brought it to a dignified halt before
+an imposing edifice on Third Avenue. The precaution was well taken, for a
+long, pale face that had been pressed to a front window promptly
+transferred itself to the front door, and an anxious voice called out:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, Nellie, <i>why</i> did you stay out so late? Didn't you know it was
+your duty to be in before five?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's not late, Aunt Isobel,&#34; said Eleanor impatiently. &#34;It gets dark
+early, that's all.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And you must be frozen,&#34; persisted Miss Isobel, &#34;with those thin pumps
+and silk stockings, and nothing but that veil on your head.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I'm <i>hot!</i>&#34; declared Eleanor, throwing open her coat. &#34;The
+house is stifling. Can't we have a window open?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Isobel sighed. Like the rest of the family, she never knew what to
+expect from this troublesome, adorable, disturbing mystery called
+Eleanor. She worshiped her with the solicitous, over-anxious care that
+saw fever in the healthy flush of youth, regarded a sneeze as premonitory
+of consumption, and waited with dark certitude for the &#34;something
+dreadful&#34; that instinct told her was ever about to happen to her darling.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am afraid your grandmother is terribly upset about your staying out so
+late,&#34; she said, with a note of warning in her voice.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What made you tell her?&#34; demanded Eleanor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Because she asked me, and of course I could not deceive her. I don't
+believe you know how hard it is to keep things from her.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;<i>Don't</i> I!&#34; said Eleanor, with the tolerant smile of a professional
+for an amateur. &#34;Well, a few minutes more won't make any difference. I'll
+go and change my dress.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, dear; you must go to her first. She's been sending Hannah down every
+few minutes to see if you were here.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, dear! I suppose I'm in for it!&#34; sighed Eleanor, flinging her coat
+across the banister. Then, in answer to a plaintive voice from the
+library, &#34;Yes, Aunt Enid?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why on earth are you so late, sweetheart? Didn't you know your
+grandmother would be fretted?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The possessor of the plaintive voice emerged from the library, trailing
+an Oriental scarf as she came. Like her elder sister, she was tall and
+thin, but she did not wear Miss Isobel's look of martyred resignation. On
+the contrary, she had the starved look of one who is constantly trying to
+pick up the crumbs of interest that other people let fall.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Enid Bartlett might have passed for a pretty woman had her appearance not
+been permanently affected by an artist once telling her she looked like a
+Botticelli. Since that time she had done queer things to her hair, pursed
+her lips, and cultivated an expression of chronic yearning.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I haven't seen you since breakfast, Nellie,&#34; she said gently. &#34;Haven't
+you a kiss for me?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor presented a perfunctory cheek over the banisters, taking care
+that it was not the one that had been kissed a few minutes before.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Remember your promise,&#34; Aunt Enid whispered; &#34;don't forget that your
+grandmother is an old lady and you must not excite her.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But she excites me,&#34; said Eleanor doggedly. &#34;She makes me want to smash
+windows and scream.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why, Nellie!&#34; Miss Enid's mournful eyes filled with tears. Instantly
+Eleanor was all contrition.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'm sorry!&#34; she said, with a real kiss this time. &#34;I'll behave. Give you
+my word I will!&#34; And, with an affectionate squeeze of the hand that
+clasped hers, she ran up the steps.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The upper hall, like the rest of the house, was pervaded by an air of
+gloomy grandeur. Everything was dreary, formal, fixed. Not an ornament or
+a picture had been changed since Eleanor could remember. She was the only
+young thing about the place, and it always seemed to her as if the house
+and its occupants were conspiring to make her old and staid and stupid,
+like themselves.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At the door of her grandmother's room she paused. As far back as she
+could remember, her quarrels with her grandmother had been the most
+terrifying events of her life. Repetition never robbed them of their
+horror, and no amount of spoiling between times could make up to her for
+the violence of the moment. It took all the courage she had to turn the
+knob of the door and enter.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A brigadier-general planning an important campaign would have presented
+no more commanding presence than did the formidable old lady who sat at a
+flat-top desk, issuing orders in a loud, decisive tone to a small
+meek-looking man who stood before her. The most arresting feature about
+Madam Bartlett was a towering white pompadour that began where most
+pompadours end, and soared to a surprising height above her large,
+handsome, masculine face. The fact that her hair line had gradually
+receded from her forehead to the top of her head affected no change
+whatever in the arrangement of her coiffure. Neither in regard to her
+hair nor to her figure had she yielded one iota to the whims of Nature.
+Her body was still confined in the stiffest of stays, and in spite of her
+seventy years was as straight as an arrow. At Eleanor's entrance she
+motioned her peremptorily to a chair and proceeded with the business in
+hand.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You go back and tell Mr. Bangs,&#34; she was saying to the meek-looking
+person, &#34;that I want him to send somebody up here who knows more than you
+do. Do you understand?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The meek one evidently understood, for he reached nervously for his cap.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Wait!&#34; commanded Madam peremptorily. &#34;Don't start off like that, while I
+am talking to you! Tell Mr. Bangs this is the third time I've asked him
+to send me the report of Bartlett &#34; Bangs' export business for the past
+year. I want it immediately. I am not in my dotage yet. I still have some
+say-so in the firm. Well, what are you waiting for?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I was waiting to know if there was anything more, ma'am.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;If there had been I would have said so. Tell Hannah to come in as you go
+out.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor looked at her grandmother expectantly, but there was no answering
+glance. The old lady was evidently in one of her truculent moods that
+brooked no interference.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Has the plumber come?&#34; she demanded of the elderly colored maid who
+appeared at the door.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, ma'am. He can't get here till to-morrow.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Tell him I won't wait. If he can't come within an hour he needn't come
+at all. Where is Tom?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Hannah's eyes shifted uneasily. &#34;Tom? Why, Tom, he thought you discharged
+him.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;So I did. But he's not to go until I get another butler. Send him up
+here at once.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But he ain't here,&#34; persisted Hannah fearfully, &#34;He's went for good this
+time.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor, sitting demurely by the door, had a moment of unholy exultation.
+Old black Tom, the butler, had been Madam's chief domestic prop for a
+quarter of a century. He had been the patient buffer between her and the
+other servants, taking her domineering with unfailing meekness, and even
+venturing her defense when mutiny threatened below stairs. &#34;You-all don't
+understand old Miss,&#34; he would say loyally. &#34;She's all right, only she's
+jes' nachully mean, dat's all.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In the turning of this humble worm, Eleanor felt in some vague way a
+justification of her own rebellion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+His departure, however, did not tend to clear the domestic atmosphere. By
+the time Madam had settled the plumbing question and expressed her
+opinion of Tom and all his race, she was in no mood to deal leniently
+with the shortcomings of a headstrong young granddaughter.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well,&#34; she said, addressing her at last, &#34;why didn't you make it
+midnight?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's only a little after five.&#34; Eleanor knew she was putting up a feeble
+defense, and her hands grew cold.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It is nearly six, and it is dark. Couldn't you have withdrawn the
+sunshine of your presence from the hospital half an hour sooner?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Under her sharp glance there was a curious protective tenderness, the
+savage concern of a lioness for her whelp; but Eleanor saw only the
+scoffing expression in the keen eyes, and heard the note of irony in all
+she said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Your going out to the hospital is all foolishness, anyhow,&#34; the old lady
+continued, sorting her papers with efficiency. &#34;Contagious diseases,
+germs, and what not. But some women would be willing to go to Hades if
+they could tie a becoming rag around their heads. Why didn't you dress
+yourself properly before you came in here?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I wanted to, but Aunt&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Aunt Enid, I suppose! If it was left to her she'd have you trailing
+around in a Greek tunic and sandals, with a laurel wreath on your head.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+There was an ominous pause, during which Madam's wrinkled, bony hands,
+flashing with diamonds, searched rapidly among the papers.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You are all ready to start on Monday? Your clothes are in good
+condition, I presume?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor brought her gaze from a detached contemplation of the ceiling to
+a critical inspection of her finger-nails.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I suppose Aunt Isobel has attended to them,&#34; she said indifferently.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Aunt Isobel, indeed!&#34; snarled Madam. &#34;You'd lean on a broken reed if you
+depended on Isobel. And Enid is no better. <i>I</i> attended to your
+clothes. I got you everything you need, even down to a new set of furs.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Silver fox?&#34; asked Eleanor, brightening visibly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, mink. I can't abide fox. Ah! here's what I am looking for. Your
+ticket and berth reservation. Train leaves at ten-thirty Monday morning.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Grandmother,&#34; ventured Eleanor, summing up courage to lead a forlorn
+hope, &#34;you are just wasting money sending me back to Baltimore.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's my money,&#34; said the old lady grimly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's your money, but it is my life,&#34; Eleanor urged, with a quiver in her
+voice. &#34;If you are going to send me away, why not send me to New York and
+let me do the one thing in the world I want to do?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+That Madam should be willing to furnish unlimited funds for finishing
+schools, music lessons, painting lessons, and every &#34;extra&#34; that the
+curriculum offered, and yet refuse to cultivate her one real talent,
+seemed to Eleanor the most unreasonable autocracy. She had no way of
+knowing that Madam's indomitable pride, still quivering with the memory
+of her oldest son's marriage to an unknown young actress, recoiled
+instinctively from the theatrical rock on which so many of her old hopes
+had been wrecked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor's persistence in recurring to this most distasteful of subjects
+roused her to fury. A purple flush suffused her face, and her cheeks
+puffed in and out as she breathed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I suppose Claude Martel has it all mapped out,&#34; she said. &#34;He and that
+fool Harold Phipps have stirred you up to a pretty pitch. What do you see
+in that silly coxcomb, anyhow?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;If you mean Captain Phipps,&#34; Eleanor said with dignity, &#34;I see a great
+deal. He is one of the most cultivated men I ever met.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Fiddlesticks! He smells like a soap-counter! When I see an affected man
+I see a fool. He has airs enough to fill a music-box. But that's neither
+here nor there. You understand definitely that I do not wish you to see
+him again?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor's silence did not satisfy Madam. She insisted upon a verbal
+assurance, which Eleanor was loath to give.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I tell you once for all, young lady,&#34; said Madam, by this time roused to
+fury, &#34;that you have <i>got</i> to do what I say for another year. After
+that you will be twenty-one, and you can go to the devil, if you want
+to.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Grandmother!&#34; cried Eleanor, shrinking as if from a physical blow. Then,
+remembering her promise to her Aunt Enid, she bit her lip and struggled
+to keep back the tears. As she started to leave the room, Madam called
+her back.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Here, take this,&#34; she said gruffly, thrusting a small morocco box into
+her hand. &#34;Isobel and Enid never had decent necks to hang 'em on. See
+that you don't lose them.&#34; And without more ado she thrust Eleanor out of
+the room and shut the door in her face.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor fled down the hall to her own room, and after locking the door
+flung herself on the bed. It was always like that, she told herself
+passionately; they nagged at her and tormented her and wore her out with
+their care and anxiety, and then suffocated her with their affection. She
+did not want their presents. She wanted freedom, the right to live her
+own life, think her own thoughts, make her own decisions. She did not
+mean to be ungrateful, but she couldn't please them all! The family
+expectations of her were too high, too different from what she wanted.
+Other girls with half her talents for the stage had succeeded, and just
+because she was a Bartlett&#8212;&#8212;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She clenched her fists and wished for the hundredth time that she had
+never been born. She had been a bone of contention all her life, and,
+even when the two families were not fighting over her, the Bartlett blood
+was warring with the Martel blood within her. Her standards were
+hopelessly confused; she did not know what she wanted except that she
+wanted passionately to be let alone.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Nellie!&#34; called a gentle voice on the other side of the door. &#34;Are you
+ready for dinner?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Don't want any dinner,&#34; she mumbled from the depths of a pillow.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The door-handle turned softly and the voice persisted:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You must unlock the door, dearie; I want to speak to you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor flung herself off the bed and opened the door. &#34;I tell you, I
+don't want any dinner, Aunt Enid,&#34; she declared petulantly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Enid drew her down on the bed beside her and regarded her with
+pensive persuasion. &#34;I know, Nelchen; I often feel like that. But you
+must come down and make a pretense of eating. It upsets your grandmother
+to have any one of us absent from meals.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Everything I do upsets her!&#34; cried Eleanor with tragic insistence. &#34;I
+can't please her&#8212;there's no use trying. Why does she treat me the way
+she does? Why does she sometimes almost seem to hate me?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Enid's eyes involuntarily glanced at the picture of Eleanor's mother
+over the desk, taken in the doublet and hose of <i>Rosalind</i>.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Hush, child; you mustn't say such awful things,&#34; she said, drawing the
+girl close and stroking her hair. &#34;Mother adores you. Think of all she
+has done for you ever since you were a tiny baby. What other girl of your
+acquaintance has her own car, all the pretty clothes she can wear, and as
+much pin-money as she can spend?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But that's not what I <i>want</i>!&#34; cried Eleanor tragically. &#34;I want
+to <i>be</i> something and to <i>do</i> something. I feel like I am in
+prison here. I'm not good and resigned like you and Aunt Isobel, and I
+simply refuse to go through life standing grandmother's tyranny.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Poor Eleanor, so intolerably sensitive to contacts, so hopelessly
+confused in her bearings, sitting red-eyed and miserable, kicking her
+feet against the side of the bed, looked much more like a naughty child
+than like the radiant Lady Bountiful who had dispensed favors and
+received homage in the hospital a few hours before.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So swift was the sympathetic action of her nerves that any change in her
+physical condition affected her whole nature, making her an enigma to
+herself as well as to others. Even as she sat there rebellious and
+defiant, her eyes fell upon the small morocco box on her pillow, and she
+picked it up and opened it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, Aunt Enid!&#34; she cried in instant remorse. &#34;Just look what she's
+given me! Her string of pearls! The ones she wore in the portrait! And
+just think of what I've been saying about her. I'm a beast, a regular
+little beast!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+And with characteristic impetuosity she flung herself on Miss Enid's neck
+and burst into tears.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="6">CHAPTER 6</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+The sun was getting ready to set on Sunday afternoon when a tall,
+trim-looking figure turned the corner of the street leading to the
+Martels' and broke into a run. In one hand he carried a large suit-case,
+and in the other he held a bead chain wrapped in tissue-paper. In the
+breast pocket of his uniform was a paper stating that Quinby Graham was
+thereby honorably discharged from the U.S.A.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Whether it was his enforced rest, or his state of mind, or a combination
+of the two, it is impossible to say; but at least ten pounds had been
+added to his figure, the hollows had about gone from his eyes, and a
+natural color had returned to his face. But the old cough remained, as
+was evident when he presented himself breathless at the Martels' door and
+demanded of Cass:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Has she gone?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Who?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Miss Bartlett.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I believe she's fixing to go now. What's it to you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, I just want to say good-by,&#34; Quin threw off with a great show of
+indifference. &#34;She was awful good to me out at the hospital.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, I see.&#34; Then Cass dismissed the subject for one of far more
+importance. &#34;Are you out for keeps? Have you come to stay?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You bet I have. How long has she been here?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Who?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Miss Bartlett, I tell you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh! I don't know. All day, I reckon. I got to take her home now in a
+minute, but I'll be back soon. Don't you go anywhere till I come back.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin seized his arm: &#34;Cass, I'll take her home for you. I don't mind a
+bit, honest I don't. I need some exercise.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Old lady'd throw a fit,&#34; objected Cass. &#34;Old grandmother, I mean.
+Regular Tartar. Old aunts are just as bad. They devil the life out of
+Nell, except when she's deviling the life out of them.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How do you mean?&#34; Quin encouraged him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I mean Nell's a handful all right. She kicks over the traces every time
+she gets a chance. I don't blame her. They're a rotten bunch of snobs,
+and she knows it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, I could leave her at the door,&#34; Quin urged. &#34;I wouldn't let her in
+for anything for the world. But I got to talk to her, I tell you; I got
+to thank her&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Meanwhile, in the room above the young lady under discussion was
+leisurely adjusting a new and most becoming hat before a cracked mirror
+while she discussed a subject of perennial interest to the eternal
+feminine.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Rose,&#34; she was asking, &#34;what's the first thing you notice about a man?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Rose, sitting on the side of the bed nursing little Bino, the latest
+addition to the family, answered promptly:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;His mouth, of course. I wouldn't marry a man who showed his gums when he
+laughed, not if every hair of his head was strung with diamonds!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The visualization of this unpleasant picture threw Eleanor into peals of
+laughter which upset the carefully acquired angle of the new hat, to say
+nothing of the nerves of the young gentleman just arrived in the hall
+below.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I wasn't thinking of his looks only,&#34; she said; &#34;I mean everything about
+him.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why, I guess it's whether he notices me,&#34; said Rose after deliberation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Exactly,&#34; agreed Eleanor. &#34;Not only you or me, but girls. Take Cass, for
+instance; girls might just as well be broomsticks to Cass, all except Fan
+Loomis. Now, when Captain Phipps looks at you&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He never would,&#34; said Rose; &#34;he'd look straight over my head. I'll tell
+you who is a better example&#8212;Mr. Graham.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor smiled reminiscently. &#34;Oh, Sergeant Slim? <i>he's</i> thrilled,
+all right! Always looks as if he couldn't wait a minute to hear what you
+are going to say next.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He's not as susceptible as he looks,&#34; Rose pronounced from her
+vantage-point of seniority. &#34;He's just got a way with him that fools
+people. Cass says girls are always crazy about him, and that he never
+cares for any of them more than a week.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Much Cass knows about it!&#34; said Cass's cousin, pulling on her long
+gloves. Then she dismissed the subject abruptly: &#34;Rose, if I tell you
+something will you swear not to tell?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Never breathe it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Captain Phipps is coming up to Baltimore for the Easter vacation.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Does your grandmother know?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I should say <i>not</i>. She's written Miss Hammond that I'm not to
+receive callers without permission, and that all suspicious mail is to be
+opened.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How outrageous! You tell Captain Phipps to send his letters to me; I'll
+get them to you. They'll never suspect my fine Italian hand, with my name
+and address on the envelope.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor looked at her older cousin dubiously. &#34;I hate to do underhand
+things like that!&#34; she said crossly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You wouldn't have to if they treated you decently. Opening your letters!
+The idea! I wouldn't stand for it. I'd show them a thing or two.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor stood listlessly buttoning her glove, pondering what Rose was
+saying.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I wonder if I could get word to the Captain to-night?&#34; she said. &#34;Shall
+I really tell him to send the letters to you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No; tell him to bring them. I'm crazy to see what his nibs looks like.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He looks like that picture of Richard Mansfield downstairs&#8212;the one
+taken as <i>Beau Brummel</i>. He's the most fastidious man you ever saw,
+and too subtle for words.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He's terribly rich, isn't he?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't know,&#34; said Eleanor indifferently. &#34;His father is a Chicago
+manufacturer of some kind. Does Papa Claude think he is <i>very</i>
+talented?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Talented! He says he's one of the most gifted young men he ever met.
+They are hatching out some marvelous schemes to write a play together.
+Papa Claude is treading on air.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Bless his heart! Wouldn't it be too wonderful, Rose, if Captain Phipps
+should produce one of his plays? He's crazy about him.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You mean he's crazy about you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Who said so?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't have to be told. How about you, Nell? Are you in love with him?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor, taking a farewell look in the mirror, saw a tiny frown gather
+between her eyebrows. It was the second time that week she had been asked
+the question, and, as before, she avoided it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Listen!&#34; she said. &#34;Who is that talking so loud downstairs?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Investigation proved that it was Cass and Quin in hot dispute, as usual.
+On seeing her descend the stair the latter promptly stepped forward.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Cass is going to let me take you home, Miss Bartlett.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I never said I would,&#34; Cass contradicted him. &#34;I'm not going to get her
+into trouble the night before she goes away.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's for her to decide,&#34; said Quin. &#34;If she says I can go I'm going.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The very novelty of being called upon to decide anything for herself,
+augmented perhaps by the ardent desire in his eyes, caused Eleanor to tip
+the scales in his favor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't mind his taking me home,&#34; she said somewhat condescendingly.
+&#34;They'll think it's Cass.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;All buck privates look alike to them,&#34; added Rose, laughing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;My private days are over,&#34; said Quin grandly. &#34;This time next week I'll
+be out of my uniform.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You won't be half so good-looking,&#34; said Eleanor, surveying him with
+such evident approval that he had a wild idea of re&#235;nlisting at once.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Tell Papa Claude I couldn't wait for him any longer,&#34; Eleanor then said.
+&#34;Kiss him good-by for me, Rose, and tell him I'll write the minute I get
+to Baltimore.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then Cass kissed her, and Rose and the baby kissed her, and Myrna came
+downstairs to kiss her, and Edwin was called up from the basement to kiss
+her. It seemed the easiest and most natural thing in the world for
+everybody to kiss her but Quin, who would have given all he had for the
+privilege.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At last he found himself alone with her in the street, trying to catch
+step and wondering whether or not it was proper to take hold of a young
+lady's elbow. With commendable self-restraint he compromised on street
+crossings and muddy places. It was not quite dark yet, but it was going
+to be very soon, and a big pale moon was hiding behind a tall chimney,
+waiting for a chance to pounce out on unwary young couples who might be
+venturing abroad.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As they started across Central Park, an open square in the heart of the
+city, Eleanor stopped short, and with eyes fixed on the sky began
+incanting:
+</p>
+
+<div class="poem">
+<div class="stanza">
+<p>&#34;Star light, star bright</p>
+<p>Very first star I see to-night</p>
+<p>Wish I may, wish I might&#8212;</p>
+<p>May these three wishes come true before to-morrow night.&#34;</p></div></div>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I haven't got three wishes,&#34; said Quin solemnly; &#34;I've only got one.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Mercy, I have dozens! Shall I lend you some?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No! mine's bigger than all yours put together.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She flashed a look at him from under her tilted hat-brim:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What on earth's the matter with you? You look so solemn. I don't believe
+you wanted to bring me home, after all.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin didn't know what was the matter with him. Heretofore he had fallen
+in love as a pebble falls into a pond. There had been a delicious splash,
+and subsequent encircling ripples, each one further away than the last.
+But this time the pebble had fallen into a whirlpool, and was being
+turned and tossed and played with in a manner wholly bewildering.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, I wanted to come, all right,&#34; he said slowly. &#34;I <i>had</i> to come.
+Say, I wish you weren't going away to-morrow.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;So do I. I'd give anything not to.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But why do you go, then?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Because I am always made to do what I don't want to do.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin, who had decided views on individual freedom and the consent of the
+governed, promptly espoused her cause.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;They've got no right to force you. You ought to decide things for
+yourself.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you really think that? Do you think a girl has the right to go ahead
+and do as she likes, regardless of her family?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That depends on whether she wants to do the right thing. Which way do we
+turn?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;This way, if we go home,&#34; said Eleanor. Then she stopped abruptly. &#34;What
+time is it?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin consulted his watch and his conscience at the same time.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's only five-thirty,&#34; he said eagerly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I wonder if you'd do something for me?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You bet I will.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I want to go out to the hospital. I can get out there and back in my
+machine in thirty minutes. Would you be willing to go with me?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Would he be willing? Two hours before he had sworn that no power on earth
+could induce him to return to those prison walls, and now he felt that
+nothing could keep him away. Forty minutes of bliss in that snug little
+runabout with Miss Bartlett, and the destination might be Hades for all
+he cared.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It took but a few minutes to get to the garage and into the machine, and
+then they were speeding out the avenue at a pace that would surely have
+landed them in the police station had the traffic officer been on his
+job.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin, doubled up like a jack-knife beside her, was drunk with ecstasy.
+His expression when he looked at her resembled that of a particularly
+maudlin Airedale. Having her all to himself, with nobody to interfere,
+was an almost overwhelming joy. He longed to pour out his soul in
+gratitude for all that she had done for him at the hospital; he burned to
+tell her that she was the most beautiful and holy thing that had ever
+come into his life; but instead he only got his foot tangled in the
+steering gear, and muttered something about her &#34;not driving a car bad
+for a girl&#34;!
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But Eleanor was not concerned with her companion or his silent
+transports. She evidently had something of importance on her mind.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What time is the officers' mess?&#34; she asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;About six. Why?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I want to catch Captain Phipps before he leaves the hospital.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's glowing bubble burst at the word. She <i>was</i> Captain Phipps'
+girl, after all! She had simply pressed him into service in order to get
+a last interview with the one officer in the battalion for whom he had no
+respect.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The guard challenged them as they swung into the hospital area, but,
+seeing Quin's uniform, allowed them to enter. Past the long line of
+contagious wards, past the bleak two-story convalescent barracks, and up
+to the officers' quarters they swept.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You are not going in yourself?&#34; Quin protested, as she started to get
+out of the car.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why not? Haven't I been coming out here all the time?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not at night&#8212;not like this.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Nonsense. What's the harm? I'll only be a minute?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But Quin had already got out, and was holding the door with a large, firm
+hand.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No,&#34; he said humbly but positively; &#34;I'll go and bring him out here.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The unexpected note of authority in his voice nettled her instantly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I shall go myself,&#34; she insisted petulantly. &#34;Let me out.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For a moment their eyes clashed in frank combat, hers angry and defiant,
+his adoring but determined.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Listen here, Miss Bartlett,&#34; he urged. &#34;The men wouldn't understand your
+coming out like this, at night, without your uniform. I told Cass I'd
+take care of you, and I'm going to do it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You mean that you will dare to stop me from getting out of my own car?
+Take your hand off that door instantly!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She actually seized his big, strong fingers with her small gloved ones
+and tried to pull them away from the door. But Quin began to laugh, and
+in spite of herself she laughed back; and, while the two were childishly
+struggling for the possession of the door-handle, Captain Phipps all
+unnoticed passed out of the mess-hall, gave a few instructions to his
+waiting orderly, and disappeared in the darkness.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="7">CHAPTER 7</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+By the time they were on their way home, the moon, no longer dodging
+behind chimneys, had swaggered into the open. It was a hardened old
+highwayman of a moon, red in the face and very full, and it declared with
+every flashing beam that it was no respecter of persons, and that it
+intended doing all the mischief possible down there in the little world
+of men.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Eleanor Bartlett was its first victim. In the white twilight she
+forgot the social gap that lay between her and the youth beside her. She
+ceased to observe the size and roughness of his hands, but noted instead
+the fine breadth of his shoulders. She concerned herself no longer with
+his verbal lapses, but responded instead to his glowing confidence that
+everybody was as sincere and well intentioned as himself. She discovered
+what the more sophisticated Rose had perceived at once&#8212;that Quinby
+Graham &#34;had a way with him,&#34; a beguiling, sympathetic way that made one
+tell him things that one really didn't mean to tell any one. Of course,
+it was partly due to the fact that he asked such outrageously direct
+questions, questions that no one in her most intimate circle of friends
+would dare to ask. And the queer part of it was that she was answering
+them.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Before she realized it she was launched on a full recital of her woes,
+her thwarted ambition to go on the stage, her grandmother's tyranny, the
+indignity of being sent back to a school from which she had run away six
+months before. She flattered herself that she was stating her case for
+the sole purpose of getting an unprejudiced outsider's unbiased opinion;
+but from the inflection of her voice and the expressive play of eyes and
+lips it was evident that she was deriving some pleasure from the mere act
+of thus dramatizing her woes before that wholly sympathetic audience of
+one.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was not until they reached the Eastern Parkway and were speeding
+toward the twinkling lights of the city that their little bubble of
+intimacy, blown in the moonlight, was shattered by a word.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Say, Miss Eleanor,&#34; Quin blurted out unexpectedly, &#34;do you like me?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The question, together with the fact that he had dared used her first
+name, brought her up with a start.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Like you?&#34; she repeated in her most conventional tone, &#34;Why, of course.
+Whatever made you think I didn't?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I didn't think that. But&#8212;do you like me enough to let me come to see
+you when you come back?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now, a romantically wounded hero receiving favors in a hospital is one
+thing, and an unknown discharged soldier asking them is quite another.
+The very thought of Quinby Graham presenting himself as a caller, and the
+comments that would follow made Eleanor shy away from the subject in
+alarm.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, you'll be on the other side of the world by the time I get back,&#34;
+she said lightly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not me. Not if there's a chance of seeing you again.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A momentary diversion followed, during which Eleanor fancied there was
+something wrong with the radiator and expatiated at length on her
+preference for air-cooled cars.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin listened patiently. A gentleman more versed in social subtleties
+would have accepted the hint and said no more. But he was still laboring
+under the error that language was invented to reveal rather than to
+conceal thought.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You didn't answer my question,&#34; he said, when Eleanor paused for breath.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What question?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;About my coming to see you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She took shelter in a subterfuge.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I told you that the family was horrid to everybody that came to see me.
+To tell you the truth, I don't think you would be comfortable.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'm not afraid of 'em,&#34; Quin insisted fatuously. &#34;I'd butt in anywhere
+to get to see you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor's eyes dropped under his gaze.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You don't know my grandmother,&#34; she said; &#34;and, what is much more
+important, she doesn't know you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, but she might like to,&#34; urged Quin, with one of his most engaging
+smiles. &#34;Old ladies and cats always cotton to me.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor laughed. It was impossible to be dignified and superior with a
+person who didn't know the first rules of the game.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She might,&#34; she admitted; &#34;you never can tell about grandmother. She
+really is a wonderful person in many ways, and just as generous and kind
+when you are in trouble! But she says the most dreadful things; she's
+always hurting people's feelings.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She couldn't hurt mine, unless I let her,&#34; said Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, yes, she could&#8212;you don't know her. But even if she happened to be
+nice to you, there's Aunt Isobel.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What is she like?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;<i>Horribly</i> good and conscientious, and shocked to death at
+everything people do and say. I don't mean that she isn't awfully kind.
+She'll do anything for you if you are sick. But Uncle Ranny says her
+sense of duty amounts to a vice. Whatever she's doing, she thinks she
+ought to be doing something else. And she expects you to be just as good
+as she is. If she knew I was out here with a strange man to whom I'd
+never been introduced&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor was appalled at the effect upon her aunt of such indiscretion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, I could handle her all right,&#34; said Quin boastfully. &#34;I'd talk
+foreign missions to her. Any others?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Heaps. There's Aunt Flo and Uncle Ranny. He's a dear, only he's the
+black sheep of the family. He says I am a promising gray lamb, which
+makes grandmother furious. They all let her twist them round her finger
+but me. I won't twist. I never intend to.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Is that all the family?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No; there's Aunt Enid. She is the nicest of them all.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What is her line?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, she's awfully good, too. But she's different from Aunt Isobel. She
+was engaged to be married once, and grandmother broke it off because the
+man was poor. I don't think she'll ever get over it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you think she would like me?&#34; Quin anxiously inquired.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes,&#34; admitted Eleanor, &#34;I believe she would. She simply adores to mold
+people. She doesn't care how many faults they have, if they will just let
+her influence them to be better. And she does help loads of people. I am
+her one failure. She wouldn't acknowledge it for the world, but I know
+that I am the disappointment of Aunt Enid's life.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She gazed gloomily down the long moonlit road and lapsed into one of her
+sudden abstractions. A belated compunction seized her for not going
+straight home from the Martels', for being late for dinner on her last
+night, for going on with her affair with Captain Phipps, when she had
+been forbidden to see him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Miss Nell,&#34; said the persistent voice beside her, &#34;do you know what I
+intend to do while you are away?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No; what?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'm going to start in to-morrow morning and make love to your whole darn
+family!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now, if there is one thing Destiny admires in a man, it is his courage to
+defy her. She relentlessly crushes the supine spirit who acquiesces, but
+to him who snaps his fingers in her face she often extends a helping
+hand. In this case she did not make Quin wait until the morrow to begin
+his colossal undertaking. By means of a humble tack that lay in the way
+of the speeding automobile, she at once set in motion the series of
+events that were to determine his future life.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+By the time the puncture was repaired and they were again on their way,
+it was half-past seven and all hope of a timely arrival was abandoned. As
+they slowed up at the Bartlett house, their uneasiness was increased by
+the fact that lights were streaming from every window and the front door
+was standing open.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Is that the doctor?&#34; an excited voice called to them from the porch.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No,&#34; called back Eleanor, scrambling out of the car. &#34;What is the
+matter?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+No answer being received, she clutched Quin's sleeve nervously.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Something has happened! Look, the front hall is full of people. Oh, I'm
+afraid to go in! I&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Steady on!&#34; said Quin, with a firm grip on her elbow as he marched her
+up the steps and into the hall.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Everything was in confusion. People were hurrying to and fro, doors were
+slamming, excited voices were asking questions and not waiting for
+answers. &#34;What's Dr. Snowden's telephone number?&#34; &#34;Can't they get another
+doctor?&#34; &#34;Has somebody sent for Randolph?&#34; &#34;Are they going to try to move
+her?&#34; everybody demanded of everybody else.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor pushed through the crowd until she reached the foot of the steps.
+There, lying on the floor, with her towering white pompadour crushed
+ignominiously against the newel-post, lay the one person in the house who
+could have brought prompt order out of the chaos. On one side of her
+knelt Miss Enid frantically applying smelling salts, while on the other
+stood Miss Isobel futilely wringing her hands and imploring some one to
+go for a minister.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Suddenly the buzz of excited talk ceased. Madam was returning to
+consciousness. She groaned heavily, then opened one eye.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What's the matter?&#34; she demanded feebly. &#34;What's all this fuss about?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You fell down the steps, mother. Don't get excited; don't try to move.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But Madam had already tried, with the result that she fell back with a
+sharp cry of pain.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, my leg, my leg!&#34; she groaned. &#34;What are you all standing around like
+fools for? Why don't you send Tom for the doctor?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Tom isn't with us any more, dearest,&#34; said Aunt Enid with trembling
+reassurance, &#34;and Dr. Snowden is out of town. But we are trying to get
+Dr. Bean.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I won't have Bean,&#34; Madam declared, clinching her jaw with pain. &#34;I'll
+send him away if he comes.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Dr. Vaughn, then?&#34; suggested Miss Enid tenderly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Vaughn nothing! Send for Rawlins. He's an old stick, but he'll do till
+Dr. Snowden gets here.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But, mother,&#34; protested Miss Isobel. &#34;Dr. Rawlins lives in the country;
+he can't get here for half an hour.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do as I tell you and stop arguing,&#34; commanded Madam. &#34;Has anybody
+telephoned Ranny?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The two sisters exchanged significant glances.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Their line is busy,&#34; said Miss Enid soothingly. &#34;We will get him soon.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I want to be taken upstairs,&#34; announced Madam; &#34;I want to be put in my
+own bed.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A buzz of protest met this suggestion, and a small, nervous man in
+clerical garb, who had just arrived, came forward to add his voice to the
+rest.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Madam glared at him savagely. &#34;There'll be plenty of time for parsons
+when the doctors get through with me,&#34; she said. &#34;Tell some of those
+able-bodied men back there to come here and take me upstairs.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin, who had been standing in the background looking down at the
+formidable old lady, promptly came forward.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll take you up,&#34; he said. &#34;Which leg is hurt?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The old lady turned her head and looked up at him. The note of confidence
+in his voice had evidently appealed to her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's my left leg. I think it's broken just above the knee.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you want me to put a splint on it?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Are you a doctor?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, ma'am; but I can fix it so's it won't hurt you so bad when we move
+you,&#34; Quin replied.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How do you know you can?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin ran his fingers through his hair and smiled.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, I wasn't with the Ambulance Corps for six months in France for
+nothing.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Madam eyed him keenly for a moment; then, &#34;Go ahead,&#34; she commanded.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A chorus of protests from the surrounding group only deepened her
+determination.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's <i>my</i> leg,&#34; she said irritably. &#34;If he knows how to splint it,
+let him do it. I want to be taken upstairs.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It is difficult enough to apply a splint properly under favorable
+circumstances; but when one has only an umbrella and table napkins to
+work with, and is hemmed in by a doubtful and at times protesting
+audience, it becomes well-nigh impossible.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin worked slowly and awkwardly, putting the bones as nearly as possible
+in position and then binding them firmly in place. He paid no more
+attention to the agitated comments of those about him than he had paid to
+the whizzing bullets when he rendered first aid to a fallen comrade in No
+Man's Land.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+During the painful operation Madam lay with rigid jaws and clenched
+fists. Small beads of perspiration gathered on her forehead and her lips
+were white. Now and then she flinched violently, but only once did she
+speak, and that was when Miss Enid held the smelling salts too close to
+her high-bridged nose.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Haven't I got enough to stand without that?&#34; she sputtered, knocking the
+bottle into the air and sending the contents flying over the polished
+floor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When Quin finished he looked at her with frank admiration.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You got nerve, all right,&#34; he said; then he added gently: &#34;Don't you
+worry about getting upstairs; it won't hurt you much now.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You stay and help,&#34; said Madam peremptorily.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Sure,&#34; said Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was not until she was in her own bed, and word had come that Dr.
+Rawlins was on his way, that she would let Quin go, and even then she
+called him back.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You! Soldier! Come here,&#34; was the faint edict from the canopied bed. She
+was getting very weak from the pain, and her words came in gasps. &#34;Do you
+know where&#8212;the&#8212;Aristo Apartments are?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, but I can find out,&#34; said Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I want you&#8212;to&#8212;go for my son&#8212;Mr. Randolph Bartlett. If he's not at
+home&#8212;you find him. I'll make it&#8212;worth your while.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll find him,&#34; Quin said, with a reassuring pat on her wrinkled hand.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As he went into the hall, Eleanor slipped out of the adjoining room and
+followed him silently down the stairs. She did not speak until they were
+at the front door, and even then took the precaution of stepping outside.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I just wanted to come down and say good-by,&#34; she said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But you surely won't be going now?&#34; said Quin hopefully.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, I'm to go. Grandmother has just told Aunt Isobel that everything is
+to be carried out exactly as she planned it. But I wish they'd let me
+stay and help. Poor granny!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Her eyes brimmed with ready tears.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She'll pull through all right,&#34; said Quin, to whom the tear-dimmed eyes
+of youth were more unnerving than age's broken bones. &#34;Don't worry, Miss
+Eleanor, please. What time does your train go in the morning?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Ten-thirty.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll be there at ten.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor brushed her tears away quickly. &#34;No, no&#8212;you mustn't,&#34; she said
+in quick alarm. &#34;They don't know that we ever saw each other before. They
+think you just happened to be passing and ran in to help. Oh, I don't
+want to give them any more trouble. Promise me not to come!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, when you come back, then?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, yes, when I come back,&#34; she whispered hurriedly. Then she put out
+her hand impulsively. &#34;I think you've been perfectly splendid to-night.
+Good-by.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For a moment she stood there, her dainty figure silhouetted against the
+bright doorway, with the light shining through her soft hair giving her
+an undeserved halo. Then she was gone, leaving him on the steps in the
+moonlight, tenderly contemplating the hand that had just held hers.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="8">CHAPTER 8</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+It was well that Quin had an errand to perform that night. His emotions,
+which had been accumulating compound interest since five o'clock,
+demanded an outlet in immediate action. He had not the faintest idea
+where the Aristo Apartments might be; but, wherever they were, he meant
+to find them. Consultation with a telephone book at the corner drug-store
+sent him across the city to a newer and more fashionable residence
+quarter. As he left the street-car at the corner indicated, he asked a
+man who was just dismounting from a taxi-cab for further information.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When the dapper gentleman, thus addressed, turned toward him, it was
+evident that he had dined not wisely but too well. He was at that mellow
+stage that radiates affection, and, having bidden a loving farewell to
+the taxi driver, he now linked his arm in Quin's and repeated gaily:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;'Risto? Of course I can find it for you, if it's where it was this
+morning! Always make a point of helping a man that's worse off than I am.
+Always help a sholdier, anyhow. Take my arm, old chap. Take my cane, too.
+I'll help you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thus assisted and assisting, Quin good-humoredly allowed himself to be
+conducted in a zigzag course to the imposing doorway of a large
+apartment-house across the street.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Forgive me f' taking you up stairway,&#34; apologized the affable gentleman.
+&#34;Mustn't let elevator boy see you in this condishun. Take you up to my
+apartment. Put you bed in m' own room. Got to take care sholdiers.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At the second floor Quin tried to disentangle himself from his new-found
+protector.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You can find your way home now, partner,&#34; he said. &#34;I got to go down and
+find out which floor my party lives on.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But his companion held him tight.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, my boy! Mustn't go out again to-night. M.P.'s'll catch you. I'll get
+you to bed without anybody knowing. Mustn't 'sturb my wife, though.
+Mustn't make any noise.&#34; And, adding force to persuasion, he got his arms
+around Quin and backed him so suddenly against the wall that they both
+took an unexpected seat on the floor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At this inopportune moment a door opened and a delicate blonde lady in a
+pink kimono, followed by an inquisitive poodle, peered anxiously out.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;'S perfectly all right, darling!&#34; reassured the nethermost figure
+blithely. &#34;Sholdier friend's had a little too much champagne. Bringing
+him in so's won't be 'rested. Nicest kind of chap. Perfectly harmless!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin scrambled to his feet and exchanged an understanding look with the
+lady in the doorway.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I found him down at the corner. Does he belong here?&#34; he asked. And,
+upon being informed sorrowfully that he did, he added obligingly, &#34;Don't
+you want me to bring him in for you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Will you?&#34; said the lady in grateful agitation. &#34;The maids are both out,
+and I can't handle him by myself. Would you mind bringing him into his
+bedroom?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin succeeded in detaching an affectionate arm from his right leg and,
+getting his patient up, piloted him into the apartment.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'd just as leave put him to bed for you if you like?&#34; he offered,
+noting the nervousness of the lady, who was fluttering about like a
+distracted butterfly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, would you?&#34; she asked. &#34;It would help me immensely. If he isn't put
+to bed he is sure to want to go out again.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Shure to!&#34; heartily agreed the object of their solicitude. &#34;Leave him to
+me, darling. I'll hide his uniform so's he can't go out. Be a good girl,
+run along&#8212;I'll take care of him.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thus left to each other, a satisfactory compromise was effected by which
+the host agreed to be undressed and put to bed, provided Quin would later
+submit to the same treatment. It was not the first time Quin had thus
+assisted a brother in misfortune, but he had never before had to do with
+gold buttons and jeweled cuff-links, to say nothing of silk underwear and
+sky-blue pajamas. Being on the eve of adopting civilian clothes for the
+first time in two years, he took a lively interest in every detail of his
+patient's attire, from the modish cut of his coat to the smart pattern of
+his necktie.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The bibulous one, who up to the present had regarded the affair as
+humorous, now began to be lachrymose, and by the time Quin got him into
+the rose-draped bed he was in a state of deep dejection.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;My mother loves me,&#34; he assured Quin tearfully. &#34;Gives me everything. I
+don't mean to be ungrateful. But I can't go on in the firm. Bangs is
+dishonest, but she won't believe it. She thinks I don't know. They both
+think I'm a cipher. I <i>am</i> a cipher. But they've made me one. Get so
+discouraged, then go break over like this. Promised Flo never would take
+another drink. But it's no use. Can't help myself. I'm done for. Just a
+cipher, a cipher, a ci&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin standing by the bed waiting for him to get through adding noughts to
+his opinion of himself, suddenly leaned forward and examined the picture
+that hung above the table. It was of an imperial old lady in black
+velvet, with a string of pearls about her throat and a tiara on her
+towering white pompadour. His glance swept from the photograph to the
+flushed face with the tragic eyes on the pillow, and he seemed to hear a
+querulous old voice repeating: &#34;Ranny&#8212;I want Ranny. Why don't they send
+for Ranny?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+With two strides he was at the door.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Are you Mrs. Randolph Bartlett?&#34; he asked of the lady who was nervously
+pacing the hall.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes; why?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Because they sent me after him. It's his mother, you see&#8212;she's hurt.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Madam Bartlett? What's happened?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She fell down the steps and broke her leg.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How terrible! But she mustn't know about him,&#34; cried Mrs. Ranny in
+instant alarm. &#34;It always makes her furious when he breaks over; and yet,
+she is to blame&#8212;she drives him to it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How do you mean?&#34; asked Quin, plunging into the situation with his usual
+temerity.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I mean that she has dominated him, soul and body, ever since he was
+born!&#34; cried Mrs. Ranny passionately. &#34;She has forced him to stay in the
+business when every detail of it is distasteful to him. His life is a
+perfect hell there under Mr. Bangs. He ought to have an outdoor life. He
+loves animals&#8212;he ought to be on a ranch.&#34; She pulled herself up with an
+effort. &#34;Forgive me for going into all this before a stranger, but I am
+almost beside myself. Of course I am sorry for Madam Bartlett, but what
+can I do? You can see for yourself that my husband is in no condition to
+go to her.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Can't you say he's sick?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She wouldn't believe it. She's suspicious of everything I do and say. Do
+you <i>have</i> to take back an answer?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I told the old lady I'd find him for her. You see, I'm a&#8212;sort of a
+friend of Miss Eleanor's.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Under ordinary circumstances Mrs. Ranny would have been the last to
+accept this without an explanation; but there were too many other
+problems pressing for her to worry about this one.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I wonder how it would do,&#34; she said, &#34;for you to telephone that we are
+both out of town for the night, spending the week-end in the country?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I guess one lie is as good as another,&#34; said Quin ruefully. He was
+getting involved deeper than he liked, but there seemed no other way out.
+&#34;I'll telephone from the drug-store. Anything else I can do for you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You have been so kind, I hate to ask another favor.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Let's have it,&#34; said Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Would you by any chance have time to leave a package of papers at
+Bartlett &#34; Bangs' for me the first thing in the morning? Mr. Bangs has
+been telephoning me about them all day, and I've been nearly distracted,
+because my husband had them in his pocket and I did not know where he
+was.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Wait a minute,&#34; said Quin, going back into the bedroom. &#34;Are these the
+ones?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes. They must be very important; that's why I am afraid to intrust them
+to my maid. Be sure to take them to Mr. Bangs himself, and if he asks any
+questions&#8212;&#8212;&#34; She caught her trembling lip between her teeth and tried
+to force back the tears.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Don't you worry!&#34; cried Quin. &#34;I'll make it all right with him. You
+drink a glass of hot milk or something, and go to bed.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She looked up at him gratefully. &#34;I don't know your name,&#34; she said, &#34;but
+I certainly appreciate your kindness to me to-night. I wish you would
+come back some time and let us thank you&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, that's all o.k.,&#34; said Quin, turning to the door in sudden
+embarrassment. Then he discovered that he was trying to shake hands and
+hold his cap with the same hand, and in his confusion he slipped on the
+hard-wood floor, and achieved an exit that was scarcely more dignified
+than his entrance a half-hour before.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="9">CHAPTER 9</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+The news that Quin had broken through the Bartlett barrage afforded great
+amusement to the Martels at breakfast next morning. Of course they were
+sympathetic over Madam Bartlett's accident&#8212;the Martels' sympathy was
+always on tap for friend or foe,&#8212;but that did not interfere with a frank
+enjoyment of Quin's spirited account of her high-handed treatment of the
+family, especially the incident of the smelling salts.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She ought to belong to the Tank Brigade,&#34; said Rose. &#34;'Treat 'em rough'
+is her motto.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I like the old girl, though,&#34; said Quin disrespectfully, &#34;she's got so
+much pep. And talk about your nerve! You should have seen her set her jaw
+when I put the splint on!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Is the house very grand?&#34; asked Myrna, hungering for luxurious details.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No,&#34; Cass broke in scornfully. &#34;I been in the hall twice. It looks like
+a museum&#8212;big pictures and statuary, and everything dark and gloomy.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, and Miss Isobel and Miss Enid are the mummies,&#34; added Rose. &#34;The
+only nice one in the bunch besides Nell is Mr. Ranny, and he is hardly
+ever sober.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, I wouldn't be, either,&#34; said Cass, &#34;if I'd been held down like he
+has all his life. The Bartlett estate was left in trust to the old lady,
+and she holds the purse-strings and has the say-so about everything.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin refrained from mentioning the fact that he had also met Mr. Ranny.
+It was a point to his credit, for the story would have been received with
+hilarity, and he particularly enjoyed making Rose laugh.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The entrance of Mr. Martel put an end to the discussion of the Bartletts.
+Bitter as was his animosity toward the old lady, he would permit no
+disrespect to be shown her or hers in his presence. In the garish light
+of day he looked a trifle less imposing than he had on New Year's eve in
+the firelight. His long white hair hung straight and dry about his face;
+baggy wrinkles sagged under his eyes and under his chin. The shoulders
+that once proudly carried Mark Antony's shining armor now supported a
+faded velvet breakfast jacket that showed its original color only in
+patches. But even in the intimacy of the breakfast hour Papa Claude
+preserved his air of distinction, the gracious condescension of a
+temporary sojourner in an environment from which he expected at any
+moment to take flight.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When Cass had gone to work and the girls were busy cleaning up the
+breakfast dishes, he linked his arm in Quin's and drew him into the
+living-room.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I have never allowed myself to submit to the tyranny of time!&#34; he said.
+&#34;The wine of living should be tasted slowly. Pull up a chair, my boy; I
+want to talk to you. You don't happen to have a cigar about you, do you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, sir. Here are two. Take 'em both. I got to cut out smoking; it
+makes me cough.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Martel, protesting and accepting at the same time, sank into his
+large chair and bade Quin pull up a rocker. In the Martels' living-room
+all the chairs were rockers; so, in fact, were the table and the sofa,
+owing to missing castors.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am going to talk to you quite confidentially,&#34; began Mr. Martel,
+giving himself up to the enjoyment of the hour. &#34;I am going to tell you
+of a new and fascinating adventure upon which I am about to embark. You
+have doubtless heard me speak of a very wealthy and talented young friend
+of mine&#8212;Mr. Harold Phipps?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin admitted without enthusiasm that he had, and that he also knew him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, Mr. Phipps,&#8212;or Captain, as you probably know him,&#8212;after a short
+medical career has found it so totally distasteful that he is wisely
+returning to an earlier love. As soon as he gets out of the army he and I
+are going to collaborate on a play. Of course I have technic at my
+finger-tips. Construction, dramatic suspense, climax are second nature to
+me. But I confess I have a fatal handicap, one that has doubtless cost me
+my place at the head of American dramatists to-day. I have never been
+able to achieve colloquial dialogue! My style is too finished, you
+understand, my diction too perfect. Manager after manager has been on the
+verge of accepting a play, and been deterred solely on account of this
+too literary quality. I suffer from the excess of my virtue; you see?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin did not see. Mr. Martel's words conveyed but the vaguest meaning to
+him. But it flattered his vanity to be the recipient of such a great
+man's confidence.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, here's my point,&#34; continued his host impressively. &#34;Mr. Phipps
+knows nothing of technic, of construction; but he has a sense for
+character and dialogue that amounts to genius. Now, suppose I construct a
+great plot, and he supplies great dialogue? What will be the inevitable
+result? A masterpiece, a little modern masterpiece!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Martel, soaring on the wings of his imagination, failed to observe
+that his listener was not following.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Does&#8212;does Miss Eleanor know about all this?&#34; Quin asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Alas, no. I had no opportunity to tell her. Ah, Mr. Graham, I must
+confess, it hurts me, it hurts me here,&#34;&#8212;he indicated a grease-spot just
+below his vest pocket,&#8212;&#34;to be separated from that dear child just when
+she needs me most. She should be already embarked in her great career.
+Ellen Terry, Bernhardt, Rachel, all began their training very early. If
+she had been left to me she would be behind the footlights by now.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;They'll never stand for her going on the stage,&#34; said Quin
+authoritatively. It was astonishing how intimate he felt with the
+Bartletts since he had put two of them to bed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Ah, my friend,&#34; said Mr. Martel, shaking his head and smiling, &#34;what can
+be avoided whose end is purposed by the mighty gods? Eleanor will follow
+her destiny. She has the temperament, the voice, the figure&#8212;a trifle
+small, I grant you, but lithe, graceful, pliant as a reed.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, I know what you mean,&#34; Quin agreed ardently; &#34;you can tell that in
+her dancing.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But more than all, she has the great ambition, the consuming desire for
+self-expression, for&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's face clouded slightly and he again lost the thread of the
+discourse.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Lots of girls are stage-struck,&#34; he said presently, breaking in on Mr.
+Martel's rhapsody. &#34;Miss Eleanor's young yet. Don't you believe she will
+get over it?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Young! Why, Mary Anderson was playing <i>Meg Merrilies</i> when she was
+two years younger than Eleanor. I tell you, Quinby&#8212;you'll forgive my
+addressing you thus&#8212;I tell you, the girl will never get over it. She has
+inherited the histrionic gift from her mother&#8212;from me. The Bartletts
+have given her money, education, social position; but it remained for
+me&#8212;the despised Claude Martel&#8212;to give her the soul of an artist. And
+mark me,&#34;&#8212;he paused effectively with a lifted forefinger,&#8212;&#34;it will be
+Claude Martel who gives her her heart's desire. For years I have fostered
+in her a love for the drama. I have taken her to see great plays. I have
+taught her to read great lines, and above all I have fed her ambition.
+The time was limited&#8212;a night here, a day there; but I planted a seed
+they cannot kill. It has grown, it will flower; no one can stop it now.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The subject was one upon which Quin would fain have discoursed
+indefinitely, but a glance at his watch reminded him that the business of
+the day did not admit of further delay. He not only had an important
+errand to perform, but he must look for work. His exchequer, as usual,
+was very low and the need for replenishing it was imperative.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When he reached Bartlett &#34; Bangs' on the outskirts of the city, the big
+manufacturing plant was ominously still. The only sign of life about the
+place was at the wide entrance doors at the end of the yards, where a
+group of men were talking and gesticulating excitedly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What's the shindy?&#34; Quin asked a bystander.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Union men trying to keep scabs from going to work,&#34; answered his
+informant. &#34;Somebody's fixin' to get hurt there in about two minutes.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin, to whom a scrap was always a pleasant diversion, ran forward and
+craned his neck to see what was happening. Speeches were being made, hot
+impassioned speeches, now in favor of the union, now against it, and
+every moment the excitement increased. Quin listened with absorbed
+attention, trying to get the straight of the matter.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Just now a sickly-looking man, with a piece of red flannel tied around
+his throat, was standing on the steps, making a futile effort against the
+noise to explain his return to work.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I can't let 'em <i>starve</i>,&#34; he kept repeating in a hoarse,
+apologetic voice. &#34;When a man's got a sick wife and eight children, he
+ain't able to do as he likes. I don't want to give in no more 'n you-all
+do. Neither does Jim here, nor Tom Dawes. But what can we do?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do like the rest of us!&#34; shouted some one in the crowd, &#34;Stick it out!
+Learn 'em a lesson. They can't run their bloomin' old plant without us.
+Pull him down off them steps, boys!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Naw, you don't!&#34; cried another man, seizing a stick and jumping at the
+steps. &#34;We got a right to do as we like, same as you! Come on up, Tom
+Dawes! We ain't going to let our families in for the Charity
+Organization.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quick cries of &#34;Traitor!&#34; &#34;Scab!&#34; &#34;Pull 'em down!&#34; were succeeded by a
+lively scrimmage in which there was a rush for the steps.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin, from his place at the edge of the crowd, saw a dozen men surround
+three. He saw the man with the red rag about his throat put up a feeble
+defense against two assailants. Then he ceased to see and began only to
+feel. Whatever the row was about, they weren't fighting fairly, and his
+blood began to rise. He stood it as long as he could; then, with a cry of
+protest, he plunged through the crowd. In his sternest top-sergeant voice
+he issued orders, and enforced them with a brawny fist that was used to
+handling men. A moment later he dragged a limp victim from under the
+struggling group.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This unexpected interruption by an unknown man in uniform, together with
+the appearance of a stern-faced man in spectacles at an upper window, had
+an instant effect on the crowd. The strikers began to slink out of the
+yards, while the three assaulted men dusted their clothes and entered the
+factory.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin followed them in, and upon inquiring for the office was directed to
+the second floor, where he followed devious ways until he reached the
+door of a large room filled with desks in rows, at each of which sat a
+clerk.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Mr. Bangs?&#34; repeated a red-nosed girl, in answer to his inquiry. &#34;Got an
+appointment?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No,&#34; said Quin; &#34;but I've got a parcel that's to be delivered in
+person.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The red-nosed one thereupon consulted the man at the next desk, and,
+after some colloquy, conducted Quin to one of the small rooms at the rear
+of the large one.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The next moment Quin found himself face to face with the stern-looking
+personage whose mere appearance at the window a few minutes before had
+had such a subduing effect on the crowd below.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As he listened to Quin's message he looked at him narrowly and
+suspiciously with piercing black eyes that seemed intent on seeking out
+the weakest spot of whatever they rested upon.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;When did Mr. Bartlett give you these letters?&#34; he asked in a tone as
+cold as the tinkle of ice against glass.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I got 'em last night, sir.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Where?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;At his house, when I went to carry word about his mother's accident.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Close that door back of you,&#34; said Mr. Bangs, with a jerk of his head;
+then he went on, &#34;So Mr. Bartlett was at home when you reached there last
+night?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, <i>yes</i>, sir!&#34; Quin assured him with an emphasis that implied Mr.
+Randolph Bartlett's unfailing presence at his own fireside on every
+Sabbath evening.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That is strange,&#34; Mr. Bangs commented dryly. &#34;Miss Enid Bartlett
+telephoned an hour ago that her brother and his wife were out of the
+city.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin was visibly embarrassed. He was not used to treading the quicksands
+of duplicity, and he felt himself sinking.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Young man,&#34; said Mr. Bangs sternly, &#34;I am inclined to think you are
+deceiving me.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No,&#34; said Quin with spirit, &#34;I haven't deceived you; but I did lie to
+Miss Eleanor's aunt over the telephone.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What was your object?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, I couldn't tell her Mr. Bartlett was stewed, could I?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Bangs gave a short, contemptuous laugh. &#34;As I thought,&#34; he said.
+&#34;That will do.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But Quin had no intention of going until he had spoken a word in his own
+behalf. The idea had just occurred to him that by obtaining a position
+with Bartlett &#34; Bangs he could add another link to the chain that was to
+bind him to Eleanor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You don't happen to have a job for me?&#34; he inquired of the back of Mr.
+Bangs's bald, dome-like head.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;A job?&#34; repeated Mr. Bangs, glancing over his shoulder at Quin's
+uniform.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, sir. I'm out of the service now.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What can you do?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin looked at him quizzically. &#34;I can receive and obey the orders of the
+commanding officer,&#34; he said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Bangs, being humor-proof, evidently considered this impertinent, and
+repeated his question sharply.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, I'll do anything,&#34; said Quin rashly. &#34;Soldiers can't be choosers
+these days.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Bangs cast a critical eye on his strong, well built frame:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;We might use you in the factory,&#34; he said indifferently; &#34;we need all
+the strike-breakers we can get.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's face fell. &#34;I don't know about that,&#34; he said slowly. &#34;I haven't
+made up my mind yet about this union business.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I thought you were helping the union men in the yard just now.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I was helping that little Irishman that was getting the life choked out
+of him.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Bangs's mouth became a hard, straight line.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Then I take it you sympathize with the strikers?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't know whether I do or not,&#34; Quin declared stoutly. &#34;I don't know
+anything about it. But one thing's certain&#8212;I'm not going to take another
+fellow's job, when he's holding out for better conditions, until I know
+whether those better conditions are due him or not.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Bangs's fish eyes regarded him with glittering disfavor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Perhaps you would prefer an office job?&#34; he suggested with cold
+insolence. &#34;I need some one to brush out in the morning and to wash
+windows when necessary.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The erstwhile hero of the Sixth Field Artillery felt his heart thumping
+madly under his distinguished-conduct medal; but he had declared that he
+would accept any kind of work, and he was determined not to have his
+bluff called.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;All right, sir,&#34; he said gamely; &#34;I'll start at that if it will lead to
+something better.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That rests entirely with you,&#34; said Mr. Bangs. &#34;Report for work in the
+morning.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin got out of the office with a hot head, cold hands, and a terrible
+sinking of the heart. He had forged the first link in his chain&#8212;he was
+an employee of the great Bartlett &#34; Bangs Company; but the gap between
+himself and Eleanor seemed suddenly to have widened to infinity.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="10">CHAPTER 10</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+If the window-washing did not become an actuality, it was due to the
+weather rather than to any clemency on the part of Mr. Bangs. He seemed
+bent upon testing Quin's mettle, and required tasks of him that only a
+man used to the discipline of the army would have performed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin, on his part, carried out instructions with a thoroughness and
+dispatch that upset the entire office force. He had been told to clean
+things up, and he took an unholy joy in interpreting the order in
+military terms. Never before had there been such a drastic overhauling of
+the premises. He did not stop at cleaning up; he insisted upon things
+being kept clean and orderly. In a short time he had instituted reforms
+that broke the traditions of half a century.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Who moved my desk out like this?&#34; thundered Mr. Bangs on the second day
+after Quin's arrival.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I did, sir,&#34; said Quin. &#34;You can get a much better light here, and no
+draught from the door.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, when I want my desk moved I will inform you,&#34; said Mr. Bangs.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But a day's trial of the new arrangement proved so satisfactory that the
+desk remained in its new position.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Other innovations met with less favor. The clerks in the outer office
+objected to the windows being kept down from the top, and Mr. Bangs was
+constantly annoyed when he found that his papers were disturbed by a
+daily dusting and sorting. Quin met the complaints and rebuffs with easy
+good humor, and went straight on with his business. The moment his
+energies were dammed at one point, they burst forth with fresh vigor at
+another.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The only object about the office that was left undisturbed was Minerva, a
+large black cat which the stenographer told him belonged to Mr. Randolph
+Bartlett. Quin was hopelessly committed to cats in general, and to black
+cats in particular, and the fact that this one met with Mr. Bangs's
+marked disfavor made him champion her cause at once. One noon hour, in
+his first week, he was sitting alone in the inner office, scratching
+Minerva's head in the very spot behind the ear where a cat most likes to
+be scratched, when a lively voice from the doorway demanded:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, young man, what do you mean by making love to my cat in my
+absence?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She flirted with me first,&#34; said Quin. Then he took a second look at the
+stranger and got up smiling. &#34;You are Mr. Bartlett, I believe?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes. Are you waiting for Mr. Bangs?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, sir,&#34; said Quin; &#34;he's waiting for me. I'm to let him know as soon
+as you come in. I am the new office-boy.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He grinned down on the shorter man, who in his turn laughed outright.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Office-boy? What nonsense! Where have I seen you before? What is your
+name?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Quinby Graham, sir.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Drop the sir, for heaven's sake. I'm no officer. Where in the dickens
+have I met you? Oh! wait a second, I've got it! Sunday night. We were out
+somewhere together&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Hold on there,&#34; said Quin. &#34;<i>You</i> were out together, but I was out
+by myself. We met at your door.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;So you were the chap that played the good Samaritan? Well, it was damned
+clever of you, old man. I'm glad of a chance to thank you. I hadn't
+touched a drop for six weeks before that, but you see&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Bangs's metallic voice was heard in the outer office, and the two
+younger men started.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You bet I see!&#34; said Quin sympathetically as he hurried out to inform
+the senior member of the firm that the junior member awaited his
+pleasure.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+What happened at that interview was recounted to him by Miss Leaks, the
+little drab-colored stenographer, who had returned from lunch when the
+storm was at its height.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's a wonder Mr. Ranny don't kill that old man for the way he sneers at
+him,&#34; she said indignantly to Quin, &#34;Why, <i>I</i> wouldn't take off him
+what Mr. Ranny does! But then, what can he do? His mother keeps him here
+for a mouth-piece for her, and Mr. Bangs knows it. It's no wonder he
+drinks, hitched up to a cantankerous old hyena like that. He never can
+stand up for himself, but he stood up for you all right.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;For me?&#34; repeated Quin. &#34;Where did I come in?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why, he said it was a shame for a man like you to be doing the work you
+are doing, and that he for one wouldn't stand it. He talked right up to
+the boss about patriotism and our duty to the returned soldier, until he
+made the old tyrant look like ten cents! And then he come right out and
+said if Mr. Bangs couldn't offer you anything better he could.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What did he say to that?&#34; asked Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He curled up his lip and asked Mr. Ranny why he didn't engage you for a
+private secretary, and if you'll believe me Mr. Ranny looked him straight
+in the eye and said it was a good idea, and that he would.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;A private secretary!&#34; Quin exclaimed. &#34;But I don't know a blooming thing
+about stenography or typewriting.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Don't you let on,&#34; advised Miss Leaks. &#34;Mr. Ranny doesn't have enough
+work to amount to anything, and he's so tickled at carrying his point
+that he won't be particular. I can teach you how to take dictation and
+use the typewriter.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The following week found Quin installed in the smaller of the two private
+offices, with a title that in no way covered the duties he was called
+upon to perform. To be sure, he got Mr. Ranny's small affairs into
+systematic running order, and, under Miss Leaks's efficient instruction,
+was soon able slowly but accurately to hammer out the necessary letters
+on the typewriter. He was even able at times to help Mr. Chester, the
+melancholy bookkeeper whom the other clerks called &#34;Fanny.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Through working with figures all his life Mr. Chester had come to
+resemble one. With his lean body and drooping oval head, he was not
+unlike the figure nine, an analogy that might be continued by saying that
+nine is the highest degree a bachelor number can achieve, the figures
+after that going in couples. It was an open secret that the tragedy of
+Mr. Chester's uneventful life lay in that simple fact.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In addition to Quin's heterogeneous duties at the office, he was
+frequently pressed into service for more personal uses. When Mr. Ranny
+failed to put in an appearance, he was invariably dispatched to find him,
+and was often able to handle the situation in a way that was a great
+relief to all concerned.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+One day, after he had been with the firm several weeks, he was dispatched
+with a budget of papers for Madam Bartlett to sign. It was the first time
+he had entered the house since the night of the accident, and as he stood
+in the front hall waiting instructions, he looked about him curiously.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The lower floor had been &#34;done&#34; in peacock blue and gold when Miss Enid
+made her d&#233;but twenty years before, and it had never been undone. An
+embossed dado and an even more embossed frieze encircled the walls, and
+the ceiling was a complicated mosaic of color and design. The
+stiff-backed chairs and massive sofas were apparently committed for life
+to linen strait-jackets. Heavy velvet curtains shut out the light and a
+faint smell of coal soot permeated the air. Over the hall fireplace hung
+a large portrait of Madam Bartlett, just inside the drawing-room gleamed
+a marble bust of her, and two long pier-glasses kept repeating the image
+of her until she dominated every nook and corner of the place.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But Quin saw little of all this. To him the house was simply a background
+for images of Eleanor: Eleanor coming down the broad stairs in her blue
+and gray costume; Eleanor tripping through the hall in her Red Cross
+uniform; Eleanor standing in the doorway in the moonlight, telling him
+how wonderful he was.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He had written her exactly ten letters since her departure, but only two
+had been dispatched, and by a fatal error these two were identical. After
+a superhuman effort to couch his burning thoughts in sufficiently cool
+terms, he had achieved a partially successful result; but, discovering
+after addressing the envelope that he had misspelled two words, he
+laboriously made another copy, addressed a second envelope, then
+inadvertently mailed both.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He had received such a scoffing note in reply that his ears tingled even
+now as he thought of it. It was only when he recalled the postscript that
+he found consolation. &#34;How funny that you should get a position at
+Bartlett &#34; Bangs's,&#34; she had written. &#34;If you should happen to meet any
+member of my family, for heaven's sake don't mention my name. They might
+link you up with the Hawaiian Garden, or the trip to the camp that night
+grandmother was hurt. Just let our friendship be a little secret between
+you and me.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;'You and me,'&#34; Quin repeated the words softly to himself, as he stood
+there among the objects made sacred by her one-time presence.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Madam Bartlett wishes you to come upstairs and explain the papers before
+she signs them,&#34; said a woman in nurse's uniform from the stair landing,
+and, cap in hand, Quin followed her up the steps.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At the open door of the large front room he paused. Lying in royal state
+in a huge four-poster bed was Madam Bartlett, resplendent in a purple
+robe, with her hair dressed in its usual elaborate style, and in her ears
+pearls that, Quin afterward assured the Martels, looked like moth-balls.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You go on out of here and stay until I ring for you,&#34; she snapped at the
+nurse; then she squinted her eyes and looked at Quin. She did not put on
+her eye-glasses; they were reserved for feminine audiences exclusively.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What do they mean by sending me this jumble of stuff?&#34; she demanded,
+indicating the papers strewn on the silk coverlid. &#34;How do they expect me
+to know what they are all about?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;They don't,&#34; said Quin reassuringly, coming forward; &#34;they sent me to
+tell you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And who are you, pray?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am Mr. Randolph's er&#8212;er&#8212;secretary.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For the life of him he could not get through it without a grin, and to
+his relief the old lady's lips also twitched.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Much need he had for a secretary!&#34; she said, then added shrewdly:
+&#34;Aren't you the soldier that put the splint on my leg?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin modestly acknowledged that he was.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It was a mighty poor job,&#34; said Madam, &#34;but I guess it was better than
+nothing.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How's the leg coming on?&#34; inquired Quin affably.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's not coming on at all,&#34; Madam said. &#34;If I listen to those fool
+doctors it's coming off.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin shook his head in emphatic disapproval.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Don't you listen to 'em,&#34; he advised earnestly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Doctors don't know everything! Why, they told a fellow out at the
+hospital that his arm would have to come off at the shoulder. He lit out
+over the hill, bath-robe and all, for his home town, and got six other
+doctors to sign a paper saying he didn't need an amputation. He got back
+in twenty-four hours, was tried for being A. W. O. L., and is serving his
+time in the prison ward to-day. But he's still got his arm all right.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Good for him!&#34; said Madam heartily; then, recalling the business in
+hand, she added peevishly: &#34;Well, stop talking now and explain these
+papers.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin went over them several times with great patience, and then held the
+ink-well while she tremblingly signed her name.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Kinder awkward doing things on your back,&#34; he said sympathetically, as
+she sank back exhausted.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Awkward? It's torture. The cast is bad enough in itself; but having to
+lie in one position like this makes me sore all over.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You don't have to tell me,&#34; said Quin, easing up the bed-clothes with
+quite a professional air; &#34;I was six months on my back. But there's no
+sense in keeping you like this. Why don't they rig you up a pulley, so's
+you can change the position of your body without disturbing your leg?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How do you mean?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Like this,&#34; said Quin, taking a paper-knife and a couple of spoons from
+the table and demonstrating his point.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Madam listened with close attention, and so absorbed were she and Quin
+that neither of them were conscious of Miss Isobel's entrance until they
+heard her feeble protest:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I would not dare try anything like that without consulting Dr. Rawlins.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Nobody wants you to dare anything,&#34; flared out her mother. &#34;What the boy
+says sounds sensible. He says he has fixed them for the soldiers at the
+hospital. I want him to fix one for me.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;When shall I come?&#34; Quin asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Come nothing. You'll stay and do it now. Telephone the factory that I am
+keeping you here for the morning. Isobel, order him whatever he needs.
+And now get out of here, both of you; I want to take a nap.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Thus it was that, an hour later, the new colored butler was carrying the
+papers back to Bartlett &#34; Bangs's, and Mr. Randolph's new secretary was
+sawing wood in Madam Bartlett's cellar. It was a humble beginning, but he
+whistled jubilantly as he worked. Already he saw himself climbing, by
+brilliant and spectacular deeds, to a dazzling pinnacle of security in
+the family's esteem.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="11">CHAPTER 11</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+Madam Bartlett's accident had far-reaching results. For fifty years her
+firm hand had brooked no slightest interference with the family
+steering-wheel, and now that it was removed the household machinery came
+to a standstill. She who had &#34;ridden the whirlwind and directed the
+storm&#34; now found herself ignominiously laid low. Instead of rising with
+the dawn, primed for battle in club committee, business conclave, or
+family council, she lay on her back in a darkened room, a prisoner to
+pain. The only vent she had for her pent-up energy was in hourly tirades
+against her daughters for their inefficiency, the nurses for their
+incompetency, the doctors for their lack of skill, and the servants for
+their disobedience.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The one person who, in any particular, found favor with her these days
+was her son's new secretary. Every Saturday, when Quinby Graham stopped
+on his way to the bank with various papers for her to sign, he was plied
+with questions and intrusted with various commissions. A top sergeant was
+evidently just what Madam had been looking for all her life&#8212;one trained
+to receive orders and execute them. All went well until one day when Quin
+refused to smuggle in some forbidden article of diet; then the
+steam-roller of her wrath promptly passed over him also.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He waited respectfully until her breath and vocabulary were alike
+exhausted, then said good-humoredly:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I used to board with a woman up in Maine that had hysterics like that.
+They always made her feel a lot better. Don't you want me to shift that
+pulley a bit? You don't look comfortable.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Madam promptly ordered him out of the room. But next day she made an
+excuse to send for him, and actually laughed when he stepped briskly up
+to the bed, saluted smartly, and impudently asked her how her grouch was.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+There was something in his very lack of reverence, in his impertinent
+assumption of equality, in his refusal to pay her the condescending
+homage due feebleness and old age, that seemed to flatter her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He's a mule,&#34; she told Randolph&#8212;&#34;a mule with horse sense.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's change from khaki to civilian clothes affected him in more ways
+than one. Constitutionally he was opposed to saying &#34;sir&#34; to his fellow
+men; to standing at attention until he was recognized; to acknowledging,
+by word or gesture, that he was any one's inferior on this wide and
+democratic planet. He much preferred organizing to being organized,
+leading to being led. Early in his military training he had evinced an
+inclination to take things into his own hands and act without authority.
+It was somewhat ironic that the very trait that had deprived him of a
+couple of bars on his shoulder should have put the medal on his breast.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But freedom from the restrictions of army life brought its penalties. He
+found that blunders condoned in a soldier were seriously criticized in a
+civilian; that the things he had been at such pains to learn in the past
+two years were of no apparent value to him now. It was a constant
+surprise to him that a plaid suit and three-dollar necktie should meet
+with less favor in the feminine eye than a dreary drab uniform.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+About the first of March he was getting somewhat discouraged at his slow
+progress, when an incident happened that planted his feet firmly on the
+first rung of his social ladder.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Ever since their mother's accident, Miss Isobel and Miss Enid had stood
+appalled before their new responsibilities. They were like two trembling
+dead leaves that still cling to a shattered but sturdy old oak. What made
+matters worse was the absence of the faithful black Tom, who for years
+had served them by day and guarded them by night. They lived in constant
+fear of burglars, which grew into a veritable terror when some one broke
+into the pantry and rifled the shelves.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin heard about it when he arrived on Saturday morning, and as usual
+offered advice:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What you need is a man in the house. Then you wouldn't be scared all the
+time.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well,&#34; said Madam, &#34;what about you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's face fell. He had no desire to exchange the noisy, wholesome
+family life of the Martels for the silent, somber grandeur of the
+Bartletts. His affections had taken root in the shabby little brown house
+that always seemed to be humming gaily to itself. When the piano was not
+being played, the violin or guitar was. There were bursts of laughter,
+snatches of song, and young people going and coming through doors that
+never stayed closed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You don't seem keen about the proposition,&#34; Madam commented dryly,
+smoothing the bed-clothes with her wrinkled fingers.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, I can't say I am,&#34; Quin admitted. &#34;You see, I'm living with some
+friends out on Sixth Street. They are sort of kin-folks of yours, I
+believe&#8212;the Martels.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A carefully aimed hand grenade could have produced no more violent or
+immediate result. Madam damned the Martels, individually and
+collectively, and furiously disclaimed any relationship.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;They are a trifling, worthless lot!&#34; she stormed. &#34;I wish I'd never
+heard of them. They fastened their talons on my son Bob, and ruined his
+life, and now they are doing all they can to ruin my granddaughter.
+Haven't you ever heard them speak of me?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, yes,&#34; said Quin with laughing significance.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What do they say?&#34; Madam demanded instantly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You want it straight?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, Mr. Martel told me only last night that he thought you were an
+object of pity.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Madam's jaw relaxed in amazement.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What on earth did he mean?&#34; she asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He said you'd got 'most everything in life that he'd missed, but he'd
+hate to change places with you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She lay perfectly still, staring at him with her small restless eyes, and
+when she spoke again it was to revert to the subject of burglars.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin was relieved. He had been skating on thin ice in discussing the
+Martels, for any moment might have brought up a question concerning
+Eleanor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I used to have a corporal that was an ex-burglar,&#34; he said, plunging
+into the new subject with alacrity. &#34;First-rate fellow, too. Last I heard
+of him, he had a position as chauffeur with a rich old lady who lived
+alone up in Detroit. She had two burglar-alarm systems, but the joke of
+it was she made him sleep in the house for extra protection!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I suppose you are trying to frighten me off from engaging you?&#34; Madam
+asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not exactly,&#34; Quin smiled. &#34;Of course I'll come if you can't get anybody
+else. But there's no question of engaging me. If I come, I pay board.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Madam laughed aloud for the first time since her accident.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you take me for a landlady?&#34; she asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Only when you take me for a night-watchman,&#34; said Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+They eyed each other steadily for a moment, then she held out her hand.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;We'll compromise,&#34; she said. &#34;No salary and no board. We'll try it out
+for a week.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The next day Quin's suit-case, containing all his worldly possessions,
+was transferred from the small stuffy room over the Martels' kitchen to
+the large luxurious one over the Bartletts' dining-room. It was quite the
+grandest room he had ever occupied, with its massive walnut furniture and
+its heavily draped windows; but, had it been stripped bare but for a
+single picture, it would still have been a <i>chambre de luxe</i> to him.
+The moment he entered he discovered a photograph of Eleanor on the
+mantel, and ten minutes later, when Hannah tapped at the door to say that
+dinner was served, he was still standing with arms folded on the shelf in
+absorbed adoration.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+That first meal with the Misses Bartlett was an ordeal he never forgot.
+Their formal aloofness and evident dismay at his presence were enough in
+themselves to embarrass him; but combined with the necessity of choosing
+the right knife and fork, of breaking his bread properly, and of removing
+his spoon from his coffee-cup, they were quite overpowering. During his
+two years in the army he had drifted into the easy habits and easier
+vernacular of the enlisted man. Whatever knowledge he had of the
+amenities of life had almost been forgotten. But, though his social
+virtues were few, he passionately identified himself with them rather
+than with his faults, which were many. To prove his politeness, for
+instance, he insisted upon his hostesses having second helps to every
+dish, offered to answer the telephone whenever it rang, and even
+obligingly started to answer the door-bell during the salad course.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+That dinner was but the initiation into a week of difficult adjustments.
+When he was not in the arctic region surrounding Miss Isobel and Miss
+Enid, he was in the torrid zone of Madam's presence. New and embarrassing
+situations confronted him on every hand, and when he was not breaking
+conventions he was breaking china. But Quin was not sensitive, and, in
+spite of the fact that he was being silently or vocally condemned most of
+the time, he cheerfully persevered in his determination to win the
+respect of the family.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The saving of his ignorance was that he never tried to conceal it. He
+looked at it with surprise and discussed it with disconcerting frankness.
+He was no more abashed in learning new and better ways of conducting
+himself than he would have been in learning a new language. He laughed
+good-humoredly at his mistakes and seldom committed the same one a second
+time. His limitations were to him like the frontier to a pioneer&#8212;a thing
+to be reached and crossed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+If only he could have contented himself with performing the one duty
+required of him and then gracefully effacing himself, his success would
+have been assured. But that was not Quin's nature. Having identified
+himself with the family, he promptly assumed full responsibility for its
+welfare. By the end of the second week he was the self-constituted head
+of the establishment. No mission was too high or too low for him to
+volunteer to perform. One moment he was tactfully severing diplomatic
+relations with a consulting physician in the front hall, the next he was
+firing the furnace in the basement. Whenever he was in the house he was
+meeting emergencies and adjusting difficulties, upsetting established
+customs and often achieving unexpected results with new ones.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Isobel and Miss Enid stood aghast at his temerity, and waited hourly
+for the lightning of Madam's wrath to annihilate him. But, though the
+bolts rained about him, they failed to destroy him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On one occasion Miss Isobel was so outraged by his familiar attitude
+toward her mother that she plucked up courage to remonstrate with him;
+but Madam, instead of appreciating the interference on her behalf,
+promptly turned upon her defender.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Now, Isobel,&#34; she said caustically, &#34;<i>you</i> may be old enough to
+want men to respect you, but I am young enough to want them to like me.
+You leave young Graham alone.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin meanwhile, in spite of his arduous duties at the office and at home,
+was living in a world of dreams. The privilege of hearing Eleanor's name
+frequently mentioned, of getting bits of news of her from time to time,
+the exciting possibility of being under the same roof with her when she
+returned, supplied the days with thrilling zest. Since her teasing note
+in answer to his double-barreled communication, he had written but once
+and received no answer; but he knew that she was expected home for the
+Easter vacation, and he lived on that prospect.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+One evening, when he was summoned to Madam's room to shorten her new
+crutches, he realized that the all-important subject was under
+discussion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Isn't that exactly like her?&#34; Madam was saying. &#34;Refusing to go in the
+first place, and now objecting to coming home.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, it isn't especially gay for her here, is it?&#34; Miss Enid ventured
+in feeble defense. &#34;I am afraid we are rather dull company for a young
+girl.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, make it gay,&#34; commanded Madam. &#34;You and Isobel aren't so old and
+feeble that you can't think of some way to entertain young people.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;A tea?&#34; suggested Miss Enid.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;A tea would never tempt Eleanor. She's too much her mother's child to
+enjoy anything so staid and respectable.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why don't you give her a dance?&#34; suggested Quin enthusiastically,
+looking up from his work.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Give who a dance?&#34; demanded Madam in surprise.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Miss Eleanor,&#34; said Quin, bending over his work and blushing to the
+roots of his stubby hair.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The three ladies exchanged startled glances; then Miss Enid said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course. I had forgotten that you met her the night of the accident. I
+wonder if we <i>could</i> give the dear child a party?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It is not to be thought of,&#34; said Miss Isobel, &#34;with no regular butler,
+and mother ill&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I tell you, I'm <i>not</i> ill!&#34; snapped Madam. &#34;I intend to be up and
+about by Easter. I'll give as many parties as I like. Hurry up with those
+crutches, Graham; do you think I am going to wait all night?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+One of Quin's first acts upon coming into the house had been to aid and
+abet Madam in her determination to use her injured leg. Dr. Rawlins had
+infuriated her by his pessimistic warnings and his dark suggestions of a
+wheeled chair.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;We'll show 'em what you can do when you get that cast off,&#34; Quin had
+reassured her with the utmost confidence. &#34;I've limbered up heaps of
+stiff legs for the fellows. It takes patience and grit. I got the
+patience and you got the grit, so there we are!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now that the cast was off, a few steps were attempted each night, during
+which painful operation Miss Enid fled to another room to shed tears of
+apprehension, while Miss Isobel hovered about the hall, ready to call the
+doctor if anything happened.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Is that better?&#34; he asked now, as he got Madam to her feet and carefully
+adjusted the crutches. &#34;If you say they are too short, I'll tell you what
+the little man said when he was teased about his legs. 'They reach the
+ground,' he said; 'what more can you ask?'&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Shut up your nonsense, and mind what you are doing!&#34; cried Madam. &#34;My
+leg is worse than it was yesterday. I can't put my foot to the ground.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, yes, you can,&#34; Quin insisted, coaxing her from the bed-post to the
+dresser. &#34;You are coming on fine. I never saw but one person do better.
+That was a guy I knew in France who never danced a step until he lost a
+leg, and then his cork leg taught his other leg to do the fox-trot.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Didn't I tell you to hush!&#34; commanded Madam, laughing in spite of
+herself. &#34;You will have me falling over here in a minute.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When she was back in her chair and Quin was leaving, she beckoned to him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What about Mr. Ranny?&#34; she asked in an anxious whisper. &#34;Was he at the
+office to-day?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin had been dreading the question, but when it came he did not evade
+it. Randolph Bartlett's lapses from grace were coming with such alarming
+frequency that the sisters' frantic efforts to keep the truth from their
+mother only resulted in arousing her suspicion and making her more
+unhappy.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No,&#34; said Quin; &#34;he hasn't been there for a week. He's never going to be
+any better as long as he stays in the business. You don't know what he
+has to stand from Mr. Bangs.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I know what Mr. Bangs has had to stand from him.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes; but Mr. Ranny's never mean. He is one of the kindest, nicest
+gentlemen I ever met up with. But he can't stand being nagged at all the
+time, and he feels that he don't count for anything. He says Mr. Bangs
+considers him a figurehead, and that he'd rather be selling shoestrings
+for himself than be in partnership with him.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, and if I let him go that's what he <i>would</i> be doing,&#34; said
+Madam bitterly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Mr. Chester don't think so,&#34; persisted Quin; &#34;he says Mr. Ranny's got a
+lot of ability.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Don't quote that sissified Francis Chester to me. He may be a good
+man&#8212;I suppose he is; but I can't abide the sight of him. He goes around
+holding one hand in the other as if he were afraid he'd spill it! What
+did you say he said about Ranny?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He said he had ability; that if he was on his own in the country some
+place&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;'On his own'!&#34; Madam's contempt was great. &#34;He hasn't <i>got</i> any
+own. He's just like the girls&#8212;no force or decision about any of them.
+Their father wasn't like that; I am sure <i>I'm</i> not. What's the
+matter with them, anyhow?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin looked her straight in the eyes. &#34;Do you want to know, honest?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Disconcerting as it was to have an oratorical question taken literally,
+Madam's curiosity prompted her to nod her head.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;The same thing's the matter with them,&#34; said Quin, with brutal
+frankness, &#34;that's the matter with your leg. They've been broken and kept
+in the cast too long.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then, before he could get the berating he surely deserved, he was off
+down the stairs, disturbing the silence of the house with his cheerful
+whistle.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At breakfast the next morning he scented trouble. Until now he had made
+little headway with the two sisters, having been too much occupied in
+storming the fortress of Madam's regard to concern himself with the
+outlying districts. But this morning he met with an even colder reception
+than usual. In vain he fired off his best jokes: Miss Enid remained pale
+and languid, and Miss Isobel presided over the coffee-pot as if it had
+been a funeral urn. A crisis was evidently pending, and he determined to
+meet it half way.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Is Queen Vic mad at me?&#34; he asked suddenly, leaning forward on his
+folded arms and smiling with engaging candor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Isobel started to pour the cream into the sugar-bowl, but caught
+herself in the act.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;If you mean my mother,&#34; she said with reproving dignity, &#34;she has asked
+me to tell you&#8212;that is, we all think it best&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;For me to go?&#34; Quin finished it for her. &#34;Now, look here, Miss Isobel;
+you can fire me, but you know you can't fire the furnace! Who is going to
+stay here at night? Who is going to carry Madam up and down stairs? Of
+course I don't want to butt in, but if ever a house needed a man it's
+this one. Why don't you have me stay on until things get to running easy
+again?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+There was an embarrassing pause during which Miss Isobel fidgeted with
+the cups and saucers and Miss Enid bit her lips nervously.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Don't you-all like me?&#34; persisted Quin with his terrible directness.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now, Miss Isobel had spent her life in evasions and reservations and
+compromises. To have even a personal liking stripped thus in public
+offended her maiden modesty, and she scurried to the cover of silence.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course we like you,&#34; murmured Miss Enid, coming to her rescue. &#34;We
+like you very much, Mr. Graham, and we appreciate your kindness in coming
+to help us out. But mother feels that we shouldn't impose on your good
+nature any longer.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin shook his impatient head.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's not it,&#34; he said. &#34;She's mad at something I said last night, and
+she's got a right to be. It was true all right, but it was none of my
+business. I made up my mind before I went to bed that I was going to
+apologize. I can fix things up with her. It's you and Miss Isobel I can't
+understand. You say you like me, but you don't act like it. I know I make
+mistakes about lots of things, and that I do things wrong and say things
+I oughtn't to. But all you got to do is to call me down. I want to help
+you; but that's not all&#8212;I want to learn the game. When a fellow has
+knocked around with men since he was a kid&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He broke off suddenly and stared into his coffee-cup.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I think he might go up and speak to mother, don't you, Isobel?&#34; asked
+Miss Enid tentatively.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin pushed back his chair and rose precipitately from the table,
+dragging the cloth away as he did so.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's not the point!&#34; he said heatedly. &#34;It's for you two to decide, as
+well as her. Do you want me to go or to stay?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Isobel and Miss Enid, who had been assuring each other almost hourly
+that they could not stand that awful boy in the house another day, looked
+at each other intercedingly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It would be a great help if you could stay at least until mother learns
+to use her crutches,&#34; urged Miss Enid.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, and until we get some one we can trust to stay with us at night,&#34;
+added Miss Isobel.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll stay as long as you like!&#34; said Quin heartily; and he departed to
+make his peace with Madam.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="12">CHAPTER 12</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+From that time on Quin's status in the family became less anomalous. To
+be sure, he was still Mr. Randolph's private secretary, Madam's top
+sergeant, Miss Isobel's and Miss Enid's body-guard, and the household's
+general-utility man; but he was now something else in addition. Miss
+Isobel had discovered, quite by chance, that he was the grandson of Dr.
+Ezra Quinby, whose book &#34;Christianizing China&#34; had been one of the
+inspirations of her girlhood.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And to think we considered asking him to eat in the pantry!&#34; she
+exclaimed in horror to her sister.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, I told you all along he was a gentleman by instinct,&#34; said Miss
+Enid.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+To be sure, they were constantly shocked by his manners and his frank
+method of speech, but they were also exhilarated. He was like a
+disturbing but refreshing breeze that swept through their quiet, ordered
+lives. He talked about things and places they had never heard of or seen,
+and recounted his experiences with an enthusiasm that was contagious.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As for Quin, he found, to his surprise, that he was enjoying his new
+quarters quite as much as he had the old ones. Madam was a never-ending
+source of amusement and interest to him, and Miss Isobel and Miss Enid
+soon had each her individual appeal. He liked the swish of their silk
+petticoats, and the play of their slim white hands about the coffee-tray.
+He liked their super-feminine delicacies of speech and motion, and the
+flattering interest they began to take in all his affairs.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Isobel developed a palpitating concern for his spiritual welfare and
+invited him to go to church with her. She even introduced him to the
+minister with proud reference to his distinguished grandfather, and
+basked in the reflected glory.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin did not take kindly to church. He considered that he had done his
+full duty by it in the first fourteen years of his life, when he, along
+with the regenerate heathen, had been forced to attend five services
+every Sunday in the gloomy chapel in the compound at Nanking. But if
+Eleanor's aunt had asked him to accompany her to the gates of hell
+instead of the portals of heaven, he would have acquiesced eagerly. So
+strenuously did he lift his voice in the familiar hymns of his youth that
+he was promptly urged to join the choir, an ordeal whose boredom was
+mitigated only during the few moments when the collection was taken up
+and he and the tenor could bet on which deacon would make his round
+first.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Not for years had Miss Isobel had such thrilling occupation as that of
+returning Ezra Quinby's grandson to the spiritual fold. In spite of the
+fact that Quin was a fairly decent chap already, whose worst vices were
+poker and profanity, she persisted in regarding him as a brand which she
+had been privileged to snatch from the burning.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+What gave him a yet more intimate claim upon her was the fact that his
+heart and lungs were still troublesome, and with any over-exertion on his
+part, or a sudden change in the weather, his chest became very sore and
+his racking cough returned. At such times Miss Isobel was in her glory.
+She would put him to bed with hot-water bottles and mustard plasters and
+feed him hot lemonade. Quin took kindly to the coddling. No one had
+fussed over him like that since his mother died, and he was touchingly
+grateful.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Say, you'd be a wonder out at the hospital,&#34; he said to her on one of
+these occasions. &#34;I wish some of those fellows with the flu could have
+you to look after them.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Isobel's long, sallow face with its dark-ringed eyes lit up for a
+moment.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;There is nothing I should like better,&#34; she said. &#34;But of course it's
+out of the question.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Mother doesn't approve of us doing any work at the camp. She did make an
+exception in the case of my niece, but Eleanor was so insistent. Sister
+and I try never to oppose mother's wishes. It cuts us off from a great
+many things; but then, I contend that our first duty is to her.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Isobel's attitude toward her mother was that of a monk to his
+haircloth shirt. She acquired so much merit in her friends' eyes and in
+her own by her patient endurance that the penance was robbed of half its
+sting.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Things are awful bad out at the hospital now,&#34; went on Quin. &#34;A fellow
+was telling me yesterday that in some of the wards they only have one
+nurse to two hundred patients. The epidemic is getting worse every day.
+You-all in town here don't know what it's like where there's so many sick
+and so few to take care of 'em.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Isobel, with morbid interest, insisted upon the details. When Quin
+had finished his grim recital, she turned to him with scared
+determination.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you know,&#34; she fluttered, &#34;I almost feel as if I ought to go in spite
+of mother's wishes.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course you ought,&#34; Quin conceded, &#34;especially when you are keeping a
+trained nurse here in the house who doesn't do a thing but carry up trays
+and sit around and look at herself!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I know it,&#34; Miss Isobel admitted miserably. &#34;I've lain awake nights
+worrying over it. Sister and I are perfectly able to do what is to be
+done. But mother insists upon keeping the nurse.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, she can't keep you, if you really want to go. I guess you got a
+right to do your duty.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The word was like a bugle call to Miss Isobel. She went about all day in
+a tremor of uncertainty, and at last yielded to Quin's insistence, and,
+donning Eleanor's Red Cross uniform, accompanied him to the hospital.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Every afternoon after that, when Madam was taking her rest, Miss Isobel,
+feeling like Machiavelli one moment and Florence Nightingale the next,
+stepped into the carriage, already loaded with delicacies, and proceeded
+on her errand of mercy. She invariably returned in a twitter of subdued
+excitement, and recounted her experiences with breathless interest at the
+dinner-table.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I've never seen sister like this before,&#34; Miss Enid told Quin. &#34;She
+talks more in an hour now than she used to talk in a week, and she seems
+so happy.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The change wrought in Miss Isobel's life by Quin's advent into the family
+was mild, however, compared to the cataclysm effected in the life of her
+sister. Miss Enid, having had her own affections wrecked in early youth,
+spent her time acting as a sort of salvage corps following the
+devastation caused by her cyclonic mother. When Madam shattered things to
+bits, Miss Enid tried patiently to remold them nearer to the heart's
+desire. She had acquired a habit of offsetting every disagreeable remark
+by an agreeable one, and she was apt to see incipient halos hovering
+above heads where less sympathetic observers saw horns. When the last
+chance of getting rid of the disturbing but helpful Quin vanished, she
+set herself to work to discover his possibilities with the view of
+undertaking his social reclamation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+One evening, as he was passing through the hall, she called him into the
+library. It was a small, high-ceilinged room, with bookcases reaching to
+the ceiling, and a massive mahogany table bearing a reading-lamp with two
+green shades. Lincoln and his Cabinet held session over one door, and
+Andrew Jackson, surrounded by his weeping family, died over the other.
+Miss Enid, with books piled up in front of her, was sitting at the table.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Quinby,&#34; she said,&#8212;it had been &#34;Quinby&#34; ever since the discovery of his
+grandfather,&#8212;&#34;I wonder if you can help me? I have a club paper on the
+14th, and I can't find a thing about my subject. Can't you tell me
+something about the position of women in China?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin, who had come in expecting to be called upon to put up a window or
+fix the electric light, looked at her blankly. Under ordinary
+circumstances he would have laughingly disclaimed any knowledge of the
+subject; but with Miss Enid sitting there looking up at him with such
+flattering confidence, it was different. Out of the dusty pigeon holes of
+his brain he dragged odds and ends of information, memories of the native
+houses, the customs and manners of the people, stories he had heard from
+his Chinese nurses, street incidents he had seen, stray impressions
+picked up here and there by a lively active American boy in a foreign
+city.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I ought to be able to tell you a lot more,&#34; he said apologetically in
+conclusion. &#34;I could if I wasn't such a bonehead.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But you've given me just what I wanted!&#34; cried Miss Enid. &#34;And you've
+made it all so <i>vivid</i>. It takes a very good mind to register
+details like that and to be able to present them in such good order.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin looked at her quizzically. He was confident enough of his abilities
+along other lines, but he had a low opinion of his mental equipment.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I guess the only kind of sense I got is common,&#34; he said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But Miss Enid would not have it so. &#34;No,&#34; she said, earnestly regarding
+the toe of her beaded slipper; &#34;your mind is much above the average. But
+it isn't enough to be born with brains&#8212;one must know how to use them.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I suppose you mean I don't?&#34; asked Quin, also regarding the beaded
+slipper.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Nobody does who has had no training,&#34; Miss Enid gently suggested. &#34;It
+seems a pity that a young man of your possibilities should have had so
+little opportunity for cultivating them.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, I ain't a Methuselah!&#34; said Quin, slightly peaked. &#34;What's the
+matter with me beginning now?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's rather late, I am afraid. Still, other men have done it. I wonder
+if you would consider taking up some night courses at the university?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'd consider anything that would get me on in the world. I've got a very
+particular reason, Miss Enid, for&#8212;for wanting to get on.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She looked at him with increased interest.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Really? How interesting! You must tell me all about it some day. But
+this would keep you back for a time. You would have to give all your
+spare hours to study, and you might not even be able to take the better
+position they promised you at the factory this spring.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I've already got it,&#34; Quin said. &#34;Mr. Bangs told me to-day that I was to
+start in as shipping clerk Monday morning. But he'd let me off nights if
+I'd put it up to him. Old Chester says&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Enid's Pre-Raphaelite brows contracted slightly. &#34;Don't you think it
+would be more respectful&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Sure,&#34; agreed Quin; &#34;I didn't mean any harm. I like Mr. Chester. He
+asked me to come up to his rooms some night and see his collection of
+flutes.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That was like him,&#34; Miss Enid said warmly. &#34;He's always doing kind
+things like that. I know his reputation for being diffident and hard to
+get acquainted with, but once you get beneath the surface&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin was not in the least interested in Mr. Chester's surface. He sat on
+the edge of the table, swinging his foot and staring off into space,
+wholly absorbed in the idea of cultivating that newly discovered
+intellect of his.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Say, Miss Enid,&#34; he said, impulsively interrupting her eulogy of Mr.
+Chester's neglected virtues, &#34;I wish you'd sort of take me in hand.
+<i>You</i> know what I need better than I do. If you'll get a line on
+that school business, I'll start right in, if I have to start in the
+kindergarten. Hand out the dope and I'll take it. And whenever you see me
+doing things wrong, or saying things wrong, I'd take it as a favor if
+you'd jack me up.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Enid smiled ruefully. &#34;Why, Quinby, that is just what we have all
+been doing ever since you came. If you weren't the best-natured&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not a bit of it,&#34; disclaimed Quin. &#34;Queen Vic lets me have it in the
+neck sometimes, but that's nothing. I've learned more since I've been in
+this house than I ever learned in all my life put together. Why,
+sometimes I don't hardly know myself!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Two negatives, Quinby, make an affirmative,&#34; suggested Miss Enid primly;
+and thus his higher education began.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Enid was right when she said his mind was above the average. Its one
+claim to superiority lay in the fact that it had received the little
+training it had at first hand. What he knew of geography he knew, not
+from maps, but from actual observation in many parts of the world. Higher
+mathematics were unknown to him, but through years of experience he had
+learned to solve the most difficult of all problems&#8212;that of making ends
+meet. He had learned astronomy from a Norwegian sailor, as they lay on
+the deck of a Pacific transport night after night in the southern seas.
+He had even tackled literature during his six months in hospital, when he
+had plowed through all the books the wards provided from Dante's
+&#34;Inferno&#34; to &#34;Dere Mable.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Soon after his talk with Miss Enid he decided to call upon Mr. Chester,
+not because Mr. Chester was an enlivening companion, but because he was
+so touchingly grateful for the casual friendship that Quin bestowed upon
+him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He's so sort of lonesome,&#34; Quin told Miss Leaks. &#34;When he looks at me
+with those big dog eyes of his, I feel like scratching him back of his
+ear.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Chester, in his small but tastefully furnished bachelor apartment,
+outdid himself in his efforts to be hospitable. He insisted upon Quin
+taking the best chair, gave him a good cigar, showed him some rare first
+editions, displayed his collection of musical instruments, and struggled
+valiantly to establish a common footing. But there was only one subject
+upon which they could find anything to say, and they came back again and
+again to the affairs of the Bartlett family.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why don't you ever come around and see the folks?&#34; Quin asked
+hospitably. &#34;They get awful lonesome with so few people dropping in.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Chester in evident embarrassment flicked the ash from his cigar and
+answered guardedly:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I used to be there a great deal in the old days. Unfortunately, Madam
+Bartlett and I had a misunderstanding. As a matter of fact, I have not
+crossed that threshold in&#8212;let me see&#8212;it must be fifteen years! It was a
+party, I remember, given for Eleanor, the little granddaughter, on her
+fifth birthday.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, yes!&#34; said Quin, finding Mr. Chester for the first time interesting.
