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diff --git a/41581-8.txt b/41581-8.txt deleted file mode 100644 index ddf5a8f..0000000 --- a/41581-8.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,7655 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Amazing Grace, by Kate Trimble Sharber - -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: Amazing Grace - Who Proves that Virtue Has Its Silver Lining - -Author: Kate Trimble Sharber - -Illustrator: R. M. Crosby - -Release Date: December 8, 2012 [EBook #41581] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AMAZING GRACE *** - - - - -Produced by Melissa McDaniel and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - - - - - - -Transcriber's Note: - - Inconsistent hyphenation and spelling in the original document have - been preserved. Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. - - Italic text is denoted by _underscores_. - - - - - AMAZING GRACE - - [Illustration: I took up the first one] - - - - - AMAZING GRACE - - _Who Proves That Virtue Has Its Silver Lining_ - - By - KATE TRIMBLE SHARBER - _Author of_ - THE ANNALS OF ANN, AT THE AGE OF EVE, ETC. - - ILLUSTRATED BY - R. M. CROSBY - - INDIANAPOLIS - THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY - PUBLISHERS - - - - - COPYRIGHT 1914 - THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY - - PRESS OF - BRAUNWORTH & CO. - BOOKBINDERS AND PRINTERS - BROOKLYN, N. Y. - - - - - TO - LAURA NORVELL ELLIOTT - WHO HAS THE OLD LETTERS-- - - - - -CONTENTS - - - CHAPTER PAGE - - I STRAINED RELATIONS 1 - - II A GLIMPSE OF PROMISED LAND 26 - - III NIP AND TUCK 40 - - IV THE QUALITY OF MERCY 59 - - V ET TU, BRUTE! 82 - - VI FLAG DAY 99 - - VII STRAWS POINT 115 - - VIII LONGEST WAY HOME 128 - - IX MAITLAND TAIT 141 - - X IN THE FIRELIGHT 157 - - XI TWO MEN AND A MAID 168 - - XII AN ASSIGNMENT 186 - - XIII JILTED! 211 - - XIV THE SKIES FALL 230 - - XV THE JOURNEY 244 - - XVI LONDON 278 - - XVII HOUSE OF A HUNDRED DREAMS 312 - - - - -AMAZING GRACE - - - - -AMAZING GRACE - - - - -CHAPTER I - -STRAINED RELATIONS - - -Some people, you will admit, can absorb experience in gentle little -homeopathic doses, while others require it to be shot into them by -hypodermic injections. - -Certainly my Dresden-china mother up to the time of my birth had been -forced to take this bitter medicine in every form, yet she had never -been known to profit by it. She would not, it is true, fly in the very -face of Providence, but she _would_ nag at its coat tails. - -"You might as well name this child 'Praise-the-Lord,' and be done with -it!" complained the rich Christie connection (which mother had always -regarded as outlaws as well as in-laws), shaking its finger across the -christening font into mother's boarding-school face on the day of my -baptism. "Of course all the world knows you're _glad_ she's -posthumous, but--" - -"But with Tom Christie only six weeks in spirit-land it isn't decent!" -Cousin Pollie finished up individually. - -"Besides, good families don't name their children for abstract -things," Aunt Hannah put in. "It--well, it simply isn't done." - -"A woman who never does anything that isn't done, never does anything -worth doing," mother answered, through pretty pursed lips. - -"But, since you must be freakish, why not call her Prudence, or -Patience--to keep Oldburgh from wagging its tongue in two?" Aunt -Louella suggested. - -Oldburgh isn't the town's name, of course, but it's a descriptive -alias. The place itself is, unfortunately, the worst overworked -southern capital in fiction. It is one of the Old South's "types," -boasting far more social leaders than sky-scrapers--and you can't -suffer a blow-out on _any_ pike near the city's limits that isn't -flanked by a college campus. - -"Oldburgh knows how I feel," mother replied. "If this baby had been a -boy I should have named him Theodore--gift of God--but since she's a -girl, her name is _Grace_." - -She said it smoothly, I feel sure, for her Vere de Vere repose always -jutted out like an iceberg into a troubled sea when there was a family -squall going on. - -"_All_ right!" pronounced two aunts, simultaneously and acidly. - -"All _right_!" chorused another two, but Cousin Pollie hadn't given up -the ship. - -"Just name a girl Faith, Hope or Natalie, if you want her to grow up -freckle-faced and marry a ribbon clerk!" she threatened. "Grace is -every bit as bad! It is indicative! It proclaims what you think of -her--what you will expect of her--and just trust her to disappoint -you!" - -Which is only too true! You may be named Fannie or Bess without your -family having anything up its sleeve, but it's an entirely different -matter when you're named for one of the prismatic virtues. You know -then that you're expected to take an A. B. degree, mate with a -millionaire and bring up your children by the Montessori method. - -"Bet Gwace 'ud ruther be ducked 'n cwistened, anyhow!" observed -Guilford Blake, my five-year-old betrothed.--Not that we were Hindus -and believed in infant marriage exactly! Not that! We were simply -southerners, living in that portion of the South where the principal -ambition in life is to "stay put"--where everything you get is -inherited, tastes, mates and demijohns--where blood is thicker than -axle-grease, and the dividing fence between your estate and the next -is properly supposed to act as a seesaw basis for your amalgamated -grandchildren.--Hence this early occasion for "Enter Guilford." - -"My daughter is not going to disappoint me," mother declared, as she -motioned for Guilford's mother to come forward and keep him from -profaning the water in the font with his little celluloid duck. - -"Don't be too sure," warned Cousin Pollie. - -"Well, I'll--I'll risk it!" mother fired back. "And if you must know -the truth, I couldn't express my feelings of gratitude--yes, I said -_grat_itude--in any other name than Grace. I have had a wonderful -blessing lately, and I am going to give credit where it is due! It was -nothing less than an act of heavenly grace that released me!" - -At this point the mercury dropped so suddenly that Cousin Pollie's -breath became visible. Only six weeks before my father had died--of -delirium tremens. It was a case of "the death wound on his gallant -breast the last of _many_ scars," but the Christies had never given -mother any sympathy on that account. He had done nothing worse, his -family considered, than to get his feet tangled up in the line of -least resistance. Nearly every southern man born with a silver spoon -in his mouth discards it for a straw to drink mint julep with! - -"Calling her the whole of the doxology isn't going to get that -Christie look off her!" father's family sniffed, their triumph -answering her defiant outburst. "She is the living image of Uncle -Lancelot!" - -You'll notice this about in-laws. If the baby is like their family -their attitude is triumphant--if it's like anybody else on the face of -the earth their manner is distinctly accusing. - -"'Lancelot!'" mother repeated scornfully. "If they had to name him for -poetry why didn't they call him Lothario and be done with it!" - -The circle again stiffened, as if they had a spine in common. - -"Certainly it isn't becoming in you to train this child up with a -disrespectful feeling toward Uncle Lancelot," some one reprimanded -quickly, "since she gives every evidence of being very much like him -in appearance." - -"My child like that notorious Lancelot Christie!" mother repeated, -then burst into tears. "Why she's a Moore, I'll have you -understand--from here--down to _here_!" - -She encompassed the space between the crown of my throbbing head and -the soles of my kicking feet, but neither the tears nor the -measurements melted Cousin Pollie. - -"A Moore! Bah! Why, you needn't expect that she'll turn out anything -like you. A Lydia Languish mother always brings forth a caryatid!" - -"A what?" mother demanded frenziedly, then remembering that Cousin -Pollie had just returned from Europe with guide-books full of strange -but not necessarily insulting words, she backed down into her former -assertion. "She's a Moore! She's the image of my revered father." - -"There's something in that, Pollie," admitted Aunt Louella, who was -the weak-kneed one of the sisters. "Look at the poetic little brow -and expression of spiritual intelligence!" - -"But what a combination!" Aunt Hannah pointed out. "As sure as you're -a living woman this mouth and chin are like Uncle Lancelot!--Think of -it--Jacob Moore and Lancelot Christie living together in the same -skin!" - -"Why, they'll tear the child limb from limb!" - -This piece of sarcasm came from old great-great-aunt, Patricia -Christie, who never took sides with anybody in family disputes, -because she hated them one and all alike. She rose from her chair now -and hobbled on her stick into the midst of the battle-field. - -"Let me see! Let me see!" - -"She's remarkably like Uncle Lancelot, aunty," Cousin Pollie declared -with a superior air of finality. - -"She's a thousand times more like my father than I, myself, am," poor -little mother avowed stanchly. - -"Then, all I've got to say is that it's a devilish bad combination!" -Aunt Patricia threw out, making faces at them impartially. - -And to pursue the matter further, I may state that it was! All my life -I have been divided between those ancient enemies--cut in two by a -Solomon's sword, as it were, because no decision could be made as to -which one really owned me. - -You believe in a "dual personality"? Well, they're mine! They quarrel -within me! They dispute! They pull and wrangle and seesaw in as many -different directions as a party of Cook tourists in Cairo--coming into -the council-chamber of my conscience to decide everything I do, from -the selection of a black-dotted veil to the emancipation of the -sex--while I sit by as helpless as a bound-and-gagged spiritual -medium. - -"They're not going to affect her future," mother said, but a little -gasp of fear showed that if she'd been a Roman Catholic she would be -crossing herself. - -"Of course not!" Aunt Patricia answered. "It's all written down, -anyhow, in her little hand. Let me see the lines of her palm!" - -"Her feet's a heap cuter!" Guilford advised, but the old lady -untwisted my tight little fist. - -"Ah! This tells the story!" - -"What?" mother asked, peering over eagerly. - -"Nothing--nothing, except that the youngster's a Christie, sure -enough! All heart and no head." - -Mother started to cry again, but Aunt Patricia stopped her. - -"For the lord's sake hush--here comes the minister! Anyhow, if the -child grows up beautiful she may survive it--but heaven help the woman -who has a big heart and a big nose at the same time." - -Then, with this christening and bit of genealogical gossip by way of -introduction, the next mile-stone in my career came one day when the -twentieth century was in its wee small figures. - -"I hate Grandfather Moore and Uncle Lancelot Christie, both!" I -confided to Aunt Patricia upon that occasion, having been sent to her -room to make her a duty visit, as I was home for the holidays--a -slim-legged sorority "pledge"--and had learned that talking about the -Past, either for or against, was the only way to gain her attention. -"I hate them both, I say! I wish you could be vaccinated against your -ancestors. Are they in you to stay?" - -I put the question pertly, for she was not the kind to endure timidity -nor hushed reverence from her family connections. She was a woman of -great spirit herself, and she called forth spirit in other people. A -visit with her was more like a bomb than a benediction. - -"Hate your ancestors?" - -At this time she was perching, hawk-eyed and claw-fingered, upon the -edge of the grave, but she always liked and remembered me because I -happened to be the only member of the family who didn't keep a black -bonnet in readiness upon the wardrobe shelf. - -"I hate that grandfather and Uncle Lancelot affair! Don't you think -it's a pity I couldn't have had a little say-so in that business?" - -"Yes--no--I don't know--ouch, my knee!" she snapped. "What a -chatterbox you are, Grace! I've got rheumatism!" - -"But I've got 'hereditary tendencies,'" I persisted, "and chloroform -liniment won't do any good with my ailment. I wish I need never hear -my family history mentioned again." - -"Then, you shouldn't have chosen so notable a lineage," she exclaimed -viciously. "Your Grandfather Moore, as you know, was a famous -divine--" - -"I know--and Uncle Lancelot Christie was an equally famous infernal," -I said, for the sake of varying the story a little. I was so tired of -it. - -She stared, arrested in her recital. - -"What?" - -"Well, if you call a minister a divine, why shouldn't you call a -gambler an infernal?" - -"Just after the Civil War," she kept on, with the briefest pause left -to show that she ignored my interruption, "your grandfather did all -in his power--although he was no kin to me, I give him credit for -that--he did all in his power to re-establish peace between the states -by preaching and praying across the border." - -"And Uncle Lancelot accomplished the feat in half the time by flirting -and marrying," I reminded her. - -She turned her face away, to hide a smile I knew, for she always -concealed what was pleasant and displayed grimaces. - -"Well, I must admit that when Lancelot brought home his third Ohio -heiress--" - -"The other two heiresses having died of neglect," I put in to show my -learning. - -"--many southern aristocrats felt that if the Mason and Dixon line had -not been wiped away it had at least been broken up into dots and -dashes--like a telegraph code." - -I smiled conspicuously at her wit, then went back to my former stand. -I was determined to be firm about it. - -"I don't care--I hate them both! Nagging old crisscross creatures!" - -She looked at me blankly for a moment, then: - -"Grace, you amaze me!" she said. - -But she mimicked mother's voice--mother's hurt, helpless, -moral-suasion voice--as she said it, and we both burst out laughing. - -"But, honest Injun, aunty, if a person's got to carry around a -heritage, why aren't you allowed to choose which one you prefer?" I -asked; then, a sudden memory coming to me, I leaped to my feet and -sprang across the room, my gym. shoes sounding in hospital thuds -against the floor. I drew up to where three portraits hung on the -opposite wall. They represented an admiral, an ambassador and an -artist. - -"Why can't you adopt an ancestor, as you can a child?" I asked again, -turning back to her. - -"Adopt an ancestor?" - -Her voice was trembling with excitement, which was not brought about -by the annoyance of my chatter, and as I saw that she was nodding her -head vigorously, I calmed down at once and regretted my precipitate -action, for the doctor had said that any unusual exertion or change of -routine would end her. - -"I only meant that I'd prefer these to grandfather and Uncle -Lancelot," I explained soothingly, but her anxiety only increased. - -"Which one?" she demanded in a squeaky voice which fairly bubbled with -a "bully-for-you" sound. "_Which one_, Grace?" - -"Him," I answered. - -"They're all hims!" she screamed impatiently. - -"I mean the artist." - -At this she tried to struggle to her feet, then settled back in -exhaustion and drew a deep breath. - -"Come here! Come here quick!" she panted weakly. - -"Yes, 'um." - -She wiped away a tear, in great shame, for she was not a weeping -woman. - -"Thank God!" she said angrily. "Thank God! That awful problem is -settled at last! I knew I couldn't have a moment's peace a-dying until -I had decided." - -"Decided what?" I gasped in dismay, for I was afraid from the look in -her eyes that she was "seeing things." "Shall I call mother, or--some -one?" - -"Don't you dare!" she challenged. "Don't you leave this room, miss. -It's _you_ that I have business with!" - -"But I haven't done a thing!" I plead, as weak all of a sudden as she -was. - -"It's not what you've done, but what you _are_," she exclaimed. -"You're the only member of this family that has an idea which isn't -framed and hung up! Now, listen! I'm going to leave you -something--something very precious. Do you know about that artist over -there--James Mackenzie Christie--our really famous ancestor--_my_ -great-uncle, who has been dead these sixty years, but will always be -immortal? Do you know about him?" - -"Yes--I know!" - -"Well, I'm going to leave--those letters--those terrible love-letters -to _you_!" - -I drew back, as if she'd pointed a pistol straight at me. - -"But they're the skeleton in the closet," I repeated, having heard it -expressed that way all my life. - -She was angry for a moment, then she began laughing reminiscently and -rocking herself backward and forward slowly in her chair. Her face was -as detached and crazy as Ophelia's over her botany lesson, when she -gets on your nerves with her: "There is pansies, that's for thoughts," -and so forth. - -"Yes, he left a skeleton--what was considered a skeleton in those -days--Uncle James--our family's great man--but such a skeleton! People -now would understand how wonderful it is--with its carved ivory -bones--and golden joints and ruby eyes! _You little fool!_" - -"Why, I'm proud!" I denied, backing back, all a-tremble. "I'll love -those letters, Aunt Patricia." - -"You'd better!" - -"I'll be sure to," I reiterated, but her face suddenly softened, and -she caught up my hand in her yellow claw. She studied the palm for a -moment. - -"You'll understand them," she sighed. "Poor little, heart-strong -Christie!" - -And, whether her words were prophetic or delirious, she had told the -truth. I have understood them. - -She gave them over into my keeping that day; and the next morning we -found her settled back among her pillows, imagining that all her -brothers and sisters were flying above the mantlepiece and that the -Chinese vase was in danger. Another day passed, and on Sunday -afternoon all the wardrobe shelves yielded up their black bonnets. - -I was not distressed, but I was lonely, with an ultra-Sabbathical -repression over my spirits. - -"I believe I'll amuse myself by reading over those old letters," I -suggested to mother, as time dragged wearily before the crowd began to -gather. But she uttered a shriek, with an ultra-Sabbathical repression -over its tone. - -"Grace, you amaze me!" she said. - -"She's really a most American child!" Cousin Pollie pronounced -severely, having just finished doing the British Isles. - -After this it seemed that years and years and years of the twentieth -century passed--all in a heap. I awoke one morning to find myself set -in my ways. Most women, in the formation of their happiness, are -willing to let nature take its course, then there are others who are -not content with this, but demand a postgraduate course. I, -unfortunately, belonged to this latter class. Growing up I was fairly -normal, not idle enough at school to forecast a brilliant career in -any of the arts, nor studious enough to deserve a prediction of -mediocre plodding the rest of my life; but after school came the -deluge. I was restless, shabby and _single_--no one of which mother -could endure in her daughter. - -So I was a disappointment to her, while the rest of the tribe gloated. -The name, Grace, with all appurtenances and emoluments accruing -thereto, availed nothing. I was a failure. - -"My pet abomination begins with C," I chattered savagely to myself one -afternoon in June, a suitable number of years after the -above-mentioned christening, as I made my way to my own private desk -in the office of _The Oldburgh Herald_, pondering family affairs in my -heart as I went. "Of course this is at the bottom of the whole agony! -They just can't bear to see me turn out to be a newspaper reporter -instead of Mrs. Guilford Blake. And I hate everything that they love -best--cities, clothes, clubs, culture, civilities, conventions, -chiffons!" - -I was thinking of Cousin Pollie's comment when she first saw a feature -story in the _Herald_ signed with my name. - -"Is the girl named Grace or Disgrace?" she had asked. "Not since -America was a wilderness has the name of any Christie woman appeared -outside the head-lines of the society column!" - -"The whole connection has raised its eyebrows," I laughed, when I met -the owner and publisher of the paper down in his private office the -next day. He was an old friend of the family, having fought beside my -revered grandfather, and he had taken me into the family circle of the -_Herald_ more out of sympathy than need. - -"That's all right! It's better to raise an eyebrow than to raise -hell!" he laughed back. - -But on the June afternoon I have in mind, when I hurried up-town -thinking over my pet abominations beginning with C, I was still a -fairly civilized being. I lived at home with mother in the old house, -for one thing, instead of in an independent apartment, after the -fashion of emancipated women--and I still wore Guilford Blake's -heirloom scarab ring. - -"Aren't your nerves a little on edge just now, Grace, from the scene -this morning?" something kept whispering in my ears in an effort to -tame my savagery. It was the soft virtuous personality of my inner -consciousness, which, according to science, was Grandfather Moore. -"You'll be all right, my dear, as soon as you make up your mind to do -the square thing about this matter which is agitating you. And of -course you are going to do the square thing. Money isn't all there -is." - -"Now, that's all rot, parson!" Uncle Lancelot, in the other hemisphere -of my brain, denied stoutly. "Don't listen to him, Grace! You can't go -on living this crocheted life, and money will bring freedom." - -"He's a sophist, Grace," came convincingly across the wires. - -"He's a purist, Grace," flashed back. - -"Hush! Hush! What do two old Kilkenny cats of ancestors know about my -problems?" I cried fiercely. Then, partly to drown out their clamor, I -kept on: "My pet abominations in several syllables are--checkered -career--contiguous choice--just because his mother and mine lived next -door when they were girls--circumscribed capabilities--" - -"And the desire of your heart begins with H," Uncle Lancelot said -triumphantly. "You want Happy Humanness--different brand and harder to -get than Human Happiness--you want a House that is a Home, and above -all else you want a Husband with a sense of Humor!" - -"But how could this letter affect all this?" I asked myself, stopping -at the foot of the steps to take a message in rich vellum stationery -from my bag. "How can so much be contained in one little envelope?" - -After all, this was what it said: - - "My dear Miss Christie: - - "While in Oldburgh recently on a visit to Mr. Clarence - Wiley"--he was the author of blood-and-thunder detective - stories who lived on Waverley Pike and raised pansies between - times--"I learned that you are in possession of the - love-letters written by the famous Lady Frances Webb to your - illustrious ancestor, James Mackenzie Christie. Mr. Wiley - himself was my informer, and being a friend of your family - was naturally able to give me much interesting information - about the remaining evidences of this widely-discussed - affair. - - "No doubt the idea has occurred to you that the love-letters - of a celebrated English novelist to the first American artist - of his time would make valuable reading matter for the - public; and the suggestion of these letters being done into a - book has made such charming appeal to my mind that I resolved - to put the matter before you without delay. - - "To be perfectly plain and direct, this inheritance of yours - can be made into a small fortune for you, since the material, - properly handled, would make one of the best-selling books of - the decade. - - "If you are interested I shall be glad to hear from you, and - we can then take up at once the business details of the - transaction. Mr. Wiley spoke in such high praise of the - literary value of the letters that my enthusiasm has been - keenly aroused. - - "With all good wishes, I am, - "Very sincerely yours, - - "Julien J. Dutweiler." - -There was an embossed superscription on the envelope's flap which -read: "Coburn-Colt Company, Publishers, Philadelphia." They were -America's best-known promoters--the kind who could take six inches of -advertising and a red-and-gold binding and make a mountain out of a -mole-hill. - -"'Small fortune!'" I repeated. "Surely a great temptation _does_ -descend during a hungry spell--in real life, as well as in human -documents." - - - - -CHAPTER II - -A GLIMPSE OF PROMISED LAND - - -"Hello, Grace!" - -I was passing the society editor in her den a moment later, and she -called out a cheery greeting, although she didn't look up from her -task. She was polishing her finger-nails as busily as if she lived for -her hands--not by them. - -"Hello, Jane!" - -My very voice was out of alignment, however, as I spoke. - -"Are you going to let all the world see that you're not a headstrong -woman?" something inside my pride asked angrily, but as if for -corroboration of my conscientious whisperings, I looked in a -shamefaced way at the lines of my palm.--The head-line _was_ weak and -isolated--while the heart-line was as crisscrossed as a centipede -track! - -But a heart-line has nothing at all to do with a city editor's -desk--certainly not on a day when the crumpled balls of copy paper -lying about his waste-basket look as if a woman had thrown them! Every -one had missed its mark, and up and down the length of the room the -typewriters were clicking falsetto notes. The files of papers on the -table were in as much confusion as patterns for heathen petticoats at -a missionary meeting. - -"What's up?" - -I had made my way to the desk of the sporting editor, who writes -poetry and pretends he's so aerial that he never knows what day of the -week it is, but when you pin him down he can tell you exactly what you -want to know--from the color of the bride's going-away gown to the -amount the bridegroom borrowed on his life insurance policy. - -"Search me!" he answered--as usual. - -"But there's something going on in this office!" I insisted. -"Everybody looks as exercised as if the baby'd just swallowed a -moth-ball." - -"Huh?" - -He looked around--then opened his eyes wider. "Oh, I believe I did -hear 'em say--" - -"What?" - -"That they can't get hold of that story about the Consolidated -Traction Company." - -"--And damn those foreigners who come over here with their fool -notions of dignity!" broke in the voice of the city editor--then -stopped and blushed when he saw me within ear-shot, for it's a rule of -the office that no one shall say "damn" without blushing, except the -society editor and her assistants. - -"Who's the foreigner?" I asked, for the sake of warding off apologies. -That's why men object so strongly to women mixing up with them in -business life. It keeps them eternally apologizing. - -"Maitland Tait," he replied. - -"Maitland Tait? But that's not foreign. That's perfectly good -English." - -"So's he!" the city editor snapped. "It's his confounded John -Bullishness that's causing all the trouble." - -"But the traction company's no kin to us, is it?" the poet inquired -crossly, for he was reporting a double-header in verse, and our -chatter annoyed him. - -"Trouble will be kin to us--if somebody doesn't break in on Great -Britain and make him cough up the story," the city editor warned over -his shoulder. "I've already sent Clemons and Bolton and Reade." - -"--And it would mean a raise," the poet said, with a tender little -smile. "A raise!" - -"Are you sure?" I asked, after the superior officer had disappeared. -"I'd like--a raise." - -He looked at me contemptuously. - -"You don't know what the Consolidated Traction Company is, I suppose?" -he asked. - -My business on the paper was reporting art meetings at the Carnegie -Library and donation affairs at settlement homes because the owner and -publisher drank out of the same canteen with my grandfather--and my -fellows on the staff called me behind my back their ornamental member. - -"I do!" I bristled. "It's located at a greasy place, called -Loomis--and it's something that makes the wheels go round." - -He smiled. - -"It certainly does in Oldburgh," he said. "It's the biggest thing we -have, next to our own cotton mills and to think that they're -threatening to take their doll-rags and move to Birmingham and leave -us desolate!" - -"Where the iron would be nearer?" I asked, and he fairly beamed. - -_"Sure!_ Say, if you know that much about the company's affairs, why -don't you try for this assignment yourself?" - -But I shook my head. - -"I've got relatives in Alabama--that's how I knew that iron grows on -trees down there," I explained. - -"Well--that's what the trouble is about! Oldburgh can't tell whether -this fellow, Maitland Tait, is going to pack the 'whole blarsted -thing, don't you know, into his portmanteau' and tote it off--or buy -up more ground here and enlarge the plant so that the company's -grandchildren will call this place home." - -I turned away, feeling very indifferent. Oldburgh's problem was small -compared with that letter in my hand-bag. - -"And he won't tell?" I asked, crossing over to my own desk and fitting -the key in a slipshod fashion. - -"He seems to think that silence is the divine right of corporations. -Nobody has been able to get a word out of him--nor even to see him." - -"Then--they don't know whether he's a human being or a Cockney?" - -He leaned across toward me, his elbow flattening two tiers of keys on -his machine. - -"Say, the society's column's having fever and ague, too," he -whispered. "The tale records that two of our 'acknowledged leaders' -met him in Pittsburgh last winter--and they're at daggers' points now -for the privilege of killing the fatted calf for him.--The one that -does it first is IT, of course, and Jane Lassiter's scared to death! -The calf is fat and the knife is sharp--but no report of the killing -has come in." - -I laughed. It always makes me laugh when I think how hard some people -work to get rid of their fatted calves, and how much harder others -have to labor to acquire a veal cutlet. - -"Of course he was born in a cabin?" I turned back to the poet and -asked, after a little while devoted to my own work, in which I learned -that my mind wouldn't concentrate sufficiently for me to embroider my -story of an embryo Michaelangelo the Carnegie Art Club had just -discovered. "A cabin in the Cornish hills--don't you know?" - -The sporting editor pulled himself viciously away from his -typewriter. - -"Ty Cobb--Dry sob--By mob--" - -"Oh, I beg your pardon!" - -"Can't you see when a poem is about to die a-borning?" he asked -furiously. - -"I am sorry--and perhaps I might help you a little," I suggested with -becoming meekness. "How's this?--High job--Nigh rob--" - -I paused and he began writing hurriedly. Looking up again he threw me -a smile. - -"Bully! Grace Christie, you're the light o' my life," he announced, -"and--and of course that blamed Englishman was born in a cabin, if -that's what you want to know." - -"It's not that I care, but--they always are," I explained. "They're -born in a cabin, come across in the steerage amid terrific storms--Why -is it that everybody's story of steerage crossing is stormy?--It seems -to me it would be bad enough without that--then he sold papers for two -years beneath the cart-wheels around the Battery, and by sheer -strength of brain and brawn, has elevated himself into the proud -privilege of being able to die in a 'carstle' when it suits his -convenience." - -The sporting editor looked solicitous. - -"And now, if I were you, to keep from wearing myself out with talking, -I'd get on the car and ride out to Glendale Park," he advised. - -But I shook my head. - -"I can't." - -"You really owe it to yourself," he insisted. "You are showing -symptoms of a strange excitement to-day. You look as if you were -talking to keep from doing something more annoying--if such a thing -were possible." - -"I'm not going to weep--either from excitement or the effects of your -rudeness," I returned, then wheeling around and facing my desk again I -let my dual personality take up its song. - - "I can and I can't; - I will and I won't; - I'll be damned if I do-- - I'll be damned if I don't!" - -The story goes that a queen of Sweden composed this classic many years -ago, but it's certainly the national song of every one who has two -people living in his skin that are not on speaking terms with each -other. - -Then, partly to keep from annoying the poet again, partly because it's -the thing a woman always does, I took out the letter and read it over -once more. - -"Coburn-Colt--Philadelphia!" - -The paper was a creamy satin, the embossing severely correct, the -typing so neat and businesslike that I could scarcely believe the -letter was meant for me when I looked at the outside only. - -"Wonder what 'Julien J. Dutweiler' would call a small fortune?" I -muttered. "Five thousand dollars? Ten thousand dollars!--Good heavens, -then mother could have all the crepe meteor gowns she wanted without -my ever--_ever_ having to marry Guilford Blake for her sake!" - -But as I sat there thinking, grandfather took up the cudgels -bravely--even though the people most concerned were Christies and not -Moores. - -"Think well, Grace! That 'best-selling' clause means not only Maine -to California, but England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and -Berwick-on-the-Tweed!" he warned. "Everybody who had ever heard of -either of these two unfortunate people will buy a copy of the book and -read it to find out what really happened!" - -"But the letters are hers!" Uncle Lancelot reminded him. "If people -don't want posterity to know the truth about them they ought to -confine themselves to wireless communications." - -"And--what would your Aunt Patricia say?" grandfather kept on. "What -would James Christie say? What would Lady Frances Webb say?" - -Thinking is certainly a bad habit--especially when your time belongs -to somebody else and you are not being paid to think! Nevertheless, I -sat there all the afternoon, puzzling my brain, when my brain was not -supposed to wake up and rub its eyes at all inside the _Herald_ -office. I was being paid to come there and write airy little nothings -for the _Herald's_ airy little readers, yet I added to my sin of -indecision by absorbing time which wasn't mine. - -"Of course the possession of these letters in a way connects you with -greatness," grandfather would say once in a while, in a lenient, -musing sort of way. "But I trust that you are not going to let this -fly to your head. Anyway, as the family has always known, your Uncle -James Christie didn't leave his letters and papers to his great-niece; -he merely _left_ them! True, she was very close to him in his last -days and he had always loved and trusted her--" - -"But there's a difference between trusting a woman and trusting her -_with your desk keys_!" Uncle Lancelot interrupted. "Uncle James ought -to have known a thing or two about women by that time!" - -"Yet we must realize that the value of the possession was -considerable, even in those days," grandfather argued gently. "We must -not blame his great-niece for what she did. James Mackenzie Christie -had caught the whole fashionable world on the tip of his camel's-hair -brush and pinioned it to canvases which were destined to get -double-starred notices in guide-books for many a year to come, and the -correspondence of kings and queens, lords and ladies made a mighty -appeal to the young girl's mind." - -"Then, that's a sure sign they'd be popular once again," said Uncle -Lancelot. "Of course there's a degree of family pride to be -considered, but that shouldn't make much difference. The Christies -have always had pride to spare--now's the time to let some of it -slide!" - -Thus, after hours of time and miles of circling tentatively around the -battlements of Colmere Abbey--the beautiful old place which had been -the home of Lady Frances Webb--I was called back with a stern -suddenness to my place in the _Herald_ office. - -"Can _you_ think of anything else?" the poet's voice begged humbly. -"I'm trying to match up just plain 'Ty' this time--but I'm dry." - -I turned to him forgivingly. I welcomed any diversion. - -"Rye, lie, die, sky,--why, what's the matter with your think tank?" I -asked him. "They swarm!" - -But before he could thank me, or apologize, the voice of the city -editor was in the doorway. He himself followed his rasping tones, and -as he came in he looked backward over his shoulder at a forlorn -dejected face outside. He looked at his watch viciously, then snapped -the case as if it were responsible for his spleen. - -"Get to work then on something else," he growled. "There's no use -spending car fare again to Loomis to-day that I can see! He's an -Englishman--and of course he kisses a teacup at this time of the -afternoon." - - - - -CHAPTER III - -NIP AND TUCK - - -When I reached home late that afternoon I was in that state of -spring-time restlessness which clamors for immediate activity--when -the home-keeping instinct tries to make you believe that you'll be -content if you spend a little money for garden seeds--but a reckless -demon of extravagance notifies you that nothing short of salary -sacrificed for railroad fare is going to avail. - -Grandfather and Uncle Lancelot, of course, came in with their -gratuitous advice, the one suggesting nasturtium beds with geraniums -along the borders--the other slyly whispering that a boat trip from -Savannah to Boston was no more than I deserved. - -Then, reaching home in this frame of mind, I was confronted with two -very perplexing and unusual conditions. _Mignon_ was being played with -great violence in the front parlor--and all over the house was the -scent of burnt yarn. - -"What's up?" I demanded of mother, as she met me at the door--dressed -in blue. "Everything seems mysterious and topsyturvy to-day! I believe -if I were to go out to the cemetery I'd find the tombstones nodding -and whispering to one another." - -"Come in here!" she begged in a Santa Claus voice. - -I went into the parlor, then gave a little shriek. - -"Mother!" - -I have neglected to state, earlier in the narrative, that the one -desire of my heart which doesn't begin with H was a player-piano! It -was there in the parlor, at that moment, shining, and singing its -wordless song about the citron-flower land. - -"It's the very one we've been _watching_ through the windows up-town," -she said in a delighted whisper. - -"But did you get it as a prize?" I inquired, walking into the dusky -room and shaking hands with my betrothed, who rose from the instrument -and made way for me to take possession. "How came it here?" - -"I had it sent out--on--on approval," she elucidated. That is, her -words took the form of an explanation, but her voice was as appealing -as a Salvation Army dinner-bell, just before Christmas. - -"On approval? But why, please?" - -"Because I want you to get used to having the things you want, -darling!" - -Then, to keep from laughing--or crying--I ran toward the door. - -"What _is_ that burning?" I asked, sniffing suspiciously. - -It was a vaguely familiar scent--scorching dress-goods--and suggestive -of the awful feeling which comes to you when you've stood too close to -the fire in your best coat-suit--or the comfortable sensation on a -cold night, when you're preparing to wrap up your feet in a red-hot -flannel petticoat. - -"What is it? Tell the truth, mother!" - -But she wouldn't. - -"It's your brown tweed skirt, Grace," Guilford finally explained, as -my eyes begged the secret of them both. They frequently had secrets -from me. - -"My brown tweed skirt?" - -"It was as baggy at the knees as if you'd done nothing all winter but -_pray_ in it!" mother whimpered in a frightened voice. "I've--I've -burned it up!" - -For a moment I was silent. - -"But what shall I tramp in?" I finally asked severely. "What can I -walk out the Waverley Pike in?" - -Then mother took fresh courage. - -"You're not going to walk!" she answered triumphantly. "You're going -to ride--in your very--own--electric--coupé! Here's the catalogue." - -She scrambled about for a book on a table near at hand--and I began to -see daylight. - -"Oh, a player-piano, and an electric coupé--all in one day! I see! My -fairy godmother--who was old Aunt Patricia, and she looked exactly -like one--has turned the pumpkin into a gold coach! You two plotters -have been putting your heads together to have me get rich quick and -gracefully!" - -"We understand that this stroke of fortune is going to make a great -change in your life, Grace," Guilford said gravely. He was always -grave--and old. The only way you could tell his demeanor from that of -a septuagenarian was that he didn't drag his feet as he walked. - -"'Stroke of fortune?'" I repeated. - -"The Coburn--" mother began. - -"Colt--" he re-enforced, then they both hesitated, and looked at me -meaningly. - -I gave a hysterical laugh. - -"You and mother have counted your Coburn-Colts before they were -hatched!" I exclaimed wickedly, sitting down and looking over the -music rolls. I did want that player-piano tremendously--although I had -about as much use for an electric coupé, under my present conditions -in life, as I had for a perambulator. - -"Grace, you're--indelicate!" mother said, her voice trembling. -"Guilford's a man!" - -"A man's a man--especially a Kentuckian!" I answered. "You're not -shocked at my mention of colts and--and things, are you, Guilford?" - -My betrothed sat down and lifted from the bridge of his nose that -badge of civilization--a pair of rimless glasses. He polished them -with a dazzling handkerchief, then replaced the handkerchief into the -pocket of the most faultless coat ever seen. He smoothed his already -well-disciplined hair, and brushed away a speck of dust from the toe -of his shoe. From head to foot he fairly bristled with signs of civic -improvement. - -"I am shocked at your reception of your mother's kind thoughtfulness," -he said. - -He waited a little while before saying it, for hesitation was his way -of showing disapproval. Yet you must not get the impression from this -that Guilford was a bad sort! Why, no woman could ride in an elevator -with him for half a minute without realizing that he was the -flower-of-chivalry sort of man! He always had a little way of standing -back from a woman, as if she were too sacred to be approached, and in -her presence he had a habit of holding his hat clasped firmly against -the buttons of his coat. You can forgive a good deal in a man if he -keeps his hat off all the time he's talking to you! - -"'Shocked?'" I repeated. - -"Your mother always plans for your happiness, Grace." - -"Of course! Don't you suppose I know that?" I immediately asked in an -injured tone. It is always safe to assume an injured air when you're -arguing with a man, for it gives him quite as much pleasure to comfort -you as it does to hurt you. - -"I didn't--mean anything!" he hastened to assure me. - -"Guilford merely jumped at the chance of your freeing yourself of this -newspaper slavery," mother interceded. "You know what a humiliation it -is to him--just as it is to me and to every member of the--Christie -family." - -My betrothed nodded so violently in acquiescence that his glasses flew -off in space. - -"You know that I am a Kentuckian in my way of regarding women, Grace," -he plead. "I can't bear to see them step down from the pedestal that -nature ordained for them!" - -I turned and looked him over--from the crown of his intensely -aristocratic fair head to the tip of his aristocratic slim foot. - -"A Kentuckian?" - -"Certainly!" - -"A Kentuckian?" I repeated reminiscently. "Why, Guilford Blake, you -ought to be olive-skinned--and black-eyed--and your shoes ought to -turn up at the toes--and your head ought to be covered by a red -fez--and you ought to sit smoking through a water-bottle of an -evening, in front of your--your--" - -"Grace!" stormed mother, rising suddenly to her feet. "I will not have -you say such things!" - -"What things?" I asked, drawing back in hurt surprise. - -"H-harems!" she uttered in a blushing whisper, but Guilford caught the -word and squared his shoulders importantly. - -"But, I say, Grace," he interrupted, his face showing that mixture of -anger and pleased vanity which a man always shows when you tell him -that he's a dangerous tyrant, or a bold Don Juan--or both. "You don't -think I'm a Turk--do you?" - -"I do." - -He sighed wistfully. - -"If I were," he said, shaking his head, "I'd have caught you--and -_veiled_ you--long before this." - -I looked at him intently. - -"You mean--" - -"That I shouldn't have let you delay our marriage this way! Why should -you, pray, when my financial affairs have changed so in the last -year?" - -I rose from my place beside the new piano, breaking gently into his -plea. - -"It isn't that!" I attempted to explain, but my voice failed drearily. -"You ought to know that--finances hadn't anything to do with it. I -haven't kept from marrying you all these years because we were both so -poor--then, last year when you inherited your money--I didn't keep -from marrying you because you were so rich!" - -"Then, what is it?" he asked gravely, and mother looked on as eagerly -for my answer as he did. This is one advantage about a life-long -betrothal. It gets to be a family institution. Or is that a -disadvantage? - -"I--don't know," I confessed, settling back weakly. - -"I don't think you do!" mother observed with considerable dryness. - -"Well, this business of your getting to be a famous compiler of -literature may help you get your bearings," Guilford kept on, after an -awkward little pause. "You have always said that you wished to -exercise your own wings a little before we married, and I have given -in to you--although I don't know that it's right to humor a woman in -these days and times. Really, I don't know that it is." - -"Oh, you don't?" - -"No--I don't. But we're not discussing that now, Grace! What I'm -trying to get at is that this offer means a good deal to you. Of -course, it is only the beginning of your career--for these fellows -will think up other things for you to do--and it will give you a way -of earning money that won't take you up a flight of dirty office -stairs every day. Understand, I mean for just a short while--as long -as you insist upon earning your own living." - -"And the honor!" mother added. "You could have your pictures in good -magazines!" - -I stifled a yawn, for, to tell the truth, the conflict had made me -nervous and weary. - -"At all events, I must decide!" I exclaimed, starting again to my -feet. "Somehow, the office atmosphere isn't exactly conducive to deep -thought--and I've had so little time since morning to get away by -myself and thresh matters out." - -Mother looked at me incredulously. - -"Will you please tell me just what you mean, Grace?" she asked. - -"I mean that I must get away--I've imagined that I ought to take some -serious thought, weigh the matter well, so to speak--before I write to -the Coburn-Colt Publishing Company. In other words, I have to decide." - -"Decide?" mother repeated, her face filled with piteous amazement. -"_Decide?_" - -"Decide?" Guilford said, taking up the strain complainingly. - -"If you'll excuse me!" I answered, starting toward the door, then -turning with an effort at nonchalance, for their sakes, to wave them a -little adieu. "Suppose you keep on playing 'Knowest thou the land -where the citron-flower blooms,' Guilford--for I am filled with -_wanderlust_ right now, and this music will help out Uncle Lancelot's -presentation of the matter considerably!" - -"What?" - -"I'm going to listen to the voices," I explained. "All day long -grandfather and Uncle Lancelot have been busy making the fur fly in my -conscience!" - -Mother darted across the room and caught my hand. - -"You don't mean to say that you have scruples--_scruples_--Grace -Christie?" - -She couldn't have hated smallpox worse--in me. - -"Honest Injun, I don't know!" I admitted. "Of course, it does seem -absurd to ponder over what a family row might be raised in the -Seventh Circle of Nirvana by the publication of these old -love-letters, but--" - -"James Mackenzie Christie died in 1849," she declared vehemently. -"Absurd! It is _insane_!" - -"That's what the Uncle Lancelot part of my intelligence keeps telling -me," I laughed. "But--good heavens! you just ought to hear the -grandfather argument." - -"What does he--what does that silly _Salem_ conscience of yours say -against the publication of the letters?" she asked grudgingly. - -I sat down again. - -"Shall I tell you?" I began good-naturedly, for I saw that mother was -at the melting point--melting into tears, however, not assent. -"Whenever I want to do anything I'm not exactly _sure_ of, these two -provoking old gentlemen come into the room--the council-chamber of my -heart--and begin their post-mortem warfare. Grandfather is -white-bearded and serene, while Uncle Lancelot looks exactly as an -Italian tenor _ought_ to look--and never does." - -"And you look exactly like him," mother snapped viciously. "Nothing -about you resembles your grandfather except your brow and eyes." - -"I know that," I answered resignedly. "Hasn't some one said that the -upper part of my face is as lofty as a Byronic thought--and the lower -as devilish as a Byronic _deed_?" - -Neither of them smiled, but Guilford stirred a little. - -"Go on with your argument, Grace," he urged patiently. He was always -patient. - -"I'm going!" I answered. "All day grandfather has been telling me what -I already know--that the Coburn-Colt Company doesn't want those -letters of James Christie's because they are literary, or beautiful, -or historical, but simply and solely because they are _bad_! They'll -make a good-seller because they're the thing the public demands right -now. Lady Frances Webb was a _married_ woman!" - -"Nonsense," mother interrupted, with a blush. "The public doesn't -demand bad things! There is merely a craze for intimate, biographical -matter--told in the first person." - -"I know," I admitted humbly. "This is what distinguishes a human from -an inhuman document." - -"The craze demands a simple straightforward narrative--" Guilford -began, then hesitated. - -"In literature this is the period of the great '_I Am_,'" I broke in. -"People want the secrets of a writer's soul, rather than the tricks of -his vocabulary, I know." - -"Well, good lord--you wouldn't be giving the twentieth century any -more of these people's souls than they themselves gave to the early -nineteenth," he argued scornfully. "She put his portrait into every -book she ever wrote--and he annexed her face in the figure of every -saint--and sinner--he painted!" - -"Well, that was because they couldn't _see_ any other faces," I -defended. - -"Bosh!" - -"But Lady Frances Webb was a good woman," mother insisted weakly. -"She had pre-Victorian ideas! She sent her lover across seas, because -she felt that she must! Why, the publication of these letters would do -_good_, not harm." - -"They would shame the present-day idea of 'affinity' right," said -Guilford. - -I nodded my head, for this was the same theory that Uncle Lancelot had -been whispering in my ears since the postman blew his whistle that -morning. And yet-- - -"Maybe you two--don't exactly understand the import of those letters -as I do," I suggested, sorry and ashamed before the gaze of their -practical eyes. "But to me they mean so much! I have always _loved_ -James Christie and--his Unattainable. I can feel for them, and--" - -"And you mean to say that you are going to give way to an absurd fancy -now--a ridiculous, far-fetched, namby-pamby, quixotic fancy?" mother -asked, in a tone of horror. - -"I--I'm--afraid so!" I stammered. - -"And miss this chance--for all the things you want most? The very -things you're toiling day and night to get?" - -"And put off the prospect of our marriage?" Guilford demanded. "I had -hoped that this business transaction would satisfy the unaccountable -desire you seem to have for independence--that after you had circled -about a little in the realm of emancipated women and their strained -notions of what constitutes freedom, you'd see the absurdity of it all -and--come to me." - -"I am awfully sorry, Guilford," I answered, dropping my eyes, for I -knew that "freedom," "independence" and "emancipation" had nothing on -earth to do with my delayed marriage--and I knew that I was doing -wrong not to say so. "I am _awfully_ sorry to disappoint you." - -"Then you have decided finally?" mother asked in a suspicious voice. - -"I believe I have," I answered. "Oh, please don't look at me that -way--and please don't cry! I can't help it!" - -"It is preposterous," Guilford said shortly. - -"But you don't--understand!" I cried, turning to him pleadingly. "You -don't know what it is to feel as I feel about those lovers--those -people who had no happiness in this world--and are haunted and -tormented by curiosity in their very graves!--don't you suppose I want -to do the thing you and mother want me to do? Of course, I do! I want -this--this new piano--and another brown tweed skirt that doesn't bag -at the knees--and I want--so many things!" - -"Then why in the name of----" he began. - -"Because I _won't_!" I told him flatly. "Call it conscience--fancy, or -what you will!--I have those two people in my power--their secrets are -right here in my hands! And I'm not going to _give them away_!" - -"Grace, you a-maze me!" mother sobbed. - -But Guilford rose tranquilly and reached for his hat. - -"Any woman who has a conscience like that ought to cauterize it--with -a curling-iron--and get rid of it," he observed dryly. - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -THE QUALITY OF MERCY - - -That night I went to my bedroom and pulled open the top of an -old-fashioned desk standing in the corner. Except for this desk there -was not another unnecessary piece of furniture in the apartment, for I -like a cell-like place to sleep. I consider that fresh air and a clear -conscience ought to be the chief adjuncts--for a cluttered-up, -luxurious bedroom always reminds me of Camille--and tuberculosis. - -"And all this fuss about a few little faded wisps of paper!" - -I sat down before the desk, after I had loosed my hair--which is that -very, very black, that is the Hibernian accompaniment to blue -eyes--and had slipped my slippers on. - -"You have put me to considerable trouble to-day, Lady Frances." - -Her portrait was hanging there--a small, cabinet-sized picture, in a -battered gold frame. Her lover had succeeded in making her face on -canvas very beautiful--with the exaggerated beauty of eyes and mouth -which all portraits of that period show. Her brow was fine and -thoughtful, irradiating the face with intelligence, yet I never looked -at her without having a feeling that I was infinitely wiser than she. - -Isn't it queer that we have this feeling of superiority over the -people in old portraits--just because they are dead and we are living? -We open an ancient book of engravings, and say: "Poor little Mary -Shelley! Simple little Jane Austen! Naughty little Nell -Gwynne!"--There's only one pictured lady of my acquaintance who smiles -down my latter-day wisdom as being a futile upstart thing. I can't -pity her! Oh, no! Nor endure her either, for she's Mona Lisa! - -I had always had this maternal protectiveness in my attitude toward -Lady Frances Webb, and to-night it was so keen that I could have -tucked her in bed and told her fairy tales to soothe away the -trembling fright she must have endured all that day. Instead of doing -this, however, I satisfied myself with reading some of the letters -over again. Isn't it a pity that above every writing-desk devoted to -inter-sex correspondence there is not a framed warning: "Beyond -Platonic Friendship Lies--Alimony!" - -Anyway, Lady Frances and James Christie tried the medium ground for a -while. Over in a large pigeonhole, far away from the rest, was a -packet of letters tied with a strong twine. They were the uninteresting -ones, because they were _muzzled_. The handwriting was the same as -that of the others--dainty, last-century chirography, as delicate and -curling as a baby's pink fingers--but I never read them, for I don't -care for muzzled things. Gossip about Lady Jersey--Marlborough -House--the cold-blooded ire of William Lamb--all this held but little -charm--compared with the other. - -"Not you--not to-night," I decided, pushing them aside quickly. "I've -got to have good pay for my pains of this day!" - -I sought another compartment, where a batch huddled together--a -carefully selected batch. They were as many, and as clinging in their -contact with one another, as early kisses. I took up the first one. - -"Dear Big Man"--it began. - -"It has been weeks and weeks now since I have seen you! If it were not -that you lived in that terrible London and I in this lonely country, I -should be too proud to remind you of the time, for I should expect you -to be the one to complain. - -"Surely it is because of this that I now hate London so! It keeps this -knowledge of separation--this sense of dreary waiting--from burning -into your heart, as it does into mine! - -"There you are kept too busy to think--but here I can do nothing -else!--Or perhaps I am quite wrong, and it is not a matter of London -and Lancashire, after all, but the more primal one of your being a -man, and my being a woman! _Do_ I love the more? I wonder? And yet, I -don't think that I care much! I am willing to love more abjectly than -any woman ever loved before--if you care for me just a little in -return." - -(I always felt _very_ wise and maternal at this point.) - -"You were an awful goose, Lady Frances!" I said. "This is a mistake -that _I_ have never made!" - -"Still, I am tormented by thoughts of you in London," the letter kept -on. "I think of you--there--as a lion. It presses down upon me, this -recollection that you are James Christie, the great artist, and the -only release from the torture is when I go alone into the library and -sit down before the fire. The two chairs are there--those two that -were there that day--and then I can forget about the lion. -'Jim--Jim!' I whisper--'just my _lover_!' - -"Then your face comes--it has to come, or I could never be good! Your -rugged face that speaks of great forests which have been your -home--the fierce young freedom which has nurtured you--and the -glorious uplift you have achieved above all that is small and weak! - -"You have asked me a thousand times why I love you, but I have never -known what to say--because I love you for so many things--until now, -when I have nothing but memories--and the ever-present sight of your -absent face. And now I don't know why I love you, but I know what I -love best about you. Shall I tell you--though of course you know -already! It is not your talent--wonderful as it is--for there have -been other artists; nor your terrible charm with its power to lure -women away from duty--for England is full of fascinating men; nor your -sweetness--and I think the first time I saw you smile I sounded the -depths of this--it is not any of these, dear heart! Not any of these! -I love best the strength of you which you use to control the -charm--the untamed force of your personality which makes your talent -seem just an incident--and the big, _big_ virility of you! - -"Do you think for a moment that you look like an artist? -Half-civilized you? Why, you are a woodsman, dear love--but not a -hunter! You could never kill living things for the joy of seeing them -die! - -"You look as if you had spent all your life in the woods, doing hard -tasks patiently--a woodcutter, or a charcoal burner! Ah, a charcoal -burner! A man who has had to grip life with bared hands and wrest his -bread from grudging circumstances. This is what you are, Jim, to my -heart's eyes. You are a primal creature--simple-souled, great-bodied, -and your mind is given over to naked truth. - -"But all the time you are a famous artist--and London's idol! Your -studio in St. James's Street is the lounging-place for curled -darlings! The hardest task that your hands perform is over the ugly -features of a fat duchess!--How can you, Jim? Why don't you come away? -You are a man first, an artist afterward--and it is the man that I -love! - -"And, Jim, _do_ you know how much I love you? Do you know how your -face leads me on?--It is your face I must have now, darling. _Portrait -of the Artist, by Himself_, is a title I have often smiled over, -wondering how a man could be induced to paint his own features, but -now I know! It is always because some woman has so clamorously -demanded it--a woman who loved him! What else can so entirely -satisfy--and when will you send it to me?" - -When I came to the end I was sorry, for I had such a way of getting en -rapport with her sentiments that I eyed the next express wagon I -passed, eagerly, to see if it could possibly be bringing the _Portrait -of the Artist, by Himself_! - -And on this occasion I reread a portion of the letter. - -"Your face--your rugged face--or I could never be good!" - -The picture of a rugged face was haunting me, and after a moment a -sudden thought came to me. - -"Why, that's what _I_ should like!" - -I had the grace to feel ashamed, of course, especially as I recalled -how mother and Guilford had tormented me that afternoon to know why I -wouldn't marry--and I found the answer in this sudden discovery. -Still, that didn't keep me from pursuing the subject. - -"A rugged face--great forests--fierce freedom--glorious uplift!--Oh, -Man! Man! Where are you--and where is your great forest?--That's -exactly what I want!" - -I turned back to the desk, after a while, and still allowing my mind -to circle away from the business at hand somewhat, I drew out another -letter. It was short--and troubled. The dear, little, lady-like -writing ran off at a tangent. - -"Yes, I have seen the picture! Next to Murillo's _Betrothal of St. -Catherine_,--the face is the loveliest thing I have ever seen on -canvas. - -"Of course it is idealized--yet so absurdly _like_ that they tell me -all Mayfair is staring! This talk--this stirring-up of what has been -sleeping--will make it a thousand times harder for us ever to see each -other, yet I am glad you did it! - -"They are saying--Mayfair--that your 'making a pageant of a bleeding -heart' is as indelicate as Caroline Lamb's _Glenarvon_! If people are -going to be in love wickedly at least they ought not to write books -about it--nor paint pictures of it!... Oh, beloved, let us pray that -we may always keep bitterness out of our portraits of each other!" - -The letter burned my fingers, for the pen marks were quick and -jagged--like electric sparks--and I felt the pain that had sent them -out; so I turned back to others of the batch--others that I knew -almost by heart, yet always found something new in. - -"I don't know that it's such an enviable state, after all, this being -in love," I mused. "It seems to me it consists of--quite a mixture! -But, of course, it will take Heaven itself to solve the problem of a -thornless rose!" - -I ran my finger over the edges of the improvised envelopes, heavily -sealed and bearing complicated foreign stamping. There were dozens of -them--many only the common garden variety of love-letters, long-drawn -out, confidential, reminiscent or hopeful, as the case might be--and a -few which sounded at times almost light-hearted. - -"When I say that I think of you all the time I am not so original as -my critics give me credit for being, dear heart," she wrote in one. -"Nothing else in the annals of love-making is so trite as this, but -when I explain how persistently your image is before me, how -intricately woven with every thought of the future--how inseparably -linked with every vision of happiness--you will know that mine is no -light nor passing attachment. - -"If I give you one foolish example of this will it bore you? I've -written you before, I believe, that this spring I have been outdoors -all the time--riding or driving about the country, because the mad -restlessness of thinking about you drives me out. In this house, in -these gardens, _you_ are so constantly present that I can do nothing -but remember--then I go away, hoping to forget--and what happens?--I -go into a castle--a place where you have never been, perhaps--and -before I can begin talking with any one, or think of any sensible -thing to say the thought comes to me: 'How well the figure of my lover -would fit in with all this grandeur! How naturally and easily he would -swing through these great rooms!' - -"Then, early some mornings I ride into the village--past cottages that -look so humble and happy that I feel my heart stifling with longing to -possess one of them--and _you_! 'How happy I could be living there,' I -think, 'but--how tremendously tall and stalwart Jim would look coming -in through this low doorway, as I called him to supper!' - -"Then I spend hours and hours planning the real home I want us to -have, dear love of mine. I don't care much whether it is a castle or a -cottage, just so it has you in it--and all around it must be the sight -of distant hills! These for _your_ artist's soul! - -"You and a hundred distant hills, Jim! Then days--and nights, and -nights and days--and summers and winters of joy! - -"Some time this will come to pass--it must--and we shall call it -heaven! And we shall rejoice that we were strong to keep the faith -through the days of trial and longing so that we could reach it and be -worthy of it. - -"And, when this shall come, I can never know fear again--fear that -London will make you cease to love me--that some other woman may gain -possession of you--that the artist in you may crush out and starve the -lover. There will be but one thought of fear then, and that will be -that you may die and leave me, but this will not be hopeless, for I -too can die! - -"Oh, do you remember that first day--that wonderful, anguished, -bewildering first day--then that night when I kissed you? When I think -of sickening fear I always remember that time. Two weeks before the -London newspapers had chronicled your visit to Colmere Abbey 'to paint -the portrait of the novelist, Lady Frances Webb,' but you were -deceiving the newspapers, for you had lost your power to paint! - -"It was quite early in the morning of that eighth or ninth day of -blessed dalliance, when the canvas still showed itself accusingly -bare, that you threw down your brush and declared you were going back -to London, 'because--because Colmere Abbey had robbed your hands of -their power.' - -"And what did I do when you told me this terrible thing? I said, -wickedly and without shame, 'Would you go away and leave me all alone -in idleness?' - -"'Idleness?' you repeated, pretending not to understand. - -"'Neither can I do any work--since you came to Colmere!' - -"You stood quite still beside the easel for a breathless moment, then: - -"'Do _I_--keep _you_--from working?' you asked. - -"Your face tried to look sorry and amazed, but the triumph showed -through and glorified your dear eyes. - -"'Then certainly I must go away--at once--to-day,' you kept on, but -you came straight across the room and placed your hands upon my -shoulders. 'Just this once--just one time, sweetheart, then I'll go -straight away and never see you again!' - -"And that night, true to your promise, you did go away, but I followed -you to the gates--and when I saw horses ready saddled there to take -you away from me, the high resolves I had made came fluttering to -earth. I put my hands up to your face and kissed you. During all the -giddy joy of that day's confessional I had kept from doing this, -but--not when I saw you leaving! - -"'I wish that this kiss could mark your cheek--and let all the world -know that you are mine,' I whispered, shivering against you in that -first madness of fear over losing you. - -"'You've made a mark!' you laughed fondly. 'A mark that I shall carry -all the days of my life.' - -"But I was still fearful. - -"'You may know that you are marked, but how will the world--how will -other women know that you are mine?' - -"'The world shall know it,' you declared, brushing back my hair and -kissing me again. 'There will never be another woman in my life--and -some day, when I can paint your portrait, it will certainly know then. -To me you are so very beautiful.'" - -Another letter was just a note, addressed to London, and evidently -written in great haste to catch a delayed post-bag. - -"Oh, my dear, that orange tree of ours--that you and I planted -together that day--is putting out tiny blossoms! Do you suppose it is -a happy omen, Jim? How I have worked with it through this dreary -winter--and now to think that it is blooming! - -"Your dear hands have touched it! It is a living thing which can -receive my caresses and repay their tenderness by growing tall and -strong and beautiful--like you. Do you wonder that I love it? - -"When you come again I shall take you out to see it, and we shall walk -softly up to the shelf where it stands--so carefully, to keep from -jarring a single leaf--and we shall separate the branches, still very -carefully, to look down at the little new stems. And, Jim--Jim--the -blossoms will be like starry young eyes looking up at us! The pink, -faintly-showing glow will be as delicate as a tiny cheek, when sleep -has flushed it--and the petals will close over our fingers with all -the clinging softness of a helpless little clutch! - -"We will be very happy for a little while, but, because I am savage -and resentful over our delayed joy, I shall cry on your shoulder and -say it's cruel--_cruel_--that you and I have only this plant to love -together." - -After this came two or three more, like it, then I reached for one -which brought a misty wetness to my eyes. The lover was gone--quite -gone--and the woman had seemed to feel that they would meet no more. - -... "At other times I remember all the months which have gone by since -then--and the miles of dark water which roll between your land and -mine. God pity the woman who has a lover across the sea! - -"_Am_ I sorry that I sent you away? You ask me this--yet how can you! -How many letters I have written, bidding you, nay _begging_ you to -come back--how many times have I dropped them into the post-bag in -the hall--then, after an hour's thought, have run in terror and -snatched them out again! - -"I am trying so hard to be good! Can I hold out--just a little while -longer? I am going to die young, remember, and that is the one hope -which consoles me! It used to be that I shrank from the medical men -who told me this--who told me with their pitying eyes and grave -looks--but now I welcome their gravity. Sir Humphrey Davy has written -a letter to my husband, advising him to send me off to Italy for this -incoming winter--but I shall not go! 'I fear that dread phthisis in -the rigor of English cold,' he writes--but for me it can not come too -soon! - -"... Yet all the time the knowledge haunts me that our lives are -passing! I can not bear it! I spend the hours out in the garden--where -the sun-dial tells me--all _silently_--of the day's wearing on. - -"Since you went away I can not listen to the sound of the clock in the -hall. That chime--that holy trustful chime--'O Lord, our God, be Thou -our Guide,' shames the unholy prayer on my lips. - -"Then the clock ticks, ticks, ticks--all day--all night--on, and on, -and on--to remind me of our hearts' wearying beats! Does this thought -ever come to madden you? That our hearts have only so many times to -throb in this life--and when we are apart every pulsation is wasted?" - -I thrust this letter back into its place--then hastily closed down the -desk. The sensation of reading a thing like that is not pleasant. She -had written with an awful, _awful_ pain in her heart--and she had -lived before the days of anesthetics! - -"Women don't feel things like that--now," I muttered, as I crossed the -room and lowered the curtain. "They--they have too many other things -to divert them, I suppose!" - -I knew, however, that I was judging everybody by myself, and certainly -_I_ had never known an awful hurt like that. - -"Why, I could listen to a _taximeter_ tick--for a whole year--while -Guilford was away from me, and I don't believe it would make me -nervous for a sight of him." - -I was considerably disgusted with myself for my callousness as I came -to this conclusion, however, and I sat down in the window, overlooking -the tiny strip of rose-garden to think it out. Presently I crossed the -room again to the desk. - -_"I'm_ not going to jest at scars--even if I haven't felt a wound!" I -decided, once and for always. - -I opened the desk then and gathered up the letters, packet by packet, -tying them into one big bundle. - -"Publish these--heart-throbs!" - -I was so furious that I could have gagged Uncle Lancelot if he had -opened his mouth--which he didn't dare do! In this respect he and -grandfather are very much like living relatives. They'll argue with -you through ninety-nine years of indecision, but once you've made up -your mind irrevocably they close their lips into a sullen -silence--saving their breath for "I told you so!" - -"I don't see how anybody could have thought of such blasphemy!" I kept -on. "It would be like a vivisection! That's what people want though, -nowadays--they won't have just a book! They want to be present at a -clinic!