+&#34;They've got a picture of her taken with Miss Enid in her party dress.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I suppose you mean this?&#34; Mr. Chester reached over and took from his
+desk a somewhat faded photograph, in a silver frame, of a little girl
+leaning against a big girl's shoulders, both enveloped in a cloud of
+white tulle.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Gee, but she was pretty!&#34; exclaimed Quin, devouring every detail of
+Eleanor's chubby features.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;A beautiful woman,&#34; sighed Mr. Chester&#8212;and Quin, looking up suddenly,
+surprised a look in his host's eyes that was anything but numerical.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Obligingly relinquishing his application of the pronoun for Mr.
+Chester's, he said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She certainly thinks a lot of you!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How do you know?&#34; demanded Mr. Chester.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;From the way she talks. She says people are barking up the wrong tree
+when they think you are cold and indifferent and all that; says you've
+got one of the noblest natures <i>she</i> ever knew.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin was appalled at the effect of these words. Mr. Chester's eyes got
+quite red around the rims and his lips actually trembled.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Poor Enid!&#34; he said. Then he remembered himself, or rather forgot
+himself, and became a Number Nine again, and bored Quin talking business
+until ten o'clock.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At parting they shook hands cordially, and Mr. Chester urged him to come
+again.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I wonder if you would care to use one of my tickets for the Symphony
+Orchestra next week?&#34; he asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin looked embarrassed. He had accepted a similar invitation the week
+before, and had confided to Rose Martel afterward that he &#34;never heard
+such a bully band playing such bum music.&#34; But Mr. Chester's intention
+was so kind that he could run no risk of offending him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll go if I can,&#34; he said, leaving himself a loophole.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Here is the ticket,&#34; said Mr. Chester, &#34;and in case you do not use it,
+perhaps you will so good as to pass it on to some one who can.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This suggestion afforded Quin an inspiration.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Say, Miss Enid,&#34; he said the next morning at breakfast. &#34;I want to give
+you a ticket to the Symphony Orchestra next Friday night. Will you go?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But, my dear boy,&#34; she protested greatly touched, &#34;I cannot go by
+myself.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You don't have to. I'm going to take you and come for you. You ain't
+going to turn me down, are you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Have you got the ticket?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Right here. Now you will go, won't you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It would have taken a less susceptible heart than Miss Enid's to resist
+Quin's persuasive tones, and in spite of Miss Isobel's disapprobation she
+agreed to go.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Just what happened on that opening night of the Fine Arts Series, when
+two old lovers found themselves in embarrassing proximity for the first
+time in fifteen years, has never been told. But from subsequent events it
+is safe to conclude that during the long program they became much more
+interested in their own unfinished symphony than in Schubert's, and when
+Quin came to take Miss Enid home, he found them in a corner of the lobby,
+still so engrossed in conversation that he obligingly walked around the
+block to give them an additional five minutes.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="13">CHAPTER 13</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+Quin's desire for self-improvement soon became an obsession. With Miss
+Enid's assistance he got into a night course at the university, and
+proceeded to attack his ignorance with something of the fierce
+determination he had attacked the Hun the year before in France. He
+plunged through bogs of history, got hopelessly entangled in the barbed
+wire of mathematics, had hand-to-hand struggles with belligerent parts of
+speech, and more than once suffered the shell-shock of despair. But his
+watchword now, as then, was, &#34;Up and at 'em!&#34; And before long he had the
+satisfaction of seeing his enemy gradually giving way.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Having taken his small public into his confidence in regard to his
+belated ambition to get an education, he was surprised to find how ready
+everybody was to help him. Mr. Chester not only assisted him with his
+mathematics, but insisted upon taking him to hear good music, in the vain
+effort to reclaim an ear hopelessly attuned to jazz and rag-time. Mr.
+Martel devoted Sunday afternoons to making him read aloud from the
+classics, with great attention to precise enunciation. Miss Isobel still
+looked after his moral welfare, and Miss Enid continued to devote herself
+to his social improvement. But it remained for Madam Bartlett to render
+him the service of which he was most in need. Whenever the bubble of his
+self-esteem threatened to carry him away, she always took pains to
+puncture it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Don't let them make a fool of you, Graham,&#34; she said one day, as she
+leaned heavily upon his arm in a painful effort to walk without her
+crutches&#8212;an experiment that she allowed neither one of her daughters to
+share, as they invariably limped with her and got frightened when she
+stumbled. &#34;They all treat you like a puppy that has learned to walk on
+its hind legs. Remember that you belong on your hind legs. You are only
+doing what most boys in your position do in their teens. If you were as
+smart as they claim, you would have got an education long ago. But young
+people these days have no sense! Just look at my granddaughter, for
+instance.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+There being no direction in which he was more eager to look, Quin gave
+her his undivided attention.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I've spent thousands of dollars on that girl's education,&#34; Madam
+continued, &#34;and what do you suppose she elected to specialize in?
+'Expression'! In my day they called it elocution. When a girl was too
+dumb to learn anything else, the teacher got money out of her parents by
+teaching her to swing her arms around her hear and say, 'Curfew Shall Not
+Ring To-night.' Now they all want to write poetry, or play the flute, or
+go on the stage, or some other fool thing like that.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What about those that want to go on a farm? That's sensible enough for
+you.&#34; Quin couldn't resist the thrust on behalf of Mr. Ranny.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's sensible for a sensible person,&#34; Madam said crossly. &#34;It's where
+<i>you</i> belong, instead of attempting all this university business.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+There were times these days when Quin quite agreed with Madam. When the
+tide of his confidence was out, he regarded himself as a hopeless fool
+and despaired of ever making up the years he had lost. But at high tide
+there was no limit to his aspirations, nor to his courage. While his
+struggles at the university kept him humble, his success at the factory
+constantly elated him. Having achieved two promotions in less than three
+months, he already saw himself a prospective member of the firm. In fact,
+he slightly anticipated this event by flinging himself into the affairs
+of Bartlett &#34; Bangs with even more ardor than was advisable. Hardly a day
+passed that he did not seek a chance to apprise Mr. Bangs of some
+colossal scheme or startling innovation that would revolutionize the
+business.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;See here, young man,&#34; said Mr. Bangs, when this had occurred once too
+often; &#34;I pay you to work for me, not to think for me.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But they are the same thing,&#34; urged Quin, with appalling temerity. &#34;Why,
+I can't sleep nights for thinking how other firms are walking away with
+our business. Smith &#34; Snelling, up in Illinois, have got a plant that's
+half as big as ours, and they export twice as much stuff as we do. And
+their plows can't touch ours; they ain't in a thousand miles of 'em.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How do you know?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I've seen 'em both in action, and I've heard men talk about 'em. Why, if
+we could get a start in the Orient, and open up an agency in Japan and
+China&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;There&#8212;that will do,&#34; said Mr. Bangs testily; &#34;you get back to your
+work. You talk too much.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Both Mr. Ranny and Mr. Chester warned Quin again and again that he was
+not supposed to emerge from the obscurity of his humble position as
+shipping clerk. But Quin was the descendant of a long line of
+missionaries whose duty it was to reform. The effect of his heredity and
+early environment was not only to increase his self-reliance and
+intensify his motive power, but to commit him to ideals as well. Once he
+recognized a condition as being capable of improvement, he could not rest
+until he had tried to better it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was not until the approach of Easter that his mind began to stray from
+the highroads of industry and learning into the byways of pleasure. From
+certain signs about the Bartlett house it was apparent that preparations
+were in progress for an event of importance. Paperhangers and cleaners
+came and went, consultations were held daily concerning new rugs and
+curtains. Miss Enid and Miss Isobel gave tentative orders and Madam
+promptly countermanded them. Workmen were engaged and dismissed and
+re&#235;ngaged. The door to the room at the head of the stairs, which he knew
+to be Eleanor's, now stood open, revealing a pink-and-white bower. Stray
+remarks now and then concerning caterers and music and invitations
+further excited his fancy, and he waited impatiently for the time when he
+should be formally apprised of Eleanor's home-coming.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Never before in his life had he been so inordinately happy. He burst into
+song at strange times and places, and had to be spoken to more than once
+for whistling in the office. Instead of studying at night, he frequently
+lapsed into delectable reveries in which he anticipated the bliss of
+being under the same roof with Eleanor. He already heard himself telling
+her about his promotions, his work at the university, his capture of her
+family. And always he pictured her as listening to him as she had that
+day at the Hawaiian Garden, with lips ready to smile or tremble and eyes
+that sparkled like little pools of water in the sunlight.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Occasionally reason suggested that she would be at home very little and
+that the obnoxious Phipps would be lying in wait for her whenever she
+went abroad. But Phipps was forbidden the house, and with such a handicap
+as that he surely was out of the running. Besides, Miss Eleanor had
+probably forgotten all about the Captain by this time! Thus reassuring
+himself, the fatuous Quin loosened the reins of his fancy and rode full
+tilt for an inevitable fall.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The first intimation of it came the week before Easter, when Madam
+presented him with a handsome watch in recognition of his services. The
+gift itself was sufficiently overwhelming, but the formal politeness of
+the presentation sounded ominous. Madam suggested almost tactfully, in
+conclusion, that, now she was on her feet again, he need not feel
+obligated to remain longer.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I <i>don't</i> feel obligated!&#34; he burst out impetuously. &#34;I'd
+rather stay here than anywhere in the world.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, you can't stay,&#34; said Madam, whose small stock of courtesy had
+been exhausted on her initial speech. &#34;My granddaughter is bringing some
+girls home with her for the Easter vacation, and I need your room.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I'll sleep in the third story,&#34; urged Quin wildly. &#34;You can billet
+me any old place&#8212;I don't care <i>where</i> you put me.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No,&#34; said Madam firmly. &#34;It's best for you to go.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+That night at dinner the sisters did what they could to soften the blow
+for Quin. They gave vague excuses that did not excuse, and explanations
+that did not explain.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course, we have no idea of losing sight of you,&#34; Miss Enid said with
+forced brightness. &#34;You must drop in often to tell us how you are getting
+along and to make mother laugh. You are the only person I know who can do
+that.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, and we shall count on you to come to supper every Sunday evening,&#34;
+Miss Isobel added; &#34;then we can go to church together.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Next Sunday?&#34; asked Quin, faintly hopeful.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, no,&#34; said Miss Isobel. &#34;For the next two weeks we shall be
+occupied with the young ladies and their friends; but after that we shall
+look for you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin looked at the two gentle sisters in dumb amazement. How <i>could</i>
+they sit there saying such kind things to him, and at the same time shut
+the door between him and the great opportunity of his life? What did it
+all mean? Where had he failed? Surely there was some terrible
+misunderstanding! In his complete bewilderment he created quite the most
+dreadful blunder that is registered against him in his long list of
+social sins.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But don't you expect me to meet the young ladies?&#34; he blurted out
+indignantly. &#34;Aren't you going to ask me to the party?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A horrible pause followed, during which the walls seemed to rock around
+him and he felt the blood surging to his head. He was starting up from
+the table when Miss Enid laid a quieting hand on his sleeve.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course you are to be invited, Quinby,&#34; she said in her suavest tones;
+&#34;the invitation will reach you to-morrow.&#34;
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="14">CHAPTER 14</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+On the night of the Bartlett party, Quin stood before the small mirror
+of his old room over the Martels' kitchen and surveyed himself in
+sections. The first view, obtained by standing on a chair, was the
+least satisfactory; for, in spite of the most correct of wing-toed
+dancing-shoes, there was a space between them and the cuffs of his
+trousers that no amount of adjustment could diminish. The second
+section was far more reassuring. Having amassed what to him seemed a
+fortune, for the purchase of a dress-suit, Quin had allowed himself to
+be persuaded by the voluble and omniscient salesman to put all of his
+money into a resplendent dinner-coat instead. The claim for the coat
+that it was &#34;the classiest garment in the city&#34; was reinforced by the
+fact that it had adorned the dummy in the shop window for seven
+consecutive days and occasioned much comment by its numerous
+&#34;novelties.&#34; Quin had no doubts whatever about the coat. Its glory not
+only dimmed his eyes to the shortcomings of the trousers, which he had
+rented for the occasion, but even made him forget the aching tooth that
+had been harassing him all day.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As he went down to present himself for the family inspection, it is
+useless to deny that he was very much impressed with the elegance and
+correctness of his costume. It had been achieved with infinite pains
+and considerable expense. Nothing was lacking, not even a silver
+cigarette-case, bearing an unknown monogram, which he had purchased at
+a pawn-shop the day before.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+His advent into the sitting-room produced a gratifying sensation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Ha! Who comes here!&#34; cried Mr. Martel. &#34;The glass of fashion and the
+mould of form.&#34; Then he came forward for close inspection. &#34;Hadn't you
+any better studs than those, my boy?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;They are the ones that came in the shirt,&#34; said Quin, instantly on the
+defensive.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, they hardly do justice to the occasion. Step upstairs, Cassius,
+and get my pearl ones out of the top chiffonier drawer.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I wish Captain Phipps could see you,&#34; said Rose admiringly. &#34;You should
+have seen his face when I told him you were going to-night! He wasn't
+invited, you know.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Where did you see him?&#34; Quin asked, brushing a speck of lint from the
+toe of his shining shoe.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Here. He's been coming twice a week to work with Papa Claude ever since
+you left. Give 'em to me, Cass&#34;&#8212;this to her brother. &#34;I'll put them in.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Aren't they too little for the buttonholes?&#34; asked Quin anxiously.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not enough to matter,&#34; Rose insisted. Then, as she finished, she added
+in a whisper: &#34;Tell Nell somebody sent his love.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Nothing doing,&#34; laughed Quin with a superior shrug; &#34;somebody else is
+taking his.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The curb was lined with automobiles by the time he arrived at the
+Bartletts'. The house looked strangely unfamiliar with its blaze of
+lights and throng of arriving guests. He instinctively felt in his pocket
+for his latch-key, and then remembered, and waited for the strange butler
+to open the door. The inside of the house looked even less natural than
+the outside. The floors were cleared for dancing and the mantels were
+banked high with flowers and ferns. Under the steps the musicians were
+already tuning their instruments.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Upstairs, sir; first room to your left,&#34; said the important person at
+the door, and Quin followed the stream of black-coated figures who were
+filing up the stairs and turning into the room he had occupied a short
+week ago. It was just as he had left it, except for the picture that no
+longer adorned the mantel.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Beg pardon, sir,&#34; said the lofty attendant who took his overcoat, &#34;your
+stud's come loose.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I bet the damn thing's going to do that all night,&#34; Quin said
+confidentially. &#34;Say, you haven't got a pin, have you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, no, sir, it couldn't be pinned,&#34; protested the man in a shocked
+tone.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin adjusted it as best he could, took a final look at himself in the
+mirror, and proceeded downstairs. Arrived in the lower hall, he glanced
+about him in some perplexity. Not a member of the family was visible, and
+he looked in vain for a familiar face. In his uncertainty as to his next
+move, he went back to the pantry and got himself a glass of water.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As he was returning to the hall, some one plucked at his sleeve and
+whispered:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Hello there, Graham!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Turning around, he encountered the gaping mouth of a shining saxophone,
+behind which beamed the no less shining countenance of Barney McGinness.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Barney had been in the 105th Infantry Band, and he and Quin had returned
+from France on the same transport. They exchanged hearty greetings under
+their breath.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Serving here to-night, are you?&#34; asked Barney.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Serving?&#34; repeated Quin; then he laughed good-naturedly. &#34;You got
+another guess coming your way, Barney.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;So it's the parlor instid of the pantry, is it? I'd 'a' seen it for
+meself if I had used me eyes instead of me mouth. You look grand enough
+to be doing a turn on the vawdyville.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin tried not to expand his chest in pride, for fear the movement would
+disturb those temperamental studs. He would fain have lingered
+indefinitely in the warmth of Barney's admiring smile, but the signal for
+the first dance was already given, and he moved nervously out into the
+throng again.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now that the moment had come for him to meet Eleanor&#8212;the moment he had
+longed for by day and dreamed of by night,&#8212;he found himself overcome
+with terrible diffidence. Suppose she did not want to see him again?
+Suppose she should be angry at him for coming to her party? Suppose she
+should be too taken up with all these strange friends of hers to have
+time to dance with him?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+After obstructing social traffic in the hall for several moments, he
+encountered Miss Enid. She was all a lavender flutter, with sleeves
+floating and scarf dangling, and she wore an air of subdued excitement
+that made her almost pretty.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why, Quinby!&#34; she said, and her eyes swept him. &#34;Have you spoken to
+mother yet?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No; where is she?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;In the library. And sister will present you to the young ladies in the
+parlor.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She hesitated a moment, then she placed a timid hand on Quin's arm.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But before you go in would you mind doing something for me? Will you
+watch the front door and let me know as soon as Mr. Chester arrives?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Mr. Chester?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes. You see, it's been a great many years since he came to the house,
+and I want to&#8212;to make sure that he is properly welcomed.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll wait for him,&#34; said Quin, glad of any excuse for not entering that
+crowded parlor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Lovely young creatures in rainbow tints drifted down the stairs and
+disappeared beyond the porti&#232;res; supercilious young men, all in tail
+coats and most of them wearing white gloves, passed and repassed him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin was experiencing the wholly new sensation of timidity. In vain he
+sought reassuring reflections from the long pier-glass, as he did guard
+duty in the front hall pending Mr. Chester's arrival. He'd be all right,
+he assured himself, as soon as he got to know some of the people. Once he
+had spoken to Eleanor and been sure of her welcome, he didn't care what
+happened. Meanwhile he worked with his shirt-stud and tried not to think
+about his tooth.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was late when Mr. Chester arrived, and by the time he had been placed
+in Miss Enid's care the receiving line in the parlor had dissolved and
+the dance was in full swing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin made his way back to the library and presented his belated respects
+to Madam, who sat enthroned in state where she could command the field
+and direct the man&#339;uvers. She was resplendent in black velvet and old
+lace. A glittering comb topped her high white pompadour, and a dog-collar
+of diamonds encircled her wrinkled neck.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, I am glad one man has the manners to come and speak to his
+hostess!&#34; she said grimly, extending her hand to Quin. &#34;The young lords
+of the present day seem to consider a lady's house a public dance-hall.
+Sit down and talk to me.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin didn't wish to sit down. He wished very ardently to plunge into that
+dancing throng and find Eleanor. But the old lady's vise-like grip closed
+on him, and he had to content himself with watching the couples circle
+past the door while he listened to a tirade against present-day customs.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why, this dancing is indecent!&#34; stormed the old lady. &#34;I never saw
+anything like it in my life! Look at that little Morris chit with her
+cheek plastered up to Johnnie Rawlins'! If somebody doesn't speak to her,
+I will! I will not have such dancing in my house! And there's Kitty
+Carey, the one with no back to her dress. What her mother is thinking
+of&#8212;Mercy! Look at the length of that skirt!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was not until Mr. and Mrs. Ranny arrived, and Madam had no time for
+any one else, that Quin was able to escape.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Can you tell me where I can find Miss Eleanor?&#34; he asked eagerly of Miss
+Isobel, whom he encountered in the back hall.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Isobel, looking thoroughly uncomfortable in a high-necked,
+long-sleeved evening dress, sighed anxiously:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am looking for her myself. She has had all the windows opened, and
+mother gave express orders that they were to be kept closed. Would you
+mind putting this one down? It makes such a draught.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was a high window and an obstinate one, and by the time it was down
+Quin's cuffs were six inches beyond his coat sleeves and his vest was
+bulging.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't want that window down,&#34; said a spirited voice behind him. &#34;I
+wish you had left it alone.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Eleanor!&#34; said Miss Isobel reprovingly. &#34;He is doing it at my request.
+It is our young friend Quinby Graham.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin wheeled about in dismay, and found himself face to face with a
+slender vision in shimmering blue and silver, a vision with flushed
+cheeks and angry eyes, who looked at him in blank amazement, then burst
+out laughing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why, for mercy sakes! I never would have known you. You look so&#8212;so
+different in civilian clothes.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The words were what he had expected, but the intonation was not. It
+seemed to call for some sort of explanation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's my face,&#34; he blurted out apologetically, drawing attention to the
+fact that of all others he most wished to ignore. &#34;Had an abscess in my
+tooth; it's swelled my jaw up a bit.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor was not in the least concerned with his affliction. A civilian
+with the toothache could not expect the consideration of a hero with a
+shrapnel wound. Moreover, this was her first appearance in the r&#244;le of
+hostess at a large party, and she fluttered about like a distracted
+humming-bird.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Isobel laid a detaining hand on her bare shoulder.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Did you know they were smoking in the dining-room, Nellie? Even some of
+the <i>girls</i> are smoking. If mother finds it out I don't know
+<i>what</i> she will do!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Call out the fire department, probably,&#34; said Eleanor flippantly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But listen! She will speak to them&#8212;you know she will. Don't you think
+you can stop them?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course I can't!&#34; declared Eleanor, her anger rekindling. &#34;And we
+can't dance with the windows down, either. Oh, dear, I wish we'd never
+<i>tried</i> to give a party!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;May I have the next dance, Miss Eleanor?&#34; Quin ventured at this
+inopportune moment.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She turned upon him a perturbed face, &#34;It's taken,&#34; she said absently.
+&#34;They are all taken until after supper. I'll give you one then.&#34; And with
+this casual promise she hurried away.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin wandered disconsolately into the hall again. Everybody seemed to
+know everybody else. Apparently he was the one outsider. At the soldier
+dances to which he was accustomed, he was used to boldly asking any girl
+on the floor to dance, sure of a welcoming smile. But here it was
+different. It seemed that a fellow must wait for an introduction which
+nobody took the trouble to give. He leaned against the door-jamb and
+indulged in bitter reflections. Much that bunch cared whether he had
+risked his life for his country or not! The girls had already forgotten
+which were the heroes and which were the slackers. He didn't care! All he
+had come for, anyhow, was to see Eleanor Bartlett. Just wait until he got
+her all to himself in that dance after supper&#8212;&#8212;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Finding the strain of being a spectator instead of a participant no
+longer endurable, he wandered upstairs and bathed his face. The pain was
+getting worse and he had a horrible suspicion that the swelling was
+increasing. In the men's dressing-room he found a game of craps in
+progress, and, upon being asked to join, was so grateful for being
+included in any group that he accepted gladly, and for half an hour
+forgot his woes while he won enough to repay Cass the sum he had advanced
+on the dress-shirt.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Stud's undone, old chap,&#34; said his opponent as he paid his debt.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Thanks, so it is,&#34; said Quin nonchalantly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As he went downstairs he encountered Miss Enid and Mr. Chester sitting
+under the palms on the landing in intimate t&#234;te-&#224;-t&#234;te.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Will you dance this with me, Miss Enid?&#34; asked Quin, leading a forlorn
+hope.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am afraid I don't know those new dances,&#34; said Miss Enid evasively,
+&#34;the only thing I can do is to waltz.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You mean a one-step?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She means a waltz,&#34; Mr. Chester repeated impressively, &#34;the most
+beautiful and dignified dance ever invented. Shall we show him, Miss
+Enid?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+And, to Quin's unbounded amazement, Mr. Chester and Miss Enid proceeded
+to demonstrate, there on the narrow landing, the grace and beauty of the
+&#34;glide waltz&#34;; and so absorbed were they in the undertaking that they did
+not even know when he ceased to be a spectator and Miss Isobel became
+one.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The latter, inexpressibly shocked at the way things were going in the
+ball-room, was on her way upstairs, when she was confronted with the
+amazing spectacle of her sister and the bald-headed Mr. Chester revolving
+solemnly and rhythmically in each other's arms on the shadowy landing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The only doubt that Miss Isobel had ever harbored concerning an all-wise
+Providence arose from the passage in Scripture that read: &#34;Man and woman
+created He them.&#34; In her secret heart she had always felt that some
+other, less material scheme might have been evolved. Softly retracing her
+steps, she slipped back downstairs and took her place beside her
+increasingly indignant mother.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The new wine was proving entirely too much for the old bottles. Madam's
+ultimatums and Miss Isobel's protests had alike proved unavailing. The
+young people invaded the house like a swarm of noisy locusts. Between
+dances they flew out to the porch, some of the couples dashing out to sit
+in automobiles, others driving madly around the block to the incessant
+honking of horns. Then the music would call them back, and in they would
+pour, singing and whistling as they came, shouting jests from room to
+room, playing ball with the decorations, utterly regardless of everything
+save their own restless, reckless, daring selves. Maddest of them all was
+Eleanor, who, conscious of the stern disapproval of the family and
+rebelling against their attempted restraint, led the merry revolt against
+old-time proprieties and took her fling, for once regardless of
+consequences.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin, meanwhile, had gone back to the dressing-room and was making
+frantic efforts to reduce the swelling in his face. If he could only keep
+it down until after his dance with Eleanor, it might swell to the
+dimensions of the dome of St. Peter's! A hurried survey from over the
+banisters assured him that supper was soon to be served, and he went back
+to his hot applications with renewed courage.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But ill luck pursued him. No sooner had the guests been seated at small
+round tables and the refreshments served, than some one remembered that a
+big charity ball was in progress at the armory, and it was proposed that
+the evening be concluded there. The suggestion met with instant approval.
+In spite of the indignant protests of the elders, the gay company, headed
+by Eleanor, left the half-eaten ices melting on their plates, and, rising
+in a body, took noisy and immediate flight.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At twelve o'clock the elaborately decorated rooms were empty, the
+musicians were packing their instruments, the caterers were removing
+trays of untasted food, and Quin, standing dazed in the deserted hall,
+one hand clasping his shirt-front and the other on his face, was trying
+in vain to realize that the party which he had inspired had proved his
+Waterloo!
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="15">CHAPTER 15</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+The next day Quin sold his dinner-coat for a fourth of what he paid for
+it, and forswore society forever. There was absolutely nothing in it, he
+assured the Martels, a conviction that assorted strangely with the fact
+that he devoured the columns in the daily papers devoted to the doings of
+the social elect, and waded through endless lists under the caption
+&#34;Among Those Present.&#34; Every hour in the day he invented a new scheme for
+seeing Eleanor, which pride alone prevented him from carrying out. He
+wrote her a dozen notes, all of which he tore up; he went out of his way
+to pass through the streets where he might catch a glimpse of her, and
+seized the slightest excuse for errands to the Bartlett house. But the
+days of her holiday slipped away, and he neither saw nor heard from her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Each morning at breakfast Mr. Martel would say hopefully, &#34;Well, Eleanor
+will surely grace our humble abode to-day,&#34; or, &#34;Something tells me my
+lady-bird will come to-day!&#34; And each evening Quin would rush home from
+work buoyed up by the hope that he might find her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I bet she'd come to-day if she knew Captain Phipps was going to be
+here,&#34; said Myrna one morning, wagging her head wisely.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What's that got to do with it?&#34; Rose asked sharply.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;They're sweethearts,&#34; said Myrna, with the frightful astuteness of
+twelve. &#34;And old Madam Bartlett won't let him come to the house, and Nell
+has to see him on the sly.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Tut, tut, child! Where did you get that notion?&#34; asked Mr. Martel,
+peeling an orange with his little fingers gracefully extended. &#34;Harold
+Phipps is years older than Nellie. He is interested solely in her
+professional career. He has a lovely, detached soul, as impersonal&#8212;What
+is the matter, Rosalind?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Nothing&#8212;crumb went down wrong. What are <i>you</i> laughing at, Quinby
+Graham?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Another crumb,&#34; said Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Between him and Rose there had sprung up a curious intimacy. All sorts of
+little wireless messages flashed between them, and Rose always seemed to
+know things without being told. She had discovered long ago that he was
+in love with Eleanor, and, instead of scoffing at him or teasing him, she
+did him the supreme favor of listening to him. Many a night, after the
+rest of the family had gone to bed, they lingered on before the fire in
+the shabby sitting-room, Rose invariably curled up in the sofa corner and
+Quin stretched out on the floor with his head against her knees.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+After his somewhat rigorous discipline at the Bartletts' it was like
+slipping out of the harness to be back at the Martels'. They held him up
+to no standard, and offered no counsel of perfection. He could tell his
+best stories without fear of reproof, laugh as loud as he liked, and
+whistle and sing without disturbing anybody. Rose mended his clothes,
+doctored him when he was sick, petted him in public as well as in
+private, and even made free to pawn his uniform when the collector
+threatened to turn off the gas if the bill was not paid.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+One evening, coming in unexpectedly, he had surprised her kissing Harold
+Phipps in the front hall. Harold's back had been to the door, and at a
+signal from Rose Quin had beat a hasty retreat. She explained later that
+she was letting the magnificent Harold have just enough rope to hang
+himself; and Quin, glad of anything that deflected Phipps from the
+pursuit of Eleanor, laughed with her over the secret flirtation and
+failed to see the danger lights that hung in her eyes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Financial affairs were evidently going worse than usual with the Martels
+these days. Cass, adamant in his resolve to pay off the numerous debts
+contracted by the family during his absence abroad, refused to contribute
+more than the barest living expenses. Rose had given up the dancing
+classes and taken a position in one of the big department-stores. Edwin
+B. had had to leave high school and go to work. The adopted baby had been
+regretfully sent to the Orphans' Home. The little brown house was reefing
+all its sails in a vain effort to weather the coming storm.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The one member of the family who soared on wings of hope above the sordid
+facts of the situation was Claude Martel. After years of search, he had
+at last found the generous benefactor, the noble young patron, who
+recognized the merit of his work. They spent hours together elaborating
+the plot of &#34;Phantom Love&#34; and discussing every detail of its
+construction. Occasionally on Saturday night Mr. Martel would mention
+quite confidentially to Quin that, owing to some delayed payments, he was
+a little pressed for ready money and that a small loan would be
+appreciated. This request invariably resulted in an elaborate Sunday
+dinner, capped with a couple of bottles of Haut Sauterne in which Mr.
+Martel took the precaution of drinking everybody's health twice over.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Ten days after the Easter party, when Quin had almost despaired of seeing
+Eleanor at all, he found her car parked in front of the house when he
+returned in the evening. Mounting the front steps two at a time, he
+opened the door with his latch-key, then paused with his hand still on
+the knob. Queer sounds were coming from the sitting-room&#8212;sounds of a
+man's agitated voice, broken by sobs. Undeterred by any sense of
+delicacy, Quin pushed open the door and bolted in.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Martel was sitting in the arm-chair in an attitude <i>King Lear</i>
+might have envied. Every line of his face and figure suggested
+unmitigated tragedy. Even the tender ministrations of Eleanor Bartlett
+who knelt beside him, failed to console him or to stem the tide of his
+lamentations.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What's the matter?&#34; cried Quin in alarm. &#34;What has happened?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Papa Claude, resting one expressive hand on Eleanor's head, extended the
+other to Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Come in, my boy, come in,&#34; he said brokenly. &#34;You are one of us: nothing
+shall be kept from you in this hour of great affliction. I am ruined,
+Quinby&#8212;utterly, irrevocably ruined!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But how? What's happened?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's grandmother!&#34; exclaimed Eleanor, struggling to her feet and
+speaking with dramatic indignation. &#34;She's written him a letter I'll
+never forgive&#8212;never! I don't care if the money <i>is</i> due me. I don't
+want it. I won't have it! What is six thousand dollars to me if it turns
+Papa Claude out in the street?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But here&#8212;hold on a minute!&#34; said Quin. &#34;What's all the racket about?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's about money,&#34; Mr. Martel roused himself to explain&#8212;&#34;the grossest
+and most material thing in the world. Years ago Eleanor's father and I
+entered into a purely personal arrangement by which he advanced me a few
+thousand dollars in a time of temporary financial depression, and as a
+mere matter of form I put up this house as security. Had the dear lad
+lived, nothing more would ever have been said about it. He was the soul
+of generosity, a prince among men. But, unfortunately, at his death he
+left his mother Eleanor's trustee.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And she has simply <i>hounded</i> Papa Claude,&#34; Eleanor broke in. &#34;She
+has tried to make him pay interest on that old note every single year,
+when she knew I didn't need the money in the least. And now she had
+notified him she will not renew the note on any terms.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She can't collect what you haven't got, can she?&#34; Quin asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She can sell the roof over our heads,&#34; said Papa Claude, with streaming
+eyes lifted to the object referred to. &#34;She can scatter my beloved family
+and drive me back into the treadmill of teaching. And all through this
+blessed, innocent child, who would give all she has in the world to see
+her poor old grandfather happy!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Again Eleanor, moved to a passion of sympathy, flung her arms around him,
+declaring that if they made him pay the note she would refund every penny
+of it the day she was twenty-one.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But Papa Claude was not to be consoled.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It will be too late,&#34; he said hopelessly. &#34;All I required was one year
+more in which to retrieve my fortunes and achieve my life ambition. And
+now, with success almost within my grasp, the goal within sight, this
+cruel blow, this bolt from the blue&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Haven't you got any other property or stocks or insurance that you could
+turn over?&#34; asked Quin, who felt that the occasion demanded numerical
+figures rather than figures of speech.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Only a small farm out near Anchordale, which belonged to my precious
+wife's father. It is quite as worthless as he was, poor dear! I have
+offered it repeatedly in payment, but they refused to consider it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Is there a house on it?&#34; persisted Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes&#8212;an uninhabitable old stone structure that has stood there for
+nearly a century. For years I have tried in vain to rent or sell it. I
+have left no stone unturned, Quinby. I know I am regarded as a visionary,
+a dreamer, but I assure you&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What about the ground?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Very hilly and woody. Absolutely good for nothing but a stock farm.
+Utterly incapable of cultivation. It's no use considering it, my dear
+boy. I have viewed the matter from every conceivable angle. There is no
+reprisal. I am doomed. This beloved house will be sold, my family
+scattered. I an old man, a penniless outcast&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, no, Papa Claude!&#34; protested Eleanor. &#34;You <i>sha'n't</i> be turned
+out. We must borrow the money. It's only a little over a year until I'm
+of age, and then I can pay it all back. Surely we can find somebody to
+help us out!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Ah, my darling, your trust is born of inexperience. People do not lend
+money without security. There is absolutely no one to whom I can appeal.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor, sitting on the arm of his chair, suddenly started up.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I have it!&#34; she cried. &#34;I know who will help us! Captain Phipps! He
+knows better than any one else what it means to you to have this next
+year free to finish the play. He will be <i>glad</i> to do it; I know he
+will.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Martel looked slightly embarrassed. &#34;As a matter of fact, he has been
+approached on the subject,&#34; he said. &#34;He was most sympathetic and kind,
+but unfortunately his money is all invested at present.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Fiddlesticks!&#34; cried Eleanor in a tone so suggestive of her paternal
+grandmother that Quin smiled. &#34;What difference does it make if it
+<i>is</i> invested? Let him un-invest it. I am sure I could get him to
+lend it to <i>me</i>, only I would hate awfully to ask him.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Martel's roving eyes came back to hers hopefully.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I wonder if you could?&#34; he said, grasping at the proffered straw.
+&#34;Perhaps if he understood that <i>your</i> career was at stake, that my
+disappointment would mean <i>your</i> disappointment, he would make some
+special effort to assist us. Will you go to him, child? Will you plead
+our cause for us?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor hesitated but a moment; then she set her lips firmly. &#34;Yes,&#34; she
+said, with a little catch in her voice; &#34;I will. I'll go to him in the
+morning.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin, who had been staring out of the window, deep in thought, turned
+abruptly to Mr. Martel.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;When do you have to have the money?&#34; he asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;By next Wednesday, the first&#8212;no, the second of April. The date is
+burned in my memory.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You see, there's no time to lose,&#34; said Eleanor. &#34;I'd rather die than do
+it, but I'll ask Harold Phipps to-morrow morning.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, you won't,&#34; said Quin peremptorily; &#34;I am going to get the money
+myself.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But he wouldn't lend it to <i>you</i>. You don't understand!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, I do. Will you leave the matter with me until Sunday night, Mr.
+Martel, and let me see what I can do?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin made the suggestion as calmly as if he had unlimited resources at
+his disposal. Had the sum been six million dollars instead of six
+thousand, he would have made the offer just the same. The paramount
+necessity of the moment was to keep Eleanor Bartlett from borrowing money
+from a man like Harold Phipps. Mr. Martel's claims were of secondary
+consideration.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;We might let him try, grandfather,&#34; suggested Eleanor. &#34;If he doesn't
+succeed, there would still be time for me to speak to the Captain.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But, my boy, where would <i>you</i> turn? What influence could you bring
+to bear?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, you'd have to trust me about that,&#34; Quin said. &#34;There are more
+ways than one of raising money, and if you'll leave it to me&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I will! I will!&#34; cried Mr. Martel in a burst of confidence. &#34;I shift my
+burden to your strong young shoulders. For three days I have borne the
+agony alone. There were special reasons for Cassius not being told. He is
+one of the noblest of God's creatures, but he lacks sentiment. I confess
+I have too much. These old walls are but brick and mortar to him, but to
+me they are the custodians of the past. Here I had hoped to sit in the
+twilight of my life and softly turn the leaves of happy memories. But
+there! Enough! 'The darkest hour oft precedes the dawn!' I will not
+despair. In your hands and my darling Eleanor's I leave my fate.
+Something tells me that, between you, you will save me! In the mean
+season not a word, not a syllable to any one. And now let us have some
+music and banish these unhappy topics.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was amazing how a gentleman so crushed by fate at five could be in
+such splendid form by seven. Mr. Martel had insisted upon having a salad
+and ices for dinner in honor of Eleanor's presence, and he mixed the
+French dressing with elaborate care, and enlivened the company with a
+succession of his sprightliest anecdotes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was Quinby Graham who was the grave one. He ate his dinner in
+preoccupied silence, arousing himself to sporadic bursts of merriment
+only when he caught Eleanor's troubled eyes watching him. Just how he was
+going to proceed with his colossal undertaking he had not the faintest
+idea. One wild scheme after another presented itself, only to be
+discarded as utterly impractical.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Under cover of leaving the dining-room, Eleanor managed to whisper to
+him:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Make Cass let you take me home. I've simply got to talk to you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But neither Cass nor Quin was to have the privilege. Mr. Martel announced
+that he was going to escort her himself. The only crumb of comfort that
+Quin was able to snatch from the wretched evening was when he was helping
+her on with her coat in the hall.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;When can I see you?&#34; he whispered anxiously.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't know,&#34; she whispered back; &#34;every hour's taken.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What about Sunday afternoon?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I've promised to motor out to Anchordale with Aunt Flo and Uncle Ranny
+to hunt for wild flowers. Think of it! When all this trouble's brewing.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Anchordale,&#34; repeated Quin absently, holding her coat suspended by the
+collar and one sleeve. &#34;Anchordale! By golly! I've got an idea! Say, I'm
+going along Sunday. You manage it somehow.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I can't manage it! You aren't invited; and, besides&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I can't help that&#8212;I'm going. What time do you start?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Three o'clock. But you can't go, I tell you! They won't understand.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;All ready, Nellie?&#34; called a voice on the stairway; and Papa Claude,
+with a smile of perfect serenity on his face, bore lightly and
+consciously down upon them.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="16">CHAPTER 16</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+During the rushing Easter vacation, Eleanor had seen less of Harold
+Phipps than Quin had feared. Considering the subliminal state of
+understanding at which they had arrived in their voluminous letters, it
+was a little awkward to account for the fact that she had found so little
+time to devote exclusively to him. They had met at dances and had had
+interrupted t&#234;te-&#224;-t&#234;tes in secluded corners, and several stolen
+interviews in the park; but her duties as hostess to two lively guests
+had left little time for the exacting demands of platonic friendship. Now
+that the girls were gone, she had counted on this last Sunday at Uncle
+Ranny's as a time when she could see Harold under proper conditions and
+make amends for any seeming neglect.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But when Sunday came, and she found herself seated at Aunt Flo's small,
+perfectly appointed dinner-table, she found it increasingly difficult to
+keep her mind upon the brilliant and cynical conversation of her most
+admired friend. To be sure, they exchanged glances freighted with
+meaning, and as usual her vanity was touched by the subtle homage of one
+who apparently regarded the rest of humanity with such cold indifference.
+He was the first person, except Papa Claude, who had ever taken her and
+her ambitions seriously, and she was profoundly grateful. But,
+notwithstanding the fact that she felt honored and distinguished by his
+friendship, she sometimes, as now, found it difficult to follow the trend
+of his conversation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+An hour before she had received an agonized note from her grandfather
+saying that nothing had been accomplished, and that, unless she could use
+her influence &#34;in a quarter that should be nameless, all, all would be
+lost!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Her dark, brooding eyes swept the table with its profusion of silver and
+cut glass, its affectation of candle-light when the world without was a
+blaze of sunshine. She looked at Uncle Ranny, with his nervous, twitching
+lips and restless, dissatisfied eyes; at Aunt Flo, delicate, affected,
+futile; at Harold Phipps, easy, polished, serene. What possible chance
+would there be of rousing people like that to sympathy for poor,
+visionary Papa Claude? For three days the dread of having to fulfil her
+promise had hung over her like a pall. Now that the time was approaching,
+the mere thought of it made her head hot and her hands cold.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Cheer up, Nell!&#34; her uncle rallied her. &#34;Don't let your misdeeds crush
+you. You'll be in high favor again by the time you get back from
+Baltimore.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Are you sharing my unpopularity with the family?&#34; asked Harold.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor confessed that she was. &#34;I've been in disgrace ever since my
+party,&#34; she said. &#34;Did Uncle Ranny tell you the way we shocked the
+aunties?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I did,&#34; said Mr. Ranny; &#34;also the way sister Isobel looked when little
+Kittie Mason shook the shimmy. It's a blessing mother did not see her; I
+veritably believe she would have spanked her.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;A delicious household,&#34; pronounced Harold. &#34;What a pity they have
+banished me. I should so love to put them in a play!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I wouldn't let you!&#34; Eleanor cried, so indignantly that the other
+three laughed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Neither bond nor free,&#34; Harold said, pursing his lips and lifting his
+brows. &#34;A little pagan at home and a puritan abroad. How are we going to
+emancipate her, Ran?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You needn't worry,&#34; said Mrs. Ranny, lazily lighting her cigarette.
+&#34;Eleanor is a lot more subtle than any one thinks; she'll emancipate
+herself before long.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor was grateful to Aunt Flo. She was tired of being considered an
+ing&#233;nue. She wanted to be treated with the dignity her twenty years
+demanded.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I have a plan for her,&#34; said Harold, with a proprietary air. &#34;Who knows
+but this time next year she will be playing in 'Phantom Love'?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor's wandering thoughts came to instant attention.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Is there a part I could play?&#34; she asked eagerly, leaning across the
+table with her chin on her clasped hands.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Harold watched her with an amused smile. &#34;What would you say if I told
+you I had written a r&#244;le especially for you? Would you dare to take it?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor closed her eyes and drew a breath of rapture.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;<i>Would</i> I? There isn't anything in heaven or earth that could
+prevent me!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Mrs. Bartlett,&#34; said the trim maid, &#34;there's a young man at the front
+door.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The conversation hung suspended while Mrs. Ranny inquired concerning his
+mission.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's the young man that brings messages from the office, ma'am.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, it must be Quin,&#34; said Mr. Ranny, rising and going into the hall.
+&#34;Did you want to see me about something?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor held her breath to listen. Was it possible that that absurd boy
+had actually followed her up to the Bartletts' with the intention of
+going with them on their expedition? Hadn't it been enough for him to
+come to her party in that idiotic coat, with his shirt-front bulging and
+his face swollen? Of course she liked him&#8212;she liked him immensely; but
+he had no right to impose upon her kindness, to make a pretext of his
+interest in Papa Claude to force himself in where he was not invited. Now
+that he had got into the scrape, he would have to get out of it as best
+he could. She was resolved not to lift a finger to help him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh! I didn't understand&#34;&#8212;Mr. Ranny's voice could be heard from the
+hall, with a cordial emphasis evidently intended to cover a blunder.
+&#34;Come right in the dining-room; we are just having coffee. You know these
+ladies, of course, and this is Captain Phipps, Mr. Graham.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin came into the room awkwardly, half extended his hand, then withdrew
+it hastily as Harold, without rising from the table, gave him a curt nod
+and said condescendingly:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How do you do, Graham?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor's quick understanding glance swept from the erect, embarrassed,
+boyish figure in the badly fitting cheap suit and obviously new tan
+shoes, to the perfectly groomed officer lounging with nonchalant grace
+with his crossed arms on the table. A curious idea occurred to her:
+Suppose they should change places, and Harold should stand there in those
+dreadful clothes Quin wore, and receive a snub from an ex-officer&#8212;would
+he be able to take it with such simple dignity and give no sign of his
+chagrin except by the slow color that mounted to his neck and brow? She,
+who a moment before had been ready to annihilate the intruder, rose
+impulsively and held out a friendly hand.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Mr. Graham and I are old friends,&#34; she said lightly. &#34;We knew each other
+out at the hospital even before he came to stay at grandmother's.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The next instant she was sorry she had spoken: for the self-control for
+which she had commended him suddenly departed, and his eyelids, which
+should have been discreetly lowered, were lifted instead, and such an
+ardent look of gratitude poured forth that she was filled with confusion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For half an hour four uncomfortable people sat in the little gilded cage
+of a drawing-room, and everybody wondered why somebody didn't do
+something to relieve the situation. Mr. and Mrs. Ranny made heroic
+efforts to entertain their unwelcome guest; Harold Phipps moved about the
+room with ill-concealed impatience; and Eleanor sat erect, with tightly
+clasped hands, as angry with Harold as she was with Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Mr. Graham,&#34; said Mrs. Ranny at length, when Harold had looked at his
+watch for the fourth time, &#34;I am afraid we shall have to ask you to
+excuse us. You see, this is our wedding anniversary, and we always
+celebrate it by a sentimental pilgrimage in search of wild flowers. I am
+afraid it's about time we were starting.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor felt Quin's eyes seek hers confidently, but she refused to meet
+them. There was a painful silence; then he spoke up hopefully:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I know where there are wild flowers to burn: I was at a place yesterday
+where you could hardly walk for them; I counted seven different kinds in
+a space about as big as this room.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Where?&#34; demanded Mr. and Mrs. Ranny in one breath.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Out Anchordale way&#8212;I don't know the name of the road. It's an
+out-of-the-way sort of place. Never was there myself until yesterday.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Could you find it again?&#34; Mrs. Ranny asked with an enthusiasm hitherto
+reserved for her poodle.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Sure,&#34; said Quin, shoving his hands in his pockets and leaning back with
+the frankest and best-natured of smiles. &#34;I never saw so many cowslips
+and buttercups and yellow violets, and these here little arums.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Arums!&#34; repeated Eleanor. &#34;What do you know about wild flowers?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I lived with 'em up in the Maine woods,&#34; said Quin. &#34;I don't know their
+high-brow names, but I know the kind of places they grow in and where to
+look for 'em.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Let's take him along!&#34; said Mrs. Ranny. &#34;We won't mind being a bit
+crowded in the motor, will we?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Involuntarily all eyes turned toward Harold Phipps.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not in the least,&#34; he said, flicking an ash from the sleeve of his
+uniform with a dexterous little finger, &#34;especially as I am not going to
+be with you all the way. These bucolic joys are hardly in my line. I'll
+get you to drop me at the Country Club.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was Eleanor's turn to cast a look of tragic appeal and get no
+response. In vain she tried to persuade him to reconsider his decision.
+His only concession was that he would remain at the apartment with her if
+she would give up the expedition, a suggestion that was promptly vetoed
+by Aunt Flo. Eleanor was angry enough to cry as she flung on her wraps in
+the little silk-hung guest-room. Men were so selfish, she savagely told
+herself; if either Quin or Harold had had a particle of consideration for
+her they would not have spoiled her last day at home.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On the way out to the club she sat between them, miserably indifferent to
+the glory of the spring day and refusing to contribute more than an
+occasional monosyllable to the conversation, which needed all the
+encouragement it could get to keep going.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Shall I see you again before you go?&#34; Harold asked coldly, upon leaving
+the car.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She wanted very much to say no, and to say it in a way that would punish
+him; but, in view of the important matter pending, she was forced to
+swallow her pride and compromise.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I can see you to-night at the Newsons', unless you prefer spending your
+evening here at the club.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You know perfectly well what I prefer,&#34; he said with a meaning look; and
+then, without glancing at Quin, across whose knees he had clasped
+Eleanor's hand, he bade his host and hostess an apologetic good-by and
+mounted the club-house steps.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What <i>made</i> you come?&#34; Eleanor demanded fiercely of Quin, under
+cover of the starting motor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I had to,&#34; Quin whispered back apologetically. &#34;We got to sell 'em the
+farm.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What farm? Papa Claude's? Whom are you going to sell it to?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin lifted a warning finger and nodded significantly at the back of Mr.
+Ranny's unsuspecting head.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Uncle Ranny?&#34; Eleanor's lips formed the words incredulously. Then the
+mere suggestion of outwitting her grandmother and saving Papa Claude by
+such a master stroke of diplomacy struck her so humorously that she broke
+into laughter, in which Quin joined.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You two are very lively all of a sudden,&#34; Mrs. Ranny said over her
+shoulder. &#34;What is the joke?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Miss Eleanor and I have gone into the real estate business. Do you want
+to buy a farm?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;We always want to buy a farm. We look at every one we hear is for sale.
+But they all cost too much.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;This one won't. It's a bargain-counter farm. A house and fifteen acres.
+You can get it for six thousand dollars if you'll buy it to-day.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;All right; we'll take it,&#34; cried Mr. Ranny gaily. &#34;Lead us to it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The quest for the farm became so absorbing that the wild flowers were
+forgotten. The oftener they took the wrong road and had to start over,
+the keener they became to reach their destination.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I believe it was a pipe-dream,&#34; said Mr. Ranny; &#34;you never saw the place
+at all.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, I did! I'm not kidding you. It's a regular peach of a place for
+anybody that's got money to fix it up. Hold on a minute; this looks like
+the side lane. Do you mind walking the rest of the way?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not if we get anywhere,&#34; said Mr. Ranny.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Their way led through a tangled thicket, across a log bridge, and up a
+steep hillside abloom from base to summit with early spring flowers. Down
+through the tender green leaves the sunshine poured, searching out many
+nooks and corners at which it would get no chance when the heavier
+foliage intervened.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;This is where the land begins,&#34; said Quin. &#34;Did you ever see such bully
+old trees? Any time you wanted to sell off lots, you see, you could do it
+on this side, without touching the farm.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Where's the house?&#34; asked Mrs. Ranny.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Right through here,&#34; said Quin, holding back the branches, &#34;Now, ain't
+that a nice old place?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+His enthusiasm met with no response.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In the center of what had once been a clearing stood an old stone
+building, half smothered in a wilderness of weeds and sassafras and cane,
+its one big chimney dreaming in the silence that seemed to have
+encompassed it for ages. The shutters hung disconsolate on their hinges,
+the window-panes were broken, the cornice sagged dejectedly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor's heart sank. It was worse, far worse, than Papa Claude had
+described it, fit only for the birds and spiders and chipmunks that were
+already in possession. How Quin could ever for a moment have thought of
+selling such a place to the fastidious Bartletts was more than she could
+imagine.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But he was carrying the matter off with a high hand, in spite of the
+dismayed faces of his prospective buyers.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course it needs a shave,&#34; he admitted, as he tore down a handful of
+trailing vines that barred the front door. &#34;But you just wait till you
+get inside and see the big stone fireplace and the queer cupboards. Why,
+this house is historic! It's been here since pioneer days. Look out for
+the floor; it's a bit rotten along here.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't think I'll come in,&#34; said Mrs. Ranny, holding up her skirts.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What a funny little staircase!&#34; cried Eleanor. &#34;And what huge rooms! You
+<i>must</i> come in, Aunt Flo, and see the fireplace.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And look at the walls!&#34; cried Quin. &#34;You don't see walls like those
+these days. But you just wait till you get upstairs. You've got the
+surprise of your life coming to you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Outside's good enough for me,&#34; Mr. Ranny declared. &#34;I want to take a
+look at that old apple orchard.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll go upstairs with you!&#34; said Eleanor. &#34;Come on, Aunt Flo; let's see
+what it's like.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At the top of the steps they both gave an exclamation of delight. The
+house, hemmed in, in front, by its trees and underbrush, overlooked from
+its rear windows a valley of surpassing loveliness. For miles the eye
+could wander over orchards full of pink-and-white peach blossoms on
+leafless boughs, over farm-lands and woody spaces full of floating clouds
+of white dogwood. Through the paneless windows came the warm spring air,
+full of the odor of tender growing things and the wholesome smell of the
+freshly upturned earth.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Randolph Bartlett, come up here this instant!&#34; called Mrs. Ranny. &#34;It's
+the loveliest thing you ever saw!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But Mr. Ranny was eagerly examining the remains of a somewhat extensive
+chicken farm.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Go down and show him around,&#34; Eleanor advised Quin, with a glimmer of
+hope. &#34;Aunt Flo and I will explore the rest of the house.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+They not only explored, but in their imagination they remodeled it.
+Eleanor, in spite of her daydreams, was a very practical little person,
+and, with her power of visualizing a scene for others as well as for
+herself, she soon made Mrs. Ranny see the place painted and clean, with
+rag rugs on the floors, quaint old mahogany furniture, tall brass
+candlesticks on the mantel, and gay chintz curtains at the windows.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mrs. Ranny grew quite animated talking about it, and forgot the
+disturbing fact that she had not had a cigarette since dinner.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you know,&#34; she said to Eleanor, as they came back to the window and
+looked down at the two men talking and gesticulating eagerly in the
+garden below, &#34;I believe if Ranny had something like this to work with
+and play with, things would be different.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course they would,&#34; Eleanor agreed eagerly&#8212;&#34;for him and for you too.
+Why don't you try it, Aunt Flo?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, it would cost too much to put it in repair. But then, six thousand
+dollars is very little, isn't it? Ran spent that much for his big car.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes; and he could <i>sell</i> his big car. You'd lots rather have this
+than an extra motor. And we could get him interested in fixing the place
+up, and he could keep dogs and cows and things&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But what about his mother?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You wouldn't have to tell her. She will be going to Maine in June, and
+you and Uncle Ranny could be all settled by the time she comes home!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor had forgotten all about Papa Claude in her eagerness to get Uncle
+Ranny his heart's desire.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I believe we could do it!&#34; Mrs. Ranny was saying. &#34;The chief expense
+would be putting in a couple of bath-rooms and fixing up the floors. As
+for the furniture, I have all my mother's stuff packed away in the
+warehouse&#8212;nice, quaint old things that would suit this place perfectly.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, Aunt Flo, let's go down this minute and make Uncle Ranny buy it!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Randolph Bartlett, whose powers of resistance were never strong, was
+already lending a willing ear to Quin's persuasive arguments, when
+Eleanor and Mrs. Ranny descended upon him in a whirlwind of enthusiasm.
+They both talked at once, rushing him from one spot to another, vying
+with each other in pointing out the wonderful possibilities of the place.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;See here, is this a frame-up?&#34; he asked laughingly. &#34;You are not
+actually in earnest, Flo? You don't mean that you would consider the
+place seriously?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I do. I never wanted anything so much in my life!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Ranny looked at her in amazement. &#34;And you mean you'd be willing to
+come out here and live four months in the year?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I mean, if we could get it fixed up right, I'd live here the year round.
+We are only fifteen minutes from town, and all our friends live out this
+way.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;By George, I've almost a notion to try it!&#34; Mr. Ranny's eyes were
+shining. &#34;Do you believe I could pull it off, Quin? I've made such a
+darned fizzle of things in the past that I'm almost afraid to kick over
+the traces again.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;The trouble is, you've never given a big enough kick to get loose,&#34; said
+Quin. &#34;Here's your chance to show 'em what you can do. I believe if you'd
+buy this place, and buckle down to knocking it into shape, you could have
+as pretty a little stock farm as there is in the State.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That sounds mighty good to me!&#34; said Mr. Ranny with the look of a
+prisoner who is promised a parole. &#34;When do you have to give an answer?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;My option is up at midnight.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Good heaven! You don't mean to-night?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, sir: not a minute later.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am afraid that settles it, as far as I'm concerned.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, it doesn't!&#34; insisted Mrs. Ranny. &#34;If you really want it, there is
+no reason you shouldn't have it. The ground alone is worth the price
+asked. Let the others go back to the car while you and I talk the matter
+over. It's the chance we've been looking for for ten years, and I'm not
+going to let it slip.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The next hour was one Eleanor never forgot. She and Quin, confident of
+the success of their conspiracy, were also jubilant over what they
+regarded as Mr. Ranny's possible emancipation. They already saw him a
+reformed character, a prosperous and contented farmer, no longer a menace
+to the peace of the family. So elated were they that, instead of going to
+the road, they explored the woods, and ended by racing down the hill like
+a couple of irresponsible children.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When they at last got back to the car, Eleanor, disheveled and limp, sank
+on the running-board and laughingly made room for Quin beside her. She
+had quite forgotten to be grown up and temperamental, a fact that Quin
+was prompt to take advantage of.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;See here!&#34; he said. &#34;Am I going to get a commission for all this?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How much do you want?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I want a lot!&#34; he threatened.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He was leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, tracing figures in
+the sand with his shoe. Eleanor noticed the nice way his hair grew on the
+back of his neck and the white skin that met the clear brown skin at the
+collar-line. In spite of his bigness and his strength, he seemed very
+young and defenseless when it came to his dealings with girls.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was useless to deny that she knew what he wanted. His eyes had been
+saying it persistently each time they had met hers for three months. They
+had whispered it after that first dance at the Hawaiian Garden; they had
+murmured it through the hospital days; they had shouted it this afternoon
+at Uncle Ranny's, so loud that she thought every one must surely hear.
+But when a young lady is engaged in the exciting business of playing with
+fire she doesn't always heed even a shouted warning. As long as she was
+very careful, she told herself, and snuffed out every blaze that
+threatened to become unmanageable, no damage would be done. The present
+moment was one requiring snuffers.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;We can't begin to pay you what we owe you,&#34; she said in her most
+conventional tone. &#34;If things go as we hope they will, it will mean
+everything to Uncle Ranny as well as to Papa Claude.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I didn't do it for them only,&#34; Quin blurted out. &#34;I didn't want you to
+borrow money from Captain Phipps.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The temptation to encourage this special spark was not to be resisted.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You don't love Mr. Phipps very much, do you?&#34; she said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No; do you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, I <i>like</i> him. He is one of my very best friends.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Am I?&#34; demanded Quin with terrible directness.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was Eleanor's turn to trace patterns in the sand.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, you see&#8212;&#8212;&#34; she began.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, I don't.&#34; Quin rose indignantly. &#34;There's nobody in the world that
+would do any more for you than I would. I may be chasing the kite in
+thinking that you <i>want</i> me to do anything, but if you'll just let
+me under the ribbon, you bet your life I'll give Phipps and the rest of
+the talent a run for their money!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He stood staring hard down the road for a moment, while she sat in
+embarrassed silence; then he broke forth again:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I know you don't want me to say these things. I know every time you head
+me off. But if you'll just let me get it off my chest this once, then I
+promise to keep the cork in if it busts the bottle!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor laughed in spite of herself.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;All right,&#34; she said; &#34;I'll listen.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well,&#34; said Quin, &#34;it's this way. I know you don't care a tinker's damn
+for me in the way I care for you. But you can't deny that you do like me
+some. You wouldn't talk to me like you do and let me do things for you if
+you didn't. What I want you to promise is that whenever you need a
+friend&#8212;a <i>best</i> friend, mind you&#8212;you will come straight to me.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He looked worth coming to as he stood there, big and strong and earnest;
+and Eleanor, being young and a woman, promptly forgot her good
+resolutions not to encourage him, and rose impulsively and held out her
+hand.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I do promise, Quin,&#34; she said, &#34;and I thank you with all my heart.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then a curious and unexpected thing happened to her. As she stood there
+on the lonely country road with her hand in his, a curious, deep, still
+feeling crept over her, a queer sensation of complete satisfaction that
+she never remembered to have felt before. For a long moment she stood
+there, her cheek almost touching that outrageous plaid tie that had so
+recently excited her derision. Then she snatched her hand away. &#34;Look
+out!&#34; she warned. &#34;They are coming.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Two minutes later Mr. and Mrs. Ranny, emerging from the thicket with
+their hands full of wild flowers, found Eleanor seated in the car in a
+bored attitude, while Quin solicitously examined a rear tire.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's all settled!&#34; Mr. Ranny cried exultingly. &#34;The farm is ours!&#34;
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="17">CHAPTER 17</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+Although Quin had taken himself and his career seriously before Eleanor's
+home-coming, it was nothing in comparison to the fever of energy that
+possessed him after her departure. He was determined to forge ahead in
+business, get an education, and become versed in the gentler branches of
+social life at the earliest possible moment. His chief trouble was that
+the days contained only twenty-four hours. Even his dreams were a jumble
+of plows and personal pronouns, of mathematical problems and social
+proprieties.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At the factory he flung himself into the affairs of the firm with a zeal
+that at times bordered on officiousness. But Mr. Bangs was beginning to
+find him useful, and, while he continued to snub him and correct him, he
+also came to depend upon him, especially in an emergency. Quin, on his
+part, was for the first time turning a critical eye on his own
+achievements in relation to those of bigger and abler men, and the result
+was chastening.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As for his mad thirst for knowledge, even the university classes,
+difficult as they were proving, failed to satisfy him. He purchased an
+expensive &#34;system&#34; in fifteen volumes, by means of which, the prospectus
+assured him, he could easily achieve a college education in eight months.
+He wore the covers off the first two booklets, then became disgusted, and
+devoted himself instead to a small handbook entitled &#34;Words We
+Mispronounce.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The branch of his education in which he was making least effort and most
+progress was in the customs and manners of polite society. He did not
+shine as yet, but he had ceased to offend, and that was a long step
+forward. Once initiated into the refinements of life, he took to them
+naturally. Miss Isobel and Miss Enid Bartlett had given him the cue, and
+Mr. Chester was keeping him up to his standard.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Between him and the latter had sprung up a queer friendship verging on
+intimacy. Ever since the night of the symphony concert he had served as a
+connecting link between the long-severed lovers, and out of gratitude he
+had been adopted as a prot&#233;g&#233;. It was Mr. Chester who assumed
+responsibility not only for his musical and literary tastes but for his
+neckties and hosiery as well. Mr. Chester, in fact, being too negative
+and conservative, acted as a much-needed soft pedal on Quin's noisy
+aggressiveness. &#34;Not so loud, Quinby,&#34; or, &#34;A little more gently, my
+boy,&#34; he would often say. And Quin would acquiesce good-naturedly and
+even gratefully. &#34;That's right, call me down,&#34; he would say; &#34;I guess
+I'll learn before I die.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In all that he did and said and thought, one object was paramount. He
+never lost sight of the fact that he was making himself over for Eleanor,
+and the prize at stake was so colossal that no obstacles deterred him. To
+be sure, this was not by any means his first amatory venture. As Rose
+Martel had said, he &#34;had a way with him&#34;&#8212;a way that had kept him
+involved in affairs of the heart since the early days in Nanking when he
+had succumbed to the charms of a slant-eyed little Celestial at the
+tender age of seven. He had always had a girl, just as he had always had
+a job; but both had varied with time and place. With a vocabulary of a
+dozen words and the sign language, he had managed to flirt across France
+and back again. He had frivoled with half a dozen trained nurses in as
+many different hospitals, and had even had a sentimental round with a
+pretty young stewardess on the transport coming home.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But this affair had been quite different. Instead of wading about in the
+shallows of love, he had tumbled in head first, and found himself beyond
+his depth and out of sight of land. It was a case of sink or swim, and
+Quin was determined not to sink if he could help himself.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The fact that Eleanor Bartlett was not of his world, that she apparently
+never gave him a second thought, that he had less than nothing on which
+to build his hopes, only made him take a deeper breath and a longer
+stroke.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The first gleam of encouragement he had received was that Sunday in the
+country, when for the fraction of a second she had let him hold her hand.
+Since then he had written her five letters and received but one brief
+note in reply. Her silence, however, did not depress him. She had told
+him she hated to write letters, a sentiment he fully shared. Only in this
+case he could not help himself. The moment anything of interest happened,
+he was seized with an uncontrollable impulse to tell Eleanor. He would
+rush home from the university at night, go up to his room, and, using the
+corner of his bureau for a desk, cover pages of lined tablet paper with a
+detailed account of the day's adventures. When every doubtful word has to
+be looked up in the dictionary, and newly acquired knowledge concerning
+participles and personal pronouns duly applied, letter-writing is a
+serious business. Sometimes a page was copied three times before it met
+with the critical approval of the composer.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Since the passing of the acute financial crisis in the Mattel family,
+Papa Claude had revived amazingly, and was once more wearing a rose in
+his buttonhole and courting the Muse. He and Harold Phipps spent several
+afternoons a week working on their play, which they hoped to get fully
+blocked out before the latter left the service and returned to his home
+in Chicago.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But, even though the sale of the farm had relieved the financial strain,
+some other trouble was brewing in the family, the cause of which Quin
+could not make out. The usually sunny atmosphere was disturbed by
+frequent electric storms between Cass and Rose, marked by stern
+disapproval on his part and fiery rebellion on hers. &#34;Rose is going to
+get herself into trouble!&#34; Cass predicted darkly to Quin; while Rose, on
+her part, declared that Cass should shave his head and enter a monastery.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What are you two ragging about, anyhow?&#34; Quin asked one morning at
+breakfast, when things were worse than usual.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Rose knows what I'm talking about,&#34; said Cass significantly. &#34;Somebody's
+going to get his face pushed in if things keep on like they are going.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Absorption in his own affairs alone prevented Quin from taking an
+immediate hand in this new family complication. It was not until late in
+May that he hit upon the truth, quite by accident.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Coming home rather later than usual one night, he stumbled over Cass
+sitting hunched up on the dark stairway, looking in his striped pajamas
+like an escaped convict.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What in the devil are you up to?&#34; Quin demanded, rubbing a bruised shin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am waiting for Rose,&#34; said Cass grimly. &#34;Some fellow comes by here
+every few nights and takes her out in a machine.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Who is he?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't know&#8212;that's what I'm going to find out.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You crazy wop!&#34; said Quin. &#34;What's got into you lately? Can't you trust
+Rose to take care of herself?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes; but I don't trust any fellow that'll go with a girl and be ashamed
+to be seen with her.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How do you know he's ashamed to be seen with her?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Because he comes sneaking in here after we've all gone to bed. He don't
+ring the door-bell; he honks once or twice; and then I hear Rose slipping
+past my door.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I didn't know any of Rose's beaux had a machine.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;They haven't. This is some rich guy that thinks any girl that works for
+her living is an easy mark. I'll show him a thing or two! I'll break his
+damned&#8212;&#8212; Listen! There's an automobile stopping now.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He started excitedly down the steps, but Quin grasped his arms.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Come back here, Cass! You can't go cavorting out there in your pajamas,
+making a mess of things. You leave it to me. I'll go out the side way and
+amble around to the front door the same time they do. They'll think I'm
+just getting home, and I can size him up for you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The next moment he was out of the house, over the low hedge, and casually
+sauntering toward the corner. The night was very dark, lightened only by
+the swinging street lamp and the two staring eyes of an automobile that
+had stopped a little distance from the house. Quin saw Rose dart out of
+the shadows and run toward the house. Some one called her name softly and
+peremptorily, but she did not stop. A man was following her out of the
+shadows. But Quin did not wait for him to arrive; he promptly stepped
+around the corner and met Rose at the front gate.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What's up?&#34; he demanded, seeing her quivering lips and angry, excited
+eyes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Tell him to go away!&#34; she whispered, trying to get the gate open. &#34;Tell
+him I never want him to speak to me again. He <i>can't</i> apologize&#8212;there
+isn't anything he can say. Just make him go away, that's all.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Miss Martel is making a mountain out of a molehill,&#34; said a suave voice
+behind them, and, turning, Quin saw the somewhat perturbed face of Harold
+Phipps, &#34;If she would listen to me for two minutes&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I won't&#8212;not for one minute! You sha'n't speak to me&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Just one word alone with you&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;See here,&#34; said Quin, stepping between them and looking Harold Phipps
+squarely in the eyes. &#34;You heard what she said, didn't you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes; but I insist upon her listening to me. She entirely misunderstood
+something I said.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I did not!&#34; Rose broke in furiously. &#34;You know perfectly well I didn't.
+I won't listen to anything you have to say on that or any other subject.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I sha'n't let you go until you do,&#34; he replied in his most authoritative
+tone.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, yes, you will,&#34; said Quin quietly. &#34;I don't know what the row's
+about, but she doesn't have to talk to you if she doesn't want to.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For a moment the two men stood silently measuring each other; then the
+one in uniform gave a slight shrug and permitted himself a faint superior
+smile.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I see,&#34; he said. &#34;The young lady's conduct did not lead me to suppose
+she was engaged. I congratulate you!&#34; And, turning on his heel, he went
+back to his car.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Rose turned quickly and seized Quin's arm.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Don't tell anybody about this, please,&#34; she implored. &#34;I've had my
+lesson&#8212;the beast!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What did he do?&#34; demanded Quin, longing for an excuse to annihilate
+Phipps.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It wasn't so much what he did&#8212;it was what he said. But you've got to
+promise not to give me away, Quin. You mustn't let on that I was out
+to-night.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But Cass is on to it. He's waiting there in the hall now.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She caught her breath sharply.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Does he know who I was with?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not yet.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Then he mustn't. It would spoil everything for Papa Claude and the play;
+and, besides, Cass is so excitable. I <i>haven't</i> done anything wrong,
+Quin! I was just out for a little fun, and that contemptible puppy
+thought&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I wish to God I'd cracked his bean!&#34; said Quin fervently.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Promise me that you won't tell!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I won't tell, but I intend to have it out with him.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, no!&#34; she whispered hysterically. &#34;I tell you, nothing more must be
+said about it. It was partly my fault; only, I didn't know he was that
+kind of a man. You know yourself I never really liked him. Only it was
+fun to go out in his car, and I get so sick of not having any clothes or
+money and having to stay in that deadly old store day in and day out!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She buried her face in her hands and sobbed violently for a moment; then
+she caught hold of Quin's sleeve.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You won't speak to him,&#34; she implored, &#34;and you won't tell Cass?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I won't do anything you don't want me to,&#34; promised Quin, proffering his
+handkerchief with his sympathy, &#34;It's your shooting-match, and Cass has
+got to keep his hands off.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Cass at this moment cautiously opened the front door, and stood in his
+bare feet, viewing them with anxious suspicion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's all right, old cove,&#34; said Quin, slipping Rose into the house and
+pulling the door to after her. &#34;No harm's done, and she won't do it
+again.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How do you know?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Because she and the fellow had a blow-out. She says she is through with
+him for good and all.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Did you see him?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes; he's a average-sized fellow with a smooth face and brown hair.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Would you know him if you saw him again?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Sure. I'll keep an eye out for him. But you've got to leave it to me. I
+can handle the situation all right now, if you just won't butt in.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;If you can get Rose to promise not to see him again, she'll stick to it;
+I can say that for her.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She won't see him. They've quarreled, I tell you. I heard her balling
+him out good before he left. The whole thing is settled, and all you got
+to do is to button up your lip and go to bed.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A week later Papa Claude announced that Harold Phipps was at last
+released from his onerous duties in the army and had returned to his home
+in Chicago, where he would in future devote himself to the writing and
+producing of great American plays.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="18">CHAPTER 18</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+In everybody's life there are hours or days or even weeks that refuse to
+march on with the solemn procession of time, but lag behind and hide in
+some byway of memory, there to remain for ever and ever. It was such a
+week that tumbled unexpectedly out of Quin's calendar about the first of
+June, and lived itself in terms of sunshine and roses, of moonshine and
+melody, seven halcyon days between the time that Eleanor returned from
+school and the Bartletts went away for the summer. For the first time
+since he met her, she seemed to have nothing more demanding to do than to
+emulate &#34;the innocent moon, who nothing does but shine, and yet moves all
+the slumbering surges of the world.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+There was no doubt about Quin's &#34;slumbering surges&#34; being moved. Within
+twenty-four hours of her return to town he became totally and hopelessly
+demoralized. Education and business were, after all, but means to an end,
+and when he saw what he conceived to be a short cut to heaven, he rashly
+discarded wings and leaped toward his heart's desire.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The hour before closing at the factory became a time of acute torture. He
+who usually stayed till the last minute, engrossed in winding up the
+affairs of the day, now seemed perfectly willing to trust their
+completion to any one who would undertake it. The instant the whistle
+blew he was off like a shot, out of the factory yard, clinging to the
+platform of a crowded trolley, catching an interurban car, plunging
+through a thicket, down an old lane, and emerging into Paradise.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The Rannys were having the adventure of their lives with the secret farm,
+an adventure shared with equal enthusiasm by their co-conspirators.
+&#34;Valley Mead&#34; was proving the most marvelous of forbidden playthings, and
+was doing for Randolph Bartlett what doctors and sanitariums and tears
+and threats had failed to do. The old place had been overhauled, the
+house made habitable, and now that furnishing was in progress, each day
+brought new and fascinating developments.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor had arrived from school just in time to fling herself heart and
+soul into the enterprise. By a happy chance she had been allowed to spend
+the week with the Randolph Bartletts, only reporting to her grandmother
+from time to time for consultations regarding summer clothes. Her strange
+indifference to this usually all-important question, together with her
+insistent plea to remain in Kentucky all summer, might have aroused the
+old lady's suspicion had she not long ago decided that the explanation of
+all Eleanor's motives was perversity.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Every morning Eleanor and Mrs. Ranny went out to the farm, and worked
+with enthusiasm. Each piece of furniture that was taken out of the crate
+was hailed with delight and dragged from one place to another to try its
+effect. The hanging of curtains was suspended while they rushed out to
+see the newly arrived rabbits with their meek eyes and tremulous pink
+mouths, or dashed out to the poultry-yard to have another look at the
+downy little fluffs of yellow that were pretending to be chickens.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But the real excitement of the day was when the workmen had departed, and
+Mr. Ranny came out with his machine laden with priceless treasures from
+the ten-cent store, or later when Quin Graham dashed up the lane with
+anything from a garden-spade to a bird-house in his hands, and with an
+enthusiasm and energy in his soul that communicated themselves to all
+concerned. Then everybody would talk at once, and everybody insist upon
+showing everybody else what had been done since morning, and there was
+more hanging of pictures and changing of furniture, and so much chatter
+and laughter that it was a wonder anything was accomplished.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. and Mrs. Ranny had agreed that they would make Valley Mead livable at
+the least possible expense, looking forward to a future day to make the
+improvements that would require much outlay of money. The pride and
+satisfaction they took in their petty economies were such as only the
+inexperienced wealthy can feel.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As for Quin, he moved through the enchanted days, blind, deaf, and dumb
+to everything but Eleanor. She was the dazzling sun in whose effulgent
+rays the rest of humanity floated like midges. So wholly blinded was he
+by her radiant presence that he did not realize the darkness into which
+he was about to be plunged until her departure was imminent.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The evening before she left found them perched upon the orchard stile, in
+that stage of intimacy that permitted him to sit at her feet and toy
+pensively with the tassel on her girdle while his eyes said the
+unutterable things that his lips were forbidden to utter.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The sky was flooded with luminous color, neither blue nor pink, but
+something deliciously between, and down below them fields of wheat
+rippled under the magic light.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;We ought to go in,&#34; said Eleanor for the third time. &#34;We've been out
+here an outrageously long time.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;They won't miss us,&#34; pleaded Quin; &#34;besides, it's our last night.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Don't talk about it!&#34; said Eleanor. &#34;It makes me so cross to have to
+leave it all at the most exciting time! When I get back everything will
+be finished and the fun all over.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;When <i>are</i> you coming back?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not until September. We have to come home then. Something's going to
+happen.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin stopped twisting the tassel and looked at her quickly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What?&#34; he demanded.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Can you keep a secret?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's a wedding, Quin.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+If the earth had suddenly quaked beneath him he could not have
+experienced a more horrible sense of devastation. He put out a hand as if
+to steady himself.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You don't mean&#8212;&#8212;&#34; he began, and could get no further.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, I do. It's to be a home wedding, very quiet, with only the family,
+and afterward they are going out to the coast.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Who are?&#34; he asked dully.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Aunt Enid and Mr. Chester. After waiting for twenty years. Isn't it too
+funny for words?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin thought it was. He threw himself back and shouted. He had never
+enjoyed a joke so much in his life. It seemed replete with humor,
+especially when he shared with Eleanor the part he had played in bringing
+them together and described the waltz on the landing the night of the
+Easter party. With the arrogance of youth they laughed hilariously at the
+late blooming romance.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What about Queen Vic?&#34; asked Quin. &#34;How did they ever get her consent?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;They didn't ask for it. After letting her keep them apart all these
+years, they just announced that they were going to be married in
+September. I expect she raised the roof; but when she saw it was all
+settled and she couldn't unsettle it, she came around and told Aunt Enid
+she could be married at home.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Good work!&#34; said Quin, who was genuinely fond of both Miss Enid and Mr.
+Chester. &#34;How is Miss Isobel taking it?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Better than you would think. I don't know what has come over Aunt
+Isobel, she's so much nicer than she used to be. The boys out at the
+hospital have made her over.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Miss Isobel's a pippin,&#34; said Quin, in a tone that implied a compliment.
+&#34;You ought to have seen how she looked after me when I was sick. Has
+Madam found out about her going out to camp?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes; but she hasn't stopped her. Something you said once about everybody
+having a right to do his duty as he saw it made Aunt Isobel take a firm
+stand and stick it out. You have certainly jolted the family out of its
+ruts, Quin. Look at Uncle Ranny; would you ever take him for the same
+person he was six months ago?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin removed his enamored gaze from her face long enough to glance toward
+the house, where the usually elegant useless Randolph was perched in the
+crotch of an old ash tree, sawing off a dead limb, and singing as he
+sawed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, when it comes to him, I guess I <i>have</i> had a finger in the
+pie,&#34; said Quin with pardonable pride. &#34;He hasn't slipped the trolley for
+two months; and if he can stay on the track now, it will be a cinch for
+him after the first of July. All he needed was a real interest in life,
+and a chance to work things out for himself.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's what we all need,&#34; Eleanor said gloomily. &#34;I wish I could do what I
+liked.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What would you do?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'd go straight to New York and study for the stage. It isn't a
+whim&#8212;it's what I've wanted most to do ever since I was a little girl. I
+may not have any great talent, but Papa Claude thinks I have. So does
+Captain Phipps. To have to wait a whole year until I'm of age is too
+stupid for words. It's just some more of grandmother's tyranny, and I'm
+not going to submit much longer; would you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin contemplated his clasped fists earnestly. For the first time, his
+belief in the consent of the governed admitted of exceptions.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'd go a bit slow,&#34; he said, feeling his own way cautiously. &#34;This stage
+business is a doubtful proposition. I don't see where the fun comes in,
+pretending to be somebody else all the time.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You would if you didn't like being yourself. Besides, I don't live my
+own life as it is.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You will some day&#8212;when you get married.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But that's just it! I don't intend to marry&#8212;I am going to devote my
+whole life to my work.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin, having but recently recovered from the fear that she was
+contemplating matrimony, now underwent a similar torture at her avowal
+that she was not. The second possibility was only a shade less appalling
+than the first.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;The trouble is,&#34; she went on very confidentially, &#34;I am not interested
+in anything in the world but my art.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, come now, Miss Eleanor!&#34; Quin rallied her. &#34;You know you were
+interested in the work out at the camp.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's true. I except that.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And you can't say you haven't been interested in our selling this farm,
+and getting Mr. and Mrs. Ranny fixed up, and all that.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course I've been interested in that; it's been no end of fun.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And then,&#34; Quin pursued his point quite brazenly, &#34;there's me. I hope
+you are a little bit interested in me?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She tried to take it lightly. &#34;Interested in you? Why, of course I am. We
+all are. Uncle Ranny was saying only this morning&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't care a hang what he said. It's <i>you</i> I'm talking about. Do
+you like me any better than you did in the spring?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You silly boy, I've always liked you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I told you I wanted a lot. Have I made any headway?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Headway? I should say you have. I never saw such improvement! If the
+university classes have done this much for you in four months, what will
+you be by the end of the year?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's right,&#34; said Quin bitterly. &#34;Open the switch and sidetrack me!
+But just tell me one thing: is there anybody you <i>are</i> interested
+in?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Now, see here, Quin,&#34; said Eleanor peremptorily, &#34;you haven't any right
+to ask me questions like that. All I promised was that you could be my
+chum.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes; but I meant a chum plus.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, you'd better look out or you will be a chum minus.&#34; Then she
+caught sight of his eyes, and leaned forward in sudden contrition. &#34;I'm
+sorry to hurt you, Quin, but you must understand&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I do,&#34; he admitted miserably. &#34;Only this week out here together, and the
+way you've looked at me sometimes, made me kind of hope&#8212;&#8212;&#34; His voice
+broke. &#34;It's all right. I'll wait some more.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This was the time Eleanor should have carried out her intention of going
+back to the house. Instead, she sat on in the deepening twilight under
+the feminine delusion that she was being good to the miserable youth who
+sat huddled close to her knees on the step below her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Through his whole big being Quin was quivering with the sense of her
+nearness, afraid to move for fear something stronger than his will would
+make him seize her slender little body and crush it to him in an agony of
+tenderness and yearning.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How beautiful it is out here now!&#34; she said softly. &#34;Don't you love the
+feel of wings everywhere? Little flying things going home? Everything
+seems to be whispering!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin did not answer. He sat silent and immovable until the light in the
+valley had quite faded, and the twitter of the birds had been superseded
+by the monotonous, mournful plaint of a whip-poor-will in a distant tree.
+Then he stirred and looked up at Eleanor with a rueful smile.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I know what's the matter with that damned old bird,&#34; he said. &#34;He's in
+love!&#34;
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="19">CHAPTER 19</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+Notwithstanding the fact that the sale of the Martels' house was averted
+and Rose's affair with Harold Phipps successfully terminated,
+catastrophe, which was evidently due the family, arrived before the
+summer had fairly begun. The irrepressible Claude had no sooner weighed
+the anchor of responsibility than he set sail for New York to embark once
+more on dramatic waters. He had secured a small part in a summer stock
+company which would leave him ample time to work on &#34;Phantom Love,&#34; which
+he confidently counted upon to retrieve his fortunes. The withdrawal of
+even his slender contribution to the household expenses made a
+difference, especially as Edwin came down with the measles early in July.
+Before the boy had got the green shade off his afflicted eyes, Cass was
+laid low with typhoid fever.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+No other event in the family could have wrought such disastrous results.
+Rose was compelled to give up her position to nurse him, and while the
+income ceased the expenses piled up enormously.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Nothing was more natural than that Quinby Graham should fling himself
+into the breach. His intimacy with Cass had begun on the transport going
+to France, and continued with unabated zeal until he was wounded in the
+summer of 1918. For six months he had lost sight of him, only to find him
+again in the hospital at Camp Zachary Taylor. He was not one to share the
+privileges of Cass's home without also sharing its hardships.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's a shame we've got to take help from you,&#34; said Rose; &#34;just when you
+are beginning to get ahead, too!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You cut that out,&#34; said Quin. &#34;I'd like to know if you didn't take me in
+and treat me like one of the family? Ain't Cass the best friend a man
+ever had? And wouldn't he do as much and more for me?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But even Quin's salary failed to meet the emergency. Doctor's bills, drug
+bills, grocery bills, became more and more formidable. One day Rose was
+reduced to selling two of Papa Claude's autographed photographs.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I wouldn't do that&#8212;yet,&#34; said Quin, who had begun to walk to the
+factory to save carfare. &#34;Those old boys and girls are his friends; we
+can't sell them. I can see him now talking to 'em through his pipe smoke.
+I ought to have some junk we can soak. Let's go see.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The investigation resulted in the conversion of a pair of new wing-toed
+dancing-shoes and a silver cigarette-case into an ice-bag and an electric
+fan.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I could stand everything else,&#34; said Rose, &#34;if we could just get the
+children out of the house. Edwin is still as weak as a kitten, and Myrna
+looks as if she might come down with the fever any day.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin had a brilliant idea. &#34;Why not ship 'em both to the country? Ed
+could come to town to work every day, and Myrna could help somebody
+around the house.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That sounds mighty fine; but who is going to take two children to board
+for nothing?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't know yet,&#34; said Quin; &#34;that's what I've got to find out.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+That night he went out to Valley Mead and put the matter squarely up to
+Mr. and Mrs. Ranny.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;We're up against it at our house,&#34; he said; &#34;I want to borrow something
+from you two good people.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You can have anything we've got!&#34; said Mr. Ranny rashly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, I want to borrow some fresh air for a couple of sick kids. I want
+you to ask 'em out here for a week.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. and Mrs. Ranny looked aghast at the preposterous suggestion, but Quin
+gave them no time to demur. He plunged into explanation, and clinched his
+argument by saying:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Ed would only be here at night, and Myrna could help around the house.
+They are bully youngsters. No end of fun, and they wouldn't give you a
+bit of trouble.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I have only one maid!&#34; protested Mrs. Ranny.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What of that?&#34; said Quin. &#34;Myrna's used to working at home; she'd be
+glad to help you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;If it was anybody on earth but the Martels,&#34; Mr. Ranny objected, with
+contracted brow. &#34;The families have been at daggers' points for years.
+Why, the very name of Martel makes mother see red.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, the children aren't responsible for that!&#34; Quin broke in
+impatiently; then he pulled himself up. &#34;However, if you don't want to do
+'em a good turn, that settles it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But it doesn't settle it,&#34; said Mr. Ranny. &#34;What are you going to do
+with them?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Hanged if I know,&#34; said Quin; &#34;but you bet I'll do something.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The conversation then wandered off to Eleanor, and Quin listened with
+vague misgivings to accounts of her good times&#8212;yachting parties, tennis
+tournaments, rock teas, shore dinners&#8212;all of which suggested to him an
+appallingly unfamiliar world.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I tell you who was up there for a week,&#34; said Mr. Ranny. &#34;Harold Phipps.
+You remember meeting him at our apartment last spring?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What's he doing there?&#34; Quin demanded with such vehemence that they both
+laughed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Probably making life miserable for Mother Bartlett,&#34; said Mrs. Ranny. &#34;I
+can't imagine how she ever consented to have him come, or how he ever had
+the nerve to go, after the way they've treated him.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Harold's not concerned with the feelings of the family,&#34; said Mr. Ranny;
+&#34;he is after Nell.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But Mrs. Ranny scorned the idea. &#34;He looks upon her as a perfect child,&#34;
+she insisted; &#34;besides, he's too lazy and conceited to be in love with
+anybody but himself.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That may be, but Nell's got him going all right.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then the conversation veered back to the Martels, with the result that an
+hour later Quin was on his way home bearing a gracefully worded note from
+Mrs. Ranny inviting the children to spend the following week at Valley
+Mead. But, in spite of the success of his mission, he sat with a box of
+fresh eggs in his lap and a huge bunch of flowers in his hand, his hat
+rammed over his eyes, staring gloomily out of the car window into the
+starless night.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Since Eleanor's departure he had had no word from her, and the news that
+filtered through Valley Mead was more disconcerting than the silence. The
+thought of her dancing, sailing, and motoring with Harold Phipps filled
+him with a frenzy of jealousy. He grew bitter at the thought of her
+flitting heedlessly from one luxurious pleasure to another, while Cass
+lay in that stifling city, fighting for his life and lacking even the
+necessities for his comfort.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Every week since her departure he had written her, even though the
+letters grew shorter and blunter as his duties increased. Up until now,
+however, he, like every one else, had tried to shield Eleanor from
+anything ugly and sordid. He had tried to make light of the situation and
+reassure her as to results; but he was determined to do it no longer. It
+wasn't right, he told himself angrily, for anybody to go through life
+blinded to all the misery and suffering and poverty in the world. He was
+going to write her to-night and tell her the whole story and spare her
+nothing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But he did not write. When he reached home Cass had had a turn for the
+worse, and there were ice-baths to prepare and other duties to perform
+that left him no time for himself.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The next day Edwin and Myrna were sent out to the Randolph Bartletts',
+and Rose and Quin cleared the decks for the hard fight ahead. Fan Loomis
+came in to help nurse in the day-time, and Quin was on duty through the
+long, suffocating August nights.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At the end of the week Cass's condition was so serious that the Bartletts
+insisted on keeping the children at the farm. Myrna had proved a cheery,
+helpful little companion, and Edwin, while more difficult to handle, was
+picking up flesh and color, and was learning to run the car.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Cass's fever dragged on, going down one day only to rise higher the next.
+Seven weeks, eight weeks, nine weeks passed, and still no improvement.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin, trying to keep up his work at the factory on two or three hours'
+sleep out of the twenty-four, grew thin and haggard, and coughed more
+than at any time since he had left the hospital. During the long night
+vigils he made sporadic efforts to keep up his university work, but he
+made little headway.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Go on to bed, Quin,&#34; Rose whispered one night, when she found him asleep
+with his head against the bed-post. &#34;You'll be giving out next, and God
+knows what I'll do then.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not me!&#34; he declared, suppressing a yawn. &#34;You're the one that's done
+in. Why don't you stay down?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I can't,&#34; she murmured, kneeling anxiously beside the unconscious
+patient. &#34;He looks worse to me to-night. Do you believe we can pull him
+through?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She had on a faded pink kimono over her thin night-gown, and her heavy
+hair was plaited down her back. There were no chestnut puffs over her
+ears or pink spots on her cheeks, and her lips looked strange without
+their penciled cupid's bow. But to Quin there was something in her drawn
+white face and anxious, tender eyes that was more appealing. In their
+long siege together he had found a staunch dependence and a power of
+sacrifice in the girl that touched him deeply.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't know, Rose,&#34; he admitted, reaching over and smoothing her hair;
+&#34;but we'll do our darnedest.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At the touch of his hand she reached up and impulsively drew it down to
+her cheek, holding it there with her trembling lips against its hard
+palm.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The night was intensely hot and still. That afternoon they had moved Cass
+into Rose's room in the hope of getting more air from the western
+exposure; but only the hot smell of the asphalt and the stifling odor of
+car smoke came through the curtainless window. The gas-jet, turned very
+low, threw distorted shadows on the bureau with its medley of toilet
+articles and medicine bottles. Through the open door of the closet could
+be seen Rose's personal belongings; under the table were a pair of
+high-heeled slippers; and two white stockings made white streaks across
+the window-sill.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin sat by Cass's bedside, with his hand clasped to Rose's cheek, and
+fought a battle that had been raging within him for days. Without being
+in the least in love with Rose, he wanted desperately to take her in his
+arms and comfort her. They were both so tired, so miserable, so
+desperately afraid of that shadowy presence that hovered over Cass. They
+were practically alone in the house, accountable to no one, and drawn
+together by an overwhelming anxiety. In Rose's state of emotional tension
+she was responsive to his every look and gesture. He had but to hold out
+his arms and she would sink into them.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Again and again his eyes traveled from her bright tumbled head to Cass's
+flushed face, with its absurd round nose and eyes that could no longer
+keep watch over a pleasure-loving sister. What would happen if Cass
+should die? Who would take care of her and the children, helpless and
+penniless, with only Papa Claude and his visions to stand between them
+and the world? A great wave of sympathy rushed over him for the girl
+kneeling there with her face buried in the bed-clothes. She had asked so
+little of life&#8212;just a few good times to offset the drudgery, just an
+outlet for the ocean of love that was dammed up in her small body. Love
+was the only thing she cared about; it was the only thing that mattered
+in life. Cass never understood her, but Quin understood her. He was like
+that himself. The blood was pounding through his veins too, a terrible
+urgence was impelling him toward her. Why shouldn't they throw discretion
+to the winds and answer the call?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then his mind did a curious thing. It brought up out of the sub-conscious
+a question that Eleanor Bartlett had once asked him: &#34;Do you think a
+person has a right to go ahead and do what he wants, regardless of
+consequences?&#34; He saw her face, moonlit and earnest, turned up to his,
+and he heard himself answering her: &#34;That depends on whether he wants the
+right thing.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Rose stirred, and he withdrew his hand and stood up.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;See here, young lady,&#34; he said with authority; &#34;I'll give you just two
+minutes to clear out of here! No, I don't want you to leave your door
+open; I'll call you if there's any change.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But, Quin, I don't want to be alone&#8212;I want to be with you.&#34; Her eyes
+were full of frank appeal, and her lips trembling.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You are too sleepy to know what you want,&#34; he said. &#34;Up with you&#8212;not
+another word. You'll feel better to-morrow. Good-night.&#34; And with a
+little push he put her out of the room and closed the door.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="20">CHAPTER 20</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+Quin stood under the big car-shed at the Union Depot, and for the sixth
+time in ten minutes consulted the watch that was the pride of his life.
+He had been waiting for half an hour, not because the train was late, but
+because he proposed to be on the spot if by any happy chance it should
+arrive ahead of schedule time. The week before he had received a picture
+post-card on whose narrow margin were scrawled the meager lines:
+</p>
+
+<p class="quote">
+So glad Cass is up again. Rose says you've been a brick. Home on
+Sept. 2. Hope to see you soon. E. M. B.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was the only communication he had had from Eleanor since they sat on
+the stile in the starlight at Valley Mead three months before. To be
+sure, in her infrequent letters to Rose she had always added, &#34;Give my
+love to Quinby Graham,&#34; and once she said: &#34;Tell him I've been meaning to
+write to him all summer.&#34; Notwithstanding the fact that Quin had waited
+in vain for that letter for twelve consecutive weeks, that he had passed
+through every phase of indignation, jealousy, and consuming fear that can
+assail a young and undisciplined lover, he nevertheless watched for the
+incoming train with a rapture undimmed by disturbing reflections. The
+mere fact that every moment the distance was lessening between him and
+Eleanor, that within the hour he should see her, hear her, feel the clasp
+of her hand, was sufficient to send his spirits soaring into sunny spaces
+of confidence far above the clouds of doubt.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Hello, Quinby; what are you doing here?&#34; asked a voice behind him; and
+turning he saw the long, oval face and lady-like figure of Mr. Chester.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Same thing you are,&#34; said Quin, grinning sympathetically. &#34;Only if I was
+in your shoes I'd be walking the tracks to meet the train.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Chester shook his head and smiled primly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;When you have waited twenty years for a young lady, twenty minutes more
+or less do not matter.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;They would to me!&#34; Quin declared emphatically. &#34;When is the wedding to
+be?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;On the fourteenth. And that reminds me&#34;&#8212;Mr. Chester ran his arm
+confidentially through Quin's and tried to catch step. &#34;I want to ask a
+favor of you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A favor to Quin meant anything from twenty-five cents to twenty-five
+dollars, and the fact that Mr. Chester should come to him flattered and
+embarrassed him at the same time.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What's mine is yours,&#34; he said magnanimously.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, you don't understand,&#34; said Mr. Chester. &#34;You see, not being a club
+man or a society man, I have in a way dropped out of things. I have
+comparatively few friends, and unfortunately they are not in a set
+personally known to Madam Bartlett. Miss Enid and I thought that it might
+solve the difficulty, and avoid complications, if you would agree to
+serve as my best man.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why, I'd be willing to serve as the preacher to see you and Miss Enid
+get married,&#34; said Quin heartily. Then his thoughts flew after his
+departed Tuxedo and the gorgeous wing-toed pumps. &#34;What'll I have to
+wear?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It is to be a noon affair,&#34; reassured Mr. Chester. &#34;Simple morning coat,
+you know, and light-gray tie.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's ideas concerning a morning coat were extremely vague, and the
+possibility of his procuring one vaguer still; but the occasion was too
+portentous to admit of hesitation. He and Mr. Chester continued their
+walk to the far end of the shed, and then stood looking down at the coal
+cars being loaded from the yards.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;White gloves, I suppose?&#34; observed Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Pearl gray, with very narrow stitching. I think that's better taste,
+don't you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Sure,&#34; agreed Quin. &#34;Flower in the buttonhole, or anything like that?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+While this all-important detail was being decided, a clanging bell and
+the hiss of an engine announced the incoming train. Before the two
+waiting cavaliers could reach the gate, Eleanor Bartlett came through,
+laden with wraps and umbrellas.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I like the way you meet us,&#34; she called out. &#34;For mercy sake, help me.&#34;
+And she deposited her burden in Quin's outstretched arms. Then, as Mr.
+Chester strode past them with flying coat-tails in quest of Miss Enid,
+she burst out laughing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Say, you are looking great,&#34; said Quin, with devouring eyes, as he
+surveyed her over the top of his impedimenta.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's more than you are.&#34; She scanned his face in dismay. &#34;Have you been
+sick?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, indeed. Never felt better.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I know&#8212;it was nursing Cass that did it. Rose wrote me all about it. If
+you don't look better right away, I shall make you go straight to bed and
+I'll come feed you chicken soup.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;My fever's rising this minute!&#34; cried Quin, &#34;I believe I've got a chill.
+Send for the ambulance!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not till after the wedding. I'll have you know I am to be Aunt Enid's
+bridesmaid.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You've got nothing on me,&#34; said Quin, &#34;I'm the best man!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This struck them both as being so excruciatingly funny that they did not
+see the approaching cavalcade, with Madam walking slowly at its head,
+until Quin heard his name called.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, dear,&#34; said Eleanor, &#34;there they come. And I've got a thousand
+questions to ask you and a million things to tell you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Come here, young man, and see me walk!&#34; was Madam's greeting. &#34;Do I look
+like a cripple? Leg off at the knee, crutches for life? Bah! We fooled
+them, didn't we?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin made a tremendous fuss over the old lady. He also threw the aunties
+into pleased confusion by pretending that he was going to kiss them, and
+occasioned no end of laughter and good-natured banter by his incessant
+teasing of Mr. Chester. He was in that state of effervescence that
+demanded an immediate outlet.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Madam found him so amusing that she promptly detailed him as her special
+escort.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Eleanor can look after the baggage,&#34; she said, &#34;and Isobel can look
+after Eleanor. The turtle-doves can take a taxi.&#34; And she closed her
+strong old fingers around Quin's wrist and pulled him forward.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He shot an appealing glance over his shoulder at Eleanor, who shook her
+head in exasperation; then he obediently conducted Madam to her carriage
+and scrambled in beside her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Now,&#34; she said, when he had got a cushion at her back and a stool under
+her foot, &#34;tell me: where's Ranny&#8212;drunk as usual?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, siree!&#34; said Quin proudly. &#34;Sober as usual. He hasn't touched a drop
+since you went away.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She looked at him incredulously.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Are you lying?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am not.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Her hard, suspicious old face began to twitch and her eyelids reddened.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;This is your doing,&#34; she said gruffly. &#34;You've put more backbone into
+him than all the doctors together.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's not all I've done,&#34; said Quin. &#34;What are you going to say when I
+tell you I've sold him a farm?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;A farm? You've got no farm; and he had no money to buy it, if you had.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's all right. He has had a farm for three months. You ought to see
+him&#8212;up at six o'clock every morning looking after things, and so keen
+about getting back to it in the evening that he never thinks about going
+to the club or staying in town.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What's all this nonsense you are talking?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's not nonsense. He's bought a little place out near Anchordale. They
+are living there.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And they did this without consulting me!&#34; Madam's eyes blazed. &#34;Why, he
+is no more capable of running a farm than a ten-year-old child! I have
+fought it for years. He knew perfectly well if he told me I'd stop it
+instantly. He will appeal to me to help out within six months, you'll
+see! I sha'n't do it! I'll show my children if they can do without me
+that I can go without them.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She was working herself into a fine rage. The aigrette on her bonnet
+quivered, and the black velvet band about her neck was getting so tight
+that it looked as if it couldn't stand the strain much longer.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why didn't he write me?&#34; she stormed. &#34;Am I too old and decrepit to be
+consulted any more? Is he going to follow Enid's high-handed way of
+deciding things without the slightest reference to my wishes?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I expect he is,&#34; said Quin cheerfully. &#34;You see, you can't stiffen a
+fellow's backbone, as you call it, for one thing and not another. When he
+found out he could stop drinking, he decided he could do other things as
+well. He's started a chicken farm.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Madam groaned: &#34;Of course. I never knew a fool that sooner or later
+didn't gravitate to chickens. He will get an incubator next.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He has two already. He and Mrs. Ranny are studying out the whole
+business scientifically.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And I suppose they've got a rabbit hutch, and a monkey, and some white
+mice?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not quite. But they've got a nice place. Want to go out with me next
+Saturday and see 'em?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I do not. I'm not interested in menageries. I never expect to cross the
+threshold.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin pulled up the cape that had slipped from her shoulder, and adjusted
+it carefully.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;When Mr. Ranny comes in to see you,&#34; he said, &#34;I hope you won't ball him
+out right away. He's awful keen on this stunt, you know. It sort of takes
+the place of the things he has given up.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Madam glared straight ahead of her for a few moments, then she said
+curtly:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll not mention it until he does.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, but I <i>want</i> you to. He's as nervous as a witch about how you
+are going to take it. You see, he thinks more of your opinion than he
+does of anybody's, and he wants your approval. If you could jump right in
+and say you think it's a bully idea, and that you are coming out to see
+what he has done, and&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you want me to lie?&#34; Madam demanded fiercely.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No,&#34; said Quin, laughing; &#34;I am trying to warm you up to the project
+now, so you won't have to lie.&#34; Then, seeing her face relax a little, he
+leaned toward her and said in his most persuasive tone:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;See here, now! I did my best to straighten Mr. Ranny out. He's making
+the fight of his life to keep straight. It's up to you to stand by us.