--They want to see others' hearts writhe--because they have no -feelings of their own!" - -Then, after my thoughts had had time to get away from the past up into -the present and project themselves, somewhat spitefully, into the -future, I made another decision, slamming the desk lid to accentuate -it. - -"I shall not publish them myself--nor ever give anybody else a chance -to publish them!" I declared. "By rights they are not really mine! I -am just their guardian, because Aunt Patricia couldn't take them on -her journey with her--and some day I shall take them on a journey with -me. To Colmere Abbey--that dream-house of mine! That's the thing to -do! And burn them on the hearth in the library, where she likely -burned his--if she did burn them! Of course I can't run the risk of -what the next generation might do!" - -This last thought tormented me as I fell asleep. - -"No, I can not hand those letters down to my daughters," I decided -drowsily, being in that hazy state where the mind traverses unheard-of -fields--unheard-of for waking thought--and queer little twisting -decisions come. "They would _never_ be able to understand!" - -I was aroused by this hypothesis into sudden wakefulness. - -"Of course they could not understand--me or my feelings!" I muttered, -sitting up in bed and facing the darkness defiantly. "They _could_ -not--if--_if_ they were Guilford's daughters, too!" - - - - -CHAPTER V - -ET TU, BRUTE! - - -My first waking thought the next morning had nothing on earth to do -with the dilemma of the day before. I stretched my arms lazily, then a -little shrinkingly, as I remembered what the daily grind would be. -There was to be a Flag Day celebration of the Daughters of the -American Revolution--and I was to report Major Coleman's speech. -That's why I shrank. I am not a society woman. - -"D. A. R.," I grumbled, jumping out of bed and going across to the -window to see what kind of day we were going to have.--"_D-a-r-n!_" - -Anyway, the day was all right, and after waving a welcome to the -sun--whose devout worshiper I am--I rubbed a circle of dust off the -mirror and looked at myself. Every woman has distinctly pretty -days--and distinctly homely ones; and usually the homely ones come to -the front viciously when you're booked for something extraordinary. -However, this proved to be one of my good-looking periods, and out of -sheer gratitude I polished off the whole expanse of the mirror. -Incidentally, I am not an absolutely dustless housekeeper, in spite of -my craze for simplicity. I consider that there are only two things -that need be kept passionately clean in this life--the human skin and -the refrigerator. - -"Are you going to dress for the fête--before you go to the office?" -mother inquired rebelliously, as she saw me arranging my hair with -that look of masculine expectation later on in the morning. "Why don't -you get your other work off, then come back home and dress?" - -"Well--because," I answered indifferently. - -"But the _Sons_ of the Revolution are going to meet with the -Daughters!" she warned. - -"I know that." - -As if to demonstrate my possession of this knowledge I turned away -from the mirror and displayed my festive charms. A light gray -coat-suit had been converted into the deception of a gala garment by -the addition of Irish lace; and mother, looking it over -contemptuously, went into her own bedroom for a moment, and came back -carrying her diamond-studded D. A. R. pin. She held it out toward -me--with the air of a martyr. - -"But--aren't you going to wear it yourself?" I asked, with a little -feeling of awe at the lengths of mother-love. She had been regent of -her chapter--and loved the organization well enough to go to -Washington every year. - -"No." - -"Then--then do you mean to say that you're not going to Mrs. Walker's -to-day?" - -She shook her head. - -"Why--mother!" - -I turned to her and saw that a tear had dropped down upon the last -golden bar bridging the wisp of red, white and blue. There were ten -bars in all, each one engraved for an ancestor--and when I wore the -thing I felt like a foreign diplomat sitting for his picture. - -"What's the matter, honey?" I asked. She had always been my little -girl, and I felt at times as if I were unduly severe in my discipline -of her. - -"Grace, you don't know how I feel!" - -The words came jerkily--and I knew that I was in for it. - -"Does your head ache?" I asked hastily. "You'd better get on the car -and ride out into the--" - -"My head _doesn't_ ache!" she denied stoutly. "It's my h-heart!--To -see you--Grace Chalmers Christie--racing around to such things as this -in a coat-suit! You ought, by right of birth and charm, be the chief -ornament of such affairs as this--the chief ornament, I say--yet you -go carrying a _'hunk o' copy paper_!'" - -"In my bag," I modified. - -"And you get up and leave places before you get a bite of food--and -race back to that office, like a wild thing, to _'turn it in_!'" - -This contemptuous use of my own jargon caused me to laugh. - -"And do you think that the wearing of this heavy pin will prove so -exhausting that I'll have to stay at Mrs. Walker's to-day for a bite -of food?" I asked. - -She looked at me in helpless reproach. - -"I want you to go to this thing as a D. A. R.," she explained, "not as -a _Herald_ reporter." - -"Then I'll wear it," I promised, kissing her soothingly. "But you must -go, too." - -She shook her head again. - -"I can't--I really can't!" she said. "I've got nothing fine enough to -wear. This is going to be a magnificent thing, every one tells -me--with all the local Sons--and this wonderful Major Coleman to -lecture on flags." - -She looked at me suspiciously as she uttered her plaint about the Sons -being present, and in answer, I thrust forward one gray suede pump. - -"But I'm ready for any Son on earth--Oldburgh earth," I protested. -"Don't you _see_ my exquisite lace collar--and the pink satin rose in -my chapeau--and this silken and buskskin footgear? Surely no true Son -would ever pause to suspect the 'hunk o' copy paper' which lieth -beneath all this glory!" - -"Isn't Guilford going with you?" she called after me as I left the -house a few minutes later. "Will he meet you at the office?" - -"No--thank heaven--it's an awful thing to have to listen to two men -talk at the same time--especially when you're taking one down in -shorthand--and Guilford is mercifully busy this afternoon." - -I had a bunch of pink roses, gathered fresh that morning from our -strip of garden, and I stopped in the office of the owner and -publisher when I had reached the _Herald_ building. Just because he's -old, and drank out of the same canteen with my grandfather I made a -habit of keeping fresh flowers in his gray Rookwood vase. This spot -of color, together with the occasional twinkle from his eyes, made the -only break in the dusty newspapery monotony of the room. He looked up -from his desk, and his face brightened as he saw my holiday attire. - -"Well, Grace?" - -He started up, big and shaggy--and wistful--like a St. Bernard. I like -old men to look like St. Bernards--and young ones to look like -greyhounds. - -"Don't get up--nor clear off a chair for me," I warned, catching up -the vase and starting toward the water-cooler. "I can't stay a -minute." - -He collapsed into his squeaky revolving chair. When he was a lad a -Yankee minnie ball had implanted a kiss upon his left shoulder-blade, -and he still carried that side with a jaunty little hike--a most -flirtatious little hike, which, however, caused the distinguished rest -of him to appear unduly severe. - -"Ah! But you must explain the 'dolled-up' aspect," he begged. - -I laughed at the schoolgirl slang. - -"Why, this is Flag Day!" I told him. "How can you have -forgotten?--There will be a gigantic celebration at Mrs. Hiram -Walker's--and all the pedigreed world will be there." - -He smiled--slowly. - -"And you're writing it up?" - -"Just Major Coleman's lecture! They say he is quite the most learned -man in the world on the subject of flags. He knows them and loves -them. He carries them about with him on these lecture tours in -felt-lined steel cases." - -"Cases?" he smiled. - -"Certainly," I answered. "Whatever a man esteems most precious--or -useful--he has cases for! The commercial man has his sample cases--the -medical man his instrument cases--the artistic man, his--" - -"Divorce cases," he interrupted dryly. - -"Alas, yes!" I sighed, my thoughts traveling back. - -He wheeled slowly, giving me a glance which finally tapered off with -the pink rosebuds in my hands. - -"Then," he asked kindly, "if you're going to a very great affair this -afternoon, why don't you keep these flowers and wear them yourself?" - -I shook my head. - -"But I'm a newspaper woman!" I said with dignity. "I might as well -wear a vanity-bag as to wear flowers." - -"Bosh! You're not a newspaper woman, Grace," he denied, still looking -at me half sadly. "And yet--well, sometimes it is--just such women as -you who do the amazing things." - -"Mother thinks so, certainly!" I laughed. "But you meant in what way, -for instance?" - -He hesitated, studying me for a moment, while I held still and let -him, for there's always a satisfaction in being studied when there's a -satin rose in your hat. - -"Oh--nothing," he finally answered, with a look of regret upon his -face. - -"But it is something!" I persisted, "and, even if I am in a big hurry, -I shan't budge until you tell me!" - -"Well, since you insist--I only meant to say that I'd been doing a -little thinking on my own account lately--as owner and publisher of -this paper, with its interests at heart--and I've wondered just how -much a woman might accomplish, after a man had failed." - -"A woman?" - -"By the ill use of her eyes, I mean," he confessed, his own eyes -twinkling a little. "Women can gain by the ill use of their eyes what -men fail to accomplish by their straightforward methods." - -"But that's what men hate so in women!" I said. - -He nodded. - -"Ye-es--maybe! That is, they make a great pretense of hating a woman -when she uses her eyes to any end save one--charming them for their -own dear sakes!" - -"They naturally grudge her the spoils she gains by the ill use of -those important members," I answered defensively. - -"Oh," he put in quickly, "I wasn't going to suggest that you do any -such thing--unless you wanted to! I was merely thinking--that was -all!" - -"And besides," I kept on, "all the men who have ever done anything -worth being interviewed for--nearly all of them, I mean--are so old -that--" - -He interrupted me wrathfully. - -"Old men are not necessarily blind men, Miss Christie," he explained. -"But we'll change the subject, if you please!" - -"Anyway, it doesn't happen once in twenty years that a newspaper woman -gets a scoop just because she's a woman," I continued, not being ready -just then to change the subject even if he had demanded it. - -"It does," he contradicted. "It's one of the most popular plots for -magazine stories." - -"Bah! Magazine stories and life are two different propositions, my -dear Captain Macauley!" I explained with a blasé air. "I should like -some better precedent before I started out on an assignment." - -"Yet you are a most unprecedented young woman," he replied in a -meaning tone. "I've suspected it before--but recent reports confirm my -worst imaginings." - -I glanced at him searchingly. - -"You've been talking with mother?" I ventured. - -For a moment he was inscrutable. - -"Oh, I know you have!" I insisted. "She's told it to everybody who -will listen." - -"The story of the Coburn-Colt that wasn't hatched?" - -His face was severe, but the little upward twist of his left shoulder -was twitching as if with suppressed emotion. - -"She told you with tears in her eyes, I know," I kept on. "All the old -friends get the tearful accompaniment." - -"Well, miss, doesn't that make you all the more ashamed of your -foolishness?" he demanded. - -"My foolishness?" - -Something seemed to give way under me as he said this, for he was -always on my side, and I had never found sympathy lacking before. - -"I mean that--that Don Quixote carried to an extreme becomes Happy -Hooligan," he pronounced. - -I drew back in amazement. - -"Why, Captain Horace Macauley--of Company A--18th Kentucky Infantry!" - -He tried hard not to smile. - -"You needn't go so far back--stay in the present century, if you -please." - -"But ever since then--even to this good day and in a newspaper office, -where the atmosphere is so cold-blooded that a mosquito couldn't fly -around without getting a congestive chill, you know your reputation! -Why, you could give the Don horse spurs and armor, then arrive a full -week ahead of him at a windmill!" - -"Tommy-rot." - -"Supererogation is a prettier word," I amended, but he shook his head. - -"No! Six syllables are like six figures-they get you dizzy when you -commence fooling with them! Besides, I was discussing _your_ right to -commit foolish acts of self-sacrificing, Grace, not mine." - -"But it didn't seem foolish to me," I tried to explain. - -"When you're working in this rotten newspaper office, where no woman -could possibly feel at home, for the vigorous sum of seventy-five -dollars a month?--Then it doesn't seem idiotic?" - -"No!" - -"And your mother moping and pining for the things she ought to have?" - -"No-o--not much!" - -"And Guilford Blake standing by, waiting like a gentleman for this -fever of emancipation to pass by and desquamation to take place?" - -This interested me. - -"What's 'desquamation?'" I asked. "I haven't time to get my dictionary -now." - -"You couldn't find it in any save a medical dictionary, likely," he -explained, with a pretense at patience. "Anyway, it's the peeling off -process which follows a high fever--especially such fevers as you -girls of this restless, modern temperament so often experience!" - -I shivered. - -"Ugh! It doesn't sound pretty!" I commented. - -"Nor is it pretty," he assured me, "but it's very wholesome. Once -you've caught the fever, lived through it, peeled off and got a shiny -new skin you're forever immune against its return. This, of course, is -what Guilford is waiting so patiently for. He is one of the most -estimable young fellows I know, Grace, and--" - -I looked wounded. - -"Don't you suppose I know that?" I asked. Then glancing quickly at the -watch bracelet on my wrist, and seeing with a gasp of relief that the -hands were pointing toward the dangerous hour of three, I turned -toward the door. - -"I must hurry!" I plead. "You've really no idea what an interesting -occasion a Flag Day celebration is, Captain Macauley!" - -"No?" he smiled, understanding my sudden determination to leave. - -"Indeed, no! Why, for three hundred and sixty-four days in the year -you may have a gentle Platonic affection for General Washington, Paul -Revere and the rest, but on the other day--Flag Day--your flame is -rekindled into a burning zeal! You can't afford to be late! You must -hurry!--Especially if you have to go there on the street-car!" - -"It's a deuced pity you can't get up a zeal for a devoted _living_ -man," he called after me in a severe voice as I reached the door. -"It's a pity you can't see the idiocy of this determination of -yours--before that publishing company revokes its offer." - -"Well, who knows?" I answered, waving him a gay good-by. "I hate -street-cars above everything, and I'm sorry my coupé isn't waiting at -the door right now!" - - - - -CHAPTER VI - -FLAG DAY - - -Now, according to my ethics, there are two kinds of men who go to -daylight parties--idiots and those that are dragged there by their -wives. - -I had scarcely crossed the lawn of Seven Oaks and found for myself a -modest place beside the speaker's stand--which was garlanded with as -many different kinds of flags as there were rats in Hamelin Town--when -I observed that this present congregation held a fair sprinkling of -each kind. - -But these held my attention for only a moment--because of the house in -the background, and the trees overhead. (To be candid, Mrs. Hiram -Walker's country place is not exactly a soothing retreat to visit -when temptation is barking at your heels like a little hungry dog--and -the desire of your heart begins with H.) - -"House that's a Home" might have been written on the sign-board of the -car-station much more truthfully than "Seven Oaks"--for only the -immense patriarchal ones were included in the "Seven" there being -hordes of lesser ones which were no more mentioned than children are -when they're getting big enough to be paying railroad fare. The grove -was well cared for, but not made artificial, and even the -luxuriousness of the house itself could not hurt the charm, for the -Hiram Walkers were human beings before they were society column -acrobats. - -Our families had always been friends, so I happened to know that years -and years ago, when Mr. Walker was a clerk in an insurance -office--with a horse and buggy for business through the week and joy -unconfined on Sunday--they had been in the habit of haunting this -spot, he and his slim young wife--bringing a basket full of supper -and thrusting the baby's milk bottle down into the ice-cream freezer. -Then, there were more years, of longing and saving; they bought the -hill, patiently enduring a period of blue-prints and architectural -advice before the house was built. By this time Mrs. Walker's slimness -was gone, and Mr. Walker had found out the vanity of hair tonics--but -the house was theirs at last. It was big and very beautiful--roomy, -rather than mushroomy--and thoughtful, rambling, old-timey, spreading -out a great deal of portico to the kiss of the sun. Brown-hooded monks -and clanking beads ought, by rights, to have gone with that portico. - -Then, the June sunshine was doing such wonders with the oaks, great -and small, along the hillsides! - -It touched up, with a tinge of glory, even the shining motor-cars in -the driveway. There were dozens of them--limousines, touring cars, -lady-like coupés--with their lazy, half-asleep attendants, and the -regularity of their unbroken files, their dignity, their quietness, -and the glitter of the sun against their metal gave them something of -a martial aspect. The silver sheen of the lamps and levers was brought -out in a manner to suggest a line of marching men, silent, but very -potent--and enjoying more than a little what they offered to view, the -dazzle of helmet, sword and coat-of-mail. - -The beauty of it all--the softened glory of the shade in which I sat -making me feel that I was a spectator at a tournament--cast a spell -over me, for I never find it very hard to fall spellbound. Isn't it -funny that when you're possessed of an intelligence which has fits of -St. Vitus' dance they call it Imagination?--That's the kind mine -is--jerky and unreliable. It is the kind of imagination which can take -a dried-up acorn and draw forth a medieval forest; or gaze upon a -rusty old spur and live over again the time when knights were bold. - -But to get back to "those present." - -First of all, I noted Oldburgh's best-known remittance man. I noted -him mentally, mind you, not paragraphically, for they never made me do -the real drudgery of the society page. He was sitting beside his mama, -swinging her gauze fan annoyingly against her lorgnette chain. His -divorce the year before had come near uniting Church and State, since -it's a fact that nothing so cements conflicting bodies like the -uprising of a new common foe; and he had sinned against both -impartially. After him came two or three financial graybeards; three -or four yearling bridegrooms, not broken yet to taking the bit between -their teeth and staying rebelliously at the office; a habitual -"welcomer to our city"--Major Harvey Coleman, a high officer in the -Sons of the American Revolution, and the pièce de résistence of this -occasion--then--then--! - -Well, certainly the impassive being next him was the most -unsocial-looking man I had ever had my eyes droop beneath the gaze of! - -He was sitting in the place of honor--in the last chair of the first -row--but despite this, he so clearly did not belong at that party, -and he so clearly wished himself away that I--well, I instantly began -searching through the crowds to find a woman with handcuffs! I felt -sure that, whoever she might be--she hadn't got him there any other -way! - -And yet--and yet--(my thoughts were coming in little dashing jerks -like that) he _was_ rather too big for any one woman to have handled -him! - -I decided this after another look and another droop of my own eyes, -for he was still looking--and that was what I decided about him -first--that he was very _big_! Then misbehaving brown hair came next -into my consciousness. It came to top off a picture which for a moment -caused me to wonder whether he was really a flesh-and-blood man at -Mrs. Walker's reception, or the spirit of some woodsman--come again, -after many years, to haunt the grove of the Seven Oaks. - -His New York clothes didn't make a bit of difference--except to spoil -the illusion a little. They were all light gray, except for a glimpse -of blue silk hose, and their perfection only served to remind you that -it was a pity for a man who looked like _that_ to dress like _that_! - -Modern man has but one artistic garment--a bathrobe; yet it wouldn't -have relieved my feelings any if this man had been dressed in one. For -he wasn't artistic--and certainly he wasn't modern! - -Still, I felt the pity of it all, for he ought to have had better -perceptions. He ought to have had his clothes and cosmic consciousness -match! He ought to have been dressed in a coat of goatskin--and his -knees ought to have been bare--and the rawhide thongs of his moccasins -ought to have been strong and firm! - -I had just reached this point in my plans for the change in his -wardrobe, when our hostess bustled up and shooed me out of my quiet -corner. - -"Grace," she whispered, "move out a bit, will you, and let me crowd a -man in over there--" - -"In here?" - -She nodded. - -"Where he can't _escape_!" she explained. - -I gathered up my opened sheet of copy paper and moved obediently into -the next chair, which she had indicated. - -"That's right--thank you! I've found out by experience that if you let -certain suspicious characters linger on the ragged edges of a crowd -like this they're sure to disappear." - -Then she turned and beckoned to my Fifth-Avenue-looking -backwoodsman--with a smile of triumph. - -"_Him?_" I asked in surprise. - -She was looking in his direction, so failed to see the expression of -my face. - -"It's no more than he deserves--having this American Revolution rubbed -in on him," she observed absently. "I have never worked so hard in my -life over any one man as I have over this identical Maitland Tait!" - -I saw him rise and come toward her--then I began having trouble with -my throat. I couldn't breathe very easily. - -"Maitland Tait!" I gasped. - -"Yes--_the_ Maitland Tait!" - -Her voice sounded with a brass-band echo of victory. - -"But how did you--" - -"By outwitting Pollie Kendall--plague take her!" - -The man was coming leisurely, stopping once to speak to one of the -graybeard financiers. - -"Have you met him?" Mrs. Walker asked carelessly, as he approached. - -"No." - -She turned to him. - -"I'm going to put you in here--where you'll have to stay," she -laughed, her big, heavy frame looking dwarfed beside his own towering -height. - -"I wasn't going to run away." - -"No? You can't always tell--and I thought it safe to take every -precaution, for this lecture may be long, and it's certain to be -irritating to one of your nationality.--In this location you'll be in -the clutches of the Press, you see, and--by the way, you must meet -Miss Christie!--Mr. Tait, Miss Christie!" - -His face was still perfectly impassive, and he bowed gravely--with -that down-to-the-belt grace which foreigners have. I nodded the pink -satin rose on my hat in his direction. This was all! Neither made any -further demonstration than that!--And to think that since Creation's -dawn--the world over--the thing is done just as idly and carelessly as -that! "Mr. Tait, Miss Christie!"--These are the words which were -said--and, dear me, all the days of one's life ought to be spent in -preparation for the event! - -"You are a Daughter of the Revolution, I presume?" his voice finally -asked me--a deep clear voice, which was strong enough to drown out the -Wagnerian processionals beating at that moment against my brain, and -to follow me off on the mother-of-pearl cloud I had embarked upon. It -was a glorious voice, distinctly un-American, but with the suggestion -of having the ability to do linguistic contortions. He looked like a -man who had traveled far--over seas and deserts--and his voice -confirmed it. It proclaimed that he could bargain with equal ease in -piasters and pence. Still, it was a big wholesome voice. It matched -the coat of goatskin, the bare knees and the moccasins I had planned -for him. - -"Yes, I am," I answered. - -Our eyes met for an instant, as he disengaged his gaze from that -ten-barred insignia on my coat. Far, far back, concealed by his dark -iris, was a tinge of amused contempt. - -"Then I dare say you're interested in this occasion?" he inquired. I -shouldn't say that he inquired, for he didn't. His tone held a -challenge. - -"No, indeed, I'm not!" I answered foolishly. "I came only because I -have to write up Major Coleman's speech for my paper. I am a special -writer for the _Herald_." - -And it was then that he smiled--really smiled. I saw a transformation -which I had never seen in any other man's face, for with him a smile -escapes! There is a breaking up of the ruggedness, an eclipse of the -stern gravity for a moment, and--no matter how much you had cared for -these an instant before--you could not miss them then--not in that -twinkling flood of radiance! - -"Oh--so you're not an ancestor-worshiper?" - -"No." - -"But I thought Americans were!" he insisted. - -"Americans?" I repeated loftily. "Why, of course, that's an -English--religion." - -"Not always," he answered grimly, and the Italian band stationed -behind the clump of boxwood cut short any further conversation. - -I was glad, for I did not want to talk to him then. I merely wanted to -stand off--and look at him--and tell myself what manner of man he must -be. - -To do this I glanced down at my copy paper, with one eyelid raised in -favor of his profile. An ancestor-worshiper? Absurd! Ancestors were -quite out of the question with him, I felt sure. There was something -gloriously _traditionless_ about his face and expansive frame. But his -hands? Those infallible records of what has gone before?--I dropped my -eyes to their normal position. His hands were _good_! They were big -and long and brown--that shade of brownness that comes to a meerschaum -pipe after it has been kissed a time or two by nicotine. And his hair -was brown, too light by several shades to match with his very dark -eyes, but it likely looked lighter on account of its conduct, standing -up, and away, and back from his face. His complexion spoke of an -early-to-bed and early-to-tub code of ethics. His nose and mouth were -well in the foreground. - -"You are a man who cares nothing at all for your ancestors--but you'll -care a great deal for your descendants!" was the summing up I finally -made of him. - -At the close of the band's Hungarian Rhapsody he leaned over and -whispered to me. - -"Did you say the _Herald_?" he asked. - -"Yes." - -"I have had my--attention called to your paper recently," he said, in -so serious a tone that I was compelled to look up and search for the -smile which I felt must lurk behind it. And when I saw it there I felt -reassured, and smiled in response. - -"So they told me at the office," I said with great cordiality. "Is it -three or four of our reporters you've thrown down your front steps?" - -"Oh, I haven't got close enough to them to throw them down the steps," -he disclaimed quickly. "That's one thing you have to guard against -with reporters. They've got you--if they once see the whites of your -eyes!" - -I felt it my duty to bristle, in defense of my kind. - -"Not unless your eyes _talk_," I said. Then, when he stared at me in -uncertainty for a moment, I dropped my own eyes again, for I felt -that they were proclaiming their convictions as loudly as a Hyde Park -suffragette meeting. - -The band at that moment struck up _The Star-Spangled Banner_ in a -manner to suggest the president's advent into the theater, and I -searched in my bag for my pencil. I had seen the lecturer cough. - -"I say--how long is this convocation supposed to last?" Maitland Tait -inquired in a very inconspicuous whisper, as the white-flanneled lion -of the affair arose from his chair and became the cynosure of -lorgnettes. - -"Well, this talk will absorb about forty-five minutes, I should -hazard," I said. Already I had had the forethought to jot down the -usual opening: "Ladies and Gentlemen--Daughters and Sons of the -American Revolution: It is with a feeling of profoundest pleasure that -I have the privilege of being with you to-day," etc. So for the moment -my attention was undivided. - -"And there will be other talks?" - -"Yes." - -"And a walk through the gardens, I believe Mrs.--Mrs. Walker said?" - -"Probably so. The Seven Oaks gardens are very lovely in June." - -At the mention of gardens his eyes wandered, with what I fancied was a -tinge of homesickness, toward the colorful flowering spaces beyond the -box hedges. There were acres and acres of typical English gardens back -there; and the odor of the sweet old-fashioned shrubs came in on -gentle heat waves from the open area. He looked as if he would like to -be back there in those English-looking gardens--with all the people -gone. - - - - -CHAPTER VII - -STRAWS POINT - - -"And are you going to write up the whole thing?" he inquired, during a -little commotion caused by one of the large flags slipping from its -stand and threatening to obscure the speaker. - -"You mean make a society column report of it?" - -"Yes." - -"No. I'm a sort of special feature writer on the _Herald_, and I am to -get only this speech of Major Coleman's to put in my Sunday page." - -The lecture had commenced in good earnest by this time, and I was -scribbling away in shorthand as I talked. - -"Not one among us is insensible to the visions of patriotic pride and -affection which the very name of 'Old Glory' conjures up within us, -but at the same time we may do well to review, quite dispassionately, -once in a while the wonderful chain of historical changes which came -about in evolving this flag to its present form.... For we all realize -that there is no perfect thing in this world which has not been an -evolution from some imperfect thing.... When Pope Gregory, -the"--Somethingth, I quite failed to catch his number--"granted to -Scotland the white cross of St. Andrew, and to England the red cross -of St. George, he faintly surmised what a tempest in a teapot he was -stirring up!" - -He paused, and the man at my side got in a word, edgewise. - -"All of it?" he asked, looking aghast at the pages of long-tailed dots -and dashes under my hand. I laughed. - -"I'm paid to do it," I answered. "I don't disfigure my handwriting -this way for nothing." - -"But--but--you must be very clever," he commented, so appalled at the -thought that he forgot he was talking to a stranger. I like that -faculty. I like a man who dares to be awkwardly sincere. - -"Not clever--only very needy," I replied, turning over the page as I -saw the lecturer replace the white flag of St. Andrew into its stand -and take up the thread of his talk. "And I don't know that I need get -every word of the discourse. The women who read my page don't care a -rap about flags--but they do care to see a picture of Major Coleman -and his wife and their dog on the piazza of their winter home, just -out from Tampa!--I've got to have enough of this lecture to carry that -picture." - -He nodded gravely. - -"I see. But after you get this report?" - -"I'm going back to the city," I answered. "I have to catch the five -o'clock car in." - -"... The jealousy became so fierce between the two nations--the absurd -jealousy over which should first salute the flag of the other--St. -George claiming great superiority in the way of godliness over St. -Andrew, and St. Andrew, with the true Scotch spirit, stiffening his -neck to the breaking point, while waiting for St. George to take off -his hat to him, that when the story of this dissension reached the -ears of Pope Gregory, he--" - -I never knew what he did until afterward, for at that moment I saw -Maitland Tait slip his watch out carefully, guarding the action with -an outspread left hand. - -"I've an engagement at five, too," he said. - -"... He determined to lose no time," was the next sentence I found -myself jotting down on paper, and wondering whether Major Coleman had -really said such a thing or whether it had been born in my mind of the -stress of the moment.... "He was a man of the most impulsive, -sometimes of the most erratic, actions." - -"Of course!" my heart said between thumps. "I shouldn't like him if he -were not." - -"I can make my excuses to Mrs. Walker at the same time you make -yours," the deep voice said, in a surprisingly soft tone. - -"... For he saw in such a course protection and peace," Major Coleman -announced. "All the world suspected that his ultimate aim was union, -but--" - -"An international alliance," my heart explained, as I jotted down the -words of the lecturer. - -"Mayn't I take you back to town in my car?" - -"... And all the world knew that he was a man absolutely untrammeled -by tradition," the white-flanneled one proclaimed. - -"Thank you, that would be lovely, but I'm afraid Mrs. Walker won't -consent to your going so soon," I said between curlicues. - -"I'm going, however," he answered. "I've an important engagement, -and--I'm not going to stay at this--this," he closed his lips firmly, -but the silence said "_cussed_," that dear, fierce, American -adjective. "I'm not going to stay at this party one minute after -you're gone. I don't like to talk to just any woman." - -"... Yet I would have you understand that he was a temperamental man," -was thundered in a warning tone from the speaker's stand. "He was -quick in judgment and action, but he was fine and sensitive in spirit. -I've never a doubt that he disliked and feared the occasion which -caused this precipitate action. He was quaking in his boots all the -time, but he was courageous. He decided to make brief work of -formalities and take a short cut to his heart's desire." - -"What was it he did?" I asked of Mr. Tait, startled at the thought of -what I'd missed. "Do you know what this thing was that Pope Gregory -did?" - -"No-o--listen a minute!" he suggested. - -"... Can't you just imagine now that he was afraid of what people -might say--or do?" asked the major encouragingly. "It was absolutely -unprecedented in the annals of history--such a quick, rash and sudden -decision. If England and Scotland were going to be eternally bickering -over their flags, they should have _one_ flag! They should be united! -They should--" - -"The _Union Jack_!" whispered the deep voice close at my side, while -the grave dark eyes lighted, as--as they should have lighted, or I'd -never have forgiven him. "He created the Union Jack, by George!" - -And the speaker on the stand demonstrated the truth of this conclusion -by displaying a big British flag, which caught in its socket as he -attempted to lift it and occasioned another pause in the speech. - -"This enthusiasm makes me hungry," Maitland Tait observed, as the -audience courteously saluted the ancient emblem of hostility, and the -echoes of applause died away. "Since we're going to get no tea here, -can't we drive by some place up-town? There's a good-looking place in -Union Street--" - -"But that would make you very late for your engagement, I'm afraid," I -demurred. "It will take some little time to drive in." - -He looked at me wonderingly for a moment. - -"My engagement? Oh, yes--but it can wait." - -"Then, if it can, I'm afraid Mrs. Walker will not let you off. I -happen to know that--" - -He cut short my argument by motioning me to pay attention to the -speaker, who at the moment had replaced the flag of Pope Gregory's -cunning, and was talking away at a great rate. - -"... Yet, who can say that the hastiest actions do not often bring -about the best results? Certainly when a decision is made out of an -excessive desire to bring happiness to all parties concerned, its -immediate action can not fail to denote a wholesome heartiness which -should always be emulated.... Different from most men of his native -country, possessing a genuinely warm heart, a subtle mentality, -coupled with a conscience which impelled him always toward the right, -he was enabled, by this one impetuous act, to become a benefactor of -mankind! What he longed for was harmony--a harmonious union; and what -he has achieved has been the direct outcome of a great longing. He -created a union--wholesome, strengthening and permanent," I took down -in shorthand. - - * * * * * - -I have a confused impression--I suppose I should say post-impression, -for I didn't remember anything very clearly until afterward--that -Betsy Ross, Pope Gregory, the Somethingth, and Mrs. Hiram Walker were -all combining to tie my hands and feet together with thongs of red, -white and blue. - -It seemed hours and hours before that lecture ended, then more hours -before the tall restless man and I could make our way through a sea of -massaged faces to a distant point where our hostess stood giving -directions to a white-coated servant. - -She turned to me, with a fluttering little air of regret, when I -reached her side. - -"Grace, surely you don't have to hurry off at this unchristian hour!" -she insisted. "My dear, you really should stay! Solinski has arranged -the loveliest spread, and I'm not going to keep the company waiting -forever to get to it, either!