+You don't want to pitch the fat back in the fire, do you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+They had reached the big house on Third Avenue, and the carriage was
+slowing up at the curbing. Quin, receiving no answer to his question,
+carefully helped Madam up the steps and into the house, where black
+Hannah was waiting to receive her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You can't come in,&#34; said Madam gruffly. &#34;I am tired. I will see you some
+other time.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;All right,&#34; said Quin. &#34;What time shall I come Saturday afternoon?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Saturday afternoon? Why then?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;To go out to Mr. Ranny's farm.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For an instant they measured glances; then Quin began to laugh&#8212;a
+confident, boyish laugh full of teasing affection.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Come on,&#34; he coaxed, &#34;be a good scout. Let's give 'em the surprise of
+their lives.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You rascal, you!&#34; she said, hitting at him with her cane. &#34;I believe you
+are at the bottom of all this. Mind, I promise you nothing.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You don't have to,&#34; he called back. &#34;I can trust you. I'll be here at
+three!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He arrived on Saturday an hour early in the hope of seeing Eleanor, and
+was gloriously rewarded by thirty minutes alone with her in the big dark
+drawing-room. All the way up from the factory he had thought of the
+things he wanted to tell her&#8212;all the Martel news, the progress of
+affairs at Valley Mead, the fact that he had won his first-term
+certificate at the university, and above all about his promotion at
+Bartlett &#34; Bangs. But Eleanor gave him no chance to tell her anything.
+She was like a dammed-up stream that suddenly finds an outlet. Into
+Quin's sympathetic ears she poured her own troubles, talking with her
+hands and her eyes as well as her lips, exaggerating, dramatizing,
+laughing one minute, half crying the next.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The summer, it seemed, had been one long series of clashes with her
+grandmother. She hadn't enjoyed one day of it, she assured him; that is,
+not a <i>whole</i> day, for of course there were some gorgeous times in
+between. Her friends had not been welcome at the house, and one (whom
+Quin devoutly hoped was Mr. Phipps) had been openly insulted. She had not
+been allowed to take part in the play given at the club-house, when it
+had been planned with her especially in mind for the leading r&#244;le. She
+had even been forbidden to go to the last boathouse dance, because it was
+a moonlight affair, and grandmother had never heard of such a thing as
+dancing without lights.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She has spent the entire summer nagging at me,&#34; Eleanor concluded. &#34;I
+couldn't do a thing to please her. If I stayed in she wanted me to go
+out; if I went out she thought I ought to stay in. If I put on one dress
+she invariably made me change it for another. And as for being late to
+meals, why, each time it happened you would have thought I'd broken the
+ten commandments.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Couldn't you have pushed up the stroke and got there on time?&#34; asked
+Quin, whose army training made him inclined to sympathize with Madam at
+this point.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, I could not. I am always late. It's a Martel trait&#8212;that's why it
+infuriates grandmother. But it wasn't any of these things I've been
+telling you that caused the real trouble. It was her constant
+interference in my private affairs. I am simply sick of being dictated to
+about my choice of friends.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You mean Mr. Phipps?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She looked at him quickly. &#34;How did you know?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Mrs. Ranny told me he was up there, and I guessed there was a shindy.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I should say there was&#8212;for the entire three days he was there! If he
+hadn't been big enough to rise above it and ignore grandmother, she would
+have succeeded in breaking up one of the most beautiful friendships of my
+life.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin absently twisted a corner of the corpulent sofa cushion which he
+held in his lap, before he asked cautiously:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What is it you like so much in him. Miss Nell?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor curled her feet under her on the sofa, and launched forth on a
+favorite theme:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, to begin with, he's the most cosmopolitan man I ever met.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Cosmopolitan? How do you mean?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Awfully sophisticated. A sort of citizen of the world, you know.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You mean he's traveled a lot, knocked around in queer places, like me?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, no; it isn't that. As a matter of fact, he has never been out of
+this country. But I mean that, wherever he'd go, he would be at home.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes,&#34; Quin admitted, with a grim smile; &#34;that's where he was most of the
+time when he was in the army. What else do you like about him?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I sha'n't tell you. You are prejudiced, like all the rest. He says that
+only an artist can understand an artist.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Meaning, I suppose, that he understands you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes; and I believe I understand him. Of course I don't agree with him in
+all his ideas. But then, I've been brought up in such a narrow way that I
+know I am frightfully conventional. He is awfully advanced, you know. Why
+don't you like him, Quin?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Numerous concrete and very emphatic reasons sprang to Quin's lips. He
+would have liked nothing better than to answer her question fully and
+finally; but instead he only smiled at her and said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why, I guess the main reason is because you do.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor looked at him dubiously: &#34;No,&#34; she said; &#34;it's something besides
+that. The family have probably filled your ears with silly gossip. Mr.
+Phipps <i>was</i> wild at one time&#8212;he told me all about it. But that's
+ancient history; you can take my word for it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin would have taken her word for almost anything when she looked at him
+with such star-eyed earnestness, but he was obliged to make an exception
+in the present instance.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He's nothing in my young life,&#34; he said indifferently. &#34;What I want to
+know is whether you are home to stay?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor glanced at the door, listened, then she said:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't know yet. You see, Papa Claude is to be in New York this winter,
+finishing his play. He says if I will come on he will put me in the
+Kendall School of Expression and see that I get the right start. It's the
+chance of a life-time, and I'm simply wild to go.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And Queen Vic won't hear of it?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not for a second. She knows perfectly well that I can go on the stage
+the day I am twenty-one, yet through sheer obstinacy she refuses to
+advance me a penny to do as I like with before the 20th of next July.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She don't do it for meanness,&#34; Quin ventured. &#34;She'd give you all she
+had if it came to a showdown. But none of 'em realize you are grown up;
+they are afraid to turn you loose.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, I've stood it as long as I intend to. I made up my mind that I
+would stick it out until after Aunt Enid's wedding. It nearly breaks my
+heart to do anything to hurt her and Aunt Isobel; but even they are
+beginning to rebel against grandmother's tyranny.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What do you mean to do?&#34; asked Quin, with a sudden sinking of the heart.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am not sure yet; I haven't quite made up my mind. But I am not going
+to stay here. I am too unhappy, Quin, and with Aunt Enid gone&#8212;&#8212;&#34; Her
+voice broke, and as she caught her lip between her small white teeth she
+stared ahead of her with tragic eyes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin laid his arm along the sofa, as close to her shoulders as he dared,
+and looked at her in dumb sympathy.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Don't you think you might try a different tack with the old lady?&#34; he
+ventured presently. &#34;Even a porcupine likes to have its head scratched,
+and I think sometimes she's kind of hungry for somebody to cotton up to
+her a bit. Don't you think you might&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Who left that front door open?&#34; broke in a harsh, peremptory voice from
+the landing. &#34;I don't care <i>who</i> opened it&#8212;I want it shut, and kept
+shut. Where's Quinby Graham? I thought you said he was waiting.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin rose precipitately and made a dash for the hall, while Eleanor
+discreetly disappeared through a rear door.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well,&#34; said Madam grimly, pulling on her gloves, &#34;it is a novel
+experience to find a young person who has a respect for other people's
+time.&#34;
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="21">CHAPTER 21</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+For the next two weeks Eleanor made a heroic effort to follow Quin's
+advice and be nice to Madam. She wanted, with all her heart, to gain her
+point peacefully, and she also wanted Quin's approval of what she was
+doing. In spite of his obvious adoration, she frequently detected a note
+of criticism in his voice, that, while it piqued her, also stirred her
+conscience and made her see things in a new and disturbing light. For the
+first time, she began to wonder if she could be partly to blame for the
+friction that always existed between herself and her grandmother. She
+certainly had taken an unholy joy in flaunting her Martel characteristics
+in the old lady's face. It was not that she preferred to identify herself
+with her mother's family rather than with her father's. The Martel
+shiftlessness and visionary improvidence were quite as intolerable to her
+as the iron-clad conventions of the Bartletts. She could take correction
+from Aunt Isobel and Aunt Enid, but there was something in her
+grandmother's caustic comments that made her tingle with instant
+opposition, as a delicate vase will shiver at the sound of its own
+vibration.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+During the days before the wedding she surprised herself by her docility
+and acquiescence in all that was proposed for her. She even accepted
+without demur the white swiss and blue ribbons that a week before she had
+considered entirely too infantile for an adult maid of honor. This
+particular exhibition of virtue was due to the exemplary behavior of the
+bride herself. Miss Enid had longed for the regulation white satin, tulle
+veil, and orange blossoms; but Madam had promptly cited the case of the
+old maid who waited so long to marry that her orange blossoms turned to
+oranges.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Enid was married in a sober traveling dress, and carried a
+prayer-book. She and Mr. Chester stood in front of the drawing-room
+mantel, where twenty years before Madam had expressed her opinion
+concerning sentimental young fools who thought they could live on fifteen
+dollars a week.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The budding romance, snatched ruthlessly up and flung into the dust-heap
+of common sense, had lain dormant all these years, until Quinby Graham
+had stumbled upon its dried old roots, and planted them once again in the
+garden of dreams.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Why is it that we will breathlessly follow the callowest youth and the
+silliest maiden through the most intricate labyrinth of love, never
+losing interest until they drop safely into one another's arms, and yet
+when two seasoned, mellowed human beings tried by life and found worthy
+of the prize of love, dare lift a sentimental lid or sigh a word of
+romance, we straightway howl with derision?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was not until Eleanor stood beside the elderly bride that the affair
+ceased to be funny to her. For the first time, she saw something pathetic
+and beautiful in the permanence of a love that, starved and thwarted and
+blasted by ridicule, could survive the years and make two faded,
+middle-aged people like Aunt Enid and Mr. Chester eager to drain the
+dregs of life together, when they had been denied the good red wine.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Her eyes wandered from their worn, elated faces to the rows of solemn
+figures behind them. Madam, as usual, dominated the scene. Her portrait
+gazed in portentously from the hall; her marble bust gleamed from a
+distant corner; and she herself, the most resplendent person present, sat
+in a chair of state placed like a proscenium-box, and critically observed
+the performance.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;If she only <i>wouldn't</i> curl her lip like that!&#34; thought Eleanor
+shudderingly; then she remembered her resolution and looked at Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He too was looking preternaturally solemn, and his lips were moving
+softly in unison with Mr. Chester's. If Eleanor could have heard those
+inaudible responses she would have been startled by the words: &#34;I,
+Quinby, take thee, Eleanor.&#34; But she only observed that he was lost in a
+day-dream, and that she had never seen him look so nice.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Indeed, he was a very different-looking person from the boy that six
+months ago had mortified her by his appearance at her Easter party in
+&#34;the classiest coat in the market.&#34; The propriety of his garments made
+her suspect that Uncle Ranny had had a hand in their selection.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And I like the way he's got his hair slicked back,&#34; she thought. &#34;I
+wonder how he ever managed it?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+After the wedding breakfast, which was a lavish one, and the departure of
+the bride and groom, for California, where they were to make their future
+home, Madam summoned Eleanor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;There's no use in you and Quin Graham staying here with all these
+fossils,&#34; she said, lowering her voice. &#34;People hate to go home from a
+wedding almost as much as they do from a funeral! You two take this and
+go to a matin&#233;e.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This unexpected concession to Eleanor's weakness touched her deeply. She
+flew into the hall to tell Quin, and then rushed upstairs to change her
+dress.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I believe the scheme is working!&#34; she said joyously, as she and Quin sat
+in the theater waiting for the curtain to rise. &#34;Grandmother has been
+peaches and cream to me all week. This morning she capped the climax by
+giving me a check for a hundred dollars to buy a gold mesh bag.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;A <i>what!</i>&#34; cried Quin, aghast.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;A mesh bag. But I am not going to get it. I sent the check to Rose. It
+has nearly killed me not to have a penny to send them all summer, and
+this came just in time. Have you heard about Myrna?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Being asked to spend the winter at Mrs. Ranny's? I should say I have!
+She's the happiest kid alive.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And grandmother has even stood for that! It's a perfect scream to hear
+her bragging about 'my son's farm.' She will be talking about 'my
+daughter's husband' next.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Queen Vic's all right,&#34; Quin declared stoutly. &#34;Her only trouble is that
+she's been trying to play baseball by herself; she's got to learn
+team-work.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The play happened to be &#34;The Better 'Ole&#34;; and from the moment the
+curtain rose Eleanor was oblivious to everything but the humor and pathos
+and glory of the story. She followed with ready tears and smiles the
+adventures of the three Tommies; she thrilled to the sentimental songs
+beside the stage camp fire; she laughed at the antics of the incomparable
+Corporal Bill. It was not until the second act that she became conscious
+of the queer behavior of her companion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin sat hunched up in his wedding suit, his jaw set like a vise, staring
+solemnly into space with an expression she had never seen in his face
+before. He seemed to have forgotten where he was and whom he was with.
+His hand had crushed the program into a ball, and his breath came short,
+as it always did when he was excited or over-exerted.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor, whose emotions up to now had been pleasantly and superficially
+stirred, suddenly saw the play from a new angle. With quick imagination
+she visualized the great reality of which all this was but a clever sham.
+She saw Quin passing through it all, not to the thunder of stage shrapnel
+and the glare of a red spot-light, but in the life-and-death struggle of
+those eighteen months in the trenches. Before she knew it, she too was
+gazing absently into space, shaken with the profound realization that
+here beside her, his shoulder touching hers, was one who had lived more
+in a day than she had ever lived in a life-time.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+They said little during the last intermission, and the silence brought
+them closer together than any words could have done.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It takes a fellow back&#8212;all this,&#34; Quin roused himself to say in
+half-apology.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I know,&#34; said Eleanor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+They walked home in the autumn twilight in that exalted, romantic mood in
+which a good play leaves one. Now that the tension was over, it was quite
+possible to prolong the enjoyment by discussing the strong and weak
+points of the performance. Eleanor was surprised to find that Quin, while
+ignorant of the meaning of the word technic nevertheless had decided and
+worth-while opinions about every detail, and that his comments were often
+startlingly pertinent.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+They reached the Bartletts' before they knew it, and Quin sighed
+ruefully:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I wish Miss Enid and Mr. Chester could get married every Wednesday! When
+can I see you again?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Some time soon.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;To-morrow night?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am afraid that's too soon.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Friday?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No; I am going to a dance at the Country Club Friday night.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Still he lingered disconsolately on the lower step, unable to tear
+himself away.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you know,&#34; he said, gaining time by presenting a grievance, &#34;you
+never have danced with me but twice in your life?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She looked at him dreamily.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;The funny thing is that I remember those two dances better than any I've
+ever had with anybody else.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He came up the steps two at a time.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What do you mean by that?&#34; he demanded. &#34;Are you joshing me?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, honest. That New Year's eve with the blizzard raging outside, and
+that bright crowded hall, and all you boys just home from France. Do you
+remember the big blue parrots that swung in hoops from the chandeliers?
+And that wonderful saxophone and the big bass drum!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Then it isn't <i>me</i> that you remember? Just a darned old parrot
+hanging on a hoop, and a saxophone and a drum!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You silly! Of course it's you too! I remember every single thing you
+told me, and how terribly thrilled I was. This afternoon brought it all
+back. I shall never forget this, either. Not as long as I live!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She started to put out her hand; but, seeing the look in Quin's eyes, she
+reconsidered and opened the door instead.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;So long,&#34; she said casually. &#34;I'll probably see you sometime next week.
+In the meanwhile I'll be good to granny!&#34;
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="22">CHAPTER 22</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+When Eleanor reached the Country Club on Friday night, she found a box of
+flowers waiting for her in the dressing-room. It was the second box she
+had received that day. The first bore the conspicuous label, &#34;Wear-Well
+Shoes,&#34; and contained a bunch of wild evening primroses wrapped in wet
+moss. With this more sophisticated floral offering was a sealed note
+which she opened eagerly:
+</p>
+
+<div class="quote">
+<p class="noindent">
+<i>Mademoiselle Beaux Yeux</i>&#8212;[she read]:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Save all the dances after the intermission for me. I will reach L. at
+nine-thirty, get out to the club for a couple of hours with you, and
+catch the midnight express back to Chicago. Pin my blossoms close to
+your heart, and bid it heed what they whisper.
+</p>
+
+<p class="noindent">
+H. P.
+</p></div>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor read the note twice, conscious of the fact that a dozen envious
+eyes were watching her. She considered this quite the most romantic thing
+that had happened to her. For a man like Mr. Phipps to travel sixteen
+hours out of the twenty-four just to dance with her was a triumph indeed.
+It made her think of her old friend Joseph, in the Bret Harte poem, who
+</p>
+
+<div class="poem">
+<div class="stanza">
+<p>Swam the Elk's creek and all that,</p>
+<p>Just to dance with old Folingsbee's daughter,</p>
+<p>The Lily of Poverty Flat.</p></div></div>
+
+<p>
+Not that Eleanor felt in the least humble. She had never felt so proud in
+her life as she smiled a little superior smile and slipped the note in
+her bosom.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not orchids!&#34; exclaimed Kitty Mason, poking an inquisitive finger under
+the waxed paper.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why not?&#34; Eleanor asked nonchalantly. &#34;They are my favorite flowers.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I thought the orchid king was in Chicago?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He is&#8212;that is, he was. He's probably on the train now. I have just had
+a note saying he was running down for the dance and would go back
+to-night.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The news had the desired effect. Six noses, which were being vigorously
+powdered, were neglected while their owners burst forth in a chorus of
+exclamations sufficiently charged with envious admiration to satisfy the
+most rapacious d&#233;butante.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I should think you'd be perfectly paralyzed trying to think of things to
+talk to him about,&#34; said little Bessie Meed, who had not yet put her hair
+up. &#34;Older men scare me stiff.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;They don't me,&#34; declared Lou Pierce; &#34;they make me tired. Sitting out
+dances, and holding hands, and talking high-brow. When I come to a dance
+I want to dance. Give me Johnnie Rawlings or Pink Bailey and a good old
+jazz.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor pinned on her orchids and moved away. The girls seemed incredibly
+young and noisy and crass. Less than six months ago she, too, was romping
+through the dances with Jimmy and Pink, and imagining that a fox-trot
+divided between ten partners constituted the height of enjoyment. Mr.
+Phipps had told her in the summer that she was changing. &#34;The little
+butterfly is emerging from her chrysalis,&#34; was the poetic way he had
+phrased it, with an accompanying look that spoke volumes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Once on the dance floor, however, she forgot her superior mood and
+enjoyed herself inordinately until supper-time. Just as she and Pink were
+starting for the refreshment room, she caught sight of a familiar
+graceful figure, standing apart from the crowd, watching her with level,
+penetrating eyes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Pink, I forgot!&#34; she said hastily; &#34;I'm engaged for supper. I'll see you
+later.&#34; And without further apology she slipped through the throng and
+joined Harold.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Let's get out of this,&#34; he said, lightly touching her bare arm and
+piloting her toward the porch.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But don't you want any supper?&#34; asked Eleanor, amazed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not when I have you,&#34; whispered Harold.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor gave a regretful glance at a mammoth tray of sandwiches being
+passed, then allowed herself to be drawn out through the French window
+into the cool darkness of the wide veranda.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Let's sit in that car down by the first tee,&#34; Harold suggested. &#34;It's
+only a step.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor hesitated. One of the ten social commandments imposed upon her
+was that she was never to leave the porch at a Country Club dance. That
+the porch edge should be regarded as the limit of propriety had always
+seemed to her the height of absurdity; but so far she had obeyed the
+family and confined her flirtations to shadowy corners and dim nooks
+under bending palms.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What's the trouble?&#34; Harold inquired solicitously. &#34;The little gold
+slippers?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No&#8212;I don't mind the slippers; but, you see, I'm not supposed to go off
+the porch.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How ridiculous! Of course you are going off the porch. I have only one
+hour to stay, and I've something very important to tell you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But why can't we sit here?&#34; she insisted, indicating an unoccupied
+bench.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Because those ubiquitous youngsters will be clamoring for you the moment
+the music begins. Haven't you had enough noise for one night? Perhaps you
+prefer to go inside and be pushed about and eat messy things with your
+fingers?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Now you are horrid!&#34; Eleanor pouted. &#34;I only thought&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You mean you <i>didn't</i> think!&#34; corrected Harold, putting the tip of
+his finger under her chin and tilting her face up to his. &#34;You just
+repeated what you'd been taught to say. Use your brains, Eleanor. What
+possible harm can there be in our quietly sitting out under the light of
+the stars, instead of on this crowded piazza with that distracting din
+going on inside?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course there isn't really.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, then, come on&#34;; and he led the way across the strip of dewy lawn
+and handed her into the car.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor experienced a delicious sense of forbidden joy as she sank on the
+soft cushions and looked back at the brilliantly lighted club-house. The
+knowledge that in many of those other cars parked along the roadway other
+couples were cozily twosing, and that not a girl among them but would
+have changed places with her, added materially to her enjoyment.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was not that Harold Phipps was popular. She had to admit that he had
+more enemies than friends. But rumors of his wealth, his position, and
+his talent, together with his distinguished appearance, had made him the
+most sought after officer stationed at the camp. That he should have
+swooped down from his eagle flight with Uncle Ranny's sophisticated group
+to snatch her out of the pool of youthful minnows was a compliment she
+did not forget.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well,&#34; he said, lazily sinking into his corner of the car and observing
+her with satisfaction, &#34;haven't you something pretty to say to me, after
+I've come all these miles to hear it?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor laughed in embarrassment. It was much easier to say pretty things
+in letters than to say them face to face.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;There is one thing that I always have to say to you,&#34; she said, &#34;and
+that's thank you. These orchids are perfectly sweet, and the candy that
+came yesterday&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Was also <i>perfectly</i> sweet? Come, Eleanor, let's skip the
+formalities. Were you or were you not glad to see me?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why, of course I was.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, you didn't look it. I am not used to having girls treat me as
+casually as you do. How much have you missed me?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Heaps. How's the play coming on?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Marvelously! We've worked out all the main difficulties, and I signed up
+this week with a manager.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not <i>really</i>! When will it be produced?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Sometime in the spring. I go on to New York next month to make the final
+arrangements. When do you go?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't know that I am going. I'm trying my best to get grandmother's
+consent.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You must go anyhow,&#34; said Harold. &#34;I want you to have three months at
+the Kendall School, and then do you know what I am going to do?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What?&#34; she asked with sparkling eagerness.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am going to try you out in 'Phantom Love.' You remember you said if I
+wrote a part especially for you that nothing in heaven or earth could
+prevent your taking it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And <i>have</i> you written a part especially for me?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I certainly have. A young Southern girl who moves through the play like
+a strain of exquisite music. The only trouble is that the r&#244;le promises
+to be more appealing than the star's.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's the loveliest thing I ever heard of anybody doing!&#34; cried
+Eleanor, breathless with gratitude. &#34;Does Papa Claude know?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course he knows. We worked it out together. I am going to find him a
+small apartment, so he can be ready for you when you come. It shouldn't
+be later than November the first.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor wore such a look as Joan of Arc must have worn when she first
+heard the heavenly voices. Her shapely bare arms hung limp at her sides,
+and her white face, with its contrasting black hair, shone like a
+delicate cameo against the darkness.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Harold, leaning forward with elbows on his knees, kept lightly touching
+and retouching his mustache.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;In the first act,&#34; he continued softly, &#34;I've put you in the Red Cross
+Uniform&#8212;the little blue and white one, you know, that you used to break
+hearts in out at the camp hospital. In the second act you are to be in
+riding togs, smart in every detail, something very chic, that will show
+your figure to advantage; in the last act I want you exactly as you are
+this minute&#8212;this soft clingy gold gown, and the gold slippers, and your
+hair high and plain like that, with the band of dull gold around it. I
+wouldn't change an inch of you, not from your head to your blessed little
+feet!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As he talked Eleanor forgot him completely. She was busy visualizing the
+different costumes, even going so far as to see herself slipping through
+folds of crimson velvet to take insistent curtain calls. Already in
+imagination she was rich and famous, dispensing munificent bounty to the
+entire Martel family. Then a disturbing thought pricked her dream and
+brought her rudely back to the present. As long as her grandmother
+regarded her going to New York as a foolish whim, a passing craze, she
+might be wheedled into yielding; but at the first suggestion of a
+professional engagement, her opposition would become active and violent,
+Eleanor sighed helplessly and looked at Harold.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What shall I do if grandmother refuses to send me?&#34; she asked
+desperately.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You can let me send you,&#34; he said quietly. &#34;It's folly to keep up this
+pretense any longer, Eleanor. You love me, don't you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I&#8212;I like you,&#34; faltered Eleanor, &#34;better than almost anybody. But I am
+never going to marry; I don't think I shall ever care for anybody&#8212;that
+way.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He watched her with an amused practised glance. &#34;We won't talk about it
+now,&#34; he said lightly. &#34;We will talk instead of your career. You remember
+that night at Ran's when you recited for me? I can hear you now saying
+those lines:
+</p>
+
+<div class="poem">
+<div class="stanza">
+<p>'Or if thou think'st I am too quickly won</p>
+<p>I'll frown and be perverse, and say thee nay.'</p></div></div>
+
+<p class="noindent">
+For days I was haunted by the beauty and subtlety of your voice, the
+unconscious grace of your poses, your little tricks of coquetry, and the
+play of your eyebrows.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Did you really see all that in me the first night?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I saw more. I saw that, if taken in time, you were destined to be a
+great actress. I swore then and there that you should have your chance,
+and that I should be the one to give it to you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No. Don't answer me now. You are like a little bud that's afraid to open
+its petals. Once you get out of this chilling atmosphere of criticism and
+opposition, you will burst into glorious bloom.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But it would mean a terrible break with the family. I don't believe I
+can&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, you can. I know you better than you know yourself. If Madam
+Bartlett persists in refusing to send you to New York, you are going to
+be big enough to let me do it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He was holding her hand now, and talking with unusual earnestness.
+Eleanor thought she had never seen a greater exhibition of magnanimity.
+That he was willing to give all and ask for nothing, to be patient with
+her vacillations, and understand and sympathize with what everybody else
+condemned in her, touched her greatly. She turned to him impulsively.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll do whatever you say,&#34; she said. &#34;You and Papa Claude go ahead and
+make the arrangements, and I promise you I'll come.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Harold Phipps should have left it there; but Eleanor was never more
+irresistible than when she was in a yielding mood, and now, when she
+lifted starry eyes of gratitude, he tumbled off his pedestal of noble
+detachment, and drew her suddenly into his arms.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In an instant her soft mood vanished. She scrambled hastily to her feet
+and got out of the car.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am going in,&#34; she said abruptly. &#34;I'm cold.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Harold laughingly followed. &#34;Cold?&#34; he repeated in his laziest tone. &#34;My
+dear girl, you could understudy the North Pole! However, it was my
+mistake; I'm sorry. Shall we go in and dance?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For the next half-hour he and Eleanor were the most observed couple on
+the floor. The &#34;ubiquitous youngsters,&#34; seeing his air of proprietorship,
+forbore to break in, and it was not until the last dance that Pink
+Bailey, looking the immature college boy he was, presented himself
+apologetically to take Eleanor home.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Bring your car around, and she will be ready,&#34; said Harold loftily. Then
+he turned to Eleanor, &#34;I shall expect a letter every day. You must keep
+me posted how things are going.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+They were standing on the club-house steps now, and she was looking
+dreamily off across the golf links.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Did you hear me?&#34; he said impatiently.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, I was listening to the whip-poor-wills. They always take me back to
+Valley Mead. Write every day? Heavens, no. I hate to write letters.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But you'll write to me, you little ingrate! I shall send you such nice
+letters that you'll have to answer them.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A vagrant breeze, with a hint of autumn, blew Eleanor's scarf across his
+shoulder, and he tenderly replaced it about her throat.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Are you cold?&#34; he asked solicitously.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor, under cover of the crowd that was surging about them, felt a
+sudden access of boldness.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not so cold as some people think,&#34; she said mischievously; then, without
+waiting for further good-by, she sped down the steps and into the waiting
+car.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="23">CHAPTER 23</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+Of all the multitudinous ways in which Dan Cupid, Unlimited, does
+business, none is more nefarious than his course by correspondence. Once
+he has induced two guileless clients to plunge into the traffic of love
+letters, the rest is easy. Wild speculation in love stock, false
+valuations, hysterical desire to buy in the cheapest and sell in the
+dearest market, invariably follow. Before the end of the month Harold
+Phipps and Eleanor Bartlett were gambling in the love market with a
+recklessness that would have staggered the most hardened old speculator.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Harold, instead of being handicapped by his absence at the most critical
+point in his love affair, took advantage of it to exhibit one of his most
+brilliant accomplishments. He sent Eleanor a handsome tooled-leather
+portfolio to hold his letters, which he wrote on loose-leaf sheets and
+mailed unfolded. They were letters that deserved preservation, prose
+poems composed with infinite pains and copied with meticulous care. If
+the potpourri was at times redolent of the dried flowers of other men's
+loves, Eleanor was blissfully unaware of it. When he wrote of the
+lonesome October of his most immemorial year, or spoke of her pilgrim
+soul coming to him at midnight in the silence of the sleep-time, she
+thrilled with admiration for his genius.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Such literary masterpieces deserved adequate answers, and she found
+herself trying to make up in quantity what she lacked in quality. His
+letters always began, &#34;Dearest H&#233;lo&#239;se,&#34; or &#34;M&#233;lisande,&#34; or &#34;Baucis,&#34; or
+&#34;Isolde&#34;; and, rather than acknowledge her ignorance of these classic
+allusions, she looked them up and sent her answers to &#34;Dear Ab&#233;lard,&#34; or
+&#34;Pell&#233;as,&#34; or &#34;Philemon,&#34; or &#34;Tristan,&#34; as the case demanded. She indited
+her missives with a dainty gold pen engraved with an orchid, which Harold
+had requested her never to profane by secular use.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The correspondence, while throbbing with emotion, was not by any means
+devoid of practical details. Harold lost no opportunity of urging Eleanor
+to remain firm in her resolve to go to New York. It would be sheer folly,
+he pointed out, to give up the chance of a professional d&#233;but, a chance
+that might not come again in years. He pointed out that her grandfather
+had changed all his plans on the strength of her coming, and would be
+utterly heartbroken if she failed to keep her promise. He delicately
+intimated that her failure to take the part he had so laboriously written
+for her might seal the fate of &#34;Phantom Love&#34; and prove the downfall of
+both its creators.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+His conclusion to all these specious arguments was that the only way out
+of the tangle was for her to consent to a nominal engagement to him that
+would bind her to nothing, and yet would give him the right to send her
+to New York if Madam Bartlett refused to do so. In answer to Eleanor's
+doubts and misgivings, he assured her in polyphonic prose that he knew
+her far better than she knew herself, and that he would be &#34;content to
+wait at the feet of little Galatea, asking nothing, giving all, until the
+happy day when she should wake to life and love and the consciousness
+that she was wholly and happily his.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+And Galatea read his letters with increasing ardor and slept with them
+under her pillow. It was all so secret and romantic, this glorious
+adventure rushing to fulfilment, under the prosy surface of everyday
+life. Of course she did not want to be married&#8212;not for ages and ages;
+but to be engaged, to be indefinitely adored by a consummate lover like
+Harold Phipps, who so beautifully shared her ambition, was an exciting
+and tempting proposition. Like most girls of her type, when her personal
+concerns became too complex for reason, she abandoned herself to impulse.
+She merely shut her eyes and allowed herself to drift toward a
+destination that was not of her choosing. Like a peripatetic Sleeping
+Beauty, she moved through the days in a sort of trance, waiting
+liberation from her thraldom, but fearing to put her fate to the test by
+laying the matter squarely and finally before her grandmother.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was easy enough to drop out of her old round of festivities. She had
+been away all summer, and new groups had formed with which she took no
+trouble to ally herself. Her friends seemed inordinately young and
+foolish. She wondered how she had ever endured the trivial chatter of
+Kitty Mason and the school-boy antics of Pink Bailey and Johnnie
+Rawlings. After declining half a dozen invitations she was left in peace,
+free to devote all her time to composing her letters, to poring over
+plays and books about the theater, or to sitting listless absorbed in
+day-dreams.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The one old friend who refused to be disposed of was Quinby Graham. On
+one pretext or another he managed to come to the house almost every day,
+and he seldom left it without managing to see her. Sometimes when she was
+in the most arduous throes of composition, the maid would come to her
+door and say: &#34;Mr. Quin's downstairs, and he says can you come to the
+steps a minute&#8212;he's got something to show you?&#34; Or Miss Isobel would
+pause on the threshold to say: &#34;Quinby is looking for you, Eleanor. I
+think it is something about a new tire for your automobile.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+And Eleanor would impatiently thrust her letter into a desk drawer and go
+downstairs, where she would invariably get so interested in what Quin had
+to say to her or to show her that she would forget to come up again.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Sometimes they went out to Valley Mead together for week-ends. On those
+days Eleanor not only failed to write to Harold, but also failed to think
+about him. The excitement of seeing what new wonders had been wrought
+since the last visit, of scouring the woods for nuts and berries, of
+going on all-day picnics to a neighboring hill-top, made her quite forget
+her castles in the air. She descended from the clouds of art and under
+Quin's tutelage learned to fry chops and bacon and cook eggs in the open.
+She got her face and hands smudged and her hair tumbled, and she forgot
+all about enunciating clearly and holding her poses. So abandoned was she
+to what Harold called her &#34;bourgeois mood&#34; that she was conscious of
+nothing but the sheer joy of living.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Often when she and Quin were alone together, she longed to take him into
+her confidence. She was desperately in need of counsel, and his level
+head and clear judgments had solved more than one problem for her. But
+she realized that, in spite of the heroic effort he was making to keep
+within bounds, he was nevertheless liable to overflow into sentiment with
+the slightest encouragement. Confession of her proposed flight, moreover,
+involved an explanation of her relation to Harold Phipps, and upon that
+point Quin could not be counted to sympathize.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+With the first of November came a letter that brought matters to a
+crisis. Claude Martel wrote that he must know immediately the date of her
+arrival in New York, since the place he had bespoken for her at the
+Kendall School of Expression could no longer be held open; he must also
+give a definite answer about the apartment.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor received the letter one Saturday as she was starting to a tea.
+All afternoon she listened to the local chatter about her as a lark
+poised for flight might listen to the twittering of house sparrows. Her
+mind was in a ferment of elation and doubt, of trepidation and joyful
+anticipation. The moment she had longed for and yet dreaded was at hand.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Returning across Central Park in the dusk, she rehearsed what she was
+going to say to her grandmother. The moment for approaching her had never
+seemed more propitious. Ever since she had accepted Quin's advice and
+&#34;cottoned up&#34; to the old lady, relations between them had been amazingly
+amicable. Her willingness to stay at home in the evening and take Miss
+Enid's place as official reader and amanuensis had placed her in high
+favor, and Madam, not to be outdone in magnanimity, had allowed her many
+privileges.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Now that there seemed some ground for the hope that she might gain her
+grandmother's consent to the New York proposition, Eleanor realized how
+ardently she wanted it. It was not the money alone, it was her moral
+support and approval&#8212;hers and Aunt Isobel's. Aunt Enid would understand,
+had understood in a way; so would Uncle Ranny and Aunt Flo. As for Quin
+Graham&#8212;&#8212;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She heard a cough near by, and turning saw a couple sitting on a bench
+half hidden in the heavy shrubbery. Their backs were toward her, and she
+noticed that the girl's hand rested on the man's shoulder and that their
+heads were bent in intimate conversation. The next instant she recognized
+Rose Mattel's hat and the dim outline of Quin's troubled profile.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Turning sharply to the right, she hurried up through the pergola and out
+into the avenue. She wondered why she was so unaccountably angry. Rose
+and Quin had a perfect right to sit in the square at twilight and talk as
+much as they liked. It was not her business, anyhow, she told herself;
+she ought to be glad for poor Rose to have any diversion she could get
+after being in that hideous store all day. She didn't blame Rose one bit.
+But if Quin thought as much of somebody else as he pretended to, she
+couldn't see what he would have to say to another girl out here in the
+park at twilight, especially a girl that he saw three times a day at
+home! Could there be anything between them? She had scorned the idea when
+it was once tentatively suggested to her by Harold Phipps. Of
+<i>course</i> there couldn't. And yet&#8212;&#8212;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So preoccupied was she with these disturbing reflections that she almost
+forgot the real business in hand until she stood on her own doorstep
+waiting to be admitted.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Old Miss says for you to come up to her room the minute you git in,&#34;
+Hannah said, with an ominous note in her voice.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What's the matter, Hannah? Uncle Ranny?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Lord, no, honey! Mr. Ranny's behavin' himself like a angel. Hit was
+somethin' that come in the mail. Miss Isobel she don't know, and I don't
+know; but Old Miss certainly has got it in fer somebody.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor's new-found confidence promptly deserted her, and she hastily
+took stock of her own shortcomings. Of course she was writing daily to
+Harold, but the matter of her private correspondence had been threshed
+out during the summer and she had emerged battered but victorious. Aside
+from that, she could think of no probable cause she had given for
+offense.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In the hall she met Miss Isobel.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Mother has been asking for you, dear,&#34; she said in a voice heavy with
+premonition. &#34;She's very much upset about something.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor anxiously mounted the stairs. It was evidently not a propitious
+moment to present her case; and yet, Papa Claude must have an answer
+within twenty-four hours. At the door of Madam's room she hesitated. Then
+she took the small remnant of her courage in both hands and entered.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Madam was sitting at her desk under the crystal chandelier, with a
+severity of expression that suggested nothing less than a court martial.
+Without speaking she waved Eleanor to a seat, and began searching through
+her papers. The light fell full on her high white pompadour and threw the
+deep lines about her grim mouth into heavy relief.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you remember,&#34; she began ponderously, &#34;a check I gave you the day of
+Enid's wedding?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, grandmother.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, where is the bag you bought with it?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Evasion had so often been Eleanor's sole weapon of defense that she
+seized it now.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I&#8212;I haven't bought it yet,&#34; she faltered; then she added weakly: &#34;I
+haven't seen any I particularly cared about.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You still have the money?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well&#8212;I've spent some of it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How much?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't know that I remember exactly.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Madam's lip curled.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Perhaps I can stimulate your memory,&#34; she said, running her fingers
+through a bunch of canceled checks. &#34;Here is the check I gave you,
+indorsed to Rose Martel.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor flushed crimson. The imputation of untruthfulness was one to
+which she was particularly sensitive. Her fear of her grandmother had
+taught her early in life to take refuge in subterfuge, a shelter that she
+heartily despised but which she still clung to. In her desire to meet
+Rose's imperative need, she had passed her gift on to her, with the
+intention of saving enough from her own allowance to get the mesh bag
+later. The fact that the canceled check would be returned to her
+grandmother had never occurred to her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;So <i>that's</i> where my money has been going!&#34; cried Madam. &#34;They've
+succeeded in working me through you, have they? Just as they succeeded in
+working Ranny through Quinby Graham.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No&#8212;no, grandmother! Please listen! They have never asked me for a
+penny. But when I found out the terrible time they'd been having, the
+children sick all summer and Cass down with typhoid&#8212;why, if it hadn't
+been for Quin&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;So they sponged on him too, did they? He's a bigger fool than I gave him
+credit for being.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But they <i>didn't</i> sponge. He is Cass's best friend, and he was glad
+to help. He and Rose did all the nursing themselves.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, I heard about it. In the house alone for six weeks. That doesn't
+speak very well for her reputation.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Grandmother! You've no right to say that! Rose may talk recklessly and
+do foolish things, but she wouldn't do anything wrong for the world.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, if she did, she wouldn't be the first member of her family to
+compromise a man so that he had to marry her.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What do you mean?&#34; demanded Eleanor, quivering with indignation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's neither here nor there,&#34; said Madam. &#34;There's enough rottenness
+in the present without raking up the past. But one thing is certain: if
+they ask you for money again&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I tell you, they didn't ask me!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not in so many words, perhaps, but they worked on your sympathies. I
+know them! As for Claude Martel, he would want nothing better than have
+you traveling around in some Punch and Judy show. But I scotched that
+nonsense once and for all. As for their bleeding you for money,&#34;&#8212;she
+rose and crushed the check in her hand,&#8212;&#34;I guess I know a way to stop
+that.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor rose too, and faced her. She was very pale now, her anger having
+reached a white heat.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;My mother's people may be poor,&#34; she said deliberately, &#34;but they aren't
+beggars, and at least they've come by what they have honestly.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was Madam's turn to flinch. A certain famous law-suit in the history
+of Bartlett &#34; Bangs had brought out some startling testimony, and the
+subject was one to which reference was never allowed in Madam's presence.
+At Eleanor's words the whirlwind of her wrath let loose. Her words
+hurtled like flying missiles in a cyclone. She lashed herself into a
+fury, coming back to Eleanor again and again as the cause of all her
+trouble.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I tried giving you your head,&#34; she raged in conclusion; &#34;I let you work
+through that crazy stage fever; I gave in about that man Phipps coming up
+to Maine, in the hope that you'd find out what a fool he is. That wasn't
+enough! You had to write to him. Very well, said I; go ahead and write to
+him. I flattered myself that you might develop a little sense. But I was
+mistaken. You haven't got the judgment of a ten-year-old child. Therefore
+I intend to treat you like a child. From this time on you are not to
+write to him at all. And you'll get no allowance. I'll buy you what you
+need, and you'll account for all the pin-money you spend, down to every
+postage stamp. Do you understand?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor was by this time at the door, standing with her hand on the knob,
+straight, pale, and defiant, but quivering in every limb. She felt as
+beaten, bruised, and humiliated as if the violence directed against her
+had been physical. A sick longing surged over her for Aunt Enid, into
+whose arms she could rush for comfort. But there was no Aunt Enid to turn
+to, and it was no use seeking Aunt Isobel, whose sole advice in such a
+crisis was to apologize and propitiate.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Catching her breath in a long, sobbing sigh, Eleanor rushed down the
+gloomy hall and shut herself in her room. For ten minutes she sat at her
+desk, staring grimly at the wall, with her hands gripped in her lap. She
+was like a frenzied prisoner, determined to escape but with no
+destination in view. Suddenly her eyes fell on an unopened letter on her
+blotting-pad. She tore off the envelop and read it twice. For another
+five minutes she stared at the wall. Then she seized her pen and dashed
+off a note. It took but a few minutes after that to change her light gown
+for a dark one and to fling some things into a suit-case. Just as dinner
+was being announced, she slipped down the back stairs and out of the side
+door into the somber dusk of the November evening.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="24">CHAPTER 24</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+Quin's life at the factory these past three weeks had been full of new
+and engrossing business complications. Mr. Bangs seemed bent upon trying
+him out in various departments, each change bringing new and distracting
+duties. Just what was the object of the proceeding Quin had no idea; but
+he realized that he was being singled out and experimented with, and he
+applied to each new task the accumulated knowledge and experience of
+those that had gone before. It was all very exciting and gratifying to a
+person possessed of an inordinate ambition to have a worthy shrine ready
+the moment his goddess evinced the slightest willingness to occupy it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Old Iron Jaw's got his optic on you for something,&#34; said Miss Leaks, the
+stenographer. &#34;Maybe he wants you to pussy-foot around in Shields' shoes
+and do his dirty work for him.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, he's got another guess coming,&#34; said Quin; but her remark
+disturbed him. Of course it was no concern of his how the firm did
+business, but more than once he had been called upon to negotiate some
+delicate matter that was not at all to his liking.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;See here, young man,&#34; Mr. Bangs said upon one of these occasions, &#34;I am
+not paying you for advice. You are here to carry out my orders and to
+make no comments.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's all right,&#34; Quin agreed good-naturedly; &#34;but I got a conscience
+that was trained to stand on its hind legs and bark at a lie.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;The quicker you muzzle it the better,&#34; said Mr. Bangs. &#34;You can't do
+business these days by the Golden Rule.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On the Saturday when Eleanor saw Quin in the park with Rose Martel, the
+factory had been in the throes of one of its most violent upheavals. Some
+weeks before the old steam engine had been replaced by an expensive
+electric drive. There had been much interest manifested in the
+installation of the modern motor, and Quin, with his natural love of
+machinery, had rejoiced that his duties as shipping clerk required him to
+be present at the unpacking. He and Dirk, the foreman, never tired of
+discussing the perfection of each particular feature. But a few days
+after the departure of the installation foreman, the new motor burnt out,
+necessitating the shutting down of the factory and causing much
+inconvenience.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Dirk was beside himself with rage. He declared that something heavy had
+been dropped upon the armature winding, and he blamed every one who could
+have been responsible, and some who could not. In the midst of his tirade
+he was summoned to the office, where he was closeted for more than an
+hour with Mr. Bangs and Mr. Shields. When he emerged, it was with the
+avowed belief that the armature had been defective when received. This
+sudden change of front, taken in connection with the fact that the third
+payment was due on the motor in less than sixty days, set every tongue
+wagging.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin was in no way involved in the transaction; but, as usual, he had an
+emphatic opinion, which he did not hesitate to express.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't know what's got into Dirk!&#34; he said indignantly to Mr. Shields,
+the traffic manager, as they left the office together. &#34;He knows the
+injury to the armature was done in our shop and that we are responsible
+for it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I guess Dirk's like the rest of us,&#34; said Shields bitterly; &#34;he knows a
+lot he can't tell.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What do you mean? Do you think it was a frame-up?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, we don't call it that. But when the boss gets in a hole,
+somebody's got to pull him out. I'm getting mighty sick of it myself.
+Wish to the Lord I could pull up stakes as Mr. Bartlett and Mr. Chester
+did.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was not until they separated that Quin's thoughts left the disturbing
+events of the day and flew to something more pleasing. For two weeks now
+he had had to content himself with chance interviews with Eleanor, meager
+diet for a person with an omnivorous appetite; but to-night there was the
+prospect for a long, uninterrupted evening. Since the day of Miss Enid's
+wedding he had found her perplexed and absent-minded; but the fact that
+she always had a smile for him, and that nothing was seen or heard of
+Harold Phipps, sufficed to satisfy him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When he started across Central Park the sun was just setting, and he
+turned off the main path and dropped down on a bench to rest for a
+moment. He had acquired a taste for sunsets at a tender age, having
+watched them from many a steamer's prow. He knew how the harbor of
+Hongkong brimmed like a goblet of red wine, how Fujiyama's snow-capped
+peak turned rose, he knew how beautiful the sun could look through a
+barrage of fire. But it was of none of these that he thought as he sat on
+the park bench, his arms extended along the back, his long legs stretched
+out, and his eyes on a distant smokestack. He was thinking of a country
+stile and a girl in white and green, in whose limpid eyes he watched the
+reflected light of the most wonderful of all his sunsets.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For the third time since leaving the office, he consulted his watch.
+Six-thirty! Another hour and a half must be got through before he could
+see her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A rustle of leaves behind him made him look up, but before he could turn
+his head two hands were clapped over his eyes. Investigation proved them
+to be feminine, and he promptly took them captive.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's Rose?&#34; he guessed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Let me go!&#34; she laughed; &#34;somebody will see you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She slipped around the bench and dropped down beside him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I was coming out the avenue and spied you mooning over here by yourself.
+What's the trouble?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No trouble at all. Just stopped to get my wind a bit&#8212;and watch the
+sunset.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I think you are working too hard.&#34; She looked at him with anxious
+solicitude. &#34;I've a good notion to put you on buttermilk again.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Good work! Put me on anything you like except dried peaches and
+wienies.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And you need more recreation,&#34; Rose persisted. &#34;It's not good for
+anybody to work all day and go to school at night. What's the matter with
+us getting Cass and Fan Loomis and going down to Fontaine Ferry
+to-night?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Can't do it,&#34; said Quin with ill-concealed pride. &#34;Got a date with Miss
+Eleanor Bartlett.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Rose sat silent for a moment, stirring the dead leaves with her shabby
+boot; then she turned and laid her hand on his shoulder.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Quin,&#34; she said, &#34;I am worried sick about Nell and Harold Phipps.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin, who had been trying to beguile a squirrel into believing that a
+pebble was a nut, looked up sharply.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What do you mean?&#34; he said. &#34;She hasn't seen him since last summer, and
+she never mentions his name.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;<i>Don't</i> she? She hardly talks about anything else. She writes to
+him all the time and wears his picture in her watch!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you know that?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course I know it. She can't talk about him at home, so she pours it
+all out to me.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But haven't you told her what you know about him?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I've hinted at it, but she won't believe me because she knows I hate
+him. I wanted to tell her about what he said to me, and about that nurse
+he got into trouble out at the hospital; but I was afraid it might make
+an awful row and spoil everything for Papa Claude.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't care who it spoils things for! She's got to be told.&#34; Quin's
+eyes were blazing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But perhaps if we leave it alone he'll get tired of her. They say he
+keeps after a girl until he gets her engaged to him, then drops her.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He'd never drop Miss Nell. No man would. He'd be trying to marry her.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But what can we <i>do?</i> The more people talk about him, the more
+she's going to take up for him. That's Nell all over.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Couldn't Mr. Martel&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Papa Claude's as much taken in as she is. You remember the night over
+home when he talked about his lovely detached soul? He never sees the
+truth about anybody.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, he's going to see the truth about this. If you don't write to him
+to-night and tell him the kind of man Mr. Phipps is, I will!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Wait till to-morrow. I'll have another round with Nell. I've got some
+proof that I think she'll have to believe.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin rose restlessly. He wanted to go to the Bartletts' at once, if only
+to stand guard at the gate against the danger that threatened Eleanor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Aren't you coming home to supper?&#34; asked Rose.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No,&#34; he said absently; &#34;I don't want any supper.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For an hour he paced the streets, trying to think things out. His burning
+desire was to go straight to Eleanor and lay the whole matter before her.
+But according to his ethics it was a poor sport who would discredit a
+rival, especially on hearsay. He must leave it to Rose, and let her
+furnish the proof she said she possessed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At eight o'clock he rang the Bartletts' bell, and was surprised when Miss
+Isobel opened the door.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She isn't here,&#34; she said in answer to his inquiry. &#34;We cannot imagine
+what has become of her. She must have gone out just before dinner, and
+she has not returned.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Didn't she say where she was going?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No.&#34; Miss Isobel's lips worked nervously; then she drew Quin into the
+dining-room and closed the door, &#34;She and mother had a very serious
+misunderstanding, and&#8212;and I'm afraid mother was a little severe. I did
+not know Eleanor was gone until she failed to come down to dinner. I've
+just sent Hannah up to telephone my brother to see if she is there.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She probably is,&#34; Quin spoke with more assurance than he felt. &#34;About
+what time did she leave here?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It must have been between six-thirty and seven. How long would it take
+her to get out to Ranny's?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Depends on whether she went in her machine or a street-car,&#34; said Quin
+evasively. &#34;Besides, she may have gone to the Martels'.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't think so,&#34; said Miss Isobel, twisting her handkerchief in her
+slender fingers; &#34;because, you see, she&#8212;she took her suit-case.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For the first time, Quin's face reflected the anxiety of Miss Isobel's.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When Hannah returned she reported that no one answered the telephone at
+the Randolph Bartletts'.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Suppose the child gets there and nobody is at home!&#34; groaned Miss
+Isobel, whose imagination always rushed toward disaster. &#34;What on earth
+shall I do?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Leave it to me,&#34; said Quin. &#34;I'll run around to the Martels', and if
+she's not there I'll go out to Valley Mead. She's sure to be one place or
+the other.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course she must be; but I'm so anxious! You will go right away, won't
+you? And telephone the minute you find out where she is. Then I'll tell
+mother I gave her permission to go.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Isobel pushed him toward the door as she spoke:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You&#8212;you don't think anything dreadful could have happened to her, do
+you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin patted her shoulder reassuringly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course not,&#34; he blustered. &#34;She'll probably be in before I get around
+the corner. If not, I bet I find her at the Martels', toasting
+marshmallows.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In spite of his assumed confidence, he ran every step of the way home. As
+he turned the corner he saw with dismay that the house was dark. His call
+in the front hall brought no answer. He turned on the light, and saw an
+unstamped letter addressed to himself on the table. The fact that the
+writing was Eleanor's did not tend to decrease his alarm.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He tore off the envelop and read:
+</p>
+
+<div class="quote">
+<p class="noindent">
+<i>Dear Quin:</i>
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Grandmother has said things to me that I can never forgive as long as
+I live. I am leaving her house in a few moments forever. By the time
+you get this I shall be on my way to Chicago to join Harold Phipps.
+We have been engaged for two weeks. I did not mean to marry him for
+years and years, but I've simply <i>got</i> to do something. He cares
+more for me and my career than any one else in the world, and he
+understands me better than anybody.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+You'll get this when you go home to supper, and I want you to
+telephone Aunt Isobel right away and tell her I won't be home
+to-night. She will think I am with Rose and that will keep her from
+being anxious. I don't care how anxious grandmother is! To-morrow
+I'll send them a wire from Chicago telling them I'm married.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Dear Quin, I know this is a terribly serious step, and I know you
+won't approve; but I am unhappy enough to die, and I don't know where
+else to turn, or what to do. Some day I hope you will know Mr. Phipps
+better, and see what a really fine man he is. Do try to comfort Aunt
+Isobel, and make her understand. Please don't hate me, but try to
+forgive your utterly miserable friend,
+</p>
+
+<p class="noindent">
+E. M. B.
+</p></div>
+
+<p>
+Quin stood staring at the letter. He felt as he had on that August day
+when the flying shrapnel struck him&#8212;the same intense nausea, the deadly
+exhaustion, the bursting pain in his head. Involuntarily he raised his
+hand to the old wound, half expecting to feel the blood stream again
+through his fingers.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Married! Married!&#34; he kept repeating to himself dazedly. &#34;Miss Nell gone
+to marry that man, that scoundrel!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He sat down on the stair steps and tried to hold the thought in his mind
+long enough to realize it. But Phipps himself kept getting in the way:
+Phipps the slacker, as he had known him in the army; Phipps the
+condescending lord of creation, who had refused to take his hand at Mr.
+Ranny's; and oftenest of all Phipps the philanderer, who had insulted
+Rose Mattel, and been responsible for the dismissal of more than one
+nurse from the hospital. The mere thought of such a man in connection
+with Eleanor Bartlett made Quin's strong fingers clench around an
+imaginary neck and brought beads of perspiration to his forehead.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Something's got to be done!&#34; he thought wildly, staggering to his feet.
+&#34;I got to stop it; I got&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then the sense of his helplessness swept over him, and he sat down again
+on the steps. She had evidently left on the eight-o'clock train for
+Chicago, and it was now eight-thirty. There was nothing to be done. What
+a fool he had been to go on hoping and daring! She had told him again and
+again that she didn't care for him; but she had also told him that she
+did not intend to many anybody. But if she hadn't cared for him, why had
+she come to him with her troubles, and followed his advice, and wanted
+his good opinion? Why had she looked at him the way she had the day of
+Miss Enid's wedding, and said she remembered her dances with him better
+than those with anybody else? In bitterness of spirit he went over all
+the treasured words and glances he had hoarded since the day he met her.
+He didn't believe she loved Harold Phipps! She didn't love anybody&#8212;yet.
+But, in her mad desire to escape from home, she had taken the first means
+that presented itself. She had stepped into a trap, from which he was
+powerless to rescue her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In a sudden anguish of despair he flung himself face downward on the
+steps and gave way to his anguish. There was no one to see and no one to
+hear. All the doubts and discouragements, the humiliations and
+disappointments, through which he had passed to win her, came back to
+mock him, now he had lost her. The world had suddenly become an
+intolerable vacuum in which he gasped frantically for breath.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+What was the use in going on? Why not put an end to everything? He could
+make it appear an accident. Nobody would be the wiser. The temptation was
+growing stronger every second, when he suddenly remembered Miss Isobel.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I forgot she was waiting,&#34; he muttered, stumbling into the sitting-room
+and fumbling for the telephone. &#34;Miss Nell said I was to keep her from
+being anxious&#8212;she wanted me to comfort her. But what in hell can I say!&#34;
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="25">CHAPTER 25</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+At nine-thirty Edwin came in and passed up the creaking stairs. Ten
+minutes later Cass limped by the door, stopping a moment in the pantry to
+get a bite to eat. Quin sat motionless in the dark sitting-room and made
+no sign. He was waiting for Rose, with a dumb dependence the strongest
+man feels for the understanding feminine in times of crisis.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When he heard her cheerful voice calling good night to Fan Loomis, the
+clock was just striking ten.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Quin! What is it?&#34; she cried in alarm the moment she saw his face. &#34;Is
+anybody dead?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Worse! She's run away to get married!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not Myrna?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No. Miss Nell. She left to-night for Chicago to marry Phipps!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But she can't!&#34; cried Rose wildly. &#34;It's got to be stopped. He's not fit
+to marry anybody! We've got to stop her!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I tell you, it's too late! She left on the eight-o'clock train.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Who said so? Are you sure? Do the Bartletts know?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Nobody knows but you and me; nobody must know&#8212;yet. Maybe she'll change
+her mind.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But the Bartletts will miss her. Have they called up?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I 'phoned Miss Isobel that she was all right and she'd telephone in the
+morning. All right! Good God, Rose, can't we do something?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;If I could get Harold Phipps's address I'd send him a telegram that
+would scare the wits out of him.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin brushed the suggestion aside. &#34;It's no use wasting time on him;
+we've got to reach her.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But how can we? Let me think. Do you suppose I could send her a telegram
+to be delivered on the train? <i>Anything</i> that would make her wait
+until somebody could get to her.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll get to her,&#34; Quin cried. &#34;I'll search every hotel in Chicago. You
+send the telegram and I'll start on the next train.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A hurried consultation of time-tables showed that a Pennsylvania train
+left in ten minutes, and was due in Chicago the next morning at
+seven-thirty.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You can't make that,&#34; said Rose, but even as she spoke Quin was rushing
+for the door.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Have you got enough money?&#34; she called after him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+His meteor flight was checked. Ramming his hands in his pockets, he
+pulled out a handful of silver.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Wait!&#34; cried Rose, speeding up to her room and returning with a small
+roll of bills. &#34;It's what's left of Nell's check. Good-by&#8212;I'll send the
+telegram.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Ten minutes later, as the night express for Chicago pulled out of the
+station, the bystanders were amused by the sight of a bare-headed young
+man dashing madly through the gate and across the railroad tracks. The
+train had not yet got under way, but its speed was increasing and the
+runner's chances lessened every moment.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He'll never catch it,&#34; said the gate-keeper. &#34;He'd lost his wind before
+he got here.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He ain't lost his nerve,&#34; said a negro porter, craning his neck in
+lively interest. &#34;He's lettin' hisself go lak a Derby-winner on de home
+stretch!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Has he give up?&#34; asked the gate-keeper, turning aside to stamp a ticket.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not him. He's bound to ketch dat train ef it busts a hamstring. He's
+done got holt de rear platform! He's pullin' hisself up! There! I tole
+you so! I knowed he was the kind of fellow that gits what he goes after.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin caught the train, but he paid for his run. A brakeman found him
+collapsed on the platform, in such a paroxysm of coughing that the train
+had covered many miles before he was sufficiently recovered to go inside
+and take a seat. But, even as he leaned back limp and exhausted, he was
+conscious of a dull satisfaction that he was traveling toward Eleanor. He
+refused to think of the absurdity of his wild quest, of her probable
+anger at his interference. He fought back his despair, his jealousy, his
+inordinate fear. The one thing necessary now was to get to her&#8212;to be on
+hand in case she needed him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Through the interminable hours of the night almost every breath came with
+an effort, but he scarcely heeded the fact. With characteristic
+persistence he forced himself to follow her steps in imagination from the
+time she left home until she reached her destination. The eight-o'clock
+sleeper that she had taken was due in Chicago at five-thirty. She would
+probably not leave it before seven at the earliest, and by that time
+Rose's telegram ought to have reached her. He tried to picture its effect
+on her. Much would depend upon the time that intervened between its
+reception and her seeing Mr. Phipps. If he met her, as he probably would,
+he would sweep aside all her doubts. If, on the other hand, Eleanor had
+time to think the matter over, her innate common sense might make her
+wait at least until she heard what Rose had to tell her. On the bare
+chance of his not meeting her, what would she do? Take the next train
+home? Go to his apartment? Go to a hotel alone?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Plan after plan rushed through Quin's mind, only to be impatiently
+discarded. He sat tense and still, with his clenched hands rammed in his
+pockets and his eyes fixed on the black square of the window. Sometimes
+dim objects flew past, and now and then sharp, vivid lights stabbed the
+darkness. Once the smelting-pots of a huge iron foundry belched forth a
+circle of swirling flames, and for a moment wrenched his mind off his
+problems. Then the regular pounding of the wheels on the rails recalled
+him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She's gone to be married. Gone&#8212;to be married. Gone&#8212;to be married.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He realized that they had been saying it in monotonous rhythm ever since
+he started&#8212;that they would go on saying it through eternity.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Suddenly the train jarred to a standstill. Figures with lanterns emerged
+through a cloud of steam and stood under his window.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Guess we got a hot-box,&#34; said a sleepy passenger across the aisle. &#34;That
+means I'll miss my connection.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin got up and went out on the platform. He was filled with rage at the
+lazy deliberation with which the men set about their task. He longed to
+wrench the tools out of their hands and do the job himself.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How much will this put us behind?&#34; he demanded of the conductor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, not more than twenty minutes. We'll make some of it up before
+morning.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Once more under way, Quin dropped into a troubled sleep. He dreamed that
+he was pursuing a Hun over miles of barbed-wire entanglements; but when
+he overtook him and forced him to the ground, the face under the steel
+helmet was the smiling, supercilious face of Harold Phipps. He woke up
+with a start and stretched his cold limbs. The black square of the window
+had turned to gray; arrows of rain shot diagonally across it. He realized
+for the first time that he had neither hat nor overcoat, but he did not
+care. In ten minutes more he would be in Chicago, in the same city with
+Eleanor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Notwithstanding the fact that it was pouring rain when the train pulled
+into the station, Quin stood on the lowest step of the platform, ready to
+alight.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Say, young fellow, you forgot your hat,&#34; said a man behind him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Didn't have any,&#34; answered Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I got an extra cap if you want it,&#34; offered the man obligingly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin, already on the platform, caught it as the man tossed it out to him.
+Dashing through the depot, he hurled himself into a taxi.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Monon Station!&#34; he shouted, &#34;and drive like the devil.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Just what kind of chauffeur the devil is has never been demonstrated, but
+if that taxi-driver, urged on by Quin, was his counterpart, it is safe to
+infer that there are no traffic laws in Hades. In spite of the fact that
+the streets were like glass from the driving rain, and the wind-shield a
+gray blur, in spite of the fact that a tire went flat on a rear wheel,
+that decrepit old taxi rose to the occasion and made the transit in
+record time.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Arrived at the station, Quin thrust a bill into the driver's hand and
+dashed down the steps to the lower level. In answer to his frenzied
+inquiry he was told that the Express had come in two hours before and
+that the passengers had probably all left the sleeper by this time.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Nothing daunted, he rushed out to the tracks and accosted a porter who
+was sweeping out the rear coach.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yas, sir, this is it,&#34; answered the negro. &#34;Young lady? Yas, sir; there
+was five or six of 'em on board last night. Pretty? Yas, sir, they was
+all pretty&#8212;all but one, and she wasn't so bad looking.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Did one of them get a telegram in the night or this morning?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The porter's face brightened. &#34;Yas, sir. Boy come through soon as we got
+in. Had a wire for young lady in lower six.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you know what time she left the car?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;About half hour ago, I should say. Party she was expecting to meet her
+didn't turn up, and I had to git her a red-cap to carry her suit-case.
+Thanky, sir.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin tore back to the station and dashed through the waiting-room, the
+dining-room, the baggage-room. He was on the point of going out to the
+taxi-stand and interrogating each driver in turn, when his eyes were
+caught by a smart suit-case that lay unattended on one of the seats. It
+bore the inscription &#34;E.M.B.&#8212;Ky.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In his sudden relief he could have snatched it up and embraced it. But
+where was Eleanor? For five interminable minutes he stood guard over her
+property, watching every exit and entrance, and pacing the floor in his
+impatience. Suddenly an idea occurred to him, and, cursing himself for
+his stupidity, he strode over to the telephone-booths.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor was in the corner one, the receiver at her ear, evidently waiting
+for her call. As Quin flung upon the door she turned and faced him in
+defiant surprise.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What are you doing here?&#34; she demanded indignantly. &#34;Did grandmother
+send you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No; she doesn't know I'm here.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor turned nervously to the telephone.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Hello! I can't understand you. Put&#8212;what? Oh! I forgot. Wait a
+minute&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Letting the receiver swing, she fumbled in her purse; then, finding no
+small change, looked appealingly at Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He produced the necessary coin and handed it to her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't think I'd put it in just yet,&#34; he said quietly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For a moment she paused irresolute; then she dropped the coin in the
+slot.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Is this the Hotel Kington?&#34; she asked. &#34;Will you please try again to get
+Mr. Phipps&#8212;Harold Phipps? P-h-i-p-p-s.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin watched her fingers drumming on the shelf, and he knew he ought to
+go out of the booth and close the door; but instead he stayed in and
+closed it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He doesn't answer?&#34; Eleanor was repeating over the telephone. &#34;Will you
+please page the dining-room, and if he is not at breakfast send a
+bell-boy up to waken him? It's <i>very</i> important.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Again there was a long wait, during which Eleanor did not so much as turn
+her head in Quin's direction. It was only when her answer came that she
+looked at him blankly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;They say he isn't there. The chambermaid was cleaning the room, and said
+his bed had not been disturbed.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then, seeing a humorously unsympathetic look flit across Quin's face, she
+burst out angrily:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What right had you to follow me over here?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+They were standing very close in the narrow glass enclosure, and as he
+looked down at the small, trembling figure with her back against the wall
+and her eyes full of frightened defiance, he felt uncomfortably like a
+hunter who has run down some young wild thing and holds it at bay.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Please, Miss Nell,&#34; he implored, &#34;don't think I'm going to peach on you!
+Whatever you do, I'll stand by you. Only I thought, perhaps, you might
+need a friend.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I <i>have</i> a friend!&#34; she retorted furiously. &#34;If Harold Phipps had
+received my telegram last night, nothing in the world could have stopped
+him from meeting me&#8212;nothing!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then the defiance dropped from her eyes, leaving her small sensitive face
+quivering with hurt pride and an overwhelming doubt. She bit her lips and
+turned away to hide her tears.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin put a firm hand on her arm and piloted her back to her suit-case.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What we both need is breakfast,&#34; he said. &#34;Come to think of it, I
+haven't had a mouthful since yesterday noon.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Neither have I; but I couldn't swallow a bite. Besides, I've got to find
+Harold.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, you can't do anything till he gets back to the hotel. If you'll
+come in with me while I get a cup of coffee, we can talk things over.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She followed him reluctantly into the dining-room, but refused to order
+anything. For some time she sat with her chin on her clasped hands,
+watching the door; then she turned toward him accusingly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Did you see Rose's telegram?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He watched her open her purse and take out a yellow slip, which she
+handed to him.
+</p>
+
+<p class="quote">
+&#34;Don't take the step planned. Imperative reasons forbid. Rose.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p class="noindent">
+he read slowly; then he looked up. &#34;Well?&#34; he said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What does she mean?&#34; burst forth Eleanor. &#34;How dared she send me a
+message like that unless she knew something&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She broke off abruptly and her eyes searched Quin's face. But he was
+apparently counting the grains of sugar that were going into his coffee,
+and refused to look up.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;If it had been grandmother or Aunt Isobel I shouldn't have been in the
+least surprised; they are just a bunch of prejudices and believe every
+idle story they hear. But Rose is different. She's known about Harold and
+me for months. She forwarded his letters to me when I was in Baltimore.
+And now for her to turn against me like this&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why don't you wait till you hear her side of it?&#34; suggested Quin, still
+concerned with the sugar-bowl.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How can I?&#34; cried Eleanor, flinging out her hands. &#34;I've no place to go,
+and I've no money. If I had had money enough I'd have gone straight to
+Papa Claude last night.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's heart gained a beat. He made a hurried calculation of his
+financial resources in the vain hope that that might yet be the solution
+of the difficulty. Whatever was to be done must be done at once, for
+Harold Phipps might arrive at any moment, and Quin felt instinctively
+that his advent would decide the matter.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I wish I had enough to send you,&#34; he said, &#34;but all I've got is my
+return ticket and enough to buy another one for you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At the mere suggestion Eleanor's anger flared.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll never go back to grandmother's! I'll jump in the lake first!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What's the matter with Valley Mead?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What good would that do? Grandmother would make Uncle Ranny send me
+straight home. No; I've thought of all those things&#8212;it's no use.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You could go to the Martels'.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, and put another burden on Cass. I tell you, I'm not going home. I
+am going to see Harold, and&#8212;and talk things over, and perhaps go
+straight on to New York to-night.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You can't see him if he is out of town.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why do you think he is out of town?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, he isn't here,&#34; Quin observed dryly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The next moment he was sorry he had said it, for the light died out of
+her face and she looked so absurdly young and helpless that it was all he
+could do to refrain from gathering her up in his arms and carrying her
+home by force.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;See here, Miss Nell,&#34; he said earnestly, leaning across the table.
+&#34;Would you be willing to go back to the Martels' if you knew that this
+time next month you'd be in New York with money enough to carry you
+through the winter?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No. That is&#8212;whose money?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Your own. I'll go to Queen Vic and put the whole thing up to her so she
+can't get around it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor brushed the suggestion aside impatiently.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Don't you suppose I've exhausted every possible argument? And now, when
+she finds out what I've done&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But you haven't done anything&#8212;yet.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She wouldn't believe me if I told her that I hadn't seen Harold. She
+never believes me.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She'd believe <i>me</i>,&#34; said Quin, &#34;and what's more she'd listen to
+me.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor did not answer; she sat doggedly watching the swinging doors,
+through which a draggled throng came and went.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He'll be here soon,&#34; she said half-heartedly&#8212;&#34;unless he's gone off for
+a week-end somewhere. If he doesn't come soon we can go up to the hotel
+and find out whether he left any address. Perhaps you could get me a room
+there until to-morrow.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's courage was at its lowest ebb. It was like trying to save a
+drowning person who fights desperately against being saved. He heard a
+stentorian voice through a megaphone announcing that the eight-thirty
+train for the southwest would leave in five minutes on track three, and
+he decided to stake his all on a last chance.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's my train,&#34; he said, rising briskly. &#34;Are you coming with me, or
+are you going to stay here?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am going to stay. But you can't leave me like this! It's pouring rain
+and I haven't any umbrella, and if I get to the hotel and he isn't there,
+what shall I do? Why don't you help me, Quin? Why don't you stay with me
+till he comes?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Sorry,&#34; said Quin, steeling his heart against those appealing eyes and
+praying for strength to be firm, &#34;but I've got to be ready to go back to
+work to-morrow morning. Is it good-by?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He held out his hand, but she did not take it. Instead she clutched his
+sleeve.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What would <i>you</i> do, Quin?&#34; she asked. &#34;Tell me honestly, not what
+you want me to do, or think I ought to do, but what would you do in my
+place?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In spite of his pretended haste, he stopped to consider the matter.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well,&#34; he admitted frankly, &#34;it would depend entirely on how much I
+trusted the fellow I'd promised to marry.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I <i>do</i> trust him, and I'm going to marry him; but, you see, Rose's
+telegram, and his not being here, and all, have made me so unhappy! I
+know he can explain everything when I see him, only I don't know what to
+do now. Do you think I ought to go back?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's for you to decide.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I tell you I can't decide. Somebody's always made up my mind for me,
+and now to have to decide this big thing all in a minute&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;All aboard for the Southwestern Limited!&#34; came the voice through the
+megaphone.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor glanced instinctively at her suit-case, then up at Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Shall I take it?&#34; he asked, with his heart in his throat; and then, when
+she did not say no, he seized it in one hand and her in the other.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;We'd better run for it!&#34; he said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But, Quin&#8212;wait a minute&#8212;I won't go to grandmother's! You've got to
+protect me&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You leave it to me!&#34; he said, as he thrust her almost roughly through
+the crowd and rushed her toward the gate.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="26">CHAPTER 26</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+&#34;So I am to understand that the young lady defies my authority and
+refuses point-blank to come home.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's about what it comes to, I reckon.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was evening of that eventful Sunday when Eleanor and Quin had returned
+from Chicago. He and Madam Bartlett sat facing each other in the
+sepulchral library, where the green reading-light cast its sickly light
+on Lincoln and his Cabinet, on Andrew Jackson dying in the bosom of his
+family, on Madam savagely gripping the lions' heads on the arms of her
+mahogany chair.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+That her quarrel with Eleanor and the girl's subsequent flight had made
+the old lady suffer was evinced by the pinched look of her nostrils and
+the heavy, sagging lines about her mouth; but in her grim old eyes there
+was no sign of compromise.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Very well!&#34; she said. &#34;Let her stay at her precious Martels'. She will
+stand just about one week of their shiftlessness. I shan't send her a
+stitch of clothes or a cent of money. Maybe I can starve some sense into
+her.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin traced the pattern in the table-cover with a massive brass
+paper-knife. It was a delicate business, this he had committed himself
+to, and everything depended upon his keeping Madam's confidence.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You never did try letting her have her head, did you?&#34; He put the
+question as a disinterested observer.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No. I don't intend to until she gets this fool stage business out of her
+mind.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, of course you can hold that up for six months, but you can't stop
+it in the end.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, I can, too. I'd like to know if I didn't keep Isobel from being a
+missionary, and Enid from marrying Francis Chester when he didn't make
+enough money to pay her carfare.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's so,&#34; agreed Quin cheerfully. &#34;And then, there was Mr. Ranny.&#34; He
+waited for the remark to sink in; then he went on lightly: &#34;But say! They
+all belong to another generation. Things are run on different lines these
+days.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;More's the pity! Every little fool of a kite thinks all it has to do is
+to break its string to be free.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Miss Nell don't want to break the string; she just wants it lengthened.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Madam turned upon him fiercely.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;See here, young man. You think I don't know what you are up to; but,
+remember, I wasn't born yesterday. If Eleanor has sent you up here to
+talk this New York stuff&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She hasn't; I came of my own accord.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, you needn't think just because I've shown you a few favors that
+you can meddle in family affairs. It's not the first time you've attended
+to other people's business.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Her fingers were working nervously and her eyes beginning to twitch. She
+made Quin think of Minerva when Mr. Bangs came into the office.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I bet there's one time you are glad I meddled,&#34; he said with easy good
+humor. &#34;You might have been walking on a peg-stick, Queen Vic, if I
+hadn't butted in. Do you have to use your crutches now?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Crutches! I should say not. I don't even use a cane. See here!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She rose and, steadying herself, walked slowly and painfully to the door
+and back.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Bully for you!&#34; said Quin, helping her back into the chair. &#34;Now what
+were we talking about?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You were trying to hold a brief for Eleanor.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;So I was. You see, I had an idea that if you'd let me put the case up to
+you fair and square, maybe you'd see it in a different light.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, that's where you were mistaken.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How do you know? You haven't listened to me yet!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Madam glared at him grimly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Go ahead,&#34; he said. &#34;Get it out of your system.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, it's like this,&#34; Quin plunged into his subject. &#34;Next July Miss
+Nell will be of age and have her own money to do as she likes with, won't
+she?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She won't have much,&#34; interpolated Madam. &#34;Twenty thousand won't take
+her far.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It will take her to New York and let her live pretty fine for two or
+three years. Everybody will cotton up to her and flatter her and make her
+think she's a second Julia Marlowe, and meantime they'll be helping her
+spend her money. Now, my plan is this. Why don't you give her just barely
+enough to live on, and let her try it out on the seamy side for the next
+six months? Nobody will know who she is or what's coming to her, and
+maybe when she comes up against the real thing she won't be so keen about
+it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Madam followed him closely, and for a moment it looked as if the common
+sense of his argument appealed to her. Then her face set like a vise.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No!&#34; she thundered her decision. &#34;It would be nothing less than handing
+her over bodily to that pompous old biped Claude Martel! For the next six
+months she has got to stay right here, where I can know what she is doing
+and where she is!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you know where she was last night?&#34; Quin played his last trump.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She shot a suspicious look at him from under her shaggy brows.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You said she was at the Martels'.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I did not. I said she was all right and you'd hear from her to-day.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Where was she?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She was on the way to Chicago to join Mr. Phipps.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He could not have aimed his blow more accurately. Its effect was so
+appalling that he feared the consequences. Her face blanched to an ashy
+white and her eyes were fixed with terror.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She&#8212;she&#8212;hasn't married him?&#34; she cried hoarsely.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, no; not yet. But she may any time.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Good Lord! Why haven't you told me this before? Call Isobel! No! she's
+at church! Get Ranny! Somebody must go after the child!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin laid a quieting hand on her arm, which was shaking as if with the
+palsy.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Don't get excited,&#34; he urged. &#34;Somebody did go after her last night, and
+brought her home.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But where is she now? Where is that contemptible Phipps? I'll have him
+arrested! Are you sure Nellie is safe?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I left her safe and sound at the Martels' half an hour ago. Will you
+listen while I tell you all about it?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As quietly as he could he told the story, interrupted again and again by
+Madam's hysterical outbursts. When he had finished she struggled to her
+feet.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;The child is stark mad!&#34; she cried. &#34;I am going after her this instant.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She won't see you,&#34; warned Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll show you whether she sees me or not! I am going to bring her home
+with me to-night. She's got to be protected against that scoundrel. Ring
+for the carriage!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin did not move. &#34;She said if any of you started after her you'd find
+her gone when you got there.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But who will tell her?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I will. I promised she wouldn't have to see you. It was the only way I
+could get her back from Chicago.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She scowled at him in silence, measuring his determination against her
+own.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Very well,&#34; she said at last. &#34;Since you are in such high favor, go and
+tell her that she can come home, and nothing more will be said about it.
+I suppose there's nothing else to do under the circumstances. But I'll
+teach her a lesson later!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin balanced the paper-knife carefully on one finger.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't think you quite understand,&#34; he said. &#34;She isn't coming home.
+She still says she is going to marry Mr. Phipps. He will probably get her
+telegram when he goes to the hotel, and when she doesn't turn up in
+Chicago he will take the first train down here. That's the way I've
+figured it out.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And do you think I am going to sit here, and do nothing while all this
+is taking place?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No; that's what I been driving at all along. I want you and Miss Nell to
+come to some compromise before he gets here.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What sort of compromise? Haven't I swallowed my pride and promised to
+say nothing if she comes back? Does she want me to get down on my knees
+and apologize?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No. That's the trouble. She don't want you to do anything. All she is
+thinking about is getting married and going to New York.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She can go to New York without that! That contemptible man! I knew all
+summer he was filling her head with romantic notions, but I never dreamed
+of this. Why, she's nothing but a child! She doesn't know what love
+is&#8212;&#8212;&#34; Then her voice broke in sudden panic. &#34;We must stop it at any
+cost. Go&#8212;go promise her anything. Tell her I'll send her to New York, to
+Europe, anywhere to get her out of that wretch's clutches. My poor child!
+My poor baby!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Her grief was no less violent than her anger had been, and her tearless
+sobs almost shook her worn old frame to pieces.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin knew just how she felt. It had been like that with him last night
+when he heard the news. With one stride he was beside her and had
+gathered her into his arms.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;There, there!&#34; he said tenderly. &#34;It's going to be all right. We are
+going to find a way out.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This unexpected caress, probably the first one Madam had received in many
+years, reduced her to a state of unprecedented humility. She transferred
+her resentment from Eleanor to Harold Phipps, and announced herself ready
+to follow whatever course Quin suggested.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'd offer her just this and nothing more,&#34; he advised: &#34;The fare to New
+York, tuition at the dramatic school, and ten dollars a week.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She can't live on that.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, she can. Rose Martel does.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Madam became truculent at once.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Don't quote that girl to me. Eleanor's been used to very different
+surroundings.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's the point. Let her have what she hasn't been used to. You have
+tried giving her a bunch of your money and telling her how to spend it.
+Try giving her a little of her own and letting her do as she likes with
+it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't care what she does for the present, if she just won't marry that
+man Phipps. Make her give you her word of honor not to have anything
+whatever to do with him for the next six months. By that time she will
+have forgotten all about him.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll do my best,&#34; said Quin, rising. &#34;You'll hear from me first thing in
+the morning.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, go now! But ring first for Hannah. We must pack the child's things
+to-night. The main thing is to get her out of town before that hound can
+get here. Don't you think either Ranny or Isobel had better take her on
+to New York to-morrow?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin returned to the Martels' breathing easily for the first time in
+twenty-four hours. As he passed Rose's room on the way to his own, he saw
+a light over the transom, and heard the girls' voices rising in heated
+argument. He knew that the subject under discussion was Harold Phipps,
+and that Rose's arraignment was meeting with indignant denial and
+protest. But the fact that Rose could offer specific evidence that would
+shake the staunchest confidence gave him grim satisfaction.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He stumbled into his own small room, and lay across the bed looking up at
+the shadows made by the street lamp on the ceiling. Would Miss Nell
+believe what she heard? Would it go very hard with her? Would she give
+Phipps up? Would she accept Madam's offer? And, if she did, would she
+ever be willing to come home again?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then his thoughts swerved away from all those perplexing questions and
+went racing back over the events of the day. For nine blissful hours he
+had had Eleanor all to himself. They had taken a day-coach to avoid
+meeting any one she knew, and he had managed to secure a rear seat, out
+of the range of curious eyes. Here she had poured out all her troubles,
+allowing the accumulated bitterness of years to find vent in a torrent of
+unrestrained confidence.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She recalled the days of her unhappy childhood, when she had been fought
+over and litigated about and contended for, until the whole world seemed
+a place of hideous discord and petty jealousies. She pictured her
+circumscribed life at the Bartletts', shut in, watched over, smothered
+with care and affection, but never allowed an hour of freedom. She dwelt
+on the increasing tyranny of her grandmother, the objection to her
+friends, the ruthless handling of several prospective lovers. And she
+ended by telling him all about her affair with Harold Phipps, and
+declaring that nothing they could say or do would make her give him up!
+And then, quite worn out, she had fallen asleep and her head had drooped
+against his shoulder.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin could feel now the delicious weight of her limp body as she leaned
+against him. He had sat so still, in his fear of waking her, that his arm
+had been numb for an hour. Then, later on, when she did wake up, he had
+got her some cold water to bathe her face, and persuaded her to eat a
+sandwich and drink a glass of milk. After that she had felt much better,
+and even cheered up enough to laugh at the way he looked in the queer cap
+the obliging stranger had given him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I could make her happy! I know I could make her happy!&#34; he whispered
+passionately to the shadows on the ceiling. &#34;She don't love me now; but
+maybe when she gets over this&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+His thoughts leaped to the future. He must be ready if the time ever
+came. He must forge ahead in the next six months, and be in a position by
+the time Eleanor had tried out her experiment to put his fate to the
+test. He must make up to old Bangs, and stop criticizing his methods and
+saying things that annoyed him. He must sacrifice everything now to the
+one great object of pleasing him. Pleasing him meant advancement;
+advancement meant success; success might mean Eleanor!
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He got up restlessly and tiptoed to the door. The light over Rose's
+transom was gone and the house was silent.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="27">CHAPTER 27</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+Eleanor did not leave for New York the following day. Neither did she see
+Harold Phipps when he arrived on the morning train. His anxious inquiries
+over the telephone were met by Rose's cool assurance that Miss Bartlett
+was spending the week-end with her, and that she would write and explain
+her silly telegram. His demand for an immediate interview was parried
+with the excuse that Miss Bartlett was confined to her bed with a severe
+headache and could not see any one. Without saying so directly, Rose
+managed to convey the impression that Miss Bartlett was quite indifferent
+to his presence in the city and not at all sure that she would be able to
+see him at all.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This was an interpretation of the situation decidedly more liberal than
+the facts warranted. Even after Eleanor had been served with the
+unpalatable truth, generously garnished with unpleasant gossip, she still
+clung to her belief in Harold and the conviction that he would be able to
+explain everything when she saw him. Quin's report of Madam's offer to
+send her to New York was received in noncommittal silence. She would
+agree to nothing, she declared, until she saw Harold, her only concession
+being that she would stay in bed until the afternoon and not see him
+before evening.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+About noon a messenger-boy brought her a box of flowers and a bulky
+letter. The latter had evidently been written immediately after Harold's
+talk with Rose, and he made the fatal mistake of concluding, from her
+remarks, that Eleanor had changed her mind after sending the telegram and
+had not come to Chicago. He therefore gave free rein to his imagination,
+describing in burning rhetoric how he had received her message Saturday
+night just as he was retiring, how he tossed impatiently on his bed all
+night, and rose at dawn to be at the station when the train came in. He
+pictured vividly his ecstasy of expectation, his futile search, his
+bitter disappointment. He had dropped everything, he declared, to take
+the next train to Kentucky to find out what had changed her plans, and to
+persuade her to be married at once and return with him to Chicago. The
+epistle ended with a love rhapsody that deserved a better fate than to be
+torn into shreds and consigned to the waste-basket.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Tell the boy not to wait!&#34; was Eleanor's furious instruction. &#34;Tell him
+there's no answer now or ever!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then she pitched the flowers after the note, locked her door, and refused
+to admit any one for the rest of the day.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+After that her one desire was to get away. She felt utterly humiliated,
+disillusioned, disgraced, and her sole hope for peace lay in the further
+humiliation of accepting Madam's offer and trying to go on with her work.
+But even here she met an obstacle. A letter arrived from Papa Claude,
+saying that he would not be able to get possession of the little
+apartment until December first, a delay that necessitated Eleanor's
+remaining with the Martels for another month.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The situation was a delicate and a difficult one. Eleanor was more than
+willing to forgo the luxuries to which she had been accustomed and was
+even willing to share Rose's untidy bedroom; but the knowledge that she
+was adding another weight to Cass's already heavy burden was intolerable
+to her. To make things worse, she was besieged with notes and visits and
+telephone calls from various emissaries sent out by her grandmother.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll go perfectly crazy if they don't leave me alone!&#34; she declared one
+night to Quin. &#34;They act as if studying for the stage were the wickedest
+thing in the world. Aunt Isobel was here all morning, harping on my
+immortal soul until I almost hoped I didn't have one. This afternoon Aunt
+Flo came and warned me against getting professional notions in my head,
+and talked about my social position, and what a blow it would be to the
+family. Then, to cap the climax, Uncle Ranny had the nerve to telephone
+and urge me against taking any step that would break my grandmother's
+heart. Uncle Ranny! Can you beat that?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'd chuck the whole bunch for a while,&#34; was Quin's advice. &#34;Why don't
+you let their standards go to gallagher and live up to your own?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's what I want to do, Quin,&#34; she said earnestly. &#34;My standards are
+just as good as theirs, every bit. I've got terrifically high ideals.
+Nobody knows how serious I feel about the whole thing. It isn't just a
+silly whim, as grandmother thinks; it's the one thing in the world I care
+about&#8212;now.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin started to speak, reconsidered it, and whistled softly instead. He
+had formed a Spartan resolve to put aside his own claims for the present,
+and be in word and deed that &#34;best friend&#34; to whom he had urged Eleanor
+to come in time of trouble. With heroic self-control, he set himself to
+meet her problems, even going so far as to encourage her spirit of
+independence and to help her build air-castles that at present were her
+only refuge from despair.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Just think of all the wonderful things I can do if I succeed,&#34; she said.
+&#34;Papa Claude need never take another pupil, and Myrna can go to college,
+and Cass and Fan Loomis can get married.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And don't forget Rose,&#34; suggested Quin, to keep up the interest. &#34;You
+must do something handsome for her. She's a great girl, Rose is!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor looked at him curiously, and the smallest of puckers appeared
+between her perfectly arched brows. Quin saw it at once, and decided that
+Rose's recent handling of Mr. Phipps had met with disfavor, and he sighed
+as he thought of the hold the older man still had on Eleanor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+During the next difficult weeks Quin devoted all his spare time to the
+grateful occupation of diverting the Martels' woe-begone little guest.
+Hardly a day passed that he did not suggest some excursion that would
+divert her without bringing her into contact with her own social world,
+from which she shrank with aversion. On Sundays and half-holidays he took
+her on long trolley rides to queer out-of-the-way places where she had
+never been before: to Zachary Taylor's grave, and George Rogers Clark's
+birthplace, to the venerable tree in Iroquois Park that bore the carved
+inscription, &#34;D. Boone, 1735.&#34; One Sunday morning they went to Shawnee
+Park and rented a rowboat, in which they followed the windings of the
+Ohio River below the falls, and had innumerable adventures that kept them
+out until sundown.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor had never before had so much liberty. She came and went as she
+pleased; and if she missed a meal the explanation that she was out with
+Quin was sufficient. Sometimes when the weather was good she would walk
+over to Central Park and meet him when he came home in the evening. They
+would sit under the bare trees and talk, or look over the books he had
+brought her from the library.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At first she had found his selections a tame substitute for her recent
+highly spiced literary diet; but before long she began to take a languid
+interest in them. They invariably had to do with outdoor things&#8212;stars
+and flowers, birds and beasts, and adventures in foreign lands.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Here's a jim-dandy!&#34; Quin would say enthusiastically. &#34;It's all about
+bees. I can't pronounce the guy that wrote it, but, take it from me, he's
+got the dope all right.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was in the long hours of the day, when Eleanor was in the house alone,
+that she faced her darkest problems. She had been burnt so badly in her
+recent affair that she wanted nothing more to do with fire; yet she was
+chilled and forlorn without it. With all her courage she tried to banish
+the unworthy image of Harold Phipps, but his melancholy eyes still
+exercised their old potent charm, and the memory of his low, insistent
+tones still echoed in her ears. She came to the tragic conclusion that
+she was the victim of a hopeless infatuation that would follow her to her
+grave.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+So obsessed was she by the thought of her shattered love affair that she
+failed to see that a troubled conscience was equally responsible for her
+restlessness. Her life-long training in acquiescence and obedience was at
+grips with her desire to live her own life in her own way. She had not
+realized until she made the break how much she cared for the family
+approval, how dependent she was on the family advice and assistance, how
+hideous it was to make people unhappy. Now that she was about to obtain
+her freedom, she was afraid of it. Suppose she did not make good? Suppose
+she had no talent, after all? Suppose Papa Claude was as visionary about
+her career as he was about everything else? At such times a word of
+discouragement would have broken her spirit and sent her back to bondage.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Would you go on with it?&#34; she asked Quin, time and again.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Sure,&#34; said Quin stoutly; &#34;you'll never be satisfied until you try it
+out.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But suppose I'm a failure?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, then you've got it out of your system, and won't have to go
+through life thinking about the big success you'd have been if you'd just
+had your chance.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She was not satisfied with his answer, but it had to suffice. While he
+never discouraged her, she felt that he shared the opinion of the family
+that her ambition was a caprice to be indulged and got rid of, the sooner
+the better.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The first day of December brought word from Claude Martel that the
+apartment was ready. Eleanor left on twenty-four hours' notice, and it
+required the combined efforts of both families to get her off. She had
+refused up to the last to see her grandmother, but had yielded to united
+pressure and written a stiff good-by note in which she thanked her for
+advancing the money, and added&#8212;not without a touch of bitterness&#8212;that
+it would all be spent for the purpose intended.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Randolph Bartlett took her to the station in his car, and Miss Isobel met
+them there with a suit-case full of articles that she feared Eleanor had
+failed to provide.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I put in some overshoes,&#34; she said, fluttering about like a distracted
+hen whose adopted duckling unexpectedly takes to water. &#34;I also fixed up
+a medicine-case and a sewing basket. I knew you would never think of
+them. And, dear, I know how you hate heavy underwear, but pneumonia is so
+prevalent. You must promise me not to take cold if you can possibly avoid
+it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor promised. Somehow, Aunt Isobel, with her anxious face and her
+reddened eyelids, had never seemed so pathetic before.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll write to you, auntie,&#34; she said reassuringly; &#34;and you mustn't
+worry.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Don't write to me,&#34; whispered Miss Isobel tremulously. &#34;Write to mother.
+Just a line now and then to let her know you think of her. She's quite
+feeble, Nellie, and she talks about you from morning until night.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor's face hardened. She evidently did not enjoy imagining the nature
+of Madam's discourse. However, she squeezed Aunt Isobel's hand and said
+she would write.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then Quin arrived with the ticket and the baggage-checks, the train was
+called, and Eleanor was duly embraced and wept over.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;We won't go through the gates,&#34; said Mr. Ranny, with consideration for
+Miss Isobel's tearful condition. &#34;Quin will get you aboard all right.
+Good-by, kiddie!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor stumbled after Quin with many a backward glance. Both Aunt Isobel
+and Uncle Ranny seemed to have acquired haloes of kindness and affection,
+and she felt like a selfish ingrate. She looked at the lunch-box in her
+hand, and thought of Rose rising at dawn to fix it before she went to
+work. She remembered the little gifts Cass and Myrna and Edwin had
+slipped in her bag. How good they had all been to her, and how she was
+going to miss them! Now that she was actually embarked on her great
+adventure, a terrible misgiving seized her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Train starts in two minutes, boss!&#34; warned the porter, as Quin helped
+Eleanor aboard and piloted her to her seat.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You couldn't hold it up for half an hour, could you?&#34; asked Quin. Then,
+as he glanced down and met Eleanor's eyes brimming with all those recent
+tendernesses, his carefully practised stoicism received a frightful jolt.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As the &#34;All aboard!&#34; sounded, she clutched his sleeve in sudden panic.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, Quin, I know I'm going to be horribly lonesome and homesick. I&#8212;I
+wish you were going too!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;All right! I'll go! Why not?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But you can't! I was fooling. You must get off this instant!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;May I come on later? Say in the spring?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, yes! But get off now! Quick, we are moving!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She had almost to push him down the aisle and off the steps. Then, as the
+train gained speed, instead of looking forward to the wide fields of
+freedom stretching before her, she looked wistfully back to the
+disconsolate figure on the platform, and, with a sigh that was half for
+him and half for herself, she lifted her fingers to her lips and rashly
+blew him a good-by kiss.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="28">CHAPTER 28</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+That a&#235;rial kiss proved more intoxicating to Quin than all the more
+tangible ones he had ever received. It sent him swaggering through the
+next few months with his head in the air and his heart on fire. Nothing
+could stop him now, he told himself boastfully. Old Bangs was showing him
+signal favor, Madam Bartlett was his staunch friend, Mr. Ranny and the
+aunties were his allies, and even if Miss Nell didn't care for him yet,
+she didn't care for anybody else, and when a girl like Miss Nell looks at
+a fellow the way she had looked at him&#8212;&#8212;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At this rapturous point he invariably abandoned cold prose for poetry and
+burst into song.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Almost every week brought him a letter from Eleanor&#8212;not the romantic,
+carefully penned epistles she had indited to Harold Phipps, but hasty
+scrawls often dashed off with a pencil. In them she described her absurd
+attempts at housekeeping in the little two-room apartment; her absorbing
+experiences in the dramatic school; all the ups and downs of her
+wonderful new life. She was evidently enjoying her freedom, but Quin
+flattered himself that between the lines he could find evidences of
+discouragement, of homesickness, and of the coming disillusionment on
+which he was counting to bring her home when her six months of study were
+over.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was only when Rose read him Papa Claude's lengthy effusions that his
+heart misgave him. Papa Claude announced that Eleanor was sweeping
+everything before her at the dramatic school, where her beauty and talent
+were causing much comment, and that he had not been mistaken when he had
+foreseen her destiny, and, &#34;single-handed against the world,&#34; forced its
+fulfilment.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Usually, upon reading one of Papa Claude's pyrotechnical efforts, Quin
+went to see Madam Bartlett. After all, he and the old lady were paddling
+in the same canoe, and their only chance of success was in pulling
+together.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As the end of the six months of probation approached, Madam became more
+and more anxious. Ever since Eleanor's high-handed departure she had been
+undergoing a metamorphosis. Like most autocrats, the only things of which
+she took notice were the ones that impeded her progress. When they proved
+sufficiently formidable to withstand annihilation, she awarded them the
+respect that was their due. Eleanor's childish whim, heretofore crushed
+under her disapprobation, now loomed as a terrifying possibility. The
+girl had proved her mettle by living through the winter on a smaller
+allowance than Madam paid her cook. She had shown perseverance and pluck,
+and an amazing ability to get along without the aid of the family. In a
+few months she would be of age, and with the small legacy left her by her
+spendthrift father, would be in a position to snap her fingers in the
+face of authority.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;If it weren't for that fool Phipps I'd have her home in twenty-four
+hours,&#34; Madam declared to Quin. &#34;She'll be wanting to take a professional
+engagement next.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin tried to reassure her, but his words rang hollow. He too was growing
+anxious as the months passed and Eleanor showed no sign of returning. He
+longed to throw his influence with Madam's in trying to induce her to
+come back before it was too late. The only thing that deterred him was
+his sense of fair play to Eleanor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You let Miss Nell work it out for herself,&#34; he advised; &#34;don't threaten,
+her or persuade her or bribe her. Leave her alone. She's got more common
+sense than you think. I bet she'll get enough of it by May.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, if she doesn't, I'm through with her, and you can tell her so. I
+meant to make Eleanor a rich woman, but, mark my word, if she goes on the
+stage I'll rewrite my will and cut her off without a penny. I'll even
+entail what I leave Isobel and Enid. I'll make her sorry for what she's
+done!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But with the approach of spring it was Madam who was sorry and not
+Eleanor. Quin's sympathies were roused every time he saw the old lady.
+Her affection and anxiety fought constantly against her pride and
+bitterness. For hours at a time she would talk to him about Eleanor,
+hungrily snatching at every crumb of news, and yet refusing to pen a line
+of conciliation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;If she can do without me, I can do without her,&#34; she would say
+stubbornly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's business brought him to the Bartlett home oftener than usual these
+days. For twenty years Madam and Mr. Bangs, as partners in the firm of
+Bartlett &#34; Bangs, had tried to run in opposite directions on the same
+track, with the result that head-on collisions were of frequent
+occurrence. Since Randolph Bartlett's retirement from the firm, Quin had
+succeeded him as official switchman, and had proven himself an adept. His
+skill in handling the old lady was soon apparent to Mr. Bangs, who lost
+no time in utilizing it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+One afternoon in April, when Quin was busily employed at his desk, his
+eyes happened to fall upon a calendar, the current date of which was
+circled in red ink. The effect of the discovery was immediate. His
+energetic mood promptly gave way to one of extreme languor, and his gaze
+wandered from the papers in his hand across the grimy roof tops.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This time last year he and Miss Nell had made their first pilgrimage to
+Valley Mead. It was just such a day as this, warm and lazy, with big
+white clouds loafing off there in the west. He wondered if the peach
+trees were in bloom now, and whether the white violets were coming up
+along the creek-bank. How happy and contented Miss Nell always seemed in
+the country! She had never known before what the outdoor life was like.
+How he would like to take her hunting for big game up in the Maine woods,
+or camping out in the Canadian Rockies with old Cherokee Jo for a guide!
+Or better still,&#8212;here his fancy bolted completely,&#8212;if he could only
+slip with her aboard a transport and make a thirty days' voyage through
+the South Seas!
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was at this transcendent stage of his reveries that a steely voice at
+his elbow observed:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You seem to be finding a great deal to interest you in that smokestack,
+young man!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin descended from his height with brisk embarrassment.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Anything you wanted, sir?&#34; he asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Bangs looked about cautiously to make sure that nobody was in
+ear-shot, then he said abruptly:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I want you to come out to my place with me for overnight. I want to talk
+with you.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's amazement at this request was so profound that for a moment he did
+not answer. Surmises as to the nature of the business ranged from summary
+dismissal to acceptance into the firm. Never in his experience at the
+factory had any employee been recognized unofficially by Mr. Bangs. To
+all appearances, he lived in a large limousine which deposited him at the
+office at exactly eight-thirty and collected him again on the stroke of
+four. Rumor hinted, however, that he owned a place in the suburbs, and
+that the establishment was one that did not invite publicity.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Very well, sir,&#34; said Quin. &#34;What time shall I be ready?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;We will start at once,&#34; said Mr. Bangs, leading the way to the door.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+On the drive out, Quin's efforts at conversation met with small
+encouragement. Mr. Bangs responded only when he felt like it, and did not
+scruple to leave an observation, or even a question, permanently
+suspended in an embarrassing silence. Quin soon found it much more
+interesting to commune with himself. It was exciting to conjecture what
+was about to happen, and what effect it would have on his love affair. If
+he got a raise, would he be justified in putting his fate to the test?
+All spring he had fought the temptation of going to New York in the hope
+that by waiting he would have more to offer. If by any miracle of grace
+Miss Nell should yield him the slightest foothold, he must be prepared to
+storm the citadel and take possession at once.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The abrupt turn of the automobile into a somber avenue of locusts
+recalled him to the present, and he looked about him curiously. Mr. Bangs
+had not been satisfied to build his habitation far from town; he had
+taken, the added precaution to place it a mile back from the road. It was
+a somewhat pretentious modern house, half hidden by a high hedge. The
+window-shades were drawn, the doors were closed. The only signs of life
+about the place were a porch chair, still rocking as if from recent
+occupation, and a thin blue scarf that had evidently been dropped in
+sudden flight.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Bangs let himself in with a latch-key, and led the way into a big
+dreary room that was evidently meant for a library. A handsome suite of
+regulation mahogany furniture did its best to justify the room's claim to
+its title, but rows of empty bookshelves yawned derision at the pretense.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Bangs lit the electrolier, and, motioning Quin to a chair, sat down
+heavily. Now that he had achieved a guest, he seemed at a loss to know
+what to do with him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you play chess?&#34; he asked abruptly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I can play 'most anything,&#34; Quin boasted. &#34;Poker's my specialty.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For an hour they bent over the chess-board, and Quin was conscious of
+those piercing black eyes studying him and grimly approving when he made
+a good play. For the first time, he began to rather like Mr. Bangs, and
+to experience a thrill of satisfaction in winning his good opinion.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Only once was the game interrupted. The colored chauffeur who had driven
+them out came to the door and asked:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Shall I lay the table for two or three, sir?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Bangs lifted his head long enough to give him one annihilating
+glance.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I have but one guest,&#34; he said significantly. &#34;Set the table for two.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The dinner was one of the best Quin had ever tasted, and his frank
+enjoyment of it, and franker comment, seemed further to ingratiate him
+with Mr. Bangs, who waxed almost agreeable in discussing the various
+viands.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+After dinner they returned to the library and lit their cigars, and Quin
+waited hopefully.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This time he was not to be disappointed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Graham,&#34; said Mr. Bangs, &#34;what salary are you drawing?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;One hundred and fifty, sir.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How long have you been at the factory?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;A year last February.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not so long as I thought. You are satisfied, I take it?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin saw his chance and seized it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's all right until I can get something better.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Bangs relit his cigar, and took his time about it. Then he blew out
+the match and threw it on the floor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am looking for a new traffic manager,&#34; he said.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What's the matter with Mr. Shields?&#34; Quin inquired in amazement.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I have fired him. He talks too much. I want a man to manage traffic, not
+to superintend a Sunday-school.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But Mr. Shields has been there for years!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's the trouble. I want a younger man&#8212;one who is abreast of the
+times, familiar with modern methods.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's heart leaped within him. Could Mr. Bangs be intimating that he,
+Quinby Graham, with one year and four months' experience, might step over
+the heads of all of those older and more experienced aspirants into the
+empty shoes of the former traffic manager?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The South Seas seemed to flow just around the corner.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I have been considering the matter,&#34; continued Mr. Bangs, catching a
+white moth between his thumb and forefinger and taking apparent pleasure
+in its annihilation, &#34;and I've decided not to get a new man in for the
+summer, but to let you take the work for the present and see what you can
+do with it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's joy was so swift and sudden that even the formidable banks of Mr.
+Bangs's presence could not keep it from overflowing.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I can handle it as easy as falling off a log!&#34; he cried excitedly. &#34;I
+know every State in the Union and then some. Of course, I hate to see old
+Shields go, but he <i>is</i> a slow-coach. I'll put it all over him!
+You'll see if I don't!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am not so sure about that,&#34; said Mr. Bangs. &#34;Shields had the sense to
+do what he was told without arguing the matter.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin laughed joyously. &#34;Right you are!&#34; he agreed. &#34;I'd have come out of
+the service with a couple of bars on my shoulders if I hadn't argued so
+much. I don't know what gets into me, but when I see a better way of
+running things I just have to say so.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, I don't want you to say so to me,&#34; warned Mr. Bangs. &#34;There are
+certain business methods that we've got to observe, whether we like them
+or not. Take the matter of listing freight, for instance. That's where
+Shields fell down. He knows perfectly well that there isn't a successful
+firm in the country that doesn't classify its stuff under the head that
+calls for the lowest freight rates.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How do you mean?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Bangs proceeded to explain, concluding his remarks with the
+observation that you couldn't afford to be too particular in these
+matters.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But it is beating the railroads, isn't it?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;The railroads can afford it. They lose no chance to gouge the
+manufacturers. It's like taxes. The government knows that everybody is
+going to dodge them, and so it allows for it. Nobody is deceived, and
+nobody is the worse for it. Human nature is what it is, and you can't
+change it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Does the traffic manager have to classify the exports?&#34; Quin asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Certainly; that and routing the cars is his principal business. It's a
+difficult and responsible position in many ways, and I have my doubts
+about your being able to fill it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I can fill it all right,&#34; said Quin, as confidently as before, but with
+a certain loss of enthusiasm. Upon the shining brows of his great
+opportunity he had spied the incipient horns of a dilemma.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For the next two hours Mr. Bangs explained in detail the duties of the
+new position, going into each phase of the matter with such efficient
+thoroughness that Quin forgot his scruples in his absorbed interest in
+the recital. It was no wonder, he said to himself, that Mr. Bangs was one
+of the most successful manufacturers in the South. A man who was not only
+an executive and administrator, but who could make with his own hands the
+most complicated farming implement in his factory, was one to command
+respect. Even if he did not like him personally, it was a great thing to
+work under him, to have his approval, to be trusted by him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When Quin went up to his room at eleven o'clock, his head was whirling
+with statistics and other newly acquired facts, which he spent an hour
+recording in his note-book.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was not until he went to bed and lay staring into the darkness that
+the mental tumult subsided and the moral tumult began. The questions that
+he had resolutely kept in abeyance all evening began to dance in impish
+insistence before him. What right had he to take Shields's place, when he
+had said exactly the things that Shields had been fired for saying? Did
+he want to go the way Shields had gone, compromising with his conscience
+in order to keep his job, ashamed to face his fellow man, cringing,
+remorseful, unhappy?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then Mr. Bangs's arguments came back to him, specious, practical,
+convincing. Business was like politics; you could keep out if you didn't
+like it, but if you went in you must play the game as others played it or
+lose out. Five hundred a month! Why, a fellow wouldn't be ashamed to ask
+even a rich girl to marry him on that! The thought was balm to his pride.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As he lay there thinking, he was conscious of a disturbing sound in the
+adjoining room, and he lifted his head to listen. It sounded like some
+one crying&#8212;not a violent outburst, but the hopeless, steady sobbing of
+despair. His thoughts flew back to that blue scarf on the porch, to the
+inquiry about an extra seat at the table. They were true, then, those
+rumors about the lonely, unhappy woman whom Mr. Bangs had kept a virtual
+prisoner for years. Quin wondered if she was young, if she was pretty. A
+fierce sympathy for her seized him as he listened to her sobs on the
+other side of the wall. What a beast a man was to put a woman in a
+position like that!
+</p>
+
+<p>
+His wrath, thus kindled, threw Mr. Bangs's other characteristics into
+startling relief. He saw him at the head of his firm, hated and despised
+by every employee. He saw him deceiving Madam Bartlett, sneering at Mr.
+Ranny's efforts at reform, terrorizing little Miss Leaks. Then he had a
+swift and relentless vision of himself in his new position, a well
+trained automaton, expected to execute Mr. Bangs's orders not only in the
+factory but in the Bartlett household as well.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He tossed restlessly on his pillow. If only that woman would stop crying,
+perhaps he could get a better line on the thing! But she did not stop,
+and somehow while she cried he could see nothing good in Bangs or what he
+stood for. Hour after hour his ambition and his love fought against his
+principles, and dawn found him still awake, staring at the ceiling.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Going back to town after an early breakfast, he said to Mr. Bangs:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I've been thinking it over, sir, and if you don't mind I think I'll keep
+the position I've got.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What do you mean?&#34; demanded Mr. Bangs. &#34;You decline the promotion?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am afraid I am not the man for the job,&#34; said Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's for me to decide.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin was visibly embarrassed. After his enthusiasm of the night before,
+his present attitude called for an explanation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, you see,&#34; he said awkwardly, &#34;it may be good business and all
+that, but there are some things a fellow can't do when he feels about
+them the way I do.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Meaning, I suppose, that your standards are so much higher than those of
+the rest of us that you cannot trade in the market-place?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, sir; I don't mean anything of the kind,&#34; Quin flashed back, hot at
+the accusations of self-righteousness, but unable to defend himself
+without criticizing his employer.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And this is final? You've definitely decided?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I have.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Very well; I am through with you.&#34; And Mr. Bangs unfolded his newspaper
+and read it the rest of the way to the city.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At the office door he was dismounting from the car with his silence still
+unbroken, when Quin asked nervously:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Shall I go on with my old job, sir?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Mr. Bangs wheeled upon him, his eyes like fiery gimlets.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No!&#34; he thundered. &#34;You needn't go on with anything! For six months I
+have wasted time trying to teach you something about business. I've
+pushed you along faster than your ability warranted. I've given you a
+chance to quadruple your salary. And what is the result? You give me a
+lot of hot air about your conscience. Why don't you get a soap-box and
+preach on the street-corners? You can draw your money and go. There is no
+room on my pay-roll for angels!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+And, with a contemptuous shrug, he passed into the factory, leaving Quin
+standing dazed and appalled on the sidewalk.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="29">CHAPTER 29</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+As long as a man can see his goal shining, however faint and distant, he
+will steer his craft with tolerable reason and patience; but let the
+beacon-light be extinguished, and he promptly abandons reason and rashly
+trusts to instinct to guide him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin, who had resolutely kept his course as long as he had been sure of
+his steady progress toward success, lost his head completely at this
+sudden collapse of his hopes, and took the first train for New York. A
+sudden mad necessity was upon him to see Eleanor at once. One look of
+encouragement, one word of hope from her, and he would rush back to port
+and gladly begin the voyage all over again.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He arrived at the Eighty-second Street apartment about six o'clock in the
+evening, and, after studying the dingy name-plates, took the five flights
+of stairs with uncommendable speed, and presented himself at the rear
+door on the sixth floor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As he waited for an answer to his ring, he wondered if he had not made a
+mistake about the name on the door-plate. The narrow dark hall, permeated
+with a smell of onions and cabbage, was all too familiar to him, but it
+was not at all the proper setting for Eleanor. His bewilderment increased
+when the door was opened by a white-aproned figure, who after a moment of
+blank amazement seized his hand in both of hers and pressed it
+rapturously.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At least, that was what Quin imagined took place; but when, a moment
+later, he sat opposite a composed young lady who had removed her impulse
+with her apron, he knew that he must have been mistaken. She was still
+his adored Miss Nell, but with a difference that carried her leagues away
+from him. He knew how to cope with the hot-headed, rebellious Miss Nell;
+with the teasing, indifferent, provocative Miss Nell; and even with the
+disconsolate little Miss Nell who had wept against his shoulder coming
+home from Chicago. But in the presence of this beautiful, grown-up,
+self-contained young lady he felt thoroughly awkward and ill at ease. Had
+it not been for the warmth of her smile and the eagerness with which she
+plied him with questions, his courage would have failed him utterly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Now tell me all about everything!&#34; she urged. &#34;You are the first human
+being I've seen from home for four mortal months. How's everybody at
+grandmother's? Has Aunt Enid come home? How are Rose and the children?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;One at a time!&#34; protested Quin. &#34;Tell me first about yourself. What sort
+of a place is this you are living in?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You mustn't criticize our suite!&#34; she said gaily. &#34;This is a combination
+bedroom, dining-room, and kitchen. I am the cook and housemaid, and Papa
+Claude is the butler. You ought to see the way I've learned to cook on
+the chafing-dish!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin was not in the least interested in her culinary accomplishments. It
+offended his sense of the proprieties to see his divinity reduced to such
+necessities, and he did not at all approve of her surroundings.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;When are you coming home?&#34; he asked abruptly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor's eyes dropped.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That depends. I may be here all summer. I've had an engagement offered
+me.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's hands grew cold. &#34;You don't mean that you're going to act for
+<i>pay</i>?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course. Why not? That's what I've been working for.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I thought when you tried it out that you would change your
+mind&#8212;that you wouldn't like it as much as you thought you would.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I <i>do</i>. I adore it! Nothing on earth can ever make me give it
+up!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's heart sank. &#34;But I thought you'd had enough,&#34; he said. &#34;I thought
+you were homesick and lonesome.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Who wouldn't have been? Look at the way they have treated me at home? Do
+you know, none of them ever write to me any more?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin tried not to look guilty, but the fact that he had counseled this
+course of discipline weighed upon him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Haven't I written enough for the family?&#34; he asked.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But she was not to be put off.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;They treat me as if I had done something disgraceful!&#34; she said
+indignantly. &#34;My allowance is just half what it used to be, and yet I
+have to pay all my own expenses. As for clothes, I never was so shabby in
+my life. But I can stand that. It's grandmother's silence that I resent.
+How can she pretend to care for me when she ignores my letters and treats
+me with perfect indifference?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Hurt pride quivered through the anger in her voice, and she looked at
+Quin appealingly. Stung by his silence, she burst out afresh:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Doesn't she ever ask about me? Has she let me go for good and all?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Wasn't that what you wanted?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You <i>know</i> it wasn't! I did everything to get her consent. I'd&#8212;I'd
+give anything now if she would look at things differently. Do you think,
+when she finds out that I am actually on the stage, that she will ever
+forgive me&#8212;that she will ever want me to come home again?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+That was the moment when Quin should have delivered Madam's ultimatum;
+but, before he had the chance, a key was turned in the lock, and the next
+instant Claude Martel's effulgent presence filled the room.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For a moment he stood poised lightly, consciously, his cane and gloves in
+one hand, and his soft felt hat turned gracefully across the other. On
+his ankles were immaculate white spats, and in his buttonhole blossomed
+the inevitable rose.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Quinby Graham!&#34; he cried in accents of rapture. &#34;My Cassius's beloved
+Quin! <i>My</i> beloved Quin! What happy fortune blew you hither? But no
+matter. You are here&#8212;you are ours. Eleanor and I are going out to a
+studio party at a dear, dear friend's. You shall accompany us!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, no, Papa Claude,&#34; protested Eleanor. &#34;Quin doesn't want to go to
+Miss Linton's messy old party. Neither do I. You go and leave us here.
+There are a million things I want to ask him.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But Papa Claude would not consider it. &#34;You can ask them to-morrow,&#34; he
+said. &#34;To-night I claim you both. We will introduce Quinby as one of the
+gallant heroes of the Great War. I shall tell his story&#8212;no&#8212;he shall
+tell it! Come, put on your hat, Eleanor; we must start at once.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But here! Hold on!&#34; protested Quin, laughing and freeing himself from
+Papa Claude's encircling arm, &#34;I'm not fixed to go to a party, and I
+haven't got any story to tell. I'll clear out and come back to-morrow.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, no!&#34; protested Eleanor and Papa Claude in a breath, and after a
+brief struggle for supremacy the latter triumphantly continued:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I promise you shall say nothing, if you prefer it. Modesty is
+gallantry's crowning grace. But you <i>must</i> accompany us. My heart is
+set upon it. Eleanor darling, here's your wrap. Come, Quinby, my boy!&#34;
+And the dynamic little gentleman hooked an arm through each of theirs
+and, in spite of their protests, bore them triumphantly down the stairs
+and off to the party.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was not until they had boarded a crowded downtown car and found
+themselves wedged in the aisle that Quin and Eleanor managed to have
+another word alone.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's a shame we had to come!&#34; she pouted, looking up at him from under a
+tilted hat-brim that supported three dangling cherries.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Where are we going?&#34; he asked, thrilled by the discovery that her lips
+and the cherries matched.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;To a studio party down in Washington Square. Papa Claude is trying to
+get Estelle Linton to play the lead in 'Phantom Love.' You always meet
+all sorts of freaks at her parties.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I didn't come to New York to meet freaks.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What did you come for?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Shall I tell you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course&#8212;why not?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You want to know? Right now?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He was looking at her with an expression that was never intended to be
+worn in a public conveyance, and the thin-faced Polish woman on whose
+toes they were all but standing looked at them with such lively
+comprehension that Eleanor felt called upon to assume her most haughty
+and dignified manner for the rest of the way.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Linton's party was in full swing when they arrived. It was an
+extremely hilarious party, the interest centering about a fat man in a
+dress-suit, with a bath towel around his waist, who was attempting to
+distil a forbidden elixir from an ingenious condenser of his own
+invention.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The studio, under a grimy skylight, was cluttered with bric-&#224;-brac,
+animate and inanimate. A Daibutsu in a gilded shrine dominated one
+corner, and a handsome woman in a Manchu coat and swinging ear-rings of
+jade held court in another. At sight of the Martel group she laid down
+the small silver pipe she was smoking, and swam toward them through a
+cloud of incense and tobacco smoke.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Dear old C. M.! Bless his heart!&#34; she cried, kissing Papa Claude
+effusively. Then she nodded good-naturedly to Eleanor, and held out a
+welcoming hand to Quin.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Who is this nice boy?&#34; she asked, her languid black eyes sweeping his
+face.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Allow me to present ex-Sergeant Quinby Graham,&#34; said Papa Claude
+impressively&#8212;&#34;a soldier of whom his friends and his country have every
+reason to be proud.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then, to Quin's utter chagrin, he was conscious of the fact that Papa
+Claude was giving, in an audible aside, an account of his prowess that
+placed him second only to another sergeant whom the world acclaimed its
+chief hero.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;For the Lord's sake, head him off!&#34; he whispered in an agony of
+embarrassment to Eleanor. &#34;I didn't do half those things he's telling
+about, and besides&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But it was too late to interfere. Papa Claude, the center of one animated
+group after another, was kissing his way through the crowd, whispering
+the news as he went&#8212;that the guest of the evening was no other than the
+distinguished young Graham whom they all doubtless remembered, etc.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Within fifteen minutes Quin found himself the lion of the evening. Even
+the fat man and his improvised still were eclipsed by the
+counter-attraction. His very earnestness in disclaiming the honors thrust
+upon him added enormously to his popularity. The more clumsy and awkward
+he was, and the more furiously he blushed and protested, the more
+attention he received.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;So na&#239;f!&#34; &#34;So perfectly natural!&#34; &#34;Nothing but a boy, and yet think what
+he has done!&#34; were phrases heard on every side.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Papa Claude corralled him in the corner with the Daibutsu and pompously
+presented each guest in turn. Quin felt smothered by the incense and the
+flattery. His collar grew tight, perspiration beaded his brow, and he
+began to cough.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Effects of mustard-gas,&#34; Papa Claude explained in a stage whisper.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For seeming hours the agony endured, until the advent of refreshments
+caused a momentary diversion, and he made a hasty bolt for Eleanor and
+freedom.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He found her sitting on the divan, looking rather bored by the attentions
+of a stout elderly person with small porcine eyes and a drooping black
+mustache. Without troubling to apologize, Quin interrupted the
+conversation to say abruptly:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Miss Nell, I am going.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor started to rise, but the red-faced one lifted a protesting voice.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;See here, young man,&#34; he blustered. &#34;You can't run off with this little
+girl just when I've got my first chance at her this evening. She's going
+to stay right here and let me make love to her&#8212;isn't she?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He turned a confident eye upon Eleanor, and even ventured to lay a plump
+detaining finger on her cool, slim wrist.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor rose instantly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I thought you were never coming!&#34; she said impatiently over the stout
+man's head, &#34;I've been ready to go for an hour!&#34;
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="30">CHAPTER 30</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+Down in the open square, under the clear cool stars, they looked at each
+other and laughed.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Lead me to a bus!&#34; cried Quin. &#34;I want to ride on top of it where the
+wind can blow through my whiskers. My head feels like a joss-house!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, but you were funny!&#34; cried Eleanor. &#34;I wish you could have seen your
+face when all those women swarmed around you. I was afraid you were going
+to jump out of the window! Did you ever feel anything so hot and stuffy
+as that room? And weren't they all silly and make-believe?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin gave a mighty sigh of relief at being out of it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Is this the sort of thing you get let in for often?&#34; he inquired,
+aghast.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oftener than I like. You see, all those people are Papa Claude's old
+friends, and he's been having a lovely time showing me off as he showed
+you off to-night.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But you surely don't <i>like</i> it?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Of course I don't. And they know it. They are already calling me a prig,
+and poking fun at me for not smoking and for not liking to have my hands
+patted and my cheeks pinched. Isn't it funny, Quin? At home I was always
+miserable because there were too many barriers; I wanted to tear them all
+down. Here, where there aren't any, I find myself building them up at
+every turn, and getting furious when people climb over them.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Bartlett <i>versus</i> Martel, eh?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I suppose so. Heaven knows, I wish I were one thing or the other.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, I don't know,&#34; said Quin. &#34;You are pretty nice just as you are.&#34;
+Then he added inconsequently: &#34;Who was that fat man you were talking to
+when I came up?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Mr. Pfingst. He is Estelle Linton's backer.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Backer?&#34; queried Quin. Then, when he saw Eleanor's eyes drop, he added
+vaguely: &#34;Oh! I see!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For the next block, strange to say, he did not think so much about
+Eleanor as he did about Miss Isobel Bartlett. The whole situation kept
+presenting itself through her austere eyes, and instinctively he put a
+protecting hand on Eleanor's elbow.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When at last they were on top of the bus, with the big, noisy city
+apparently going in the opposite direction, they promptly forgot all
+about the studio party and plunged headlong into their own important
+affairs.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Begin at the <i>very</i> beginning,&#34; commanded Eleanor, settling herself
+for a good long ride; &#34;I want you to tell me everything.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The beginning and the end and all that lay between them could easily have
+been compassed in three words by Quin. But there were things he had
+pledged himself to tell her before he even broached the subject that was
+shrieking for utterance. With painstaking exactness he set forth the
+facts that led up to his dismissal, trying to be fair to Mr. Bangs as
+well as to himself, and, above all, to claim no credit for taking the
+stand he had.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But Eleanor would not see it thus. With characteristic fervor she
+espoused his cause. She declared he had been treated outrageously. He
+ought to have taken the matter straight to her grandmother. The very
+idea! After all the work he had done at the factory, for him to be
+dismissed just because he wouldn't do a thing that he considered
+dishonorable! She <i>hated</i> Mr. Bangs&#8212;she always had hated him; and
+the more she dwelt upon the fact, the more ardently she approved Quin's
+course.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It was perfectly splendid of you to refuse his offer!&#34; she cried, and
+her eyes blazed with that particular ray of feminine partisanship that is
+most soothing to the injured masculine. &#34;And you won't lose by it in the
+long run. You'll get another position right off. Why don't you try to get
+one here in New York?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Would you like me to?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I should say I should! Then we could do all sorts of jolly things
+together. Not studio parties or cabarets, but jolly outdoor things like
+we used to do at home. Do stay, Quin; won't you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She was looking up at him with such frank urgency and such entire
+sympathy that Quin lost his head completely.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Miss Nell,&#34; he blurted out, &#34;if I stay and get a job and make good, will
+you marry me?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor, who was used to much more subtle man&#339;uvers, was caught
+unaware by this sudden attack. For a second she was thrown into
+confusion; then she rallied all her forces for the defense.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why, of course I won't!&#34; she said&#8212;then added with more conviction: &#34;I
+am not going to marry <i>anybody</i>&#8212;not for years and years.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I'll wait years and years,&#34; persisted Quin eagerly. &#34;I wouldn't
+marry any girl until I could take care of her. But if you'll just give me
+a tip that maybe some day perhaps&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was very difficult to go on addressing his remarks to an impassive
+classic profile&#8212;so difficult, in fact, that he abandoned the effort and
+let his eyes say the rest for him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor stirred uneasily.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I <i>wish</i> you wouldn't be foolish, Quin, and spoil all our fun. I've
+told you I mean to go on the stage for good and all. You know you
+wouldn't want an actress for a wife.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'd want you, whatever you were,&#34; he said with such fervor that she
+rashly gave him her luminous eyes again in gratitude.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He made the most of the opportunity thus offered.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Honest, now!&#34; he boldly challenged her. &#34;You can't deny that you love me
+just a little bit, can you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She stared straight ahead of her down the long dim avenue, making no
+response to his question. The cherries that swung from her hat-brim
+stirred not a hair's-breadth, but the commotion their stillness caused in
+Quin's heart was nothing short of cyclonic.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;More than when you left Kentucky?&#34; he persisted relentlessly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This time a barely perceptible nod stirred the cherries.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;There!&#34; he said triumphantly. &#34;I knew it! Just keep right on the way you
+are going, and I won't say a word!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I haven't given you any encouragement; you mustn't think I have.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I know it. But you haven't turned me down.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At this she smiled at him helplessly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You are not very easy to turn down, Quin.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No,&#34; he admitted; &#34;it can't be done.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+At this moment the bus rounded a sharp corner without slowing up, and the
+passengers on top were lurched forward with such violence that at least
+one masculine arm took advantage of the occasion to clasp a swaying lady
+with unnecessary solicitude. It may have been a second, and it may have
+been longer, that Quin sat with his arm about Eleanor and his hand
+clasping hers. Time and space ceased to exist for him and blessed
+infinity set in. And then&#8212;&#8212;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Good gracious!&#34; she cried, starting up. &#34;Where are we? I'd forgotten all
+about our cross-street.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As a matter of fact they were in Harlem.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+All the way back Eleanor refused to be serious about anything. The
+mischievous, contradictory, incalculable little devil that always lurked
+in her took full possession. She teased Quin, and laughed at him, leading
+him on one minute and running to cover the next.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When they reached the apartment, she tripped up the five flights as
+lightly as a bird, and Quin, in his effort to keep up with her, overtaxed
+himself and paid the penalty. Heart and lungs were behaving outrageously
+when he reached the top landing, and he had to steady himself by the
+banister.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, Quin, I ought to have remembered!&#34; Eleanor cried, with what he
+considered divine compassion. &#34;I can't bear to hear you cough like that!
+It sounds as if it were tearing you to pieces.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's nothing!&#34; said Quin, struggling to get his breath. &#34;I'll be all
+right in a minute. What's the box by the door?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor's glance followed his.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;If that old walrus, Pfingst, has dared to send me flowers again!&#34; she
+cried, pouncing on the card and holding it so they both could read it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Penciled in small, even lines were the words:
+</p>
+
+<p class="quote">
+Sorry to find the lady-bird flown. Will call up in the morning. H. P.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Even in the dimly lighted hall, Quin could see the flush that suffused
+Eleanor's face.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's Harold Phipps,&#34; she said, trying to be casual. &#34;I&#8212;I didn't know he
+was in town.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin followed her into the apartment, and stood dully by the table as she
+untied the box and lifted half a dozen exquisite white orchids from their
+bed of maidenhair ferns. Then, trying very hard to keep his voice steady,
+he asked gently:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What does this mean, Miss Nell? I thought you weren't going to have
+anything more to do with that man.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, I haven't. That is, not&#8212;not until he came on last month to see
+about the play.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;What play?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;'Phantom Love.'&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But why did you have to see him?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Because I am to be in the play.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not in <i>his</i> play?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No more his than Papa Claude's.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's face darkened.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I saw him for only a few minutes,&#34; Eleanor went on, &#34;and Papa Claude was
+with us. I give you my word, Quin, I've never spoken to him alone, or
+answered one of his letters.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Then he has been writing to you? What business has he got worrying you
+with letters and flowers when you have told him you are through with
+him?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In spite of his effort to keep calm, there was a rising note of anger in
+his voice.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He is not worrying me,&#34; said Eleanor, evidently conscious of her
+weakness in admitting Harold at the window of friendship when she had
+banished him from the door of love. &#34;He understands perfectly that
+everything is over between us. But it would be silly for us to refuse to
+speak to each other when we shall necessarily be thrown together a lot.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Thrown together? How do you mean?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;At rehearsals.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you mean he is to be here in New York?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes&#8212;after next month. He has given up his position in Chicago, so he
+can devote all the time to the play. You see, he not only helped to write
+it, but he is financing it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;So he is the&#8212;backer?&#34; Quin was scarcely responsible for what he said,
+so suddenly had disaster trodden on the heels of ecstasy.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;He is Papa Claude's partner and producer,&#34; said Eleanor with dignity.
+&#34;If I don't care anything for him, I don't see what harm there is in
+seeing him.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not liking whisky won't keep it from going to your head,&#34; said Quin
+stubbornly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That's perfect nonsense; and besides, what can I do? It's his play as
+well as ours. I can't ask him to stay away from rehearsals.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No; but you can stay away yourself. You don't have to be in this play.
+Something else will turn up. You can afford to wait.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But that's just the point&#8212;I can't! And, besides, think how silly and
+childish it would be for me to refuse a wonderful chance for a
+professional d&#233;but that might not come again in years.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But don't you see, Miss Nell, you are in honor bound not to go on with
+this?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Honor bound? How do you mean?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why, to Queen Vic.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I agreed to break my engagement with Harold Phipps and not to answer any
+of his letters. I've kept my promise.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes; but I thought, and I made her think, that you agreed not to see him
+or have anything to do with him for six months.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, the time will be up in six weeks.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Lots can happen in six weeks.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+If Quin had been wise he would have taken another tack; but, in his
+earnest effort to make her see her duty to Madam, he failed to press his
+own more personal claims, and thus lost his one chance of reaching her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor understood impulse, emotion, but she would not listen to reason.
+The mere mention of Madam's name stirred up a whirlwind that snuffed out
+any love-lights that might have been kindling. She stood with her back to
+the table, twisting Harold Phipps's card in her fingers, and she looked
+at Quin suspiciously.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Did grandmother send you up here to see if I was keeping my word?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She did not. She doesn't know I am here.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Then it's just <i>you</i> who don't trust me?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, I don't think you are playing quite fair,&#34; admitted Quin bluntly,
+&#34;either to Queen Vic or to me.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And I suppose you propose to go back and tell her so?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I propose nothing of the kind. It's up to you whether we both keep our
+word, or whether we both break it. You know what I think, and you see the
+position I am in.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I can settle that,&#34; said Eleanor with spirit. &#34;I can write home to-night
+and tell them what I intend to do. That will exonerate you, if that is
+what you are after.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It <i>isn't</i> what I am after, and you know it! For God's sake, Miss
+Nell, be fair! You know you can't go on with this thing without starting
+up the old trouble with Mr. Phipps.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But, I tell you, I <i>can</i>. I can control the situation perfectly.
+Why can't you trust me, Quin?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't trust <i>him</i>. He's got ways of compromising a girl that you
+don't know anything about. If he ever gets wind of your going to
+Chicago&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I wish you wouldn't throw that up to me!&#34; There was real anger in her
+voice, which up to now had shown signs of softening. &#34;Just because I
+happened to me a fool once, it doesn't follow that I'll be one again! It
+won't be pleasant for me, but I am not going to let his connection with
+'Phantom Love' spoil my chance of a lifetime.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And he will be at all the rehearsals, I suppose, and up here in the
+apartment between-times.&#34; Quin's jealousy ran through him like fire
+through dry stubble. &#34;You'll probably be seeing him every day.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And what if I do?&#34; demanded Eleanor. &#34;I have told you our relations are
+strictly professional.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That card looks like it,&#34; said Quin bitterly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor tossed the object referred to in the trash-basket and looked at
+him defiantly. The very weakness of her position made her peculiarly
+sensitive to criticism, and the fact that her mentor was her one-time
+slave augmented her wrath.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;See here, Miss Nell.&#34; Quin came a step closer, and his voice was husky
+with emotion. &#34;I know how keen you are about the stage; but, take it from
+me, you are making a wrong start. If you'll just promise to wait until
+your time is up&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I won't promise anything! What's the use? Nobody believes me. Even you
+are siding with grandmother and suspecting me of breaking my word. I
+don't intend to submit to it any longer!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Queer, spasmodic movements were going on in Quin's lungs, and he
+controlled his voice with difficulty.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You mean you are going on seeing Mr. Phipps and letting him send you
+flowers and things?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am <i>not</i>!&#34; Eleanor cried furiously. &#34;But, if I should, it's
+nobody's business but my own!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For an agonizing moment they faced each other angrily, both of them lost
+in the labyrinth of their own situation. At the slightest plea for help
+on her part, Quin would have broken through his own difficulties and
+rushed to her rescue. He would even have offered to plead her cause again
+at the family tribunal. But she was like a wilful child who is determined
+to walk alone on a high and dangerous wall. The very effort to protect
+her might prove disastrous.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;If that's the case,&#34; said Quin, with his jaw thrust out and his nostrils
+quivering, &#34;what do you want me to do?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't care what you do!&#34; Eleanor flung back&#8212;&#34;just so you leave me
+alone.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Without a word, he picked up his hat and strode out of the apartment and
+down the stairs. At every landing he paused, hoping against hope that she
+might call him back. Even at the door he paused, straining his ears for
+the faintest whisper from above. But no sound broke the stillness, and
+with a gesture of despair he flung open the door and passed out into the
+darkness.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="31">CHAPTER 31</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+When an extremely energetic person has spent eighteen months making
+connections with a family, he does not find it easy to sever them in a
+day. Quin's announcement that he was going to leave the Martels met with
+a storm of protest. He had the excellent excuse that when Cass married in
+June there would be no room for him, but it took all his diplomacy to
+effect the change without giving offense. Rose was tearful, and Cass
+furious, and a cloud of gloom enveloped the little brown house.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+With the Bartletts it was no easier. On his return from New York he had
+found three notes from them, each of which requested an immediate
+interview. Madam's stated that she had heard of his dismissal from the
+factory and that she was ready to do battle for him to the death.
+&#34;Geoffrey Bangs got rid of Ranny,&#34; she wrote, &#34;and now he thinks he can
+ship you. But I guess I'll show him who is the head of the firm.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The second note was from Miss Isobel and was marked &#34;Confidential.&#34; In
+incoherent sentences it told of a letter just received from Eleanor, in
+which she announced that she was planning to make her professional d&#233;but
+in July, and that as Mr. Phipps was connected with the play in which she
+was to appear, she felt that she could accept no further favors from her
+grandmother. Miss Isobel implored Quin to come at once and advise her
+what to do about telling Madam, especially as they were leaving for Maine
+within the next ten days.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The third delicately penned epistle was a gentle effusion from Miss Enid,
+who was home on a visit and eager to see &#34;dear Quin, who had been the
+innocent means of reuniting her and the dearest man in all the world.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was these letters that put Quin's desire for flight into instant
+action. He must go where he would not be questioned or asked for advice.
+The mere mention of Eleanor's name was agony to him. It contracted his
+throat and sent the blood pounding through his veins. His hurt was so
+intolerable that he shrank from even a touch of sympathy. Perhaps later
+on he would be able to face the situation, but just now his one desire
+was to get away from everything connected with his unhappiness.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In beating about in his mind for a temporary refuge, he remembered a
+downtown rooming-house to which he had once gone with Dirks, the foreman
+at Bartlett &#34; Bangs. Here he transferred his few possessions, and
+persuaded Rose to tell the Bartletts that he had left town for an
+indefinite stay. This he hoped would account for his absence until they
+left for their summer vacation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The ten weeks that followed are not pleasant ones to dwell upon. The
+picture of Quin tramping the streets by day in a half-hearted search for
+work, and tramping them again at night when he could not sleep, of him
+lying face downward on a cot in a small damp room, with all his
+confidence and bravado gone, and only his racking cough for company, are
+better left unchronicled.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He fought his despair with dogged determination, but his love for Eleanor
+had twined itself around everything that was worth while in him. In
+plucking it out he uprooted his ambition, his carefully acquired
+friendships, his belief in himself, his faith in the future. For eighteen
+months he had lived in the radiance of one all-absorbing dream, with a
+faith in its ultimate fulfilment that transcended every fear. And now
+that that hope was dead, the blackness of despair settled upon him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+That fact that Eleanor had broken faith with him, that she was willing to
+renew her friendship with Harold Phipps when she knew what he was, that
+she was willing to give up friends and family and her inheritance for the
+sake of being with him, could have but one explanation.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin used to tell himself this again and again, as he lay in the hot
+darkness with his hands clasped across his eyes. He used it as a whip
+with which to scourge any vagrant hopes that dared creep into his heart.
+Hadn't Miss Nell told him that she didn't care what he said or did, just
+so he left her alone? Hadn't she let him come away without expressing a
+regret for the past or a hope for the future?
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But, even as his head condemned her, his heart rushed to her defense.
+After all, she had never said she cared for him. And why should she care
+for a fellow like him, with no education, or money, or position? Even
+with her faults, she was too good for the best man living. But she cared
+for Harold Phipps&#8212;and with that bitter thought the turmoil began all
+over again.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He was not only unhappy, but intolerably lonely and ill. He missed Rose
+and her care for him; he missed Cass's friendship; he missed his visits
+to the Bartletts; and above all he missed his work. His interest still
+clung to Bartlett &#34; Bangs, and the only times of forgetfulness that he
+had were when he and Dirks were discussing the business of the firm.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+What made matters worse was the humid heat of the summer. A low
+barometer, always an affliction to him, in his present nervous state was
+torture. Night after night he lay gasping for breath, and in the morning
+he rose gaunt and pale, with hollow rings under his eyes. Having little
+desire for food, he often made one meal a day suffice, substituting
+coffee for more solid food.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This method of living could have but one result. By the middle of July he
+was confined to his bed with a heavy bronchial cold and a temperature
+that boded ill. Once down and defenseless, he became a prey to all the
+feminine solicitude of the rooming-house. The old lady next door pottered
+in and out, putting mustard plasters on his chest and forgetting to take
+them off, and feeding him nauseous concoctions that she brewed over a
+coal-oil stove. A woman from upstairs insisted on keeping his window and
+door wide open, and trying cold compresses on his throat. While the
+majorful mother of six across the hall came in each night to sweep the
+other two out, close the window and door, and fill the room with
+eucalyptus fumes.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin let them do whatever they wanted. The mere business of breathing
+seemed to be about all he could attend to these days. The only point on
+which he was firm was his refusal to notify his friends or to have a
+doctor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll be all right when this beastly weather lets up,&#34; he said to Dirks
+one Sunday night. &#34;Is there any sign of clearing?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not much. It's thick and muggy and still raining in torrents. I wish
+you'd see a doctor.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Pride kept Quin from revealing the fact that he had no money to pay a
+doctor. Five weeks without work had completely exhausted his exchequer.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'm used to these knockouts,&#34; he wheezed with assumed cheerfulness one
+Sunday night. &#34;It's not half as bad as it sounds. I'll be up in a day or
+so.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Dirks was not satisfied. His glance swept the small disordered room, and
+came back to the flushed face on the pillow.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Don't you want some grub?&#34; he suggested. &#34;I'll get you anything you
+like.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No, thanks; I'm not hungry. You might put the water-pitcher over here by
+the bed. My tongue feels like a shredded-wheat biscuit.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Dirks gave him some water, then turned to go.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, by the way,&#34; he said, &#34;Here's a letter for you that's been laying
+around at the factory for a couple of days. Nobody knew where to forward
+it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Like a shot Quin was up in bed and holding out an eager hand. But at
+sight of the small cramped writing he lay back on his pillow listlessly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It's from Miss Isobel Bartlett,&#34; he said indifferently. &#34;Wonder what
+she's doing back in town in the middle of the summer.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I hear they are all back,&#34; Dirks said. &#34;The old lady is very ill and
+they had to bring her home. If you want anything in the night, just pound
+on the wall. I'm going to fetch a doctor if you ain't better in the
+morning.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When Dirks had gone Quin opened his letter and read:
+</p>
+
+<div class="quote"><p class="noindent">
+<i>Dear Quin:</i>
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I am rushing this off to the factory in the hope that they have your
+address and can get into communication with you at once. Mother has
+had two dreadful attacks with her appendix, and the doctors say she
+cannot survive another. But she refuses point-blank to be operated
+on, and my brother and sister and I are powerless to move her. Won't
+you come the moment you get this, and try to persuade her? She has
+such confidence in your judgment, and you could always do more with
+her than any one else. I am almost wild with anxiety and I don't know
+which way to turn. Do come at once.
+</p>
+
+<p class="noindent">
+Your friend,
+</p>
+
+<p class="noindent">
+<span class="sc">Isobel Bartlett</span>.
+</p></div>
+
+<p>
+Quin sprang out of bed, and then sat down limply, waiting for the
+furniture to stop revolving about him. It was evident that he would have
+to use his head to save his legs, if he expected to make any progress.
+Holding to the bed-post, he brought all his concentration to bear on the
+whereabouts of the various garments he had thrown off ten days before.
+The lack of a clean shirt and the imperative need of a shave presented
+grave difficulties, but he would have gone to Miss Isobel's rescue if he
+had had to go in pajamas!
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When at last he had struggled into his clothes, he put out his light and
+tiptoed past Dirks' door. At the first sniff of night air he began to
+cough, and he clapped his hand over his mouth, swearing softly to
+himself. On the front steps he hesitated. The rain was falling in sheets,
+and the street lights shone through a blur of fog. For the first time,
+Quin realized it was a block to the car line, and that he had no
+umbrella. Hard experience had taught him the dire results of exposure and
+overexertion. But the excitement of once more getting in touch with the
+Bartletts, of being of service to Madam, and above all of hearing news of
+Eleanor, banished all other considerations. Turning up his coat collar
+and pulling his hat over his eyes, he went down the steps and started on
+an uncertain run for the corner.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="32">CHAPTER 32</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+During the days that Quin was floundering in the bog of poverty, illness
+and despair, Eleanor Bartlett was triumphantly climbing the peak of
+achievement. &#34;Phantom Love,&#34; after weeks of strenuous rehearsal and
+nerve-racking uncertainty, had had its premiere performance at Atlantic
+City and scored an instantaneous hit.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+All spring Eleanor had lived in excited anticipation of the event. In the
+hard work demanded of her she had found welcome relief from some of her
+own complicated problems. She wanted to forget that she had broken her
+word, that she was causing the family serious trouble, and more than all
+she wanted to forget Quinby Graham and the look on his face when he left
+her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+During her stay in New York she had suffered many disillusions. She had
+seen her dreams translated into actual and disconcerting realities. But,
+in spite of the fact that much of the gold and glamour had turned to
+tinsel, she was still fascinated by the life and its glorious
+possibilities.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was not until she got into the full swing of the rehearsals that she
+made a disconcerting discovery. Try as she would, she could not adapt
+herself to the other members of the company. She hated their petty
+jealousies and intermittent intimacies, the little intrigues and the
+undercurrent of gossip that made up their days. From the first she
+realized that she was looked upon as an alien. The fact that she was
+shown special favors was hotly resented, and her refusal to rehearse
+daily the love passages with Finnegan, the promising young comedian who
+two years before had driven an ice-wagon in New Orleans, was a constant
+grievance to the stage manager. In the last matter Harold Phipps had
+upheld her, as he had in all others; but his very championship
+constituted her chief cause of worry.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Since the day of his joining the company she had given him no opportunity
+for seeing her alone. By a method of protection peculiarly her own, she
+had managed to achieve an isolation as complete as an alpine blossom in
+the heart of an iceberg. But in the heat and enthusiasm of a successful
+try-out, when everybody was effervescing with excitement, it was
+increasingly difficult to maintain this air of cold detachment.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Papa Claude alone was sufficient to warm any atmosphere. He radiated
+happiness. Every afternoon, arrayed in white flannels and a soft white
+hat, with a white rose in his buttonhole, he rode in his chair on the
+boardwalk, bowing to right and to left with the air of a sovereign
+graciously acknowledging his subjects. Night found him in the
+proscenium-box at the theater, beaming upon the audience, except when he
+turned vociferously to applaud Eleanor's exits and entrances.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The entire week of the first performance was nothing short of
+pandemonium. Mr. Pfingst had brought a large party down from New York on
+his yacht, and between rehearsals and performances there was an endless
+round of suppers and dinners and sailing-parties.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+With the arrival of Sunday morning Eleanor was in a state of physical and
+emotional exhaustion. She was sitting before her dressing-table in a
+sleeveless pink n&#233;glig&#233;e, with her hair dangling in two thick childish
+braids over her shoulder, when Papa Claude dashed in from the next room
+to announce that Mr. Pfingst had invited the entire cast to have lunch on
+his yacht.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Not for me!&#34; said Eleanor, sipping her coffee between yawns. &#34;I am going
+straight back to bed and sleep all day.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Morning megrims!&#34; cried Papa Claude, fresher than the proverbial daisy.
+&#34;What you need is a frolic with old Neptune! We bathe at eleven, go
+aboard the <i>Minta</i> at twelve, lunch at one. Pfingst's chef is an
+artist; he can create a lobster Newburg that is an epic!&#34; Papa Claude's
+tongue made the circle of his lips as he spoke.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't like lobster,&#34; Eleanor pouted; &#34;and, what's more, I don't like
+Mr. Pfingst.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Nonsense, my love! Pfingst is a prince of good fellows. Very
+generous&#8212;very generous indeed. Besides, there will be others on
+board&#8212;Harold and Estelle and myself.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor laid her face against his sleeve.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I wish you and I could run off somewhere for the day alone. I am so sick
+of seeing those same people day in and day out. They never talk about
+anything but themselves.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Papa Claude stroked her hair and smiled tolerantly. It was natural that
+his little Eleanor should be capricious and variable and addicted to
+moods. She was evidently acquiring temperament.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Some one tapped at the door, and he sprang to answer it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I've just been to your room, and the maid said you were in here,&#34; said
+Harold Phipps's voice.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Come right in!&#34; cried Papa Claude, flinging wide the door. &#34;We are just
+discussing plans, and need you to cast the deciding vote.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I'm not dressed, Papa Claude!&#34; expostulated Eleanor. &#34;I still have
+on my kimono.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;A charming costume,&#34; said Papa Claude&#8212;&#34;one in which a whole nation
+appears in public. I leave it to my distinguished collaborator: could any
+toilet, however elaborate, be more becoming?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Harold gave a light laugh as his glance rested with undisguised approval
+on the slender figure in its clinging silk garment, the rosy hues of
+which were reflected in the girl's flaming cheeks.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Just stopped for a second, C. M.,&#34; Harold said, avoiding her indignant
+eyes. &#34;I wanted to tell you about the New York press notices. They are
+simply superb! <i>Tribune</i> has a column. The <i>Times</i> and <i>Herald</i>
+give us a headliner. And even the old <i>Sun</i> says there are passages in
+'Phantom Love' that might have been written by Moli&#232;re!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Where are the papers?&#34; cried Papa Claude, prancing with excitement.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I gave mine to Estelle. You can get them downstairs at the news-stand.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll run down now&#8212;be back in a second.&#34; And Papa Claude rushed
+impetuously from the room.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor and Harold stood facing each other where he had left them, he
+with an air of apologetic amusement, and she with an angry dignity that
+rested incongruously on her childish prettiness.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Will you please go down and tell Mr. Pfingst that I am not coming to his
+party?&#34; she asked, with the obvious intention of getting rid of him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why aren't you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Because I don't like him.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Neither do I. But what has that to do with it? Estelle Linton will take
+him off our hands.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't care for Miss Linton, either. If I had known&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Oh, come! Haven't we got past that?&#34; scoffed Harold, sitting astride a
+chair and looking at her quizzically. &#34;Nobody pays any attention to
+Estelle's numerous little affairs. I'd as soon think of criticizing a
+Watteau lady on an ivory fan!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You can probably catch Mr. Pfingst in the dining-room if you go down at
+once,&#34; suggested Eleanor pointedly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But I've no intention of going down at once. Eleanor, why do you play
+with me like this? Can't you see that this can't go on? I've been
+patient, God knows. For two months I've done nothing but advance your
+interests, put you forward in every conceivable way. And what have I got?
+The merest civility! Do you suppose it's pleasant for me to know that
+everybody in the company is whispering about my infatuation for you and
+your indifference to me? The maddening part of it is that I know
+perfectly well you are <i>not</i> indifferent. You are in love with me.
+You always have been. You'd have married me last fall if some busybody
+hadn't filled your ears with scandal. Confess, wouldn't you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes; but&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I knew it! And you are going to marry me now. You can do anything you
+want, have anything you want. I'll put you at the head of your own
+company; I'll take you over to London. I'll do anything under heaven but
+give you up.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He rose suddenly and went toward her, catching her bare arm and trying to
+draw her toward him; but she struggled from his embrace.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Let me go!&#34; she cried furiously. &#34;If you don't leave the room instantly,
+I will! There's Papa Claude now. Let me pass!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was not Papa Claude, however, to whom she opened the door. It was
+Estelle Linton, smartly attired for the day's expedition, and exhibiting
+all the compensating charms with which she sought to atone for her lack
+of brains and morals. With a glance of sophisticated comprehension she
+took in the disordered room, the perturbed young people, the unfinished
+breakfast-tray; then she burst into a gay little laugh.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Ten thousand pardons!&#34; she cried, backing away from the door in assumed
+confusion. &#34;I shouldn't have called so early. I just ran in to bring you
+<i>Town Topics</i>. The most killing article about you, dear. By-by; I'll
+see you later!&#34; And, kissing her hand to Eleanor, she flitted down the
+hall.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Shall I go or will you?&#34; Eleanor demanded of Harold.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She was standing in the open door, all the color fled from her face and
+her eyes blazing with anger.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I'll go, of course,&#34; said Harold. &#34;Only, you must not mind Estelle.
+Everybody knows she's a fool&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The door was slammed in his face and locked before he finished the
+sentence.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For a moment Eleanor stood immovable; then her eye fell on the paper that
+Estelle Linton had thrust into her hand, and she saw her stage name on
+the title-page.
+</p>
+<div class="quote">
+<p>
+    Pretty little romance back of the production of &#34;Phantom Love&#34; [she
+    read]. It is rumored that a wealthy young Chicago playwright, having
+    met with family opposition in winning a young Southern belle, took
+    advantage of her histrionic ambition, and persuaded her to play a
+    r&#244;le in his new play, which he wrote especially for her. Those who
+    saw the opening performance of &#34;Phantom Love&#34; at Atlantic City
+    Wednesday night will have little trouble in recognizing the heroine
+    of the story. Miss Nell Martel is one of the daintiest bits of
+    femininity that have flitted behind the footlights in many moons.
+    She has youth and beauty and a certain elusive charm. But the fact
+    remains that she can not act. For the continued success of the really
+    brilliant play, let us hope that the young lady's lover may soon
+    become her husband, and that, having won his prize, he will
+    substitute a professional for the charming young amateur who is in
+    no way up to the rest of the really excellent cast.
+</p></div>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor crushed the paper in her hand, flung herself across the bed, and
+buried her hot face in the pillow. All her life she had walked unafraid
+and inviolate, protected by her social position, the over-zealous
+solicitude of the family, and her own purity. She had flown out of the
+family nest, confident of her power to take care of herself, to breast
+any storm. And here, at the beginning of her flight, she found herself in
+utter confusion of body and spirit, powerless to protect herself against
+such conduct as Harold's, such printed gossip as lay before her, or such
+unspeakable insinuations as Estelle Linton's.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When Papa Claude returned, her first impulse was to pour out her troubles
+to him; but second thought restrained her. He was too much a part of that
+casual, irresponsible world to take anything it did or said seriously.
+She called through the door to him that she had gone to bed and was going
+to stay there.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But she did not stay there. She got up and knelt by the open window,
+looking across the seething mass of humanity on the boardwalk below to
+the calm stretches of blue sea beyond. For the first time, she faced her
+problem fairly and squarely. Up to now she had been trying to compromise,
+to be broad and tolerant and cosmopolitan. But she had to admit that the
+new life satisfied her no more than the old had. One was too
+circumscribed, the other too free. If it was true that she had no talent
+and was simply tolerated in the company because of Harold Phipps, she
+must know it at once. To be drawing a salary that she did not earn, and
+accepting favors for which a definite reward would be expected, was
+utterly intolerable to her.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A wild desire seized her to go back to New York and seek another
+engagement. In spite of what that odious article said, she believed that
+she could succeed on the stage. Papa Claude believed in her; the Kendall
+School people were enthusiastic about her work; they would help her to
+make another start.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But did she honestly want to make another start? A conscience that had
+overslept itself began to stir and waken. After all, what did the
+plaudits of hundreds of unknown people count for, when the approval and
+affection of those nearest and dearest was withdrawn? What would any
+success count for against the disgust she felt for herself.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+A wave of terrific homesickness swept over her. But what was it she
+wanted, she asked herself, in place of this gay kaleidoscope of light and
+color and ceaseless confusion? Not the stagnation of the Bartlett
+household, certainly not the slipshod poverty of the Martels. She
+searched her heart for the answer.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+And as she knelt there with her head on the window-sill, looking
+miserably out to sea, a strange thing happened to her. In a moment of
+swift, sure vision she saw Quinby Graham's homely, whimsical face, she
+felt his strong arms around her, and into her soul came a deep, still
+feeling of unutterable content.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I am coming, Quin!&#34; she whispered, with a little catch in her voice.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then it was that Destiny played her second trump for Quin. It was in the
+form of a telegram that a bell-boy brought up from the office, and it
+announced that Madam Bartlett was not expected to live through the day.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Within twenty-four hours Eleanor was in Kentucky.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Is she living?&#34; she demanded of Hannah, who answered her ring at her
+grandmother's door.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I don't know, honey,&#34; whispered Hannah, ashy with fright. &#34;They's
+operatin' now. We thought she was going to die all day yesterday, but she
+never give in to be operated on till Mr. Quin come.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Where are Aunt Isobel and Aunt Enid?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;They's all in the library. Mr. Ranny's there, too. Ain't nobody upstairs
+with her but jest the doctors an' the nurse an' Mr. Quin.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor crept upstairs and sat down on the top step, outside that door
+before which she had halted in dread so many times before. Remorse and
+sympathy and acute apprehension struggled for mastery. All the old
+antagonism for her grandmother was swept away in the dread prospect of
+losing her. It was impossible to think of the family existing without
+her. She held it up, kept it together, maintained the proud old Bartlett
+tradition.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+There was a sound behind the closed doors. Eleanor strained her ears to
+listen. It was someone coughing, at first gently, then violently. The
+next moment the door opened and a wild-eyed, unshaven figure staggered
+into the hall.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Damn that ether!&#34; some one muttered.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+And then, before Eleanor could get to her feet, Quinby Graham came
+unsteadily toward her, stumbled twice, then pitched forward on his face,
+striking his head on the banister as he fell.
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="chapter"><a name="33">CHAPTER 33</a>
+</p>
+
+
+<p>
+Two weeks later, when Quin struggled back to consciousness, he labored
+under the delusion that he was still in the army and back in the camp
+hospital. Eleanor, who scarcely left his bedside, was once more Miss
+Bartlett, the ward visitor, and he was Patient Number 7. He tried to
+explain to all those dim figures moving about the darkened room that he
+was making her a bead chain, and unless they got him more beads he could
+not finish it in time. When they reassured him and tried to get him to
+take food, he invariably wanted to know if Miss Bartlett had brought it,
+and which was her day to come again. Then the doctor and the nurse would
+argue with him, and try to make him remember things he was sure had never
+happened, and his mental distress would become acute. At such times
+somebody, who of course could not be Miss Bartlett, but who had her voice
+and eyes, would take his hand and tell him to go to sleep, then the
+tangles would all come straight.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+One day he was startled out of a stupor by the sound of a querulous old
+voice saying:
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I guess if he could get out of bed to come across the city to me, I can
+come across the hall to him. Wheel me closer!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin was drifting off again, when a hand gripped his wrist.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Open your eyes, boy! Look at me. Do you know who this is?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He lifted his heavy lids, and wondered dully what Madam was doing at the
+camp hospital.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Put the blinds up,&#34; she commanded to some one back of her. &#34;Let him see
+the wall-paper, the furniture. Move that fool screen away.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+For the first time, Quin brought his confused attention to bear on his
+surroundings, and even glanced at the space over the mantel to see if a
+certain picture was at its old place.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You are in my house,&#34; said Madam, with a finality that was not to be
+disputed. &#34;Do you remember the first time you came here?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He shook his head.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes, you do. I fell down the steps and broke my leg, and you came in off
+the street to tie me up with an umbrella and the best table napkins. What
+are you smiling about?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Smelling salts,&#34; Quin murmured, as if to himself.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You don't need any smelling salts!&#34; cried Madam, missing his allusion.
+&#34;All you need is to rouse yourself and put your mind on what I am saying.
+Do you remember living in this house?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He could not truthfully say that he did, though familiar objects and
+sounds seemed to be all around him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, I'll make you,&#34; said Madam, nothing daunted. &#34;You stayed in this
+very room for three months to keep the burglars from stealing Isobel and
+Enid, and every night you walked me up and down the hall on my crutches.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She paused and looked at him expectantly; but things were still a blur to
+him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You surely remember the Easter party?&#34; she persisted. &#34;If you can forget
+the way your shirt kept popping open that night, and the way your jaw
+swelled up, it's more than I can!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin winced. Even concussion of the brain had failed to deaden the memory
+of that awful night.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I sort of remember,&#34; he admitted.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Good! That will do for to-day. As for the rest, I'll tell you what
+happened. You came here one night two weeks ago, when everybody had me
+dead and buried, and you deviled me into having an operation that saved
+my life. You stood right by me while they did it. Then you collapsed and
+knocked your head on the banister, and, as if that wasn't enough,
+developed pneumonia on top of it. Now all you've got to think about is
+getting well.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But&#8212;but&#8212;Miss Eleanor?&#34; Quin queried weakly, fearing that the blessed
+presence that had hovered over him was but a figment of his dreams.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She came home to help bury me,&#34; said Madam. &#34;Failing to get the job, she
+took to nursing you. Now stop talking and go to sleep. If I hear any more
+of this stuff and nonsense about your being in a hospital and making bead
+chains, I'll forbid Eleanor crossing the threshold; do you hear?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+From that time on Quin's convalescence was rapid&#8212;almost too rapid, in
+fact, for his peace of mind. Never in his life had he been so watched
+over and so tenderly cared for. Mr. Ranny kept him supplied with fresh
+eggs and cream from Valley Mead; Mr. Chester and Miss Enid deluged him
+with magazines and flowers; Miss Isobel gave him his medicine and fixed
+his tray herself; Madam chaperoned his thoughts and allowed no intruding
+fancies or vagaries.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But all these attentions were as nothing to him, compared with the
+miracle of Eleanor's presence. Just why she was remaining at home he
+dared not ask, for fear he should be told the date of her departure. The
+fact that she flitted in and out of his room, flirting with the doctor,
+teasing the aunties, assuming a divine proprietorship over him, was
+heaven enough in itself.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Sometimes, when they were alone and she thought he was asleep he would
+see the dancing, restless light die out of her eyes, and a beautiful
+exalted look come into them as if she were listening to the music of the
+spheres.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He attributed this to the fact that she was happy in being once more
+reconciled to the family. Even she and Madam seemed to be on terms of the
+closest intimacy, and he spent hours in trying to understand what had
+effected the change.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As he grew stronger and was allowed to sit up in bed, he realized, with a
+shock, what a fool's paradise he was living in. A few more days and he
+must go back to that dark, damp room in Chestnut Street. He must find
+work&#8212;and work, however menial, for which he had the strength. Eleanor
+would return to New York, and he would probably never see her again.
+During his illness she had been heavenly kind to him, but that was no
+reason for thinking she had changed her mind. She had given him his final
+answer there in New York, and he was grimly determined never to open the
+subject again.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+But one day, when they were alone together, his resolution sustained a
+compound fracture. Eleanor was reading aloud to him, and in the midst of
+a sentence she put down the book and looked at him queerly.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Quin,&#34; she said, &#34;did you know I am not going back?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Why not? Did the play fail?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No. It's a big success. Papa Claude will probably make a small fortune
+out of it.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But you? What's the trouble?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I've had enough. I had made up my mind to leave the company even before
+I was sent for.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's eyes searched her face, but for once he held his tongue.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She was evidently finding it hard to continue. She twisted the fringe of
+the counterpane in her slender, white fingers, and she did not look at
+him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;It all turned out as you said it would,&#34; she admitted at last. &#34;I&#8212;I
+simply couldn't stand Harold Phipps.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin's heart performed an athletic feat. It leaped into his throat and
+remained there.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But you'll be joining some other company, I suppose?&#34; He tried to make
+his voice formal and detached.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;That depends,&#34; she said; and she looked at him again in that queer,
+tremulous, mysterious way that he did not in the least understand.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Her small hands were fluttering so close to his that he could have
+captured them both in one big palm; but he heroically refrained. He kept
+saying over and over to himself that it was just Miss Nell's way of being
+good to a fellow, and that, whatever happened, he must not make her
+unhappy and sorry&#8212;he must not lose his head.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Quin,&#34;&#8212;her voice dropped so low he could scarcely hear it,&#8212;&#34;have you
+ever forgiven me for the way I behaved in New York?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Sure!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+He was trembling now, and he wondered how much longer he could hold out.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you&#8212;do you&#8212;still feel about me the way you&#8212;you did&#8212;that night on
+the bus?&#34; she whispered.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Quin looked at her as a Christian martyr might have looked at his
+persecutor.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;I think about you the way I've always thought about you,&#34; he said
+hopelessly&#8212;&#34;the way I shall go on thinking about you as long as I live.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well,&#34; said Eleanor, with a sigh of relief, &#34;I guess that settles it&#34;;
+and, to his unspeakable amazement, she laid her head on his pillow and
+her cheek on his.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+When he recovered from his shock of subliminal ecstasy, his first thought
+was of the trouble he was storing up for Eleanor. Even his rapture was
+dimmed by the prospect of involving her in another love affair that could
+only meet with bitter opposition of her family.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;We must keep it dark for the present,&#34; he urged, holding her close as if
+he feared she would slip away. &#34;Maybe, when I am well, and have a good
+position, and all, they won't take it so hard.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor refused to listen to any such counsel. She wanted to announce
+their engagement at once, and be married at the earliest possible date.
+He needed her to take care of him, she declared; and besides, they could
+make a start on the money that would soon be due her from her father's
+estate. To this proposition Quin would not listen, and they had a
+spirited quarrel and reached no agreement.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Eleanor had fallen seriously in love for the first time in her life, and
+it was a sudden and overwhelming experience. During those anxious days of
+Quin's illness, when his life had hung in the balance, she had time to
+realize what he meant to her. Now that he needed skilful nursing and
+constant care to assure his recovery, she was determined not to be
+separated from him.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In spite of his protests, she joyfully announced their engagement to
+Uncle Ranny and the aunties at dinner, and was surprised to find that the
+family tree, instead of being rocked to its foundation, was merely
+pleasantly stirred in its branches.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You see, we could not help suspecting it,&#34; Miss Isobel twittered
+excitedly to Quin, when she brought him his tray. &#34;You talked about her
+incessantly in your delirium, and the dear child was almost beside
+herself the night we thought you might not recover. I told sister then
+that if you got well&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But what about Madam?&#34; Quin interrupted anxiously. &#34;What will she think
+of Miss Nell's being engaged to a fellow like me, with no money or
+position, or any prospects of being able to marry for God knows how
+long?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Miss Isobel looked grave. &#34;Nellie is breaking the news to her now,&#34; she
+said primly. &#34;I am afraid she is going to find it very hard. But, as
+sister says, there are times when one has to follow one's own judgments.
+When mother sees that we all stand together about this&#8212;&#8212;&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+She waved her hand with a little air of finality. It was the second time
+in her life that she had made even a gesture toward freedom.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+The interview between Eleanor and her grandmother lasted for more than an
+hour, and nobody knew the outcome of it until the next morning, when a
+family council was called in Quin's room. Madam was wheeled in in state,
+resplendent in purple and gold, with her hair elaborately dressed, as
+usual.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+To everybody's amazement, she opened the conference by abruptly announcing
+that she had decided that Eleanor and Quin should be married at once.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;She's at loose ends, and he's at loose ends. The sooner they get tied
+up, the better,&#34; was the way she put it.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But hold on!&#34; cried Quin, sitting up in bed. &#34;I can't do that, you know;
+I've got to get on my feet first.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;How are you going to get on your feet until you get your strength back?&#34;
+demanded Madam. &#34;You look like going to work, don't you?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, the doctor has promised me I can go out on Saturday. I ought to be
+able to go to work in a couple of weeks.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Couple of fiddle-sticks! Dr. Rawlins told me it would be two months
+before you would be fit for work, and even then you would have to be
+careful.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, you don't think I am going to let Miss Nell in on a deal like
+that, do you?&#34; Quin's voice broke and he gripped Eleanor's hand until she
+winced.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;But, Quin, I want it to be now,&#34; Eleanor begged. &#34;Grandmother and I have
+gone over it from every standpoint, and she's come to see it as I do. You
+need me, and I need you. Why can't you be sensible and see it as we do?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+How Quin ever withstood those pleading tones and beseeching eyes, it is
+impossible to say. But withstand them he did, announcing stubbornly that
+it was bad enough for a girl to marry a chap with broken bellows; but for
+her to marry one she would not only have to nurse, but support as well,
+was not to be thought of. There was but one thing to do, and that was to
+wait.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Then it was that Madam, who had been reasonably patient up till now, lost
+her temper and delivered an ultimatum.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You'll marry her now or not at all,&#34; she thundered. &#34;I am sick and tired
+of the way you try to run this family, Quinby Graham! For more than a
+year now you have carried things with a high hand. You got Ranny out of
+the factory and on a farm. You married Enid to Francis Chester, and sent
+them to California. You made me let Eleanor go to New York, and came very
+near landing her on the stage for good. And now, when I have been
+persuaded into letting the child marry you, you are not satisfied, but
+insist on doing it at your own time and in your own way!&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;You forgot one thing, granny,&#34; suggested Eleanor demurely. &#34;He made you
+have the operation.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Madam was not to be diverted. She glared at Quin like an angry old
+lioness.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Are you going to do as I advise?&#34; she demanded.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;No; not until I get a job.&#34; Quin's jaw was set as firmly as hers, and
+their eyes measured each other's with equal determination.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Well, then I'll give you a job,&#34; she announced with sudden decision.
+&#34;I'll send you to China.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;To China?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Yes. Bartlett &#34; Bangs has just opened a branch house in Shanghai. They
+are looking for a man to take charge of it. Your knowledge of the
+language would make up for your lack of experience. Besides, the sea
+voyage will do you good.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Do you mean it?&#34; cried Quinn eagerly. &#34;Would Mr. Bangs agree?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Geoffrey Bangs would take you back at the factory to-morrow. But I don't
+want you there, under him. I want to turn you loose on China. It's the
+only place I know that's big enough to exhaust your energies. You will
+probably have the entire country plowing up its ancestors before spring.&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;And what about you?&#34; said Quin, turning eagerly to Eleanor. &#34;Would you
+go with me?&#34;
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;<i>Will</i> I?&#34; said Eleanor, her eyes dancing.
+</p>
+
+<hr class="short">
+
+<p>
+That night, when Miss Isobel was tucking Madam into bed, she made bold to
+ask her how she happened to give her consent to the wedding.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+&#34;Isobel,&#34; said Madam, cocking a wise old eye, &#34;it might as well be now as
+later. When a man like Quinby Graham makes up his mind to marry a certain
+girl, the devil himself can't stop him!&#34;
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Quin, by Alice Hegan Rice
+
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Quin, by Alice Hegan Rice
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Quin
+
+Author: Alice Hegan Rice
+
+Release Date: December 5, 2006 [EBook #20033]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK QUIN ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by David Garcia and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was
+produced from images generously made available by The
+Kentuckiana Digital Library)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+    [Illustration: "If you don't leave the room instantly, I will!"]
+
+
+
+                               Q U I N
+
+
+
+                                 BY
+
+                           ALICE HEGAN RICE
+
+
+             Author of "Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch,"
+             "Lovey Mary," "Sandy," "Calvary Alley," etc.
+
+
+
+                               NEW YORK
+                            THE CENTURY CO.
+                                 1921
+
+
+
+                         Copyright, 1921, by
+                           THE CENTURY CO.
+
+                         PRINTED IN U. S. A.
+
+
+
+                        TO MY MERRIEST FRIEND
+
+                         JOSEPHINE F. HAMILL
+
+
+
+
+                         Transcriber's Note:
+
+         The Table of Contents was not in the original text and
+           has been created for the convenience of the reader.
+
+
+
+                               CONTENTS
+
+                CHAPTER  1                    CHAPTER 18
+                CHAPTER  2                    CHAPTER 19
+                CHAPTER  3                    CHAPTER 20
+                CHAPTER  4                    CHAPTER 21
+                CHAPTER  5                    CHAPTER 22
+                CHAPTER  6                    CHAPTER 23
+                CHAPTER  7                    CHAPTER 24
+                CHAPTER  8                    CHAPTER 25
+                CHAPTER  9                    CHAPTER 26
+                CHAPTER 10                    CHAPTER 27
+                CHAPTER 11                    CHAPTER 28
+                CHAPTER 12                    CHAPTER 29
+                CHAPTER 13                    CHAPTER 30
+                CHAPTER 14                    CHAPTER 31
+                CHAPTER 15                    CHAPTER 32
+                CHAPTER 16                    CHAPTER 33
+                CHAPTER 17
+
+
+
+
+                               Q U I N
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 1
+
+
+If the dollar Quinby Graham tossed up on New Year's eve had not elected
+to slip through his fingers and roll down the sewer grating, there might
+have been no story to write. Quin had said, "Tails, yes"; and who knows
+but that down there under the pavement that coin of fate was registering
+"Heads, no"? It was useless to suggest trying it over, however, for
+neither of the young privates with town leave for twenty-four hours
+possessed another coin.
+
+The heavier of the two boys, Cass Martel,--the lame one, whose nose began
+quite seriously, as if it had every intention of being a nose, then
+changed abruptly into a button,--scraped the snow from the sewer grating
+with his cane, and swore savagely under his breath. But Quin shrugged his
+shoulders with a slow, easy-going laugh.
+
+"That settles it," he said triumphantly. "We got to go to the Hawaiian
+Garden now, because it's the only place that's free!"
+
+"I'll be hanged if I know what you want to go to a dance for," argued his
+companion fiercely. "Here you been on your back for six months, and your
+legs so shaky they won't hardly hold you. Don't you know you can't
+dance?"
+
+"Sure," agreed Quin amicably. "I don't mean to dance. But I got to go
+where I can see some girls. I'm dead sick of men. Come on in. We don't
+need to stay but a little while."
+
+"That's too long for me," said Cass. "If you weren't such a bonehead for
+doing what you start out to do, we could do something interesting."
+
+One might have thought they were Siamese twins, from the way in which
+Cass ignored the possibility of each going his own way. He glared at his
+tall companion with a mingled expression of rage and dog-like devotion.
+
+"Cut it out, Cass," said Quin at last, putting an end to an argument that
+had been in progress for fifteen minutes. "I'm going to that dance, and
+I'm going to make love to the first girl that looks at me. I'll meet you
+wherever you say at six o'clock."
+
+Cass, seeing that further persuasion was useless, reluctantly consented.
+
+"Well, you take care of yourself, and don't forget you are going home
+with me for the night," he warned.
+
+"Where else could I go? Haven't got a red cent, and I wouldn't go back
+out to the hospital if I had to bunk on the curbstone! So long, _cherie_!"
+
+Sergeant Quinby Graham, having thus carried his point, adjusted his
+overseas cap at a more acute angle, turned back his coat to show his
+distinguished-conduct medal, and went blithely up the steps to the
+dance-hall. He was tall and outrageously thin, and pale with the pallor
+that comes from long confinement. His hands and feet seemed too big for
+the rest of him, and his blond hair stuck up in a bristly mop above his
+high forehead. But Sergeant Graham walked with the buoyant tread of one
+who has a good opinion not only of himself but of mankind in general.
+
+The only thing that disturbed his mind was the fact that, swagger as he
+would, his shoulders, usually so square and trim, refused to fill out his
+uniform. It was the first time he had had it on for six months, his
+wardrobe having been limited to pajamas and bath-robes during his
+convalescence in various hospitals at home and abroad.
+
+Two years before, when he had left a lumber camp in Maine to answer
+America's first call for volunteers to France, his personal appearance
+had concerned him not in the least. But the army had changed that, as it
+had changed most things for Quin.
+
+He checked his overcoat at the hall entrance, stepped eagerly up to the
+railing that divided the spectators from the dancers, and drew a deep
+breath of satisfaction. Here, at last, was something different from the
+everlasting hospital barracks: glowing lights, holiday decorations, the
+scent of flowers instead of the stale fumes of ether and disinfectants;
+soul-stirring music in place of the wheezy old phonograph grinding out
+the same old tunes; and, above all, girls, hundreds of them, circling in
+a bewildering rainbow of loveliness before him.
+
+Was it any wonder that Quin's foot began to twitch, and that, in spite of
+repeated warnings at the hospital, a blind desire seized him to dance? At
+the mere thought his heart gained a beat--that unruly heart, which had
+caused so much trouble. It had never been right since that August day in
+the Sevzevais sector, when, to quote his citation, he "had shown great
+initiative in assuming command when his officer was disabled, and, with
+total disregard for his personal safety, had held his machine-gun against
+almost impossible odds." In the accomplishment of this feat he had been
+so badly gassed and wounded that his career as a soldier was definitely,
+if gloriously, ended.
+
+The long discipline of pain to which he had been subjected had not,
+however, conquered Quin's buoyancy. He was still tremendously vital, and
+when he wanted anything he wanted it inordinately and immediately. Just
+now, when every muscle in him was keeping time to that soul-disturbing
+music, he heard his own imperative desire voiced at his elbow:
+
+"I don't want to go home. I want to dance. Nobody will notice us. Just
+one round, Captain Phipps."
+
+The voice was young and singularly vibrant, and the demand in it was
+quite as insistent as the demand that was clamoring in Quin's own
+khaki-covered breast.
+
+He craned his neck to see the speaker; but she was hidden by her escort,
+in whose supercilious profile he recognized one of the officers in charge
+of his ward at the hospital.
+
+"You foolish child!" the officer was saying, fingering his diminutive
+mustache and viewing the scene with a somewhat contemptuous smile. "You
+said if I would bring you in for a moment you wouldn't ask to stay."
+
+"I know, but I always break my promises," said the coaxing voice; "and
+besides I'm simply crazy to dance."
+
+"You surely don't imagine that I would get out on the floor with all this
+hoi-poloi?"
+
+Quin saw a pair of small gloved hands grasp the railing resolutely, and
+he was straightway filled with indignation that any man, of whatever
+rank, should stand back on his dignity when a voice like that asked a
+favor. A similar idea had evidently occurred to the young lady, for she
+said with some spirit:
+
+"The only difference I can see between these boys and you is that they
+are privates who got over, and you are an officer who didn't."
+
+Quin could not hear the answer, but as the officer shifted his position
+he caught his first glimpse of the girl. She was very young and obviously
+imperious, with white skin and coal-black hair and the most utterly
+destructive brown eyes he had ever encountered. Discretion should have
+prompted him to seek immediate safety out of the firing-line, but instead
+he put himself in the most exposed position possible and waited results.
+
+They arrived on schedule time.
+
+"Captain Phipps!" called a page. "Wanted on the telephone."
+
+"Will you wait for me here just a second?" asked the officer.
+
+"I don't know whether I will or not," was the spirited answer; "I may go
+home."
+
+"Then I'll follow you," said the Captain as he pushed his way through the
+crowd to the telephone-booth.
+
+It was just at this moment, when the jazz band was breaking into its most
+beguiling number, that Quin's eyes and the girl's eyes met in a glance of
+mutual desire. History repeated itself. Once again, "with total disregard
+for his personal safety, Sergeant Graham assumed command when his officer
+was disabled," and rashly flung himself into the breach.
+
+"Will you dance it with me?" he asked eagerly, and he blushed to the
+roots of his stubbly hair.
+
+There was an ominous pause, during which the young girl stood irresolute,
+while Mrs. Grundy evidently whispered "Don't" in one ear and instinct
+whispered "Do" in the other. It lasted but a second, for the next thing
+Quin knew, a small gloved hand was slipped into his, a blue plume was
+tickling his nose, and he was gliding a bit unsteadily into Paradise.
+
+What his heart might do after that dance was of absolutely no consequence
+to him. It could beat fast or slow, or even stop altogether, if it would
+only hold out as long as the music did. Round and round among the dancers
+he guided his dainty partner, carefully avoiding the entrance end of the
+hall, and devoutly praying that his clumsy army shoes might not crush
+those little high-heeled brown pumps tripping so deftly in and out
+between them. He was not used to dancing with officers' girls, and he
+held the small gray-gloved hand in his big fist as if it were a bird
+about to take flight.
+
+Next to the return of the Captain, he dreaded that other dancers, seeing
+his prize, would try to capture her; but there was a certain tempered
+disdain in the poise of his little partner's head, an ability to put up a
+quick and effective defense against intrusion, that protected him as
+well.
+
+Neither of them spoke until the music stopped, and then they stood
+applauding vociferously, with the rest, for an encore.
+
+"I ought to go," said the Radiant Presence, with a guilty glance upward
+from under long eyelashes. "You don't see a very cross-looking Captain
+charging around near the door, do you?"
+
+"No," said Quin, without turning his head, "I don't see him"--and he
+smiled as he said it.
+
+Now, Quin's smile was his chief asset in the way of looks. It was a
+leisurely smile, that began far below the surface and sent preliminary
+ripples up to his eyes and the corners of his big mouth, and broke
+through at last in a radiant flash of good humor. In this case it met a
+very prompt answer under the big hat.
+
+"You see, I'm not supposed to be dancing," she explained rather
+condescendingly.
+
+"Nor me, either," said Quin, breathing heavily.
+
+Then the band decided to be accommodating, and the saxophone decided to
+out-jazz the piano, and the drum got its ambition roused and joined in
+the competition, and the young couple who were not supposed to be dancing
+out-danced everything on the floor!
+
+Quin's heart might have adjusted itself to that first dance, but the
+rollicking encore, together with the emotional shock it sustained every
+time those destructive eyes were trained upon him, was too much for it.
+
+"Say, would you mind stopping a bit?--just for a second?" he gasped, when
+his breath seemed about to desert him permanently.
+
+"You surely aren't _tired_?" scoffed the young lady, lifting a pair of
+finely arched eyebrows.
+
+"No; but, you see--as a matter of fact, ever since I was gassed----"
+
+"Gassed!"
+
+The word acted like a charm. The girl's sensitive face, over which the
+expressions played like sunlight on water, softened to instant sympathy,
+and Quin, who up to now had been merely a partner, suddenly found himself
+individual.
+
+"Did you see much actual service?" she asked, her eyes wide with
+interest.
+
+"Sure," said Quin, bracing himself against a post and trying to keep his
+breath from coming in jerks; "saw sixteen months of it."
+
+Her quick glance swept from the long scar on his forehead to the bar on
+his breast.
+
+"What do all those stars on the rainbow ribbon mean?" she demanded.
+
+"Major engagements," said Quin diffidently.
+
+"And the silver one in the middle?"
+
+"A citation," He glanced around to make sure none of the other boys were
+near, then confessed, as if to a crime: "That's where I got my medal."
+
+"Come over here and sit down this minute," she commanded. "You've got to
+tell me all about it."
+
+It would be very pleasant to chronicle the fact that our hero modestly
+declined to take advantage of the opportunity thus offered. But it must
+be borne in mind that, his heart having failed him at a critical hour, he
+had to fall back upon his tongue as the only means at hand of detaining
+the Celestial Being who at any moment might depart. With what breath he
+had left he told his story, and, having a good story to tell, he did it
+full justice. Sometimes, to be sure, he got his pronouns mixed, and once
+he lost the thread of his discourse entirely; but that was when he became
+too conscious of those star-like eyes and the flattering absorption of
+the little lady who for one transcendent moment was deigning "to love him
+for the dangers he had passed." With unabated interest and curiosity she
+drank in every detail of his recital, her half-parted lips only closing
+occasionally to say, "Wonderful!" or "How _perfectly_ wonderful!"
+
+On and on went the music, round and round went the dancers, and still the
+private in the uniform that was too big and the officer's girl in blue
+and gray sat in the alcove, totally oblivious to everything but each
+other.
+
+It was not until the girl happened to look at the ridiculous little watch
+that was pretending to keep time on her wrist that the spell was broken.
+
+"Merciful heaven!" she exclaimed dramatically, "It's six o'clock. What
+_will_ the family say to me? I must fly this minute."
+
+"But ain't you going to finish this dance with me?" asked Quin with
+tragic insistence.
+
+"Ought you to dance again?" The note was personal and divinely
+solicitous.
+
+"I oughtn't, but I am"; and, with superb disregard for doctors and syntax
+alike, Quin put a firm arm around that slender yielding figure and swept
+her into the moving crowd.
+
+They danced very quietly this time, for he was determined to hold out to
+the end. In fact, from the dreamy, preoccupied look on their faces one
+might have mistaken them for two zealous young acolytes lost in the
+performance of a religious rite.
+
+Quin was still in a trance when he helped her on with her coat and
+piloted her down the crowded stairs. He could not bear to have her
+jostled by the boisterous crowd, and he glared at the men whose admiring
+glances dared to rest too long upon her.
+
+Now that the dance was over, the young lady was in a fever of impatience
+to get away. Qualms of remorse seized her for the way she had treated her
+one-time escort, and she hinted at the trouble in store for her if the
+family heard of her escapade.
+
+Outside the pavements were white with snow, and falling flakes glistened
+against the blue electric lights. Holiday crowds thronged the sidewalks,
+and every other man was in uniform.
+
+"I left my car at the corner," said Quin's companion, nervously
+consulting her watch for the fourth time. "You needn't come with me; I
+can find it all right."
+
+But Quin hadn't the slightest intention of forgoing one second of that
+delectable interview. He followed her to her car, awkwardly helped her
+in, and stood looking at her wistfully. In her hurry to get home she
+seemed to have forgotten him entirely. In two minutes she would never
+know that she had met him, while he----
+
+"Good-by, Soldier Boy," she said, suddenly holding out her hand.
+
+"My name is Graham," stammered Quin--"Sergeant Quinby Graham; Battery C,
+Sixth Field Artillery. And yours?"
+
+She was fussing with the starter by this time, but she smiled up at him
+and shook her head.
+
+"I? Oh, I haven't any! I'm just an irresponsible young person who is
+going to gets fits for having stayed out so late. But it was worth it,
+wasn't it--Sergeant Slim?"
+
+And then, before he knew what had happened, the small runabout was
+skilfully backed out of its narrow space and a red tail-light was rapidly
+wagging down the avenue, leaving him standing dazed on the curbstone.
+
+"Where in the devil have you been?" demanded a cross voice behind him,
+and turning he encountered Cass's snub-nose and irate eyes.
+
+Quin's own eyes were shining and his face was flushed. With a laugh he
+flung his arm around his buddy's shoulder and affectionately punched his
+head.
+
+"In heaven," he answered laconically.
+
+"Funny place to leave your overcoat!" said Cass, viewing him with
+suspicion. "Quin Graham, have you had a drink?"
+
+Quin hilariously declared his innocence. The draught of which he had so
+freely imbibed, though far more potent than any earthly brew, was one
+against which there are no prohibitory laws.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 2
+
+
+The fact that Cass had neglected to tell the family that he was bringing
+a friend home to supper did not in the least affect his welcome. It was
+not that the daily menu was of such a lavish nature that a guest or two
+made no difference; it was simply that the Martels belonged to that
+casual type which accepts any interruption to the regular order of things
+as a God-sent diversion.
+
+In the present instance Rose had only to dispatch Edwin to the grocery
+for eggs and cheese, and send Myrna next door to borrow a chafing-dish,
+and, while these errands were being accomplished, to complete her own
+sketchy toilet. Rose was an impressionist when it came to dress. She got
+the desired effect with the least possible effort, as was evinced now by
+the way she was whirling two coils of chestnut hair, from which the
+tangles had not been removed, into round puffs over each ear. A dab of
+rouge on each cheek, a touch of red on the lips, a dash of powder over
+the whole, sleeves turned back, neck turned in, resulted in a poster
+effect that was quite satisfactory.
+
+Of course the Martels had heard of Quinby Graham: his name had loomed
+large in Cass's letters from France and later in his conversation; but
+this was the first time the hero was to be presented in person.
+
+"What's he like, Rose?" asked Myrna, arriving breathlessly with the
+chafing-dish. Myrna was twelve and seemed to labor under the constant
+apprehension that she was missing something, due no doubt to the fact
+that she was invariably dispatched on an errand when anything interesting
+was pending.
+
+"Don't know," said Rose; "the hall was pitch-dark. He's got a nice voice,
+though, and a dandy handshake."
+
+"I bid to sit next to him at supper," said Myrna, hugging herself in
+ecstasy.
+
+"You can if you promise not to take two helps of the Welsh rabbit."
+
+Myrna refused to negotiate on any such drastic terms. "Are we going to
+have a fire in the sitting-room?" she asked.
+
+"I don't know whether there is any more wood. Papa Claude promised to
+order some. You go see while I set the table. I've a good notion to call
+over the fence and ask Fan Loomis to come to supper."
+
+"Oh, Rose, _please_ do!" cried Myrna. "I won't take but one help."
+
+Cass, in the meanwhile, was making his guest at home in the sitting-room
+by permitting him to be useful.
+
+"You can light the lamp," he said, "while I make a fire."
+
+Quin was willing to oblige, but the lamp was not. It put up a stubborn
+resistance to all efforts to coax it to do its duty.
+
+"I bet it hasn't been filled," said Cass; then, after the fashion of
+mankind, he lifted his voice in supplication to the nearest feminine ear:
+
+"Oh! Ro--ose!"
+
+His older sister, coming to the rescue, agreed with his diagnosis of the
+case, and with Quin's assistance bore the delinquent lamp to the kitchen.
+
+"Hope you don't mind being made home-folks," she said, patting the puffs
+over her ears and looking at him sideways.
+
+"Mind?" said Quin. "If you knew how good all this looks to me! It's the
+first touch of home I've had in years. Wish you'd let me set the
+table--I'm strong on K. P."
+
+"Help yourself," said Rose; "the plates are in the pantry and the silver
+in the sideboard drawer. Wait a minute!"
+
+She took a long apron from behind the door and handed it to him.
+
+"How do these ends buckle up?" he asked, helplessly holding out the
+straps of the bib.
+
+"They button around your little neck," she told him, smiling. "Turn
+round; I'll fix it."
+
+"Why turn round?" said Quin.
+
+Their eyes met in frank challenge.
+
+"You silly boy!" she said--but she put her arms around his neck and
+fastened the bib just the same.
+
+How that supper ever got itself cooked and served is a marvel. Everybody
+took a turn at the stirring and toasting, everybody contributed a missing
+article to the table, and there was much rushing from kitchen to
+dining-room, with many collisions and some upsets.
+
+Quin was in the highest of spirits. Even Cass had never seen him quite
+like this. With his white apron over his uniform, he pranced about,
+dancing attendance on Rose, and keeping Myrna and Edwin in gales of
+laughter over his antics. Every now and then, however, his knees got
+wabbly and his breath came short, and by the time supper was prepared he
+was quite ready to sit down.
+
+"What a shame Nell's not here!" said Rose, breaking the eggs into the
+chafing-dish. "Then we could have charades. She's simply great when she
+gets started."
+
+"Who is Nell?" asked Quin.
+
+"Eleanor Bartlett, our cousin. She's like chicken and ice-cream--the rich
+Bartletts have her on weekdays and we poor Martels get her only on
+Sundays. Hasn't Cass ever told you about Nell?"
+
+"Do you suppose I spend my time talking about my precious family?"
+growled Cass.
+
+"No, but Nell's different," said Rose; "she's a sort of Solomon's baby--I
+mean the baby that Solomon had to decide about. Only in this case neither
+old Madam Bartlett nor Papa Claude will give up their half; they'd see
+her dead first."
+
+"You did tell me about her," said Quin to Cass, "one night when we were
+up in the Cantigny offensive. I remember the place exactly. Something
+about an orphan, and a lawsuit, and a little girl that was going to be an
+actress."
+
+"That's the dope," said Cass. "Only she's not a kid any more. She grew up
+while I was in France. She's a great girl, Nell is, when you get her away
+from that Bartlett mess!"
+
+"Does anybody know where Papa Claude is?" Rose demanded, dexterously
+ladling out steaming Welsh rabbit on to slices of crisp brown toast.
+
+"He is here, _mes enfants_, he is here!" cried a joyous voice from the
+hall, followed by a presence at once so exuberant and so impressive
+that Quin stared in amazement.
+
+"This is Quinby Graham, grandfather," said Cass, by way of introduction.
+
+The dressy old gentleman with the flowing white locks and the white rose
+in his buttonhole bore down upon Quin and enveloped his hand in both his
+own.
+
+"I welcome you for Cassius' sake and for your own!" he declared with such
+effusion that Quin was visibly embarrassed. "My grandson has told me of
+your long siege in the hospital, of your noble service to your country,
+of your gallant conduct at----"
+
+"Sit down, Papa Claude, and finish your oration after supper," cried
+Rose; "the rabbit won't wait on anybody."
+
+Thus cut short, Mr. Martel took his seat and, nothing daunted, helped
+himself bountifully to everything within reach.
+
+"I am a gourmet, Sergeant Graham, but not a gourmand. Edwin Booth used to
+say----"
+
+"Sir?" answered Edwin Booth's namesake from the kitchen, where he had
+been dispatched for more bread.
+
+"No, no, my son, I was referring to----"
+
+But Papa Claude, as usual, did not get to finish the sentence. The advent
+of the next-door neighbor, who had been invited and then forgotten,
+caused great amusement owing to the fact that there was no more supper
+left.
+
+"Give her some bread and jam, Myrna," said Rose; "and if the jam is out,
+bring the brown sugar. You don't mind, do you, Fan?"
+
+Fan, an amiable blonde person who was going to be fat at forty, declared
+that she didn't want a thing to eat, honestly she didn't, and that
+besides she adored bread and brown sugar.
+
+"We won't stop to wash up," said Rose; "Myrna will have loads of time to
+do it in the morning, because she doesn't have to go to school. We'll
+just clear the table and let the dishes stand."
+
+"We are incorrigible Bohemians, as you observe," said Mr. Martel to Quin,
+with a deprecating arching of his fine brows. "We lay too little stress,
+I fear, on the conventions. But the exigencies of the dramatic
+profession--of which, you doubtless know, I have been a member for the
+past forty years----"
+
+"Take him in the sitting-room, Mr. Graham," urged Rose; "I'll bring your
+coffee in there."
+
+Without apparently being conscious of the fact, Mr. Martel, still
+discoursing in rounded periods, was transferred to the big chair beside
+the lamp, while Quin took up his stand on the hearth-rug and looked about
+him.
+
+Such a jumble of a room as it was! Odds and ends of furniture, the
+survival of various household wrecks; chipped bric-a-brac; a rug from
+which the pattern had long ago vanished; an old couch piled with shabby
+cushions; a piano with scattered music sheets. On the walls, from ceiling
+to foot-board, hung faded photographs of actors and actresses, most of
+them with bold inscriptions dashed across their corners in which the
+donors invariably expressed their friendship, affection, or if the
+chirography was feminine their devoted love, for "dear Claude Martel."
+Over the mantel was a portrait of dear Claude himself, taken in the role
+of Mark Antony, and making rather a good job of it, on the whole, with
+his fine Roman profile and massive brow.
+
+It was all shabby and dusty and untidy; but to Quinby Graham, standing on
+the hearth-rug and trying to handle his small coffee-cup as if he were
+used to it, the room was completely satisfying. There was a cozy warmth
+and mellowness about it, a kindly atmosphere of fellowship, a sense of
+intimate human relations, that brought a lump into his throat. He had
+almost forgotten that things could be like this!
+
+So absorbed was he in his surroundings, and in the imposing old actor
+encompassed by the galaxy of pictured notables, that he lost the thread
+of Mr. Martel's discourse until he heard him asking:
+
+"What is the present? A clamor of the senses, a roar that deafens us to
+the music of life. I dwell in the past and in the future, Sergeant
+Graham--the dear reminiscent past and the glorious unborn future. And
+that reminds me that Cassius tells me that you are both about to receive
+your discharge from the army and are ready for the next great adventure.
+May I ask what yours is to be? A return, perhaps, to your native city?"
+
+"My native city happens to be a river," said Quin. "I was born on a
+house-boat going up the Yangtse-Kiang."
+
+"Indeed!" cried Mr. Martel with interest. "What a romantic beginning! And
+your family?"
+
+"Haven't got any. You see, sir," said Quin, expanding under the
+flattering attention of his host, "my people were all missionaries. Most
+of them died off before I was fourteen, and I was shipped back to America
+to go to school. I didn't hold out very long, though. After two years in
+high school I ran away and joined the navy."
+
+"And since then you have been a soldier of fortune, eh? No cares, no
+responsibilities. Free to roam the wide world in search of adventure."
+
+Quin studied the end of his cigarette.
+
+"That ain't so good as it sounds," he said. "Sometimes I think I'd
+amounted to more if I had somebody that belonged to me."
+
+"Isn't it rather early in the season for a young man's fancy to be
+lightly turning----"
+
+The quotation was lost upon Quin, but the twinkle in the speaker's
+expressive eye was not.
+
+"I didn't mean that," he laughingly protested; "I mean a mother or a
+sister or somebody like that, who would be a kind of anchor. Take Cass,
+for instance; he's steady as a rock."
+
+"Ah! Cassius! One in ten thousand. From the time he was twelve he has
+shared with me the financial burden. An artist, Sergeant Graham, must
+remain aloof from the market-place. Now that I have retired permanently
+from the stage in order to devote my time exclusively to writing, my only
+business engagement is a series of lectures at the university, where, as
+you know, I occupy the chair of Dramatic Literature."
+
+The chair thus euphemistically referred to was scarcely more than a
+three-legged stool, which he occupied four mornings in the week, the rest
+of his time being spent at home in the arduous task of writing tragedies
+in blank verse.
+
+"What I got to think about is a job," said Quin, much more interested in
+his own affairs than in those of his host.
+
+"Commercial or professional?" inquired Mr. Martel.
+
+"Oh, I can turn my hand to 'most anything," bragged Quin, blowing
+smoke-rings at the ceiling. "It's experience that counts, and, believe
+me, I've had a plenty."
+
+"Experience plus education," added Mr. Martel; "we must not underestimate
+the advantages of education."
+
+"That's where I'm short," admitted Quin. "My folks were all smart enough.
+Guess if they had lived I'd been put through college and all the rest of
+it. My grandfather was Dr. Ezra Quinby. Ever hear of him?"
+
+Mr. Martel had to acknowledge that he had not.
+
+"Guess he is better known in China than in America," said Quin. "He died
+before I was born."
+
+"And you have no people in America?"
+
+"No people anywhere," said Quin cheerfully; "but I got a lot of friends
+scattered around over the world, and a bull-dog and a couple of cats up
+at a lumber-camp near Portland."
+
+"Cassius tells me that you are thinking of returning to Maine."
+
+Quin ran his fingers through his hair and laughed. "That was yesterday,"
+he said. "To-day you couldn't get me out of Kentucky with a machine-gun!"
+
+Claude Martel rose and laid an affectionate hand on his shoulder. "Then,
+my boy, we claim you as our own. Cassius' home is your home, his family
+your family, his----"
+
+The address of welcome was cut short by Cass's arrival with an armful of
+wood which he deposited on the hearth, and a moment later the girls,
+followed by Edwin, came trooping in from the kitchen.
+
+"Let's make a circle round the fire and sing the old year out," suggested
+Rose gaily. "Myrna, get the banjo and the guitar. Shall I play on the
+piano, Papa Claude, or will you?"
+
+Mr. Martel, expressing the noble sentiment that age should always be an
+accompaniment to youth, took his place at the piano and, with a pose
+worthy of Rubinstein, struck a few preliminary chords, while the group
+about the fire noisily settled itself for the evening.
+
+"You can put your head against my knees, if you like," Rose said to Quin,
+who was sprawling on the floor at her feet. "There, is that comfy?"
+
+"I'll say it's all right!" said Quin with heartfelt satisfaction.
+
+There was something free and easy and gipsy-like about the evening, a
+sort of fireside picnic that brought June dreams in January. As the hours
+wore on, the singing, which had been noisy and rollicking, gradually
+mellowed into sentiment, a sentiment that found vent in dreamy eyes and
+long-drawn-out choruses, with a languorous over-accentuation of the
+sentimental passages. One by one, the singers fell under the spell of the
+music and the firelight. Cass and Fan Loomis sat shoulder to shoulder on
+the broken-springed couch and gazed with blissful oblivion into the red
+embers on the hearth. Rose, whose voice led all the rest, surreptitiously
+wiped her eyes when no one was looking; Edwin and Myrna, solemnly
+plucking their banjo and guitar, were lost in moods of dormant emotion;
+while Papa Claude at the piano let his dim eyes range the pictured walls,
+while his memory traveled back through the years on many a secret tryst
+of its own.
+
+But it was the lank Sergeant with the big feet, and the hair that stood
+up where it shouldn't, who dared to dream the most preposterous dream of
+them all. For, as he sang there in the firelight, a little god was busy
+lighting the tapers in the most sacred shrines of his being, until he
+felt like a cathedral at high mass with all the chimes going.
+
+    "There's a long, long trail a-winding
+      Into the land of my dreams,
+    Where the nightingales are singing
+      And a white moon beams."
+
+How many times he had sung it in France!--jolting along muddy, endless
+roads, heartsick, homesick.
+
+    "There's a long, long night of waiting
+      Until my dreams all come true,
+    Till the day when I'll be going
+      Down that long, long trail with you."
+
+What had "you" meant to him then? A girl--a pretty girl, of course; but
+_any_ girl. And now?
+
+Ah, now he knew what he had been going toward, not only on those terrible
+roads in France, but all through the years of his life. An exquisite,
+imperious little officer's girl with divinely compassionate eyes, who
+wasn't ashamed to dance with a private, and who had let him hold her hand
+at parting while she said in accents an angel might have envied,
+"Good-by, Soldier Boy."