--The ices will be the surprise of the -season." - -"I'm sorry," I began, but she interrupted me. - -"Why _didn't_ your mother come?" - -Already her vague regret over my own hasty departure had melted away, -and as she saw the tall man following me, evidently bent upon the same -mission as mine, she put her query in a perfunctory way to hide her -chagrin. - -"Mother couldn't come, Mrs. Walker. There is only one D. A. R. pin in -the family, as you know--and I had to wear that." - -Maitland Tait, looking over my shoulder, heard my explanation and -smiled. - -"It is a great deprivation to miss the rest of your charming party, -Mrs. Walker," he began, but as he mentioned going, in a cool final -voice, our hostess emitted a little terrified shriek. - -"What? Not you, too!" - -His face was the picture of deep contrition. - -"I _am_ sorry," he said, as only an Englishman can say it, and it -always sounds as if he were digging regret up out of his heart with a -shovel, "but I have an important engagement that really can not -wait--" - -"And the General Seth O'Callen Chapter fairly holding its breath to -meet you!" she wailed, the despair in her voice so genuine that it was -impossible to keep back a smile. "That is our chapter composed -entirely of _young_ women, you know, and I'd given their regent my -word of honor that you'd be here to-day!" - -"Which the Regent has entirely forgotten in the charm of that -delightful lecture we've just heard, I'm sure," he answered, his tones -regretfully mollifying. "If it were at all possible for me to get word -to the man--the men--" - -The rest of the fabrication was cut short and drowned out by the -shriek of a trolley-car, grinding noisily round a curve of the track -at that instant. It was the five-o'clock car, and I had grown to -watch for its shriek as fearfully as ever Cinderella listened for the -stroke of twelve from the castle clock. For me there was never a -garden party without its trolley-car back to the city--its hateful, -five-o'clock car--its hurried, businesslike, hungry summons--while ice -in tea glasses tinkled to the echo. - -From force of long habit now that grinding sound of the car-wheels -acted upon my nervous system like a fire alarm upon an engine -horse--and I started to run. - -"Charming party--so sorry to have to rush off this way--hope next time -I'll not be so busy--yes, I'll tell mother!" - -I gathered the folds of copy paper close, having forgotten to thrust -them away out of sight into my bag, and made a break for the front -gate. Then, as I reached the line of waiting motor-cars, I -remembered--and stopped still with a foolish little feeling. - -Looking back I saw Mrs. Walker shaking hands in an injured fashion -with her troublesome lion--who, after the manner of lions, proved that -he could afford anxiety as well after being caught as before,--and -turning her back resolutely upon his departing glory.--The whole of -the General Seth O'Callen Chapter was before her, I knew she was -thinking bitterly. - -"Thank goodness she won't see this!" I volunteered to myself, as the -tall gray figure came hastily down the line and caught up with me. -"She has troubles enough of her own, and--and she won't stop to wonder -over whether I went back to the city by trolley, motor, or chariot of -fire!" - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - -LONGEST WAY HOME - - -"You hadn't forgotten?" he inquired, coming up behind me with an -expression of uneasiness as I passed the first two or three cars in -the line. - -"No--that is, I forgot for only a moment! I'm so used to going to town -on this trolley-car." - -"Then--ah, here we are--" - -The limousine to which I was conducted was a gleaming dark-blue -affair, with light tan upholstery, and the door-knobs, clock-case and -mouth-piece of the speaking-tube were of tortoise-shell. - -The chauffeur touched something and the big creature began a softened, -throbbing breathing. Isn't it strange how we can not help regarding -automobiles as _creatures_? Sometimes we think of them as gliding -swans--at other times as fiery-eyed dragons. It all depends upon -whether _we're_ the duster, or the dustee. - -I gained the idea as I stepped into this present one--which of course -belonged to the gliding swan variety--that its master must be rather -ridiculously well-to-do--for a cave-man. His initials were on the -panels, and the man at the wheel said, "Mr. Tait, sir," after a -fashion that no American-trained servant, white, black, or -almond-eyed, ever said. Evidently the car had come down from -Pittsburgh and the chauffeur had made a longer journey. Together, -however, they spelled perfection--and luxury. Still, strange to say, -the notion of this man's possible wealth did not get on my throat and -suffocate me, as the notion of Guilford's did. I felt that the man -himself really cared very little about it all. The idea of his being a -man who could do hard tasks patiently did not fade in the glamour of -this damask and tortoise-shell. - -"Which is--the longest way to town?" he asked in a perfectly grave, -matter-of-fact way as we started. - -"Down this lane to the Franklin Pike, then out past Fort Christian to -Belcourt Boulevard--and on to High Street," I replied in a perfectly -grave, matter-of-fact way, as if he were a tubercular patient, bound -to spend a certain number of hours in aimless driving every day. - -"Thank you," he answered very seriously, then turned to the chauffeur. - -"Collins, can you follow this line? I think we drove out this way the -day the car came?" - -"Oh, yes, sir--thank you," the man declared, slipping his way in and -out among the throngs of other vehicles. - -Then as we whirled away down the pike I kept thinking of this -man--this young Englishman, who had come to America and elevated -himself into the position of vice-president and general-manager of the -Consolidated Traction Company, but, absurdly enough, no thought of the -limousine nor the traction company came into my musings. I thought of -him as a spirit--a spirit-man, who had lived in the woods. He had -dwelt in a hut--or a cave--and toiled with his hands, hewing down -trees, burning charcoal, eating brown bread at noon. Then, at dusk, he -laid aside his tools, rumbling homeward in a great two-wheeled cart, -whistling as he went, but softly--because he was deep in thought. - -The seven _ages_ of man are really nothing to be compared in point of -interest with the different conditions of mind which women demand of -them. - -Very young girls seek about--often in vain--for a man who can compel; -then later, they demand one who can feel; afterward their own -expansion clamors for one who can understand--but the final stage of -all is reached when the feminine craving can not be satisfied save by -the man who can _achieve_. - -This, of course, indicates that the woman herself is -experienced--sometimes even to the point of being a widow--but it is -decidedly a satisfying state of mind when it is once reached, because -it is permanent. - -And your man of achievement is pretty apt to be an uncomplicated -human. His deepest "problem" is how to make the voices of the -nightingale and alarm clock harmonize. For he is a lover between -suns--and a _laborer_ during them. - -At Solinski's Japanese tea-room in Union Street, the limousine slowed -up. The band was playing _The Rosary_ as we went in, for it was the -hour of the afternoon for the professional seers and seen of -Oldburgh's medium world to drop in off the sidewalks for half an hour -and dawdle over a tutti-frutti. The ultra-sentimental music always -gets such people as these--and the high excruciating notes of this -love-wail were ringing out with an intense poignancy. - -"Each hour a pearl--each pearl a prayer--" - -"Which table do you prefer?" my companion asked me, but for a moment I -failed to answer. I was looking up at the clock, and I saw that the -hands were pointing to six. I had met Maitland Tait at four!--Thus I -had two pearls already on my string, I reckoned. - -"Oh, which table--well, farther back, perhaps!" - -I came down to earth after that, for getting acquainted with the -caprices of a man's appetite is distinctly an earthly joy. Yet it -certainly comes well within the joy class, for nothing else gives you -the comfortable sense of possession that an intimate knowledge of his -likes and dislikes bestows. - -Just after the "each-hour-a-pearl" stage you begin to feel that you -have a _right_ to know whether he takes one lump or two! And the -homely, every-day joys are decidedly the best. You don't tremble at -the sounds of a man's rubber heels at the door, perhaps, after you're -so well acquainted with him that you've set him a hasty supper on the -kitchen table, or your fingers have toyed with his over the dear task -of baiting a mouse-trap together--but he gets a dearness in this phase -which a pedestal high as Eiffel Tower couldn't afford.--It is this -dearness which makes you endure to see Prince Charming's coronet -melted down into ducats to buy certified milk! - -"And what are--those?" Maitland Tait asked, after the tea-service was -before us, and I had poured his cup. He was looking about the place -with a frank interest, and his gaze had lighted upon a group of -marcelled, manicured manikins at a near-by table. They were chattering -and laughing in an idly nervous fashion. - -I dropped in two lumps of sugar and passed him his cup. - -"They are wives," I answered. - -"What?" - -"Just wives." - -Being English, it took him half a second to smile--but when he did I -forgave him the delay. - -"_Just_ wives? Then that means not mothers, nor helpmeets, nor--" - -"Nor housekeepers, nor suffragettes, nor saints, nor sinners, nor -anything else that the Lord intended, nor apprehended," I finished up -with a fierce suddenness, for that was what Guilford wanted me to be. -"They're _just_ wives." - -He stirred his tea thoughtfully. - -"That's what I find all over America," he said, but not with the air -of making a discovery. "Men must work, and women must _eat_." - -"And the sooner it's over the sooner to--the opera," I said. - -He looked at me in surprise. - -"Then you recognize it?" he asked. - -"Recognize it? Of course _I_ recognize it--but I'm not a fair sample. -I work for my living." - -He was silent for a moment, looking at the manikins with a sort of -half-hearted pity. - -"If they could all be induced to work they'd not be what they are--to -men," he observed. - -"To men?" - -"I find that an American wife is a tormenting side-issue to a man's -busy life," he said, with a tinge of regret. "And I am sorry, too--for -they are most charming. For my part, I should like a woman who could -do things--who was clever enough to be an inspiration." - -I nodded heartily, forgetful of personalities. - -"I too like the workers in the world," I coincided. "My ideal man is -one whose name will be made into a verb." - -He laughed. - -"Like Marconi, eh, and Pasteur--and--" - -"And Boycott, and Macadam, and--oh, a host of others!" - -It was quite a full minute before he spoke again. - -"I don't see how I could make my name into a verb," he said quietly, -"but I must begin to think about it. It is certainly a valuable -suggestion." - -It was my turn to laugh, which I did, nervously. - -"In Oldburgh, Tait seems to stand for the opposite of dictate," I -hazarded. "That means to _talk_, and you won't--talk." - -"But I am talking," he insisted. "I'm asking you questions as fast as -ever I can." - -"However, your technique is wrong," I replied. "You shouldn't ask -questions of a newspaper woman. You should let her ask the questions, -and you should furnish the answers." - -"But you're not a newspaper woman now, are you?" he demanded in some -alarm. "I hope not--and certainly I must ask you questions before I -begin to tell you things. There are quite a few facts which I wish to -find out now." - -"And they are, first--?" - -"Where you live?" - -I told him, and he took from his pocket a small leather book with his -name, Maitland Tait, and an address in smaller letters which I could -not make out, on the inside lining. In a small, rather cramped hand, -he wrote the address I gave him, "1919 West Clydemont Place," then -looked up at me. - -"Next?" I laughed, in a flutter. - -"Next I want to know when you will let me come to see you?" - -"When?" I repeated, rather blankly. - -He drew slightly back. - -"I should have said, of course, _if_ you will let me come, but--" - -"But I shall be very glad to have you come," I made haste to explain. -"I--I was only thinking!" - -I was thinking of my betrothed--for the first time that afternoon. - -"The length of time I am to stay in the South is very uncertain," he -went on to explain with a gentle dignity. "At first it appeared that I -might have to make a long stay, but we are settling our affairs so -satisfactorily that I may be able to get back to Pittsburgh at any -time now. That's why I feel that I can't afford to lose a single day -in doing the really important things." - -"Then come," I said, with a friendly show, which was in truth a -desperate spirit of abandon. "Come some day--" - -"To-morrow?" he asked. - -"To-morrow--at four." - -But during the rest of the meal grandfather and Uncle Lancelot came -and took their places on either side of me. They were distinctly de -trop, but I could not get rid of them. - -"This is--really the wrong thing to do, Grace," grandfather said, so -soberly that when I rose to go and looked in the mirror to see that my -hat was all right, his own sad blue eyes were looking out at me in -perplexed reproach. "--Very wrong." - -Then the sad blue eyes took in the lower part of my face. I believe -I've neglected to say that there is a dimple in my chin, and Uncle -Lancelot's spirit is a cliff-dweller living there. He comes out and -taunts the thoughtful eyes above. - -"Nonsense, parson!" he expostulated jauntily now. "Look on the lips -while they are red! She's _young_!" - -"Youth doesn't excuse folly," said grandfather severely. - -"It exudes it, however," the other argued. - -I turned away, resolutely, from their bickering. I had enough to -contend with besides them--for suddenly I had begun wondering what on -earth mother _would_ say, after she'd said: "Grace, you amaze me!" - - - - -CHAPTER IX - -MAITLAND TAIT - - -The only difference between the houses in West Clydemont Place and -museums was that there was no admission fee at the front door. -Otherwise they were identical, for the "auld lang syne" flavor greeted -you the moment you put foot into that corner of the town. You knew -instinctively that every family there owned its own lawn-mower and -received crested invitations in the morning mail. - -Yet it was certainly not fashionable! Indeed, from a -butler-and-porte-cochère standpoint it was shabby. The business of -owning your own lawn-mower arises from a state of mind, rather than -from a condition of finances, anyway. We were poor, but aloof--and -strung high with the past-tension. The admiral, the ambassador and -the artist rubbed our aristocracy in on any stray caller who lingered -in the hall, if they had failed to be pricked by it on the point of -grandfather's jeweled sword in the library. - -I saw 1919 through a new vista as I came up to it in the late dusk, -following the Flag Day reception, and I wondered what the effect of -all this antiquity would be on the mind of a man who so clearly -disregarded the grandfather clause in one's book of life. I hoped that -he would be amused by it, as he had been by the long-tailed D. A. R. -badge on my coat. - -"You'd better have a little fire kindled up in the library, Grace," -mother observed chillingly just after lunch that next afternoon. "It's -true it's June, but--" - -"But the day _is_ bleak and raw," I answered, with a sudden cordial -sense of relief that she was on speaking terms with me again. -"Certainly I'll tell Cicely to make a fire." - -"The dampness of the day has nothing at all to do with it," she kept -on with frozen evenness. "I suggested it because a fire is a safe -place for a girl to look into while her profile is being studied." - -"Mother!" - -Her sense of outraged propriety suddenly slipped its leash. - -"It keeps her eyes looking earnest, instead of _eager_," she burst -out. "And any girl who'd let a man--allow a man--to run away from a -party whose very magnificence was induced on his account, and take her -off to tea in a public place, and come to see her the very next -afternoon--a stranger, and a foreigner at that--is--is playing with -fire!" - -"You mean she'd better be playing with fire while he's calling?" I -asked quietly. "We must remember to have the old andirons polished, -then." - -She stopped in her task of dusting the parlor--whose recesses without -the shining new player-piano suddenly looked as bare and empty as a -shop-window just after the holidays. - -"You wilfully ignore my warning," she declared. "If this man left that -party yesterday and comes calling to-day, of course he's impressed! -And if you let him, of course _you're_ impressed. This much goes -without saying; but I beg you to be careful, Grace! You happen to have -those very serious, _betraying_ eyes, and I want you to guard them -while he's here!" - -"By keeping my hands busy, eh?" I laughed. "Well, I'll promise, -mother, if that'll be any relief to you." - -So the fire was kindled, as a preventative measure; and at four -o'clock he came--not on the stroke, but ten minutes after. I was glad -that he had patronized the street railway service for this call, and -left the limousine in its own boudoir--you couldn't imagine anything -so exquisite being kept in a lesser place--or I'm afraid that our -little white-capped maid would have mistaken it for an ambulance and -assured him that nobody was sick. Gleaming blue limousines were scarce -in that section. - -"Am I early?" he asked, after we had shaken hands and he had glanced -toward the fire with a little surprised, gratified expression. "I -wasted a quarter of an hour waiting for this car." - -Now, a woman can always forgive a man for being late, if she knows he -started on time, so with this reassurance I began to feel at home with -him. I leaned over and stirred the fire hospitably--to keep my eyes -from showing just how thoroughly at home I felt. - -"No--you are not early. I was expecting you at four, and--and mother -will be down presently." - -He studied my profile. - -"I was out at the golf club dance last night," he said, after a pause, -with a certain abruptness which I had found characterized his more -important parts of speech. I stood the tongs against the marble -mantlepiece and drew back from the flame. - -"Was it--enjoyable?" I asked politely. - -"Extremely. Mrs. Walker was there, and she had very kindly forgiven -me for my defection of the afternoon. In fact, she was distinctly -cordial. She talked to me a great deal of you and your mother." - -My heart sank. It always does when I find that my women friends have -been talking a great deal about me. - -"Oh, did she?" - -"She is very fond of you, it seems--and very puzzled by you." - -"Puzzled because I work for the _Herald_?" - -I spoke breathlessly, for I wondered if Mrs. Walker had told of the -Guilford Blake puzzle, as well; but after one look into the candid -half-amused eyes I knew that this information had been withheld. - -"Well, yes. She touched upon that, among other things." - -"But what things?" I asked impatiently. At the door I heard the maid -with the tea tray. "I suppose, however, just the usual things that people -tell about us. That we have been homeless and penniless--except for -this old barn--since I was a baby, and that, one by one, the pomps of -power have been stripped from us?" - -He looked at me soberly for a moment. - -"Yes, she told me all this," he said. - -"And that our historic rosewood furniture was sold, years ago, to Mrs. -Hartwell Gill, the grocer's wife who used the chair-legs as -battering-rams?" - -He smiled. - -"Against Oldburgh's unwelcoming doors? Yes." - -"And that--" - -"That you belonged to the most aristocratic family in the whole -state," he interrupted softly. "So aristocratic that even the -possession of the rosewood furniture is an open sesame! And of course -this state is noted for its blooded beings, even in my own country." - -"Really?" I asked, with a little gratified surprise. - -"Indeed, yes!" he replied earnestly. "And Mrs. Walker told me -something that I had not in the least thought to surmise--that you are -a descendant of the famous artist, Christie. I don't know why I -happened not to think about it, for the name is one which an -Englishman instantly connects with portrait galleries. He was very -favorably known on our side." - -"Yes. He had a very remarkable--a very pathetic history," I said. - -Turning around, he glanced at a small portrait across the room. - -"Is--is this James Christie?" he asked. - -"Yes. There is a larger one in the hall." - -He walked across the room and examined the portrait. After a -perfunctory survey, which did not include any very close examination -of the strong features--rugged and a little harsh, and by no means the -glorious young face which had been a lodestar to Lady Frances Webb--he -turned back to me. For a moment I fancied that he was going to say -something bitter and impulsive--something that held a tinge of -mass-hatred for class, but his expression changed suddenly. I saw -that his impulse had passed, and that what he would say next would be -an afterthought. - -"Do you care for him--for this sort of thing?" he asked, waving his -hand carelessly toward the other portraits in the room and toward the -sword, lying there in an absurd sort of harmlessness beneath its glass -case. "I imagined that you didn't." - -He spoke with a tinge of disappointment. Evidently he was sorry to -find me so pedigreed a person. - -"I do--and I don't," I answered, coming across the room to his side -and drawing back a curtain to admit a better light. "I certainly care -for--him." - -"The artist?" - -"Yes." - -"But why?" he demanded, with a sudden twist of perversity to his big -well-shaped mouth. "To me it seems such a waste of time--this -sentiment for romantic antiquity. But I am not an unprejudiced judge, -I admit. I have spent all the days of my life hating aristocracy." - -"Oh, my feeling for him is not caused by his aristocracy," I made -haste to explain. "And indeed, the Christies were very commonplace -people until he elevated them into the ranks of fame. He was not only -an artist of note, but he was a very strong man. It is this part of -his history that I revere, and when I was a very young girl I -'adopted' him--from all the rest of my ancestors--to be the one I'd -care for and feel a pride in." - -He smiled. - -"Of course you don't understand," I attempted to explain with a little -flurry. "No _man_ would ever think of adopting an ancestor, but--" - -He interrupted me, his smile growing gentler. - -"I think I understand," he said. "I did the selfsame thing, years ago -when I was a boy. But my circumstances were rather different from -yours. I selected my grandfather--my mother's father, because he was -clean and fine and strong! He was--he was a collier in Wales." - -"A collier?" I repeated, wondering for the moment over the -unaccustomed word. - -"A coal-miner," he explained briefly. "He was honest and -kind-hearted--and I took him for my example. He left me no heirlooms -that--" - -I turned away, looking at the room's furnishings with a feeling of -reckless contempt. - -"Heirlooms are--are a nuisance to keep dusted!" I declared quickly. - -"Yet you evidently like them," he said, as we took our places again -before the fire, and the little maid, in her nervous haste, made an -unnecessary number of trips in and out. The firelight was glowing -ruddily over the silver things on the tea-table, and looking up, I -caught his eyes resting upon the ring I wore--Guilford's scarab. "That -ring is likely an heirloom?" - -"Yes--the story goes that Mariette himself found it," I elucidated, -slipping the priceless old bit of stone off my hand and handing it to -him to examine. - -But as I talked my head was buzzing, for grandfather was at one ear -and Uncle Lancelot was at the other. - -"Grace, you ought to tell him!" grandfather commanded sharply. "Tell -him this minute! Say to him: 'This ring is an heirloom in the family -of my betrothed.'" - -"_Rot_, parson!" came in Uncle Lancelot's dear comforting tones. -"Shall a young woman take it for granted that every man who admires -the color of her eyes is interested in her entire history?--Why, it -would be absolutely indelicate of Grace to tell this man that she's -engaged. It's simply none of his business." - -"You'll see! You'll see!" grandfather warned--and my heart sank, for -when a member of your family warns you that you'll see, the sad part -of it is that you _will_ see. - -"It's a royal scarab, isn't it?" Maitland Tait asked, turning the -ancient beetle over and viewing the inscription on the flat side. - -"Yes--perhaps--oh, I don't know, I'm sure," I answered in a bewildered -fashion. Then suddenly I demanded: "But what else did Mrs. Walker tell -you? Surely she didn't leave off with the mention of one illustrious -member of my family." - -"She told me about your great-aunt--the queer old lady who left James -Christie's relics to you because you were the only member of the -family who didn't keep a black bonnet in readiness for her funeral," -he laughed, as he handed me back the ring. - -"They were just a batch of letters," I corrected, "not any other -relics." - -"Yes--the letters written by Lady Frances Webb," he said. - -It was my turn to laugh. - -"I knew that Mrs. Walker must have been talkative," I declared. "She -didn't tell you the latest touch of romance in connection with those -letters, did she?" - -He was looking into the fire, with an expression of deep -thoughtfulness; and I studied his profile for a moment. - -"Late romance?" he asked in a puzzled fashion, as he turned to me. - -"A publishing company has made me an offer to publish those letters! -To make them into a stunning 'best-seller,' with a miniature portrait -of Lady Frances Webb, as frontispiece, I dare say, and the -oftenest-divorced illustrator in America to furnish pictures of -Colmere Abbey, with the lovers mooning 'by Norman stone!'" - -He was silent for a little while. - -"No, she didn't tell me this," he finally answered. - -"Then it is because she doesn't know it!" I explained. "You see, -mother is still too grieved to mention the matter to any one by -telephone--and it happens that she hasn't met Mrs. Walker face to face -since the offer was made." - -"And--rejected?" he asked, with a little smile. - -"Yes, but how did you know?" - -The smile sobered. - -"There are some things one _knows_," he answered. "Yet, after all, -what are you going to do with the letters? If you don't publish them -now how are you going to be sure that some other--some future -possessor will not?" - -"I can't be sure--that's the reason I'm not going to run any risks," I -told him. "I'm going to burn them." - -He started. - -"But that would be rather a pity, wouldn't it?" he asked. "She was -such a noted writer that I imagine her letters are full of literary -value." - -"It would be a cold-blooded thing for _me_ to do," I said -thoughtfully. "I've an idea that some day I'll take them back to -England and--and burn them there." - -"A sort of feeling that they'd enjoy being buried on their native -soil?" he asked. - -"I'll take them to Colmere Abbey--her old home," I explained. "To me -the place has always been a house of dreams! She describes portions of -the gardens in her letters--tells him of new flower-beds made, of new -walls built--of the sun-dial. I have always wanted to go there, and -some day I shall bundle all these letters up and pack them in the -bottom of a steamer trunk--to have a big bonfire with them on the very -same hearth where she burned his." - - - - -CHAPTER X - -IN THE FIRELIGHT - - -Again there was a silence, but it was not the kind of silence that -gives consent. On the other hand his look of severity was positively -discouraging. - -"If I may inquire, what do you know about this place--this Colmere -Abbey?" he finally asked. "I mean, do you know anything of it in this -century--whether it's still standing or not--or anything at all save -what your imagination pictures?" - -It was a rather lawyer-like query, and I shook my head, feeling -somewhat nonplused. - -"No--nothing!" - -"Then, if you should go to England, how would you set about finding -out?" - -"Oh, that wouldn't be so bad. In fact, I believe it would be a unique -experience to go journeying to a spot with nothing more recent than a -Washington Irving sketch as guide-book." - -He looked at me half pityingly. - -"You might be disappointed," he said gently. "For my part, I have -never taken up a moment's time mooning about people's ancestral -estates--I've had too much real work to do--but I happen to know that -residents often fight shy of tourists." - -I had a feeling of ruffled dignity. - -"Of course--tourists!" I answered, bridling a little. - -"Because," he hastened to explain, "the owners of the places can so -often afford to live at home only a short season every year. Many of -them are poor, and the places they own are mortgaged to the turrets." - -"And the shut-up dilapidation would not make pleasant sight-seeing for -rich Americans?" - -He nodded. - -"I happen to have heard some such report about this Colmere -Abbey--years ago," he said. - -"Are you sure it was the same place?" I asked, my heart suddenly -bounding. "Colmere, in Lancashire?" - -"Quite sure! I was brought up in Nottingham, and have heard of the -estate, but have never seen it." - -"Then it's still there--my house of dreams?" - -For a moment I waited, palpitatingly, for him to say more, but he only -looked at me musingly, then back into the fire. After a second he -leaned forward, shaking his unruly hair back, as if he were trying to -rid himself from a haunting thought. - -"I--I can't talk about 'landed gentry,'" he said, turning to me with a -quick fierceness. "I grow violent when I do! You've no idea how -hateful the whole set is to a man who has had to make his own way in -the world--against them!" Then, after this burst of resentment, his -mood seemed to change. "But we must talk about England," he added, -with a hasty gentleness. "There are so many delightful things we can -discuss! Tell me, have you been there? Do you like it?" - -I nodded an energetic affirmative. - -"I have been there and--I love it! But it was a long while ago, and I -wasn't old enough to understand about the things which would interest -me most now." - -"A long while ago?" - -"Yes--let me see--ten years, I believe! At all events it was the -summer after we sold the rosewood furniture--and the piano. Mother was -so amazed at herself for having the nerve to part with the grand piano -that she had to take a sea-voyage to recover herself." - -"But what a happy idea!" he commented seriously, as he looked around. -"A grand piano would really be a nuisance in this cozy room." - -For a long time afterward I wondered whether my very deepest feeling -of admiration for him had been born at the moment I looked at him -first, or when he made this remark. But I've found it's as hard to -ascertain Love's birthday as it is to settle the natal hour of a -medieval author. - -"How long have you been in America?" I next asked, abruptly; and he -looked relieved. - -"Ten years--off and on," he answered briskly. "Most of the time in -Pittsburgh, for my grandfather had chosen that place for me. He would -not have consented to my going back to England often, if he had lived, -but I have been back a number of times, for I love journeying over the -face of the earth--and, strange as it may seem, I love England. Some -day--when things--when my affairs--are in different shape over there I -shall go back to stay." - -The tea things were finally arranged by Cicely's nervous dusky hands, -and with a cordial showing of the letter-but-not-spirit-hospitality, -mother appeared, in the wake of the steaming kettle. - -Her expression said more plainly than words that she would do the -decent thing or die. - -"I was--" she began freezingly, as we both arose to greet her, "I -was--" - -She took in at a glance Maitland Tait's gigantic size, and shrank -back--a little frightened. Then his good clothes reassured her. A -giant who patronizes a good New York tailor is a _cut_ above an -ordinary giant, she evidently admitted. - -"--detained," she added, with the air of making a concession. She -accepted the chair he drew up for her, and his down-to-the-belt grace -began making itself conspicuous. She looked him over, and her -jaundiced eye lost something of its color. - -"--_unavoidably_," she plead, with a regretful prettiness. - -Then she made the tea, and when she saw how caressingly the big man's -smooth brown hands managed his cup, the remaining thin layer of ice -over her cordiality melted, and she became the usual charming mother -of a marriageable daughter. While she was at all times absolutely -loyal to Guilford, still she knew that a mother's appearance is a -daughter's asset, and she had always laid up treasures for me in this -manner. - -"You were at Mrs. Walker's Flag Day reception yesterday Grace tells -me?" she inquired as casually as if a bloody battle of words had not -been waging over the occurrence all morning. "And Mrs. Kendall was -talking with me this morning on the telephone about her dance Friday -night--" - -She paused, looking at him interrogatively, because that had been Mrs. -Kendall's own emotion when mentioning the matter. - -Mr. Tait glanced toward me. - -"Ah, yes--I had forgotten! You will be there?" - -"Yes," I answered hastily, and mother came near scalding the kitten on -the rug in the excess of her surprise. All morning, through the smoke -of battle, I had sent vehement protestations against having my white -tissue redraped for the occasion, declaring that nothing could induce -me to go. - -"I find that one usually goes to no less than three social affairs on -a trip like this--and I--well, I'm afraid I'm rather an unsocial -brute! I select the biggest things to go to, for one has to talk -less, and there is a better chance of getting away early," he -explained. - -Mother left the room soon after this--the sudden change of decision -about the dance had been too much for her. Even perfect clothes and -well-bred hands and a graceful waist-line could not make her forgive -this in me. She made a hasty excuse and left. - -Then our two chairs shifted themselves back into their former -positions before the fire and we talked on in the gloaming. Somehow, -since that outburst of anger against the present-day owners of Colmere -Abbey, the vision of the big man--the cave-man--in the coat of -goatskins, with the bare knees and moccasins, had come back -insistently. - -Yet it was just a vision, and after a few minutes it vanished--after -the manner of visions since the world began. He looked out the window -at the creeping darkness and rose to go. - -"Then I'm to see you Friday night?" he asked at parting. - -"Yes." - -"I'm--I'm glad." - -There had been a green and gold sunset behind the trees in the park -across the way, and after a moment more he was lost in this weird -radiance; then he suddenly came to view again, in the glow of electric -light at the corner. - -A car to the city swung round the curve just then, and a dark figure, -immensely tall in the shadows, stepped from the pavement. I heard the -conductor ring up a fare--a harsh metallic note that indicated -_finality_ to me--then silence. - -"He's gone--gone--gone!" something sad and lonesome was saying in my -heart. "What if he should be suddenly called back to Pittsburgh and I -shouldn't see him again?" - -To see the very last of him I had dropped down beside the front door, -with my face pressed against the lace-veiled glass, and so intent was -I upon my task that I had entirely failed to hear mother's agitated -step in the hall above. - -I was brought to, however, when I heard the click of the electric -switch upon the stair. The lower hall was suddenly flooded with light. -I scrambled to my feet as quickly as I could. Mother's face, peering -at me from the landing, was already pronouncing sentence. - -"Grace, I was just coming down to tell you that--well, I am compelled -to say that you _amaze_ me!" she emitted first, with a tone of utter -hopelessness struggling through her newly-fired anger. "Down on your -knees in your new gown--and gowns as scarce as angels' visits, too!" - -"Ah--but--I'm sorry--" - -"What on earth are you doing there?" she kept on. - -I turned to her, blinking in the dazzling light. - -"I was--let me see?