+
+Quin sighed profoundly and slipped his arm under his head, and at the
+same moment the owner of the knee upon which he was leaning also heaved a
+sigh and shifted _her_ position, and somehow in the adjustment two lonely
+hands came in contact and evidently decided that, after all, substitutes
+were _some_ comfort.
+
+It was not until all the whistles in town had announced the birth of the
+New Year that the party broke up, and it was not until then that Quin
+realized that he was very tired, and that his pulse was behaving in a way
+that was, alas, all too familiar.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 3
+
+
+Friday after New Year's found Sergeant Graham again flat on his back at
+the Base Hospital, facing sentence of three additional weeks in bed. In
+vain had he risked a reprimand by hotly protesting the point with the
+Captain; in vain had he declared to the nurse that he would rather live
+on his feet than die on his back. Judgment was passed, and he lay with an
+ice-bag on his head and a thermometer in his mouth and hot rage in his
+heart.
+
+What made matters worse was that Cass Martel had come over from the
+Convalescent Barracks only that morning to announce that he had received
+his discharge and was going home. To Quin it seemed that everybody but
+himself was going home--that is, everybody but the incurables. At that
+thought a dozen nameless fears that had been tormenting him of late all
+seemed to get together and rush upon him. What if the doctors were
+holding him on from month to month, experimenting, promising,
+disappointing, only in the end to bunch him with the permanently disabled
+and ship him off to some God-forsaken spot to spend the rest of his life
+in a hospital?
+
+He gripped his hands over his chest and gave himself up to savage
+rebellion. If they would let him alone he might get well! In France it
+had been his head. Whenever the wound began to heal and things looked a
+bit cheerful, some saw-bones had come along and thumped and probed and
+X-rayed, and then it had been ether and an operation and the whole
+blooming thing over again. Then, when they couldn't work on his head any
+longer, they'd started up this talk about his heart. Of course his heart
+was jumpy! All the fellows who had been badly gassed had jumpy hearts.
+But how was he ever going to get any better lying there on his back? What
+he needed was exercise and decent food and something cheerful to think
+about. He wanted desperately to get away from his memories, to forget the
+horrors, the sickening sights and smells, the turmoil and confusion of
+the past two years. In spite of his most heroic efforts, he kept living
+over past events. This time last year he had been up in the Toul sector,
+where half the men he knew had gone west. It was up there old Corpy had
+got his head shot off....
+
+He resolutely fixed his attention on a spider that was swinging directly
+over his head and tried to forget old Corpy. He thought instead of
+Captain Phipps, but the thought did not calm him. What sense was there in
+his ordering more of this fool rest business? Well, he told himself
+fiercely, he wasn't going to stand for it! The war was over, he had done
+his part, he was going to demand his freedom. Discipline or no
+discipline, he would go over Phipps' head and appeal to the Colonel.
+
+Throwing aside the ice-bag, he looked around for his uniform. But the
+nurse had evidently mistrusted the look in his eyes when she gave him the
+Captain's orders, for the hook over his bed was empty. He raised himself
+in his cot and glared savagely down the ward, sniffing the air
+suspiciously. Two orderlies were wheeling No. 17 back from the
+operating-room, and Quin already caught the faint odor of ether. The
+first whiff of it filled him with loathing.
+
+Thrusting his bare feet into slippers and his arms into a shabby old
+bath-robe, he flung himself out of bed and slipped out on the porch. The
+air was cold and bracing and gloriously free from the hospital
+combination of wienerwuerst, ether, and dried peaches that had come to be
+a nightmare odor to him. He sat on the railing and drew in deep,
+refreshing breaths, and as he did so things began to right themselves.
+Fair play to Quin amounted almost to a religion, and it was suddenly
+borne in upon him that he would not be where he was had he observed the
+rules of the game. But then again, if he had not danced, he never would
+have----
+
+At that moment something so strange happened that he put a hot hand to a
+hotter brow and wondered if he was delirious. The singularly vibrant
+voice that had been echoing in his memory since New Year's eve was saying
+directly behind him:
+
+"I shall give them all the chocolate they want, Captain Harold Phipps,
+and you may court-martial me later if you like!"
+
+Quin glanced up hastily, and there, framed in the doorway, in a Red Cross
+uniform, stood his dream girl, looking so much more ravishing than she
+had before that he promptly snatched the blue and gray vision from its
+place of honor and installed a red, white, and blue one instead. So
+engrossed was he in the apparition that he quite failed to see Captain
+Phipps surveying him over her shoulder.
+
+"Number 7!" said the Captain with icy decision, "weren't you instructed
+to stay in bed?"
+
+"I was, sir," said Quin, coming to attention and presenting a decidedly
+sorry aspect.
+
+"Go back at once, and add three days to the time indicated. This way,
+Miss Bartlett."
+
+Now, it is well-nigh impossible to preserve one's dignity when suffering
+a reprimand in public; but when you are handicapped by a shabby
+bath-robe, a three days' growth of beard, and a grouch that gives you the
+expression of a bandit, and the public happens to be the one being on
+earth whom you are most anxious to please, the situation becomes tragic.
+
+Quin set his jaw and shuffled ignominiously off to bed, thankful for once
+that he had been considered unworthy a second glance from those luminous
+brown eyes. His satisfaction, however, was short-lived. A moment later
+the young lady appeared at the far end of the ward, carrying an absurd
+little basket adorned with a large pink bow, from which she began to
+distribute chocolates.
+
+A feminine presence in the ward always created a flutter, but the
+previous flutters were mere zephyrs compassed to the cyclone produced by
+the new ward visitor. Some one started the phonograph, and Michaelis, who
+had been swearing all day that he would never be able to walk again,
+actually began to dance. Witticisms were exchanged from bed to bed, and
+the man who was going to be operated on next morning flung a pillow at an
+orderly and upset a vase of flowers. Things had not been so cheerful for
+weeks.
+
+Quin, lying in the last bed in the ward, alternated between rapture and
+despair as he watched the progress of the visitor. Would she recognize
+him? Would she speak to him if she did, when he looked like that? Perhaps
+if he turned his face to the wall and pretended to be asleep she would
+pass him by. But he did not want her to pass him by. This might be the
+only chance he would ever have to see her again!
+
+Back in his fringe of consciousness he was frantically groping for the
+name the Captain had mentioned: Barnet? Barret? Bartlett? That was it!
+And with the recovery of the name Quin's mind did another somersault.
+Bartlett? Where had he heard that name? Eleanor Bartlett? Some nonsense
+about "Solomon's baby." Why, Rose Martel, of course.
+
+Then all thought deserted him, for the world suddenly shrank to five feet
+two of femininity, and he heard a gay, impersonal voice saying:
+
+"May I put a cake of chocolate on your table?"
+
+For the life of him, he could not answer. He only lay there with his
+mouth open, looking at her, while she straightened the contents of her
+basket. One more moment and she would be gone. Quin staked all on a
+chance shot.
+
+"Thank you, Miss Eleanor Bartlett," he said, with that ridiculous blush
+that was so out of keeping with his audacity.
+
+She looked at him in amazement; then her face broke into a smile of
+recognition.
+
+"Well, bless my soul, if it isn't Sergeant Slim! What are you doing
+here?"
+
+"Same thing I been doing for six months," said Quin sheepishly; "counting
+the planks in the ceiling."
+
+"But I thought you had got well. Oh, I hope it wasn't the dancing----"
+
+"Lord, no," said Quin, keeping his hand over his bristly chin. "I'm
+husky, all right. Only they've got so used to seeing me laying around
+that they can't bear to let me go."
+
+"Do you have to lie flat on your back like that, with no pillow or
+anything?"
+
+"It ain't so bad, except at mess-time."
+
+"And you can't even sit up to eat?"
+
+"Not supposed to."
+
+Miss Bartlett eyed him compassionately.
+
+"I am coming out twice a week now--Mondays and Fridays--and I'm going to
+bring you something nice every time I come. How long will you be here?"
+
+"Three weeks," said Quin--adding, with a funny twist of his lip, "three
+weeks and three days."
+
+"Oh! Were you the boy on the porch? How funny I didn't recognize you! I'm
+going to ask Captain Phipps to let you off those extra days."
+
+"No, you mustn't." Quin objected earnestly; "I'll take what's coming to
+me. Besides," he added, "one of those days might be a Monday or a
+Friday!"
+
+This seemed to amuse her, for she smiled as she wrote his name and bed
+number in a small notebook, with the added entry: "Oyster soup,
+cigarettes, and a razor."
+
+Just as she was leaving, she remembered something and turned back.
+
+"How did you know my name?" she asked with lively curiosity.
+
+"Didn't the Captain call it on the porch?"
+
+"Did he? But not my first name. How on earth _did_ you know that?"
+
+"Perhaps I guessed it," Quin said, looking mysterious. And just then a
+nurse came along and thrust the thermometer back in his mouth, and the
+conversation was abruptly ended.
+
+Of course the calendar must have been right about the three weeks that
+followed; there probably were seven days in each week and twenty-four
+hours in each day. But Quin wasn't sure about it. He knew beyond doubt
+that there were three Mondays and four Fridays and one wholly gratuitous
+and never-to-be-forgotten Sunday when Miss Bartlett brought his dinner
+from town, and insisted upon cutting his chicken for him and feeding him
+custard with a spoon. The rest of the days were lost in abstract time,
+during which Quin had his hair cut and his face shaved, and did
+bead-work.
+
+Until now he had sturdily refused to be inveigled into occupational
+therapy. Those guys that were done for could learn to knit, he said, and
+to make silly little mats, and weave things on a loom. If he couldn't do
+a man's work he'd be darned if he was going to do a woman's. But now all
+was changed. He announced his intention of making the classiest bead
+chain that had ever been achieved in 2 C. He insisted upon the instructor
+getting him the most expensive beads in the market, regardless of size or
+color.
+
+Now, for Quin, with his big hands and lack of dexterity, to have worked
+with beads under the most favorable conditions would have been difficult,
+but to master the art lying flat on his back was a _tour de force_. He
+pricked his fingers and broke his thread; he upset the beads on the
+floor, on the bed, in his tray; he took out and put in with infinite
+patience, "each bead a thought, each thought a prayer."
+
+"Don't you think you had better give it up?" asked the instructor, in
+despair, after the fourth lesson.
+
+"You don't know me," said Quin, setting his jaw. "You been trying to get
+me into this for two weeks--now you've got to see me through."
+
+It did not take long for the other patients to discover Quin's state of
+mind.
+
+"How about your heart disease, Graham?" they inquired daily; "think it's
+going to be chronic?"
+
+But Quin had little time for them. The distinction he had enjoyed as the
+champion poker-player in 2 C. began to wane as his popularity with the
+new ward visitor increased.
+
+"I like your nerve!--keeping her up there at your bed all the time,"
+complained Michaelis.
+
+"She's an old friend of mine," Quin threw off nonchalantly.
+
+"Aw, what you tryin' to put over on us?" scoffed Mike. "Where'd you ever
+git to know a girl like that?"
+
+"Well, I know her all right," said Quin.
+
+The little mystery about Miss Bartlett's first name had been a fruitful
+topic of conversation between a couple whose topics were necessarily
+limited. She had teased Quin to tell her how he knew, and also how he
+knew she wanted to go on the stage; and Quin had teased back; and at last
+it had resolved itself into a pretty contest of wits.
+
+This served to keep her beside him often as long as four minutes. Then he
+would gain an additional two minutes by showing her what progress he had
+made with his chain, and consulting her preference for an American flag
+or a Red Cross worked in the medallion.
+
+When every other means of detaining her had been exhausted, he sometimes
+resorted to strategy. Constitutionally he was opposed to duplicity; he
+was built on certain square lines that disqualified him for many a
+comfortable round hole in life. But under the stress of present
+circumstances he persuaded himself that the end justified the means.
+Ignoring the fact that he was as devoid of relations as a tree is of
+leaves in December, he developed a sudden sense of obligation to an
+imaginary cousin whom he added, without legal authority, to the
+population of Peru, Indiana. By means of Miss Bartlett's white hand he
+frequently informed her that she was not to worry about him, because he
+was "doing splendid," and that a hospital "wasn't so worse when you get
+used to it." And while he dictated words of assurance to his "Cousin Sue"
+his eyes feasted upon a dainty profile with long brown lashes that swept
+a peach-blow cheek. Once he became so demoralized by this too pleasing
+prospect that he said "tell him" instead of "tell her," and the lashes
+lifted in instant inquiry.
+
+"I mean--er--her husband," Quin gasped.
+
+"But you had me direct the other letters to Miss Sue Brown."
+
+"Yes, I know," said Quin, with an embarrassment that might have been
+attributed to skeletons in family closets; "but, you see--she--er--she
+took back her own name."
+
+The one cloud that darkened Quin's horizon these days was Captain Phipps.
+His visits to the ward always coincided with Miss Bartlett's, and he
+seemed to take a spiteful pleasure in keeping the men at attention while
+he engaged her in intimate conversation. He was an extremely fastidious,
+well groomed young man, with an insolent hauteur and a certain lordly air
+of possession that proclaimed him a conqueror of the sex. Quin regarded
+him with growing disfavor.
+
+When the three weeks were almost over, Quin was allowed to sit up, and
+even to walk on the porch. Miss Bartlett found him there one day when she
+arrived.
+
+"Aha!" she cried, "I've found you out, Sergeant Slim! You are Cass
+Martel's hero, and that's where you heard about me and found out my first
+name."
+
+Quin pleaded guilty, and their usual five minutes together lengthened
+into fifteen while she gave him all the news of the Martel family. Cass
+had taken his old position at the railroad office, and, dear knows, it
+was a good thing! And Rose was giving dancing lessons. And what did he
+think little old Myrna had done? Adopted a baby! Yes, a baby; wasn't it
+too ridiculous! An Italian one that the washwoman had forsaken. And Papa
+Claude had given up his lectures at the university in order to write the
+great American play. Weren't they the funniest and the dearest people he
+had ever known?
+
+It was amazing how intimate Quin and Miss Bartlett got on the subject of
+the Martels. He had to tell her in detail just what a brick her cousin
+Cass was, and she had to tell him what a really wonderful actor Papa
+Claude used to be.
+
+"Captain Phipps says he knows more about the stage than any man in the
+country."
+
+"What does the Captain know about it?" asked Quin.
+
+"Captain Phipps? Why, he's a playwright. He means to devote all his time
+to the stage as soon as he gets out of the army. You may not believe it,
+but he is an even better dramatist than he is a doctor."
+
+"Oh, yes, I do," said Quin; "that's easy to believe."
+
+The sarcasm was lost upon Miss Bartlett, who was intent upon delivering
+her message from the Martels. They had sent word that they expected Quin
+to come straight to them when he got his discharge, and that his room was
+waiting for him.
+
+"And you?" asked Quin eagerly. "You'll be there every Sunday?"
+
+Her face, which had been all smiles, underwent a sudden change. She said
+with something perilously like a pout:
+
+"No, I shan't; I'm to be shipped off to school next week."
+
+"School?" repeated Quin incredulously. "What do you want to be going back
+to school for?"
+
+"I _don't_ want to. I hate it. It's the price I am paying for that dance
+I had with you at the Hawaiian Garden--that and other things."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"Some old tabby of a chaperon saw me there and came and told my
+grandmother."
+
+"But what could she have told? You didn't do anything you oughtn't to."
+
+Miss Bartlett shook her head. It was evidently something she could not
+explain, for she sat staring gloomily at the wall above the bed, then she
+said abruptly: "Well, I must be going. Good-by if I don't see you again!"
+
+"But you will," announced Quin fiercely. "You are going to see me next
+Sunday at the Martels'. I'll be there if I land in the guard-house for
+it."
+
+"Why, your time's up Saturday, isn't it? Oh! I forgot those three extra
+days. Captain Phipps has got to let you off. He will if I tell him to."
+
+At this something quite unexpected and elemental surged up in Quin. He
+forgot the amenities that he had taken such pains to observe in Miss
+Bartlett's presence, he entirely lost sight of the social gap that lay
+between them, and blurted out with deadly earnestness:
+
+"Say, are you his girl?"
+
+This had the effect of bringing Miss Bartlett promptly to her feet, and
+the next instant poor Quin was saying in an agony of regret:
+
+"I'm sorry, Miss Bartlett. I didn't mean to be nervy. Honest, I didn't.
+Wait a minute--_please_----"
+
+But she was gone, leaving him to spend the rest of the afternoon searching
+for a phrase sufficiently odious to express his own opinion of himself.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 4
+
+
+Eleanor Bartlett, speeding home from the hospital with Captain Phipps
+beside her, repeated Quin's question to herself more than once. Up to the
+present her loves, like her friendships, had been entirely episodic. She
+had gone easily from one affair to another not so much from fickleness as
+from growth. What she wanted on Monday did not seem in the least
+desirable on Saturday, and it was a new and disturbing sensation to have
+the same person dominating her thoughts for so many consecutive days. If
+her relations with the young officer from Chicago were as platonic as she
+would have herself and her family believe, why had she allowed the affair
+to arrive at a stage that precipitated her banishment? Why was she even
+now flying in the face of authority and risking a serious reprimand by
+letting him ride in her car?
+
+In fierce justification she told herself it was simply because the family
+had meddled. If they had not interfered, things would never have reached
+the danger mark. She had met Captain Phipps three weeks ago at her Uncle
+Randolph Bartlett's, and had at first not been sure that she liked him.
+He had seemed then a little superior and condescending, and had evidently
+considered her too young to be interesting. But the next time they met
+there Aunt Flo had made her do the balcony scene from "Romeo and Juliet,"
+and since then all had been different.
+
+Captain Phipps had not only monopolized her at the dances--he had also
+found time from his not over-arduous military duties to drop in on her
+frequently in the afternoons. For hours at a time they had sat in the
+long, dim Bartlett parlor, with only the ghostly bust of old Madam
+Bartlett for a chaperon, ostensibly absorbed in the study of modern
+drama, but finding ample time to dwell at length upon Eleanor's
+qualifications for the stage and the Captain's budding genius as a
+playwright. And just when Ibsen and Pinero were giving place to
+Sudermann, and vague personal ambitions were crystallizing into definite
+plans, the family interfered.
+
+The causes of their condemnation were as varied as they were numerous. He
+was ten years older than Eleanor; he was too sophisticated a companion
+for a young girl; he had taken her to a public dance-hall on New Year's
+eve, where she had been seen dancing with an unknown private; he had been
+quite insolent to Madam when she had taken him to task for it; and, most
+heinous of all, he was encouraging her in her ambition to go on the
+stage. And beneath it all, Eleanor knew quite well, was the nervous
+flutter of apprehension that seized the entire family whenever a
+threatening masculine presence loomed on the horizon.
+
+She stole a glance at her handsome companion, and, seeing that he was
+observing her, quickly lowered her eyes. The Captain had a flattering way
+of studying her poses, remarking on the lines of her gowns and her hats.
+He was constantly discovering interesting things about her that she had
+not known before. But sometimes, as now, she was restive under his too
+close scrutiny.
+
+"So you are actually going to leave me next week?" he asked, with a note
+of personal aggrievement.
+
+"To leave you? I like that! If it weren't for you I shouldn't be going."
+
+"Are they really sending you away on my account?"
+
+"Indeed they are. Grandmother says you are encouraging me about the
+stage, and that poor Papa Claude is demoralizing us both."
+
+"Isn't that absurd?" said the Captain. "Dear old C. M. is about as
+innocuous as a peacock. Madam Bartlett should have been born in the
+seventeenth century. What will she say when she sees your name blazing
+over a Broadway theater?"
+
+"In one of your plays! Oh, Captain, wouldn't that be glorious?"
+
+"Haven't I asked you to drop the 'Captain'? My name is Harold. Say it!"
+
+"No; I can't."
+
+"Yes, you can. Come!"
+
+But she defied him with tightly closed lips and dancing eyes. With
+feminine instinct she had discovered that the irresistible Captain was
+piqued and stimulated by the unusual taste of opposition.
+
+"You little minx!" he said, lifting an accusing finger. "Those eyes of
+yours are going to do a lot of damage before they get through with it."
+
+Eleanor took kindly to the thought that she was dangerous. If she could
+cause disturbance to an individual by the guarded flutter of her eyelids,
+what effect might she not produce by giving them full play before a
+larger audience?
+
+"Do you really think I could act if I got the chance?" she asked
+dreamily.
+
+"I am absolutely sure. Your grandfather's quite right when he says you
+were born to the footlights. With your voice and your unusual coloring
+and your plastic little body----"
+
+"But you can't imagine the opposition," Eleanor broke in. "It isn't as if
+my mother and father were living. I believe they would understand. But
+grandfather and the aunties, and even Uncle Ranny, throw a fit at the
+mere mention of the stage."
+
+"You do not belong to them," said the Captain impatiently. "You do not
+even belong to yourself. A great talent belongs to the world. All these
+questions will settle themselves, once you take the definite step."
+
+"And you actually believe that I will get to New York to study?"
+
+"I don't believe--I _know_. I intend to make it my business to see that
+you do."
+
+There was a confident ring of masterful assurance in his voice that
+carried delicious conviction. A person who was so absolutely sure of
+himself made other people sure of him, too, for the moment.
+
+Eleanor, sitting low in the car, with her absent eyes fixed on the road
+ahead, lapsed into a daydream. From an absorbed contemplation of herself
+and her dramatic career, her mind veered in gratitude to the one who most
+believed in its possibility. What a friend he had been! Just when she had
+been ready to give up in despair, he had fanned her dying hope into a
+glorious blaze that illuminated every waking hour. And it was not only
+his sympathetic interest in her thwarted ambition that touched her: it
+was also the fact that he had rescued her from the daily boredom of
+sitting with elderly ladies making interminable surgical dressings, and
+by an adroit bit of diplomacy outwitted the family and introduced her as
+a ward visitor at the camp hospital.
+
+The mere thought of the hospital sent her mind flying off at a tangent.
+Even the stage gave way for the moment to this new and all-absorbing
+occupation. Never in her life had she done anything so interesting. The
+escape from home, the personal contact with all those nice, jolly boys,
+the excitement of being of service for the first time in her butterfly
+existence, was intoxicating. She smiled now as she thought of the way
+Graham's eager head always popped up the moment she entered the door,
+and of how his face shone when she talked to him. After all, she told
+herself, there _was_ something thrilling in having hands that had
+captured a machine-gun laboriously threading tiny beads for her, in
+having a soldier who had been decorated for courage stammer and blush
+in her presence.
+
+"Well," said the Captain, who had been lazily observing her, "aren't you
+about through with your mental monologue?"
+
+Eleanor roused herself with a start.
+
+"Oh, I am sorry! I was thinking about my boys at the hospital. You can't
+imagine how I hate to leave them!"
+
+The answer was evidently not what the Captain had expected. As long as
+his company of feminine admirers marched in adoring unison he was
+indifferent to their existence; but let one miss step and he was
+instantly on the alert.
+
+"I haven't noticed any tears being shed over leaving me," he said, and
+the aggrieved note in his voice promptly stirred her humor.
+
+"Why should I mind leaving you? You don't need me."
+
+"How do you know?"
+
+She looked at him scoffingly.
+
+"You don't need anything or anybody. You've got all you want in
+yourself."
+
+"I'll show you what I want!" he said, and, quickly bending toward her, he
+kissed her on the cheek.
+
+It was the merest brush of his lips, but it brought the color flaming
+into her face and the lightning into her eyes. She had never been so
+angry in her life, and it seemed to her an age that she sat there rigid
+and indignant, suffocated by his nearness but powerless to move away.
+Then she got the car stopped, and announced with great dignity that she
+was nearly home and that she would have to ask him to get out.
+
+Captain Phipps lazily descended from the car, then stood with elbows on
+the ledge of the door and rolled a cigarette with great deliberation.
+Eleanor, in spite of her wrath, could not help admiring the graceful,
+conscious movement of his slender hands with their highly polished nails.
+It was not until he had struck his match that he looked at her and smiled
+quizzically.
+
+"What a dear little goose you are! Do you suppose that stage lovers are
+going to stand in the wings and throw kisses to you?"
+
+"No," said Eleanor hotly; "but that will be different."
+
+"It certainly will," he agreed amiably. "You will not only have to be
+kissed, but you will have to kiss back. You have a lot of little
+puritanical prejudices to get over, my dear, before you can ever hope to
+act. You don't want to be a thin-blooded little old maid, do you?"
+
+The shot was well aimed, for Eleanor had no desire to follow in the arid
+footsteps of her two spinster aunts. She looked at Captain Phipps
+unsteadily and shook her head.
+
+"Of course you don't," he encouraged her. "You aren't built for it.
+Besides, it's an actress's business to cultivate her emotions rather than
+repress them, isn't it?"
+
+"Yes, I suppose it is."
+
+"Then, for heaven's sake, obey your impulses and let other people obey
+theirs. From now on you are to be identified with a profession that
+transcends the petty conventions of society. Confess! Aren't you already
+a little ashamed of getting angry with me just now?"
+
+She was not ashamed, not in the least; but her ardent desire to prove her
+fitness for that coveted profession, together with the compelling
+insistence of that persuasive voice, prompted her to hold out a reluctant
+hand and to smile.
+
+"You are a darling child!" said Captain Phipps, with a level glance of
+approval. "I shall see you to-morrow. When? Where?"
+
+But she would make no engagement. She was in a flutter to be gone. It was
+her first experience at dancing on a precipice, and, while she liked it,
+she could not deny, even to herself, that at times it made her
+uncomfortably hot and dizzy.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 5
+
+
+Eleanor's thoughts were still in a turmoil as she slowed her car to a
+within-the-law limit of speed and brought it to a dignified halt before
+an imposing edifice on Third Avenue. The precaution was well taken, for a
+long, pale face that had been pressed to a front window promptly
+transferred itself to the front door, and an anxious voice called out:
+
+"Oh, Nellie, _why_ did you stay out so late? Didn't you know it was your
+duty to be in before five?"
+
+"It's not late, Aunt Isobel," said Eleanor impatiently. "It gets dark
+early, that's all."
+
+"And you must be frozen," persisted Miss Isobel, "with those thin pumps
+and silk stockings, and nothing but that veil on your head."
+
+"But I'm _hot!_" declared Eleanor, throwing open her coat. "The house is
+stifling. Can't we have a window open?"
+
+Miss Isobel sighed. Like the rest of the family, she never knew what to
+expect from this troublesome, adorable, disturbing mystery called
+Eleanor. She worshiped her with the solicitous, over-anxious care that
+saw fever in the healthy flush of youth, regarded a sneeze as premonitory
+of consumption, and waited with dark certitude for the "something
+dreadful" that instinct told her was ever about to happen to her darling.
+
+"I am afraid your grandmother is terribly upset about your staying out so
+late," she said, with a note of warning in her voice.
+
+"What made you tell her?" demanded Eleanor.
+
+"Because she asked me, and of course I could not deceive her. I don't
+believe you know how hard it is to keep things from her."
+
+"_Don't_ I!" said Eleanor, with the tolerant smile of a professional for
+an amateur. "Well, a few minutes more won't make any difference. I'll go
+and change my dress."
+
+"No, dear; you must go to her first. She's been sending Hannah down every
+few minutes to see if you were here."
+
+"Oh, dear! I suppose I'm in for it!" sighed Eleanor, flinging her coat
+across the banister. Then, in answer to a plaintive voice from the
+library, "Yes, Aunt Enid?"
+
+"Why on earth are you so late, sweetheart? Didn't you know your
+grandmother would be fretted?"
+
+The possessor of the plaintive voice emerged from the library, trailing
+an Oriental scarf as she came. Like her elder sister, she was tall and
+thin, but she did not wear Miss Isobel's look of martyred resignation. On
+the contrary, she had the starved look of one who is constantly trying to
+pick up the crumbs of interest that other people let fall.
+
+Enid Bartlett might have passed for a pretty woman had her appearance not
+been permanently affected by an artist once telling her she looked like a
+Botticelli. Since that time she had done queer things to her hair, pursed
+her lips, and cultivated an expression of chronic yearning.
+
+"I haven't seen you since breakfast, Nellie," she said gently. "Haven't
+you a kiss for me?"
+
+Eleanor presented a perfunctory cheek over the banisters, taking care
+that it was not the one that had been kissed a few minutes before.
+
+"Remember your promise," Aunt Enid whispered; "don't forget that your
+grandmother is an old lady and you must not excite her."
+
+"But she excites me," said Eleanor doggedly. "She makes me want to smash
+windows and scream."
+
+"Why, Nellie!" Miss Enid's mournful eyes filled with tears. Instantly
+Eleanor was all contrition.
+
+"I'm sorry!" she said, with a real kiss this time. "I'll behave. Give you
+my word I will!" And, with an affectionate squeeze of the hand that
+clasped hers, she ran up the steps.
+
+The upper hall, like the rest of the house, was pervaded by an air of
+gloomy grandeur. Everything was dreary, formal, fixed. Not an ornament or
+a picture had been changed since Eleanor could remember. She was the only
+young thing about the place, and it always seemed to her as if the house
+and its occupants were conspiring to make her old and staid and stupid,
+like themselves.
+
+At the door of her grandmother's room she paused. As far back as she
+could remember, her quarrels with her grandmother had been the most
+terrifying events of her life. Repetition never robbed them of their
+horror, and no amount of spoiling between times could make up to her for
+the violence of the moment. It took all the courage she had to turn the
+knob of the door and enter.
+
+A brigadier-general planning an important campaign would have presented
+no more commanding presence than did the formidable old lady who sat at a
+flat-top desk, issuing orders in a loud, decisive tone to a small
+meek-looking man who stood before her. The most arresting feature about
+Madam Bartlett was a towering white pompadour that began where most
+pompadours end, and soared to a surprising height above her large,
+handsome, masculine face. The fact that her hair line had gradually
+receded from her forehead to the top of her head affected no change
+whatever in the arrangement of her coiffure. Neither in regard to her
+hair nor to her figure had she yielded one iota to the whims of Nature.
+Her body was still confined in the stiffest of stays, and in spite of her
+seventy years was as straight as an arrow. At Eleanor's entrance she
+motioned her peremptorily to a chair and proceeded with the business in
+hand.
+
+"You go back and tell Mr. Bangs," she was saying to the meek-looking
+person, "that I want him to send somebody up here who knows more than you
+do. Do you understand?"
+
+The meek one evidently understood, for he reached nervously for his cap.
+
+"Wait!" commanded Madam peremptorily. "Don't start off like that, while I
+am talking to you! Tell Mr. Bangs this is the third time I've asked him
+to send me the report of Bartlett & Bangs' export business for the past
+year. I want it immediately. I am not in my dotage yet. I still have some
+say-so in the firm. Well, what are you waiting for?"
+
+"I was waiting to know if there was anything more, ma'am."
+
+"If there had been I would have said so. Tell Hannah to come in as you go
+out."
+
+Eleanor looked at her grandmother expectantly, but there was no answering
+glance. The old lady was evidently in one of her truculent moods that
+brooked no interference.
+
+"Has the plumber come?" she demanded of the elderly colored maid who
+appeared at the door.
+
+"No, ma'am. He can't get here till to-morrow."
+
+"Tell him I won't wait. If he can't come within an hour he needn't come
+at all. Where is Tom?"
+
+Hannah's eyes shifted uneasily. "Tom? Why, Tom, he thought you discharged
+him."
+
+"So I did. But he's not to go until I get another butler. Send him up
+here at once."
+
+"But he ain't here," persisted Hannah fearfully, "He's went for good this
+time."
+
+Eleanor, sitting demurely by the door, had a moment of unholy exultation.
+Old black Tom, the butler, had been Madam's chief domestic prop for a
+quarter of a century. He had been the patient buffer between her and the
+other servants, taking her domineering with unfailing meekness, and even
+venturing her defense when mutiny threatened below stairs. "You-all don't
+understand old Miss," he would say loyally. "She's all right, only she's
+jes' nachully mean, dat's all."
+
+In the turning of this humble worm, Eleanor felt in some vague way a
+justification of her own rebellion.
+
+His departure, however, did not tend to clear the domestic atmosphere. By
+the time Madam had settled the plumbing question and expressed her
+opinion of Tom and all his race, she was in no mood to deal leniently
+with the shortcomings of a headstrong young granddaughter.
+
+"Well," she said, addressing her at last, "why didn't you make it
+midnight?"
+
+"It's only a little after five." Eleanor knew she was putting up a feeble
+defense, and her hands grew cold.
+
+"It is nearly six, and it is dark. Couldn't you have withdrawn the
+sunshine of your presence from the hospital half an hour sooner?"
+
+Under her sharp glance there was a curious protective tenderness, the
+savage concern of a lioness for her whelp; but Eleanor saw only the
+scoffing expression in the keen eyes, and heard the note of irony in all
+she said.
+
+"Your going out to the hospital is all foolishness, anyhow," the old lady
+continued, sorting her papers with efficiency. "Contagious diseases,
+germs, and what not. But some women would be willing to go to Hades if
+they could tie a becoming rag around their heads. Why didn't you dress
+yourself properly before you came in here?"
+
+"I wanted to, but Aunt----"
+
+"Aunt Enid, I suppose! If it was left to her she'd have you trailing
+around in a Greek tunic and sandals, with a laurel wreath on your head."
+
+There was an ominous pause, during which Madam's wrinkled, bony hands,
+flashing with diamonds, searched rapidly among the papers.
+
+"You are all ready to start on Monday? Your clothes are in good
+condition, I presume?"
+
+Eleanor brought her gaze from a detached contemplation of the ceiling to
+a critical inspection of her finger-nails.
+
+"I suppose Aunt Isobel has attended to them," she said indifferently.
+
+"Aunt Isobel, indeed!" snarled Madam. "You'd lean on a broken reed if you
+depended on Isobel. And Enid is no better. _I_ attended to your clothes.
+I got you everything you need, even down to a new set of furs."
+
+"Silver fox?" asked Eleanor, brightening visibly.
+
+"No, mink. I can't abide fox. Ah! here's what I am looking for. Your
+ticket and berth reservation. Train leaves at ten-thirty Monday morning."
+
+"Grandmother," ventured Eleanor, summing up courage to lead a forlorn
+hope, "you are just wasting money sending me back to Baltimore."
+
+"It's my money," said the old lady grimly.
+
+"It's your money, but it is my life," Eleanor urged, with a quiver in her
+voice. "If you are going to send me away, why not send me to New York and
+let me do the one thing in the world I want to do?"
+
+That Madam should be willing to furnish unlimited funds for finishing
+schools, music lessons, painting lessons, and every "extra" that the
+curriculum offered, and yet refuse to cultivate her one real talent,
+seemed to Eleanor the most unreasonable autocracy. She had no way of
+knowing that Madam's indomitable pride, still quivering with the memory
+of her oldest son's marriage to an unknown young actress, recoiled
+instinctively from the theatrical rock on which so many of her old hopes
+had been wrecked.
+
+Eleanor's persistence in recurring to this most distasteful of subjects
+roused her to fury. A purple flush suffused her face, and her cheeks
+puffed in and out as she breathed.
+
+"I suppose Claude Martel has it all mapped out," she said. "He and that
+fool Harold Phipps have stirred you up to a pretty pitch. What do you see
+in that silly coxcomb, anyhow?"
+
+"If you mean Captain Phipps," Eleanor said with dignity, "I see a great
+deal. He is one of the most cultivated men I ever met."
+
+"Fiddlesticks! He smells like a soap-counter! When I see an affected man
+I see a fool. He has airs enough to fill a music-box. But that's neither
+here nor there. You understand definitely that I do not wish you to see
+him again?"
+
+Eleanor's silence did not satisfy Madam. She insisted upon a verbal
+assurance, which Eleanor was loath to give.
+
+"I tell you once for all, young lady," said Madam, by this time roused to
+fury, "that you have _got_ to do what I say for another year. After that
+you will be twenty-one, and you can go to the devil, if you want to."
+
+"Grandmother!" cried Eleanor, shrinking as if from a physical blow. Then,
+remembering her promise to her Aunt Enid, she bit her lip and struggled
+to keep back the tears. As she started to leave the room, Madam called
+her back.
+
+"Here, take this," she said gruffly, thrusting a small morocco box into
+her hand. "Isobel and Enid never had decent necks to hang 'em on. See
+that you don't lose them." And without more ado she thrust Eleanor out of
+the room and shut the door in her face.
+
+Eleanor fled down the hall to her own room, and after locking the door
+flung herself on the bed. It was always like that, she told herself
+passionately; they nagged at her and tormented her and wore her out with
+their care and anxiety, and then suffocated her with their affection. She
+did not want their presents. She wanted freedom, the right to live her
+own life, think her own thoughts, make her own decisions. She did not
+mean to be ungrateful, but she couldn't please them all! The family
+expectations of her were too high, too different from what she wanted.
+Other girls with half her talents for the stage had succeeded, and just
+because she was a Bartlett----
+
+She clenched her fists and wished for the hundredth time that she had
+never been born. She had been a bone of contention all her life, and,
+even when the two families were not fighting over her, the Bartlett blood
+was warring with the Martel blood within her. Her standards were
+hopelessly confused; she did not know what she wanted except that she
+wanted passionately to be let alone.
+
+"Nellie!" called a gentle voice on the other side of the door. "Are you
+ready for dinner?"
+
+"Don't want any dinner," she mumbled from the depths of a pillow.
+
+The door-handle turned softly and the voice persisted:
+
+"You must unlock the door, dearie; I want to speak to you."
+
+Eleanor flung herself off the bed and opened the door. "I tell you, I
+don't want any dinner, Aunt Enid," she declared petulantly.
+
+Miss Enid drew her down on the bed beside her and regarded her with
+pensive persuasion. "I know, Nelchen; I often feel like that. But you
+must come down and make a pretense of eating. It upsets your grandmother
+to have any one of us absent from meals."
+
+"Everything I do upsets her!" cried Eleanor with tragic insistence. "I
+can't please her--there's no use trying. Why does she treat me the way
+she does? Why does she sometimes almost seem to hate me?"
+
+Miss Enid's eyes involuntarily glanced at the picture of Eleanor's mother
+over the desk, taken in the doublet and hose of _Rosalind_.
+
+"Hush, child; you mustn't say such awful things," she said, drawing the
+girl close and stroking her hair. "Mother adores you. Think of all she
+has done for you ever since you were a tiny baby. What other girl of your
+acquaintance has her own car, all the pretty clothes she can wear, and as
+much pin-money as she can spend?"
+
+"But that's not what I _want_!" cried Eleanor tragically. "I want to _be_
+something and to _do_ something. I feel like I am in prison here. I'm not
+good and resigned like you and Aunt Isobel, and I simply refuse to go
+through life standing grandmother's tyranny."
+
+Poor Eleanor, so intolerably sensitive to contacts, so hopelessly
+confused in her bearings, sitting red-eyed and miserable, kicking her
+feet against the side of the bed, looked much more like a naughty child
+than like the radiant Lady Bountiful who had dispensed favors and
+received homage in the hospital a few hours before.
+
+So swift was the sympathetic action of her nerves that any change in her
+physical condition affected her whole nature, making her an enigma to
+herself as well as to others. Even as she sat there rebellious and
+defiant, her eyes fell upon the small morocco box on her pillow, and she
+picked it up and opened it.
+
+"Oh, Aunt Enid!" she cried in instant remorse. "Just look what she's
+given me! Her string of pearls! The ones she wore in the portrait! And
+just think of what I've been saying about her. I'm a beast, a regular
+little beast!"
+
+And with characteristic impetuosity she flung herself on Miss Enid's neck
+and burst into tears.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 6
+
+
+The sun was getting ready to set on Sunday afternoon when a tall,
+trim-looking figure turned the corner of the street leading to the
+Martels' and broke into a run. In one hand he carried a large suit-case,
+and in the other he held a bead chain wrapped in tissue-paper. In the
+breast pocket of his uniform was a paper stating that Quinby Graham was
+thereby honorably discharged from the U.S.A.
+
+Whether it was his enforced rest, or his state of mind, or a combination
+of the two, it is impossible to say; but at least ten pounds had been
+added to his figure, the hollows had about gone from his eyes, and a
+natural color had returned to his face. But the old cough remained, as
+was evident when he presented himself breathless at the Martels' door and
+demanded of Cass:
+
+"Has she gone?"
+
+"Who?"
+
+"Miss Bartlett."
+
+"I believe she's fixing to go now. What's it to you?"
+
+"Oh, I just want to say good-by," Quin threw off with a great show of
+indifference. "She was awful good to me out at the hospital."
+
+"Oh, I see." Then Cass dismissed the subject for one of far more
+importance. "Are you out for keeps? Have you come to stay?"
+
+"You bet I have. How long has she been here?"
+
+"Who?"
+
+"Miss Bartlett, I tell you."
+
+"Oh! I don't know. All day, I reckon. I got to take her home now in a
+minute, but I'll be back soon. Don't you go anywhere till I come back."
+
+Quin seized his arm: "Cass, I'll take her home for you. I don't mind a
+bit, honest I don't. I need some exercise."
+
+"Old lady'd throw a fit," objected Cass. "Old grandmother, I mean.
+Regular Tartar. Old aunts are just as bad. They devil the life out of
+Nell, except when she's deviling the life out of them."
+
+"How do you mean?" Quin encouraged him.
+
+"I mean Nell's a handful all right. She kicks over the traces every time
+she gets a chance. I don't blame her. They're a rotten bunch of snobs,
+and she knows it."
+
+"Well, I could leave her at the door," Quin urged. "I wouldn't let her in
+for anything for the world. But I got to talk to her, I tell you; I got
+to thank her----"
+
+Meanwhile, in the room above the young lady under discussion was
+leisurely adjusting a new and most becoming hat before a cracked mirror
+while she discussed a subject of perennial interest to the eternal
+feminine.
+
+"Rose," she was asking, "what's the first thing you notice about a man?"
+
+Rose, sitting on the side of the bed nursing little Bino, the latest
+addition to the family, answered promptly:
+
+"His mouth, of course. I wouldn't marry a man who showed his gums when he
+laughed, not if every hair of his head was strung with diamonds!"
+
+The visualization of this unpleasant picture threw Eleanor into peals of
+laughter which upset the carefully acquired angle of the new hat, to say
+nothing of the nerves of the young gentleman just arrived in the hall
+below.
+
+"I wasn't thinking of his looks only," she said; "I mean everything about
+him."
+
+"Why, I guess it's whether he notices me," said Rose after deliberation.
+
+"Exactly," agreed Eleanor. "Not only you or me, but girls. Take Cass, for
+instance; girls might just as well be broomsticks to Cass, all except Fan
+Loomis. Now, when Captain Phipps looks at you----"
+
+"He never would," said Rose; "he'd look straight over my head. I'll tell
+you who is a better example--Mr. Graham."
+
+Eleanor smiled reminiscently. "Oh, Sergeant Slim? _he's_ thrilled, all
+right! Always looks as if he couldn't wait a minute to hear what you are
+going to say next."
+
+"He's not as susceptible as he looks," Rose pronounced from her
+vantage-point of seniority. "He's just got a way with him that fools
+people. Cass says girls are always crazy about him, and that he never
+cares for any of them more than a week."
+
+"Much Cass knows about it!" said Cass's cousin, pulling on her long
+gloves. Then she dismissed the subject abruptly: "Rose, if I tell you
+something will you swear not to tell?"
+
+"Never breathe it."
+
+"Captain Phipps is coming up to Baltimore for the Easter vacation."
+
+"Does your grandmother know?"
+
+"I should say _not_. She's written Miss Hammond that I'm not to receive
+callers without permission, and that all suspicious mail is to be
+opened."
+
+"How outrageous! You tell Captain Phipps to send his letters to me; I'll
+get them to you. They'll never suspect my fine Italian hand, with my name
+and address on the envelope."
+
+Eleanor looked at her older cousin dubiously. "I hate to do underhand
+things like that!" she said crossly.
+
+"You wouldn't have to if they treated you decently. Opening your letters!
+The idea! I wouldn't stand for it. I'd show them a thing or two."
+
+Eleanor stood listlessly buttoning her glove, pondering what Rose was
+saying.
+
+"I wonder if I could get word to the Captain to-night?" she said. "Shall
+I really tell him to send the letters to you?"
+
+"No; tell him to bring them. I'm crazy to see what his nibs looks like."
+
+"He looks like that picture of Richard Mansfield downstairs--the one
+taken as _Beau Brummel_. He's the most fastidious man you ever saw, and
+too subtle for words."
+
+"He's terribly rich, isn't he?"
+
+"I don't know," said Eleanor indifferently. "His father is a Chicago
+manufacturer of some kind. Does Papa Claude think he is _very_ talented?"
+
+"Talented! He says he's one of the most gifted young men he ever met.
+They are hatching out some marvelous schemes to write a play together.
+Papa Claude is treading on air."
+
+"Bless his heart! Wouldn't it be too wonderful, Rose, if Captain Phipps
+should produce one of his plays? He's crazy about him."
+
+"You mean he's crazy about you."
+
+"Who said so?"
+
+"I don't have to be told. How about you, Nell? Are you in love with him?"
+
+Eleanor, taking a farewell look in the mirror, saw a tiny frown gather
+between her eyebrows. It was the second time that week she had been asked
+the question, and, as before, she avoided it.
+
+"Listen!" she said. "Who is that talking so loud downstairs?"
+
+Investigation proved that it was Cass and Quin in hot dispute, as usual.
+On seeing her descend the stair the latter promptly stepped forward.
+
+"Cass is going to let me take you home, Miss Bartlett."
+
+"I never said I would," Cass contradicted him. "I'm not going to get her
+into trouble the night before she goes away."
+
+"That's for her to decide," said Quin. "If she says I can go I'm going."
+
+The very novelty of being called upon to decide anything for herself,
+augmented perhaps by the ardent desire in his eyes, caused Eleanor to tip
+the scales in his favor.
+
+"I don't mind his taking me home," she said somewhat condescendingly.
+"They'll think it's Cass."
+
+"All buck privates look alike to them," added Rose, laughing.
+
+"My private days are over," said Quin grandly. "This time next week I'll
+be out of my uniform."
+
+"You won't be half so good-looking," said Eleanor, surveying him with
+such evident approval that he had a wild idea of reenlisting at once.
+
+"Tell Papa Claude I couldn't wait for him any longer," Eleanor then said.
+"Kiss him good-by for me, Rose, and tell him I'll write the minute I get
+to Baltimore."
+
+Then Cass kissed her, and Rose and the baby kissed her, and Myrna came
+downstairs to kiss her, and Edwin was called up from the basement to kiss
+her. It seemed the easiest and most natural thing in the world for
+everybody to kiss her but Quin, who would have given all he had for the
+privilege.
+
+At last he found himself alone with her in the street, trying to catch
+step and wondering whether or not it was proper to take hold of a young
+lady's elbow. With commendable self-restraint he compromised on street
+crossings and muddy places. It was not quite dark yet, but it was going
+to be very soon, and a big pale moon was hiding behind a tall chimney,
+waiting for a chance to pounce out on unwary young couples who might be
+venturing abroad.
+
+As they started across Central Park, an open square in the heart of the
+city, Eleanor stopped short, and with eyes fixed on the sky began
+incanting:
+
+    "Star light, star bright
+    Very first star I see to-night
+    Wish I may, wish I might--
+    May these three wishes come true before to-morrow night."
+
+"I haven't got three wishes," said Quin solemnly; "I've only got one."
+
+"Mercy, I have dozens! Shall I lend you some?"
+
+"No! mine's bigger than all yours put together."
+
+She flashed a look at him from under her tilted hat-brim:
+
+"What on earth's the matter with you? You look so solemn. I don't believe
+you wanted to bring me home, after all."
+
+Quin didn't know what was the matter with him. Heretofore he had fallen
+in love as a pebble falls into a pond. There had been a delicious splash,
+and subsequent encircling ripples, each one further away than the last.
+But this time the pebble had fallen into a whirlpool, and was being
+turned and tossed and played with in a manner wholly bewildering.
+
+"Oh, I wanted to come, all right," he said slowly. "I _had_ to come. Say,
+I wish you weren't going away to-morrow."
+
+"So do I. I'd give anything not to."
+
+"But why do you go, then?"
+
+"Because I am always made to do what I don't want to do."
+
+Quin, who had decided views on individual freedom and the consent of the
+governed, promptly espoused her cause.
+
+"They've got no right to force you. You ought to decide things for
+yourself."
+
+"Do you really think that? Do you think a girl has the right to go ahead
+and do as she likes, regardless of her family?"
+
+"That depends on whether she wants to do the right thing. Which way do we
+turn?"
+
+"This way, if we go home," said Eleanor. Then she stopped abruptly. "What
+time is it?"
+
+Quin consulted his watch and his conscience at the same time.
+
+"It's only five-thirty," he said eagerly.
+
+"I wonder if you'd do something for me?"
+
+"You bet I will."
+
+"I want to go out to the hospital. I can get out there and back in my
+machine in thirty minutes. Would you be willing to go with me?"
+
+Would he be willing? Two hours before he had sworn that no power on earth
+could induce him to return to those prison walls, and now he felt that
+nothing could keep him away. Forty minutes of bliss in that snug little
+runabout with Miss Bartlett, and the destination might be Hades for all
+he cared.
+
+It took but a few minutes to get to the garage and into the machine, and
+then they were speeding out the avenue at a pace that would surely have
+landed them in the police station had the traffic officer been on his
+job.
+
+Quin, doubled up like a jack-knife beside her, was drunk with ecstasy.
+His expression when he looked at her resembled that of a particularly
+maudlin Airedale. Having her all to himself, with nobody to interfere,
+was an almost overwhelming joy. He longed to pour out his soul in
+gratitude for all that she had done for him at the hospital; he burned to
+tell her that she was the most beautiful and holy thing that had ever
+come into his life; but instead he only got his foot tangled in the
+steering gear, and muttered something about her "not driving a car bad
+for a girl"!
+
+But Eleanor was not concerned with her companion or his silent
+transports. She evidently had something of importance on her mind.
+
+"What time is the officers' mess?" she asked.
+
+"About six. Why?"
+
+"I want to catch Captain Phipps before he leaves the hospital."
+
+Quin's glowing bubble burst at the word. She _was_ Captain Phipps' girl,
+after all! She had simply pressed him into service in order to get a last
+interview with the one officer in the battalion for whom he had no
+respect.
+
+The guard challenged them as they swung into the hospital area, but,
+seeing Quin's uniform, allowed them to enter. Past the long line of
+contagious wards, past the bleak two-story convalescent barracks, and up
+to the officers' quarters they swept.
+
+"You are not going in yourself?" Quin protested, as she started to get
+out of the car.
+
+"Why not? Haven't I been coming out here all the time?"
+
+"Not at night--not like this."
+
+"Nonsense. What's the harm? I'll only be a minute?"
+
+But Quin had already got out, and was holding the door with a large, firm
+hand.
+
+"No," he said humbly but positively; "I'll go and bring him out here."
+
+The unexpected note of authority in his voice nettled her instantly.
+
+"I shall go myself," she insisted petulantly. "Let me out."
+
+For a moment their eyes clashed in frank combat, hers angry and defiant,
+his adoring but determined.
+
+"Listen here, Miss Bartlett," he urged. "The men wouldn't understand your
+coming out like this, at night, without your uniform. I told Cass I'd
+take care of you, and I'm going to do it."
+
+"You mean that you will dare to stop me from getting out of my own car?
+Take your hand off that door instantly!"
+
+She actually seized his big, strong fingers with her small gloved ones
+and tried to pull them away from the door. But Quin began to laugh, and
+in spite of herself she laughed back; and, while the two were childishly
+struggling for the possession of the door-handle, Captain Phipps all
+unnoticed passed out of the mess-hall, gave a few instructions to his
+waiting orderly, and disappeared in the darkness.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 7
+
+
+By the time they were on their way home, the moon, no longer dodging
+behind chimneys, had swaggered into the open. It was a hardened old
+highwayman of a moon, red in the face and very full, and it declared with
+every flashing beam that it was no respecter of persons, and that it
+intended doing all the mischief possible down there in the little world
+of men.
+
+Miss Eleanor Bartlett was its first victim. In the white twilight she
+forgot the social gap that lay between her and the youth beside her. She
+ceased to observe the size and roughness of his hands, but noted instead
+the fine breadth of his shoulders. She concerned herself no longer with
+his verbal lapses, but responded instead to his glowing confidence that
+everybody was as sincere and well intentioned as himself. She discovered
+what the more sophisticated Rose had perceived at once--that Quinby
+Graham "had a way with him," a beguiling, sympathetic way that made one
+tell him things that one really didn't mean to tell any one. Of course,
+it was partly due to the fact that he asked such outrageously direct
+questions, questions that no one in her most intimate circle of friends
+would dare to ask. And the queer part of it was that she was answering
+them.
+
+Before she realized it she was launched on a full recital of her woes,
+her thwarted ambition to go on the stage, her grandmother's tyranny, the
+indignity of being sent back to a school from which she had run away six
+months before. She flattered herself that she was stating her case for
+the sole purpose of getting an unprejudiced outsider's unbiased opinion;
+but from the inflection of her voice and the expressive play of eyes and
+lips it was evident that she was deriving some pleasure from the mere act
+of thus dramatizing her woes before that wholly sympathetic audience of
+one.
+
+It was not until they reached the Eastern Parkway and were speeding
+toward the twinkling lights of the city that their little bubble of
+intimacy, blown in the moonlight, was shattered by a word.
+
+"Say, Miss Eleanor," Quin blurted out unexpectedly, "do you like me?"
+
+The question, together with the fact that he had dared used her first
+name, brought her up with a start.
+
+"Like you?" she repeated in her most conventional tone, "Why, of course.
+Whatever made you think I didn't?"
+
+"I didn't think that. But--do you like me enough to let me come to see
+you when you come back?"
+
+Now, a romantically wounded hero receiving favors in a hospital is one
+thing, and an unknown discharged soldier asking them is quite another.
+The very thought of Quinby Graham presenting himself as a caller, and the
+comments that would follow made Eleanor shy away from the subject in
+alarm.
+
+"Oh, you'll be on the other side of the world by the time I get back,"
+she said lightly.
+
+"Not me. Not if there's a chance of seeing you again."
+
+A momentary diversion followed, during which Eleanor fancied there was
+something wrong with the radiator and expatiated at length on her
+preference for air-cooled cars.
+
+Quin listened patiently. A gentleman more versed in social subtleties
+would have accepted the hint and said no more. But he was still laboring
+under the error that language was invented to reveal rather than to
+conceal thought.
+
+"You didn't answer my question," he said, when Eleanor paused for breath.
+
+"What question?"
+
+"About my coming to see you."
+
+She took shelter in a subterfuge.
+
+"I told you that the family was horrid to everybody that came to see me.
+To tell you the truth, I don't think you would be comfortable."
+
+"I'm not afraid of 'em," Quin insisted fatuously. "I'd butt in anywhere
+to get to see you."
+
+Eleanor's eyes dropped under his gaze.
+
+"You don't know my grandmother," she said; "and, what is much more
+important, she doesn't know you."
+
+"No, but she might like to," urged Quin, with one of his most engaging
+smiles. "Old ladies and cats always cotton to me."
+
+Eleanor laughed. It was impossible to be dignified and superior with a
+person who didn't know the first rules of the game.
+
+"She might," she admitted; "you never can tell about grandmother. She
+really is a wonderful person in many ways, and just as generous and kind
+when you are in trouble! But she says the most dreadful things; she's
+always hurting people's feelings."
+
+"She couldn't hurt mine, unless I let her," said Quin.
+
+"Oh, yes, she could--you don't know her. But even if she happened to be
+nice to you, there's Aunt Isobel."
+
+"What is she like?"
+
+"_Horribly_ good and conscientious, and shocked to death at everything
+people do and say. I don't mean that she isn't awfully kind. She'll do
+anything for you if you are sick. But Uncle Ranny says her sense of duty
+amounts to a vice. Whatever she's doing, she thinks she ought to be doing
+something else. And she expects you to be just as good as she is. If she
+knew I was out here with a strange man to whom I'd never been
+introduced----"
+
+Eleanor was appalled at the effect upon her aunt of such indiscretion.
+
+"Oh, I could handle her all right," said Quin boastfully. "I'd talk
+foreign missions to her. Any others?"
+
+"Heaps. There's Aunt Flo and Uncle Ranny. He's a dear, only he's the
+black sheep of the family. He says I am a promising gray lamb, which
+makes grandmother furious. They all let her twist them round her finger
+but me. I won't twist. I never intend to."
+
+"Is that all the family?"
+
+"No; there's Aunt Enid. She is the nicest of them all."
+
+"What is her line?"
+
+"Oh, she's awfully good, too. But she's different from Aunt Isobel. She
+was engaged to be married once, and grandmother broke it off because the
+man was poor. I don't think she'll ever get over it."
+
+"Do you think she would like me?" Quin anxiously inquired.
+
+"Yes," admitted Eleanor, "I believe she would. She simply adores to mold
+people. She doesn't care how many faults they have, if they will just let
+her influence them to be better. And she does help loads of people. I am
+her one failure. She wouldn't acknowledge it for the world, but I know
+that I am the disappointment of Aunt Enid's life."
+
+She gazed gloomily down the long moonlit road and lapsed into one of her
+sudden abstractions. A belated compunction seized her for not going
+straight home from the Martels', for being late for dinner on her last
+night, for going on with her affair with Captain Phipps, when she had
+been forbidden to see him.
+
+"Miss Nell," said the persistent voice beside her, "do you know what I
+intend to do while you are away?"
+
+"No; what?"
+
+"I'm going to start in to-morrow morning and make love to your whole darn
+family!"
+
+Now, if there is one thing Destiny admires in a man, it is his courage to
+defy her. She relentlessly crushes the supine spirit who acquiesces, but
+to him who snaps his fingers in her face she often extends a helping
+hand. In this case she did not make Quin wait until the morrow to begin
+his colossal undertaking. By means of a humble tack that lay in the way
+of the speeding automobile, she at once set in motion the series of
+events that were to determine his future life.
+
+By the time the puncture was repaired and they were again on their way,
+it was half-past seven and all hope of a timely arrival was abandoned. As
+they slowed up at the Bartlett house, their uneasiness was increased by
+the fact that lights were streaming from every window and the front door
+was standing open.
+
+"Is that the doctor?" an excited voice called to them from the porch.
+
+"No," called back Eleanor, scrambling out of the car. "What is the
+matter?"
+
+No answer being received, she clutched Quin's sleeve nervously.
+
+"Something has happened! Look, the front hall is full of people. Oh, I'm
+afraid to go in! I----"
+
+"Steady on!" said Quin, with a firm grip on her elbow as he marched her
+up the steps and into the hall.
+
+Everything was in confusion. People were hurrying to and fro, doors were
+slamming, excited voices were asking questions and not waiting for
+answers. "What's Dr. Snowden's telephone number?" "Can't they get another
+doctor?" "Has somebody sent for Randolph?" "Are they going to try to move
+her?" everybody demanded of everybody else.
+
+Eleanor pushed through the crowd until she reached the foot of the steps.
+There, lying on the floor, with her towering white pompadour crushed
+ignominiously against the newel-post, lay the one person in the house who
+could have brought prompt order out of the chaos. On one side of her
+knelt Miss Enid frantically applying smelling salts, while on the other
+stood Miss Isobel futilely wringing her hands and imploring some one to
+go for a minister.
+
+Suddenly the buzz of excited talk ceased. Madam was returning to
+consciousness. She groaned heavily, then opened one eye.
+
+"What's the matter?" she demanded feebly. "What's all this fuss about?"
+
+"You fell down the steps, mother. Don't get excited; don't try to move."
+
+But Madam had already tried, with the result that she fell back with a
+sharp cry of pain.
+
+"Oh, my leg, my leg!" she groaned. "What are you all standing around like
+fools for? Why don't you send Tom for the doctor?"
+
+"Tom isn't with us any more, dearest," said Aunt Enid with trembling
+reassurance, "and Dr. Snowden is out of town. But we are trying to get
+Dr. Bean."
+
+"I won't have Bean," Madam declared, clinching her jaw with pain. "I'll
+send him away if he comes."
+
+"Dr. Vaughn, then?" suggested Miss Enid tenderly.
+
+"Vaughn nothing! Send for Rawlins. He's an old stick, but he'll do till
+Dr. Snowden gets here."
+
+"But, mother," protested Miss Isobel. "Dr. Rawlins lives in the country;
+he can't get here for half an hour."
+
+"Do as I tell you and stop arguing," commanded Madam. "Has anybody
+telephoned Ranny?"
+
+The two sisters exchanged significant glances.
+
+"Their line is busy," said Miss Enid soothingly. "We will get him soon."
+
+"I want to be taken upstairs," announced Madam; "I want to be put in my
+own bed."
+
+A buzz of protest met this suggestion, and a small, nervous man in
+clerical garb, who had just arrived, came forward to add his voice to the
+rest.
+
+Madam glared at him savagely. "There'll be plenty of time for parsons
+when the doctors get through with me," she said. "Tell some of those
+able-bodied men back there to come here and take me upstairs."
+
+Quin, who had been standing in the background looking down at the
+formidable old lady, promptly came forward.
+
+"I'll take you up," he said. "Which leg is hurt?"
+
+The old lady turned her head and looked up at him. The note of confidence
+in his voice had evidently appealed to her.
+
+"It's my left leg. I think it's broken just above the knee."
+
+"Do you want me to put a splint on it?"
+
+"Are you a doctor?"
+
+"No, ma'am; but I can fix it so's it won't hurt you so bad when we move
+you," Quin replied.
+
+"How do you know you can?"
+
+Quin ran his fingers through his hair and smiled.
+
+"Well, I wasn't with the Ambulance Corps for six months in France for
+nothing."
+
+Madam eyed him keenly for a moment; then, "Go ahead," she commanded.
+
+A chorus of protests from the surrounding group only deepened her
+determination.
+
+"It's _my_ leg," she said irritably. "If he knows how to splint it, let
+him do it. I want to be taken upstairs."
+
+It is difficult enough to apply a splint properly under favorable
+circumstances; but when one has only an umbrella and table napkins to
+work with, and is hemmed in by a doubtful and at times protesting
+audience, it becomes well-nigh impossible.
+
+Quin worked slowly and awkwardly, putting the bones as nearly as possible
+in position and then binding them firmly in place. He paid no more
+attention to the agitated comments of those about him than he had paid to
+the whizzing bullets when he rendered first aid to a fallen comrade in No
+Man's Land.
+
+During the painful operation Madam lay with rigid jaws and clenched
+fists. Small beads of perspiration gathered on her forehead and her lips
+were white. Now and then she flinched violently, but only once did she
+speak, and that was when Miss Enid held the smelling salts too close to
+her high-bridged nose.
+
+"Haven't I got enough to stand without that?" she sputtered, knocking the
+bottle into the air and sending the contents flying over the polished
+floor.
+
+When Quin finished he looked at her with frank admiration.
+
+"You got nerve, all right," he said; then he added gently: "Don't you
+worry about getting upstairs; it won't hurt you much now."
+
+"You stay and help," said Madam peremptorily.
+
+"Sure," said Quin.
+
+It was not until she was in her own bed, and word had come that Dr.
+Rawlins was on his way, that she would let Quin go, and even then she
+called him back.
+
+"You! Soldier! Come here," was the faint edict from the canopied bed. She
+was getting very weak from the pain, and her words came in gasps. "Do you
+know where--the--Aristo Apartments are?"
+
+"No, but I can find out," said Quin.
+
+"I want you--to--go for my son--Mr. Randolph Bartlett. If he's not at
+home--you find him. I'll make it--worth your while."
+
+"I'll find him," Quin said, with a reassuring pat on her wrinkled hand.
+
+As he went into the hall, Eleanor slipped out of the adjoining room and
+followed him silently down the stairs. She did not speak until they were
+at the front door, and even then took the precaution of stepping outside.
+
+"I just wanted to come down and say good-by," she said.
+
+"But you surely won't be going now?" said Quin hopefully.
+
+"Yes, I'm to go. Grandmother has just told Aunt Isobel that everything is
+to be carried out exactly as she planned it. But I wish they'd let me
+stay and help. Poor granny!"
+
+Her eyes brimmed with ready tears.
+
+"She'll pull through all right," said Quin, to whom the tear-dimmed eyes
+of youth were more unnerving than age's broken bones. "Don't worry, Miss
+Eleanor, please. What time does your train go in the morning?"
+
+"Ten-thirty."
+
+"I'll be there at ten."
+
+Eleanor brushed her tears away quickly. "No, no--you mustn't," she said
+in quick alarm. "They don't know that we ever saw each other before. They
+think you just happened to be passing and ran in to help. Oh, I don't
+want to give them any more trouble. Promise me not to come!"
+
+"Well, when you come back, then?"
+
+"Yes, yes, when I come back," she whispered hurriedly. Then she put out
+her hand impulsively. "I think you've been perfectly splendid to-night.
+Good-by."
+
+For a moment she stood there, her dainty figure silhouetted against the
+bright doorway, with the light shining through her soft hair giving her
+an undeserved halo. Then she was gone, leaving him on the steps in the
+moonlight, tenderly contemplating the hand that had just held hers.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 8
+
+
+It was well that Quin had an errand to perform that night. His emotions,
+which had been accumulating compound interest since five o'clock,
+demanded an outlet in immediate action. He had not the faintest idea
+where the Aristo Apartments might be; but, wherever they were, he meant
+to find them. Consultation with a telephone book at the corner drug-store
+sent him across the city to a newer and more fashionable residence
+quarter. As he left the street-car at the corner indicated, he asked a
+man who was just dismounting from a taxi-cab for further information.
+
+When the dapper gentleman, thus addressed, turned toward him, it was
+evident that he had dined not wisely but too well. He was at that mellow
+stage that radiates affection, and, having bidden a loving farewell to
+the taxi driver, he now linked his arm in Quin's and repeated gaily:
+
+"'Risto? Of course I can find it for you, if it's where it was this
+morning! Always make a point of helping a man that's worse off than I am.
+Always help a sholdier, anyhow. Take my arm, old chap. Take my cane, too.
+I'll help you."
+
+Thus assisted and assisting, Quin good-humoredly allowed himself to be
+conducted in a zigzag course to the imposing doorway of a large
+apartment-house across the street.
+
+"Forgive me f' taking you up stairway," apologized the affable gentleman.
+"Mustn't let elevator boy see you in this condishun. Take you up to my
+apartment. Put you bed in m' own room. Got to take care sholdiers."
+
+At the second floor Quin tried to disentangle himself from his new-found
+protector.
+
+"You can find your way home now, partner," he said. "I got to go down and
+find out which floor my party lives on."
+
+But his companion held him tight.
+
+"No, my boy! Mustn't go out again to-night. M.P.'s'll catch you. I'll get
+you to bed without anybody knowing. Mustn't 'sturb my wife, though.
+Mustn't make any noise." And, adding force to persuasion, he got his arms
+around Quin and backed him so suddenly against the wall that they both
+took an unexpected seat on the floor.
+
+At this inopportune moment a door opened and a delicate blonde lady in a
+pink kimono, followed by an inquisitive poodle, peered anxiously out.
+
+"'S perfectly all right, darling!" reassured the nethermost figure
+blithely. "Sholdier friend's had a little too much champagne. Bringing
+him in so's won't be 'rested. Nicest kind of chap. Perfectly harmless!"
+
+Quin scrambled to his feet and exchanged an understanding look with the
+lady in the doorway.
+
+"I found him down at the corner. Does he belong here?" he asked. And,
+upon being informed sorrowfully that he did, he added obligingly, "Don't
+you want me to bring him in for you?"
+
+"Will you?" said the lady in grateful agitation. "The maids are both out,
+and I can't handle him by myself. Would you mind bringing him into his
+bedroom?"
+
+Quin succeeded in detaching an affectionate arm from his right leg and,
+getting his patient up, piloted him into the apartment.
+
+"I'd just as leave put him to bed for you if you like?" he offered,
+noting the nervousness of the lady, who was fluttering about like a
+distracted butterfly.
+
+"Oh, would you?" she asked. "It would help me immensely. If he isn't put
+to bed he is sure to want to go out again."
+
+"Shure to!" heartily agreed the object of their solicitude. "Leave him to
+me, darling. I'll hide his uniform so's he can't go out. Be a good girl,
+run along--I'll take care of him."
+
+Thus left to each other, a satisfactory compromise was effected by which
+the host agreed to be undressed and put to bed, provided Quin would later
+submit to the same treatment. It was not the first time Quin had thus
+assisted a brother in misfortune, but he had never before had to do with
+gold buttons and jeweled cuff-links, to say nothing of silk underwear and
+sky-blue pajamas. Being on the eve of adopting civilian clothes for the
+first time in two years, he took a lively interest in every detail of his
+patient's attire, from the modish cut of his coat to the smart pattern of
+his necktie.
+
+The bibulous one, who up to the present had regarded the affair as
+humorous, now began to be lachrymose, and by the time Quin got him into
+the rose-draped bed he was in a state of deep dejection.
+
+"My mother loves me," he assured Quin tearfully. "Gives me everything. I
+don't mean to be ungrateful. But I can't go on in the firm. Bangs is
+dishonest, but she won't believe it. She thinks I don't know. They both
+think I'm a cipher. I _am_ a cipher. But they've made me one. Get so
+discouraged, then go break over like this. Promised Flo never would take
+another drink. But it's no use. Can't help myself. I'm done for. Just a
+cipher, a cipher, a ci----"
+
+Quin standing by the bed waiting for him to get through adding noughts to
+his opinion of himself, suddenly leaned forward and examined the picture
+that hung above the table. It was of an imperial old lady in black
+velvet, with a string of pearls about her throat and a tiara on her
+towering white pompadour. His glance swept from the photograph to the
+flushed face with the tragic eyes on the pillow, and he seemed to hear a
+querulous old voice repeating: "Ranny--I want Ranny. Why don't they send
+for Ranny?"
+
+With two strides he was at the door.
+
+"Are you Mrs. Randolph Bartlett?" he asked of the lady who was nervously
+pacing the hall.
+
+"Yes; why?"
+
+"Because they sent me after him. It's his mother, you see--she's hurt."
+
+"Madam Bartlett? What's happened?"
+
+"She fell down the steps and broke her leg."
+
+"How terrible! But she mustn't know about him," cried Mrs. Ranny in
+instant alarm. "It always makes her furious when he breaks over; and yet,
+she is to blame--she drives him to it."
+
+"How do you mean?" asked Quin, plunging into the situation with his usual
+temerity.
+
+"I mean that she has dominated him, soul and body, ever since he was
+born!" cried Mrs. Ranny passionately. "She has forced him to stay in the
+business when every detail of it is distasteful to him. His life is a
+perfect hell there under Mr. Bangs. He ought to have an outdoor life. He
+loves animals--he ought to be on a ranch." She pulled herself up with an
+effort. "Forgive me for going into all this before a stranger, but I am
+almost beside myself. Of course I am sorry for Madam Bartlett, but what
+can I do? You can see for yourself that my husband is in no condition to
+go to her."
+
+"Can't you say he's sick?"
+
+"She wouldn't believe it. She's suspicious of everything I do and say. Do
+you _have_ to take back an answer?"
+
+"I told the old lady I'd find him for her. You see, I'm a--sort of a
+friend of Miss Eleanor's."
+
+Under ordinary circumstances Mrs. Ranny would have been the last to
+accept this without an explanation; but there were too many other
+problems pressing for her to worry about this one.
+
+"I wonder how it would do," she said, "for you to telephone that we are
+both out of town for the night, spending the week-end in the country?"
+
+"I guess one lie is as good as another," said Quin ruefully. He was
+getting involved deeper than he liked, but there seemed no other way out.
+"I'll telephone from the drug-store. Anything else I can do for you?"
+
+"You have been so kind, I hate to ask another favor."
+
+"Let's have it," said Quin.
+
+"Would you by any chance have time to leave a package of papers at
+Bartlett & Bangs' for me the first thing in the morning? Mr. Bangs has
+been telephoning me about them all day, and I've been nearly distracted,
+because my husband had them in his pocket and I did not know where he
+was."
+
+"Wait a minute," said Quin, going back into the bedroom. "Are these the
+ones?"
+
+"Yes. They must be very important; that's why I am afraid to intrust them
+to my maid. Be sure to take them to Mr. Bangs himself, and if he asks any
+questions----" She caught her trembling lip between her teeth and tried
+to force back the tears.
+
+"Don't you worry!" cried Quin. "I'll make it all right with him. You
+drink a glass of hot milk or something, and go to bed."
+
+She looked up at him gratefully. "I don't know your name," she said, "but
+I certainly appreciate your kindness to me to-night. I wish you would
+come back some time and let us thank you----"
+
+"Oh, that's all o.k.," said Quin, turning to the door in sudden
+embarrassment. Then he discovered that he was trying to shake hands and
+hold his cap with the same hand, and in his confusion he slipped on the
+hard-wood floor, and achieved an exit that was scarcely more dignified
+than his entrance a half-hour before.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 9
+
+
+The news that Quin had broken through the Bartlett barrage afforded great
+amusement to the Martels at breakfast next morning. Of course they were
+sympathetic over Madam Bartlett's accident--the Martels' sympathy was
+always on tap for friend or foe,--but that did not interfere with a frank
+enjoyment of Quin's spirited account of her high-handed treatment of the
+family, especially the incident of the smelling salts.
+
+"She ought to belong to the Tank Brigade," said Rose. "'Treat 'em rough'
+is her motto."
+
+"I like the old girl, though," said Quin disrespectfully, "she's got so
+much pep. And talk about your nerve! You should have seen her set her jaw
+when I put the splint on!"
+
+"Is the house very grand?" asked Myrna, hungering for luxurious details.
+
+"No," Cass broke in scornfully. "I been in the hall twice. It looks like
+a museum--big pictures and statuary, and everything dark and gloomy."
+
+"Yes, and Miss Isobel and Miss Enid are the mummies," added Rose. "The
+only nice one in the bunch besides Nell is Mr. Ranny, and he is hardly
+ever sober."
+
+"Well, I wouldn't be, either," said Cass, "if I'd been held down like he
+has all his life. The Bartlett estate was left in trust to the old lady,
+and she holds the purse-strings and has the say-so about everything."
+
+Quin refrained from mentioning the fact that he had also met Mr. Ranny.
+It was a point to his credit, for the story would have been received with
+hilarity, and he particularly enjoyed making Rose laugh.
+
+The entrance of Mr. Martel put an end to the discussion of the Bartletts.
+Bitter as was his animosity toward the old lady, he would permit no
+disrespect to be shown her or hers in his presence. In the garish light
+of day he looked a trifle less imposing than he had on New Year's eve in
+the firelight. His long white hair hung straight and dry about his face;
+baggy wrinkles sagged under his eyes and under his chin. The shoulders
+that once proudly carried Mark Antony's shining armor now supported a
+faded velvet breakfast jacket that showed its original color only in
+patches. But even in the intimacy of the breakfast hour Papa Claude
+preserved his air of distinction, the gracious condescension of a
+temporary sojourner in an environment from which he expected at any
+moment to take flight.
+
+When Cass had gone to work and the girls were busy cleaning up the
+breakfast dishes, he linked his arm in Quin's and drew him into the
+living-room.
+
+"I have never allowed myself to submit to the tyranny of time!" he said.
+"The wine of living should be tasted slowly. Pull up a chair, my boy; I
+want to talk to you. You don't happen to have a cigar about you, do you?"
+
+"Yes, sir. Here are two. Take 'em both. I got to cut out smoking; it
+makes me cough."
+
+Mr. Martel, protesting and accepting at the same time, sank into his
+large chair and bade Quin pull up a rocker. In the Martels' living-room
+all the chairs were rockers; so, in fact, were the table and the sofa,
+owing to missing castors.
+
+"I am going to talk to you quite confidentially," began Mr. Martel,
+giving himself up to the enjoyment of the hour. "I am going to tell you
+of a new and fascinating adventure upon which I am about to embark. You
+have doubtless heard me speak of a very wealthy and talented young friend
+of mine--Mr. Harold Phipps?"
+
+Quin admitted without enthusiasm that he had, and that he also knew him.
+
+"Well, Mr. Phipps,--or Captain, as you probably know him,--after a short
+medical career has found it so totally distasteful that he is wisely
+returning to an earlier love. As soon as he gets out of the army he and I
+are going to collaborate on a play. Of course I have technic at my
+finger-tips. Construction, dramatic suspense, climax are second nature to
+me. But I confess I have a fatal handicap, one that has doubtless cost me
+my place at the head of American dramatists to-day. I have never been
+able to achieve colloquial dialogue! My style is too finished, you
+understand, my diction too perfect. Manager after manager has been on the
+verge of accepting a play, and been deterred solely on account of this
+too literary quality. I suffer from the excess of my virtue; you see?"
+
+Quin did not see. Mr. Martel's words conveyed but the vaguest meaning to
+him. But it flattered his vanity to be the recipient of such a great
+man's confidence.
+
+"Well, here's my point," continued his host impressively. "Mr. Phipps
+knows nothing of technic, of construction; but he has a sense for
+character and dialogue that amounts to genius. Now, suppose I construct a
+great plot, and he supplies great dialogue? What will be the inevitable
+result? A masterpiece, a little modern masterpiece!"
+
+Mr. Martel, soaring on the wings of his imagination, failed to observe
+that his listener was not following.
+
+"Does--does Miss Eleanor know about all this?" Quin asked.
+
+"Alas, no. I had no opportunity to tell her. Ah, Mr. Graham, I must
+confess, it hurts me, it hurts me here,"--he indicated a grease-spot just
+below his vest pocket,--"to be separated from that dear child just when
+she needs me most. She should be already embarked in her great career.
+Ellen Terry, Bernhardt, Rachel, all began their training very early. If
+she had been left to me she would be behind the footlights by now."
+
+"They'll never stand for her going on the stage," said Quin
+authoritatively. It was astonishing how intimate he felt with the
+Bartletts since he had put two of them to bed.
+
+"Ah, my friend," said Mr. Martel, shaking his head and smiling, "what can
+be avoided whose end is purposed by the mighty gods? Eleanor will follow
+her destiny. She has the temperament, the voice, the figure--a trifle
+small, I grant you, but lithe, graceful, pliant as a reed."
+
+"Yes, I know what you mean," Quin agreed ardently; "you can tell that in
+her dancing."
+
+"But more than all, she has the great ambition, the consuming desire for
+self-expression, for----"
+
+Quin's face clouded slightly and he again lost the thread of the
+discourse.
+
+"Lots of girls are stage-struck," he said presently, breaking in on Mr.
+Martel's rhapsody. "Miss Eleanor's young yet. Don't you believe she will
+get over it?"
+
+"Young! Why, Mary Anderson was playing _Meg Merrilies_ when she was two
+years younger than Eleanor. I tell you, Quinby--you'll forgive my
+addressing you thus--I tell you, the girl will never get over it. She has
+inherited the histrionic gift from her mother--from me. The Bartletts
+have given her money, education, social position; but it remained for
+me--the despised Claude Martel--to give her the soul of an artist. And
+mark me,"--he paused effectively with a lifted forefinger,--"it will be
+Claude Martel who gives her her heart's desire. For years I have fostered
+in her a love for the drama. I have taken her to see great plays. I have
+taught her to read great lines, and above all I have fed her ambition.
+The time was limited--a night here, a day there; but I planted a seed
+they cannot kill. It has grown, it will flower; no one can stop it now."
+
+The subject was one upon which Quin would fain have discoursed
+indefinitely, but a glance at his watch reminded him that the business of
+the day did not admit of further delay. He not only had an important
+errand to perform, but he must look for work. His exchequer, as usual,
+was very low and the need for replenishing it was imperative.
+
+When he reached Bartlett & Bangs' on the outskirts of the city, the big
+manufacturing plant was ominously still. The only sign of life about the
+place was at the wide entrance doors at the end of the yards, where a
+group of men were talking and gesticulating excitedly.
+
+"What's the shindy?" Quin asked a bystander.
+
+"Union men trying to keep scabs from going to work," answered his
+informant. "Somebody's fixin' to get hurt there in about two minutes."
+
+Quin, to whom a scrap was always a pleasant diversion, ran forward and
+craned his neck to see what was happening. Speeches were being made, hot
+impassioned speeches, now in favor of the union, now against it, and
+every moment the excitement increased. Quin listened with absorbed
+attention, trying to get the straight of the matter.
+
+Just now a sickly-looking man, with a piece of red flannel tied around
+his throat, was standing on the steps, making a futile effort against the
+noise to explain his return to work.
+
+"I can't let 'em _starve_," he kept repeating in a hoarse, apologetic
+voice. "When a man's got a sick wife and eight children, he ain't able to
+do as he likes. I don't want to give in no more 'n you-all do. Neither
+does Jim here, nor Tom Dawes. But what can we do?"
+
+"Do like the rest of us!" shouted some one in the crowd, "Stick it out!
+Learn 'em a lesson. They can't run their bloomin' old plant without us.
+Pull him down off them steps, boys!"
+
+"Naw, you don't!" cried another man, seizing a stick and jumping at the
+steps. "We got a right to do as we like, same as you! Come on up, Tom
+Dawes! We ain't going to let our families in for the Charity
+Organization."
+
+Quick cries of "Traitor!" "Scab!" "Pull 'em down!" were succeeded by a
+lively scrimmage in which there was a rush for the steps.
+
+Quin, from his place at the edge of the crowd, saw a dozen men surround
+three. He saw the man with the red rag about his throat put up a feeble
+defense against two assailants. Then he ceased to see and began only to
+feel. Whatever the row was about, they weren't fighting fairly, and his
+blood began to rise. He stood it as long as he could; then, with a cry of
+protest, he plunged through the crowd. In his sternest top-sergeant voice
+he issued orders, and enforced them with a brawny fist that was used to
+handling men. A moment later he dragged a limp victim from under the
+struggling group.
+
+This unexpected interruption by an unknown man in uniform, together with
+the appearance of a stern-faced man in spectacles at an upper window, had
+an instant effect on the crowd. The strikers began to slink out of the
+yards, while the three assaulted men dusted their clothes and entered the
+factory.
+
+Quin followed them in, and upon inquiring for the office was directed to
+the second floor, where he followed devious ways until he reached the
+door of a large room filled with desks in rows, at each of which sat a
+clerk.
+
+"Mr. Bangs?" repeated a red-nosed girl, in answer to his inquiry. "Got an
+appointment?"
+
+"No," said Quin; "but I've got a parcel that's to be delivered in
+person."
+
+The red-nosed one thereupon consulted the man at the next desk, and,
+after some colloquy, conducted Quin to one of the small rooms at the rear
+of the large one.
+
+The next moment Quin found himself face to face with the stern-looking
+personage whose mere appearance at the window a few minutes before had
+had such a subduing effect on the crowd below.
+
+As he listened to Quin's message he looked at him narrowly and
+suspiciously with piercing black eyes that seemed intent on seeking out
+the weakest spot of whatever they rested upon.
+
+"When did Mr. Bartlett give you these letters?" he asked in a tone as
+cold as the tinkle of ice against glass.
+
+"I got 'em last night, sir."
+
+"Where?"
+
+"At his house, when I went to carry word about his mother's accident."
+
+"Close that door back of you," said Mr. Bangs, with a jerk of his head;
+then he went on, "So Mr. Bartlett was at home when you reached there last
+night?"
+
+"Oh, _yes_, sir!" Quin assured him with an emphasis that implied Mr.
+Randolph Bartlett's unfailing presence at his own fireside on every
+Sabbath evening.
+
+"That is strange," Mr. Bangs commented dryly. "Miss Enid Bartlett
+telephoned an hour ago that her brother and his wife were out of the
+city."
+
+Quin was visibly embarrassed. He was not used to treading the quicksands
+of duplicity, and he felt himself sinking.
+
+"Young man," said Mr. Bangs sternly, "I am inclined to think you are
+deceiving me."
+
+"No," said Quin with spirit, "I haven't deceived you; but I did lie to
+Miss Eleanor's aunt over the telephone."
+
+"What was your object?"
+
+"Well, I couldn't tell her Mr. Bartlett was stewed, could I?"
+
+Mr. Bangs gave a short, contemptuous laugh. "As I thought," he said.
+"That will do."
+
+But Quin had no intention of going until he had spoken a word in his own
+behalf. The idea had just occurred to him that by obtaining a position
+with Bartlett & Bangs he could add another link to the chain that was to
+bind him to Eleanor.
+
+"You don't happen to have a job for me?" he inquired of the back of Mr.
+Bangs's bald, dome-like head.
+
+"A job?" repeated Mr. Bangs, glancing over his shoulder at Quin's
+uniform.
+
+"Yes, sir. I'm out of the service now."
+
+"What can you do?"
+
+Quin looked at him quizzically. "I can receive and obey the orders of the
+commanding officer," he said.
+
+Mr. Bangs, being humor-proof, evidently considered this impertinent, and
+repeated his question sharply.
+
+"Oh, I'll do anything," said Quin rashly. "Soldiers can't be choosers
+these days."
+
+Mr. Bangs cast a critical eye on his strong, well built frame:
+
+"We might use you in the factory," he said indifferently; "we need all
+the strike-breakers we can get."
+
+Quin's face fell. "I don't know about that," he said slowly. "I haven't
+made up my mind yet about this union business."
+
+"I thought you were helping the union men in the yard just now."
+
+"I was helping that little Irishman that was getting the life choked out
+of him."
+
+Mr. Bangs's mouth became a hard, straight line.
+
+"Then I take it you sympathize with the strikers?"
+
+"I don't know whether I do or not," Quin declared stoutly. "I don't know
+anything about it. But one thing's certain--I'm not going to take another
+fellow's job, when he's holding out for better conditions, until I know
+whether those better conditions are due him or not."
+
+Mr. Bangs's fish eyes regarded him with glittering disfavor.
+
+"Perhaps you would prefer an office job?" he suggested with cold
+insolence. "I need some one to brush out in the morning and to wash
+windows when necessary."
+
+The erstwhile hero of the Sixth Field Artillery felt his heart thumping
+madly under his distinguished-conduct medal; but he had declared that he
+would accept any kind of work, and he was determined not to have his
+bluff called.
+
+"All right, sir," he said gamely; "I'll start at that if it will lead to
+something better."
+
+"That rests entirely with you," said Mr. Bangs. "Report for work in the
+morning."
+
+Quin got out of the office with a hot head, cold hands, and a terrible
+sinking of the heart. He had forged the first link in his chain--he was
+an employee of the great Bartlett & Bangs Company; but the gap between
+himself and Eleanor seemed suddenly to have widened to infinity.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 10
+
+
+If the window-washing did not become an actuality, it was due to the
+weather rather than to any clemency on the part of Mr. Bangs. He seemed
+bent upon testing Quin's mettle, and required tasks of him that only a
+man used to the discipline of the army would have performed.
+
+Quin, on his part, carried out instructions with a thoroughness and
+dispatch that upset the entire office force. He had been told to clean
+things up, and he took an unholy joy in interpreting the order in
+military terms. Never before had there been such a drastic overhauling of
+the premises. He did not stop at cleaning up; he insisted upon things
+being kept clean and orderly. In a short time he had instituted reforms
+that broke the traditions of half a century.
+
+"Who moved my desk out like this?" thundered Mr. Bangs on the second day
+after Quin's arrival.
+
+"I did, sir," said Quin. "You can get a much better light here, and no
+draught from the door."
+
+"Well, when I want my desk moved I will inform you," said Mr. Bangs.
+
+But a day's trial of the new arrangement proved so satisfactory that the
+desk remained in its new position.
+
+Other innovations met with less favor. The clerks in the outer office
+objected to the windows being kept down from the top, and Mr. Bangs was
+constantly annoyed when he found that his papers were disturbed by a
+daily dusting and sorting. Quin met the complaints and rebuffs with easy
+good humor, and went straight on with his business. The moment his
+energies were dammed at one point, they burst forth with fresh vigor at
+another.
+
+The only object about the office that was left undisturbed was Minerva, a
+large black cat which the stenographer told him belonged to Mr. Randolph
+Bartlett. Quin was hopelessly committed to cats in general, and to black
+cats in particular, and the fact that this one met with Mr. Bangs's
+marked disfavor made him champion her cause at once. One noon hour, in
+his first week, he was sitting alone in the inner office, scratching
+Minerva's head in the very spot behind the ear where a cat most likes to
+be scratched, when a lively voice from the doorway demanded:
+
+"Well, young man, what do you mean by making love to my cat in my
+absence?"
+
+"She flirted with me first," said Quin. Then he took a second look at the
+stranger and got up smiling. "You are Mr. Bartlett, I believe?"
+
+"Yes. Are you waiting for Mr. Bangs?"
+
+"No, sir," said Quin; "he's waiting for me. I'm to let him know as soon
+as you come in. I am the new office-boy."
+
+He grinned down on the shorter man, who in his turn laughed outright.
+
+"Office-boy? What nonsense! Where have I seen you before? What is your
+name?"
+
+"Quinby Graham, sir."
+
+"Drop the sir, for heaven's sake. I'm no officer. Where in the dickens
+have I met you? Oh! wait a second, I've got it! Sunday night. We were out
+somewhere together----"
+
+"Hold on there," said Quin. "_You_ were out together, but I was out by
+myself. We met at your door."
+
+"So you were the chap that played the good Samaritan? Well, it was damned
+clever of you, old man. I'm glad of a chance to thank you. I hadn't
+touched a drop for six weeks before that, but you see----"
+
+Mr. Bangs's metallic voice was heard in the outer office, and the two
+younger men started.
+
+"You bet I see!" said Quin sympathetically as he hurried out to inform
+the senior member of the firm that the junior member awaited his
+pleasure.
+
+What happened at that interview was recounted to him by Miss Leaks, the
+little drab-colored stenographer, who had returned from lunch when the
+storm was at its height.
+
+"It's a wonder Mr. Ranny don't kill that old man for the way he sneers at
+him," she said indignantly to Quin, "Why, _I_ wouldn't take off him what
+Mr. Ranny does! But then, what can he do? His mother keeps him here for a
+mouth-piece for her, and Mr. Bangs knows it. It's no wonder he drinks,
+hitched up to a cantankerous old hyena like that. He never can stand up
+for himself, but he stood up for you all right."
+
+"For me?" repeated Quin. "Where did I come in?"
+
+"Why, he said it was a shame for a man like you to be doing the work you
+are doing, and that he for one wouldn't stand it. He talked right up to
+the boss about patriotism and our duty to the returned soldier, until he
+made the old tyrant look like ten cents! And then he come right out and
+said if Mr. Bangs couldn't offer you anything better he could."
+
+"What did he say to that?" asked Quin.
+
+"He curled up his lip and asked Mr. Ranny why he didn't engage you for a
+private secretary, and if you'll believe me Mr. Ranny looked him straight
+in the eye and said it was a good idea, and that he would."
+
+"A private secretary!" Quin exclaimed. "But I don't know a blooming thing
+about stenography or typewriting."
+
+"Don't you let on," advised Miss Leaks. "Mr. Ranny doesn't have enough
+work to amount to anything, and he's so tickled at carrying his point
+that he won't be particular. I can teach you how to take dictation and
+use the typewriter."
+
+The following week found Quin installed in the smaller of the two private
+offices, with a title that in no way covered the duties he was called
+upon to perform. To be sure, he got Mr. Ranny's small affairs into
+systematic running order, and, under Miss Leaks's efficient instruction,
+was soon able slowly but accurately to hammer out the necessary letters
+on the typewriter. He was even able at times to help Mr. Chester, the
+melancholy bookkeeper whom the other clerks called "Fanny."
+
+Through working with figures all his life Mr. Chester had come to
+resemble one. With his lean body and drooping oval head, he was not
+unlike the figure nine, an analogy that might be continued by saying that
+nine is the highest degree a bachelor number can achieve, the figures
+after that going in couples. It was an open secret that the tragedy of
+Mr. Chester's uneventful life lay in that simple fact.
+
+In addition to Quin's heterogeneous duties at the office, he was
+frequently pressed into service for more personal uses. When Mr. Ranny
+failed to put in an appearance, he was invariably dispatched to find him,
+and was often able to handle the situation in a way that was a great
+relief to all concerned.
+
+One day, after he had been with the firm several weeks, he was dispatched
+with a budget of papers for Madam Bartlett to sign. It was the first time
+he had entered the house since the night of the accident, and as he stood
+in the front hall waiting instructions, he looked about him curiously.
+
+The lower floor had been "done" in peacock blue and gold when Miss Enid
+made her debut twenty years before, and it had never been undone. An
+embossed dado and an even more embossed frieze encircled the walls, and
+the ceiling was a complicated mosaic of color and design. The
+stiff-backed chairs and massive sofas were apparently committed for life
+to linen strait-jackets. Heavy velvet curtains shut out the light and a
+faint smell of coal soot permeated the air. Over the hall fireplace hung
+a large portrait of Madam Bartlett, just inside the drawing-room gleamed
+a marble bust of her, and two long pier-glasses kept repeating the image
+of her until she dominated every nook and corner of the place.
+
+But Quin saw little of all this. To him the house was simply a background
+for images of Eleanor: Eleanor coming down the broad stairs in her blue
+and gray costume; Eleanor tripping through the hall in her Red Cross
+uniform; Eleanor standing in the doorway in the moonlight, telling him
+how wonderful he was.
+
+He had written her exactly ten letters since her departure, but only two
+had been dispatched, and by a fatal error these two were identical. After
+a superhuman effort to couch his burning thoughts in sufficiently cool
+terms, he had achieved a partially successful result; but, discovering
+after addressing the envelope that he had misspelled two words, he
+laboriously made another copy, addressed a second envelope, then
+inadvertently mailed both.
+
+He had received such a scoffing note in reply that his ears tingled even
+now as he thought of it. It was only when he recalled the postscript that
+he found consolation. "How funny that you should get a position at
+Bartlett & Bangs's," she had written. "If you should happen to meet any
+member of my family, for heaven's sake don't mention my name. They might
+link you up with the Hawaiian Garden, or the trip to the camp that night
+grandmother was hurt. Just let our friendship be a little secret between
+you and me."
+
+"'You and me,'" Quin repeated the words softly to himself, as he stood
+there among the objects made sacred by her one-time presence.
+
+"Madam Bartlett wishes you to come upstairs and explain the papers before
+she signs them," said a woman in nurse's uniform from the stair landing,
+and, cap in hand, Quin followed her up the steps.
+
+At the open door of the large front room he paused. Lying in royal state
+in a huge four-poster bed was Madam Bartlett, resplendent in a purple
+robe, with her hair dressed in its usual elaborate style, and in her ears
+pearls that, Quin afterward assured the Martels, looked like moth-balls.
+
+"You go on out of here and stay until I ring for you," she snapped at the
+nurse; then she squinted her eyes and looked at Quin. She did not put on
+her eye-glasses; they were reserved for feminine audiences exclusively.
+
+"What do they mean by sending me this jumble of stuff?" she demanded,
+indicating the papers strewn on the silk coverlid. "How do they expect me
+to know what they are all about?"
+
+"They don't," said Quin reassuringly, coming forward; "they sent me to
+tell you."
+
+"And who are you, pray?"
+
+"I am Mr. Randolph's er--er--secretary."
+
+For the life of him he could not get through it without a grin, and to
+his relief the old lady's lips also twitched.
+
+"Much need he had for a secretary!" she said, then added shrewdly:
+"Aren't you the soldier that put the splint on my leg?"
+
+Quin modestly acknowledged that he was.
+
+"It was a mighty poor job," said Madam, "but I guess it was better than
+nothing."
+
+"How's the leg coming on?" inquired Quin affably.
+
+"It's not coming on at all," Madam said. "If I listen to those fool
+doctors it's coming off."
+
+Quin shook his head in emphatic disapproval.
+
+"Don't you listen to 'em," he advised earnestly.
+
+"Doctors don't know everything! Why, they told a fellow out at the
+hospital that his arm would have to come off at the shoulder. He lit out
+over the hill, bath-robe and all, for his home town, and got six other
+doctors to sign a paper saying he didn't need an amputation. He got back
+in twenty-four hours, was tried for being A. W. O. L., and is serving his
+time in the prison ward to-day. But he's still got his arm all right."
+
+"Good for him!" said Madam heartily; then, recalling the business in
+hand, she added peevishly: "Well, stop talking now and explain these
+papers."
+
+Quin went over them several times with great patience, and then held the
+ink-well while she tremblingly signed her name.
+
+"Kinder awkward doing things on your back," he said sympathetically, as
+she sank back exhausted.
+
+"Awkward? It's torture. The cast is bad enough in itself; but having to
+lie in one position like this makes me sore all over."
+
+"You don't have to tell me," said Quin, easing up the bed-clothes with
+quite a professional air; "I was six months on my back. But there's no
+sense in keeping you like this. Why don't they rig you up a pulley, so's
+you can change the position of your body without disturbing your leg?"
+
+"How do you mean?"
+
+"Like this," said Quin, taking a paper-knife and a couple of spoons from
+the table and demonstrating his point.
+
+Madam listened with close attention, and so absorbed were she and Quin
+that neither of them were conscious of Miss Isobel's entrance until they
+heard her feeble protest:
+
+"I would not dare try anything like that without consulting Dr. Rawlins."
+
+"Nobody wants you to dare anything," flared out her mother. "What the boy
+says sounds sensible. He says he has fixed them for the soldiers at the
+hospital. I want him to fix one for me."
+
+"When shall I come?" Quin asked.
+
+"Come nothing. You'll stay and do it now. Telephone the factory that I am
+keeping you here for the morning. Isobel, order him whatever he needs.
+And now get out of here, both of you; I want to take a nap."
+
+Thus it was that, an hour later, the new colored butler was carrying the
+papers back to Bartlett & Bangs's, and Mr. Randolph's new secretary was
+sawing wood in Madam Bartlett's cellar. It was a humble beginning, but he
+whistled jubilantly as he worked. Already he saw himself climbing, by
+brilliant and spectacular deeds, to a dazzling pinnacle of security in
+the family's esteem.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 11
+
+
+Madam Bartlett's accident had far-reaching results. For fifty years her
+firm hand had brooked no slightest interference with the family
+steering-wheel, and now that it was removed the household machinery came
+to a standstill. She who had "ridden the whirlwind and directed the
+storm" now found herself ignominiously laid low. Instead of rising with
+the dawn, primed for battle in club committee, business conclave, or
+family council, she lay on her back in a darkened room, a prisoner to
+pain. The only vent she had for her pent-up energy was in hourly tirades
+against her daughters for their inefficiency, the nurses for their
+incompetency, the doctors for their lack of skill, and the servants for
+their disobedience.
+
+The one person who, in any particular, found favor with her these days
+was her son's new secretary. Every Saturday, when Quinby Graham stopped
+on his way to the bank with various papers for her to sign, he was plied
+with questions and intrusted with various commissions. A top sergeant was
+evidently just what Madam had been looking for all her life--one trained
+to receive orders and execute them. All went well until one day when Quin
+refused to smuggle in some forbidden article of diet; then the
+steam-roller of her wrath promptly passed over him also.
+
+He waited respectfully until her breath and vocabulary were alike
+exhausted, then said good-humoredly:
+
+"I used to board with a woman up in Maine that had hysterics like that.
+They always made her feel a lot better. Don't you want me to shift that
+pulley a bit? You don't look comfortable."
+
+Madam promptly ordered him out of the room. But next day she made an
+excuse to send for him, and actually laughed when he stepped briskly up
+to the bed, saluted smartly, and impudently asked her how her grouch was.
+
+There was something in his very lack of reverence, in his impertinent
+assumption of equality, in his refusal to pay her the condescending
+homage due feebleness and old age, that seemed to flatter her.
+
+"He's a mule," she told Randolph--"a mule with horse sense."
+
+Quin's change from khaki to civilian clothes affected him in more ways
+than one. Constitutionally he was opposed to saying "sir" to his fellow
+men; to standing at attention until he was recognized; to acknowledging,
+by word or gesture, that he was any one's inferior on this wide and
+democratic planet. He much preferred organizing to being organized,
+leading to being led. Early in his military training he had evinced an
+inclination to take things into his own hands and act without authority.
+It was somewhat ironic that the very trait that had deprived him of a
+couple of bars on his shoulder should have put the medal on his breast.
+
+But freedom from the restrictions of army life brought its penalties. He
+found that blunders condoned in a soldier were seriously criticized in a
+civilian; that the things he had been at such pains to learn in the past
+two years were of no apparent value to him now. It was a constant
+surprise to him that a plaid suit and three-dollar necktie should meet
+with less favor in the feminine eye than a dreary drab uniform.
+
+About the first of March he was getting somewhat discouraged at his slow
+progress, when an incident happened that planted his feet firmly on the
+first rung of his social ladder.
+
+Ever since their mother's accident, Miss Isobel and Miss Enid had stood
+appalled before their new responsibilities. They were like two trembling
+dead leaves that still cling to a shattered but sturdy old oak. What made
+matters worse was the absence of the faithful black Tom, who for years
+had served them by day and guarded them by night. They lived in constant
+fear of burglars, which grew into a veritable terror when some one broke
+into the pantry and rifled the shelves.
+
+Quin heard about it when he arrived on Saturday morning, and as usual
+offered advice:
+
+"What you need is a man in the house. Then you wouldn't be scared all the
+time."
+
+"Well," said Madam, "what about you?"
+
+Quin's face fell. He had no desire to exchange the noisy, wholesome
+family life of the Martels for the silent, somber grandeur of the
+Bartletts. His affections had taken root in the shabby little brown house
+that always seemed to be humming gaily to itself. When the piano was not
+being played, the violin or guitar was. There were bursts of laughter,
+snatches of song, and young people going and coming through doors that
+never stayed closed.
+
+"You don't seem keen about the proposition," Madam commented dryly,
+smoothing the bed-clothes with her wrinkled fingers.
+
+"Well, I can't say I am," Quin admitted. "You see, I'm living with some
+friends out on Sixth Street. They are sort of kin-folks of yours, I
+believe--the Martels."
+
+A carefully aimed hand grenade could have produced no more violent or
+immediate result. Madam damned the Martels, individually and
+collectively, and furiously disclaimed any relationship.
+
+"They are a trifling, worthless lot!" she stormed. "I wish I'd never
+heard of them. They fastened their talons on my son Bob, and ruined his
+life, and now they are doing all they can to ruin my granddaughter.
+Haven't you ever heard them speak of me?"
+
+"Oh, yes," said Quin with laughing significance.
+
+"What do they say?" Madam demanded instantly.
+
+"You want it straight?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Well, Mr. Martel told me only last night that he thought you were an
+object of pity."
+
+Madam's jaw relaxed in amazement.
+
+"What on earth did he mean?" she asked.
+
+"He said you'd got 'most everything in life that he'd missed, but he'd
+hate to change places with you."
+
+She lay perfectly still, staring at him with her small restless eyes, and
+when she spoke again it was to revert to the subject of burglars.
+
+Quin was relieved. He had been skating on thin ice in discussing the
+Martels, for any moment might have brought up a question concerning
+Eleanor.
+
+"I used to have a corporal that was an ex-burglar," he said, plunging
+into the new subject with alacrity. "First-rate fellow, too. Last I heard
+of him, he had a position as chauffeur with a rich old lady who lived
+alone up in Detroit. She had two burglar-alarm systems, but the joke of
+it was she made him sleep in the house for extra protection!"
+
+"I suppose you are trying to frighten me off from engaging you?" Madam
+asked.
+
+"Not exactly," Quin smiled. "Of course I'll come if you can't get anybody
+else. But there's no question of engaging me. If I come, I pay board."
+
+Madam laughed aloud for the first time since her accident.
+
+"Do you take me for a landlady?" she asked.
+
+"Only when you take me for a night-watchman," said Quin.
+
+They eyed each other steadily for a moment, then she held out her hand.
+
+"We'll compromise," she said. "No salary and no board. We'll try it out
+for a week."
+
+The next day Quin's suit-case, containing all his worldly possessions,
+was transferred from the small stuffy room over the Martels' kitchen to
+the large luxurious one over the Bartletts' dining-room. It was quite the
+grandest room he had ever occupied, with its massive walnut furniture and
+its heavily draped windows; but, had it been stripped bare but for a
+single picture, it would still have been a _chambre de luxe_ to him. The
+moment he entered he discovered a photograph of Eleanor on the mantel,
+and ten minutes later, when Hannah tapped at the door to say that dinner
+was served, he was still standing with arms folded on the shelf in
+absorbed adoration.
+
+That first meal with the Misses Bartlett was an ordeal he never forgot.
+Their formal aloofness and evident dismay at his presence were enough in
+themselves to embarrass him; but combined with the necessity of choosing
+the right knife and fork, of breaking his bread properly, and of removing
+his spoon from his coffee-cup, they were quite overpowering. During his
+two years in the army he had drifted into the easy habits and easier
+vernacular of the enlisted man. Whatever knowledge he had of the
+amenities of life had almost been forgotten. But, though his social
+virtues were few, he passionately identified himself with them rather
+than with his faults, which were many. To prove his politeness, for
+instance, he insisted upon his hostesses having second helps to every
+dish, offered to answer the telephone whenever it rang, and even
+obligingly started to answer the door-bell during the salad course.
+
+That dinner was but the initiation into a week of difficult adjustments.
+When he was not in the arctic region surrounding Miss Isobel and Miss
+Enid, he was in the torrid zone of Madam's presence. New and embarrassing
+situations confronted him on every hand, and when he was not breaking
+conventions he was breaking china. But Quin was not sensitive, and, in
+spite of the fact that he was being silently or vocally condemned most of
+the time, he cheerfully persevered in his determination to win the
+respect of the family.
+
+The saving of his ignorance was that he never tried to conceal it. He
+looked at it with surprise and discussed it with disconcerting frankness.
+He was no more abashed in learning new and better ways of conducting
+himself than he would have been in learning a new language. He laughed
+good-humoredly at his mistakes and seldom committed the same one a second
+time. His limitations were to him like the frontier to a pioneer--a thing
+to be reached and crossed.
+
+If only he could have contented himself with performing the one duty
+required of him and then gracefully effacing himself, his success would
+have been assured. But that was not Quin's nature. Having identified
+himself with the family, he promptly assumed full responsibility for its
+welfare. By the end of the second week he was the self-constituted head
+of the establishment. No mission was too high or too low for him to
+volunteer to perform. One moment he was tactfully severing diplomatic
+relations with a consulting physician in the front hall, the next he was
+firing the furnace in the basement. Whenever he was in the house he was
+meeting emergencies and adjusting difficulties, upsetting established
+customs and often achieving unexpected results with new ones.
+
+Miss Isobel and Miss Enid stood aghast at his temerity, and waited hourly
+for the lightning of Madam's wrath to annihilate him. But, though the
+bolts rained about him, they failed to destroy him.
+
+On one occasion Miss Isobel was so outraged by his familiar attitude
+toward her mother that she plucked up courage to remonstrate with him;
+but Madam, instead of appreciating the interference on her behalf,
+promptly turned upon her defender.
+
+"Now, Isobel," she said caustically, "_you_ may be old enough to want men
+to respect you, but I am young enough to want them to like me. You leave
+young Graham alone."
+
+Quin meanwhile, in spite of his arduous duties at the office and at home,
+was living in a world of dreams. The privilege of hearing Eleanor's name
+frequently mentioned, of getting bits of news of her from time to time,
+the exciting possibility of being under the same roof with her when she
+returned, supplied the days with thrilling zest. Since her teasing note
+in answer to his double-barreled communication, he had written but once
+and received no answer; but he knew that she was expected home for the
+Easter vacation, and he lived on that prospect.
+
+One evening, when he was summoned to Madam's room to shorten her new
+crutches, he realized that the all-important subject was under
+discussion.
+
+"Isn't that exactly like her?" Madam was saying. "Refusing to go in the
+first place, and now objecting to coming home."
+
+"Well, it isn't especially gay for her here, is it?" Miss Enid ventured
+in feeble defense. "I am afraid we are rather dull company for a young
+girl."
+
+"Well, make it gay," commanded Madam. "You and Isobel aren't so old and
+feeble that you can't think of some way to entertain young people."
+
+"A tea?" suggested Miss Enid.
+
+"A tea would never tempt Eleanor. She's too much her mother's child to
+enjoy anything so staid and respectable."
+
+"Why don't you give her a dance?" suggested Quin enthusiastically,
+looking up from his work.
+
+"Give who a dance?" demanded Madam in surprise.
+
+"Miss Eleanor," said Quin, bending over his work and blushing to the
+roots of his stubby hair.
+
+The three ladies exchanged startled glances; then Miss Enid said:
+
+"Of course. I had forgotten that you met her the night of the accident. I
+wonder if we _could_ give the dear child a party?"
+
+"It is not to be thought of," said Miss Isobel, "with no regular butler,
+and mother ill----"
+
+"I tell you, I'm _not_ ill!" snapped Madam. "I intend to be up and about
+by Easter. I'll give as many parties as I like. Hurry up with those
+crutches, Graham; do you think I am going to wait all night?"
+
+One of Quin's first acts upon coming into the house had been to aid and
+abet Madam in her determination to use her injured leg. Dr. Rawlins had
+infuriated her by his pessimistic warnings and his dark suggestions of a
+wheeled chair.
+
+"We'll show 'em what you can do when you get that cast off," Quin had
+reassured her with the utmost confidence. "I've limbered up heaps of
+stiff legs for the fellows. It takes patience and grit. I got the
+patience and you got the grit, so there we are!"
+
+Now that the cast was off, a few steps were attempted each night, during
+which painful operation Miss Enid fled to another room to shed tears of
+apprehension, while Miss Isobel hovered about the hall, ready to call the
+doctor if anything happened.
+
+"Is that better?" he asked now, as he got Madam to her feet and carefully
+adjusted the crutches. "If you say they are too short, I'll tell you what
+the little man said when he was teased about his legs. 'They reach the
+ground,' he said; 'what more can you ask?'"
+
+"Shut up your nonsense, and mind what you are doing!" cried Madam. "My
+leg is worse than it was yesterday. I can't put my foot to the ground."
+
+"Oh, yes, you can," Quin insisted, coaxing her from the bed-post to the
+dresser. "You are coming on fine. I never saw but one person do better.
+That was a guy I knew in France who never danced a step until he lost a
+leg, and then his cork leg taught his other leg to do the fox-trot."
+
+"Didn't I tell you to hush!" commanded Madam, laughing in spite of
+herself. "You will have me falling over here in a minute."
+
+When she was back in her chair and Quin was leaving, she beckoned to him.
+
+"What about Mr. Ranny?" she asked in an anxious whisper. "Was he at the
+office to-day?"
+
+Quin had been dreading the question, but when it came he did not evade
+it. Randolph Bartlett's lapses from grace were coming with such alarming
+frequency that the sisters' frantic efforts to keep the truth from their
+mother only resulted in arousing her suspicion and making her more
+unhappy.
+
+"No," said Quin; "he hasn't been there for a week. He's never going to be
+any better as long as he stays in the business. You don't know what he
+has to stand from Mr. Bangs."
+
+"I know what Mr. Bangs has had to stand from him."
+
+"Yes; but Mr. Ranny's never mean. He is one of the kindest, nicest
+gentlemen I ever met up with. But he can't stand being nagged at all the
+time, and he feels that he don't count for anything. He says Mr. Bangs
+considers him a figurehead, and that he'd rather be selling shoestrings
+for himself than be in partnership with him."
+
+"Yes, and if I let him go that's what he _would_ be doing," said Madam
+bitterly.
+
+"Mr. Chester don't think so," persisted Quin; "he says Mr. Ranny's got a
+lot of ability."
+
+"Don't quote that sissified Francis Chester to me. He may be a good
+man--I suppose he is; but I can't abide the sight of him. He goes around
+holding one hand in the other as if he were afraid he'd spill it! What
+did you say he said about Ranny?"
+
+"He said he had ability; that if he was on his own in the country some
+place----"
+
+"'On his own'!" Madam's contempt was great. "He hasn't _got_ any own.
+He's just like the girls--no force or decision about any of them. Their
+father wasn't like that; I am sure _I'm_ not. What's the matter with
+them, anyhow?"
+
+Quin looked her straight in the eyes. "Do you want to know, honest?"
+
+Disconcerting as it was to have an oratorical question taken literally,
+Madam's curiosity prompted her to nod her head.
+
+"The same thing's the matter with them," said Quin, with brutal
+frankness, "that's the matter with your leg. They've been broken and kept
+in the cast too long."
+
+Then, before he could get the berating he surely deserved, he was off
+down the stairs, disturbing the silence of the house with his cheerful
+whistle.
+
+At breakfast the next morning he scented trouble. Until now he had made
+little headway with the two sisters, having been too much occupied in
+storming the fortress of Madam's regard to concern himself with the
+outlying districts. But this morning he met with an even colder reception
+than usual. In vain he fired off his best jokes: Miss Enid remained pale
+and languid, and Miss Isobel presided over the coffee-pot as if it had
+been a funeral urn. A crisis was evidently pending, and he determined to
+meet it half way.
+
+"Is Queen Vic mad at me?" he asked suddenly, leaning forward on his
+folded arms and smiling with engaging candor.
+
+Miss Isobel started to pour the cream into the sugar-bowl, but caught
+herself in the act.
+
+"If you mean my mother," she said with reproving dignity, "she has asked
+me to tell you--that is, we all think it best----"
+
+"For me to go?" Quin finished it for her. "Now, look here, Miss Isobel;
+you can fire me, but you know you can't fire the furnace! Who is going to
+stay here at night? Who is going to carry Madam up and down stairs? Of
+course I don't want to butt in, but if ever a house needed a man it's
+this one. Why don't you have me stay on until things get to running easy
+again?"
+
+There was an embarrassing pause during which Miss Isobel fidgeted with
+the cups and saucers and Miss Enid bit her lips nervously.
+
+"Don't you-all like me?" persisted Quin with his terrible directness.
+
+Now, Miss Isobel had spent her life in evasions and reservations and
+compromises. To have even a personal liking stripped thus in public
+offended her maiden modesty, and she scurried to the cover of silence.
+
+"Of course we like you," murmured Miss Enid, coming to her rescue. "We
+like you very much, Mr. Graham, and we appreciate your kindness in coming
+to help us out. But mother feels that we shouldn't impose on your good
+nature any longer."
+
+Quin shook his impatient head.
+
+"That's not it," he said. "She's mad at something I said last night, and
+she's got a right to be. It was true all right, but it was none of my
+business. I made up my mind before I went to bed that I was going to
+apologize. I can fix things up with her. It's you and Miss Isobel I can't
+understand. You say you like me, but you don't act like it. I know I make
+mistakes about lots of things, and that I do things wrong and say things
+I oughtn't to. But all you got to do is to call me down. I want to help
+you; but that's not all--I want to learn the game. When a fellow has
+knocked around with men since he was a kid----"
+
+He broke off suddenly and stared into his coffee-cup.
+
+"I think he might go up and speak to mother, don't you, Isobel?" asked
+Miss Enid tentatively.
+
+Quin pushed back his chair and rose precipitately from the table,
+dragging the cloth away as he did so.
+
+"That's not the point!" he said heatedly. "It's for you two to decide, as
+well as her. Do you want me to go or to stay?"
+
+Miss Isobel and Miss Enid, who had been assuring each other almost hourly
+that they could not stand that awful boy in the house another day, looked
+at each other intercedingly.
+
+"It would be a great help if you could stay at least until mother learns
+to use her crutches," urged Miss Enid.
+
+"Yes, and until we get some one we can trust to stay with us at night,"
+added Miss Isobel.
+
+"I'll stay as long as you like!" said Quin heartily; and he departed to
+make his peace with Madam.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 12
+
+
+From that time on Quin's status in the family became less anomalous. To
+be sure, he was still Mr. Randolph's private secretary, Madam's top
+sergeant, Miss Isobel's and Miss Enid's body-guard, and the household's
+general-utility man; but he was now something else in addition. Miss
+Isobel had discovered, quite by chance, that he was the grandson of Dr.
+Ezra Quinby, whose book "Christianizing China" had been one of the
+inspirations of her girlhood.
+
+"And to think we considered asking him to eat in the pantry!" she
+exclaimed in horror to her sister.
+
+"Well, I told you all along he was a gentleman by instinct," said Miss
+Enid.
+
+To be sure, they were constantly shocked by his manners and his frank
+method of speech, but they were also exhilarated. He was like a
+disturbing but refreshing breeze that swept through their quiet, ordered
+lives. He talked about things and places they had never heard of or seen,
+and recounted his experiences with an enthusiasm that was contagious.
+
+As for Quin, he found, to his surprise, that he was enjoying his new
+quarters quite as much as he had the old ones. Madam was a never-ending
+source of amusement and interest to him, and Miss Isobel and Miss Enid
+soon had each her individual appeal. He liked the swish of their silk
+petticoats, and the play of their slim white hands about the coffee-tray.
+He liked their super-feminine delicacies of speech and motion, and the
+flattering interest they began to take in all his affairs.
+
+Miss Isobel developed a palpitating concern for his spiritual welfare and
+invited him to go to church with her. She even introduced him to the
+minister with proud reference to his distinguished grandfather, and
+basked in the reflected glory.
+
+Quin did not take kindly to church. He considered that he had done his
+full duty by it in the first fourteen years of his life, when he, along
+with the regenerate heathen, had been forced to attend five services
+every Sunday in the gloomy chapel in the compound at Nanking. But if
+Eleanor's aunt had asked him to accompany her to the gates of hell
+instead of the portals of heaven, he would have acquiesced eagerly. So
+strenuously did he lift his voice in the familiar hymns of his youth that
+he was promptly urged to join the choir, an ordeal whose boredom was
+mitigated only during the few moments when the collection was taken up
+and he and the tenor could bet on which deacon would make his round
+first.
+
+Not for years had Miss Isobel had such thrilling occupation as that of
+returning Ezra Quinby's grandson to the spiritual fold. In spite of the
+fact that Quin was a fairly decent chap already, whose worst vices were
+poker and profanity, she persisted in regarding him as a brand which she
+had been privileged to snatch from the burning.
+
+What gave him a yet more intimate claim upon her was the fact that his
+heart and lungs were still troublesome, and with any over-exertion on his
+part, or a sudden change in the weather, his chest became very sore and
+his racking cough returned. At such times Miss Isobel was in her glory.
+She would put him to bed with hot-water bottles and mustard plasters and
+feed him hot lemonade. Quin took kindly to the coddling. No one had
+fussed over him like that since his mother died, and he was touchingly
+grateful.
+
+"Say, you'd be a wonder out at the hospital," he said to her on one of
+these occasions. "I wish some of those fellows with the flu could have
+you to look after them."
+
+Miss Isobel's long, sallow face with its dark-ringed eyes lit up for a
+moment.
+
+"There is nothing I should like better," she said. "But of course it's
+out of the question."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Mother doesn't approve of us doing any work at the camp. She did make an
+exception in the case of my niece, but Eleanor was so insistent. Sister
+and I try never to oppose mother's wishes. It cuts us off from a great
+many things; but then, I contend that our first duty is to her."
+
+Miss Isobel's attitude toward her mother was that of a monk to his
+haircloth shirt. She acquired so much merit in her friends' eyes and in
+her own by her patient endurance that the penance was robbed of half its
+sting.
+
+"Things are awful bad out at the hospital now," went on Quin. "A fellow
+was telling me yesterday that in some of the wards they only have one
+nurse to two hundred patients. The epidemic is getting worse every day.
+You-all in town here don't know what it's like where there's so many sick
+and so few to take care of 'em."
+
+Miss Isobel, with morbid interest, insisted upon the details. When Quin
+had finished his grim recital, she turned to him with scared
+determination.
+
+"Do you know," she fluttered, "I almost feel as if I ought to go in spite
+of mother's wishes."
+
+"Of course you ought," Quin conceded, "especially when you are keeping a
+trained nurse here in the house who doesn't do a thing but carry up trays
+and sit around and look at herself!"
+
+"I know it," Miss Isobel admitted miserably. "I've lain awake nights
+worrying over it. Sister and I are perfectly able to do what is to be
+done. But mother insists upon keeping the nurse."
+
+"Well, she can't keep you, if you really want to go. I guess you got a
+right to do your duty."
+
+The word was like a bugle call to Miss Isobel. She went about all day in
+a tremor of uncertainty, and at last yielded to Quin's insistence, and,
+donning Eleanor's Red Cross uniform, accompanied him to the hospital.
+
+Every afternoon after that, when Madam was taking her rest, Miss Isobel,
+feeling like Machiavelli one moment and Florence Nightingale the next,
+stepped into the carriage, already loaded with delicacies, and proceeded
+on her errand of mercy. She invariably returned in a twitter of subdued
+excitement, and recounted her experiences with breathless interest at the
+dinner-table.
+
+"I've never seen sister like this before," Miss Enid told Quin. "She
+talks more in an hour now than she used to talk in a week, and she seems
+so happy."
+
+The change wrought in Miss Isobel's life by Quin's advent into the family
+was mild, however, compared to the cataclysm effected in the life of her
+sister. Miss Enid, having had her own affections wrecked in early youth,
+spent her time acting as a sort of salvage corps following the
+devastation caused by her cyclonic mother. When Madam shattered things to
+bits, Miss Enid tried patiently to remold them nearer to the heart's
+desire. She had acquired a habit of offsetting every disagreeable remark
+by an agreeable one, and she was apt to see incipient halos hovering
+above heads where less sympathetic observers saw horns. When the last
+chance of getting rid of the disturbing but helpful Quin vanished, she
+set herself to work to discover his possibilities with the view of
+undertaking his social reclamation.
+
+One evening, as he was passing through the hall, she called him into the
+library. It was a small, high-ceilinged room, with bookcases reaching to
+the ceiling, and a massive mahogany table bearing a reading-lamp with two
+green shades. Lincoln and his Cabinet held session over one door, and
+Andrew Jackson, surrounded by his weeping family, died over the other.
+Miss Enid, with books piled up in front of her, was sitting at the table.
+
+"Quinby," she said,--it had been "Quinby" ever since the discovery of his
+grandfather,--"I wonder if you can help me? I have a club paper on the
+14th, and I can't find a thing about my subject. Can't you tell me
+something about the position of women in China?"
+
+Quin, who had come in expecting to be called upon to put up a window or
+fix the electric light, looked at her blankly. Under ordinary
+circumstances he would have laughingly disclaimed any knowledge of the
+subject; but with Miss Enid sitting there looking up at him with such
+flattering confidence, it was different. Out of the dusty pigeon holes of
+his brain he dragged odds and ends of information, memories of the native
+houses, the customs and manners of the people, stories he had heard from
+his Chinese nurses, street incidents he had seen, stray impressions
+picked up here and there by a lively active American boy in a foreign
+city.
+
+"I ought to be able to tell you a lot more," he said apologetically in
+conclusion. "I could if I wasn't such a bonehead."
+
+"But you've given me just what I wanted!" cried Miss Enid. "And you've
+made it all so _vivid_. It takes a very good mind to register details
+like that and to be able to present them in such good order."
+
+Quin looked at her quizzically. He was confident enough of his abilities
+along other lines, but he had a low opinion of his mental equipment.
+
+"I guess the only kind of sense I got is common," he said.
+
+But Miss Enid would not have it so. "No," she said, earnestly regarding
+the toe of her beaded slipper; "your mind is much above the average. But
+it isn't enough to be born with brains--one must know how to use them."
+
+"I suppose you mean I don't?" asked Quin, also regarding the beaded
+slipper.
+
+"Nobody does who has had no training," Miss Enid gently suggested. "It
+seems a pity that a young man of your possibilities should have had so
+little opportunity for cultivating them."
+
+"Well, I ain't a Methuselah!" said Quin, slightly peaked. "What's the
+matter with me beginning now?"
+
+"It's rather late, I am afraid. Still, other men have done it. I wonder
+if you would consider taking up some night courses at the university?"
+
+"I'd consider anything that would get me on in the world. I've got a very
+particular reason, Miss Enid, for--for wanting to get on."
+
+She looked at him with increased interest.
+
+"Really? How interesting! You must tell me all about it some day. But
+this would keep you back for a time. You would have to give all your
+spare hours to study, and you might not even be able to take the better
+position they promised you at the factory this spring."
+
+"I've already got it," Quin said. "Mr. Bangs told me to-day that I was to
+start in as shipping clerk Monday morning. But he'd let me off nights if
+I'd put it up to him. Old Chester says----"
+
+Miss Enid's Pre-Raphaelite brows contracted slightly. "Don't you think it
+would be more respectful----"
+
+"Sure," agreed Quin; "I didn't mean any harm. I like Mr. Chester. He
+asked me to come up to his rooms some night and see his collection of
+flutes."
+
+"That was like him," Miss Enid said warmly. "He's always doing kind
+things like that. I know his reputation for being diffident and hard to
+get acquainted with, but once you get beneath the surface----"
+
+Quin was not in the least interested in Mr. Chester's surface. He sat on
+the edge of the table, swinging his foot and staring off into space,
+wholly absorbed in the idea of cultivating that newly discovered
+intellect of his.
+
+"Say, Miss Enid," he said, impulsively interrupting her eulogy of Mr.
+Chester's neglected virtues, "I wish you'd sort of take me in hand. _You_
+know what I need better than I do. If you'll get a line on that school
+business, I'll start right in, if I have to start in the kindergarten.
+Hand out the dope and I'll take it. And whenever you see me doing things
+wrong, or saying things wrong, I'd take it as a favor if you'd jack me
+up."
+
+Miss Enid smiled ruefully. "Why, Quinby, that is just what we have all
+been doing ever since you came. If you weren't the best-natured----"
+
+"Not a bit of it," disclaimed Quin. "Queen Vic lets me have it in the
+neck sometimes, but that's nothing. I've learned more since I've been in
+this house than I ever learned in all my life put together. Why,
+sometimes I don't hardly know myself!"
+
+"Two negatives, Quinby, make an affirmative," suggested Miss Enid primly;
+and thus his higher education began.
+
+Miss Enid was right when she said his mind was above the average. Its one
+claim to superiority lay in the fact that it had received the little
+training it had at first hand. What he knew of geography he knew, not
+from maps, but from actual observation in many parts of the world. Higher
+mathematics were unknown to him, but through years of experience he had
+learned to solve the most difficult of all problems--that of making ends
+meet. He had learned astronomy from a Norwegian sailor, as they lay on
+the deck of a Pacific transport night after night in the southern seas.
+He had even tackled literature during his six months in hospital, when he
+had plowed through all the books the wards provided from Dante's
+"Inferno" to "Dere Mable."
+
+Soon after his talk with Miss Enid he decided to call upon Mr. Chester,
+not because Mr. Chester was an enlivening companion, but because he was
+so touchingly grateful for the casual friendship that Quin bestowed upon
+him.
+
+"He's so sort of lonesome," Quin told Miss Leaks. "When he looks at me
+with those big dog eyes of his, I feel like scratching him back of his
+ear."
+
+Mr. Chester, in his small but tastefully furnished bachelor apartment,
+outdid himself in his efforts to be hospitable. He insisted upon Quin
+taking the best chair, gave him a good cigar, showed him some rare first
+editions, displayed his collection of musical instruments, and struggled
+valiantly to establish a common footing. But there was only one subject
+upon which they could find anything to say, and they came back again and
+again to the affairs of the Bartlett family.
+
+"Why don't you ever come around and see the folks?" Quin asked
+hospitably. "They get awful lonesome with so few people dropping in."
+
+Mr. Chester in evident embarrassment flicked the ash from his cigar and
+answered guardedly:
+
+"I used to be there a great deal in the old days. Unfortunately, Madam
+Bartlett and I had a misunderstanding. As a matter of fact, I have not
+crossed that threshold in--let me see--it must be fifteen years! It was a
+party, I remember, given for Eleanor, the little granddaughter, on her
+fifth birthday."
+
+"Oh, yes!" said Quin, finding Mr. Chester for the first time interesting.
+"They've got a picture of her taken with Miss Enid in her party dress."
+
+"I suppose you mean this?" Mr. Chester reached over and took from his
+desk a somewhat faded photograph, in a silver frame, of a little girl
+leaning against a big girl's shoulders, both enveloped in a cloud of
+white tulle.
+
+"Gee, but she was pretty!" exclaimed Quin, devouring every detail of
+Eleanor's chubby features.
+
+"A beautiful woman," sighed Mr. Chester--and Quin, looking up suddenly,
+surprised a look in his host's eyes that was anything but numerical.
+
+Obligingly relinquishing his application of the pronoun for Mr.
+Chester's, he said:
+
+"She certainly thinks a lot of you!"
+
+"How do you know?" demanded Mr. Chester.
+
+"From the way she talks. She says people are barking up the wrong tree
+when they think you are cold and indifferent and all that; says you've
+got one of the noblest natures _she_ ever knew."
+
+Quin was appalled at the effect of these words. Mr. Chester's eyes got
+quite red around the rims and his lips actually trembled.
+
+"Poor Enid!" he said. Then he remembered himself, or rather forgot
+himself, and became a Number Nine again, and bored Quin talking business
+until ten o'clock.
+
+At parting they shook hands cordially, and Mr. Chester urged him to come
+again.
+
+"I wonder if you would care to use one of my tickets for the Symphony
+Orchestra next week?" he asked.
+
+Quin looked embarrassed. He had accepted a similar invitation the week
+before, and had confided to Rose Martel afterward that he "never heard
+such a bully band playing such bum music." But Mr. Chester's intention
+was so kind that he could run no risk of offending him.
+
+"I'll go if I can," he said, leaving himself a loophole.
+
+"Here is the ticket," said Mr. Chester, "and in case you do not use it,
+perhaps you will so good as to pass it on to some one who can."
+
+This suggestion afforded Quin an inspiration.
+
+"Say, Miss Enid," he said the next morning at breakfast. "I want to give
+you a ticket to the Symphony Orchestra next Friday night. Will you go?"
+
+"But, my dear boy," she protested greatly touched, "I cannot go by
+myself."
+
+"You don't have to. I'm going to take you and come for you. You ain't
+going to turn me down, are you?"
+
+"Have you got the ticket?"
+
+"Right here. Now you will go, won't you?"
+
+It would have taken a less susceptible heart than Miss Enid's to resist
+Quin's persuasive tones, and in spite of Miss Isobel's disapprobation she
+agreed to go.
+
+Just what happened on that opening night of the Fine Arts Series, when
+two old lovers found themselves in embarrassing proximity for the first
+time in fifteen years, has never been told. But from subsequent events it
+is safe to conclude that during the long program they became much more
+interested in their own unfinished symphony than in Schubert's, and when
+Quin came to take Miss Enid home, he found them in a corner of the lobby,
+still so engrossed in conversation that he obligingly walked around the
+block to give them an additional five minutes.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 13
+
+
+Quin's desire for self-improvement soon became an obsession. With Miss
+Enid's assistance he got into a night course at the university, and
+proceeded to attack his ignorance with something of the fierce
+determination he had attacked the Hun the year before in France. He
+plunged through bogs of history, got hopelessly entangled in the barbed
+wire of mathematics, had hand-to-hand struggles with belligerent parts of
+speech, and more than once suffered the shell-shock of despair. But his
+watchword now, as then, was, "Up and at 'em!" And before long he had the
+satisfaction of seeing his enemy gradually giving way.
+
+Having taken his small public into his confidence in regard to his
+belated ambition to get an education, he was surprised to find how ready
+everybody was to help him. Mr. Chester not only assisted him with his
+mathematics, but insisted upon taking him to hear good music, in the vain
+effort to reclaim an ear hopelessly attuned to jazz and rag-time. Mr.
+Martel devoted Sunday afternoons to making him read aloud from the
+classics, with great attention to precise enunciation. Miss Isobel still
+looked after his moral welfare, and Miss Enid continued to devote herself
+to his social improvement. But it remained for Madam Bartlett to render
+him the service of which he was most in need. Whenever the bubble of his
+self-esteem threatened to carry him away, she always took pains to
+puncture it.
+
+"Don't let them make a fool of you, Graham," she said one day, as she
+leaned heavily upon his arm in a painful effort to walk without her
+crutches--an experiment that she allowed neither one of her daughters to
+share, as they invariably limped with her and got frightened when she
+stumbled. "They all treat you like a puppy that has learned to walk on
+its hind legs. Remember that you belong on your hind legs. You are only
+doing what most boys in your position do in their teens. If you were as
+smart as they claim, you would have got an education long ago. But young
+people these days have no sense! Just look at my granddaughter, for
+instance."
+
+There being no direction in which he was more eager to look, Quin gave
+her his undivided attention.
+
+"I've spent thousands of dollars on that girl's education," Madam
+continued, "and what do you suppose she elected to specialize in?
+'Expression'! In my day they called it elocution. When a girl was too
+dumb to learn anything else, the teacher got money out of her parents by
+teaching her to swing her arms around her hear and say, 'Curfew Shall Not
+Ring To-night.' Now they all want to write poetry, or play the flute, or
+go on the stage, or some other fool thing like that."
+
+"What about those that want to go on a farm? That's sensible enough for
+you." Quin couldn't resist the thrust on behalf of Mr. Ranny.
+
+"It's sensible for a sensible person," Madam said crossly. "It's where
+_you_ belong, instead of attempting all this university business."
+
+There were times these days when Quin quite agreed with Madam. When the
+tide of his confidence was out, he regarded himself as a hopeless fool
+and despaired of ever making up the years he had lost. But at high tide
+there was no limit to his aspirations, nor to his courage. While his
+struggles at the university kept him humble, his success at the factory
+constantly elated him. Having achieved two promotions in less than three
+months, he already saw himself a prospective member of the firm. In fact,
+he slightly anticipated this event by flinging himself into the affairs
+of Bartlett & Bangs with even more ardor than was advisable. Hardly a day
+passed that he did not seek a chance to apprise Mr. Bangs of some
+colossal scheme or startling innovation that would revolutionize the
+business.
+
+"See here, young man," said Mr. Bangs, when this had occurred once too
+often; "I pay you to work for me, not to think for me."
+
+"But they are the same thing," urged Quin, with appalling temerity. "Why,
+I can't sleep nights for thinking how other firms are walking away with
+our business. Smith & Snelling, up in Illinois, have got a plant that's
+half as big as ours, and they export twice as much stuff as we do. And
+their plows can't touch ours; they ain't in a thousand miles of 'em."
+
+"How do you know?"
+
+"I've seen 'em both in action, and I've heard men talk about 'em. Why, if
+we could get a start in the Orient, and open up an agency in Japan and
+China----"
+
+"There--that will do," said Mr. Bangs testily; "you get back to your
+work. You talk too much."
+
+Both Mr. Ranny and Mr. Chester warned Quin again and again that he was
+not supposed to emerge from the obscurity of his humble position as
+shipping clerk. But Quin was the descendant of a long line of
+missionaries whose duty it was to reform. The effect of his heredity and
+early environment was not only to increase his self-reliance and
+intensify his motive power, but to commit him to ideals as well. Once he
+recognized a condition as being capable of improvement, he could not rest
+until he had tried to better it.
+
+It was not until the approach of Easter that his mind began to stray from
+the highroads of industry and learning into the byways of pleasure. From
+certain signs about the Bartlett house it was apparent that preparations
+were in progress for an event of importance. Paperhangers and cleaners
+came and went, consultations were held daily concerning new rugs and
+curtains. Miss Enid and Miss Isobel gave tentative orders and Madam
+promptly countermanded them. Workmen were engaged and dismissed and
+reengaged. The door to the room at the head of the stairs, which he knew
+to be Eleanor's, now stood open, revealing a pink-and-white bower. Stray
+remarks now and then concerning caterers and music and invitations
+further excited his fancy, and he waited impatiently for the time when he
+should be formally apprised of Eleanor's home-coming.
+
+Never before in his life had he been so inordinately happy. He burst into
+song at strange times and places, and had to be spoken to more than once
+for whistling in the office. Instead of studying at night, he frequently
+lapsed into delectable reveries in which he anticipated the bliss of
+being under the same roof with Eleanor. He already heard himself telling
+her about his promotions, his work at the university, his capture of her
+family. And always he pictured her as listening to him as she had that
+day at the Hawaiian Garden, with lips ready to smile or tremble and eyes
+that sparkled like little pools of water in the sunlight.
+
+Occasionally reason suggested that she would be at home very little and
+that the obnoxious Phipps would be lying in wait for her whenever she
+went abroad. But Phipps was forbidden the house, and with such a handicap
+as that he surely was out of the running. Besides, Miss Eleanor had
+probably forgotten all about the Captain by this time! Thus reassuring
+himself, the fatuous Quin loosened the reins of his fancy and rode full
+tilt for an inevitable fall.
+
+The first intimation of it came the week before Easter, when Madam
+presented him with a handsome watch in recognition of his services. The
+gift itself was sufficiently overwhelming, but the formal politeness of
+the presentation sounded ominous. Madam suggested almost tactfully, in
+conclusion, that, now she was on her feet again, he need not feel
+obligated to remain longer.
+
+"But I _don't_ feel obligated!" he burst out impetuously. "I'd rather
+stay here than anywhere in the world."
+
+"Well, you can't stay," said Madam, whose small stock of courtesy had
+been exhausted on her initial speech. "My granddaughter is bringing some
+girls home with her for the Easter vacation, and I need your room."
+
+"But I'll sleep in the third story," urged Quin wildly. "You can billet
+me any old place--I don't care _where_ you put me."
+
+"No," said Madam firmly. "It's best for you to go."
+
+That night at dinner the sisters did what they could to soften the blow
+for Quin. They gave vague excuses that did not excuse, and explanations
+that did not explain.
+
+"Of course, we have no idea of losing sight of you," Miss Enid said with
+forced brightness. "You must drop in often to tell us how you are getting
+along and to make mother laugh. You are the only person I know who can do
+that."
+
+"Yes, and we shall count on you to come to supper every Sunday evening,"
+Miss Isobel added; "then we can go to church together."
+
+"Next Sunday?" asked Quin, faintly hopeful.
+
+"Well, no," said Miss Isobel. "For the next two weeks we shall be
+occupied with the young ladies and their friends; but after that we shall
+look for you."
+
+Quin looked at the two gentle sisters in dumb amazement. How _could_ they
+sit there saying such kind things to him, and at the same time shut the
+door between him and the great opportunity of his life? What did it all
+mean? Where had he failed? Surely there was some terrible misunderstanding!
+In his complete bewilderment he created quite the most dreadful blunder
+that is registered against him in his long list of social sins.
+
+"But don't you expect me to meet the young ladies?" he blurted out
+indignantly. "Aren't you going to ask me to the party?"
+
+A horrible pause followed, during which the walls seemed to rock around
+him and he felt the blood surging to his head. He was starting up from
+the table when Miss Enid laid a quieting hand on his sleeve.
+
+"Of course you are to be invited, Quinby," she said in her suavest tones;
+"the invitation will reach you to-morrow."
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 14
+
+
+On the night of the Bartlett party, Quin stood before the small mirror
+of his old room over the Martels' kitchen and surveyed himself in
+sections. The first view, obtained by standing on a chair, was the
+least satisfactory; for, in spite of the most correct of wing-toed
+dancing-shoes, there was a space between them and the cuffs of his
+trousers that no amount of adjustment could diminish. The second
+section was far more reassuring. Having amassed what to him seemed a
+fortune, for the purchase of a dress-suit, Quin had allowed himself to
+be persuaded by the voluble and omniscient salesman to put all of his
+money into a resplendent dinner-coat instead. The claim for the coat
+that it was "the classiest garment in the city" was reinforced by the
+fact that it had adorned the dummy in the shop window for seven
+consecutive days and occasioned much comment by its numerous
+"novelties." Quin had no doubts whatever about the coat. Its glory not
+only dimmed his eyes to the shortcomings of the trousers, which he had
+rented for the occasion, but even made him forget the aching tooth that
+had been harassing him all day.
+
+As he went down to present himself for the family inspection, it is
+useless to deny that he was very much impressed with the elegance and
+correctness of his costume. It had been achieved with infinite pains
+and considerable expense. Nothing was lacking, not even a silver
+cigarette-case, bearing an unknown monogram, which he had purchased at
+a pawn-shop the day before.
+
+His advent into the sitting-room produced a gratifying sensation.
+
+"Ha! Who comes here!" cried Mr. Martel. "The glass of fashion and the
+mould of form." Then he came forward for close inspection. "Hadn't you
+any better studs than those, my boy?"
+
+"They are the ones that came in the shirt," said Quin, instantly on the
+defensive.
+
+"Well, they hardly do justice to the occasion. Step upstairs, Cassius,
+and get my pearl ones out of the top chiffonier drawer."
+
+"I wish Captain Phipps could see you," said Rose admiringly. "You should
+have seen his face when I told him you were going to-night! He wasn't
+invited, you know."
+
+"Where did you see him?" Quin asked, brushing a speck of lint from the
+toe of his shining shoe.
+
+"Here. He's been coming twice a week to work with Papa Claude ever since
+you left. Give 'em to me, Cass"--this to her brother. "I'll put them in."
+
+"Aren't they too little for the buttonholes?" asked Quin anxiously.
+
+"Not enough to matter," Rose insisted. Then, as she finished, she added
+in a whisper: "Tell Nell somebody sent his love."
+
+"Nothing doing," laughed Quin with a superior shrug; "somebody else is
+taking his."
+
+The curb was lined with automobiles by the time he arrived at the
+Bartletts'. The house looked strangely unfamiliar with its blaze of
+lights and throng of arriving guests. He instinctively felt in his pocket
+for his latch-key, and then remembered, and waited for the strange butler
+to open the door. The inside of the house looked even less natural than
+the outside. The floors were cleared for dancing and the mantels were
+banked high with flowers and ferns. Under the steps the musicians were
+already tuning their instruments.
+
+"Upstairs, sir; first room to your left," said the important person at
+the door, and Quin followed the stream of black-coated figures who were
+filing up the stairs and turning into the room he had occupied a short
+week ago. It was just as he had left it, except for the picture that no
+longer adorned the mantel.
+
+"Beg pardon, sir," said the lofty attendant who took his overcoat, "your
+stud's come loose."
+
+"I bet the damn thing's going to do that all night," Quin said
+confidentially. "Say, you haven't got a pin, have you?"
+
+"Oh, no, sir, it couldn't be pinned," protested the man in a shocked
+tone.
+
+Quin adjusted it as best he could, took a final look at himself in the
+mirror, and proceeded downstairs. Arrived in the lower hall, he glanced
+about him in some perplexity. Not a member of the family was visible, and
+he looked in vain for a familiar face. In his uncertainty as to his next
+move, he went back to the pantry and got himself a glass of water.
+
+As he was returning to the hall, some one plucked at his sleeve and
+whispered:
+
+"Hello there, Graham!"
+
+Turning around, he encountered the gaping mouth of a shining saxophone,
+behind which beamed the no less shining countenance of Barney McGinness.
+
+Barney had been in the 105th Infantry Band, and he and Quin had returned
+from France on the same transport. They exchanged hearty greetings under
+their breath.
+
+"Serving here to-night, are you?" asked Barney.
+
+"Serving?" repeated Quin; then he laughed good-naturedly. "You got
+another guess coming your way, Barney."
+
+"So it's the parlor instid of the pantry, is it? I'd 'a' seen it for
+meself if I had used me eyes instead of me mouth. You look grand enough
+to be doing a turn on the vawdyville."
+
+Quin tried not to expand his chest in pride, for fear the movement would
+disturb those temperamental studs. He would fain have lingered
+indefinitely in the warmth of Barney's admiring smile, but the signal for
+the first dance was already given, and he moved nervously out into the
+throng again.
+
+Now that the moment had come for him to meet Eleanor--the moment he had
+longed for by day and dreamed of by night,--he found himself overcome
+with terrible diffidence. Suppose she did not want to see him again?
+Suppose she should be angry at him for coming to her party? Suppose she
+should be too taken up with all these strange friends of hers to have
+time to dance with him?
+
+After obstructing social traffic in the hall for several moments, he
+encountered Miss Enid. She was all a lavender flutter, with sleeves
+floating and scarf dangling, and she wore an air of subdued excitement
+that made her almost pretty.
+
+"Why, Quinby!" she said, and her eyes swept him. "Have you spoken to
+mother yet?"
+
+"No; where is she?"
+
+"In the library. And sister will present you to the young ladies in the
+parlor."
+
+She hesitated a moment, then she placed a timid hand on Quin's arm.
+
+"But before you go in would you mind doing something for me? Will you
+watch the front door and let me know as soon as Mr. Chester arrives?"
+
+"Mr. Chester?"
+
+"Yes. You see, it's been a great many years since he came to the house,
+and I want to--to make sure that he is properly welcomed."
+
+"I'll wait for him," said Quin, glad of any excuse for not entering that
+crowded parlor.
+
+Lovely young creatures in rainbow tints drifted down the stairs and
+disappeared beyond the portieres; supercilious young men, all in tail
+coats and most of them wearing white gloves, passed and repassed him.
+
+Quin was experiencing the wholly new sensation of timidity. In vain he
+sought reassuring reflections from the long pier-glass, as he did guard
+duty in the front hall pending Mr. Chester's arrival. He'd be all right,
+he assured himself, as soon as he got to know some of the people. Once he
+had spoken to Eleanor and been sure of her welcome, he didn't care what
+happened. Meanwhile he worked with his shirt-stud and tried not to think
+about his tooth.
+
+It was late when Mr. Chester arrived, and by the time he had been placed
+in Miss Enid's care the receiving line in the parlor had dissolved and
+the dance was in full swing.
+
+Quin made his way back to the library and presented his belated respects
+to Madam, who sat enthroned in state where she could command the field
+and direct the manoeuvers. She was resplendent in black velvet and old
+lace. A glittering comb topped her high white pompadour, and a dog-collar
+of diamonds encircled her wrinkled neck.
+
+"Well, I am glad one man has the manners to come and speak to his
+hostess!" she said grimly, extending her hand to Quin. "The young lords
+of the present day seem to consider a lady's house a public dance-hall.
+Sit down and talk to me."
+
+Quin didn't wish to sit down. He wished very ardently to plunge into that
+dancing throng and find Eleanor. But the old lady's vise-like grip closed
+on him, and he had to content himself with watching the couples circle
+past the door while he listened to a tirade against present-day customs.
+
+"Why, this dancing is indecent!" stormed the old lady. "I never saw
+anything like it in my life! Look at that little Morris chit with her
+cheek plastered up to Johnnie Rawlins'! If somebody doesn't speak to her,
+I will! I will not have such dancing in my house! And there's Kitty
+Carey, the one with no back to her dress. What her mother is thinking
+of--Mercy! Look at the length of that skirt!"
+
+It was not until Mr. and Mrs. Ranny arrived, and Madam had no time for
+any one else, that Quin was able to escape.
+
+"Can you tell me where I can find Miss Eleanor?" he asked eagerly of Miss
+Isobel, whom he encountered in the back hall.
+
+Miss Isobel, looking thoroughly uncomfortable in a high-necked,
+long-sleeved evening dress, sighed anxiously:
+
+"I am looking for her myself. She has had all the windows opened, and
+mother gave express orders that they were to be kept closed. Would you
+mind putting this one down? It makes such a draught."
+
+It was a high window and an obstinate one, and by the time it was down
+Quin's cuffs were six inches beyond his coat sleeves and his vest was
+bulging.
+
+"I don't want that window down," said a spirited voice behind him. "I
+wish you had left it alone."
+
+"Eleanor!" said Miss Isobel reprovingly. "He is doing it at my request.
+It is our young friend Quinby Graham."
+
+Quin wheeled about in dismay, and found himself face to face with a
+slender vision in shimmering blue and silver, a vision with flushed
+cheeks and angry eyes, who looked at him in blank amazement, then burst
+out laughing.
+
+"Why, for mercy sakes! I never would have known you. You look so--so
+different in civilian clothes."
+
+The words were what he had expected, but the intonation was not. It
+seemed to call for some sort of explanation.
+
+"It's my face," he blurted out apologetically, drawing attention to the
+fact that of all others he most wished to ignore. "Had an abscess in my
+tooth; it's swelled my jaw up a bit."
+
+Eleanor was not in the least concerned with his affliction. A civilian
+with the toothache could not expect the consideration of a hero with a
+shrapnel wound. Moreover, this was her first appearance in the role of
+hostess at a large party, and she fluttered about like a distracted
+humming-bird.
+
+Miss Isobel laid a detaining hand on her bare shoulder.
+
+"Did you know they were smoking in the dining-room, Nellie? Even some of
+the _girls_ are smoking. If mother finds it out I don't know _what_ she
+will do!"
+
+"Call out the fire department, probably," said Eleanor flippantly.
+
+"But listen! She will speak to them--you know she will. Don't you think
+you can stop them?"
+
+"Of course I can't!" declared Eleanor, her anger rekindling. "And we
+can't dance with the windows down, either. Oh, dear, I wish we'd never
+_tried_ to give a party!"
+
+"May I have the next dance, Miss Eleanor?" Quin ventured at this
+inopportune moment.
+
+She turned upon him a perturbed face, "It's taken," she said absently.
+"They are all taken until after supper. I'll give you one then." And with
+this casual promise she hurried away.
+
+Quin wandered disconsolately into the hall again. Everybody seemed to
+know everybody else. Apparently he was the one outsider. At the soldier
+dances to which he was accustomed, he was used to boldly asking any girl
+on the floor to dance, sure of a welcoming smile. But here it was
+different. It seemed that a fellow must wait for an introduction which
+nobody took the trouble to give. He leaned against the door-jamb and
+indulged in bitter reflections. Much that bunch cared whether he had
+risked his life for his country or not! The girls had already forgotten
+which were the heroes and which were the slackers. He didn't care! All he
+had come for, anyhow, was to see Eleanor Bartlett. Just wait until he got
+her all to himself in that dance after supper----
+
+Finding the strain of being a spectator instead of a participant no
+longer endurable, he wandered upstairs and bathed his face. The pain was
+getting worse and he had a horrible suspicion that the swelling was
+increasing. In the men's dressing-room he found a game of craps in
+progress, and, upon being asked to join, was so grateful for being
+included in any group that he accepted gladly, and for half an hour
+forgot his woes while he won enough to repay Cass the sum he had advanced
+on the dress-shirt.
+
+"Stud's undone, old chap," said his opponent as he paid his debt.
+
+"Thanks, so it is," said Quin nonchalantly.
+
+As he went downstairs he encountered Miss Enid and Mr. Chester sitting
+under the palms on the landing in intimate tete-a-tete.
+
+"Will you dance this with me, Miss Enid?" asked Quin, leading a forlorn
+hope.
+
+"I am afraid I don't know those new dances," said Miss Enid evasively,
+"the only thing I can do is to waltz."
+
+"You mean a one-step?"
+
+"She means a waltz," Mr. Chester repeated impressively, "the most
+beautiful and dignified dance ever invented. Shall we show him, Miss
+Enid?"
+
+And, to Quin's unbounded amazement, Mr. Chester and Miss Enid proceeded
+to demonstrate, there on the narrow landing, the grace and beauty of the
+"glide waltz"; and so absorbed were they in the undertaking that they did
+not even know when he ceased to be a spectator and Miss Isobel became
+one.
+
+The latter, inexpressibly shocked at the way things were going in the
+ball-room, was on her way upstairs, when she was confronted with the
+amazing spectacle of her sister and the bald-headed Mr. Chester revolving
+solemnly and rhythmically in each other's arms on the shadowy landing.
+
+The only doubt that Miss Isobel had ever harbored concerning an all-wise
+Providence arose from the passage in Scripture that read: "Man and woman
+created He them." In her secret heart she had always felt that some
+other, less material scheme might have been evolved. Softly retracing her
+steps, she slipped back downstairs and took her place beside her
+increasingly indignant mother.
+
+The new wine was proving entirely too much for the old bottles. Madam's
+ultimatums and Miss Isobel's protests had alike proved unavailing. The
+young people invaded the house like a swarm of noisy locusts. Between
+dances they flew out to the porch, some of the couples dashing out to sit
+in automobiles, others driving madly around the block to the incessant
+honking of horns. Then the music would call them back, and in they would
+pour, singing and whistling as they came, shouting jests from room to
+room, playing ball with the decorations, utterly regardless of everything
+save their own restless, reckless, daring selves. Maddest of them all was
+Eleanor, who, conscious of the stern disapproval of the family and
+rebelling against their attempted restraint, led the merry revolt against
+old-time proprieties and took her fling, for once regardless of
+consequences.
+
+Quin, meanwhile, had gone back to the dressing-room and was making
+frantic efforts to reduce the swelling in his face. If he could only keep
+it down until after his dance with Eleanor, it might swell to the
+dimensions of the dome of St. Peter's! A hurried survey from over the
+banisters assured him that supper was soon to be served, and he went back
+to his hot applications with renewed courage.
+
+But ill luck pursued him. No sooner had the guests been seated at small
+round tables and the refreshments served, than some one remembered that a
+big charity ball was in progress at the armory, and it was proposed that
+the evening be concluded there. The suggestion met with instant approval.
+In spite of the indignant protests of the elders, the gay company, headed
+by Eleanor, left the half-eaten ices melting on their plates, and, rising
+in a body, took noisy and immediate flight.
+
+At twelve o'clock the elaborately decorated rooms were empty, the
+musicians were packing their instruments, the caterers were removing
+trays of untasted food, and Quin, standing dazed in the deserted hall,
+one hand clasping his shirt-front and the other on his face, was trying
+in vain to realize that the party which he had inspired had proved his
+Waterloo!
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 15
+
+
+The next day Quin sold his dinner-coat for a fourth of what he paid for
+it, and forswore society forever. There was absolutely nothing in it, he
+assured the Martels, a conviction that assorted strangely with the fact
+that he devoured the columns in the daily papers devoted to the doings of
+the social elect, and waded through endless lists under the caption
+"Among Those Present." Every hour in the day he invented a new scheme for
+seeing Eleanor, which pride alone prevented him from carrying out. He
+wrote her a dozen notes, all of which he tore up; he went out of his way
+to pass through the streets where he might catch a glimpse of her, and
+seized the slightest excuse for errands to the Bartlett house. But the
+days of her holiday slipped away, and he neither saw nor heard from her.
+
+Each morning at breakfast Mr. Martel would say hopefully, "Well, Eleanor
+will surely grace our humble abode to-day," or, "Something tells me my
+lady-bird will come to-day!" And each evening Quin would rush home from
+work buoyed up by the hope that he might find her.
+
+"I bet she'd come to-day if she knew Captain Phipps was going to be
+here," said Myrna one morning, wagging her head wisely.
+
+"What's that got to do with it?" Rose asked sharply.
+
+"They're sweethearts," said Myrna, with the frightful astuteness of
+twelve. "And old Madam Bartlett won't let him come to the house, and Nell
+has to see him on the sly."
+
+"Tut, tut, child! Where did you get that notion?" asked Mr. Martel,
+peeling an orange with his little fingers gracefully extended. "Harold
+Phipps is years older than Nellie. He is interested solely in her
+professional career. He has a lovely, detached soul, as impersonal--What
+is the matter, Rosalind?"
+
+"Nothing--crumb went down wrong. What are _you_ laughing at, Quinby
+Graham?"
+
+"Another crumb," said Quin.
+
+Between him and Rose there had sprung up a curious intimacy. All sorts of
+little wireless messages flashed between them, and Rose always seemed to
+know things without being told. She had discovered long ago that he was
+in love with Eleanor, and, instead of scoffing at him or teasing him, she
+did him the supreme favor of listening to him. Many a night, after the
+rest of the family had gone to bed, they lingered on before the fire in
+the shabby sitting-room, Rose invariably curled up in the sofa corner and
+Quin stretched out on the floor with his head against her knees.
+
+After his somewhat rigorous discipline at the Bartletts' it was like
+slipping out of the harness to be back at the Martels'. They held him up
+to no standard, and offered no counsel of perfection. He could tell his
+best stories without fear of reproof, laugh as loud as he liked, and
+whistle and sing without disturbing anybody. Rose mended his clothes,
+doctored him when he was sick, petted him in public as well as in
+private, and even made free to pawn his uniform when the collector
+threatened to turn off the gas if the bill was not paid.
+
+One evening, coming in unexpectedly, he had surprised her kissing Harold
+Phipps in the front hall. Harold's back had been to the door, and at a
+signal from Rose Quin had beat a hasty retreat. She explained later that
+she was letting the magnificent Harold have just enough rope to hang
+himself; and Quin, glad of anything that deflected Phipps from the
+pursuit of Eleanor, laughed with her over the secret flirtation and
+failed to see the danger lights that hung in her eyes.
+
+Financial affairs were evidently going worse than usual with the Martels
+these days. Cass, adamant in his resolve to pay off the numerous debts
+contracted by the family during his absence abroad, refused to contribute
+more than the barest living expenses. Rose had given up the dancing
+classes and taken a position in one of the big department-stores. Edwin
+B. had had to leave high school and go to work. The adopted baby had been
+regretfully sent to the Orphans' Home. The little brown house was reefing
+all its sails in a vain effort to weather the coming storm.
+
+The one member of the family who soared on wings of hope above the sordid
+facts of the situation was Claude Martel. After years of search, he had
+at last found the generous benefactor, the noble young patron, who
+recognized the merit of his work. They spent hours together elaborating
+the plot of "Phantom Love" and discussing every detail of its
+construction. Occasionally on Saturday night Mr. Martel would mention
+quite confidentially to Quin that, owing to some delayed payments, he was
+a little pressed for ready money and that a small loan would be
+appreciated. This request invariably resulted in an elaborate Sunday
+dinner, capped with a couple of bottles of Haut Sauterne in which Mr.
+Martel took the precaution of drinking everybody's health twice over.
+
+Ten days after the Easter party, when Quin had almost despaired of seeing
+Eleanor at all, he found her car parked in front of the house when he
+returned in the evening. Mounting the front steps two at a time, he
+opened the door with his latch-key, then paused with his hand still on
+the knob. Queer sounds were coming from the sitting-room--sounds of a
+man's agitated voice, broken by sobs. Undeterred by any sense of
+delicacy, Quin pushed open the door and bolted in.
+
+Mr. Martel was sitting in the arm-chair in an attitude _King Lear_ might
+have envied. Every line of his face and figure suggested unmitigated
+tragedy. Even the tender ministrations of Eleanor Bartlett who knelt
+beside him, failed to console him or to stem the tide of his
+lamentations.
+
+"What's the matter?" cried Quin in alarm. "What has happened?"
+
+Papa Claude, resting one expressive hand on Eleanor's head, extended the
+other to Quin.
+
+"Come in, my boy, come in," he said brokenly. "You are one of us: nothing
+shall be kept from you in this hour of great affliction. I am ruined,
+Quinby--utterly, irrevocably ruined!"
+
+"But how? What's happened?"
+
+"It's grandmother!" exclaimed Eleanor, struggling to her feet and
+speaking with dramatic indignation. "She's written him a letter I'll
+never forgive--never! I don't care if the money _is_ due me. I don't
+want it. I won't have it! What is six thousand dollars to me if it turns
+Papa Claude out in the street?"
+
+"But here--hold on a minute!" said Quin. "What's all the racket about?"
+
+"It's about money," Mr. Martel roused himself to explain--"the grossest
+and most material thing in the world. Years ago Eleanor's father and I
+entered into a purely personal arrangement by which he advanced me a few
+thousand dollars in a time of temporary financial depression, and as a
+mere matter of form I put up this house as security. Had the dear lad
+lived, nothing more would ever have been said about it. He was the soul
+of generosity, a prince among men. But, unfortunately, at his death he
+left his mother Eleanor's trustee."
+
+"And she has simply _hounded_ Papa Claude," Eleanor broke in. "She has
+tried to make him pay interest on that old note every single year, when
+she knew I didn't need the money in the least. And now she had notified
+him she will not renew the note on any terms."
+
+"She can't collect what you haven't got, can she?" Quin asked.
+
+"She can sell the roof over our heads," said Papa Claude, with streaming
+eyes lifted to the object referred to. "She can scatter my beloved family
+and drive me back into the treadmill of teaching. And all through this
+blessed, innocent child, who would give all she has in the world to see
+her poor old grandfather happy!"
+
+Again Eleanor, moved to a passion of sympathy, flung her arms around him,
+declaring that if they made him pay the note she would refund every penny
+of it the day she was twenty-one.
+
+But Papa Claude was not to be consoled.
+
+"It will be too late," he said hopelessly. "All I required was one year
+more in which to retrieve my fortunes and achieve my life ambition. And
+now, with success almost within my grasp, the goal within sight, this
+cruel blow, this bolt from the blue----"
+
+"Haven't you got any other property or stocks or insurance that you could
+turn over?" asked Quin, who felt that the occasion demanded numerical
+figures rather than figures of speech.
+
+"Only a small farm out near Anchordale, which belonged to my precious
+wife's father. It is quite as worthless as he was, poor dear! I have
+offered it repeatedly in payment, but they refused to consider it."
+
+"Is there a house on it?" persisted Quin.
+
+"Yes--an uninhabitable old stone structure that has stood there for
+nearly a century. For years I have tried in vain to rent or sell it. I
+have left no stone unturned, Quinby. I know I am regarded as a visionary,
+a dreamer, but I assure you----"
+
+"What about the ground?"
+
+"Very hilly and woody. Absolutely good for nothing but a stock farm.
+Utterly incapable of cultivation. It's no use considering it, my dear
+boy. I have viewed the matter from every conceivable angle. There is no
+reprisal. I am doomed. This beloved house will be sold, my family
+scattered. I an old man, a penniless outcast----"
+
+"No, no, Papa Claude!" protested Eleanor. "You _sha'n't_ be turned out.
+We must borrow the money. It's only a little over a year until I'm of
+age, and then I can pay it all back. Surely we can find somebody to help
+us out!"
+
+"Ah, my darling, your trust is born of inexperience. People do not lend
+money without security. There is absolutely no one to whom I can appeal."
+
+Eleanor, sitting on the arm of his chair, suddenly started up.
+
+"I have it!" she cried. "I know who will help us! Captain Phipps! He
+knows better than any one else what it means to you to have this next
+year free to finish the play. He will be _glad_ to do it; I know he
+will."
+
+Mr. Martel looked slightly embarrassed. "As a matter of fact, he has been
+approached on the subject," he said. "He was most sympathetic and kind,
+but unfortunately his money is all invested at present."
+
+"Fiddlesticks!" cried Eleanor in a tone so suggestive of her paternal
+grandmother that Quin smiled. "What difference does it make if it _is_
+invested? Let him un-invest it. I am sure I could get him to lend it to
+_me_, only I would hate awfully to ask him."
+
+Mr. Martel's roving eyes came back to hers hopefully.
+
+"I wonder if you could?" he said, grasping at the proffered straw.
+"Perhaps if he understood that _your_ career was at stake, that my
+disappointment would mean _your_ disappointment, he would make some
+special effort to assist us. Will you go to him, child? Will you plead
+our cause for us?"
+
+Eleanor hesitated but a moment; then she set her lips firmly. "Yes," she
+said, with a little catch in her voice; "I will. I'll go to him in the
+morning."
+
+Quin, who had been staring out of the window, deep in thought, turned
+abruptly to Mr. Martel.
+
+"When do you have to have the money?" he asked.
+
+"By next Wednesday, the first--no, the second of April. The date is
+burned in my memory."
+
+"You see, there's no time to lose," said Eleanor. "I'd rather die than do
+it, but I'll ask Harold Phipps to-morrow morning."
+
+"No, you won't," said Quin peremptorily; "I am going to get the money
+myself."
+
+"But he wouldn't lend it to _you_. You don't understand!"
+
+"Yes, I do. Will you leave the matter with me until Sunday night, Mr.
+Martel, and let me see what I can do?"
+
+Quin made the suggestion as calmly as if he had unlimited resources at
+his disposal. Had the sum been six million dollars instead of six
+thousand, he would have made the offer just the same. The paramount
+necessity of the moment was to keep Eleanor Bartlett from borrowing money
+from a man like Harold Phipps. Mr. Martel's claims were of secondary
+consideration.
+
+"We might let him try, grandfather," suggested Eleanor. "If he doesn't
+succeed, there would still be time for me to speak to the Captain."
+
+"But, my boy, where would _you_ turn? What influence could you bring to
+bear?"
+
+"Well, you'd have to trust me about that," Quin said. "There are more
+ways than one of raising money, and if you'll leave it to me----"
+
+"I will! I will!" cried Mr. Martel in a burst of confidence. "I shift my
+burden to your strong young shoulders. For three days I have borne the
+agony alone. There were special reasons for Cassius not being told. He is
+one of the noblest of God's creatures, but he lacks sentiment. I confess
+I have too much. These old walls are but brick and mortar to him, but to
+me they are the custodians of the past. Here I had hoped to sit in the
+twilight of my life and softly turn the leaves of happy memories. But
+there! Enough! 'The darkest hour oft precedes the dawn!' I will not
+despair. In your hands and my darling Eleanor's I leave my fate.
+Something tells me that, between you, you will save me! In the mean
+season not a word, not a syllable to any one. And now let us have some
+music and banish these unhappy topics."
+
+It was amazing how a gentleman so crushed by fate at five could be in
+such splendid form by seven. Mr. Martel had insisted upon having a salad
+and ices for dinner in honor of Eleanor's presence, and he mixed the
+French dressing with elaborate care, and enlivened the company with a
+succession of his sprightliest anecdotes.
+
+It was Quinby Graham who was the grave one. He ate his dinner in
+preoccupied silence, arousing himself to sporadic bursts of merriment
+only when he caught Eleanor's troubled eyes watching him. Just how he was
+going to proceed with his colossal undertaking he had not the faintest
+idea. One wild scheme after another presented itself, only to be
+discarded as utterly impractical.
+
+Under cover of leaving the dining-room, Eleanor managed to whisper to
+him:
+
+"Make Cass let you take me home. I've simply got to talk to you."
+
+But neither Cass nor Quin was to have the privilege. Mr. Martel announced
+that he was going to escort her himself. The only crumb of comfort that
+Quin was able to snatch from the wretched evening was when he was helping
+her on with her coat in the hall.
+
+"When can I see you?" he whispered anxiously.
+
+"I don't know," she whispered back; "every hour's taken."
+
+"What about Sunday afternoon?"
+
+"I've promised to motor out to Anchordale with Aunt Flo and Uncle Ranny
+to hunt for wild flowers. Think of it! When all this trouble's brewing."
+
+"Anchordale," repeated Quin absently, holding her coat suspended by the
+collar and one sleeve. "Anchordale! By golly! I've got an idea! Say, I'm
+going along Sunday. You manage it somehow."
+
+"But I can't manage it! You aren't invited; and, besides----"
+
+"I can't help that--I'm going. What time do you start?"
+
+"Three o'clock. But you can't go, I tell you! They won't understand."
+
+"All ready, Nellie?" called a voice on the stairway; and Papa Claude,
+with a smile of perfect serenity on his face, bore lightly and
+consciously down upon them.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 16
+
+
+During the rushing Easter vacation, Eleanor had seen less of Harold
+Phipps than Quin had feared. Considering the subliminal state of
+understanding at which they had arrived in their voluminous letters, it
+was a little awkward to account for the fact that she had found so little
+time to devote exclusively to him. They had met at dances and had had
+interrupted tete-a-tetes in secluded corners, and several stolen
+interviews in the park; but her duties as hostess to two lively guests
+had left little time for the exacting demands of platonic friendship. Now
+that the girls were gone, she had counted on this last Sunday at Uncle
+Ranny's as a time when she could see Harold under proper conditions and
+make amends for any seeming neglect.
+
+But when Sunday came, and she found herself seated at Aunt Flo's small,
+perfectly appointed dinner-table, she found it increasingly difficult to
+keep her mind upon the brilliant and cynical conversation of her most
+admired friend. To be sure, they exchanged glances freighted with
+meaning, and as usual her vanity was touched by the subtle homage of one
+who apparently regarded the rest of humanity with such cold indifference.
+He was the first person, except Papa Claude, who had ever taken her and
+her ambitions seriously, and she was profoundly grateful. But,
+notwithstanding the fact that she felt honored and distinguished by his
+friendship, she sometimes, as now, found it difficult to follow the trend
+of his conversation.
+
+An hour before she had received an agonized note from her grandfather
+saying that nothing had been accomplished, and that, unless she could use
+her influence "in a quarter that should be nameless, all, all would be
+lost!"
+
+Her dark, brooding eyes swept the table with its profusion of silver and
+cut glass, its affectation of candle-light when the world without was a
+blaze of sunshine. She looked at Uncle Ranny, with his nervous, twitching
+lips and restless, dissatisfied eyes; at Aunt Flo, delicate, affected,
+futile; at Harold Phipps, easy, polished, serene. What possible chance
+would there be of rousing people like that to sympathy for poor,
+visionary Papa Claude? For three days the dread of having to fulfil her
+promise had hung over her like a pall. Now that the time was approaching,
+the mere thought of it made her head hot and her hands cold.
+
+"Cheer up, Nell!" her uncle rallied her. "Don't let your misdeeds crush
+you. You'll be in high favor again by the time you get back from
+Baltimore."
+
+"Are you sharing my unpopularity with the family?" asked Harold.
+
+Eleanor confessed that she was. "I've been in disgrace ever since my
+party," she said. "Did Uncle Ranny tell you the way we shocked the
+aunties?"
+
+"I did," said Mr. Ranny; "also the way sister Isobel looked when little
+Kittie Mason shook the shimmy. It's a blessing mother did not see her; I
+veritably believe she would have spanked her."
+
+"A delicious household," pronounced Harold. "What a pity they have
+banished me. I should so love to put them in a play!"
+
+"But I wouldn't let you!" Eleanor cried, so indignantly that the other
+three laughed.
+
+"Neither bond nor free," Harold said, pursing his lips and lifting his
+brows. "A little pagan at home and a puritan abroad. How are we going to
+emancipate her, Ran?"
+
+"You needn't worry," said Mrs. Ranny, lazily lighting her cigarette.
+"Eleanor is a lot more subtle than any one thinks; she'll emancipate
+herself before long."
+
+Eleanor was grateful to Aunt Flo. She was tired of being considered an
+ingenue. She wanted to be treated with the dignity her twenty years
+demanded.
+
+"I have a plan for her," said Harold, with a proprietary air. "Who knows
+but this time next year she will be playing in 'Phantom Love'?"
+
+Eleanor's wandering thoughts came to instant attention.
+
+"Is there a part I could play?" she asked eagerly, leaning across the
+table with her chin on her clasped hands.
+
+Harold watched her with an amused smile. "What would you say if I told
+you I had written a role especially for you? Would you dare to take it?"
+
+Eleanor closed her eyes and drew a breath of rapture.
+
+"_Would_ I? There isn't anything in heaven or earth that could prevent
+me!"
+
+"Mrs. Bartlett," said the trim maid, "there's a young man at the front
+door."
+
+The conversation hung suspended while Mrs. Ranny inquired concerning his
+mission.
+
+"It's the young man that brings messages from the office, ma'am."
+
+"Oh, it must be Quin," said Mr. Ranny, rising and going into the hall.
+"Did you want to see me about something?"
+
+Eleanor held her breath to listen. Was it possible that that absurd boy
+had actually followed her up to the Bartletts' with the intention of
+going with them on their expedition? Hadn't it been enough for him to
+come to her party in that idiotic coat, with his shirt-front bulging and
+his face swollen? Of course she liked him--she liked him immensely; but
+he had no right to impose upon her kindness, to make a pretext of his
+interest in Papa Claude to force himself in where he was not invited. Now
+that he had got into the scrape, he would have to get out of it as best
+he could. She was resolved not to lift a finger to help him.
+
+"Oh! I didn't understand"--Mr. Ranny's voice could be heard from the
+hall, with a cordial emphasis evidently intended to cover a blunder.
+"Come right in the dining-room; we are just having coffee. You know these
+ladies, of course, and this is Captain Phipps, Mr. Graham."
+
+Quin came into the room awkwardly, half extended his hand, then withdrew
+it hastily as Harold, without rising from the table, gave him a curt nod
+and said condescendingly:
+
+"How do you do, Graham?"
+
+Eleanor's quick understanding glance swept from the erect, embarrassed,
+boyish figure in the badly fitting cheap suit and obviously new tan
+shoes, to the perfectly groomed officer lounging with nonchalant grace
+with his crossed arms on the table. A curious idea occurred to her:
+Suppose they should change places, and Harold should stand there in those
+dreadful clothes Quin wore, and receive a snub from an ex-officer--would
+he be able to take it with such simple dignity and give no sign of his
+chagrin except by the slow color that mounted to his neck and brow? She,
+who a moment before had been ready to annihilate the intruder, rose
+impulsively and held out a friendly hand.
+
+"Mr. Graham and I are old friends," she said lightly. "We knew each other
+out at the hospital even before he came to stay at grandmother's."
+
+The next instant she was sorry she had spoken: for the self-control for
+which she had commended him suddenly departed, and his eyelids, which
+should have been discreetly lowered, were lifted instead, and such an
+ardent look of gratitude poured forth that she was filled with confusion.
+
+For half an hour four uncomfortable people sat in the little gilded cage
+of a drawing-room, and everybody wondered why somebody didn't do
+something to relieve the situation. Mr. and Mrs. Ranny made heroic
+efforts to entertain their unwelcome guest; Harold Phipps moved about the
+room with ill-concealed impatience; and Eleanor sat erect, with tightly
+clasped hands, as angry with Harold as she was with Quin.
+
+"Mr. Graham," said Mrs. Ranny at length, when Harold had looked at his
+watch for the fourth time, "I am afraid we shall have to ask you to
+excuse us. You see, this is our wedding anniversary, and we always
+celebrate it by a sentimental pilgrimage in search of wild flowers. I am
+afraid it's about time we were starting."
+
+Eleanor felt Quin's eyes seek hers confidently, but she refused to meet
+them. There was a painful silence; then he spoke up hopefully:
+
+"I know where there are wild flowers to burn: I was at a place yesterday
+where you could hardly walk for them; I counted seven different kinds in
+a space about as big as this room."
+
+"Where?" demanded Mr. and Mrs. Ranny in one breath.
+
+"Out Anchordale way--I don't know the name of the road. It's an
+out-of-the-way sort of place. Never was there myself until yesterday."
+
+"Could you find it again?" Mrs. Ranny asked with an enthusiasm hitherto
+reserved for her poodle.
+
+"Sure," said Quin, shoving his hands in his pockets and leaning back with
+the frankest and best-natured of smiles. "I never saw so many cowslips
+and buttercups and yellow violets, and these here little arums."
+
+"Arums!" repeated Eleanor. "What do you know about wild flowers?"
+
+"I lived with 'em up in the Maine woods," said Quin. "I don't know their
+high-brow names, but I know the kind of places they grow in and where to
+look for 'em."
+
+"Let's take him along!" said Mrs. Ranny. "We won't mind being a bit
+crowded in the motor, will we?"
+
+Involuntarily all eyes turned toward Harold Phipps.
+
+"Not in the least," he said, flicking an ash from the sleeve of his
+uniform with a dexterous little finger, "especially as I am not going to
+be with you all the way. These bucolic joys are hardly in my line. I'll
+get you to drop me at the Country Club."
+
+It was Eleanor's turn to cast a look of tragic appeal and get no
+response. In vain she tried to persuade him to reconsider his decision.
+His only concession was that he would remain at the apartment with her if
+she would give up the expedition, a suggestion that was promptly vetoed
+by Aunt Flo. Eleanor was angry enough to cry as she flung on her wraps in
+the little silk-hung guest-room. Men were so selfish, she savagely told
+herself; if either Quin or Harold had had a particle of consideration for
+her they would not have spoiled her last day at home.
+
+On the way out to the club she sat between them, miserably indifferent to
+the glory of the spring day and refusing to contribute more than an
+occasional monosyllable to the conversation, which needed all the
+encouragement it could get to keep going.
+
+"Shall I see you again before you go?" Harold asked coldly, upon leaving
+the car.
+
+She wanted very much to say no, and to say it in a way that would punish
+him; but, in view of the important matter pending, she was forced to
+swallow her pride and compromise.
+
+"I can see you to-night at the Newsons', unless you prefer spending your
+evening here at the club."
+
+"You know perfectly well what I prefer," he said with a meaning look; and
+then, without glancing at Quin, across whose knees he had clasped
+Eleanor's hand, he bade his host and hostess an apologetic good-by and
+mounted the club-house steps.
+
+"What _made_ you come?" Eleanor demanded fiercely of Quin, under cover of
+the starting motor.
+
+"I had to," Quin whispered back apologetically. "We got to sell 'em the
+farm."
+
+"What farm? Papa Claude's? Whom are you going to sell it to?"
+
+Quin lifted a warning finger and nodded significantly at the back of Mr.
+Ranny's unsuspecting head.
+
+"Uncle Ranny?" Eleanor's lips formed the words incredulously. Then the
+mere suggestion of outwitting her grandmother and saving Papa Claude by
+such a master stroke of diplomacy struck her so humorously that she broke
+into laughter, in which Quin joined.
+
+"You two are very lively all of a sudden," Mrs. Ranny said over her
+shoulder. "What is the joke?"
+
+"Miss Eleanor and I have gone into the real estate business. Do you want
+to buy a farm?"
+
+"We always want to buy a farm. We look at every one we hear is for sale.
+But they all cost too much."
+
+"This one won't. It's a bargain-counter farm. A house and fifteen acres.
+You can get it for six thousand dollars if you'll buy it to-day."
+
+"All right; we'll take it," cried Mr. Ranny gaily. "Lead us to it."
+
+The quest for the farm became so absorbing that the wild flowers were
+forgotten. The oftener they took the wrong road and had to start over,
+the keener they became to reach their destination.
+
+"I believe it was a pipe-dream," said Mr. Ranny; "you never saw the place
+at all."
+
+"Yes, I did! I'm not kidding you. It's a regular peach of a place for
+anybody that's got money to fix it up. Hold on a minute; this looks like
+the side lane. Do you mind walking the rest of the way?"
+
+"Not if we get anywhere," said Mr. Ranny.
+
+Their way led through a tangled thicket, across a log bridge, and up a
+steep hillside abloom from base to summit with early spring flowers. Down
+through the tender green leaves the sunshine poured, searching out many
+nooks and corners at which it would get no chance when the heavier
+foliage intervened.
+
+"This is where the land begins," said Quin. "Did you ever see such bully
+old trees? Any time you wanted to sell off lots, you see, you could do it
+on this side, without touching the farm."
+
+"Where's the house?" asked Mrs. Ranny.
+
+"Right through here," said Quin, holding back the branches, "Now, ain't
+that a nice old place?"
+
+His enthusiasm met with no response.
+
+In the center of what had once been a clearing stood an old stone
+building, half smothered in a wilderness of weeds and sassafras and cane,
+its one big chimney dreaming in the silence that seemed to have
+encompassed it for ages. The shutters hung disconsolate on their hinges,
+the window-panes were broken, the cornice sagged dejectedly.
+
+Eleanor's heart sank. It was worse, far worse, than Papa Claude had
+described it, fit only for the birds and spiders and chipmunks that were
+already in possession. How Quin could ever for a moment have thought of
+selling such a place to the fastidious Bartletts was more than she could
+imagine.
+
+But he was carrying the matter off with a high hand, in spite of the
+dismayed faces of his prospective buyers.
+
+"Of course it needs a shave," he admitted, as he tore down a handful of
+trailing vines that barred the front door. "But you just wait till you
+get inside and see the big stone fireplace and the queer cupboards. Why,
+this house is historic! It's been here since pioneer days. Look out for
+the floor; it's a bit rotten along here."
+
+"I don't think I'll come in," said Mrs. Ranny, holding up her skirts.
+
+"What a funny little staircase!" cried Eleanor. "And what huge rooms! You
+_must_ come in, Aunt Flo, and see the fireplace."
+
+"And look at the walls!" cried Quin. "You don't see walls like those
+these days. But you just wait till you get upstairs. You've got the
+surprise of your life coming to you."
+
+"Outside's good enough for me," Mr. Ranny declared. "I want to take a
+look at that old apple orchard."
+
+"I'll go upstairs with you!" said Eleanor. "Come on, Aunt Flo; let's see
+what it's like."
+
+At the top of the steps they both gave an exclamation of delight. The
+house, hemmed in, in front, by its trees and underbrush, overlooked from
+its rear windows a valley of surpassing loveliness. For miles the eye
+could wander over orchards full of pink-and-white peach blossoms on
+leafless boughs, over farm-lands and woody spaces full of floating clouds
+of white dogwood. Through the paneless windows came the warm spring air,
+full of the odor of tender growing things and the wholesome smell of the
+freshly upturned earth.
+
+"Randolph Bartlett, come up here this instant!" called Mrs. Ranny. "It's
+the loveliest thing you ever saw!"
+
+But Mr. Ranny was eagerly examining the remains of a somewhat extensive
+chicken farm.
+
+"Go down and show him around," Eleanor advised Quin, with a glimmer of
+hope. "Aunt Flo and I will explore the rest of the house."
+
+They not only explored, but in their imagination they remodeled it.
+Eleanor, in spite of her daydreams, was a very practical little person,
+and, with her power of visualizing a scene for others as well as for
+herself, she soon made Mrs. Ranny see the place painted and clean, with
+rag rugs on the floors, quaint old mahogany furniture, tall brass
+candlesticks on the mantel, and gay chintz curtains at the windows.
+
+Mrs. Ranny grew quite animated talking about it, and forgot the
+disturbing fact that she had not had a cigarette since dinner.
+
+"Do you know," she said to Eleanor, as they came back to the window and
+looked down at the two men talking and gesticulating eagerly in the
+garden below, "I believe if Ranny had something like this to work with
+and play with, things would be different."
+
+"Of course they would," Eleanor agreed eagerly--"for him and for you too.
+Why don't you try it, Aunt Flo?"
+
+"Oh, it would cost too much to put it in repair. But then, six thousand
+dollars is very little, isn't it? Ran spent that much for his big car."
+
+"Yes; and he could _sell_ his big car. You'd lots rather have this than
+an extra motor. And we could get him interested in fixing the place up,
+and he could keep dogs and cows and things----"
+
+"But what about his mother?"
+
+"You wouldn't have to tell her. She will be going to Maine in June, and
+you and Uncle Ranny could be all settled by the time she comes home!"
+
+Eleanor had forgotten all about Papa Claude in her eagerness to get Uncle
+Ranny his heart's desire.
+
+"I believe we could do it!" Mrs. Ranny was saying. "The chief expense
+would be putting in a couple of bath-rooms and fixing up the floors. As
+for the furniture, I have all my mother's stuff packed away in the
+warehouse--nice, quaint old things that would suit this place perfectly."
+
+"Oh, Aunt Flo, let's go down this minute and make Uncle Ranny buy it!"
+
+Randolph Bartlett, whose powers of resistance were never strong, was
+already lending a willing ear to Quin's persuasive arguments, when
+Eleanor and Mrs. Ranny descended upon him in a whirlwind of enthusiasm.
+They both talked at once, rushing him from one spot to another, vying
+with each other in pointing out the wonderful possibilities of the place.
+
+"See here, is this a frame-up?" he asked laughingly. "You are not
+actually in earnest, Flo? You don't mean that you would consider the
+place seriously?"
+
+"But I do. I never wanted anything so much in my life!"
+
+Mr. Ranny looked at her in amazement. "And you mean you'd be willing to
+come out here and live four months in the year?"
+
+"I mean, if we could get it fixed up right, I'd live here the year round.
+We are only fifteen minutes from town, and all our friends live out this
+way."
+
+"By George, I've almost a notion to try it!" Mr. Ranny's eyes were
+shining. "Do you believe I could pull it off, Quin? I've made such a
+darned fizzle of things in the past that I'm almost afraid to kick over
+the traces again."
+
+"The trouble is, you've never given a big enough kick to get loose," said
+Quin. "Here's your chance to show 'em what you can do. I believe if you'd
+buy this place, and buckle down to knocking it into shape, you could have
+as pretty a little stock farm as there is in the State."
+
+"That sounds mighty good to me!" said Mr. Ranny with the look of a
+prisoner who is promised a parole. "When do you have to give an answer?"
+
+"My option is up at midnight."
+
+"Good heaven! You don't mean to-night?"
+
+"Yes, sir: not a minute later."
+
+"I am afraid that settles it, as far as I'm concerned."
+
+"No, it doesn't!" insisted Mrs. Ranny. "If you really want it, there is
+no reason you shouldn't have it. The ground alone is worth the price
+asked. Let the others go back to the car while you and I talk the matter
+over. It's the chance we've been looking for for ten years, and I'm not
+going to let it slip."
+
+The next hour was one Eleanor never forgot. She and Quin, confident of
+the success of their conspiracy, were also jubilant over what they
+regarded as Mr. Ranny's possible emancipation. They already saw him a
+reformed character, a prosperous and contented farmer, no longer a menace
+to the peace of the family. So elated were they that, instead of going to
+the road, they explored the woods, and ended by racing down the hill like
+a couple of irresponsible children.
+
+When they at last got back to the car, Eleanor, disheveled and limp, sank
+on the running-board and laughingly made room for Quin beside her. She
+had quite forgotten to be grown up and temperamental, a fact that Quin
+was prompt to take advantage of.
+
+"See here!" he said. "Am I going to get a commission for all this?"
+
+"How much do you want?"
+
+"I want a lot!" he threatened.
+
+He was leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, tracing figures in
+the sand with his shoe. Eleanor noticed the nice way his hair grew on the
+back of his neck and the white skin that met the clear brown skin at the
+collar-line. In spite of his bigness and his strength, he seemed very
+young and defenseless when it came to his dealings with girls.
+
+It was useless to deny that she knew what he wanted. His eyes had been
+saying it persistently each time they had met hers for three months. They
+had whispered it after that first dance at the Hawaiian Garden; they had
+murmured it through the hospital days; they had shouted it this afternoon
+at Uncle Ranny's, so loud that she thought every one must surely hear.
+But when a young lady is engaged in the exciting business of playing with
+fire she doesn't always heed even a shouted warning. As long as she was
+very careful, she told herself, and snuffed out every blaze that
+threatened to become unmanageable, no damage would be done. The present
+moment was one requiring snuffers.
+
+"We can't begin to pay you what we owe you," she said in her most
+conventional tone. "If things go as we hope they will, it will mean
+everything to Uncle Ranny as well as to Papa Claude."
+
+"I didn't do it for them only," Quin blurted out. "I didn't want you to
+borrow money from Captain Phipps."
+
+The temptation to encourage this special spark was not to be resisted.
+
+"You don't love Mr. Phipps very much, do you?" she said.
+
+"No; do you?"
+
+"Well, I _like_ him. He is one of my very best friends."
+
+"Am I?" demanded Quin with terrible directness.
+
+It was Eleanor's turn to trace patterns in the sand.
+
+"Well, you see----" she began.
+
+"No, I don't." Quin rose indignantly. "There's nobody in the world that
+would do any more for you than I would. I may be chasing the kite in
+thinking that you _want_ me to do anything, but if you'll just let me
+under the ribbon, you bet your life I'll give Phipps and the rest of the
+talent a run for their money!"
+
+He stood staring hard down the road for a moment, while she sat in
+embarrassed silence; then he broke forth again:
+
+"I know you don't want me to say these things. I know every time you head
+me off. But if you'll just let me get it off my chest this once, then I
+promise to keep the cork in if it busts the bottle!"
+
+Eleanor laughed in spite of herself.
+
+"All right," she said; "I'll listen."
+
+"Well," said Quin, "it's this way. I know you don't care a tinker's damn
+for me in the way I care for you. But you can't deny that you do like me
+some. You wouldn't talk to me like you do and let me do things for you if
+you didn't. What I want you to promise is that whenever you need a
+friend--a _best_ friend, mind you--you will come straight to me."
+
+He looked worth coming to as he stood there, big and strong and earnest;
+and Eleanor, being young and a woman, promptly forgot her good
+resolutions not to encourage him, and rose impulsively and held out her
+hand.
+
+"I do promise, Quin," she said, "and I thank you with all my heart."
+
+Then a curious and unexpected thing happened to her. As she stood there
+on the lonely country road with her hand in his, a curious, deep, still
+feeling crept over her, a queer sensation of complete satisfaction that
+she never remembered to have felt before. For a long moment she stood
+there, her cheek almost touching that outrageous plaid tie that had so
+recently excited her derision. Then she snatched her hand away. "Look
+out!" she warned. "They are coming."
+
+Two minutes later Mr. and Mrs. Ranny, emerging from the thicket with
+their hands full of wild flowers, found Eleanor seated in the car in a
+bored attitude, while Quin solicitously examined a rear tire.
+
+"It's all settled!" Mr. Ranny cried exultingly. "The farm is ours!"
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 17
+
+
+Although Quin had taken himself and his career seriously before Eleanor's
+home-coming, it was nothing in comparison to the fever of energy that
+possessed him after her departure. He was determined to forge ahead in
+business, get an education, and become versed in the gentler branches of
+social life at the earliest possible moment. His chief trouble was that
+the days contained only twenty-four hours. Even his dreams were a jumble
+of plows and personal pronouns, of mathematical problems and social
+proprieties.
+
+At the factory he flung himself into the affairs of the firm with a zeal
+that at times bordered on officiousness. But Mr. Bangs was beginning to
+find him useful, and, while he continued to snub him and correct him, he
+also came to depend upon him, especially in an emergency. Quin, on his
+part, was for the first time turning a critical eye on his own
+achievements in relation to those of bigger and abler men, and the result
+was chastening.
+
+As for his mad thirst for knowledge, even the university classes,
+difficult as they were proving, failed to satisfy him. He purchased an
+expensive "system" in fifteen volumes, by means of which, the prospectus
+assured him, he could easily achieve a college education in eight months.
+He wore the covers off the first two booklets, then became disgusted, and
+devoted himself instead to a small handbook entitled "Words We
+Mispronounce."
+
+The branch of his education in which he was making least effort and most
+progress was in the customs and manners of polite society. He did not
+shine as yet, but he had ceased to offend, and that was a long step
+forward. Once initiated into the refinements of life, he took to them
+naturally. Miss Isobel and Miss Enid Bartlett had given him the cue, and
+Mr. Chester was keeping him up to his standard.
+
+Between him and the latter had sprung up a queer friendship verging on
+intimacy. Ever since the night of the symphony concert he had served as a
+connecting link between the long-severed lovers, and out of gratitude he
+had been adopted as a protege. It was Mr. Chester who assumed
+responsibility not only for his musical and literary tastes but for his
+neckties and hosiery as well. Mr. Chester, in fact, being too negative
+and conservative, acted as a much-needed soft pedal on Quin's noisy
+aggressiveness. "Not so loud, Quinby," or, "A little more gently, my
+boy," he would often say. And Quin would acquiesce good-naturedly and
+even gratefully. "That's right, call me down," he would say; "I guess
+I'll learn before I die."
+
+In all that he did and said and thought, one object was paramount. He
+never lost sight of the fact that he was making himself over for Eleanor,
+and the prize at stake was so colossal that no obstacles deterred him. To
+be sure, this was not by any means his first amatory venture. As Rose
+Martel had said, he "had a way with him"--a way that had kept him
+involved in affairs of the heart since the early days in Nanking when he
+had succumbed to the charms of a slant-eyed little Celestial at the
+tender age of seven. He had always had a girl, just as he had always had
+a job; but both had varied with time and place. With a vocabulary of a
+dozen words and the sign language, he had managed to flirt across France
+and back again. He had frivoled with half a dozen trained nurses in as
+many different hospitals, and had even had a sentimental round with a
+pretty young stewardess on the transport coming home.
+
+But this affair had been quite different. Instead of wading about in the
+shallows of love, he had tumbled in head first, and found himself beyond
+his depth and out of sight of land. It was a case of sink or swim, and
+Quin was determined not to sink if he could help himself.
+
+The fact that Eleanor Bartlett was not of his world, that she apparently
+never gave him a second thought, that he had less than nothing on which
+to build his hopes, only made him take a deeper breath and a longer
+stroke.
+
+The first gleam of encouragement he had received was that Sunday in the
+country, when for the fraction of a second she had let him hold her hand.
+Since then he had written her five letters and received but one brief
+note in reply. Her silence, however, did not depress him. She had told
+him she hated to write letters, a sentiment he fully shared. Only in this
+case he could not help himself. The moment anything of interest happened,
+he was seized with an uncontrollable impulse to tell Eleanor. He would
+rush home from the university at night, go up to his room, and, using the
+corner of his bureau for a desk, cover pages of lined tablet paper with a
+detailed account of the day's adventures. When every doubtful word has to
+be looked up in the dictionary, and newly acquired knowledge concerning
+participles and personal pronouns duly applied, letter-writing is a
+serious business. Sometimes a page was copied three times before it met
+with the critical approval of the composer.
+
+Since the passing of the acute financial crisis in the Mattel family,
+Papa Claude had revived amazingly, and was once more wearing a rose in
+his buttonhole and courting the Muse. He and Harold Phipps spent several
+afternoons a week working on their play, which they hoped to get fully
+blocked out before the latter left the service and returned to his home
+in Chicago.
+
+But, even though the sale of the farm had relieved the financial strain,
+some other trouble was brewing in the family, the cause of which Quin
+could not make out. The usually sunny atmosphere was disturbed by
+frequent electric storms between Cass and Rose, marked by stern
+disapproval on his part and fiery rebellion on hers. "Rose is going to
+get herself into trouble!" Cass predicted darkly to Quin; while Rose, on
+her part, declared that Cass should shave his head and enter a monastery.
+
+"What are you two ragging about, anyhow?" Quin asked one morning at
+breakfast, when things were worse than usual.
+
+"Rose knows what I'm talking about," said Cass significantly. "Somebody's
+going to get his face pushed in if things keep on like they are going."
+
+Absorption in his own affairs alone prevented Quin from taking an
+immediate hand in this new family complication. It was not until late in
+May that he hit upon the truth, quite by accident.
+
+Coming home rather later than usual one night, he stumbled over Cass
+sitting hunched up on the dark stairway, looking in his striped pajamas
+like an escaped convict.
+
+"What in the devil are you up to?" Quin demanded, rubbing a bruised shin.
+
+"I am waiting for Rose," said Cass grimly. "Some fellow comes by here
+every few nights and takes her out in a machine."
+
+"Who is he?"
+
+"I don't know--that's what I'm going to find out."
+
+"You crazy wop!" said Quin. "What's got into you lately? Can't you trust
+Rose to take care of herself?"
+
+"Yes; but I don't trust any fellow that'll go with a girl and be ashamed
+to be seen with her."
+
+"How do you know he's ashamed to be seen with her?"
+
+"Because he comes sneaking in here after we've all gone to bed. He don't
+ring the door-bell; he honks once or twice; and then I hear Rose slipping
+past my door."
+
+"I didn't know any of Rose's beaux had a machine."
+
+"They haven't. This is some rich guy that thinks any girl that works for
+her living is an easy mark. I'll show him a thing or two! I'll break his
+damned---- Listen! There's an automobile stopping now."
+
+He started excitedly down the steps, but Quin grasped his arms.
+
+"Come back here, Cass! You can't go cavorting out there in your pajamas,
+making a mess of things. You leave it to me. I'll go out the side way and
+amble around to the front door the same time they do. They'll think I'm
+just getting home, and I can size him up for you."
+
+The next moment he was out of the house, over the low hedge, and casually
+sauntering toward the corner. The night was very dark, lightened only by
+the swinging street lamp and the two staring eyes of an automobile that
+had stopped a little distance from the house. Quin saw Rose dart out of
+the shadows and run toward the house. Some one called her name softly and
+peremptorily, but she did not stop. A man was following her out of the
+shadows. But Quin did not wait for him to arrive; he promptly stepped
+around the corner and met Rose at the front gate.
+
+"What's up?" he demanded, seeing her quivering lips and angry, excited
+eyes.
+
+"Tell him to go away!" she whispered, trying to get the gate open. "Tell
+him I never want him to speak to me again. He _can't_ apologize--there
+isn't anything he can say. Just make him go away, that's all."
+
+"Miss Martel is making a mountain out of a molehill," said a suave voice
+behind them, and, turning, Quin saw the somewhat perturbed face of Harold
+Phipps, "If she would listen to me for two minutes----"
+
+"But I won't--not for one minute! You sha'n't speak to me----"
+
+"Just one word alone with you----"
+
+"See here," said Quin, stepping between them and looking Harold Phipps
+squarely in the eyes. "You heard what she said, didn't you?"
+
+"Yes; but I insist upon her listening to me. She entirely misunderstood
+something I said."
+
+"I did not!" Rose broke in furiously. "You know perfectly well I didn't.
+I won't listen to anything you have to say on that or any other subject."
+
+"I sha'n't let you go until you do," he replied in his most authoritative
+tone.
+
+"Oh, yes, you will," said Quin quietly. "I don't know what the row's
+about, but she doesn't have to talk to you if she doesn't want to."
+
+For a moment the two men stood silently measuring each other; then the
+one in uniform gave a slight shrug and permitted himself a faint superior
+smile.
+
+"I see," he said. "The young lady's conduct did not lead me to suppose
+she was engaged. I congratulate you!" And, turning on his heel, he went
+back to his car.
+
+Rose turned quickly and seized Quin's arm.
+
+"Don't tell anybody about this, please," she implored. "I've had my
+lesson--the beast!"
+
+"What did he do?" demanded Quin, longing for an excuse to annihilate
+Phipps.
+
+"It wasn't so much what he did--it was what he said. But you've got to
+promise not to give me away, Quin. You mustn't let on that I was out
+to-night."
+
+"But Cass is on to it. He's waiting there in the hall now."
+
+She caught her breath sharply.
+
+"Does he know who I was with?"
+
+"Not yet."
+
+"Then he mustn't. It would spoil everything for Papa Claude and the play;
+and, besides, Cass is so excitable. I _haven't_ done anything wrong,
+Quin! I was just out for a little fun, and that contemptible puppy
+thought----"
+
+"I wish to God I'd cracked his bean!" said Quin fervently.
+
+"Promise me that you won't tell!"
+
+"I won't tell, but I intend to have it out with him."
+
+"No, no!" she whispered hysterically. "I tell you, nothing more must be
+said about it. It was partly my fault; only, I didn't know he was that
+kind of a man. You know yourself I never really liked him. Only it was
+fun to go out in his car, and I get so sick of not having any clothes or
+money and having to stay in that deadly old store day in and day out!"
+
+She buried her face in her hands and sobbed violently for a moment; then
+she caught hold of Quin's sleeve.
+
+"You won't speak to him," she implored, "and you won't tell Cass?"
+
+"I won't do anything you don't want me to," promised Quin, proffering his
+handkerchief with his sympathy, "It's your shooting-match, and Cass has
+got to keep his hands off."
+
+Cass at this moment cautiously opened the front door, and stood in his
+bare feet, viewing them with anxious suspicion.
+
+"It's all right, old cove," said Quin, slipping Rose into the house and
+pulling the door to after her. "No harm's done, and she won't do it
+again."
+
+"How do you know?"
+
+"Because she and the fellow had a blow-out. She says she is through with
+him for good and all."
+
+"Did you see him?"
+
+"Yes; he's a average-sized fellow with a smooth face and brown hair."
+
+"Would you know him if you saw him again?"
+
+"Sure. I'll keep an eye out for him. But you've got to leave it to me. I
+can handle the situation all right now, if you just won't butt in."
+
+"If you can get Rose to promise not to see him again, she'll stick to it;
+I can say that for her."
+
+"She won't see him. They've quarreled, I tell you. I heard her balling
+him out good before he left. The whole thing is settled, and all you got
+to do is to button up your lip and go to bed."
+
+A week later Papa Claude announced that Harold Phipps was at last
+released from his onerous duties in the army and had returned to his home
+in Chicago, where he would in future devote himself to the writing and
+producing of great American plays.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 18
+
+
+In everybody's life there are hours or days or even weeks that refuse to
+march on with the solemn procession of time, but lag behind and hide in
+some byway of memory, there to remain for ever and ever. It was such a
+week that tumbled unexpectedly out of Quin's calendar about the first of
+June, and lived itself in terms of sunshine and roses, of moonshine and
+melody, seven halcyon days between the time that Eleanor returned from
+school and the Bartletts went away for the summer. For the first time
+since he met her, she seemed to have nothing more demanding to do than to
+emulate "the innocent moon, who nothing does but shine, and yet moves all
+the slumbering surges of the world."