--oh, _yes_!" A brilliant thought had just come to -me. "--I was looking for the _key_!" - -Now, I happen to hate a liar worse than anything else on earth, and I -hated myself fervently as I told this one. - -"The key?" she asked suspiciously. - -"It--it had fallen on the floor," I kept on, for of course whatever -you do you must do with all your might, as we learn in copy-book days. - -"And it never occurred to you to turn on the light?" she demanded, -coming up and looking at me as if to see the extent of disfigurement -this new malady had wrought. "Down on your knees searching for a -key--and it never occurred to you to turn on the light?" - -"No," I answered, thankful to be able to tell the truth again. "No, it -never once occurred to me!" - - - - -CHAPTER XI - -TWO MEN AND A MAID - - -Have you ever thought that the reason we can so fully sympathize with -certain great people of history, and not with others, is because we -are occasionally granted a glimpse of the emotion our favorites -enjoyed--or endured? - -For instance, no man who has ever knocked the "t" out of "can't" -stands beside Napoleon's tomb without a sensation which takes the form -of: "_We_ understand each other--don't we, old top?" - -And every year at spring-time, Romeo is patted on the back -condescendingly by thousands of youths--so susceptible that they'd -fall in love with anything whose skirt and waist met in the back. - -The night of the Kendalls' dance _I_ knew what Cleopatra's cosmic -consciousness resembled--exactly. I knew it from the moment she -glanced away from the glint of her silver oars of the wonderful Nile -barge (because the glint of Antony's dark eyes was so much more -compelling) to the hour she recklessly unwrapped the basket of figs in -her death chamber! I ran the whole gamut of her emotions--'twixt love -and duty--and I came out of it feeling that--well, certainly I felt -that a conservatory is a room where eavesdroppers hear no good of -themselves! - -"Is everybody crazy to-night?" I whispered to Guilford, as we paused -for a moment before the dancing commenced just outside one of the -downy, silky reception rooms--quite apart from the noisy ballroom -farther back--and I saw two people inside. The girl was seated before -the piano, and was singing softly, while the man stood at her side, -listening with a rapt expression. - -"Who would ever have thought that _that_ girl would be singing _that_ -song to _that_ man?" I asked, with a quivery little feeling that the -world was going topsyturvy with other people besides me. The singer -was the careless, rowdy golf champion of the state, and the man -listening was Oldburgh's astonishing young surgeon--the kind who never -went anywhere because it was said he laid aside his scalpel only when -he was obliged to pick up his fork. - -"What is the song?" Guilford inquired, looking in, then drawing back -softly and dropping the curtain that screened the doorway. - -"_Caro Mio Ben!_" - -"A love song?" - -I smiled. - -"Well, rather!" - -Then somebody crowded up and separated Guilford and me. I stood there -listening to the lovely Italian words, and wondering if the night were -in truth bewitched. Guilford, under the impulse induced by a white -tissue gown and big red roses, had suffered an unusual heart-action -already and had spent half an hour whispering things in my ear which -made me feel embarrassed and ashamed. The only thing which can -possibly make a lifelong engagement endurable is the brotherly -attitude assumed by the lover in his late teens. - -"Come in," he said, elbowing his way back to me through the chattering -throng of the autumn's débutantes, after a few minutes. "I hear the -violins beginning to groan--and say--_haven't_ they got everybody -worth having here to-night?" - -"I don't--know," I replied vaguely, looking up and down the length of -the room that we were entering. - -"But--there's Mrs. Walker, and there are the Chester girls, and Dan -Hunter, just back from Africa--and--" - -"Certainly they've got a fine selection of Oldburgh's solid, -rolled-gold ornaments," I commented dryly, as my eyes searched the -other side of the room. - -"Oh, besides local talent in plenty to create some excitement, there's -an assortment of imported artists," he went on. "That French fellow, -d'Osmond, has been teaching some of the kids a new figure and they're -going to try it to-night. Have you met him?" - -"Yes, indeed--oh, no, of course I haven't met him, Guilford!" I -answered impatiently. "How could I meet a stray French nobleman? The -society editor is _his_ Boswell." - -He turned away, hurt at my show of irritation, but I didn't care. I -was in that reckless mood that comes during a great fire, or a storm -at sea, or any other catastrophe when the trivialities of living fade -into pygmy proportions before the vast desire for mere life. - -"And there's that Consolidated Traction Company fellow," he said -humbly, calling my attention to a bunch of new arrivals at the doors -of the ballroom. "What's his name?" - -"Maitland Tait." - -"Have you met him?" he inquired. - -Now usually Guilford is not humble, nor even very forgiving, so that -when he turned to me again and showed that he was determined to be -entertaining, I glanced at a mirror we happened to be passing. How -easy it would be to keep men right where we wanted them if life could -be carried on under frosted lights, in white tissue gowns, holding big -red roses! - -"Yes, I've met him," I answered giddily. "He was at Mrs. Walker's Flag -Day reception Tuesday--and he brought me to town in his car, then came -calling Wednesday afternoon, and--" - -Guilford had stopped still and was looking at me as if anxious to know -when I'd felt the first symptoms. - -"Oh, it's true," I laughed desperately. - -"Then why----" - -"Didn't I tell you?" - -"Yes--that is, you might have mentioned it. Of course, it really makes -no difference--" He smiled, dismissing it as a triviality. - -Gentle reader, I don't know whether your sympathies have secretly been -with Guilford all the time or not--but I know that mine were -distinctly with him at that moment. If there is ever a season when a -woman's system is predisposed toward the malady known as sex love, it -is when some man is magnanimous about another man. And Guilford's -manner at that instant was magnanimous--and I already had fifty-seven -other varieties of affection for him! I decided then, in the twinkling -of my fan chain, which I was agitating rather mercilessly, that if -Guilford were the kind of a man I _could_ love, he'd be the very man I -should adore. - ---But he wasn't. And the kind I could love was disentangling himself -from the group around the door and coming toward me at that very -moment. - -"Have you met him?" I asked of my companion, trying to pretend that -the noise was my fan chain and not my heart. - -"No." - -In another instant they were shaking hands cordially. - -"You'll excuse me a moment?" Guilford asked, turning to me--after he -and Maitland Tait had propounded and answered perfunctory questions -about Oldburgh. "I wanted to speak to--Delia Ramage." - -I had never before in my life heard of his wishing to speak to Delia -Ramage, but she was the nearest one to him, so he veered across to her -side, while I was left alone with the new arrival. This is called -heaping coals of fire. - -"I was glad to see you--a moment ago," Maitland Tait said in that low -intimate tone which is usually begotten only by daily or hourly -thought. Take two people who have not seen each other for a week, nor -thought of each other, and when they meet they will shrill out -spontaneous, falsetto tones--but not so with two people whose spirits -have communed five minutes before. They lower their voices when they -come face to face, for they realize that they are before the sanctum. -"You're looking most--unusually well." - -He was not, but I refrained from telling him so. Most thoughtful men -assume a look of constraint when they are forced to mingle with a -shallow-pated, boisterous throng, and he was strictly of this type--I -observed it with a thrill of triumph. - -Yet the festive appearance of evening dress was not unbecoming to him. -His was that kind of magnificent plainness which showed to advantage -in gala attire, and I knew that even if I could get him off to live -the life of a cave-man, occasionally a processional of the tribe would -cause him to thrust brilliant feathers into his goatskin cap and bind -his sandals with gleaming new thongs. But then the martial excitement -of a processional would cause his eyes to light up with a brilliancy -to match the feathers in his cap, and a dance could not do this. - -"Of course you're engaged for the first dance?" he asked, as the music -began and a general commotion ensued. "I knew that I'd have to miss -that--when I was late. But"--he came a step closer and spoke as if -acting under some hasty impulse--"I want to tell you how very lovely -I think you are to-night! I hope you do not mind my saying this? I -didn't know it before--I thought it was due to other influences--but -you are beautiful." - -It was at this moment that the silver oars of the Nile barge were -dimmed under the greater resplendence of dark eyes--and the purple -silk sails closed out the sky, but closed in heaven. Cleopatra and I -might have cut our teeth on the same coral ring, for all the -inferiority _I_ felt to her in that instant. - -"I--I'm afraid--" I began palpitatingly, for you must know that -palpitations are part of the Egyptian rôle--the sense of danger and -wrong were what raised--or lowered--the flitting space of time out of -the ordinary lover thrills. "I am afraid----" - -"But you must not say that!" he commanded, his deep voice muffled. -"This is just the beginning of what I wish to say to you." - -I wrenched my eyes away from his--then looked quickly for Guilford. -Grandfather Moore's warnings in my ear were choking the violin music -into demoniac howls. I don't believe that any woman ever really enjoys -having two men love her at the same time--and this is not -contradicting what I've said in the above paragraph about Cleopatra. I -never once said that I had _enjoyed_ feeling like her--you simply took -it for granted that I had! - -"Aren't you going to dance--with some one?" I asked, turning back -quickly, as Guilford's arm slipped about me and we started away into a -heartless, senseless motion. Maitland Tait stood looking at me for an -instant without answering, then swept his eyes down the room to where -Mrs. Charles Sefton--a sister-in-law of the house of Kendall--and her -daughter Anabel were standing. Mrs. Sefton was a pillar of society, -and, if one _must_ use architectural similes, Anabel was a block. They -caught him and made a sandwich of him on the spot. I whirled away with -Guilford. - -At the end of the dance I found myself at the far end of the ballroom, -close to a door that opened into a small conservatory. The dim green -within looked so calm and uncomplicated beside the glare of light -which surrounded me that I turned toward it--thirstily. - -"I'm going in here to rest a minute, Guilford," I explained, setting -him free with a little push toward a group of girls he knew. "You run -along and dance with some of them. Men aren't any too plentiful -to-night." - -"No-o--I'll go with you," he objected lazily, slipping his cigarette -case from his pocket. "You're too darned pretty to-night to stay long -in a conservatory alone." - -"But I'll not be alone," I replied, with a return of that frightful -recklessness which tempted me to throw myself on his mercy and say: -"I'm in love with this Englishman--madly in love! I have never been in -love before--and I hope I shall never be again if it always feels like -this!" Instead of saying this, however, I said, with a smile: "Don't -think for a moment that I shall be alone. Grandfather and Uncle -Lancelot will be with me." - -He looked disgusted. - -"What's going on in your conscience now?" he asked, with slightly -primped lips. - -"Something--that I'll tell you about later." - -"But has it got to be threshed out to-night?" he demanded irritably. -"I had hoped that we might spend this one evening acting like human -beings." - -"Still, it seems that we can't," I answered, with a foolish attempt to -sound inconsequential. "Please let me sit down in here by myself for a -little while, Guilford." - -He turned on his heel, with an unflattering abruptness, and left me. I -entered the damp, earthy-smelling room, where wicker tables held giant -ferns, and a fountain drizzling sleepily in the center of the -apartment, broke off the view of a green cane bench just beyond; I -made for this settee and sank down dejectedly. - -How long I sat there I could not tell--one never can, if you've -noticed--but after a little while I heard the next dance start, and -then three people, still in the position of a sandwich, entered. - -"How warm it is to-night!" I heard Maitland Tait's voice suddenly -proclaim, in a fretful tone, as if the women with him were responsible -for the disagreeable fact. But he drew up a chair, rather meekly, and -subsided into it. "This is the first really warm night we've had this -summer." - -"It seems like the irony of fate, doesn't it?" Anabel Sefton asked -with a nervous little giggle. There are some girls who can never talk -to a man five minutes without bringing fate's name into the -conversation. - -"We had almost no dances during April and May, when one really needed -violence of some sort to keep warm," her mother hastened to explain. -"And now, at this last dance of the season, it is actually hot." - -"The last big dance, mother." - -"Of course!" Mrs. Sefton leaned toward the other two chairs -confidentially. "A crush like this is too big," she declared. - -"Oh, but I like the big affairs," Anabel pouted. "You never know then -who you're going to run across! Just think of the unfamiliar faces -here to-night! I happened up on Gayle Cargill and Doctor Macdonald -down in the drawing-room a while ago--where they'd hidden to sing -Italian, sotto voce!" - -"Then Dan Hunter is here--for a wonder," her mother agreed, as if a -recital of Oldburgh's submerged tenth were quite the most interesting -thing she could think up for a foreigner's delectation, "and Grace -Christie! Have you met Miss Christie, Mr. Tait?" - -"Yes," he replied. - -"She's gone in for newspaper work," Anabel elucidated. - -"Just a pose," her mother hastily added. "She really belongs to one of -our best families, and is engaged to Guilford Blake." - -"But she won't marry him," Anabel said virtuously. "I'm sure _I_ can't -understand such a nature. They've been engaged all their lives -and----" - -"She doesn't deserve anything better than to lose him," her mother -broke in. "If he should chance to look in some other direction for a -while she'd change her tactics, no doubt." - -"Oh--no doubt," echoed a deep male voice, the tones as cool as the -water-drops plashing into the fountain beside him. - -"Anyway, it's her kind--those women who would be sirens if the -mythological age hadn't passed--who cause so much trouble in the -world," Mrs. Sefton wound up. At fifty-two women can look upon sirens -dispassionately. - -After a while the music began throbbing again, and a college boy came -up to claim Anabel. The trio melted quietly away. I rose from my chair -and started toward the door when I saw that Maitland Tait had not left -with the others. He was standing motionless beside the fountain. - -I came up with him and he did not start. Evidently he had known all -the while that I was in the room. - -"Well?" he said, with a certain aloofness that strangely enough gave -him the appearance of intense aristocracy. "Well?" - -"Well--" I echoed, feebly, but before I could go away farther he had -drawn himself up sharply. - -"I was coming to look for you--to say good-by," he said. - -"Good-by?" I repeated blankly. "You mean good night, don't you?" - -"No." - -Our eyes met squarely then, and mine dropped. They had hit against -steel. - -"And this is--good-by?" I plead, while I felt that wild wind and waves -were beating against my body and that the skies were falling. - -"Of course!" he answered harshly. "What else could it be?" - -I think that we must have stood there in silence for a minute or more, -then, without speaking another word, or even looking at me squarely -in the face again, he moved deliberately away and I lost all trace of -him in the crowd. - - - - -CHAPTER XII - -AN ASSIGNMENT - - -The next afternoon the city editor again said "Damn" and blushed. - -"You needn't blush," I said to him wearily. - -He glanced around in surprise. - -"No?" - -"No! I quite agree with you!" - -It was late in the afternoon, but I made no apology for my tardiness, -as I hung my hat on its nail and started toward my desk. - -"Oh, you feel like saying it yourself, eh?" he questioned. - -"I do." - -He turned then and looked at me squarely. It was very seldom that he -did such a thing, and as some time had elapsed since his last look he -was likely able to detect a subtle change in my face. - -"What's wrong with you?" he asked gruffly. "If you had _my_ job, now, -there'd be something to worry over! What's the matter?" - -"Nothing." - -He turned away, precipitately. - -"Gee! Let me get out of here! That's what women always say when -they're getting ready to cry." - -"But I'm not going to cry!" I assured him, as he dashed through the -doorway and I turned with some relief to my desk, for talking was -somewhat of an effort. - -I raised the top, whistling softly--one can nearly _always_ manage a -little sizzling whistle--then shrank back in terror from what I saw -there.--Such chaos as must have been scattered about before sunrise on -the morning of the First Day! Was it possible that I had been excited -yesterday to the point of leaving the mucilage bottle unstopped? - -I set to work, however, with a little sickening sense of shame, to -making right the ravages that had taken place. - -"A woman may fashion her balloon of anticipation out of silver -tissue--but her parachute is _always_ made of sack-cloth!" I groaned. - -My desk was really in the wildest disorder. The tin top of the -mucilage bottle had disappeared, the bottle had been overturned, its -contents had been lavished upon the devoted head of a militant -suffragette, and she was pinioned tightly to my blotting-pad. - -"The elevator to Success is not running--take the stairs," grinned a -framed motto above the desk. - -"You take a--back seat!" I said, jumping up and turning the thing to -the wall. "What do I care about success, if it's the sort of thing -connected with typewriters, offices, copy paper and a pot of paste? -I'm--I'm _des-qua-mat-ing_!" - -Never before in my experience had the life of journalistic devotion -looked quite so black as the ink that accompanies it. - -"Mottoes about success ought to belong to men, anyhow!" I said again, -looking up furiously at the drab back of the frame. "I'm not a man, -nor cut out for man's work. I'm just a woman, and my head aches!" - -I looked again at the militant suffragette, for it was a tragedy to -me. I had spent a week of time and five honest dollars in the effort -to get that photograph from a New York studio. She wasn't any common -suffragette, but a strict head-liner. - -"I'm not even a woman--I'm a child to let a little thing like this -upset me," I was deciding a while later, when the door of the room -opened again and some one entered. - -"You're a big baby!" the city editor pronounced disgustedly, coming up -to my desk and lowering his voice. "I knew you were going to cry." - -"I--I think I may be coming down with typhoid," I said coldly, to -keep from encouraging him in conversation. "And I've got a terrible -lot of work to do before it gets quite dark. Really, an awful lot." - -He dropped back a few paces, then circled nearer once more. - -"Got anything--special?" he asked aimlessly. - -His manner was so entirely inconsequential that I knew he had the most -important thing for a month up his sleeve. - -"Do you call this--mess anything special?" I asked. "I've got to do a -general house-cleaning, and I wish I had a vacuum machine that would -suck the whole business up into its mouth, swallow it and digest -it--so I'd never see a scrap of it again." - -Have I said before that he was a middle-aged man, named Hudson, and -had scant red hair? It doesn't make any special difference about his -looks, since I hadn't taken any rash vow to marry the first -unfortunate man who crossed my path, but he looked so ludicrously -insignificant and unlike an instrument of fate as he stood there, -trying to break the news to me by degrees. - -"Hate your ordinary work this afternoon?" he asked. - -"I hate everything." - -"Then, how would you like to change off a little?" - -"I'd like to change off from breathing--if that would accommodate you -any," I replied. - -He made a "tut-tut" admonition with the tip of his tongue. - -"You might not find blowing red-hot coals any pleasanter," he warned, -"and angry little girls like you can't hope to go to heaven when they -die!" - -I rose, with a great effort after professional dignity. - -"Mr. Hudson, evidently you have an assignment for me," I said. "Will -you be so good as to let me know what it is?" - -But even then he looked for a full thirty seconds into the luscious -doors of a fruit stand across the street. - -"I want _you_ to get--that Consolidated Traction Company story for -me," he then declared. - -I jumped back as I had never jumped but once in my life before--the -time when Aunt Patricia announced that she was going to leave James -Christie's love-letters to me. - -"You were at that dance last night!" I cried out accusingly, then -realizing the absurdity of this I began stammering. "I mean, that I'm -a special feature writer!" I kept on before he had had time to send me -more than a demon's grin of comprehension. - -"You are and this story is devilish special," he returned. "I want you -to get it." - -His tone, which all of a sudden was the boiled-down essence of -business, sent me in a tremor over toward the nail where my hat hung. -It was getting dark and I remembered then that I had heard fragments -of telephonic conversation earlier in the evening anent "catching him -there about seven." - -"Well?" - -He looked at me--with almost a human expression. - -"I wasn't at the ball last night--but grapevines have been rustling, I -admit," he said. "I hate like the very devil to ask you to do it, if -you want to know the truth, but there's no other way out. I hope you -believe me." - -"A city editor doesn't have to be believed, but has to be obeyed," I -responded, rising again from my chair where I had dropped to lock my -desk. "Now, what is it I must do?" - -"Well, I have a hunch that you will succeed where Clemons and Bolton -and Reade have failed," he said. "And the foolish way the fellow acts -makes it necessary for us to use all haste and strategy!" - -"The fellow?" - -"Maitland Tait. A day or two ago it was understood that he might -remain in this town for several days longer--then to-day comes the -news that he's straining every nerve to get away to-morrow!" - -"Oh, to-morrow!" - -"It appears that all the smoke in Pittsburgh is curling up into -question marks to find out when he's coming back--" - -"He's so important?" - -"Exactly! But to-night he's going to hold a final conference at -Loomis, and you can catch him before time for this if you'll go right -on now." - -"Very well," I answered, feeling myself in profound hypnosis. - -"And, say! You'll have to hurry," he said, pressing the advantage my -quiet demeanor offered. "Here! Take this hunk o' copy paper and hike!" - -I accepted the proffered paper, still hypnotized, then when I had -reached the door I stopped. - -"Understand, Mr. Hudson, I'm doing this because you have assigned it -to me!" I said with a cutting severity. "Please let that be perfectly -plain! I shouldn't go a step toward Loomis--not even if it were a -matter of life and death--if it were _not_ a matter of urgent -business!" - -He looked at me blankly for a moment, then grinned. Afterward I -realized that he knew this declaration was being made to my own inner -consciousness, and not to him. - -"Don't ask him for a photograph--for God's sake!" he called after me, -from the head of the steps. "Remember--you're going out there on the -_Herald's_ account and the _Herald_ doesn't need his picture, because -it happens that we've already got a dandy one of him!" - -I turned back fiercely. - -"I hadn't _dreamed_ of asking him for his photograph!" I fired. "I -hope I have some vestige of reasoning power left!" - -At the corner a car to Loomis was passing, and once inside I inspected -every passenger in the deadly fear of seeing some one whom I knew. -There was no one there, however, who could later be placed on the -witness-stand against me, so I sat down and watched the town outside -speeding by--first the busy up-town portion, then the heavy wholesale -district, with its barrels tumbling out of wagon ends and its mingled -odor of fruit, vinegar and molasses, combined with soap and tanned -hides. After this the river was crossed, we sped through a suburban -settlement, out into the open country, then nearer and nearer and -nearer. - -All the time I sat like one paralyzed. I hated intensely the thought -of going out there, but the very speed of the car seemed to furnish -excuse enough for me not to get off! I didn't have will power enough -to push the bell, so when the greasy terminal of the line was reached -I rose quietly and left the car along with a number of men in overalls -and a bevy of tired dejected-looking women. - -"They ought to call it 'Gloom-is,'" I muttered, as I alighted at the -little wooden station, where one small, yellow incandescent light -showed you just how dark and desolate the place was. "And these people -live here!--I'll never say a word against West Clydemont Place again -as long as I live!" - -Without seeming to notice the gloom, the people who had come out on -the car with me dispersed in different directions, two or three of the -men making first for the shadow of a big brick building which stood -towering blackly a little distance up from the car tracks. I followed -after them, then stopped before a lighted door at this building while -they disappeared into a giant round-house farther back. The whir of -machinery was steady and monotonous, and it served to drown out the -noise my heart was making, for I was legitimately frightened, even in -my reportorial capacity, as well as being embarrassed and ashamed, -independent of the _Herald_. It was a most unpleasant moment. - -"This must be the office!" - -The big door was slightly ajar, so I entered, rapping with unsteady -knuckles a moment later against the forbidding panels of another door -marked "Private." - -"Well?" - -"Well" is only a tolerant word at best--never encouraging--and now it -sounded very much like "Go to the devil!" - -"I don't give a rap if he _is_ the Vice-President and General Manager -of the Consolidated Traction Company," I muttered, the capital letters -of his position and big corporation, however, pelting like giant -hailstones against my courage. "I'm Special Feature Writer for _The -Oldburgh Herald_!" - -"If you've got any business with me open that door and come in!" was -the further invitation I received. "If you haven't, go on off!" - -The invitation wasn't exactly pressing in its tone, but I managed to -nerve myself up to accepting it. - -"But I have got some--business with you!" I gasped, as I opened the -door. - -Mr. Tait turned around from his desk--a worse-looking desk by far than -the one I had left at the _Herald_ office. - -"Good lord--that is, I mean to say, _dear_ me!" he muttered, as he -wheeled and saw me. "Miss Christie!" - - [Illustration: "This must be the office"] - -"Are you so surprised--then?" - -"Surprised? Of course, a little, but--no-o, not so much either, when -you come to think of it!" - -The room was bare and barn-like, with a couple of shining desks, and -half a dozen chairs. A calendar, showing a red-gowned lady, who in -turn was showing her knees, hung against the opposite wall. Mr. Tait -drew up one of the chairs. - -"Thank you--though I haven't a minute to stay!" - -I stammered a little, then sat down and scrambled about in my bag for -a small fan I always carried. - -"A minute?" - -"Not long, really--for it's getting late, you see!" - -My fingers were twitching nervously with the fan, trying to stuff it -back into the bag and hide that miserable copy paper which had sprung -out of its lair like a "jack-in-the-box" at the opening of the clasp. - -He smiled--so silently and persistently that I was constrained to look -up and catch it. He had seemed not to observe the copy paper. - -"If you're in such a hurry your '_business_' must be urgent," he said, -and his tone was full of satire. - -"It is, but--" - -I looked at him again, then hesitated, my voice breaking suddenly. -Somehow, I felt that I was a thousand miles away from that magic spot -on the Nile where the evening before had placed me. He looked so -different! - -"You needn't rub it in on me!" I flashed back at him. - -His chair was tilted slightly against the desk, and he sat there -observing me impersonally as if I were a wasp pinned on a cardboard. -He was looking aloof and keenly aristocratic--as he was at the -entrance of the conservatory the evening before. - -"Rub it in on you?" - -"I mean that I didn't want to come out here to-night!" - -My face was growing hot, and try as I would to keep my eyes dry and -professional-looking something sprang up and glittered so -bewilderingly that as I turned away toward the lady on the calendar, -she looked like a dozen ladies--all of them doing the hesitation -waltz. - -He straightened up in his chair, relieving that impertinent tilt. - -"Oh,--you didn't want to come?" - -"Of course not!" - -I blinked decisively--and the red-gowned one faded back to her normal -number, but my eyelids were heavy and wet still. - -"But--but--" - -"Please don't think that I came out here to-night because I wanted to -see you, Mr. Tait!" I was starting to explain, when he interrupted me, -the satire quite gone. - -"But, after all, what else was there to do?" he asked, with surprising -gentleness. - -"What else?" - -"Yes. Certainly it was _your_ next move,--Grace!" - -My heart out-did the machinery in the round-house in the way of making -a hubbub at that instant, but he seemed not to hear. - -"I mean to say--I--I expected to hear from you in some manner to-day. -That is, I _hoped_ to hear." - -I gave a hysterical laugh. - -"But you didn't expect me to board a trolley-car and run you down -after night in your own den--surely?" I demanded. - -He half rose from his chair, hushing my mocking word with a gesture. -His manner was chivalrously protecting. - -"You shan't talk that way about yourself!" he said insistently. -"Whatever you have chosen to do is--is--all right!" - -I felt bewildered. - -"I just wanted to let you know--" I began, when he stopped me again, -this time with an air of finality. - -"Please don't waste this _dear_ little hour in explaining!" he begged. -"I want you to know--to feel absolutely that nothing you might ever do -could be misunderstood by me! I feel now that I _know_ you--your -impulsive, headstrong ways--" - -"'Heart-strong,' Aunt Patricia used to say," I modified softly. - -He nodded. - -"Of course--'heart-strong!' I understand you! I understand why you -refrained from telling me of your engagement, even." - -My eyes dropped. - -"I didn't--know then." - -"You didn't know how I felt--what an unhappy complication you were -stirring up." - -There was a tense little silence, then he spoke again. - -"If you are not in love with your fiancé--never have been in love with -him--why do you maintain the relationship?" he asked, in as careful -and businesslike a manner as if he were inquiring the price of -pig-iron. - -"Because--because that's the way we do things down here in this -state," I answered. "What we _never_ have done before, we have a hard -time starting--and mother idolizes him!" - -He smiled--his own particular brand of smile--for the first time. - -"Little--goose!" he said. - -"Then--last night, when you pretended that you were going straight -away--" - -"I _am_ going away," he broke in with considerable dignity. "That is, -I have my plans laid that way now." - -"Plans?" - -"Yes. It's true that my resolution to get away from this town was born -rather precipitately last night; however, I have been able to make my -plans coincide." - -"Oh!" I began with a foolish little quiver in my voice, then collected -myself. "I'm glad that you could arrange your affairs so -satisfactorily." - -He looked across at me, his mouth grim. - -"Why should I stay?" he demanded. "To-night will see the finishing up -of the business which brought me to Oldburgh!" - -Then, and not until then, I'm afraid, did I really recall the face of -my city editor--and the fact that he had sent me out to obtain an -interview, not a proposal. - -"Your business with the Macdermott Realty Company?" I inquired. - -Maitland Tait looked at me with an amused smile. - -"What do you know about that?" he asked. - -"Nothing except what all the world knows!" - -I managed to inject some hurt feeling into my voice, as if I had a -right to know more, which in truth I felt. - -"And how much does the world know?" - -"Merely that you've either planned to shut down this plant here and -move the whole business to Birmingham, or you've bought up acres and -acres more of Oldburgh's suburbs and will make this spot so important -and permanent that the company's grandchildren will have to call it -home." - -"But you--_you_ don't know which I've done, eh?" - -I shook my head. - -"Then shall I tell you? Are you interested?" - -"I'm certainly interested in knowing whether or not you'll--ever come -back to Oldburgh--but I don't want you to tell _me_ anything you'd -rather I shouldn't know." - -"I believe I want to tell you," he replied, his face softening -humorously. "We have bought acres and acres more of Oldburgh's -suburbs, and we're going to have quite a little city out here!" - -"There's room for improvement," I observed, looking out through the -window into the greasy darkness. - -"There is and I'm going to see to it that the improvement's made! -There will be model cottages here in place of those miserable hovels -that I'm glad you can't see from here to-night--and each cottage will -have its garden spot--" - -"That's good!" I approved. "I love gardens." - -"Wait until you see some English ones I have seen," he said -patriotically. - -"I shall--then pattern my own by them! But--these Loomis plans?" - -"Model cottages, with gardens--then a schoolhouse, with well-kept -grounds--a club-room for men--" - -"And a _sewing_ circle for their wives," I added contemptuously. - -He looked taken aback. - -"Don't you like that?" he asked anxiously. "Why shouldn't they sew?" - -"But why should they--just because they're women?" I asked in answer, -and after a moment he began to see light. - -"Of course if you prefer having them write novels, model in clay and -illumine parchments we'll add those departments," he declared, with a -generous air. "We're determined to have everything that an altruistic -age has thrust upon the manufacturer to reduce his net income." - -"And--occasionally--_you'll_ be coming back to Oldburgh to see that -the gardens grow silver bells and cockle shells and pretty maids all -in a row?" I suggested, but after a momentary smile his face sobered. - -"I don't know! There are things--in England--that complicate any -arrangements, I mean _business_ arrangements, I might wish to make -just now." - -"And Loomis will have to get along without you?" - -I had put the question idly, with no ulterior motive in the world, but -he leaned forward until the arm of his revolving chair scraped against -my chair. - -"Loomis _can_ get along without me," he said, in a low tone, "and -therefore must--but if I should find that I am needed--_wanted_ here -in Oldburgh--" - -The shriek of the city-bound trolley-car broke in at that instant -upon the quiet of the room, interrupting his slow tense words; and I -sprang up and crossed to the window, for I felt suddenly a wild -distaste to having Maitland Tait say important things to me then and -there! Something in me demanded the most beautiful setting the world -could afford for what he was going to say! - -"I ought--I ought to catch that car!" - -He followed me, his face gravely wondering. - -"My motor is here. I'll take you back to town," he said, looking over -my shoulder into the noisy, dimly-lit scene. - -"But--weren't you going to be busy out here this evening?" - -"Yes--later. I'll go with you, then return to a meeting I have here." - -He rang the bell beside his desk and a moment later the face of -Collins appeared in the doorway. Outside the limousine was breathing -softly. - -I don't remember what we talked about going in to town, or whether we -talked at all or not; but when the machine slowed up at the _Herald_ -building and Maitland Tait helped me out, there was the same light -shining from his eyes that shone there the night before--the light -that made the glint of the silver oars on Cleopatra's Nile barge turn -pale--and the radiance half blinded me. - -"Grace, you don't want me to say anything to-night--I can see that," -he said. "And you are right--if you are still bound to that other man! -I can say nothing until I know you are free--" - -He whispered the words, our hands meeting warmly. - -"But, if you are going away!