+
+There was no doubt about Quin's "slumbering surges" being moved. Within
+twenty-four hours of her return to town he became totally and hopelessly
+demoralized. Education and business were, after all, but means to an end,
+and when he saw what he conceived to be a short cut to heaven, he rashly
+discarded wings and leaped toward his heart's desire.
+
+The hour before closing at the factory became a time of acute torture. He
+who usually stayed till the last minute, engrossed in winding up the
+affairs of the day, now seemed perfectly willing to trust their
+completion to any one who would undertake it. The instant the whistle
+blew he was off like a shot, out of the factory yard, clinging to the
+platform of a crowded trolley, catching an interurban car, plunging
+through a thicket, down an old lane, and emerging into Paradise.
+
+The Rannys were having the adventure of their lives with the secret farm,
+an adventure shared with equal enthusiasm by their co-conspirators.
+"Valley Mead" was proving the most marvelous of forbidden playthings, and
+was doing for Randolph Bartlett what doctors and sanitariums and tears
+and threats had failed to do. The old place had been overhauled, the
+house made habitable, and now that furnishing was in progress, each day
+brought new and fascinating developments.
+
+Eleanor had arrived from school just in time to fling herself heart and
+soul into the enterprise. By a happy chance she had been allowed to spend
+the week with the Randolph Bartletts, only reporting to her grandmother
+from time to time for consultations regarding summer clothes. Her strange
+indifference to this usually all-important question, together with her
+insistent plea to remain in Kentucky all summer, might have aroused the
+old lady's suspicion had she not long ago decided that the explanation of
+all Eleanor's motives was perversity.
+
+Every morning Eleanor and Mrs. Ranny went out to the farm, and worked
+with enthusiasm. Each piece of furniture that was taken out of the crate
+was hailed with delight and dragged from one place to another to try its
+effect. The hanging of curtains was suspended while they rushed out to
+see the newly arrived rabbits with their meek eyes and tremulous pink
+mouths, or dashed out to the poultry-yard to have another look at the
+downy little fluffs of yellow that were pretending to be chickens.
+
+But the real excitement of the day was when the workmen had departed, and
+Mr. Ranny came out with his machine laden with priceless treasures from
+the ten-cent store, or later when Quin Graham dashed up the lane with
+anything from a garden-spade to a bird-house in his hands, and with an
+enthusiasm and energy in his soul that communicated themselves to all
+concerned. Then everybody would talk at once, and everybody insist upon
+showing everybody else what had been done since morning, and there was
+more hanging of pictures and changing of furniture, and so much chatter
+and laughter that it was a wonder anything was accomplished.
+
+Mr. and Mrs. Ranny had agreed that they would make Valley Mead livable at
+the least possible expense, looking forward to a future day to make the
+improvements that would require much outlay of money. The pride and
+satisfaction they took in their petty economies were such as only the
+inexperienced wealthy can feel.
+
+As for Quin, he moved through the enchanted days, blind, deaf, and dumb
+to everything but Eleanor. She was the dazzling sun in whose effulgent
+rays the rest of humanity floated like midges. So wholly blinded was he
+by her radiant presence that he did not realize the darkness into which
+he was about to be plunged until her departure was imminent.
+
+The evening before she left found them perched upon the orchard stile, in
+that stage of intimacy that permitted him to sit at her feet and toy
+pensively with the tassel on her girdle while his eyes said the
+unutterable things that his lips were forbidden to utter.
+
+The sky was flooded with luminous color, neither blue nor pink, but
+something deliciously between, and down below them fields of wheat
+rippled under the magic light.
+
+"We ought to go in," said Eleanor for the third time. "We've been out
+here an outrageously long time."
+
+"They won't miss us," pleaded Quin; "besides, it's our last night."
+
+"Don't talk about it!" said Eleanor. "It makes me so cross to have to
+leave it all at the most exciting time! When I get back everything will
+be finished and the fun all over."
+
+"When _are_ you coming back?"
+
+"Not until September. We have to come home then. Something's going to
+happen."
+
+Quin stopped twisting the tassel and looked at her quickly.
+
+"What?" he demanded.
+
+"Can you keep a secret?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"It's a wedding, Quin."
+
+If the earth had suddenly quaked beneath him he could not have
+experienced a more horrible sense of devastation. He put out a hand as if
+to steady himself.
+
+"You don't mean----" he began, and could get no further.
+
+"Yes, I do. It's to be a home wedding, very quiet, with only the family,
+and afterward they are going out to the coast."
+
+"Who are?" he asked dully.
+
+"Aunt Enid and Mr. Chester. After waiting for twenty years. Isn't it too
+funny for words?"
+
+Quin thought it was. He threw himself back and shouted. He had never
+enjoyed a joke so much in his life. It seemed replete with humor,
+especially when he shared with Eleanor the part he had played in bringing
+them together and described the waltz on the landing the night of the
+Easter party. With the arrogance of youth they laughed hilariously at the
+late blooming romance.
+
+"What about Queen Vic?" asked Quin. "How did they ever get her consent?"
+
+"They didn't ask for it. After letting her keep them apart all these
+years, they just announced that they were going to be married in
+September. I expect she raised the roof; but when she saw it was all
+settled and she couldn't unsettle it, she came around and told Aunt Enid
+she could be married at home."
+
+"Good work!" said Quin, who was genuinely fond of both Miss Enid and Mr.
+Chester. "How is Miss Isobel taking it?"
+
+"Better than you would think. I don't know what has come over Aunt
+Isobel, she's so much nicer than she used to be. The boys out at the
+hospital have made her over."
+
+"Miss Isobel's a pippin," said Quin, in a tone that implied a compliment.
+"You ought to have seen how she looked after me when I was sick. Has
+Madam found out about her going out to camp?"
+
+"Yes; but she hasn't stopped her. Something you said once about everybody
+having a right to do his duty as he saw it made Aunt Isobel take a firm
+stand and stick it out. You have certainly jolted the family out of its
+ruts, Quin. Look at Uncle Ranny; would you ever take him for the same
+person he was six months ago?"
+
+Quin removed his enamored gaze from her face long enough to glance toward
+the house, where the usually elegant useless Randolph was perched in the
+crotch of an old ash tree, sawing off a dead limb, and singing as he
+sawed.
+
+"Well, when it comes to him, I guess I _have_ had a finger in the pie,"
+said Quin with pardonable pride. "He hasn't slipped the trolley for two
+months; and if he can stay on the track now, it will be a cinch for him
+after the first of July. All he needed was a real interest in life, and a
+chance to work things out for himself."
+
+"It's what we all need," Eleanor said gloomily. "I wish I could do what I
+liked."
+
+"What would you do?"
+
+"I'd go straight to New York and study for the stage. It isn't a
+whim--it's what I've wanted most to do ever since I was a little girl. I
+may not have any great talent, but Papa Claude thinks I have. So does
+Captain Phipps. To have to wait a whole year until I'm of age is too
+stupid for words. It's just some more of grandmother's tyranny, and I'm
+not going to submit much longer; would you?"
+
+Quin contemplated his clasped fists earnestly. For the first time, his
+belief in the consent of the governed admitted of exceptions.
+
+"I'd go a bit slow," he said, feeling his own way cautiously. "This stage
+business is a doubtful proposition. I don't see where the fun comes in,
+pretending to be somebody else all the time."
+
+"You would if you didn't like being yourself. Besides, I don't live my
+own life as it is."
+
+"You will some day--when you get married."
+
+"But that's just it! I don't intend to marry--I am going to devote my
+whole life to my work."
+
+Quin, having but recently recovered from the fear that she was
+contemplating matrimony, now underwent a similar torture at her avowal
+that she was not. The second possibility was only a shade less appalling
+than the first.
+
+"The trouble is," she went on very confidentially, "I am not interested
+in anything in the world but my art."
+
+"Oh, come now, Miss Eleanor!" Quin rallied her. "You know you were
+interested in the work out at the camp."
+
+"That's true. I except that."
+
+"And you can't say you haven't been interested in our selling this farm,
+and getting Mr. and Mrs. Ranny fixed up, and all that."
+
+"Of course I've been interested in that; it's been no end of fun."
+
+"And then," Quin pursued his point quite brazenly, "there's me. I hope
+you are a little bit interested in me?"
+
+She tried to take it lightly. "Interested in you? Why, of course I am. We
+all are. Uncle Ranny was saying only this morning----"
+
+"I don't care a hang what he said. It's _you_ I'm talking about. Do you
+like me any better than you did in the spring?"
+
+"You silly boy, I've always liked you."
+
+"But I told you I wanted a lot. Have I made any headway?"
+
+"Headway? I should say you have. I never saw such improvement! If the
+university classes have done this much for you in four months, what will
+you be by the end of the year?"
+
+"That's right," said Quin bitterly. "Open the switch and sidetrack me!
+But just tell me one thing: is there anybody you _are_ interested in?"
+
+"Now, see here, Quin," said Eleanor peremptorily, "you haven't any right
+to ask me questions like that. All I promised was that you could be my
+chum."
+
+"Yes; but I meant a chum plus."
+
+"Well, you'd better look out or you will be a chum minus." Then she
+caught sight of his eyes, and leaned forward in sudden contrition. "I'm
+sorry to hurt you, Quin, but you must understand----"
+
+"I do," he admitted miserably. "Only this week out here together, and the
+way you've looked at me sometimes, made me kind of hope----" His voice
+broke. "It's all right. I'll wait some more."
+
+This was the time Eleanor should have carried out her intention of going
+back to the house. Instead, she sat on in the deepening twilight under
+the feminine delusion that she was being good to the miserable youth who
+sat huddled close to her knees on the step below her.
+
+Through his whole big being Quin was quivering with the sense of her
+nearness, afraid to move for fear something stronger than his will would
+make him seize her slender little body and crush it to him in an agony of
+tenderness and yearning.
+
+"How beautiful it is out here now!" she said softly. "Don't you love the
+feel of wings everywhere? Little flying things going home? Everything
+seems to be whispering!"
+
+Quin did not answer. He sat silent and immovable until the light in the
+valley had quite faded, and the twitter of the birds had been superseded
+by the monotonous, mournful plaint of a whip-poor-will in a distant tree.
+Then he stirred and looked up at Eleanor with a rueful smile.
+
+"I know what's the matter with that damned old bird," he said. "He's in
+love!"
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 19
+
+
+Notwithstanding the fact that the sale of the Martels' house was averted
+and Rose's affair with Harold Phipps successfully terminated,
+catastrophe, which was evidently due the family, arrived before the
+summer had fairly begun. The irrepressible Claude had no sooner weighed
+the anchor of responsibility than he set sail for New York to embark once
+more on dramatic waters. He had secured a small part in a summer stock
+company which would leave him ample time to work on "Phantom Love," which
+he confidently counted upon to retrieve his fortunes. The withdrawal of
+even his slender contribution to the household expenses made a
+difference, especially as Edwin came down with the measles early in July.
+Before the boy had got the green shade off his afflicted eyes, Cass was
+laid low with typhoid fever.
+
+No other event in the family could have wrought such disastrous results.
+Rose was compelled to give up her position to nurse him, and while the
+income ceased the expenses piled up enormously.
+
+Nothing was more natural than that Quinby Graham should fling himself
+into the breach. His intimacy with Cass had begun on the transport going
+to France, and continued with unabated zeal until he was wounded in the
+summer of 1918. For six months he had lost sight of him, only to find him
+again in the hospital at Camp Zachary Taylor. He was not one to share the
+privileges of Cass's home without also sharing its hardships.
+
+"It's a shame we've got to take help from you," said Rose; "just when you
+are beginning to get ahead, too!"
+
+"You cut that out," said Quin. "I'd like to know if you didn't take me in
+and treat me like one of the family? Ain't Cass the best friend a man
+ever had? And wouldn't he do as much and more for me?"
+
+But even Quin's salary failed to meet the emergency. Doctor's bills, drug
+bills, grocery bills, became more and more formidable. One day Rose was
+reduced to selling two of Papa Claude's autographed photographs.
+
+"I wouldn't do that--yet," said Quin, who had begun to walk to the
+factory to save carfare. "Those old boys and girls are his friends; we
+can't sell them. I can see him now talking to 'em through his pipe smoke.
+I ought to have some junk we can soak. Let's go see."
+
+The investigation resulted in the conversion of a pair of new wing-toed
+dancing-shoes and a silver cigarette-case into an ice-bag and an electric
+fan.
+
+"I could stand everything else," said Rose, "if we could just get the
+children out of the house. Edwin is still as weak as a kitten, and Myrna
+looks as if she might come down with the fever any day."
+
+Quin had a brilliant idea. "Why not ship 'em both to the country? Ed
+could come to town to work every day, and Myrna could help somebody
+around the house."
+
+"That sounds mighty fine; but who is going to take two children to board
+for nothing?"
+
+"I don't know yet," said Quin; "that's what I've got to find out."
+
+That night he went out to Valley Mead and put the matter squarely up to
+Mr. and Mrs. Ranny.
+
+"We're up against it at our house," he said; "I want to borrow something
+from you two good people."
+
+"You can have anything we've got!" said Mr. Ranny rashly.
+
+"Well, I want to borrow some fresh air for a couple of sick kids. I want
+you to ask 'em out here for a week."
+
+Mr. and Mrs. Ranny looked aghast at the preposterous suggestion, but Quin
+gave them no time to demur. He plunged into explanation, and clinched his
+argument by saying:
+
+"Ed would only be here at night, and Myrna could help around the house.
+They are bully youngsters. No end of fun, and they wouldn't give you a
+bit of trouble."
+
+"But I have only one maid!" protested Mrs. Ranny.
+
+"What of that?" said Quin. "Myrna's used to working at home; she'd be
+glad to help you."
+
+"If it was anybody on earth but the Martels," Mr. Ranny objected, with
+contracted brow. "The families have been at daggers' points for years.
+Why, the very name of Martel makes mother see red."
+
+"Well, the children aren't responsible for that!" Quin broke in
+impatiently; then he pulled himself up. "However, if you don't want to do
+'em a good turn, that settles it."
+
+"But it doesn't settle it," said Mr. Ranny. "What are you going to do
+with them?"
+
+"Hanged if I know," said Quin; "but you bet I'll do something."
+
+The conversation then wandered off to Eleanor, and Quin listened with
+vague misgivings to accounts of her good times--yachting parties, tennis
+tournaments, rock teas, shore dinners--all of which suggested to him an
+appallingly unfamiliar world.
+
+"I tell you who was up there for a week," said Mr. Ranny. "Harold Phipps.
+You remember meeting him at our apartment last spring?"
+
+"What's he doing there?" Quin demanded with such vehemence that they both
+laughed.
+
+"Probably making life miserable for Mother Bartlett," said Mrs. Ranny. "I
+can't imagine how she ever consented to have him come, or how he ever had
+the nerve to go, after the way they've treated him."
+
+"Harold's not concerned with the feelings of the family," said Mr. Ranny;
+"he is after Nell."
+
+But Mrs. Ranny scorned the idea. "He looks upon her as a perfect child,"
+she insisted; "besides, he's too lazy and conceited to be in love with
+anybody but himself."
+
+"That may be, but Nell's got him going all right."
+
+Then the conversation veered back to the Martels, with the result that an
+hour later Quin was on his way home bearing a gracefully worded note from
+Mrs. Ranny inviting the children to spend the following week at Valley
+Mead. But, in spite of the success of his mission, he sat with a box of
+fresh eggs in his lap and a huge bunch of flowers in his hand, his hat
+rammed over his eyes, staring gloomily out of the car window into the
+starless night.
+
+Since Eleanor's departure he had had no word from her, and the news that
+filtered through Valley Mead was more disconcerting than the silence. The
+thought of her dancing, sailing, and motoring with Harold Phipps filled
+him with a frenzy of jealousy. He grew bitter at the thought of her
+flitting heedlessly from one luxurious pleasure to another, while Cass
+lay in that stifling city, fighting for his life and lacking even the
+necessities for his comfort.
+
+Every week since her departure he had written her, even though the
+letters grew shorter and blunter as his duties increased. Up until now,
+however, he, like every one else, had tried to shield Eleanor from
+anything ugly and sordid. He had tried to make light of the situation and
+reassure her as to results; but he was determined to do it no longer. It
+wasn't right, he told himself angrily, for anybody to go through life
+blinded to all the misery and suffering and poverty in the world. He was
+going to write her to-night and tell her the whole story and spare her
+nothing.
+
+But he did not write. When he reached home Cass had had a turn for the
+worse, and there were ice-baths to prepare and other duties to perform
+that left him no time for himself.
+
+The next day Edwin and Myrna were sent out to the Randolph Bartletts',
+and Rose and Quin cleared the decks for the hard fight ahead. Fan Loomis
+came in to help nurse in the day-time, and Quin was on duty through the
+long, suffocating August nights.
+
+At the end of the week Cass's condition was so serious that the Bartletts
+insisted on keeping the children at the farm. Myrna had proved a cheery,
+helpful little companion, and Edwin, while more difficult to handle, was
+picking up flesh and color, and was learning to run the car.
+
+Cass's fever dragged on, going down one day only to rise higher the next.
+Seven weeks, eight weeks, nine weeks passed, and still no improvement.
+
+Quin, trying to keep up his work at the factory on two or three hours'
+sleep out of the twenty-four, grew thin and haggard, and coughed more
+than at any time since he had left the hospital. During the long night
+vigils he made sporadic efforts to keep up his university work, but he
+made little headway.
+
+"Go on to bed, Quin," Rose whispered one night, when she found him asleep
+with his head against the bed-post. "You'll be giving out next, and God
+knows what I'll do then."
+
+"Not me!" he declared, suppressing a yawn. "You're the one that's done
+in. Why don't you stay down?"
+
+"I can't," she murmured, kneeling anxiously beside the unconscious
+patient. "He looks worse to me to-night. Do you believe we can pull him
+through?"
+
+She had on a faded pink kimono over her thin night-gown, and her heavy
+hair was plaited down her back. There were no chestnut puffs over her
+ears or pink spots on her cheeks, and her lips looked strange without
+their penciled cupid's bow. But to Quin there was something in her drawn
+white face and anxious, tender eyes that was more appealing. In their
+long siege together he had found a staunch dependence and a power of
+sacrifice in the girl that touched him deeply.
+
+"I don't know, Rose," he admitted, reaching over and smoothing her hair;
+"but we'll do our darnedest."
+
+At the touch of his hand she reached up and impulsively drew it down to
+her cheek, holding it there with her trembling lips against its hard
+palm.
+
+The night was intensely hot and still. That afternoon they had moved Cass
+into Rose's room in the hope of getting more air from the western
+exposure; but only the hot smell of the asphalt and the stifling odor of
+car smoke came through the curtainless window. The gas-jet, turned very
+low, threw distorted shadows on the bureau with its medley of toilet
+articles and medicine bottles. Through the open door of the closet could
+be seen Rose's personal belongings; under the table were a pair of
+high-heeled slippers; and two white stockings made white streaks across
+the window-sill.
+
+Quin sat by Cass's bedside, with his hand clasped to Rose's cheek, and
+fought a battle that had been raging within him for days. Without being
+in the least in love with Rose, he wanted desperately to take her in his
+arms and comfort her. They were both so tired, so miserable, so
+desperately afraid of that shadowy presence that hovered over Cass. They
+were practically alone in the house, accountable to no one, and drawn
+together by an overwhelming anxiety. In Rose's state of emotional tension
+she was responsive to his every look and gesture. He had but to hold out
+his arms and she would sink into them.
+
+Again and again his eyes traveled from her bright tumbled head to Cass's
+flushed face, with its absurd round nose and eyes that could no longer
+keep watch over a pleasure-loving sister. What would happen if Cass
+should die? Who would take care of her and the children, helpless and
+penniless, with only Papa Claude and his visions to stand between them
+and the world? A great wave of sympathy rushed over him for the girl
+kneeling there with her face buried in the bed-clothes. She had asked so
+little of life--just a few good times to offset the drudgery, just an
+outlet for the ocean of love that was dammed up in her small body. Love
+was the only thing she cared about; it was the only thing that mattered
+in life. Cass never understood her, but Quin understood her. He was like
+that himself. The blood was pounding through his veins too, a terrible
+urgence was impelling him toward her. Why shouldn't they throw discretion
+to the winds and answer the call?
+
+Then his mind did a curious thing. It brought up out of the sub-conscious
+a question that Eleanor Bartlett had once asked him: "Do you think a
+person has a right to go ahead and do what he wants, regardless of
+consequences?" He saw her face, moonlit and earnest, turned up to his,
+and he heard himself answering her: "That depends on whether he wants the
+right thing."
+
+Rose stirred, and he withdrew his hand and stood up.
+
+"See here, young lady," he said with authority; "I'll give you just two
+minutes to clear out of here! No, I don't want you to leave your door
+open; I'll call you if there's any change."
+
+"But, Quin, I don't want to be alone--I want to be with you." Her eyes
+were full of frank appeal, and her lips trembling.
+
+"You are too sleepy to know what you want," he said. "Up with you--not
+another word. You'll feel better to-morrow. Good-night." And with a
+little push he put her out of the room and closed the door.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 20
+
+
+Quin stood under the big car-shed at the Union Depot, and for the sixth
+time in ten minutes consulted the watch that was the pride of his life.
+He had been waiting for half an hour, not because the train was late, but
+because he proposed to be on the spot if by any happy chance it should
+arrive ahead of schedule time. The week before he had received a picture
+post-card on whose narrow margin were scrawled the meager lines:
+
+    So glad Cass is up again. Rose says you've been a brick. Home on
+    Sept. 2. Hope to see you soon. E. M. B.
+
+It was the only communication he had had from Eleanor since they sat on
+the stile in the starlight at Valley Mead three months before. To be
+sure, in her infrequent letters to Rose she had always added, "Give my
+love to Quinby Graham," and once she said: "Tell him I've been meaning to
+write to him all summer." Notwithstanding the fact that Quin had waited
+in vain for that letter for twelve consecutive weeks, that he had passed
+through every phase of indignation, jealousy, and consuming fear that can
+assail a young and undisciplined lover, he nevertheless watched for the
+incoming train with a rapture undimmed by disturbing reflections. The
+mere fact that every moment the distance was lessening between him and
+Eleanor, that within the hour he should see her, hear her, feel the clasp
+of her hand, was sufficient to send his spirits soaring into sunny spaces
+of confidence far above the clouds of doubt.
+
+"Hello, Quinby; what are you doing here?" asked a voice behind him; and
+turning he saw the long, oval face and lady-like figure of Mr. Chester.
+
+"Same thing you are," said Quin, grinning sympathetically. "Only if I was
+in your shoes I'd be walking the tracks to meet the train."
+
+Mr. Chester shook his head and smiled primly.
+
+"When you have waited twenty years for a young lady, twenty minutes more
+or less do not matter."
+
+"They would to me!" Quin declared emphatically. "When is the wedding to
+be?"
+
+"On the fourteenth. And that reminds me"--Mr. Chester ran his arm
+confidentially through Quin's and tried to catch step. "I want to ask a
+favor of you."
+
+A favor to Quin meant anything from twenty-five cents to twenty-five
+dollars, and the fact that Mr. Chester should come to him flattered and
+embarrassed him at the same time.
+
+"What's mine is yours," he said magnanimously.
+
+"No, you don't understand," said Mr. Chester. "You see, not being a club
+man or a society man, I have in a way dropped out of things. I have
+comparatively few friends, and unfortunately they are not in a set
+personally known to Madam Bartlett. Miss Enid and I thought that it might
+solve the difficulty, and avoid complications, if you would agree to
+serve as my best man."
+
+"Why, I'd be willing to serve as the preacher to see you and Miss Enid
+get married," said Quin heartily. Then his thoughts flew after his
+departed Tuxedo and the gorgeous wing-toed pumps. "What'll I have to
+wear?"
+
+"It is to be a noon affair," reassured Mr. Chester. "Simple morning coat,
+you know, and light-gray tie."
+
+Quin's ideas concerning a morning coat were extremely vague, and the
+possibility of his procuring one vaguer still; but the occasion was too
+portentous to admit of hesitation. He and Mr. Chester continued their
+walk to the far end of the shed, and then stood looking down at the coal
+cars being loaded from the yards.
+
+"White gloves, I suppose?" observed Quin.
+
+"Pearl gray, with very narrow stitching. I think that's better taste,
+don't you?"
+
+"Sure," agreed Quin. "Flower in the buttonhole, or anything like that?"
+
+While this all-important detail was being decided, a clanging bell and
+the hiss of an engine announced the incoming train. Before the two
+waiting cavaliers could reach the gate, Eleanor Bartlett came through,
+laden with wraps and umbrellas.
+
+"I like the way you meet us," she called out. "For mercy sake, help me."
+And she deposited her burden in Quin's outstretched arms. Then, as Mr.
+Chester strode past them with flying coat-tails in quest of Miss Enid,
+she burst out laughing.
+
+"Say, you are looking great," said Quin, with devouring eyes, as he
+surveyed her over the top of his impedimenta.
+
+"It's more than you are." She scanned his face in dismay. "Have you been
+sick?"
+
+"No, indeed. Never felt better."
+
+"I know--it was nursing Cass that did it. Rose wrote me all about it. If
+you don't look better right away, I shall make you go straight to bed and
+I'll come feed you chicken soup."
+
+"My fever's rising this minute!" cried Quin, "I believe I've got a chill.
+Send for the ambulance!"
+
+"Not till after the wedding. I'll have you know I am to be Aunt Enid's
+bridesmaid."
+
+"You've got nothing on me," said Quin, "I'm the best man!"
+
+This struck them both as being so excruciatingly funny that they did not
+see the approaching cavalcade, with Madam walking slowly at its head,
+until Quin heard his name called.
+
+"Oh, dear," said Eleanor, "there they come. And I've got a thousand
+questions to ask you and a million things to tell you."
+
+"Come here, young man, and see me walk!" was Madam's greeting. "Do I look
+like a cripple? Leg off at the knee, crutches for life? Bah! We fooled
+them, didn't we?"
+
+Quin made a tremendous fuss over the old lady. He also threw the aunties
+into pleased confusion by pretending that he was going to kiss them, and
+occasioned no end of laughter and good-natured banter by his incessant
+teasing of Mr. Chester. He was in that state of effervescence that
+demanded an immediate outlet.
+
+Madam found him so amusing that she promptly detailed him as her special
+escort.
+
+"Eleanor can look after the baggage," she said, "and Isobel can look
+after Eleanor. The turtle-doves can take a taxi." And she closed her
+strong old fingers around Quin's wrist and pulled him forward.
+
+He shot an appealing glance over his shoulder at Eleanor, who shook her
+head in exasperation; then he obediently conducted Madam to her carriage
+and scrambled in beside her.
+
+"Now," she said, when he had got a cushion at her back and a stool under
+her foot, "tell me: where's Ranny--drunk as usual?"
+
+"No, siree!" said Quin proudly. "Sober as usual. He hasn't touched a drop
+since you went away."
+
+She looked at him incredulously.
+
+"Are you lying?"
+
+"I am not."
+
+Her hard, suspicious old face began to twitch and her eyelids reddened.
+
+"This is your doing," she said gruffly. "You've put more backbone into
+him than all the doctors together."
+
+"That's not all I've done," said Quin. "What are you going to say when I
+tell you I've sold him a farm?"
+
+"A farm? You've got no farm; and he had no money to buy it, if you had."
+
+"That's all right. He has had a farm for three months. You ought to see
+him--up at six o'clock every morning looking after things, and so keen
+about getting back to it in the evening that he never thinks about going
+to the club or staying in town."
+
+"What's all this nonsense you are talking?"
+
+"It's not nonsense. He's bought a little place out near Anchordale. They
+are living there."
+
+"And they did this without consulting me!" Madam's eyes blazed. "Why, he
+is no more capable of running a farm than a ten-year-old child! I have
+fought it for years. He knew perfectly well if he told me I'd stop it
+instantly. He will appeal to me to help out within six months, you'll
+see! I sha'n't do it! I'll show my children if they can do without me
+that I can go without them."
+
+She was working herself into a fine rage. The aigrette on her bonnet
+quivered, and the black velvet band about her neck was getting so tight
+that it looked as if it couldn't stand the strain much longer.
+
+"Why didn't he write me?" she stormed. "Am I too old and decrepit to be
+consulted any more? Is he going to follow Enid's high-handed way of
+deciding things without the slightest reference to my wishes?"
+
+"I expect he is," said Quin cheerfully. "You see, you can't stiffen a
+fellow's backbone, as you call it, for one thing and not another. When he
+found out he could stop drinking, he decided he could do other things as
+well. He's started a chicken farm."
+
+Madam groaned: "Of course. I never knew a fool that sooner or later
+didn't gravitate to chickens. He will get an incubator next."
+
+"He has two already. He and Mrs. Ranny are studying out the whole
+business scientifically."
+
+"And I suppose they've got a rabbit hutch, and a monkey, and some white
+mice?"
+
+"Not quite. But they've got a nice place. Want to go out with me next
+Saturday and see 'em?"
+
+"I do not. I'm not interested in menageries. I never expect to cross the
+threshold."
+
+Quin pulled up the cape that had slipped from her shoulder, and adjusted
+it carefully.
+
+"When Mr. Ranny comes in to see you," he said, "I hope you won't ball him
+out right away. He's awful keen on this stunt, you know. It sort of takes
+the place of the things he has given up."
+
+Madam glared straight ahead of her for a few moments, then she said
+curtly:
+
+"I'll not mention it until he does."
+
+"Oh, but I _want_ you to. He's as nervous as a witch about how you are
+going to take it. You see, he thinks more of your opinion than he does of
+anybody's, and he wants your approval. If you could jump right in and say
+you think it's a bully idea, and that you are coming out to see what he
+has done, and----"
+
+"Do you want me to lie?" Madam demanded fiercely.
+
+"No," said Quin, laughing; "I am trying to warm you up to the project
+now, so you won't have to lie." Then, seeing her face relax a little, he
+leaned toward her and said in his most persuasive tone:
+
+"See here, now! I did my best to straighten Mr. Ranny out. He's making
+the fight of his life to keep straight. It's up to you to stand by us.
+You don't want to pitch the fat back in the fire, do you?"
+
+They had reached the big house on Third Avenue, and the carriage was
+slowing up at the curbing. Quin, receiving no answer to his question,
+carefully helped Madam up the steps and into the house, where black
+Hannah was waiting to receive her.
+
+"You can't come in," said Madam gruffly. "I am tired. I will see you some
+other time."
+
+"All right," said Quin. "What time shall I come Saturday afternoon?"
+
+"Saturday afternoon? Why then?"
+
+"To go out to Mr. Ranny's farm."
+
+For an instant they measured glances; then Quin began to laugh--a
+confident, boyish laugh full of teasing affection.
+
+"Come on," he coaxed, "be a good scout. Let's give 'em the surprise of
+their lives."
+
+"You rascal, you!" she said, hitting at him with her cane. "I believe you
+are at the bottom of all this. Mind, I promise you nothing."
+
+"You don't have to," he called back. "I can trust you. I'll be here at
+three!"
+
+He arrived on Saturday an hour early in the hope of seeing Eleanor, and
+was gloriously rewarded by thirty minutes alone with her in the big dark
+drawing-room. All the way up from the factory he had thought of the
+things he wanted to tell her--all the Martel news, the progress of
+affairs at Valley Mead, the fact that he had won his first-term
+certificate at the university, and above all about his promotion at
+Bartlett & Bangs. But Eleanor gave him no chance to tell her anything.
+She was like a dammed-up stream that suddenly finds an outlet. Into
+Quin's sympathetic ears she poured her own troubles, talking with her
+hands and her eyes as well as her lips, exaggerating, dramatizing,
+laughing one minute, half crying the next.
+
+The summer, it seemed, had been one long series of clashes with her
+grandmother. She hadn't enjoyed one day of it, she assured him; that is,
+not a _whole_ day, for of course there were some gorgeous times in
+between. Her friends had not been welcome at the house, and one (whom
+Quin devoutly hoped was Mr. Phipps) had been openly insulted. She had not
+been allowed to take part in the play given at the club-house, when it
+had been planned with her especially in mind for the leading role. She
+had even been forbidden to go to the last boathouse dance, because it was
+a moonlight affair, and grandmother had never heard of such a thing as
+dancing without lights.
+
+"She has spent the entire summer nagging at me," Eleanor concluded. "I
+couldn't do a thing to please her. If I stayed in she wanted me to go
+out; if I went out she thought I ought to stay in. If I put on one dress
+she invariably made me change it for another. And as for being late to
+meals, why, each time it happened you would have thought I'd broken the
+ten commandments."
+
+"Couldn't you have pushed up the stroke and got there on time?" asked
+Quin, whose army training made him inclined to sympathize with Madam at
+this point.
+
+"No, I could not. I am always late. It's a Martel trait--that's why it
+infuriates grandmother. But it wasn't any of these things I've been
+telling you that caused the real trouble. It was her constant
+interference in my private affairs. I am simply sick of being dictated to
+about my choice of friends."
+
+"You mean Mr. Phipps?"
+
+She looked at him quickly. "How did you know?"
+
+"Mrs. Ranny told me he was up there, and I guessed there was a shindy."
+
+"I should say there was--for the entire three days he was there! If he
+hadn't been big enough to rise above it and ignore grandmother, she would
+have succeeded in breaking up one of the most beautiful friendships of my
+life."
+
+Quin absently twisted a corner of the corpulent sofa cushion which he
+held in his lap, before he asked cautiously:
+
+"What is it you like so much in him. Miss Nell?"
+
+Eleanor curled her feet under her on the sofa, and launched forth on a
+favorite theme:
+
+"Well, to begin with, he's the most cosmopolitan man I ever met."
+
+"Cosmopolitan? How do you mean?"
+
+"Awfully sophisticated. A sort of citizen of the world, you know."
+
+"You mean he's traveled a lot, knocked around in queer places, like me?"
+
+"Oh, no; it isn't that. As a matter of fact, he has never been out of
+this country. But I mean that, wherever he'd go, he would be at home."
+
+"Yes," Quin admitted, with a grim smile; "that's where he was most of the
+time when he was in the army. What else do you like about him?"
+
+"I sha'n't tell you. You are prejudiced, like all the rest. He says that
+only an artist can understand an artist."
+
+"Meaning, I suppose, that he understands you?"
+
+"Yes; and I believe I understand him. Of course I don't agree with him in
+all his ideas. But then, I've been brought up in such a narrow way that I
+know I am frightfully conventional. He is awfully advanced, you know. Why
+don't you like him, Quin?"
+
+Numerous concrete and very emphatic reasons sprang to Quin's lips. He
+would have liked nothing better than to answer her question fully and
+finally; but instead he only smiled at her and said:
+
+"Why, I guess the main reason is because you do."
+
+Eleanor looked at him dubiously: "No," she said; "it's something besides
+that. The family have probably filled your ears with silly gossip. Mr.
+Phipps _was_ wild at one time--he told me all about it. But that's
+ancient history; you can take my word for it."
+
+Quin would have taken her word for almost anything when she looked at him
+with such star-eyed earnestness, but he was obliged to make an exception
+in the present instance.
+
+"He's nothing in my young life," he said indifferently. "What I want to
+know is whether you are home to stay?"
+
+Eleanor glanced at the door, listened, then she said:
+
+"I don't know yet. You see, Papa Claude is to be in New York this winter,
+finishing his play. He says if I will come on he will put me in the
+Kendall School of Expression and see that I get the right start. It's the
+chance of a life-time, and I'm simply wild to go."
+
+"And Queen Vic won't hear of it?"
+
+"Not for a second. She knows perfectly well that I can go on the stage
+the day I am twenty-one, yet through sheer obstinacy she refuses to
+advance me a penny to do as I like with before the 20th of next July."
+
+"She don't do it for meanness," Quin ventured. "She'd give you all she
+had if it came to a showdown. But none of 'em realize you are grown up;
+they are afraid to turn you loose."
+
+"Well, I've stood it as long as I intend to. I made up my mind that I
+would stick it out until after Aunt Enid's wedding. It nearly breaks my
+heart to do anything to hurt her and Aunt Isobel; but even they are
+beginning to rebel against grandmother's tyranny."
+
+"What do you mean to do?" asked Quin, with a sudden sinking of the heart.
+
+"I am not sure yet; I haven't quite made up my mind. But I am not going
+to stay here. I am too unhappy, Quin, and with Aunt Enid gone----" Her
+voice broke, and as she caught her lip between her small white teeth she
+stared ahead of her with tragic eyes.
+
+Quin laid his arm along the sofa, as close to her shoulders as he dared,
+and looked at her in dumb sympathy.
+
+"Don't you think you might try a different tack with the old lady?" he
+ventured presently. "Even a porcupine likes to have its head scratched,
+and I think sometimes she's kind of hungry for somebody to cotton up to
+her a bit. Don't you think you might----"
+
+"Who left that front door open?" broke in a harsh, peremptory voice from
+the landing. "I don't care _who_ opened it--I want it shut, and kept
+shut. Where's Quinby Graham? I thought you said he was waiting."
+
+Quin rose precipitately and made a dash for the hall, while Eleanor
+discreetly disappeared through a rear door.
+
+"Well," said Madam grimly, pulling on her gloves, "it is a novel
+experience to find a young person who has a respect for other people's
+time."
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 21
+
+
+For the next two weeks Eleanor made a heroic effort to follow Quin's
+advice and be nice to Madam. She wanted, with all her heart, to gain her
+point peacefully, and she also wanted Quin's approval of what she was
+doing. In spite of his obvious adoration, she frequently detected a note
+of criticism in his voice, that, while it piqued her, also stirred her
+conscience and made her see things in a new and disturbing light. For the
+first time, she began to wonder if she could be partly to blame for the
+friction that always existed between herself and her grandmother. She
+certainly had taken an unholy joy in flaunting her Martel characteristics
+in the old lady's face. It was not that she preferred to identify herself
+with her mother's family rather than with her father's. The Martel
+shiftlessness and visionary improvidence were quite as intolerable to her
+as the iron-clad conventions of the Bartletts. She could take correction
+from Aunt Isobel and Aunt Enid, but there was something in her
+grandmother's caustic comments that made her tingle with instant
+opposition, as a delicate vase will shiver at the sound of its own
+vibration.
+
+During the days before the wedding she surprised herself by her docility
+and acquiescence in all that was proposed for her. She even accepted
+without demur the white swiss and blue ribbons that a week before she had
+considered entirely too infantile for an adult maid of honor. This
+particular exhibition of virtue was due to the exemplary behavior of the
+bride herself. Miss Enid had longed for the regulation white satin, tulle
+veil, and orange blossoms; but Madam had promptly cited the case of the
+old maid who waited so long to marry that her orange blossoms turned to
+oranges.
+
+Miss Enid was married in a sober traveling dress, and carried a
+prayer-book. She and Mr. Chester stood in front of the drawing-room
+mantel, where twenty years before Madam had expressed her opinion
+concerning sentimental young fools who thought they could live on fifteen
+dollars a week.
+
+The budding romance, snatched ruthlessly up and flung into the dust-heap
+of common sense, had lain dormant all these years, until Quinby Graham
+had stumbled upon its dried old roots, and planted them once again in the
+garden of dreams.
+
+Why is it that we will breathlessly follow the callowest youth and the
+silliest maiden through the most intricate labyrinth of love, never
+losing interest until they drop safely into one another's arms, and yet
+when two seasoned, mellowed human beings tried by life and found worthy
+of the prize of love, dare lift a sentimental lid or sigh a word of
+romance, we straightway howl with derision?
+
+It was not until Eleanor stood beside the elderly bride that the affair
+ceased to be funny to her. For the first time, she saw something pathetic
+and beautiful in the permanence of a love that, starved and thwarted and
+blasted by ridicule, could survive the years and make two faded,
+middle-aged people like Aunt Enid and Mr. Chester eager to drain the
+dregs of life together, when they had been denied the good red wine.
+
+Her eyes wandered from their worn, elated faces to the rows of solemn
+figures behind them. Madam, as usual, dominated the scene. Her portrait
+gazed in portentously from the hall; her marble bust gleamed from a
+distant corner; and she herself, the most resplendent person present, sat
+in a chair of state placed like a proscenium-box, and critically observed
+the performance.
+
+"If she only _wouldn't_ curl her lip like that!" thought Eleanor
+shudderingly; then she remembered her resolution and looked at Quin.
+
+He too was looking preternaturally solemn, and his lips were moving
+softly in unison with Mr. Chester's. If Eleanor could have heard those
+inaudible responses she would have been startled by the words: "I,
+Quinby, take thee, Eleanor." But she only observed that he was lost in a
+day-dream, and that she had never seen him look so nice.
+
+Indeed, he was a very different-looking person from the boy that six
+months ago had mortified her by his appearance at her Easter party in
+"the classiest coat in the market." The propriety of his garments made
+her suspect that Uncle Ranny had had a hand in their selection.
+
+"And I like the way he's got his hair slicked back," she thought. "I
+wonder how he ever managed it?"
+
+After the wedding breakfast, which was a lavish one, and the departure of
+the bride and groom, for California, where they were to make their future
+home, Madam summoned Eleanor.
+
+"There's no use in you and Quin Graham staying here with all these
+fossils," she said, lowering her voice. "People hate to go home from a
+wedding almost as much as they do from a funeral! You two take this and
+go to a matinee."
+
+This unexpected concession to Eleanor's weakness touched her deeply. She
+flew into the hall to tell Quin, and then rushed upstairs to change her
+dress.
+
+"I believe the scheme is working!" she said joyously, as she and Quin sat
+in the theater waiting for the curtain to rise. "Grandmother has been
+peaches and cream to me all week. This morning she capped the climax by
+giving me a check for a hundred dollars to buy a gold mesh bag."
+
+"A _what!_" cried Quin, aghast.
+
+"A mesh bag. But I am not going to get it. I sent the check to Rose. It
+has nearly killed me not to have a penny to send them all summer, and
+this came just in time. Have you heard about Myrna?"
+
+"Being asked to spend the winter at Mrs. Ranny's? I should say I have!
+She's the happiest kid alive."
+
+"And grandmother has even stood for that! It's a perfect scream to hear
+her bragging about 'my son's farm.' She will be talking about 'my
+daughter's husband' next."
+
+"Queen Vic's all right," Quin declared stoutly. "Her only trouble is that
+she's been trying to play baseball by herself; she's got to learn
+team-work."
+
+The play happened to be "The Better 'Ole"; and from the moment the
+curtain rose Eleanor was oblivious to everything but the humor and pathos
+and glory of the story. She followed with ready tears and smiles the
+adventures of the three Tommies; she thrilled to the sentimental songs
+beside the stage camp fire; she laughed at the antics of the incomparable
+Corporal Bill. It was not until the second act that she became conscious
+of the queer behavior of her companion.
+
+Quin sat hunched up in his wedding suit, his jaw set like a vise, staring
+solemnly into space with an expression she had never seen in his face
+before. He seemed to have forgotten where he was and whom he was with.
+His hand had crushed the program into a ball, and his breath came short,
+as it always did when he was excited or over-exerted.
+
+Eleanor, whose emotions up to now had been pleasantly and superficially
+stirred, suddenly saw the play from a new angle. With quick imagination
+she visualized the great reality of which all this was but a clever sham.
+She saw Quin passing through it all, not to the thunder of stage shrapnel
+and the glare of a red spot-light, but in the life-and-death struggle of
+those eighteen months in the trenches. Before she knew it, she too was
+gazing absently into space, shaken with the profound realization that
+here beside her, his shoulder touching hers, was one who had lived more
+in a day than she had ever lived in a life-time.
+
+They said little during the last intermission, and the silence brought
+them closer together than any words could have done.
+
+"It takes a fellow back--all this," Quin roused himself to say in
+half-apology.
+
+"I know," said Eleanor.
+
+They walked home in the autumn twilight in that exalted, romantic mood in
+which a good play leaves one. Now that the tension was over, it was quite
+possible to prolong the enjoyment by discussing the strong and weak
+points of the performance. Eleanor was surprised to find that Quin, while
+ignorant of the meaning of the word technic nevertheless had decided and
+worth-while opinions about every detail, and that his comments were often
+startlingly pertinent.
+
+They reached the Bartletts' before they knew it, and Quin sighed
+ruefully:
+
+"I wish Miss Enid and Mr. Chester could get married every Wednesday! When
+can I see you again?"
+
+"Some time soon."
+
+"To-morrow night?"
+
+"I am afraid that's too soon."
+
+"Friday?"
+
+"No; I am going to a dance at the Country Club Friday night."
+
+Still he lingered disconsolately on the lower step, unable to tear
+himself away.
+
+"Do you know," he said, gaining time by presenting a grievance, "you
+never have danced with me but twice in your life?"
+
+She looked at him dreamily.
+
+"The funny thing is that I remember those two dances better than any I've
+ever had with anybody else."
+
+He came up the steps two at a time.
+
+"What do you mean by that?" he demanded. "Are you joshing me?"
+
+"No, honest. That New Year's eve with the blizzard raging outside, and
+that bright crowded hall, and all you boys just home from France. Do you
+remember the big blue parrots that swung in hoops from the chandeliers?
+And that wonderful saxophone and the big bass drum!"
+
+"Then it isn't _me_ that you remember? Just a darned old parrot hanging
+on a hoop, and a saxophone and a drum!"
+
+"You silly! Of course it's you too! I remember every single thing you
+told me, and how terribly thrilled I was. This afternoon brought it all
+back. I shall never forget this, either. Not as long as I live!"
+
+She started to put out her hand; but, seeing the look in Quin's eyes, she
+reconsidered and opened the door instead.
+
+"So long," she said casually. "I'll probably see you sometime next week.
+In the meanwhile I'll be good to granny!"
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 22
+
+
+When Eleanor reached the Country Club on Friday night, she found a box of
+flowers waiting for her in the dressing-room. It was the second box she
+had received that day. The first bore the conspicuous label, "Wear-Well
+Shoes," and contained a bunch of wild evening primroses wrapped in wet
+moss. With this more sophisticated floral offering was a sealed note
+which she opened eagerly:
+
+    _Mademoiselle Beaux Yeux_--[she read]:
+
+    Save all the dances after the intermission for me. I will reach L. at
+    nine-thirty, get out to the club for a couple of hours with you, and
+    catch the midnight express back to Chicago. Pin my blossoms close to
+    your heart, and bid it heed what they whisper.
+
+    H. P.
+
+Eleanor read the note twice, conscious of the fact that a dozen envious
+eyes were watching her. She considered this quite the most romantic thing
+that had happened to her. For a man like Mr. Phipps to travel sixteen
+hours out of the twenty-four just to dance with her was a triumph indeed.
+It made her think of her old friend Joseph, in the Bret Harte poem, who
+
+    Swam the Elk's creek and all that,
+    Just to dance with old Folingsbee's daughter,
+    The Lily of Poverty Flat.
+
+Not that Eleanor felt in the least humble. She had never felt so proud in
+her life as she smiled a little superior smile and slipped the note in
+her bosom.
+
+"Not orchids!" exclaimed Kitty Mason, poking an inquisitive finger under
+the waxed paper.
+
+"Why not?" Eleanor asked nonchalantly. "They are my favorite flowers."
+
+"But I thought the orchid king was in Chicago?"
+
+"He is--that is, he was. He's probably on the train now. I have just had
+a note saying he was running down for the dance and would go back
+to-night."
+
+The news had the desired effect. Six noses, which were being vigorously
+powdered, were neglected while their owners burst forth in a chorus of
+exclamations sufficiently charged with envious admiration to satisfy the
+most rapacious debutante.
+
+"I should think you'd be perfectly paralyzed trying to think of things to
+talk to him about," said little Bessie Meed, who had not yet put her hair
+up. "Older men scare me stiff."
+
+"They don't me," declared Lou Pierce; "they make me tired. Sitting out
+dances, and holding hands, and talking high-brow. When I come to a dance
+I want to dance. Give me Johnnie Rawlings or Pink Bailey and a good old
+jazz."
+
+Eleanor pinned on her orchids and moved away. The girls seemed incredibly
+young and noisy and crass. Less than six months ago she, too, was romping
+through the dances with Jimmy and Pink, and imagining that a fox-trot
+divided between ten partners constituted the height of enjoyment. Mr.
+Phipps had told her in the summer that she was changing. "The little
+butterfly is emerging from her chrysalis," was the poetic way he had
+phrased it, with an accompanying look that spoke volumes.
+
+Once on the dance floor, however, she forgot her superior mood and
+enjoyed herself inordinately until supper-time. Just as she and Pink were
+starting for the refreshment room, she caught sight of a familiar
+graceful figure, standing apart from the crowd, watching her with level,
+penetrating eyes.
+
+"Pink, I forgot!" she said hastily; "I'm engaged for supper. I'll see you
+later." And without further apology she slipped through the throng and
+joined Harold.
+
+"Let's get out of this," he said, lightly touching her bare arm and
+piloting her toward the porch.
+
+"But don't you want any supper?" asked Eleanor, amazed.
+
+"Not when I have you," whispered Harold.
+
+Eleanor gave a regretful glance at a mammoth tray of sandwiches being
+passed, then allowed herself to be drawn out through the French window
+into the cool darkness of the wide veranda.
+
+"Let's sit in that car down by the first tee," Harold suggested. "It's
+only a step."
+
+Eleanor hesitated. One of the ten social commandments imposed upon her
+was that she was never to leave the porch at a Country Club dance. That
+the porch edge should be regarded as the limit of propriety had always
+seemed to her the height of absurdity; but so far she had obeyed the
+family and confined her flirtations to shadowy corners and dim nooks
+under bending palms.
+
+"What's the trouble?" Harold inquired solicitously. "The little gold
+slippers?"
+
+"No--I don't mind the slippers; but, you see, I'm not supposed to go off
+the porch."
+
+"How ridiculous! Of course you are going off the porch. I have only one
+hour to stay, and I've something very important to tell you."
+
+"But why can't we sit here?" she insisted, indicating an unoccupied
+bench.
+
+"Because those ubiquitous youngsters will be clamoring for you the moment
+the music begins. Haven't you had enough noise for one night? Perhaps you
+prefer to go inside and be pushed about and eat messy things with your
+fingers?"
+
+"Now you are horrid!" Eleanor pouted. "I only thought----"
+
+"You mean you _didn't_ think!" corrected Harold, putting the tip of his
+finger under her chin and tilting her face up to his. "You just repeated
+what you'd been taught to say. Use your brains, Eleanor. What possible
+harm can there be in our quietly sitting out under the light of the
+stars, instead of on this crowded piazza with that distracting din going
+on inside?"
+
+"Of course there isn't really."
+
+"Well, then, come on"; and he led the way across the strip of dewy lawn
+and handed her into the car.
+
+Eleanor experienced a delicious sense of forbidden joy as she sank on the
+soft cushions and looked back at the brilliantly lighted club-house. The
+knowledge that in many of those other cars parked along the roadway other
+couples were cozily twosing, and that not a girl among them but would
+have changed places with her, added materially to her enjoyment.
+
+It was not that Harold Phipps was popular. She had to admit that he had
+more enemies than friends. But rumors of his wealth, his position, and
+his talent, together with his distinguished appearance, had made him the
+most sought after officer stationed at the camp. That he should have
+swooped down from his eagle flight with Uncle Ranny's sophisticated group
+to snatch her out of the pool of youthful minnows was a compliment she
+did not forget.
+
+"Well," he said, lazily sinking into his corner of the car and observing
+her with satisfaction, "haven't you something pretty to say to me, after
+I've come all these miles to hear it?"
+
+Eleanor laughed in embarrassment. It was much easier to say pretty things
+in letters than to say them face to face.
+
+"There is one thing that I always have to say to you," she said, "and
+that's thank you. These orchids are perfectly sweet, and the candy that
+came yesterday----"
+
+"Was also _perfectly_ sweet? Come, Eleanor, let's skip the formalities.
+Were you or were you not glad to see me?"
+
+"Why, of course I was."
+
+"Well, you didn't look it. I am not used to having girls treat me as
+casually as you do. How much have you missed me?"
+
+"Heaps. How's the play coming on?"
+
+"Marvelously! We've worked out all the main difficulties, and I signed up
+this week with a manager."
+
+"Not _really!_ When will it be produced?"
+
+"Sometime in the spring. I go on to New York next month to make the final
+arrangements. When do you go?"
+
+"I don't know that I am going. I'm trying my best to get grandmother's
+consent."
+
+"You must go anyhow," said Harold. "I want you to have three months at
+the Kendall School, and then do you know what I am going to do?"
+
+"What?" she asked with sparkling eagerness.
+
+"I am going to try you out in 'Phantom Love.' You remember you said if I
+wrote a part especially for you that nothing in heaven or earth could
+prevent your taking it."
+
+"And _have_ you written a part especially for me?"
+
+"I certainly have. A young Southern girl who moves through the play like
+a strain of exquisite music. The only trouble is that the role promises
+to be more appealing than the star's."
+
+"That's the loveliest thing I ever heard of anybody doing!" cried
+Eleanor, breathless with gratitude. "Does Papa Claude know?"
+
+"Of course he knows. We worked it out together. I am going to find him a
+small apartment, so he can be ready for you when you come. It shouldn't
+be later than November the first."
+
+Eleanor wore such a look as Joan of Arc must have worn when she first
+heard the heavenly voices. Her shapely bare arms hung limp at her sides,
+and her white face, with its contrasting black hair, shone like a
+delicate cameo against the darkness.
+
+Harold, leaning forward with elbows on his knees, kept lightly touching
+and retouching his mustache.
+
+"In the first act," he continued softly, "I've put you in the Red Cross
+Uniform--the little blue and white one, you know, that you used to break
+hearts in out at the camp hospital. In the second act you are to be in
+riding togs, smart in every detail, something very chic, that will show
+your figure to advantage; in the last act I want you exactly as you are
+this minute--this soft clingy gold gown, and the gold slippers, and your
+hair high and plain like that, with the band of dull gold around it. I
+wouldn't change an inch of you, not from your head to your blessed little
+feet!"
+
+As he talked Eleanor forgot him completely. She was busy visualizing the
+different costumes, even going so far as to see herself slipping through
+folds of crimson velvet to take insistent curtain calls. Already in
+imagination she was rich and famous, dispensing munificent bounty to the
+entire Martel family. Then a disturbing thought pricked her dream and
+brought her rudely back to the present. As long as her grandmother
+regarded her going to New York as a foolish whim, a passing craze, she
+might be wheedled into yielding; but at the first suggestion of a
+professional engagement, her opposition would become active and violent,
+Eleanor sighed helplessly and looked at Harold.
+
+"What shall I do if grandmother refuses to send me?" she asked
+desperately.
+
+"You can let me send you," he said quietly. "It's folly to keep up this
+pretense any longer, Eleanor. You love me, don't you?"
+
+"I--I like you," faltered Eleanor, "better than almost anybody. But I am
+never going to marry; I don't think I shall ever care for anybody--that
+way."
+
+He watched her with an amused practised glance. "We won't talk about it
+now," he said lightly. "We will talk instead of your career. You remember
+that night at Ran's when you recited for me? I can hear you now saying
+those lines:
+
+    'Or if thou think'st I am too quickly won
+    I'll frown and be perverse, and say thee nay.'
+
+For days I was haunted by the beauty and subtlety of your voice, the
+unconscious grace of your poses, your little tricks of coquetry, and the
+play of your eyebrows."
+
+"Did you really see all that in me the first night?"
+
+"I saw more. I saw that, if taken in time, you were destined to be a
+great actress. I swore then and there that you should have your chance,
+and that I should be the one to give it to you."
+
+"But----"
+
+"No. Don't answer me now. You are like a little bud that's afraid to open
+its petals. Once you get out of this chilling atmosphere of criticism and
+opposition, you will burst into glorious bloom."
+
+"But it would mean a terrible break with the family. I don't believe I
+can----"
+
+"Yes, you can. I know you better than you know yourself. If Madam
+Bartlett persists in refusing to send you to New York, you are going to
+be big enough to let me do it."
+
+He was holding her hand now, and talking with unusual earnestness.
+Eleanor thought she had never seen a greater exhibition of magnanimity.
+That he was willing to give all and ask for nothing, to be patient with
+her vacillations, and understand and sympathize with what everybody else
+condemned in her, touched her greatly. She turned to him impulsively.
+
+"I'll do whatever you say," she said. "You and Papa Claude go ahead and
+make the arrangements, and I promise you I'll come."
+
+Harold Phipps should have left it there; but Eleanor was never more
+irresistible than when she was in a yielding mood, and now, when she
+lifted starry eyes of gratitude, he tumbled off his pedestal of noble
+detachment, and drew her suddenly into his arms.
+
+In an instant her soft mood vanished. She scrambled hastily to her feet
+and got out of the car.
+
+"I am going in," she said abruptly. "I'm cold."
+
+Harold laughingly followed. "Cold?" he repeated in his laziest tone. "My
+dear girl, you could understudy the North Pole! However, it was my
+mistake; I'm sorry. Shall we go in and dance?"
+
+For the next half-hour he and Eleanor were the most observed couple on
+the floor. The "ubiquitous youngsters," seeing his air of proprietorship,
+forbore to break in, and it was not until the last dance that Pink
+Bailey, looking the immature college boy he was, presented himself
+apologetically to take Eleanor home.
+
+"Bring your car around, and she will be ready," said Harold loftily. Then
+he turned to Eleanor, "I shall expect a letter every day. You must keep
+me posted how things are going."
+
+They were standing on the club-house steps now, and she was looking
+dreamily off across the golf links.
+
+"Did you hear me?" he said impatiently.
+
+"Oh, I was listening to the whip-poor-wills. They always take me back to
+Valley Mead. Write every day? Heavens, no. I hate to write letters."
+
+"But you'll write to me, you little ingrate! I shall send you such nice
+letters that you'll have to answer them."
+
+A vagrant breeze, with a hint of autumn, blew Eleanor's scarf across his
+shoulder, and he tenderly replaced it about her throat.
+
+"Are you cold?" he asked solicitously.
+
+Eleanor, under cover of the crowd that was surging about them, felt a
+sudden access of boldness.
+
+"Not so cold as some people think," she said mischievously; then, without
+waiting for further good-by, she sped down the steps and into the waiting
+car.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 23
+
+
+Of all the multitudinous ways in which Dan Cupid, Unlimited, does
+business, none is more nefarious than his course by correspondence. Once
+he has induced two guileless clients to plunge into the traffic of love
+letters, the rest is easy. Wild speculation in love stock, false
+valuations, hysterical desire to buy in the cheapest and sell in the
+dearest market, invariably follow. Before the end of the month Harold
+Phipps and Eleanor Bartlett were gambling in the love market with a
+recklessness that would have staggered the most hardened old speculator.
+
+Harold, instead of being handicapped by his absence at the most critical
+point in his love affair, took advantage of it to exhibit one of his most
+brilliant accomplishments. He sent Eleanor a handsome tooled-leather
+portfolio to hold his letters, which he wrote on loose-leaf sheets and
+mailed unfolded. They were letters that deserved preservation, prose
+poems composed with infinite pains and copied with meticulous care. If
+the potpourri was at times redolent of the dried flowers of other men's
+loves, Eleanor was blissfully unaware of it. When he wrote of the
+lonesome October of his most immemorial year, or spoke of her pilgrim
+soul coming to him at midnight in the silence of the sleep-time, she
+thrilled with admiration for his genius.
+
+Such literary masterpieces deserved adequate answers, and she found
+herself trying to make up in quantity what she lacked in quality. His
+letters always began, "Dearest Heloise," or "Melisande," or "Baucis," or
+"Isolde"; and, rather than acknowledge her ignorance of these classic
+allusions, she looked them up and sent her answers to "Dear Abelard," or
+"Pelleas," or "Philemon," or "Tristan," as the case demanded. She indited
+her missives with a dainty gold pen engraved with an orchid, which Harold
+had requested her never to profane by secular use.
+
+The correspondence, while throbbing with emotion, was not by any means
+devoid of practical details. Harold lost no opportunity of urging Eleanor
+to remain firm in her resolve to go to New York. It would be sheer folly,
+he pointed out, to give up the chance of a professional debut, a chance
+that might not come again in years. He pointed out that her grandfather
+had changed all his plans on the strength of her coming, and would be
+utterly heartbroken if she failed to keep her promise. He delicately
+intimated that her failure to take the part he had so laboriously written
+for her might seal the fate of "Phantom Love" and prove the downfall of
+both its creators.
+
+His conclusion to all these specious arguments was that the only way out
+of the tangle was for her to consent to a nominal engagement to him that
+would bind her to nothing, and yet would give him the right to send her
+to New York if Madam Bartlett refused to do so. In answer to Eleanor's
+doubts and misgivings, he assured her in polyphonic prose that he knew
+her far better than she knew herself, and that he would be "content to
+wait at the feet of little Galatea, asking nothing, giving all, until the
+happy day when she should wake to life and love and the consciousness
+that she was wholly and happily his."
+
+And Galatea read his letters with increasing ardor and slept with them
+under her pillow. It was all so secret and romantic, this glorious
+adventure rushing to fulfilment, under the prosy surface of everyday
+life. Of course she did not want to be married--not for ages and ages;
+but to be engaged, to be indefinitely adored by a consummate lover like
+Harold Phipps, who so beautifully shared her ambition, was an exciting
+and tempting proposition. Like most girls of her type, when her personal
+concerns became too complex for reason, she abandoned herself to impulse.
+She merely shut her eyes and allowed herself to drift toward a
+destination that was not of her choosing. Like a peripatetic Sleeping
+Beauty, she moved through the days in a sort of trance, waiting
+liberation from her thraldom, but fearing to put her fate to the test by
+laying the matter squarely and finally before her grandmother.
+
+It was easy enough to drop out of her old round of festivities. She had
+been away all summer, and new groups had formed with which she took no
+trouble to ally herself. Her friends seemed inordinately young and
+foolish. She wondered how she had ever endured the trivial chatter of
+Kitty Mason and the school-boy antics of Pink Bailey and Johnnie
+Rawlings. After declining half a dozen invitations she was left in peace,
+free to devote all her time to composing her letters, to poring over
+plays and books about the theater, or to sitting listless absorbed in
+day-dreams.
+
+The one old friend who refused to be disposed of was Quinby Graham. On
+one pretext or another he managed to come to the house almost every day,
+and he seldom left it without managing to see her. Sometimes when she was
+in the most arduous throes of composition, the maid would come to her
+door and say: "Mr. Quin's downstairs, and he says can you come to the
+steps a minute--he's got something to show you?" Or Miss Isobel would
+pause on the threshold to say: "Quinby is looking for you, Eleanor. I
+think it is something about a new tire for your automobile."
+
+And Eleanor would impatiently thrust her letter into a desk drawer and go
+downstairs, where she would invariably get so interested in what Quin had
+to say to her or to show her that she would forget to come up again.
+
+Sometimes they went out to Valley Mead together for week-ends. On those
+days Eleanor not only failed to write to Harold, but also failed to think
+about him. The excitement of seeing what new wonders had been wrought
+since the last visit, of scouring the woods for nuts and berries, of
+going on all-day picnics to a neighboring hill-top, made her quite forget
+her castles in the air. She descended from the clouds of art and under
+Quin's tutelage learned to fry chops and bacon and cook eggs in the open.
+She got her face and hands smudged and her hair tumbled, and she forgot
+all about enunciating clearly and holding her poses. So abandoned was she
+to what Harold called her "bourgeois mood" that she was conscious of
+nothing but the sheer joy of living.
+
+Often when she and Quin were alone together, she longed to take him into
+her confidence. She was desperately in need of counsel, and his level
+head and clear judgments had solved more than one problem for her. But
+she realized that, in spite of the heroic effort he was making to keep
+within bounds, he was nevertheless liable to overflow into sentiment with
+the slightest encouragement. Confession of her proposed flight, moreover,
+involved an explanation of her relation to Harold Phipps, and upon that
+point Quin could not be counted to sympathize.
+
+With the first of November came a letter that brought matters to a
+crisis. Claude Martel wrote that he must know immediately the date of her
+arrival in New York, since the place he had bespoken for her at the
+Kendall School of Expression could no longer be held open; he must also
+give a definite answer about the apartment.
+
+Eleanor received the letter one Saturday as she was starting to a tea.
+All afternoon she listened to the local chatter about her as a lark
+poised for flight might listen to the twittering of house sparrows. Her
+mind was in a ferment of elation and doubt, of trepidation and joyful
+anticipation. The moment she had longed for and yet dreaded was at hand.
+
+Returning across Central Park in the dusk, she rehearsed what she was
+going to say to her grandmother. The moment for approaching her had never
+seemed more propitious. Ever since she had accepted Quin's advice and
+"cottoned up" to the old lady, relations between them had been amazingly
+amicable. Her willingness to stay at home in the evening and take Miss
+Enid's place as official reader and amanuensis had placed her in high
+favor, and Madam, not to be outdone in magnanimity, had allowed her many
+privileges.
+
+Now that there seemed some ground for the hope that she might gain her
+grandmother's consent to the New York proposition, Eleanor realized how
+ardently she wanted it. It was not the money alone, it was her moral
+support and approval--hers and Aunt Isobel's. Aunt Enid would understand,
+had understood in a way; so would Uncle Ranny and Aunt Flo. As for Quin
+Graham----
+
+She heard a cough near by, and turning saw a couple sitting on a bench
+half hidden in the heavy shrubbery. Their backs were toward her, and she
+noticed that the girl's hand rested on the man's shoulder and that their
+heads were bent in intimate conversation. The next instant she recognized
+Rose Mattel's hat and the dim outline of Quin's troubled profile.
+
+Turning sharply to the right, she hurried up through the pergola and out
+into the avenue. She wondered why she was so unaccountably angry. Rose
+and Quin had a perfect right to sit in the square at twilight and talk as
+much as they liked. It was not her business, anyhow, she told herself;
+she ought to be glad for poor Rose to have any diversion she could get
+after being in that hideous store all day. She didn't blame Rose one bit.
+But if Quin thought as much of somebody else as he pretended to, she
+couldn't see what he would have to say to another girl out here in the
+park at twilight, especially a girl that he saw three times a day at
+home! Could there be anything between them? She had scorned the idea when
+it was once tentatively suggested to her by Harold Phipps. Of
+_course_ there couldn't. And yet----
+
+So preoccupied was she with these disturbing reflections that she almost
+forgot the real business in hand until she stood on her own doorstep
+waiting to be admitted.
+
+"Old Miss says for you to come up to her room the minute you git in,"
+Hannah said, with an ominous note in her voice.
+
+"What's the matter, Hannah? Uncle Ranny?"
+
+"Lord, no, honey! Mr. Ranny's behavin' himself like a angel. Hit was
+somethin' that come in the mail. Miss Isobel she don't know, and I don't
+know; but Old Miss certainly has got it in fer somebody."
+
+Eleanor's new-found confidence promptly deserted her, and she hastily
+took stock of her own shortcomings. Of course she was writing daily to
+Harold, but the matter of her private correspondence had been threshed
+out during the summer and she had emerged battered but victorious. Aside
+from that, she could think of no probable cause she had given for
+offense.
+
+In the hall she met Miss Isobel.
+
+"Mother has been asking for you, dear," she said in a voice heavy with
+premonition. "She's very much upset about something."
+
+Eleanor anxiously mounted the stairs. It was evidently not a propitious
+moment to present her case; and yet, Papa Claude must have an answer
+within twenty-four hours. At the door of Madam's room she hesitated. Then
+she took the small remnant of her courage in both hands and entered.
+
+Madam was sitting at her desk under the crystal chandelier, with a
+severity of expression that suggested nothing less than a court martial.
+Without speaking she waved Eleanor to a seat, and began searching through
+her papers. The light fell full on her high white pompadour and threw the
+deep lines about her grim mouth into heavy relief.
+
+"Do you remember," she began ponderously, "a check I gave you the day of
+Enid's wedding?"
+
+"Yes, grandmother."
+
+"Well, where is the bag you bought with it?"
+
+Evasion had so often been Eleanor's sole weapon of defense that she
+seized it now.
+
+"I--I haven't bought it yet," she faltered; then she added weakly: "I
+haven't seen any I particularly cared about."
+
+"You still have the money?"
+
+"Well--I've spent some of it."
+
+"How much?"
+
+"I don't know that I remember exactly."
+
+Madam's lip curled.
+
+"Perhaps I can stimulate your memory," she said, running her fingers
+through a bunch of canceled checks. "Here is the check I gave you,
+indorsed to Rose Martel."
+
+Eleanor flushed crimson. The imputation of untruthfulness was one to
+which she was particularly sensitive. Her fear of her grandmother had
+taught her early in life to take refuge in subterfuge, a shelter that she
+heartily despised but which she still clung to. In her desire to meet
+Rose's imperative need, she had passed her gift on to her, with the
+intention of saving enough from her own allowance to get the mesh bag
+later. The fact that the canceled check would be returned to her
+grandmother had never occurred to her.
+
+"So _that's_ where my money has been going!" cried Madam. "They've
+succeeded in working me through you, have they? Just as they succeeded in
+working Ranny through Quinby Graham."
+
+"No--no, grandmother! Please listen! They have never asked me for a
+penny. But when I found out the terrible time they'd been having, the
+children sick all summer and Cass down with typhoid--why, if it hadn't
+been for Quin----"
+
+"So they sponged on him too, did they? He's a bigger fool than I gave him
+credit for being."
+
+"But they _didn't_ sponge. He is Cass's best friend, and he was glad to
+help. He and Rose did all the nursing themselves."
+
+"Yes, I heard about it. In the house alone for six weeks. That doesn't
+speak very well for her reputation."
+
+"Grandmother! You've no right to say that! Rose may talk recklessly and
+do foolish things, but she wouldn't do anything wrong for the world."
+
+"Well, if she did, she wouldn't be the first member of her family to
+compromise a man so that he had to marry her."
+
+"What do you mean?" demanded Eleanor, quivering with indignation.
+
+"That's neither here nor there," said Madam. "There's enough rottenness
+in the present without raking up the past. But one thing is certain: if
+they ask you for money again----"
+
+"I tell you, they didn't ask me!"
+
+"Not in so many words, perhaps, but they worked on your sympathies. I
+know them! As for Claude Martel, he would want nothing better than have
+you traveling around in some Punch and Judy show. But I scotched that
+nonsense once and for all. As for their bleeding you for money,"--she
+rose and crushed the check in her hand,--"I guess I know a way to stop
+that."
+
+Eleanor rose too, and faced her. She was very pale now, her anger having
+reached a white heat.
+
+"My mother's people may be poor," she said deliberately, "but they aren't
+beggars, and at least they've come by what they have honestly."
+
+It was Madam's turn to flinch. A certain famous law-suit in the history
+of Bartlett & Bangs had brought out some startling testimony, and the
+subject was one to which reference was never allowed in Madam's presence.
+At Eleanor's words the whirlwind of her wrath let loose. Her words
+hurtled like flying missiles in a cyclone. She lashed herself into a
+fury, coming back to Eleanor again and again as the cause of all her
+trouble.
+
+"I tried giving you your head," she raged in conclusion; "I let you work
+through that crazy stage fever; I gave in about that man Phipps coming up
+to Maine, in the hope that you'd find out what a fool he is. That wasn't
+enough! You had to write to him. Very well, said I; go ahead and write to
+him. I flattered myself that you might develop a little sense. But I was
+mistaken. You haven't got the judgment of a ten-year-old child. Therefore
+I intend to treat you like a child. From this time on you are not to
+write to him at all. And you'll get no allowance. I'll buy you what you
+need, and you'll account for all the pin-money you spend, down to every
+postage stamp. Do you understand?"
+
+Eleanor was by this time at the door, standing with her hand on the knob,
+straight, pale, and defiant, but quivering in every limb. She felt as
+beaten, bruised, and humiliated as if the violence directed against her
+had been physical. A sick longing surged over her for Aunt Enid, into
+whose arms she could rush for comfort. But there was no Aunt Enid to turn
+to, and it was no use seeking Aunt Isobel, whose sole advice in such a
+crisis was to apologize and propitiate.
+
+Catching her breath in a long, sobbing sigh, Eleanor rushed down the
+gloomy hall and shut herself in her room. For ten minutes she sat at her
+desk, staring grimly at the wall, with her hands gripped in her lap. She
+was like a frenzied prisoner, determined to escape but with no
+destination in view. Suddenly her eyes fell on an unopened letter on her
+blotting-pad. She tore off the envelop and read it twice. For another
+five minutes she stared at the wall. Then she seized her pen and dashed
+off a note. It took but a few minutes after that to change her light gown
+for a dark one and to fling some things into a suit-case. Just as dinner
+was being announced, she slipped down the back stairs and out of the side
+door into the somber dusk of the November evening.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 24
+
+
+Quin's life at the factory these past three weeks had been full of new
+and engrossing business complications. Mr. Bangs seemed bent upon trying
+him out in various departments, each change bringing new and distracting
+duties. Just what was the object of the proceeding Quin had no idea; but
+he realized that he was being singled out and experimented with, and he
+applied to each new task the accumulated knowledge and experience of
+those that had gone before. It was all very exciting and gratifying to a
+person possessed of an inordinate ambition to have a worthy shrine ready
+the moment his goddess evinced the slightest willingness to occupy it.
+
+"Old Iron Jaw's got his optic on you for something," said Miss Leaks, the
+stenographer. "Maybe he wants you to pussy-foot around in Shields' shoes
+and do his dirty work for him."
+
+"Well, he's got another guess coming," said Quin; but her remark
+disturbed him. Of course it was no concern of his how the firm did
+business, but more than once he had been called upon to negotiate some
+delicate matter that was not at all to his liking.
+
+"See here, young man," Mr. Bangs said upon one of these occasions, "I am
+not paying you for advice. You are here to carry out my orders and to
+make no comments."
+
+"That's all right," Quin agreed good-naturedly; "but I got a conscience
+that was trained to stand on its hind legs and bark at a lie."
+
+"The quicker you muzzle it the better," said Mr. Bangs. "You can't do
+business these days by the Golden Rule."
+
+On the Saturday when Eleanor saw Quin in the park with Rose Martel, the
+factory had been in the throes of one of its most violent upheavals. Some
+weeks before the old steam engine had been replaced by an expensive
+electric drive. There had been much interest manifested in the
+installation of the modern motor, and Quin, with his natural love of
+machinery, had rejoiced that his duties as shipping clerk required him to
+be present at the unpacking. He and Dirk, the foreman, never tired of
+discussing the perfection of each particular feature. But a few days
+after the departure of the installation foreman, the new motor burnt out,
+necessitating the shutting down of the factory and causing much
+inconvenience.
+
+Dirk was beside himself with rage. He declared that something heavy had
+been dropped upon the armature winding, and he blamed every one who could
+have been responsible, and some who could not. In the midst of his tirade
+he was summoned to the office, where he was closeted for more than an
+hour with Mr. Bangs and Mr. Shields. When he emerged, it was with the
+avowed belief that the armature had been defective when received. This
+sudden change of front, taken in connection with the fact that the third
+payment was due on the motor in less than sixty days, set every tongue
+wagging.
+
+Quin was in no way involved in the transaction; but, as usual, he had an
+emphatic opinion, which he did not hesitate to express.
+
+"I don't know what's got into Dirk!" he said indignantly to Mr. Shields,
+the traffic manager, as they left the office together. "He knows the
+injury to the armature was done in our shop and that we are responsible
+for it."
+
+"I guess Dirk's like the rest of us," said Shields bitterly; "he knows a
+lot he can't tell."
+
+"What do you mean? Do you think it was a frame-up?"
+
+"Well, we don't call it that. But when the boss gets in a hole,
+somebody's got to pull him out. I'm getting mighty sick of it myself.
+Wish to the Lord I could pull up stakes as Mr. Bartlett and Mr. Chester
+did."
+
+It was not until they separated that Quin's thoughts left the disturbing
+events of the day and flew to something more pleasing. For two weeks now
+he had had to content himself with chance interviews with Eleanor, meager
+diet for a person with an omnivorous appetite; but to-night there was the
+prospect for a long, uninterrupted evening. Since the day of Miss Enid's
+wedding he had found her perplexed and absent-minded; but the fact that
+she always had a smile for him, and that nothing was seen or heard of
+Harold Phipps, sufficed to satisfy him.
+
+When he started across Central Park the sun was just setting, and he
+turned off the main path and dropped down on a bench to rest for a
+moment. He had acquired a taste for sunsets at a tender age, having
+watched them from many a steamer's prow. He knew how the harbor of
+Hongkong brimmed like a goblet of red wine, how Fujiyama's snow-capped
+peak turned rose, he knew how beautiful the sun could look through a
+barrage of fire. But it was of none of these that he thought as he sat on
+the park bench, his arms extended along the back, his long legs stretched
+out, and his eyes on a distant smokestack. He was thinking of a country
+stile and a girl in white and green, in whose limpid eyes he watched the
+reflected light of the most wonderful of all his sunsets.
+
+For the third time since leaving the office, he consulted his watch.
+Six-thirty! Another hour and a half must be got through before he could
+see her.
+
+A rustle of leaves behind him made him look up, but before he could turn
+his head two hands were clapped over his eyes. Investigation proved them
+to be feminine, and he promptly took them captive.
+
+"It's Rose?" he guessed.
+
+"Let me go!" she laughed; "somebody will see you."
+
+She slipped around the bench and dropped down beside him.
+
+"I was coming out the avenue and spied you mooning over here by yourself.
+What's the trouble?"
+
+"No trouble at all. Just stopped to get my wind a bit--and watch the
+sunset."
+
+"I think you are working too hard." She looked at him with anxious
+solicitude. "I've a good notion to put you on buttermilk again."
+
+"Good work! Put me on anything you like except dried peaches and
+wienies."
+
+"And you need more recreation," Rose persisted. "It's not good for
+anybody to work all day and go to school at night. What's the matter with
+us getting Cass and Fan Loomis and going down to Fontaine Ferry
+to-night?"
+
+"Can't do it," said Quin with ill-concealed pride. "Got a date with Miss
+Eleanor Bartlett."
+
+Rose sat silent for a moment, stirring the dead leaves with her shabby
+boot; then she turned and laid her hand on his shoulder.
+
+"Quin," she said, "I am worried sick about Nell and Harold Phipps."
+
+Quin, who had been trying to beguile a squirrel into believing that a
+pebble was a nut, looked up sharply.
+
+"What do you mean?" he said. "She hasn't seen him since last summer, and
+she never mentions his name."
+
+"_Don't_ she? She hardly talks about anything else. She writes to him all
+the time and wears his picture in her watch!"
+
+"Do you know that?"
+
+"Of course I know it. She can't talk about him at home, so she pours it
+all out to me."
+
+"But haven't you told her what you know about him?"
+
+"I've hinted at it, but she won't believe me because she knows I hate
+him. I wanted to tell her about what he said to me, and about that nurse
+he got into trouble out at the hospital; but I was afraid it might make
+an awful row and spoil everything for Papa Claude."
+
+"I don't care who it spoils things for! She's got to be told." Quin's
+eyes were blazing.
+
+"But perhaps if we leave it alone he'll get tired of her. They say he
+keeps after a girl until he gets her engaged to him, then drops her."
+
+"He'd never drop Miss Nell. No man would. He'd be trying to marry her."
+
+"But what can we _do?_ The more people talk about him, the more she's
+going to take up for him. That's Nell all over."
+
+"Couldn't Mr. Martel----"
+
+"Papa Claude's as much taken in as she is. You remember the night over
+home when he talked about his lovely detached soul? He never sees the
+truth about anybody."
+
+"Well, he's going to see the truth about this. If you don't write to him
+to-night and tell him the kind of man Mr. Phipps is, I will!"
+
+"Wait till to-morrow. I'll have another round with Nell. I've got some
+proof that I think she'll have to believe."
+
+Quin rose restlessly. He wanted to go to the Bartletts' at once, if only
+to stand guard at the gate against the danger that threatened Eleanor.
+
+"Aren't you coming home to supper?" asked Rose.
+
+"No," he said absently; "I don't want any supper."
+
+For an hour he paced the streets, trying to think things out. His burning
+desire was to go straight to Eleanor and lay the whole matter before her.
+But according to his ethics it was a poor sport who would discredit a
+rival, especially on hearsay. He must leave it to Rose, and let her
+furnish the proof she said she possessed.
+
+At eight o'clock he rang the Bartletts' bell, and was surprised when Miss
+Isobel opened the door.
+
+"She isn't here," she said in answer to his inquiry. "We cannot imagine
+what has become of her. She must have gone out just before dinner, and
+she has not returned."
+
+"Didn't she say where she was going?"
+
+"No." Miss Isobel's lips worked nervously; then she drew Quin into the
+dining-room and closed the door, "She and mother had a very serious
+misunderstanding, and--and I'm afraid mother was a little severe. I did
+not know Eleanor was gone until she failed to come down to dinner. I've
+just sent Hannah up to telephone my brother to see if she is there."
+
+"She probably is," Quin spoke with more assurance than he felt. "About
+what time did she leave here?"
+
+"It must have been between six-thirty and seven. How long would it take
+her to get out to Ranny's?"
+
+"Depends on whether she went in her machine or a street-car," said Quin
+evasively. "Besides, she may have gone to the Martels'."
+
+"I don't think so," said Miss Isobel, twisting her handkerchief in her
+slender fingers; "because, you see, she--she took her suit-case."
+
+For the first time, Quin's face reflected the anxiety of Miss Isobel's.
+
+When Hannah returned she reported that no one answered the telephone at
+the Randolph Bartletts'.
+
+"Suppose the child gets there and nobody is at home!" groaned Miss
+Isobel, whose imagination always rushed toward disaster. "What on earth
+shall I do?"
+
+"Leave it to me," said Quin. "I'll run around to the Martels', and if
+she's not there I'll go out to Valley Mead. She's sure to be one place or
+the other."
+
+"Of course she must be; but I'm so anxious! You will go right away, won't
+you? And telephone the minute you find out where she is. Then I'll tell
+mother I gave her permission to go."
+
+Miss Isobel pushed him toward the door as she spoke:
+
+"You--you don't think anything dreadful could have happened to her, do
+you?"
+
+Quin patted her shoulder reassuringly.
+
+"Of course not," he blustered. "She'll probably be in before I get around
+the corner. If not, I bet I find her at the Martels', toasting
+marshmallows."
+
+In spite of his assumed confidence, he ran every step of the way home. As
+he turned the corner he saw with dismay that the house was dark. His call
+in the front hall brought no answer. He turned on the light, and saw an
+unstamped letter addressed to himself on the table. The fact that the
+writing was Eleanor's did not tend to decrease his alarm.
+
+He tore off the envelop and read:
+
+    _Dear Quin:_
+
+    Grandmother has said things to me that I can never forgive as long as
+    I live. I am leaving her house in a few moments forever. By the time
+    you get this I shall be on my way to Chicago to join Harold Phipps.
+    We have been engaged for two weeks. I did not mean to marry him for
+    years and years, but I've simply _got_ to do something. He cares
+    more for me and my career than any one else in the world, and he
+    understands me better than anybody.
+
+    You'll get this when you go home to supper, and I want you to
+    telephone Aunt Isobel right away and tell her I won't be home
+    to-night. She will think I am with Rose and that will keep her from
+    being anxious. I don't care how anxious grandmother is! To-morrow
+    I'll send them a wire from Chicago telling them I'm married.
+
+    Dear Quin, I know this is a terribly serious step, and I know you
+    won't approve; but I am unhappy enough to die, and I don't know where
+    else to turn, or what to do. Some day I hope you will know Mr. Phipps
+    better, and see what a really fine man he is. Do try to comfort Aunt
+    Isobel, and make her understand. Please don't hate me, but try to
+    forgive your utterly miserable friend,
+
+    E. M. B.
+
+Quin stood staring at the letter. He felt as he had on that August day
+when the flying shrapnel struck him--the same intense nausea, the deadly
+exhaustion, the bursting pain in his head. Involuntarily he raised his
+hand to the old wound, half expecting to feel the blood stream again
+through his fingers.
+
+"Married! Married!" he kept repeating to himself dazedly. "Miss Nell gone
+to marry that man, that scoundrel!"
+
+He sat down on the stair steps and tried to hold the thought in his mind
+long enough to realize it. But Phipps himself kept getting in the way:
+Phipps the slacker, as he had known him in the army; Phipps the
+condescending lord of creation, who had refused to take his hand at Mr.
+Ranny's; and oftenest of all Phipps the philanderer, who had insulted
+Rose Mattel, and been responsible for the dismissal of more than one
+nurse from the hospital. The mere thought of such a man in connection
+with Eleanor Bartlett made Quin's strong fingers clench around an
+imaginary neck and brought beads of perspiration to his forehead.
+
+"Something's got to be done!" he thought wildly, staggering to his feet.
+"I got to stop it; I got----"
+
+Then the sense of his helplessness swept over him, and he sat down again
+on the steps. She had evidently left on the eight-o'clock train for
+Chicago, and it was now eight-thirty. There was nothing to be done. What
+a fool he had been to go on hoping and daring! She had told him again and
+again that she didn't care for him; but she had also told him that she
+did not intend to many anybody. But if she hadn't cared for him, why had
+she come to him with her troubles, and followed his advice, and wanted
+his good opinion? Why had she looked at him the way she had the day of
+Miss Enid's wedding, and said she remembered her dances with him better
+than those with anybody else? In bitterness of spirit he went over all
+the treasured words and glances he had hoarded since the day he met her.
+He didn't believe she loved Harold Phipps! She didn't love anybody--yet.
+But, in her mad desire to escape from home, she had taken the first means
+that presented itself. She had stepped into a trap, from which he was
+powerless to rescue her.
+
+In a sudden anguish of despair he flung himself face downward on the
+steps and gave way to his anguish. There was no one to see and no one to
+hear. All the doubts and discouragements, the humiliations and
+disappointments, through which he had passed to win her, came back to
+mock him, now he had lost her. The world had suddenly become an
+intolerable vacuum in which he gasped frantically for breath.
+
+What was the use in going on? Why not put an end to everything? He could
+make it appear an accident. Nobody would be the wiser. The temptation was
+growing stronger every second, when he suddenly remembered Miss Isobel.
+
+"I forgot she was waiting," he muttered, stumbling into the sitting-room
+and fumbling for the telephone. "Miss Nell said I was to keep her from
+being anxious--she wanted me to comfort her. But what in hell can I say!"
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 25
+
+
+At nine-thirty Edwin came in and passed up the creaking stairs. Ten
+minutes later Cass limped by the door, stopping a moment in the pantry to
+get a bite to eat. Quin sat motionless in the dark sitting-room and made
+no sign. He was waiting for Rose, with a dumb dependence the strongest
+man feels for the understanding feminine in times of crisis.
+
+When he heard her cheerful voice calling good night to Fan Loomis, the
+clock was just striking ten.
+
+"Quin! What is it?" she cried in alarm the moment she saw his face. "Is
+anybody dead?"
+
+"Worse! She's run away to get married!"
+
+"Not Myrna?"
+
+"No. Miss Nell. She left to-night for Chicago to marry Phipps!"
+
+"But she can't!" cried Rose wildly. "It's got to be stopped. He's not fit
+to marry anybody! We've got to stop her!"
+
+"I tell you, it's too late! She left on the eight-o'clock train."
+
+"Who said so? Are you sure? Do the Bartletts know?"
+
+"Nobody knows but you and me; nobody must know--yet. Maybe she'll change
+her mind."
+
+"But the Bartletts will miss her. Have they called up?"
+
+"I 'phoned Miss Isobel that she was all right and she'd telephone in the
+morning. All right! Good God, Rose, can't we do something?"
+
+"If I could get Harold Phipps's address I'd send him a telegram that
+would scare the wits out of him."
+
+Quin brushed the suggestion aside. "It's no use wasting time on him;
+we've got to reach her."
+
+"But how can we? Let me think. Do you suppose I could send her a telegram
+to be delivered on the train? _Anything_ that would make her wait until
+somebody could get to her."
+
+"I'll get to her," Quin cried. "I'll search every hotel in Chicago. You
+send the telegram and I'll start on the next train."
+
+A hurried consultation of time-tables showed that a Pennsylvania train
+left in ten minutes, and was due in Chicago the next morning at
+seven-thirty.
+
+"You can't make that," said Rose, but even as she spoke Quin was rushing
+for the door.
+
+"Have you got enough money?" she called after him.
+
+His meteor flight was checked. Ramming his hands in his pockets, he
+pulled out a handful of silver.
+
+"Wait!" cried Rose, speeding up to her room and returning with a small
+roll of bills. "It's what's left of Nell's check. Good-by--I'll send the
+telegram."
+
+Ten minutes later, as the night express for Chicago pulled out of the
+station, the bystanders were amused by the sight of a bare-headed young
+man dashing madly through the gate and across the railroad tracks. The
+train had not yet got under way, but its speed was increasing and the
+runner's chances lessened every moment.
+
+"He'll never catch it," said the gate-keeper. "He'd lost his wind before
+he got here."
+
+"He ain't lost his nerve," said a negro porter, craning his neck in
+lively interest. "He's lettin' hisself go lak a Derby-winner on de home
+stretch!"
+
+"Has he give up?" asked the gate-keeper, turning aside to stamp a ticket.
+
+"Not him. He's bound to ketch dat train ef it busts a hamstring. He's
+done got holt de rear platform! He's pullin' hisself up! There! I tole
+you so! I knowed he was the kind of fellow that gits what he goes after."
+
+Quin caught the train, but he paid for his run. A brakeman found him
+collapsed on the platform, in such a paroxysm of coughing that the train
+had covered many miles before he was sufficiently recovered to go inside
+and take a seat. But, even as he leaned back limp and exhausted, he was
+conscious of a dull satisfaction that he was traveling toward Eleanor. He
+refused to think of the absurdity of his wild quest, of her probable
+anger at his interference. He fought back his despair, his jealousy, his
+inordinate fear. The one thing necessary now was to get to her--to be on
+hand in case she needed him.
+
+Through the interminable hours of the night almost every breath came with
+an effort, but he scarcely heeded the fact. With characteristic
+persistence he forced himself to follow her steps in imagination from the
+time she left home until she reached her destination. The eight-o'clock
+sleeper that she had taken was due in Chicago at five-thirty. She would
+probably not leave it before seven at the earliest, and by that time
+Rose's telegram ought to have reached her. He tried to picture its effect
+on her. Much would depend upon the time that intervened between its
+reception and her seeing Mr. Phipps. If he met her, as he probably would,
+he would sweep aside all her doubts. If, on the other hand, Eleanor had
+time to think the matter over, her innate common sense might make her
+wait at least until she heard what Rose had to tell her. On the bare
+chance of his not meeting her, what would she do? Take the next train
+home? Go to his apartment? Go to a hotel alone?
+
+Plan after plan rushed through Quin's mind, only to be impatiently
+discarded. He sat tense and still, with his clenched hands rammed in his
+pockets and his eyes fixed on the black square of the window. Sometimes
+dim objects flew past, and now and then sharp, vivid lights stabbed the
+darkness. Once the smelting-pots of a huge iron foundry belched forth a
+circle of swirling flames, and for a moment wrenched his mind off his
+problems. Then the regular pounding of the wheels on the rails recalled
+him.
+
+"She's gone to be married. Gone--to be married. Gone--to be married."
+
+He realized that they had been saying it in monotonous rhythm ever since
+he started--that they would go on saying it through eternity.
+
+Suddenly the train jarred to a standstill. Figures with lanterns emerged
+through a cloud of steam and stood under his window.
+
+"Guess we got a hot-box," said a sleepy passenger across the aisle. "That
+means I'll miss my connection."
+
+Quin got up and went out on the platform. He was filled with rage at the
+lazy deliberation with which the men set about their task. He longed to
+wrench the tools out of their hands and do the job himself.
+
+"How much will this put us behind?" he demanded of the conductor.
+
+"Oh, not more than twenty minutes. We'll make some of it up before
+morning."
+
+Once more under way, Quin dropped into a troubled sleep. He dreamed that
+he was pursuing a Hun over miles of barbed-wire entanglements; but when
+he overtook him and forced him to the ground, the face under the steel
+helmet was the smiling, supercilious face of Harold Phipps. He woke up
+with a start and stretched his cold limbs. The black square of the window
+had turned to gray; arrows of rain shot diagonally across it. He realized
+for the first time that he had neither hat nor overcoat, but he did not
+care. In ten minutes more he would be in Chicago, in the same city with
+Eleanor.
+
+Notwithstanding the fact that it was pouring rain when the train pulled
+into the station, Quin stood on the lowest step of the platform, ready to
+alight.
+
+"Say, young fellow, you forgot your hat," said a man behind him.
+
+"Didn't have any," answered Quin.
+
+"I got an extra cap if you want it," offered the man obligingly.
+
+Quin, already on the platform, caught it as the man tossed it out to him.
+Dashing through the depot, he hurled himself into a taxi.
+
+"Monon Station!" he shouted, "and drive like the devil."
+
+Just what kind of chauffeur the devil is has never been demonstrated, but
+if that taxi-driver, urged on by Quin, was his counterpart, it is safe to
+infer that there are no traffic laws in Hades. In spite of the fact that
+the streets were like glass from the driving rain, and the wind-shield a
+gray blur, in spite of the fact that a tire went flat on a rear wheel,
+that decrepit old taxi rose to the occasion and made the transit in
+record time.
+
+Arrived at the station, Quin thrust a bill into the driver's hand and
+dashed down the steps to the lower level. In answer to his frenzied
+inquiry he was told that the Express had come in two hours before and
+that the passengers had probably all left the sleeper by this time.
+
+Nothing daunted, he rushed out to the tracks and accosted a porter who
+was sweeping out the rear coach.
+
+"Yas, sir, this is it," answered the negro. "Young lady? Yas, sir; there
+was five or six of 'em on board last night. Pretty? Yas, sir, they was
+all pretty--all but one, and she wasn't so bad looking."
+
+"Did one of them get a telegram in the night or this morning?"
+
+The porter's face brightened. "Yas, sir. Boy come through soon as we got
+in. Had a wire for young lady in lower six."
+
+"Do you know what time she left the car?"
+
+"About half hour ago, I should say. Party she was expecting to meet her
+didn't turn up, and I had to git her a red-cap to carry her suit-case.
+Thanky, sir."
+
+Quin tore back to the station and dashed through the waiting-room, the
+dining-room, the baggage-room. He was on the point of going out to the
+taxi-stand and interrogating each driver in turn, when his eyes were
+caught by a smart suit-case that lay unattended on one of the seats. It
+bore the inscription "E.M.B.--Ky."
+
+In his sudden relief he could have snatched it up and embraced it. But
+where was Eleanor? For five interminable minutes he stood guard over her
+property, watching every exit and entrance, and pacing the floor in his
+impatience. Suddenly an idea occurred to him, and, cursing himself for
+his stupidity, he strode over to the telephone-booths.
+
+Eleanor was in the corner one, the receiver at her ear, evidently waiting
+for her call. As Quin flung upon the door she turned and faced him in
+defiant surprise.
+
+"What are you doing here?" she demanded indignantly. "Did grandmother
+send you?"
+
+"No; she doesn't know I'm here."
+
+Eleanor turned nervously to the telephone.
+
+"Hello! I can't understand you. Put--what? Oh! I forgot. Wait a
+minute----"
+
+Letting the receiver swing, she fumbled in her purse; then, finding no
+small change, looked appealingly at Quin.
+
+He produced the necessary coin and handed it to her.
+
+"I don't think I'd put it in just yet," he said quietly.
+
+For a moment she paused irresolute; then she dropped the coin in the
+slot.
+
+"Is this the Hotel Kington?" she asked. "Will you please try again to get
+Mr. Phipps--Harold Phipps? P-h-i-p-p-s."
+
+Quin watched her fingers drumming on the shelf, and he knew he ought to
+go out of the booth and close the door; but instead he stayed in and
+closed it.
+
+"He doesn't answer?" Eleanor was repeating over the telephone. "Will you
+please page the dining-room, and if he is not at breakfast send a
+bell-boy up to waken him? It's _very_ important."
+
+Again there was a long wait, during which Eleanor did not so much as turn
+her head in Quin's direction. It was only when her answer came that she
+looked at him blankly.
+
+"They say he isn't there. The chambermaid was cleaning the room, and said
+his bed had not been disturbed."
+
+Then, seeing a humorously unsympathetic look flit across Quin's face, she
+burst out angrily:
+
+"What right had you to follow me over here?"
+
+They were standing very close in the narrow glass enclosure, and as he
+looked down at the small, trembling figure with her back against the wall
+and her eyes full of frightened defiance, he felt uncomfortably like a
+hunter who has run down some young wild thing and holds it at bay.
+
+"Please, Miss Nell," he implored, "don't think I'm going to peach on you!
+Whatever you do, I'll stand by you. Only I thought, perhaps, you might
+need a friend."
+
+"I _have_ a friend!" she retorted furiously. "If Harold Phipps had
+received my telegram last night, nothing in the world could have stopped
+him from meeting me--nothing!"
+
+Then the defiance dropped from her eyes, leaving her small sensitive face
+quivering with hurt pride and an overwhelming doubt. She bit her lips and
+turned away to hide her tears.
+
+Quin put a firm hand on her arm and piloted her back to her suit-case.
+
+"What we both need is breakfast," he said. "Come to think of it, I
+haven't had a mouthful since yesterday noon."
+
+"Neither have I; but I couldn't swallow a bite. Besides, I've got to find
+Harold."
+
+"Well, you can't do anything till he gets back to the hotel. If you'll
+come in with me while I get a cup of coffee, we can talk things over."
+
+She followed him reluctantly into the dining-room, but refused to order
+anything. For some time she sat with her chin on her clasped hands,
+watching the door; then she turned toward him accusingly.
+
+"Did you see Rose's telegram?"
+
+"No."
+
+He watched her open her purse and take out a yellow slip, which she
+handed to him.
+
+    "Don't take the step planned. Imperative reasons forbid. Rose."
+
+he read slowly; then he looked up. "Well?" he said.
+
+"What does she mean?" burst forth Eleanor. "How dared she send me a
+message like that unless she knew something----"
+
+She broke off abruptly and her eyes searched Quin's face. But he was
+apparently counting the grains of sugar that were going into his coffee,
+and refused to look up.
+
+"If it had been grandmother or Aunt Isobel I shouldn't have been in the
+least surprised; they are just a bunch of prejudices and believe every
+idle story they hear. But Rose is different. She's known about Harold and
+me for months. She forwarded his letters to me when I was in Baltimore.
+And now for her to turn against me like this----"
+
+"Why don't you wait till you hear her side of it?" suggested Quin, still
+concerned with the sugar-bowl.
+
+"How can I?" cried Eleanor, flinging out her hands. "I've no place to go,
+and I've no money. If I had had money enough I'd have gone straight to
+Papa Claude last night."
+
+Quin's heart gained a beat. He made a hurried calculation of his
+financial resources in the vain hope that that might yet be the solution
+of the difficulty. Whatever was to be done must be done at once, for
+Harold Phipps might arrive at any moment, and Quin felt instinctively
+that his advent would decide the matter.
+
+"I wish I had enough to send you," he said, "but all I've got is my
+return ticket and enough to buy another one for you."
+
+At the mere suggestion Eleanor's anger flared.
+
+"I'll never go back to grandmother's! I'll jump in the lake first!"
+
+"What's the matter with Valley Mead?"
+
+"What good would that do? Grandmother would make Uncle Ranny send me
+straight home. No; I've thought of all those things--it's no use."
+
+"You could go to the Martels'."
+
+"Yes, and put another burden on Cass. I tell you, I'm not going home. I
+am going to see Harold, and--and talk things over, and perhaps go
+straight on to New York to-night."
+
+"You can't see him if he is out of town."
+
+"Why do you think he is out of town?"
+
+"Well, he isn't here," Quin observed dryly.
+
+The next moment he was sorry he had said it, for the light died out of
+her face and she looked so absurdly young and helpless that it was all he
+could do to refrain from gathering her up in his arms and carrying her
+home by force.
+
+"See here, Miss Nell," he said earnestly, leaning across the table.
+"Would you be willing to go back to the Martels' if you knew that this
+time next month you'd be in New York with money enough to carry you
+through the winter?"
+
+"No. That is--whose money?"
+
+"Your own. I'll go to Queen Vic and put the whole thing up to her so she
+can't get around it."
+
+Eleanor brushed the suggestion aside impatiently.
+
+"Don't you suppose I've exhausted every possible argument? And now, when
+she finds out what I've done----"
+
+"But you haven't done anything--yet."
+
+"She wouldn't believe me if I told her that I hadn't seen Harold. She
+never believes me."
+
+"She'd believe _me_," said Quin, "and what's more she'd listen to me."
+
+Eleanor did not answer; she sat doggedly watching the swinging doors,
+through which a draggled throng came and went.
+
+"He'll be here soon," she said half-heartedly--"unless he's gone off for
+a week-end somewhere. If he doesn't come soon we can go up to the hotel
+and find out whether he left any address. Perhaps you could get me a room
+there until to-morrow."
+
+Quin's courage was at its lowest ebb. It was like trying to save a
+drowning person who fights desperately against being saved. He heard a
+stentorian voice through a megaphone announcing that the eight-thirty
+train for the southwest would leave in five minutes on track three, and
+he decided to stake his all on a last chance.
+
+"That's my train," he said, rising briskly. "Are you coming with me, or
+are you going to stay here?"
+
+"I am going to stay. But you can't leave me like this! It's pouring rain
+and I haven't any umbrella, and if I get to the hotel and he isn't there,
+what shall I do? Why don't you help me, Quin? Why don't you stay with me
+till he comes?"
+
+"Sorry," said Quin, steeling his heart against those appealing eyes and
+praying for strength to be firm, "but I've got to be ready to go back to
+work to-morrow morning. Is it good-by?"
+
+He held out his hand, but she did not take it. Instead she clutched his
+sleeve.
+
+"What would _you_ do, Quin?" she asked. "Tell me honestly, not what you
+want me to do, or think I ought to do, but what would you do in my
+place?"
+
+In spite of his pretended haste, he stopped to consider the matter.
+
+"Well," he admitted frankly, "it would depend entirely on how much I
+trusted the fellow I'd promised to marry."
+
+"I _do_ trust him, and I'm going to marry him; but, you see, Rose's
+telegram, and his not being here, and all, have made me so unhappy! I
+know he can explain everything when I see him, only I don't know what to
+do now. Do you think I ought to go back?"
+
+"That's for you to decide."
+
+"But I tell you I can't decide. Somebody's always made up my mind for me,
+and now to have to decide this big thing all in a minute----"
+
+"All aboard for the Southwestern Limited!" came the voice through the
+megaphone.
+
+Eleanor glanced instinctively at her suit-case, then up at Quin.
+
+"Shall I take it?" he asked, with his heart in his throat; and then, when
+she did not say no, he seized it in one hand and her in the other.
+
+"We'd better run for it!" he said.
+
+"But, Quin--wait a minute--I won't go to grandmother's! You've got to
+protect me----"
+
+"You leave it to me!" he said, as he thrust her almost roughly through
+the crowd and rushed her toward the gate.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 26
+
+
+"So I am to understand that the young lady defies my authority and
+refuses point-blank to come home."
+
+"That's about what it comes to, I reckon."
+
+It was evening of that eventful Sunday when Eleanor and Quin had returned
+from Chicago. He and Madam Bartlett sat facing each other in the
+sepulchral library, where the green reading-light cast its sickly light
+on Lincoln and his Cabinet, on Andrew Jackson dying in the bosom of his
+family, on Madam savagely gripping the lions' heads on the arms of her
+mahogany chair.
+
+That her quarrel with Eleanor and the girl's subsequent flight had made
+the old lady suffer was evinced by the pinched look of her nostrils and
+the heavy, sagging lines about her mouth; but in her grim old eyes there
+was no sign of compromise.
+
+"Very well!" she said. "Let her stay at her precious Martels'. She will
+stand just about one week of their shiftlessness. I shan't send her a
+stitch of clothes or a cent of money. Maybe I can starve some sense into
+her."
+
+Quin traced the pattern in the table-cover with a massive brass
+paper-knife. It was a delicate business, this he had committed himself
+to, and everything depended upon his keeping Madam's confidence.
+
+"You never did try letting her have her head, did you?" He put the
+question as a disinterested observer.
+
+"No. I don't intend to until she gets this fool stage business out of her
+mind."
+
+"Well, of course you can hold that up for six months, but you can't stop
+it in the end."
+
+"Yes, I can, too. I'd like to know if I didn't keep Isobel from being a
+missionary, and Enid from marrying Francis Chester when he didn't make
+enough money to pay her carfare."
+
+"That's so," agreed Quin cheerfully. "And then, there was Mr. Ranny." He
+waited for the remark to sink in; then he went on lightly: "But say! They
+all belong to another generation. Things are run on different lines these
+days."
+
+"More's the pity! Every little fool of a kite thinks all it has to do is
+to break its string to be free."
+
+"Miss Nell don't want to break the string; she just wants it lengthened."
+
+Madam turned upon him fiercely.
+
+"See here, young man. You think I don't know what you are up to; but,
+remember, I wasn't born yesterday. If Eleanor has sent you up here to
+talk this New York stuff----"
+
+"She hasn't; I came of my own accord."
+
+"Well, you needn't think just because I've shown you a few favors that
+you can meddle in family affairs. It's not the first time you've attended
+to other people's business."
+
+Her fingers were working nervously and her eyes beginning to twitch. She
+made Quin think of Minerva when Mr. Bangs came into the office.
+
+"I bet there's one time you are glad I meddled," he said with easy good
+humor. "You might have been walking on a peg-stick, Queen Vic, if I
+hadn't butted in. Do you have to use your crutches now?"
+
+"Crutches! I should say not. I don't even use a cane. See here!"
+
+She rose and, steadying herself, walked slowly and painfully to the door
+and back.
+
+"Bully for you!" said Quin, helping her back into the chair. "Now what
+were we talking about?"
+
+"You were trying to hold a brief for Eleanor."
+
+"So I was. You see, I had an idea that if you'd let me put the case up to
+you fair and square, maybe you'd see it in a different light."
+
+"Well, that's where you were mistaken."
+
+"How do you know? You haven't listened to me yet!"
+
+Madam glared at him grimly.
+
+"Go ahead," he said. "Get it out of your system."
+
+"Well, it's like this," Quin plunged into his subject. "Next July Miss
+Nell will be of age and have her own money to do as she likes with, won't
+she?"
+
+"She won't have much," interpolated Madam. "Twenty thousand won't take
+her far."
+
+"It will take her to New York and let her live pretty fine for two or
+three years. Everybody will cotton up to her and flatter her and make her
+think she's a second Julia Marlowe, and meantime they'll be helping her
+spend her money. Now, my plan is this. Why don't you give her just barely
+enough to live on, and let her try it out on the seamy side for the next
+six months? Nobody will know who she is or what's coming to her, and
+maybe when she comes up against the real thing she won't be so keen about
+it."
+
+Madam followed him closely, and for a moment it looked as if the common
+sense of his argument appealed to her. Then her face set like a vise.
+
+"No!" she thundered her decision. "It would be nothing less than handing
+her over bodily to that pompous old biped Claude Martel! For the next six
+months she has got to stay right here, where I can know what she is doing
+and where she is!"
+
+"Do you know where she was last night?" Quin played his last trump.
+
+She shot a suspicious look at him from under her shaggy brows.
+
+"You said she was at the Martels'."
+
+"I did not. I said she was all right and you'd hear from her to-day."
+
+"Where was she?"
+
+"She was on the way to Chicago to join Mr. Phipps."
+
+He could not have aimed his blow more accurately. Its effect was so
+appalling that he feared the consequences. Her face blanched to an ashy
+white and her eyes were fixed with terror.
+
+"She--she--hasn't married him?" she cried hoarsely.
+
+"No, no; not yet. But she may any time."
+
+"Good Lord! Why haven't you told me this before? Call Isobel! No! she's
+at church! Get Ranny! Somebody must go after the child!"
+
+Quin laid a quieting hand on her arm, which was shaking as if with the
+palsy.
+
+"Don't get excited," he urged. "Somebody did go after her last night, and
+brought her home."
+
+"But where is she now? Where is that contemptible Phipps? I'll have him
+arrested! Are you sure Nellie is safe?"
+
+"I left her safe and sound at the Martels' half an hour ago. Will you
+listen while I tell you all about it?"
+
+As quietly as he could he told the story, interrupted again and again by
+Madam's hysterical outbursts. When he had finished she struggled to her
+feet.
+
+"The child is stark mad!" she cried. "I am going after her this instant."
+
+"She won't see you," warned Quin.
+
+"I'll show you whether she sees me or not! I am going to bring her home
+with me to-night. She's got to be protected against that scoundrel. Ring
+for the carriage!"
+
+Quin did not move. "She said if any of you started after her you'd find
+her gone when you got there."
+
+"But who will tell her?"
+
+"I will. I promised she wouldn't have to see you. It was the only way I
+could get her back from Chicago."
+
+She scowled at him in silence, measuring his determination against her
+own.
+
+"Very well," she said at last. "Since you are in such high favor, go and
+tell her that she can come home, and nothing more will be said about it.
+I suppose there's nothing else to do under the circumstances. But I'll
+teach her a lesson later!"
+
+Quin balanced the paper-knife carefully on one finger.
+
+"I don't think you quite understand," he said. "She isn't coming home.
+She still says she is going to marry Mr. Phipps. He will probably get her
+telegram when he goes to the hotel, and when she doesn't turn up in
+Chicago he will take the first train down here. That's the way I've
+figured it out."
+
+"And do you think I am going to sit here, and do nothing while all this
+is taking place?"
+
+"No; that's what I been driving at all along. I want you and Miss Nell to
+come to some compromise before he gets here."
+
+"What sort of compromise? Haven't I swallowed my pride and promised to
+say nothing if she comes back? Does she want me to get down on my knees
+and apologize?"
+
+"No. That's the trouble. She don't want you to do anything. All she is
+thinking about is getting married and going to New York."
+
+"She can go to New York without that! That contemptible man! I knew all
+summer he was filling her head with romantic notions, but I never dreamed
+of this. Why, she's nothing but a child! She doesn't know what love
+is----" Then her voice broke in sudden panic. "We must stop it at any
+cost. Go--go promise her anything. Tell her I'll send her to New York, to
+Europe, anywhere to get her out of that wretch's clutches. My poor child!
+My poor baby!"
+
+Her grief was no less violent than her anger had been, and her tearless
+sobs almost shook her worn old frame to pieces.
+
+Quin knew just how she felt. It had been like that with him last night
+when he heard the news. With one stride he was beside her and had
+gathered her into his arms.
+
+"There, there!" he said tenderly. "It's going to be all right. We are
+going to find a way out."
+
+This unexpected caress, probably the first one Madam had received in many
+years, reduced her to a state of unprecedented humility. She transferred
+her resentment from Eleanor to Harold Phipps, and announced herself ready
+to follow whatever course Quin suggested.
+
+"I'd offer her just this and nothing more," he advised: "The fare to New
+York, tuition at the dramatic school, and ten dollars a week."
+
+"She can't live on that."
+
+"Yes, she can. Rose Martel does."
+
+Madam became truculent at once.
+
+"Don't quote that girl to me. Eleanor's been used to very different
+surroundings."
+
+"That's the point. Let her have what she hasn't been used to. You have
+tried giving her a bunch of your money and telling her how to spend it.
+Try giving her a little of her own and letting her do as she likes with
+it."
+
+"I don't care what she does for the present, if she just won't marry that
+man Phipps. Make her give you her word of honor not to have anything
+whatever to do with him for the next six months. By that time she will
+have forgotten all about him."
+
+"I'll do my best," said Quin, rising. "You'll hear from me first thing in
+the morning."
+
+"Well, go now! But ring first for Hannah. We must pack the child's things
+to-night. The main thing is to get her out of town before that hound can
+get here. Don't you think either Ranny or Isobel had better take her on
+to New York to-morrow?"
+
+Quin returned to the Martels' breathing easily for the first time in
+twenty-four hours. As he passed Rose's room on the way to his own, he saw
+a light over the transom, and heard the girls' voices rising in heated
+argument. He knew that the subject under discussion was Harold Phipps,
+and that Rose's arraignment was meeting with indignant denial and
+protest. But the fact that Rose could offer specific evidence that would
+shake the staunchest confidence gave him grim satisfaction.
+
+He stumbled into his own small room, and lay across the bed looking up at
+the shadows made by the street lamp on the ceiling. Would Miss Nell
+believe what she heard? Would it go very hard with her? Would she give
+Phipps up? Would she accept Madam's offer? And, if she did, would she
+ever be willing to come home again?
+
+Then his thoughts swerved away from all those perplexing questions and
+went racing back over the events of the day. For nine blissful hours he
+had had Eleanor all to himself. They had taken a day-coach to avoid
+meeting any one she knew, and he had managed to secure a rear seat, out
+of the range of curious eyes. Here she had poured out all her troubles,
+allowing the accumulated bitterness of years to find vent in a torrent of
+unrestrained confidence.
+
+She recalled the days of her unhappy childhood, when she had been fought
+over and litigated about and contended for, until the whole world seemed
+a place of hideous discord and petty jealousies. She pictured her
+circumscribed life at the Bartletts', shut in, watched over, smothered
+with care and affection, but never allowed an hour of freedom. She dwelt
+on the increasing tyranny of her grandmother, the objection to her
+friends, the ruthless handling of several prospective lovers. And she
+ended by telling him all about her affair with Harold Phipps, and
+declaring that nothing they could say or do would make her give him up!
+And then, quite worn out, she had fallen asleep and her head had drooped
+against his shoulder.
+
+Quin could feel now the delicious weight of her limp body as she leaned
+against him. He had sat so still, in his fear of waking her, that his arm
+had been numb for an hour. Then, later on, when she did wake up, he had
+got her some cold water to bathe her face, and persuaded her to eat a
+sandwich and drink a glass of milk. After that she had felt much better,
+and even cheered up enough to laugh at the way he looked in the queer cap
+the obliging stranger had given him.
+
+"I could make her happy! I know I could make her happy!" he whispered
+passionately to the shadows on the ceiling. "She don't love me now; but
+maybe when she gets over this----"
+
+His thoughts leaped to the future. He must be ready if the time ever
+came. He must forge ahead in the next six months, and be in a position by
+the time Eleanor had tried out her experiment to put his fate to the
+test. He must make up to old Bangs, and stop criticizing his methods and
+saying things that annoyed him. He must sacrifice everything now to the
+one great object of pleasing him. Pleasing him meant advancement;
+advancement meant success; success might mean Eleanor!
+
+He got up restlessly and tiptoed to the door. The light over Rose's
+transom was gone and the house was silent.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 27
+
+
+Eleanor did not leave for New York the following day. Neither did she see
+Harold Phipps when he arrived on the morning train. His anxious inquiries
+over the telephone were met by Rose's cool assurance that Miss Bartlett
+was spending the week-end with her, and that she would write and explain
+her silly telegram. His demand for an immediate interview was parried
+with the excuse that Miss Bartlett was confined to her bed with a severe
+headache and could not see any one. Without saying so directly, Rose
+managed to convey the impression that Miss Bartlett was quite indifferent
+to his presence in the city and not at all sure that she would be able to
+see him at all.
+
+This was an interpretation of the situation decidedly more liberal than
+the facts warranted. Even after Eleanor had been served with the
+unpalatable truth, generously garnished with unpleasant gossip, she still
+clung to her belief in Harold and the conviction that he would be able to
+explain everything when she saw him. Quin's report of Madam's offer to
+send her to New York was received in noncommittal silence. She would
+agree to nothing, she declared, until she saw Harold, her only concession
+being that she would stay in bed until the afternoon and not see him
+before evening.
+
+About noon a messenger-boy brought her a box of flowers and a bulky
+letter. The latter had evidently been written immediately after Harold's
+talk with Rose, and he made the fatal mistake of concluding, from her
+remarks, that Eleanor had changed her mind after sending the telegram and
+had not come to Chicago. He therefore gave free rein to his imagination,
+describing in burning rhetoric how he had received her message Saturday
+night just as he was retiring, how he tossed impatiently on his bed all
+night, and rose at dawn to be at the station when the train came in. He
+pictured vividly his ecstasy of expectation, his futile search, his
+bitter disappointment. He had dropped everything, he declared, to take
+the next train to Kentucky to find out what had changed her plans, and to
+persuade her to be married at once and return with him to Chicago. The
+epistle ended with a love rhapsody that deserved a better fate than to be
+torn into shreds and consigned to the waste-basket.
+
+"Tell the boy not to wait!" was Eleanor's furious instruction. "Tell him
+there's no answer now or ever!"
+
+Then she pitched the flowers after the note, locked her door, and refused
+to admit any one for the rest of the day.
+
+After that her one desire was to get away. She felt utterly humiliated,
+disillusioned, disgraced, and her sole hope for peace lay in the further
+humiliation of accepting Madam's offer and trying to go on with her work.
+But even here she met an obstacle. A letter arrived from Papa Claude,
+saying that he would not be able to get possession of the little
+apartment until December first, a delay that necessitated Eleanor's
+remaining with the Martels for another month.
+
+The situation was a delicate and a difficult one. Eleanor was more than
+willing to forgo the luxuries to which she had been accustomed and was
+even willing to share Rose's untidy bedroom; but the knowledge that she
+was adding another weight to Cass's already heavy burden was intolerable
+to her. To make things worse, she was besieged with notes and visits and
+telephone calls from various emissaries sent out by her grandmother.
+
+"I'll go perfectly crazy if they don't leave me alone!" she declared one
+night to Quin. "They act as if studying for the stage were the wickedest
+thing in the world. Aunt Isobel was here all morning, harping on my
+immortal soul until I almost hoped I didn't have one. This afternoon Aunt
+Flo came and warned me against getting professional notions in my head,
+and talked about my social position, and what a blow it would be to the
+family. Then, to cap the climax, Uncle Ranny had the nerve to telephone
+and urge me against taking any step that would break my grandmother's
+heart. Uncle Ranny! Can you beat that?"
+
+"I'd chuck the whole bunch for a while," was Quin's advice. "Why don't
+you let their standards go to gallagher and live up to your own?"
+
+"That's what I want to do, Quin," she said earnestly. "My standards are
+just as good as theirs, every bit. I've got terrifically high ideals.
+Nobody knows how serious I feel about the whole thing. It isn't just a
+silly whim, as grandmother thinks; it's the one thing in the world I care
+about--now."
+
+Quin started to speak, reconsidered it, and whistled softly instead. He
+had formed a Spartan resolve to put aside his own claims for the present,
+and be in word and deed that "best friend" to whom he had urged Eleanor
+to come in time of trouble. With heroic self-control, he set himself to
+meet her problems, even going so far as to encourage her spirit of
+independence and to help her build air-castles that at present were her
+only refuge from despair.
+
+"Just think of all the wonderful things I can do if I succeed," she said.
+"Papa Claude need never take another pupil, and Myrna can go to college,
+and Cass and Fan Loomis can get married."
+
+"And don't forget Rose," suggested Quin, to keep up the interest. "You
+must do something handsome for her. She's a great girl, Rose is!"
+
+Eleanor looked at him curiously, and the smallest of puckers appeared
+between her perfectly arched brows. Quin saw it at once, and decided that
+Rose's recent handling of Mr. Phipps had met with disfavor, and he sighed
+as he thought of the hold the older man still had on Eleanor.
+
+During the next difficult weeks Quin devoted all his spare time to the
+grateful occupation of diverting the Martels' woe-begone little guest.
+Hardly a day passed that he did not suggest some excursion that would
+divert her without bringing her into contact with her own social world,
+from which she shrank with aversion. On Sundays and half-holidays he took
+her on long trolley rides to queer out-of-the-way places where she had
+never been before: to Zachary Taylor's grave, and George Rogers Clark's
+birthplace, to the venerable tree in Iroquois Park that bore the carved
+inscription, "D. Boone, 1735." One Sunday morning they went to Shawnee
+Park and rented a rowboat, in which they followed the windings of the
+Ohio River below the falls, and had innumerable adventures that kept them
+out until sundown.
+
+Eleanor had never before had so much liberty. She came and went as she
+pleased; and if she missed a meal the explanation that she was out with
+Quin was sufficient. Sometimes when the weather was good she would walk
+over to Central Park and meet him when he came home in the evening. They
+would sit under the bare trees and talk, or look over the books he had
+brought her from the library.
+
+At first she had found his selections a tame substitute for her recent
+highly spiced literary diet; but before long she began to take a languid
+interest in them. They invariably had to do with outdoor things--stars
+and flowers, birds and beasts, and adventures in foreign lands.
+
+"Here's a jim-dandy!" Quin would say enthusiastically. "It's all about
+bees. I can't pronounce the guy that wrote it, but, take it from me, he's
+got the dope all right."
+
+It was in the long hours of the day, when Eleanor was in the house alone,
+that she faced her darkest problems. She had been burnt so badly in her
+recent affair that she wanted nothing more to do with fire; yet she was
+chilled and forlorn without it. With all her courage she tried to banish
+the unworthy image of Harold Phipps, but his melancholy eyes still
+exercised their old potent charm, and the memory of his low, insistent
+tones still echoed in her ears. She came to the tragic conclusion that
+she was the victim of a hopeless infatuation that would follow her to her
+grave.
+
+So obsessed was she by the thought of her shattered love affair that she
+failed to see that a troubled conscience was equally responsible for her
+restlessness. Her life-long training in acquiescence and obedience was at
+grips with her desire to live her own life in her own way. She had not
+realized until she made the break how much she cared for the family
+approval, how dependent she was on the family advice and assistance, how
+hideous it was to make people unhappy. Now that she was about to obtain
+her freedom, she was afraid of it. Suppose she did not make good? Suppose
+she had no talent, after all? Suppose Papa Claude was as visionary about
+her career as he was about everything else? At such times a word of
+discouragement would have broken her spirit and sent her back to bondage.
+
+"Would you go on with it?" she asked Quin, time and again.
+
+"Sure," said Quin stoutly; "you'll never be satisfied until you try it
+out."
+
+"But suppose I'm a failure?"
+
+"Well, then you've got it out of your system, and won't have to go
+through life thinking about the big success you'd have been if you'd just
+had your chance."
+
+She was not satisfied with his answer, but it had to suffice. While he
+never discouraged her, she felt that he shared the opinion of the family
+that her ambition was a caprice to be indulged and got rid of, the sooner
+the better.
+
+The first day of December brought word from Claude Martel that the
+apartment was ready. Eleanor left on twenty-four hours' notice, and it
+required the combined efforts of both families to get her off. She had
+refused up to the last to see her grandmother, but had yielded to united
+pressure and written a stiff good-by note in which she thanked her for
+advancing the money, and added--not without a touch of bitterness--that
+it would all be spent for the purpose intended.
+
+Randolph Bartlett took her to the station in his car, and Miss Isobel met
+them there with a suit-case full of articles that she feared Eleanor had
+failed to provide.
+
+"I put in some overshoes," she said, fluttering about like a distracted
+hen whose adopted duckling unexpectedly takes to water. "I also fixed up
+a medicine-case and a sewing basket. I knew you would never think of
+them. And, dear, I know how you hate heavy underwear, but pneumonia is so
+prevalent. You must promise me not to take cold if you can possibly avoid
+it."
+
+Eleanor promised. Somehow, Aunt Isobel, with her anxious face and her
+reddened eyelids, had never seemed so pathetic before.
+
+"I'll write to you, auntie," she said reassuringly; "and you mustn't
+worry."
+
+"Don't write to me," whispered Miss Isobel tremulously. "Write to mother.
+Just a line now and then to let her know you think of her. She's quite
+feeble, Nellie, and she talks about you from morning until night."
+
+Eleanor's face hardened. She evidently did not enjoy imagining the nature
+of Madam's discourse. However, she squeezed Aunt Isobel's hand and said
+she would write.
+
+Then Quin arrived with the ticket and the baggage-checks, the train was
+called, and Eleanor was duly embraced and wept over.
+
+"We won't go through the gates," said Mr. Ranny, with consideration for
+Miss Isobel's tearful condition. "Quin will get you aboard all right.
+Good-by, kiddie!"
+
+Eleanor stumbled after Quin with many a backward glance. Both Aunt Isobel
+and Uncle Ranny seemed to have acquired haloes of kindness and affection,
+and she felt like a selfish ingrate. She looked at the lunch-box in her
+hand, and thought of Rose rising at dawn to fix it before she went to
+work. She remembered the little gifts Cass and Myrna and Edwin had
+slipped in her bag. How good they had all been to her, and how she was
+going to miss them! Now that she was actually embarked on her great
+adventure, a terrible misgiving seized her.
+
+"Train starts in two minutes, boss!" warned the porter, as Quin helped
+Eleanor aboard and piloted her to her seat.
+
+"You couldn't hold it up for half an hour, could you?" asked Quin. Then,
+as he glanced down and met Eleanor's eyes brimming with all those recent
+tendernesses, his carefully practised stoicism received a frightful jolt.
+
+As the "All aboard!" sounded, she clutched his sleeve in sudden panic.
+
+"Oh, Quin, I know I'm going to be horribly lonesome and homesick. I--I
+wish you were going too!"
+
+"All right! I'll go! Why not?"
+
+"But you can't! I was fooling. You must get off this instant!"
+
+"May I come on later? Say in the spring?"
+
+"Yes, yes! But get off now! Quick, we are moving!"
+
+She had almost to push him down the aisle and off the steps. Then, as the
+train gained speed, instead of looking forward to the wide fields of
+freedom stretching before her, she looked wistfully back to the
+disconsolate figure on the platform, and, with a sigh that was half for
+him and half for herself, she lifted her fingers to her lips and rashly
+blew him a good-by kiss.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 28
+
+
+That aerial kiss proved more intoxicating to Quin than all the more
+tangible ones he had ever received. It sent him swaggering through the
+next few months with his head in the air and his heart on fire. Nothing
+could stop him now, he told himself boastfully. Old Bangs was showing him
+signal favor, Madam Bartlett was his staunch friend, Mr. Ranny and the
+aunties were his allies, and even if Miss Nell didn't care for him yet,
+she didn't care for anybody else, and when a girl like Miss Nell looks at
+a fellow the way she had looked at him----
+
+At this rapturous point he invariably abandoned cold prose for poetry and
+burst into song.
+
+Almost every week brought him a letter from Eleanor--not the romantic,
+carefully penned epistles she had indited to Harold Phipps, but hasty
+scrawls often dashed off with a pencil. In them she described her absurd
+attempts at housekeeping in the little two-room apartment; her absorbing
+experiences in the dramatic school; all the ups and downs of her
+wonderful new life. She was evidently enjoying her freedom, but Quin
+flattered himself that between the lines he could find evidences of
+discouragement, of homesickness, and of the coming disillusionment on
+which he was counting to bring her home when her six months of study were
+over.
+
+It was only when Rose read him Papa Claude's lengthy effusions that his
+heart misgave him. Papa Claude announced that Eleanor was sweeping
+everything before her at the dramatic school, where her beauty and talent
+were causing much comment, and that he had not been mistaken when he had
+foreseen her destiny, and, "single-handed against the world," forced its
+fulfilment.
+
+Usually, upon reading one of Papa Claude's pyrotechnical efforts, Quin
+went to see Madam Bartlett. After all, he and the old lady were paddling
+in the same canoe, and their only chance of success was in pulling
+together.
+
+As the end of the six months of probation approached, Madam became more
+and more anxious. Ever since Eleanor's high-handed departure she had been
+undergoing a metamorphosis. Like most autocrats, the only things of which
+she took notice were the ones that impeded her progress. When they proved
+sufficiently formidable to withstand annihilation, she awarded them the
+respect that was their due. Eleanor's childish whim, heretofore crushed
+under her disapprobation, now loomed as a terrifying possibility. The
+girl had proved her mettle by living through the winter on a smaller
+allowance than Madam paid her cook. She had shown perseverance and pluck,
+and an amazing ability to get along without the aid of the family. In a
+few months she would be of age, and with the small legacy left her by her
+spendthrift father, would be in a position to snap her fingers in the
+face of authority.
+
+"If it weren't for that fool Phipps I'd have her home in twenty-four
+hours," Madam declared to Quin. "She'll be wanting to take a professional
+engagement next."
+
+Quin tried to reassure her, but his words rang hollow. He too was growing
+anxious as the months passed and Eleanor showed no sign of returning. He
+longed to throw his influence with Madam's in trying to induce her to
+come back before it was too late. The only thing that deterred him was
+his sense of fair play to Eleanor.
+
+"You let Miss Nell work it out for herself," he advised; "don't threaten,
+her or persuade her or bribe her. Leave her alone. She's got more common
+sense than you think. I bet she'll get enough of it by May."
+
+"Well, if she doesn't, I'm through with her, and you can tell her so. I
+meant to make Eleanor a rich woman, but, mark my word, if she goes on the
+stage I'll rewrite my will and cut her off without a penny. I'll even
+entail what I leave Isobel and Enid. I'll make her sorry for what she's
+done!"
+
+But with the approach of spring it was Madam who was sorry and not
+Eleanor. Quin's sympathies were roused every time he saw the old lady.
+Her affection and anxiety fought constantly against her pride and
+bitterness. For hours at a time she would talk to him about Eleanor,
+hungrily snatching at every crumb of news, and yet refusing to pen a line
+of conciliation.
+
+"If she can do without me, I can do without her," she would say
+stubbornly.
+
+Quin's business brought him to the Bartlett home oftener than usual these
+days. For twenty years Madam and Mr. Bangs, as partners in the firm of
+Bartlett & Bangs, had tried to run in opposite directions on the same
+track, with the result that head-on collisions were of frequent
+occurrence. Since Randolph Bartlett's retirement from the firm, Quin had
+succeeded him as official switchman, and had proven himself an adept. His
+skill in handling the old lady was soon apparent to Mr. Bangs, who lost
+no time in utilizing it.
+
+One afternoon in April, when Quin was busily employed at his desk, his
+eyes happened to fall upon a calendar, the current date of which was
+circled in red ink. The effect of the discovery was immediate. His
+energetic mood promptly gave way to one of extreme languor, and his gaze
+wandered from the papers in his hand across the grimy roof tops.
+
+This time last year he and Miss Nell had made their first pilgrimage to
+Valley Mead. It was just such a day as this, warm and lazy, with big
+white clouds loafing off there in the west. He wondered if the peach
+trees were in bloom now, and whether the white violets were coming up
+along the creek-bank. How happy and contented Miss Nell always seemed in
+the country! She had never known before what the outdoor life was like.
+How he would like to take her hunting for big game up in the Maine woods,
+or camping out in the Canadian Rockies with old Cherokee Jo for a guide!
+Or better still,--here his fancy bolted completely,--if he could only
+slip with her aboard a transport and make a thirty days' voyage through
+the South Seas!
+
+It was at this transcendent stage of his reveries that a steely voice at
+his elbow observed:
+
+"You seem to be finding a great deal to interest you in that smokestack,
+young man!"
+
+Quin descended from his height with brisk embarrassment.
+
+"Anything you wanted, sir?" he asked.
+
+Mr. Bangs looked about cautiously to make sure that nobody was in
+ear-shot, then he said abruptly:
+
+"I want you to come out to my place with me for overnight. I want to talk
+with you."
+
+Quin's amazement at this request was so profound that for a moment he did
+not answer. Surmises as to the nature of the business ranged from summary
+dismissal to acceptance into the firm. Never in his experience at the
+factory had any employee been recognized unofficially by Mr. Bangs. To
+all appearances, he lived in a large limousine which deposited him at the
+office at exactly eight-thirty and collected him again on the stroke of
+four. Rumor hinted, however, that he owned a place in the suburbs, and
+that the establishment was one that did not invite publicity.
+
+"Very well, sir," said Quin. "What time shall I be ready?"
+
+"We will start at once," said Mr. Bangs, leading the way to the door.
+
+On the drive out, Quin's efforts at conversation met with small
+encouragement. Mr. Bangs responded only when he felt like it, and did not
+scruple to leave an observation, or even a question, permanently
+suspended in an embarrassing silence. Quin soon found it much more
+interesting to commune with himself. It was exciting to conjecture what
+was about to happen, and what effect it would have on his love affair. If
+he got a raise, would he be justified in putting his fate to the test?
+All spring he had fought the temptation of going to New York in the hope
+that by waiting he would have more to offer. If by any miracle of grace
+Miss Nell should yield him the slightest foothold, he must be prepared to
+storm the citadel and take possession at once.
+
+The abrupt turn of the automobile into a somber avenue of locusts
+recalled him to the present, and he looked about him curiously. Mr. Bangs
+had not been satisfied to build his habitation far from town; he had
+taken, the added precaution to place it a mile back from the road. It was
+a somewhat pretentious modern house, half hidden by a high hedge. The
+window-shades were drawn, the doors were closed. The only signs of life
+about the place were a porch chair, still rocking as if from recent
+occupation, and a thin blue scarf that had evidently been dropped in
+sudden flight.
+
+Mr. Bangs let himself in with a latch-key, and led the way into a big
+dreary room that was evidently meant for a library. A handsome suite of
+regulation mahogany furniture did its best to justify the room's claim to
+its title, but rows of empty bookshelves yawned derision at the pretense.
+
+Mr. Bangs lit the electrolier, and, motioning Quin to a chair, sat down
+heavily. Now that he had achieved a guest, he seemed at a loss to know
+what to do with him.
+
+"Do you play chess?" he asked abruptly.
+
+"I can play 'most anything," Quin boasted. "Poker's my specialty."
+
+For an hour they bent over the chess-board, and Quin was conscious of
+those piercing black eyes studying him and grimly approving when he made
+a good play. For the first time, he began to rather like Mr. Bangs, and
+to experience a thrill of satisfaction in winning his good opinion.
+
+Only once was the game interrupted. The colored chauffeur who had driven
+them out came to the door and asked:
+
+"Shall I lay the table for two or three, sir?"
+
+Mr. Bangs lifted his head long enough to give him one annihilating
+glance.
+
+"I have but one guest," he said significantly. "Set the table for two."
+
+The dinner was one of the best Quin had ever tasted, and his frank
+enjoyment of it, and franker comment, seemed further to ingratiate him
+with Mr. Bangs, who waxed almost agreeable in discussing the various
+viands.
+
+After dinner they returned to the library and lit their cigars, and Quin
+waited hopefully.
+
+This time he was not to be disappointed.
+
+"Graham," said Mr. Bangs, "what salary are you drawing?"
+
+"One hundred and fifty, sir."
+
+"How long have you been at the factory?"
+
+"A year last February."
+
+"Not so long as I thought. You are satisfied, I take it?"
+
+Quin saw his chance and seized it.
+
+"It's all right until I can get something better."
+
+Mr. Bangs relit his cigar, and took his time about it. Then he blew out
+the match and threw it on the floor.
+
+"I am looking for a new traffic manager," he said.
+
+"What's the matter with Mr. Shields?" Quin inquired in amazement.
+
+"I have fired him. He talks too much. I want a man to manage traffic, not
+to superintend a Sunday-school."
+
+"But Mr. Shields has been there for years!"
+
+"That's the trouble. I want a younger man--one who is abreast of the
+times, familiar with modern methods."
+
+Quin's heart leaped within him. Could Mr. Bangs be intimating that he,
+Quinby Graham, with one year and four months' experience, might step over
+the heads of all of those older and more experienced aspirants into the
+empty shoes of the former traffic manager?
+
+The South Seas seemed to flow just around the corner.
+
+"I have been considering the matter," continued Mr. Bangs, catching a
+white moth between his thumb and forefinger and taking apparent pleasure
+in its annihilation, "and I've decided not to get a new man in for the
+summer, but to let you take the work for the present and see what you can
+do with it."
+
+Quin's joy was so swift and sudden that even the formidable banks of Mr.
+Bangs's presence could not keep it from overflowing.
+
+"I can handle it as easy as falling off a log!" he cried excitedly. "I
+know every State in the Union and then some. Of course, I hate to see old
+Shields go, but he _is_ a slow-coach. I'll put it all over him! You'll
+see if I don't!"
+
+"I am not so sure about that," said Mr. Bangs. "Shields had the sense to
+do what he was told without arguing the matter."
+
+Quin laughed joyously. "Right you are!" he agreed. "I'd have come out of
+the service with a couple of bars on my shoulders if I hadn't argued so
+much. I don't know what gets into me, but when I see a better way of
+running things I just have to say so."
+
+"Well, I don't want you to say so to me," warned Mr. Bangs. "There are
+certain business methods that we've got to observe, whether we like them
+or not. Take the matter of listing freight, for instance. That's where
+Shields fell down. He knows perfectly well that there isn't a successful
+firm in the country that doesn't classify its stuff under the head that
+calls for the lowest freight rates."
+
+"How do you mean?"
+
+Mr. Bangs proceeded to explain, concluding his remarks with the
+observation that you couldn't afford to be too particular in these
+matters.
+
+"But it is beating the railroads, isn't it?"
+
+"The railroads can afford it. They lose no chance to gouge the
+manufacturers. It's like taxes. The government knows that everybody is
+going to dodge them, and so it allows for it. Nobody is deceived, and
+nobody is the worse for it. Human nature is what it is, and you can't
+change it."
+
+"Does the traffic manager have to classify the exports?" Quin asked.
+
+"Certainly; that and routing the cars is his principal business. It's a
+difficult and responsible position in many ways, and I have my doubts
+about your being able to fill it."
+
+"I can fill it all right," said Quin, as confidently as before, but with
+a certain loss of enthusiasm. Upon the shining brows of his great
+opportunity he had spied the incipient horns of a dilemma.
+
+For the next two hours Mr. Bangs explained in detail the duties of the
+new position, going into each phase of the matter with such efficient
+thoroughness that Quin forgot his scruples in his absorbed interest in
+the recital. It was no wonder, he said to himself, that Mr. Bangs was one
+of the most successful manufacturers in the South. A man who was not only
+an executive and administrator, but who could make with his own hands the
+most complicated farming implement in his factory, was one to command
+respect. Even if he did not like him personally, it was a great thing to
+work under him, to have his approval, to be trusted by him.
+
+When Quin went up to his room at eleven o'clock, his head was whirling
+with statistics and other newly acquired facts, which he spent an hour
+recording in his note-book.
+
+It was not until he went to bed and lay staring into the darkness that
+the mental tumult subsided and the moral tumult began. The questions that
+he had resolutely kept in abeyance all evening began to dance in impish
+insistence before him. What right had he to take Shields's place, when he
+had said exactly the things that Shields had been fired for saying? Did
+he want to go the way Shields had gone, compromising with his conscience
+in order to keep his job, ashamed to face his fellow man, cringing,
+remorseful, unhappy?
+
+Then Mr. Bangs's arguments came back to him, specious, practical,
+convincing. Business was like politics; you could keep out if you didn't
+like it, but if you went in you must play the game as others played it or
+lose out. Five hundred a month! Why, a fellow wouldn't be ashamed to ask
+even a rich girl to marry him on that! The thought was balm to his pride.
+
+As he lay there thinking, he was conscious of a disturbing sound in the
+adjoining room, and he lifted his head to listen. It sounded like some
+one crying--not a violent outburst, but the hopeless, steady sobbing of
+despair. His thoughts flew back to that blue scarf on the porch, to the
+inquiry about an extra seat at the table. They were true, then, those
+rumors about the lonely, unhappy woman whom Mr. Bangs had kept a virtual
+prisoner for years. Quin wondered if she was young, if she was pretty. A
+fierce sympathy for her seized him as he listened to her sobs on the
+other side of the wall. What a beast a man was to put a woman in a
+position like that!
+
+His wrath, thus kindled, threw Mr. Bangs's other characteristics into
+startling relief. He saw him at the head of his firm, hated and despised
+by every employee. He saw him deceiving Madam Bartlett, sneering at Mr.
+Ranny's efforts at reform, terrorizing little Miss Leaks. Then he had a
+swift and relentless vision of himself in his new position, a well
+trained automaton, expected to execute Mr. Bangs's orders not only in the
+factory but in the Bartlett household as well.
+
+He tossed restlessly on his pillow. If only that woman would stop crying,
+perhaps he could get a better line on the thing! But she did not stop,
+and somehow while she cried he could see nothing good in Bangs or what he
+stood for. Hour after hour his ambition and his love fought against his
+principles, and dawn found him still awake, staring at the ceiling.
+
+Going back to town after an early breakfast, he said to Mr. Bangs:
+
+"I've been thinking it over, sir, and if you don't mind I think I'll keep
+the position I've got."
+
+"What do you mean?" demanded Mr. Bangs. "You decline the promotion?"
+
+"I am afraid I am not the man for the job," said Quin.
+
+"That's for me to decide."
+
+Quin was visibly embarrassed. After his enthusiasm of the night before,
+his present attitude called for an explanation.
+
+"Well, you see," he said awkwardly, "it may be good business and all
+that, but there are some things a fellow can't do when he feels about
+them the way I do."
+
+"Meaning, I suppose, that your standards are so much higher than those of
+the rest of us that you cannot trade in the market-place?"
+
+"No, sir; I don't mean anything of the kind," Quin flashed back, hot at
+the accusations of self-righteousness, but unable to defend himself
+without criticizing his employer.
+
+"And this is final? You've definitely decided?"
+
+"I have."
+
+"Very well; I am through with you." And Mr. Bangs unfolded his newspaper
+and read it the rest of the way to the city.
+
+At the office door he was dismounting from the car with his silence still
+unbroken, when Quin asked nervously:
+
+"Shall I go on with my old job, sir?"
+
+Mr. Bangs wheeled upon him, his eyes like fiery gimlets.
+
+"No!" he thundered. "You needn't go on with anything! For six months I
+have wasted time trying to teach you something about business. I've
+pushed you along faster than your ability warranted. I've given you a
+chance to quadruple your salary. And what is the result? You give me a
+lot of hot air about your conscience. Why don't you get a soap-box and
+preach on the street-corners? You can draw your money and go. There is no
+room on my pay-roll for angels!"
+
+And, with a contemptuous shrug, he passed into the factory, leaving Quin
+standing dazed and appalled on the sidewalk.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 29
+
+
+As long as a man can see his goal shining, however faint and distant, he
+will steer his craft with tolerable reason and patience; but let the
+beacon-light be extinguished, and he promptly abandons reason and rashly
+trusts to instinct to guide him.
+
+Quin, who had resolutely kept his course as long as he had been sure of
+his steady progress toward success, lost his head completely at this
+sudden collapse of his hopes, and took the first train for New York. A
+sudden mad necessity was upon him to see Eleanor at once. One look of
+encouragement, one word of hope from her, and he would rush back to port
+and gladly begin the voyage all over again.
+
+He arrived at the Eighty-second Street apartment about six o'clock in the
+evening, and, after studying the dingy name-plates, took the five flights
+of stairs with uncommendable speed, and presented himself at the rear
+door on the sixth floor.
+
+As he waited for an answer to his ring, he wondered if he had not made a
+mistake about the name on the door-plate. The narrow dark hall, permeated
+with a smell of onions and cabbage, was all too familiar to him, but it
+was not at all the proper setting for Eleanor. His bewilderment increased
+when the door was opened by a white-aproned figure, who after a moment of
+blank amazement seized his hand in both of hers and pressed it
+rapturously.
+
+At least, that was what Quin imagined took place; but when, a moment
+later, he sat opposite a composed young lady who had removed her impulse
+with her apron, he knew that he must have been mistaken. She was still
+his adored Miss Nell, but with a difference that carried her leagues away
+from him. He knew how to cope with the hot-headed, rebellious Miss Nell;
+with the teasing, indifferent, provocative Miss Nell; and even with the
+disconsolate little Miss Nell who had wept against his shoulder coming
+home from Chicago. But in the presence of this beautiful, grown-up,
+self-contained young lady he felt thoroughly awkward and ill at ease. Had
+it not been for the warmth of her smile and the eagerness with which she
+plied him with questions, his courage would have failed him utterly.
+
+"Now tell me all about everything!" she urged. "You are the first human
+being I've seen from home for four mortal months. How's everybody at
+grandmother's? Has Aunt Enid come home? How are Rose and the children?"
+
+"One at a time!" protested Quin. "Tell me first about yourself. What sort
+of a place is this you are living in?"
+
+"You mustn't criticize our suite!" she said gaily. "This is a combination
+bedroom, dining-room, and kitchen. I am the cook and housemaid, and Papa
+Claude is the butler. You ought to see the way I've learned to cook on
+the chafing-dish!"
+
+Quin was not in the least interested in her culinary accomplishments. It
+offended his sense of the proprieties to see his divinity reduced to such
+necessities, and he did not at all approve of her surroundings.
+
+"When are you coming home?" he asked abruptly.
+
+Eleanor's eyes dropped.
+
+"That depends. I may be here all summer. I've had an engagement offered
+me."
+
+Quin's hands grew cold. "You don't mean that you're going to act for
+_pay_?"
+
+"Of course. Why not? That's what I've been working for."
+
+"But I thought when you tried it out that you would change your
+mind--that you wouldn't like it as much as you thought you would."
+
+"But I _do_. I adore it! Nothing on earth can ever make me give it up!"
+
+Quin's heart sank. "But I thought you'd had enough," he said. "I thought
+you were homesick and lonesome."
+
+"Who wouldn't have been? Look at the way they have treated me at home? Do
+you know, none of them ever write to me any more?"
+
+Quin tried not to look guilty, but the fact that he had counseled this
+course of discipline weighed upon him.
+
+"Haven't I written enough for the family?" he asked.
+
+But she was not to be put off.
+
+"They treat me as if I had done something disgraceful!" she said
+indignantly. "My allowance is just half what it used to be, and yet I
+have to pay all my own expenses. As for clothes, I never was so shabby in
+my life. But I can stand that. It's grandmother's silence that I resent.
+How can she pretend to care for me when she ignores my letters and treats
+me with perfect indifference?"
+
+Hurt pride quivered through the anger in her voice, and she looked at
+Quin appealingly. Stung by his silence, she burst out afresh:
+
+"Doesn't she ever ask about me? Has she let me go for good and all?"
+
+"Wasn't that what you wanted?"
+
+"You _know_ it wasn't! I did everything to get her consent. I'd--I'd give
+anything now if she would look at things differently. Do you think, when
+she finds out that I am actually on the stage, that she will ever forgive
+me--that she will ever want me to come home again?"
+
+That was the moment when Quin should have delivered Madam's ultimatum;
+but, before he had the chance, a key was turned in the lock, and the next
+instant Claude Martel's effulgent presence filled the room.
+
+For a moment he stood poised lightly, consciously, his cane and gloves in
+one hand, and his soft felt hat turned gracefully across the other. On
+his ankles were immaculate white spats, and in his buttonhole blossomed
+the inevitable rose.
+
+"Quinby Graham!" he cried in accents of rapture. "My Cassius's beloved
+Quin! _My_ beloved Quin! What happy fortune blew you hither? But no
+matter. You are here--you are ours. Eleanor and I are going out to a
+studio party at a dear, dear friend's. You shall accompany us!"
+
+"Oh, no, Papa Claude," protested Eleanor. "Quin doesn't want to go to
+Miss Linton's messy old party. Neither do I. You go and leave us here.
+There are a million things I want to ask him."
+
+But Papa Claude would not consider it. "You can ask them to-morrow," he
+said. "To-night I claim you both. We will introduce Quinby as one of the
+gallant heroes of the Great War. I shall tell his story--no--he shall
+tell it! Come, put on your hat, Eleanor; we must start at once."
+
+"But here! Hold on!" protested Quin, laughing and freeing himself from
+Papa Claude's encircling arm, "I'm not fixed to go to a party, and I
+haven't got any story to tell. I'll clear out and come back to-morrow."
+
+"No, no!" protested Eleanor and Papa Claude in a breath, and after a
+brief struggle for supremacy the latter triumphantly continued:
+
+"I promise you shall say nothing, if you prefer it. Modesty is gallantry's
+crowning grace. But you _must_ accompany us. My heart is set upon it.
+Eleanor darling, here's your wrap. Come, Quinby, my boy!" And the dynamic
+little gentleman hooked an arm through each of theirs and, in spite of
+their protests, bore them triumphantly down the stairs and off to the
+party.
+
+It was not until they had boarded a crowded downtown car and found
+themselves wedged in the aisle that Quin and Eleanor managed to have
+another word alone.
+
+"It's a shame we had to come!" she pouted, looking up at him from under a
+tilted hat-brim that supported three dangling cherries.
+
+"Where are we going?" he asked, thrilled by the discovery that her lips
+and the cherries matched.
+
+"To a studio party down in Washington Square. Papa Claude is trying to
+get Estelle Linton to play the lead in 'Phantom Love.' You always meet
+all sorts of freaks at her parties."
+
+"I didn't come to New York to meet freaks."
+
+"What did you come for?"
+
+"Shall I tell you?"
+
+"Of course--why not?"
+
+"You want to know? Right now?"
+
+He was looking at her with an expression that was never intended to be
+worn in a public conveyance, and the thin-faced Polish woman on whose
+toes they were all but standing looked at them with such lively
+comprehension that Eleanor felt called upon to assume her most haughty
+and dignified manner for the rest of the way.
+
+Miss Linton's party was in full swing when they arrived. It was an
+extremely hilarious party, the interest centering about a fat man in a
+dress-suit, with a bath towel around his waist, who was attempting to
+distil a forbidden elixir from an ingenious condenser of his own
+invention.
+
+The studio, under a grimy skylight, was cluttered with bric-a-brac,
+animate and inanimate. A Daibutsu in a gilded shrine dominated one
+corner, and a handsome woman in a Manchu coat and swinging ear-rings of
+jade held court in another. At sight of the Martel group she laid down
+the small silver pipe she was smoking, and swam toward them through a
+cloud of incense and tobacco smoke.
+
+"Dear old C. M.! Bless his heart!" she cried, kissing Papa Claude
+effusively. Then she nodded good-naturedly to Eleanor, and held out a
+welcoming hand to Quin.
+
+"Who is this nice boy?" she asked, her languid black eyes sweeping his
+face.
+
+"Allow me to present ex-Sergeant Quinby Graham," said Papa Claude
+impressively--"a soldier of whom his friends and his country have every
+reason to be proud."
+
+Then, to Quin's utter chagrin, he was conscious of the fact that Papa
+Claude was giving, in an audible aside, an account of his prowess that
+placed him second only to another sergeant whom the world acclaimed its
+chief hero.
+
+"For the Lord's sake, head him off!" he whispered in an agony of
+embarrassment to Eleanor. "I didn't do half those things he's telling
+about, and besides----"
+
+But it was too late to interfere. Papa Claude, the center of one animated
+group after another, was kissing his way through the crowd, whispering
+the news as he went--that the guest of the evening was no other than the
+distinguished young Graham whom they all doubtless remembered, etc.
+
+Within fifteen minutes Quin found himself the lion of the evening. Even
+the fat man and his improvised still were eclipsed by the
+counter-attraction. His very earnestness in disclaiming the honors thrust
+upon him added enormously to his popularity. The more clumsy and awkward
+he was, and the more furiously he blushed and protested, the more
+attention he received.
+
+"So naif!" "So perfectly natural!" "Nothing but a boy, and yet think what
+he has done!" were phrases heard on every side.
+
+Papa Claude corralled him in the corner with the Daibutsu and pompously
+presented each guest in turn. Quin felt smothered by the incense and the
+flattery. His collar grew tight, perspiration beaded his brow, and he
+began to cough.
+
+"Effects of mustard-gas," Papa Claude explained in a stage whisper.
+
+For seeming hours the agony endured, until the advent of refreshments
+caused a momentary diversion, and he made a hasty bolt for Eleanor and
+freedom.
+
+He found her sitting on the divan, looking rather bored by the attentions
+of a stout elderly person with small porcine eyes and a drooping black
+mustache. Without troubling to apologize, Quin interrupted the
+conversation to say abruptly:
+
+"Miss Nell, I am going."
+
+Eleanor started to rise, but the red-faced one lifted a protesting voice.
+
+"See here, young man," he blustered. "You can't run off with this little
+girl just when I've got my first chance at her this evening. She's going
+to stay right here and let me make love to her--isn't she?"
+
+He turned a confident eye upon Eleanor, and even ventured to lay a plump
+detaining finger on her cool, slim wrist.
+
+Eleanor rose instantly.
+
+"I thought you were never coming!" she said impatiently over the stout
+man's head, "I've been ready to go for an hour!"
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 30
+
+
+Down in the open square, under the clear cool stars, they looked at each
+other and laughed.
+
+"Lead me to a bus!" cried Quin. "I want to ride on top of it where the
+wind can blow through my whiskers. My head feels like a joss-house!"
+
+"Oh, but you were funny!" cried Eleanor. "I wish you could have seen your
+face when all those women swarmed around you. I was afraid you were going
+to jump out of the window! Did you ever feel anything so hot and stuffy
+as that room? And weren't they all silly and make-believe?"
+
+Quin gave a mighty sigh of relief at being out of it.
+
+"Is this the sort of thing you get let in for often?" he inquired,
+aghast.
+
+"Oftener than I like. You see, all those people are Papa Claude's old
+friends, and he's been having a lovely time showing me off as he showed
+you off to-night."
+
+"But you surely don't _like_ it?"
+
+"Of course I don't. And they know it. They are already calling me a prig,
+and poking fun at me for not smoking and for not liking to have my hands
+patted and my cheeks pinched. Isn't it funny, Quin? At home I was always
+miserable because there were too many barriers; I wanted to tear them all
+down. Here, where there aren't any, I find myself building them up at
+every turn, and getting furious when people climb over them."
+
+"Bartlett _versus_ Martel, eh?"
+
+"I suppose so. Heaven knows, I wish I were one thing or the other."
+
+"Oh, I don't know," said Quin. "You are pretty nice just as you are."
+Then he added inconsequently: "Who was that fat man you were talking to
+when I came up?"
+
+"Mr. Pfingst. He is Estelle Linton's backer."
+
+"Backer?" queried Quin. Then, when he saw Eleanor's eyes drop, he added
+vaguely: "Oh! I see!"
+
+For the next block, strange to say, he did not think so much about
+Eleanor as he did about Miss Isobel Bartlett. The whole situation kept
+presenting itself through her austere eyes, and instinctively he put a
+protecting hand on Eleanor's elbow.
+
+When at last they were on top of the bus, with the big, noisy city
+apparently going in the opposite direction, they promptly forgot all
+about the studio party and plunged headlong into their own important
+affairs.
+
+"Begin at the _very_ beginning," commanded Eleanor, settling herself for
+a good long ride; "I want you to tell me everything."
+
+The beginning and the end and all that lay between them could easily have
+been compassed in three words by Quin. But there were things he had
+pledged himself to tell her before he even broached the subject that was
+shrieking for utterance. With painstaking exactness he set forth the
+facts that led up to his dismissal, trying to be fair to Mr. Bangs as
+well as to himself, and, above all, to claim no credit for taking the
+stand he had.
+
+But Eleanor would not see it thus. With characteristic fervor she
+espoused his cause. She declared he had been treated outrageously. He
+ought to have taken the matter straight to her grandmother. The very
+idea! After all the work he had done at the factory, for him to be
+dismissed just because he wouldn't do a thing that he considered
+dishonorable! She _hated_ Mr. Bangs--she always had hated him; and the
+more she dwelt upon the fact, the more ardently she approved Quin's
+course.
+
+"It was perfectly splendid of you to refuse his offer!" she cried, and
+her eyes blazed with that particular ray of feminine partisanship that is
+most soothing to the injured masculine. "And you won't lose by it in the
+long run. You'll get another position right off. Why don't you try to get
+one here in New York?"
+
+"Would you like me to?"
+
+"I should say I should! Then we could do all sorts of jolly things
+together. Not studio parties or cabarets, but jolly outdoor things like
+we used to do at home. Do stay, Quin; won't you?"
+
+She was looking up at him with such frank urgency and such entire
+sympathy that Quin lost his head completely.
+
+"Miss Nell," he blurted out, "if I stay and get a job and make good, will
+you marry me?"
+
+Eleanor, who was used to much more subtle manoeuvers, was caught unaware
+by this sudden attack. For a second she was thrown into confusion; then
+she rallied all her forces for the defense.
+
+"Why, of course I won't!" she said--then added with more conviction: "I
+am not going to marry _anybody_--not for years and years."
+
+"But I'll wait years and years," persisted Quin eagerly. "I wouldn't
+marry any girl until I could take care of her. But if you'll just give me
+a tip that maybe some day perhaps----"
+
+It was very difficult to go on addressing his remarks to an impassive
+classic profile--so difficult, in fact, that he abandoned the effort and
+let his eyes say the rest for him.
+
+Eleanor stirred uneasily.
+
+"I _wish_ you wouldn't be foolish, Quin, and spoil all our fun. I've told
+you I mean to go on the stage for good and all. You know you wouldn't
+want an actress for a wife."
+
+"I'd want you, whatever you were," he said with such fervor that she
+rashly gave him her luminous eyes again in gratitude.
+
+He made the most of the opportunity thus offered.
+
+"Honest, now!" he boldly challenged her. "You can't deny that you love me
+just a little bit, can you?"
+
+She stared straight ahead of her down the long dim avenue, making no
+response to his question. The cherries that swung from her hat-brim
+stirred not a hair's-breadth, but the commotion their stillness caused in
+Quin's heart was nothing short of cyclonic.
+
+"More than when you left Kentucky?" he persisted relentlessly.
+
+This time a barely perceptible nod stirred the cherries.
+
+"There!" he said triumphantly. "I knew it! Just keep right on the way you
+are going, and I won't say a word!"
+
+"But I haven't given you any encouragement; you mustn't think I have."
+
+"I know it. But you haven't turned me down."
+
+At this she smiled at him helplessly.
+
+"You are not very easy to turn down, Quin."
+
+"No," he admitted; "it can't be done."
+
+At this moment the bus rounded a sharp corner without slowing up, and the
+passengers on top were lurched forward with such violence that at least
+one masculine arm took advantage of the occasion to clasp a swaying lady
+with unnecessary solicitude. It may have been a second, and it may have
+been longer, that Quin sat with his arm about Eleanor and his hand
+clasping hers. Time and space ceased to exist for him and blessed
+infinity set in. And then----
+
+"Good gracious!" she cried, starting up. "Where are we? I'd forgotten all
+about our cross-street."
+
+As a matter of fact they were in Harlem.
+
+All the way back Eleanor refused to be serious about anything. The
+mischievous, contradictory, incalculable little devil that always lurked
+in her took full possession. She teased Quin, and laughed at him, leading
+him on one minute and running to cover the next.
+
+When they reached the apartment, she tripped up the five flights as
+lightly as a bird, and Quin, in his effort to keep up with her, overtaxed
+himself and paid the penalty. Heart and lungs were behaving outrageously
+when he reached the top landing, and he had to steady himself by the
+banister.
+
+"Oh, Quin, I ought to have remembered!" Eleanor cried, with what he
+considered divine compassion. "I can't bear to hear you cough like that!
+It sounds as if it were tearing you to pieces."
+
+"It's nothing!" said Quin, struggling to get his breath. "I'll be all
+right in a minute. What's the box by the door?"
+
+Eleanor's glance followed his.
+
+"If that old walrus, Pfingst, has dared to send me flowers again!" she
+cried, pouncing on the card and holding it so they both could read it.
+
+Penciled in small, even lines were the words:
+
+    Sorry to find the lady-bird flown. Will call up in the morning. H. P.
+
+Even in the dimly lighted hall, Quin could see the flush that suffused
+Eleanor's face.
+
+"It's Harold Phipps," she said, trying to be casual. "I--I didn't know he
+was in town."
+
+Quin followed her into the apartment, and stood dully by the table as she
+untied the box and lifted half a dozen exquisite white orchids from their
+bed of maidenhair ferns. Then, trying very hard to keep his voice steady,
+he asked gently:
+
+"What does this mean, Miss Nell? I thought you weren't going to have
+anything more to do with that man."
+
+"Well, I haven't. That is, not--not until he came on last month to see
+about the play."
+
+"What play?"
+
+"'Phantom Love.'"
+
+"But why did you have to see him?"
+
+"Because I am to be in the play."
+
+"Not in _his_ play?"
+
+"No more his than Papa Claude's."
+
+Quin's face darkened.
+
+"I saw him for only a few minutes," Eleanor went on, "and Papa Claude was
+with us. I give you my word, Quin, I've never spoken to him alone, or
+answered one of his letters."
+
+"Then he has been writing to you? What business has he got worrying you
+with letters and flowers when you have told him you are through with
+him?"
+
+In spite of his effort to keep calm, there was a rising note of anger in
+his voice.
+
+"He is not worrying me," said Eleanor, evidently conscious of her
+weakness in admitting Harold at the window of friendship when she had
+banished him from the door of love. "He understands perfectly that
+everything is over between us. But it would be silly for us to refuse to
+speak to each other when we shall necessarily be thrown together a lot."
+
+"Thrown together? How do you mean?"
+
+"At rehearsals."
+
+"Do you mean he is to be here in New York?"
+
+"Yes--after next month. He has given up his position in Chicago, so he
+can devote all the time to the play. You see, he not only helped to write
+it, but he is financing it."
+
+"So he is the--backer?" Quin was scarcely responsible for what he said,
+so suddenly had disaster trodden on the heels of ecstasy.
+
+"He is Papa Claude's partner and producer," said Eleanor with dignity.
+"If I don't care anything for him, I don't see what harm there is in
+seeing him."
+
+"Not liking whisky won't keep it from going to your head," said Quin
+stubbornly.
+
+"That's perfect nonsense; and besides, what can I do? It's his play as
+well as ours. I can't ask him to stay away from rehearsals."
+
+"No; but you can stay away yourself. You don't have to be in this play.
+Something else will turn up. You can afford to wait."
+
+"But that's just the point--I can't! And, besides, think how silly and
+childish it would be for me to refuse a wonderful chance for a
+professional debut that might not come again in years."
+
+"But don't you see, Miss Nell, you are in honor bound not to go on with
+this?"
+
+"Honor bound? How do you mean?"
+
+"Why, to Queen Vic."
+
+"I agreed to break my engagement with Harold Phipps and not to answer any
+of his letters. I've kept my promise."
+
+"Yes; but I thought, and I made her think, that you agreed not to see him
+or have anything to do with him for six months."
+
+"Well, the time will be up in six weeks."
+
+"Lots can happen in six weeks."
+
+If Quin had been wise he would have taken another tack; but, in his
+earnest effort to make her see her duty to Madam, he failed to press his
+own more personal claims, and thus lost his one chance of reaching her.
+
+Eleanor understood impulse, emotion, but she would not listen to reason.
+The mere mention of Madam's name stirred up a whirlwind that snuffed out
+any love-lights that might have been kindling. She stood with her back to
+the table, twisting Harold Phipps's card in her fingers, and she looked
+at Quin suspiciously.
+
+"Did grandmother send you up here to see if I was keeping my word?"
+
+"She did not. She doesn't know I am here."
+
+"Then it's just _you_ who don't trust me?"
+
+"Well, I don't think you are playing quite fair," admitted Quin bluntly,
+"either to Queen Vic or to me."
+
+"And I suppose you propose to go back and tell her so?"
+
+"I propose nothing of the kind. It's up to you whether we both keep our
+word, or whether we both break it. You know what I think, and you see the
+position I am in."
+
+"I can settle that," said Eleanor with spirit. "I can write home to-night
+and tell them what I intend to do. That will exonerate you, if that is
+what you are after."
+
+"It _isn't_ what I am after, and you know it! For God's sake, Miss Nell,
+be fair! You know you can't go on with this thing without starting up the
+old trouble with Mr. Phipps."
+
+"But, I tell you, I _can_. I can control the situation perfectly. Why
+can't you trust me, Quin?"
+
+"I don't trust _him_. He's got ways of compromising a girl that you don't
+know anything about. If he ever gets wind of your going to Chicago----"
+
+"I wish you wouldn't throw that up to me!" There was real anger in her
+voice, which up to now had shown signs of softening. "Just because I
+happened to me a fool once, it doesn't follow that I'll be one again! It
+won't be pleasant for me, but I am not going to let his connection with
+'Phantom Love' spoil my chance of a lifetime."
+
+"And he will be at all the rehearsals, I suppose, and up here in the
+apartment between-times." Quin's jealousy ran through him like fire
+through dry stubble. "You'll probably be seeing him every day."
+
+"And what if I do?" demanded Eleanor. "I have told you our relations are
+strictly professional."
+
+"That card looks like it," said Quin bitterly.
+
+Eleanor tossed the object referred to in the trash-basket and looked at
+him defiantly. The very weakness of her position made her peculiarly
+sensitive to criticism, and the fact that her mentor was her one-time
+slave augmented her wrath.
+
+"See here, Miss Nell." Quin came a step closer, and his voice was husky
+with emotion. "I know how keen you are about the stage; but, take it from
+me, you are making a wrong start. If you'll just promise to wait until
+your time is up----"
+
+"I won't promise anything! What's the use? Nobody believes me. Even you
+are siding with grandmother and suspecting me of breaking my word. I
+don't intend to submit to it any longer!"
+
+Queer, spasmodic movements were going on in Quin's lungs, and he
+controlled his voice with difficulty.
+
+"You mean you are going on seeing Mr. Phipps and letting him send you
+flowers and things?"
+
+"I am _not!_" Eleanor cried furiously. "But, if I should, it's nobody's
+business but my own!"
+
+For an agonizing moment they faced each other angrily, both of them lost
+in the labyrinth of their own situation. At the slightest plea for help
+on her part, Quin would have broken through his own difficulties and
+rushed to her rescue. He would even have offered to plead her cause again
+at the family tribunal. But she was like a wilful child who is determined
+to walk alone on a high and dangerous wall. The very effort to protect
+her might prove disastrous.
+
+"If that's the case," said Quin, with his jaw thrust out and his nostrils
+quivering, "what do you want me to do?"
+
+"I don't care what you do!" Eleanor flung back--"just so you leave me
+alone."
+
+Without a word, he picked up his hat and strode out of the apartment and
+down the stairs. At every landing he paused, hoping against hope that she
+might call him back. Even at the door he paused, straining his ears for
+the faintest whisper from above. But no sound broke the stillness, and
+with a gesture of despair he flung open the door and passed out into the
+darkness.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 31
+
+
+When an extremely energetic person has spent eighteen months making
+connections with a family, he does not find it easy to sever them in a
+day. Quin's announcement that he was going to leave the Martels met with
+a storm of protest. He had the excellent excuse that when Cass married in
+June there would be no room for him, but it took all his diplomacy to
+effect the change without giving offense. Rose was tearful, and Cass
+furious, and a cloud of gloom enveloped the little brown house.
+
+With the Bartletts it was no easier. On his return from New York he had
+found three notes from them, each of which requested an immediate
+interview. Madam's stated that she had heard of his dismissal from the
+factory and that she was ready to do battle for him to the death.
+"Geoffrey Bangs got rid of Ranny," she wrote, "and now he thinks he can
+ship you. But I guess I'll show him who is the head of the firm."
+
+The second note was from Miss Isobel and was marked "Confidential." In
+incoherent sentences it told of a letter just received from Eleanor, in
+which she announced that she was planning to make her professional debut
+in July, and that as Mr. Phipps was connected with the play in which she
+was to appear, she felt that she could accept no further favors from her
+grandmother. Miss Isobel implored Quin to come at once and advise her
+what to do about telling Madam, especially as they were leaving for Maine
+within the next ten days.
+
+The third delicately penned epistle was a gentle effusion from Miss Enid,
+who was home on a visit and eager to see "dear Quin, who had been the
+innocent means of reuniting her and the dearest man in all the world."
+
+It was these letters that put Quin's desire for flight into instant
+action. He must go where he would not be questioned or asked for advice.
+The mere mention of Eleanor's name was agony to him. It contracted his
+throat and sent the blood pounding through his veins. His hurt was so
+intolerable that he shrank from even a touch of sympathy. Perhaps later
+on he would be able to face the situation, but just now his one desire
+was to get away from everything connected with his unhappiness.
+
+In beating about in his mind for a temporary refuge, he remembered a
+downtown rooming-house to which he had once gone with Dirks, the foreman
+at Bartlett & Bangs. Here he transferred his few possessions, and
+persuaded Rose to tell the Bartletts that he had left town for an
+indefinite stay. This he hoped would account for his absence until they
+left for their summer vacation.
+
+The ten weeks that followed are not pleasant ones to dwell upon. The
+picture of Quin tramping the streets by day in a half-hearted search for
+work, and tramping them again at night when he could not sleep, of him
+lying face downward on a cot in a small damp room, with all his
+confidence and bravado gone, and only his racking cough for company, are
+better left unchronicled.
+
+He fought his despair with dogged determination, but his love for Eleanor
+had twined itself around everything that was worth while in him. In
+plucking it out he uprooted his ambition, his carefully acquired
+friendships, his belief in himself, his faith in the future. For eighteen
+months he had lived in the radiance of one all-absorbing dream, with a
+faith in its ultimate fulfilment that transcended every fear. And now
+that that hope was dead, the blackness of despair settled upon him.
+
+That fact that Eleanor had broken faith with him, that she was willing to
+renew her friendship with Harold Phipps when she knew what he was, that
+she was willing to give up friends and family and her inheritance for the
+sake of being with him, could have but one explanation.
+
+Quin used to tell himself this again and again, as he lay in the hot
+darkness with his hands clasped across his eyes. He used it as a whip
+with which to scourge any vagrant hopes that dared creep into his heart.
+Hadn't Miss Nell told him that she didn't care what he said or did, just
+so he left her alone? Hadn't she let him come away without expressing a
+regret for the past or a hope for the future?
+
+But, even as his head condemned her, his heart rushed to her defense.
+After all, she had never said she cared for him. And why should she care
+for a fellow like him, with no education, or money, or position? Even
+with her faults, she was too good for the best man living. But she cared
+for Harold Phipps--and with that bitter thought the turmoil began all
+over again.
+
+He was not only unhappy, but intolerably lonely and ill. He missed Rose
+and her care for him; he missed Cass's friendship; he missed his visits
+to the Bartletts; and above all he missed his work. His interest still
+clung to Bartlett & Bangs, and the only times of forgetfulness that he
+had were when he and Dirks were discussing the business of the firm.
+
+What made matters worse was the humid heat of the summer. A low
+barometer, always an affliction to him, in his present nervous state was
+torture. Night after night he lay gasping for breath, and in the morning
+he rose gaunt and pale, with hollow rings under his eyes. Having little
+desire for food, he often made one meal a day suffice, substituting
+coffee for more solid food.
+
+This method of living could have but one result. By the middle of July he
+was confined to his bed with a heavy bronchial cold and a temperature
+that boded ill. Once down and defenseless, he became a prey to all the
+feminine solicitude of the rooming-house. The old lady next door pottered
+in and out, putting mustard plasters on his chest and forgetting to take
+them off, and feeding him nauseous concoctions that she brewed over a
+coal-oil stove. A woman from upstairs insisted on keeping his window and
+door wide open, and trying cold compresses on his throat. While the
+majorful mother of six across the hall came in each night to sweep the
+other two out, close the window and door, and fill the room with
+eucalyptus fumes.
+
+Quin let them do whatever they wanted. The mere business of breathing
+seemed to be about all he could attend to these days. The only point on
+which he was firm was his refusal to notify his friends or to have a
+doctor.
+
+"I'll be all right when this beastly weather lets up," he said to Dirks
+one Sunday night. "Is there any sign of clearing?"
+
+"Not much. It's thick and muggy and still raining in torrents. I wish
+you'd see a doctor."
+
+Pride kept Quin from revealing the fact that he had no money to pay a
+doctor. Five weeks without work had completely exhausted his exchequer.
+
+"I'm used to these knockouts," he wheezed with assumed cheerfulness one
+Sunday night. "It's not half as bad as it sounds. I'll be up in a day or
+so."
+
+Dirks was not satisfied. His glance swept the small disordered room, and
+came back to the flushed face on the pillow.
+
+"Don't you want some grub?" he suggested. "I'll get you anything you
+like."
+
+"No, thanks; I'm not hungry. You might put the water-pitcher over here by
+the bed. My tongue feels like a shredded-wheat biscuit."
+
+Dirks gave him some water, then turned to go.
+
+"Oh, by the way," he said, "Here's a letter for you that's been laying
+around at the factory for a couple of days. Nobody knew where to forward
+it."
+
+Like a shot Quin was up in bed and holding out an eager hand. But at
+sight of the small cramped writing he lay back on his pillow listlessly.
+
+"It's from Miss Isobel Bartlett," he said indifferently. "Wonder what
+she's doing back in town in the middle of the summer."
+
+"I hear they are all back," Dirks said. "The old lady is very ill and
+they had to bring her home. If you want anything in the night, just pound
+on the wall. I'm going to fetch a doctor if you ain't better in the
+morning."
+
+When Dirks had gone Quin opened his letter and read:
+
+    _Dear Quin:_
+
+    I am rushing this off to the factory in the hope that they have your
+    address and can get into communication with you at once. Mother has
+    had two dreadful attacks with her appendix, and the doctors say she
+    cannot survive another. But she refuses point-blank to be operated
+    on, and my brother and sister and I are powerless to move her. Won't
+    you come the moment you get this, and try to persuade her? She has
+    such confidence in your judgment, and you could always do more with
+    her than any one else. I am almost wild with anxiety and I don't know
+    which way to turn. Do come at once.
+
+    Your friend,
+
+    ISOBEL BARTLETT.
+
+Quin sprang out of bed, and then sat down limply, waiting for the
+furniture to stop revolving about him. It was evident that he would have
+to use his head to save his legs, if he expected to make any progress.
+Holding to the bed-post, he brought all his concentration to bear on the
+whereabouts of the various garments he had thrown off ten days before.
+The lack of a clean shirt and the imperative need of a shave presented
+grave difficulties, but he would have gone to Miss Isobel's rescue if he
+had had to go in pajamas!
+
+When at last he had struggled into his clothes, he put out his light and
+tiptoed past Dirks' door. At the first sniff of night air he began to
+cough, and he clapped his hand over his mouth, swearing softly to
+himself. On the front steps he hesitated. The rain was falling in sheets,
+and the street lights shone through a blur of fog. For the first time,
+Quin realized it was a block to the car line, and that he had no
+umbrella. Hard experience had taught him the dire results of exposure and
+overexertion. But the excitement of once more getting in touch with the
+Bartletts, of being of service to Madam, and above all of hearing news of
+Eleanor, banished all other considerations. Turning up his coat collar
+and pulling his hat over his eyes, he went down the steps and started on
+an uncertain run for the corner.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 32
+
+
+During the days that Quin was floundering in the bog of poverty, illness
+and despair, Eleanor Bartlett was triumphantly climbing the peak of
+achievement. "Phantom Love," after weeks of strenuous rehearsal and
+nerve-racking uncertainty, had had its premiere performance at Atlantic
+City and scored an instantaneous hit.
+
+All spring Eleanor had lived in excited anticipation of the event. In the
+hard work demanded of her she had found welcome relief from some of her
+own complicated problems. She wanted to forget that she had broken her
+word, that she was causing the family serious trouble, and more than all
+she wanted to forget Quinby Graham and the look on his face when he left
+her.
+
+During her stay in New York she had suffered many disillusions. She had
+seen her dreams translated into actual and disconcerting realities. But,
+in spite of the fact that much of the gold and glamour had turned to
+tinsel, she was still fascinated by the life and its glorious
+possibilities.
+
+It was not until she got into the full swing of the rehearsals that she
+made a disconcerting discovery. Try as she would, she could not adapt
+herself to the other members of the company. She hated their petty
+jealousies and intermittent intimacies, the little intrigues and the
+undercurrent of gossip that made up their days. From the first she
+realized that she was looked upon as an alien. The fact that she was
+shown special favors was hotly resented, and her refusal to rehearse
+daily the love passages with Finnegan, the promising young comedian who
+two years before had driven an ice-wagon in New Orleans, was a constant
+grievance to the stage manager. In the last matter Harold Phipps had
+upheld her, as he had in all others; but his very championship
+constituted her chief cause of worry.
+
+Since the day of his joining the company she had given him no opportunity
+for seeing her alone. By a method of protection peculiarly her own, she
+had managed to achieve an isolation as complete as an alpine blossom in
+the heart of an iceberg. But in the heat and enthusiasm of a successful
+try-out, when everybody was effervescing with excitement, it was
+increasingly difficult to maintain this air of cold detachment.
+
+Papa Claude alone was sufficient to warm any atmosphere. He radiated
+happiness. Every afternoon, arrayed in white flannels and a soft white
+hat, with a white rose in his buttonhole, he rode in his chair on the
+boardwalk, bowing to right and to left with the air of a sovereign
+graciously acknowledging his subjects. Night found him in the
+proscenium-box at the theater, beaming upon the audience, except when he
+turned vociferously to applaud Eleanor's exits and entrances.
+
+The entire week of the first performance was nothing short of
+pandemonium. Mr. Pfingst had brought a large party down from New York on
+his yacht, and between rehearsals and performances there was an endless
+round of suppers and dinners and sailing-parties.
+
+With the arrival of Sunday morning Eleanor was in a state of physical and
+emotional exhaustion. She was sitting before her dressing-table in a
+sleeveless pink negligee, with her hair dangling in two thick childish
+braids over her shoulder, when Papa Claude dashed in from the next room
+to announce that Mr. Pfingst had invited the entire cast to have lunch on
+his yacht.
+
+"Not for me!" said Eleanor, sipping her coffee between yawns. "I am going
+straight back to bed and sleep all day."
+
+"Morning megrims!" cried Papa Claude, fresher than the proverbial daisy.
+"What you need is a frolic with old Neptune! We bathe at eleven, go
+aboard the _Minta_ at twelve, lunch at one. Pfingst's chef is an artist;
+he can create a lobster Newburg that is an epic!" Papa Claude's tongue
+made the circle of his lips as he spoke.
+
+"I don't like lobster," Eleanor pouted; "and, what's more, I don't like
+Mr. Pfingst."
+
+"Nonsense, my love! Pfingst is a prince of good fellows. Very
+generous--very generous indeed. Besides, there will be others on
+board--Harold and Estelle and myself."
+
+Eleanor laid her face against his sleeve.
+
+"I wish you and I could run off somewhere for the day alone. I am so sick
+of seeing those same people day in and day out. They never talk about
+anything but themselves."
+
+Papa Claude stroked her hair and smiled tolerantly. It was natural that
+his little Eleanor should be capricious and variable and addicted to
+moods. She was evidently acquiring temperament.
+
+Some one tapped at the door, and he sprang to answer it.
+
+"I've just been to your room, and the maid said you were in here," said
+Harold Phipps's voice.
+
+"Come right in!" cried Papa Claude, flinging wide the door. "We are just
+discussing plans, and need you to cast the deciding vote."
+
+"But I'm not dressed, Papa Claude!" expostulated Eleanor. "I still have
+on my kimono."
+
+"A charming costume," said Papa Claude--"one in which a whole nation
+appears in public. I leave it to my distinguished collaborator: could any
+toilet, however elaborate, be more becoming?"
+
+Harold gave a light laugh as his glance rested with undisguised approval
+on the slender figure in its clinging silk garment, the rosy hues of
+which were reflected in the girl's flaming cheeks.
+
+"Just stopped for a second, C. M.," Harold said, avoiding her indignant
+eyes. "I wanted to tell you about the New York press notices. They are
+simply superb! _Tribune_ has a column. The _Times_ and _Herald_ give us
+a headliner. And even the old _Sun_ says there are passages in 'Phantom
+Love' that might have been written by Moliere!"
+
+"Where are the papers?" cried Papa Claude, prancing with excitement.
+
+"I gave mine to Estelle. You can get them downstairs at the news-stand."
+
+"I'll run down now--be back in a second." And Papa Claude rushed
+impetuously from the room.
+
+Eleanor and Harold stood facing each other where he had left them, he
+with an air of apologetic amusement, and she with an angry dignity that
+rested incongruously on her childish prettiness.
+
+"Will you please go down and tell Mr. Pfingst that I am not coming to his
+party?" she asked, with the obvious intention of getting rid of him.
+
+"Why aren't you?"
+
+"Because I don't like him."
+
+"Neither do I. But what has that to do with it? Estelle Linton will take
+him off our hands."
+
+"I don't care for Miss Linton, either. If I had known----"
+
+"Oh, come! Haven't we got past that?" scoffed Harold, sitting astride a
+chair and looking at her quizzically. "Nobody pays any attention to
+Estelle's numerous little affairs. I'd as soon think of criticizing a
+Watteau lady on an ivory fan!"
+
+"You can probably catch Mr. Pfingst in the dining-room if you go down at
+once," suggested Eleanor pointedly.
+
+"But I've no intention of going down at once. Eleanor, why do you play
+with me like this? Can't you see that this can't go on? I've been
+patient, God knows. For two months I've done nothing but advance your
+interests, put you forward in every conceivable way. And what have I got?
+The merest civility! Do you suppose it's pleasant for me to know that
+everybody in the company is whispering about my infatuation for you and
+your indifference to me? The maddening part of it is that I know
+perfectly well you are _not_ indifferent. You are in love with me. You
+always have been. You'd have married me last fall if some busybody hadn't
+filled your ears with scandal. Confess, wouldn't you?"
+
+"Yes; but----"
+
+"I knew it! And you are going to marry me now. You can do anything you
+want, have anything you want. I'll put you at the head of your own
+company; I'll take you over to London. I'll do anything under heaven but
+give you up."
+
+He rose suddenly and went toward her, catching her bare arm and trying to
+draw her toward him; but she struggled from his embrace.
+
+"Let me go!" she cried furiously. "If you don't leave the room instantly,
+I will! There's Papa Claude now. Let me pass!"
+
+It was not Papa Claude, however, to whom she opened the door. It was
+Estelle Linton, smartly attired for the day's expedition, and exhibiting
+all the compensating charms with which she sought to atone for her lack
+of brains and morals. With a glance of sophisticated comprehension she
+took in the disordered room, the perturbed young people, the unfinished
+breakfast-tray; then she burst into a gay little laugh.
+
+"Ten thousand pardons!" she cried, backing away from the door in assumed
+confusion. "I shouldn't have called so early. I just ran in to bring you
+_Town Topics_. The most killing article about you, dear. By-by; I'll see
+you later!" And, kissing her hand to Eleanor, she flitted down the hall.
+
+"Shall I go or will you?" Eleanor demanded of Harold.
+
+She was standing in the open door, all the color fled from her face and
+her eyes blazing with anger.
+
+"I'll go, of course," said Harold. "Only, you must not mind Estelle.
+Everybody knows she's a fool----"
+
+The door was slammed in his face and locked before he finished the
+sentence.
+
+For a moment Eleanor stood immovable; then her eye fell on the paper that
+Estelle Linton had thrust into her hand, and she saw her stage name on
+the title-page.
+
+    Pretty little romance back of the production of "Phantom Love" [she
+    read]. It is rumored that a wealthy young Chicago playwright, having
+    met with family opposition in winning a young Southern belle, took
+    advantage of her histrionic ambition, and persuaded her to play a
+    role in his new play, which he wrote especially for her. Those who
+    saw the opening performance of "Phantom Love" at Atlantic City
+    Wednesday night will have little trouble in recognizing the heroine
+    of the story. Miss Nell Martel is one of the daintiest bits of
+    femininity that have flitted behind the footlights in many moons.
+    She has youth and beauty and a certain elusive charm. But the fact
+    remains that she can not act. For the continued success of the really
+    brilliant play, let us hope that the young lady's lover may soon
+    become her husband, and that, having won his prize, he will
+    substitute a professional for the charming young amateur who is in
+    no way up to the rest of the really excellent cast.
+
+Eleanor crushed the paper in her hand, flung herself across the bed, and
+buried her hot face in the pillow. All her life she had walked unafraid
+and inviolate, protected by her social position, the over-zealous
+solicitude of the family, and her own purity. She had flown out of the
+family nest, confident of her power to take care of herself, to breast
+any storm. And here, at the beginning of her flight, she found herself in
+utter confusion of body and spirit, powerless to protect herself against
+such conduct as Harold's, such printed gossip as lay before her, or such
+unspeakable insinuations as Estelle Linton's.
+
+When Papa Claude returned, her first impulse was to pour out her troubles
+to him; but second thought restrained her. He was too much a part of that
+casual, irresponsible world to take anything it did or said seriously.
+She called through the door to him that she had gone to bed and was going
+to stay there.
+
+But she did not stay there. She got up and knelt by the open window,
+looking across the seething mass of humanity on the boardwalk below to
+the calm stretches of blue sea beyond. For the first time, she faced her
+problem fairly and squarely. Up to now she had been trying to compromise,
+to be broad and tolerant and cosmopolitan. But she had to admit that the
+new life satisfied her no more than the old had. One was too
+circumscribed, the other too free. If it was true that she had no talent
+and was simply tolerated in the company because of Harold Phipps, she
+must know it at once. To be drawing a salary that she did not earn, and
+accepting favors for which a definite reward would be expected, was
+utterly intolerable to her.
+
+A wild desire seized her to go back to New York and seek another
+engagement. In spite of what that odious article said, she believed that
+she could succeed on the stage. Papa Claude believed in her; the Kendall
+School people were enthusiastic about her work; they would help her to
+make another start.
+
+But did she honestly want to make another start? A conscience that had
+overslept itself began to stir and waken. After all, what did the
+plaudits of hundreds of unknown people count for, when the approval and
+affection of those nearest and dearest was withdrawn? What would any
+success count for against the disgust she felt for herself.
+
+A wave of terrific homesickness swept over her. But what was it she
+wanted, she asked herself, in place of this gay kaleidoscope of light and
+color and ceaseless confusion? Not the stagnation of the Bartlett
+household, certainly not the slipshod poverty of the Martels. She
+searched her heart for the answer.
+
+And as she knelt there with her head on the window-sill, looking
+miserably out to sea, a strange thing happened to her. In a moment of
+swift, sure vision she saw Quinby Graham's homely, whimsical face, she
+felt his strong arms around her, and into her soul came a deep, still
+feeling of unutterable content.
+
+"I am coming, Quin!" she whispered, with a little catch in her voice.
+
+Then it was that Destiny played her second trump for Quin. It was in the
+form of a telegram that a bell-boy brought up from the office, and it
+announced that Madam Bartlett was not expected to live through the day.
+
+Within twenty-four hours Eleanor was in Kentucky.
+
+"Is she living?" she demanded of Hannah, who answered her ring at her
+grandmother's door.
+
+"I don't know, honey," whispered Hannah, ashy with fright. "They's
+operatin' now. We thought she was going to die all day yesterday, but she
+never give in to be operated on till Mr. Quin come."
+
+"Where are Aunt Isobel and Aunt Enid?"
+
+"They's all in the library. Mr. Ranny's there, too. Ain't nobody upstairs
+with her but jest the doctors an' the nurse an' Mr. Quin."
+
+Eleanor crept upstairs and sat down on the top step, outside that door
+before which she had halted in dread so many times before. Remorse and
+sympathy and acute apprehension struggled for mastery. All the old
+antagonism for her grandmother was swept away in the dread prospect of
+losing her. It was impossible to think of the family existing without
+her. She held it up, kept it together, maintained the proud old Bartlett
+tradition.
+
+There was a sound behind the closed doors. Eleanor strained her ears to
+listen. It was someone coughing, at first gently, then violently. The
+next moment the door opened and a wild-eyed, unshaven figure staggered
+into the hall.
+
+"Damn that ether!" some one muttered.
+
+And then, before Eleanor could get to her feet, Quinby Graham came
+unsteadily toward her, stumbled twice, then pitched forward on his face,
+striking his head on the banister as he fell.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER 33
+
+
+Two weeks later, when Quin struggled back to consciousness, he labored
+under the delusion that he was still in the army and back in the camp
+hospital. Eleanor, who scarcely left his bedside, was once more Miss
+Bartlett, the ward visitor, and he was Patient Number 7. He tried to
+explain to all those dim figures moving about the darkened room that he
+was making her a bead chain, and unless they got him more beads he could
+not finish it in time. When they reassured him and tried to get him to
+take food, he invariably wanted to know if Miss Bartlett had brought it,
+and which was her day to come again. Then the doctor and the nurse would
+argue with him, and try to make him remember things he was sure had never
+happened, and his mental distress would become acute. At such times
+somebody, who of course could not be Miss Bartlett, but who had her voice
+and eyes, would take his hand and tell him to go to sleep, then the
+tangles would all come straight.
+
+One day he was startled out of a stupor by the sound of a querulous old
+voice saying:
+
+"I guess if he could get out of bed to come across the city to me, I can
+come across the hall to him. Wheel me closer!"
+
+Quin was drifting off again, when a hand gripped his wrist.
+
+"Open your eyes, boy! Look at me. Do you know who this is?"
+
+He lifted his heavy lids, and wondered dully what Madam was doing at the
+camp hospital.
+
+"Put the blinds up," she commanded to some one back of her. "Let him see
+the wall-paper, the furniture. Move that fool screen away."
+
+For the first time, Quin brought his confused attention to bear on his
+surroundings, and even glanced at the space over the mantel to see if a
+certain picture was at its old place.
+
+"You are in my house," said Madam, with a finality that was not to be
+disputed. "Do you remember the first time you came here?"
+
+He shook his head.
+
+"Yes, you do. I fell down the steps and broke my leg, and you came in off
+the street to tie me up with an umbrella and the best table napkins. What
+are you smiling about?"
+
+"Smelling salts," Quin murmured, as if to himself.
+
+"You don't need any smelling salts!" cried Madam, missing his allusion.
+"All you need is to rouse yourself and put your mind on what I am saying.
+Do you remember living in this house?"
+
+He could not truthfully say that he did, though familiar objects and
+sounds seemed to be all around him.
+
+"Well, I'll make you," said Madam, nothing daunted. "You stayed in this
+very room for three months to keep the burglars from stealing Isobel and
+Enid, and every night you walked me up and down the hall on my crutches."
+
+She paused and looked at him expectantly; but things were still a blur to
+him.
+
+"You surely remember the Easter party?" she persisted. "If you can forget
+the way your shirt kept popping open that night, and the way your jaw
+swelled up, it's more than I can!"
+
+Quin winced. Even concussion of the brain had failed to deaden the memory
+of that awful night.
+
+"I sort of remember," he admitted.
+
+"Good! That will do for to-day. As for the rest, I'll tell you what
+happened. You came here one night two weeks ago, when everybody had me
+dead and buried, and you deviled me into having an operation that saved
+my life. You stood right by me while they did it. Then you collapsed and
+knocked your head on the banister, and, as if that wasn't enough,
+developed pneumonia on top of it. Now all you've got to think about is
+getting well."
+
+"But--but--Miss Eleanor?" Quin queried weakly, fearing that the blessed
+presence that had hovered over him was but a figment of his dreams.
+
+"She came home to help bury me," said Madam. "Failing to get the job, she
+took to nursing you. Now stop talking and go to sleep. If I hear any more
+of this stuff and nonsense about your being in a hospital and making bead
+chains, I'll forbid Eleanor crossing the threshold; do you hear?"
+
+From that time on Quin's convalescence was rapid--almost too rapid, in
+fact, for his peace of mind. Never in his life had he been so watched
+over and so tenderly cared for. Mr. Ranny kept him supplied with fresh
+eggs and cream from Valley Mead; Mr. Chester and Miss Enid deluged him
+with magazines and flowers; Miss Isobel gave him his medicine and fixed
+his tray herself; Madam chaperoned his thoughts and allowed no intruding
+fancies or vagaries.
+
+But all these attentions were as nothing to him, compared with the
+miracle of Eleanor's presence. Just why she was remaining at home he
+dared not ask, for fear he should be told the date of her departure. The
+fact that she flitted in and out of his room, flirting with the doctor,
+teasing the aunties, assuming a divine proprietorship over him, was
+heaven enough in itself.
+
+Sometimes, when they were alone and she thought he was asleep he would
+see the dancing, restless light die out of her eyes, and a beautiful
+exalted look come into them as if she were listening to the music of the
+spheres.
+
+He attributed this to the fact that she was happy in being once more
+reconciled to the family. Even she and Madam seemed to be on terms of the
+closest intimacy, and he spent hours in trying to understand what had
+effected the change.
+
+As he grew stronger and was allowed to sit up in bed, he realized, with a
+shock, what a fool's paradise he was living in. A few more days and he
+must go back to that dark, damp room in Chestnut Street. He must find
+work--and work, however menial, for which he had the strength. Eleanor
+would return to New York, and he would probably never see her again.
+During his illness she had been heavenly kind to him, but that was no
+reason for thinking she had changed her mind. She had given him his final
+answer there in New York, and he was grimly determined never to open the
+subject again.
+
+But one day, when they were alone together, his resolution sustained a
+compound fracture. Eleanor was reading aloud to him, and in the midst of
+a sentence she put down the book and looked at him queerly.
+
+"Quin," she said, "did you know I am not going back?"
+
+"Why not? Did the play fail?"
+
+"No. It's a big success. Papa Claude will probably make a small fortune
+out of it."
+
+"But you? What's the trouble?"
+
+"I've had enough. I had made up my mind to leave the company even before
+I was sent for."
+
+Quin's eyes searched her face, but for once he held his tongue.
+
+She was evidently finding it hard to continue. She twisted the fringe of
+the counterpane in her slender, white fingers, and she did not look at
+him.
+
+"It all turned out as you said it would," she admitted at last. "I--I
+simply couldn't stand Harold Phipps."
+
+Quin's heart performed an athletic feat. It leaped into his throat and
+remained there.
+
+"But you'll be joining some other company, I suppose?" He tried to make
+his voice formal and detached.
+
+"That depends," she said; and she looked at him again in that queer,
+tremulous, mysterious way that he did not in the least understand.
+
+Her small hands were fluttering so close to his that he could have
+captured them both in one big palm; but he heroically refrained. He kept
+saying over and over to himself that it was just Miss Nell's way of being
+good to a fellow, and that, whatever happened, he must not make her
+unhappy and sorry--he must not lose his head.
+
+"Quin,"--her voice dropped so low he could scarcely hear it,--"have you
+ever forgiven me for the way I behaved in New York?"
+
+"Sure!"
+
+He was trembling now, and he wondered how much longer he could hold out.
+
+"Do you--do you--still feel about me the way you--you did--that night on
+the bus?" she whispered.
+
+Quin looked at her as a Christian martyr might have looked at his
+persecutor.
+
+"I think about you the way I've always thought about you," he said
+hopelessly--"the way I shall go on thinking about you as long as I live."
+
+"Well," said Eleanor, with a sigh of relief, "I guess that settles it";
+and, to his unspeakable amazement, she laid her head on his pillow and
+her cheek on his.
+
+When he recovered from his shock of subliminal ecstasy, his first thought
+was of the trouble he was storing up for Eleanor. Even his rapture was
+dimmed by the prospect of involving her in another love affair that could
+only meet with bitter opposition of her family.
+
+"We must keep it dark for the present," he urged, holding her close as if
+he feared she would slip away. "Maybe, when I am well, and have a good
+position, and all, they won't take it so hard."
+
+Eleanor refused to listen to any such counsel. She wanted to announce
+their engagement at once, and be married at the earliest possible date.
+He needed her to take care of him, she declared; and besides, they could
+make a start on the money that would soon be due her from her father's
+estate. To this proposition Quin would not listen, and they had a
+spirited quarrel and reached no agreement.
+
+Eleanor had fallen seriously in love for the first time in her life, and
+it was a sudden and overwhelming experience. During those anxious days of
+Quin's illness, when his life had hung in the balance, she had time to
+realize what he meant to her. Now that he needed skilful nursing and
+constant care to assure his recovery, she was determined not to be
+separated from him.
+
+In spite of his protests, she joyfully announced their engagement to
+Uncle Ranny and the aunties at dinner, and was surprised to find that the
+family tree, instead of being rocked to its foundation, was merely
+pleasantly stirred in its branches.
+
+"You see, we could not help suspecting it," Miss Isobel twittered
+excitedly to Quin, when she brought him his tray. "You talked about her
+incessantly in your delirium, and the dear child was almost beside
+herself the night we thought you might not recover. I told sister then
+that if you got well----"
+
+"But what about Madam?" Quin interrupted anxiously. "What will she think
+of Miss Nell's being engaged to a fellow like me, with no money or
+position, or any prospects of being able to marry for God knows how
+long?"
+
+Miss Isobel looked grave. "Nellie is breaking the news to her now," she
+said primly. "I am afraid she is going to find it very hard. But, as
+sister says, there are times when one has to follow one's own judgments.
+When mother sees that we all stand together about this----"
+
+She waved her hand with a little air of finality. It was the second time
+in her life that she had made even a gesture toward freedom.
+
+The interview between Eleanor and her grandmother lasted for more than an
+hour, and nobody knew the outcome of it until the next morning, when a
+family council was called in Quin's room. Madam was wheeled in in state,
+resplendent in purple and gold, with her hair elaborately dressed, as
+usual.
+
+To everybody's amazement, she opened the conference by abruptly announcing
+that she had decided that Eleanor and Quin should be married at once.
+
+"She's at loose ends, and he's at loose ends. The sooner they get tied
+up, the better," was the way she put it.
+
+"But hold on!" cried Quin, sitting up in bed. "I can't do that, you know;
+I've got to get on my feet first."
+
+"How are you going to get on your feet until you get your strength back?"
+demanded Madam. "You look like going to work, don't you?"
+
+"Well, the doctor has promised me I can go out on Saturday. I ought to be
+able to go to work in a couple of weeks."
+
+"Couple of fiddle-sticks! Dr. Rawlins told me it would be two months
+before you would be fit for work, and even then you would have to be
+careful."
+
+"Well, you don't think I am going to let Miss Nell in on a deal like
+that, do you?" Quin's voice broke and he gripped Eleanor's hand until she
+winced.
+
+"But, Quin, I want it to be now," Eleanor begged. "Grandmother and I have
+gone over it from every standpoint, and she's come to see it as I do. You
+need me, and I need you. Why can't you be sensible and see it as we do?"
+
+How Quin ever withstood those pleading tones and beseeching eyes, it is
+impossible to say. But withstand them he did, announcing stubbornly that
+it was bad enough for a girl to marry a chap with broken bellows; but for
+her to marry one she would not only have to nurse, but support as well,
+was not to be thought of. There was but one thing to do, and that was to
+wait.
+
+Then it was that Madam, who had been reasonably patient up till now, lost
+her temper and delivered an ultimatum.
+
+"You'll marry her now or not at all," she thundered. "I am sick and tired
+of the way you try to run this family, Quinby Graham! For more than a
+year now you have carried things with a high hand. You got Ranny out of
+the factory and on a farm. You married Enid to Francis Chester, and sent
+them to California. You made me let Eleanor go to New York, and came very
+near landing her on the stage for good. And now, when I have been
+persuaded into letting the child marry you, you are not satisfied, but
+insist on doing it at your own time and in your own way!"
+
+"You forgot one thing, granny," suggested Eleanor demurely. "He made you
+have the operation."
+
+Madam was not to be diverted. She glared at Quin like an angry old
+lioness.
+
+"Are you going to do as I advise?" she demanded.
+
+"No; not until I get a job." Quin's jaw was set as firmly as hers, and
+their eyes measured each other's with equal determination.
+
+"Well, then I'll give you a job," she announced with sudden decision.
+"I'll send you to China."
+
+"To China?"
+
+"Yes. Bartlett & Bangs has just opened a branch house in Shanghai. They
+are looking for a man to take charge of it. Your knowledge of the
+language would make up for your lack of experience. Besides, the sea
+voyage will do you good."
+
+"Do you mean it?" cried Quinn eagerly. "Would Mr. Bangs agree?"
+
+"Geoffrey Bangs would take you back at the factory to-morrow. But I don't
+want you there, under him. I want to turn you loose on China. It's the
+only place I know that's big enough to exhaust your energies. You will
+probably have the entire country plowing up its ancestors before spring."
+
+"And what about you?" said Quin, turning eagerly to Eleanor. "Would you
+go with me?"
+
+"_Will_ I?" said Eleanor, her eyes dancing.
+
+                       *          *          *
+
+That night, when Miss Isobel was tucking Madam into bed, she made bold to
+ask her how she happened to give her consent to the wedding.
+
+"Isobel," said Madam, cocking a wise old eye, "it might as well be now as
+later. When a man like Quinby Graham makes up his mind to marry a certain
+girl, the devil himself can't stop him!"
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Quin, by Alice Hegan Rice
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