--You'll come and say good-by?" - -"If it's to say good-by there'll be no use coming," he answered. "You -_know_ how I feel!" - -"But we must say good-by!" I plead. - -He leaned forward then, as he made a motion to step back into the car. -His eyes were passionate. - -"What matters where good-by is said--if we can do nothing but say it?" -he demanded. "It's _your_ next move, Grace." - - - - -CHAPTER XIII - -JILTED! - - -When a tempest in a teapot goes out at the spout it is always -disappointing to spectators! - -One naturally expects the vessel to burst--or the lid to fly off, at -least--and when neither takes place one experiences a little collapsed -feeling of disappointment. - -The barest thought of the pain I was going to inflict upon Guilford -Blake when I broke my lifelong engagement to him had been sending -shivers up and down my backbone ever since four o'clock on the -afternoon of Mrs. Hiram Walker's reception--_then_, when I turned away -from Maitland Tait's motor-car the night I went to Loomis on urgent -business, and came face to face with my betrothed standing in the -shadow of the office door waiting for me--the unexpected happened! - -Mr. Blake broke his engagement with me! - -"Grace, you amaze me!" he said. - -He said it so quietly, with so icy an air of disapproval that I looked -up quickly to see what the trouble was. Then I observed that he had -told the truth. I hadn't crushed, wounded, nor annihilated him. I had -simply amazed him. - -"Oh, Guilford! I didn't know you were here!" - -"I suppose not." - -"But, how does it happen--?" - -He motioned me to silence. - -"Have the goodness to let me ask the questions," he suggested. - -"Oh, certainly!" - -"Will you, first of all, tell me what this means?" was the opening -query, but before I could reply he went on: "Not that _I_ have any -right to pry into your affairs, understand!" - -"Guilford!" - -"It's true! My right to question you has ceased to exist!" - -"You mean that you have washed your hands of me?" I gasped. After all, -it was most unusual for Guilford and me to be talking to each other -like this. I was bewildered by the novelty of it. - -He caught the sound of the gasp and interpreted it as a plea for -quarter. It settled him in his determination. - -"I must," he declared. - -"By all means--if that's the way you feel about it," I said -courteously, as if granting a request. - -He looked down at me, in a manner that said: "It hurts me more than it -does you, my child." - -"I've endured--things from you before this, Grace," he reminded me, -"But to-night--why, this out-Herods-Herod!" - -Now, if he had looked hurt--cruelly wounded or deeply shocked--I'd -have been penitent enough to behave decently to him. But he didn't. He -was simply angry. He looked like the giant when he was searching -around for Jack and saying: "Fee! Faw! Fum! I smell the blood of an -Englishman!" - -"But what have I done?" I demanded indignantly. "Mayn't a man come to -see me, and--" - -"Certainly he may!" - -"And mayn't I--" - -"And you may go to see him, too--if you like!" - -"What do you mean?" - -"I mean--I mean," he answered, stammering a little with wrath, "of -course _you_ may do such things--Grace Christie may--but my future -wife may not." - -For a moment I had a blinded angry paralysis descend upon me. I had a -great desire to do something to relieve the situation, but I didn't -know what to do--rather as you feel sometimes at the breakfast table -when your morning grapefruit hits you squarely in the eye. - -"Suppose you try to calm yourself a little and tell me just what the -trouble is," I said, struggling after calmness for my own individual -use. - -He took off his hat and mopped his brow. - -"Your mother suspected last night that something had gone wrong with -you at that dance," he began explaining, the flash of the street light -at the corner showing that he had gone quite pale. - -"Well?" - -"She said that you came in looking wild-eyed and desperate." - -"I am not willing to admit that," I said with dignity. - -"And, then she knew you didn't sleep!" he kept on. "All day she has -been feeling that something was amiss with you." - -"I see! And when I didn't show up to-night at dinner--" - -"She called the office--naturally." - -"Naturally!" I encouraged. - -"And the fool who answered the telephone consoled her by telling her -that you had--gone--out--to--_Loomis_!" - -He paused dramatically, but I failed to applaud. - -"Well, what next?" I inquired casually. - -He drew back. - -"Then you don't deny it?" - -I gave a little laugh. - -"Why should I attempt to deny it?" I asked. "Haven't you just caught -me in the act of coming back in Mr. Tait's car?" - -"I have!" he answered in gloating triumph, "that is, I have caught you -leaving his car--while he made love to you at the curb! This, however, -doesn't necessarily confirm the Loomis rumor!" - -He waited for me to explain further, but I simply bowed my head in -acquiescence. - -"Yes," I said serenely. "He was making love to me." - -"And you acknowledge this, too?" - -I made a gesture of impatience. - -"I acknowledge everything, Guilford!--That you and I have been the -victims of heredity, first of all, and--" - -He drew back stiffly. - -"Victims? I beg pardon?" - -"I mean in this engagement of ours--that we had nothing to do with!" - -"But I assure you that I have never looked upon myself in the light of -a victim!" he said proudly. "And--although I know that it will not -interest you especially--I wish to add that I have never given a -serious thought to any other woman in my life." - -"Yet you have never been in love with me!" I challenged. - -He hesitated. - -"I have always felt very close to you," he endeavored to explain. "We -have so many things in common--there is, of course, a peculiar -congeniality--" - -"Congeniality?" - -It struck me that the only point of congeniality between us was that -we were both Caucasians, but I didn't say it. - -"Our parents were friends long before we were born! This, of itself, -certainly must bring in its wake a degree of mutual affection," he -explained, and as the words "mutual affection" came unfeelingly from -his lips I suddenly felt a thousand years further advanced in wisdom -than he. - -"But real love may be--is, I'm sure--a vastly different thing from the -regard we've had for each other," I ventured, trying not to make a -display of my superiority in learning, but he interrupted me -contemptuously. - -"'Real love!' What could you possibly know about that?" he asked -chillingly. "You, who are ready to flirt with any stray foreigner who -chances to stop over in this city for a week! But for me--why, I have -never glanced at another woman! I have always understood my good -fortune in being affianced to the one woman in the whole country round -who was best fitted to bear the honored name which has descended to -me." - -When he said this I began to feel sorry for him. I was not sorry for -his disappointment, you understand, but for his view-point. "I was -never fitted for it, Guilford!" I said humbly. "It's true I come of -the same sort of stock that produced you--but I am awkwardly grafted -on my family tree! At heart I am a barbarian." - -"What do you mean?" - -"I mean--the things you love most I simply forget about." - -"I think you do!" he coincided heartily. "You have certainly forgotten -all about ordinary propriety to-night." - -At this I waxed furious again. - -"How I hate that word propriety!" I said. "And there's another one--a -companion word which I never mean to use until I'm past sixty! It's -_Platonic_!--Those two words remind me of tarpaulins in a smuggler's -boat because you can hide so much underneath them!" - -"I'm not speaking of hiding things," he fired back, as angry as I was. -"And, if you want to know the truth, I rather admire your honesty in -not trying to pretend that your flirtation with this Englishman _is_ -Platonic!--Yet that certainly doesn't throw any more agreeable light -upon this happening to-night.--You _did_ go to Loomis!" - -I could scarcely keep from laughing at this, for his anger seemed to -be centered in one spot--like an alderman's avoirdupois! He was -thinking far less of losing me than of the indelicacy of my going to -Loomis. - -"Yes," I answered, trying to make my words inconsequential. "Old man -Hudson sent me!" - -His hat, which he had held deferentially in his hand all this time, -suddenly fluttered to the ground. - -"What!" - -"Didn't you and mother _know_ that?" I asked. - -"That--that it was a business proposition?" he panted. - -"Certainly--or I should never have gone! How little you and mother -know about me, after all, Guilford." - -He looked crestfallen for a moment, then his face brightened once more -into angry triumph. - -"But I saw him making love to you!" he summed up hastily, as an -afterthought. - -"Yes--you did," I assured him exultantly. - -"And you met him for the first time--let me see? What day was it?" - -I ignored the sarcasm. - -"Tuesday," I answered. "At four o'clock in the afternoon." - -"And not a soul in this town knows a thing about him!" - -"Except myself," I protested. "I know a great deal about him." - -"Then, do you happen to know--I heard it from a fellow in Pittsburgh -who has followed his meteoric career as captain of industry--do _you_ -happen to know that he makes no secret of having left England because -he was so handicapped by disadvantages of birth?" - -I hesitated just a moment--not in doubt as to what I should say, but -as to how I should say it. - -"That's all right, Guilford," I answered complacently. "If his -ancestors all looked like 'gentlemen of the jury' it doesn't lessen -his own dignity and grandeur." - -Now, if you've never been in a circuit court room you can't appreciate -the above simile, but Guilford was a lawyer. - -He looked at me in a dazed fashion for an instant. - -"Grace, you don't feel ill--nor anything--do you?" he asked anxiously. - -"Oh, no!" - -"But I can't believe that you're exactly right in your mind!" - -"Well--maybe--" - -"I can't believe that to-morrow morning will actually dawn and find us -asunder," he kept on quickly. "It must be some sort of fantastic -dream." - -"It will seem very--queer, at first, Guilford," I confessed, with a -preliminary shrinking at the thought of facing mother. - -"Queer's no word to use in connection with it," he answered crossly, -then I heard heavy footsteps in the corridor above, and I took a -quick step toward him. - -"I must go up-stairs," I whispered. "Old man Hudson is making night -hideous, I know!--But all this is really true, Guilford! And--and you -must wear _this_ in your vest pocket now!" - -I slipped the scarab ring into his hand. - -"You are determined?" he asked dully. - -"I am--awakened," I replied. - -"What do you mean?" - -"I mean that you are not really in love with me--never have been in -love with me, and never could be except upon certain occasions when I -was dreadfully dressed-up--where there were red roses and the sound of -violin music." - -"Grace, you are--unkind," he said, with a groping look on his face. "I -confess that I don't in the least understand you!" - -"Then how lucky we are!" I exclaimed. "So many people don't find this -out until after they've got their house all furnished! We're going to -be friends always, Guilford." - -Then, without waiting for him to say more I turned away and ran -breathlessly up the steps into the office. - -The brilliant light in the city news room met me squarely as I opened -the door. I blinked a little--then raised my left hand and examined it -closely. It looked--_awful_! I had worn that same ring ever since I -was seventeen years old--and I felt as I might feel if I'd just had my -hair cut off or suffered some other unprecedented loss. - -The city editor looked up from his desk. - -"Well?" he inquired. "Have you got it?" - -I was still gazing at that left hand. - -"No," I answered stupidly. "It's _gone_!" - -He jumped to his feet. - -"Here!" he commanded sharply. "Sit down here!" - -I sat down, letting my bag slide to the floor. - -"You don't feel sick--do you?" - -"No." - -"You didn't fall off the street-car--did you?" - -"No." - -"You haven't happened to any sort of trouble--have you?" - -"No." - -The "No--No--No--" was in the monotonous tone a person says -"Ninety-nine" when his lungs are being examined. - -Mr. Hudson looked at me closely. - -"Then--the story!" he said. - -I blankly reached for my bag, opened it and took out the blank copy -paper. - -"Oh--damn--" he began, then swallowed. - -This awakened me from my trance. - -"But he _does_!" I exclaimed in triumph. He _is_--and he's _going to -be_!" - -"Here?" the editorial voice called out sharply and joyously. "Here in -Oldburgh?" - -My head bobbed a concise yes. - -"Bigger and better than ever?" my questioner tormented. - -"A thousand times! Happiness for everybody!--Where there's a family -there'll also be a House that's a Home--" - -The old fellow began scribbling. - -"I reckon he means model cottages," he observed sourly. "They all make -a great pretense of loving their neighbor as themselves in this day -and time." - -"Yes--even if it's a cottage it will certainly be a model one--and -what more could one desire?" I asked, rambling again. - -"Then--what else?" - -"And--oh! Gardens! Gardens--gardens!" - -He held up his hand. - -"Wait--you go too darn fast!" - -"I'm sorry! Maybe I have gone too fast!" I answered, as I settled back -in my chair and my face reddened uncomfortably. "Maybe I have gone too -fast!" - -"You have! You confuse me--talking the way you do and looking the way -you do! By rights I ought to make you write the story out -yourself--but you don't look as if you could spell 'Unprecedented good -fortune in the annals of Oldburgh's industrial career,' to-night!" - -"I'm sure I couldn't," I admitted readily. "Please don't ask me to." - -"Well--go on with your narrative. What else?" - -"Acres and acres! Acres and _acres_!" I impressed upon him. "That's -what I've always wanted! I love acres so much better than -neighbors--don't you?" - -He paused in his writing. - -"Of course the Macdermott Realty Company did the stunt?" he asked, -scratching his head with his pencil tip and leaving a little black -mark along the field of redness. "We mustn't forget to mention each -individual member of the firm.--And then--?" - -"A schoolhouse," I remembered. - -He glared. - -"A schoolhouse?" he questioned. "What for?" - -"For the children!" I answered, lowering my eyes. "Did you think there -wouldn't be any children? How could there be a House that was a Home -without them?" - -"Oh, and this fellow, Tait, is going to see to it that they're -educated, eh? They're going to have advantages that he didn't -have--and all that sort of thing? Very praiseworthy, I'm sure!" - -I sprang up from my chair. - -"I'm going home, Mr. Hudson, please!" I begged. "There _is_ something -wrong with my head." - -He smiled. - -"It's different from any other woman's head I ever saw," he admitted -half grudgingly. "It's _level_!" - -"But indeed you're mistaken!" I plead. "Right this minute I'm--I'm -seeing things!" - -Then, when I said this a gentle light stole over his face--such a -light I'm sure that few people ever saw there--perhaps nobody ever had -except Mrs. Hudson the day he proposed to her. - -"Visions?" he asked kindly. "A House that's a Home--and _English_ -gardens." - -"That's not fair!" I warned. "I really ought not to have gone out -there to-night--and I don't know whether he'll want all this written -up or not--for I didn't mention the _Herald's_ name in our -conversation, and--" - -"Bosh!" he snapped. "Rot! And piffle! You had a right to go out there -if I sent you--and of course he can't object to the public knowing -_now_! Why, I expect any one of the reporters could have got as much -out of him to-night as you did!" - -"Do you really think so?" I asked, from the doorway. "Good night, Mr. -Hudson. You can easily make two columns out of that, by drawing on -your--past experience." - -He waved me crossly away, without once looking up or saying "Thank -you" and I caught a car home. Half an hour later, when the curve was -turned into the full face of West Clydemont Place I still thought I -was "seeing things." A big motor-car stood before our door, but my -heart changed its tune when I got closer. It was not a limousine. It -was a doctor's coupé. Mother had suffered a violent chill. - -"Grace, I--have no words!" she moaned, as I came into the room. - - - - -CHAPTER XIV - -THE SKIES FALL - - -Before morning words began coming to her--gradually. First she moaned, -then muttered, then raged. The chill disappeared and fever came on. By -daybreak, however, they had both been left with the things that were, -and mother slipped into her kimono. - -"Go bring me the morning paper," she condescended, after the passing -of the creamery wagon announced that busy life was still going on. - -I rushed out into the front yard. The tree-tops were misty with that -white fog which looks as if darkness were trailing her nightrobe -behind her; and already on the neighboring lawns the automatic -sprinklers were caroming across the green as if they had St. Vitus' -dance. - -"On a day like this _nothing_ is too good to be true!" I decided, as I -picked up the paper and scurried back into the house. - -"And got _your_ name to it--Grace Chalmers Christie!" mother wailed in -despair, as she opened the sheet and saw two columns, broken by a face -that could do much more sensible things than "launch a thousand ships -and burn the topless towers of Ilium." - -"Let's--see," I suggested, peering over her shoulder and watching the -words dancing up and down on either side of this face. I couldn't read -anything, but I managed to catch an occasional "Macdermott" as it -pranced along in front of an occasional "model cottage." - -"Take it!--Burn it!" mother commanded, after she had read enough to -realize that the thing was entirely too dull to prove interesting to -any feminine creature. - -She thrust it into my hand, and I took it into my bedroom, where I -began a frenzied search for the scissors. - -"I'd rather have you by yourself--away from all suggestions of -Macdermotts and enlarged traction companies," I whispered, snipping -the picture from the page and laying it caressingly in the drawer of -the old-fashioned desk. - -There it lay all morning--and I whispered to it and caressed it. - -"A picture in a drawer is worth two on the wall," I said once, as I -pushed it away quickly to keep mother from seeing it. But the fun of -the secret was not at all times uppermost. - -"You are so beautiful--so beautiful," I wailed, as I looked at it -another time. "I almost wish you were not--so beautiful." - -For you must know that no woman in love ever _enjoys_ her man's good -looks! She loves him for so many other things besides beauty that she -feels this demand is a needless cruelty--adding to her torture and -making her love him the more. The only male beauty she can -ungrudgingly adore is that which she cradles in her arms--the -miniature of the Big Good Looks which have lured her and tormented -her! - -Then--just for the sake of keeping away from this drawer--I did -different things to pass away the morning. I said good-by to the -picture, then went into the library and looked up a word in the -dictionary. I looked at the picture again after that--to make sure -that it was still there--then I decided to wash my hair. But I changed -my mind, for I was afraid the water might drip on the picture and ruin -it. I looked up a bodkin and some blue baby ribbon--and forgot to gear -up the corset-cover whose eyelets were gaping hungrily before my eyes. -While I was trying to remember what one usually does with a bodkin and -blue ribbon I looked at the picture again--and, well, if you have ever -been there you can understand; and if you haven't no words could ever -explain. - -Then the telephone in the hall! I tried to keep away from it as hard -as they say a murderer tries to keep away from the scene of his -crime. - -"I won't call him until afternoon," I kept telling myself. "It would -be perfectly outrageous. I'll call him from the office--just about -dusk, and----" - -Then I began seeing things again--houses and English gardens, with -children and schoolhouses in the background, and a smile on the face -of Pope Gregory, the Somethingth, when he saw the Union Jack and Old -Glory flying in peace above this vision--until I came to the office in -time for the one o'clock staff meeting. - -The first thing I saw there was a note lying on my desk. It bore no -post-mark, so I knew that it must have come by messenger. - -"What can he have said?" I thought, catching it up and weighing it in -my hands. "And I wonder why he sent it here to the _Herald_ office, -instead of out home--and why he addressed it to Miss G. C. Christie, -as if it were a business communication instead of to Miss Grace -Chalmers Christie, and why----" - -I looked at it again. It was surely from him, for it was written on -traction company paper. I was glad of this, for I can forgive a man -for anything--if he doesn't use fancy note-paper with his monogram in -the corner. - -I weighed it, and turned it over several times, and found a vague -"Habana" fragrance about it--before I ran a hairpin under the flap and -opened it. It ran as follows: - - "My dear Miss Christie-- - - "I have no doubt that you already know every man to be an - Achilles--who welds a heel protector out of his egotism. Now, - it happens that my most vulnerable spot is a distaste to - being made a fool of; and to-day I can realize what a heavy - coating of self-importance lay over this spot yesterday to - blind me to your real motive. - - "My apology for being such an easy-mark is that it was a case - of mistaken identity. I want you to know that, as an actress, - you are amazing! I firmly believed that an unusually fair and - charming woman was doing me a great honor--but I awoke this - morning from my trance to find that a clever newspaper - reporter had outwitted me. - - "I understand now why American Woman must be kept as a - tormenting side-issue in a man's busy life. He can't afford - to let her come to the front or she throws dust in his eyes. - - "Of course the words I said to the vision of my own fancy and - the promises I exacted, do not hold good with the reporter. I - am leaving Oldburgh at noon to-day, and even if I were not, - you would not care to see me again, since I know nothing more - that would serve as a front-page article for the _Herald_." - - "Very sincerely yours, - "MAITLAND TAIT." - -Now, do you know what happens when a woman receives such a letter as -this--a letter that starts seismic disturbances? Well, first she -blames her eyesight. She thinks she hasn't read the thing aright! Then -she carries it off into some dark corner where she hopes she can see -better, for the strong glare of day seems to make matters worse. If -there's an attic near, so much the better! - -But there was no available attic to the _Herald_ office, so I walked -into the society editor's private room and slammed the door. I had -thrust the note into my blouse, so that I'd have a little -breathing-spell while I was getting it out, and as I tugged with a -contrary belt pin I breathed very hard and fast. - -But the second reading disclosed few details that had not been sent -over the wires at the first report. Likewise the third, fourth and -fifth. After that I lost count, and when I regained consciousness -there was a heavy knock at the door--a knock in the possessive case. I -rose wearily and admitted the rightful owner. - -"Say, Grace," she commenced excitedly, "the old man's asking for -you--Captain Macauley! He wants you to come down to his den at once -for an interview. How does it feel to be the biggest thing on the -_Herald_--for a day?" - -I put my hand up to my forehead. - -"It feels like----" - -She laughed. - -"Then try to look like it," she suggested. "Why, you look positively -seasick to-day." - -I didn't stop to explain my bearing false witness, but dashed past her -to the head of the stairs. Captain Macauley's office was on a lower -floor, and by the time I had gone leisurely down the steps I had -quieted my eyelids somewhat. - -"Well, Grace--how about the illegitimate use of weapons?" the old man -laughed, lifting his shaggy head from the front page of the day's -_Herald_, as I entered. "Sit down! Sit down--I want to talk with you." - -But for a moment he failed to talk. He looked me over quizzically, -then turned to his desk and drew a yellow envelope from a pigeonhole. -It was a telegram. I opened it wonderingly. - -"Pauline Calhoun met with a serious motor-car accident yesterday and -will be compelled to cancel her contract with you." I read. I looked -at the old man. - -"To go abroad this summer for the _Herald_?" I asked. - -He nodded. - -"We've _advertised_ her going," he said mournfully. "And the -transportation is here." - -"She was to have sailed Saturday week?" I asked, wondering at the -cunning machinery of my own brain, which could keep on working after -it was cold and dead! Every inch of my body was paralyzed. - -"On the _Luxuria_," he said cheeringly, as he saw my expression. "The -_Luxuria_, mind you, young lady!" - -"And to miss it? How tragic!" I kept on absently, wishing that the -whole Cunard Line was at the bottom of the sea if he meant to keep me -there chattering about it all day. - -"But it's tragic for the _Herald_," he snapped. "Don't you see we're -up against it? Here, every paper in the South is doing stunts like -this--getting out special stuff with its individual brand--and Pauline -Calhoun can deliver the goods." - -"Not with her arm broken," I mused aloud. - -He looked at me impatiently. - -"The thing is, we've got to send _somebody_ abroad next week--somebody -whose leg is not broken!" - -"Oh!" - -"And Hudson and I have been discussing you. This job you roped in -last night was more than we'd given you credit for, and--so--well, -can't you speak?" - -I couldn't speak, but I could laugh. I felt as if my fairy godmother -had taken me to a moving-picture show--where one scene was from -Dante's _Inferno_ and the next one was from a novel by the Duchess. - -"There'd be Italy----" Captain Macauley began, but I shrank back. - -"Not Italy!" I begged. "I couldn't go to Italy now." - -"Why?" - -"Because you'd want me to write a lot of sentimental stuff from -there--and I'm not sentimental--now." - -He smiled. - -"Italy is the land of lovers," he whispered, his eyes twinkling over -some 1870 recollection. "You must be in love with _somebody_ when -you're in Italy--and you can no more hide it than you can hide -nettle-rash." - -"I don't want to go there," I said stiffly. - - [Illustration: "Well, can't you speak?"] - -"Well, you wouldn't have to!" he answered readily. "This steamer -ticket reads from New York to Liverpool." - -"Liverpool?" I repeated, as blankly as if geography hadn't been my -favorite book at school--to eat apples behind. - -"And Hudson suggested, since you showed last night that you were keen -on getting the news of the hour, that you'd likely succeed in a new -line in England. We've been surfeited on Westminster Abbey and the -lakes, so we want _news_! Coal strikes and suffragettes--and other -curses!" - -"News?" - -"Instead of mooning around Hampstead Heath listening to the newest -scandal about George Romney and his lady friend, stay strictly in the -twentieth century and get in line with the militants. Describe how -they address crowds from cart-tails." - -"I see," I said slowly. - -But in my attempts to see I think I must have passed my left hand -across my forehead. At all events, he caught sight of its ringless -state. - -"Grace!" he exclaimed, catching my fingers roughly and scrutinizing -the little pallid circle left by the ring's long contact--sometimes -the healthiest, sometimes the deadliest pallor that female flesh is -heir to! "Does this mean that you've broken off with Guilford Blake?" - -"Yes." - -His face grew grave. - -"Then, child, I beg your pardon for talking so glibly about your going -away!--I didn't know." - -"But it isn't that--it's not that I'm worrying over now," I explained -forlornly. "And Guilford's not hurt! Please don't waste sympathy on -him. He'll be glad, when the first shock gets over, for I've tormented -him unmercifully." - -"Then--what is it?" he asked, very gently. - -I drew away my hand. - -"It's--something _else_! And please don't change your mind about -sending me abroad! I'd like very much to go away from here. Anywhere -except to Italy." - -He reached over and patted my bereft hand affectionately. - -"So the something else is the same sort of something, after all?" - -"Perhaps." - -"Then run along and begin getting ready," he said. "Get clothes in -your head--and salt-sprayed decks on moonlight nights, and wild -adventures." - -I smiled. - -"That's right! Smile! I _can't_ send out a representative with a -broken leg--and I'd prefer not sending out one with a broken heart." - -I turned away then, struggling fiercely with something in my throat, -but just for an instant. - -"Broken heart!" I repeated scornfully. "It's not that bad. You mustn't -think I'm such a fool." - -"Well," he said briskly, "whatever it is, cut it out! And, believe me, -my dear, a steamer trunk is the best possible grave for unrequited -love." - - - - -CHAPTER XV - -THE JOURNEY - - -Personally, I am of such an impatient disposition that I can't bear to -read a chapter in a book which begins: "Meanwhile----" Life is too -short for meanwhiles! But, since the Oldburgh epoch of my career has -passed, and the brilliant new epoch has a sea-voyage before it--and -crossing the ocean is distinctly a "meanwhile" occupation--I have -decided to mark time by taking extracts from my green leather voyage -book, with the solid gold clasp and the pencil that won't write. (The -city editor gave me the book.) - -The first entry was made at the breakfast table in an unnecessarily -smart New York hotel. That's one bad feature about having a newspaper -pay your traveling expenses! You can't have the pleasure of indulging -the vagabondage of your nature--as you can when you're traveling on -your hook. The lonely little entry says: - - "_Hate_ New York! Always feel countrified and unpopular - here!" - -But the next one was much better. It reads: - - "_Love_ the sea, whose principal charm is the sky above it! - The one acceptable fact about orthodox Heaven is that it's up - in the sky. You couldn't endure it if it were in any closer - quarters." - -Yet between New York and Heaven there lay several unappreciated -days--days when I sat for long hours facing strange faces and hearing -a jumbled jargon about "barth" hours, deck chairs and miscarried -roses. By the way, a strange trick of fate had filled my own bare -little stateroom with flowers. I say a trick of fate, because some of -them were for Pauline Calhoun, whose New York friends had heard of her -proposed journey, but not of her accident, and some of them were -addressed to me. I could understand the Pauline blossoms, but those -directed to Miss Grace Christie were mystifying--very. But I accepted -them with hearty thanks, and the time I spent wondering over them kept -me from grieving over the fact that the Statue of Liberty was the only -person on the horizon whose face I had ever seen before; and they kept -me feeling like a prima donna for half a week. - -"Henry Walker couldn't have sent them," I pondered the first day, as -the big, big box was deposited inside my door. "He's not such a close -friend, even though he is the Hiram Walkers' son--and then, New York -law students never have any money left over for orchids." - -I enumerated all the other people I happened to know in New York at -that time, all of them there for the purpose of "studying" something, -and not for the purpose of buying vast quantities of the -highest-priced flower blown, and the mystery only loomed larger. - -Still, the question could not keep me entirely occupied between meals, -and on the very day we sailed, before we had got into the space where -the union of the sea and sky seem to shut out all pettiness, I got to -feeling very sorry for myself. Thinking to get rid of this by mingling -with humanity, I went down into the lounge, where I was amazed to find -dozens of other women sitting around feeling sorry for themselves. It -was not an inspiring sight, so after a vain attempt to read, I curled -my arms round a sofa cushion in the corner of the big room and turned -my face away from the world in general. The next communication I -received was rather unexpected. I heard a brisk voice, close beside me -exclaim: - -"My word! A great big girl like you crying!" - -It was an English voice--a woman's, or rather a girl's, and as I -braced up indignantly I met the blue-gray eyes of a fresh-faced young -Amazon bent toward my corner sympathetically. - -"I'm not crying," I denied. - -She turned directly toward me then, and I saw a surprised smile come -over her face. - -"Oh, _you_! No--I supposed that you were ill; but the little kid over -there----" - -I saw then that there was a tiny girl tucked farther away into the -corner, her shoulders heaving between the conflict of pride and grief. - -"Cheer up, and I'll tell you a story," the English girl encouraged, -and after a few minutes the small flushed face came out of its -hiding-place. - -"So you thought I was talking to _you_?" - -She turned to me laughingly after the smaller bunch of loneliness had -been soothed and sent away. - -"I was--mistaken----" - -"But I'm sure I should have offered to tell you a story--if I had -supposed that it would do you any good," she continued. - -"Almost anything--any sound of a human voice would do me good now," I -answered desperately, and with that sky-rocket sort of spontaneity -which you feel you can afford once or twice in a lifetime. - -"You're alone?" - -"Yes--and miserable." - -Her blue eyes were very frank and friendly, and I immediately -straightened up with a hope that we might discover some mutual -interest nearer and dearer than the Boston Tea-Party. - -That's one good thing about a seafaring life--the preliminaries that -you are able to do without in making friends. If you meet a nice woman -who discovers that her son went to Princeton with your father's -friend's nephew you at once take it for granted that you may tell her -many things about yourself that are not noted down in your passport. - -"You're American--of course?" this English girl asked next. - -I acquiesced patriotically, but not arrogantly. - -"Yes--I'm American! My name's Grace Christie, and I'm a newspaper -woman from--from----" - -I hesitated, and she looked at me inquiringly. - -"I didn't understand the name of the state?" she said. - -"Because I haven't told you yet!" I laughed. "I remember other -experiences in mentioning my native place to you English. You always -say, 'Oh, the place where the negro minstrels come from!'" - -She smiled, and her face brightened suddenly. - -"The South! How nice! I _love_ Americans!" she exclaimed, confiding -the clause about her affection for my countrymen in a lowered voice, -and looking around to make sure that no one heard. - -Then, after this, it took her about half a minute to invite me out of -my corner and to propose that I go and meet her father and mother. - -"We'll find them in the library," she ventured, and we did. - -"The South! How nice! We _love_ Americans!" they both exclaimed, as we -unearthed them a little while later in a corner of the reading-room. -And before they had confided to me their affection for my countrymen -they lowered their voices and glanced at their daughter to make sure -that she was not listening. They made their observations in precisely -the same tone and they looked precisely alike, except that the father -had side-whiskers. They were both small and slight and very durably -dressed. - -"Miss Christie is a newspaper woman--traveling alone!" - -The daughter, whom they addressed as "Hilda" made the announcement -promptly, and her manner seemed to warn them that if they found this -any just cause or impediment they were to speak now or else hereafter -forever hold their peace. - -"Indeed?" said the mother, looking over my clothes with a questioning -air, which, however, did not disapprove. "Indeed?" - -"My word!" said the father, also taking stock of me, but his glance -got no further than my homesick face. "My _word_!" - -But you are not to suppose from the tone that anything had gone -seriously wrong with his word. He said it in a gently searching way, -as an old grandfather, seeking about blindly on the mantlepiece might -say, "My spectacles!" - -So realistic was the impression of his peering around mildly in -search of something that I almost jumped up from my chair to see if I -could, by mistake, be sitting on his word. - -"Isn't she young?" - -His twinkling little gray eyes sought his wife's as if for -corroboration, and she nodded vigorously. - -"Indeed, yes, Herbert! But they shed their pinafores long before our -girls do, remember!" - -Then he turned to his daughter. - -"My dear, the American women _are_ so capable!" he said, and she threw -him a smile which would have been regarded as impertinent--on English -soil. - -"Well, I'm sure I've no objections to being an American woman myself," -she said. - -"And you do not mind the loneliness of the trip you're taking?" the -mother put in hastily, as if to cover her daughter's remark. - -"I didn't--until to-day." - -"But we must see to it now that you're not too lonely," she hastened -to assure me. "Where have they put you in the dining-room, my dear?" - -I mentioned my table's location. - -"Oh, but we'll get the steward to change you at once!" they chorused, -when it had been pointed out to them that my position in the salon was -isolated and far away from the music of the orchestra. - -"We're just next the captain's table," Hilda explained. "We happened -to know him and----" - -"And it's inspiring to watch the liberties he takes with the menu," -the father said. "I'd best write down our number, though I'll see the -steward myself." - -From his pocketbook he produced a card, scribbling their table number -upon the back and handing it to me. - -I took it and glanced at the legend the face of it bore, first of all, -for figures are just figures, even though they do radiate out from the -captain's table. - -"Mr. Herbert Montgomery, Bannerley Hall, Bannerley, Lancashire," was -the way it read. - -"Lancashire?" I asked, looking up so quickly that Hilda mistook my -emotion for dismay. - -"Yes, we live in Lancashire, but----" - -"But we're going on to London first," Mrs. Montgomery assured me. - -"We'll see to it that you're put down, safe and sound, at Charing -Cross," Mr. Herbert Montgomery finished up. - -I looked up again, this time in sheer bewilderment. - -"Liverpool's in Lancashire," Hilda explained. "I thought perhaps you -were afraid we would desert you as soon as we docked." - -I laughed in some embarrassment. - -"I'm sure I never before heard that Liverpool had any connection with -Lancashire," I explained. "But I was thinking of--something else." - -"Something else--how curious! Why, what else is Lancashire noted for -in America, pray?" - -They were all three looking at me in some excitement, for my eyes were -betraying the palpitations I was experiencing. - -"Do you--does it happen that you have ever heard of Colmere Abbey?" I -asked. - -They drew a deep breath, evidently relieved. - -"Do we!" they chorused again, as they had a habit of doing, I learned, -whenever they were surprised or amused. "Well, _rather_!" - -"Surely you don't mean to tell me that it's your own home?" I -demanded, wondering if coincidence had gone so far, but they shook -their heads. - -"No! Just next-door neighbors." - -"Next-door neighbors to the place, my dear young lady," Mr. Montgomery -modified, glancing at his wife rather reproachfully. "Not to -the--owner of Colmere!" - -But I scarcely heard him. I was trying to place an ancient memory in -my mind. - -"'Bannerley Hall!'" - -"That's our place." - -"But I'm trying to remember where I have heard of it," I explained. -"Of course! They all mentioned it at one time or another." - -"They?--Who, my dear? Why Herbert--isn't this interesting?" - -"Why, Washington Irving--and Lady Frances Webb--and Uncle James -Christie." - -Their questions and my half-dazed answers were tumbling over one -another. - -"James Christie--Grace Christie?" Mrs. Montgomery asked, connecting -our names with a delighted opening of her eyes. "Why, my _dear_!" - -"How fortunate I was!" observed Hilda. "I knew, though, from the -moment I saw the back of your head that you were no ordinary American -tourist!" - -"They all 'rode over to Bannerley Hall--the day being fine!'" I -quoted, from one of the letters written by Lady Frances Webb. - -"That was in my great-grandfather's time," Mr. Montgomery elucidated. -"And James Christie was your----" - -"Uncle--with several 'greats' between." - -"He was even more famous in England than in his own country," Mrs. -Montgomery threw in hastily, as she saw her husband's eyes -twinkling--a sure sign, I afterward learned, that he was going to say -something wicked. "He painted all the notable people of the age." - -"He made many pictures of the Lady Frances Webb," Mr. Montgomery -succeeded in saying, after a while. "I don't know whether it's well -known in America or not, but--there was--_talk_!" - -"Herbert!" - -He stiffened. - -"It's true, my dear." - -"We don't know whether it's true or not!" she contended. - -"Well, it's tradition! I'm sure Miss Christie wouldn't want to come to -England and not learn all the old legends she might." - -Then, partly because I was bubbling over with excitement, and partly -because I wished to ease Mrs. Montgomery's mind on the subject, I -began telling them my story--from the day of Aunt Patricia's sudden -whim, three days before her death, down to the packet of faded letters -lying at that moment in the bottom of my steamer trunk. - -"I thought perhaps the present owner of Colmere might let me burn them -there!" I explained. "I have pictured her as a dear and somewhat -lonely old dowager who would take a great deal of interest in this -ancient affair." - -The three looked at me intently for an instant, but not one of them -laughed. - -"And you're carrying them back to Colmere--instead of selling them!" -Mrs. Montgomery finally uttered in a little awed voice, as I finished -my story. "How extraordinary!" - -"Very," said Hilda. - -"Most un-American--if you'll not be offended with me for saying so, -Miss Christie," Mr. Montgomery observed. Then he turned to his wife. -"My dear, only _think_ of Lord Erskine!" he said. - -She shook her head. - -"But I mustn't!" she answered, with a sad little smile. "I really -couldn't think of Lord Erskine while listening to anything so -pretty." - -I caught at the name, curiously. - -"Lord Erskine?" - -"Yes--the present owner of the abbey." - -"But--what a beautiful-sounding name! Lord Erskine!" - -I looked at them encouragingly, but a hush seemed to have fallen over -their audible enthusiasm. Mrs. Montgomery's lips presently primped -themselves up into a signal for me to come closer to her side--where -her husband might not hear her. - -"Lord Erskine is, my dear--the most--notorious old man in _England_!" -she pronounced--so terribly that "And may the Lord have mercy on his -soul" naturally followed. Her verdict was final. - -"But what has he done?" I started to inquire, the journalistic -tendency for the moment uppermost, but her lips showed white lines of -repression. - -"He is never _mentioned_!" she warned briefly, and I felt constrained -to wish that the same punishment could be applied to America's -ancient sinners. - -"Oh, so bad as that?" - -She leaned closer. - -"My dear Miss Christie, it would be impossible--quite impossible--to -enumerate the peccadillos of that wretched old creature!" - -"Yet you women are always ready to attempt the impossible!" her -husband interposed, after his noisy attempt at lighting a cigarette -had failed to drown out our voices. - -She looked up at him. - -"Herbert, I don't understand you, I'm sure." - -He laughed. - -"Well, I don't understand you, either!" he replied. "For twenty years -now I have noticed that when two or three women in our part of the -country are gathered together the first thing they say to each other -before the men have come into the room is that Lord Erskine's recent -escapades are positively unmentionable--then they fly at each other's -throats for the privilege of retailing them." - -She continued to stare at him, steadily and with no especial -unfriendliness in her gaze. - -"And the men--over their wine?" she asked casually. - -He squared his shoulders. - -"That's a very different matter," he declared. "With us he is as -honest and open a diversion as hunting! The first thing we say in -greeting, if we meet a neighbor on the road is: 'What's the latest -news from Lord Erskine?'" - -Their eyes challenged each other humorously for another moment, when -Hilda broke in. - -"Don't you think we've given Miss Christie a fairly good idea that she -mustn't expect to be invited down to Colmere Abbey--and that if she is -invited, she mustn't go?" she inquired, with gentle sarcasm. - -"But, before we get away from the subject--what of the Webb family?" I -begged forlornly. "Is there no one living who might take an interest -in the story of Lady Frances?" - -I am sure my voice was as sad with disappointment as old Joe -Jefferson's used to be when he'd plead: "Does _no one_ know Rip Van -Winkle?" - -"Lord Erskine's mother was a Webb," Mrs. Montgomery explained. - -"The one fact which can be stated about the old gentleman which need -not be blushed for," her husband added. "In truth, he has always been -vastly proud of his lineage." - -"About all that he's ever had to be proud of! His own performances in -social and family life have been--well, what I have outlined to you. I -happened to know details of some earlier happenings, and all I can say -is that my own attitude toward Lord Erskine is rather unchristian." - -"But I believe Miss Christie was asking about the family history -further back than the present lord," Hilda reminded them again, and -her mother took the cue. - -"Ah, yes! To be sure! It's the failing of later years, my dear, to -wish to discuss one's own memories! But of course your interest lies -in the traditions of the novelist." - -"Her history has always held a peculiar interest for me," I replied, -"first, naturally, on account of the connecting link--then on account -of the--tragic complication----" - -She nodded her head briskly. - -"Yes--poor Lady Frances! She was not very happy, if the ancient -reports be true." - -"I judge not--from her letters." - -"But her memory is held in great reverence by the educated people -around in the country," she hastened to assure me. "And there is a -lovely memorial tablet in the church--quite aside from the tomb! A -literary club of London had it placed there!" - -"And every birthday there are wreaths," Mr. Montgomery threw in, -evidently hoping to make it up to me for the disheartening gossip of -the present age; but my dreams were rapidly fading--and I saw my -chances for having a bonfire on the library hearth at Colmere go up -in something far more unsubstantial than smoke. - -"Well, I'm sure we've told Miss Christie quite enough about our -neighbors--for a first sitting," Hilda Montgomery broke in at this -point, as she rose and made a reckless suggestion that we go out and -walk a little while. "_I_ don't wish to spend the whole afternoon -talking about a villainous old Englishman!" she confided, when we were -well out of ear-shot. "One might spend the time talking about -'Americans--don't you know?'" - -"Americans?" - -"Yes--charming, handsome, young Americans! You remember the first -thing I told you was that I loved Americans?" - -"Yes--and your father and mother said they did, too--when you weren't -listening." - -She nodded her blond head, in energetic delight. - -"They are trying to pretend that it will be a difficult matter to win -their consent--but it won't." - -We steered our course around a group of people who were disputing, in -Wabash tones, over a game of shuffleboard. - -"Consent?" I repeated. - -"His name is John McAdoo Carpenter--and he lives at South Bend, -Indiana--did you ever hear of the place? Did you ever hear of him?" - -She caught me by the arm and we walked precipitately over to the -railing--out of the sound of the Wabash tones. - -"If I don't talk to somebody before that sun goes down I'll jump right -over this railing," she explained. "Here's his picture!" - -I took the small blue leather case and looked at the honest, rather -distinguished face it held. - -"But why should your parents disapprove of _him_?" I asked in such -genuine surprise that she gave me a smile which sealed forever our -friendship. - -"They don't--really! It's just that they like to torment me because he -happened not to be born in either New York or Kentucky. An -Englishman's knowledge of America's excellence extends no further -than that." - -Night was coming on--and the sea looked pretty vast and unfriendly. It -was the lonesome hour, when any feminine thing far away from home has -to wax either confidential or tearful. Hilda was determined to be -confidential, and I let her have her say. I went down, after a while, -and dressed for dinner--listlessly and without heart, but when I went -into the dining-room a little later and found my place at the table -next the captain's, the geniality of the family atmosphere I found -there was vastly cheering. - -Mrs. Montgomery was a rather magnificent little gray-haired lady in -gray satin and diamonds, and her husband had made the evolution from -the chrysalis state into that of the butterfly by donning his dress -clothes and putting up a monocle in place of the comfortable reading -glasses he had worn in the afternoon. Hilda was wholesome and -sweet-looking but quite secondary to her parents, in a soft blue -gown. - -The subject under discussion when I arrived was evidently the points -of superiority of one American locality over another and they took me -into their confidence at once. - -"I appeal to you, Miss Christie, as an American," Mr. Montgomery said, -after the steward who had acted as my pilot was out of hearing. -"Shouldn't you think now--if you didn't know the difference--_shouldn't_ -you think now that a 'South _Bender'_ was a species of acrobat?" - - * * * * * - -Then, try as hard as I might to keep all physical signs of my mental -infirmity from cropping out in my log-book, the second evening out -found an entry like this showing itself--written almost entirely -without effort on my part--like "spirit writing": - - "To-night the orchestra is playing _The Rosary_, and I had to - get away from all those people in the lounge! - - "I have come down here--away from it, as I thought, but, no! - Those same high, wailing notes that we heard that first - day--_that first day_--are ringing in my ears this minute. - - "How they sob--sob--sob! And over the hours they spent - together! That's the foolish part of it! I am sobbing over - the hours I _might_ have spent with him--and didn't! - - "'Are like a string of pearls to me!' - - "Bah! The hours I spent with him wouldn't make pearls enough - for a stick-pin--much less a rosary! - - "To me _Caro Mio Ben_ is a much more sensible little love - plaint! I wonder if _he_ knows it? I wonder if he heard that - girl singing in the parlor the night of the Kendalls' - dance--and if it still rings--rings--rings in his mind every - time he thinks of me? Or if he ever thinks of me at all?" - -I have inserted this not so much to show you how very critical my case -was, as to demonstrate how valuable a thing is diversion. Without -Hilda and the elder Montgomerys I should no doubt have tried to -emulate Lady Frances Webb in the feat of writing heart-throbs. - -The third day's observation was a distinct improvement. - - "The men on shipboard are rather better than the women--just as - they are on dry land. True, there are some who have sold - Chicago real estate, and are now bent upon spending the rest of - their lives running over to Europe to criticize everything that - they can not buy. Nothing is sacred to them--until after they - have paid duty on it. They revere and caress their own Italian - mantlepieces, their cases of majolica, and their collection of - Wedgwood--when these are safely decorating their lake-shore - homes--but what Europe keeps for herself they scorn. - - "'Bah! I don't see anything so swell about St. Mark's--nor St. - Doge's either!' I heard one emit this morning. 'But, old man, - you just ought to see the champagne glasses I bought last year - in Venice. The governor dined with me the other night, and he - said----' etc. - - "Then, there's another sort of Philistine, who goes all over - the Old World eating his lunch off places where men have - suffered, died, or invented pendulums. - - "'That confounded Leaning Tower _does_ feel like it's wiggling - as you go up, but pshaw! it's perfectly safe! Why, I stayed on - top long enough to eat three sandwiches and drink a bottle of - that red ink you get for half a dollar in Florence!' - - "This doesn't create much of a stir, however, because there's - always one better. - - "'Nice little tower down there in Pisa--and you really have to - have something like that to relieve your constitution of the - pictorial strain in Florence--but you see, after you've eaten - hard-boiled eggs on top of _Cheops_, climbing the Leaning Tower - is not half so exciting as riding a sapling was when you were a - boy!' - - "'And oh, speaking of hard-boiled eggs--have you ever been to - Banff, Mr. Smith?' one of the women in the crowd speaks up. - 'Yes, the scenery in the Canadian Rockies is all right, of - course, but just to _think_ of having your eggs perfectly hot - and well done in the waters of Banff!' - - "There are other women on board, however, whose thoughts are - not on food. They are more amusing by far to watch than the - innocent creatures who love Banff. They manage to stay well out - of view by strong daylight, then come into the lounge at night, - dressed in plumes and diamonds like Cinderella's stepsisters, - and select the husbands of sea-sick wives to ask advice about - focusing a kodak or going to Gibraltar to buy a mandarin coat! - - "But, as I have said, the men for the greater part are much - more interesting than the women--still I have never aspired to - a nautical flirtation, for a month after one is past you can't - recall the principal's name. You do well if you can remember - his nationality." - -The entry broke off with this piece of sarcasm, which, after all, is -actual truth. A friend of mine had such an experience. A month after a -bitter parting on a moonlit deck one night she came face to face with -the absent one in a church in Rome--and all she could stammer was: -"Oh--you _Canadian_!" - -The fourth day--after the last vestige of the gulls had been left -behind--I began to grow impatient. The "meanwhile" aspect of life in -general was beginning to press down. - - "I wish mother had named me 'Patience,' for I love a joke!" I - wrote frantically--with the same feeling of suffocation which - caused Lady Frances Webb to rush out to the rose garden where - the sun-dial stood, to keep from hearing the clock tick. - - "To me, the inertia which a woman is supposed to exhibit is - the hardest part of her whole earthly task! And I don't know - what it's for, either, unless to prepare her for a future - incarnation into a camel! - - "Yet, if you're a woman, you just must stay still and let - your heart's desire slip through your fingers--even if you - have to lock yourself up into your bedroom closet to - accomplish it!" - -And yet, even as I wrote, I wondered what I'd do when I should be back -in America. Somehow, I didn't exactly fancy myself getting a ticket -home from New York with stop-over privileges at Pittsburgh--where I -could spend an exciting time looking up a city directory! - -And so the remaining days of the voyage passed. The Montgomery family -planned to have me go home with them, after a day in London, and -declared that I could find as much interesting news to write home for -the _Herald_ from Lancashire as from any other portion of the United -Kingdom, since one never knew where a fire would be started or a bomb -discovered through the playful antics of the women who have changed -the "clinging" sex into the _flinging_ sex; and I had accepted -fervently--when, on the trip from Liverpool down to London, these -arrangements were abruptly upset. - -We were a little late in landing, and rushed straight to the train, -where a tea-basket, operated in the compartment which we had to -ourselves, was giving me the assurance that surely, next to a hayloft -on a rainy morning, a private compartment in a British train is the -coziest spot on the face of the earth, when Mr. Montgomery suddenly -dropped the sheet of newspaper he had been eagerly scanning. - -"My _word_!" he said. - -His exclamation was so insistent that I immediately felt in my pocket -to see if I had his word, and his wife glanced up from the lamp which -she was handling lovingly. - -"Yes, Herbert?" - -"But I say--Lord Erskine is dead!" - -"Herbert!" - -Her tone was accusing, but her husband nodded, with a pleased look of -assurance. - -"You may read it for yourself, I'm sure--if you don't believe me!" - -He handed the paper over to her, and she received it gingerly, after -looking to the tea-basket with a housewifely air, and placing the -lamp quite to one side, out of harm's way. Then she turned to the -article indicated, reading slowly, while her daughter looked over her -shoulder. - -"Why, he's _been_ dead!" - -She glanced up suddenly, toward me, with a shamefaced look. - -"He was dead at the very time you were telling Grace all those -atrocious things about him!" Hilda reminded her, smiling at the look -of discomfiture which had crept over the kindly, wrinkled little face. - -"Yes! It's--extraordinary!" - -"And it makes us both feel--a little uncomfortable, eh?" - -Her husband's tone was tormenting, but she turned on him seriously. - -"I'm sure, Herbert, dear, you said quite as much as I did!" she -declared, evidently finding relief in the knowledge. "Still--this news -does rather make one--think." - -The girl rattled the sheet of paper excitedly. - -"I'm thinking!" she announced, her eyes wide. "I'm thinking of Colmere -Abbey! What a chance for some rich decent American! Somebody that one -could easily endure, you understand!" - -"Hilda!" - -She waved aside the reprimand. - -"Grace understands me--and what I think of Americans," she answered -quickly. "But, mother, this _is_ a problem! What Englishman would buy -the place--with its haunting tales--and monstrous value? Nobody would -be rich enough except one of the millionaires who owns a dozen homes -already. And the next-of-kin will inherit nothing along with the place -to keep it up!" - -"Hilda! This is neither respectful nor neighborly," her mother -remonstrated again, then she turned to her husband. "Shall you write -to the new Lord Erskine from London, Herbert?" - -Her tone was one of foregone conclusion, conventional enough, but very -kindly, and her husband nodded obediently. - -"Oh, to be sure, my dear," he chirruped in a dutiful way. "I shall -wire his lawyers immediately and----" - -"And ask for the pleasure of putting him up while he's in the -country?" - -"Certainly! Certainly!" - -"It will be unpleasant--this period of mourning that we shall have to -affect--for his sake," she went on, "but it is out of respect for the -neighborly proprieties, after all." - -Mrs. Montgomery was looking at us all in turn, in some little -perplexity, when a sudden recollection came to me of how difficult it -is sometimes to amalgamate guests--no matter how many rooms there are -to one's house. - -"And I'll defer my visit until later?" I suggested. - -She instantly smiled across at me. - -"Just a few days--if you don't mind, dear," she said. "I had planned -so many delightful things for _your_ stay--and I know that you -wouldn't enjoy the period of mourning." - -"Not so much as you would if you had known Lord Erskine!" her husband -put in wickedly. "And I'm determined to mourn only the briefest time -possible." - -"Not an hour later than Saturday!" his wife promised generously--and a -few hours afterward when they put me down at Charing Cross and sent me -whirling away to a lady-like hotel in Bloomsbury, it was with spoken, -written and pantomime directions as to which trains, and what-timed -trains--and _how many_ trains I was to take toward the end of the week -to get to Bannerley. - -In the meanwhile I knuckled down devotedly to London--and sent my -deductions home across seas, in neatly typed packets, to _The Oldburgh -Herald_. - - - - -CHAPTER XVI - -LONDON - - -What can't be appreciated can always be ridiculed--whether it's Old -Masters, new waltzes, or a wife's Easter bonnet--and this is the -reason we have always had such reams of journalistic "fun" at the -expense of the broad English "a" and the narrow English view. - -For my part, I consider that--next to the French in New Orleans--the -English in England are the golden-ruliest people to be found in -profane history. - -You'll find that they're "insular" only when they're traveling off -their dear island--and it's homesickness, after all, which makes them -so disagreeably arrogant. - -To be sure, the Frenchman in New Orleans will, if you ask him for a -word of direction toward the Old Absinthe House, take you into his -private office, draw for you a diagram of the whole city, advise you -at length not to go unescorted into the Market, then follow you to the -door with the final warning: "And it would be well for you to observe -a certain degree of caution, my dear young lady, for our city is -filled with wickedness, and your eyes are--_pardon?_--most charming!" - -This is delightful, of course, and by far the most romantic thing in -the way of adventure America has to offer, but rambling around London -presents a dearer and more home-like charm. - -The Englishman who directs you to a church, or a university square, -stops to say nothing about your eyes--much less would he mention the -existence of good and evil--but he points out to you the tomb, or -chained Bible, or famous man's pew you are seeking, then glides -modestly away before you've had time to say: "It's awfully good of you -to take all this trouble for a stranger!" - -But the truth of the matter is that you don't in the least feel -yourself a stranger in London, and you like your kindly Englishman so -cordially that you secretly resolve to put a muzzle on your own -particular cannon cracker the next Fourth of July. - -The shilling guide-books speak of London as the "gray old grandmother -of cities," meaning thereby to call attention to her upstart progeny -across the seas, but to my mind the title of grandmother is much more -applicable on account of the joyous surprises she has shut away in -dark closets. - -One of the main pleasures of a visit to any grandmother is the gift of -treasure which she is likely to call forth mysteriously from some -tightly-closed cupboard and place in your hands for your own exclusive -possession--and certainly this old dingy city outgrannies granny when -it comes to that. - -In the dingiest little book-stall imaginable, lighted by a candle and -tended by a ragged-cuffed gentleman with a passion for Keats, you may -find the very edition of something that college professors in your -native town are offering half a year's salary for! You buy it for five -dollars--which seems much more insignificant when spoken of by the -pound--then run out and hail the nearest cab, offering the chauffeur -an additional shilling to get you out of the neighborhood in ten -seconds! Your heart is thumping in guilty fear that the ragged-cuffed -gentleman with the passion for Keats may discover his mistake and run -after you to demand his treasure back! - -You make a similar escape, a few hours later, with a Wedgwood -tea-caddy, whose delicate color the pottery has never been able to -duplicate--and with Sheffield plate your suit-case runneth over! - -And your emotions while doing all this? Why, you've never before known -what "calm content" could mean. - -In the first place, you never feel countrified and unpopular in -London, as you do in New York. Your clothes have a way of brightening -up and looking noticeably smart as if they'd just enjoyed a sojourn -at the dry cleaner's--and everybody you meet seems to care -particularly for Americans. You are at home there--not merely with the -at-home feeling which a good hotel and agreeable society give--but -there's a feeling of satisfaction much deeper than this. Something in -you, which has always known and loved England, is seeing familiar -faces again--the something which made you strain your eyes over -_Mother Goose_ by firelight years ago, and thrill over _Ivanhoe_ and -anything which held the name "Sherwood Forest" on its printed page. -It's something congenial--or prenatal--who knows? - -(Oh yes! I answer very readily "Present!" when any one calls: -"Anglomaniac!") - -It was only natural that I should let my adoration for Great Britain -show through in the copy I sent home to _The Oldburgh Herald_, and as -if to prove that honesty is the best policy, I received a letter of -praise from Captain Macauley. - -"Anybody can run a foreign country down," he wrote, "but you've proved -that you're original by praising one! Stay there as long as you have -an English adjective left to go upon, then forget your sorrows, chase -away down to Italy and show us what you can do with 'bellissimo.'" - -But I didn't do this, for the letter overtook me only after I had -reached Bannerley, and was seeing things which I could hope for no -words, either English or Italian, to describe. - -I left London on Friday--which I ought to have had better sense than -to do, having been properly brought up by a black mammy--hoping to -reach the home of my shipboard friends early enough Saturday morning -to hear the pigeons coo under the eaves of Bannerley Hall. All my life -I had cherished an ambition to hear pigeons coo under eaves of an -ancestral place, and with this thought uppermost in my heart, I packed -my suit-case and drove to Paddington Station. I received my first -damper at the ticket window. - -"Bannerley?" the agent repeated, looking at me with a shade of pity, -as I mentioned my destination. "Bannerley?" - -"Certainly, Bannerley!" I insisted, with some effort toward a -dignified bearing, but the first glance at his doubtful face caused my -spirits to sink. Being by nature an extremist, they sank to the -bottom. All in a twinkling the cooing of pigeons in my mental picture -was changed to the croaking of ravens. "It's not so very difficult to -get to Bannerley, is it?" - -He scratched his head. - -"No-o--not in a general way, miss, but there ain't no telling _when_ -you'll get there." - -I drew back, more hurt than angry. - -"But my friends have already warned me that I shall have to change at -Leamington--and Manchester--and Oldham--and----" - -"Can't help that!" he exclaimed heartlessly, looking over my shoulder -at the line of waiting tourists. "Since the coal strike, trains on -them side-lines has been as scarce and irregular as a youngster's -teeth at shedding time." - -I tried to smile politely, but another glance at his face showed me -that he wasn't expecting such an act of supererogation. - -"Getting off into the unbeaten paths sounds pretty enough in a -guide-book," he kept on hastily, "but the first thing you do when you -meet an unbeaten path is to want to beat it!" - -I faded out of the line and let my successor take my place. - -"He's just an old grouch!" I told myself consolingly, as I got a seat -next a window. "Nothing really terrible can befall you when -traveling--if you've got a Masonic pin on your coat!" - -(One of my Christie relations had thus decorated me and assured me.) - -Then I forgot all about his gloomy warnings, for the train rumbled -across a thousand street crossings--then out into all the sheep -pastures in the civilized world, and--it was summer! - -"This country _must_ be Kent!" I mused, not geographically, but -esthetically certain--as soft feathery green broke off occasionally -into a pollard-trimmed swamp--then came up again a little later into a -gentle, sheep-dotted rise. And I remembered the Duchess once more--"A -stalwart, fair-haired lover, and a dozen Kentish lanes!" - -I have lived to learn that this is common to Americans who have been -brought up to understand that Kent is the garden-spot of England. No -matter at which point along the entire coastline they may board a -train, their first conviction upon seeing suburban scenery is that it -_must_ be Kent! (I say "suburban" advisedly, for none of it is far -enough away from the other to be rural.) - -So my journey through an elongated and rather circuitous Kent kept my -mind away from the croakings of the ticket seller at Paddington--until -the next morning at daybreak, when I found myself put down with -mournful ceremony at a little wayside station which ought to have -been labeled "St. Helena." - -"Just as sorry as you are, miss, but this is your nearest hope for a -train to Bannerley!" the guard said, by way of an appropriate -farewell, so off I got. - -"But this place is surely named St. Helena," I groaned, as I looked -about me, yet the only actual similarity was in the matter of its -being entirely surrounded. The island entirely surrounded by water, of -course--this station entirely surrounded by land. I believe that I had -never before in my life seen such a stretch of unimproved property! - -"'The woods and I--and their infinite call,'" I quoted, as I looked -out somewhat shamefacedly across the acres. For it was exactly the -kind of place I had always longed to possess for my very own--yet here -I had arrived at it, and might, for all I knew to the contrary, take -possession of it by right of discovery--yet I was feeling lonely and -resentful at the very start. - -Then I remembered Robinson Crusoe and took heart, straining my eyes in -hope of a sail, but nowhere was there a human face to be seen, nor -sign of life. Not even a freight car stood drearily on a -side-track--and, as you know, you have to be very far away from the -center of things not to find a freight car! None was here, however, -for there wasn't a side-track for it to stand upon--the main line -running in two shining threads far away toward Ireland. - -The only moving bodies visible were a paper sack being blown gently -down the track, a blue fly buzzing around a blackened banana peeling -and a rook cawing overhead. I looked up at the rook and smiled -philosophically. - -"I anticipated a 'coo,' then apprehended a 'croak'--what I get is a -happy compromise, a 'caw,'" I said, and I find that things usually -turn out this way in the great journey of life. Nothing is ever so -good, nor so bad, as you think it's going to be when you're standing -at the ticket window. The great anticipator is also a great -apprehender--therefore realization is bound to be a relief. - -Then, as if in reward of my optimism, I began to scent the odor of -escaping coffee. - -"It _is_ inhabited!" I cried. - -Springing up, I darted around to the other side of the station, and -there, in a clump of trees, lying snug and humane-looking in the -morning light, was a tiny cottage. I waited, and presently there -issued from the doorway a man--wiping his mouth reminiscently. - -He espied me at once and came up, cap in hand. - -"Was you wanting something, miss?" he asked. - -"A train," I replied, trying to sound inconsequential with the -lordliness that comes of intense disgust. "I have a ticket to -Bannerley--and I have friends there _waiting_!" - -The man dared to smile. - -"Since the coal strike that's mostly what folks does, miss," he -explained. - -There was a moment of strained silence, which was broken by the -appearance of a young boy--an eerie creature who had seemed to glide -straight out of the eastern horizon on a bicycle. The station-master -turned to him. - -"Take this here parcel up to Lord Erskine--and be quicker than you was -yesterday!" he said. - -The boy's face and mine changed simultaneously, his brightening, mine -paling. - -"Lord Erskine!" I cried, a little ghostly feeling of fear stealing -over me--for my American instincts failed to grasp the rapidity with -which dead men's shoes can be snatched off and fitted with new rubber -heels in England--"Lord Erskine is dead." - -The little messenger boy looked at me pityingly. - -"'E _wuz_," he explained, "but 'e ain't now!" - -"And--and do you mean to tell me that this is the station for Colmere -Abbey?" I demanded, turning again to the man. - -"Yes, miss." - -He tried hard not to look supercilious, but there, six feet above my -head, was the name "Colmere" in faded yellow letters against the -black background of the sign-board. And I had always believed in -psychic warnings! - -"I--I hadn't thought to look at the sign-board," I endeavored to -explain. "It seems that it doesn't matter what your station is, for -you're as far away from your destination at one place as at -another--during the coal strike! You think I can't get a train to -Bannerley until----" - -"Perhaps to-night--perhaps not until to-morrow morning," he answered -with cruel frankness, and I knew from heresay that trains did -occasionally wander, comet-fashion, out of their orbit, and come -through stations at unexpected moments. "Still, there's a railroad -hotel about a mile down the track." - -"A railroad hotel?" - -"Where the men get their meals--the guards and porters!" - -My spirits sank. - -"That old kill-joy at Paddington knew what he was talking about!" I -said to myself--then aloud: "But, couldn't I get a carriage, or -a----" - -He shook his head. - -"We mostly uses bicycles around here--when we don't walk," he -explained. - -"But I must get to Bannerley!" I burst out in desperation. "And I am a -first-rate walker! How far is it?" - -I was beginning to realize that the adventure might make good copy, -headed: "Wonderful Pedestrian Journey through Historic Lancashire." -Many a slighter incident has called forth heavier head-lines. - -"Walk?" - -"Certainly--then take up the matter with the railroad company in -Glasgow, just before I sail for home!" - -My terrible manner caused him to look me over, quickly. - -"Was you wanting to get to the village--or the hall?" he asked, -evidently impressed by my severity, and my heart softened. - -"To the hall," I answered. "Mrs. Montgomery is expecting me." - -He tried hard not to show that he was impressed, but he failed. -Evidently Mrs. Montgomery was a great personage, and I took on a tinge -of reflected glory not to be entirely ignored. - -"The hall is a mile from the village--and the village is three miles -from here," he explained gently. "Of course, there's short cuts, if a -body knows 'em--but for a lady like you----" - -The click of the telegraph instrument clamored for his attention, so -he reluctantly left me. I remained outside, listening to the caw of -the rook. Presently he came out again. - -"There will be a train through here pretty soon--but it's coming from -the direction of Bannerley instead of going toward there--still----" - -"Still, it will give us occasion to hope for better things later on," -I answered cheerfully. "And it has occurred to me that I might while -away a portion of the morning by walking up to the gates of Colmere -Abbey. That boy went in this direction, didn't he?" - -"Not a quarter of a mile, miss--down in this direction," he assured -me. "Just follow this road, and you'll find the lodge in a clump of -trees." - -The "May" hedges were glistening with the early sunbeams, and as I -walked down the railroad track the distance seemed quite a good deal -short of the quarter of a mile mentioned. I found the clump of trees -indicated--then a small gray building. My heart bounded, and I rubbed -my eyes to make sure that I was awake. - -"Is this the entrance to Colmere Abbey?" I asked of the boy on the -bicycle, who was turning out of the gate at that moment. - -"This is one of the lodges--but not the grand one, madam!" he answered -anxiously. - -"Oh, indeed? But one can get to the park through this gate?" I -persisted. - -"Oh, yes, madam." - -He showed an inclination to act as my esquire, but I got rid of him by -promising him sixpence if he would take care of my bag until I -returned to the station--then I crossed the greasy railroad track and -entered the shade of the trees. It was far from being my ideal entrée -into the old house of my heart's desire, but it was something of an -adventure--until I reached the gates. There I was halted. - -"Yes, miss--if you please?" - -It was an acid voice, and I looked at the doorway of the house, out of -which an old woman was issuing. She was garbed in profound black. - -"I want to get in--to see the grounds of the abbey," I explained -casually, but she was not to be overwhelmed by any airy nonchalance. -She shook her head. - -"But that can't be!" - -The smile which accompanied this information was almost gleeful. - -"No? But why not?" - -She looked at me pityingly. - -"Didn't you know we was in mourning?" she demanded, bristling with -importance. - -I instantly made a penitent face, then glanced appreciatively at her -gown, but she gave no evidence of being a physiognomist. She failed -to take note of my contrite expression. - -"You can't go sight-seeing in here!" she said. - -"Not even a little way?" - -I accompanied this plea by the display of a shining half-crown, which -I carried in my glove for emergency. That's one good thing about being -away from the United States--you don't have to regard money so -tenderly. You realize that shillings and francs and lire were made to -spend for souvenirs and service, but dollars--ugh! They were made to -put in the bank! So I twinkled this ever-ready half-crown temptingly -in the morning light, but she shook her head again. - -"While we was in mourning?" she demanded, with a gasp of outraged -propriety. "Why--_wha'ud the minister say?_" - -At this I turned away sadly--for I had been in England long enough to -know there's never any use trying to surmise _what_ the minister 'ud -say! - -"Just the same, you'd make a dandy old servant--and I'm a great mind -to buy you and put you in my suit-case, along with the Sheffield -candlesticks," I thought, as I made my way back to the station. - -During my absence a train had come clattering in--and it stood -stock-still now, while the engineer and the station-master held a long -conversation over a basket of homing pigeons which had been deposited -upon the platform. I viewed the locomotive listlessly enough--the walk -having taken some of my former impatient energy away, but my interest -was aroused as I came upon the platform by the appearance of a servant -in livery, disentangling from one of the compartments a suit-case and -leather hat-box. - -The man's back was toward me, as he struggled to lift his burden high -above the precious basket of pigeons which was usurping place and -attention, but the look of the traveling paraphernalia held my eye for -a moment. - -"Could it belong to an American?" I mused. - -The servant deposited the cases on the platform, then turned, still -with his back toward me, and took part in the lively pigeon argument. -I looked at the beautiful smoothness of the leather. - -"Of course they're American!" I decided, for you must know that nearly -any Englishman's luggage would compare unfavorably with the bags Aunt -Jemima brings with her when she comes up to the city for a week's -mortification to her nephews. - -"Never judge an Englishman by the luggage he lugs!" is only a fair act -of discretion. - -I crossed the platform, partly to get away from the mournful sounds -emanating from the wicker basket, and then, at the door of the little -station I was arrested by another sound. It was a sound which had -certainly not been there when I had left, half an hour before! I -halted--wondering if there really could be anything in psychic -warnings! - -Inside the dingy little room some one was whistling! The melody was -falling upon the air with a certain softness which, however, did not -conceal its suppressed vehemence--and the tune was _Caro Mio Ben!_ - -"Anybody has a right to whistle it!" I told myself savagely, but I -still hesitated--my heart standing still from the mere force of the -hypothesis. After a moment it began beating again, as if to make up -for lost time. - -The whistling man inside left off his music--then I heard his -footsteps tramping impatiently across the bare wooden floor. He -finally came to the door and looked out. I glanced up, and our eyes -met! It _was Caro Mio Ben! It was Caro Mio Ben!_ - -"Well?" he said. - -He stood perfectly still for half a minute it seemed--making no effort -toward a civilized greeting. - -"Well!" I responded--as soon as I could. - -"This is queer, isn't it?" - -I looked at him. - -"'Queer?'" I managed to repeat--that is, I heard the word escaping -past the tightening muscles of my throat. "_Queer!_" - -"Most extraordinary!" - -"I should--I think I should like to sit down!" I decided, as he -continued to stand staring at me, and I suddenly realized that I was -very tired. - -He moved aside. - -"By all means! Come in and sit down, Miss Christie. This station -fellow here tells me that you have been disappointed in your train." - -"I have," I answered. - -I might have added that I had been disappointed in everything most -important in life, as well--but his own face was wearing such an -expression of calm serenity that I was soothed as I looked at it. - -"That's quite a problem here in England just now," he observed -politely. - -"So I have been informed." - -After this, conversation flagged, until the silence made me nervous. - -"I should think we ought to be asking each other--questions!" I -suggested, trying to bring him to a realization of the necessary -formalities, but he only turned and looked down at me, with a slightly -amused, slightly superior smile. - -"Questions?" - -"About _ships_--and how long we intend staying--and what travelers -usually ask!" I said. - -He shook his head, as if the subjects held little interest for him. - -"Why should I ask that--when I happen to know?" he inquired. - -"You know--what?" - -"That you came over on the _Luxuria_." - -"Yes?" - -"And that _The Oldburgh Herald_ sent you--to write up the coal -strike." - -"Yes--it did." - -"And that you are going to stay--some time." - -I was decidedly uncomfortable. - -"Will you please explain how you knew all this?" I asked. - -His smile died away. - -"Mrs. Hiram Walker wrote her son to call on me while I was in New -York," he explained in his serious lawyer-like manner, "and he -happened to leave a copy of _The Oldburgh Herald_ in my rooms." - -"Oh! That was quite simple, wasn't it?" - -"Quite!" - -It occurred to me then that there was no use trying to keep fate's -name out of this conversation--and also it came to me that the orchids -were no longer a mystery--but before I could make up my mind to -mention this he turned to me ferociously. - -"You _did_ make a fool of me!" he accused. - -My heart began thumping again. - -"What do you mean?" I began, but he cut me short. - -"It is this that I can not get over! The thought has come to me that -perhaps if I might hear you acknowledge it, I might be able to forgive -you better." - -"Forgive me?" - -He leaned toward me. - -"If you don't mind, I should like to hear you say: 'Maitland Tait, I -did make a fool of you!'" - -"But I didn't!" I denied stoutly, while my face flushed, and all the -fighting blood in me seemed to send forth a challenge from my cheeks. -"I'll say what I _do_ think, however, if you wish to hear it!" - -"And that is----?" - -"Maitland Tait, you made a fool of yourself!" - -He looked disappointed. - -"Oh, I know that!" he replied. - -"You do? Since when, please?" - -"Why, I knew it before I crossed the Ohio River!" he acknowledged, -seeming to take some pride in the fact. "I--I intended to -apologize--or something--when I got to Pittsburgh, but when I reached -New York, on my way here, I saw that you were coming to England, -too----" - -"So you thought the matter could easily wait--I see!" I observed, -then, to change the subject, I asked: "Have you been here long?" - -"Two weeks! I knew that I should get news of you in _this_ -neighborhood, sooner or later." - -I instantly smiled. - -"I have come here for my first Sunday, you see, but----" - -"But you haven't been to the abbey yet, have you?" he asked. - -The boyish anxiety in his tone gave me a thrill. Something in the -thought of his remembering my romantic whim touched me. - -"No. I have just come from there--the lodge--but the old woman at the -gates wouldn't let me in." - -He looked interested. - -"No? But why not?" - -"The master of the house has just died," I explained. "It would be a -terrible breach of etiquette to go sight-seeing over the mourning -acres." - -His lips closed firmly. - -"Nonsense! I'll venture that's just a servant's whim." He slipped out -his watch. "Shall I go over and try to beg or bribe permission for -you? I'm not easily daunted by their refusals, and--I'll have a little -time to spare this morning, if you'd care to put your marooned period -to such a use." - -"I _am_ marooned," I told him, wondering for a moment what the -Montgomerys would think of my delay, "and I should like this, of -course, above anything else that England has to offer, but----" - -Then, after his precipitate fashion, he waited for no more. He paused -at the edge of the platform for a low-toned colloquy with Collins--I -could easily distinguish now that the liveried creature was -Collins--and the two disappeared down the car track. After the -briefest delay he returned. - -"What can't be cured must be ignored," he said with a shrug, as he -came up. "The poor old devil evidently regards us as very impious -and--American, but I made everything all right with her." - -"But how----?" I started to inquire, also at the same moment starting -down the track toward the lodge house, when he stopped both my -question and my progress. - -"Let us wait here--I have sent Collins to get a car for us from the -garage not far away." - -He led the way out to a drive, sheltered with trees, on the other side -of the track, and we awaited the coming of Collins--neither showing -any disposition to talk. - -"Is this _your_ car?" I presently asked, as the servant driving a -gleaming black machine drew up in front of us. "I hadn't imagined that -you would have your own car down in the country with you." - -"I've had experience with these trains," he explained briefly, then he -looked the car over with a masterful eye. "Yes, it's mine." - -"I really shouldn't have needed to ask--there's so strong a family -resemblance to the other one--the limousine you had in Oldburgh." - -He looked pleased. - -"I hope you'll like this one--it's a Blanton Six, you see," he -explained with a pat of affectionate pride upon the door-handle as he -helped me in. - -Collins climbed to his place at the wheel, and without another -word--without one backward look--I was whirled away into the Land of -Long Ago--the period where I had always belonged. - - * * * * * - -At the second lodge--the grand one--I pinched myself. I had to, to see -whether I was awake--or dreaming a Jane Austen dream. Maitland Tait, -watching me closely, saw the act. - -"You're quite awake," he assured me gravely. - -"But--what are you?" I inquired. "Are you yourself--or Aladdin, -or----" - -I broke off abruptly, for the car was gliding over a bridge, and -underneath was a silvery, glinting ribbon, that might, in fairy-land, -pass for a river. - -"Shall I stop the car and let you dabble the toe of your shoe in the -water?" my guide asked. - -I looked at him in bewilderment. - -"I shan't be able to believe it's just water--unless you do," I -explained. He had seen the look I let fall upon the shining breast of -the stream. - -"And I'll send Collins away." - -"Of course! It's sacrilegious to let any wooden-faced human look -upon--all this!" - -The car obediently let us out, then steamed softly away, up the road -and out of sight. - -Mr. Tait held out his hand to me and helped me down the steep little -river bank. I dabbled the toe of my shoe in the water, and as he -finally drew me away, with the suggestion of further delights, I -caught sight of a tiny fish, lying whitely upward in a tangle of -weeds. - -"How _could_ he die?" I asked mournfully, as we walked away and -climbed back to the level of the park. "It seems so unappreciative." - -The man beside me laughed. - -"_Things_--even the most beautiful things on earth--don't keep -people--or fish alive," he said. "They can't even make people want to -stay alive--if this is all they have, and after all, the river is -just a thing--and the park is a thing--and the house is a thing!" - -We had walked on rapidly, and at that moment the house itself became -apparent. I clutched his arm. - -"A thing!" I denied, looking at it in a dazed fashion. "Why, it's the -House of a Hundred Dreams! It's all the dreams of April mornings--and -Christmas nights--and----" - -"And what?" he asked gravely. But my eyes were still intoxicated. - -"Why, it's Religion--and Art--and _Love_--and Comfort!" - -He looked at it wonderingly, as if he expected to see statues -representing these chapters in the book of Life. - -What he saw was a tangle of gravel walks, gray as the desert, drawing -away from grassy places and coming up sharply against the house. -_Such_ a house! A church--a tomb--a fluttering-curtained -living-hall--all stretched out in one long chain of battlemented -stone. Where the church began and the living-hall ended no one could -say, for there were trees everywhere. - -"The lower part of the abbey is in good condition, it seems," my -conductor remarked, as we approached. - -"Good condition!" I echoed. "Why, those doorways are as realistic -as--Sunday morning! I feel that I ought to have on a silk dress--and -hold the corners of my prayer-book with a handkerchief--to keep from -soiling my white gloves." - -"If you listen perhaps you can hear the choir-boys," he said, after a -pause, and without smiling. - -"But there might be a sermon, too!" I objected. - -High above the doors was a great open space of a missing window; then, -over this, smaller spaces for smaller windows; and--in a niched -pinnacle--the Virgin. - -"How can she--a woman in love--endure all this beauty?" I asked, my -voice hushed with awe. - -"She's endured it for many centuries, it seems," he answered. - -But we came closer then. - -"Why, she hasn't even seen it--not once!" I cried, for I saw then that -she was not looking up, but down--at the burden in her arms. - -Instinctively Maitland Tait bared his head as we crossed the -threshold. - -"Shall we try to find a way through here into the gardens?" he asked. - - - - -CHAPTER XVII - -HOUSE OF A HUNDRED DREAMS - - -The shadows inside the roofless old abbey were warm and friendly. The -sunlight gleamed against the tombs with a cheer which always falls -over very old grief spots. - -"This quietude--this sense of all rightness--makes you feel that nothing -really matters, doesn't it?" I asked, looking around with a sort of -awed delight as we paused to read one or two inscriptions--voluminous -in length and medieval in spelling. - -The man at my side was less awed. - -"Shall we go on to the gardens, then?" he asked. "You'll not think so -little of temporal pleasures there, perhaps." - -I looked up at him. - -"But why?" - -"Well, because these gardens are usually filled with suggestions of -living joys--for one thing. There are millions of forget-me-nots, -which always give a cheering aspect to the landscape--and there are -frequently the flowers mentioned in Shakespeare's plays." - -With a sigh of regret we left the sanctuary. Then, turning a corner of -the old stone wall we came full upon a side of the house which was -receiving shamelessly the biggest sun-kiss I had ever seen. But then, -it was the biggest house I had ever seen. It was the gladdest sun--and -it was the warmest blending. Between house and sun--as if they were -the love children of this union--lay thousands of brilliant flowers. - -When I could get my breath I made a quick suggestion that we go -closer. - -"I want to know which is rosemary--and which is rue!" I told him. But -he stopped a moment and detained me. - -We halted beside a fallen stone, at a point slightly separated from -the walls of the house--a sort of half-way ground, where the shadow of -the Greek cross on an isolated pinnacle seemed still to claim the -ground for religion, against the encroachments of the work-a-day -world. Maitland Tait's sudden smile was a mixture of amusement and -tenderness. - -"I've recently heard a story about this spot--this identical -stone--which will interest you," he said. "A monk comes here at -night--one of those old fellows buried in there." - -I smiled. - -"It's quite true!" he insisted. "People have seen him." - -"I know it," I avowed seriously. "I was not smiling out of unbelief, -but out of sheer joy at beholding with mine own eyes the 'Norman -stone!' - - "'He mutters his prayers on the midnight air, - And his mass of the days that are gone.'" - -Maitland Tait looked at me in surprise. - -"Do you know all the legends of the place?" he asked. - -I shook my head sorrowfully. - -"I wish I did," I replied. "For so many years this has been my House -of a Hundred Dreams!" - -We both fell into a moment's dreamy thoughtfulness, which I was first -to cast aside. - -"Come and tell me about the plants, if you can!" I begged. "Which _is_ -rosemary, and which is rue?" - -We walked down a flight of worn steps, and came upon prim gravel -pathways. - -"This is rosemary," he said, "and here, by the sun-dial, is rue." - -Then, even when I realized that this was the place where Lady Frances -Webb had spent her wearisome days, to keep from hearing the clock -chime in the hall, I could not be sad. The sun-dial was another grief -spot, it was true, but it was an ancient grief spot--and it was -located in a golden sea of sunshine, under a sky that was the -reflection of forget-me-nots. - -"She could gather the rue while the sun-dial told, all silently, of -the day's wearing on," I said. - -He looked at me uncertainly. - -"Did she say that in her letters?" he asked. - -"Yes. She had sent her lover away, you see, and--there was nothing -else in life." - -"And she longed for the days to pass silently?" - -"She stayed out here as much as she could--to keep from hearing the -clock in the hall," I told him. "The chime shamed the unholy prayer on -her lips, she said--and the sound of the ticking reminded her of her -heart's wearying beats." - -"Of _their_ hearts' wearying beats, you mean," he exclaimed, and a -quick look of pain which darted into his face showed me that he -comprehended. Then, for the first time, I began to grasp what a lover -he would make! Before this time I had been absorbed with thoughts of -him as a beloved. - -Suddenly my hat began to feel intolerably heavy, and my gloves -intolerably hot. I tampered fumblingly with the pearl clasp at my left -wrist, and drew that glove off first. Maitland Tait was watching me. -He saw my hand--my bare ringless hand. He stared at it as if it might -have been a ghost, although it looked fairly pink and healthy in the -warm glow of the noonday sun. Even the little pallid circle on the -third finger was quite gone. - -"Grace----" he said. - -"Yes?" - -"Does this mean that you're--you're----" - -A discreet cough--a still distant, but distinctly warning -cough--interrupted for a moment. Collins was coming toward us, from -the ruins of the old abbey. Maitland Tait looked up and saw him -coming, but he did not stop. On the other hand, the sight of his -servant seemed to goad him into a hasty precipitation. - -"Grace, will you marry me?" he asked. - -"Of _course_!" I managed to say, but not too energetically, for the -muscles of my throat were giving me trouble again. - -"Soon?" he asked hungrily. - -I felt very reckless and--American. - -"Before the shadows pass round this dial again, if you _insist_," I -smiled. - -But his eyes were very grave. - -"Without knowing anything more about me than you know now?" - -"Why, I know everything about you," I replied, in some astonishment. -"I know that you are the biggest, and the best-looking, and the -dearest----" - -"You know nothing about me," he interrupted softly, "except what I -have told you. I am a working man! I have always had the mass hatred -for class, and--and my grandfather was a coal-digger in Wales." - -I was silent. - -"Yet, you are willing to marry me?" he asked. - -"Of course! Coal is--very warming," I answered. - - * * * * * - -Collins descended the flight of stone steps and came slowly along the -gravel walk. When he had come to the respectful distance he stopped. -No English servant ever approaches very close--as if there were a -quarantine around the sacred person of the served. - -"My Lord," he said, but stammeringly, as a man halts over a -newly-acquired language--"My Lord, Mrs. Carr wishes to know if you -will have lunch served in the oak room, or in the----" - -"In the oak room," the man standing beside me answered readily enough. -"And have the old wing opened and lighted, Collins. We want to see the -pictures in there." - -The servant breathed the inevitable "Thank you," and turned away. - -I seemed suddenly to feel that the golden sea of sunlight was sweeping -me away--up into the blue, which was the reflection of forget-me-nots. -And there loomed big on my horizon a house that was a home! - -"My _Lord_?" I demanded, as soon as I could speak. - -Maitland Tait nodded reassuringly. - -"My father died two weeks ago," he said. "And I _had_ to come into the -title." - -"And this place is _yours_!" I sang out, feeling that all the years of -my life I had been destiny's love-child. "This old abbey is yours! The -park is yours! The garden is yours! The sun-dial is yours!" - -"And the girl is mine!" he said, with a grave smile. "I am careless of -all the other." - -His gravity sobered my wild spirits. - -"And your father was--Lord Erskine?" I finally asked. - -"He _was_--Lord Erskine," he answered. "He married out of his -station--far, far above his station, _I_ think----" - -His big beautiful mouth set grimly, but he said nothing more, and I -knew that this was as heavily as he would ever tread upon the ashes of -the dead. Gradually, bit by bit, I learned the history of the muddy -pool of mistake and fault, out of which the tender blossom of his -boyhood had been dragged. His father had never seen him, but a -certain stiff-necked family pride had caused him to provide material -bounty for his child. The combination of a good education and rugged -plebeian industry had made him what he was. - -"But why didn't you tell me--that day when you first came to see me -and we talked about this place--why didn't you tell me that it was -_your_ ancestral home?" - -He looked at me in surprise. - -"Why, because I had made up my mind to marry you!" he said. "You told -me that this old place was a sort of dreamland of yours--and I didn't -want to complicate matters. I wanted your love for me to be a -reality." - -"Well, it--it is!" I confessed. - -After a long while--that is, the sun-dial said it was a long -while--spent this way a sudden thought of my waiting hosts at -Bannerley came over me. I sprang up from the step of the pedestal -where we had been sitting. - -"I _must_ get some word to Mrs. Montgomery!" I said. "They will be -thinking that my rash American ways have got me into some dreadful -scrape, I'm afraid." - -But the serene man at my side was still serene. His face looked as if -nothing on earth could ever cause him a pang again. He caught my hand -and drew me gently, but rather steadfastly back to my place. - -"Mrs. Montgomery knows everything--except that we are going to be -married--when did you say, to-morrow?" he smiled. "I've been staying -with them, and they told me about you, and I told them about you--and -we had rather a satisfactory adjustment of neighborly relations." - -I looked at him in awe. I could not quite shake off the idea that he -had a miraculous lamp hidden about somewhere in his pockets. Things -seemed to _happen_ when he wished them to happen. - -"Did you chance to know that I would take a bad train and be delayed -here this morning at sunrise?" I asked, trying to look dignified and -unawed. "Did you know that I should be compelled to waste precious -morning hours pacing up and down a railway station platform?" - -"Why, of course," he answered imperturbably. "Mrs. Montgomery sent me -over to meet you." - -I sprang up again, more energetically this time. - -"Then why didn't you meet me?" I asked, with the horror of shocking -English propriety overwhelming me. "Come! We must go to Bannerley at -once." - -He rose and followed me toward the main garden path. Then he pointed -the way to the house door. - -"I've had Collins telephone that your train was very, very late," he -explained. "She'll not be surprised--nor too inquisitive. She even -suggested this morning that if you shouldn't get in until evening--the -drive to Bannerley is very fine by moonlight." - - * * * * * - -In the late afternoon the chilly dusk sent little forerunners ahead, -which caused the old wing of the house to be lighted from within, -instead of opened to the cool dying sunset. A cheery fire was kindled -in the room which had once been the library of Lady Frances Webb. - -The dampness and air of disuse disappeared, and it seemed as if -personalities came forth from the shadowy corners and sat beside the -fire with Maitland Tait and me. - -"This was her own desk, they tell me," he said, as he was showing the -ancient treasures to me, yet still looking at them himself with -half-awed, almost unbelieving eyes. "This was where all her famous -books were written." - -I crossed the room to where the little locked secretary stood. Its -polished surface was sending back the firelight's glow and seemed to -proclaim that its own mahogany was imprisoned sunshine. - -"And she wrote those letters here," I said in a hushed voice. "Do you -suppose she has some of his letters locked away somewhere?" - -He nodded, fitting the key to its lock very carefully. - - [Illustration: He drew me to a corner of the room] - -"All of them! All the letters written her by--Uncle James." - -"And we are going to look over them together--you and I are going to -read these love-letters--before we burn them?" I asked, quick joy -making my voice tremulous. - -For a moment there was silence in the old room, then he turned away -from the secretary, and came very close. - -"Why burn them--now?" he asked, his own strong voice of a sudden more -tremulous than mine. "Why burn them, now, darling? Why not--hand-- -them--down?" - -Then--in that instant--I knew what life was going to mean to me. And I -felt as if I had the great joy of the world--hugged close--in a circle -of radiance--like the _Madonna della Sedia_! - -"I can be good--a very good woman--if I have your face before me," I -told him. - -After a while he smiled, then took my hand and drew me to a shadowy -corner of the room. - -"You haven't seen this yet," he said. - -There was a crimson velvet curtain hanging before a picture, and he -drew aside the folds. - -"This is--Uncle James," - -The candlelight shone against the canvas, and glittered in dancing -little waves over the name-plate on the frame. - -"_Portrait of the Artist, by Himself._" - -"Was it a comfort to her, I wonder?" my lover said, his thoughts only -half with the past. - -"A torturing comfort--the kind a woman like her demands," I answered. -"She had to go to it every hour in every day--and look at it--to make -her heart ache, because it was only a picture. She was a human -being--as well as a novelist, so that such as this could only add to -her anguish. She wanted a _living_ face----" - -"She wanted--this?" - -He set the candlestick down and put both arms round me. - -"She wanted--_this_?" he breathed. - -His face was close above mine-waiting for the first kiss. A moment -later it came--descending gently, like some blessed holy thing. And -it was that. - -"You are like him," I whispered. "Your face can make me good." - -His arms tightened, and a smile escaped. - -"And yours? What will you be like to me?" he asked. - -I looked up, remembering. - -"Like--just an American woman--a tormenting side-issue in your busy -life?" - -But he shook his head gravely. - -"No--not that." - -A casement was open near by, and he drew me toward the shaft of -radiance which fell into the shadowed room. - -Across the courtyard, white now with moonlight, were the ruins of the -abbey. There shone a softened luster through the space of the absent -window, and above, resplendent in her niche, stood the Virgin. Her -head was bowed above the burden in her arms. - -"Like that--_like that_!" he whispered. - - -THE END - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Amazing Grace, by Kate Trimble Sharber - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AMAZING GRACE *** - -***** This file should be named 41581-8.txt or 41581-8.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/4/1/5/8/41581/ - -Produced by Melissa McDaniel and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions -will be renamed. - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no -one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation -(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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